Saint Augustine's Love And Love

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In Book Thirteen of Confessions, Saint Augustine’s subject matter is the Holy Spirit, who is love. We are enlightened to the main point of his entire work. He believed that everything and everyone is connected to love. He said, when we share this love, which comes from the Holy Spirit, we are closest to God. In this essay, I will summarize Augustine’s final work and I will compare it to the teachings of Plotinus, Stoics and Skepticism. I will evaluate its value through different philosophical viewpoints shared through various texts.
Historically, the work of Augustine was written in the early church age. The church during this time was new and blooming. Several different philosophies were being taught. There was, naturally, a mix of church …show more content…

“Of one thing I am sure sure—that, apart from you, nothing I have or am can be good, and ‘anything I gain is mere deprivation’ if it be not my God” (Page 318). He admonished those who are believers to follow the ways of the Lord, for there is no other worthy way to live our lives. We should be thankful for God’s love and care towards us. He did not create us because he had to. He is quite capable of handling things on his own. We are small in comparison to such a great God. “Everything created is beautiful, since you made it who are indescribably more beautiful than anything you made” (Page …show more content…

Everything and everyone is a part of this love. He said he is moved by the love of God. This love compels him to do what God instructs him to. In this last book of Confessions, he summed up his whole testimony and how it all comes back to love; which is the Holy Spirit. “The weight moving me is love. By your gift we are kindled and moved upward, we are set afire and we go, we ‘ascend the heart’s ascents’ and ‘sing the climbing song’” (Page 318). He believed God is triune: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This triune God is described as the Trinity. The whole trinity was present at creation. Each person of the trinity had a specific function (e.g. The Spirit hovered over the waters). He argued that the Spirit of God compels us upward yet our soul is determined to drag us back down to earth. Our soul continually pulls upon us to return our affections to this world. This is the struggle we are faced with every day. When we desire to do any good, it is only because we are being drawn to do it through the love given to us by the Holy

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