ДУХ И ДУША

1. About spiritual and mental-physical taste You should not allow yourself to eat mental and physical sweets. We have two tastes: one is spiritual, the other is mental and physical. They chase each other away. When there is a taste of the spiritual, everything else is grass; and when you have to taste the soul-body, then the taste for the spiritual diminishes. From this you yourself see what should be done in order to preserve the taste of spiritual blessings (6, p. 49). 2. The connection of the soul with the body and their separation by death What tricky things do you see in the words of Climacus? The soul does not have existence from the body, but receives it together with the body and in order to live with the body. And death will come to separate them. And it’s amazing how the soul will live without a body, having become accustomed to living with the body. The separation of the soul from the body is a punishment, and it must be sensitive (8, p. 5). 3. Soul and spirit (regarding the accusation of unorthodoxy) If I said that we have a soul inside us, and that’s all, and then added that it is of the same origin as the soul of animals, then I should be embarrassed. And I say that within us the soul constitutes the lower side of the inner life there, and the highest is the spirit, which is from God, a god-like, equal-angelic force, which constitutes the characteristic feature of man. Consequently, there is nothing to be embarrassed about for fear of relegating man to the ranks of animals. Usually we say: soul-soul. But in essence, one should say “soul-spirit” or “spirit-soul”. Taking the word “soul” as a spirit-soul... I will not say in any way that it is of the same origin as the soul of animals, for the spirit is from God; and taking it separately from the spirit, I say this (1, pp. 97–98). When God created man, he first formed a body from dust. What was this body? Clay grouse or living body? - It was a living body, it was an animal in the form of a man, with an animal soul. Then God breathed His spirit into him - and from an animal he became a man - an Angel in the form of a man. As it was then, so people are now. Souls are reflected from their parents or transferred through natural birth, and the spirit is inhaled by God, Who is everywhere (1, p. 98). The Holy Fathers distinguish between spirit, soul and body: Anthony the Great, Isaac the Syrian, Ephraim the Syrian and others. They do not say what properties our souls are. But, comparing what St. writes. Anthony about the genera of living creatures, I point out that, according to his mind, our soul is of the same nature as the soul of animals (1, pp. 98–99). 4. The soul of animals and humans; relationship of spirit to soul The soul - a spiritual being - is not a manifestation of some other force, like a rainbow, but is an independent, special personality, freely rational, whose normal state is life in communion with God, who honored it in creation with His image (1, p. 160). 5. The nature of the soul and Angel is immaterial Dispute about the soul. My entire book is aimed at proving that the nature of the soul and the Angel cannot be material. But nature is another matter, and the way of being is another. Whoever does not want to accept a soul without a shell, let him accept this shell, but without the nature of the soul, which should be spiritual. Having allowed the shell - thin, ethereal, it will receive a form and will be satisfied (2, p. 4). 6. The spirit of man. Soul of the world and animals This is how I think about the world. The basis of the material world is atoms. But atoms are not all the same: they are different, like different elements. However, they themselves have neither movement nor mutual connection. Everything produces forces acting in them. What are these forces? I admit a ladder of immaterial forces of a spiritual nature. Mutual attraction, chemical affinity, crystallization, plants, animals are produced by corresponding immaterial forces that proceed, rising gradually. The substrate of all these forces is the soul of the world. God, having created this immaterial soul, put into it the ideas of all creatures, and it instinctively, as they say, produces them, at the beck and excitement of God (2, pp. 107–108). The soul was created together with the word: let there be light! This light - ether - is the shell of the soul. With words, let something new be created... On the second day - the firmament. When God said: let the earth destroy...then the soul of the world listened to Him and did what was commanded. She separated from herself all kinds of plant souls, which gave rise to various plants and then began to reproduce them according to their kind. Also according to the word of God: let the earth bring forth every living soul - the soul singled out the souls of animals, which produced different kinds of animals. When it was necessary to create man, the command was not given to the earth: let him bring forth, but in the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity it was said: “Let us create...” The body is specially created from dust. It was not a dead body, but a living one with an animal soul. A spirit will be breathed into this soul—God’s spirit, destined to know God, to honor God, to seek and taste God, and to have all one’s contentment in Him and in nothing but Him. This spirit, uniting with the soul of an animal, raised it above the soul of animals by a whole stage, and we see in man that, to a certain extent, everything goes like that of animals... up to intelligence, and then a series of forces begin, even of a spiritual nature, but above the soul... reason, will, taste. Even further - fear of God, conscience, dissatisfaction with created things, desire for God. These are spiritual manifestations completely detached from the soul. You can also place soul-spirituality between soul and spirit: an idealizing mind, a will that rebuilds everything anew, and creativity (in the arts). This is genius from the mental, practical and artistic side. Spirit in the soul or soul in the spirit. These are all natural manifestations. They are not in their present form in experience due to the breakdown of forces in the fall. Graceful actions reveal spirit and spirituality in their true form. Souls lower than spirit and man are immersed in the soul of the world. But a person’s soul cannot plunge there, but the spirit is carried away by grief - this is after death (2, pp. 108–109). So this is where your chemistry comes from. In some kind of chemical soul. In this soul there is an instinctively felt image of what needs to be made from the elements. She takes them and builds her own. The plant also has a chemical soul. But she is in the service of the plant soul. In an animal they both exist, but they serve in the service of the animal’s soul. Or this: the soul of animals, being able to act like an animal, is also able to produce that which is characteristic of the plant and chemical soul. The equally vegetative soul, knowing how to do its own thing, also knows how to do chemical things. There is unity of nature here. I remember that Schubert in Geschichte der Seele - “History of the Soul” - reveals these provisions in detail. Both the fall and the redemption are conveniently reconciled with this (2, p. 109). What you say is true: we know less about the material world than about the spiritual. And God does not give and will not give, because it is not necessary for us. We will always remain on the surface in this regard... Mastery of the elements and forces acting on earth will expand; but this is not knowledge, but only the ability to use what is revealed by itself. The essence of the matter is forever hidden for us (2, pp. 109–110). 7. The human heart is accessible only to the Lord No one has the power to control the heart. It lives a special life. In itself it rejoices, in itself it saddens. And there's nothing you can do about it. Only the Lord of all, who contains everything in His right hand, has the power to enter into it and put feelings into it, without taking into account the natural currents of its changes. May the Lord make you wise in everything (2, p. 205). 8. Mental body and spiritual body You ask what does the apostle mean by the mental body and the spiritual body? Read this whole place and you will see what you should understand. This is 1 Cor. 15, 40–45. St. Paul talks there about the resurrection and about the different glories of the resurrected bodies, and not about the soul. What is sown, he says, is the spiritual body; it is not the soul that is sown, that is, it is placed in the ground, but the body; the spiritual body rises, it is not the soul that rises, for it does not die, but the body. So, here we must understand by body our body. On earth it is spiritual, but after the resurrection it will be spiritual. Why it is called this way is interpreted differently. Saint Chrysostom says that it is spiritual on earth, because it is animated only by the soul. And after the resurrection it will be spiritual, because it will be the dwelling place not of one soul, but of a soul filled with the Spirit. And on earth, he says, the soul has the Spirit, but He is not always inherent in it, because it is sometimes driven away by unclean thoughts, feelings and deeds, but there He will fill it all. Then he adds St. Chrysostom: maybe it was called spiritual after the resurrection because it will be lighter, subtler, more mobile (4, pp. 238–239). 9. About mental, carnal and spiritual life You once wrote that you were reading the book “What is spiritual life...” It depicts that we have three tiers of life: spiritual life, mental and carnal... The last two are selfish. The first requires self-sacrifice both at the beginning and in the continuation, and in every task. Why does mental and physical life go on without much sacrifice? – Because their needs, their desires and objects of satisfaction are visual, tactile... Having become accustomed to this tactility, we become motionless towards detached objects. The soul is cold towards them, and even more so the flesh... but towards their objects they are hot, burning with lust. However, the procedure of desire is the same in the spirit, just like with them... The soul knows that this or that object will bring it, and reaches out to it, wanting to taste the sweetness from it... Transfer this to the spiritual. One must see and, at least presumably, be convinced that from this or that spiritual object or deed there will be such and such good, consolation, pleasure. If this blessing has already been experienced at least once, then the confidence here will not be speculative, but real, based on experience. I believe you have this last one. If you please, now stand firm on this every time laziness overcomes you, and this is the same as wanting the spiritual and the carnal, but not the spiritual, and try a little to restore the feeling of the already experienced benefit from the spiritual matter, from which laziness is now distracting. As soon as you manage to do this, the soul will give in, for it is powerless to stand against the spirit. If you remember spiritual sensations, you cannot help but realize that these sensations, like heaven from earth, stand above mental-physical ones. According to this superiority, already experienced, even a weak trace of spiritual sensation repels everything spiritual and is strong to attract our consciousness and will (6, pp. 41–42). You portray it in such a way that your lower side takes precedence over your higher, as if by some necessity... If she takes it, you are to blame... because you don’t do what you should or do nothing so that she doesn’t take over, but leave your mother-in-law to your dispositions, as they flow without control (remember Krylov’s fable: Vaska listens and eats), and even more so, remaining with your wills on their side (6, pp. 42–43). So make it a law, as soon as laziness attacks the spiritual, to restore the feeling of good from it and go over to its side by will, decisive, merciless towards yourself, in the conviction that otherwise you will not get into the Kingdom. A little struggle is required, but everyone is capable of it (6, p. 43). You might be interested in: