AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO

(354-430) the greatest theologian of the early church. Wrote 1. Confessions ; 2. The City of God ; and 3. On the Trinity . His theory of reality: absolute theism, supernaturalism . Reality is God, who is Being; Being is good; non-Being is evil (see Plotinus ). God has personality and impersonality, transcendence and immanence, omnipotence and perfect will. As Being, God gives reality to phenomena . As Supreme Person ( theism ), God exercises perfect will by which the world is created from nothing, sustained, perfected, and consummated. All existence, including space and time, is absolutely dependent on God's will. Reality is two-fold ( dualism ): God as Being, the Good, the Eternal; and His creation as phenomenal, dependent, temporal.