Augustine's Way Into the Will: The Theological and Philosophical Significance of de Libero Arbitrio

An original account of Augustine's theory of will, based on a close reading of his pivotal and fundamental text, the dialogue On Free Choice. Simon Harrison takes Augustine's philosophical arguments and literary form seriously and so reveals a way of thinking about the will that is grounded in the individual reader's response. He shows the centrality of Augustine's philosophical method, his 'way in to the will', as opposed to the construction of a monolithic 'theory of will'. Harrison relates the argument of On Free Choice to other key texts of Augustine's, in particular the City of God and the Confessions, and rehabilitates a widely read but often misinterpreted book to show the importance of Augustine as a major philosopher.