Послание 41. К Силуану и Евпрепиану, сынам

Since I often want to know about the disciples, my sons, and you yourself sometimes want to inform about them, I considered it good, both for brevity and for confidentiality, to designate them with alphabetical signs, twenty-four letters, namely: α will mean our father, β - archbishop, γ - Kalogir, δ - Athanasius, ε - Barsanuphius, ζ - Nicholas, η - Sophronia, θ - Euphemia, ι - Ioannicia, κ - Dometiana, λ - economy, μ - Arsenia, ν - Akakia, ξ - Meletia, o - Luciana, π - Epiphania, ρ - Litoia, σ - Basil, τ - Evschimon, υ - Silouan, φ - Euprepiana, χ - Gregory, ψ - Eustathius, ω - me. So, when a letter is placed in an inscription, it shows whose letter it is; for example, α - our father, and each one is exactly the same. Again, when I ask: “How is β?”, obviously, it must be understood that the question concerns the archbishop. In the same way, when I ask: “How are those at β doing well?” - it is clear that the question concerns those with him; exactly the same with other letters. If the question is: “What do you hear about π or about ρ, or about ψ?” – the answer must be relative to each of these letters. If I ask: “Who came from outside?” “You must answer by letter: either η, or ο, or those who were with η or ο, in such and such a number”; “this and that happened with such and such a letter.” In the same way, when death happens: “such and such a letter has died (or is sick, or is grieving),” and so on. If something happens to anyone at the letter, then, indicating the name, say, for example, about Christopher, that he ran away from ε, as happened. Thus, when you receive letters sent by us, the letter will have a letter in the inscription - of course, if it is from the person designated by the letters. So you yourself, when sending letters from the same letters, put these letters in your letter. If the senders do not know this, then erase the inscription and put the letter of the person who wrote the letter. If it is not one of those indicated by letters, then let the inscription remain, as in my letters. If the addressee is not one of those indicated by letters, then let there be an inscription indicating to whom the letter is addressed. It should also be noted that in each of my letters to those designated by letters, the inscription will be as follows: ω to α, and so on. And letters sent to me should be marked: α or υ, or some other letter. You also need to know the following: since there are three more letters that stand outside the twenty-four letters, namely: stigma, coppa and sampi, the first will mean all our brothers who once committed sins, before or after, the second - the patriarch, the third - the Emperor. So, when it is necessary to either ask me or notify us about one of these three, it will be indicated by one of these letters. You might be interested in: