c) Lectio: She read the whole Bible two or three times a year, copying out what was especially useful for her. She chose Thagaste in order to study Scripture there under Alypius, the friend of Augustine. She was “philologos”—a lover of literature, reading, and the Bible “was never out of her holy hands.” She liked private recitation of the whole Psalter—she completed privately the psalms not said in Office that day (Daily Psalter). She was perfect in both Greek and Latin; she read all the Patristic treatises she could get.
d) Austerity: When she was rich, the embroidery of a rich garment she wore had scratched her tender skin and caused inflammation. But now she wore the maphorion [garment covering the head and shoulders] and cowl of coarse hair cloth. She had obtained strength from the Lord by prayer. “Ask and you shall receive.”
e) Reclusion: She wanted perpetual reclusion in North Africa but renounced it in order to maintain contact with people who needed her. But she spent a great part of her time in her cell, in solitude, lying in a box.
Her Monastic Life in the East
She went to the Holy Land as an integral part of Sequela Christi “the following of Christ.” She meets St. Cyril at Alexandria. Reaching Jerusalem, she gives money in secret through others, and is registered among poor pilgrims. She lives at the Holy Sepulchre, praying there at night.
In Egypt, she tries to give gold to hermits, but is blocked by their refusals. She meets the Abbot of Tabenna, Victor, and visits Nitria and the desert of Cells. “The hermits received her as a man.” On the Mount of Olives she retires to her mother’s cell, and encloses herself there in sackcloth and ashes, after Epiphany. Then she builds a convent for about ninety nuns, with a special emphasis on rehabilitating fallen women.
[Her] ascetic teaching: Its basis is:
a) They have come to give their virginity to Christ, body and soul: body—total separation from the world of men; soul—vigilance in prayer, in fear and in the presence of angels, avoiding all evil thoughts (note the Evagrian background).
b) All ascesis is based on purity of love for God and one another. Without this their asceticism is false. The devil can imitate all the virtues but not love and humility.
c) Faith is the essential foundation of all true ascesis.
[Her] practice entails the following:
a) She has them fast, but would guard against pride in fasting. Hence fasting is “the last of the virtues” and for its merit depends on obedience. To neglect other virtues and depend on fasting alone is like a bride who appears in old clothes but only has a pair of very fine shoes. However, they must persevere in fasting with joy and be generous in it. They must enter by this narrow gate.
b) Obedience “consists in this: doing what you do not like to do, for the satisfaction of the one who commands you, and doing violence to yourself for the sake of Christ.”
c) Liturgy. They rose at night after a short sleep, “Not having satisfied one’s desire for sleep”—but then returned to bed afterwards. Night Office consisted in “Three responsories, three lessons and fifteen antiphons”; there were also “Morning Office” (Lauds); Tierce “because then the Paraclete came upon the Apostles”; Sext “because then Abraham received the Lord”; None “when Peter and John went to the Temple”; Vespers, a time of “special fervor—the hour when the disciples of Emmaus travelled with Christ, the Hour of peace.” There was Mass on Friday, Sunday and Feasts. The church contained relics of Zachary, St. Stephen, and the forty martyrs of Sebaste.
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1 An ancient Roman lineage to which possibly belonged Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony) and many others.
2 The Paradise or Garden of the Holy Fathers: Being Histories of the Anchorites, Recluses, Monks, Coenobites, and Ascetic Fathers of the Deserts of Egypt between A.D. CCL and A.D. CCCC Circiter, ed. and trans. Ernest A. Wallis Budge, 2 vols. (London: Chatto & Windus, 1907), 1:160 (slightly revised).
LECTURE 10
Monasticism in Mesopotamia and Syria
Here the ascetic element is even more emphasized. The monks of Palestine and Mesopotamia in general were more rigid and extreme than the monks of Egypt. Theodoret of Cyrrhus is the main source for information about these monks. [For instance:]
1) St. James of Nisibis, bishop, d. 361, hermit and then bishop—typical of Syrian monasticism—lived on wild herbs, without fixed abode, slept in a cave in winter, outdoors in summer.
2) St. Aphraates, a Persian abbot and then bishop.
3) St. Ephrem, deacon, lived temporarily as anchorite outside Edessa, [a] famous Syrian liturgical poet.
4) St. John Chrysostom lived for a time (six years) as monk and hermit alternately, outside Antioch and wrote in defense of monastic life and on compunction. He is noted more as bishop and Doctor, defender of orthodoxy. We shall see later that he welcomes Cassian and Egyptian Origenist monks to Constantinople.
The Stylites
The Stylites—column sitters—first made their appearance in Syria. St. Symeon Stylites, born in Antioch, died 459, is one of the great saints of the fifth century. He first chained himself to a rock, then got a pillar ten feet high, changed to one thirty feet high and finally on one sixty-three feet high, renowned throughout the world for his miracles. After the death of Symeon there was a bitter struggle for his relics between the Patriarch of Antioch and the monks who had settled around his pillar. [The] Patriarch got them with the help of soldiers. But afterwards the relics were taken to Constantinople. A huge basilica was built around the abandoned pillar and was a great center of pilgrimages, comparable to Lourdes or Fatima today. Celebrations were held there in 1959—fifteenth centenary of his death.
How did stylites live? St. Symeon spent thirty-seven years on top of pillars—thirty of them on the sixty-three-foot pillar. He stood without shelter, protected by a railing. He prayed with metaniae (repeated genuflections). A pilgrim once counted up to 1,244 successive prostrations. He was tied to a post in Lent when he fasted the whole forty days. Other stylites had shelters. Food was hauled up in a basket, provided by faithful and disciples. They preached to the crowds, gave spiritual direction. Those who wanted a “private” interview went up a ladder. Pilgrims came from all over the world: Gaul, Britain, Turkestan.
Other stylites: St. Daniel, St. Symeon the Younger, St. Jonas. Attempts at stylitism in the West were stopped by bishops.
What attitude should we take toward this kind of sanctity? The fashion has been to disparage it, to treat it as something absurd and grotesque. This is not the full truth. It was a witness to the divine transcendency, and to the superiority of the spirit. Precisely its uselessness was what made this witness powerful. If we are to fully understand our contemplative vocation, we must be able to understand the uselessness, the “folly” of the stylites. The folly of God is greater than the wisdom of men. It was a protest against the worldly preoccupation with politics, and politico-theological struggles, with earthly and ecclesiastical ambition, etc. Symeon converted thousands of pagans.
However, it must be admitted that the monasticism of Palestine and Syria represents an extreme against which St. Benedict himself is clearly in reaction. We have a story of St. Benedict reproving a hermit who chained himself to a rock. St. Benedict inveighed against the independence and irresponsibility of monks who wandered about without superiors. The Sarabaites and Gyrovagues flourished mostly in Syria—monks without ecclesiastical control. Great deviations occurred, and monasticism would quickly have been ruined if there had not been intervention on the part of men like St. Basil to bring in sobriety and organization. On the other hand, we must not imagine that Basilian monasticism was something tightly and rigidly organized either. But there was the control of obedience and the sobering influence of discretion.
Hermits of Nitria and Scete
We now come to the heart of our subject: the great monastic centers of northern Egypt, where Cassian and Germanus wandered about consulting the “old men”—the land of the Apothegmata [“Sayings”], and of the other famous Desert Father te
xts. First, let us list summarily the more famous collections of stories, proverbs, and other Desert Father material. This is in addition to the Life of Anthony, etc. mentioned above.
1) Historia Monachorum, translated by Rufinus.
2) Historia Lausiaca, by Palladius, disciple of St. John Chrysostom—gets its name from the fact that it was dedicated to Lausus, chamberlain of Theodosius II. Dom C. Butler made a famous English translation and edition (1904). It was written before Cassian’s Conferences, in 419–20.
3) The Apothegmata [“Sayings”] or Verba Seniorum. This is without doubt the best source for the spirituality of the Desert Fathers, better even than Cassian. Its advantages:
a) This collection represents predominantly the spirit of the hermits of Scete, and Scete was the center of the purest and most perfect eremitism in Egypt.
b) It is completely simple and colloquial, without frills or decorations, and seems to go back faithfully to the actual manner of expression of the Fathers themselves. In doing so, it gives us a picture not of exalted and extraordinary men living in an atmosphere of marvelous spiritual events, but of simple and humble hermits fleeing everything savoring of pride and display, preferring all that is obscure and unobtrusive.
c) It is concerned with the spiritual life and not with strange and marvelous tales.
d) The Fathers are content to confine themselves exclusively to practical and simple matters of everyday life. They generally refuse even to venture a comment on Scripture or any form of theological doctrine. They just discuss the ways of confronting problems of ascetic life.
e) The stories are taken from life, many of them consisting simply of “words of salvation” or fragments of spiritual advice given by a master to a disciple.
f) The doctrine of the Apothegmata is marked above all by its simplicity and discretion. It is a doctrine that can be followed and is basically healthy, as opposed to the exaggerations that are found in some of the other sources.
g) The Apothegmata are more purely Coptic. The other sources represent mixtures from Syrian and other Oriental sources. We can distinguish clearly between the humble and practical spirituality of the original Coptic monks, and the intellectualism of Evagrius, for instance, Macarius also.
Apothegmata, properly so called, “words of salvation,” [are] brief proverbial statements, and longer stories with a practical moral, illustrating a truth about the hermit life.
Characteristics of Desert Spirituality
The primary concern of the desert life is to seek God, to seek salvation. The salutation common among Desert Fathers was “sotheis”—mayest thou be saved. Many of the sentences are simply answers to the question, “What ought I to do?” Hence the answers are simple, succinct summaries of some of the main obligations of a monk in the primitive sense.
But remember, these were bits of advice given to individuals; hence they are responses to special individual needs, and are not in themselves the universal answer to all questions. They must be pieced together and seen in perspective—must be seen in light of special circumstances.
[And] remember that there was no set rule for the hermit—only certain rather free prevalent customs. He had to make his own rule of life, based on the individual teaching and advice received from the Fathers. He had to know what to accept and what to discard as useless to him. The memorable phrases which have been preserved are remarkable not so much for their special depth, as for the fact that someone was struck very deeply by them and held on to them as coming from God. They became a rule of life for him.
There was no irresponsible license in the true Desert Fathers. The Desert Fathers were not necessarily magic directors, wizard gurus, who had a series of infallible answers on all points. They were humble and sagacious men, of few words, whom the Holy Ghost used for His purposes. We must know how to take advantage of direction in this sense. If we seek our director as a kind of oracle, he will always fail us. If we are prepared to listen to him in simplicity and accept, with faith, some ordinary observation of his as coming from God, then he will be able to help us. This faith requires not absolute blindness of the reason and common sense: it requires a certain trust and response on our part, an awareness that this is fitting for our case, which faith intensifies and enables us to see in an entirely supernatural light. For this, we must be open and trusting. We must be able to let go a little. If we cannot trust any director, then we will have more trials and difficulties. Confidence in a director is a grace to be prayed for. In any case we all should be attentive to special “words of salvation” that come to us in reading, sermons, conferences or direction, as God’s special words for us.
What should the monk do? [Here are] a few examples taken at random from our small collection What Ought I to Do?1 A general summary of the virtues of monastic life:
An elder said: Here is the monk’s life-work / obedience / meditation / not judging others / not reviling / not complaining. For it is written: You who love the Lord / hate evil. So this is the monk’s life—not to walk in agreement with an unjust man / nor to look with his eyes upon evil / not to go about being curious / and neither to examine nor to listen to the business of others. Not to take anything with his hands / but rather to give to others. Not to be proud in his heart / nor to malign others in his thoughts. Not to fill his stomach / but in all things to behave with discretion. Behold / in all this you have the monk.
Have no confidence in your own virtuousness, do not worry about a thing once it has been done, control your tongue and your belly.
This saying of St. Anthony is simple and wise, basic—humility, trust, and temperance. Note the wisdom of the Desert Fathers who insist on not worrying about things that can no longer be changed. What is done is done. Don’t fret over it, but do not do it again—true penance.
* To accept illness and temptation with thanksgiving.
* Purity of intention and obedience.
* Work—the monk must not be idle—but must spend his life in solitary work supporting himself and aiding the weaker brethren.
* Silence—meaning not mutism but wise control of speech, especially refraining from all vainglory in talk, all showing off knowledge, all desire to prove one’s point or justify oneself. Silence is for the sake of contemplation—cf. Arsenius, “Fuge, tace, quiesce.” “Fly, be silent, and rest in prayer.” Arsenius reminds us that the monk is above all one who renounces the world and flies from it. Why? Because possessions lay one open to attacks of demons. Hence importance of poverty, and even strict poverty in the monastic life itself—no compromise with spirit of proprietorship, even in the best and most necessary of things. One should not have anything he is not willing to part with, even if it is taken violently and unjustly.
* Hence solitude: one must “stay in the cell, the cell will teach you all things.” The desert life should lead to contemplation, but by the way of humility. A monk should not just be content with his little ascetic routine: he should seek to become “all fire.” He should be “all eye like the cherubim and seraphim.”
But the way to contemplation is barred by insuperable obstacles, in anyone who is uncharitable and despises others, who is attached to exterior penance for its own sake, or is in any way proud, attached to himself, noisy, turbulent, arrogant, etc. The hallmark of the true saint in the desert as everywhere else is charity. And this simple charity is both active and passive: active in the sense that it is all ready to perform works of mercy, when the occasion arises, and passive in the sense that it supports every injury and trial with heroic patience. The charity of the Desert Fathers is outstanding and it is what most impresses the readers of the Verba Seniorum. In other collections, their asceticism and miracles tend to be more prominent.
Some other characteristics of desert spirituality:
The quality of being a stranger or an exile, a man without any fixed abode or home, in the likeness of Christ who had nowhere to rest His head. But this includes stability in a cell, except certain cases like Bessarion who “wandered about
the desert without any more cares than a bird of the heavens [but always stayed in the same general area, otherwise no stability] . . . no house, no desire to travel, no books . . . entirely freed from all bodily desires, resting only on the firmness of his faith.”
Anachoresis—solitude. The Desert Fathers repeat the Neoplatonic maxim, “alone with the Alone,” solus ad Solum. This does not exclude charity as we have seen. Solitude, with work and prayer, forms one of the three great obligations of the desert monk. These three together are his very life itself. But solitude is combined with the strict obligation of hospitality and instruction. The guest sent by God is to be received as Christ Himself, and entertained. The obligation of fasting yields to the primary obligation of charity; one breaks fast to eat with [a] guest. A disciple or a tempted brother must be counseled and helped.
Humility—is the essence of charitable social relations, on both sides.
Penthos—Compunction, also is of the very essence of desert spirituality, allied with fear of the Lord and humility: against useless and empty laughter. The life of the Desert Father is serious, and penthos is an instrument for interiority. It drives one into the depths, makes one thoughtful, hesitant to trust in his own words and opinions, ready to listen, aware of his failings. But it is combined with courage and hope in God. It is not mere morbid pessimism. Abbot Isaias was told by Abbot Macarius: “Flee from men” (this was a word of salvation) but he asked for explanation. Fleeing from men, according to Macarius, implies “to remain seated in your cell and to bewail your sins.” Hence the connection between penthos and anachoresis, euche (prayer) and humility—also stability. This shows the important and vital interconnection between all the virtues in an organic whole, in the desert life. Note also, devotion to Our Lord and to the Blessed Mother is connected with penthos. Abbot Poemen comes out of ecstasy and says: “My spirit was there where holy Mary the Mother of God, wept at the foot of the Savior’s Cross. And I would very much like always to weep like that.” This sort of thing, thought to be characteristic of devotio moderna, is often found in the simplicity of the Desert Fathers.
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