Augustine on Freedom and God

Augustine wrote much about the relationship between God's activity and human freedom. Early and late in his career, he insists on two truths: God is the cause of every activity and we have freedom of choice. He does not mean that our actions are both determined and free. If this is what compatibilism means, then Augustine is not a compatibilist. He simply insists on human freedom and denies that God's providence takes it away. But neither does he mean that our free actions are not caused by God. This would be a metaphysical impossibility as well as heretical. If being free from God is what libertarianism means, then Augustine is not a libertarian. The best we can do philosophically to explain how both propositions are true is negative: we can show that it is not possible to deny either one. We cannot deny that everything comes from God, for from any exercise of our reason thinking about the world, we come to the knowledge of the existence of God the creator, source of all that is. Nor can we to deny that we have free choice, for without it "we" cannot act at all. The only possible positive explanation is theological. In Christ are both divine activity and human freedom. We live and act in grace by freely entering into a covenant freely offered by God.