I finished reading St.Augustine's Confessions some days ago and feel that I've gained some small extra insight into the Christian faith that I did not have before, specifically regarding the human condition as it pertains to sin and dependency upon God. I do wonder if even very many Christians have a similarly clear understanding of these two fundamental notions.

I've compiled a very short essay that extracts the central observations that Augustine makes about humanity in his Confessions, and therein are contained my new found insights. The writing that follows is a minor assignment for a class, and I have removed the citations for neatness. Writing it as served the dual purpose of saving my thoughts here and earning credit for the class.


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Augustine’s view of the human condition is comparable to the states and transitions in his own life. He regards the thirty-three years prior to his baptism as a state that was aligned with his base nature and was laden with misery, confusion and wrong doing, and it was only by his conscious decision to turn to God that he was relieved of that state. Likewise, he believes that man is innately wicked in the eyes of the Christian god, that as such man is inept and miserable in all areas of importance and that it is only by a conscious decision to submit to the will of that god that man may find fulfillment. To Augustine, sin is an indelible characteristic of humanity, which entraps us with a perverse love of things that are otherwise beautiful, and man, who is incapable of purging himself of sin without God, is tormented and ineffectual.

Augustine observes in himself and in others that disobedience to the Christian notion of divine law is inherent in human behavior. Augustine accepts on the basis of testimony that he displayed inclinations toward selfish wrath and vengeance in his infancy, and he observes this as common behavior among infants. Though he doesn’t pretend that such behavior is universal among infants, it is evidence that the sinful tendencies that he observes of himself later in life were present upon his birth. It is as he says of his later years, “So small a boy and so great a sinner." We see in Augustine’s recollective observations not only the presence of sin in infancy and childhood (ages contemporarily regarded as innocent) but the nature of sin as the prevailing feature of human behavior unless intervened upon by an outside agency, whether by the discipline of academic instructors or God. In Augustine’s depiction it seems that if man is left to his own whims and devices, he will inevitably turn to sin, so it can be said that Augustine views humanity as inherently sinful.

It is impossible to consider Augustine’s view of humanity if not in relation to sin, and to that end Augustine’s analysis of the human condition also concludes why humans sin. Augustine observes that men do not commit offenses against God’s law simply for the sake of doing so but will do so out of love for some other thing that they hope to attain, whether that thing is a person, an object, or a status among men. When the object of attraction is not obvious, Augustine deduces that it must be the love of liberty and self sufficiency, such as from God’s law, which prompts one to make the offense. Though the thing that attracts man may indeed be beautiful and possess virtuous qualities, it is a misplacement of one’s love and energy to pursue it above God, for God is what sustains it and possesses every virtue and reward that prompts man’s admiration of it. Augustine expresses this in his own words, “The soul is guilty of fornication when she turns from You and seeks from any other source what she will nowhere find pure and without taint unless she returns to You.” When man hungers for any virtue or quality, he ought to turn to God who possesses what man seeks in overabundance. When he fails to do this, he has misdirected his love, committed an affront to the virtues of God, and denied himself the only thing that could sate his hunger, and a sin has therefore been committed. Humans sin because they perversely misplace their love.

Given Augustine’s belief that all humans are sinners, and given that sinning refers to a departure from the one thing that sustains man and fulfills his longings, it follows that humanity must have a natural tendency toward despair and inability. Man cannot fulfill his needs and cannot achieve his longings except through the remission of sin and that cannot be done, by definition, except by loving God before everything. This establishes humans as inherently dependent upon the higher power of God for their happiness. Augustine echoes this in thanking God for having forced Augustine’s attentions upon God, the one cure for his ailments, “At that time my soul was in misery, and You pricked the soreness of its wound, that leaving all things it might turn to You, who are over all and without whom all would return to nothing, that it might turn to You and be healed." Humans, in Augustine’s view are ineffectual and self-defeating except when they act through a love of God. Theologian Alister McGrath, who holds a Doctor of Divinity degree, observes that “Augustine’s view of human nature is that it is frail, weak, and lost, and needs divine assistance and care if it is to be restored and renewed."

Augustine regards man as a creature marked at birth by sin, a creature that wants to possess the treasures of God without submitting to God, a creature too foolish to know where its love ought to be spent, and a creature that will inevitably ruin itself because of that fact. This perspective on humanity bears similarities with such ancient characters as Oedipus, who was destined upon his birth to commit a great folly. He was warned by the Gods that he would commit this folly, but he considered his own virtues to be sufficient enough in escaping it. In his mind, no submission to divine counsel was necessary. As long as he had his wit he thought he could avoid his fall, but he was too ignorant of his nature to have avoided it, and that ignorance transported him to it all the faster. According to Augustine, humans are as ignorant of their dependency on divine mandate as Oedipus, and that is their undoing.

I have finished reading a comprehensive summary of Buddhism as a philosophy and way of life as presented by Steve Hagen. As such, I feel informed enough to posit a valid opinion of the philosophy as it has been presented to me. That is not to say that I lacked an understanding of it beforehand, but this book has opened me to aspects that have been crucial in forming a more concrete assessment. That said, I will expand upon what it is that I have learned and what it is that I think of the philosophy.

It is important to note that I am referring to it as a philosophy and not as a religion. For simplicity, I will define "religion" as any framework for tradition and belief that, as a symptom of its conception, demands faith as opposed to direct observation or rational deduction, which are more so bases of philosophy.

As it turns out, as is evident by the Buddha's words, Buddhism formed strictly as a philosophy with no religious elements whatsoever. I will conjecture that such elements which are associated with it today probably became so through cultural diffusion with Asia's other major worldviews. I will not discuss them here.

What Buddhism really is is a calculated response to the human condition. It makes observations that are readily apparent and draws conclusions based thereon. this is a particularly admirable aspect of Buddhism, that it intentionally places awareness and observation at the head of its priorities rather than faith or allegiance. Throughout its teachings there are many points of observation worth touching upon, but the "Four Noble Truths" are the thesis of Buddhism and are the observations made by Buddha himself. They are:

1. Life invariably involves suffering.
2. The origin of suffering is attachment.
3. The cessation of suffering is attainable.
4. The Eightfold Path is the means toward that cessation.

The Eightfold Path is an eight-point methodology for understanding, behaving and developing in manners conducive toward the cessation of pain, or Nirvana. The eight points are: Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Meditation. Buddhists have a particular way of defining and justifying each of these. Underlying them all are a wealth of wise observations and stunningly clear conclusions.

It is important to recognize that these points do not serve the function of a moral code in Buddhism. The Buddhists have no definitive moral code. As they would see it, it is not "wrong" of you to not live by these eight tenets any more than it is wrong for a sleeper to not wake up. The Buddha merely presented what he thought was an adequate remedy for the disturbances that he saw in people's lives, and whether or not someone chooses to engaged upon the path is truly a matter of choice and preference.

So what is it that disturbs people's lives? Buddhists will say that it is attachment. They will say that reality is an ever flowing stream in which no area of the flow exists in permanence or in independence from the flow. We are hurt by our attachment to the notion meaningful permanence and by our attachment to independent forms at all. Indeed, what part of a flowing rush of water has an independent form? All aspects of the flow are interconnected and inseparable. The idea is that if we were not attached to permanence and independent forms, but could recognize the continuity between all things and their temporal nature, then we could become one with the flow and nothing about it could any longer trouble us.

The problem, according to Hagen, can be described in more ways than merely attachment. It's similar to the factorization of an equation, where the product of two smaller components provide the equation. The factors of attachment are ignorance and intent. Attachment=(ignorance)(intent). This makes very fluid sense. If not for intent, we would not have the attachment to permanence. If not for ignorance, we could more readily recognize the continuity between all things and the lack of particular and indivisible forms.

Now that the problem can be reduced to the simple terms of ignorance and intent, which truly define everything that Buddhism sets out to solve, I think that I'm ready to give specific opinions on what I like and dislike about Buddhism.

What I can find nothing but praise for in the philosophy is its absolute appreciation for awareness and knowledge. It is founded on the importance of making critical firsthand observations. It is admirable for its recognition that ignorance is rife beyond measure throughout humanity and that it is the source of a great deal of corruption in our condition. While I do not agree with all of the conclusions reached by Buddhists teachers through their search for awareness and knowledge, I do respect the rationale underlying those conclusions. This mirrors an aspect of Buddhism's intellectual integrity in that the philosophy never pretends that knowledge can be handed down from an authoritative source, secret until made as a gift. Hagen is adamant throughout the book that truth is available for everyone to observe and conjecture upon equally. There's an almost Socratic love for truth within Buddhism. I suspect this is why Buddhism has adapted more readily to modern science than other religions. In making their point, Buddhists seem quite comfortable in referencing genetic biology or particle physics, because the mindset allows for such a swift assimilation of new information and new observations into old concepts.

From the outset, Buddhism observes that our wants and desires (intentions) can never truly and surely be satisfied. It observes that this insatiable longing is the source of much grief -- brief glimpses of happiness, yes, but mostly grief. It regards grief as bad, so it sets out to abolish it, and the most direct way to do that is by removing wants and desires (intentions) from our lives as to achieve a kind of complacent harmony, a nirvana -- though that itself must not be the object of intent.

The problem I have with this was from the outset the idea that we should ever expect or want to achieve a state of eternal complacency in which we've no further needs to be fulfilled. I've said before that emotional states are not ends in themselves and should not be pursued as such, so when the Buddhist seeks to remove himself from intention, I ask him "Why?" He says "To put to rest the turmoil and grief," and in my eyes he is committing a folly, because (no differently than a heroin addict) he is pursuing an emotional state rather than a change to the world around him, which should be what we do pursue. The Buddhist may counter "that change to the world around us is irrelevant, for it is a fleeting change made to things not even real in the way we perceive them." To that, I would counter "That differs in no respect from the internal change that you are seeking but instead leaves you complacent and ill equipped for this world." Perhaps this verges on why the Buddhists do not pretend that "waking up," as they call it, is a moral imperative, but merely a matter of personal preference.

All of that said, I do see a great deal of value in the ability to detach one's self from intent. It is not something that I would promote living throughout one's life, but there are individual moments where discipline over one's base desires could save one's life or spare him or her momentary grief that simply has no benefit or functional reason for being there. I value my times of joy and my lofty ambitions. If that means that I suffer on occasion, I am satisfied with that and do not expect to ever find utter fulfillment or a life without grief, but there are moments when it is in line with one's own ambitions and intentions if he or she may simply exercise the ability to let go of attachment. Learning to momentarily let go is something that Buddhism would be of immense helpfulness in.

It's difficult, being born so late in the history of civilization. There are so many books that precede me, and new ones today are published in massive quantity, and I'm under such a constrained time frame with which to experience all these packets of knowledge and culture. I've gone through seventy-five in the last three years, and yet the titles in my 'to read' list have not seemed to lessen once.

I read on philosophy, religion, science, history, and fiction that is either classical or directly relevant to modern society. Some of the authors are obscure, and I feel ashamed to say that I've deprived myself of some of the greater legends of literature. I look forward to reading Milton and Newton sometime this year.

I imagine that selecting a favorite book or piece of writing maybe difficult for most regular readers, but not for me. I have read plays, religious satire, philosophical commentary and I’ve read from poets and scientists, but nothing for me has been as profoundly deep and enjoyable and covered the same breadth of literary aristry as Goethe’s Faust. It is my favorite piece of writing by far, so much so that I fully intend to read alternately translated versions of it.

I very much see myself as Faust, an academic weary of age and tired of Earth, hungry for things and secrets that are forbidden, and eager to wager whatever is necessary for a chance at attaining them. Then there is Mephistopheles, whose antagonistic role is almost forgotten due to his charm and wit. There is a strength and lure about his character that you can almost become drunk on just imagining, and I see him in my character as well.

There is more to Goethe’s Faust than the characters though. The play is a profound commentary on the nature of the human experience, on love, lust, religion, politics, and it is delivered in a surreal and intricate manner. In the poetry of Goethe’s words, or rather those of the translator who opted to maintain his poetic devices, there is a music that carries the themes. It’s all done with more detail and hidden instances of profound wisdom, historical, biblical, and literary allusion than I think I’ve ever seen In a single piece of writing before. I maybe overstepping my bounds in saying this, but I think, even though Goethe frequently paid tribute to his English counterpart, that Goethe was in fact no less the master than Shakespeare.

In any case, it has been my favorite thing to read, and I’m sure I shall write about it again, to include my feelings on the others I’ve read.