Description
Book SynopsisWe are used to thinking of words as signs of inner thoughts. In Outward Signs, Philip Cary argues that Augustine invented this expressionist semiotics, where words are outward signs expressing an inward will to communicate, in an epochal departure from ancient philosopical semiotics, where signs are means of inference, as smoke is a sign of fire. Augustine uses his new theory of signs to give an account of Biblical authority, explaining why an authoritative external teaching is needed in addition to the inward teaching of Christ as divine Wisdom, which is conceived in terms drawn from Platonist epistemology. In fact for Augustine we literally learn nothing from words or any other outward sign, because the truest form of knowledge is a kind of Platonist vision, seeing what is inwardly present to the mind. Nevertheless, because our mind''s eye is diseased by sin we need the help of external signs as admonitions or reminders pointing us in the right direction, so that we may look and see
Trade ReviewAlong with its companion work, Inner Grace, this careful and insightful book breaks new ground in the study of Augustine theology of grace and sacraments. * Augustines.de *
Table of ContentsINTRODUCTION: EXPRESSIONIST SEMIOTICS AND THE POWERLESSNESS OF THE EXTERNAL; PART I: WORDS FROM WHICH WE LEARN NOTHING; PART II: POWERLESS SACRAMENTS; CONCLUSION
