Confessions (Hendrickson Christian Classics) | 
 enlarge | Author: Saint, Bishop Of Hippo Augustine
Publisher: Hendrickson Publishers
Category: Book
List Price: $8.97
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Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 651147
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 360
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 8.6 x 5.5 x 0.9
ISBN: 1565634519
Dewey Decimal Number: 248
EAN: 9781565634510
ASIN: 1565634519
Publication Date: August 30, 2004
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| Customer Reviews:
 Great, but a bad translation. August 1, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Augustine's Confessions is one of the greatest books ever, but this is a terrible translation. There are far better versions out there you can find at the same price, or even lower.
 Confessions April 20, 2006
3 out of 29 found this review helpful
Great book! Very easy reading, it teaches:
1. That Manicheans are still around today, though they go by different names.
..... a. Environmentalist (pg 50), and
......b. Good and bad forces - Star Wars movies.
2. How a Godly Mother (Monica) acts and is remembered by her son.
3. etc.
Yours in Christ,
Alex
A personal soul searching February 18, 2006
16 out of 18 found this review helpful
Reading Confessions by St. Augustine was a richly rewarding experience. The man examined his conscience, soul and thinking processes with as complete honesty as I have ever encountered in my lifetime. Some of the questions he posed and answered have never entered my mind; other areas he examined and anlyzed were areas of concern to me. In my areas of questioning, St. Augustine provided guidance/direction and most times answers that satisfied my quest for "understanding". Altogether "Confessions" is a book that I shall read (at leisure) many more times.
Rose Miller
Jackson, MI
Take and read! May 24, 2005
39 out of 47 found this review helpful
Augustine's 'Confessions' is among the most important books ever written. One of the first autobiographical works in the modern sense, it also represents the first time a psychological and theological enterprise were combined. It also helps to bridge the gap between the Classical world and the Medieval world, exhibiting strong elements identifying with each of those major historical periods.
Most undergraduates in the liberal arts encounter the book at some point; all seminarians do (or should!). Many adults find (or rediscover) the book later, after school. For many in these categories, there are concepts, narrative strands and historical data new and unusual for them. However, Augustine's 'Confessions' is still generally more accessible in many ways that truly classical pieces; it has interior description as well as external reporting that we are familiar with in modern writing.
The 'Confessions' shows Augustine's personality well - he was a passionate person, but his focus wavered for much of his life until finally settling upon Christianity and the Neoplatonic synthesis with this faith. Even while remaining a passionate Christian and rejecting the sort of dualism present in the Manichee teachings, he varied between various positions within these systems. Augustine's varied thought reaches through many denominational and scholarly paradigms.
The 'Confessions' are divided into thirteen chapters, termed 'Books' - the first ten of the books are autobiographical, with Augustine describing both events in his life as well as his philosophical and religious wanderings during the course of his life. The text is somewhat difficult to take at times, as this is writing with a purpose, as indeed most autobiographies are. The purpose here at times seems to be to paint Augustine in the worst possible light (the worse his condition, the better his conversion/salvation ends up being); at other times, one gets a sense (as one might get when reading the Pauline epistles) that there is some significant degree of ego at work here (Paul boasts of being among the better students, and so does Augustine, etc.).
Augustine also uses his Confessions as a tract against the Manichean system - once a faithful adherent, Augustine later rejects the Manichean beliefs as heretical; however, one cannot get past the idea that Augustine retained certain of their intellectual aspects in his own constructions even while denouncing them in his official life story.
The whole of the conversion turns on two primary books - Book Seven, his conversion to the Neoplatonic view of the world, including the metaphysics and the ethics that come along with this system; and Book 8, which describes his conversion to Christianity proper. This is where perhaps the most famous directive, 'Tolle! Lege!' ('Take and read!') comes from - Augustine heard a voice, and he picked up the nearest book, which happened to be a portion of the Pauline epistles, arguing against the undisciplined lifestyle Augustine lived. Scholars continue to debate whether Augustine's conversion to Christianity was more profound or more important than his conversion to Neoplatonism; in any event, Christianity interpreted through a Platonic framework became the norm for centuries, and remains a strong current within the Christian world view; Protestant reformers as they went back to the 'original bible' in distinction from the Catholic interpretations of the day also went back to the 'original Augustine' for much of their theology.
The final three books are Augustine's dealing with the creation of the world via narrative stories in Genesis 1 exegetically and hermeneutically. This is very different from what is done in modern biblical scholarship, but is significant in many respects, not the least of which as it gives a model of the way Augustine dealt with biblical texts; given Augustine's towering presence over the development of Western Christianity in both Catholic and Protestant strands, understanding his methods and interpretative framework can lead to significant insights into the ideas of medieval and later church figures.
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