How Confessions drew on 2 Corinthians
A documented line of influence: Augustine of Hippo demonstrably engaged Paul’s work. The commentary below is Gröblé’s, verbatim from each work’s page.
The source
2 Corinthians
Paul · c. 56
BibleThe influenced
Confessions
Augustine of Hippo · c. 398
Ancient RomeRelevance
7/10
On Confessions’s page
- Augustine names what the Neoplatonists lacked, and it's Paul
- 2 Corinthians threads the Confessions — 5:6 ("absent from You... more present with myself") sits at the heart of Book X, with 1:11 and 6:10 nearby
- The epistle's faith-not-sight, the Spirit given as a pledge, is the grace that completed Augustine's conversion where philosophy stalled; reading it first shows you what he was reaching past philosophy to find
On 2 Corinthians’s page
- The Pauline grace that the Platonist books could not give Augustine
- 2 Corinthians runs through the Confessions — "so long as I be absent from You, I am more present with myself than with You" (5:6) anchors Book X, with 1:11 and 6:10 woven alongside
- Paul's "earnest of the Spirit" and walking "by faith, not by sight" supply the language Augustine reaches for when reason runs out