Confessions Truth Quotes

Some pronoun clarification: "they" are the Manichees and "you" is God. In fact, this is the very first we hear of the Manichees in the Confessions, considering how important they are in Augustine's development. Augustine sees the Manichees as people who lay claim to a false truth. And that's a pretty dangerous sign, because it means that any shmuck can claim truths. Now, logically, we might say "But why should we believe Augustine's truth? Why is his truth any more real than what the Manichees believe?" Well, dear readers, this little conundrum isn't lost on Augustine either, which is why he is so intent on showing why the logic behind Christian notions of God, good and evil, free will, and the creation are foolproof. Oh, and we'd also like to draw your attention to the Manichees's motto: "Truth and truth alone." Now what do you make of that?

What is the difference between opinions and truth, according to Augustine? Okay, okay, the truth is firm. Like a rock. And opinions are like puffs of wind, we get it. But does that mean that opinions are never the same as the truth? And how do we distinguish between them, according to Augustine?

So much likening of truth and rocks, right? Again, we come up against the problem of how to tell truth from fiction. Which is hard, because sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. In fact, the whole issue of truth seems to lie in defining the darn thing. How do we recognize it? Where do we find it? How do we not fall into fiction-traps?

This truth is a little different from the other truths. Instead of being about philosophical or theological grandeur, this truth is about the truth of the past—i.e., "what happened" in the most basic sense. So this passage is an example of a rhetorical question. But why does Augustine implore God at this particular moment? This is right after Augustine tells us about what a fanboy he was for Faustus, so it seems like Augustine just wants to reassure God that he's telling him the honest-to-God truth. So maybe part of confessing is an adherence to telling the truth, even when that truth is unflattering.

Well, we guess it doesn't make much sense to give up worldly aims just for the sake of it. You see, by now, Augustine has gotten the sense that maybe Manichaeism isn't the way to go, but that still doesn't mean that Christianity is. Plus, it's really convenient for Augustine to write off Christianity until its truth is starring him in the face, because Christianity has all these demands about giving up "worldly aims" (read: sex, ambition, pride). It's like a barter: no truth, no piety. Also, we should point out how truth, which before was a rock, has now become light. This is definitely not the last you will see of this whole light metaphor, so it's worth noting.

See what we meant about light? Okay, but the million-dollar question is really: what is the Light? It would be easy to say God, and probably not incorrect, but why doesn't Augustine just say "God" then? Are "Light" and "truth" and "God" synonymous? Well, sometimes Augustine capitalizes the word "truth," and sometimes he doesn't. Same goes for "light." And God is always capitalized in the Christian faith, right…?

Well this is a neat little definition of truth, now, isn't it? Truths refer to things that actually exist. Now, one of the ways in which Augustine approaches thinking about God is to take God and the Scriptures as absolutely true, and then to come up with explanations of physical or textual problems around those truths. So this line actually gives us insight into Augustine's philosophical reasoning, and gives us a better understanding of how Augustine comes to the conclusions that he does.

Hm, one pesky problem about "truth" is that it can be an adjective or a noun. Now, you might be thinking, "Lots of words are like that and I don't lose any sleep over them." To which we reply, "But in this case, doesn't this mean that there is a distinction being made between 'true' things and the truth?" To which you reply, "Is that a rhetorical question?" To which we answer "Is it?" All right, all right, we'll stop.

This quote brings up a lot of the same issues as the other quotes about truth. Here, Augustine is using "truth" as both an adjective and a noun, and possibly in different ways. And he's conflating the ideas of truth, God, and light. But what's interesting about this passage is that Augustine has managed to make his lifelong quest for truth, as in knowledge, the same as his lifelong spiritual quest. Were they always the same thing? Or is this a new development for our man Augustine?

We're back to that old dichotomy between opinion and truth again. Whereas before Augustine defined truth in terms of its eternal quality (it's unchanging like a rock, remember?), now he describes truth as universal. Opinion, it seems, has more to do with a person's ego than anything else, and if there's one thing this book tells us, it's that people are fallible. So one way for us to recognize if something is the truth is if it's true for everybody. Clever, huh? And Augustine gets to this idea when he talks about how the Scriptures can be read in many different ways that are equally correct. Fascinating.