Preview

diotoma on love

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
3541 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
diotoma on love
Love’s ladder’s God

It was their final conversation. She would soon die, although neither of them knew it at the time. St. Augustine and his mother waited for a ship that would take her across the sea, to Africa, where she had raised him. She had always prayed he would become a Catholic; now, after many years, he was one. “There we talked together,” he writes in his Confessions, “she and I alone in deep joy.” This common joy stemmed from their shared company, but also their shared belief in God:
Our conversation had brought us to this point, that any pleasure whatsoever of the bodily senses, in any brightness whatsoever of corporeal light, seemed to us not worthy of comparison with the pleasure of that eternal Light, not worthy even of mention. Rising as our love flamed upwards towards that Selfsame, we passed in review the various levels of bodily things, up to the heavens themselves, whence sun and moon and star shine upon this earth. And higher still we soared, thinking in our minds and speaking and marveling at Your works: and so we came to our own souls, and went beyond them to come at last to that region of richness unending, where You feed Israel forever with the food of truth: and there life is that Wisdom by which all things are made, both the things that have been and the things that are yet to be. But this Wisdom itself is not made: it is as it has ever been, and so it shall be forever: indeed “has ever been” and “shall be forever” have no place in it, but it simply is, for it is eternal: whereas “to have been” and “to be going to be” are not eternal. And while we were thus talking of His Wisdom and panting for it, with all the effort of our heart we did for one instant attain to touch it; then sighing, and leaving the first fruits of our spirit bound to it, we returned to the sound of our own tongue, in which a word has both beginning and ending. For what is like to your Word, our Lord, who abides in Himself forever, yet grows not old and makes all

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Atonement Research Paper

    • 1633 Words
    • 7 Pages

    9 However, as it is written: “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived” the things God has prepared for those who love him—…

    • 1633 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Police Pursuit Liability

    • 1085 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Cited: The Holy Bible, King James Version. New York: Oxford Edition: 1769; King James Bible Online, 2008. http://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/.…

    • 1085 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Ultimately, could the “Promised Land” in the Old Testament that the LORD appears to be leading the Israelites to obtain; in essence, also be their sexual bodies (their land within) – to lead them back to their “Godly sexual beings within?” This beautiful possibility perhaps is likely.…

    • 936 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hebrew Wisdom

    • 879 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Bibliography: Hindson, Edward E., and Yates, Gary E. The Essence of the Old Testament: A Survey. Nashville, Tenn.: B & H Academic, 2012.…

    • 879 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    She not only encouraged him throughout his entire life, but also offered herself as a humble example to follow. Augustine said, "While I was still a boy, then I had heard of an eternal life promised us through the humility of our Lord God stooping to our pride. My mother had great hope in you, O God, and as soon as I came our of her womb I was marked with the sign of the Lord's cross and was salted with His salt." (13). Monica prayed for her son despite his sinful ways. "My mother knew nothing of my illness, yet, though she was far away, she continued to pray for me." (91). Also, Augustine's mother appealed to high church officials when she felt like her preaching was not enough. As Augustine said, "My mother asked this bishop to be so kind as to discuss things with me, to expose my mistakes, to unteach me what was bad, and to teach me what was good..."…

    • 1268 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    ACIM Text Study Answers

    • 1061 Words
    • 5 Pages

    In this section, we learn that our body is a Holy Temple and we learn the place of the Holy Inner Alter that can only be seen with perfect Clarity. It is here you find refuge, comfort, peace; healing and we commune with our Creator. “The children of God are entitled to the perfect comfort that comes from perfect trust”. We are dependent on God, Our Daily Bread, and He, our Creator longs to commune with us, His Creation.…

    • 1061 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In my day he spoke according to this word, but I saw my desire upon him and upon his house, and Israel utterly perished forever.…

    • 774 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.I have fed you…

    • 1378 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Confessions” recounts St. Augustine’s life of materialistic desires, newfound philosophy, and final conversion to Catholicism. Specifically in Book IV of “Confessions,” St. Augustine is talking to God about his grieving the death of a close friend of his. Consequently, he is saddened when he realizes that everything he loves on this Earth is mortal, except God. He states, “For that first grief had pierced so easily and so deep only because I had spilt out my soul upon the sand, in loving a mortal as if he were never to die.”1 As the prayer continues, St. Augustine accepts that loving friends can be fulfilling, but having an equal or greater love for God will protect and bring internal peace.…

    • 521 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Libanius

    • 948 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Not only was his mother’s influence strong, but Augustine himself was more sensitive and prone to the influence of women. Augustine easily set his conversion to Manichaeism aside, but the one thing that really kept him from becoming Christian was his lust. “I had prayed to you... ' Give me chastity and continence, but not yet.' For I was afraid that you would answer my prayer at once and cure me too soon of the disease of lust…” Women has always been his weakness. Augustine discusses how he postponed embracing Christianity because he wanted love and to tie the knot. Either way, whether he is with mother or a wife, he binds himself to some kind of…

    • 948 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Augustine describes his life in this section as a period of time in which his life was “one of being seduced and seducing, being deceived and deceiving in a variety of desires,” referring to his current interests and what he was actually pursuing at the time. More specifically, he was referring to the fact that he was a teaching a liberal subject to students (rhetoric) while believing in a “false” religion behind closed doors, relishing in the attention and popularity he and he students received from their rhetoric mastery all while wanting to purge themselves of their prideful and sinful behaviors.2 Another regret that Augustine reveals in this section is that he maintained such a long relationship with his concubine who was also the mother of his child. He notes…

    • 2284 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    essay, we will take a look at this claim from a theological, Biblical and personal view to…

    • 693 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    bible

    • 1117 Words
    • 5 Pages

    14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.…

    • 1117 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Augustine

    • 1467 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Augustine was born November 13, A.D. 354, in Tagaste (it is call today Souk Ahras, Algeria); and died seventy six years later in Hippo Regius (pp.1) Augustine was raise up in a family with both parents his father (Patricius) who was a nonbeliever until later in life and Augustine mother (Monica) a child of God. Augustine was taught at a young age about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by his mother; Augustine like any other young teenager did not like school but at the same time had a desire to be like by his teacher’s; like any other child Augustine did have some bad behavior at times; Augustine did not meet any stringer in school because of his personality and Augustine did have a good many friends. Augustine parents saw that their son was college material and they had a desire to send him to college, but like so many parents they were concern about the cost of college and where they would get the money form. Augustine parents Patricius and Monica with the help of family and friends put together enough money to send their son to the University Madaura; but after Augustine began school his father died, that left Augustine mother with limited resources but Monica were determine to keep her son in school. While in school Augustine met a young woman and they had a relationship together and this young lady (name unknown), gave birth to Augustine son; this woman live with Augustine for over a decade but Augustine had to give her up to make a society marriage in Milan and this decision broke his heart; Augustine son (Adeodatus) live with his father until his death at a young age. Augustine begin to read Cicero Hortensius; in the next two or three years later Augustine being a Manichean he became an Academic philosophers; but at the same time Augustine did not forget what he have been taught about the Lord from his mother earlier in life; Apostle Paul reminded Timothy of that in 2 Timothy 1:5. When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in…

    • 1467 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Christian Philosophers

    • 9122 Words
    • 37 Pages

    At age 17, through the generosity of fellow citizen Romanianus, Augustine went to Carthage to continue his education in rhetoric. Although raised as a Christian, Augustine left the church to follow the Manichaean religion, much to the despair of his mother, Monica. As a youth Augustine lived a hedonistic lifestyle for a time, associating with young men who boasted of their sexual exploits with women and urged the inexperienced boys, like Augustine, to seek out experiences or to make up stories about experiences in order to gain acceptance and avoid ridicule. It was during this period that he uttered his famous prayer, "Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet" (Latin: da mihi castitatem et continentiam, sed noli modo). At a young age, he began an affair with a young…

    • 9122 Words
    • 37 Pages
    Powerful Essays