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Philosophical Haiku

St Augustine of Hippo (354-430 CE)

by Terence Green

Beyond space and time
God stands over creation
All done, yet to be.

St Augustine is a deeply complex and troublesome figure, at once both sympathetic and repugnant. At an early age he showed he was profoundly sensitive to the suffering of others, whereas as a bishop he was quite willing to persecute heretics, not to mention doom unbaptized babies to Hell.

In his Confessions (400 CE) – considered the first instance of autobiography in Western literature – he candidly talks of his sinful youth, when he wallowed in the fleshpots of Carthage.

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