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Even though Augustine provides reasons to support his statements in Confessions, some of his reasons or statements are still subject to critic. From here on, I will state possible objections by the critics and defend with my own reasons to support Augustine and strengthen his arguments. First of all, Augustine’s statement that time seems to move toward the non-existence (past) gives opening for critics to object by reasoning that in all cases, time only flows from the past into the future; coffee and milk will mix spontaneously after pouring the milk in (future) but will never un-mix after pouring milk in (past). The critic’s reason seems to be reasonable only on the ground that the critic already knows that milk and coffee will mix. What about to the majority with no knowledge of it? In my opinion, to such people, time flows from the future into the non-existence past; they can predict at a certain moment (present) that milk and coffee will mix (future) by basing on their previous experience that X and Y does mix recently (present of future things), at the instant they pour the milk into coffee they will see that it mixes (present of present things), and in the end they knew that milk and coffee did mix (past) and next time, will remember at an instant like they remembered that X and Y did mix before (present of past things). Therefore, I believe “time exists … in the sense that it tends toward non-existence”.

Second, a critic can argue that time exists not at the present instant with no duration but instead that it does have measurable duration, can provide examples of how a person can tell how long it takes for an object to move from point A to B, who can run faster or how a watch can tell the duration, and can argue how all the measurements can be done not through the mind but experimentally, externally from the mind. The critic needs to keep in mind that these are two different “times” she is referring to. Augustine is referring to time from larger creation view point in the sense that in eternity, there is only present, but in this world there seems to be past, present and future, which conveys that the bodies are created with time and moving in time. However the critic is referring to the different notion of time or fractional instant of the creation timeline. Nonetheless, if we are to accept that past and future have no existence or that time doesn’t have real existence in them, at any instant present, there will be no duration; for instance when trying to measure how fast a person is running at the present, she will see that it is immeasurable. And if we are to judge who runs faster, in order for us to remember the “time” taken for both runners, we may have to simultaneously recall form memory of their times and in this case, present is working with the past through memory, using the distention of the soul, the mind. In these cases, either the critic’s counter arguments are irrelevant to Augustine’s main concept of time or the arguments which are meant to contradict his concepts are instead being supportive.

I would provide a model based on God’s omniscience to support Augustine in that his notion of timeless God is consistent with the Bible and that instead of contradicting God’s omniscience, it is even strengthening the Biblical statements of Him. According to the confessions and how Augustine comes about to study the nature of time in detail in his Confessions, there are critics who counter argue him by asking that if there is no time before the creation by God, what He’s doing before all these creations. It appears to me that they are arguing that before creation, God has no will to do so and that there has to be a moment when He decides to initialize the creation. In order to do so, there has to be a new will being created and entering God and if He is truly eternal, this new will cannot enter Him or His old will to do nothing (no creation) cannot be changed. This is as if questioning the eternality of God.

Furthermore, in my opinion, the critics seem to also doubt the omniscient nature of God because they are stating that nothing could exist before creation and that only if something gets created, it may enter into God and change Him. Let’s look at such statement from the perspective of knowledge. If we were to reason like the critics, before the creation, there was nothing, not even knowledge, and if there was no knowledge, God did not possess knowledge before its creation and thus He does not know everything or possess omniscience as told in the Bible. If knowledge was later created, then for God to be considered omniscient, He has to be willing to change from “know nothing” to “know all”. These statements are contradicting both God’s eternality and omniscience. However, Augustine’s notion of timeless God helps solve this contradictory problem; “in eternity nothing moves into the past: all is present”. God exists outside of the time so there is only present (no past or future) in eternity and the present consists of the ability to perceive all at once and that everything He knows already exists, which is consistent with God’s omniscience nature. Since the creation of time and the bodies are also a timeless act, through God, all creations happen in an instant without any moments to be labeled as past or future upon God’s creation. The critics may counter argue by using creationism chapter of Genesis by saying that above statement cannot be right because God did not just create all in an instant but took six days of creations and by saying that my reasons to support Augustine have fallacy.

Their counter argument can be replied in two ways. First I could object their counter argument and restate Augustine where he said that Biblical passages should not be taken literally but instead only spiritually, which means that the critics are interpreting the Bible with the wrong reason. On the other hand, I could instead agree with their statement about the creation in six days while also restating Augustine’s statement on Biblical interpretation. For a timeless God of eternity, everything exist at present and in this case everything is still created at an instant even though it may seem days according to the uncertain accounts of “someone” but no one can know for sure the duration of the creation because as said before, the creation is a timeless act and Biblical duration cannot be taken literally. That is why I state that Augustine’s notion and understanding of the nature of time and eternity is no where in contradiction but even supports the Biblical nature of God.

In Summary, Augustine argues that there is no time before creation and that eternity consists only of the present. He also states that God of eternity exist outside of time and that all creations are made in an instant by a timeless act. He provides reasons to support that even though time has no real existence, it can have its existence through the presence and incorporation of memories and predictions and that one reason people can measure time is due to distention of the soul; through the memory, introduced by the mind, which is also the soul. Although Augustine’s arguments are subject to critics, they are not weakened by the critics’ objections because either the critics’ views are weak, irrelevant or are supporting Augustine in a sense. Furthermore, Augustine’s notion of nature of time is consistent with Biblical aspect of God, His actions and events in nature.

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Literatures Cited
Saint Augustine. Confessions.1961. Penguin Group, Book XI.

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