As with any great work of the literary imagination, the Confessions of Saint Augustine defies categorization. It is part spiritual autobiography, part theological meditation-but above all, it is one of the most superb masterpieces ever written. In St. Augustine's Confessions: The Arc of Conversion, you will join leading Augustine expert and award-winning professor James Wetzel in exploring this timeless work anew. You will come to see how the Confessions is both his most personal and universal work-one that has had incalculable influence in the history of Christianity and Western philosophy. Reading his text closely, you will look at its structures, context, metaphors, themes of conversion, and enduring power to inspire. Whatever your level of familiarity with Augustine, you will plumb new depths of meaning in these erudite, insightful lectures. While Augustine is a master of words and an artist of affections, you will discover that it is precisely these gifts that he must dispossess to become receptive to the voice of God. Above all else, a confession demands humility, a virtue that can only be offered, never claimed. As you "pick up and read" this spiritual masterwork, you will become the reader of another soul and discover the divine generosity that shines through its pages. These lectures will lead you into the restless heart of which Augustine speaks, one that is startled by grace and desiring of peace.
"Jim Wetzel is one of the most profound of Augustine scholars in our age, and a remarkably illuminating and luminous teacher. His writings have shaped Augustine scholarship for a generation. But until now only his students and colleagues have been fortunate to encounter his living voice, and I am delighted that it will come before a larger audience. Take and listen!"
Charles Mathewes, University of Virginia
"Jim Wetzel is the most profound and original interpreter of Augustine currently working in the English-speaking world. His books, especially Augustine and the Limits of Virtue and Augustine: A Guide for the Perplexed, are essential for anyone interested in Augustine."
Paul J. Griffiths, Duke Divinity School
"St. Augustine is a complex and rich thinker who always attended to the heart, the affective, in the search for God. Jim Wetzel's approach to understanding Augustine is similarly embedded in the multi-dimensional human search for meaning; the heart has its place."
Michael W. Higgins, Distinguished Professor of Catholic Thought, Sacred Heart University
