Reading Three Ways

2. 'Academic' reading

To recap, 'academic reading' is the reading that focuses on technical mastery. ‘This is reading whose principle tools are the concept deployed in coercive argument and the repeatable experiment’. As this reading is primarily for explanation and analysis, it may well be the primary mode of reading you practice through your training for ministry. It's the kind fo reading you do when you need to excavate a text for resources to help you write your essays and assignments.

With this model in mind, read the first couple of pages of Augustine's Confessions. [We are using the Confessions as an example; feel very welcome to substitute it for another text should you wish.] You may have read these words many times before, or this might be the first time you are reading them. In any case, read them afresh. Read Augustine with 'academic eyes', trying to excavate the text for meaning and information. This isn't an easy text. It might require you to read and read again. In the process of re-reading you may discover something new that gives new insight into what Augustine is trying to say. 

If, at any point, you would like to read on, click here to be taken to the e-Book. An alternative translation, which you may find easier, can be found here.