Dear list members,
I would be very grateful if somebody could help me with the following
question: when was the word abyss first introduced in the vocabulary of
neoplatonic/augustinian philosophers? Abyss, in St. Bernard, is used to
describe the impossibility of an close union between God and man. Only
charity (caritas), he says, can be a means to reach God, but the gap
remains. I believe there is grounds to think that St. Augustine could have
been the first to introduce the word. Is there anybody who knows where in
his work I can find it, and if it was not him, who used the word and where?
I hope you'll forgive my ignorance, but I am not exactly a theologist and I
need this information for literary reasons.
Thank you very much in advance,
Claudia Boscolo
Ps: please excuse my English too: I am obviously a foreigner...
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