Abstract

This work is a systematic, phenomenological investigation of the experience of human restlessness; as such, it is an original, existential interpretation of St. Augustine's Christian thought in as much as it achieves a philosophical synthesis of Augustine and Martin Heidegger's Being and Time work. Using Heidegger's hermeneutical methodology, the author composes what he calls a "fundamental ontology" founded upon, and intrinsic to, Augustine's experience of restlessness in the Confessions. The author begins this philosophical project by first showing the philosophical influence of Augustine for understanding Heidegger's Sein und Zeit by disclosing what he calls the "Augustinian Constitution" of this work. Thus, having shown the comprehensive influence of Augustine on Heidegger's thought and methodology, and revealing major concepts in the text as being secular versions of Augustine's concepts, the author further argues for their intrinsic compatibility. The work is an interesting contribution to Augustinian and Heideggerian studies as well as being an original phenomenology in which the author hopes to cause a scholarly revival in Augustinian philosophy and theology, or an "Augustinian phenomenology"