Augustine Reflection Essay

Augustine’s Confessions is a diverse blend of autobiographical accounts as well as philosophical, theological and critical analysis of the Christian Bible. Augustine treats his autobiography as an opportunity to recount his life and mentions how each event in his life has a religious and philosophical explanation. Augustine had many major events happen in his life but only 3 events would deem of extreme importance to his journey to faith. Theses major events were Book II how he describes that he considered his time of adolescence to be the most lurid and sinful period of his life, Book III how this becomes the lowest point in his relationship with God because his

In the Confessions by Saint Augustine, this great philosopher experiences many problems and emotions related to sin and evil. As a boy, he often felt darkness, blindness, and confusion while attempting to find rest in God. Augustine started out in childhood with a restless heart because he had to live in two different worlds. These worlds consisted of his mother’s Christian faith, and the world of everything else. These two worlds confused and disturbed Augustine as a child. Augustine’s father was pagan and his mother was Christian, and they both wanted him to be very successful in the world. As he became confused, he began asking questions that could not be answered such as, “Humans often feel restless, but what is it they need to feel at

You prompt us yourself to find satisfaction in appraising you, since you made us tilted toward you, and our heart is unstable until stabilized in you. Quintessentially, this quote from Confessions symbolizes Augustine’s perilous journey towards Christianity. Although appearing earlier in what is colloquially known as the “first autobiography”, Augustine expounds on this very idea throughout his writings. Whether that includes his attraction and disdain for Manichaeism or his affinity with Neo-Platonism, one could argue this quote acted as the foundation of his inquisitions of these pre-modern dogmatic sects. Augustine, despite his perils with intellectual paradoxes, sought to understand these rigid entities that seemed to have variant

In St. Augustine’s Confessions, Augustine explains how his parents give up a lot for him and his education. Although his father was acknowledged for his financial attribution to Augustine’s education, he never cared if his sons character would mature through the educational system. St. Augustine’s dad paid more than a richer man would pay for their son’s education because he wanted to provide Augustine with the proper education. (Confessions, II, 5). St. Augustine showed very little respect toward his father but had a great deal of respect to his mother, Monica, since she was a practicing Christian (II,60). In spite of his respect for her as a Christian, Augustine criticized his mother for getting in the way of his sexual desire (II,8). But his father arranged his marriage and encouraged him to have children (II,6). Unlike Confucius’s teachings of remaining reverent to your parent, Augustine openly criticized his family’s wrong doings because God was his heart and only truth (II,5).

Augustine financial support for his education, he did not care how Augustine’s character would advance through his education. St. Augustine’s dad paid more than a richer man would pay for their son’s education because he wanted to provide Augustine with the proper education. (Confessions, II, 5). Unlike the attitude toward his father, St. Augustine showed a great deal of respect to his mother, Monica, since she was a practicing Christian (II,60). In spite of this, Augustine criticized his mother for holding him back from his sexual desire (II,8). But his father arranged his marriage and encouraged him to have children (II,6). Unlike Confucius’s teachings of remaining reverent to your parent, Augustine openly criticized his family’s wrong doings because God was his heart and only truth (II,5).

In Augustine’s Confessions, he confesses many things of which we are all guilty; the greatest of which is his sadness of not having a relationship with God earlier in his life. He expressed to us that to neglect a relationship with God is far worse than the pity he felt for Dido. In reviewing his life, he had come to examine life and how there are temptations in this world that can keep us distracted. He tells to us how he became aware of this fact; everything is negligible except love for God, and his own guilt at not having found this truth sooner.

Young Augustine weeps for the woman who dies for her love, as an older Augustine weeps over his complete ignorance and incontinence. Young Augustine is ignorant of the presence of God in his life, and is compelled not to weep for his own spiritual distance from God, but instead for a tragedy that, in the mind of the older Augustine, is incomparable to the tragedy of being without God. The older Augustine is compelled by his advanced knowledge of the Lord’s proximity to lament his previous lack of control over his habits, proclaiming “I had no love for you and ‘committed fornication against you’ (Ps. 72:27); and in my fornications, I heard all round me the cries ‘Well done, well done’ (Ps. 34:21; 39:16) … I abandoned you to pursue the lowest things of your creation.” (Conf. 16). This reveals that Young Augustine lives an entirely habitual life, never thinking of God or his importance, instead concerned with material and worldly concerns such as reputation and honor. This state of pure habit does not leave space for Young Augustine to have continence, and leaves him to act out his life according to passion and emotions.

Augustine’s Confessions is an autobiography written around 400 A.D which details his spiritual journey, and each of the books address a certain element of Augustine’s steps in his spiritual path. In Book III, he develops his overcoming of lust by introducing the book with the line: “I went to Carthage, where I found myself in the midst of a hissing cauldron of lust.” (III.1, pp55). The theme of non-sexual lust instantly becomes the focal point of the book and Augustine presents the “hissing cauldron” as a low point in his relationship with God, for he wanders away from his creator by loving his own ways; however, he later discovers this was merely lust compared to the true love of God. In this essay, I will argue that Book III of Confessions

However, Augustine has another agenda- his confessions are also meant to show his praise and love for God. He says this in the fifth book with: "Accept the sacrifice of my confessions by the agency of my tongue, which Thou has formed and quickened, that it may confess to Thy name... But let my soul praise Thee, that it may love Thee; and let it confess Thine own mercies to Thee, that it may praise Thee." This is a clear declaration of his praise to God, and ​almost another underlying message of the text to the audience. So as he is writing about his life, he is trying also to set an example to the audience about how his choices were not always the best and use this as a guide to their own lives. And finally through his story, use his conversion and change as a way to praise God to show that even someone who "strayed off" the path was able to redeem themselves and how merciful and good God is to accept someone even as sinful as he was.

In St. Augustine’s Confessions, Augustine’s worldly experiences throughout his autobiography are crucial to his understanding of Christianity. Augustine reflects on his childhood experience of stealing pears from his neighbors to understand his sinful nature. Augustine struggles to understand his motivation for taking the pears when he knows that the pears are not necessarily better than those at his own home. He finally recognizes that this transgression is of the most wicked nature because he was sinning for the sake of sinning. “Now let my heart tell you what it was seeking there in that I became evil for no reason. I had no motive for my wickedness except wickedness itself”(29). By reflecting on a worldly experience, he is able to reach a

Augustine is our exemplar to human nature, as well as the guideline to what it means to be human. He demonstrates both the good and bad qualities that humans obtain and show that not everything can always be all-good. In the Confessions Augustine talks about how he knows about his own imperfections. He states “At one time in adolescence I was burning to find satisfaction in hellish pleasures” (Augustine, Confessions, pg. 24). Many of his imperfections have brought a new way of thinking about the human being. In the Confessions, Augustine focuses on his autobiography and how sin comes from inside us humans. From this we have learned about the term introspective conscience and how it depicts when someone is constantly looking at him or herself and looking at the motivation to sin.

It is obvious from The Confession that Augustine was a man who struggled endlessly to extricate himself from the bondage of sin, but the more he tried, the more he failed and sinks deeper into its abyss. And with every failure, comes a sense of disappointment and despondency, until he had a strange experience. In AD 386, while sitting in his garden, Augustine heard a voice from some children playing not far away urging “him” to pick the book—the Bible, and read. What he read from Apostle Paul’s letter to the Roman Christian in Chapter 13 transformed, not only his understanding of the hopelessness and despair man encounters in trying to solve the problem of sin on his own, but he saw the provision that God has made to remedy the consequences of sin and the grace he has graciously provided to live a life that is acceptable to God. That moment was the turning point in Augustine’s life and how he developed his sotoriological

The first major milestone of St. Augustine’s conversion to the Christian faith was his realization during his adolescent years that his behavior was pointlessly reckless and rebellious and far from God’s design for his life. Born to St. Monica, St. Augustine was raised in a faith filled home. He was integrated into the church from a young age and was raised in Christian institutions during his

The book expresses three main concerns. One is Augustine’s frank and detailed acknowledgment of his personal sinfulness and the power he came to recognize as God’s provident grace—protective, creative, salvific—in every moment of his life. He also wrote in order to confess his own Christian faith and clearly repudiate any supposed lingering connections on his part with Manichaeism. Finally, The Confessions are a heartfelt paean of praise and thanksgiving in honor of God’s glory.

At this point in his life, Augustine is recognized for doing many things for the Church as a priest, author, and defender of faith. As an author he wrote Confessions, his spiritual autobiography, and City of God, his great work describing the Christian philosophy throughout history. In this magnificent work,