Charity and Almsgiving in Donatist Sermons and Cyprian of Carthage’s Legacy

Abstract

Still under-investigated collection of Donatist sermons from Vienna provides us with a possibility to see the life of North African Donatist communities in a new light. While almost all our sources are polemical in nature, those texts were used in the Donatist catechesis. The paper deals with the treatment of charity and almsgiving, its understanding and justification, in the Donatist preaching. Furthermore, the subject is considered in relation to the legacy of Cyprian of Carthage, due to his great influence on both the history of the Donatist schism and the development of the concept of charity in the Western Christianity.