Поучение в 31-ю неделю. Объяснение таинственного значения евангельской повести

The holy fathers give a mysterious interpretation to the event that the Gospel now tells us about. They see in the blind man, who attracted the attention and mercy of the God-man intensified by his request and cry, the image of a praying sinner, praying relentlessly and with tears, receiving through such prayer forgiveness of sins and renewal of the soul by Divine grace 219. We are all sinners; We are all in dire need of God's mercy. Sinners! Let us consider with attention how a sinner receives God's mercy through prayer. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Gospel narrates, left the city of Jericho. His disciples and a multitude of people followed him. A blind man was sitting on the way, asking passers-by for alms. Hearing the noise of a large crowd, he became curious about the reason for the public meeting. They answered him that Jesus was walking, that this multitude was attracted by His presence. Then the blind man began to shout in a loud voice: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Those who walked ahead of the Lord stopped the blind man, ordering him to remain silent; but he shouted even more loudly: “Son of David, have mercy on me.” The Lord stopped and ordered him to be brought to Himself. The blind man was called. He threw off his outer clothing and appeared before the Lord. The Lord asked him: “What do you want from Me?” The blind man answered: “Lord! I want You to give me sight.” The Lord said: “see clearly: your faith will save you.” The blind man immediately received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God (Luke 18:35–43; Mark 10:46–52). In spiritual terms, all sinners must be recognized as blind: they are definitely blind. The Holy Scripture calls them blind (Matthew 15:14); the very fact proves their blindness. The vision of sinners is so distorted and damaged by sin that in all fairness it must be recognized and called blindness. This blindness is the blindness of the spirit. This blindness is all the more dangerous because it most recognizes and preaches itself as having the most satisfactory, most excellent vision. The blind sinner does not see either God, or eternity, or himself, or the purpose for which man was created, or the death that awaits him and all people, which is inevitable neither for him nor for any of the people. Unhappy! He acts out of his blindness, he acts to destroy himself, he acts for the vain and temporary, he chases only ghosts. And death, forgotten by him, comes, tears him away from the field of his activity, presents him to the judgment of God, about which he never thought, for which he was not at all prepared. The beginning of the return to sight for a blind sinner is the consciousness and confession of blindness, the abandonment of activities performed under the guidance of this blindness. Jericho was located in a valley cut through by the Jordan River. The terrain occupied by other Israeli cities is generally mountainous. The low position of Jericho depicts our state of decline. A mysterious blind man came out of Jericho. He stopped participating in the affairs of the city residents; he stopped committing obvious sins through the body; he sat down by the path along which the Savior and salvation walk; began to beg for alms from those passing by, and subsist on meager alms. Those who pass by are living vessels of the Holy Spirit, whom God sent into the world to guide the world to salvation, throughout the life of the world 220 (2 Pet. 1:19). Those passing by are the instructions of the shepherds of the Church and ascetics of piety, temporarily wandering on earth like all people; they guide the sinner at the beginning of his conversion; they feed his smooth soul with knowledge delivered by faith from hearing (Rom. 10:17). The blind man, although he left the city, could not go far from it because of his blindness. He sat near the city gates; City rumors reached his ears, disturbed his heart, and confused his mind. Likewise, a blind sinner, when he leaves gross sins, cannot sever his connection with sin, both living inside him and acting on him from the outside. And after his conversion he remains near sin and in sin; sinful thoughts, dreams, sensations never cease to disturb his mind and heart. Those accompanying and cooperating with Christ - the prophets, apostles and holy fathers - proclaim to the blind man about the closeness of the Savior to him, because the blind man in his darkness cannot imagine that God is near him. God seems to him to be remote, as if completely non-existent. A blind man, instructed by the word of God that the omnipresent God is closer to him than all the objects of the visible and invisible world, is encouraged and begins the feat of prayer. He entered into a feat; but his mind is sealed with carnal wisdom and, being material due to the assimilation of material impressions, cannot pray spiritually; his heart, infected with various addictions, is constantly distracted by these addictions from prayer. The prayer of a blind man is dumb, material, mixed with carnal and sinful thoughts and dreams, desecrated by them, cannot rise from the ground, crawls on the ground, is cast down to the ground, he only makes an effort to rise from the ground. The blind man does not have a satisfactory concept of God: this concept is not characteristic of the carnal state; The prayer feat of a blind man is also a physical feat. “Blind,” said the Monk Mark the Ascetic, “is he who cries out and says: “Son of David! have mercy on me." He still prays physically, he has not yet acquired spiritual intelligence.” He sits, alone, at the gates of Jericho. In the field of prayer, the ascetic encounters many and varied obstacles. Actions and their strength are based on the blindness of the ascetic. While the blind man was busy begging for alms from those passing by, his position was that of someone sitting. And during his initial cries, he remained in a sitting position. There is still no true spiritual progress, no spiritual movement in those who study the word of God according to the letter and through bodily prayer. He continues to remain under the influence of sinful thoughts and feelings, under the influence of carnal wisdom; he continues to remain on earth; the procession to heaven is impossible for him, unnatural. He strives in the feat of prayer, as if in a feat that is alien to him, he forces himself to the feat by force, he drags himself towards this feat, as if towards his worst enemy, an unmerciful killer. This feeling, this pledge of the carnal man to prayer is characteristic of him: it kills, it slaughters our old man, and the old man fears the slaughter, wants to avoid it, resists it with all his might. The ascetic is surrounded by fallen spirits: they did not leave him because he did not receive liberation from them, having submitted to them through his former sinful life that preceded his conversion to God. They try to keep him enslaved; they forbid him to pray; they threaten him, embarrass him, take all measures to force him into silence. They bring him unbelief, suggesting that his prayer will not be heard. They bring him hopelessness, remembering the many sins he has committed, vividly presenting them to the imagination and feelings, arousing pleasure in them in the soul and body. They plunder and destroy his prayer, bringing to mind various concerns, presenting the need for immediate attention to them. They produce dryness and despondency in the soul, so that the ascetic, seeing the futility of his efforts, leaves him. They mock the feat, mock it as fruitless and futile, because they tremble at its consequences. An ascetic of prayer, who has devoted himself to the feat of prayer far from the activities of human society, will hear the hellish chatter of demons. He will see his captivity, his chains and prison. “Thou hast made us,” says the great worker of prayer, “reproach by our neighbors, imitation and desecration of those around us. All day long my shame is before me, and the coldness of my face covers me, from the voice of reproach, from the face of the enemy and the one who drives out” (Ps. 43:14-17). Faith is needed here: “Your faith will save you,” the Lord said to the blind man after healing him. Faith is needed for constancy in the feat of prayer; constancy, patience and long-suffering are needed; rejection of false shame and perseverance are needed for the feat to bear its wonderful fruit. Initially, an intensified physical feat is needed: kneeling is needed, tiring the body, humbling the soul; we need long standing and all-night vigils: we need oral and public prayer, prayer combined with crying and screaming, when we are alone, in a cell seclusion, and we can cry and groan freely; We need an unspoken prayer with an unspoken cry of the heart when we are in the company of people. They forbade the blind man to cry, and he cried the more; They commanded the blind man to be silent, and he cried out the louder. This is what we must do: we must overcome and trample upon all obstacles to prayer; we must ignore all obstacles and pray all the more earnestly and diligently. If during your morning rule your prayer was plundered by thoughts and dreams, and you did not belong to yourself, due to the violence of the passions that overwhelmed you, then do not weaken, do not become despondent. With renewed zeal, stand up for the evening rule, intensifying to listen to your prayers and gathering your scattered thoughts, like the leader of Israel, who said to his soldiers: “Let us take courage and be strong for our people and for the cities of our God, and the Lord will do what is good in His sight” (2 Samuel 10:12). In the feat of prayer, it is necessary to renounce oneself, to submit our success to the will of our God, who gives, at a time known to Him, grace-filled prayer to those who, by their own deed, actively prove their will to have it (1 Samuel 2:9). “I do not honor my soul” to myself (Acts 20:24), says the apostle; deceived by pride and conceit, they consider themselves worthy of grace. If during the year our success in prayer, despite constant exercise in it, turned out to be meager and insignificant, next year we will use the efforts within our control so that our success will be fruitful. If ten years have passed, if dozens of years have passed, and we have not yet seen the desired fruit, let us try to remain faithful to the feat in the remaining days of our life. The treasure obtained by feat is eternal; it is an immeasurable price; It is not at all strange that God’s Providence allows us work that would, at least somewhat, correspond to the acquisition that crowns it. The main condition for success in prayer is that prayer is always performed with the greatest reverence and attention. This requires not only abandonment of a sinful life, but also removal out of town, which primarily depicts the rejection of all worries and concerns during prayer. We achieve this when we cast everything that concerns us on the Lord. The Holy Church invites us to such devotion to God; She often recalls this devotion, saying: “We will give ourselves, each other and our whole life to Christ our God” 221. Attentive prayer will be aided by remembering the omnipresence and omniscience of God. If God is present in every place, then He is also present in the place of our prayer. If He sees everything, then He also sees the disposition of our heart, the mood of our mind. Standing in prayer, we stand before the face of God, at the judgment of God; We have the opportunity to appease God with our prayerful cry and groaning. Remembering the uncertainty of the hour of death also stimulates fervent, warm prayers. We will not sin at all if every time we pray, we pray as if at the last hour of our life, as if at the hour of our death. When the mind pays attention to prayer, the heart also listens to it, expressing and proving its attention with a feeling of repentance. To more easily achieve a state of attention, the holy fathers advise praying slowly, as if enclosing the mind in the words of prayer, so that not a single word escapes attention. An escaped word is a lost word! A prayer that escapes attention is a lost prayer! A mind that has not acquired the habit of attention has difficulty accustoming itself to it. This should not dishearten and embarrass the ascetic of prayer. “Inconsistency,” says Saint John Climacus, “is characteristic of the mind” 222 of fallen man, a mind corrupted by sin. “When your mind,” the great John continues to instruct the ascetic of prayer, “is drawn away from attention due to its infancy, you again introduce it into the words of prayer. Master this invisible feat and remain constantly in it. If you do this, then the One who sets the boundaries of the sea will come to you and will command your mind: “Thou shalt come to this in thy prayer, and thou shalt not pass over, but thy waves shall be broken within thee” (Job 38:11) 223; Let your thoughts be concentrated in you. Constant work in acquiring attention is active evidence before God of our sincere desire to have attention. But it is impossible for a person to bind his spirit through his own efforts: this requires the command of the Supreme Spirit, that Spirit who is the Lord and Creator of our spirit. And the Spirit of God does this work. This is the Sent One who is sent by the Son of God to the blind man sitting and crying, who calls the blind man to Jesus (John 16:7-14). The Spirit of God proclaims the Son of God (John 16:14). The Spirit, having overshadowed the servant of Christ, instructs him “in all truth” (John 16:13), and instructs him in attentive prayer. The attention of the mind during prayer is its complete aspiration towards the Truth, it is its correct state and action; absent-mindedness, on the contrary, is a state of self-delusion, is a sign that the mind is carried away by the teaching of lies - thoughts and dreams that are brought to it by demons and arise from a nature sickened by sin. The state of deep, constant attention during prayer comes from the touch of Divine grace on our spirit. The granting of grace-filled attention to the one praying is the original spiritual gift of God 224. The blind man, having heard the invitation, is animated, delighted by this invitation, gets up, takes off his outer clothing, and goes to appear before the Lord. “When the mind, through graceful attention,” says the fathers, “unites with the soul, then it is filled with indescribable sweetness and joy” 225. Then the spiritual advancement of the ascetic of prayer begins; then, with the power and purity of prayer, he rushes with his whole being towards God; then all extraneous thoughts and dreams retreat, disappear, as Saint David said: “Depart from Me, all who do iniquity, for the Lord has heard the voice of my weeping, the Lord has heard my prayer, the Lord has accepted my prayer. Let all my enemies—the rejected spirits—be ashamed and dismayed; let them return and be ashamed” (Ps. 6:9-11). The removal of outer clothing signifies the abandonment of many and various external images of prayer: they are replaced by prayer in the spiritual cage, which embraces and combines all private activities. Being an extensive work, it absorbs and combines in itself the entire life of the ascetic. “There are many types of virtue,” said the Monk Nilus of Sora, “but they are private; heartfelt prayer is the source of all blessings: the soul is watered with it, like a garden with abundant waters” 226. Pure prayer is coming before the face of God. He who comes before God asks for insight and receives the grace-filled enlightenment of his mind and heart. He enters into true knowledge of God and worship: he no longer returns to his former position of immobility, to the gates of the city; but, joining the other disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, he will follow Him. He has all the opportunity and the necessary ability to follow such a path. “Whoever prays with his lips,” says Saint Simeon the New Theologian, “but has not yet acquired spiritual intelligence and cannot pray with his mind, is like a blind man who cried out: “Son of David! have mercy on me." But the one who has acquired spiritual intelligence and prays with a mind whose spiritual eyes have been opened is like the same blind man when the Lord healed him, when his sight was restored and he, seeing the Lord, no longer called Him the Son of David, but confessed Him to be the Son of God and rendered Him the worship due to God” 227 . Faith is the basis of prayer. Whoever believes in God, as he should believe, will certainly turn to God in prayer and will not deviate from prayer until he receives the promises of God, until he becomes assimilated to God and unites with God. “Faith,” said Saint John Climacus, “is a state of the soul alien to doubt, unshakable by any opposition. A believer is one who not only confesses God as omnipotent, but also believes that he will receive everything from Him. Faith is the mother of silence” 228, both in private and in the heart. He who believes that God constantly provides for him, places all his trust in Him, calms his heart with hope, with the help of hope removes all worries from himself and devotes himself with all his soul to the study of the will of God, revealed to humanity in the Holy Scriptures, revealed even more abundantly by the feat of prayer. By faith in God, the ascetic endures and overcomes all obstacles arising from fallen nature and erected by spirits of malice, obstacles that intensify to confuse his prayer and take away from him the means of communication with God. “Multiplicities have been with me since my youth; on my ridge is the work of sinners, continuing their iniquity” (Ps. 129:2-3). But I, strengthened and guided by faith, constantly “lifted my eyes, my mind and heart to You, my Lord. Behold, as the eyes of a servant are in the hand of his masters, as the eyes of a servant are in the hand of her mistress: so are our eyes to the Lord our God, until he will show mercy to us” (Ps. 122:1-2). Amen. Venerable Mark the Ascetic. On the spiritual law, ch. 13, 14; Venerable Simeon the New Theologian. A word about faith. Dobrot., part 1 “The Imams are the most famous prophetic word, heeding it, like a luminary, shining in a dark place, do good, until the day will illuminate, and the morning star will shine in your hearts.” 3rd petition at the small litany Borrowed from the 28th word of the Ladder Callistus and Ignatius Xanthopoulos, ch. 24. Kindness, part 2 Nikifor the Monastic. A word about sobriety and guarding the heart. Dobrot., part 2 A word about Faith. Dobrot., part 1 You might be interested in: