St. Augustine Confessions Analysis

Book Summary and Analysis: Confessions

Born in 354 in Thagaste, St. Augustine was born to a Christian mother and a pagan father. Augustine was always interested in learning and knowledge, and it was this desire to learn that led to him becoming a teacher and eventually teaching in Carthage, Rome and Milan.1 However it was not just secular knowledge Augustine was seeking, rather Augustine was also searching for the right to faith to believe in, and though he started off as a believer in Manichee theosophy, he eventually converted to Christianity. St. Augustine’s novel Confessions is more than a man revealing his thoughts and confessions; it is a record of a man’s journey to discover his faith. This work illustrates the internal struggle
some face when finding themselves and most importantly, it demonstrated how Christianity appealed to so many groups of people, regardless of previous beliefs, gender, or social status, and gained such a massive following. Book IV of Confessions discusses Augustine’s early career of teaching rhetoric, as well as describing the death of one of Augustine’s good friends.
Augustine describes his life in this section as a period of time in which his life was “one of being seduced and seducing, being deceived and deceiving in a variety of desires,” referring to his current interests and what he was actually pursuing at the time. More specifically, he was referring to the fact that he was a teaching a liberal subject to students (rhetoric) while believing in a “false” religion behind closed doors, relishing in the attention and popularity he and he students received from their rhetoric mastery all while wanting to purge themselves of their prideful and sinful behaviors.2 Another regret that Augustine reveals in this section is that he maintained such a long relationship with his concubine who was also the mother of his child. He notes
that:
She was not my partner in what is called a lawful marriage. I had found her in my state of wandering desire and lack of prudence. With her I learnt by direct experience how wide a difference there is between the partnership of marriage entered into for the sake of having a family and the mutual consent of those who love is a matter of physical sex, and for whom the birth of a child is contrary to their intention.3

This passage indicates that Augustine realized that his relationship with this woman was wrong, but admits he found it in a state of mind in which he was lost, and was unable to control his desires for sex, and thus continued the relationship. Augustine moves on to describe how when he was teaching in Thagaste he had developed very close relationship with a man he had grown up with as a kid. Unfortunately his friend passed away at the moment in which Augustine started to become very close with him. “It had been sweet to me beyond all the sweetnesses of life that I had experienced,” is how Augustine describes his experiences with his friend, indicating how truly important this man was in his life.4 However an interesting point is when Augustine points out that when his friend was ill, a baptism had been preformed on the friend without his conscious approval, and once the friend realized what was performed on him, he was appalled and asked Augustine to not discuss these kinds of matters to him ever again. Augustine didn’t seem to understand why he would feel this way and decided to wait until his friend was healthy again to discuss his religious viewpoints. However this time never came as his friend became ill with a fever once more and ended up passing away. This section illustrates the power Christianity has over people because looking back Augustine realizes the importance of his friend’s baptism and hints that the baptism was what made him regain strength and health for a few days which indicates how strong Augustine believed Christianity to truly be. After his friend’s death, Augustine became severely depressed, as he now described the town as being “a torture to me; my father’s house a strange world of unhappiness; all that I had shared with him was without him transformed into a cruel torment. My soul felt burdened by a vast load of misery.”5 The loss of his friend was what made Augustine pack up and move from Thagaste to Carthage. It is in Book V where Augustine’s views of Manichaeism start to diminish, as while he is learning about astronomy and the scientific and mathematical orders of things, he compares them to the sayings of Mani, and realizes that they don’t match up to what he is learning and so he deems them foolish.6 Augustine then stresses the importance of understanding not just nature or God, but both, as a knowledge and understanding of both leads to the happiest person.7 Still unsatisfied with the teachings of Mani, Augustine sought to talk with Faustus, who only disappointed Augustine even more, which led to Augustine’s enthusiasm towards Mani’s writings to be even further diminished.8 These doubts towards Manichaeism only fueled Augustine’s desire to find himself even more, as he was realizing what he believed to be true about the sciences were not matching up to his belief system, leading him to wonder what more was out there in spiritual terms. Augustine then moved away to Rome, as a result of having unruly students who were difficult to teach.9 However his career in Rome was short lived, as though the students were more well behaved, some developed the habit of leaving class early so that they didn’t have to pay Augustine for his teaching services. This upset Augustine, and led him to accept a position as a rhetoric teacher in Milan.10 Once in Milan, Augustine met a bishop named Ambrose, and was initially attracted to him not because of his teachings of the Church, but rather his kindness. Augustine admits that through his relationship with Ambrose he began to grow closer to the Catholic church and notes that “the Catholic faith appeared not to have been defeated but also not yet to be the conqueror,” meaning that though he had not abandoned his previous beliefs just yet, he was getting closer and closer to accepting Christianity.11 He then claimed to be a catechumen, basically beginning to accept the church but not fully committed. Book VI is more of a discussion of events revolving around Augustine’s friends and family more than anything. Augustine’s mother moves up to Milan with him, and Ambrose is very pleased, as he was fond of how religious she was. Augustine reveals that Ambrose would often praise Augustine for having such a wonderful mother, however Augustine confesses that Ambrose has no idea what kind of son he really is as he describes himself as “someone who doubted all these things and believed it impossible to find the way of life.”12 This is significant because it shows Augustine’s self discovery, and how he is still questioning what to believe in and what to discard. Though he is starting to move away from being a Manichee, he still hasn’t decided to fully become devoted to the Catholic Church either. He is still trying to find himself, and figure out what is right and wrong in his world. Augustine’s acceptance of the Church steadily grew and he realized that some including Ambrose believed in a more figurative interpretation of God, rather than confining him to a human body. This was significant for Augustine because this interpretation was one that really clicked and made sense to him. This realization turned into guilt for Augustine, as he felt bad for being ignorant towards God’s real image.13 Augustine was also happy with the way Ambrose and others were interpreting the Bible, and he soon began to lean more towards the Catholic Church than with Manichaeism. Augustine admits to God that “at least I always retained belief both that you are and that you care for us, even if I did not know what to think about your substantial nature or what way would lead, or lead me back to you,” this being significant because this was one of the many reasons Christianity was so appealing to people: it was a forgiving faith that allowed for passage into a better world after death. Followers believed that God was forgiving and truly did care about each and every follower, solidifying another appeal to the religion, a personal relationship with God.14 Augustine then goes on to describe how he had to sever ties with the mother of his son, as she was hindering his future marriage. He was upset, but understood the importance of getting married rather than just having a casual partner. He admits that he was “not a lover of marriage but a slave of lust” and found another partner to be with while he waited to be wed.15 He deeply regrets his decision of finding another women, but claims that it was the power of God that made him step away from that sinful life. In Book VIII Augustine recalls how he had visited with Simplicianus, senior priest to Ambrose. With him Augustine discusses how he had read some Platonist work by Victorinus, and Simplicianus tells stories about what he knew about Simplicanus. For many years Victorinus worshipped the cult of Osiris, but Augustine points out it didn’t take much for him to realize he should be worshipping Christ instead, and gladly started believing Christianity later in his life.16 After hearing this story, Augustine comes to the conclusion that happiness and joy is greater the more pain someone has suffered, and it is with this that Augustine starts turning towards converting even more, as he believes he has suffered a lot.17 Augustine then has a conversation with Ponticianus, and it was in this conversation that Augustine believes he was touched by God, and that God “took me up from behind my own back where I had placed myself because I did not wish to observe myself and you set me before my face so that I should see how vile I was, how twisted and filthy, covered in sores and ulcers.”18 Augustine also describes how he was having an inner struggle within himself when it came to his sexual desires:
“Vain trifles and the triviality of the empty-headed, my old loves, held me back. They tugged at the garment of my flesh and whispered: ‘Are you getting rid of us?’ And ‘from this moment we shall never be with you again, not for ever and ever.’ Nevertheless, they held me back. I hesitated to detach myself, to be rid of them, to make the leap to where I was being called. Meanwhile the overwhelming force of habit was saying to me: ‘Do you think you can live without them?’”19 Augustine is going back and forth in his mind because he is having a hard trouble letting go of his sinful past, though he realizes that it is not the way to live, and that he should shed his old image and develop a relationship with God. However he also realizes once he leaves this aspect of his life behind, there is no going back. Finally it all makes sense to Augustine and he breaks down in tears as he reflects on his life and appears to be lost. However he picks up the book of the apostle Paul and reads the first passage: “not in riots and drunken parties, not in eroticism and indecencies, not in strife and rivalry, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh in its lusts,” and it was in this moment that everything finally made sense: Augustine was converted.20 This work shows how Christianity appealed to a wide array of people because initially Augustine was a believer of Manichaeism, but still was able to eventually convert to Christianity because of the religion’s appeal.
More specifically, the personal relationship with God seemed to have a profound effect on Augustine, because he found himself directly engaging with God multiple times, including the instance in Book VIII where God made him look at his true self. There is evidence in Confessions that Christianity even attracted women, as Augustine’s mother was a devout Christian and hoped that her son would eventually become one as well. One can infer that Augustine’s mom tried to teach Augustine about Christianity, as Christianity was so popular because it spread through women and their households. Augustine also was attracted to the religion because he viewed God as one that was forgiving, and truly cared about his followers, rather than a god who punishes its followers for doing wrong. This was attractive to many people, because regardless what you had done in the past, God was willing to forgive you and wash away your sinful mistakes. St. Augustine’s Confessions is more than just a memoir of a man’s journey and his quest to figure out who he was and what he believed in, it is also a work that shows how appealing Christianity was to the masses. Christianity appealed to a wide range of people for many reasons, including being free to join and open to all social classes, but
most importantly it offered a personal relationship with God, that promised salvation to a better place life after death; something which other religions at the time didn’t offer. These factors are what peaked Augustine’s initial interest in the religion, and eventually led to his conversion. Confessions is one of the many examples of how Christianity was able to amass a following—by offering what others weren’t.

Works Cited
St. Augustine. Confessions. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.