St. Augustin Essay -- essays research papers

From the synopsis of St. Augustine Confessions and Beowulf, it is clear that the two authors, St. Augustine and the poet respectively, differ on their checks of death, which helps to paint a breach picture of the human being that each writer lived in. In Augustines writings, death swordplays a major role in life it serves as the stepping stone to a enormouser existence in heaven. In Augustines world, Christianity and God both play an important role in how death is viewed. In the poets writings we claver a distinguishable perspective, one in which the time you spend on earth is of great importance very little thought is precondition to life aft(prenominal) death. Although God is mentioned and discussed throughout the writing, it is a very different perspective than the one shown by Augustine.In the writing of St. Augustine, the reader gets a small glimpse of what life was like in the Roman conglomerate in the forth century, and more particularly how death was viewed during this period. According to the Confessions, life, though valued, was just a time spent before God chose to earn your mind to heaven contingent of course on the fact that you were a Christian. Yet in a moment, before we had reached the end of the first year of a relay transmittership&8230.you took him from this world (Confessions, 75). When all hope of saving him was lost, he was baptize as he lay unconscious (Confessions, 75). This passage about St. Augustines friend helps to illustrate that as death drew near in Augustines time, thoughts went to the after life in heaven. This hypothesis is furthered when Augustine writes about the death of his mother. And so on the ninth day of her illness, when she was fifty-six and I was thirty-three, her pious and devoted disposition was set free from the torso (Confessions, 200). Some might argue that the suffer that Augustine describes at both the deaths of his friend and mother illustrates that death was not looked on as a passage to l ife in heaven, but as a very sorrowful and deplorable event. Though Augustine admits to feeling great sorrow at the death of those close to him, he goes on to call for out that these feelings are merely of the imperfect body. When one lets go and listens to his soul he will see that all things begin and end with God. For the senses of the body are sluggish, because they are senses of flesh and blood&8230They are limited by their own nature (Confessions, ... ...n a rich shroud or embalmed with spices, nor did she deficiency to have a special monument or a dangerous in her own country&8230All she wanted was that we should remember her at your altar, (Confessions, 204). This is a very strong example of how different the worlds of St. Augustine and the poet were. From the limited view of the life presented by the authors of the Confessions and Beowulf, it is easy to see that the worlds in which they lived were very different. The world of St. Augustine seems well ordered and compact with cities and government officials. It seems to be a exceedingly intellectual culture strongly influenced by religion and God. The world of the poet seems untold different in nature than that of St. Augustine. The poets world seems to be much little organized and vast, with various kings as opposed to government officials. It seems to be live with many roaming bands, and the people seem to be much less intellectually and religiously motivated. It seems they lived simple lives in a constant search for fame and notoriety. With such different cultures it is not difficult to concede that their respective views on death would be as diverse as the cultures themselves.