Instruction for tonsure into the monastic order

How monks should always fight against three enemies Part one. About daily warfare and how monks must take up arms against these three enemies and defeat them Part two. About the beginning of monasticism and what it means to be a monk Just as the warriors of this world, coming together for battle, equip themselves with all kinds of weapons in order to be terrible for their enemies, and courageously take up arms against them, so Christ’s soldiers must also equip themselves with all kinds of spiritual weapons when they are going to go out to battle against invisible enemies. As it is written, “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities and powers and rulers of the world” (Eph. 6:12) dark, against three strong enemies - the body, the world and the devil. Let us hear more clearly in the Gospel of Matthew in chapters 10 and 16, as the Lord said to His disciples: “Whoever loves father or mother more than Me is worthy of Me. Whoever loves a son or daughter more than Me is worthy of Me. Those who do not accept their cross, and those who are worthy of Me will come after Me” (Matthew 10:37–38). “Whoever wants to save his soul will destroy it, and whoever destroys his soul for the sake of Me and the Gospel will save it. What good is it for a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul, or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matthew 16:25–26). In the Holy Gospel, the Lord clearly indicated three enemies warring against our soul. The first and greatest enemy is the devil, against whom the Lord commands us to take up the cross. The second enemy is our body with what is characteristic of it; He commanded us to resist it by rejecting father, mother, son and daughter. The third enemy is the world; He said about this: “If he gains the whole world, what good will it do?” (see Matthew 16:26). Monks must fight against three enemies and take up arms against them always when they run into the races of this world (see 1 Cor. 9:24). The spectators of this battle are both God and His angels, and the devil and his angels. The place of battle is the distance between the righteous and the sinful. Horse - body. The rider and rider are the soul, the leader of the army is the mind. The weapon of the soldiers of Christ is faith, like an invincible shield. Patience is like a strong helmet. Diligent prayer is like a sword. Unfeigned humility is like a bow and arrow. The devil is very afraid of such weapons. The regiments of Satan and the leaders of his army: the first regiment is pride, delicacy, uncleanness, murder, vanity, rage, anger. The devil rules over them and strikes the soul with sin like an arrow. The second regiment of satanic power is the malice of this world, for it fights with seduction and temporary sweetness and various beauties. Then our body itself wages its war on the soul through overeating, drunkenness and lust for fornication, laziness and other sinful passions. Indeed, our battle is very difficult against the first enemy: the visible nature with the invisible. “Unless the Lord is our helper” (see Ps. 93:17) against such an enemy, we will not be able to defeat him. But we will not overcome others without God’s help. The first step to warfare and war against this world is when we move away from it, leaving its voluptuousness and seductive dreams of its beauties, perishable wealth, temporary joy, and accept Christ’s image of voluntary poverty, so that through our poverty we glorify the wealth of Him who, being rich, became poor for our sake, so that we might be enriched by His poverty (see 2 Cor. 8:9) and draw closer to God. For “the whole world lies in evil” (1 John 5:19), and all that is in the world is carnal lust and worldly pride that deceives our eyes (see 1 John 2:16). Therefore, the apostle said: “Love neither this world nor the things that are in the world (see 1 John 2:15), for if anyone wants to be a friend to the world, he becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). Therefore, flee from this world, like Lot from the burning of Sodom, to the mountain of silent life Zoar, like Israel from Egypt. Hurry from the darkness of sin to the promised land, to a life pleasing to God, pure and sinless. Flee from Babylonian slavery to Sinai freedom. Reject the world and the seduction that is in it, get away from it on an irrevocable journey. And so you will defeat the regiments of the first enemy, and with your victory you will rejoice the Heavens, and you will bring sorrow to the demons. If he overcomes you and takes your souls captive, then, even if you acquire wealth and beauty for the whole world, there will be no benefit from it. For you cannot redeem your soul from captivity with any things - or what ransom will you give for it? (see Matthew 16:26) You will overcome the strength of the first strength of the body if you are separated from your relatives - father, mother, wife, children, brother and sister - for they remain in worldly earthly service, like dead men (cf. Matthew 8:21-22; Luke 9:59-60). You hurry to the service of God and move away from earthly wisdom to heavenly ones, to where Christ reigns forever. It is appropriate to separate not from all your relatives, but only from those who interfere with your salvation and philosophize about earthly things, saying: “Get married, son, and gather wealth in the world, work for property, acquire villages, plant vineyards, gather a multitude of slaves - and have fun in the midst of this all the days of your life, for you are the heir of our house.” It is appropriate to flee from those parents and separate from those who show darkness instead of light and death instead of life. If our parents advise us good and lead us to God and to serve Him, such parents should be deeply loved and revered as saints and their will and advice should be diligently followed. Once again you will overcome the body and destroy the strength of its second strength, if you refrain from eating too much sweet food and drinking immeasurably, then by fasting you will kill the lust of sin and kill the lust of the flesh. You will also overcome other passions or sinful motives: you will destroy laziness with vigor, the desire for fornication with the chastity of purity, for with such arrows the body fights against our soul. “For the flesh lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh, and so they oppose each other” (Gal. 5:17). For our body itself, by its nature, is our enemy, since it fights with the soul through the lusts of its sin. But, on the contrary, it is also a friend, because it helps the soul in good ways. With my body, with God's help, I can fast, shed tears, kneel, give alms - we cannot do this with a naked soul, without a body. And the body also protects the soul from pride, for the soul is an essence of a high kind, like the image of God, and therefore is elevated by arrogance. If he turns his gaze to the body, then he humbles his arrogance and understands that the body originates from dirt, and man is dust. That is why Saint Gregory spoke about the union and alienation of soul and body: merciful enemy and slandering friend. For if a person looks at the lower world - the body, then he becomes temporary, mortal, the heir of fire and darkness. On the contrary, if he turns his rational eye to the heavenly world, then he will be a great, eternal, immortal and heir of the heavenly light. Therefore, I pray to you, as the servants of Christ: do not be captives of the earthly world - body and death, but move on to the heavenly world and the immortal limit, in order to appear as heirs of its light. And if you defeat the first regiments of your enemies, then you will be able to easily take up arms against the devil himself, the ruler of the world, the prince of darkness, his dark powers and the opposing forces and defeat their army. Just take on the whole armor of God, so that you can use it to repel and extinguish the kindled arrows of the evil one (see Eph. 6, 13 and 16). For with three weapons - faith, patience and prayer - all the warfare of the devil and his power is destroyed and easily driven away: pride - by humility, vanity - by self-denial, fornication - by purity. Especially with the cross you will defeat and overcome these three enemies of yours when you accept the cross of your patience and on it you mortify your body, crucify yourself to the world, and die to a sinful life. And, like a dead corpse, you will not look at sin or touch it. Then your victory will appear like the moon during the full moon, in the radiance of eternal glory, and the angels of God, rejoicing, will come out to meet you, and the King of eternal glory, Christ, will accept His victorious one, and will glorify him before the assembly of His bright angels, before the patriarchs, prophets and apostles, and will number him among the ranks of these righteous people, and will grant him a place in His Heavenly Kingdom. The monk is the fulfiller of all the commandments of Christ, the perfection of Christianity, the abyss of humility, the pillar of patience, the unceasing remembrance of death, the never-failing source of tears, the treasure of purity, the mocker of everything corruptible, the trampler of everything pleasant and seductive in this world, voluntary self-mortification. He is an everyday martyr and enforcer of his nature, a God-pleasing sacrifice, an ever-burning lamp of spiritual wisdom, an enlightened mind, a contemplator of everything visible and invisible, quickly ascending prayers, contemplation of God, a pure heart, unceasing lips of God’s praise, the dwelling of the Holy Trinity, a spectacle for angels and people, a terror for demons. He is called a monk because he has a different residence, not physical, but spiritual, he has a different activity, a different age, different food, different clothing and work. He is also called a monk because of his black and deplorable clothes; is also called a monk, or solitary, carefree - one with the One God must have communion. Lawmakers and teachers of monastic life: the first is Melchizedek, a priest of the Most High God, who lived without a wife, without relatives in the desert (see Heb. 7, 1 and 3). The second is the wonderful Elijah, who lived without a wife in the wilderness of Horeb. The third is John the Baptist, who lived in the Jordanian desert without a wife, without any property, who did not eat meat or drink wine, and wore a garment of mourning - a hair shirt. We clearly testify about the law and antiquity of the monastic order that it was legitimized and approved by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. For the Lord Himself lived without a wife in virginity, a pure life, in poverty and lack of wealth. Likewise, His apostles, leaving father and mother, wife and children and everything in the world, followed Christ. Therefore, the monks follow Christ’s teaching and advice and imitate the life of the apostles. For they abandon everything that is pleasant and tempting in the world, the pride of life and the lust for everything sweet. They leave marriage, fun, bodily peace and temporary wealth, but they themselves follow Christ, taking up their cross: voluntary patience, poverty and virginity, wandering in the deserts and mountains. Instead of bright houses there are dark caves, dens and abysses of the earth (see Heb. 11:38). Instead of a wife and children, there are beasts of the earth and birds of the air in the deserts. Instead of light clothes and sweet food and drink - hair shirt, thin clothes, hunger and a little water to quench thirst. Instead of drunkenness and fun - crying, sighing and shedding tears. Their bed is the earth, and their cover is the sky. all this is their free cross of everyday patience. For this reason, the monks hated the vanity of life and did not bind themselves to worldly purchases (see 2 Tim. 2:4), wives, children and houses. They do not burden themselves with wealth in order to more conveniently serve the Lord and please Him, and therefore choose the best bliss for themselves. After all, every married man worries about how to please his wife, and the wife also worries about how to please her husband, and an unmarried man worries about how to please his God (see 1 Cor. 7:32, 33) and serve Him faithfully. In addition, they also know that living with a wife is by nature, this is how both animals and pagans live. But to live without a wife, in virginity and purity, is above nature, for it is the work of angels and the life of the holy saints of God who always serve the Lord. As the apostle says, “if anyone fasts and prays, let him separate himself from his wife for a while” (cf. 1 Cor. 7:5). But monks always remain in fasting and prayer until their death, which is why they do not have wives. Yes, and in the Old Law it was commanded that those who approach to serve the Lord should be separated from their wives (cf. Ex. 19:15). monks always work for God, always stand in His service, therefore they are separated from their wives until death and so serve Him in purity as His faithful servants. Although the heretics humiliate the monks because they allegedly abhor marriage and food, and cite the apostolic word against them: “The Spirit clearly said that in the last times some will depart from the faith, listening to the teachings of demons, forbidding to marry and to eat what God has created” (see 1 Tim. 4, 1 and 3), however, the apostle prophesied about various heretics who will come after apostles: about the Manichaeans, Marcionites, Ebionites and God-abhorrent Eutychians. Those who were called Manichaeans recognized two different gods: one god in heaven - the good one, and the other on earth - the evil ruler of the world. And in this form, misunderstanding the apostolic word, they spread their damned heresy and abhorred food prepared on earth. Therefore, not eating meat and not drinking wine is not contempt, but a form of abstinence. And from the very beginning, from the creation of the world until the flood, they did not eat meat or drink wine. And in the Law of Moses, the Nazirites did not drink wine (cf.: Numbers 6:3) and did not eat any vegetables and meat, as well as pork (cf.: Lev. 11:7; Deut. 14:8). Also, Daniel and the three youths abhorred the meat food of King Nebuchadnezzar. Moses, Elijah and the Lord Himself fasted, not eating meat or drinking wine for forty days and nights. Saint John the Baptist did not eat meat or drink wine all the days of his life. And did he really adhere to the demonic teachings? Tell me, heretic! You, now reproaching fasters! But the whole universe knows that they were filled with the Holy Spirit, since they abstained from good meat, wine and wife. The ancient theologians say the same thing about Matthew the Evangelist and James Alphaeus: they did not eat meat or drink wine all the days of their lives. They did not disdain what was created by God, but abstained and killed sinful passions in their bodies by fasting. For fasting is a terrible thing for demons, but for God it is a beloved and most honest gift, as evidenced by the fifth canon of the Council of Nicaea. The monastic order and law for those who truly worship God (see John 4:23) and fasters were established by the apostles after the Ascension of the Lord, as the Evangelist Luke writes in the Acts: “The multitude of those who believed in Jerusalem had one heart and one soul. For they, selling their possessions, had everything in common” (see Acts 4:32), except for their wives. So Ananias and his wife Sapphira lied about the price and died because they did not make the money common, hiding from the price. Therefore, the apostles, having sworn an oath and a promise to certain faithful young men from among the people, begged them and taught them to live without wives, in purity, voluntary poverty and obedience, remaining in this until their death. Then many followed their advice and favorably accepted this honest deed. And so the apostles legitimized the monastic order, tonsuring the heads of these young men in Cenchrea for a monastic, celibate and pure life. Saint Paul did the same when he tonsured four men and Aquila and Priscilla (see Acts 21:23–26 and Acts 18:18). Those who took monastic vows were called not monks, but servants of God, as evidenced by Dionysius the Areopagite, the eighth disciple of the holy Apostle Paul, in a letter to one monk Dimophilus, calling him a servant of God and a slave, who had completely cut off his own will and surrendered himself entirely to the will of God. And just as a slave is not free from his master, so a monk is never idle in serving God, but incessantly serves Him day and night - with praise, thanksgiving, prayer, singing, vigil, fasting and contemplation of God. These are the true deeds of the servant of the Lord. The whole virtue of Christian perfection and all the commandments and perfections of God in monastic life lies in voluntary squalor, purity, and obedience. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the mirror of all virtue and its teacher, the light of perfection, the source of purity. For He Himself was born of the Most Pure Virgin and He Himself lived in virginity and purity until His free death. And when he was hanging on the Cross, he entrusted the Most Pure Virgin, His Mother, to a disciple and a virgin. He himself loved voluntary poverty: the rich God was born in a wretched manger, from a wretched Virgin, He lived wretchedly in the world and had no place to lay his head (see Matt. 8:20). He died poor and naked on the Cross, He who dresses “in light like a robe” (Ps. 103:2). He spent his life in obedience from his birth, “he was obedient even to death, death on the cross” (Phil. 2:8). And since then, obedience in the glorious Church of Christ has been legitimized by God Himself. Monks make a vow before God and with an oath undertake to preserve these three virtues of Christian perfection: purity and true virginity, voluntary poverty and unhypocritical obedience, as well as to fulfill other virtues that are born from these three, as the most important ones. monastic life is divided into three parts, or three ranks: the first - communal monks, the second - monastic ones and the third - solitary desert dwellers. There is also a fourth one between them, called “fallen”. These are self-willed people who live like robbers; each of them has his own property and acts according to the impulses of his will. They live without any rank and law, they are hypocrites, and do not practice monasticism, as Cassian said. Monks who live according to rank must adorn themselves with every virtue: humility, chastity, patience, love, fasting and prayer. Therefore, I pray to monastics: do not be slaves to laziness and vileness, but, working out your salvation in fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12), decorate your mind with the thought of God, for this is a truly honest deed and is characteristic of truly monastics. Do not love slumber and dreams, but create diligent prayer with your lips. Seek not the perishable blessings of the present age, but the eternal blessings of the future. If you do this, then you will be a true servant of God. And your Lord says: “Where I am, there will My servant also reign with Me in the glory of My Kingdom” (see John 12:26). Grant us all this Kingdom, O Christ our God, that there we may praise You together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto ages of ages. Amen. So it is with St. Paisius.