Hannah Arendt Library: St. Augustine

On a recent trip to the Hannah Arendt Library at Bard College, we came across this book: The Basic Writings of Saint Augustine.

As one can see from the following images, Arendt spent some time adding marginalia to this particular selection of Augustine's Confessions, Book XI: page 202. At left, we see Arendt react to Chapter 29 with the following comment: "Distinction! because time is distinctive."

Below, we see that Arendt has annotated two passages. The first, marked by a single vertical line and an "X," reads: "'What did God make before He made heaven and earth?' Or, 'How came it into His mind to make anything when He never before made anything?'"

The second section, distinguished by two "X's" and an underline, proceeds as follows: "Let them therefore see that there could be no time without a created being."

Saint Augustine played an important part in Arendt's intellectual development. After all, she spent the greater part of her career writing and re-writing her dissertation on Augustine's conception of love. You can read more about Arendt's dissertation here.