Augstine and Time

What is time? Why is it important to people? What do the terms past, present, and future mean to us? Time is always on the minds of people. We never have enough of it; it goes too fast and at times too slow. Augustine attempts to explain what time is in human terms but also acknowledges that this is difficult to understand when thinking of God, eternity, past, present, future, etc. In Confessions Book Eleven: Father (Origin), Chapter Three Augustine looks at the nature of time. This is where he famously wrote, “I know what it is if no one asks; but if anyone does, then I cannot explain it.” (p. 267). Augustine argues that time was created when God created the world and that He lives in a world outside of time. Time is only needed for people and that we question the meaning of time to have a deeper understanding of God. I will look critically at the explanation that St. Augustine gives of time and its human and divine aspects. I will also examine if Augustine’s description of time is still relevant today. Why is even wondering about what time is important. What was happening before creation, “the mystery of time, which is essentially bound up with the mystery of the created being” (Hausheer, 1937, p. 503).

In Book Eleven of Confessions, Augustine begins his discuss of the nature of time. Chapter Three begins with the discussion of time in relation to understanding the presence of God in our human world. Augustine writes:

There was, therefore, no time before you made anything, since time itself is something you made. No time could be eternal along with you, since you were always there; and if time were always, it would not be time. Then what is time? Who can give a brief or easy answer? Who can even form a conception of it to be put in words? Yet what do we mention more often or with more familiarity in our conversation then time? We must therefore know what we are talking about we refer to it, or when we hear someone else doing so. But what, exactly, is that? I know what it is if no one asks; but if anyone does then I cannot explain it. But this at least I can venture: If nothing were passing away, there would be no past time; and if nothing were still coming, there would be no future time; and if nothing were passing, there would be no present time. But what mode of existence can those first two times have, since the past is no longer and the future is not yet? And the third time, the present, if it were not passing away, would not be the present but the eternal. But if the present is only a time because it is passing away, how can we say it exists, since the reason for its existing as time is that it will soon not be which means we can only say it exists because it is on its way to non-existence? (p. 267).

This is the beginning of Augustine’s question of time. First, Augustine begins by stating that time did not exist before God made anything since time was something He made. Time cannot be eternal according to Augustine. I agree with Augustine that time can not be eternal. If time was eternal then it would have always existed along with God. The past, present, and future would then apply to God. It seems that Boethius, in his Consolation of Philosophy, makes a point that is relevant to time and God; “that the higher power of comprehension embraces the lower, but in no way does the lower rise to the level of the higher.” (p. 138). We can not understand the higher meaning of time which seems to me to be eternity but God can understand our lower meaning of time, measuring time in relation to movement.

There is no easy answer for describing what time is and yet it is something that we discuss in everyday life as Augustine indicated. When thinking about what time is Augustine implies that he understands what time is when thinking about it but is unable to explain it. What are past, present, and future? These are words that we use to describe time; we can describe time but that still does not answer the question. “Plato had spoken of past, present, and future as forms of time which seek to imitate the simultaneity of eternity. Most Platonists spoke of time in defined terms of the movements of heavenly bodies. Plotinus defined time in psychological terms as the experience of the soul in moving from one state to another.” (Chadwick, 1986, p. 71). There are many ways to try to explain time. I agree with Augustine when he states that it is hard to say what it is. I would define time as movement the Earth in space but I think of what the three tenses, past, present, and future I feel that they are humans’ attempt to define and explain the events that happen to us.

Explaining the tenses of time is also a problem for Augustine. In order the have the past something has to be passing away; according to Augustine the “past is no longer” (Conf. XII. 17). As for the past, Augustine describes how historians use their minds to put the past into words describing the events, even though those events have gone out of existence. Augustine does not take into account the human need to remember things. We use information from the past to help us prepare for the future. The future also poses a problem for Augustine since it has not happened yet. Again, I feel that Augustine leaves out the human aspect for memory and thought. We remember the past so we can prepare for the future.

Why was the concept of time so important to Augustine? Time is important to people today but not in the same sense that it was to Augustine. Today, adults worry about getting to work on time and children count the minutes until Christmas. Do we really think about time and its relationship to God today? One topic that Augustine seemed to be concerned with the prophets and how they are able to give information about the future. “When issues become particularly difficult he asks God to clarify them; these frequent prayers should not surprise us in the work of a philosopher who believes that intellectual enlightenment comes from God, even in subjects based on reason and not on faith.” (Barreau, 2004, p. 39). An example is found in Confessions XII, Augustine continues to question God’s use of time:

These are queries, Father, not conclusions. Control and guide me, my God. Will anyone claim that what we learned as children and teach our children is not true after all, that there are not three tenses, past, present, and future, but only the present, and the other two do not exist, but only as emerging out of mystery, when future turns into the present, and submerging into mystery, when the present turns into the past? If the future did not exist, how could prophets foretell it? There would be nothing to foretell.