Week 6: Book V — Faustus, Rome, and Ambrose

1.Augustine had waited nine years for Faustus, the great Manichaean teacher, expecting him to resolve all his doubts. When Faustus finally arrives, Augustine admires his eloquence but finds his knowledge shallow. He observes: "Mine ears were already cloyed with the like, nor did they seem to me therefore better, because better said; nor therefore true, because eloquent." What had God already taught him that enabled him to make this distinction? And why is this lesson — that eloquence is not the same as truth — still urgently needed?

2.Though Faustus cannot answer Augustine's questions, he is honest about his ignorance: "he knew that he knew not these things, and was not ashamed to confess it." Augustine actually respects him more for this. What does this episode say about the relationship between intellectual humility and genuine wisdom?

3.Augustine secretly deceives his mother, Monica, to board a ship for Rome — telling her he is just seeing off a friend. He even points to a chapel of St. Cyprian to distract her. Augustine later reflects that God "disregarded" Monica's prayers that night for him to stay, "that Thou mightest make me what she ever asked." How does this episode complicate simple ideas about answered prayer?