Confessions

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:06:18 -0500

Summary

Created near 400BC this book constitutes one of the earliest Christian autobiographies we have. Written as a protracted and one-sided conversation with God, Augustine attempts to lay out his soul to God and his many readers. Written as a collection of thirteen books, the first nine deal with his life up to the age of 33 which is the traditionally accepted age of Jesus when he was crucified. The main story is his conversion to Catholicism and the backdrop is his own personal struggles and failings. His central struggle was in the eradication of his sexuality, the journey to celibacy was a difficult one for Augustine, he had a few mistresses including one during his pending engagement which was broken off after his conversion. This struggle takes up most of the pages dedicated to character flaws, while his key psychological struggle was being converted from Manicheism. Another interesting topic that got discussed thoroughly was astrology, evidently Augustine used to be paid by others to read their future in the stars, he would have had all the girls in 2023. If there is one thing to know about Augustine, it is that he questions, he questions everything. This ultimately leads him to lose faith in Manicheism in favor of the more convincing ideas presented by Catholicism. One way of looking at this text is as a tract to any would be Catholics who were currently Manichaeans. The last four books shift into abstract questions about memory, time, creation, and interpretation of scriptures.

Confessions on George's Blog

Confessions