Letters 1 part 24/55

For the devil prevailed through the one who held power.

For it is from you that the choosing of the best things comes.

Faithful is God, in whom you have hoped, to give you the crown of perfection.

I only beseech you to endure yet a very little longer the assaults and the threats, which your steadfastness, in Christ Jesus your Master and Bridegroom, may dissolve like sea-foam.

May you receive my letter out of spiritual love, and may you give me in return your sacred prayer.

[To Spatharea] Having heard from many of the excellent qualities of your godly conduct, I have now also learned by experience, through what you sent to my insignificant self, that you have seeds of piety in your heart, being mindful of those who suffer for Christ's sake.

Whence, as I learn, you also keep yourself uninvolved in the communion of the heretics.

Thanks be to God for your dignified gravity.

My lady is the spouse of that good man, beloved by all;

A good man, known to us of old.

You have from the beginning been both lovers of monks and attendants of the needy, just as also now;

For indeed I hear that Litoios also, our son, is being received as a guest at your blessed hearth;

For you yourself know the others, whom you also look after.

Good is your labor, blessed is your widowhood;

May you be kept in all things pleasing to Christ, and receiving in return, in eternal life, the reward laid up for us, my most honored lady.

{To the Hypatissa} I read the letter of your honored self, and for your health I, the humble one, glorified God;

I speak of health not so much of the body (for there are times when this is even unprofitable to some, when it is not directed toward the work of virtue), but of the soul;

How is this known? Because you keep yourself unharmed from communion with the Christ-opposing heresy, through fear of God and orthodox faith;

in these things I too rejoice, being the trainer of such a God-minded woman.

but at your affliction I grieved with you no little, as you are tried with calamity upon calamity;

I pray therefore, as the least of all, that by the mercy of God the griefs that have befallen you be dispelled, both concerning your children and concerning your servants;

But you, O revered woman, bear your afflictions with thanksgiving, for whom the Lord loves he disciplines, since it is through afflictions that one attains eternal life — yet with moderation (I remind you) toward those under your hand;

relaxing the threat, as the apostle says, knowing that your own Master too is in the heavens.

But I know that you are kindly disposed toward them.

And do not be burdened by this reminder given out of love.

In all things, then, may my Lord keep you free from affliction, prospering you in the path of his commandments.

{To Abbot Macarius} Even before reading it, from the mere act of receiving into my hands the holy letter of your beatitude, my humble soul was comforted, my God-honored father;

but when I had read it, I was released from every suspicion that had been troubling my lowliness, having learned the reasons for the delay in writing, and I glorified my good God, having found the spiritual love of your God-loving self remaining sincere toward us the lowly ones.

and may these things also endure, O peacemaker of all, God and Lord;

For know, most God-loving one, that you are genuinely loved by us, and that we maintain the bond of love unbroken, since we were also moved earlier to write to you as you entered upon the contests for piety — not as though our lowly letter could be of any benefit or had power to encourage (for we are far removed from such things, both in word and in life), but because the occasion and love demanded it;

for the sake of which we were also compelled to write to other brothers and fathers.

And well, and quite fittingly, has your honored self said that one must redeem the time, out of consideration for those who persecute and for those who have not thought in brotherly fashion;

Whose fall would not make anyone groan, so grievous is it and so harmful to the whole Church of God? If even for those who acted so irrationally a semblance of 'economy' is thought to have been contrived — O the evil source and root! You know, father, whom I mean, from whom the rest too went off through his evil counsel.

wishing to send up to God a prayer of pardon concerning this.

Do you not marvel, O man of God? Has not the prophetic word been fulfilled, that priest and prophet alike were struck with astonishment? Who would give to my head water, and to my eyelids a fountain of tears, that I might weep over so great a shattering? Those precious ones, equal in worth to gold, have become as earthen vessels.

But why do I lament the affairs of others? Let me turn my lament upon myself.

How shall I be saved from the evil one? How, being powerless myself, shall I get through the present struggle, seeing that even the strong have slipped? For this reason I beseech your holiness: stand — you yourself, the elect of God — unbending, firm, fixed in the unshaken faith of Christ, strengthening and confirming by your own steadfastness, together with many others in whom there is a living spirit, even my own laxity, which loves indeed to suffer all things for Christ and because of Christ, but is deemed unworthy on account of its immeasurable sins.

May the mighty hand of the Lord keep you strong and powerful, with God, against those who are against God, my father and master.

{To Abbot Athanasius} As I had already for a long time been musing and longing to learn news of your holiness, your God-loved letter arrived — how much it gladdened and delighted me, what need is there even to say? For I was released from anxiety and glorified our good God, having learned of the soundness both of your bodily condition and of the state of your honored soul;

For what a letter it was! Full of brotherly love, replete with divine courage, fruitful with burning zeal, truly filled with the gifts of the Spirit — and this while you were in prison, bound in iron! O your good confession, O your steadfast heart!

You were scourged together with Christ, not once but even twice, and having been beaten you rejoiced, and you chose exile with great gladness, and the torments you suffered for God became to you as delights.

For this reason I call you my father, and father of many, an athlete of piety, a pillar and foundation of the truth, and confessedly a confessor of Christ — not one who has run a single lap on the racecourse of witness and then grown faint and turned back, as those around Joseph who slipped (concerning whom that saying might fittingly be said:

No one who has put his hand to the plow and turned back is fit for the kingdom of heaven;

for whom great is the lawlessness, but greater still the shame in the midst of the world, together with the curse of the millstone of scandal) — but rather one who has completed, and well I know will complete, many good courses, by the good pleasure of God, unto the end of the crowns.

Rejoice, most excellent Athanasius, a name great among all and reverend, fittingly given to you also according to the meaning of the name itself;

rejoice, O well-stemmed shoot of the Lord, in whom is his rest;

By what, it says, shall a young man direct his way? By keeping your words.

May you rejoice, most beloved to me and father of my spiritual children, the one on account of affection, the other on account of your office, my fellow-worker and fellow-contestant — if indeed it is possible for me, the worthless one, to be counted in the reckoning too;

for I have gained nothing good, nor have I contributed anything to the church of God; but if indeed there is anything, to Him be the grace, since you too work together with like-mindedness through mutual connection, so that, as it is written, the grace bestowed on us through many persons might be given thanks on your behalf.

This is my small address, that of the lowly one.

But you, O sacred head, building upon your good foundation, perfect yourself as a house of God, being prepared even unto blood in the confession of Christ, always praying the same things also on my behalf, lest because of my sins I be cut off from your sacred triad, nor again from the other fathers of equal glory to you;

for there are still those who have not bent the knee to Baal.

{To Philip the monk} The things that have happened to you, spiritual child, have become known to us;

you, for the protection of the brothers there, through the mediation of brother Theodoulos, our child, who was sent by the steward, by my representative, and by the brothers under him — all of whom cooperated to this very end.

And indeed we too, the humble ones, have received the vote, sealing in the Holy Spirit what has come to pass: that you are abbot of the monastery there, as one put forward and given by ourselves to be the head of the body of that same brotherhood, having through you gained all the brothers.

We rejoice, then, in these things, and we hold you there as one who follows and remains a disciple to us, but who leads the rest in the Lord.

See therefore, child, how you are to live — in a manner befitting God and according to the canons, in imitation of our brotherhood, being directed toward every commandment of God.

And since what is required now is the guarding of orthodoxy, guard yourself, child, abstaining altogether from communion with heretics, being ready for every affliction and distress for the sake of Christ, on whose account also the war of persecution is everywhere.

Stand firmly against the assaults of the adversaries of the faith; do not be terrified; do not betray Christ by betraying the truth;

If it is necessary to be persecuted, be persecuted with joy; it is a good thing to be a fellow-fugitive with Christ;

If the occasion should demand yet more, give your body to scourges, your blood to the martyrdom of Christ, at the same time rousing up also those under your hand to suffer the same things, teaching, admonishing, exhorting, encouraging, arming them, as a good front-line soldier of Christ.

Please the God who has enlisted you into this good army, not being bound by desire for earthly things, because all things are passing and foreign to us, since we are all sojourners and strangers.

Where is the one who brought you into the light? Has he not passed away? Did he not leave everything behind, taking up only one thing — the burden of his own works, whether good or otherwise? If you are thus directed to conduct your life, behold, the spirit of my humility is with you.

I confess you to be a precious member of mine, a genuine child in the portion of our brotherhood, or, to put it more intimately, in the lot of the saints.

You have received the flock of Christ; keep watch, shepherd it, labor as Jacob did, through the frost of the noetic night and the heat of the day, strengthening the weak, turning back the straying, binding up the broken, driving away the noetic beasts with prayers, presenting yourself in all things as a pattern of good works, so that through this pleasing shepherding you may be worthy of the kingdom of heaven, praying at the same time also for us, that as we have been entrusted by God to teach, we may also go forward in practicing what we teach.

{To Constantine the curator} A good report of your honored self, coming to my ears, persuaded me to write to you, good man;

And what is this report? That along with your other virtue, which you have from the grace of God, you still hold fast to guilelessness, guarding the orthodox faith as a treasure in the storeroom of your honored soul, and withdrawing from communion with the heretics.

I had much thanks in this to my God, that laymen, equally with monks, strive to please the Lord, fleeing the pit of heresy;

For it truly is a pit, brother, and a snare of the devil, and communion with them separates the one caught in it from Christ and carries him far from the flock of the Lord.

For as light is separated from darkness, so too is orthodox communion separated from heretical communion;

for the one illumines, the other darkens; and the one unites to Christ, the other to the devil; and the one gives life to the soul, the other puts it to death.

You do well, then, running to the fountain of life and not drawing from the deadly cup of impiety, whose end is eternal destruction.

But see to it that, just as you have begun, you also complete the course in the power of Christ, who is able to receive you into his own kingdom and glory through a good end.

Pray for us sinners, brother of the same faith.

father, since you possess both humility and strong faith and fervent eagerness and courageous endurance and wisdom of speech, which the son of perdition and that dormouse of unreason was not able to withstand;

and thanks be to God, who has given you a mouth that hits the mark and a tongue that cuts through heretical babbling.

Now therefore, my genuine son and much-longed-for father, there are yet prizes of contests, since I have learned that you have been transferred to the place of punishment;

Stand, I entreat you; be manly, I beg you; excel, I beseech you; show forth the works of the power of God in this weak flesh; I supplicate you at your feet;

May he who tortures you give up assailing the rest, defeated by your contests.

Among bishops, my light, shine; among monks, my life, rise to the summit; among confessors, my very heart and crown, be crowned;

Let heaven and earth praise you upon this; let priests and hierarchs together with monks glorify you, each one claiming you as an adornment for his own order, according to his proper rank.

So be it: we suffer hardship, we hunger, we faint with thirst, we are perplexed, we are driven to utter despair — I might add — we are scourged;

The foot in the stocks, the neck in bonds, the sword, and finally, fire.

What is this compared to the kingdom of heaven? What is it compared to the good things promised? And know that it cannot be that one who suffers for Christ's sake does not have Christ as his helper, allowing him to be tried only so far as we are able to bear.

For is it not the same one who puts to death and gives life? Let us not, then, brother, grow faint, hearing him who says: 'I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God.'

Thus I hope concerning you; thus do you also pray concerning me, the sinner, setting aside the praises which you unworthily attach to me.

For I am the least of all men.

{To Bessarion, my son} I read your letter with pleasure, my son, in finding therein your health and eagerness, your endurance and comfort.

Blessed are you, my son Bessarion, because you suffer for Christ's sake, condemned to prison by the impious—which is glory and a crown to you.

What do you think the Cretans feel when they hear that you are a confessor of Christ? You have brought glory to your family and your homeland, and to me, unworthy as I am, and indeed to your brothers as well.

Be sharpened in the knowledge of God; silence the heretics who assail you, teaching them that Christ's icon is called 'Christ' by appellation, not by nature, in which it is honored (and, conversely, dishonored likewise); so too the icon of the Theotokos, so too that of each of the saints.

In your endurance obtain your reward, remembering me also, the sinner, that I may be preserved in all things.

{To Hypatius, my son} I was pleased with your letters, my son, that you cherish and love those very things which I too love in the Lord, so that I have welcomed both your former resolve and your latter humility.

Be, then, my son, well-pleasing to God together with brother Lucian.

For it is neither pious nor blameless for you to be divided—being not only brothers, but also men separated from me, the lowly one.

Is this not enough for me, but must there be, even after a separation, yet another separation? Alas for this evil!

Even if this comes from the devil, who envies concord and for this reason contrives either enmities or entanglements, so as to work division out of both parties, yet let us, not being ignorant of his devices, do violence to our nature and draw down, through humility, the mercy of God, so that we may not be separated.

May Christ thus be with you.

Who among the apostles is greater than Peter and John? Yet Peter also yields to John to speak publicly, and Peter likewise gives way when Paul is speaking.

For it was not so that anyone might seize the primacy, but they had regard for whatever was needful and orderly among them.

Thus may you also be imitators of the saints.

I rejoice that through you the word goes forth to those who seek it, but let it be with counsel.

We choose others as well, and the revenues out of necessity.

Love of roaming about is fruitless and dissolves the soul.

Knowing these things, keep yourself safe and sound for my sake.

{To Bassian, my son} I visit you again through this letter, my son Bassian, and greet you in the Lord.

Live, rejoice, be glad, because you have been deemed worthy for Christ's sake to be in prison, in solitude, in affliction, in distress.

A little later, unspeakable joy will dawn for you at the end of your struggles.

Therefore, my son, embrace it willingly, endure in the Lord, considering the eternal rewards, when you shall leap for joy forever.

See that the devil lies in wait for everyone, seeking our destruction, that he may entangle us, that he may darken the mind.

Be watchful even in prison, for here he becomes even fiercer toward us, since we are isolated and have no one to drag us this way and that.

You, therefore, occupy yourself with handiwork, reading, psalmody, prayer, and heavenly thoughts, lest he, finding you idle and inactive, should strike you down.

But as often as he wounds you, so often let it be counteracted by the fear of God, and let him by no means hold us down.

Great is the matter of being saved; it requires great struggles too.

May all your sins up to the present be forgiven you.

'Now I have begun'—say this also yourself—'this is the change wrought by the right hand of the Most High.'

Remember my lowliness.

Your brothers who are with me greet you.

{To Euodius and John, my sons} And now, having received your letter, my beloved son, I welcomed it, recognizing your true faith and love, and moreover also your noble and sacred resolve, which you hold for the truth of God, being ready to suffer all things for it.

Blessed is the Lord, who has thus prepared and equipped you.

This greatly gladdened me; this drew me all the more into affection for you, and then it strengthened me as well.

For while you are being poured out as a libation for Christ's sake, I, the lowly one, am strengthened.

In such a disposition, then, may the Holy Spirit preserve you (I speak in the plural, because I have learned that brother John, my equally beloved son, is with you).

For this is the meaning of 'for your sake we are put to death all the day long'—this, I say, is our preparation and readiness.

But pray, I beseech you, also for me the lowly one, that I may complete in the Lord the contest set before us, not only the visible one, but also the one perceived in the mind.

Your brothers who are with me greet you.

{To Dorotheus, my son} And again I begin to write to you, my beloved son.

For the letter of yours which I received was a reply to my earlier letters.

How, then, are you? I ask; how do you pass your days?

Well—I know it (I say this according to God's will—

for what is sweeter than to suffer for the truth?)—but as regards the body, you fare very grievously, the prison itself being most wretched, and further the bread given to you being hard to eat, as I have been told.

But what can be done regarding the harsh man who holds you—a military guard, and no monk, far be it to call him an abbot? Yet the time has brought it about that those who are God's may be manifested, and likewise the tares on the opposite side.

At the time of the Moechian synod, they kept making excuses for their sins.

They have now been exposed, [showing] that they were acting impiously in those matters as well.

But you, my beloved son, as of old, so now also suffer for Christ's sake, dwelling in a prison for him, being alone in it, yet not alone.

For Christ is with you, and so is the angel who guards your life.

Let us endure, I beseech you, looking to him who prepares for us the crowns of endurance.

Even if we are choked by faintheartedness, let us be sweetened by hope.

Even if we are hard-pressed by our needs, let us take courage through eager expectation.

For what of it? Is the Lord not able to rain down bread invisibly, or whatever else is edible? But he awaits our endurance, that he may crown us, that he may glorify and gladden us forever.

Behold, this world is like a dream.

All things will pass away, but he who does the will of the Lord will live forever and will not die.

Ever renewing your soul with these thoughts, rejoice, for great is your reward in the heavens.

{To another son, Dorotheus} Good Dorotheus, greetings.

May grace and mercy be yours from God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who has strengthened you to give yourself up for his sake to scourges and blows, to prison and exile.

Whence comes this good to you? From being unknown you have become manifest, from being without honor you have become glorious, from being of lesser standing among your brothers in the Lord you have become great and honored.

Do you see how I, the lowly one, address you? Many who surpass you desire to receive but a syllable from me, yet to you I write a letter full of praise.

For thus God glorifies those who glorify him.

Praise God, give thanks, that he has done great and wonderful things for you—that you are now called his confessor among Christians.

You have outshone many bishops, many abbots, many hermits, shining forth in the church.

Consider your calling, consider your glory.

Do not slumber, do not fall away; strive unto death in endurance.

For 'he who endures to the end,' it says, 'will be saved.'

Guard yourself with all vigilance, lest you slip into any passion of dishonor;

for this too is a great martyrdom: to keep the conscience pure from sin.

Cleanse it always through repentance, through tears, through prayers, beseeching also on behalf of me the sinner, that I may be saved from every evil work.

The brothers who are with me greet you most warmly.

May God keep you, my beloved child, unharmed and unscathed in all things, as you fulfill the contest set before you in the Lord.

{To Titus and Philo, sons} O good Titus, and my good Philo, what a strange sight it is, that out of your many brothers you were chosen by God to confess him, and for this reason to be in prison! Surely it is because you loved greatly; surely it is because you truly believed.

I therefore bless my God and Lord, who has done great things in you.

Take heed, brothers, as I also wrote to you beforehand: stand nobly, without faintheartedness, mightily, as you were called by God;

glorify him in your members; do not accept the teaching of the heretic; do not falter before the hardship of prison, hearing him who says that we must enter the kingdom of heaven through many tribulations.

Remember me also, the sinner.

The brothers who are with me greet you;

{To Nicholas the baker} How do you suppose I receive your gifts and blessings, beloved man? Not even so many talents of gold would be sweeter for me to receive, because they come from an orthodox man, one who keeps the ancient love and has not been ensnared in communion with the heresy;

and this greatly astonishes me: how you remain unburned in the midst of the fire.

But indeed you will yet continue to remain so by divine providence, so that you may carry off to God a great gift, that of your own salvation.

I was greatly delighted, and indeed I have called you blessed, because on a feast day you received the letter-bearer as a fellow guest at table in a strange place and at a table laden with abundance;

in return for which the Lord will make you recline on that day with Abraham and Isaac unto everlasting gladness.

{To Isidore, a layman} Once again I have caused you trouble, man of God and true friend, on account of your gifts;

but the Lord will measure back to you a heavenly reward, which you seek from the Lord, for whose sake you also pursue a life of virginity and reverence, spending your leisure in churches, occupying yourself in works of piety as a lover of monks, as one without guile, dwelling in your own house after the manner of the patriarch Jacob.

I further exhort you to hold fast to orthodoxy and to abstain from heretical communion, on account of which we shall have boldness before the judgment seat of Christ.

Remember us, offering holy prayers, my most honored and most beloved one.

{To an Abbess} The brother has reported to me that he has seen your honored self, and that you are well in spirit, holding fast to hope through endurance,

in him who has manifested his own power even in a weak nature;

for truly you are blessed among nuns, indeed among all women besides, because in these days — in which not only women of the monastic habit and canonesses were overcome, but also nearly all the monks and abbots throughout Byzantium as well — you yourself, together with four others, chose rather to suffer for Christ than to share in the heretical communion that separates from Christ.

For whoever partakes of it is disinherited from Christ, as Judas was, and a partner of those who seized the Lord to crucify him;

for indeed those who diminish and cast away his image are persecutors and crucifiers of Christ, just as they are also of the Theotokos herself and of each of the saints.

Take heed, servant of Christ, lest you put to shame him who called you to his confession.

You are a holy seed (I pass over the seed according to the flesh, since that too is of such a kind), but I mean the seed of Thecla the protomartyr, of Febronia, of Eugenia, of Matrona, and of women like them;

I mentioned Matrona, because also in her days, when there was heresy and certain nuns persisted in abstaining from communion — as you accursed heretics likewise do now — those who could not bear their resolve forced open their mouths with violent hand and poured their communion into them;

but what was done by force of hand was not reckoned against them; so you too must expect to be tried greatly for Christ's sake.

For Christ is our helper, even if they try us unto blood.

Pray for us to the Lord, that we sinners too may not fail to obtain Christ.

{To John of Chalcedon} The longing which I had travailed with for a long time, having now given birth to it, I, the humble one, rightly give thanks to my God;

And what is this longing? To be joined by letter to your fatherly holiness, to give a greeting, and to make known how great and how vast this longing is — not that it was not present before, but that now it has been kindled all the more by our shared suffering for the sake of truth;

for where there is concord of faith, there manifestly is also the bond of love, and where there is the bond of love, there God is the sum and head, for whose sake and on whose account is our suffering.

But our own case is of no account, being worthless in every respect; whereas the present circumstances of your holiness, and of those like you, are of the greatest renown, since you have chosen to face danger for the sake of piety and to endure hardship;

for how great an affliction it is, that your piety should be confined somewhere far from the city, and should drag out, day after day, the toils and pains of exile, and the anxious cares that belong to them, both in spirit and in body — and this in a body weak and unaccustomed to such things, even though sufficiently trained beforehand in the voluntary labors of asceticism.

But well done, O best of fathers, that the Church took you from the senate at first as an ornament for herself, and now also as a guardian of her pious doctrines, having bound upon yourself the crown of confession — how could it be otherwise? — suffering for Christ and not yielding to those who persecute Christ, even though it may not seem so to those who drive you into exile;

For the icon of Christ is Christ, just as the figure of the cross is the cross;

and I need not even speak yet of the Theotokos and of any of the saints whatsoever, since you know this, and indeed rather instruct us, and skillfully teach the uninitiated and unwise.

Terrible, then, O divine and sacred head, is this impiety, a forerunner of the coming of the Antichrist and, as it were, his very image, since it wars against the icon of Christ, which has no division whatsoever from its archetype;

for such is the nature of the things spoken of.

Wherefore, as great as the magnitude of their impiety is, so great is our boast of confession, which yields not second place even to the martyrs of Christ of old.