The theological implications of confession as lamentation to God in Augustine’s Confessions

Abstract

In Confessions (2.3.5), Augustine distinguished between two natures of confession. He admits the nature of his confession as a narrative to God and the whole human race, and more importantly, as a lamentation to God. He casts his confession in the form of a rhetorical question when he asks, God! But I am narrating this story in your presence to my kind, to the whole human race, whatever the tiny fraction of it which happens to come across these writings of mine.’ He continues to ask, ‘And why is this? Obviously so that I, and whoever reads this, may ponder the depths from which we must cry out to you.’ What is closer to your ears than a heart that makes its confession to you and a faithful life? Therefore, the purpose of this study is twofold: (1) to examine the nature of confession as cathartic grief, a cry out for divine reconciliation; and (2) to examine the hermeneutical praxis of Augustine’s introspective rhetoric in his Confessions. This study will adopt a historical-critical method to interpret both the nature and purpose of confession.