Autor: Liddy, Richard M.

Buch: Transforming Light

Titel: Transforming Light

Stichwort: Augustinus, Cassiciacum, Fragen

Kurzinhalt: Augustin: frühe Dialoge; Fragen des 30-jährigen; Neuplatonismus, De Beata Vita, Hortensius,

Textausschnitt: () What is the good life? Does it consist in great possessions? But do not great possessions bring the fear of their own loss? Is 'wisdom' the way to a happy life? a wisdom in which the lower levels of the human person are subordinated to the human mind? (De Beata Vita) [...] Does wisdom consist in knowing the truth or only in seeking the truth? Can any truth be known with certitude? Is there the Truth that can enlighten us about what is truth? How come to a vision of such Truth? (Contra Academicos) [...] If God is good, how account for evil? Does evil, like the jagged edges of a single stone in a mosaic, fit into some larger plan, some larger order in the universe?
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... in these dialogues Augustine is obviously trying to set his convictions into some kind of intelligible framework. Afraid perhaps of being carried away with the emotion of the moment, he is trying to consolidate the fruits of his conversion in rational terms.
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1) Conversion from corporeal thinking;
2) Refutation of skepticism;
3) Faith and understanding;
4) Veritas: from truths to the Truth.
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What the Hortensius represented for Augustine, as he beautifully recounts in the Confessions, was that it inspired in him a disinterested search for the truth, a desire that remained beneath the surface of his life throughout all the years of his moral and philosophical wandering: