Holy. Ignatius Bryanchaninova warnings about false elders and the impossibility of obeying them. "Invisible abuse: the advice of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov)

The head of virtues is prayer; their foundation is fasting. Fasting is constant moderation in food with prudent recklessness in it.

A proud man! you dream so much and so highly of your mind, but it is in perfect and continuous dependence on the stomach.

The law of fasting, while outwardly the law for the womb, is essentially a law for the mind.

The mind, this king in man, if it wants to enter into the rights of its autocracy and preserve them, must first of all submit to the law of fasting. Only then will he be constantly cheerful and bright; only then can he dominate the desires of the heart and body; only with constant sobriety can he study the commandments of the gospel and follow them. The foundation of virtues is fasting.

The newly created man, introduced to paradise, has been given the only commandment, the commandment to fast. Of course, one commandment was given because it was sufficient to preserve primordial man in his integrity.

The commandment did not speak about the quantity of food, but only prohibited the quality. Let those who recognize fasting only in the quantity of food, and not in quality, be silent. As they delve deeper into the experiential study of fasting, they will see the importance of the quality of food.

So important is the commandment of fasting, announced by God to man in paradise, that, together with the commandment, he pronounced the threat of execution for breaking the commandment. The execution consisted in the defeat of people by eternal death.

And now, sinful death continues to afflict those who break the holy commandment of fasting. He who does not observe moderation and due discernment in food, cannot preserve either virginity or chastity, cannot curb anger, indulges in laziness, despondency and sadness, becomes a slave to vanity, a dwelling place of pride, which is introduced into a person by his carnal state, which is the most luxurious and well-fed meals.

The command to fast has been renewed or confirmed by the Gospel. Listen to yourself, but not when your hearts are aggravated by overeating and drunkenness, - the Lord bequeathed. Eating and drunkenness impart stupidity not only to the body, but to the mind and heart, that is, they introduce a person to a fleshly state for their soul and body.

On the contrary, fasting introduces a Christian into a spiritual state. Purified by fasting, he is humble in spirit, chaste, modest, silent, subtle in heart feelings and thoughts, light in body, capable of spiritual exploits and speculation, capable of accepting Divine grace.

The carnal man is completely immersed in sinful pleasures. He is voluptuous in body, heart, and mind; he is not only capable of spiritual pleasure and the acceptance of Divine grace, but also of repentance. He is generally incapable of spiritual pursuits: he is nailed to the ground, drowned in materiality alive - dead in soul.

Woe to you saturation now: as if hung up! This is the utterance of the Word of God to those who break the commandment of holy fasting. What will you eat in eternity, when you have learned here the only satiety with material brushes and material pleasures that are not in heaven? What will you eat in eternity when you have not tasted a single heavenly good? How can you eat and enjoy heavenly blessings when you have not acquired any sympathy for them, have acquired disgust?

The daily bread of Christians is Christ. The insatiable satiety of this bread is satiety and salvation, to which all Christians are invited.

Be insatiably satiated with the Word of God, insatiably satiated with the fulfillment of the commandments of Christ, insatiably satiate with a meal prepared to resist those who are cold to you, and drink in the cup of the sovereign.

Where do we begin, says St. Macarius the Great, "who have never been engaged in the study of our hearts? Standing outside, we will knock with prayer and fasting, as the Lord commanded: Pull and it will be opened to you."

This feat, which is offered to us by one of the greatest instructors of monasticism, was the feat of the holy apostles. From among him, they were vouchsafed to hear the broadcasting of the Spirit. To those who serve them the Lord, says the writer of their deeds, and to those who are fasting, the Holy Spirit speaks: separate Me Barnabas and Saul for work, on their call. Then you fasted and prayed, and laid your hands on nya, letting them go. From the midst of the feat, in which fasting and prayer were copulated, the command of the Spirit was heard about the calling of the pagans to Christianity.

Wonderful copulation of fasting with prayer! Prayer is powerless if it is not based on fasting, and fasting is fruitless if prayer is not created on it.

Fasting removes a person from the passions of the flesh, and prayer fights against the passions of the soul, and, having conquered them, penetrates the entire composition of a person, purifies him; into the purified verbal temple, she will introduce God.

He who, without cultivating the land, sows it: he destroys the grain, and instead of wheat reaps thorns. Likewise, if we sow the seeds of prayer without thinning the flesh, then instead of righteousness we will bear fruit sin. Prayer will be destroyed and plundered by various vain and vicious thoughts and dreams, defiled by voluptuous sensations. Our flesh originated from the earth, and unless it is cultivated like the earth, it can never bear the fruit of righteousness.

On the contrary, if someone cultivates the land with great care and expense, but leaves it un-sown, then it is thickly covered with tares. So, when the body is thinned by fasting, and the soul is not cultivated by prayer, reading, humility: then fasting becomes the parent of numerous tares-spiritual passions: high-mindedness, vanity, contempt.

What is the passion of gluttony and drunkenness? Having lost its correctness, the natural desire for food and drink, which requires a much larger quantity and varied quality of them than is needed to maintain life and bodily strength, on which excessive nutrition acts contrary to its natural purpose, acts harmful, weakening and destroying them.

The desire for food is straightened by a simple meal and abstinence from satiety and enjoyment of food. First, one must give up satiety and pleasure: this refines the desire for food, and receives rightness. When desire becomes right, then it is satisfied with mere food.

On the contrary, the desire for food, satisfied with satiety and pleasure, is dulled. To excite it, we resort to a variety of delicious foods and drinks. The desire appears at first to be satisfied; then it becomes more whimsical, and, finally, turns into a painful passion, seeking incessant pleasure and satiety, constantly being dissatisfied.

Intending to devote ourselves to serving God, let us put fasting as the basis of our exploit. An essential quality of any foundation must be unshakable firmness: otherwise it is impossible for a building to stand on it, no matter how solid the building itself is. And we in no way, never, under any pretext, will allow ourselves to break the fast with satiety, especially drunkenness.

The Holy Fathers admit that the best fasting is eating food once a day that is not full. Such fasting does not relax the body by prolonged non-eating and does not burden it with an excess of food, moreover, it keeps it capable of soul-saving activity. Such fasting does not represent any striking feature, and therefore the fasting person has no reason for the exaltation to which a person is so inclined about virtue itself, especially when it is sharply exposed.

He who is engaged in bodily labor or is so weak in body that he cannot be content with eating food once a day: he must eat twice. Fasting for a person, not a person for fasting.

But with any use of food, both rare and frequent, satiety is strictly prohibited: it makes a person incapable of spiritual exploits, and opens the door to other carnal passions.

Immoderate fasting, that is, prolonged excessive abstinence in food, is not approved by the Holy Fathers: from immeasurable abstinence and the exhaustion that results from it, a person becomes incapable of spiritual exploits, often turns to gluttony, often falls into a passion of exaltation and pride.

The quality of food is very important: The forbidden fruit of paradise, although it was beautiful in appearance and tasty, but it had a detrimental effect on the soul: it gave it the knowledge of good and evil, and thus destroyed the integrity in which our forefathers were created.

And now food continues to have a strong effect on the soul, which is especially noticeable when drinking wine. This action of food is based on its various effects on flesh and blood, and on the fact that its vapors and gases from the stomach rise to the brain and have an effect on the mind.

For this reason, all smirking drinks, especially bread drinks, are forbidden to the ascetic, as they deprive the mind of sobriety, and thus victory in mental battle. A conquered mind, especially with voluptuous thoughts, delighted with them, is deprived of spiritual grace; acquired by many and long-term labors is lost in a few hours, in a few minutes.

A monk should by no means use wine, said the Monk Pimen the Great. This rule must be followed by every godly Christian who wishes to preserve his childhood and chastity. The Holy Fathers followed this rule, and if they did use wine, it was very rare and with the greatest moderation.

Hot food should be expelled from the meal of a temperate person, as arousing bodily passions. These are pepper, ginger and other spices.

The most natural food is that which is assigned to man by the Creator immediately upon creation - food from the vegetable kingdom: God said to our forefathers: Behold you every herb of seed that sows seed, hedgehog is all on the top of the earth: and every tree that has fruit in itself seed seed, you will be food. Already after the flood, the consumption of meat is allowed.

Vegetable food is the best for the ascetic. It is the least hot blood, the least fattening the flesh; vapors and gases separating from it and ascending to the brain have the least effect on it; finally, it is the healthiest, as it produces the least mucus in the stomach. For these reasons, when using it, with particular convenience, the purity and vigor of the mind is preserved, and with them its power over the whole person; when it is used, passions act weaker, and a person is more capable of engaging in feats of piety.

Fish dishes, especially prepared from large sea fish, have a completely different property: they have a more noticeable effect on the brain, make the body fat, warm the blood, fill the stomach with harmful mucus, especially with frequent and constant use.

These actions are incomparably stronger from the use of meat food: it makes the flesh extremely fat, giving it a special weight, hot blood, its vapors and gases greatly burden the brain. For this reason, it is not at all used by monks, it is the property of people living in the middle of the world, always busy with intense bodily labor. But for them, the constant use of it is harmful.

How! the imaginary clever girls will exclaim here: meat food is allowed to man by God, and do you forbid the use of it? - To this we reply with the words of the Apostle: All the fly is the essence (that is, everything is allowed to me), but not all is for the good: all the fly is the essence, but not all are edifying. We shy away from eating meat not because we consider them unclean, but because they produce a special stupidity in our entire composition, hinder spiritual success.

The Holy Church, by her wise institutions and decrees, allowing Christians living in the middle of the world to eat meat, did not allow their constant use, but divided the times of meat-eating from times to abstaining from meat, from times to sobering up a Christian from his meat-eating. Anyone who observes them can learn from experience such fruit of fasts.

For monastics, it is forbidden to eat meat; it is allowed to eat dairy food and eggs during meat-eating times. On certain times and days, they are allowed to eat fish. But most of the time they can eat only one plant food.

Vegetable food is almost exclusively used by the most zealous devotees of piety, who especially felt the walking of the Spirit of God in themselves due to the aforementioned convenience of this food and its cheapness. For drinking, they use one water, avoiding not only hot and grinning drinks, but also nutritious ones, which are all bread drinks.

The rules of fasting were established by the Church for the purpose of helping her children, as a guide for the entire Christian society. At the same time, it is prescribed for everyone to consider themselves with the help of an experienced and judicious spiritual father, and not to impose on themselves a fast that exceeds strength: because, we repeat, fasting is for a person, and not a person for fasting; the food given for the maintenance of the body must not destroy it.

"If you keep your womb," said St. Basil the Great, - then you will ascend to heaven, but if you do not hold back, then you will be a victim of death. " Under the name of paradise should be understood here a grace-filled prayer state, and under the name of death a passionate state. The blessed state of a person, during his stay on earth, serves as a guarantee of his eternal bliss in heavenly Eden, the fall into the power of sin and into a state of mental death serve as a guarantee of falling into the hellish abyss for eternal torment. Amen.

Sermons and Talks

About Orthodoxy

Living in obedience to the elder

Pharisee

About Orthodoxy

(Word in the first week of Great Lent)

V beloved brethren! The beginning of our word in the week of Orthodoxy is quite natural to be the question: what is Orthodoxy?

Orthodoxy is true knowledge of God and worship of God; Orthodoxy is worship of God by Spirit and Truth; Orthodoxy is the glorification of God by true knowledge of Him and worship of Him; Orthodoxy is the glorification by God of a person, a true servant of God, by the granting of the grace of the All-Holy Spirit to him. The Spirit is the Glory of Christians 1. Where there is no Spirit, there is no Orthodoxy.

There is no Orthodoxy in the teachings and philosophies of men: a false-named reason reigns in them - the fruit of the fall. Orthodoxy is the teaching of the Holy Spirit, given by God to men for salvation. Where there is no Orthodoxy, there is no salvation. "He who wants to be saved, first of all it is fitting for him to keep the catholic faith, but if anyone who is whole and innocent does not keep it, except for every bewilderment, he will perish forever."

A precious treasure is the teaching of the Holy Spirit! It is taught in Holy Scripture and in the Holy Tradition of the Orthodox Church. A precious treasure is the teaching of the Holy Spirit! It is the guarantee of our salvation. Precious, irreplaceable, incomparable for each of us is our blessed lot in eternity: as much precious, as much beyond any price, and the guarantee of our blessedness is the teaching of the Holy Spirit.

In order to preserve this pledge for us, the Holy Church today counts publicly those teachings that were generated and published by Satan, which are an expression of enmity towards God, which slander our salvation, rob it from us. Like predatory wolves, like deadly snakes, like tates and murderers, the Church denounces these teachings, protecting us from them and calling out from perdition those deceived by them, she betrays these teachings and those who stubbornly adhere to them to anathema.

The word anathema signifies excommunication, rejection. When the Church gives anathema to any teaching, this means that the teaching contains blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and for salvation must be rejected and eliminated, just like poison is removed from food. When a person surrenders to anathema, it means that the person has assimilated the blasphemous teaching for himself irrevocably, depriving them of salvation for himself and those neighbors to whom he communicates his way of thinking. When a person decides to leave the blasphemous teaching and accept the teaching, the content of the Orthodox Church, then he is obliged, according to the rules of the Orthodox Church, to anathematize the false teaching that he hitherto contained and which destroyed him, alienating him from God, keeping him in enmity to God, in blaspheming the Holy One. Spirit, in fellowship with Satan.

The meaning of anathema is the meaning of spiritual ecclesiastical healing against an illness in the human spirit that causes eternal death. All human teachings inflict eternal death, introducing their thinking, drawn from a false mind, from carnal wisdom, this common property of fallen spirits and men, into God's open teaching about God. Human speculation introduced into the teaching of the Christian faith is called heresy, and following this teaching is called evil.

The Apostle also counts heresies among the deeds of the flesh4. They belong to the deeds of the flesh by their source, the fleshly wisdom, which is death, which is enmity against God, which does not obey the law of God, it can be lower. They belong to the deeds of the flesh in their consequences. Having alienated the human spirit from God, uniting him with the spirit of Satan according to his main sin - blasphemy, they subject him to the enslavement of passions, as abandoned by God, as devoted to his own fallen nature. Their unreasonable heart is darkened, says the Apostle about the wise men who deviated from the true knowledge of God: the verb to be wise, objurodesh, substituting the truth of God in a lie: for this, for the sake of giving them up, God in the passion of dishonesty. The passions of dishonor are various kinds of lustful passions. The behavior of the heresiarchs was depraved: Apollinarius had an adulterous relationship7, Eutykhios was especially enslaved by the passion of avarice, 8 Arius was depraved to the point of incredible. When his chant, "Thalia," began to be read at the first Council of Nicaea, the Fathers of the Council shut up their ears, refused to hear shame, which could never come to the mind of a pious man. Thalia was burned. Fortunately for Christianity, all copies of it have been destroyed: there is historical information left to us that this work breathed frantic debauchery9. Many works of the latest heresiarchs are similar to Thalia: in them terrible blasphemy is combined and mixed with expressions of terrible, inhuman debauchery and blasphemy. Blessed are those who have never heard or read these eruptions of hell. When reading them, the union of the spirit of the heresiarchs with the spirit of Satan becomes evident.

Heresies, being a deed of the flesh, the fruit of carnal wisdom, were invented by fallen spirits. Flee godless heresies, says Saint Ignatius the God-bearer, the essence of the devil's invention, the beginning is the evil serpent10. This should not be surprising: fallen spirits descended from the height of spiritual dignity, they fell into fleshly wisdom more than humans. People have the ability to move from carnal to spiritual wisdom; fallen spirits are deprived of this opportunity. People are not so strongly influenced by fleshly wisdom, because in them the natural good is not destroyed, as in spirits, by a fall. In humans, good is mixed with evil, and therefore obscene; in the fallen spirits, evil alone reigns and operates. The fleshly wisdom in the realm of spirits has received the most extensive, complete development that it can attain. Their main sin is their frenzied hatred of God, expressed in terrible, incessant blasphemy. They became proud of God Himself; they turned obedience to God, natural to creatures, into continuous opposition, into irreconcilable enmity. From this their fall is deep, and the plague of eternal death with which they are struck is incurable. Their essential passion is pride; they are dominated by monstrous and foolish vanity; find delight in all kinds of sin, constantly revolve in them, passing from one sin to another. They grovel in love of money, in gluttony, and in adultery11. Not being able to commit carnal sins bodily, they commit them in dreaming and feeling; they have assimilated into a disembodied nature the vices inherent in the flesh; they have developed these unnatural vices in themselves incomparably more than how much they can be developed between people12. Falling from heaven, - says the Prophet about the fallen cherubim, - the day of the rising in the morning, crushing to the ground. You advertise in your mind: I will ascend to heaven, I will put my throne above the stars, I will be like the Most High. Now you have descended into hell and into the foundations of the earth; you will be overthrown on the mountains, like a dead man13.

Fallen spirits, containing in themselves the beginning of all sins, try to draw people into all sins with a purpose and a thirst for their destruction. They involve us in various pleasing to the flesh, in greed, in popularity, painting before us the objects of these passions with the most seductive painting. In particular, they try to draw into pride, from which they vegetate, as from the seeds of a plant, enmity and blasphemy. The sin of blasphemy, which is the essence of all heresy, is the most serious sin, as a sin belonging to the rejected spirits proper, and constituting their most distinctive feature. Fallen spirits try to cover up all sins with a specious mask, which is called justification in the ascetic Fatherland writings14. They do this with the aim of making people more comfortable to be deceived, easier to agree to accept sin. They do exactly the same with blasphemy: they try to cover it up with a magnificent name, magnificent eloquence, sublime philosophy. A terrible weapon in the hands of the spirits - heresy! Through heresy, they have destroyed entire nations, having stolen from them, unnoticed by them, Christianity, replacing Christianity with a blasphemous teaching, embellishing the deadly teaching with the name of a purified, true, restored Christianity. Heresy is a sin committed primarily in the mind. This sin, being accepted by the mind, is communicated to the spirit, pours out on the body, defiles our very body, which has the ability to receive sanctification from communion with Divine grace and the ability to be defiled and infected by communion with fallen spirits. This sin is little perceptible and incomprehensible to those who do not know with the definiteness of Christianity, and therefore easily catches in its nets simplicity, ignorance, indifferent and superficial confession of Christianity. For the time being of the heresy, the Monks John the Great, Gerasim of Jordan and some other saints of God were caught. If the holy men, who spent their lives in exclusive concern for salvation, could not suddenly understand the blasphemy covered by a mask: what to say about those who spend their lives in everyday care, have an insufficient, the most insufficient concept of faith? How can they recognize the deadly heresy when it appears to them adorned with the guise of wisdom, righteousness and holiness? This is the reason why entire human societies and entire nations easily bowed under the yoke of heresy. For this reason, it is very difficult to convert from heresy to Orthodoxy, much more difficult than from unbelief and idolatry. Heresies that come closer to atheism are more conveniently recognized and abandoned than heresies that are less distant from the Orthodox faith, and therefore more veiled. The Roman emperor, Equal to the Apostles, the great Constantine, wrote a letter to Saint Alexander, Patriarch of Alexandria, denouncer of the heresiarch Arius, exhorting him to stop the debate that was breaking the world because of empty words. With these words, which are called empty, the Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ was rejected, Christianity was destroyed15. So ignorance in the holy husband, zealous for piety, was deceived by the intrigue of heresy that was inaccessible to his comprehension.

Heresy, being a grave sin, a mortal sin, is healed quickly and decisively, like a sin of the mind, sincere, from the bottom of his heart, anathema to it. Saint John Climacus said: “The Holy Catholic Church accepts heretics when they sincerely anathematize their heresy16, and immediately honors them with the Holy Mysteries, and those who have fallen into fornication, even if they confessed and forsake their sin, commanded, according to the apostolic rules, to excommunicate for many years from the Holy Mysteries17 ". The impression made by carnal sin remains in a person both through the confession of sin and after his forsaking; the impression made by heresy is immediately destroyed when it is rejected. A sincere and resolute surrender of heresy to anathema is a cure that finally and completely frees the soul from heresy. Without this cure, the poison of blasphemy remains in the human spirit, and never ceases to shake it with bewilderment and doubt, produced by an ineradicable sympathy for heresy; there remain the thoughts charged to the mind of Christ18, making salvation inconvenient for the one possessed by them, possessed by rebellion and opposition to Christ, who was in communion with Satan. Medicine by anathema has always been recognized as necessary by the Holy Church from the terrible disease of heresy. When Blessed Theodorite, Bishop of Kirk, appeared at the fourth ecumenical Council before the Council Fathers, wishing to justify the accusations against him, the Fathers demanded of him, first of all, that he anathematize the heresiarch Nestorius. Theodoret, who rejected Nestorius, but not as decisively as the Church rejected him, wanted to explain himself. The fathers again demanded from him that he decisively, without reservations, anathematize Nestorius and his teaching. Theodoret again expressed a desire to explain himself, but the Fathers again demanded from him anathema to Nestorius, threatening otherwise to recognize Theodoret himself as a heretic. Theodorite pronounced the anathema to Nestorius and all the heretical teachings of that time. Then the Fathers glorified God, proclaimed Theodoret an Orthodox shepherd, and Theodorite no longer demanded an explanation, spewing out from his soul the reasons that aroused the need for explanation19. Such is the attitude of the human spirit to the terrible disease of heresy.

Having heard today the formidable proclamation of spiritual medicine, let us accept it with a true understanding of it, and, applying it to our souls, we will sincerely and decisively reject those disastrous teachings that the Church will anathema to our salvation. If we have always rejected them, then we will be confirmed by the voice of the Church in rejecting them. Spiritual freedom, lightness, strength, which we will certainly feel in ourselves, will testify before us the correctness of church action and the truth of the teaching it proclaims.

The Church proclaims: "Those who captivate their minds into obedience to Divine revelation and those who have fought for it we bless and praise; those who oppose the truth, if they have not repented before the Lord, who awaited their conversion and repentance, if they did not want to follow the Holy Scriptures and Tradition of the primordial Church, we excommunicate and anathematize ".

"Denying the existence of God, and claiming that this world is original, that everything is done in it without God's providence, by chance: anathema."

"To those who say that God is not a spirit, but a substance, who also does not recognize Him as righteous, merciful, wise, omniscient, and utters blasphemy like this: anathema."

"To those who dare to assert that the Son of God is not consubstantial and not equal to the Father, nor is the Spirit removed, - who do not confess that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one God: anathema."

"Those who do not accept the grace of redemption, preached by the Gospel, as the only means to our justification before God: anathema."

"To those who dare to say that the most pure Virgin Mary was not before Christmas, at birth and after the birth of the Virgin: anathema."

"To those who disbelieve, that the Holy Spirit made wise the Prophets and Apostles, through them he announced to us the true way to salvation, testifying to him with miracles that He still dwells in the hearts of faithful and true Christians, guiding them into all truth: anathema."

"To those who reject the immortality of the soul, the end of the century, future judgment and eternal retribution for virtues in heaven, and condemnation for sins: anathema."

"To those who reject the sacraments of Christ's holy Church: anathema."

"To those who reject the councils of the Holy Fathers and their traditions, harmonizing with Divine revelation, piously guarded by the Orthodox Catholic Church: anathema."

Divine Truth became human in order to save us, who perished from the acceptance and assimilation of a murderous lie, if you abide in my word, she says, if you accept my teaching and remain faithful to it, truly you will be my disciples and understand the Truth, and Truth will set you free 21. Only the one who resolutely rejects, will constantly reject all the teachings invented and invented by rejected spirits and people, hostile to the teachings of Christ, the teachings of God, who insinuate its integrity and inviolability, can remain faithful to the teaching of Christ. In an inviolable whole, the frank teaching of God is preserved solely and exclusively in the bosom of the Eastern Orthodox Church. Amen.

1 John VII, 39.

2 Symbol of St. Athanasius the Great, Patriarch of Alexandria. Psalter with the investigation.

3 Ladder. Word 1.

4 Gal. V, 20.

5 Rome. VIII, 6.7.

6 Rome. I, 21.22.25.26.

7 Life of the Monk Ephraim the Syrian.

8 Fleury's Church History. Volume 2, book. 27, ch. 28.

9 Also. Volume 1, book. 10, ch. 36 and book. eleven.

10 Epistle 1 to the Grallians.

11 Saint Ignatius the God-bearer. Epistle to Philippi.

12 Saint Basil the Great calls a fallen spirit the parent of passionate fleshly weaknesses. Prayers for desecration, canon.

13 Isaiah XIV, 12,13,14,15,19.

14 The Monk Abba Dorotheos. A lesson about a hedgehog not to make up your mind.

15 Fleury's Church History. Volume 1, book. 10, ch. 42.

16 Word 15, ch. 49.

Canon 17 of the Council of Laodicea.

18 2 Cor. X, 5.

19 Fleury, A History of Christianity. Volume 2, book. 20, ch. 24.

20 Following the week of Orthodoxy.

21 John VIII, 31, 32.

Living in obedience to the elder

T About what has been said about hermitage and seclusion must also be said about obedience to the elders in the form in which it was among ancient monasticism: such obedience is not given to our time. The Reverend Cassian the Roman says that the Egyptian Fathers, among whom monasticism flourished especially and bore amazing spiritual fruits, "assert that it is good to govern and be governed inherent in the wise, and determine that this is the greatest gift and grace of the Holy Spirit" (Reverend Cassian. On dormitory charter, book 2, ch. 3.).

A necessary condition for such obedience is a Spiritual instructor who, by the will of the Spirit, would mortify the fallen will of the one who obeyed him in the Lord, and in this fallen will he would also mortify all passions. The fallen and corrupted will of man contains in itself the striving for all passions. It is obvious that the mortification of the fallen will, accomplished so majestically and victoriously by the will of the Spirit of God, cannot be accomplished by the fallen will of the mentor, when the mentor himself is still enslaved by the passions.

“If you want to renounce the world,” said Saint Simeon the New Theologian to the monks of his day, “and learn the gospel life, then do not surrender (entrust) yourself to an inexperienced or passionate teacher, so as not to learn, instead of the gospel life, the devil’s life: because good teachers and good teachers, and evil ones - evil; evil fruits will certainly grow from evil seeds.Everyone who does not see and who promises to instruct is a deceiver and casts those who follow him into the pit of destruction according to the word of the Lord: Matthew 15:14. The Monk Simeon, the New Theologian, chapters 32 and 34. Philosophy, part 1)

On another occasion, this great saint of God, advising the monk to act according to the instructions of the spiritual father, adds: "However, let him do this only when he knows that his spiritual father is a partaker of the Spirit, that he will not speak to him contrary to the will of God, but according to his gift and according to the measure of the obedient, he will praise what is pleasing to God and useful to the soul, so as not to turn out to be obedient to man and not to God "(Word 8).

In this sense, the apostle also bequeathed: do not become slaves of men (Cor. 7:23). He commands the very service of the masters to be performed spiritually, and not in the character of those pleasing to people, but in the character of the servants of Christ, doing the will of God in external service to men (Ephesians 6: 6). Am I now seeking favor with people, he says, or with God? Do I try to please people? If I still pleased people, I would not be a slave of Christ. Do you not know to whom we surrender ourselves as slaves in obedience - to a man of fleshly wisdom or to God - to whom as slaves we surrender ourselves to obedience: either to sin and carnal wisdom into death, or into obedience to the righteousness of God and for salvation (Rom 6: 1).

Obedience forms the one who obeys in the image of the one to whom he obeys: And he conceived cattle before the rods, - to speak the Scriptures (Gen. 30, 39). Those elders who take on the role ... let us use this unpleasant word that belongs to the pagan world in order to more accurately explain the matter, which, in essence, is nothing more than soul-destroying acting and the saddest comedy - the elders who take on the role of the ancient holy Elders, not having their spiritual gifts, let them know that their very intention, their very thoughts and their notions about the great monastic deed - obedience are false, that their very way of thinking, their mind, their knowledge are self-deception and demonic charm, which cannot but give fruit corresponding to itself in the instructed by them.

Their wrong and inadequate mood can only for some time remain invisible to the inexperienced beginner led by them, if this new beginner is in any way clever and engages in holy reading with the direct intention of salvation. In due time, it must certainly open up and serve as a pretext for the most unpleasant separation, for the most unpleasant relationship between the elder and the student, for the mental breakdown of both.

It is a terrible thing to accept, out of self-conceit and willfully, responsibilities that can be performed only at the command of the Holy Spirit and the action of the Spirit; It is a terrible thing to imagine oneself as a vessel of the Holy Spirit, while communion with Satan has not yet been dissolved and the vessel does not cease to be defiled by the action of Satan! Such hypocrisy and hypocrisy are awful! It is disastrous for oneself and for one's neighbor, criminal before God, blasphemous.

In vain will they point out to us the Monk Zechariah, who, being in obedience to the inexperienced elder, his father in the flesh, Karion, attained monastic perfection, or to the Monk Akaki, who escaped in the residence of a cruel elder, who drove his disciple prematurely into the grave by inhuman beatings ( Patericon Alphabetical and Memorable Legends Ladder, article 4, ch. 3).

The one and the other were in obedience to insufficient elders, but they were guided by the advice of the Spiritual Fathers, also the most instructive examples, which were in abundance in their eyes: for this reason alone, they could remain in outward obedience to their elders. These cases are outside the general order and rule.

"The manner of action of the Providence of God," said Saint Isaac of Syria, "is quite different from the general human order. You keep to the general order" (Word 1). They will object: the faith of a novice can replace the lack of an elder. It is not true: faith in the truth saves, faith in lies and in demonic delusion destroys, according to the teaching of the Apostle. And with all the unrighteous deception of those who perish, - he says of those who perish arbitrarily, - that they did not accept the love of truth for their salvation. From this, God will send them the action of error, so that they will believe a lie, so that all who did not believe the truth, but loved unrighteousness, be condemned. (2 Sol. 2, 10-12).

By faith it will be for you (Matthew 9:29), - said the Lord, the Truth Itself, to the two blind men and healed them from blindness: he has no right to repeat the words of the Truth-Self, lies and hypocrisy to justify their criminal behavior, by which they destroy their neighbors. There were very, very rare cases when faith, according to the special look of God, acted through sinners, accomplishing the salvation of these sinners.

In Egypt, the elder of the robbers Flavian, intending to rob a certain nunnery, donned monastic attire and came to this monastery. The nuns accepted him as one of the holy fathers, brought him into the church, asking him to bring a prayer for them to God, which Flavian fulfilled against his will and to his surprise. Then a meal was presented to him. At the end of the meal, the nuns washed his feet. In the monastery, one of the sisters was blind and deaf. The nuns brought her in and gave her water, which had washed the stranger's feet. The patient was immediately healed. The nuns glorified God and the holy life of a strange monk, proclaiming a miracle that had happened. The grace of God descended on the elder of the robbers: he brought repentance and from the elder of the robbers transformed himself into a banner-bearing father (Alphabet. Patericon, letter "F").

In the life of Saint Theodore, Bishop of Edessa, we read that the harlot, being forced by the desperate wife of Ader, brought God a prayer for her dead son, that the baby was resurrected through the prayer of the harlot. The harlot, horrified by what had happened to her, immediately abandoned her sinful life, entered a monastery and achieved holiness through an ascetic life (Cheti-Menaion, July, 9th day).

Such events are exceptions. Contemplating them, we will do the right thing if we marvel at the sight and incomprehensible destinies of God, strengthen ourselves in faith and hope; we will act very wrongly if we take these events as a role model. As a guide to our behavior, God Himself has given us the Law of God, that is, Holy Scripture and the Fatherly Scriptures. The Apostle Paul decisively says: We command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to distance yourself from every brother who walks disorderly, and not according to the tradition that has been received from us (2 Thess. 3: 6). Tradition is here called the moral tradition of the Church. It is set forth in the Holy Scriptures and in the writings of the Holy Fathers.

The Monk Pimen the Great gave orders to immediately be separated from the elder, cohabitation with whom turns out to be insane (the Alphabetic Patericon), apparently due to the violation of the moral tradition of the Church by this elder.

It is a different matter when there is no mental harm, but thoughts only confuse: embarrassing thoughts are obviously demonic; we do not need to obey them as acting exactly where we receive the spiritual benefit that they want to steal from us.

Monastic obedience, in the form and character as it took place in the midst of ancient monasticism, is a high spiritual sacrament. Comprehension of him and full imitation of him have become impossible for us: perhaps one pious prudent consideration of him, perhaps the assimilation of his spirit.

Then we will embark on the path of correct judgment and soul-saving prudence, when, reading the experiences and rules of doing the ancient Fathers - their obedience, equally wondrous in leaders and in those led, we will see in modern times the general decline of Christianity, we confess that we are unable to inherit the work of the Fathers in in its fullness and in all its abundance. And that is the great mercy of God to us, great happiness for us, that it is left to us to feed on the grains falling from the spiritual meal of the Fathers. These grains do not constitute the most satisfactory food, but they can, although not without a feeling of need and hunger, protect against mental death.

In the preceding chapter the spiritual residence provided by the Providence of God to our time is named in grains. It is based on guidance in the matter of salvation by the Holy Scriptures and the writings of the Holy Fathers, with advice and edification borrowed from the modern fathers and brethren. In a proper sense, this is the obedience of the ancient monks in a different form, adapted to our weakness, mainly mental.

To the ancient novices, their Spiritual instructors proclaimed immediately and directly the will of God: now the monks themselves must seek the will of God in the Scriptures and therefore be subject to frequent and prolonged perplexities and errors. Prosperity was then rapid in the nature of doing; now it is inert, again according to the quality of doing. Such is the favor of our God in us: we are obliged to obey him and with thanksgiving revere him.

Our modern monastic residence according to the Scriptures and the advice of the fathers and brethren is consecrated by the example of the head of monasticism, the Monk Anthony the Great. He was not in obedience to the elder, but in his new leadership he lived separately and borrowed instructions from Scripture and from different fathers and brethren: from one he learned abstinence, from the other meekness, patience, humility, from another strict vigilance over himself, silence, trying to assimilate the virtue of every virtuous monk, showing obedience to everyone as much as possible, humbling himself before everyone and praying to God incessantly (Cheti-Minei, January 17).

Do you too, the new-beginner, in the same way! Show the abbots and other monastic authorities an unhypocritical and inhuman obedience, obedience alien to flattery and caress, obedience for God's sake. Show obedience to all fathers and brothers in their orders that are not contrary to the Law of God, the charter and order of the monastery and the orders of the monastery authorities. But in no way be obedient to evil, if it happened to you to endure some sorrow for your inhuman pleasing and your firmness.

Consult with virtuous and sensible fathers and brothers; but assimilate their advice with the utmost care and discretion. Don't get carried away by the advice on its initial effect on you! Due to your passion and blindness, you may like other passionate and harmful advice solely out of your ignorance and inexperience, or because it pleases some kind of secret, unknown to you, passion that lives in you.

With weeping and heartfelt sighs, pray to God that He would not allow you to deviate from His all-holy will to follow the fallen human will, yours or your neighbor's, your advisor. Both about your thoughts and about the thoughts of your neighbor, about his advice, consult the Gospel.

Vanity and conceit love to teach and instruct. They don't care about the dignity of their advice! They do not think that they can inflict an incurable ulcer on their neighbors with absurd advice, which is accepted by an inexperienced novice with imprecise trust, with fleshly and blood heat! They need success, whatever the quality of this success, whatever its beginning! They need to impress the novice and morally subdue him! they need human praise. They need to be branded as saints, reasonable, sagacious elders, teachers! They need to feed their insatiable vanity, their pride.

The Prophet's prayer was always righteous, and it is especially righteous now: Save [me], Lord, for the righteous has not become, for there are no faithful among the sons of men. Each one tells a lie to his neighbor; flattering lips, they speak from a false heart. (Psalm 11: 2). A false and hypocritical word cannot but be an evil and pernicious word. Care must be taken against this sentiment.

"Study the Divine Scriptures," says Simeon the New Theologian, "and the writings of the Holy Fathers, especially active, so that, by comparing the teachings and behavior of your teacher and the elder, you can see them (this teaching and behavior), as in a mirror, and understand; agree with Scripture to assimilate and contain in thought; but false and bad to know and reject, so as not to be deceived.

Know that in our day there are many deceivers and false teachers. "

The Monk Simeon lived in the tenth century after the Nativity of Christ, nine centuries before our time: already when the voice of the righteous in the Holy Church of Christ was heard about the lack of true, spirit-bearing leaders, about the multitude of false teachers. As time went on, satisfactory teachers of monasticism became more and more scarce: then the Holy Fathers began to more and more offer guidance in the Holy Scriptures and the writings of the Fatherland.

The Monk Nilus of Sorsk, referring to the Fathers who wrote before him, says: "It is not a small feat," they said, "to find an immovable teacher for this wonderful work (true monastic heartfelt and intelligent prayer). And the Holy Fathers said that even then it was hardly possible to find an immutable teacher in such subjects; now, when they have become scarce to the extreme, one must search with all care. to learn from the Divine Scriptures, hearing the Lord Himself say: Study the Scriptures, for you think through them to have eternal life (John 5:39). And everything that was written before, in the Holy Scriptures, was written to us for instruction (Rom. 15 , 4).

The Reverend Nile lived in the 15th century; he founded a skete not far from Belo-Ozero, where he practiced prayer in deep solitude. It is useful to listen to the elders of modern times, with what humility and selflessness the Monk Nile responds to the instructions that he taught to the brethren.

"No one should hide the words of God out of his negligence, but confess his weakness and together not hide the truth of God, so as not to make us guilty of a transgression of God's commandment. , like the sand of the sea: inspecting them innocently, we teach those who come to us and who need them (demanding, inquiring). It is more correct: we do not teach, because we are unworthy of this, but the blessed Holy Fathers teach from the Divine Scripture "(St. Nil Sorsk Tradition It would not be superfluous to note here that the Monk Nilus of Sorsk, although he had the grace of God, did not dare to explain the Scriptures spontaneously, but followed the explanation given by the Fathers. The path of humility is the only sure way to salvation).

Here is an excellent example for modern instruction! He is quite psychic to the mentor and instructor; he is the correct expression of moderate prosperity; it is combined with the rejection of conceit, insane arrogance and insolence, into which those who imitate the appearance of the Great Barsanuphius and other signifying Fathers fall, without the grace of the Fathers. What was in those an expression of the abundant presence of the Holy Spirit in them, then in the reckless, hypocritical imitators serves as an expression of abundant ignorance, self-delusion, pride, insolence.

Beloved fathers! Let us pronounce the word of God to our brethren with all kinds of humility and reverence, realizing that we are insufficient for this service and protecting ourselves from vanity, which greatly chills passionate people when they teach the brethren. Think that we must give an answer for every idle word (Matthew 12, 36), the more painful is the answer for the word of God, spoken with vanity and at the prompting of vanity.

The Lord will destroy all flattering lips, an eloquent tongue, those who say: With our tongue we will overpower, our lips are with us; who is our master? (Psalm 11: 4, 5). The Lord will destroy those who seek his glory, and not God's. Let us be afraid of the reproof of the Lord! Let us utter the word of edification at the request of an essential necessity, not as instructors, but as those in need of instruction and striving to become partakers of the instruction taught by God in His all-holy Word.

Serve one another, each with the gift, says the holy Apostle Peter, which you received as good stewards of the many different grace of God. Does anyone speak, speak as the words of God, with the fear of God and reverence for the words of God, and not as his own words: does anyone serve, serve according to the power that God gives, and not as if from his own: so that God be glorified in everything through Jesus Christ (1 Peter 4, 10, 11).

The one who acts out of himself acts for vanity, brings himself and those who listen to him as a sacrifice to Satan: he who acts from the Lord acts for the glory of the Lord, accomplishes his own salvation and the salvation of his neighbors by the Lord, the only Savior of men.

Let us be afraid of teaching the novice any kind of thoughtless instruction that is not based on the word of God and on the spiritual understanding of the word of God. It is better to confess ignorance than to show insanity.

Let us be protected from the great calamity - to turn the gullible novice from a servant of God into a servant of man (1 Cor. 7:23), drawing him to the creation of the fallen will of man instead of the all-holy will of God. The modest attitude of the counselor to the instructed is completely different from that of the elder to the unconditional novice, the servant in the Lord.

The advice does not contain a condition to fulfill it without fail: it can be fulfilled and not fulfilled. The counselor does not bear any responsibility for his advice, if he gave it with the fear of God and humility, not spontaneously, but being asked and forced. Likewise, the one who has received advice is not bound by him: it remains at his discretion and reasoning to fulfill or not to fulfill the advice received. Obviously, how the path of counseling and following the Holy Scriptures is consistent with our weak times.

Pharisee

B ratia! Let us take a closer look in the Gospel to the disposition of the Lord God our Savior Jesus Christ. We will see that he is never tempted by sinners, no matter how grievous their sins are. Also, there is no example in the entire Gospel for the holy Apostles to be tempted by someone. On the contrary, the Pharisees are incessantly tempted, tempted by the All-Perfect Himself, by the incarnate God; they are tempted to the point that they condemn Him as a criminal, put to death abominable; The Savior is crucified on the cross in the midst of two robbers! From this naturally follows the conclusion that the inclination to be seduced is a grave affliction of the soul, it is a sign of a Pharisee. One should carefully look after the heart, and mortify in it the feeling of temptation against one's neighbor with spiritual reasoning, gleaned from the Gospel.

The Gospel is a holy and all-holy book! As the sun is imprinted in clear waters, so Christ is depicted in the Gospel. Whoever wants to see Christ, let him cleanse the mind and heart by repentance! He will see in the Gospel Christ, the true God, the Savior of fallen men; will see in the Gospel what qualities a disciple of Jesus should have, who is called to learn meekness and humility from the Lord Himself. In these God-imitating virtues he will find blissful peace for his soul.

Part one

V The Lord once went into the house of the publican Matthew, transforming the publican into an Apostle, the incarnate God lay down to eat with sinners. The Pharisees, seeing this, were tempted. Why, they said to Jesus' disciples, why does the Teacher eat and drink with the tax collectors and sinners? ...

Tell me first, Pharisees, why do you call these people sinners? Is it not closer to call them happy and blessed, Angels, Cherubim, because God deigned to lie down in their company? Wouldn't it be better for you to say: "We are sinners too! And accept us, merciful Jesus, at Your feet. You, the Heart-seer and the true Judge, preferred these sinners to us, passing us, You lay down with them. It can be seen that our sins before You are heavier than them. sins. With them you lean: let us, though, fall at your feet. "

There is no holy stench of humility in the dark righteous, rich in the righteousness of fallen human nature, in the righteousness of a fake world, in the righteousness of demons. They boldly condemn the Lord, condemn the sinners accepted by Him, who thus become true righteous, - they reject the Lord, they say: Your Teacher. They make it clear by this that they do not recognize Him as their Teacher.

The Lord's answer is the answer to all the beginnings of the secret ailment of the Pharisees, to all the state of their soul. This answer contains a terrible condemnation and rejection from the face of God of all imaginary human righteousness, combined with the condemnation of one's neighbor. They do not require, said the Lord, the health of a doctor, but sick. Go ahead and learn what to eat, I want mercy, not sacrifice. Do not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

Once, on the Sabbath day, the Lord walked with his holy disciples and the Apostles between the fields sown with bread. The disciples, feeling hungry, began to pick ears; washing them with their hands, cleansed the grains that were used for food. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to the Lord: Behold, Thy disciples are doing, but he is not worthy to do on the Sabbath. The Lord, having mentioned David and the priests, of whom the first violated the ritual law by chance, and the latter, according to the prescription of the law, violate the law, again repeats to the Pharisees a formidable remark: If they knew more quickly what there is: I want mercy, and not sacrifice, they never did it quickly condemn the innocent ...

Sense of temptation - how picky, how malicious! pretends to adhere to the forms of the law with petty clarity, but tramples on the essence of the law. Gloomy and blind Pharisee! Hear what the Lord says to you: I want mercy. Seeing the lack of your neighbor, have mercy on your neighbor: this is your oud! The weakness that you see in him today may become your weakness tomorrow. You are tempted only because you are proud and blind! You fulfill some of the outer rules of the law, and for this you admire yourself; you despise, condemn your neighbors, in whom you notice the violation of certain trifles, and do not notice the fulfillment of the great, secret virtues, beloved of God, unfamiliar to your haughty, cruel heart. You haven't looked enough in yourself; you did not see yourself: only because of this you do not recognize yourself as a sinner. Because of this, your heart was not broken, it was not filled with repentance and humility: from this you did not understand that, along with all other people, you need God's mercy, salvation. It is terrible not to admit that you are a sinner! Jesus denies himself who does not recognize himself as a sinner: he did not come, he says, call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance. What blessedness it is to acknowledge oneself as a sinner! The one who professes to be a sinner gains access to Jesus. What bliss - to behold your sins! What bliss - to look into your heart! Whoever looks into his heart will forget that there are sinners on earth, except for him alone. If he even glances at his neighbors: then they all seem to him blameless, beautiful, like Angels. Looking into himself, examining his sinful spots, he is convinced that the only means for his salvation is the mercy of God, that he is an invisible slave, not only for violation, but also for insufficient fulfillment of the commandments of God, in fulfillment more like a distortion than fulfillment ... Needing mercy himself, he pours it abundantly on his neighbors, he has for them one mercy. As soon as they knew what to eat: I want mercy, not sacrifice, they didn’t more quickly condemn the innocent. The righteous did not come to call, but sinners to repentance.

Our merciful Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, who did not reject repentant publicans and harlots, did not neglect the Pharisees either: He came to heal a person from all his ailments, and between them from Pharisees, especially incurable only because this disease recognizes and proclaims itself flourishing health, rejects the doctor and healing, she herself wants to heal the illnesses of others, using blows with heavy logs to remove a barely noticeable powder from a delicate eye.

A certain Pharisee invited the Lord to share a meal with him. And he entered the house of the Pharisees, next to him, narrating the Gospel of the merciful Lord. It seems that the Pharisee, although he had zeal and some faith in the Lord, while accepting Him, he gave a place and calculation of what degree of greeting to give the Guest. If there had not been a calculation based on the consciousness of his righteousness and dignity, which would have prevented the Pharisee from rushing out to meet the Divine Visitor, trembling to fall at His holy feet, to lay His soul and heart under His feet. This was not done; the Pharisee missed the blessed opportunity to honor the Savior as the Savior. A certain wife of that city, a famous sinner, steals what has been lost. She hurries with a vessel of fragrant peace to the house of the Pharisee, enters the temple where the meal was, begins to wash the Savior's feet with tears, and wipe them with the hair of her head - kiss the Savior's feet and smear them with peace.

The blind Pharisee does not see the virtue taking place before his eyes, exposing the coldness, the deadness of his heart. Temptation and condemnation move in his soul. He thinks: If he were a prophet, he would see who and what kind of wife touches Him: as if there is a sinner. Why do you belittle God by calling Him only a prophet? Why do you call her a sinner who honors God better than you? Fear, shut up: the Creator is present! To Him belongs the judgment on His creatures; It is to him to forgive five hundred and fifty denarii of a sinful debt equally: He is omnipotent and infinitely rich. The Pharisee usually lets this out of his own mind! Seeing five hundred denarii owed by his neighbor, he does not pay attention to his fifty, does not even consider them a duty, while the determination of the Divine Judgment announces that both of them have nothing to give, that both of them equally need forgiveness of the debt. To repay the one who does not have ima, I will give it back. Lack of humility, from which the disease of Pharisaism, extremely hinders spiritual success. While those who have fallen into grave sins, with burning zeal and contrition of spirit, bring repentance, forget the whole world, see their sin incessantly, and mourn it before God, - the eyes of the Pharisee are doubled. His sin, which appears to him insignificant, does not attract all his attention to itself. He remembers, knows some of his good deeds, and puts his hope on them. He sees the shortcomings of others; comparing them with his own, he recognizes his lungs, excusable. The more his own truth grows in his eyes, the more the grace-filled justification given to the penitent is diminished. This weakens, the feeling of repentance is destroyed. With the belittling of the feeling of repentance, the march to spiritual success is hampered; with the destruction of the feeling of repentance, a person is perverted from the path of salvation to the path of self-conceit and self-delusion. He becomes a stranger to holy love for God and neighbors. Her sinners are released from me, the Lord said about the blessed sinner, as if you will love a lot. And little is left to him, he loves less.

Infected with the disease of Pharisaism, he is deprived of spiritual prosperity. The soil of his heart is tough, does not bring harvest: for spiritual fruitfulness, a heart is needed, cultivated by repentance, softened, moistened with emotion and tears. Deprivation of prosperity is already significant damage! But the harm that comes from pharisaism is not limited to the sterility of the soul: the deadly infection of pharisaism is for the most part associated with the most disastrous consequences. Pharisaism not only renders his good deeds fruitless for a person, but directs them to evil in his soul, to his condemnation before God.

The Lord portrayed this in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican who prayed together in the temple of God. The Pharisee, looking at himself, did not find reasons for repentance, for a feeling of heartfelt contrition; on the contrary, he found reasons to be pleased with himself, to admire himself. He saw in himself fasting, giving alms; but I did not see the vices that I saw, or thought to see in others, and by which I was tempted. I say I thought to see: because the eyes of temptation are large; he also sees such sins in his neighbor, which are not in him at all, which his imagination, led by deceit, invented for the neighbor. The Pharisee, in his self-delusion, brings praise to God for his state of mind. He hides his exaltation, and it hides from him, under the guise of thanksgiving to God. On a superficial glance at the Law, it seemed to him that he was an executor of the Law, pleasing to God. He forgot that the commandment of the Lord, in the words of the Psalmist, is very broad, that heaven itself is unclean before God, that God does not take pleasure in sacrifices, not even in burnt offerings, when they are not accompanied and do not contribute to contrition and humility of spirit, that the Law of God is necessary plant in the very heart to achieve true, blissful, spiritual righteousness. The manifestation of this righteousness begins in a person with a feeling of poverty in spirit. The vain Pharisee thinks to give thanks, to glorify God: God, I give praise to You, he says, as if we were, like other people, predators, unrighteous women, adulterers. He counts the obvious transgressions that can be seen by all; but he does not say a word about spiritual passions, about pride, guile, hatred, envy, hypocrisy. And they make up the Pharisee! They darken and mortify the soul, make it incapable of repentance! They destroy love for one's neighbor, and give birth to a temptation filled with coldness, pride and hatred! The vain Pharisee thinks to thank God for his good deeds; but God turns away from him; God pronounces a terrible sentence against him: Everyone who ascends will be humbled.

When Pharisaism intensifies and ripens, it takes possession of the soul: then its fruits are terrible. There is no lawlessness before which it would shudder, to which it would not dare. The Pharisees dared to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. The Pharisees dared to call the Son of God raging. The Pharisees allowed themselves to assert that the incarnate God, the Savior who came to earth, is dangerous to public welfare; for the civil life of the Jews. And what are all these intertwined fictions for? In order, under the cover of external justice, under the guise of the protection of nationality, laws, religion, to saturate the insatiable anger with his blood, to sacrifice blood to envy and vanity in order to commit Deicide. Pharisaism is a terrible poison; Pharisaism is a terrible mental illness.

We will try to draw an image of the Pharisee, borrowing painting from the Gospel, so that everyone, peering into this terrible, monstrous image, can be carefully preserved according to the will of the Lord from the kvass of the Pharisee: from the way of thinking, from the rules, from the mood of the Pharisees.

The Pharisee, content with the performance of the external rituals of religion and the performance of some visible good deeds, alien and pagans, servilely serves passions, who constantly tries to cover up, which he largely does not see in himself and does not understand, which produce in him complete blindness in relation to God and all Divine teaching. Cognition, and therefore seeing in oneself the action of the passions of the soul, is delivered by repentance; but the Pharisee is not available for the sense of repentance. How can a heart satisfied with itself be broken, moved, humbled? Unable to repentance, he is incapable of seeing the light of the commandments of God, enlightening the eyes of the mind. Although he is engaged in reading Scripture, although he sees these commandments in him, he does not stop at them in his obscurity: they slip away from his eyes, and he replaces them with his own thoughts, absurd, ugly. What could be stranger, more incongruous than the Pharisee speculations mentioned in the Gospel! Even if he bows to the church, the Pharisees argued, there is nothing: but if he bows to the church's gold, he must eat. The Pharisee, abandoning the fulfillment of the commandments of God, which constitute the essence of the Law, strives for a refined fulfillment of external trifles, even if this was with an obvious violation of the commandments. God's holy commandments, in which eternal life, were left by the Pharisees without any attention, completely forgotten! You will, the Lord said to them, mint, and copra, and kimin, and the one who left the law, judgment, mercy and faith ... Leaders of the blindness, straining out mosquitoes, but Velbluds devouring.

The most secretive of all emotional passions is vanity. This passion is more than any other masked before the human heart, giving it pleasure, often taken for consolation of conscience, for Divine consolation, and it is on vanity that the Pharisee is leavened. He does everything for human praise; he loves that his alms, and his fasting, and his prayer have witnesses. He cannot be a disciple of the Lord Jesus, commanding His followers to neglect human glory, to walk the path of humiliation, deprivation, suffering. The cross of Jesus serves as a temptation for the Pharisee. He needs a Messiah, similar to Alexander the Great, or Napoleon I, with the loud glory of a conqueror, with trophies, with booty! The thought of the glory of heaven, spiritual, of the glory of God, eternal, of eternity itself, is inaccessible to his soul, creeping on the ground, in earthly dust and corruption. The Pharisee loves money. His heart is where his treasure is. There is his faith, there is his feelings, there is hope, there is love! With his lips, with the edge of his tongue, he confesses God, but with his heart he rejects Him. He never feels the presence of God, does not see the providence of God, does not know by experience what the fear of God means. For his heart there is no God, and there are no neighbors. He is all earthly, all fleshly, all in the power of the passions of the soul, moves by them, is governed by them, attracts to all iniquity, lives and acts solely for self-love. In this soul an idol is erected. Incessant incense is smoked to the idol, incessant sacrifices are slaughtered. How can the service of the all-holy God unite in this soul with the service of an abominable idol? This soul is in terrible desolation, in terrible darkness, in terrible death. This is a dark nativity scene, inhabited only by fierce animals, or even more fierce robbers. This is a coffin decorated on the outside for the sensual human eyes, so easily deceiving, inside filled with dead bones; stench, worms, all unclean, God-hating.

The Pharisee, being a stranger to God, needs to appear before people as a servant of God; being full of all iniquities, it needs to appear virtuous before people; striving to satisfy his passions, he has the need to give his actions a plausibility. A disguise is necessary for a Pharisee. Far from wanting to be truly pious and virtuous, only wanting to reckon among people for such, the Pharisee clothed himself in hypocrisy. Everything in it is a composition, everything is fiction! Deeds, words, his whole life - an incessant lie. His heart, like a dark hell, is filled with all passions, all vices, continuous torment. And this hellish heart breathes on one's neighbor an inhuman, murderous feeling of temptation and condemnation. The Pharisee who cares to appear righteous before men, being a child of Satan in his soul, catches some features from the Law of God; adorns himself with them so that the inexperienced eye does not recognize him as an enemy of God and, having trusted him as a friend of God, becomes his sacrifice. The Pharisee condemns in his neighbors not evil, not vice, not violation of the Law. Not! How can he condemn the evil of which he is a friend and confidante? His arrows are directed at virtue. But, in order to be more accurate, he slanders virtue, ascribes evil to it, is tempted to this evil, and, apparently, striking him, kills the servant of Christ that he hates. Pharisee! Are you leading to the execution of an innocent person for a crime that you yourself invented for him? The execution belongs to you, as well as the crime! Is it really encouraging that a disciple of Christ, imitating Christ, in silence drinks the cup of suffering that you have prepared for him? Unhappy! fear this very magnanimous and mysterious silence. As the follower of Jesus is silent now for the sake of Jesus: so at the terrible, universal judgment Jesus will cry for him, denounce the wicked, unrecognized by people, and send him into eternal torment. The Pharisees invented crimes for the God-man Himself; they will arrange execution for Him; they bought His blood; they pretended not to understand Him.

The greatest atrocity on earth was committed by the Pharisees. They have always been faithful, and until now they have been faithful to their hellish calling. They are the main enemies and persecutors of true, Christian virtue and piety, not stopping at any means or any crime. Against them thunders the definition of the Lord: 3miya, offspring of vipers, how can you escape from the judgment of the fire of hell? For this reason, behold, I will send to you the prophets and the wise and the scribes: you will kill and crucify from them, and from them you beat against your host, and wore out from hail to hail: as if all righteous blood that is shed on the earth come on you, from the roof of the righteous Abel to the roof of Zachariah, the son of Barakhin, who is also the one between the church and the oltar. Amen, I say to you, as if all this will come to this generation. The words of the Lord have come to pass, and they are still being accomplished: hitherto infected with Pharisee kvass in implacable enmity with the true disciples of Jesus, they persecute them, now openly, now under cover of slander and temptation; eagerly, tirelessly seek their blood. "Lord Jesus Christ, help Thy servants. Grant them to understand You, and follow You, You, Who is like a sheep to slaughter, and like the Lamb is silent before the one who shears him. Grant them with a clear eye of mind to see You, and suffering in blissful silence, as if in front of Your eyes, to be enriched with gifts of grace, to feel in yourself the peace-giving breeze of the Holy Spirit, which proclaims to Your servant that otherwise it is impossible to be Yours, as partaking of the cup of suffering, which You have chosen as the lot of staying on Your land and Yours. "

Part two

G God has uttered in the holy Gospel many commandments that introduce thoughts and feelings into a person, completely opposite to the soul-destroying, man-hating pharisaism. These commandments destroy the very principles on which Pharisaism is based and is based. Observe, said the Lord, in general from the kvass of the Pharisee. One of the Evangelists explains that the Lord named the teaching of the Pharisees with the word kvass of the Pharisees, and another Evangelist understands by this word their hypocrisy. This is one and the same: out of hypocritical behavior, the mindset and doctrine of the Pharisees arise; on the contrary, the doctrine and way of thinking of the Pharisees educate a hypocrite for whom no sin is terrible, no virtue is respectful; he hopes to cover up every sin, excuse it, justify it, and replace every virtue with pretense.

The Lord taught His disciples direct, sincere behavior, based on holy wisdom, and not justified by cunning - behavior from which pure virtue should shine and with its heavenly beauty attract the eyes and hearts of people. So let your light be enlightened before men, as if they see your good deeds, and glorify your Father, who is not for everyone. The Pharisees, on the contrary, only wished to appear righteous, cared only about making themselves appear as servants of God in front of the society of people, in front of the masses, which are usually not discerning. And now we can see that the Pharisees resort to all sorts of twists and turns, so that their deeds, which have the appearance of good, shine as brightly as possible before the eyes of people, and their atrocities were excused by political necessity, the guise of justice and wise forethought, the desire to prevent by allowing a lesser evil, a greater evil, and so on. excuses so abundantly flowing from a heart filled with guile. The Lord forbids such behavior in very strong terms. You are naturally, he says, justifying yourself before men, but God is your heart's message, as if a hedgehog is high in men, an abomination is before God. The Pharisees tried to cover up their spiritual passions, actions, and their fruits with justifications. Mental outgrowths, under the haze and coolness of justifications, usually take deep roots into the soul, become a plump tree, embracing with branches all human activity, that is, penetrating all his thoughts, all feelings, all actions. Saint Pimen the Great said: “if justifications help a person’s sinful will, then he becomes corrupted and perishes.

With behavior that is not selflessly looking for virtue in the eyes of God, but looking for the glory of virtue in the eyes of people, in their insignificant opinion, fickle, changeable, - a person is unable to cognize the Christian faith, to accept the teaching of Christ, for which a heart is needed that recognizes itself as sinful, confessing her sin. How can you believe, says the Savior to the Pharisees, that you receive glory from one another, and do not seek glory, even from God alone? ... The Lord will take away from His disciples all food for vanity. He wants the altar of the heart to be cleansed of the bad idol, of everything that belongs to idol service. The Lord commands us to do all good deeds in secret. And alms, according to His will, be in secret! and let the fast be in secret! and prayer - in a locked cage! Our good deeds must be hidden not only from people, but also from ourselves, so that not only people do not corrupt our souls with praise, but our very hearts do not flatter us, and do not commit adultery, violating the holy union with holy humility. Do not let your shuyts know what your right hand is doing. This is not enough! The Lord commanded to deny oneself in a short-term earthly life, to trample all justifications, all truth for the truth of the gospel. What is the truth of the gospel? in suffering, in the cross! Here the Savior calls His disciple! here He fixes the dispute between those who are called! separates tares from wheat here! here he marks the elect with his seal! He who will not receive his cross, and he is coming after Me, is worthy to bear Me. He who has found his soul, will destroy him: and others who will destroy his soul for Me, will find him.

Brethren! at the foot of the cross of Christ, let us lay down and bury all the concepts of the world about honor, about offenses, about insults, about losses, about injustice, about human laws and about human justice. Let's make ourselves fools for Christ's sake! Let us substitute our flies for spitting, hacking! our earthly honor, decrepit, and crumbled with the ashes of humiliation! let us not look with mercy and sympathy at our corruptible property: let them plunder and carry it with whirlwinds, when they are allowed! let us not spare our flesh in voluntary exploits and involuntary sufferings! let us learn from the Lord Jesus Christ His mysterious silence, which is the most sublime Theology and eloquence that astonishes the Angels! To him, God incarnate, the world did not give justice: should we seek it from the world? Let us renounce her at the foot of the cross of Christ! Let us not be beasts that gnaw and sting the catchers and other animals that attack them! let us become like the Lamb of God here on earth, during our short-term earthly wandering, and He will make us similar to Himself in eternity, where our bliss will have no end and no worlds. And here, in earthly exile, the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, comes to the faithful disciple of Jesus, casts on his soul the ineffable bliss of the future life, which takes away from him the feeling of suffering, which brings him into invisible, holy pleasure, independent of people and circumstances. Before this enjoyment, all earthly pleasures, even legal ones, are insignificant.

The main distinguishing feature of a hypocrite, the first arrow he fires at his neighbor, is the temptation and condemnation of the neighbor emanating from temptation. Temptation in intentional villains is often feigned, invented, as it were, a correct pretext for an atrocity, preparing in advance both the atrocity and the justification of the atrocity; the temptation in Adam, still infected with decay, even if they were well-meaning and striving for salvation, is a sign of decay and a very important and persistent ailment. This disease counteracts repentance, from which - purification. Seduction is a painful look at the weakness of a neighbor, in which these weaknesses grow to an immense, ugly magnitude. Seduction is a fiend of self-love that infiltrates the soul, alien to love for one's neighbor and correct love for oneself. The Lord likened this ailment to a log, in comparison with which any obvious sin of a neighbor is only a bitch. Do not judge, said the Lord, that you will not be judged. If you judge by judgment, they judge you: and measure it to you in a small measure ... You hypocrite, take the first log out of your hairline: and then behold, take the bitch out of your brother's hairline. One must violently distract oneself from the judgment of one's neighbors, shielding oneself from him by the fear of God and humility. In order to weaken and, with God's help, completely eradicate from your heart the temptation to your neighbor, you must, in the light of the Gospel, delve into yourself, observe your weaknesses, examine your sinful aspirations, movements and states. When our sin attracts our eyes to itself, there will be no time for us to observe the shortcomings of our neighbor, to notice them. Then all our neighbors will seem to us beautiful, saints; then each of us recognizes himself as the greatest sinner in the world, the only sinner in the world; then the gates will open wide for us, the embrace of true, real repentance.

The great Pimen said: “We and our brothers are like two pictures. If a person, looking at himself, finds flaws in himself, then in his brother he sees perfection. thin. " The greatest saints of God were especially concerned about seeing themselves as sinners, and so many sinners that the sins of their neighbors, obvious and great, seemed to them insignificant, excusable. The Monk Sisoy said to Abba Oru: - "Give me instruction." Do you have a power of attorney to me? Abba Ohr asked him. - "I have," Sisoy answered. - Come on, Abba Ohr told him, and do what I do. “What is your work, Father?” Abba Sisoi asked him. The elder said: “I see myself worse than all people.

If a person reaches that state, said Pimen the Great, about which the Apostle said everything is pure pure, then he will see that he is worse than any creature. The brother asked the elder: How can I think of myself that I am worse than a murderer? Pimen answered: "If a person reaches the state indicated by the Apostle and sees a person who committed murder, he will say: he once committed this sin, and I kill myself daily." The brother told Pimen's words to another elder. The elder answered: "If a person reaches the state of such purity and sees the sins of his brother, then his righteousness will swallow this sin." The brother asked: What is his righteousness? The elder answered: "The constant accusation of oneself."

These are the true hearers and creators of the Gospel Law! Having driven out condemnation and temptation from their hearts, they were filled with holy love for their neighbor, pouring out mercy on everyone and healing sinners with mercy. It was said by the holy Fathers about the great Macarius of Egypt that he was like an earthly god - with such mighty mercy he bore the shortcomings of his neighbors. Abba Ammon, constantly looking into himself and exposing his soul for its shortcomings, came to deep humility and holy simplicity. From a lot of love for his neighbor, he did not see evil in him, he forgot about the existence of evil. Once they brought to him - since he was a bishop - a girl who had conceived in the womb, and they said: "So and so did this, impose an epitomy on them." Ammon, having marked her womb with a cross, ordered her to give six pairs of canvases, saying: "When the time comes for her to give birth, she herself, or her child, would not have died, and there would have been something to bury them in." Those who accused the girl, said to him: What are you doing? impose an epitomy on them! He answered: "Brethren! She is close to death! What else to do with her?" - and let her go. Once Abba Ammon came to a certain residence of the monks to share a meal with the brethren. One of the brothers of that place was very upset in his behavior: a woman visited him. This became known to the other brethren; they were embarrassed and, having gathered for a conference, decided to expel the brother from his hut. Learning that Bishop Ammon was here, they came to him and asked him to go with them to inspect his brother's cell. The brother also learned about this, and hid the woman under a large wooden vessel, turning the vessel upside down. Abba Ammon understood this, and for God's sake, he covered his brother's sin. Having arrived with many brothers in the cell, he sat down on a wooden vessel and ordered to search the cell. Kellia was searched, the woman was not found. "What is it?" Abba Ammon said to the brethren: "God forgive you your transgression." After that, he prayed and told everyone to go out. He himself went after the brethren. As he left, he graciously took the accused brother by the hand, and said to him with love: "Brother, take heed to yourself!" Thus, Saint Ammon withdrew from condemning anyone, and healed sinners, softening them with the mercy of their hearts, leading them to repentance by mercy.

How much the Lord takes us away from the abyss of temptation and condemnation; how much the true servants of the Lord move away from this terrible, disastrous abyss: so much, on the contrary, the devil draws us into it, covering it with various excuses. One of Satan's excuses is reckless jealousy, taken by many for a zeal for piety, for holy zeal. “A man led by reckless jealousy, says St. Isaac of Syria, will never be able to reach the world of thoughts. But an alien of this world is alien to joy. If the world of thought is perfect health, and jealousy is contrary to the world: then he who has crafty jealousy will be afflicted with a great ailment. O man! believing that you are kindled with righteous jealousy against other people's shortcomings, you drive away the health of your soul. Work, work for the health of your soul! If you want to heal the weak, then understand that the sick need more attentive care than cruelty. just as you don’t help others, you throw yourself into a serious illness. Such zeal in a person belongs not to signs of wisdom, but to the ailments of the soul, to a lack of spiritual reason, to greater ignorance. The beginning of God's wisdom is quietness and meekness, qualities of a great and strong soul, which is in her from a solid way of thinking, and those who bear human infirmities. "

The sin of temptation and condemnation is so convenient for the destruction of men and therefore is so beloved by the devil that he is not content with stirring up in our hearts a zeal that is crafty and alien to the gospel reason, arousing prideful thoughts, always combined with humiliation and contempt for our neighbor; but he also arranges obvious intrigues to entice the inattentive into temptation and condemnation. Abba Pimen said: “The Scripture says: I can see your eyes, verbs. But I advise you not to even talk about what you touched with your own hands. One brother was deceived in this way: it seemed to him that his brother was sinning with a woman. For a long time he wrestled with himself; finally, coming up, he pushed them with his foot, thinking that they were exactly them, and said: "Is it enough for you, how long? But it turned out that there were sheaves of wheat. That is why I told you:" do not expose, even if you touch it with your own hands. "

The sin of condemnation is so disgusting to God that He becomes angry, turns away from His saints themselves, when they allow themselves to condemn their neighbors: He will take away His grace from them, as can be seen from the numerous examples preserved by church writers for the benefit and edification of Christian generations. No righteousness gives the right to condemn a sinning brother, to whom the Lord can very conveniently bestow substantial righteousness, incomparably greater than that which we think to find in ourselves. We can be righteous by the proper righteousness of God; when we condemn our neighbor, then by this we reject the truth of God, we replace it with our righteousness, or, more correctly, the disease of Pharisaism. He who condemns his neighbor delights in the rank of God, to Whom the only one belongs to the judgment of His creatures, - delights in the rank of Christ, who has to judge the living and the dead on the last day.

The wondrous John Savvait told about himself: "while I was living in the desert far from the monastery, a brother came from the monastery to visit me. I asked him:" How do the fathers and brethren live? "Well for your prayers, he answered. Then I asked about one of the brothers, about whom there was a thin rumor. He answered me: believe me, father: this brother continues to live as before. Hearing this, I said: “Oh!” and immediately fell into a frenzy. I saw myself standing before Calvary in Jerusalem. Our Lord Jesus Christ stood on Calvary between two robbers. I rushed to worship Him. At that time - I see - the Lord turned to the Angels who were standing before Him, and said to them: "Cast him out, because he is the Antichrist in relation to Me: anticipating my judgment, he condemned his brother. While they were driving me out, and I was leaving the doors, my mantle got entangled in them, and was held back by them. There I left her. Immediately coming to my senses, I said to my brother who visited me: "This day is fierce for me." He asked: why is this, father? I told him what I had seen, adding that the removed mantle means the cover of God and God's help taken away from me. From that day on, I went deep into the desert, and wandered in it for seven years, not eating bread, not going under the roof and not talking with any of the people. After this time, I saw the Lord again: He returned my mantle to me.

Brethren! we will be attentive to ourselves! Let us sweat to cleanse ourselves not only of bodily passions, but also of spiritual passions, of vanity, unbelief, deceit, envy, hatred, love of money and other similar ailments, which apparently move and act in one soul, without the participation of the body, and therefore are called sincere. I said "apparently": they have an effect on the body, but subtle, not perceptible and comprehensible to many. By paying attention to ourselves and by cleansing ourselves of these passions, love for our neighbor is gradually sown in us, and from it the feeling of temptation against our neighbor and his condemnation will weaken and destroy. Let us constantly remember that there is no righteousness, pleasing to God, outside the poverty of spirit. Let us justify our neighbors, but condemn ourselves, so that God will grant us His grace and mercy, which He will grant to the only humble and merciful. Amen.

Matt. IX, 11.
Matt. IX, 12-13.
Matt. XII, 2.
Matt. XII, 7.
Matt. XII, 7; IX, 13.
Onion. VII, 36.
Onion. VII, 39.
Onion. VII, 42.
Onion. VII, 47.
Onion. Ch. Xviii.
Job. XV, 15.
Ps. L.
Ps. XXXIX, 9. - Matt. V, 3.
Onion. XVIII, 11.
Onion. XVIII, 14.
Matt. XVI, 6.
Matt. XXIII, 16.
Matt. XXIII, 23-24.
Matt. XXIII, 33-36.
Isaiah, liii, 7.
Matt. XVI, 6.
Matt. XVI, 12.
Onion. XII, 1,
Matt. V, 16.
Onion. XVI, 15.
Alphabetic Patericon.
John. V, 44.
Matt. VI, 3.
Matt. X, 38-39.
Matt. VII, 1-5.
Alphabetic Patericon.
Alphabetic Patericon.
Titus. I, 15.
Alphabetic Patericon.
Step 89
Proverbs XXV, 8.
Alphabetic Patericon.
The life of the Monk Basil the New, the ordeal of condemnation. Chetya-Minea. March 26th day.
The patericon is alphabetic.

Cleanliness and renewal delivered
holy baptism, restore by repentance ...
and, if possible, frequent Communion
Holy Mysteries of Christ.
Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov)

The saint considered the need to read Holy Scripture and patristic creations especially important, since there were practically no living vessels of Divine grace left in his time. This is the same, if such words can be used, we also experience. In the introduction to the collection "Fatherland" the saint writes: "Careful reading of these sayings and stories (that is, patristic - approx. the author) evokes on the reader - as from paradise - from the first centuries of Christianity the fragrance of holy simplicity and true service to God, abundantly overshadowed by Divine grace. It can direct the activity of a monk on the true path of pleasing God, delivering the most correct views on this activity; it can bring consolation in the various sorrows that arise in the soul of a monk - rushing towards him from the outside; it can nourish and maintain the peaceful and prayerful mood of a monk, just as oil nourishes and sustains the burning of a lamp. Whoever assimilates to himself the teaching of the fathers proposed here, he, being in the midst of human society, will acquire a heartfelt silence. Whoever remains alien to this teaching will be indignant at the rumor of thoughts and painting of dreams in the most secluded wilderness, and in an inert seclusion, will lead a worldly life. The heart is brought into silence by spiritual work, combined with sickness or crying of the heart. "

Some may say that all this is necessary for monks, but for us, those who live in the world, very little is enough. But this is a completely wrong opinion, it is fundamentally wrong and, moreover, harmful to spiritual life. The ascetic = monk equation is wrong. Ascetic work is obligatory for every Christian. Therefore, it will be especially useful for us to turn to the literary heritage of St. Ignatius, so that his works would help us to understand the essence and meaning of Christian asceticism.

What does the saint write about repentance as a preparation for Communion and about the actual Communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ?

“By the sacrament of confession, all sins committed by word, deed, and thought are resolutely cleansed. In order to erase from the heart the sinful habits rooted in it for a long time, it takes time, you need a constant stay in repentance. Constant repentance consists in constant contrition of the spirit, in the struggle with the thoughts and sensations with which the sinful passion hidden in the heart reveals itself, in curbing bodily feelings and the womb, in humble prayer, in frequent confession ”,? St. Ignatius writes. Repentance inseparably accompanies faith in Christ, in principle it should precede faith in the Lord, and after baptism, repentance heals the sins into which a person fell due to his weakness and sinful habit. Repentance should be accomplished not only with the mouth, not with short-term crying, not only with external participation in confession, but with internal contrition, repentance for sins, as well as the desire to leave a sinful life and not return to it. Bishop Ignatius says that “for the one who constantly betrays his friends, they become enemies to him, they depart from him as from a traitor, and whoever confesses his sins, they depart from that, because sins, based and fastening on the pride of the fallen nature, do not tolerate exposure and shame. " But often a person cannot dominate the sin that attracts him, and sin, in turn, dominates the person. Thus, we become slaves to sin, and a person can stay in such a slave state for his entire life. Saint Ignatius reminds every Christian that God gave repentance to help a person in the fight against sin, but we do not always use this help, but even in the hope of repentance we sin arbitrarily and deliberately, we try to “outsmart” the Lord. Such "will be struck by sudden death, and they will not be given time for repentance and good deeds."

Repentance heals the sinful wounds of a Christian and is a preparation for receiving the Savior Jesus Christ into his soul and heart in the sacrament of Communion. The Sacrament of Communion, established by the Lord Himself at the Last Supper through the command: “And taking the cup and giving thanks, he said: take it and share it among yourselves, for I tell you that I will not drink of the fruit of the grape until the Kingdom of God comes. And taking bread and giving thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying: This is my body, which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me "(Luke 22, 17-19)," is an omnipotent command operating in the whole earth, operating through the centuries and millennia. " What happens during the Divine Liturgy performed by a bishop or priest is incomprehensible to the human mind, and is accepted only by our belief that under the guise of bread and wine we partake of the true Body and true Blood of our Savior Jesus Christ. The saint writes: “What a wonderful institution! It is natural for the human mind to be perplexed before the establishment of the supernatural and incomprehensible ... Carnal wisdom says about this sacrament: "This word is cruel" (John 4:60), but this word was uttered by God, who accepted mankind for the salvation of people: and therefore attention to the word and judgments about him should not be superficial. Obedience to the word must be accepted by faith, from the bottom of the soul, just as the incarnate God must be accepted. "

Partaking of the Holy Body and Blood of Christ, every Christian enters into the closest communion with the Lord. In confirmation of this truth, Saint Ignatius quotes the words of Saint John Chrysostom: “We are one body with the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are flesh of His Flesh, bone of His Bones. Mystery science! Pay attention to what is said: we are united with the all-holy flesh of the Lord not only through love, but also through the sacrament itself. The All-Holy Flesh of the Lord becomes our food! He gave us this food, wanting to show the love he has for us. " Jesus Christ replaced with Himself the forefather Adam, through whose fall the entire human race was condemned to death. Leading the human race instead of the old Adam, the Lord replaces with His Flesh and Blood the flesh and blood borrowed by humanity from Adam, giving people eternal life. The Savior himself said: “Jesus said to them: truly, truly, I say to you: unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you will not have life in you” (John 6, 53).

The Holy Mysteries are the true Body and Blood of Christ, but for the external perception of man They remain under the forms of bread and wine. This great sacrament is perceived by faith, revealing its power for sincere believers. Saint Ignatius, basing on his deep spiritual experience, says that during the Communion of the Holy Mysteries, one can clearly feel the touch of Christ to the soul of the partaker, the union of Christ with the soul of the partaker. A Christian begins to feel this wondrous touch without instruction by the word in tranquility, meekness, humility, love for all, coldness for everything earthly and in sympathy for the future age. These wonderful sensations are implanted in the soul of a Christian by the grace of Christ. “Everyone who participates with attention and reverence, with due preparation, with faith, feels a change in himself. If not immediately after Communion, then after some time. A wonderful world descends on the mind and heart; members of the body are clothed with calmness; the seal of grace falls on the face; thoughts and feelings are bound by sacred spiritual bonds that forbid reckless freedom and lightness, which restrain them. "

That is, as natural food strengthens the human body, so the Divine food - the Body and Blood of Christ - strengthens and nourishes not only the spiritual, but also the bodily human being, strengthens the will, mind and heart, and the desires and feelings of a person acquire the correct orientation, receiving liberation from sin.

Collection of letters of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov), Bishop of the Caucasus. Moscow – SPb., 1995. Letter 321. P. 576.
Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Ascetic experiences. M., 1996, p. 83
In the already quoted letter 321, the saint says a terrible thing, which was a real characteristic of that time: “... A terrible time! The living organs of Divine grace have decisively become scarce; in their vestments wolves appeared: they deceive and destroy the sheep. It is necessary to understand this, but few understand it. " It should be said that every priest, and especially one preparing to become a priest, must understand the importance of his ministry and be afraid of falling into the category of destroyers, and not shepherds of Christ's flock.
Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Puffiness. Minsk, 2002.S. 30.
The question of the universality of ascetic doing is the subject of a separate study and it is not entirely appropriate to consider it in our work. Such works as "Asceticism according to the Christian-Orthodox teaching" by S. Zarin, "The meaning of the Christian feat" by Archbishop Theodore (Pozdeevsky) speak about this in detail. In these books, on the basis of patristic creations, the meaning of ascetic work and the struggle with passions is revealed as necessary conditions for achieving salvation, and it is also concluded that in the ancient Church there was no division into ascetics and laity (as they are trying to do now), but an ascetic feat carried by all Christians equally.
Ascetic experiences. M., 1996.S. 102.
In the same place.
In the same place. P. 104.
Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Ascetic sermon and letters to the laity. // Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Compositions. SPb, 1886.T. 4.P. 130.
In the same place. P. 116.
In the same place. P. 117.
Collection of letters of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov), Bishop of the Caucasus. S. 197.

A person who wants to avoid bad karma, violence, murder, in order to somehow deal with him, he must just stop eating meat. Give up this sense of taste, which is actually delicious and is only due to the tendency to violence.

The head of virtues is prayer; their foundation is fasting.

Fasting is constant moderation in food, with discretion in it.

A proud man! You dream so much and so highly of your mind, but it is in perfect and continuous dependence on the stomach.

The law of fasting, while outwardly the law for the womb, is essentially a law for the mind.

The mind, this king in man, if it wants to enter into the rights of its autocracy and preserve them, must, first of all, submit to the law of fasting. Only then will he be constantly cheerful and bright; only then can he dominate the desires of the heart and body; only with constant sobriety can he study the commandments of the gospel and follow them. The foundation of virtues is fasting.

The newly created man, introduced to paradise, has been given the only commandment, the commandment to fast. Of course, one commandment was given because it was sufficient to preserve primordial man in his integrity.

The commandment did not speak about the quantity of food, but only prohibited the quality. Let those who recognize fasting only in the quantity of food, and not in quality, be silent. As they delve deeper into the experiential study of fasting, they will see the importance of the quality of food.

So important is the commandment of fasting, announced by God to man in paradise, that, together with the commandment, he pronounced the threat of execution for breaking the commandment. The execution consisted in the defeat of people by eternal death.

And now, sinful death continues to afflict those who break the holy commandment of fasting. He who does not observe moderation and due discernment in food cannot preserve either virginity or chastity, cannot curb anger, indulges in laziness, despondency and sorrow, becomes a slave to vanity, a dwelling place of pride, which is introduced into a person by his carnal state, which is the most luxurious and well-fed meals.

The command to fast has been renewed or confirmed by the Gospel. Listen to yourself, but not when your hearts are burdened with gluttony and drunkenness (Luke 21:34), the Lord bequeathed. Gluttony and drunkenness impart stupidity not only to the body, but to the mind and heart, that is, they introduce a person to a fleshly state by their soul and body.

On the contrary, fasting brings a Christian into a spiritual state. Purified by fasting, he is humble in spirit, chaste, modest, silent, subtle in heart feelings and thoughts, light in body, capable of spiritual exploits and speculation, capable of accepting Divine grace.

The carnal man is completely immersed in sinful pleasures. He is voluptuous in body, heart, and mind; he is not only capable of spiritual pleasure and the acceptance of Divine grace, but also of repentance. He is generally incapable of spiritual pursuits: he is nailed to the ground, drowned in materiality, alive - dead in soul.

Woe to you saturation now: as if hung up! (Luke 6:25) This is the utterance of the word of God to those who break the commandment of holy fasting. What will you eat in eternity, when you have learned here the only satiety with material brushes and material pleasures that are not in heaven? What will you eat in eternity when you have not tasted a single heavenly good? How can you eat and enjoy heavenly blessings when you have not acquired any sympathy for them, have acquired disgust?

The daily bread of Christians is Christ. The insatiable satiety of this bread is satiety and salvation, to which all Christians are invited.

Satisfy yourself with the word of God; be filled with insatiable fulfillment of the commandments of Christ; eat up your meal insatiably, prepared to resist those who chill you, and get drunk a cup of sovereign (Psalm 22.5).

Where do we start, says Saint Macarius the Great (Word 1, ch. 4), who has never studied our hearts? Standing outside, we will knock with prayer and fasting, as the Lord commanded: Puff, and it will be opened to you (Matthew 7: 7).

This feat, which is offered to us by one of the greatest instructors of monasticism, was the feat of the holy apostles. From among him, they were vouchsafed to hear the broadcasting of the Spirit. And to those who serve them the Lord, says the writer of their deeds, and to those who are fasting, speaking the Holy Spirit: separate Me Barnabas and Saul for work, at their calls. Then you fasted and prayed, and laid your hands on her, letting them go (Acts 13: 2.3). From the midst of the feat, in which fasting and prayer were copulated, the command of the Spirit was heard about the calling of the pagans to Christianity.

Wonderful copulation of fasting with prayer! Prayer is powerless if it is not based on fasting, and fasting is fruitless if prayer is not created on it (Rev. Mark the Ascetic. Word 8 about fasting and humility).

Fasting removes a person from the passions of the flesh, and prayer fights against the passions of the soul, and, having conquered them, penetrates the entire composition of a person, purifies him; she introduces God into the purified verbal temple.

He who, without cultivating the land, sows it, destroys the grain, and instead of wheat reaps the thorns. Likewise, if we sow the seeds of prayer without thinning the flesh, then instead of righteousness we will bear fruit sin.

Prayer will be destroyed and plundered by various vain and vicious thoughts and dreams, defiled by voluptuous sensations. Our flesh originated from the earth and, if we do not cultivate it like the earth, it can never bear the fruit of righteousness (ibid.).

On the contrary, if someone cultivates the land with great care and expense, but leaves it unseeded, then it is thickly covered with tares. So, when the body is thinned by fasting, and the soul is not cultivated by prayer, reading, humility, then fasting becomes the parent of numerous tares - emotional passions: high-mindedness, vanity, contempt (ibid.).

What is - the passion of gluttony and drunkenness? Having lost its correctness, the natural desire for food and drink, requiring a much larger quantity and varied quality of them than is necessary to maintain the life and strength of the body, on which excessive nutrition acts contrary to its natural purpose, acts harmful, weakening and destroying them.

The desire for food is straightened by a simple meal and abstinence from satiety and enjoyment of food. First, one must give up satiety and pleasure: this refines the desire for food, and receives rightness. When desire becomes right, then it is satisfied with simple food.

On the contrary, the desire for food, satisfied with satiety and pleasure, is dulled. To excite it, we resort to a variety of delicious foods and drinks. The desire appears at first to be satisfied; then it becomes more whimsical, and, finally, turns into a painful passion, seeking incessant pleasure and satiety, constantly being dissatisfied. Intending to devote ourselves to serving God, let us put fasting as the basis of our exploit. An essential quality of any foundation must be unshakable firmness: otherwise it is impossible for a building to stand on it, no matter how solid the building itself is. And we will never, under any pretext, allow ourselves to break the fast with satiety, especially drunkenness.

The Holy Fathers admit that the best fasting is the consumption of food once a day is not full. Such fasting does not relax the body by prolonged non-eating and does not burden it with an excess of food, moreover, it keeps it capable of soul-saving activity. Such fasting does not represent any striking feature, and therefore the fasting person has no reason for the exaltation to which a person is so inclined about virtue itself, especially when it is sharply exposed.

He who is engaged in bodily labor, or is so weak in body that he cannot be content with eating once a day, must eat twice. Fasting for a person, not a person for fasting.

But with any use of food, both rare and frequent, satiety is strictly prohibited: it makes a person incapable of spiritual exploits and opens the door to other carnal passions.

Immoderate fasting, that is, prolonged excessive abstinence in food, is not approved by the holy fathers: from immeasurable abstinence and the exhaustion that results from it, a person becomes incapable of spiritual exploits, often turns to gluttony, often falls into a passion of exaltation and pride. The quality of the food is very important. The forbidden fruit of paradise, although it was beautiful in appearance and tasty, but it had a detrimental effect on the soul: it imparted to it the knowledge of good and evil, and thus destroyed the integrity in which our forefathers were created. And now food continues to have a strong effect on the soul, which is especially noticeable when drinking wine. This effect of food is based on its various effects on flesh and blood and on the fact that its vapors and gases from the stomach rise to the brain and have an effect on the mind. For this reason, all hopping drinks, especially bread drinks, are forbidden to the ascetic, as they deprive the mind of sobriety, and thus victory in mental battle. A conquered mind, especially with voluptuous thoughts, delighted with them, is deprived of spiritual grace; acquired by many long-term labors is lost in a few hours, in a few minutes.

A monk should by no means drink wine, said the Monk Pimen the Great (Alphabetical Patericon). This rule must be followed by every godly Christian who wishes to preserve his virginity and chastity. The Holy Fathers followed this rule, and if they did use wine, it was very rare and with the greatest moderation.

Hot food should be expelled from the meal of the abstinent, as arousing bodily passions. These are pepper, ginger and other spices.

The most natural food is that which is assigned to man by the Creator immediately upon creation - food from the Kingdom of the Vegetables: God said to our forefathers: Behold, give you every herb of seed that sows seed, the hedgehog is on the top of the earth of all: and every tree that has the fruit of the seed of seed in it will be food for you (Gen. 1:29). Already after the flood, the consumption of meat is permitted (Genesis 9: 3).

Vegetable food is the best for the ascetic. It is the least hot blood, the least fattening the flesh; vapors and gases separating from it and ascending to the brain have the least effect on it; finally, it is the healthiest, as the least mucus producing in the stomach. For these reasons, when using it, the purity and vigor of the mind is preserved with particular convenience, and with them its power over the whole person; when it is used, passions are weaker, and a person is more capable of engaging in feats of piety.

Fish dishes, especially prepared from large sea fish, have a completely different property: they have a sensible effect on the brain, make the body fat, warm the blood, fill the stomach with harmful mucus, especially with frequent and constant use.

These actions are incomparably stronger from the consumption of meat food: it makes the flesh extremely fat, giving it a special stoutness, and hot blood; its vapors and gases are very burdensome to the brain. For this reason, it is not used by monks at all; it is the property of people living in the middle of the world, always busy with intense bodily labor. But for them, the constant use of it is harmful.

How! The imaginary clever girls will exclaim here: meat food is allowed to man by God, and do you forbid the use of it? - To this we answer with the words of the apostle: All my years are the essence(that is, everything is allowed to me), but not all of them crawl: all the years are the essence, but they do not edify all (1 Cor. 10:23). We shy away from eating meat not because we consider it unclean, but because it produces a particular stoutness in our entire composition, hinders spiritual success.

The Holy Church, by her wise institutions and decrees, allowing Christians living in the middle of the world to eat meat, did not allow the constant use of meat, but divided the times of meat-eating from times to abstaining from meat, from times to sobering up a Christian from his meat-eating. Anyone who observes them can learn from experience such fruit of fasts.

For monastics it is forbidden to eat meat; it is allowed to eat dairy food and eggs during meat-eating times. On certain times and days, they are allowed to eat fish. But most of the time they can eat only one plant food.

Vegetable food is almost exclusively used by the most zealous devotees of piety, who especially felt the walking of the Spirit of God in themselves (see 2 Cor. 6:17), due to the aforementioned convenience of this food and its cheapness. For drinking, they use one water, avoiding not only hot and hopping drinks, but also nutritious, which are all bread drinks (Ladder. Word 14, ch. 12).

The rules of fasting were established by the Church with the aim of helping her children, as a guide for the entire Christian society. At the same time, it is prescribed for everyone to consider himself with the help of an experienced and judicious spiritual father and not impose on himself a fast that exceeds strength: because, we repeat, fasting is for a person, and not a person for fasting; the food given for the maintenance of the body must not destroy it.

“If you restrain your womb,” said Saint Basil the Great, “you will enter paradise; if you do not hold back, you will be a victim of death ”(Rev. Nilus of Sorsk. Word 5. Thought of gut eating). Under the name of paradise should be understood here a grace-filled prayer state, and under the name of death a passionate state. The blessed state of a person during his stay on earth serves as a guarantee of his eternal bliss in heavenly Eden; the descent into the power of sin and into the state of mental death is a guarantee of the descent into the hellish abyss for eternal torment. Amen.

Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov. Ascetic experiences. Volume 1

A sight worthy of bitter sobbing: Christians who do not know what Christianity is! And this spectacle is almost incessantly greeted nowadays; rarely are they comforted by the opposite, as if - a comforting spectacle! Rarely can they, in a large crowd of those who call themselves Christians, dwell on a Christian both by name and by the deed itself.

I will try to answer you in as few words as possible, so that verbosity does not in the least damage the clarity of the presentation. "Christians! You talk about salvation, but you do not know that salvation, why people need it, finally, do not know Christ - the only means of our salvation!" This is the true teaching on this subject, the teaching of the Holy Ecumenical Church: salvation consists in the return of communion with God. This communion lost the entire human race through the fall of the forefathers. The entire human race is a category of perished creatures. Perdition is the lot of all people, both virtuous and evil. We are conceived in lawlessness, we are born in sin! "I will descend to my son, lamenting into hell," said the holy patriarch Jacob about himself and his holy son Joseph, chaste and beautiful!

Not only sinners, but also the righteous of the Old Testament descended into hell at the end of their earthly wanderings. Such is the power of human good deeds! Such is the price of the virtues of our fallen nature! In order to restore the fellowship of man with God, otherwise, for salvation, atonement was necessary. The redemption of the human race was not accomplished by an Angel, not by an Archangel, not by any other of the higher, but limited and created beings - it was accomplished. By the very infinite God. Executions - the lot of the human race - are replaced by His execution; the lack of human merit is replaced by His infinite merit. All weak human good deeds that descended into hell have been replaced by one powerful good deed: faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. The Jews asked the Lord: "What can we do and do the works of God?" The Lord answered them: "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him, He is His ambassador." (John 6:29). We need one good deed for salvation: faith, but faith is a work. By faith, by faith alone, we can enter into communion with God through the ordinances given by Him.

The question that you have proposed is now proposed in a row: "Why not be saved," you write, "to pagans, Mohammedans and so-called heretics? There are good people among them. It would be disgusting for the mercy of God to destroy these kind people! Yes! This is disgusting even to common sense human! And heretics - the same Christians. To consider yourself saved, and members of other beliefs perished - and crazy, and extremely proud. "

In vain, you mistakenly think and say that good people between pagans and Mohammedans will be saved, that is, they will enter into communion with God! It is in vain that you look at the opposite idea, as it were, at novelty, as at a delusion that has crept in! Not! This is the constant teaching of the true Church, Old Testament and New Testament. The Church has always recognized that one means of salvation is the Redeemer!
She recognized that the greatest virtues of the fallen nature descend into hell! If the righteous of the True Church, the lamps from which the Holy Spirit shone, the prophets and miracle workers who believed in the coming Redeemer, but who preceded the coming of the Redeemer by their death, descended into hell, then how do you want the pagans and Mohammedans because they seem kind to you who did not know and did not believe in the Redeemer, received salvation delivered by one, one, I repeat to you, means - by faith in the Redeemer? Christian! Get to know Christ!

Understand that you do not know Him, that you have denied Him, recognizing that salvation is possible without Him for some kind of good deeds! He who recognizes the possibility of salvation without faith in Christ denies Christ and, perhaps not knowing, falls into the grave sin of blasphemy.
"We think," says the holy Apostle Paul, "by faith a man can be justified, without the works of the law." (Rom. 3:28). The truth of God "by the faith of Jesus Christ in all and on all believers: there is no difference. All sinning and deprivation are the essence of the glory of God. Justify the tuna by His grace, deliverance, hedgehog in Christ Jesus." (Rom. 3:28). The truth of God "by the faith of Jesus Christ in all and on all believers: there is no difference. All sinning and deprivation are the essence of the glory of God. Justify the tune by His grace, deliverance, the hedgehog about Christ Jesus." You will object, the holy Apostle James demands without fail good deeds; he teaches that "faith apart from works is dead." Consider what the holy Apostle James requires! - you will see that he demands, like all the Divinely inspired writers of Holy Scripture, deeds of faith, and not good deeds of our fallen nature! It requires a living faith, confirmed by the deeds of the new man, and not the good deeds of the fallen nature, contrary to faith.
He cites the deed of the patriarch Abraham, the deed from which the faith of the Righteous One appeared: and this deed consisted of sacrificing his only-begotten son to God. To sacrifice your son is not at all a good deed by human nature: it is a good deed as the fulfillment of God's command, as a deed of faith. Look closely at the New Testament and, in general, at all of Holy Scripture: you will find that it requires the fulfillment of the commandments of God, that this fulfillment is called works, that from this fulfillment of the commandments of God, faith in God becomes alive, as an active one; without him she is dead, as if devoid of any movement.

And, on the contrary, you will find that the good deeds of the fallen nature, from feelings, from blood, from impulses and the most tender sensations of the heart, are forbidden, rejected! And it is precisely these kind deeds that you like in pagans and Mohammedans! For them, even if it was with the rejection of Christ, you want to give them salvation.

Your judgment about common sense is strange! From what, by what right do you find, recognize it in yourself? If you are a Christian, then you must have a Christian concept about this subject, and not some other, arbitrary or seized no one knows where! The Gospel teaches us that by the fall we have acquired a false-named mind, that the mind of our fallen nature, whatever its natural dignity, no matter how sophisticated the scholarship of the world, retains the dignity brought to it by the fall, remains a false mind. It is necessary to reject it, to surrender to the leadership of faith: and with this leadership, in due time, after significant deeds in piety, God will grant His faithful servant the mind of Truth, or the Spiritual mind; this reason can and should be recognized as sound reason: it is the declared faith, so admirably described by the holy Apostle Paul in the 2nd chapter of his Epistle to the Hebrews.

Basis for Spiritual Discussion: God. It rests on this solid stone and therefore does not hesitate, does not fall. We, Christians, recognize the common reason that you call so painful, so darkened and deluded, that its healing cannot be accomplished otherwise than by cutting off all the knowledge that constitutes it, by the sword of faith and by rejecting it. If we recognize him as sound, recognize on some basis unknown, shaky, indefinite, constantly changing, then he, sound, will certainly reject Christ. This has been proven by experiments. What does your common sense tell you? That it is contrary to your common sense to acknowledge the destruction of good people who do not believe in Christ! - little of! Such destruction of the virtuous is contrary to the mercy of such an all-good being as God. - Of course, you had a revelation from above about this subject, about what is disgusting and what is not disgusting to the mercy of God? - Not! But common sense shows it. - A! Your common sense! ..

However, with your sound mind, where did you get that it is possible for you to comprehend with your own limited human mind, what is disgusting and what is not disgusting to the mercy of God? .. Let me say our thought? The Gospel, otherwise the Teaching of Christ, otherwise the Holy Scripture, otherwise the Holy Ecumenical Church, have revealed to us everything that a person can know about the mercy of God, invoking all intellectualization, all human comprehension, inaccessible to them. The wobbling of the human mind is in vain when it seeks to define the limitless God, when it seeks to explain the inexplicable, to subordinate to its own considerations ... whom? .. God! Such an undertaking is a satanic undertaking!

He who is called a Christian and does not know the teaching of Christ! If you have not learned the incomprehensibility of God from this blessed, heavenly teaching - go to school, listen to what the children are learning! They are explained by the teachers of mathematics in the "theory of the infinite" that it, as an indefinite quantity, does not obey the laws that govern definite quantities - numbers, that its results can be completely opposite to the results of numbers. And you want to define the laws of the action of God's mercy, you say: this is in accordance with him, this is repugnant to him! It agrees or disagrees with your common sense, with your concepts and feelings - does it follow from the fact that God is obliged to understand and feel, how do you understand and feel? And this is what you demand from God!

Here is the most reckless and quite proud undertaking! Do not blame the judgment of the Church for the lack of common sense and humility: this is your fault! She, the holy Church, only follows steadily the teaching of God about the actions of God, revealed by God Himself! Obediently, her true children follow her, enlightened by faith, trampling on the boastful mind that rises up against God! We believe that we can know about God only what God was pleased to reveal to us! If there had been another path to the knowledge of God, a path that we could pave the mind with our own efforts, "revelation" would not have been given to us. It is given because we need it.
Vain and deceitful are their own self-reflections and the wanderings of the human mind!

You say: "Heretics are the same Christians." Where did you get this from? Is anyone who calls himself a Christian and does not know anything about Christ, out of extreme ignorance, dare to recognize himself as a Christian like the heretics, and not to distinguish the Holy Christian Faith from the child of the oath of blasphemous heresy! Otherwise, true Christians talk about it! Numerous hosts of saints accepted the martyr's crown, preferred the fierce and prolonged torment, prison, exile, rather than agree to participate with the heretics in their blasphemous teaching; The Ecumenical Church has always recognized heresy as a mortal sin, has always recognized that a person infected with the terrible disease of heresy - soul, alien to grace and salvation, in communion with the devil and his destruction .

Heresy is a sin of the mind, more a sin of the devil than of a human; she is the daughter of the devil, his invention - wickedness close to idolatry. The Fathers usually call idolatry wickedness and heresy evil. In idolatry, the devil received divine honor from blinded people; and by heresy he makes blind people participants in his main sin - Blasphemy. Whoever reads the Acts of the Councils with attention will easily be convinced that the character of the heretics is completely satanic. He will see their terrible hypocrisy, excessive pride, will see behavior made up of incessant lies, will see that they are devoted to various low passions; will see that they, when they have the opportunity, decide on all the most terrible crimes and atrocities. Especially remarkable is their irreconcilable hatred for the children of the true Church and thirst for their blood! Heresy is associated with hardening of the heart, with a terrible darkening and damage to the mind, stubbornly holding on to the soul infected by it, and it is difficult for a person to heal from an illness! Every heresy contains blasphemy against the Holy Spirit: it either blasphemes the dogma of the Holy Spirit, or the action of the Holy Spirit, but blasphemes against the Holy Spirit.

The Essence of All Heresy - Blasphemy ... Saint Flavian, Patriarch of Constantinople, who captured in blood the confession of the true faith, pronounced the definition of the local Council of Constantinople on the heresiarch Eutychios in the following words: following their Blasphemy, especially since he did not even heed our advice and instructions for the adoption of sound doctrine.
Therefore, weeping and sighing for his final destruction, we declare on behalf of our Lord Jesus Christ that he fell into Blasphemy that he was stripped of all priestly dignity, our communion and management of the monastery, letting everyone know , who will henceforth converse with him or visit him, that they themselves will undergo excommunication " ... This definition is recognized by the whole Church, confirmed by the Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon.

The heresy of Eutychios consisted in the fact that he did not confess in Christ after the incarnation of two natures, as the Church confesses - he admitted one divine nature. You will say: only! .. The answer of a certain person clothed in this world to Saint Alexander the Patriarch of Alexandria about the Arian heresy is funny because of the lack of true knowledge and bitterly pitiful in its quality and consequences. This person advises the Patriarch to keep the peace, not to start quarrels, so much contrary to the spirit of Christianity, because of some words ; writes that he does not find anything reprehensible in the teachings of Arius, some difference in the turnover of words - only! These turns of words, notes the historian Fleury, in which there is nothing reprehensible, reject the Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ - only!
It means that they are overthrowing the whole Christian faith - only! Remarkable: all ancient heresies, under various changing guises, strove towards one goal: they rejected the Divine Word and distorted the dogma of the Incarnation. The newest ones most strive to reject the actions of the Holy Spirit: with terrible blasphemy they rejected the Divine Liturgy, all the sacraments, everything, everything where the Ecumenical Church has always recognized the action of the Holy Spirit. They called it human institutions - boldly: superstition, delusion! Of course, you see neither robbery nor theft in heresy. Maybe that's the only reason why you consider it not a sin?

Here the Son of God is rejected, here the Holy Spirit is rejected and blasphemed - only! He who accepts and contains the Blasphemous teaching, who utters Blasphemy does not rob, does not steal, even does good deeds of the fallen nature, he is a wonderful person! How can God deny him salvation! .. The whole reason for our last bewilderment, as well as all others, is a deep ignorance of Christianity.
Do not think that ignorance is an unimportant flaw! Not! Its consequences can be disastrous, especially now, when innumerable books with a Christian title, with a satanic teaching, circulate in society. If you do not know the true Christian teaching, you can just take the false, blasphemous for the true, assimilate it for yourself, and with it assimilate eternal destruction. The blasphemer will not be saved! And those perplexities that you portrayed in your letter are already terrible heralds of your salvation. Their essence is denial of Christ!

Don't play with your salvation, don't play! Otherwise, you will cry forever. Read the New Testament and the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church ..; study in the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church how to correctly understand Scripture, what kind of living, what thoughts and feelings befitting a Christian. Study Christ and Christianity from Scripture and living faith. Before the terrible hour comes, in which you have to appear before God for judgment, acquire the justification given by God to all people through the medium of Christianity.