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Julian allegations and an authority he invokes
People are not renewed through baptism, but only supposedly renewed; not freed, but only supposedly freed;…
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People are not renewed through baptism, but only supposedly renewed; not freed, but only supposedly freed; not saved, but only supposedly saved.
Augustine reports that Julian compares this position to Epicurus’s teaching that the gods have not a body but something like a body, not blood but something like blood.
Whatever is done in the present age deserves blame.
Latin source witness
Latin non innovari homines per Baptismum, sed quasi innovari; non liberari, sed quasi liberari; non salvari, sed quasi salvari
Quidquid in praesenti saeculo agitur, esse culpandum
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About this text Julian wrote in the early 400s, in the fight over Pelagius. This is later than the first three centuries of the church.
Julian’s earlier work To Turbantius, in four books, survives only in the excerpts Augustine quotes in his six-book reply, Against Julian. The excerpts are grouped here by those six books. Latin source text is on each section when recovered.
Julian of Eclanum (c. 386–c. 455) was bishop of Eclanum in southern Italy until 418, when he was deposed and exiled for refusing to condemn Pelagius. The most learned Pelagian controversialist, he pursued Augustine across a decade of pamphlet war.
None of Julian's works survives directly; what remains is preserved in the long quotations of Augustine, who answered him book by book. Reconstructed from those hostile pages, Julian emerges as a formidable defender of free will, marriage, and the goodness of creation.
English follows Julian’s words as Augustine excerpts them in Against Julian. This is not a recovered complete To Turbantius.
Printed text used
Translated from Augustine, Against Julian We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Latin on any section, or the Latin source link, to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.
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