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Home > Resources > Interdisciplinary > Theology > Theological Reflection Theological Reflection in Augustine’s Confessions
David Rylaarsdam
from For God So Loved the World, ed. by Arie C. Leder (Belleville, ON: Essence, 2006). Used by permission.
Since Augustine tells us things about his early life in The Confessions, some people
assume it as an autobiography. Actually, autobiography as we know it doesn’t arise till well
over a millennium after Augustine is dead. Moreover, Augustine would be an unlikely person to create a new genre, “autobiography,” for he wants to make clear that he is not the author of
his own story; God is. In his Confessions, Augustine is not giving the history of his own life
as much as he is doing theological reflection. He is using life experiences to reflect on God,
creation, and their relation. I want to point out six prominent characteristics of Augustine’s
theological reflection, because some or all of these may edify our own habits today.
Full text
Read the Confessions online at the Christian Classics Ethereal Library