Confessions

Book IX concludes the autobiographical portion of Confessions, the remaining pages committed to philosophical exploration and Biblical commentary. Moving no further than Monica’s death in 387 CE, Augustine leaves unexplained the 13 or so years that passed between that event and the writing of this book. As this was the period in which Augustine became a bishop and began his influential ministry in Hippo Regius (modern Annaba, Algeria), Roman Africa’s second most important city, Augustine may have left out these years under the presumption that most readers of the day would already have been familiar with his doings of that period (O'Donnell, James. “St. Augustine.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 9 Nov. 2021).

Still, Augustine did not actually become a bishop until eight or nine years after Monica’s death, nor did he even move to Hippo or become a clergyman until 391 CE. Until that point, he had lived as a monk in Thagaste, raising Adeodatus on his family’s estate until the boy’s untimely death just a year after their return. In 391 CE, Augustine went to Hippo to establish a monastery. Instead, he found himself forced by a crowd into joining the clergy to replace an outgoing bishop (“Saint Augustine Never Thought of Becoming a Priest.” Agustino Recoletos, The Order of Augustinian Recollects, 2019). Thus, Augustine’s meteoric rise, impressive even in his lifetime and which would end with him as one of the most influential thinkers in the history of Christianity, began against his will. Perhaps this fact contributed to his decision to end his narrative with his mother’s death. Although throughout Confessions Augustine often thanks God for influencing his future through others against his will, perhaps he saw this explanation as less appropriate post-conversion, when he ought to have been better attuned to God’s plan for him.

Whatever Augustine’s reasons may have been for ending his narrative where he does, the story of Monica’s life and the religious experience they shared just before her death serve as powerful thematic capstones. An autobiography by its very nature cannot pass judgment on its subject’s entire life, but, while Augustine could not say with any certainty—not to mention humility—whether he was heaven-bound, his prominent inclusion of Monica’s life story and his confidence in asserting that “she neither died in misery nor died altogether” allow him to suggest the way his life might one day be remembered (176), or at least the way he hopes it will. The parallels between Monica’s drinking and his pear theft emphasize the similarity of their journeys. When he describes her motivations as deriving “not from any real craving for drink, but from a certain exuberance of youthful naughtiness” (169), he sounds as if he could be narrating his own rationale back in Book II.

Perhaps even more significant is the experience Augustine and Monica share overlooking the garden in Ostia, which constitutes the culmination of Augustine’s religious enlightenment. Reminiscent of the Neoplatonism-inspired vision he describes in Book VII, this epiphany goes even further: “And as we talked and panted for [the land of God], we just touched the edge of it by the utmost leap of our hearts; then, sighing and unsatisfied, we left the first-fruits of our spirits captive there, and returned” (173). While before, Augustine had only seen a light and heard a voice, here he asserts that he and his mother actually reached God’s realm and left parts of themselves there. It is hard to imagine how any mortal could experience the Christian divine more closely than this without dying, and it is fitting that Augustine should not have reached this point alone. Throughout Confessions, he has marveled at the mystery of human relationships, their power and allure often equaling and eluding that of God. The experience he has with Monica, then, suggests that the greatest joy and truth may only be accessible when love of the divine and love for other humans are wed.

Nevertheless, Augustine makes it clear which of these loves he values most when discussing the grief he felt following his mother’s death. The pain he speaks of is reminiscent of that which plagued him after his friend’s death in Book IV, and yet his conversion has granted him incredible mastery over outward manifestation of sadness. When he does cry, even though it is all alone, he deems it a sin that must be confessed, viewing his grief as a reminder that “any sort of habit is bondage” (177), unacceptable given his belief that no soul should be bound to anything other than God. To modern readers, this denial of basic human emotions may seem severe and even unhealthy, and it is conspicuous given his recognition of the value of love between humans, so recently made clear by the story of the garden in Ostia. This contradiction is yet another example of the complexity of Augustine’s life experiences transcending the framework of his faith.

Modern readers may also be troubled by Monica’s perspectives on the role of the wife, grounded though they may be in scripture. Augustine reports that, in order to avoid confrontation, Monica overlooked Patricius’s infidelities, and she managed his excessive anger by “learn[ing] to offer him no resistance, by deed or even by word” (171). Furthermore, she chastised her friends when they complained about their physically abusive husbands, reminding them “with serious import that from the time they had heard their marriage contracts read out they had been in duty bound to consider these as legal documents which made slaves of them” (171). Augustine makes no objection to this state of affairs. Rather, he approves of his mother for having silenced her own agency and humanity in service of his father. This is tragically ironic given his condemnation of slavery, although the profound sexism of the world Augustine lived in almost certainly prevented him from realizing it.

One final concern for modern readers is Augustine’s vague depiction of the actions of Empress Justina, accusing her of simply “persecuting your faithful Ambrose, in the interest of the Arian heresy by which she had been led astray” (167). Though Augustine implies that Ambrose’s life was at risk, he does not explain how exactly this necessitates the sit-in. Augustine returns once more to the political context when he claims that, following the alleged miracles, “although [Justina] was not brought to the healthy state of believing, her persecuting fury was curbed” (168). These characterizations are conspicuously reductive, and indeed the historical record reveals Augustine’s account to be oversimplification and exaggeration at once:

The Arian Court of Valentinian II, urged on by Valentinian’s Arian mother Justina, brought about the conflict by demanding one of the basilicas in Milan for Arian worship. Ambrose not surprisingly refused this request, whereupon the Court passed a law granting freedom of worship to Arians and threatening with the death penalty anyone—like Ambrose—who interfered with this freedom. The Court also made two attempts to seize a basilica—one of the attempts consisting of a siege of several days and nights. Ambrose’s uncompromising stand was supported by the citizens of Milan and was finally successful (Lenox-Conyngham, Andrew. “The Topography of the Basilica Conflict of A.D. 385/6 in Milan.” Historia, vol. 31, no. 3, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1982, p. 353. JSTOR, 2022)

Although the full story by no means vindicates Justina, it is inaccurate to describe her actions as persecution. Firstly, it is impossible to tell to what degree Justina was to blame for these occurrences as they came not from her but from the Court. Furthermore, her efforts to secure a site of worship for Arianism, a popular creed at the time, might well be praised, and the government seizure of property remains somewhat commonplace today, even if it is often condemned. Finally, there is no evidence that the alleged miracles had any impact on the Court’s decision to stand down. Rather, Ambrose’s sit-in seems to have been the determining factor. As for Ambrose himself, it appears he would only have risked execution had he prevented Arians from worshipping. Of course, considering how much more challenging it would have been in that time to research and fact-check an event like this as well as the likelihood that his sources were biased, Augustine’s inaccuracies are understandable.

While Book IX may finally satisfy the reader’s curiosity about Monica and, to a lesser extent, Patricius, Augustine reveals tantalizingly little about Adeodatus. All that Augustine shares about his son in Confessions can be summed up in a short list: He was born out of wedlock, he was left with Augustine when his parents separated, he was good-looking and clever, he was baptized alongside his father, he cried when his grandmother died, and he himself died not so long thereafter.

That there is more to Adeodatus’s story and Augustine’s feelings about him is suggested by his name alone, which is Latin for “godsend.” Augustine was 18 when Adeodatus was born, a year away from becoming a Manichee. For Augustine and his unnamed lover to name their son this even though the child’s very existence would have been viewed as immoral in both the pagan context of his father and the Christian context of his mother suggests that Augustine may have felt in his heart that his family was meant to be, regardless of societal judgments (Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Illegitimacy.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 20 Jul. 1998). If this were the case, it makes sense that a post-conversion Augustine might not want to dig too deeply into the moral quagmire at the heart of the matter.

One final reason why Augustine may have ended his personal narrative here is that by this point he had not only arrived at Christianity but also internalized a desire to spread his religion to others, thereby justifying the publication of Confessions. Immediately after converting, the previously vain Augustine passed up the opportunity to draw attention to himself by announcing his conversion and consequent retirement right away, choosing instead to take some time to regroup. Likely he chose to do so because he wanted to make sure that, when he did reveal the truth, he would be able to direct the attention toward persuasive elements of Christianity rather than toward himself. During the interim, he thought extensively on how best to save others, even the Manichees, against whom he still bore some resentment:

Oh, that they could have heard me, those who still love emptiness and chase falsehood! They might perhaps be so shaken as to spew it out, and then you would hear them when they cried to you, because he who for us died a true death in the flesh now intercedes on their behalf (164).

Not long thereafter, Augustine seized an opportunity to return to Thagaste, identifying it as the “place where we could best serve you” (168). Ending Book IX, Augustine calls on God to preserve the memory of his parents in order to “inspire your servants who are my brethren, your children who are my masters, whom I now serve with heart and voice and pen” (180). Even if Augustine failed to include, or in some cases even anticipate, the steps that awaited him between the end of his narrative and the writing of this evangelical book, the foundation of his proselytism was firmly laid, allowing him to use Books IX-XIII to flesh out his vision of and for Christianity.