Augustine's Intellectual Development

Although Augustine’s Confessions is often viewed as the personal account of Augustine’s personal spiritual development, the implications on education made throughout this text are of key importance. Despite receiving one of the finest educations available in his day, Augustine is often very critical of it. His childhood education leaves him completely disordered and disoriented, and distant from God; however, Cicero’s Hortensius marks a fundamental transformation in Augustine and his conception of knowledge. Augustine’s intellectual development draws fundamental questions on what constitutes a good education, and more importantly the purpose of an education [and its relation to human happiness]. Augustine began his education in his hometown

Augustine recounts several times the failure to properly begin ‘life’. Augustine suggested that he was thrown into this stream of life and he was educated and brought in that stream - forced to treat it as the truth about the world - by elders and teachers. In light of this, one might be tempted to say that here Augustine questions if we possess the power and authority to teach knowledge into the younger minds of children. Augustine believed that the authority to teach derived from God’s providence. Human is infected by sins and human authority in teaching is only legitimate when it is grounded on divine authority and when it is to redeem human from sins. Furthermore, there exists a gap between a teacher’s teaching and a student’s learning. Student does not learn just because the teacher intends to teach. It is our love, not our intentions, that initiates students to

When we look at Augustine, we clearly see how his childhood education has left completely disoriented, disordered, with the wrong passions, appetites, desires, and separated from God. In effect, what is the purpose of education? The different sides of this debate are most effectively represented in two parts. On one hand, many argue that education should be practical. In other words, education should focus on vocational and technical skills for a specific profession. Augustine’s education is an example as its goal was a mastering of public rhetoric and oratory skills to gain access of the public career. On the other hand, many view education in a less applied and technical sense; an education grounded in the theoretical, and not necessarily one that equips with vocational skills. In fact, the fundamental argument is what accounts for happiness in life. Is having a prominent position with power and wealth the ultimate human happiness? Or is it, as Augustine and Cicero argue, the pursuit of truth and wisdom through philosophy the true route to happiness? Power does give us access and priority to what we want, however it is not under our control, it is accorded by others. Wealth is a means to an end, a means to acquire products that make us feel good. Yet, what makes us feel good and is satisfying our desires the true