Craig J. N. de Paulo

By tracing some of the historical and hermeneutical influences of Augustine on Martin Heidegger and his 1927 magnum opus, this article argues that Being and Time has an “Augustinian constitution.” While Heidegger’s philosophical terms are in a certain sense original, many of them have their conceptual origins in Augustine’s Christian thought and in his philosophizing from experience. The article systematically revisits all of Heidegger’s citations of Augustine, which reveals not only the rhetorical influence of Augustine on the organization of Being and Time, but also the fact that the conceptual inspiration of the work and the development of its philosophicalterms are significantly indebted to Augustine. Further, an original synthesis of Heidegger’s methodology with Augustine’s thought on restlessness and conversion is developed in order to demonstrate the philosophical compatibility between Heidegger and Augustine. This synthesis results in what the author considers the foundations for an Augustinian phenomenology.

The Influence of Augustine on Heidegger: The Emergence of an Augustinian Phenomenology, edited with an Introduction by Craig J. N. de Paulo Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2006. Details: Preface by John Macquarrie and distinguished contributors include Robert Dodaro, O.S.A., Peg Birmingham, Theodore Kisiel, Daniel Dahlstrom, George Pattison, James K. A. Smith, Wayne Hankey and Matthias Fritsch. (Advance Praise by James J. O’Donnell, Jaroslav Pelikan and Joseph Margolis and reviewed in the American Catholic Philosophy Quarterly, vol. 82, Spring 2008, issue no. 2, in article form.) Bishop de Paulo is the founder of "Augustinian phenomenology," a field within phenomenology that merges the Christian existential thought of Augustine with the methodology of Martin Heidegger.

Augustinian Just War Theory and the Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq: Confessions, Contentions and the Lust for Power,edited by Craig J. N. de Paulo, Senior Editor, et al. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2011. Details: A work concerning Augustine’s influence on Christian just war theory and the rhetoric of just war theorists from two symposia in addition to an Augustinian critique of the wars. Preface by Most Rev. Sean Cardinal O’ Malley, O.F.M. Cap., Archbishop of Boston. Foreword by Roland J. Teske, S.J. Chapter One is a brief history of Augustine’s influence on the theory. Chapter Two includes a transcript of a symposium on the topic that includes the following distinguished contributors: Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J., John D. Caputo, Most Rev. Edwin Cardinal O’Brien, Ambassador Thomas Melady, Col. Jack Jacobs, Dr. Joseph Hagan. Chapter Three includes a transcript of a colloquium on the topic that includes the following distinguished scholars and contributors: Joseph Margolis, Frederick Van Fleteren, Brian Kane, et al. (Advance Praise by James J. O’Donnell and Arthur Waldron.)

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"