Abstract

This essay aims to combine a historical and a theoretical approach to Augustine’s radical insistence on the absolute dominion of divine providence in the beginning of faith . It revisits the development of Augustine’s conception of initium fidei with emphasis on the actual effects of divine grace in the psychological process of willing. By appealing to Augustine’s later reflection on the power of the will, it shows that his growing stress on the absolute authority of grace in his final years accords with his deepened original understanding of the will and its freedom against a deterministic background