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Theoliptos, Metropolitan of Philadelphia: On Inner Work in Christ And the Monastic Profession
The monastic profession is a lofty and fruitful tree whose root is detachment from all corporeal things, whose branches are freedom from passionate craving and total alienation from what you have renounced, and whose fruit is the acquisition of virtue, a deifying love, and the uninterrupted joy mat results from these two things; for, as St Paul says, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace and the other things he mentions (cf Gal. 5:22).
Flight from the world is rewarded by refuge in Christ. By 'world I mean here attachment to sensory things and to worldly proclivities. If you detach yourself from such things through knowledge of the truth you are assimilated to Christ, acquiring a love for Him that allows you to put aside all worldly matters and to purchase the precious pearl, that is to say, Christ Himself (cf Matt 13:46).
You put on Christ through the baptism of salvation (cf. Gal. 3:27), being thus washed clean, illumined with spiritual grace and restored to your original nobility. But what happened then as a result of your weakness of will? Through over-attachment to the world you subverted your likeness to God, through coddling the flesh you rendered the divine image within you powerless, and with passion-embroiled thoughts you beclouded your soul's mirror so that Christ, the spiritual Sun, can no longer manifest Himself in it.
Now, however, you have transfixed your soul with the fear of God. You have recognized the world's benighted abnormity and the mental dissipation and vain distraction which it generates, and you have been wounded by a longing for stillness. Obedient to the precepts 'Seek peace and pursue it' (Ps. 34:14) and 'Return to your rest, O my soul' (Ps. I 16:7), you have sought to bring peace to your thoughts. You have therefore resolved to regain the nobility that you received through grace at baptism, but jettisoned by your own free choice through your self-indulgence in the world; and accordingly you have entered this sacred school and set to work, donning the venerable habit of repentance and vowing courageously to remain in the monastery until death.
This is now the second covenant you have made with God. The first you made when you originally entered into this life; the second, as you swiftly approach its dose. Then through the profession of the trae faith you were numbered among Christ's flock; now you are united to Him through repentance. Then you found grace; now you have contracted an obligation. Then, still a little child, you were not aware of the honor conferred on you, although later, as you grew up, you began to appreciate the greatness of the gift and restrained your tongue accordingly. Now, having reached complete understanding, you fully recognize the significance of the vow you are taking. Beware lest you fail to fulfill this promise as well, and are cast, like some shattered pot, into the outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (cf . Matt. 8:12). No path other than that of repentance leads to salvation.
Listen to what David promises you: 'You have made the Most High your refuge' (Ps. 91:9) and, if on the model of Christ you choose a life of tribulation, 'no plague will come near you' (Ps. 91:10) - no evil, that is to say, will be inflicted on you because of your worldly life. Now that you have chosen to repent, you will not be shadowed by avidity, self-indulgence, self-glorification, self-display or sensual dissipation. Distraction of the mind, captivity of the intellect, the levity of successive thoughts, and every other kind of deliberate prevarication and confusion - from all such aberrations you will be set free. Nor will you be constrained by the love of parents, brothers and sisters, relatives, friends and acquaintances, and you will not waste time in pointless meetings and talks with them
If you thus give yourself soul and body to the religious life, no scourge of anguish will afflict you (cf. Ps. 91:10), nor will distress pierce your heart or darken your countenance. Distress is muted in those who have renounced the life of pleasure and are free from attachment to the things that I have mentioned, for Christ reveals Himself to the striving soul and bestows ineffable joy on the heart. No worldly delight or suffering can take away this spiritual joy, for holy meditation, the mindfulness of God that brings salvation, divine
Theoliptos, Metropolitan of Philadelphia On Inner Work in Christ And the Monastic Profession
thoughts and words of wisdom nourish and protect everyone engaged in spiritual warfare. That is why such a person treads upon all mindless desire and headstrong anger as upon an asp or basilisk, quelling pleasure as though it were a snake and wrath as though it were a lion (cf Ps. 91:13. LXX). This is because he has transferred all his hope from men and from worldly things to God, has been enriched with divine knowledge and always calls spiritually upon God to come to his aid. As the Psalmist writes, 'Because he has set his hope on Me, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he has known My name. He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him: not only will I deliver him from those who afflict him, but I will also glorify him' (cf. Ps. 91:15-16).
Do you see the struggles of those who lead a godly ascetic life, and the rewards granted them? Then put your calling into action without more ado. Just as you have secluded yourself bodily, rejecting worldly things, so likewise seclude yourself in soul by subjecting also the thoughts of all such things. You have changed your outward clothing; make your monastic profession into a reality. You have separated yourself from crowds of strangers; distance yourself also from the few who are related to you by birth. If you do not put an end to delusions prompted by external things, you will not overcome those that ambush you from within. If you do not triumph over those who fight against you with visible means, you will not repulse your invisible enemies. But when you have quelled both external and inner distraction, your intellect will rise to spiritual labor and spiritual discourse. In the place of conventional dealings with relatives and friends you will follow the ways of virtue; and instead of filling your soul with vain words born of worldly contacts, you will illumine and fill it with understanding through meditating upon the meaning of Holy Scripture.
To give free rein to the senses is to shackle the soul, to shackle the senses is to liberate it. When the sun sets, night comes; when Christ leaves the soul, the darkness of the passions envelops it and incorporeal predators tear it asunder. When the visible sun rises, animals retreat into their lairs; when Christ rises in the heaven of the praying mind, worldly preoccupations and proclivities abscond, and the intellect goes forth to its labor - that is, to meditate on the divine - until the evening (cf. Ps. 104:19-23). Not that the intellect limits its fulfillment of the spiritual law to any period of time or performs it according to some measure; on the contrary, it continues to fulfill it until it reaches the term of this present life and the soul departs from the body. That is what is meant in the Psalms when it is said, 'How I have loved Thy law, Lord; it is my meditation all the day long' (Ps. I 19:97) - where 'day' means the whole course of one's present life.
Suspend, then, your gossip with the outer world and fight against the thoughts within until you find the abode of pure prayer and Christ's dwelling-place. Thus you will be illumined and mellowed by His knowledge and His presence, enabled to experience tribulation for His sake as joy and to shun worldly pleasure as you would bitter poison.
Winds rouse the Sea's waves, and until they drop the waves will not subside and the sea will not grow calm. Similarly, if you are not careful evil spirits will rouse in your soul memories of parents, brothers and sisters, relatives, acquaintances, banquets, celebrations, theatres and various other images of pleasure; and they will incite you to seek for happiness in visual, vocal and corporeal things, so that you waste not only the present moment but also the time that you sit alone in your cell, in bringing to mind what you have seen and spoken about. Preoccupied in this way with memories of his worldly activities, the monk's life passes profitlessly: he is like a man who retreads his own footsteps in the snow.
If we continue to nourish the demons, when will we slay them? If we let our mind dwell on actions and thoughts related to meaningless friendships and habits, when will we mortify the will of the flesh? When will we live the Christ-like life to which we have committed ourselves? The foot's imprint in the snow dissolves when the sun shines or when it begins to rain. Mind-embedded memories of self-indulgence whether in thought or act are effaced when as the result of prayer and tears of compunction Christ rises in the heart. But when will the monk who does not practice what he has professed expunge passion-imbued memories from his mind?
Moral virtues pertaining to the body are effectuated when you give up commerce with the world. Holy images and thoughts are imprinted on the soul when you efface memories of previous actions by frequent prayer and fervent compunction. Heartfelt contrition and the illumination that comes from constant mindfulness of God excise evil memories like a razor.
Copy the wisdom of the bees; when they become aware of an encircling swarm of wasps, they remain inside their hive and so escape the attacks with which they are threatened. Wasps signify commerce with the world: avoid such commerce at all costs, stay in your cell, and there try to re-enter the innermost citadel of the soul, the dwelling-place of Christ, where you will truly find the peace, joy and serenity of Christ the spiritual Sun - gifts that He irradiates and with which He rewards the soul that receives Him with faith and devotion.
Sitting in your cell, then, be mindful of God, raising your intellect above all things and prostrating it wordlessly before Him, exposing your heart's state to Him, and cleaving to Him in love. For mindfulness of God is the contemplation of God, who draws to Himself the mtellect's vision and aspiration, and illumines the intellect with His own light. When the intellect turns toward God and stills all representational images of created things, it perceives in an imageless way, and through an ignorance surpassing all knowledge its vision is illumined by God's unapproachable glory. Although not knowing, because what it perceives is beyond all knowledge, nevertheless the intellect does know through the truth of Him who truly is and who alone transcends all being. Nourishing its love on the wealth of goodness that pours forth from God, and fulfilling thereby its own nature, it is granted blessed and eternal repose.
Such are the characteristics of true mindfulness of God. Prayer is the mind's dialogue with God, in which words of petition are uttered with the intellect riveted wholly on God. For when the mind unceasingly repeats the name of the Lord and the intellect gives its full attention to the invocation of the divine name, the light of the knowledge of God overshadows the entire soul hke a luminous cloud.
Concentrated mindfulness of God is followed by love and joy: 'I remembered God, and I rejoiced', writes the Psalmist (Ps. 77:3. LXX). Pure prayer is followed by divine knowledge and compunction; again the Psalmist writes, 'On whatever day I call upon Thee, behold, I shall know that Thou art my God' (Ps. 56:9. LXX); and. The offering acceptable to God is a contrite spirit' (Ps. 51:17). When intellect and mind stand attentive before God in fervent supplication, compunction of the soul will ensue. When intellect, intelligence and spirit prostrate themselves before God, the first through attentiveness, the second through invocation, and the third through Compunction and love, the whole of your inner self serves God; for 'You shall love your God with all your heart' (Deut. 6:5; Matt. 22:37).
You should take particular notice of this lest, though you think you are praying, you wander far from prayer, and accomplish nothing. This is what happens during the chanting of psalms when the tongue utters the words of the verses while the intellect is carried away elsewhere and is dispersed among passion-charged thoughts and other things, with the result that comprehension of the psalms goes by the board. The same thing also happens where we mind is concerned. Time and again, when the mind repeats the words of the prayer the intellect does not keep it company and does not fix its attention on God, to whom our words of prayer are being addressed; imperceptibly it is turned aside by one thought or another. The mind says the words as usual, but the intellect lapses from the knowledge of God. As a result, the soul is devoid of understanding and devotion, since the intellect is fragmented by fantasies, distracted by what has enticed it away or by what it has deliberately chosen.
When there is no conscious understanding of prayer and when the suppliant does not put himself in the presence of Him whom he invokes, how can the soul be gladdened? How can a heart find joy when it only pretends to pray but lacks true prayer? 'The hearts of those who seek the Lord will rejoice' (cf Ps. 105:3). To seek the Lord is to prostrate yourself with your whole mind and with great fervor before God and to expel every worldly thought with the knowledge and love of God that spring from pure and unremitting prayer.
In order to clarify the nature of the vision born in the intellect as a result of the mindfulness of God and the status of the mind during pure prayer, I shall use the analogy of the bodily eye and tongue. What the pupil is to the eye and utterance is to the tongue, mindfulness is to the intellect and prayer is to the mind. Just as the eye, when it receives the visual impression of an object, makes no sound, but acquires knowledge of what is seen through the experience of sight, so it is with the intellect: when through its mindfulness of God it is lovingly assimilated to Him, cleaving to Him exponentially and in the silence of direct and unalloyed intellection, it is illumined by divine light and receives a pledge of the radiance in store for it. Or again, as the tongue when it speaks reveals to the hearer the hidden disposition of the intellect, so the mind, when it repeats frequently and ardently the brief words of the prayer, reveals the soul's petition to the all-knowing God. Persistence in prayer and unceasing contrition of heart enkindle God's compassion for man and call down the riches of salvation; for 'God will not despise a broken and a contrite heart' (Ps. 51:17).
Another illustration which may lead you to an understanding of pure prayer is that of the earthly king. When you approach a king, you stand before him bodily, entreat him orally, and fix your eyes upon him, thus drawing to yourself his royal favor. Act in the same manner, whether in church or in the solitude of your cell. When in God's name you gather together with the brethren, present yourself bodily to God and offer Him psalms chanted orally; and likewise keep your intellect attentive to the words and to God Himself, aware of who it is that your intellect addresses and entreats. For when the mind devotes itself to prayer actively and with purity, the heart is granted inexpressible peace and a joy which cannot be taken away. Again, when you sit alone in your cell, cleave to this mental prayer with watchful intellect and contrite spirit. Then on account of your watchfulness the grace of contemplation will descend upon you, knowledge will dwell in you by virtue of your prayer, and wisdom will repose in you because of your compunction, banishing mindless pleasure and replacing it with divine love.
Believe me, I tell the truth. If in all your activity you cleave inseparably to the mother of blessings, prayer, then prayer itself will not rest until it has shown you the bridal chamber and has led you within, filling you with ineffable glory and joy. By removing every impediment, prayer smoothes the path of virtue and renders it easy for those who pursue it.
Consider now the effects of mental prayer. Dialogue with God destroys passion-imbued thoughts, while the intellect's concentration on God dispels worldly preoccupations. Compunction of soul repels affection for the flesh, and the prayer born from ceaseless invocation of the divine name reveals itself as the concordance and union of intellect, intelligence and soul; for 'where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am in the midst of them' (Matt. 18:20). Thus by recollecting the powers of the soul dispersed by the passions, and by uniting them to one another and to itself, prayer assimilates the tripartite soul to the one God in three hypostases.
By first removing the ugliness of sin from the soul through the practice of virtue, and then through sacred knowledge renewing the divine beauty imprinted upon it, prayer presents the soul to God. At once the soul recognizes its Creator, for 'on whatever day I call upon Thee, behold, I shall know that Thou art my God' (Ps. 56:9. LXX); and in turn it is known by God, for 'the Lord knows those that are His' (2 Tim. 2:19). It knows God because of the purity of His image within it, for every image leads one back to its original; and it is known by God because its likeness to God has been restored through the practice of the virtues. Thus it is by means of the virtues that the soul knows God and is known by God. The person who courts the favor of a king does so in one of three ways. He either entreats his possible benefactor with words, or stands silently before him, or throws himself at his feet Pure prayer, uniting to itself intellect, intelligence and spirit, invokes the divine name with the intelligence; with the intellect it concentrates its unwavering attention on God whom it invokes; and with the spirit it manifests compunction, humility, and love. In this way it entreats the unonginate Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - the one God.
Just as variety in food stimulates the appetite, so the varied forms of virtue awaken the activity of the intellect. Thus while you travel the path of the mind, repeat again and again the words of the prayer, hold converse with the Lord, cry out ceaselessly, and do not give up, praying frequently and imitating the boldness of the widow who managed to prevail upon the inexorable judge (cf Luke 18:1-5). Then you will walk in the path of the Spirit, impervious to sensual desires, the flow of your prayer unbroken by worldly thoughts, and you will become a temple of God, praising Him undistractedly. If you pray in the mind in this way you will be granted the privilege of attaining mindfulness of God and will penetrate the innermost sanctuary of the intellect, mystically contemplating the Invisible and alone celebrating in solitude God alone in the unity of divine knowledge and in outpourings of love.
When you see yourself, therefore, growing sluggish in prayer, take up a book and by paying careful attention to what you read absorb its meaning. Do not read through the words in a cursory fashion, but examine them with depth of understanding and treasure their meaning. Then meditate on what you have read, so that your mind in comprehending it is mellowed and it remains unforgotten. Thus will your ardor for reflection on things divine be kindled, for 'a fire shall be kindled during my meditation' (Ps. 39:3. LXX). just as you have to chew food before you can savor its taste, so you have to ruminate in your soul on holy texts before they enrich and gladden the mind: as the Psalmist says, 'How sweet Thy words are in my throat' (Ps. 119:103). Learn by heart the words of the Gospels and me sayings of the blessed fathers, and study their lives diligently, so that you may meditate on these things during the night. In this way when your mind grows listless in prayer you can refresh it by reading and meditating on sacred texts and rekindle its appetite for prayer.
When chanting psalms, do this in a low voice, with your intellect fully attentive: do not allow any phrase to go uncomprehended. Should anything escape your understanding, begin the verse again, and repeat this as many times as necessary, until your intellect grasps what is being said. For the intellect can attend to the chanting and simultaneously can recollect God. You may learn this from everyday experience: you can meet and speak with someone and also focus your eyes on him. Similarly, you can chant psalms and focus on God through recollectedness.
Do not neglect prostration. It provides an image of man's fall into sin and expresses the confession of our sinfulness. Getting up, on the other hand, signifies repentance and the promise to lead a life of virtue. Let each prostration be accompanied by a noetic invocation of Christ, so that by faUing before the Lord in soul and body you may gain the grace of the God of souls and bodies.
To dispel sleep and indolence while practicing mental prayer you may occupy your hands with some quiet task, for this, too, contributes to the ascetic struggle. All such tasks when accompanied by prayer quicken the intellect, banish listlessness, give youthful vigor to the soul, and render the intellect more prompt and eager to devote itself to mental work.
When the wooden sounding-board is struck, leave your cell, your eyes lowered and your mind anchored in mindfulness of God. When you have entered the church and taken your place in the choir, do not indulge in idle talk with the monk next to you or let your intellect be distracted by vain droughts. Secure your tongue with the chanting of psalms and your mind with prayer. After the dismissal, go back to your cell and begin the tasks prescribed for you by your rule.
When you enter the refectory, do not look round to see how much food your brethren are eating and so fragment your soul with ugly suspicions. Look only at what lies before you; with your mouth eat your food, with your ears listen to what is being read, and with your soul pray. Nourishing body and spirit in this way, with your whole being you may truly praise Him who 'satisfies your desire with blessings' (Ps. 103:5. LXX). Then rise and enter your cell with dignity and silence, and like an industrious bee make virtue your labor of love. When you work with the brethren, let your hands do the work while your lips keep silence, and let your intellect be mindful of God. Should someone be prompted to speak idle words, to restore order rise and make a prostration.
Repulse evil thoughts and do not let than penetrate the heart and settle there; for when passion-imbued thoughts persist they bring the passions themselves to life and are the death of the intellect. As soon as you sense that they are attacking you, try to destroy them with the arrow of prayer. If they go on importuning you to be let in, confusing your mind, now withdrawing, now assailing you again, you may be sure that a prevement desire for them on your part is giving them strength. Because the soul's free will has been overcome in this way, they now have a lawful claim against it, and so they perturb and pester it. Hence you should expose them through confession, for evil thoughts take to flight as soon as they are denounced. Just as darkness recedes when light shines, so the light of confession dispels the darkness of impassioned thoughts. The vanity and self-indulgence that provided an opening for such thoughts are destroyed by the shame felt in confessing them and by the hardship of the penance imposed. Evil thoughts See in confusion when they find the mind already free from passions as a result of continuous, truly contrite prayer.
When a spiritual athlete tries by means of prayer to cut off the thoughts that agitate him, he is successful for a while and, wrestling and fighting, controls his mental distraction. But he is not delivered completely, because he is still attached to the things that cause these disturbing thoughts - to bodily comfort, that is to say, and to worldly ambition. It is for this reason, indeed, that he is reluctant to confess his thoughts. Thus he is not at peace, for he himself keeps hold of what properly belongs to his enemies. If you retain someone else's goods, will not the rightful owner claim them back from you? And if you do not surrender what you wrongfully possess, how can you escape from your adversary? But when the spiritual athlete, strengthened by mindfulness of God, willingly humiliates and ill-treats his mortal self, and confesses his thoughts without shame, the enemy withdraws at once, and the mind - now free - enjoys ceaseless prayer and unintermpted meditation on things divine.
Reject completely every suspicion about someone else that rises in your heart, because it destroys love and peace. But accept with courage any calamity that comes from without, since it provides an opportunity for exercising the patience that leads to salvation, the patience that bestows an abiding-place and repose in heaven.
If you pass your days in this manner, you will spend this present-life in good heart, glad in the expectation of blessedness; and at death you will leave this world with confidence and be translated to the place of repose that the Lord has prepared for you, granting you as a reward for your present labors the privilege of reigning with Him in His kingdom. To Him be all glory, honor and worship, as also to His unorigmate Father, and to His all-holy, blessed and life-quickening Spirit, now, for ever, and through all the ages. Amen.
