Confessions By Augustine Of Hippo - 1839 Words

Confessions is an autobiography that Augustine of Hippo writes to depict his journey of finding the religious truth regarding the origin of evil. In his autobiography, Augustine argues that Christianity possesses the most compelling answer to the origin of evil, and shows that Christianity’s definition evil is the extent that a person has strayed away from God. He argues that human free will leads to sin when a person pursues worldly desires instead of dedicating their lives to God, which in turn causes them to be labelled as evil. The author successfully argues through a series of events that portray Augustine’s decisions to commit sins and follow his desires for worldly things that Christianity’s definition of evil is indeed connected to†¦show more content†¦This illustrates to the audience that evil is not any kind of physical manifestation like the Manicheans teach their followers, but rather that evil is only a label and something that does not exis t on the material plane. Using this line of reasoning, Augustine strengthens his argument that Christianity’s views are more valid and sensible by showing the audience that there is no evil to God and as such, his creations are not initially tainted by sins that lead them to be classified as â€Å"evil†. This connects to Christianity’s definition of evil which states that â€Å"evil was nothing but a privation of good† (Book 3:7) which means that evil is simply the absence of good and therefore, considered as a label of how a person strays away from God. The author uses an autobiography to create a literary version of himself to represent the choices that he made throughout his life and how all of these choices lead him to Christianity. During the story of Augustine’s life, he confesses both to God and to his audience that it is his own decisions that lead him to commit sin. He emphasizes the fact that free will enables people to turn away from God and live a sinful life devoted to worldly pleasures. â€Å"†¦free will is the cause of our doing evil†¦ I willed or was unwilling to do something, I was utterly certain that it was none but myself who willed or was unwilling—and immediately I realized that there