Augustine's View Of Christianity In The Middle Ages

Christian Belief in the Middle Ages In the Middle Ages, there were numerous models for Christians. These models shaped how Christians who lived in that time behaved and acted. Three of those works are Augustine’s Confessions, Turold’s the Song of Roland, and Dante’s Divine Comedy. All three stories manifested ideal Christian beliefs and actions which became what the Christians in the Middle Ages strived to be like. Augustine’s view of Christianity is detailed in his novel Confessions, which happens to become a model for Christians in the Middle Ages. The novel begins when Augustine is an infant and ends with his conversion to Christianity. Throughout Confessions¬, Augustine renounces several activities he was a part of in his childhood.
For instance, Augustine believed humans are innately sinful and that sin takes hold in early infanthood. Another example would be the pear tree incident. When Augustine was a child, he and his friends would steal pears and then feed the fruit to the pigs. He concluded from this incident that people do evil because Satan entices them with the thrill of sinning. This action is self-destructive and takes away from the good. Finally, at the end of Confessions, Augustine converts to Christianity because he heard a child repeating ‘take and read’. Augustine reads the Bible and then converts. In Turold’s Song of Roland, another model for Middle Age Christians is established. The model character is that of Roland. In the poem, Roland is ready to give his all for what he believes in – France and Christianity. Additionally, the Archbishop Turpin declares that the morally right action for a Christian warrior to take is to fight for the glory of God and their country. God is also said to have been on the French army’s side because when Charlemagne was searching for the rest of the Muslims, God had the sun stand still until Charlemagne found them. Lastly, in Dante’s Divine Comedy, there is yet another model for Christians in the Middle Ages. This story detailed what Hell supposedly was like and how one rose from Purgatory to Heaven. The poem informs the reader of which actions are sins and which are not, which developed the story into a model for Christians who lived in the Middle Ages. In the Middle Ages, Christians were supposed to contribute all they do to God. Christians from this time period believed that sin took hold of a person from as early an age as infanthood. Anything bad that happened to them, they fully believed it was God’s plan. Anyone who was not a Christian, was inevitably an enemy.