Слово 74

(1) About attachment to relatives. – (2) About despair and its types. – (3) About the need to admonish such people with the words of Scripture. – (4) Whoever does not fulfill even the smallest commandment cannot be said to be a true believer. – (5) Tribute depiction of the procession along the royal path among temptations. – (6) Harm for a monk from addiction to relatives. 1. It would be better for me to remain silent and mourn my sins, and not take upon myself the work of a teacher, in order to teach your love and show others the path of salvation, not because the work of teaching is contrary to the commandment of Christ - on the contrary, it is very pleasing to Him - but because I am unworthy of such spiritual work. Why am I very afraid that the word of David is not coming to me, who says: To the sinner God says: How many things will you tell of My justifications and will you accept My covenant with your lips? But you hated punishment and you rejected My words (Ps. 49:16-17). For whoever does not like to obey the laws of God does not like the lessons that come from the words of the Lord, and closes his ears so as not to hear the words containing the teaching about future judgment and reward for sinners, or about eternal fire, or about the torment of hell, or about eternal condemnation, from which it is impossible for anyone who has once fallen under its definition to escape. And whoever does not strive with all his soul to always have the commandments of Christ before his eyes and keep them, but despises them and prefers to do everything contrary to these commandments, he has turned (thrown away - Ed.) the words of the Lord backwards (backwards, for himself). For when the Lord commands, crying: repent, for the kingdom of heaven is drawing near (Matthew 4:17), and again: strive to enter through the narrow gate (Luke 13:24), and the one who hears this not only does not repent and does not force himself to enter through the narrow gate, but spends all the days of his life in carelessness and carelessness about his soul, trying every hour sins upon sins, rest and nourishing his body more than necessary - which is a sign of a wide and spacious path that leads a person to eternal destruction, and not a narrow and sorrowful one that leads to eternal life - such a one has turned the words of the Lord back, for himself, and creates only his own desires, or, better to say, the devil’s. I, poor one, am the first of those who do this, and, being as if in a ditch of mud, and feeling my extreme misery, I cry out from the depths of the mud to everyone outside walking near the ditch, saying: my brethren, flee further from this terrible ditch and follow the straight path, which is Christ; Let none of you shy away, either on the wrist or on the surface, so as not to end up here, like me, the poorest and most unfortunate, and not to lose, along with earthly and heavenly blessings. Know that the all-evil devil, the enemy of our souls, plots all sorts of intrigues and deceits in order to gather as many of us as possible into this most terrible ditch, among other means he also uses our attachment to our relatives. He throws it like a rope noose around everyone’s neck, and drags everyone who accepts this bridle and, casting them into the mud of mortal sins, plunges them into the ditch of despair; when he brings them down to the lowest depths of sin, he binds them and leaves them there. 2. Let us flee, my brothers, I pray you, from such destruction of our souls. The enemy of our souls, the devil, with such wickedness leads them into a state of despair and covers it up with such deceit that they do not even think that they have fallen into it, do not listen to the Divine Scriptures, do not give faith to the words of those who tell them about it, and place everything below their own wisdom or, better said, ignorance and insensibility, since they do not feel that they are tied in a noose up to their necks - which is worse than any despair. For it is another matter when someone despairs of his salvation due to the multitude of sins into which he has fallen, and another when someone considers evil to be good and, while doing it, maintains the conviction that he is doing good. Whoever despairs because of the multitude of his sins, if you teach him the doctrine of repentance and God’s love for mankind and let him understand that there are no sins, no matter how many there may be, that repentance will not blot out, that where sin abounds, grace abounds, and that there is great joy in heaven over the one sinner who repents, perhaps he will come to his senses and be moved, but another Once he desires to get rid of that many sins, he will ease his conscience from this unbearable burden and, despising all the blessings of the world, will resort to repentance with great zeal. But whoever holds evil as good, comes to repentance with great difficulty and does not at all agree to accept such healing medicines. For how is it possible for someone who does not believe and does not even entertain the thought that he is sick in soul or has fallen to decide on such spiritual self-healing? 3. Why do we need to collect as many spiritual words as possible from the Holy Gospel and other Divine Scriptures in order to convince them and show them what their error is and how they deviated from the straight path that they began to walk, and how the devil, approaching these monks with flattery, threw a noose of addiction around their necks; then show how he dragged them into the rapids and entanglements of sins, how he plunged them into the deepest ditch of wickedness, how he brought them to the most extreme destruction, and there, having tied them up, he abandoned them and left, in the confidence that they would never be freed. When we say all this to those who believe the words of the Divine Scripture, come to their senses, recognize their sins and confess themselves that they are truly in the most disastrous state, then we will give them decent healing for their wounds - all from the words of the Divine Scripture. However, I beg you all, pray to the Lord God for me, who, being ignorant, is forced to accept the feat of the word, to demonstrate everything that has been said, may the grace of the All-Holy Spirit shine in me and may it enlighten my heart and my mind, and grant me the strength to utter some word useful for your souls. And oh, when would this grace of the Holy Spirit, not according to my dignity, but for your own benefit, itself deign to resound (echo) the words of truth into your ears and thus enlighten you with its light, and mysteriously show you everything that I said above, as if saying to you: here, here is the way, here is the rapids, here is the enemy, here is the rope, here is the brother (tempted)! And look with what joy he accepts the noose, and how the enemy drags him away! - And then consistently show everything one after another, without any omission, finally show how we can escape the enemy’s snares, make us free from the bonds of the devil and lead us to heaven. So, let's start from the beginning and from the very top. Our Lord and God, the true Son of God and the Father, consubstantial, monoglorious. co-throne and co-throne with the Father and the Holy Spirit, abiding in the Father, who abides in Him, seeing our disastrous and pitiful state and this slavery, in which we enslaved for so many years to our enemy the devil, who deceived us into sin, out of His ineffable love for mankind, he took pity on us, wanted to free us from this slavery and the deception of the devil, and for this purpose he condescended from heaven to earth and, having become a man, lived with us, men, sinners, and, having given commandments to His holy disciples and Apostles, again ascended into heaven to His Father with much glory, after He commanded them: going into the whole world, preach the Gospel to every creature... keep them more often, not this and that, but everything that was commanded to you, - and saying: everything, He did not forsake any one commandment that he would not command us to fulfill. Then what does he say? He who has faith and is baptized will be saved, but he who does not have faith will be condemned (Mark 16:15-16; Matthew 28:20). 4. Well, my beloved brother, did you understand what was said: he who believed and was baptized, and then again: he who did not believe (απισησας)? Or should I tell you about this? For this word seems simple and understandable to everyone, but contains deeply hidden thoughts. Here it is not said about that one faith that Christ is God, but it is also said about faith that embraces all the holy commandments, when that is, someone accepts all the commandments with faith and holds the conviction that not one of them is idle, but that all the words of God, down to the jot and tittle, are life and bring eternal life. Whoever thus believes in all the commandments of Christ and, as promised in holy Baptism, keeps and fulfills them all, without omitting a single one, will be saved. On the contrary, whoever disbelieves any word of Christ, to a single tittle or jot, will be condemned, as if he had rejected Christ the Lord Himself. And righteously. For the one who believes Him in great things - that He, let's say point by point, being God, became man immutably and unchangeably, that He was crucified and died, that He rose again and appeared to the Apostles, having entered to them through a closed door, that He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father, that He is to come to judge the living and the dead and to reward each according to his deeds, and that first of all He has to resurrect all people who were born from Adam and will be born before the end of the age - who believes all this, and does not believe the following words: I say to you, that every idle word that men speak will be given back on the day of judgment (Matthew 12:36) - how is it possible for one to be faithful and be numbered among the faithful? In the same way, whoever believes Christ in these terrible and great mysteries, surpassing every mind and every human thought, and in everything that has been accomplished and still has to be accomplished by Christ our Lord, and does not believe Him in the following words spoken by Him: whoever wants to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and come after Me (Mark 8:34), - also: whoever loves his father or a mother is more worthy of Me than Me (Matthew 10:37), - and again: if anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, and wife, and children, and brothers, and sisters, and also his soul, he cannot be My disciple (Luke 14:26), - and: whoever destroys one of these little commandments... he will be called in the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:19) - how is it possible for such a one to be considered faithful, and not more so condemned as an unfaithful, and even worse than an unfaithful, when in regard to the most important things he confesses that he believes in Christ, but in small things (as it seems to him) he despises Him, God and the Lord of all, as if he were a liar - and in relation to other things he says that he believes in Christ as God true, and does not believe in His word that He says: for every idle word men will render their word on the day of judgment, like some insignificant person? Christ speaks grief to those who laugh and pleases those who cry, but he, laughing, blaspheming and empty talk, thinks that he will be saved. Even what? – Without denying himself according to the commandment of the Lord and without bearing his cross, he thinks that he will follow Christ crucified for him, and, loving his relatives more than Christ, he considers himself worthy of Christ. Thus, those who seem to come to Christ and leave the world and worldly things, but do not reject all their relatives and at the same time their very life, do everything contrary to this, love their relatives more than Christ - in vain they think that they are disciples of Christ, and, every day breaking not just one small commandment, but many, and, moreover, great ones, in vain they imagine that they are not doing anything ungodly - not enough, they dream even to be some great and wondrous ones in the kingdom of heaven. The greatest evil is that they say that by acting this way they are not in the least violating the commandments, and not only do they say this, but they foolishly try to convince us, who defend the word of truth, of this. But let's return to our subject. So, all the commandments that Christ commanded the Apostles, He equally commanded us, so that we keep them, every single one. And we can observe them, even while in the world, but we don’t want to, because we are weak in faith and love for Christ. That this, which I have now said, is true, is confirmed by all who, before the law, in the law and after the incarnation of our Savior Christ, pleased God, being in the world, with children and wives, and in all worldly cares. Because they had no attachment to all this at all, but were detached from it by their own will. Some of them were brighter in faith and deeds than those who spent their lives in the mountains and caves. Why do we, relying on the commandment of the Lord, as if directly spoken to us and adapted to our weakness, deny everything, enter on a narrow and regrettable path, physically separate from the world and what is in the world, leave one place and move to another - to a monastery, and begin the feat of virtues, in which everyone strives, more or less, as he pleases. – Why are we doing this? In order to acquire impartiality to what has been said and to renounce attachment to it, since otherwise this would prevent us from immediately moving away from the world from beginning to walk the path leading to the kingdom of heaven, following the commandments of the Lord and obeying His commandments. 5. But, I ask you, thoroughly understand the power of the words that I now want to offer you. Imagine in your mind a certain royal path, all smoothed out by the feet of those who previously walked along it kindly and pleasing to God; on both sides of it imagine mountains, hollows, cliffs, high cliffs and gaps, and between them imagine fields, meadows, places of entertainment with shadows and trees full of various fruits; imagine also that there are many wild animals, robbers and murderers hiding there in different places. Know now that if we, having entered this path, walk along it, imitating those who walked along it before us - the saints - then none of this can seduce us, attract our feelings or harm us. When, walking along the path of the Lord's commandments, we, when passing between the said objects, do not turn our eyes to any of them, then none of those robbers or animals will dare to openly attack us, they will not even dare to come close to us, especially if we follow some spiritual guide and have good companions. It happens, however, that those robbers sometimes stand at a distance, sometimes come closer, and some of them frighten us and look at us brutally, like murderers, others, on the contrary, kindly turn to us with flattering and seemingly friendly words, showing the pleasantness of the places there, the beauty of the trees and fruits and inviting us to rest a little after worthwhile labors and taste the fruits, sweet to the taste and beautiful to look at - and many others invent tricks and use countless tricks to somehow lure us away from that royal path. So they constantly bother us day and night, both when we are awake and when we sleep, and sometimes they fight us with shameful lusts, sometimes with desires for forbidden foods, sometimes they desperately attack us and threaten us that they will kill us, thinking thereby to intimidate us and lead us astray from the royal path. Some of them say that it is impossible to endure all the difficulties of this path; others - that these works are completely futile and cannot bring any benefit to those who use them; still others say again that this path we are following has no end, and they show us some of those who have not achieved any success in anything. These are especially those who spent a lot of time in asceticism and did not receive any benefit from this long-term stay in it, because they did not walk the path of God’s commandments with reason, and not with a right and pious thought, but labored willfully and with pride. Such people always stop their flow according to God and, fearing, return back, and then, sinking into negligence, they betray themselves to the devil and begin to do what pleases him. 6. But where can I retell to you, my spiritual brothers, all the intrigues and deceits of our enemy the devil and his evil demons, when they are countless? Why, having aroused the attention and love of the ascetics by what I said, I leave the rest to them to figure out themselves. I will undertake to depict to you what I promised, that is, the bonds of attachment that we have for our relatives, how the crafty devil binds us with this addiction (and especially those who have already conquered many other passions and have been adorned with the crowns of this victory) and through it, this evil one casts us down into darkness and destruction. But listen more carefully to what I say. Imagine that you are on the path mentioned above, and either have just begun to walk, or have already been walking along it for some time, and met many attacks from the said robbers and animals, but, by the grace of Christ, you were not seduced by their caresses, nor were you drawn to pleasure by the beauty of the things visible there, nor were you struck by fear and intimidation - and you did not deviate from that royal path, and did not stop on it, without moving. forward, nor back, but with more and more liveliness and desire you flow forward. Do you think that when you are flowing like this, the devil has left you alone and left you behind, refusing to fight with you? No no! He will not give you peace; but, knowing that we left our father and mother, and all kinship in general, and promised God, when we accepted the monastic schema, to fulfill this commandment along with the others about whom it was said, and seeing that he could not seduce us from the royal path by any means - what does he do? First he brings to mind our parents and relatives, then, intending to confuse our minds and bring us to the point of disobeying the commandment of Christ, which commands us to reject our relatives, he offers from the Divine Scripture sayings spoken to people in other positions and relationships, saying within us: Honor your father and your mother, the Divine Scripture commands, and do not despise those belonging to your tribe ( Is.58:7), because, as the Apostle says, whoever does not provide for those around him has denied the faith (1 Tim.5:8). This evil one does not properly know that this was said not so that we would love our parents and relatives more than Christ, and prefer them to the love of Christ, but to teach us obedience to God, for if we must obey and honor our parents, shouldn’t we all the more obey God, our Creator and our parents themselves? But, O wicked devil, those characteristic of our tribe are not our relatives, but fellow believers, about which property you do not know as it should be, and you offer us relatives according to the flesh, trying to plunge us into love and passion for them. When we notice his deception and understand it well, either on our own, or with the help of our leaders and brethren, walking with us along the path of Christ, what is this seducer secretly whispering inside our mind? You, he says, have already achieved such a measure of prosperity and perfection that none of your brothers knows; You have acquired complete impartiality and dispassion, therefore you can always, as you wish, indifferently look at your relatives, as if at strangers. He puts this into his mind, and, immediately imagining some relative, if not physically, then in thought, he again says secretly: how can you leave this creation of God to destruction, seeing that he is wallowing in ignorance of God, like dumb animals? Why don’t you give him a helping hand, enlighten his mind and teach him to know the God who created him? What excuse will you give and what will you answer on the terrible day of judgment? - Then he stops such speech and only inspires him to remember him in his prayers and shed tears of compassion for him, repeating in his heart the following words of Scripture: take away what is honorable from what is unworthy, as my mouth will be - again: He has created for one the least of these brothers of mine, You have created for Me (Matthew 25:40), - and again: I was a father to the weak ( Job 29:16). And all this is clearly the charm of the devil. If that brother (to whom this is instilled) does not succumb to such suggestions and, having gathered his strength, resists the enemy - the devil, saying: what I must do for my dear one, I must do the same for a stranger, who is more dear to me in God than he is in the flesh, then the evil enemy answers him, saying: truly it is as you say, and God takes care of everyone in this way, that is, through others everyone knows God and believes in Him; in the same way, you know God and believe in Him - through either your relatives or other strangers, and this relative of yours comes to know God through you, and others then through him. But in these times, who is like you? And where will he go if you leave him? He will destroy his soul, and you, of course, will be guilty of his death if you leave him alone. - The brother is finally seduced by such enemy flattery, and stands, under such a plausible pretext, allowing the devil to bind himself to the rope of addictions, and when he becomes bound, then he no longer contradicts him, as if completely convinced by demonic arguments. And look, what kind of malice does this crafty and soul-corrupting villain have? As soon as he manages to bind his brother with an addiction to this, he no longer walks around him and does not bother him, so that his slander would not be revealed in any way, but what does he do? He takes hold of the end of the rope and moves away from his brother, hiding in the darkness, like the creator of darkness, that is, he leaves in his brother, like a thorn, care and concern for that relative, for he knows that that relative, or, rather, addiction to him, better than himself, will torment and hurt him incessantly. When a brother actually begins to care about his relative, then, no matter what kind of care they may be, he at the same time leaves the royal path on which he began to walk, and the further he retreats from him, the deeper the enemy enters into him, hiding, however, and only holding the rope of partiality more tightly in his hands and caring about one thing, lest his brother recognize his intrigues. Having already completely left the royal path, what do you think that brother says within himself? He who saves a soul happens to be the one who created it, and thus one finally comes to think that he is doing a Christ-like deed. If he has lay acquaintances, he begins to go to them, and sometimes he flatters them, praising them beyond measure, sometimes he denounces them strictly, and often he takes liberties in his behavior and food and deliberately lets out certain words to induce laughter, and in general treats everyone according to his character, so that he willingly accepts him and gives him money. If he sees that they are not giving anything, he begins to ask himself without shame, everywhere using the needs of his relative as an excuse. And it happens that those who hear such speeches of his, being themselves carnal and possessing the same passions, praise this unfortunate monk very much and say that he is gaining a great reward for himself. From this, that addiction, or, better to say, this pain of addiction (for relatives), grows even more and takes root in him, just as a rope eats into the flesh of the neck, enters deeper and deeper into his soul, dissolves with it and becomes inseparable from it. As a result of this, little by little he moves away from pure prayer and replaces tears for God with tears that are contrary to Him, without realizing it. Then he finally begins to envy those who have and hate them for not giving him as much as he would like. And not only does he suffer, but moreover he becomes lazy in all obedience and disobedient. At the same time, he learns to tell a lie, considering it a measure of prudence, thinking and assuring that he gives to God and spends it on his relatives. Moreover, he begins to steal little by little, without thinking, however, that this is real theft: his passion is so blinding! And in general, no matter what and how he gets for his neighbors, his conscience never accuses him of having done something bad. Why is it that the enemy, when he finally plunges the poor monk into everything that I said, releases from his hands the rope of this addiction, already firmly and deeply rooted, like some pillar that has penetrated the underworld of hell, being sure that it will never be untied. I said this little about those who began the feat. But what can we say about those who embark on the royal path of monastic life with indifference and carelessness? For such people, the passion for their relatives is so strong and widespread that through it they are caught in every net of the enemy, who walks everywhere like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour, and meanwhile they would rather agree to die than to free themselves from the teeth and come out of the terrible mouth of this destructive dragon. We, accepting with faith everything that has been said, let us pray to God with all our souls, that He may never allow us to be deceived by the enemy or, having violated any commandment, large or small, to stray from the royal path leading to the kingdom of heaven and fall into the shackles of any passion. But, walking along that path, without turning our eyes to anything else, let us strive with zeal for our mother-in-law, so that we may comprehend Christ, and when we comprehend, let us fall to Him and weep before Him, warmly praying to Him that He would never depart from us and not allow us to stray from the royal path, which is He Himself, as He says: I am the way and the truth and the life (John 14:6). Let us therefore seek Him, Let us strive to comprehend and hold Him. If we are worthy of this, then we will continue to live with Him in this life, but after death we will ascend and ascend with Him into heaven, and He will glorify us and give us the enjoyment of eternal blessings - that we may all benefit from the grace and love of our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory and power, with His beginningless Father and His All-Holy, good and life-giving Spirit, now and ever, and in the future. forever and ever. Amen. You might be interested in: