Augustine Rhetorical Analysis

Augustine, although recognized as a saint today, was not always a man of great faith. For most of his life, he was tempted with sin, and he struggled to figure out who God was. In the earlier part of his life, he was fascinated by rhetoric. He admired famous rhetoricians, and he even wrote some works of his own, including The Confessions, in which he reveals the struggles he faced. Augustine’s attraction to rhetoricians is not something unfamiliar to a modern audience, as today it is something called “celebrity worship”. Augustine fell into the trap of worshipping people because of their works, instead of worshipping God, whom all the works truly come from. In book 4 of The Confessions, Augustine explains that he had written his own book on beauty, which he dedicated to a Roman orator, Hierius. Augustine further states that Hierius, “was the sort of man [Augustine] loved in the sense of wanting to be like him” (Augustine, 70). Augustine worshipped Hierius, and many other famous rhetoricians like him. Unfamiliar with God, Augustine was in constant search of approval from other humans whom he admired. He details that if he did not find approval, “a heart vain and empty of [God’s] solid strength would be wounded” (Augustine, 71). Augustine failed to prioritize God over these other worldly “celebrities”, for
There is also evidence that “materialism and compulsive buying were significantly correlated with celebrity worship”, and that “celebrity worship, materialism, and compulsive buying were significantly related to lower self-concept clarity and to lower levels of well-being, supporting both absorption-addiction and empty self theories” (Reeves, Baker, Truluck). People today show feelings of emptiness in the same way Augustine did. They search for fulfillment in the wrong things, and they are left feeling unfulfilled, for, as Augustine later discovers, the only thing that can truly satisfy is