The Major Philosophical Reflections in St. Augustine's Confessions

di Robert Scott (Autore)

Historia Magna, 2025

The narrative in Confessions oscillates between Augustine's personal experience and his philosophical reflection, and in doing so, it provides profound insights into the nature of human existence. The centrality of memory and time in the text is particularly significant. In Book XI, Augustine meditates on the nature of time in a way that has influenced subsequent thinkers for centuries. His reflections on the past, present, and future, and the inability of humans to grasp the present fully because it is constantly slipping away into the past, echo themes from ancient philosophy, particularly the work of Plato and Aristotle. Augustine, however, introduces a theological twist, positing that time is a created reality, and only God exists outside of time, eternal and unchanging. Augustine's profound insights into the human will and its struggle between sin and grace would later lay the foundations for Christian doctrines of original sin and salvation. His ideas were revolutionary in the sense that they placed the human will at the center of the moral universe. Before Augustine, much of the philosophical and theological discussion had been focused on the metaphysical nature of God or the cosmos. Augustine, however, turned inward, scrutinizing the human soul's desires, motives, and capacity for evil. He famously remarked in Confessions that his turning away from God in his youth was not due to external circumstances, but rather his own disordered will: "You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You."

• Autore: Robert Scott
• Anno edizione: 2025
• Editore: Historia Magna
• Formato: EPUB2 con DRMFREE
• Lingua: Inglese
• Compatibilità: Tutti i dispositivi (eccetto Kindle)
• Layout: Reflowable
• EAN: 9798230095910