Confessions By St. Augustine

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Confessions is a book written by St. Augustine during the height of the Roman Empire. This book outlines his life from his perception of his infancy all the way until he is baptized in his 30’s. Confessions describes Augustine’s conversion to Christianity. He describes this conversion as a difficult one and had many doubts, but finally put God first and obtained true enlightenment. The book continues after the autobiographical section, where Augustine reflects on the bible, mainly Genesis, and continues to try and find the true meaning of God. Augustine composes this tale to detail his own sins and to praise God. He entitles this book Confessions because he is essentially confessing to God and attempting to repent for the sins he committed during his life. He tells his story to praise God for lifting him from his life of sin and lust to a life of enlightenment. St. Augustine directly addressed God and thanks God for creating him and giving him redemption. Confessions influenced Christian values during the spread of Christianity to Rome and during the medieval period. During the medieval period the majority of the population was Christian and these people based their lives around Confessions. This book had a profound effect on the spread of Christianity. Augustine writes Confessions to influence non-Christians to convert because of his strong belief in Christianity. Augustine converts to Christianity for many reasons such as crucial disagreements with Manichaeism, for example astrological beliefs and the description of God. In his travels to Carthage, Augustine encounters a man named Faustus, who was a bishop in the Manichean Church. Augustine recounts that Faustus spoke to him with loquacity and that Faustus was trying to convince Augustine about Manichean myths with the use of flashy language. Augustine says that “He was a great snare of the devil and many were
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