Has anyone read Confessions by St Augustine? Thoughts?

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I was wondering if anyone has read Confessions by St Augustine. I have tried to get through it many times and it is tough. Also, any thoughts. God Bless.
 
Reading selections from John Paul II’s encyclical letter AUGUSTINUM HIPPONSENSEM here:

payingattentiontothesky.com/2009/10/13/reading-selections-1-from-pope-john-paul-ii%e2%80%99s-apostolic-letter-augustinum-hipponsensem/

St. Augustine has been a topic of many posts. Some of the others are:
  1. A review of Peter Brown’s wonderful book, Augustine of Hippo.
  2. A collection of references by other writers that illuminate the many gifts that Augustine has for the student.
  3. A short biography of Augustine.
You’ll find links to all on that first page.

dj
 
Read it several times.

Asking for thoughts is sort of like saying, “What do you think of Hamlet?” saying “It’s great” doesn’t really do it justice! 😉

Confessions is probably the most incredible work dealing with Christianity (aside from the bible, duh) pre-Aquinas. It’s readable, enticing, thoughtful-you name it. It also deals with philosophy not related to Christianity per se. For example, Augustine’s theory of existence has alot to do with Descartes, it just predates him by 800 years. Augustine’s theory of time really wasn’t matched until Kant!
 
I loved reading Confessions, especially the first half dealing with his own life. The latter chapters are denser, in my opinion, and I was grateful I was reading it for class with an amazing professor, because I got so much more out of it that way.

Make sure you have a good translation–that can make all the difference. We used Chadwicks’s, from the Oxford World Classics series, but I’ve seen some modern “devotional” translations that were terrible.
 
mkipp said:
It seems that as I read it, I do more thinking then reading.
Click to expand...
St. Augustine does have that effect doesn’t he. Its not an easy book to read but its worth it I’m reading it for the first time at the moment, and sometimes you just have to sit back and say wow.
But as was once said to him "“Take up and read, take up and read.”😃
 
 
I’ve run through it at least four or five times. It’s a great read and it is brand new every time you read it. it helps if you know a bit about manacheeism (i think i just butchered the spelling) and pagan gnosticism in general. also beneficial is a cursory knowledge of Plato and the Socratic Dialougues, but you can manage without all that.
My advice- just read it. take from it what you can and enjoy it. Its the first autobiography in history, so you get a really neat insight to this saint. read it as you would any other novel or biography or history book or autobiography. the doctrinal points are all covered in the Catechism, so don;t worry about that on your first read. get to know st augustine and pray to him for help understanding what he wrote. he is a very complicated and brilliant man.
 
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