Hannah Hemphill: Clinging to God by Works of Mercy: Romans 12 and Psalm 73 in Augustine's City of God, Book X

In Book X of the City of God Augustine draws a well-known distinction between visible sacrifice and invisible sacrifice: "Sacrifice ... is the visible sacrament of an invisible sacrifice" (X.5). Similarly well-known is claim that "true sacrifices are works of mercy" (X.6). While nothing in this text explicitly states that the "invisible sacrifices" are tantamount to the "true sacrifices" of works of mercy, several scholars have read Augustine in this way. And, while at least a few scholars have drawn attention to Augustine's concern for readers with Platonist sympathies as a probable cause for his emphasis on invisible sacrifices, and a few more have noted his reliance on Scripture to garner the same insight, there has been little attention given to the Biblical texts which Augustine exegetes in the course of his exposition. Two texts in particular are essential for comprehending how Augustine relates works of mercy to the distinction he makes between visible and invisible sacrifice: Romans 12 and Psalm 73. By his exegesis of these texts, Augustine elucidates the relationship between visible works of mercy and invisible sacrifices and thereby situates in this complex text the sacrifice of the Passion as the work of mercy par excellence, by which the Church is able to offer a "universal sacrifice" (X, 6).