О добродетелях и страстях

You need to know that since a person is dual, that is, consists of soul and body, then he has dual feelings. There are five mental senses and five bodily senses; The sages call the spiritual powers of the soul and are the following: mind, reason, opinion, imagination and feeling; The bodily senses are: sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch. This is where their two virtues and their two vices come from. Therefore, it is very necessary for every person to clearly understand what spiritual virtues and what bodily vices are, as well as what mental and physical passions. And regarding spiritual virtues we affirm that there are mainly four generic virtues, namely: courage, prudence, chastity and justice; from them the following spiritual virtues are born: faith, hope, love, prayer, humility, meekness, generosity, patience, kindness, non-anger, knowledge of God, non-irritability, simplicity, indignation, impartiality, love of truth, freedom, aversion from condemnation, from vanity, from arrogance, from pride, from envy, from deceit and from love of money, as well as compassion, mercy, generosity, reverence, reverence, attraction to future immortal benefits, desire for the Kingdom of God, desire for sonship. The bodily virtues, about which we can more accurately say that through knowledge according to God they turn into instruments of virtues and, if they are alien to all hypocrisy and man-pleasing, lead a person to success in humility and dispassion, are the following: abstinence, fasting, hunger, thirst; vigil, all-night standing, kneeling, constant absence from going to the bathhouse, self-satisfaction with only a tunic, dry eating, eating food later (and then in small quantities), drinking only water, reclining on the bare ground, poverty, non-covetousness, emaciation, carelessness in clothing, lack of pride, solitude, silence, hopeless stay in a cell, poverty, contentment small, silence, self-exercise in handicrafts, every kind of suffering and every bodily feat. All this, when the body is healthy and is disturbed by carnal passions, is very necessary and useful, but when it is weak and, with the help of God, has overcome passions within itself, it is not so necessary, because everything will be filled with holy humility and thanksgiving. And this is enough about bodily virtues. Therefore, we are obliged to talk about mental and physical passions. The passions of the soul are: oblivion, laziness and ignorance. By these three passions, the spiritual eye, that is, the mind, is darkened by the domination of all other passions, which are: wickedness, unbelief, that is, all heresy, blasphemy, irritability, anger, vexation, irascibility, misanthropy, memory malice, slander, condemnation, unreasonable sadness, fear, apprehension, discord, jealousy, envy, vanity, pride, hypocrisy, lies, unbelief, indiscretion, indiscriminateness, short-sightedness, gluttony, covetousness, laziness, pretentiousness, addiction, attachment to earthly things, despondency, cowardice, ingratitude, murmuring, arrogance, conceit, impatience, arrogance, lust, man-pleasing, insidiousness, shamelessness, insensitivity, caressing, secrecy, mockery, double-mindedness, permission to sin out of passion, incessant thinking about sins, wandering of thoughts, self-love (the mother of all evil), love of money (the root of all vices and passions), malice and deceit. The bodily passions are: gluttony, gluttony, luxury, drunkenness, secret eating, various types of voluptuousness, fornication, adultery, debauchery, uncleanness, incest, child molestation, bestiality, evil desires and all sorts of unnatural and shameful passions, theft, sacrilege, robbery, murder out of envy or in unreasonable irritation, every bodily tranquility, satisfaction of the desires of the flesh, especially in a healthy state of the body, magic, divination, sorcery, fortune-telling, foreshadowing, panache, frivolity, bliss, passion for clothes, rubbing the face, reprehensible debauchery, playing dice, biased devotion to worldly pleasures, carnal life, which dulls the mind, making it earthy and bestial, and in no way allows one to raise one’s gaze to God and to doing virtues. The root of all evil and, as someone else would say, the primary cause are: voluptuousness, love of fame and love of money, from which all evil is born. But a person does not sin a single sin unless, as the wise ascetic Mark says, these strong giants, that is, oblivion, laziness and ignorance, overcome him and dominate him. They are born of a voluptuous and calm life, attachment to human glory and entertainment. And the primary reason and the most unsuitable mother of all this is self-love, that is, unreasonable attachment and passionate attachment to the body, dissipation and absent-mindedness of the mind, together with wit and foul language, like any freedom in speech and laughter, leading to many bad things and many falls. Moreover, you need to know that voluptuousness, which has turned into passion, is very diverse and has many types, and that there are many pleasures that deceive the soul when it is not sober before God and is not embraced by the fear of God and the love of Christ, preoccupied with the work of virtues. For from everywhere there appear thousands of pleasures that attract the eyes of the soul: bodily beauty, and money, and luxury, and fame, and laziness, and anger, and possession, and covetousness, and covetousness to seduce us give us pleasures whose gaze is bright and kind, sufficient to attract to themselves those who are enchanted by something similar and do not have in themselves a strong love for virtue, but experiencing difficulty in it. Every earthly connection, every addiction to anything material, no matter how unimportant it may be, produces in the addicted pleasure and a pleasant sensation, although unreasonable and subsequently harmful, and in this it enslaves the concupiscible power of the soul so much that the one who submits to passion, when deprived of his beloved, is plunged into irritability, into sadness, into anger, into remembrance. And if, in addition to addiction, even a small habit takes hold of a person insensitively and incurably, then, alas! it leads to the fact that the captive of an unreasonable addiction completely indulges in it because of the pleasure hidden in it, because the pleasure of lust, as said above, is diverse and finds satisfaction not only in fornication and other bodily pleasures, but also in other passions. And chastity consists not only in abstaining from fornication and carnal pleasures, but in being free from other passions. Therefore, the covetous and covetous person is unchaste. Just as one is captivated by physical beauty, so another is captivated by money; and the latter is even more unchaste, because it does not have an impulse equal to the first, which would compel him with the demand of nature itself. For, in fairness, it is not the horseman who is called the most inexperienced who does not restrain a stubborn and zealous horse, but the one who is unable to control a calm and obedient horse. And from everything it is clear that the passion for money is higher than others and unnatural, and the incentive to this passion lies not in our nature, but in perverse will; therefore, whoever voluntarily overcomes it sins unforgivably. Therefore, we must clearly understand that voluptuousness is not limited to luxury and bodily pleasures alone, but takes place in everything that we love according to our spiritual will and partiality. But in order to recognize the passions and three-component nature of the soul even more clearly, we considered it necessary, as briefly as possible, to add the following. The soul is divided into three parts: the power of thinking, irritability and concupiscence. And the sins of rational power are the following: unbelief, heresy, imprudence, blasphemy, promiscuity, ingratitude and permission for sins arising from passionate power in the soul. To heal and heal from these sins, undoubted faith in God, true, infallible and Orthodox dogmas, constant study of the words of the Spirit, pure prayer, and continuous thanksgiving to God serve. The sins of irritable power are the following: hard-heartedness, hatred, lack of compassion, rancor, murder and constant thinking about similar things. Humanity, love, meekness, brotherly love, compassion, patience and kindness serve to heal and heal from these sins. The sins of concupiscence are as follows: gluttony, gluttony, drunkenness, fornication, adultery, uncleanness, debauchery, covetousness, lust for empty glory, gold, wealth and carnal pleasures. To heal and heal from them, fasting, abstinence, suffering, non-covetousness, wasting money on the poor, striving for future benefits, the desire for the Kingdom of God, the desire for sonship serve. Now we must give an idea of ​​the passionate thoughts by which every sin is carried out. There are eight vicious thoughts: the first thought is gluttony, the second is fornication, the third is love of money, the fourth is anger, the fifth is sadness, the sixth is despondency, the seventh is vanity, the eighth is pride. So that all these thoughts disturb us or not disturb us, this is not in our will, but so that they remain or do not remain in us and arouse or do not arouse passions, this is in our will. But another thing is attack, another is friendship, another is passion, another is struggle, another is consent, bringing one closer to the cause and becoming similar to it, another is amateur activity, another is captivity. An attack is a simple reminder given by the enemy, for example: do this or that; Thus, the enemy said to Christ our God: “Let these breads be made of stone” (Matthew 4:3); and this, as has been said, is not in our will. Friendship is the acceptance of a thought inspired by the enemy, and, as it were, an occupation with it and a conversation with him combined with pleasure, taking place according to our will. Passion is the habit formed as a result of friendship towards a thought inspired by the enemy, and, as it were, constant thinking and dreaming about it. Struggle is resistance of the mind, tending either towards the destruction of passion in the thought, or to consent to a passionate thought, as the apostle says: “the flesh... lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh: and these oppose one another” (Gal. 5:17). Captivity is a forced, involuntary attraction of the heart, dominated by prejudice and long-term habit. Consent is the expression in thought of consent to passion; and self-activity is the very action at the permission of a passionate thought. Therefore, whoever argues indifferently or with his contradiction and firmness at the very beginning repels the first, that is, attack, from himself, he stops everything else at once. Gluttony is destroyed by abstinence; fornication - Divine love and attraction to the future; love of money - compassion for the poor; anger - kindness and love for everyone; worldly sadness - spiritual joy; despondency - patience, firmness and gratitude before God; vanity - by secretly doing virtues and constant prayer with heartfelt contrition; pride - in not condemning or humiliating anyone like the boastful Pharisee, but in considering oneself the least of all. Thus, the mind, having freed itself from the above-mentioned passions and ascended to God, still here begins to live a blessed life, having received the pledge of the Holy Spirit and, after departing from here, with dispassion and true knowledge is placed in the light of the Holy and Blessed Trinity, shining together with the Divine Angels throughout all the boundless ages. So, the soul, as was shown above, is three-component, because, according to what has been said, there are three forces in it: thought, irritability and lust. If in irritability there is love and philanthropy, and in lust there is purity and chastity, then the thought is bright. But if in irritability there is misanthropy and in lust there is debauchery, then the thought is darkened. The mind is then healthy, chaste and bright when the passions are subordinated to it; He spiritually contemplates the relationships of God's creatures and is raised to the Holy and Blessed Trinity. In the same way, irritability then occurs in a natural movement, when it loves all people, does not complain about any of them and does not remember evil. And lust is true to nature when, through abstinence, humility, and non-acquisitiveness, it mortifies passions, that is, carnal pleasure, the attraction to self-interest and transitory glory, and turns to Divine and heavenly love; because lust has a threefold desire: either for carnal pleasures, or for empty glory, or for the charm of wealth; and because of this attraction contrary to reason, he neglects God and God’s commandments, forgets his own nobility, becomes bitter against his neighbor, darkens his thoughts and does not allow him to raise his gaze to the truth. And whoever has acquired a higher way of thinking is still here, as said above, anticipating the Kingdom of Heaven, beginning to live a blissful life, expecting for himself the bliss prepared for those who love God, which may we, unworthy, be worthy of by the grace of Christ. It is also necessary to know that the degree of perfection of any virtue cannot be achieved by anyone who, throughout his entire life, with tireless diligence, does not strive to acquire it through active diligence. This should say about alms, about abstinence, about prayer, about love, or about any of the generic virtues, about courage, about prudence, about chastity, about justice. For each of these and similar virtues is difficult for others to achieve in part; for example, another temporarily gives alms, is generous and charitable. But for giving alms a few times, we will not call a person merciful in the proper sense; especially if the work is not done entirely well and pleasingly, for it is not entirely good when something is not done in a good manner; on the contrary, what is truly good is good if it is not deprived of reward for one reason or another, for example, due to man-pleasing or human rumor, or the search for glory, or for covetousness and injustice. God does not require what is apparently good, but requires the intention with which good is done. The God-bearing fathers say: when the mind loses sight of a pious goal, then an apparently virtuous act does not deserve praise, because what is done without reasoning and unintentionally, although it will be good, not only does not bring any benefit, but also causes harm. Meanwhile, the opposite of this happens, if anything, apparently, is the opposite, but it was done with a pious intention and according to God; for example, if someone goes into a profane house and rescues a harlot from destruction. Therefore, one who once or several times gave alms or was abstinent will not be called merciful or abstinent in the proper sense; the name will be the one who, as it has been said, for the most part and throughout his entire life, with prudence, unfalteringly practices virtue, because prudence is higher than all virtues, like a certain queen and virtue of virtues. And in a similar way, and in reasoning to the contrary, we do not suddenly call someone who once crawled into each of these vices a fornicator, a drunkard or a liar; We call someone who has repeatedly fallen into such vices and remains incorrigible. Especially for everyone who wants to succeed in virtue and tries to avoid sin, it is very necessary, in addition to what has been said, to know that since the soul is incomparably higher than the body, in many and very important respects it is undoubtedly more excellent and sufficient than it, so the spiritual virtues, especially those named after God and imitating God, are higher than the physical virtues. On the contrary, it would be fair to think that mental vices have an advantage over physical ones, both in their actions and in the punishments imposed for them, although, I don’t know why, this eludes the understanding of many: drunkenness, fornication, adultery, theft and similar vices, such as those that apparently many abhor, they are wary of, afraid of, avoid, or are punished for this, as they should, but they look indifferently at vices that are much more important than these, and for which people who are incorrigibly devoted to them are subject to the eternal punishment prescribed for them, I mean envy, rancor, wickedness, arrogance, the root of all evil, according to the Apostle - love of money and similar vices. But we have stated this simply, as much as our ignorance allowed, giving a brief and clear concept of the virtues and passions, so that from this detailed explanation a person could conveniently understand their division and judge their difference. That is why we ourselves have shown the diversity and variety of each, so as not to remain, if possible, in ignorance of any type of virtue or vice, and some, that is, virtues, especially spiritual ones, with which we approach God, with all zeal, attract to ourselves, while others, that is, vices, evade more and more. In the true sense, he is blessed, like a prudent and most conscientious merchant, who seeks virtue, follows it and diligently explores what virtue is, in order through it to draw closer to God and mentally coexist with Him; for in the proper sense, prudence, courage, wisdom, unfalse knowledge, inalienable wealth are raised by active virtue to the contemplation of the Creator. Virtue (from Greek) borrows this name from the word to choose, because virtue is arbitrary, and we do good by our own choice and arbitrariness, and not against our will and under compulsion. Prudence is called so because it represents what is useful to the mind. If you wish, let us attach to this simple word, like a golden seal, the doctrine of the image and likeness of God. A rational and verbal living being - man, as the most worthy of all God's creatures, is one created in the image and likeness of God. And every person is said to have the image of God within himself according to the dignity of his mind, and according to the dignity or elusiveness of his soul. What is the image of God? This is invisibility, immortality, freedom, as well as dominion, the power of childbirth, and edification. What is the likeness of God? Man has the likeness of God in himself in proportion to virtue, deeds named after God and imitating God, that is, in proportion to the fact that he is humanely disposed towards his only begotten, is merciful, has mercy and loves slaves like himself, and shows all kindness and compassion. For Christ our God says: “Be ye... merciful, as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:36). Every person has the image of God, because “unrepentant... gifts" of God (Rom. 11:29); Rare people have the likeness of God, and only those who are virtuous and holy, as much as possible for a person, imitating God in goodness. May we also be worthy of His all-good love for mankind, having pleased Him with good deeds, and becoming imitators of those who have pleased Christ from time immemorial, because mercy is characteristic of Him, and all glory, honor and worship are due to Him, together with the Beginning Father and the All-Holy and Good and Life-giving Spirit, now and always and unto the ages of ages. Amen. You might be interested in: