Some Thoughts on Reading Augustine's 'Confessions
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2512747 |
|---|---|
| Authors | David Bakan (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1965 |
| Volume | 5 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 149 |
| Publication date | 1965-01-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8294 • E-ISSN: 1468-5906 |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/1384264 |
| OpenAlex | W2319890997 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
Since we have taken it upon ourselves to give attention to The Confessions of Saint Augustine,* it may perhaps be in order to begin a discussion of Augustine with a confession. Somehow I have managed to live into the fifth decade of my life without having read him before. This may perhaps be a disadvantage, but it may also be an advantage. The disadvantage is the disadvantage of ignorance. I find that I am considerably less impressed by his presumptive greatness, quality of mind and heart, etc., than I have been led to expect. And being at an age which is beyond the experience of Augustine which he reports in the Confessions, I feel that I may be in a position to look upon him as a youth, making the errors which are associated with youth. Also, we are all considerably his senior, in that our intellectual history not only includes all of his, but hundreds of years of the history of mankind beyond the time of Augustine. There is little question but that the thought of Augustine dominated many hundreds of years of Western history. From the perspective of the present time, we can perhaps look upon the whole Augustinian influence as reflecting the immaturity of
Art · Linguistics · Literature · Psychoanalysis · Reading (process) · Theology · Augustinian Studies and Theology · Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies · Philosophy · Psychology
| Citations per year | 0.11 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 1982 - 2008 (27) |
| Highly cited | No |