Prot. Dionysius Dunaevsky. The many-faced preposition: how a thought penetrates the soul through feeling, reason and imaginationtranslated

In the previous publication, we analyzed in detail the classical patristic scheme of the development of sin: from a seemingly harmless excuse to the complete enslavement of the will. At the same time, it was noted that the preposition, or “attack” of a thought, is the moment of the appearance in consciousness of either a thought-concept, or a visual image, or a sudden attraction. However, in practice, many reduce the pretext solely to a visual picture, forgetting that the enemy is inventive and can attack the soul through a variety of channels. To fill this gap, let us turn to three literary examples that illustrate with surgical precision how a thought penetrates the heart through feeling, reason and imagination.

At the well in Moria: preposition-attraction

The first story centers on the hobbit Peregrin Took, better known as Pippin. While crossing Moria, the Fellowship of the Ring stops for the night in one of the halls. In the middle of the stone floor there is a deep well. And here Tolkien describes the classic picture of addiction, which invades the soul not through an image, but through a sudden, irrational attraction.

Pippin, without understanding why, makes his way to the edge of the well. No pictures were shown to him, no one whispered to him...