Theological and Ethical Discourses 1 part 24/27

For to fulfill another's will and not one's own produces not only the denial of one's own soul, but also a mortification toward the whole world.

Demons rejoice together with the one who contradicts his own father, but angels marvel at the one who humbles himself even unto death; for such a one performs the work of God, being made like the Son of God, who fulfilled obedience to his own Father even unto death, death on a cross.

Whenever these things come upon you, O monk, and you find much zeal and longing for perfection in your soul, so that you desire to fulfill every commandment of God and not to fall short even in an idle word or to sin, and not to be left behind any of the ancient saints in practice, knowledge, and contemplation, but you see yourself hindered by the one who sows the tares of despondency from advancing to such a height of holiness, by his insinuating thoughts in you, saying: 'It is impossible for you, in the midst of the world, to be saved, keeping all the commandments of God without defect' — then, sitting alone in a corner, gather yourself together, collect your thoughts, and give good counsel to your soul, and say: 'Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why do you disquiet me?'

'Hope in God, for I shall yet confess Him.'

'For the salvation of my countenance is not my works, but it is my God.'

'For no one living shall be justified before you.'

'But by faith in Him, my God, I hope to be saved through his ineffable compassion, as a free gift. Get behind me, Satan; to the Lord my God I bow down, and Him I serve from my youth, who alone is able to save me by his mercy alone.'

'Depart therefore from me; the God who made me according to his image and likeness will abolish you.'

God seeks nothing else from us men except that we not sin; and this alone is not a work of the law, but the inviolable keeping of the image and of the dignity from above, in which, standing according to nature and wearing the resplendent garment of the Spirit, we remain in God and He in us, being styled gods and sons of God by adoption, marked by the light of the knowledge of God.

Listlessness and heaviness of body, arising from laziness and negligence, come upon the soul and remove it from its accustomed rule of prayer, and produce darkening of the mind and despondency, so that from this thoughts of cowardice and blasphemy abound in the heart, and the one tempted by the demon of listlessness is not even able to enter into the accustomed place of prayer, but even grows slothful and entertains irrational notions against the Maker of all things.

Falling before the God who loves mankind, pray with groaning and tears, in the pain of your heart, for release from the burden of listlessness and evil thoughts, and there will be given to you, as you knock earnestly and persevere, swift freedom from these.

He who has acquired a pure heart has conquered cowardice; but he who is still in the process of being purified sometimes strikes it down, sometimes is struck down by it; but he who does not struggle at all either is altogether insensible and even a friend of passions and demons — one who, besides vainglory, is also diseased with the delusion of imagining himself to be something when he is nothing — or he is a slave and subject to cowardice, trembling like one infantile in his thinking, and fearing a fear where there is no fear, for there is no cowardice for those who fear the Lord.

He who fears God does not fear the onslaughts of demons, nor even their feeble attacks, nor the threats of wicked men; but, being wholly like a flame or blazing fire, going about in dark and unlit places by night and by day, he puts the demons to flight, and they flee him far more than he them, lest they be consumed by the fiery spark of divine fire sent forth from him.

He who walks in the fear of God, moving among wicked men, does not fear, having his fear within him and bearing the invincible weapon of faith, with which he is strong and able to see all things, even those things that seem to the many difficult and impossible; but like some giant in the midst of apes, or a lion roaring in the midst of dogs and foxes, he is confident in the Lord, and by the firmness of his mind strikes them with terror and dismays their minds, wielding the word in wisdom as an iron rod.

Once someone, overtaken by listlessness, had his mind grow slack and darkened, and his soul dissolved, so that from this his mourning almost vanished from his heart, and the flame of the Spirit within him was quenched, and the whole house of his body was filled with smoke; moreover, a numbness of the limbs also came upon him, and out of laziness he was carried down into immoderate sleep, so that of necessity even his customary office was left undone.

But resisting these things through self-control and vigilance, as soon as he had conquered sleep, his heart quickly hardened out of self-conceit, and as his mourning failed, cowardice crept in upon him.

But when he again perceived that it was present in him, before daybreak he went out of his cell and, departing to a dark and gloomy place, stood there, stretched his hands up to heaven, made upon himself the sign of the cross, and lifted the eye of his soul toward God; and as soon as he had humbled his reasoning a little, immediately the demon of listlessness withdrew from him a little.

But the stronger enemy, the fearsome enemy of vainglory, was stealthily undermining his reasoning, wishing to drag him down and hand him over again to the demon of cowardice; and perceiving this, he marveled, and fervently besought God to deliver his soul from such snares of the devil.

Listlessness is a test for those who struggle, becoming for them an occasion of humility.

The demon of listlessness is most accustomed, for the most part, to make war especially upon those who have made progress in prayer or who are diligent in prayer.

For no other of the demons has power against such men, whether this one prevails against them by providential permission, or whether, as I am rather persuaded, it gains its power against us from the disorders of the body.

And there are times, I know not how to put it, when this also comes upon those who struggle from the condition of the air and the misty heaviness of the south wind.

Listlessness is the death of the soul and of the mind.

If God had permitted this to work against us according to its full power, none of those who struggle would ever have been saved.

Nevertheless it is our part to resist it as far as our power allows, while it is God's part both to rouse us secretly and to show us openly as victors over it.

It is impossible for anyone who has died to be raised up without the help of him who raised himself from the dead.

Whenever the mind, stolen away into self-conceit, sinks deep into it and supposes that it possesses something of worth in itself, then the grace that invisibly enlightens it withdraws, and having left behind a brief emptiness, its weakness is at once exposed, as though wild dogs, the passions, had rushed upon it and were seeking to devour it. And being thus at a loss, having nowhere to flee and be saved, it takes refuge, through humility, in the Lord who is able to save it.

He who has come to be outside the whole world regards himself as one who is in a trackless wilderness full of wild beasts.

Whence, being seized by unspeakable fear and indescribable trembling, he cries out to God, as Jonah did from the sea-monster and from the sea of life; as Daniel did from the den of wild passions and lions; as the three youths did from the furnace of the innate, burning fire of desire; as Manasseh did from the bronze fetter of this earthen and mortal body.

And the Lord, hearkening to him, delivers him from the depth of ignorance and love of the world, just as he delivered that prophet from the sea-monster, that he might no longer return to these things; he delivers him from the pit of the evil thoughts of desire that seize and devour men's souls, as he delivered Daniel; and from the passionate preconceptions of the fire that scorches and ravages his soul and forcibly presses and drags him toward unseemly deeds, he keeps him unburned, refreshing his soul with the dew of the Holy Spirit, as he did those Israelites; and preserving him unbowed and unfallen from this earthly, heavy, and most passionate flesh, he makes him a son of light and of day, and even from here already grants him a foretaste of immortality.

A soul that dwells with attachment in this lowly state of the body, laying claim to its pleasures and clinging to human glory, or that has disregarded these yet still senses the atmosphere of that good cheer, remains wholly immovable and reluctant toward every virtue and commandment of God, being grievously weighed down and shackled by the aforesaid evils.

And she too cries out to God prophetically: 'You have torn off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness, that my glory may sing to you, and I may not be stung with grief.'

Sacred Scripture indicates three places in which the mind is accustomed to dwell.

But I say that there are rather two, not teaching anything contrary to Scripture, God forbid, but simply not counting the middle between the beginning and the end. What I mean is this: one who passes from city to city and from one country to another would not call the very road he traveled a 'country' or a 'city,' even though he beheld many marvelous things along it.

For one who passed from Egypt to the land of promise and settled there remembers all that happened in between and recounts it to everyone; yet he does not say that he passed from a first to a second, and from a second to a third city or country, but rather that he passed, as it were, from slavery to freedom, from darkness to light, and from captivity to restoration in his own homeland.

So too our human mind is accustomed to pass from passionateness to dispassion, from enslavement to the passions to the freedom of the Spirit, from that contrary-to-nature preoccupation which the spiritual law calls captivity, to the return to what is above nature; from the sea and surge of worldly life to the calm condition outside the world; from the bitterness of worldly cares and afflictions to the ineffable sweetness and freedom from care regarding every earthly thing; from the anxious distraction and turmoil concerning many things, to the one thing alone, and to wholehearted attachment and love for it.

The passage of the mind from things seen to things unseen, and its dwelling from things perceptible by sense to what lies beyond sense, produces forgetfulness of all things behind.

This, then, is what I call true stillness, and the region and place of stillness, into which he who has been counted worthy to ascend will not, like Moses on the mountain, after spending forty days and as many nights, be brought down again from there; but having been confirmed that it is good to be there, he will no longer turn back at all to the things below. And having thence become a house of the Trinity, he himself will dwell in the Trinity, as one who, being in it, dwells in the kingdom of heaven, love, evidently, holding him fast and not allowing him to fall.

Not only the one practicing stillness or the one who is subject to obedience, but also the superior, the one set over many, and the one who serves, all must be free from anxious care, that is, without doubt free from all worldly concerns. For if we are full of care, we are found to be transgressors of the commandment of God, which says: 'Be not anxious for your soul, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, or what you shall put on, for the Gentiles seek after all these things'; and again: 'Take heed lest at any time your hearts be weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this life.'

He who has his reasoning occupied with anxious care over worldly matters is not free, for he is held fast and enslaved by care for these things, whether he cares for them on his own behalf or for the sake of others.

But he who is free from these things will worry about worldly matters neither for himself nor for others, whether he happens to be a bishop, an abbot, or a deacon; yet he will never be idle, nor will he despise anything, however trivial and small, but doing and performing all things in a manner pleasing to God, he will remain free from care in all things and throughout his whole life.

...when it is being put into practice, he said: 'And why are you anxious about clothing or food?'

'Do you not see the lilies of the field and the birds of heaven, how the one grows, and the other is fed?'

Thus, abolishing the one care and confirming the other, the Lord teaches us how, without being anxious, we ought to work with diligence, and how, being free from care, we ought to abstain from work that is not fitting.

Do not tear down your own house in wishing to build up your neighbor's; for see how hard and difficult the task is, lest, while intending this, you both demolish your own and be utterly unable to build up his.

If you have not acquired complete detachment from the affairs and possessions of this life, do not wish to have the management of such affairs entrusted to you, lest you be caught up in them, and instead of receiving the wages of service, you incur the condemnation of a thief and a sacrilegious plunderer.

But if you are compelled to this by your superior, conduct yourself as one handling burning fire, and by warding off the assault of the thought through confession and repentance, you will be kept unharmed through the prayer of your superior.

He who has not become dispassionate does not even know that dispassion exists, nor indeed can he believe that anyone such exists upon the earth.

For how shall he who has not first denied himself and readily poured out his own blood for this truly blessed life suppose that another has done these things in order to acquire dispassion?

So too the one who supposes he has the Holy Spirit, while possessing nothing, never believes, when he hears of the workings of the Spirit occurring in those who do have the Holy Spirit, that there is in this generation anyone who, like the apostles of Christ and the saints from all ages, is being worked upon and moved by the divine Spirit, or who comes, knowingly and perceptibly, into a vision of him.

For each man judges his neighbor's affairs, whether in virtue or in vice, according to his own condition, as he himself stands.

Dispassion of the soul is one thing, and dispassion of the body another; for the former sanctifies even the body by its own brightness and by the outpoured light of the Spirit, whereas the latter, by itself alone, can be of no benefit to the one who has acquired it.

Immobility of the soul's and the body's members is one thing, and the acquisition of the virtues another; for the former belongs to us by nature, whereas the latter also subdues all the natural movements.

Not desiring any of the delightful and pleasant things of the world is not equal to yearning for the eternal and invisible goods; for the one is one thing and the other another. Many have despised the former, but of the latter few among men have taken any care.

It is not the case that turning away from and not seeking the glory of men is the same thing as hanging wholly upon the glory of God; rather, there is a great distance between the two. For many, even while mastered by other passions, have rejected the former, whereas very few have been counted worthy to attain the latter, and only through much labor and toil.

Being content with a cheap garment and not desiring a splendid robe is not the same thing as being clothed with the light of God; the one is one thing and the other another. Some, even while being dragged down by countless desires, have easily despised the former; but the latter is put on only by those who seek it unremittingly through every hardship, and who become sons of light and of day through the fulfillment of the commandments.

To speak humbly is one thing, and to be humble-minded another; humility is one thing, and the flower of humility another; the fruit of it is one thing, and the beauty of that fruit another, and the sweetness of that beauty yet another; and besides these, the workings that come from this fruit are yet another thing.

...to do whatever things lead us toward humility; but holy humility itself, and its remaining properties, its gifts and its workings, are a gift of God and not from us, of which no one will ever be counted worthy, unless he first duly sows beforehand those seeds that lie within his own power.

Not to be indignant at dishonors and insults, at trials and afflictions, is one thing; to take delight in them is another; to pray for those who do these things to us is yet another; to love them from the soul is another still; and beyond all these, it is yet another thing to picture mentally the face of each one of them and, as genuine friends, to embrace them dispassionately with tears of sincere love, no trace whatsoever of any distaste then being found in the soul.

But incomparably greater than these, I judge, is to come to a complete forgetfulness of whatever one may have suffered, and neither in the absence nor in the presence of those who afflicted him to be mindful of anything that happened, but to welcome them, just like friends, in conversation and at table, giving no thought at all to what took place.

To remember God is not the same as to love God, nor is fearing him the same as keeping his commandments; for these are one thing and those another, and yet both belong to the perfect and the dispassionate.

Sinlessness is one thing, and the keeping of the commandments another; for the latter belongs to those who are struggling and living according to the Gospel, whereas the former belongs only to those who have acquired the first dispassion.

Not everything that is idleness is thereby stillness; nor is everything that is stillness thereby silence; these are one thing, and those another.

For the one, idleness, belongs to those who do not wish to know what the participation in the good things of God is, nor to accomplish anything good; but the other, stillness, belongs to those who continually devote their leisure to the knowledge of God, sitting beside the word of God's innate wisdom, searching the depths of the Spirit, and being initiated into God's strange mysteries.

But the third, silence, belongs to those who carry out the noetic labor, in the attentiveness of a mind that carefully watches its thoughts.

Withdrawal, that is, the passage from one place to another, is not the same as true exile itself in the real sense, but the one is one thing and the other another.

For the one belongs to those still fighting, who are carried about either by negligence through an unstable mind, or through excess of fervor, still yearning for greater contests.

But the other belongs to those who have been crucified to the world and to the things of the world, and who continually long to be with God alone and the angels, and who never turn back at all toward human affairs.

To resist and fight against enemies is one thing, and to defeat, subdue, and put them wholly to death is another; the former is the practice of contestants and the valiant, but the latter of the dispassionate and the perfect.

All these things are the deeds of the saints who walk in the light of dispassion; but let those who perceive themselves to be outside of these things not be deceived by anyone, nor deceive their own souls, but let them recognize that they are journeying in vain in darkness.

Many indeed have hastened toward these things, one for one reason and another for another; but very few are those who undertook their practice with innate fear and love of God, and these alone, helped by grace from above, quickly accomplish the work of virtue and extend themselves further toward the things already mentioned.

...according to: 'I sent them away according to the devices of their hearts; they shall walk in their own devices.'

He who has come to experience these things through most excellent diligence will know the meaning of what has been said.

But he who is otherwise disposed may understand the things said in a sensory manner, but concerning what has been spoken spiritually and noetically, he will have only bare conceptions of the meanings, or rather, he will fashion false imaginings in his own mind, and, having been utterly deceived, will remain far from the truth of what is said.

Whenever, through many labors and sweats, you come to be above the lowliness of the body, and, having stripped off its necessities, carry it about light and as it were spiritual, so that it feels neither toil, nor hunger, nor thirst, then you see, better than in a mirror, him who is beyond mind, and with eyes uncovered by tears you behold him whom no one has ever seen, and, your soul being pierced with love for him, you complete a lament mingled with tears, then remember me, and pray earnestly for me, the lowly one, as one who has attained union with God and unashamed boldness toward him.

Repentance does not befit the one engaged in theology, nor does theology befit the one who repents; for as far as the east is from the west, so much higher is theology than repentance.

For just as a man passing his life in sicknesses and infirmities, or like a beggar clothed in rags crying out for alms, so is he who is in repentance and truly performs the works of repentance. But he who theologizes is like one who moves about in royal courts, in the splendor of the most kingly robe, being intimate with the king, always conversing with him, and hourly hearing clearly from him his commands and his wishes.

The increase of the knowledge of God becomes the cause and occasion of ignorance of all else, indeed, even of God himself, and the abundance of his illumination becomes utter blindness, and the perception that transcends and surpasses sensation becomes insensibility to all things outside it.

For how shall it be sensation, when it is ignorant of what sort, of what kind, where, what, and how the things are in which it finds itself, and is utterly unable to learn or to comprehend these things at all?

And is it not rather the case that those things are beyond sensation, while the mind, in its perception of its own weakness, is found insensible toward the things that are beyond sensation?

For the things which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man, how shall they be brought under sensation?

The Lord, who graciously bestows upon us the things beyond sensation, gives us another sensation through his Spirit, so that, in a manner beyond nature, we may perceive clearly and purely, through all our senses, his gifts and graces that are beyond sensation.

Everyone who is insensible toward the One is insensible toward all things, just as he who has sensation toward the One is in the perception of all things, and yet is outside the perception of all things.

He is within the perception of all things, and yet is not comprehended by the perception of them.

He who is deaf to the Word is deaf to every voice, just as he who hears the Word hears all things. This latter, though deaf to every other voice, hears all things and yet nothing, except of those alone who make their words in the Word, and not even of them, but only of the Word itself, which speaks voicelessly within the voice.

He who thus hears and sees and perceives knows the meaning of what is said.

...he brings them forth pierced open and sound. But being in this state, he did not yet know that he had been created as an overseer of the visible creation and an initiate of the intelligible; but though he was in honor, he was compared to, and made like, the senseless and burden-bearing beasts, and having been made like them he remains such still, neither having turned back, nor having been called back, nor led up again to his first dignity, according to the gift of the dispensation of our Master and Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

Being below, do not search into the things above; and before you become above, do not busy yourself with the things below, lest, slipping, you fall away from both, or rather be left behind together with the things below.

Just as one who has been raised up by the king from the depths of poverty to wealth, and clothed by him with an illustrious rank and robe, and bidden to stand before his face, gazes upon the king himself with longing and loves him beyond measure as his benefactor, and clearly perceives the robe with which he has been clothed, and recognizes his rank, and knows the wealth given to him — so too the monk who has truly withdrawn from the world and the affairs in it and drawn near to Christ, having been called back with keen perception and raised up, through the working of the commandments, to the height of spiritual contemplation, beholds God himself without error and clearly perceives the transformation that has come upon him; for he always sees the grace of the Spirit shining round about him, which is called a garment and a royal purple robe — or rather, which is Christ himself, since those who believe in him are clothed with him.

He who has become rich with heavenly wealth — I mean the presence and indwelling of him who said, 'I and the Father will come and make our abode with him' — knows in the knowledge of his soul how great a grace he has enjoyed, and how great and what manner of blessedness he bears within the palace of his heart; for, conversing with God as a friend with a friend, he stands with boldness before the face of him who dwells in unapproachable light.

Blessed is he who believes these things; thrice-blessed is he who hastens, through practice and sacred struggles, to attain the knowledge of what has been said. He who has arrived, through contemplation and knowledge, at the height of this state is an angel — not to say something greater — and has become near to God as a son of God.

Just as one standing on the seashore sees the boundless sea of waters, yet cannot grasp their limit, but beholds only a part, so too he who has been deemed worthy, through contemplation, to gaze into the boundless sea of the glory of God and to behold it noetically sees it — not as much as it is, but as much as is attainable to the noetic eyes of his soul.

Just as one standing by the sea not only sees it but also enters into its waters as much as he wishes, so also, among spiritual men, those who so desire come, by participation together with contemplation, to be in the light of God with knowledge, to the degree that they are impelled by longing.

Just as one standing on the sea's shore, so long as he is outside the waters, sees everything and comprehends the whole expanse of waters, but when he begins to enter into the waters and to be submerged in them, to the degree that he descends he is correspondingly deprived of the view of what is outside — so too those who come to participate in the divine light, to the degree that they advance in divine knowledge, fall proportionately rather into unknowing.

When those advancing toward spiritual perfection are partially illumined, that is, are enlightened only in the mind, then they behold as in a mirror, noetically, the glory of the Lord, and are mystically instructed by the grace from above in the knowledge of true knowledge and in the revelations of mysteries, being led up from the contemplation of beings to the knowledge of him who is beyond being.