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Peter Paul Cachia: Kif Taqra l-‘Istqarrijiet’ ta’ Santu Wistin. Maltese Augustinian Province, 2013. 123 pp.

More than two decades ago, in 1989, the Maltese Augustinian Province published a scholarly translation of St Augustine’s immortal Confessiones, which until then one could read in English as The Confessions.

The translation was the work of Maltese writer and translator Valentin Barbara, who was well known for his contribution to the bible in the Maltese language, pulished by the Għaqda Biblika Maltija.

Although scholarly and faithful to the Latin original, L-Istqarrijiet – as was the name given to the Maltese translation – is a readable book that can be understood by both the scholar and the beginner.

It must have been a success, considering that Barbara was once again asked to translate another famous work by St Augustine, the City of God (Civitate Dei ), which was published in Maltese in 1996 in two volumes.

This time, it is Fr Peter Paul Cachia who is providing us with another work on St Augustine. Cachia is an Augustinian who hails from Gozo, but who has been around quite a bit, with his missionary activities having taken him to both Hippo in North Africa’s Algeria, as well as far away Brasilia.

With a command of languages varying from North African Arabic to Brasil’s Portuguese, and with a BA in theology from the Patristicum in Rome and a licentiate from the Salesianum, Cachia was more than prepared to bring together his studied reflections, aimed to accompany the beginner in his reading of St Augustine’s Confessiones.

Considered a literary as well as a spiritual classic, The Confessions does not belong to a particular place, age or faith

Now that St Augustine’s master-piece has been added to the corpus of renowned translations from the Latin mother tongue – the language in which the Western church fathers wrote – into Maltese, Cachia’s book is an ideal introduction for those who want to understand St Augustine’s spiritual autobiography better.

Considered a literary as well as a spiritual classic, The Confessions does not belong to a particular place, age or faith but is rather a must for all those who want to consider themselves all-rounders in classical literature.

St Augustine planned his magnum opus on 10 chapters. Although autobiographical in nature, his book covers only the first 30 years or so of his life. The book ends with the narration of his conversion to orthodox Christianity, but it does not say anything about his priestly or espiscopal ministry.

Kif Taqra l-Istqarrijiet ta’ Santu Wistin is a great help for all Augustinian enthusiasts because it is written by someone who has known St Augustine for so long.

We have here an Augustinian friar who became familiar with his order years back in 1970 – more than four decades ago – and who is now at the very core of both his priesthood and monastic vocation.

Men and women tend to gather experience with time; if, as the Maltese proverb goes, time tends to ripen the prickly pears, then what about human beings? Cachia is a man who believes in ongoing formation and lifelong learning.

As recently as 2012, while Malta was celebrating the bestowal of a cardinal’s hat on one of its most renowned Augustinian sons, he was in Rome undergoing an intensive course about Augustininan spirituality, earning a diploma from the Augustinian college known as the Patristicum, next door to the Vatican.

As he writes in the preface: If the Eagle of Thagaste, as St Augustine was aptly nicknamed, were to live in our times, the first 30 years of his life would not have been very different. Cachia believes that fourth-century youths have lived in circumstances similiar to ours from a spiritual point of view.

I utterly agree with him and this should be one reason why Cachia’s book should be truly appreciated.

His book will kindle interest in all those who would like to delve deeper into patristic studies and come to know St Augustine, Christianity’s undisputedly greatest church father in the West, better.

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