205 quotes found
"What is the spiritual battle? Well, the soul is a garden divided into two parts. On one half are planted thorny bushes, and on the other half flowers. We also have a water pump with two taps and two channels. The one guides the water to the thorns and the other to the flowers. I always have the choice to open one or the other tap. I leave the thorns without water and they dry up, I water the flowers and they blossom."
"For the people of God there is no such thing as distance, even if they be thousands of miles apart. However far away our fellow human beings may be, we must stand by them."
"From the moment I became a monk I believed that death does not exist. That’s how I felt and how I always feel – that I am eternal and immortal. How magnificent!"
"Pray without forming images in your mind. Don’t try to imagine Christ. The Fathers emphasized the need for prayer to be free of images. With an image, the focus of prayer is easily lost, because one image can easily be displaced by another. And the evil one may intrude images and we lose the grace."
"Prayer should be interior, prayed with the mind and not with the lips, so as not to cause distraction with the mind wandering here and there. Let us bring Christ into our mind in an unforced manner by repeating very gently, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me’ Don’t think anything except the words, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me’. Nothing else. Nothing at all."
"God is everywhere present and fills all things. I try to take wings to infinity and fly amidst the stars. My mind is lost in the magnificence of Gods omnipotence as I contemplate the distances of millions of light years. I feel this omnipotent God before me and I open my arms and I open my soul to be united with Him, to participate in the Godhead ..."
"In prayer what is important is not the duration but the intensity. Pray albeit for five minutes, but abandoning yourself to God with love and longing. One person may pray all night long and another person only for five minutes and yet the five-minute prayer may be superior. This is a mysterious matter, of course, but that’s the way it is."
"Prayer is beneficial for everything, even for the simplest of things. For example, if you are suffering from insomnia, don’t think about sleep. Get up and leave your bedroom and then come back in and lie down on your bed as if for the first time, without thinking about whether you will sleep or not. Then concentrate your mind, recite the doxology and then repeat the prayer, ‘Lord Jesus Christ...’, three times over and that way you will fall asleep."
"Make the most of beautiful moments. Beautiful moments predispose the soul to prayer; they make it refined, noble and poetic. Wake up in the morning and see the sun rising from out of the sea as a Icing robed in regal purple. When a beautiful landscape, a picturesque chapel, or something beautiful inspires you, don’t leave things at that, but go beyond this to give glory for all beautiful things so that you experience Him who alone is ‘Comely in beauty’. All things are holy – the sea, swimming and eating. Take delight in them all. All things enrich us, all lead us to the great Love, all lead us to Christ."
"Observe all the things made by man – houses, buildings large or small, towns, villages, peoples and their civilizations. Ask questions to enrich your knowledge about each and everything; don’t be indifferent. This helps you meditate more deeply on the wonders of God. All things become opportunities for us to be joined more closely with everything and everyone. They become occasions for thanksgiving and prayer to the Lord of All. Live in the midst of everything, nature and the universe. Nature is the secret Gospel. But when one does not possess inner grace, nature is of no benefit. Nature awakens us, but it cannot bring us into Paradise."
"Do not desire wealth for giving to the poor."
"Do you desire, then, to embrace this life of solitude, and to seek out the blessings of stillness? If so, abandon the cares of the world, and the principalities and powers that lie behind them: free yourself from attachment to material things, from domination by passions and desires, so that as a stranger to all this you may attain true stillness."
"Just as it is possible to think of water both while thirsty and while not thirsty, so it is possible to think of gold with greed and without greed. The same applies to other things."
"In the whole range of evil thoughts, none is richer in resources than self-esteem."
"The demon of avarice, it seems to me, is extraordinarily complex and is baffling in his deceits. Often, when frustrated by the strictness of our renunciation, he immediately pretends to be a steward and a lover of the poor; he urges us to prepare a welcome for strangers who have not yet arrived or to send provisions for absent brethren. He makes us mentally visit prisons in the city and ransom those on sale as slaves. He suggests that we should attach ourselves to wealthy women, and advises us to be obsequious to others who have a full purse. And so, after deceiving the soul, little by little he engulfs it in avaricious thoughts and then hands it over to the demon of self-esteem."
"52. To separate the body from the soul is the privilege of only of the One who has joined them together. But to separate the soul from the body lies as well in the power of the man who pursues virtue. For our Fathers gave to the meditation of death and to the flight from the body a spiritual name: anachoresis [withdrawal]."
"64. The proof of apatheia is had when the spirit begins to see its own light, when it remains in a state of tranquility in the presence of the images it has during sleep and when it maintains its calm as it beholds the affairs of life."
"81. Agape is the progeny of apatheia. Apatheia is the very flower of ascesis. Ascesis consists in keeping the commandments. The custodian of those commandments is the fear of God which is in turn the offspring of true faith. Now faith is an interior an interior good, one which is to be found even in those who do not yet believe in God."
"97. One of the brethren owned only a book of the Gospels. He sold this and gave the money for the support of the poor. He made a statement that deserves remembrance: "I have sold the very word that speaks to me saying: 'Sell your possessions and give to the poor.'""
"3. Prayer is a continual intercourse of the spirit with God. What state of soul then is required that the spirit might thus strain after its Master without wavering, living constantly with him without intermediary?"
"5. Pray first for the gift of tears so that by means of sorrow you may soften your native rudeness. Then having confessed your sins to the Lord you will obtain pardon for them."
"6. Pray with tears and your request will find a hearing. Nothing so gratifies the Lord as supplication offered in the midst of tears."
"35. Prayer is an ascent of the spirit to God."
"36. Do you long to pray? Renounce all things. You then will become heir to all."
"37. First of all pray to be purified from your passions. Secondly, pray to be delivered from ignorance. Thirdly, pray to be freed from all temptation and abandonment."
"52. The state of prayer can be aptly described as a habitual state of imperturbable calm. It snatches to the heights of intelligible reality the spirit which loves wisdom and which is truly spiritualized by the most intense love."
"60. If you are a theologian, you truly pray. If you truly pray, you are a theologian."
"65. If you long to pray, then avoid all that is opposed to prayer. Then when God draws near, he has only to go along with you."
"70. You will not be able to pray purely if you are all involved with material affairs and agitated with unremitting concerns. For prayer is the rejection of concepts."
"83. The singing of Psalms quiets the passions and calms the intemperance of the body. Prayer, on the other hand, prepares the spirit to put its own powers into operation."
"85. Psalm-singing is an image of wisdom which is many-sided; prayer is the prelude to immaterial and uniform knowledge."
"86. Knowledge! The great possession of man. It is a fellow-worker with prayer, acting to awaken the power of thought to contemplate the divine knowledge."
"101. Just as bread is nourishment for the body and virtue for the soul, so is spiritual prayer nourishment for the intelligence."
"113. By true prayer a monk becomes another angel, for he ardently longs to see the face of the Father in heaven."
"114. Do not by any means strive to fashion some image or visualize some form at the time of prayer."
"117. Let me repeat this saying of mine that I once expressed on some other occasions: Happy is the spirit that attains to the perfect formlessness at the time of prayer."
"118. Happy is the spirit which, praying with distraction, goes on increasing its desire for God."
"119. Happy is the spirit that becomes free of all matter and is stripped of all at the time of prayer."
"120. Happy is the spirit that attains to complete unconsciousness of all sensible experience at the time of prayer."
"121. Happy is the man who thinks himself no better than dirt."
"122. Happy is the monk who views the welfare and progress of all men with as much joy as if it were his own."
"123. Happy is the monk who considers all men as god — after God."
"124. A monk is a man who is separated from all and who is in harmony with all."
"125. A monk is a man who considers himself one with all men because he seems constantly to see himself in every man."
"150. Just as sight is the most worthy of the sense, so also is prayer the most divine of the virtues."
"153. When you give yourself to prayer, rise above every other joy — then you will find true prayer."
"2. If someone should want to behold the state of his mind, let him deprive himself of all mental representations, and then he shall behold himself resembling sapphire or the colour of heaven. It is impossible to accomplish this without impassibility, for he will need God to collaborate with him and breathe into him the connatural light."
"4. The state of the mind is an intelligible height resembling the colour of heaven, to which the light of the Holy Trinity comes in the time of prayer."
"6. The pure mind is an incense burner at the time of prayer when it touches upon no sensible object. According to virtue we will be one on the eighth day; according to knowledge, on the last day."
"23. The mind cannot see the place of God within itself, unless it has transcended all the mental representations associated with objects. Nor will it transcend them, if it has not put off the passions that bind it to sensible objects through mental representations. And it will lay aside the passions through the virtues, and simple thoughts through spiritual contemplation; and this in turn it will lay aside when there appears to it the light."
"26. Prayer is a state of the mind destructive of every earthly mental representation."
"27. Prayer is a state of the mind that arises under the influence of the unique light of the Holy Trinity."
"34. The mind is the temple of the Holy Trinity."
"The main contemplations are five, under which all contemplation is comprised. And they say that the first is the contemplation of the adorable and holy Trinity, and that the second and the third are the contemplation of the incorporeal and the corporeal realities, and that the fourth and the fifth are the contemplation of the Judgment and of Providence."
"There was a time when evilness did not exist, and there will be a time when it will no more exist, whereas there was no time when virtue did not exist, and there will be no time when it will not exist. For the germs of virtue are impossible to destroy."
"Blessed is the one who has reached the knowledge that cannot be abolished (beyond what cannot be, it cannot be gone)."
"Once there was a meeting at The Cells about some matter and Abba Evagrius spoke. The priest said to him: “Abba Evagrius, we know that if you were in your homeland you would probably have been a bishop and the head of many [clergy]; but now you are living here as an alien.” He was pricked in his conscience but not disturbed. Nodding his head, he said to him: “It is true, father; nevertheless, ‘I have spoken once; I will add nothing the second time’” (Job 40:5)."
"Überschauen wir diese Ausführungen, so kann kein Zweifel bestehen, daß die Mystik des Evagrius in ihrer völlig konsequenten Geschlossenheit dem Buddhismus wesentlich näher steht als dem Christentum."
"Anyone who considers himself guilty before God and repents must believe that the reproach and contempt of others towards him is just and to be endured."
"The soul completely dominated by its desire for spiritual instruction is never sated.It is because of this that Wisdom says of herself, 'Those who eat Me will still be hungry' (Eccles. 24:21); while the Lord, who has instilled this divine desire in the soul, says of Mary who chose 'what is best' that it will not be taken away from her (cf. Luke 10:42)."
"As the separation of the soul from the body is the death of the body, so the separation of God from the soul is the death of the soul. And this death of the soul is the true death."
"A great teacher has said that after the fall our inner being naturally adapts itself to outward forms. When, then, someone is striving to concentrate his intellect in himself so that it functions, not according to the direct form of movement but according to the circular, delusion-free form, how could he not gain immensely if, instead of letting his gaze flit hither and thither, he fixes it upon his chest or his navel as upon a point of support? Outwardly curling himself – so far as is possible – into the form of a circle, in conformity with the mode of action that he tries to establish in his intellect, he also, through this same position of his body, sends into his heart the power of the intellect that is dispersed outwardly when his gaze is turned outward. If the power of the noetic demon resides in the navel of the belly, since there the law of sin exercises its dominion and provides him with fodder, why should we not establish there also the law of the intellect that, armed with prayer, contends against that dominion (cf. Rom. 7:23)? Then the evil spirit expelled through our baptism – 'the water of regeneration' (Tit. 3:5) – will not return with seven other spirits more wicked than himself and again take up residence in us, so that 'the last state is worse than the first' (Luke 11:26)."
"The summit of evil, the crime most natural to the devil, pride, was born of knowledge. But if this is so, how can it be possible that all the passions result from ignorance? Does knowledge purify the psyche? Paul says: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up (1 Corinthians 8:1)."
"Do you see? There exists a kind of knowledge that is without love. It does not purify the psyche in any way, but kills it, as it lacks the love that is the head, the body, and very root of all virtue."
"How can someone have the freedom to choose and the power to act freely, unless he were able to be evil, should he so wish?"
"Anyone who states that God should not have made those people who will be punished, is also saying that He should not have made those who will be saved, or any rational and free beings at all."
"Let us take off our life’s complex covering of rapacity and greed, since it is ugly in God’s sight and condemned, and let us put on, as the elect of God, compassion, humility, modesty and meekness."
"Anybody who thinks he is something great, even before God, is rightly abandoned by God, as one who thinks that he does not need His help."
"Thanksgiving for the benefits received from God is made acceptable by humility and not looking down on those who lack them. It is rendered unacceptable, however, by being conceited, as if those benefits resulted from our own efforts and knowledge, and by condemning those who have not received them."
"Famine means being deprived of and desiring necessary food. But there is something worse and more wretched than this famine: when someone is deprived of the necessary means of salvation and does not perceive his misfortune, having no desire to be saved."
"Some people, because their minds have gone so long without nourishment, lose their desire to eat and so do not notice the harm they are suffering."
"When you are praying, do not shape within yourself any image of the deity."
"You should be aware of this trick: at times the demons split into two groups; and when you call for help against one group, the other will come in the guise of angels."
"11. Try to make your intellect deaf and dumb during prayer; you will then be able to pray."
"71. You cannot attain pure prayer while entangled in material things and agitated by constant cares. For prayer means the shedding of thoughts."
"82. Pray gently and calmly, sing with understanding and rhythm; then you will soar like a young eagle high in the heavens."
"83. Psalmody calms the passions and curbs the uncontrolled impulses in the body; and prayer enables the intellect to activate its own energy."
"84. Prayer is the energy which accords with the dignity of the intellect; it is the intellect's true and highest activity."
"114. Never try to see a form or shape during prayer."
"115. Do not long to have a sensory image of angels or powers or Christ, for this would be madness: it would be to take a wolf as your shepherd and to worship your enemies, the demons."
"118. Blessed is the intellect that, undistracted in its prayer, acquires an ever greater longing for God."
"119. Blessed is the intellect that during prayer is free from materiality and stripped of all possessions."
"120. Blessed is the intellect that has acquired complete freedom from sensations during prayer."
"121. Blessed is the monk who regards every man as God after God."
"122. Blessed is the monk who looks with great joy on everyone's salvation and progress as if they were his own."
"124. A monk is one who is separated from all and united with all."
"125. A monk is one who regards himself as linked with every man, through always seeing himself in each."
"126. The man who always dedicates his first thoughts to God has perfect prayer."
"142. Do you have a longing for prayer? Then leave the things of this world and live your life in heaven, not just theoretically but in angelic action and godlike knowledge."
"153. If when praying no other joy can attract you, then truly you have found prayer."
"The philosopher must be above all a free man, and not a slave of the passions."
"Philosophy is a state of moral integrity combined with a doctrine of true knowledge concerning reality."
"One was not rich while another was destitute, nor did one overeat while another starved. The generosity of those who were well off made good what others lacked, this willingness to share eliminating every anomaly and establishing equality and fairness - though even then inequality still existed, produced not as it is now by the mad struggle for social status, but by a great desire to live more humbly than others. Envy, malice, arrogance and haughtiness were banished, along with all that leads to discord."
"Why do we cling to money and possessions, and disperse our intellect among a host of useless cares? Our preoccupation with such things diverts us from what is more important and makes us neglect the well-being of the soul, leading us to perdition."
"By crouching a little we are able to spring upwards; and in the same way our faculty of discrimination, after stooping to attend to the needs of the body, can once more look upwards unimpeded, separating itself from all worldly thoughts."
"Men ... have been given legs that bend: in this way they can descend sometimes to fulfill the needs of the body, and at other times ascend to fulfill those of the soul."
"We should turn our attention to material things only in so far as some necessity forces us to do so. But always to be creeping on the ground in search of pleasure is defiling and degrading for someone with experience of spiritual knowledge."
"When bodily concerns predominate, everything in man is asleep: the intellect, the soul and the senses."
"Improbable details are often included in a story because of the deeper truth they signify."
"Who, when asked, will refuse to give what is needful to one who lives a holy life?"
"How was Moses able to withstand Pharaoh when he had nothing but holiness to give him courage (cf. Exod. 5)? ... A solitary prophet once censured a king for his unlawful acts, when the king had his whole army with him. ... These holy men achieved such things because they had resolved to live for the soul alone, turning away from the body and its wants. The fact of needing nothing made them superior to all men. They chose to forsake the body and to free themselves from life in the flesh, rather than to betray the cause of holiness and, because of their bodily needs, to flatter the wealthy."
"But, as for us, when we lack something, instead of struggling courageously against our difficulties, we come fawning to the rich, like puppies wagging their tails in the hope of being tossed a bare bone or some crumbs. To get what we want, we call them benefactors and protectors of Christians, attributing every virtue to them, even though they may be utterly wicked."
"We should not flatter, because of our needs, those who value highly the very things it is our vocation to despise."
"By our free choice we abandon our own wishes and thoughts and do what God wishes and thinks. If we succeed in doing this, there is no object, no activity or place in the whole of creation that can prevent us from becoming what God from the beginning has wished for us to be: that is to say, according to His image and likeness, gods by adoption through grace, dispassionate, just, good and wise."
"Woe is me, unhappy that I am! What shall I do? I have sinned greatly; many blessings are bestowed upon me; I am very weak. Many are the temptations: sloth overwhelms me, forgetfulness benights me and will not let me see myself and my many crimes. Ignorance is evil; conscious transgression is worse; virtue is difficult to achieve; the passions are many; the demons are crafty and subtle; sin is easy; death is near; the reckoning is bitter. Alas, what shall I do? Where shall I flee from myself? For I am the cause of my own destruction."
"Stillness is an undisturbed state of the intellect, the calm of a free and joyful soul, the tranquil unwavering stability of the heart in God, the contemplation of light, the knowledge of the mysteries of God, consciousness of wisdom by virtue of a pure mind, the abyss of divine intellections, the rapture of the intellect, intercourse with God, an unsleeping watchfulness, spiritual prayer, untroubled repose in the midst of great hardship and, finally, solidarity and union with God."
"The rays of primordial Light that illumine purified souls with spiritual knowledge not only fill them with benediction and luminosity; they also, by means of the contemplation of the inner essences of created things, lead them up to the noetic heavens. The effects of the divine energy, however, do not stop here; they continue until through wisdom and through knowledge of indescribable things they unite purified souls with the One, bringing them out of a state of multiplicity into a state of oneness in Him."
"The Spirit is light, life and peace. If consequently you are illumined by the Spirit your own life is imbued with peace and serenity. Because of this you are filled with the spiritual knowledge of created beings and the wisdom of the Logos; you are granted the intellect of Christ (cf. 1 Cor. 2:16); and you come to know the mysteries of God's kingdom (cf. Luke 8:10). Thus you penetrate into the depths of the Divine and daily from an untroubled and illumined heart you utter words of life for the benefit of others; for you yourself are full of benediction, since you have within you Goodness itself that utters things new and old (cf. Matt. 13:52)."
"One day, as he stood repeating more in his intellect than with his mouth the words, 'God, have mercy upon me, a sinner' (Luke 18:13), suddenly a profuse flood of divine light appeared above him and filled the whole room. As this happened the young man lost his bearings, forgetting whether he was in a house or under a roof; for he saw nothing but light around him and did not even know that he stood upon the earth. He had no fear of falling, or awareness of the world, nor did any of those things that beset men and bodily beings enter his mind. Instead he was wholly united to non-material light, so much so that it seemed to him that he himself had been transformed into light. Oblivious of all else, he was filled with tears and with inexpressible joy and gladness. Then his intellect ascended to heaven and beheld another light, more lucid than the first. Miraculously there appeared to him, standing close to that light, the holy, angelic elder of whom we have spoken and who had given him the short rule and the book."
"Then sit down in a quiet cell, in a corner by yourself, and do what I tell you. Close the door, and withdraw your intellect from everything worthless and transient. Rest your beard on your chest, and focus your physical gaze, together with the whole of your intellect, upon the centre of your belly or your navel. Restrain the drawing-in of breath through your nostrils, so as not to breathe easily, and search inside yourself with your intellect so as to find the place of the heart, where all the powers of the soul reside. To start with you will find there darkness and an impenetrable density. Later, when you persist and practise this task day and night, you will find, as though miraculously, an unceasing joy. For as soon as the intellect attains the place of the heart, at once it sees things of which it previously knew nothing. It sees the open space within the heart and it beholds itself entirely luminous and full of discrimination."
"When candle wax is far from the fire, it is solid and can be grasped, but when you put it in the fire it melts, and there it burns in the flame and catches fire and becomes all light and so finds a perfect end in the fire. There is no way for it not to melt in the fire and pour out like water. So too, while man's intellect is by itself, without encountering God, it thinks that everything is solidly in its power. But when it draws near, as it were, to the fire of Divinity and the Holy Spirit, it is completely dominated by that divine light and become all light, and there within the flame of the All-Holy Spirit it is set aflame and softened by divine perceptions. And in that fire of Divinity, there is no way for it to consider it own concerns and desires."
"Watchfulness is a continual fixing and halting of thought at the entrance to the heart."
"A brother asked an elder, “What is hēsychia and what good does it do?”"
""When you pray", it has been wisely said by an Orthodox writer in Finland, "you yourself must be silent... You yourself must be silent; let the prayer speak". To achieve silence: this is of all things the hardest and the most decisive in the art of prayer. Silence is not merely negative - a pause between words, a temporary cessation of speech - but, properly understood, it is highly positive: an attitude of attentive alertness, of vigilance, and above all of listening. The hesychast, the person who has attained hesychia, inner stillness or silence, is par excellence the one who listens. He listens to the voice of prayer in his own heart, and he understands that this voice is not his own but that of Another speaking within him."
"Given all the ways – both explicit and subtle – in which hesychasm is profoundly embroidered into the fabric of contemporary monasticism at the Holy Mountain, it is thus justified to conclude that not only is hesychasm Athonite, but Athos too is fundamentally hesychast."
"Through hesychasm ... different parts of the Byzantine Empire were linked with each other and to its centre. In a way, hesychasm became a cultural tradition common to Greeks, Slavs and Romanians and assumed the role of an intermediary, analogous to the role played by the Cyrillo-Methodian movement of the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries."
"Hesychasm, which is too often looked upon as a philosophico-mystical “curiosity” of purely historical interest, has its roots in Christianity as such, and ... it is not merely a rather special development of Christian spirituality, but its purest and deepest expression."
"Spiritual discourse always keeps the soul free from self-esteem, for it gives every part of the soul a sense of light, so that it no longer needs the praise of men."
"Whoever loves himself cannot love God."
"No one can love God consciously in his heart unless he has first feared Him with all his heart. Through the action of fear the soul is purified and, as it were, made malleable and so it becomes awakened to the action of love."
"The perceptive faculty natural to our soul is single, but it is split into two distinct modes of operation as a result of Adam's disobedience."
"If the soul, through attentiveness, reduces the blindness caused by the love of this world, it will consider its slightest faults to be very grave and will continually shed tears. ... But if the soul persists in its worldly disposition, even though it commits a murder or some other act deserving severe punishment, it takes little notice; and it is quite unable to discern its other faults, often considering them to be signs of progress, and in its wretchedness it is not ashamed to defend them heatedly."
"One side of the soul is carried away by the passionate part in man, and we are then captivated by the good things of this life, but the other side of the soul frequently delights in the activity of the intellect and, as a result, when we practice self-restraint, the intellect longs to pursue heavenly beauty."
"If, therefore, we learn persistently to be detached from the good things of this world, we shall be able to unite the earthly appetite of the soul to its spiritual and intellectual aspiration, through the communion of the Holy Spirit who brings this about within us. For unless His divinity actively illumines the inner shrine of our heart, we shall not be able to taste God's goodness with the perceptive faculty undivided, that is, with unified aspiration."
"Timely silence, then, is precious, for it is nothing less than the mother of the wisest thoughts."
"The eye of the soul cannot be led astray when its veil, by which I mean the body, is refined to near-transparency through self-control."
"With tears we sow seeds of prayer in the earth of the heart, hoping to reap the harvest in joy."
"When candle wax is far from the fire, it is solid and can be grasped, but when you put it in the fire it melts, and there it burns in the flame and catches fire and becomes all light and so finds a perfect end in the fire. There is no way for it not to melt in the fire and pour out like water. So too, while man's intellect is by itself, without encountering God, it thinks that everything is solidly in its power. But when it draws near, as it were, to the fire of Divinity and the Holy Spirit, it is completely dominated by that divine light and becomes all light, and there within the flame of the All-Holy Spirit it is set aflame and softened by divine perceptions. And in that fire of Divinity, there is no way for it to consider it own concerns and desires."
"For this reason he did not settle in one place on Athos, as most monks do in tranquil cells, but kept moving from one place to another nearby like a vagrant. He would quickly build huts, and then burn them down again with fire. This behavior was strange for the monks, and even for people in general. The blessed one never possessed a digging fork or hoe, nor a purse, nor a bench, a table, a pot, flour, oil, or wine, nor any other material necessity, nor bread, but living like an immaterial being in places untouched by materiality, he thus possessed only the semblance of a small hut, large enough only to contain his much-suffering body. And after building this out of grasses, he would soon burn it down. For this reason, although he was not in error, he was considered deranged, and at the same time he was given the sobriquet Hutburner by earthly-minded people, who did not see in him the illuminating divine grace of the Spirit which sheltered him like a divine, celestial tent and spread sweetness, and the eternal hope and prayer which always refreshed him like dew."
"Leaving the great and wondrous Lavra, he first set off at full speed on the ascent of Athos, where the tablets of grace were promised by the Mother of God. And thus he reached it, without eating anything, on the seventh [Sunday after Easter]; for that day was the first [Sunday] after the Ascension, the so-called Sunday of the Holy Fathers. After arriving at the summit there and prostrating himself and praying to God, as was his custom every night, he spent the whole night in vigil together with some monks. But when all the monks departed in the morning and no one was left behind, he remained there alone for three entire days and nights without food and wearing only a single garment, in the service of God. And he constantly had the name of the Mother of God on his tongue, in his mind and heart through mental prayer in the Spirit."
"Thus, after spending three days in this place of fragrance, he descended at the bidding of our Lady the Mother of God as far as her church, the one called Panagia. After spending some days there, he went up again to the summit of Athos and kissed the spot where the Mother of God had appeared to stand in glory. He tearfully sought to see the vision once again, but he did not succeed; for only light and unceasing divine fragrance fell invisibly upon the holy one's senses, as before, and filled him with joy and inexpressible happiness. After going up two or three times from the Panagia and being granted this experience, he then went down from there and, going to Karmelion, found a solitary elder there and told him about his vision."
"Most people neither hear nor understand God speaking in their hearts: they listen to the urging of passion, which inhabits the soul and with its clamour drowns the still small voice of God."
"No sin is unforgivable except the sin that is not repented of."
"There are known instances when Blessed Staretz Silouan in prayer beheld something remote as though it were happening close by; when he saw into someone's future, or when profound secrets of the human soul were revealed to him. There are many people still alive who can bear witness to this in their own case but he himself never aspired to it and never accorded much significance to it. His soul was totally engulfed in compassion for the world. He concentrated himself utterly on prayer for the world, and in his spiritual life prized this love above all else."
"In my young days ... I had been attracted to the idea of pure creativity, taking the form of abstract art. ... I derived ideas for my abstract studies from life around me. I would look at a man, a house, a plant, at intricate machinery, extravagant shadowscapes on walls or ceilings, at quivering bonfire flames, and would compose them into abstract pictures, creating in my imagination visions that were not like actual reality. ... Fortunately I soon realised that it was not given to me, a human being, to create from 'nothing', in the way only God can create. I realised that everything that I created was conditioned by what was already in existence. I could not invent a new colour or line that had never existed anywhere before. An abstract picture is like a string of words, beautiful and sonorous in themselves, perhaps, but never expressing a complete thought ..."
"No one on this earth can avoid affliction; and although the afflictions which the Lord sends are not great men imagine them beyond their strength and are crushed by them. This is because they will not humble their souls and commit themselves to the will of God. But the Lord Himself guides with His grace those who are given over to God's will, and they bear all things with fortitude for the sake of God Whom they have so loved and with Whom they are glorified for ever. It is impossible to escape tribulation in this world but the man who is given over to the will of God bears tribulation easily, seeing it but putting his trust in the Lord, and so his tribulations pass."
"There are three things I cannot take in: nondogmatic faith, nonecclesiological Christianity and nonascetic Christianity. These three - the church, dogma, and asceticism - constitute one single life for me."
"If one rejects the Orthodox creed and the eastern ascetic experience of life in Christ, which has been acquired throughout the centuries, then Orthodox culture would be left with nothing but the Greek minor [key] and Russian tetraphony."
"Stand on the edge of the abyss and when you feel that it is beyond your strength, break off and have a cup of tea.""
"The waves of thoughts amaze my mind; my tongue grows numb and cannot speak, unable to utter the words in time. The noetic siphons gush forth dew in torrents - however, there is but little soil in our days. The riches of our Lord are many, but unfortunately there are few heirs. To inherit them requires a bloody struggle, but here there is only laziness. Thus I am compelled to open the ducts unto the world; for there is hope that pure souls will receive the word, and then I shall receive the reward of love. So listen to my words, lend me your ears..."
"Since God is continuously present, why do you worry? For in Him we live and move. We are carried in His arms. We breathe God; we are vested with God; we touch God; we consume God in the Mystery. Wherever you turn, wherever you look, God is everywhere: in the heavens, on the earth, in the abysses, in the trees, within the rocks, in your nous, in your heart."
"So he got up and went inside the place where he was staying, for it was already night. Then he bent his head upon his chest and began eating the sweetness that gushed forth from the prayer that he had been given. Immediately he was caught up into theoria and was totally beside himself. He wasn’t confined by walls and rocks; he was beyond all volition — without body and with a deep tranquility, in extraordinary light, and unlimited breadth. His nous contemplated only this thought: “May I never return to the body, but remain here forever.” This was the first theoria that brother saw, who then returned to himself and continued struggling for his salvation."
"Then grace overflows and one is filled with illumination and infinite joy. And since he who has been seized is unable to bear the fire of love, his senses cease, and he is caught up into theoria. Up until this point, man acts with his own will. Beyond this, he is no longer in control, nor does he recognize himself. For he has now been united with the fire and has been entirely transformed — a god by grace."
"Illumination is followed by interruptions in the prayer and frequent theorias, rapture of the nous, cessation of the senses, stillness, profound silence of the bodily members, and union of God and man into one. This is the divine exchange in which, if one endures temptations and does not stop struggling along the way, one exchanges the material for the immaterial…."
"So when grace abounds in a person and he knows all that we have written, he attains great simplicity; his nous expands and has great capacity. Just as you tasted that drop of grace when much joy and exultation came upon you, it comes again in the same manner when the nous remains in prayer. But much more comes, like a subtle breeze, like a mighty gust of fragrant wind. It overflows throughout the body, and the prayer stops; the bodily members cease to move, and only the nous is in theoria within an extraordinary light. A union of God and man occurs. Man is unable to distinguish himself. It is just like iron: before it is thrown into the fire it is called iron, but once it ignites and becomes red-hot, it is one with the fire. It is also like wax which melts when it approaches fire; it cannot remain in its natural state."
"Behold, another new year! Once again, wishes and hopes. But death is lurking somewhere, waiting for us, too. Some day or night will be the last one of our life. Wherefore, blessed is he who remembers his death day and night and prepares himself to meet it. For it has a habit of coming joyfully to those who wait for it, but it arrives unexpectedly, bitterly, and harshly for those who do not expect it."
"When grace comes, all the schemes of the evil one cease, for it abolishes them. It comes like a gentle breeze, like a subtle, fragrant zephyr which deadens the flesh and then raises the soul. It enlightens our nous. And in the end, when it comes, grace itself teaches a person."
"So come, my dearly beloved son. Come now, even if for only one day, to talk about God and to theologize; to enjoy what you yearn for; to listen to the rough crags, those mystical and silent theologians, which expound deep thoughts and guide the heart and nous towards the Creator. After spring it is beautiful here — from Holy Pascha until the Panagia’s day in August. The beautiful rocks theologize like voiceless theologians, as does all of nature — each creature with its own voice or its silence. If you bump your hand against a little plant, immediately it shouts very loudly with its natural fragrance, “Ouch! You didn’t see me, but hit me!” And so on, everything has its own voice, so that when the wind blows, their movement creates a harmonious musical doxology to God. And what more shall we say about the creeping things and winged birds? When that saint sent his disciple to tell the frogs to be quiet so that they could read the Midnight Service, they answered him, “Be patient until we’re done with Matins!”"
"God is everywhere. There is no place where God is not. The more you pay attention to Him, the more He pays attention to you. You cry out to Him, “Where art Thou, my God?” And He answers, “I am present, my child! I am always beside you.” Both inside and outside, above and below, wherever you turn, everything shouts, “God!” In Him we live and move. We breathe God, we eat God, we clothe ourselves with God. Everything praises and blesses God. All of creation shouts His praise. Everything animate and inanimate speaks wondrously and glorifies the Creator. Let every breath praise the Lord!"
"For the time being I live in a cave. I have wonderful stillness. I am the luckiest of men, for I live without cares and enjoy the honey of stillness unceasingly. And when grace departs for just a little, stillness comes as another grace and it shelters me in its harbor. And thus, the pains and sadness of this evil and tiring life seem less significant. In the present life, until one's final breath, sadness always comes mixed with joy."
"When the monk cleans the senses in stillness, the mind becomes peaceful and the heart is cleansed, and he receives grace and the light of knowledge. He becomes completely light, completely mind, completely transparent. Then he gushes theology, such that even if three people were to write down his experiences they wouldn't manage, the flow of waves is so great, and it spreads peace and the complete cessation of the passions throughout the body. The heart is enflamed from love of God and shouts out, "slow down the waves of Your grace, my Jesus, for I am melting like a candle!" And truly he melts without suffering. The mind is taken up into divine vision; and a mixing takes place. Man is transformed and becomes one with God, such that he doesn't recognize himself, just as iron becomes one with fire."
"Stillness is neither thought nor the cessation of thought. Stillness stands steadfast as wisdom when the heart is luminous and clear. Uncontrived and unfabricated, wisdom is overlooked by blind oblivion.Stillness is not one state opposed to another. It is not an external phenomenon. It is incomprehensible and ineffable because at root, it is uncreated and unconditioned. It unifies, so as to ground what is integral. It illumines, so as to clarify what is translucent. It glorifies, to liberate the glorified. It deifies, to transfigure the deified."
"Stillness does not come and go. It is we who come and go. Stillness abides, like a vast evenness, limpid and pure. It is a transcendent realm of infinite clarity."
"Stillness is neither dissipation nor dislocation. She is neither exclusion nor suppression. She is neither addiction to confusion nor fixation on separation.Stillness is ineffable freedom. Everything is ineffably free in true stillness. She is inexhaustible. She is endless. ‘After fire, a still small voice.’"
"So, true stillness is of God, from God, and wholly in God. With this we begin to enter into our rest. We begin to rest in peace. We begin to taste the bright mysteries of holy dying, that overcome death through death.Stillness is resurrection. It overcomes death by death. It reveals glory to wisdom. It unveils vision and wonder. Such wonder binds confused, divided thoughts. It is serene."
"Genuine wisdom astounds. It astonishes. It amazes. It transmutes pious opinion into silent reverence. It penetrates dogmas to unveil their core. It reveals. It illumines. It deifies. The two-edged sword was never totally lost, like lost gospels in caves and sand. But when the ancient neglected texts are found again, wisdom knows her own."
"In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus says that whoever drinks his wisdom, shall become like him. God’s ‘I AM’ is recognized as ‘I AM’ from ‘I AM.’ The Name of God is all consuming fire. Yet the bush is not consumed."
"In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus says we all come from the light, destined to be children of light, chosen of the living Father. Our origin is light, and our end is light, and when we reside in primordial light, we awaken to the light of the glory of the age to come."
"In the Odes of Solomon, Christ says, “I opened the gates that were shut; and I broke in pieces the bars of iron. My fetters grew hot and melted before me, and nothing seemed to me to be shut, because I was the opening of everything.” He also says his prayer was his love, releasing the prisoner’s bonds. Such prayer, inspired by the Spirit, inspires intercession in the desert in the spirit of liberating openness. Ineffable openness is eternally open to love’s openness to love, eternally overcoming separation at the heart of separation. Eternal oneness is eternally one with love’s overcoming of separation at the heart of separation. Uncreated presence is eternally present at the heart of separation, overcoming separation. So when love assumes separation to overcome separation, separation dissolves. When oneness assumes confusion to cure confusion, confusion is released. When presence assumes absence to undo absence, absence transmutes into ever present completeness."
"I am ‘I AM,’ thy God."
"As just remarked, there are two main forms of ecstatic longing for God:"
"The source and ground of our distractive thoughts is the fragmented state of our memory. The memory was originally simple and one-pointed, but as a result of the fall its natural powers have been perverted: it has lost its recollectedness in God and has become compound instead of simple, diversified instead of onepointed."
"We recover the original state of our memory by restoring it to its primal simplicity, when it will no longer act as a source of evil and destructive thoughts. For Adam's disobedience has not only deformed into a weapon of evil the soul's simple memory of what is good; it has also corrupted all its powers and quenched its natural appetite for virtue. The memory is restored above all by constant mindfulness of God consolidated through prayer, for this spiritually elevates the memory from a natural to a supranatural state."
"He who practises hesychasm must acquire the following five virtues, as a foundation on which to build: silence, self-control, vigilance, humility and patience."
"Nothing so fills the heart with contrition and humbles the soul as solitude embraced with self-awareness, and utter silence."
"Noetic prayer is an activity initiated by the cleansing power of the Spirit and the mystical rites celebrated by the intellect."
"For beginners prayer is like a joyous fire kindled in the heart;"
"According to theologians, noetic, pure, angelic prayer is in its power wisdom inspired by the Holy Spirit."
"The short ladder of spiritual progress – which is at the same time both small and great – has five rungs leading to perfection."
"A divine philosopher is he who through ascetic purification and noetic contemplation has achieved a direct union with God, and is a true friend of God, in that he esteems and loves the supreme, creative and true wisdom above every other love, wisdom and knowledge."
"The principal forms of contemplation are eight in number."
"The energy of grace is the power of spiritual fire that fills the heart with joy and gladness, stabilizes, warms and purifies the soul, temporarily stills our provocative thoughts, and for a time suspends the body's impulsions. The signs and fruits that testify to its authenticity are tears, contrition, humility, self-control, silence, patience, self-effacement and similar qualities, all of which constitute undeniable evidence of its presence."
"When you sit in stillness, by day or by night, free from random thoughts and continuously praying to God in humility, you may find that your intellect becomes exhausted through calling upon God and that your body and heart begin to feel pain because of the intense concentration with which you unceasingly invoke the name of Jesus, with the result that you no longer experience the warmth and joy that engender ardour and patience in the spiritual aspirant. If this is the case, stand up and psalmodize, either by yourself or with a disciple who lives with you, or occupy yourself with meditation on some scriptural passage or with the remembrance of death, or with manual labour or with some other thing, or give your attention to reading, preferably standing up so as to involve your body in the task as well. ... With the help of prayer ignore all images, whether sensory or conceptual, that rise up from the heart. For stillness means the shedding of all thoughts for a time, even those which are divine and engendered by the Spirit; otherwise through giving them our attention because they are good we will lose what is better."
"... through them [the disciples of Gregory of Sinai] their master’s writings and oral teaching spread through the monasteries and royal courts of Eastern Europe. Byzantium, Bulgaria, Serbia, Rumania and Russia were all affected by this new cosmopolitan movement: monks, churchmen, writers and artists, travelling from country to country – ‘wandering for the sake of the Lord’, as a fourteenth-century writer put it – found themselves in a similar spiritual and cultural environment; and through this ‘Hesychast International’, whose influence extended far beyond the ecclesiastical sphere, the different parts of the Byzantine Commonwealth were, during the last hundred years of its existence, linked to each other and to its centre perhaps more closely than ever before."
"Considered in its entirety, the work of Nikodimos represents an original synthesis between the hesychast movement imported from Mount Athos and the artistic and literary influences coming from Serbia. Contrary to the currents that supply the first literary school in Moldavia established at the monastery of Neamț by the monk Gabriel (1424–49), it stands apart from the Bulgarian tradition of the fourteenth century. Nikodimos’s relations with Patriarch Euthymius of Trnovo merely assume the character of an episode without profound implications for the life of his foundations."
"A hesychast missionary in the spirit of St Gregory the Sinaite, whom he had known in his youth, St Nicodemus established his rule of life in the many communities founded by himself or his disciples in the three Romanian lands. Romanian monasticism thus owes to him its hesychastic orientation in the 14th century. The resulting cultural and spiritual blossoming was to continue, more or less without interruption, for the next three centuries."
"This stillness, this silence, is everywhere, pervades, all, is the very essence of the Holy Mountain. ... But this stillness, this silence, is far more than a mere absence of sound. It has a positive quality, a quality of fullness, of plenitude, of the eternal Peace which is there reflected in the veil of the Mother of God, enshrouding and protecting her Holy Mountain, offering inner silence, peace of heart, to those who dwell there and to those who come with openness of heart to seek this blessing."
"Here every stone breathes prayers."
"There came to my mind an Athonite anecdote, typical of the monastic sense of humour, about an elder who was celebrating the pre-dawn service with his disciples. Disturbed by the noise of the nearby frogs, he went out of the chapel to remonstrate. ‘Frogs,’ he said, ‘we’ve just completed the Midnight Office and are starting Matins: would you mind keeping quiet until we’ve finished.’ Whereupon the frogs replied, ‘We’ve just completed Matins and are starting the First Hour: would you mind keeping quiet until we’ve finished.’"
"I have never actually seen wolves on Mount Athos, although in the past I have noted what I took to be their footprints in the sandy paths not far from the northern frontier of the monastic territory. No doubt they were observing me from the undergrowth nearby. The presence of wolves on the Mountain, at least as recently as the 1970s, always struck me as a reassuring sign. For wolves in their own way are hesychasts, who dislike disturbance and noisy intrusion from human beings. So long as they continued to make their home on Athos, this was an indication that the Mountain remained still a place of silence and seclusion. Their disappearance troubles me."
"Peut-être les moines qu’on appelle « gyrovagues » exaltaient-ils particulièrement notre condition d’étranger éternel : marchant sans cesse de monastère en monastère, sans être fixé – ils n’ont pas tous disparu ; il en reste, paraît-il, quelques-uns encore sur le mont Athos : ils marchent leur vie durant sur les sentiers étroits des montagnes, tournant en rond, s’endormant à la chute du jour dans l’endroit où leurs pieds les a portés ; ils passent leur vie à marmonner des prières en marchant tout le jour, sans destination ni but, ici ou là, au hasard du croisement des sentiers, à tourner, retourner, ils marchent sans aller nulle part, illustrant par l’éternel cheminement leur état d’étrangers définitifs au monde d’ici-bas."
"God is infinite Nous and man, through his nous, is both related to God, and also approaches Him. God is infinite Love, and man, with a purified heart, experiences God. God is simple, and man believes with simplicity, and struggles humbly and in a philotimo-filled way, and experiences the mysteries of God."
"The greatest memorial service for both the people in the world and our ancestors is our spiritual progress, because then they are entitled to divine help. This is apart from our prayer, which is bold before God, and the joy which our grandparents feel over us, their pride and joy. But if we lead a bad life, they suffer threefold."
"While the superior rejoiced and was delighted with Romanos' obedience, zeal and propriety, in his mind Romanos pined away, desiring that he might again abandon the tumult of the world, and that he might live in a a deserted place far from men, like the turtledove which loves solitude. He had learned about Paroria where a monastery was being built by a great man before God, Gregory of Sinai, who brought souls to God each day by the music of his words and the example of his life. Romanos was engrossed in planning a departure and wished he had wings so that he could fly through the air and get there as quickly as possible. So great a yearning did word of that holy man inspire in him, as I have heard him relate. From that time on then, while Zagora held his body, the wilderness of Paroria possessed his soul. Just as the thirstiest deer seeks the fountainhead he thirsted, and he asked God that he might go to Paroria."
"Things being thus, they learned that the wilderness of Paroria was faring well since Emperor Alexander had severely threatened the robbers and plunderers, who used to make trials for the servants of God, that if they did not stop, they would be executed. Those holy servants, having heard carefully the good news, abandoned Zagora and headed back to Paroria, their beloved wilderness and retreat. Truly this was such a place which on sight alone could bring tears of compunction to God-loving souls. For dwelling places, as it is written somewhere in the Scriptures, have been created to lead our mind to contemplation. At any rate, as we said, they went there quickly, and arriving near the monastery of the great Gregory, they built cells and settled down."
"Hadji-Georgis had had profuse, guileless love for everyone. He had always been peaceful, long-suffering, and forgiving. He had had a big heart, which is why it had been able to hold all things and all people exactly as they were. He had somehow become incorporeal. By having lived the Angelic life, he had become an angel and flown to the Heavens because he had not held onto anything, neither passions of the soul, nor material items. He had cast them all aside, which is also why he had soared to great heights."