12 Augustine of Hippo Brian Gronewoller Augustine (AD 354–430) was bishop of Hippo Regius (Annaba, Algeria), a port city in Roman North Africa, from 396 until he died. At the time of his death, Vandal pirates were besieging Hippo Regius and taking control of Roman North Africa, separating it from the easy passage across the Mediterranean to Rome that had made it a thoroughly Romanized province of the empire. Augustine’s spiritual autobio- graphy, the Confessions, provides us with most of our knowledge of his early life and spiritual journey. Aurelius Augustinus was born into a family of moderate means in the small town of Thagaste (Souk Ahras, Algeria). His mother, Monica, was a pious Christian, but his father, Patricius, did not “believe” until he was nearing death in AD 372 (Confessions I.11.17; cf. IX.9.19). 1 As a young adult, Augustine became a follower of Manichaeism, a radically dualistic religion similar in some respects to second- century Gnosticism. Trained in the art of oratory, Augustine worked as a teacher of rhetoric and sometimes engaged in public debates with Christians, using his superior skills to ridicule their beliefs and to argue for the veracity of Manichaeism. Augustine became disillusioned with his newfound religion, however, after meeting the Manichaean bishop Faustus, who was unable to provide satisfactory answers to Augustine’s searching questions. Now in his thirties, Augustine made his way from Manichaeism to Christianity with the help of insights from Neoplatonism. During this unsettled and transitional period of his life, Augustine’s career had taken him from Carthage (near modern-day Tunis, Tunisia) to Rome, and even- tually to Milan. Augustine converted to Christianity while living in Milan in 386. He returned to North Africa soon after his conversion and baptism and remained there, fervently pursuing his Christian faith, until his death in 430. Augustine interacted with late-antique Roman law in several ways throughout his life. As a Roman citizen, he lived under the umbrella of Roman law on a daily basis, and law and rhetoric were closely related disciplines in Roman culture. Augustine’s 1 Both Augustine and his mother, Monica, are venerated as saints in traditions within Eastern and Western Christianity. Peter Brown offers 372 as the year of Patricius’s death. Peter Brown, Augustine of Hippo: A Biography, new ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 3. 266