Глава 20. О том, что не должно домогаться бесед с мирскими родственниками или заботиться о делах их

We must distance ourselves from relatives, friends and parents by our disposition as much as we see the dead and the living distant from each other. For whoever has truly prepared himself for exploits of virtue, has renounced the whole world and everything in the world, and, I will say more fully, has been crucified to the world, has died for the world and for everything in the world, be it parents or brothers, or relatives in the third, fourth and further generations. Therefore, if parents withdraw from the world and begin to live the same kind of life as their son leads, then they are truly relatives and stand on the level not of parents, but of brothers. For the first, most true, father is the Father of all, and the second after Him is a mentor in spiritual life. If relatives continue to love their former life, then they form part of the world from which we have moved away, and are not in any way related to those who have put aside the carnal man and stripped themselves of their properties. And whoever fully loves friendship with worldly people and wants to constantly talk with them, as a result of frequent conversations, settles their affection in his soul. And again, whoever has filled the mind with worldly concepts has fallen behind the good undertaking, has moved away from the spiritual way of thinking, has again gathered into the soul what he had previously vomited out, and is wounded by the enemy, who with carnal affinities disturbs spiritual life. Therefore, let us wish our relatives the best, that is, truth and piety and what we have recognized as honorable for ourselves. For it is fitting for us to desire this, and it is beneficial for them to receive such fruit from us. And let us free our thoughts from care and worry about them, because the devil, as soon as he sees that we have been stripped of all worldly cares and are easily flowing towards heaven, instilling in us the thought of relatives and tuning us to care about their affairs, makes our mind worry about everyday concerns about what property our loved ones have, whether they are sufficient or meager; what profit was received from the turnovers they made and how much their wealth increased from this; what losses they suffered from the unfortunate circumstances they encountered and how much their real property decreased as a result. He also makes it so that just as we rejoice at their successes and become despondent at their failures, so we are at enmity with them against their enemies (while we are commanded not to consider anyone an enemy - Matt. 5:44), and we rejoice with friends who are often unworthy of spiritual rapprochement, we rejoice at their unrighteous and reckless gains. The devil again introduces into our thoughts all the evil dispositions towards worldly objects, which we have put aside in order to settle spiritual concepts within ourselves. And again, bringing into the soul a material and worldly way of thinking, it destroys the inner ascetic in us, making of us some kind of idol that wears the appearance of an ascetic, but is not in the least animated by virtues. And it often happened that, out of strong affection for his relatives, the ascetic dared to commit sacrilege in order to relieve his relatives from need. For what is reserved for the saints who have dedicated themselves to God is sacred, recognized and accepted as a true offering to God, and therefore whoever steals any of it is one of those who dare to commit sacrilege. Therefore, having recognized the unbearable harm of this disposition towards our own, let us avoid caring for them as a weapon of the devil. For the Lord Himself forbade such attachment and habit, not allowing one of the disciples to even say goodbye to his family, and another to bury the body of his deceased father. To those who want to say goodbye to their family, the Lord says: “No one can lay his hand on his forehead and turn back in vain; he is ruled in the Kingdom of Heaven” (Luke 9:62). And to the one who asks to bury his father, the answer is: “follow Me” and “leave the dead to bury their dead” (Luke 9:59-60). Although apparently both of them offered very plausible and fair petitions, the Savior did not give permission for them and did not allow the disciples of the Heavenly Kingdom to be separated from Him for a short time, lest they, being carried away into earthly and carnal dispositions, would do or think something that was lower than the sublime and heavenly way of thinking. Therefore, those who think about heavenly things, as if they have already been resettled from here and have mentally become worldly, are not allowed to have any respect for earthly things. If someone says: “How does the law command you to take care of your own, saying: “Neither do you despise those who belong to your tribe” (Isa. 58:7), and likewise the Apostle: “If anyone does not provide for his own, much less for his relatives, he has rejected the faith to eat and is more than an infidel” (1 Tim. 5:8),” then we will give him a short answer that the divine Apostle said this to people worldly, having material wealth and the opportunity to alleviate the needs of relatives; and likewise the law says this (I will say it briefly) to the living, and not to the dead, because the latter are not subject to any duty similar to this. And you died and were crucified to the whole world. For, having renounced material wealth, you have loved non-covetousness, having dedicated yourself to God, you have become God’s treasure. As a deceased person, you are free from any contribution to the benefit of your relatives, but as a non-covetous person, you have nothing that you could give to them. since you have brought fruit to God and the body itself, and over it, as over it as a gift to God, you no longer have power, then it is not permissible for you to turn yourself to the use of people and you must deal with only like-minded people, who themselves have dedicated everything to God. Therefore, how can the mentioned sayings of Holy Scripture be applied to you? Or will you not sin by renouncing your vow regarding asceticism? You might be interested in: