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Title: The Confessions of St. Augustine: Modern English Version (Paraclete Living Library) by St. Augustine, Hal McElwaine Helms ISBN: 0-941478-55-6 Publisher: Paraclete Press (MA) Pub. Date: 01 October, 1986 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.39 (79 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Edifying for the Heart and Mind
Comment: It is no wonder that Augustine's Confessions are read so widely. Both Protestants and Roman Catholics draw from Augustine because the insight found in his work, especially this one, is equaled by very few in history. Certainly, Augustine is the most influential church father; and there is a rise in Augustinian thought among philosophers today (c.f. "Augustinian Christian Philosophy" by Alvin Plantinga).
In the Confessions, there are really three general themes that underly each of his discussions:
1. Turning away from God
2. Confessing the greatness of God
3. Confessing turning back to God.
The third point is very Neoplatonic; in fact, many of the chapters are dripping of Neoplatonism. However, Augustine's recognition of similar ideas in Scripture is (partly) what lead him to Scripture. The first point has to do with Augustine growing up, rebelling, and eventually his converting to the Catholic church (3rd point).
There are several famous stories that people have critized Augustine about. For instance, Augustine mentions how he stole some pears with his friends. As a result, Augustine writes for pages and pages about how aweful and wicked his act was. Some might think, "it was only a few pears, get a grip." Another famous story regards Augustine's praises for God being eternal and how time itself is intrinsically painful. Is time itself intrinsically painful? That's another hot topic that has stemmed from Augustine's work.
In any case, this book is edifying both on spiritual and intellectual grounds. His confessions mention how he struggled for years with lust. However, he also has deep intellectual writings (e.g., book XI), such as about the nature of time. Those discussions are difficult, but not too difficult. To this day, people still discuss academically about the coherence and meaningfullness of his views. That being said, Augustine demonstrates in this work that he is a brilliant man, but also one that loved the Lord. I think that reading this book will be good food for your soul, as it was for mine.
Rating: 5
Summary: Still powerful after 1600 years
Comment: After Sacred Scripture itself, perhaps no other book has brought more people to a deeper understanding of the truths of the Christian faith than "Confessions." Simply put, it's the story of one well-educated, intelligent man who led a profligate life in a sophisticated pagan society. It took his mother, prayer, and the grace of Almighty God to make him a saint--and indeed one of the greatest saints of the Catholic Church.
What is most striking about Augustine's story is how easily it relates to our own lives and our own times. It is impossible to read "Confessions" without seeing a little bit of yourself in his tales of his early life. The book is perfect for anyone struggling with their Christian faith. Indeed, it helped bring me back to the Catholic Church.
This translation is well-written and highly readable. I own it and highly recommend it.
Rating: 4
Summary: A sui generis autobiography.
Comment: Saint Augustine of Hippo was born in 354 A.D. in the city of Thagaste, in the Roman North African province of Numidia, near nowadays Algiers. He died in 430, witnessing both the Fall of the glorious Roman Empire to the invasion of the Vandals in North África, and the immediate following of his ideas by maverick African Catholicism, ideas for which he fought all his life in the most passionate way. He was a giant in its own right, being the prodigal son of the feverishly Catholic Saint Monica and of Patricius, a nondescript and abusing father who was to be thrown out by Augustine to the corners in his many works, the same fate destined to his prematurely dead son Adeodatus (Latin for "Given to God"), his elder brother and his concubine, the woman he lived with for many years, according with the local tradition of the times, and whom he sloughed of in the most unabashed way. It is only in the Confessions that he seems to scourge himself on this issue, wryly acknowledging the evil done.
He was one of the most prolific writers of all times, and the mature man who wrote Confessions in his mid-life is a sharp counterpoint to the points-of-views adopted by him in his early life, when he avidly followed Manichaeism against the will of his devoted mother. He had traveled intensively trough the foremost cities of the Roman Empire and had many patronizing influent men, and ended up, one thinks, against his will, as priest and later bishop of the city of Hippo, near Thagaste, where he had the responsibility of counterbalance the powerfull influence the Donatist (after Donatus) sect exerted upon his flock, who argued that human perfection was possible and attainable in this very life and the chaff elements of the Church having to be erased in the most cruel and quick ways by bands of brigands that descended from the mountains to attack whomever opposed their doctrine. But, that was not the last time he had to combat ideas different from his, and we see Augustine again holding the sword with fierceness against resurgent Paganism and in his final days, against Pelagianism and Julian Eclanus. It is strange that such a combative man died a natural dead, escaping the atrocities inflicted by the Vandals of Genseric upon his many friends and followers.
In Augustine's view, to earn the eternal salvation, one had to confess all his past sins in the most unabashed and vocal way, and that is precisely the purpose of Confessions, to lay down all his many past sins, in order to be among the few who would be chosen by God Almight to enter upon the Eternal Kingdom. The book, originally written in Latin by a man who had little familiarity with the infuential Greek language, introduces a new style into the Literature of the time and is judged as one of the most influential autobiographies ever written . Along with his magnificent City of God, it erected the scaffolds of early Catholicism, and must be listed among one of the 100 most literary works of all times.
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Title: City of God (Penguin Classics) by St. Augustine, David Knowles, Henry Bettenson ISBN: 0140444262 Publisher: Penguin USA Pub. Date: June, 1984 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Augustine of Hippo: A Biography, Revised Edition with a New Epilogue by Peter Robert Lamont Brown ISBN: 0520227573 Publisher: University of California Press Pub. Date: 07 August, 2000 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: The Imitation of Christ by Thomas Kempis ISBN: 0375700188 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 24 March, 1998 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Aquinas's Shorter Summa: Saint Thomas's Own Concise Version of His Summa Theologica by St. Thomas Aquinas, Thomas Aquinas, St. Thomas Aquinas ISBN: 1928832431 Publisher: Sophia Inst Pr Pub. Date: 01 December, 2001 List Price(USD): $22.95 |
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Title: The Republic by Plato ISBN: 0486411214 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 18 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $2.50 |
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