Письма к родным и друзьям

Letter 369. To Father A. S. Brianchaninov. Attitude towards marriage I received your most pleasant letter dated October 22 on the 30th. I sincerely congratulate you on receiving the distinction for 25 years. The proposal, already approved by the Sovereign, is with the Minister and will probably soon be communicated to the Vologda Governor. Do me a favor, don't worry about sending me money; Thanks to God, I am not in need, and I would consider it very fair if you were pleased to count them for those that you bestowed on me when I left Vologda for St. Petersburg. You deign to know my zealous desire for the good of all members of our family. But my judgment is one-sided: it is consistent with the type of life that I lead. It has always seemed to me, and even more so now it seems, that marriage is a heavy and unbearable yoke; I was afraid of it and didn’t understand, and now I don’t understand, how people can decide to do it. And therefore, do me a favor, remove me from judgment in this matter; leave it to me to wish the well-being of my brothers and sisters, no matter what kind of life they choose - marriage or celibacy. [...] This fall I was very sick with a fever, after which I began to feel better and better. I think that the beautiful house in which I live with all the amenities, and the angelic brethren who surround me and give me peace mentally and physically, contribute a lot to this. Sorry, most respected Parent. With true respect and devotion, I have the honor to be your most humble son Letter 370. To my sister Maria Alexandrovna. About the soul-helping word, preparation for eternity, prayer, reading soul-saving books and other issues of spiritual life Truly Christ is Risen! Dearest sister Maria Alexandrovna! Likewise, I congratulate you from the bottom of my heart on the past holiday of the Resurrection of Christ; Equally, I wish you, my friend, every possible well-being. Your complaint is fair: I have been silent for too long; was silent because he hoped that our mutual disposition could not be doubted; ordinary letters from secular people, consisting of various congratulations and assurances, do not constitute the duties of a monk. I cannot refuse a word about spiritual benefit; such a word is alms, which a monk must certainly give not only for the spiritual benefit of his neighbor, but also for his own. When a person thinks more often that everything earthly is temporary, will certainly end in death - again that this death will come unknown when: - whether in many years, or tomorrow, or in a week - then a concern is born in a person about preparing himself for eternity: among these preparations is prayer. Get to know God in advance, gain courage through frequent prayers, so that when you have to appear at the Last Judgment, you can beg the Judge to be merciful to you. Leave pleasing the devil in various worldly amusements, obey the Savior, who proclaimed: “Woe to those who laugh now! Woe to the saturated now!" (Luke 6:25) - Contrary to the will of the Son of God, the devil established balls, theaters and other amusements; the money is sacrificed to the devil, which could have been offered in the person of the poor to the Lord Jesus Christ, Who will reward the giver of mercy a hundredfold in the next century. - Engage in reading Divine books with prudent moderation, preserving taste for a long time and refines it, and multiplies the heart's thirst for Divine truth, such as the books of the Chetya - Menaion, the works of St. Demetrius of Rostov, the works of St. Tikhon of Voronezh, the letters of George the Recluse. heart with an incurable ulcer. Do you ask me for a spiritual blessing for yourself and your husband? May the Lord give you the petition of your heart and may the descending grace of the Holy Comforter Spirit overshadow your minds and hearts to the knowledge of His holy will, may He open your mental eyes to consider the brevity and vanity of this earthly life, may He unkind your souls to preserve His commandments, and may He make you heirs of the endless sweets of paradise prepared for all who love God and those who hate the devil and his works, and his undertakings, and his abominable glory. Amen. Diligently loving you and wishing your spiritual salvation. April 27, 1840 Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 371. About sorrows, illnesses, preparation for eternity, characteristics of the letters of George the Recluse Truly Christ is Risen! Dearest Friend and Sister, Maria Alexandrovna! I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your sweet and kind letter. I congratulate you on the bright holiday. I am very glad that love overcame the vain fear of bothering me with your letter. Such a kind letter cannot disturb, it can only console and delight. I cannot participate in the social gaiety of my relatives; but I must and wish to take a lively part in their sorrows. They go to a monastery and choose a sorrowful life so that a joyful life does not entertain and lead to oblivion of God, and not in order to abandon the lawful and holy along with the vain. I am convinced both from the word of God and from the experiences of life that God will certainly send sorrow to whomever he loves. Because without sorrows the heart cannot die for the earth and come to life for God and eternity. Hearing about you that you were constantly sick, I understood from this that the Lord paid special attention to you and wants to give you a blissful eternity! We all must certainly enter into it, and those of us who do not want to think about it at all, but are always nailed down to the earthly with our thoughts and desires. Eternity! With what joyful hope some await it, and to others how formidable it is. So, if eternity certainly awaits us, then to prepare for it in advance requires prudence itself. Therefore, I advise you to rely on the will of God regarding your health. Keeping in mind the thought that God is calling you to Himself through sorrows, thank the Creator, who loved you, and repeat these words more often: “Glory to You, Lord, for everything that You send to me. Do Your will over Your servant.” – Thanksgiving in sorrows brings comfort and strength to endure and endure long. One should not wish for death. God doesn’t send it because we haven’t prepared for it as we should. As much as you endure here with thanksgiving, you will enjoy spiritual consolation in your future life. Read the letters of the Transdonsk Recluse George; they were recently published in Moscow in 3 volumes. A pre-spiritual book filled with the most comforting instructions for those who suffer. May God's blessing rest upon you. Letter 372. Invitation to come to St. Petersburg to receive the right direction in spiritual life Dearest Sister, Maria Alexandrovna! I congratulate you on the Feast of the Resurrection of Christ and I am very glad that you feel relief from your illness. And I think it would be good if you decided to go to Vologda via St. Petersburg. In July and August, the St. Petersburg climate is less dangerous for people in poor health than at other times of the year. A meeting with your unworthy brother could bring you innumerable benefits and would give you the right direction on the path of piety, on which you can endure hard work and have the smallest fruits, and, on the contrary, with little but correct work you can be enriched with spiritual fruits. This and St. The Apostle Paul testified: “Even if someone suffers, he will not be married, if he is tormented unlawfully” (Compare with the Russian translation). Tim. 2nd last Ch. 2, p. 5... May God grant you a strong and speedy recovery! I remain forever my most devoted brother Letter 373. About patiently walking along the path of life and advice on how to behave towards strangers Dearest Friend and Sister, Maria Alexandrovna! Thank you for your sweet letter, for your New Year greetings, for your good wishes! I heard about your bruise, which greatly increased your pain. What to do? Everyone needs to walk with patient constancy along the path on which he is set by fate - especially since it is not in our power to change this path. I do not advise you to pay much attention to people’s opinions and speeches and to subordinate your behavior to them, especially God-loving impressions and movements of the heart. Behave simply, without coercion and enthusiasm, abandon actions that are strikingly conspicuous, outside the ordinary circle of actions - this is a completely sufficient sacrifice for your neighbors. [...] Christ is with you! When we meet, maybe I’ll say something about your illness. Letter 374. About thanksgiving in sorrows and self-justification Dearest friend and sister, Maria Alexandrovna! I sincerely thank you for remembering me and invoke God’s abundant blessings on you, your husband, your daughter and on your whole house, on your entire household. Great wisdom and a great source of consolation is to thank God for all earthly sorrows, as sent to us by the very Providence of God for the salvation of our souls. Whomever the Lord loves, he punishes. May I not forget this holy way of thinking and not deviate from it due to various self-justifications, which are all lies and self-delusion, and blindness and pride. I’m getting old, I’m getting weaker, I’m becoming obsolete: that’s what I can say about myself. And again I call upon you the abundant blessing of God. Letter 375. About the behavior of his nephew A.P. Dearest Friend and Sister, Maria Alexandrovna! God bless you for the part you take in Alexey Petrovich. And it’s good that you don’t write details about him to your brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich, who had the means to find out everything about him himself. Modern politics, public and private, is non-intervention. Sticking to it is useful and prudent. Alexey, like a young man, was naughty and stupid; Probably, even now his way of thinking is not the most thorough. Time and circumstances will bring him to his senses. Brother Peter Alexandrovich acted in this circumstance as a prudent and noble man - an Orthodox Christian - should. May God's blessing rest on you, on your husband and on your daughter. And I’m completely old: I’m getting sick and getting sick. Ignatius, Bishop of the Caucasus and Black Sea. Letter 376. To my sister Alexandra ALeksandrovna Zhandre: About earthly life and true happiness I sincerely tell you - you are happy because you are following the path of salvation, because you have learned that a person should seek his happiness not in the temporary and earthly, but in the Divine and eternal. What is man on earth? - Traveler. -What is death? – The era from which our real life begins. – Wandering for a long time in this darkness of the night, in the midst of weaknesses and temptations, guided by the light of true faith, we finally reach the line where light is separated from darkness. – Happy is the man who was a true Christian. When you mentioned my prayers, you struck me like a thunderbolt. Of course, we must pray for each other not only as Christians, but also as brothers and sisters... my sinful prayer cannot yet be called a prayer; for what is prayer? – Prayer is a conversation between a person and God; I confess to you with sad frankness that almost always my tongue only somehow pronounces prayer words without any participation of the mind and heart. So am I praying? No, I sin more than I pray; however, I hope in the All-Merciful Lord that he will one day help me taste the power of prayer. Letter 378. About patience and Divine Providence Your case was completely unsuccessful, thank God! God knows what he's doing. No one is forgotten by God and the watchful eye of God watches over everyone and builds everything for his benefit. So, rely on God and abandon the unnecessary desire that the enemy brings to you to confuse you. I know that it is difficult and very difficult for you. But what to do? There is no other remedy except patience and thanksgiving to God, who is looking intently at us. Why do you get angry during your studies? “Think,” says the Great Barsanuphius, “that all earthly pursuits will pass, and the patience that you show during these pursuits will remain with you, go beyond the grave and justify or condemn you before God. Be careful not to waste this daily bread (i.e., patience), which you will need for the journey from earth to heaven.” You'll definitely need it! You write that you are now completely devoid of inner joy. Sometimes the grace of God comforts a person, and sometimes it is hidden, and he does all this at His wisest discretion, and therefore all such cases and changes must be endured with patience and considered oneself unworthy of joy or spiritual consolation. In due time you will again feel joy. Also, a person should not despair, no matter how great his sins may be: for a person is not saved by his own good works, but by faith alone in Christ the Savior; and by deeds one must prove one’s faith. Think that this great Peter also “wept bitterly” (Matthew 26:75). There is now no means of changing one’s place of residence (unless the Lord creates something unforeseen) and therefore must be strengthened with all kinds of patience and good hope. Why are you despairing? Or do you think God is unmerciful? How is it possible! He is the very best. Trust in Him and be strong. Don’t forget the prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.” This prayer can be performed during all activities; moreover, it drives away bad thoughts and fills us with joy. Sorry! Dearest sister, Alexandra Alexandrovna! Thank you for your sweetest lines, I wish you and your little one all the best. God was pleased to free us from the bonds of marriage, which was so sorrowful. G. Gendre recently died and was buried in the Nevsky Lavra. You came here to say your final funeral farewell to him. Your freedom should be a means for you to work for the Lord. Sacrifice this freedom to him and do not fetter it with carnal bonds. You have a child, to whom, having given essential existence, you must also give spiritual life, i.e. teach to believe in Christ and fulfill His Holy commandments, which contain love. He who keeps the commandments of Christ loves Christ, but he who does not keep the commandments is alien to love. May the Lord bless both mother and child. Sincerely loving brother Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 380. About blasphemous thoughts and sorrows I bring you my sincere gratitude for remembering me, a sinner and a sick person, on the days of the greatest Christian holiday! May God bless you for this good memory! May he comfort you in your sorrows! May he give you the strength to bear them with generosity and patience! For both consolation and the strength of patience are shed in us by the one mercy of God, the one grace of God! Do not be embarrassed about the thoughts of unbelief and blasphemy that come to you. This obvious demonic warfare, which happened to many saints, and lasted for a very long time. Saint Niphon was tormented by such warfare for four years. Look at his life in the Fourth Menaion, December 23. In such battles there is no need to be embarrassed, no need to fall into despair, but to throw yourself before the all-seeing and all-powerful God and, surrendering your soul to His will, ask for His mercy. Out of embarrassment and despair, the enemy’s abuse strengthens against us, but if we look at this abuse with generosity, saying to ourselves: “Well? The Lord sees this battle and allows it - it means this is His holy will and it is for my spiritual benefit”; then the abuse weakens and diminishes. Be patient and you will see the mercy of God! Throughout your entire life, from your very infancy, you were allowed sorrows. This is a sign, as the Holy Fathers affirm, of the special Providence of God. God wants to make you a participant in eternal bliss and gives you the cup of saving sorrows. Calm down and pray. May God's blessing rest upon you and your child. May 10, 1838 Archimandrite Ignatius. May God strengthen you in your sorrows! Accept my sinful and insufficient word of consolation, which I send you in these lines, in order to comfort you with God, as the prophet David said: “My soul has refused to be comforted; I remembered God and rejoiced” (Ps. 77:3–4). Firstly, every Christian must believe that he is under the constant Providence of God. This is what the Gospel teaches us. The Savior Himself says: “And the hair of your heads is numbered” (Luke 12:7). Therefore, a Christian, when sorrows are allowed to him, must undoubtedly believe that these sorrows were allowed to him by the all-good and all-wise God Himself, Who foretold to His beloved: “You will be in a world of sorrows” (John 16:33). So, one should not consider it strange, seeing oneself in sorrows, one should not give in to despondency; on the contrary, we must thank God for sorrows, as a sign of election to a blessed eternity. Thanks to thanksgiving not only dulls the fierce sting of sorrow, but also instills heavenly, spiritual consolation in the heart of the person giving thanks. You can give thanks in the words of the righteous Job. Secondly, we are all sinners before God. A sinner should not consider it strange when punishment is sent to him. No! He must open up before God, recognize himself as worthy of the sorrow sent to him and rejoice that in earthly life he accepts punishment for sins in knowledge and ignorance and thereby gets rid of eternal torment. With such reflection, it is useful to say with the holy thief: “I will receive what is worthy of my deeds; remember me, O Lord, in Your Kingdom” (Luke 23:41–42). Christ completed His earthly course in unceasing suffering. As soon as He was born, people rushed to kill Him. He invites His disciples to suffer, and to those who do not want to suffer, He says: “Whoever does not take up his cross and comes after Me is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 19:38). Consider the lives of all the Apostles: they all spent their lives and ended in suffering. Consider the lives of the martyrs: they bought heaven for themselves with blood and countless torments. Consider the lives of the saints: not Was their whole life a long, invisible martyrdom? “Wandering in the deserts, in dens and abysses of the earth, deprivation, sorrow, embitterment” (Heb. 11:38, 37), according to the Apostle, “with many bloods and deaths,” in the words of the Trebnik, they inherited a blissful eternity. “No one ascends to heaven weak,” says. Saint, the great Isaac of Syria, - on the contrary, a person who is under the special Providence of God is aware of this when incessant sorrows are sent to him.” So, give thanks, humble yourself, believe, surrender to the will of God, pray for those in whom the heart is not at peace. Only in these can you find solace and healing. Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 382. About immeasurable sorrow, about sins and other subjects ...May the merciful Lord not leave you! He allows us sorrow to cleanse us from sins; He also sends us consolation so that we do not become completely exhausted under the burden of sorrow. Immeasurable sorrow for sins, reaching the point of despair, is rejected according to the teaching of the Holy Fathers. This sorrow must be dissolved by hope for God’s mercy; we must grieve and hope together; to be sad because we anger God with our sins and move away from God; hope - because we have an all-powerful Physician for our sins, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shed His Blood for us. When blasphemous thoughts of unbelief, doubts and the like come, then, according to the teaching of the Holy Fathers, we should not be embarrassed by this, but know that these thoughts do not belong to our soul, but to our enemy - the devil. One should not be embarrassed by them, should not accept them and become entrenched in them. It is more beneficial for a sick person to pray frequently, but briefly. It is good to pray several times a day for short periods of time. The prayers are beautiful: “God, cleanse me, a sinner,” and “Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us.” They should be pronounced slowly, enclosing the mind in the words of prayer, as St. John Climacus puts it. May the merciful Lord help you and bless you and your daughter! Letter 383. About bodily illness Thank you for your letter. I heard about your illness. What to do? It is impossible to find consolation in anything else than in patience, which is born from humility. Humility consists in recognizing ourselves as worthy of the sorrow allowed to us by the Providence of God. “Whoever is worthy of her deeds is accepted” (Luke 23:41), says the prudent thief, and for condemning himself he was rewarded with higher understandings and sensations, followed by the Kingdom of Heaven. Sorrows have always been the property of those who are being saved, but they are especially characteristic of the present time, when people have weakened in the practice of virtues. So, do not be faint-hearted, but in patience and humility, surrender yourself to the will of God and thank His Holy Providence for everything sent to you. May God's blessing be upon you and your child. The Lord is with you. January 8, 1846 Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 384. Encouragement to Endure Illness May the risen Christ ease your suffering, may He grant you patience and a good, saving thought to endure temporary illness with generous patience and courage, with thanksgiving to God, who arranges our eternal joy through temporary sorrows. Thank you for your letter. May God grant you to get better. Solitude will help you a lot: - solitude combined with simple activities, inspired by love for your neighbors and piety. April 14, 1848 Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 385: Encouragement for Patience 1848 The village of Pokrovskoye. Thank you for your kind letter. Although I did not see you here with the eyes of my body, I see you with the eyes of my soul. May God strengthen you and grant you to bear your cross with patience and hope. We are all creatures - nothing else. Let us surrender ourselves into the hands of the Creator: may He do with us what He pleases. I wanted to call on you, but the time is so short that it is impossible for me to do this. This is how we will live in the deserts: I am in the Sergievskaya desert, and you are in the Maslinskaya desert; Let us take care of the healing of our mental and physical ailments, surrendering to the will of God. Christ is with you. Letter 386. Encouragement not to leave the village I received your wonderful letter dated September 18th. What a beautiful hand so far! How similar it is to the hand of the deceased mother! May God strengthen you and comfort you! Please live in Maslina without leaving until you recover, calm is necessary in case of a nervous disorder - calm and distance from objects that touch the heart. Otherwise, the disease may increase and turn into something serious and irreparable. Take my sincere advice. October 1, 1849 Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 387. About the fight against passions Truly Christ is Risen! Thank you for your friendly letter and congratulations on the Feast of Feasts of the Resurrection of Christ, on which I equally congratulate you, wishing you all true blessings. Christ, who through His death trampled the death of men and through His Resurrection granted resurrection to all who believe in Him, has already won victory over all your sorrows, and with Christ you have also won this victory. Generously endure the furious waves, generously endure the pressure of the fierce winds, endure with the power of faith - and Christ will lead you in due time to his peace. For the many illnesses that visit you in this temporary life, great consolation awaits you in eternal life. Do not be disturbed by rebellious passions, try as much as possible to resist them: a person, while on earth and clothed in a mortal body, is still subject to change, then he feels peace and tranquility of the heart, not disturbed by any passion, then he is overwhelmed by passions. Such changeability teaches us self-knowledge, humility; teaches us to constantly resort to God’s help, which as soon as it leaves us, even for one minute, then we fall and commit iniquities. Calling upon you the blessing of God. April 14, 1849 Archimandrite Ignatius Letter 388. About leaving the world “Come to Me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28), said the Lord. It will be good for you, burdened with many spiritual and physical sorrows, to obey this saving calling, and leaving the world, with which you are no longer able to deal with the cares, to ascend to a quiet monastery haven. - Your intention is not to see your daughter during your earthly life. I bless you: may God accept this essential sacrifice from you and guide you on His path. December 7, 1849 Archimandrite Ignatius Letter 389. On the patience of sorrows The earthly sorrows sent by the Lord are the guarantee of eternal salvation: why they must be endured with patience, and patience is then poured into a person’s soul when a person thanks and praises the Creator for his sorrows. We are pilgrims here on earth: both the good and bad conditions of a person pass by like a dream. Our treasure is the Lord. Don’t grieve about your daughter, leave her to the will of God. It is not with your sickness that you take great care of her. I advise you to leave your daughter in the care of the sisters in faith and hope in the Lord, and cleave to the Lord through alms and prayer: by leaving S. to the sisters or Father, you will benefit both her and yourself. But there is no need to condemn her: we are all weak, and the entire fallen human race is infected with pride. Letter 391. To sister S. A. B-k-noy. Sorrow is a great blessing I earnestly wish you both physical and mental health. May our All-Good Lord Jesus Christ, who redeemed us with His priceless Blood, strengthen you; may he grant you patience in your illnesses and other sorrows, may he instill in you gratitude for them as for the greatest blessings. Hear His most holy voice, saying: “If I love them, I rebuke and punish them” (Apoc. 3:19). Remember the righteous Job, deprived of his children and all his possessions, covered with stinking scabs, sitting on a dunghill and saying: “The Lord is given, the Lord is also taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord from now on and forever” ( Job 1:21 Remember the prophet Jonah, from the belly of the whale confessing his sin and glorifying the justice of God. Remember the three youths who were cast into the fiery furnace and from the heart of the furnace blessing God. Remember the path by which they achieved salvation. Remember all this and be jealous of the lot of the saints, say to your cowardly thoughts: and the hair of all my head is counted by God, then how can I lose heart? “I will not send,” He promises me through the mouth of His Apostle, “temptations beyond your measure,” but in the temptation itself I secretly grant you deliverance from temptation (1 Cor. 10:13). I purposely strike you with illnesses and misfortunes, so that you do not become addicted to anything vain, but in contrition of heart, seek to cleave to Me, your Creator, by fulfilling My commandments, and acquire Me within yourself; and when you acquire Me within yourself, then all your hearts will leap with endless joy: for I am Goodness Itself and inexhaustible and unchangeable bliss Itself. Thanks to the merciful God for everything, let us pray to Him to keep us in love and harmony for the glory of His holy name. Forgive and pray for the great sinner Demetrius. Letter 392. To sister Elizaveta Alexandrovna and her husband Dimitry Tikhonovich Parensov: Congratulations on the birth of a son, your trip to the monasteries, about your brothers, your studies at the monastery Dearest Sister! Elisaveta Alexandrovna! I thank you earnestly for your kind letter and share your joy about the birth of your son Peter. May God grant that the days of this baby may be preserved to the consolation of his parents. I recently returned from a tour of the monasteries of the local province - a journey that I am obliged to make every year, a rather unpleasant journey, especially across Lake Ladoga. My health is weak; the local climate influences him greatly. I don’t see Brother Mikhail, but I hear that he is planning something, that is, a marriage with a girl without any fortune. Some very kind and very respectable acquaintances, having heard this, advised him not to decide on anything before meeting with me; but he answered them that he was afraid to tell me about this. I also really regretted my brother Peter, who married so recklessly. Their circumstances are not such as to be carried away by the first impulse of the heart. Thank you, dearest Sister, for the news about the health of the Most Honorable Parent, brother Semyon and sisters Alexandra Alexandrovna and Maria Alexandrovna. I rarely write, because in the monastery I study only spiritual subjects, not paying attention to anything secular and not knowing any news from St. Petersburg, although I live so close to this city. Dearest sister! I sincerely wish you all the best, present and future. I ask you to say my most ardent bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. With sincere devotion, I remain forever your most devoted brother, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 393. About the short duration of earthly well-being, the weakness of one’s strength and the desire to end one’s days in deep peace Dearest Sister and friend, Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] Earthly well-being is always short-lived and not durable; from nowhere a cloud will rise and burst overhead. Blessed is he who keeps in his soul the treasure of faith and draws consolation from it in difficult moments of sorrow... My health is becoming very weak: this winter I am almost constantly ill. The St. Petersburg climate, especially the sea winds, act on my nerves very strongly and harmfully; It’s time to get away to some quiet corner, where the climate is more conducive to our monastic life, which is spent most of all in the church and cell and therefore is sparse in movement. As my pain intensified, I became very quiet and undemanding, and therefore the position of boss was not suited to my character; I would like to end my days outside of it - in deep peace. [...] The Sergius Hermitage is beautiful in its present state; but for the healthy, who have many years of life ahead of them. Goodbye! Be healthy, prosperous and remember your most devoted brother. January 8, 1846 Archimandrite Ignatius Letter 394. Consolation on the occasion of the death of a child Dearest friend and sister, I accept my heartfelt, most sincere participation in the grief that befell you and the most respected Dimitry Tikhonovich. But we must admit that Christians who die in adolescence are more blessed than those Christians who die in old age, having spent a life amid vanities, and often a sinful one. This is what our Holy Church teaches us, and this should comfort parents whose babies leave them and go into eternity for certain and endless bliss. The Apostle does not want us, looking at our deceased neighbors, visiting their graves and commemorating them, to indulge in inconsolable grief, just as pagans who have no hope, pagans in name and deed, or even in one deed, indulge in it. We must dissolve sorrow with faith and good hope, and where there is faith and hope, there is consolation. I wish you and the most venerable Dimitry Tikhonovich good health, with a feeling of sincere friendship I remain forever your most devoted brother Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 395. About the vanity of earthly life, reading the holy fathers and foreign writers Dearest sister Elizaveta Alexandrovna! Exactly - the path of earthly life is sorrowful; When a person has completed a significant part of it and looks back, then how vain all the pleasant things on earth seem to be, for which he strove with such greed in his youth! We will not lose, at least the rest of our life, by sacrificing it to vanity; Let us get acquainted with eternity not through romantic foreign books that lead their readers into inevitable self-delusion, but through the guidance of the Holy writers of our Church, in whom there is nothing romantic, dreamy, flattering or deceiving of the mind and heart. Reading the writers of our Church imparts a positive knowledge of man’s relationship to God, the Creator and Redeemer, and teaches us to approach Him through repentance, and not to flatter ourselves with sweet feelings of imaginary spiritual love, to which the extravagant Thomas a à Kempis, François de Sales and similar false teachers are attracted. Spiritual love is the property of the perfect; and the property of the pious and those who are being saved is the fear of God, the sight of their sins and shortcomings; the result of both is a contrite and humble heart, expressed by repentance. This is the true moral teaching of the Orthodox Church, alien to deception and self-delusion. Calling upon you the blessing of God with feelings of heartfelt devotion, with the desire for all blessings, especially spiritual, true Christian edification, which is the supreme earthly good and the guarantee of heavenly blessings, I remain forever your sincerely devoted brother Arch. Ignatius. Letter 396. Description of your illness During the great incident in this region, the destruction of the Timokhin station, I sent you, Dearest Sister, a letter through Kostroma, where Fr. Hegumen on his own business.[...] Around the 20th of December, I experienced the most severe crisis: for many days I lay not only unable to do anything, but also unable to think. From December 25th I felt better: for an hour or two a day I was so free that I could read and write. This freedom increases every day; I feel a radical healing from an illness that was secretive, silent, internal, and therefore mysterious to doctors and inaccessible to drugs... The views of the Babayevsky Monastery are comforting! - The earth is covered with ice and snow - like a dead man covered with a shroud of silver glaze; rural simplicity and customs of Russia everywhere, in which there is something sacred! To Dimitry Tikhonovich - my most zealous bow! – I wish you God’s mercy both in time and in eternity. May God's blessing rest upon you and over your entire home! Your most devoted friend and brother, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 397. On simplicity, humility and the benefits of solitude To your two letters, dearest friend and sister, I answer with one. Thank you for congratulating me on my birthday, which I myself often forget to remember. [...] Holy God-loving simplicity requires that we not compare ourselves with any of our neighbors, but live simply - for God and our salvation in Him. With such simplicity, all our neighbors will begin to seem better than us; and this is what is needed - this is humility, this leads to love for one’s neighbors, the Holy Fathers said that humility is a heartfelt feeling that begins imperceptibly in the soul from doing the commandments of Christ. I don’t recommend leaving your rooms throughout the winter. The thought that comes to you about being deprived of the Lenten church service and suggesting that you go to Church is vain. Leave him without any attention. Solitude has its benefits, significant benefits; You did not come to him on your own, but were brought by the finger of God through illness. Church service nourishes the soul, and solitude is extremely conducive to self-examination and repentance. That is why many Holy Fathers withdrew into the deep deserts and deprived themselves of Church service for many years. I would also advise you to spend Great Lent at home for the benefit of your soul and body, sometimes invite a priest to perform some of the most important services, and postpone fasting and communion of the Holy Mysteries until Peter’s Fast. It is not so important to receive communion often, but to prepare substantially for communion and therefore reap abundant benefits. Throughout her many years of life in the desert, St. Mary of Egypt never received communion: this life was a preparation for communion, which she received before the end of her life. I still haven’t left my rooms and I see that I must remain in them without leaving during the entire period of Lent... I wish you all the best from the right hand of the Creator - and your entire family. [...] Your most devoted brother Arch. Ignatius. February 16, 1847 Letter 398. About the Providence of God. – About the weakness of one’s powers “God is not without mercy,” says the proverb of pious Russians beautifully. The Providence of God is hidden by time - as if it does not exist - so that we take care, suffer, become tired; then he appears in full light with abundant benefits... My deepest bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. Your most devoted brother, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 399. On the need for patience on the path of salvation I have received your letter, my true friend and sister. I rejoice at your safe return and that you feel renewed in your soul. You can squander your life as one squanders property; you can use it to acquire blissful eternity. At your age you can already see from experience how insignificant everything earthly is and how stupid it is to spend all your time trying to gain what death takes away. Salvation is a simple matter; only this simplicity does not come cheap. And even those whose necks have not been thoroughly worn by sorrows do not give due value to this simplicity. Remember that the Lord commanded the soul to gain through patience, and said about those who please Him that they produce fruit in patience. It is impossible to improve at once. We must tolerate ourselves - our shortcomings - and little by little, with constancy, correct them, without losing heart from the falls that are common to every person. Saint Isaac of Syria, the great mentor of monastics, claims that the saints were not excluded from change, that immutability and infallibility are an impossible dream. – Remember this: such a memory will inspire you firmly and courageously in the cause of God. My most zealous bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. Your most devoted brother, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 400. Advice to address it as simply as possible You did not receive one of my letters, Dearest Sister, namely from the 14th; This is the number under which the Timokhinsky Overseer signed for his acceptance. I wish you a safe treatment: think less. Trust in God. “Walk simply,” the Holy Fathers said, “walk hoping.” “And God will cover you.” [...] It's as easy as possible with me; and as you write, write everything that comes easily from your heart; and I barely heard a hesitation - don’t write. There is a pause in thought, there is nothing to look at; and look at the hesitation of the heart... Christ is with you. To Dimitri Tikhonovich - the most zealous bow and brotherly hugs. Letter 401. The desire to end my life far from St. Petersburg I give you a report, Dearest Sister, about the further progress of my treatment. [...] They write to me from St. Petersburg and call me to come soon, i.e. after the expiration of 6 months; but I see that it is necessary to stay here all winter. Returning to St. Petersburg seems to me like a most disgusting mixture. I would consider it happiness if the Lord allowed me to end my life somewhere in a humble valley between spruce and pine trees - I do not give up oaks and other trees - paying attention to my own and the salvation of those of my neighbors who are with me in love for the sake of God... I wish you a safe and beneficial treatment. My most zealous bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. November 15, 1846 Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 402. About gross superstition, the loss of true Christianity and adherence to the external form of the Russian people I received your letter, Dearest Sister, dated November 12th, and although I wrote on the last post, I am also writing on the current one in order to provide you with some entertainment during your treatment and complete solitude... Be sure to eat beef broth and other meat foods your body needs. At certain times, the Church established abstinence from meat food so that the constantly consumed meat food would not overheat the bodies, so that they would cool down and be relieved on the plant food of Lenten times, and not because eating meat actually contained any kind of sin or uncleanness. And therefore, avoiding meat when necessary and sick is a gross prejudice of the Russian man, who has burdened the heavenly religion with many of his national profanities, straining out a mosquito and devouring a camel. In Russia, because they are engaged in the Christian faith very superficially and rudely, they go to the knowledge of Christ through seminaries and academies, which Christ did not establish, but abandoned the purification of themselves by holy deeds, which Christ established and commanded, they remain outside the true, living concepts of the faith of Christ. – What kind of Christian education will we find in Russia? Among the common people, the most excessive, scrupulous attachment to everything material, to form - from which schisms were born; - a lack, an extreme lack of knowledge and spiritual sensations. This is the same deficiency in an educated society: it is accompanied by neglect of form, strangely combined with an innate, internalized, ugly respect for this same form. – You meet a person educated by the modern education, borrowed from corrupted Europe, who knows how to shuffle around, dodge, be dexterous at a ball, in a diplomatic salon, who has some, his own, mostly stupid, sense of all subjects; – You find in him, in relation to religion, disbelief, skepticism, and, suddenly, next to the philosophical skepticism of Europe, a crude superstition, a stupid prejudice and a funny Russian hut; he will never sit thirteenth at the table, - he will be extremely worried when the salt is spilled, - he will spit on all sides when meeting with a priest or a monk. In a person who boasts of his intelligence there are two extremes, two disastrous abysses: unbelief and superstition! Where is the pure, holy faith? “It is not found either in the blind one-sided adherents of form, or in the exalted reason and wisdom of man, the reason and wisdom of the fallen, rejected by God. Faith, holy faith! Faith is the eye with which the human mind alone can see and contemplate the Holy Truth!... Its march along a narrow and regrettable path, leading to the stomach, along a path almost deserted, walked by very few. The Gospel leads a person along this path. – A detailed study of the Christian faith and everything leading to an accurate knowledge of Christ’s teaching contains the resolution of many perplexities born of unbelief and superstition. Church history has preserved for us the following event from the time of the first Christianity. On the island of Cyprus there was the great Holiness Bishop Spyridon of Trimythous, who lived at the end of the third and beginning of the fourth century, who was present at the first Council of Nicea, a man who performed great signs. In the Four Menaions there is his life (the first of December). During the first week of Great Lent, on Friday, a Christian wanderer came to him. His daughter lived with the Bishop. The bishop says to his daughter: “Do we have some food for the stranger?” The daughter replied: “My father! You don’t eat anything this week, and I try to imitate you: that’s why we don’t have any cooked food; and the meat-eater eats the leftover pork meat.” The bishop says: “Put this meat on the table and prepare a meal for us.” The daughter carried out her father's orders; The saint of God invited his guest to the table and sat down with him to eat. The wanderer said: “I am a Christian, and I do not eat meat during Lent.” The bishop answered him: “Because you are a Christian, and not a Jew, you must eat: we abstain from meat not because they are unclean, or so that there is some virtue in it, as the Jews abstain from them, but so that our bodies are not burdened with gluttony and drunkenness.” – This story is in one of my precious books, which contain many interesting and useful events and traditions of the primal Church of Christ. It is useful for people to explain such circumstances, without fear of hurting superstition (one must bear the infirmities of one’s neighbors, but not nurture their prejudices). God, seeing your direct intention, will act for good on their hearts. I have seen examples of this. How the ancient Christians put the Gospel commandment above all else, and according to it they also honored Church tradition! The Monk Cassian, a father of the 4th century, wandering around Egypt, came on a fast day to a certain holy desert dweller. The desert dweller presented him with a meal with some deviation from the strict Lenten rules. - Leaving the elder, St. Cassian asked him: “Why do the monks in Egypt allow visitors to fast, while the monks in Syria do not?” (Egyptian monks, and among the Egyptian monks, the monks of Skete were revered, and rightly so, as the most exalted monks in terms of holiness and spiritual intelligence in the whole world). The desert dweller answered: “Fasting is mine; I can have it whenever I want; and by accepting brothers and fathers, we accept Christ, Who said: “He accepts you, He accepts Me” (John 13:20), and: “the sons of marriage cannot fast until the Bridegroom is with them. When the Bridegroom departs, then they fast” (Mark 2:19; Matt. 9:15). This is the true concept of the teaching of Christ!... My most zealous bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. I hug him! Christ is with you. May God's blessing overshadow and protect you. Most devoted brother Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 403. Joy over a sister who has chosen “God as her inheritance” Your letters serve me as true, heartfelt consolation, Dearest Friend and Sister. What sight on earth could be more pleasant than when you see a soul created in the image of God, redeemed by the Blood of the God-Man - that it chooses God as its inheritance, hence it is already numbered among the little flock, which will be placed at the right hand of the impartial Judge, to whom God has deigned to give the Kingdom. I'll tell you, in the depths of my heart there has always been a secret sorrow for you. I thought: “How many strangers come to me, their souls are renewed in the knowledge of the truth and in the consolation of the heart, anticipating future bliss, the consolation that is born solely from the knowledge of the true teaching of Christ! and that sister of mine, whom God brought to perceive from the font and to whom I owe the word of salvation, stands far away from me, and I don’t know what state her soul is in? You are doing very well in entrusting your concern to God regarding the manner of our meeting. God will arrange everything according to His wisdom and goodness. I invoke God’s blessing on you and on your whole house! May your whole life be blessed. Your most devoted brother and friend, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 404. About the writings of St. Dimitry of Rostov I received your letter, Dear Sister, dated November 28th. Your treatment seems to be going well, thanks to God... [...] The works of Saint Demetrius bear the stamp of the anointing of grace and convey this anointing to their readers. The saint lived in Western Russia, was educated there, and in Western Russia at that time the Jesuits and Latinism in general had a strong influence. Therefore, the writings of St. Demetrius are not entirely pure, not entirely of an Eastern character. Some ancient Holy Writers were subjected to this, among other things St. Gregory of Nyssa, brother of Basil the Great. What to do? This is a significant flaw in the writings of St. Demetrius. For me, the best thing is: the moral teachings in the 4th part, appended to the Holy History, which seems to have been his last work, and therefore the most mature in terms of spirit... To Dimitry Tikhonovich - my most zealous bow. Thank you for the information about Kama and Pechora. Don't worry about delivering more information! These are enough. Apparently, something else is written on my fate - and I should not live on Pechora. Letter 405. About reading the 4th part of the Works of St. Demetrius of Rostov, advice to read the interpretation of the Gospel by Arch. Nikifor of Astrakhan and about his friendship with his sister I begin my writing studies for the new year of 1848 with a letter to you, Dearest friend and sister Elizaveta Alexandrovna. I congratulate you and Dimitry Tikhonovich on the upcoming New Summer, I earnestly wish you, your children, and your entire home the abundant blessing of God! May it appear both in spiritual eternal blessings and temporary ones, providing peace and convenience to the achievement of eternal blessings. [...] Regarding spiritual reading. The 4th part of the works of St. Demetrius is especially good; here you can glean a lot of very necessary and very useful information. Over time, you will need to read the interpretation of the Sunday Gospel by Nicephorus, Archbishop of Astrakhan, a very thorough and anointed writer. The Lord Himself called you to the knowledge of the Holy Truth; keep this knowledge as a precious treasure. The Apostle calls it a testament (2 Tim. 1:14). Precisely, it is a spiritual testament from God to receive eternal bliss. What can I say about me? You have my friendship in the Name of Christ, and not for weak human reasons. I look at this relationship between me and you as a gift from heaven. May the Lord, who bestowed this gift upon us, vouchsafe us to preserve it until the end of our lives and bring into eternity another talent acquired with this talent: our salvation... Christ is with you. I hug Dimitry Tikhonovich from the bottom of my heart, like a dear brother. Letter 406. About his life in the Babaevsky monastery and other questions Dearest Friend and Sister! With gratitude I return Pechora’s plans to Dimitry Tikhonovich. Must be a wonderful place! But it seems to me that I am destined to spend most of my life in St. Petersburg. If, by the grace of God, even the slightest part of my health returned and I could somehow correct my duties, then life in St. Petersburg would still be bearable. But with constant lying on the bed, you need a shelter that is calmer. This place is very calm and secluded; there are almost no visitors. The air and water are wonderful. O. Over time, the abbot receives both a special power of attorney and a special favor for me. The brothers try one to another to provide the services that depend on them... Strange thing! The French acquired many precious manuscripts belonging to the Eastern Church, and with their help they published many beautiful works relating to the Church. An extract from the writings of the fathers is also included in the lives. In terms of detail and accuracy of presentation, this book is precious; It even retains the character of the ancient simplicity with which the originals are presented. Calling on you, on Dimitri Tikhonovich, on your children and household members, the blessing of God. Letter 407. About simplicity, Archbishop Nikifor of Astrakhan, stage piety of St. Petersburg, his friends I received two letters from you, dear sister and friend Elizaveta Alexandrovna, one by mail, the other with my sister’s coachman A.A. when sending. I offer my sincerest gratitude... It will be especially comforting for me to take shelter under your roof and look at your home life! Where there is no sincerity and simplicity of heart, there is no true Christian feeling. I'm rummaging through my heart... I would like to see in it everything that is hidden in it that is complex and evil, so that I can throw out this complexity and be only kind. In simplicity there is no evil eye, no suspicious eye, no eye of condemnation of one’s neighbors! From simplicity appears pure virtue! Out of simplicity appears unalloyed love. Simplicity is formed in the human heart by the teaching of the Gospel. Why is she filled with such high wisdom? You will find examples of both holy simplicity and high wisdom in actions and instructions. The Lives are much more detailed than in the Four Menaions. Also, don’t worry about the interpretation of the Sunday Gospels: I wrote to have them sent to your name from St. Petersburg. The Greek writer is in worldly life the Count of Feotok, who was educated at European Universities, then entered monasticism, was invited to Russia and made Archbishop of Astrakhan. He stands incomparably higher than all our church writers (i.e.) Russians, combining in himself thorough scholarship with spiritual anointing. There are signs that indicate that his body is incorruptible. You will see for yourself how excellent his book is, and therefore what spiritual dignity the writer has. Oh! I wouldn’t want to go to noisy, intriguing St. Petersburg, where stage piety dominates, seeking to produce only an effect in front of people seeking and content with only a short-term effect. The stage effect is rejected by spiritual teaching. To be effective, it is enough to be, almost certainly, to be a Jesuit. Those affected by the effect either soon feel its destruction, or become fanatics. The effect produced by acting is essentially deception; its fruits cannot be good. “Not finding any effect in me, the St. Petersburg people stayed away from me for a long time. First of all, fruit began to appear among the brethren, and then some, oppressed by severe sorrows, found the need for consolation not by acting antics, but by true spiritual teaching - and became close to me. Little by little, my acquaintance expanded: a circle was formed in which a sweet, sincere, educated, cheerful simplicity, alien to any compulsion and ceremony, reigned. If God brings me to settle again in St. Petersburg and the Sergius Desert, then when you go there, you will find people who will greet you with open arms... Calling upon you and your children the blessing of God, with a feeling of heartfelt love for the Lord, I remain forever your most devoted brother, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 408. About true friendship Dearest friend and sister, Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I thank the Merciful Lord, who has made me worthy to visit your blessed home and enjoy spiritual consolation in it: your piety, the piety of your husband and the sweet piety of your children. May God's blessing overshadow your house, may it pour all blessings onto it and may it preserve it from all evil. [...] I saw N., told her about you and that maybe you were staying here. Then there was a conversation about friendship, how few friends there are these days. Then the kindest N. exclaimed: ....... These are the feelings that are instilled in the soul in advance by the teaching of Christ. Only that friendship is true and strong which is founded and cemented by Christ. Christ is with you and with your dearest children. Unworthy Archimandrite Ignatius. June 9, 1848 Sergiev Pustyn. Letter 409. “God looks at the will of man”; Creations of St. Fathers - the path to Christ; about the increase in false teachers, advice to sister Alexandra Alexandrovna not to join the monastery Dear friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I had the real pleasure of receiving your letter dated July 19th. In comparison with other provinces, cholera was less active in Vologda. Here it raged for a short time; Now it's getting quieter and quieter... Regarding myself, I will say: I feel very weak, but healing together... God looks at the will of man. It is up to us to have a good will. God will give the means and strength to bring good intentions into fulfillment, if He wants a person’s good intention to be fulfilled by deed itself. - When distributing the bribe, he accepts equal payment, and he who bore all the burden of the hot day of earthly life - and so to speak - only looked at the work of the spiritual vineyard at the eleventh hour. – The holy books compiled by the holy fathers of the Orthodox Church are in our time the only path along which one can get to the true light – Christ. The apostle says that in his time there were many false teachers; what can we say about our time? Is it that in our time the number of false teachers has multiplied endlessly, those infected with false teaching and those communicating false teaching have multiplied; Books containing and communicating false teaching have proliferated terribly. It is excellent to rely on God regarding your fate and to remain in good deeds that correspond to the present situation of everyone. I am very sorry about the condition of my sister Alexandra Alexandrovna. But I would not advise her to go to a monastery, where she would inevitably be exposed to some kind of trouble. These troubles bring great spiritual benefit, and are called monastic temptations; but in order to endure them, you must have both moral and partly physical strength. Both were taken from her. It is better to live on Olivet, if possible, and continue to engage in material mercy, for which there is a reward. And in her mind she is not capable of monastic life, which requires a simple, direct mind. And her mind is filled with self-thinking and suspicions! “Such,” said St. John Climacus, “let them see below the trace of silence,” because during a contemplative life they can easily fall into mental delusion, which is the most painful for everyone. Let such be saved in the company of men by material good deeds... May God's blessing rest upon you. Take the trouble to convey to Anna Andreevna my zealous bow and my unworthy blessing. Brother Archimandrite Ignatius, devoted to you in soul. Letter 410. About the meal prayer ...One of the monastery’s refectory prayers ends beautifully: “May we always have all the sufficiency we have, abound in every good work in Christ Jesus our Lord” [...] Letter 411. About my own and mental state Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! With all my heart I congratulate you and the kindest Dimitry Tikhonovich on the upcoming New Year, which I wish you to see through in perfect health and well-being... My health is improving significantly and quickly: I feel especially strengthened and fresh. A warm room, which was previously an absolute necessity for me, is now unbearable: both my body and my breath crave fresh, cool air. However, I am not yet cured, but only recovering... And a distinctive sign of my mental state is that I was completely disgusted with life in the noisy Sergius Hermitage, in this aristocratic cemetery. In the Babaevsky monastery I became very cheerful; and here this carefree and easy state left my soul: I moved to a state of caution, which this place requires, subject to countless and completely unexpected intrigues. The publication of Joseph is very confused and is unlikely to take place: because the censor, to whom this article came across, is very ignorant of literature and wants to change the syllable by adding many words, the most ugly ones; but I do not agree to such a change. I don’t know if I can persuade the censor with the help of other writers, otherwise the “story” cannot be published. Then - I wish you all the true blessings, I invoke God’s blessing on you and I remain forever Your most devoted brother Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 412. About devotion to the will of God Dear Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! With such poor health, it would be better to live not in the Sergius Hermitage, but in some more secluded, calm and healthy place. But we must live here and there, where and how God’s Providence, incomprehensible to the human mind, leads - to live, surrendering to the will of God and thanking God for His countless blessings poured out on us. [...] Maybe God will give the opportunity, when taking up a position, to prepare for myself a shelter that is calmer than the Babaevsky Monastery. The Holy Fathers say that one must prepare oneself for silence by enduring dishonor. I drank the full cup of these dishonors upon my arrival here: many, including my old acquaintances, demanded that upon my arrival I should immediately begin to serve and accept everyone! and I experienced extraordinary paroxysms, during which the perspiration flowed like a river and I was only able to lie down. The anger was so strong that they tried to accuse me before the Highest Family; but they, knowing that I had been slandered before them many times in vain, did not pay attention to the new slander, but were so merciful that they listened to my explanation. This shouldn't be surprising; everyone who wants to be saved is subjected to various temptations - and blessed is he if he thanks God for his sorrows. The sign of God’s calling for salvation is sorrow. Whomever God loves and wants to make His own, He sends sorrows to him, and kills him for the love of the world with sorrows. So look at Your sorrows, at Your prolonged illness. May the Lord grant you patience. I give Dimitri Tikhonovich a brotherly hug and kiss my dear Petya and Sofia. Letter 413. About life's difficulties ...For monastic life, peace is needed, and with notorious swindlers it is otherwise impossible to maintain peace either by fleeing from them, or by removing oneself from office, in which they interfere craftily and maliciously and distort the matter, presenting as a distorter the actor subordinate to them and hated by them. [...] Letter 414. About my health, the difficulties of spiritual life in the Sergius Hermitage and about writing the book “Following Christ” Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I don’t take any medications, but occasionally take warm baths at 27 degrees. I don’t know if I will take cold baths. We believe, i.e. me and my doctor, wait for the final resolution of the disease, and after that, if God grants it, take tonics, and mainly cold baths. [...] You say very rightly that you would like to see me again in some deserted place like the Babaevsky Monastery. The bustle here weighs me down immensely, takes up all my time, tramples on all spiritual thoughts and sensations, as soon as they appear. But we must be patient; in the present circumstances, a new attempt to remove from the Sergius Hermitage is impossible. When I asked to retire to the Babaevsky Monastery, I did not know that my whole illness was a cold... Having recognized my illness, I will seek removal, of course, to a warm climate - to Kyiv, for example. Now my life in these places is completely useless, and in a good climate, having strengthened myself, I could write a lot of useful things for my neighbors. I am now engaged in compiling the book “Following Christ”, as opposed to the book written in the depths of the Western Church and first condemned by this Church - as opposed to the book “Imitation of Christ”. This work proceeded very quickly in Babayki: but the absent-mindedness here is completely opposite to the occupation consisting of a detailed examination of deep and subtle human feelings and thoughts. Illness and absent-mindedness manage my time and completely take it away from useful activities. [...] Therefore, calling on You, on the most venerable Dimitri Tikhonovich and on Your dear children, the blessing of God, I remain forever Your most devoted brother and friend, Archimandrite Ignatius. Letter 415. About charity of capital and provincial residents ...The local Petersburg people do good this way, at least very often: when they see someone naked, they take pity on him, and in order to cover him, they take off the last garment from another poor man, not caring that he, like the first, will remain naked; the good aspiration of their heart is satisfied, they have accomplished virtue. ...In the provinces they do good in a simpler way: they share their own, not someone else’s, and do not resort to scams for the sake of virtue. Letter 416. Easter wish, about reducing the number of priests in parishes and advice on how a well-meaning person should behave Truly Christ is Risen! Dearest Friend and Sister Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I received your dear letter and I sincerely thank you for your congratulations on the Great Feast of Holidays - the Resurrection of Christ, wishing from the bottom of my heart that the risen Christ would resurrect your soul into the feeling of future spiritual bliss, which is given to believers in the word of Christ and the following of this word by their external and internal behavior, rejecting the word, teaching and demands of the transitory world. [...] Regarding the circumstances that you saw in Poshekhonsky district, in one of the parishes there, then this is almost a general disaster in Russia; the number of priests is so reduced that they are not able to fulfill the demands, and often the demands of the most self-needed ones. Recently, landowners from the banks of the Volga visited me and said that their parish stretched along the Volga and the rivers flowing into it for twelve miles; in ordinary times it is very difficult for a priest to correct the services, but during a flood of water, which continues for a very long time, this correction becomes completely impossible. The religion of the peasants, which relies so heavily on the fulfillment of requirements, not only essential ones necessary for all Christians, but even ritual ones, must be greatly shaken. Previously, I spoke about these objects to those who had them in their hands, with a desire for the common good; but seeing that this was being taken from the bad side and they were responding with vengeance and vile intrigues, I fell silent, remembering the words of Christ the Savior: “Do not place your pearls, lest they be trampled under your feet and you be torn asunder” (Matthew 7:6). There are a lot of people who understand intrigue well; and there are very few who understand the matter. There are a lot of people who deserve favors; and there are very few employees. A well-intentioned person should limit himself to good deeds in the circle in which God’s Providence has placed him, and which his duties indicate to him; but do not interfere in any way with your advice, especially with a remark that sets in motion someone’s egoism, no matter how true and well-intentioned this advice and this remark may be. Take the trouble to congratulate the most venerable Dimitry Tikhonovich on my behalf on the great holiday. I hug your dear children and wishing you all the true blessings I remain forever Letter 417. Review of Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow Having received your letter from Moscow dated February 13th, I immediately wrote to the Metropolitan and thanked him for his gracious attention to you and me. Exactly, he sincerely loves me, and, judging by appearances, I have lost a lot by being deprived of his protection; but, judging spiritually, one cannot help but recognize the Divine Providence at work here, which granted me to complete my earthly journey along a thorny path, and not along the path of corruptible successes, which are almost always very harmful to the soul. This is a way of thinking that calms the heart with faith in God, who acts above the wisest human considerations. Filaret is smart, smart as day, but he, too, was removed by God’s Providence from the affairs of earth, in order to be more accurately preserved for the affairs of Heaven. Earthly affairs and successes lead to pride, from which the Apostle Paul himself needed allowances and sorrows to ward off. Wishing you, the most venerable Dimitri Tikhonovich and dear children all true blessings, I remain forever Letter 418. About a solitary and noisy life, your desire for a solitary life Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I sincerely thank you for your kind letter, and I equally congratulate you all on the great Feast of the Resurrection of Christ. Believe me: your quiet life in solitude is more blessed than the noisy and bright life of many in the capital. Your life is full, but theirs is empty. A lot of entertainment gives rise to a lot of sins due to the many occurrences of sin; the solitary is protected from such meetings. Is it not for nothing that the Great Father once said: “The beginning of evil is absent-mindedness”? How I would like, with my advanced years and poor health, to take refuge in some secluded place, unknown to the world. But I still don’t see any means for this. Be the will of my God, who knows what is good for me. [...] Calling on all of you the blessing of God, with feelings of sincere devotion, I remain with you, my sincerely loving brother Archimandrite Ignatius Letter 419. About complacency in sorrows The Lord punishes whomever he loves with mercy: therefore, in sorrows one must be complacent, casting one’s fate on the will of God. Weakness is a common consequence of homeopathic medicines, therefore it should not be surprising. [...] Letter 420. Consolation in sorrow - faith in God Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I received your letter, and I am answering your sorrowful voice from my sorrows. Man is weak, and it is impossible for him to constantly remain in generosity; At times, cowardice also attacks a person. The burden caused by cowardice forces one to seek consolation, which lies in faith in God and in surrendering oneself to His Holy Will. Faith again introduces spiritual patience and generosity into the house: the same sorrow that seemed unbearable already seems very bearable.[...] Our Church is coming to an end, and is arousing praise from all of St. Petersburg. Exactly: it is original, all in images and gold, and unusually convenient for Divine services. [...] Archimandrite Ignatius, calling upon you and your family the blessing of God. Letter 421. About my pain, humility and heroism Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] [...] Our monastery is noisy; but there is nothing to do: you live not as and where you would like, but where and as the incomprehensible Providence of God leads. Devotion to the will of God and gratitude to God for everything that happens delights every situation and teaches one to derive spiritual benefit from it. Humility goes almost side by side with feat, i.e. it brings almost the same success as that achieved by feat. Humility alone, in itself, is useful; and feat without humility not only does not bring any fruit, but on the contrary, it brings harm, leading to a high opinion of oneself and condemnation of one’s neighbors. Humility consists, among other things, in recognizing ourselves as worthy of the position in which we find ourselves, and insufficiently in the position of the best and highest, even in spiritual terms, and humbly surrendering ourselves to the will of God. This mood of thoughts is evidenced in its truth by the peace brought to the heart, and instructs a person on the path of the eternal life. In our time, God grants salvation more through humility than through feat: now, with increased weaknesses, feat is especially dangerous, as it is strongly denounced by condemnation, moreover, requiring an experienced leader; and humility is always unfallen. The very weaknesses and sins, when we confess them and repent, contribute to humility. Thus, in the all-powerful right hand of the all-wise God, even evil promotes good with evil intentions, according to the expression of some great Father.[...] May the blessing of God rest upon you and upon your whole house. Letter 422. About his arrival in Stavropol and the naturalness of his removal from St. Petersburg Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I received your letter dated December 4th, addressed to Stavropol, having arrived in this city on January 4th, after a very difficult journey due to my weakness. Despite this, as I moved away from St. Petersburg, where I was completely destroyed, I began to feel better and better. But to feel the change, in its essence, you need to rest; and an hour after my arrival I began listening to the All-Night Vigil. On the 5th he celebrated mass; On the 6th also, and went out for the blessing of water; I also serve on the 7th because of my service day. I was received very cordially; I liked the place so much that I have never seen it more beautiful; The spring waters are excellent, the likes of which I have not drank for a long, long time. The city is on a huge mountain, and all in gardens. Spring waters boil in abundance from the mountain. I left St. Petersburg as that fruit falls from the tree, which can no longer borrow juice from it. My removal was so natural and logical. Here it should be calmer for me, and most importantly, work that is nourishing for the soul is the edification of others; I’m also almost sure that my health, although far from perfect, will improve greatly. I am sending you a copy of my speech, printed by order of Metropolitan Gregory. I am very grateful to Dimitry Tikhonovich for his good wishes; I thank both Petya and Sonya for remembering them about me. May God's blessing rest upon you. January 6, 1858 Unworthy Bishop Ignatius. Letter 423. Comparison of his place of residence with his former one, about the piety of the Brianchaninovs and about sorrows [...] I am very pleased with this place; the place is quiet and peaceful. I am getting used to the climate and water; but I feel much better than in St. Petersburg. Here you need to start almost everything, starting with the premises itself; however, I like this very small room much more than my high rooms in the Sergius Desert, which from here seem to me like some kind of terrible glacier. My Stavropol house is like the cells in which I lived in the Babaevsky Monastery; but much more. Near the church itself! When they are put in order, they will be very comfortable, very roomy, and super nice. They stand, like the church, among a vast orchard. I am very consoled by the piety of brother Pyotr Alexandrovich! his son Alyosha, a smart and well-behaved child. Especially the mercy of God towards our family is the piety and Orthodoxy of our family.[...] [...] The Lord sends various trials to those he loves; but also delivers them from all sorrows. Through sorrow we learn to trust in God, and not in ourselves, and we acquire a priceless treasure - Faith in God, active, living faith. May God's blessing rest upon you and your family. Your most devoted brother Ignatius, Bishop of the Caucasus. Letter 424. About surrendering oneself to the will of God with God's permission Three months have passed without five days since I finished the course of Caucasian mineral waters, and their effect continues to a strong degree. This action consists in the fact that scrofula is driven away by various rashes and sores, profuse perspiration; Significant internal pain is also felt, weakness is unusual. I can only study in the morning until 12 o’clock; after which I feel tired and exhausted. At times I wondered if consumption had arisen in me - my chest hurt so much. Well? Nothing binds me to this world. Only one unwillingness to appear before the judgment of God can be the reason for the desire to delay departure from here. The Gospel likens God's permission to a net surrounding and enveloping everywhere, which is impossible to escape (Luke 21:35). We must humble ourselves under the strong hand of God, and meet the sorrow that comes with the confession: You who are worthy of our deeds are acceptable, remember us, Lord, in Your Kingdom!!! Let us give ourselves, each other and our whole life to Christ our God!.. May the blessing of God rest upon you and upon your house. Most devoted brother Ignatius, E. Caucasian. Letter 425. Advice to be closer to God Now you are free, and in freedom you can pray to God more often and more for yourself and Your children. For your prayer for children to be heard by God, you must be closer to God. Like earthly kings, the Heavenly King is most attentive to His entourage. He becomes close to God who often prays to God with a contrite and humble heart. God is omnipresent. Every place is equally close to Him, and in every place He can appear to a person: the place where He usually appears is a contrite and humble heart. He creates tenderness in the heart with His presence... Be healthy and prosperous. May God's blessing rest upon you and your family. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 426. Advice on how to endure temptations and that a mother should maintain love for her children even when they hesitate from temptations [...] The righteous, long-suffering Job was subjected to many temptations, and said about our earthly life that all of it is a temptation for man. And then you need to know that people who fear God and honor Him, although they are allowed temptations for a time, but after that they will certainly be delivered from temptations. And so one should not indulge in sadness and hopelessness, but from the midst of temptation itself, with faith, prayerfully cry out to God, and expect His help. This is how I look at your situation. – The Great Reverend Father Isaac of Syria says that God sent His Son into the world at a time when people were especially mired in sins, especially becoming enemies of God. From this the Reverend draws the conclusion that the virtue of preserving love for people when they are exposed to sins is much more exalted than when they lead a righteous life. The fulfillment of this virtue is now incumbent upon you in relation to your children. We live in a terrible age. Unbelief has engulfed and is engulfing the earth even more: temptations have multiplied beyond number, and are multiplying even more. How can young people not be shaken! Look upon them with mercy, and diligently pray to God for them, entrusting them to God and surrendering them to His Holy will. Write to Peter more often and persuade him. Through patience we must gain both our soul and the souls of our neighbors. [...] My deepest bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich. May the mercy of God and the blessing of God cover you and your children. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 427. Advice to engage in the Jesus Prayer and handicrafts in solitude; about the necessity of sorrows for salvation Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I offer you my sincere gratitude for remembering me and for your congratulations on the Holidays and the New Year, on which I congratulate you evenly, wishing you and your family all the true blessings. Glory to the Merciful Lord, Who inspired the earthly authorities to leave a salary for Dimitri Tikhonovich. And henceforth the Merciful Lord will not leave you. He does not leave people, as long as we do not leave Him. With such solitude as awaits you in Ivashov, it is useful to engage in prayer while doing some very mechanical handicraft that does not distract your mind or distracts it the least. When doing such needlework, you need to slowly say a prayer like this: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” We must enclose our mind in the words of prayer, according to the expression and instruction of St. John Climacus, that is, say the prayer with extreme attention. In front of someone else, the prayer is said with the mind alone, and in private, in a whisper, with lips and tongue, so that one can hear oneself. It is good when a person thinks about the future life and prepares for it in good time. [...] Mineral waters stirred up my old illness, of which a lot has gone away and a lot still remains. Thank God for everything! Since the autumn of 1846 I have been feeling especially bad. I live some kind of half-life, some kind of moving corpse. According to the teachings of the Apostle, it is fitting for us (all Christians) to enter the Kingdom of Heaven through many sorrows, and precisely those that it pleases God to send us. [...] My most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius, calling upon you and your family the blessing of God. Letter 428. About the impoverishment of frankness in people, the surrender of children to God, the attitude towards “St. Petersburg” intrigues Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! In our age, one cannot even expect frankness from children of a secular school. And among monks it is now the greatest rarity. We must entrust our children to God in prayer, and then remain calm in our conscience, without indulging in an anxious state of mind. God is omnipotent: through the earnest and humble prayer of parents, He can give children a Christian direction. You have worked hard to raise your children; but the immutable Word of God says: “Unless the Lord builds a house (not made with hands, the verbal house of God is man, especially a Christian), those who build it labor in vain” (Ps. 127:1). Resort to God, and He, having purified your efforts on education through sorrows, can crown them with good success. I have noticed in many people that passion got the better of them for a while, but then the seeds of piety and good morals, sown during upbringing, took their toll. [...] As for the St. Petersburg and other intrigues, I have a desire to endure them as a cleansing medicine sent by the Providence of God, if only the Merciful Lord, after his death, would deliver eternal torment and grant the slightest shelter in the Abodes of His saints [...] Your most devoted brother Letter 429. Youth should pay tribute to the experience of adults and thank God for everything [...] Pyotr Dimitrievich and Sofia Dimitrievna are young people, very young. No matter how smart they are, they must pay tribute to their acquired experience because of their youth. It doesn't come for nothing. [...] Thank God for everything! and for having to cheer all my life. May God's blessing rest upon you and your family. Letter 430. About his participation in the celebrations on the occasion of the conquest of the eastern side of the Caucasus, about the commemoration of death Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I received your letter dated August 2 during the Great Triumph throughout the entire Caucasus; On August 25, the conquest of the eastern side of the Caucasus was celebrated everywhere. With my rotten health, I must take part in all this and be the engine of the celebration, on the occasion of which I made a speech with extreme difficulty. It's time for the old man to retire. I often feel as if I were about to die: my physique is so exhausted by illness. Happy is Dimitri Tikhonovich that he spends the rest of his life in solitude, in peace, in his arms. God, looking at the inner disposition of a person, arranges his circumstances accordingly. Those who have the will to please God are given a position in accordance with their will, so that the pious may have the opportunity to prepare themselves for eternity. The death of sinners is fierce not because of the severity of the bodily pain that accompanies it, but because of its suddenness, unexpectedness, because of the transition from earthly prosperity to terrible, unimaginable eternal torment that, after death, awaits the unrepentant sinner. It's amazing how the world deceives and blinds people. It is a truth that does not require proof that we will all die. But few people show knowledge of this truth in their lives; most of them behave as if they would never die. It is a great thing to remember death and understand its meaning. From this remembrance and understanding, a person’s life can completely change and become pleasing to God. [...] I remain my most devoted brother Ignatius, Bishop of the Caucasus and Black Sea. August 28, 1860 Letter 431. About raising children, about sorrows [...] Nowadays it is necessary for every young man to educate himself satisfactorily in his youth in order to be substantially useful to the fatherland and achieve a good position for himself. When you look at our youth, you can’t help but feel sorry for them! How flighty she is! how he doesn’t think about anything except pleasures that upset both morality and health, preparing the saddest future. It seems to me that all this is due to incorrect upbringing, which gives young people the wrong view of themselves and life. Of course, even with the most careful upbringing, nothing special can be expected from a child who is stupid or has a bad character; but where there is humanity, there is evil - human society cannot do without it - however, correct education, with many exceptions, can give many wonderful results. [...] [...] During earthly life it is impossible to do without sorrows, and those sorrows that come, come only by the permission and beck of God for the purification of man. Consequently, one must submit to the will of God and accept permission with thanksgiving to the Providence of God. [...] My deepest bow to Dimitri Tikhonovich! May God's blessing rest upon you and your family [...] Letter 432. The end of the life of a servant of the earth and a servant of God [...] God does not remain in debt to those who from youth devote themselves to His service, although He allows them various sorrows during their earthly journey for their own spiritual education; but at the same time it fills them with ineffable, eternal blessings. Towards the end of earthly life, before entering eternity, the servant of the world sees emptiness both in front and behind him, and the servant of God in front sees a reliable haven of eternal bliss, and turning his gaze to the earthly life he has spent, he sees the field of serving God, a field in which he did not labor in vain, but was appropriated to God in good time.[...] Letter 433. The desire to end life in repentance, and some social issues of that time Dearest Friend and Sister, Elizaveta Alexandrovna! I received your letter dated May 28th on June 17th. God bless you for your desire to see me closer! Maybe this will happen, or maybe they will send you somewhere far away. Be the will of God! I should wish for one thing: the end of my life in repentance, away from the noisy world. And here it’s already incomparably better than in St. Petersburg. I am very happy about the well-being of your dear children. After visiting sorrow, God sends consolation. [...] According to the way you write, many landowners are moving from a luxurious, vain, empty life to a life of modest and hard work. This life will bring more happiness than the previous life. Young nobles will understand that they need to thoroughly educate themselves in order to become members necessary for society, independent people, and therefore capable of well-organizing their own well-being, basing it on themselves, and not on anything extraneous. The transformation of peasant life immediately entailed a transformation of the life of landowners, and had a strong influence on the merchant class, which included many thousands of freed rich peasants. Other changes should also be expected: because many of the previous decrees are no longer in harmony with the Regulations made for the peasants. We must pray to God to bless these innovations, which will undoubtedly bring development to Russia and bring it out of the infantile state in which it finds itself. May God bless you all! With the onset of summer, I began to take salt-iodine-alkaline cold baths from 20 to 17 degrees, which act against scrofula and colds and at the same time strengthen. At times I feel much better than before. I entrust my future to the Lord my God. May God's blessing rest upon you and your family. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 434. On submission to the will of God with God's permission Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! Your letter dated September 17th was sent to me from Stavropol to the Babaevsky Monastery known to You, where I arrived on October 14th with the intention of ending my days in deep solitude, renouncing relations with acquaintances and relatives in the flesh, maintaining relations with acquaintances and relatives in spirit. My health and spiritual mood require this, and my rank imposes on me the obligation to preserve its holiness. With God's permission, one must submit to the will of God, and, recognizing oneself as worthy of God's wrath, humbly beg God for mercy. God accepts such prayer. [...] You will be pleased to see that the merciful Lord does not leave you, but consoles you even in the most sorrows with mercies. He will not leave us in the future, as long as we do not leave Him. May God's blessing rest upon you. Your most devoted servant and brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 435. About the patience of sorrows and the vanity of earthly life Dearest Friend and Sister Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] The time of sorrow is the time of patience! Grief is God’s permission, which must be endured with humility and reverence, giving justice to God’s justice and recognizing oneself as worthy of sorrow. From such a spiritual mood, you can pray to God for mercy with the hope of being heard. The recognition of God's justice in God's permission with a prayer for mercy is excellently stated in the prayer of the three Holy Youths of Judah, thrown into the fiery furnace of Babylon. This prayer is found in the book of the prophet Daniel. I would be ashamed to write about the patience of sorrows if I myself were not in sorrow. Since the second week of Great Lent I have become very ill. Several times I felt such a weakening of strength, as if before death, and now I feel very bad. I don’t know how to thank God enough for taking me out of worldly life and bringing me to the monastery! Earthly life at the beginning seems like a boundless field of activity, and when a person ends it and looks back, he will certainly see a lot of emptiness in his past activity. – Grief is becoming more and more social in nature. And here they expect an increase in bread prices due to a widespread reduction in crops. May God's blessing rest upon you and your children. Your most devoted brother. Bishop Ignatius. Letter 436. About dying illnesses, alms for the deceased, the benefits of remembering a seen death Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] I offer my sincere gratitude for the detailed notification of the death of Semyon Alexandrovich. Old people used to say: God grant that you suffer well before death. The great among the saints, Niphon, dying of fever, said to the Great Athanasius, who was present at his death, that just as gold is purified by fire, so is the dying of illness. The eyes of the dying are opened, and therefore they see what those present at their death cannot see. The light you write about was from heaven. It is clear that Semyon has God’s mercy. Tell the children to give alms to the poor more generously according to their father. Alms greatly help the deceased, and God will bless the children for this, and their conscience will be calmer. She did well to remove embarrassment from the dying man. And then calm down and leave everything to God. Everyone “stands or falls according to his Lord” (Rom. 14:4), said the Apostle. I believe that it was not without the Providence of God that you had to be present at death, accompanied by such torment. This death will be remembered to you, and the memory will serve as preparation for your death. For the fact that you served your brother, the merciful Lord will reward you with spiritual reward, which He Himself knows. Try to calm down, relying on the will of God. [...] In the monastery, by the grace of God, everything is fine, very secluded. God bless! Invoking God’s blessing on you and your children, with feelings of sincere devotion and respect, I remain forever Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 437. Positive review about Peter Dimitrievich and the destinies of God Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] Pyotr Dimitrievich left a very pleasant impression on me; I saw in him a thorough, intelligent, and rule-minded person. And it is noticeable that troubles in his career affected him; but they provide precious experience. [...] [...] The widespread cooling towards religion, fanatical atheism with destructive assumptions and intentions, general immorality cannot remain without consequences. Often the most extraordinary events occur suddenly and unexpectedly for those not expecting them. But a person’s whole life is filled with various sorrows. The world is ruled by the right hand of God, which is incomprehensible to us. One must understand the situation and be in awe of God’s destinies, recognizing oneself as worthy of God’s punishment. For such consciousness, mercy is sent from God. Matveevsky’s review, having an unkind intention, greatly contributed to the fact that special attention was paid to “The Lay of Death.” Significant persons write to me about this from St. Petersburg. Some got angry! what to do? at least those who remained faithful to Christianity were given a detailed teaching from the Holy Fathers about the meaning of death and how to prepare oneself for eternity. God controls man's destiny; His enemies can do to him only what God allows, and everything that God allows serves for the benefit of the soul and eternal salvation. Invoking God’s blessing on you and your children, with feelings of sincere devotion and respect, I remain your most devoted friend and brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 438. “Admonishing” and “crushing” tribulations Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! Brother Pyotr Alexandrovich brought me the news that you were visited by a serious illness: for this reason I am writing these consoling lines to you. The Holy Fathers advise us to thank God for the sorrows that are sent to us, and to confess in our prayer that we are worthy of punishment for our sins. Thus, the sorrow we accept will certainly serve us as a cleansing of our sins and as a guarantee of eternal bliss. Due to the properties of our fallen nature, we care most about the arrangement of our temporary position, and God arranges our eternal position, which we would forget about if our earthly situation were not shaken by sorrows, if the sorrows sent from time to time by the Providence of God did not remind us that everything temporary and earthly is passing away and that our main concerns should be about the eternal. Scripture says: “The Lord loves him and punishes him” (Rev. 3:19). Admonishing sorrows are sent from God to those whom He wants to have mercy on, and decisive and crushing sorrows are sent to the rejected, such as sudden death, loss of reason, and the like. Great is our God! a terrible thing - the fall of man! great thing is the redemption of man by the God-man! It is necessary to study all this thoroughly and guide your earthly journey according to the correct concept of God and yourself, so as not to perish forever. May God's blessing rest upon you and your children. Your most devoted brother and friend, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 439. On the state of the Orthodox faith in Russia We live slowly. The information reaching us about the state of the Orthodox Faith in Russia is very sad. On the one hand, it is ruined by schism, on the other by freethinking. The fight for her is very difficult due to the terrible internal pain, which, like a worm, has drained all her strength. Let the will of God be done. And so, see you nicely! May God's blessing rest upon you and your family. With feelings of sincere devotion and respect, I have the honor to be Letter 440. Fulfilling the commandments is an indispensable duty of a person, about the difficulties of that time [...] The Holy Fathers advise: when a good deed proposed and undertaken cannot be accomplished with due accuracy, then the lack of fulfillment is replenished with humility. In this case, you need to humble yourself before God: ask Him for forgiveness for being carried away and for not doing enough of a good deed. Although we are commanded to fulfill the commandments, it is commanded as our indispensable duty, as the only condition for being in communion with God, and not as a merit before God or a favor to God on our part: we are all saved, without any exception, solely by the grace of God. Christ came to save confessed sinners, not the righteous. These thoughts can calm and console you about communion with the Holy Mysteries of Christ when absent-minded. Now is the time of sighing. Almost everyone who writes to me writes from a place of sorrow. Who's having fun? unknown. God, sending you temporary sorrow, obviously favors you to draw closer to Him and more clearly prepare for eternity. I enter very little into the affairs of the world; but as far as I hear, landowners will face new troubles when introducing a new order. It’s best to rely on God and ask Him not to forsake His mercy. I think I told you that nowadays it’s difficult in general, but in a religious sense in particular. I wouldn't see anything! I wouldn't hear anything! The religious ailments of humanity are always reflected in its external life. All history bears witness to this. Letter 441. About the vanity of earthly life Dearest Friend and Sister! Elizaveta Alexandrovna! [...] May God bless your children! They will also look at life, which experimentally proves to everyone that it is vain, that all earthly acquisitions must be left on earth and go into eternity with only deeds. In the month of July I reached extreme exhaustion; and now it's bad. There is no strength at all, This is the fruit of a life spent in positions that exceeded the capabilities of the physique, and therefore destroyed them. God bless! has now approached the end, which no one can escape. Everything is fine with us. The church turns out to be extraordinary. The weather makes harvesting grain very difficult and also slows down construction. Be healthy and prosperous. I invoke God’s blessing on you and your children. Your most devoted brother and friend, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 442. On the need to resort to God in prayer during life’s difficulties The Holy Scripture predicted the disasters of the last time: that they “will come like a snare over all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth” (Luke 21:35), “and they will not be able to escape” (1 Thessalonians 5:3). Exactly! There is no way to eliminate the accumulating black thick clouds covering the horizon from everywhere. The Lord commanded to watch and pray with special care during these fierce times. The very thing shows that there is no other refuge. If you are smart enough, you won’t be able to do anything. When the St. Petersburg military governor-general Kavelin was sick with insanity, and his relatives came and tried to reason with him, which brought him into greater disorder: then the doctor who was with him once said to me: “This is the disease of our time.” Calling upon you and your children the abundant blessing of God Your most devoted servant, friend and brother E. Ignatius. Letter 443. Review of the letter from nephew P.D.; handicrafts when despondent and reading spiritual books Thank you for remembering me! I really liked Pyotr Dmitrievich’s last letter to me because of two ideas expressed: 1) that he is incapable of tenderness, 2) that the service of the present time has the character of wagging. The first served as a recommendation from his heart for me: because tenderness is a sexual (blood) feeling, a deception of oneself and others. The second recommended mind was one that looked very correctly and insightfully. Boredom, called despondency in monastic life, always attacks those who lead a solitary life from time to time. During it, it is very useful to do handicrafts, and at the same time remember the dead, who died how, and that we will certainly die. Spiritual books should be read little by little, so that the mind does not become satiated with reading. The same thing happens to the mind as to the stomach, which, having had enough, turns away from the best food. [...] Letter 444. To brother Pyotr Alexandrovich: About withdrawal from the world What should I say to You in response to Your thoughts about moving away from the world? The Lord, who blessed and established such a removal, at the same time commanded us to first count our possessions, whether it is sufficient for the creation of this high life, and the amount of our strength to fight against opposing forces. I advise you to settle this score through prayer, surrendering to the will of God. No matter how much I prayed to God to grant me a solitary life, I still remain in the Sergius Hermitage, exposed to various kinds of entertainment. It is not enough that we want: it is necessary that our desire be in accordance with the will of God. We want it now, but God sometimes prepares the same thing many years later. At the present time, you are necessary for Alyosha, who, in the event of your removal, his grandfather will rightfully attack and make him unhappy in soul and body. The visions You described should not attract Your attention: the path of L.A. is special, and from such peculiarities the St. the fathers order those who are destined to follow the common Christian path to distance themselves. My advice is to engage in soul-helping reading, be guided by it in your actions, heal through repentance for sin, and surrender to the will of God, offering God your secret thought and intention. Letter 445. On choosing a confessor In my opinion, a great virtue in a confessor is simplicity, unswerving adherence to the teachings of the Church, alien to any of his own speculations. Some are strict, some are smart; but strict and smart in their own way, they are not suitable for spiritual edification. And a strict, and intelligent, and merciful, and forbearing, and a simple-hearted, but faithful son of the Church, can be equally useful. May God grant you a confessor according to your desire. Letter 446. On the attitude towards clergy It is very prudent that you do not establish a close acquaintance with any clergy: such an acquaintance can very easily serve to harm and very, very rarely to benefit. Consult the books of St. Tikhon, Demetrius of Rostov and George the Recluse, and from the ancients - Chrysostom; tell your confessor your sins - and nothing more. The people of our century, whether in a cassock or a tailcoat, first of all inspire caution. Read the following prayers morning and evening: Trisagion, Our Father, 12 Lord have mercy, Psalm 50, Creed. Theotokos and some remembrances; after this, make 10 bows from the waist with the prayer: “God, cleanse me, a sinner.” Letter 447. About true love Nikolai Nikolaevich (Muravyov) is a deeply kind person. Many do not at all suspect this quality in him, on the contrary, they consider him cold, because he is not flattering or affectionate, while true love is strict and, appearing in business, does not need a guise - affection and flattery, with which pride certainly covers itself to deceive its neighbors. Letter 448. About the article “A Word about Death” I would like to send to You the “Word on Death”; I hope to do this after some time, when we have dealt with this article here, because it is very, very great, expounds in detail the mystery of death and shows how to live in order to die safely. My health is very bad: I can’t stand the air at all; While I’m in my cell, I feel fine, but as soon as I leave, I start to swell. Letter 449. About one’s own desire for solitude My desire to move from the noisy Sergius Hermitage to solitude, in order to more thoroughly prepare for the transition to eternity, flares up more and more. When I receive a letter from you from Stavropol, then I will write about it in more detail. Letter 450. About monasticism, about the Optina Hermitage, about the founding of one’s monastery, about not wanting one’s own elevation The more I walk the path of life and approach its end, the more I rejoice that I entered monasticism, the more I am inflamed with heartfelt zeal to achieve the goal for which the Holy Spirit established monasticism in the Church. Monasticism is not a human institution, but a Divine one, and its purpose is to remove the Christian from the vanities and cares of the world, to unite him, through repentance and crying, with God, revealing in him from here the Kingdom of God. The mercy of the mercies of the King of Kings is when He calls a person to monastic life, when in it he gives him prayerful crying and when, through the communion of the Holy Spirit, he frees him from the violence of passions and leads him into the anticipation of eternal bliss. I have seen people who have achieved this. But what did other people gain who chased vanity throughout their earthly lives? Nothing: and even if they acquired something temporary, then it was taken away from them by the inexorable and inevitable death, which is merciful to that person whose heart is not completely attached to the earth by the calling of God: “Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts” (Heb. 3:7-8). This is my answer to Your intention to end Your days in a monastery for repentance and for lasting reconciliation with God. Regarding Your son; the impartial God also accepted his desire, only at present it is impossible to fulfill this, because in our time the monasteries are in a terrible situation, and many good people, having entered them without proper preparation, became upset and died. Let Alyosha accustom himself to monastic obedience by obedience to his parent; let him prepare for himself studies in the monastery, corresponding to his origin, rules and strengths, by careful study of the sciences, Russian literature, languages, it would be nice Latin and Greek, by the way, one should not neglect calligraphy. Learning makes it possible to maintain solitude in the monastery during cell studies and can make a monk useful to society in a moral sense. For a solitary residence and for convenience to repentance, I have in mind Optina Pustyn, Kaluga province, near the city of Kozelsk, five miles away. The conveniences of this place are the following: near the desert there is a monastery, where entry to women is prohibited, surrounded by mast pine trees, therefore, completely protected from the wind; Quite a few nobles live in this monastery, under the leadership of an elder, also a nobleman, who lives a very good life; engaged in translation from Greek St. Fathers and their publication. Here is the moral side: there is solitude and there is a spiritual society, one’s own, noble, and this is not found in any Russian monastery. St. Pimen the Great said that the most important thing is good society. And so, what is especially important in worldly life for a well-educated person remains especially important in monasticism. This, important for us, will be extremely important for those young men who will accompany us: when we die, we will be consoled by the thought that we are leaving them in good hands. In material terms, Optina Pustyn is also good; The disadvantage is that live fish are scarce and expensive, and firewood is also expensive. On the thought of establishing our own new monastery, I will say that the establishment of our own monastery will lead us to material concerns, which will interfere with the care of our souls. The strong dependence of our spiritual state on our external state and the knowledge of man, borrowed from the experimental instructions of St. Fathers, leads to the conclusion that it is much easier to succeed living as wanderers and strangers in a foreign land than if we founded a monastery in our homeland, where everyone knows us and many respect us. This is my judgment about our common life, perhaps in the eleventh hour of our earthly life. As for me, I am indebted to many people for many things and, by the way, for the friendly disposition, which I did not deserve in any way, I am indebted to Nikolai Nikolaevich (Muravyov). But I am indebted to God immeasurably: because He visited me with mercy from above, which I must correspond to in my behavior. This correspondence can consist, in my opinion, only if I spend the rest of my days in deep and strict solitude. This is incomprehensible to others, for whom my conscience is hidden and who can judge me only by appearance, but for me it is quite clear. Any virtue with entertainment is not mine. The search or desire for any higher rank is sin and madness for me. If you see N.N., explain this to him. [...] I do not want him to compromise himself for my sake; I don’t want the highest clergy to become agitated because of me; finally, for myself I find it more advantageous to withdraw than to exalt, and the exaltation is fruitless, for the short time of the rest of my earthly life. [...] Letter 451. About withdrawal from the world May the Lord fulfill your pious intentions and show you the path along which you can approach Him. You pray about this too. Only then will you be able to do something decisive when I move to Optina; if N.N. wants to move you to Tiflis, move for the sake of his own benefit; many close to them pay him poorly! Letter 452. About one’s own desire to retire to Optina Pustyn and other subjects Dearest Friend and Brother Pyotr Alexandrovich!... I will tell you that I am very glad that you were able to evade managing the estate of Nikolai Nikolaevich. The sacrifice that a person makes of himself to a worthy person, especially when such a donation is combined with the benefit of the fatherland, is wonderful; but the sacrifice of oneself to God, to whom we already belong, is incomparably more excellent. Moreover, the last donation is actually necessary for us; Before death, it is necessary for us to be reconciled and unite with God through repentance, so as not to hear at His judgment: “We do not know you: depart from Me, you who called Me your Lord and violated My commandments.” Living in the Sergius Hermitage, which is, after all, a monastery, I cannot withstand the pressure of the waves and whirlwinds of life, I often falter and fall; What can we say about life in complete dependence on the world and in the middle of it? In this conviction, I wanted to see with my own eyes the Optina Hermitage, which at present is undoubtedly the best monastery in Russia in moral terms, especially its Hermitage, located 100 fathoms from the Hermitage itself, fenced on all sides by centuries-old pine trees, on sandy soil, inaccessible to the female sex, can satisfy the pious desires of a hermit in our age. Many nobles live in it, engaged in spiritual literature, but the treasure there is their confessor or elder, in whose hands is the moral leadership of the monastery brethren and most of the monastery brethren, i.e. all those who are well-intentioned and successful in virtue. He is a nobleman, 68 years old; with me on the most friendly terms. Considering the needs of my soul and my body, I chose the monastery as a place to end my days in silence, and, in order to give this undertaking some strength, I am buying a body of wooden cells. During this matter, I mentioned You to the chief monks here who were talking with me. The cells require amendment, even restructuring: they will be suitable for residence only by the summer of 1858. These are my own actions, in which my will and judgment are manifest; but I entrust this will, this judgment, these actions to the will of God, praying to Her to guide me and to direct me according to Her wise and all-good purposes. It would be a very good thing to do by giving Alyosha to the Muravyov family, both because it is much more convenient to educate him in Tiflis, and because you will probably have to spend a lot of time traveling. In addition, a young man, being brought up in the hands of others, wipes himself off better; The Muravyov family has strict morality. [...] Letter 453. About the love of money of all classes of his time Our intention requires God's favor and blessing, especially in our time, in which the passion for money has crept into all classes and ranks, drowned out and suppressed all good motives and all the most sacred duties. I would like to write an article “Man”, with the aim of understanding the purpose of man’s existence on earth; but I don’t know if I will have time and opportunity for this activity, because such activities require solitude and health. I am almost deprived of both. The chest is terribly weak and the strength is very weak; I become exhausted extremely quickly from even the smallest amount of work, especially writing. Letter 454. About the obstacles to the removal of hermitages to Optina; about the best book explaining Christianity and other subjects [...] Despite my desire to stay in Optina Hermitage, I did not get along with its abbot, and therefore the time of my removal from Sergievskaya was delayed for an unlimited time. I surrender to the will of God. You have to live differently than what you think. This is not the only fate of me. – According to human judgment, the society of the Optina monastery and the confessor – Father Macarius – are the best that could be desired in the current state of Christianity and monasticism in Russia; but the Providence of God, which guides our fate, is wiser than human judgment. Regarding the book to read, unfortunately, I must say that we do not have one that satisfactorily explains Christianity. In the absence of a better one, I think I will send the Theology of Macarius, which has been much damaged by the school system, to this book. It’s strange to see the system according to which mechanics, analytics, and the like are presented, applied to the study of God! However, this book is our best. [...] Letter 455. Briefly about my situation in St. Petersburg My position here seems very precarious to me; my good friends died out, I myself became extremely ill. However, this is my opinion and human judgment. But God’s judgment is different, and God’s Providence for man is unknown. Letter 456. About surrendering oneself to the will of God and about paying attention to oneself during social activities ...All my attempts to escape from here remain in vain, which is why I completely surrendered to the will of God, casting aside all my understandings and reasoning. The inevitably beneficial climate of the Caucasus should be beneficial for your health, and increased activity for your soul. And during activity, you can listen to yourself in the fear of God, observing that your movements and the actions that depend on them are governed not by wordless fervor, but by a sound mind, based on the desire for public and then private good, illuminated by the light of the Gospel. Letter 457. About submitting yourself to the will of God; about the need for urgent repentance Regarding Your way of life, I recognize the best choice for me and for myself: to surrender to the will of God, because we do not know for sure where spiritual benefit will meet us and where spiritual harm will meet us. We must constantly pray to God, so that He, in His infinite goodness, wisdom and power, will guide us on the path of salvation and arrange it for us. We must heal our inclinations with repentance and patiently endure our own self-indulgence until the power of the Most High overshadows us and frees us from the work of sin. In due time, God will show us what to do with ourselves. My health is so-so; circumstances are so-so. Given the current general turn of affairs, where everything strives for the most extensive material development and therefore fusses, works, and hurries without ceasing and rest, it would be unfair (it already seems so) to seek peace in the monastery itself. Therefore, everyone should value their place and time, not succumbing to the flattering advice of our enemy, who inspires us: “Behave somehow today; the time will come, a convenient place will be given, then you will behave as you should.” Contrary to this advice, let us behave every day and everywhere as we should, and correct violations in due course by repentance. The enemy flatters in order to steal all the time given for repentance. But we, having realized the flattery of the enemy, must resort to repentance every day and make a good beginning. A person who has given himself to God must consider his time now to be the best time for salvation. Book of essays by Rev. Abba Dorotheus helps to examine oneself, and also provides excellent guidance for raising young people. Letter 458. About the proper upbringing of children and mental loneliness [...] Protect your son from poisonous heretics. Do not be afraid of criticism from him for the lack of disastrous, excessive secularism: fear that terrible admonishment of the Lord that awaits parents at the Last Judgment of Christ for raising children for eternal destruction: fear those desperate and useless tears and curses on parents, which will then be uttered by children raised for hell. Are you sad in Your loneliness in spirit? This condition is the condition of almost everyone. For 38 years he lay weakened in Solomon's porch among the most crowded Jerusalem; but when the Lord who became man approached his bed, he brought Him a complaint: “I am not an imam of man” (John 5:7). A weakened man could not get attracted to a man for 38 years! - and in this case one must rely on God: He allows a person to suffer from hunger, so that the person gives the due price for food at the time when it is offered to him. “A well-fed soul,” says Scripture, “swears at the honeycomb” (Prov. 27:7). May God's blessing rest upon You and Your son! Letter 459. On the need for humility and patience during mental troubles Let the will of the Lord our God be over all of us, who knows much more than we do what is good for us. Let us surrender ourselves to Him with faith. Such faith is humility, as one saint said. Father: because humility is complete devotion to God with complete distrust of oneself. Do not be embarrassed that at times you feel bitterness, coldness and the action of passions. These periods of mental disorder must be endured with patience. St. Macarius the Great said: “In each of us there are changes, like in the air: sometimes the weather is clear, sometimes it rains, the wind rustles and there is bad weather...” Another saint, Rev. Isaac, citing and explaining these words to St. Macaria, says: “Note the word: in everyone. It was not set without a purpose, but was used for the purpose of showing that all people, without exception, not only sinners, but also saints, are at times overwhelmed by passions. There is no permanent infallibility and a constant state of mind on earth. Immutability is the heritage of the future century.” Therefore, one must look at one’s spiritual changes with prudence, as if showing and revealing to God one’s sinfulness and at the same time surrendering to His Holy will and asking for His mercy and help. Letter 460. About surrendering oneself to the will of God, one’s spiritual well-being in the Sergius Hermitage I am very glad that K.N. turned his attention to you: I earnestly wish that this attention would not be just a greeting, needed for a time and for a while. This is my desire for You as a person: and in spirit – let us commit ourselves, each other and our whole life to Christ God, for He alone knows what is good for us, and arranges our destinies for our eternal benefits, allowing us to grieve in this temporary and shortest life, according to our strength, so that our souls do not cling to the earth, but are constantly torn away from it by various sorrows and turn, oppressed from everywhere, to the Lord our God. My situation is similar to yours: they match, they match, and they don’t match. However, even in the Sergius Hermitage I enjoy such prosperity that can rarely be found on earth at the present time, especially in spiritual terms. Consequently, my sacred duty is: not to desire anything according to my understanding, will and self-justification - to desire that the will of God be done in everything. The new Metropolitan Gregory is a very pious shepherd; shows a special affection towards me. My health is so-so. [...] For me, at the end of my life, somewhere in the quiet region of my native Russia, away from St. Petersburg, which, in terms of climate and everything else, is not akin to me. However, not my will, but God’s will be done. I invoke God's blessing on You and Your son. Letter 461. About sorrows and memory of death [...] God, who controls everything, especially watches over people who want to serve Him, even if they are overcome by their weaknesses. He leads them along a sorrowful path, cutting them off from the world through sorrows and bringing them to Himself. Then he delivers them from all sorrows so that they can see His all-good Providence and acquire faith in Him. We must remember death, frighten ourselves with the uncertainty of its hour and the terrible torture that awaits every person after it: but we must also know that, according to the assurance of St. According to the fathers, sudden death does not happen to people who want to cleanse themselves by repentance, even if at times they are overcome by their infirmities; but the Just and Merciful God will give them an end in accordance with their intentions. Letter 462. About devotion to the will of God With all my heart I wish that the Merciful Lord will arrange Your circumstances in the best way for both Your temporary and eternal good. We must surrender to the will of God and subdue all thoughts of disobedience, no matter how many times these thoughts arise. My health is bad, so bad that I serve with the greatest difficulty and effort. Doctors admit that the local climate is the reason for my illness. Again: God's will be done. Letter 463. The desire to work together with my brother for the benefit of the Church and the Fatherland [...] I earnestly wish that you remain in Stavropol and that God bless us to work together for the benefit of Christianity and humanity, otherwise for the benefit of the Orthodox Church and the benefit of the fatherland closely connected with it... May the all-holy will of God be done over us and grant us sinners salvation! – The purpose of my life in Stavropol is piety. I earnestly wish and pray to the Lord to grant me to devote myself entirely to the teaching of Christ, as my duty requires, and to imbue myself and my neighbors with this teaching for salvation. Letter 464. About the location of Christianity in the Caucasus Dearest Friend and Brother Pyotr Alexandrovich! I received your letter dated October 13th on the 23rd. Your letter traveled for a long time. I thank You for all Your actions in favor of the Caucasian Church. I am extremely pleased that Alexei Fedorovich Kruzenshtern and I agree on the same concept about the effect of religion on the mountaineers. In my opinion, Mozdok, at present, is the only point from which one can act successfully; Maybe later on the right flank the commander’s residence will serve as a similar point, but that’s ahead: first you need to do what is at hand - you need to form and strengthen what is already operating, being left to its own devices. In Mozdok there is an Apostle for the mountaineers, incomparable with any missionaries: the miraculous icon of the Mother of God, to which even Mohammedans - the mountaineers - flock in large numbers. At the church in which the Icon resides, there are 800 souls of male Ossetian Christians and 700 souls of Circassian Christians. The church where the Icon is, very small and ancient. Several thousand money was raised to build a new one; if you add a small amount from the treasury to them, you can build a beautiful church that will delight the Ossetians and Circassians. It is necessary to establish religious processions with the Icon for the Terek. It would be very good to establish a communal monastery near the church and the Icon: monks are the best missionaries; Moreover, Ossetians and Circassians could join the monastery as brotherhoods, as they are inclined to do. In Mozdok there is a theological school, in the poorest condition: it needs to be put in order, and it must be given the opportunity to educate Circassian and Ossetian children, with the aim of preparing them as clerics. Having now been in Mozdok, I ordered four boys to be taken to school, and one smart 15-year-old young man came to me in Stavropol to prepare for the priesthood. With all these orders, the question of means constantly arises, because without them you can’t do anything, and they don’t exist. At the local Seminary, I proposed to strengthen the teaching of the Ossetian language; It would be necessary to introduce and develop the teaching of other local languages ​​and dialects in the Seminary, precisely for the sake of the church benefit of the region, but here they wanted to destroy the teaching of the Ossetian language, and develop the teaching of French and German, if you please see the direction! It is not without an initial reason and thought, and not without a goal. I am sending to Vasily Antonovich in writing the information that I could find about both amounts. The reason that money was not sent to me is the news of Count Tolstago in business and the extreme carelessness of Metropolitan Gregory on the one hand, and on the other hand the dislike of the minor officials of the Synod serving in this department towards me, which disposition I constantly took advantage of, and - I am proud of! May God's blessing rest upon You. Be healthy and prosperous. Your most devoted brother Ignatius, Bishop of the Caucasus and Black Sea. Letter 465. Wish for Angel Day - to know the Lord I sincerely congratulate You on Your Angel's Day. The Supreme Apostle Peter, when he confessed the Lord Jesus Christ as God and the Son of God, then heard from the Lord that the Heavenly Father Himself had revealed this to him. So, knowledge of the Lord is not something accidental, but a special gift of God. Let the soul that receives this gift rejoice in the Lord. “I used to tell you this, and on the day of your angel, I greet you with this letter.” May the Lord extend His mercy over you to the end, so that you cultivate the gift given to you and appear before the Face of the Lord with increased talent. Letter 466. Brief congratulations on the mercy of God I congratulate you on the mercy of God, by the wave of which human mercy also acts. May the Lord direct the rest of your earthly journey, according to His Holy will, to a blessed eternal refuge. Letter 467. About the Sovereign and about surrendering oneself to the will of God Count Evdokimov asked me to inform you that dispatches from St. Petersburg inform him of the arrival of the Sovereign Emperor in the Caucasus. The Emperor will not be in Stavropol. I received an official notification from St. Petersburg that my papers arrived on August 1st and were distributed to the addresses on the same day. The Emperor leaves St. Petersburg on the 7th or 8th. The Church concludes all its various petitions to God with the following words: “Let us give ourselves, each other and our whole life to Christ our God!” I conclude my letter with these words. Letter 468. About his own retirement and about Pyotr Alexandrovich’s intention to devote the rest of his days to God I answer your letter dated August 22 from Kherson: I am no longer the Bishop of the Caucasus and the Black Sea. On August 21, I received a letter from the Synodal Chief Prosecutor with the following content: “By the Highest order, I have the honor to notify Your Eminence that your most recent letter of last July 24 was received favorably by His Imperial Majesty and your wishes expressed in it were satisfied. August 6, 1861." – According to private letters, the Emperor handed over my letter to the Synod on August 4; The Synod expressed its consent to satisfy my desire. This is the all-merciful will of God for me, giving me time and convenience to carefully prepare myself for the transition to eternity through thorough repentance. Some believe that I should remain in an official capacity, for public benefit. There is an answer to this in the Gospel, which says: “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) Having been engaged in the acquisition of my soul for God, I can all the more conveniently help those of my neighbors who have the intention of acquiring their souls, being undistracted by external concerns about the church administration, into which much that is not churchly has crept in. Not being already the Bishop of the Black Sea Region, I do not have the right to meet the Emperor in Ekaterinodar. In response to your letter of the 18th, hear the following instruction from St. Fathers: “As long as a ship is at sea, it must necessarily be exposed to the diverse influence of the elements; when he enters the haven, then he enjoys peace, and the owner of the ship makes a purchase that is most profitable for him. The last one, i.e. there would be no peace and profitable trade if the difficult voyage on the sea had not been undertaken and if all obstacles and disasters had not been overcome.” Take this to yourself and strengthen yourself with hope in God, whom you intend to serve and join. Swim and swim across the stormy abyss in the Lord. Correct damage that cannot but happen through repentance. Believe and never relax. In this case you will certainly be saved. For God in no way leaves the person who does not leave God himself, despite the stumbling blocks encountered due to weakness and damage to the nature by sin. God will certainly lead such a person to salvation. But telling God: save me this way and that is impossible. Because salvation, as a gift of God, is beyond human comprehension. Why should anyone who wants to be saved ask for salvation from God, as the ineffable mercy of God, completely surrendering himself to the will of God? Letter 469. On the necessity for salvation of sorrows and temptations There is no decree on my dismissal yet, but I am ready. Thus, the all-holy and all-good will of God for me was determined. It gives me the opportunity to be useful to myself and to my neighbors in a spiritual sense, in terms of what is essentially necessary and useful. Glory to the Providence and Mercy of God! As someone who had been dismissed from the management of the diocese, I did not consider myself entitled to travel to Yekaterinodar. – Regarding the stumbling blocks that occur to a Christian while he, by the inscrutable destinies of God, is in the midst of the world, the following opinion of St. Fathers, which does not hurt to repeat. A Christian is like a ship, and the life of a Christian among people and the world is like sailing a ship on the sea. While the ship is at sea, it is exposed to the influence of winds, currents, stormy waves, hits underwater rocks, collides with other ships, is exposed to various dangers, and suffers various injuries, which are healed by repentance. When he enters the pier, then he is out of all danger; the owner unloads the goods with which the ship was filled, carries out trade and makes large profits. It is impossible to demand for a ship, when she is on the high seas, the peace that she enjoys in harbour; You cannot trade goods on the ship on the open sea. Again it is impossible for a ship to enter a quiet haven unless it first undergoes a difficult voyage on the open sea. In the same way, it is impossible for a person, as long as he is among people, not to be subjected to many different misfortunes arising from the world and from his own fall, until God brings him to a quiet refuge. God knows how long a person should be kept among the waves and storms of the sea of ​​life, and when to bring him into the quiet haven of repentance, undisturbed by the waves. But the abundant fruit gathered in solitude is the consequence of a arduous stay among people. The second is the basis for the first, and the first cannot take place unless the second precedes it. Why should everyone who wants to be saved without sin must surrender themselves with full faith to the All-Holy will of God and pray to God to grant them salvation, for salvation is not a human undertaking or a human act, but the work of God and the gift of God to man. Letter 470. About the need for oneself to repent and about the attitude towards persons who acted not in his favor Thank God for everything! Glory to God, who grants that person who has an extreme and significant need to repent of sins committed while having fun spend the rest of his days away from entertainment. I am at peace with the actions of the Moscow Metropolitan and others: for they are not carried out without God’s permission, and God leads a person to spiritual goals in ways that, in appearance, have the character of troubles and misfortunes. Glory to the Wisdom of our All-Good God. Letter 471. On receipt of the Synodal Decree on dismissal to the Babaevsky Monastery On the evening of 11 I received a Synodal decree granting me the management of the Babaev Monastery as a diocesan Bishop with 1000 rubles. ser. pensions. All that remains is to thank and glorify God, who has given me a position that could not be better desired. I think I'll leave on the 15th. The Synod did not give any passes or lifts. There is also nothing from Tiflis. Letter 472. About the proper attitude towards temptations By the grace of God, I arrived safely on September 30 in the evening in Moscow and stopped at Pr. The vicar, who, as well as the Metropolitan, was received very kindly. If they acted against me, they did it out of darkness and infatuation, and not out of malice, since the temptation that expelled me from the diocese was arranged by demons, with the permission of God, who allowed both demons and people acting under their influence to act against me, but thereby contribute to the fulfillment of God’s will for me, who was pleased to grant me time for repentance before my death. Lecturer Mark the Ascetic said: “When temptation comes, do not look for how or from whom it came, but look for something to endure it with thanksgiving.” Forbidden Rev. According to Mark, the proceedings only lead to confusion in the soul and help to sow in it the seeds of hatred and resentment towards one’s neighbors, while thanksgiving to God for the temptation sent brings the soul into the haven of faith, makes peace with one’s neighbors and serves as the cause of spiritual joy. With this view of the actions of hostile people, I attract peace into my soul. A. I found it in a most satisfactory position. He enters the true path and begins to understand monasticism as it is. In this I see God’s indescribable blessing and favor towards You and A. All the perplexities sown by the enemy between him and You were dispelled by themselves by the grace and wave of God. All you have to do is console yourself and thank God; Based on the spiritual blessings received, we hope that these blessings will continue to be poured out, and at the same time stay awake and sober, so that the blessings given are not snatched from our very hands by invisible and never-slumbering enemies. Save yourself! Unworthy Bishop Ignatius. Letter 473. About his departure from the world to rest [...] The special mercy of God brought me to a quiet refuge. Whoever wants to serve God must pray to God that God will accept his intention and arrange for him to depart from the world. My exit took place in Your eyes. When convenience presents itself, you yourself should not indulge in double-mindedness. It's eleven o'clock! The field of repentance can be closed by death in a short time. There is no time to look at the sides. Letter 474. About salvation and about his life in the Babaevsky monastery [...] We live well: in my weakness, I am very burdened by the insufficient heat in the room. [...] In my cells the room temperature hardly rises to 12 degrees. [...] Salvation is a gift from God. Whoever wants to receive salvation must pray to God to grant him His gift. – The Babaevsky Monastery is very secluded, especially in winter, and therefore demonic warfare is noticeably active here; but God is the King of the world and the Almighty, why for those who have surrendered to God, demonic warfare is not terrible, but contributes to prosperity. Letter 475. Anyone who wants to be saved must surrender himself to the will of God I congratulate you on the holiday and the New Year. May God's mercy cover you. Anyone who wants to be saved must surrender to the will of God and pray to God, so that God will say, i.e. showed him the way of salvation. Man does not know what is intended for him by God's Providence. Especially in our time of general hesitation, every situation becomes untrue and unstable if God, with His all-powerful Hand, does not strengthen it and make it true. Letter 476. About Pyotr Alexandrovich leaving the service and about other subjects [...] May the Lord arrange you according to His all-holy will and according to His ineffable mercy. Rely on God. If the time has come for your dismissal, then you will be fired; if they stop you, then be peaceful and try to live to please God, moving away from sin, especially mortal sin. We don’t say to God, save me this way and that, but we say: “Save me by your destinies.” Salvation is a gift of God, not a human invention. If it is God’s will that you be fired, then all circumstances will promote your dismissal. In Your eyes, what happened to me happened: I was suddenly snatched from one position, as if by a whirlwind, and placed in another. But this other provision cannot yet be considered valid due to the unreasonable circumstances; it takes some time for it to become more definite. It is advisable that you be given the promised pension: Your years are approaching old age, and insufficient maintenance will be very constraining, but sufficient will add comfort that can be called necessary. A.P.’s money should be left untouched, because this is his idea, and an order contrary to it can greatly confuse him. A solid thought under the current circumstances! The young man may have to end his monastic life outside the monastery. From the published works it is clear that the entire educated society in all classes has adopted a new direction, which should have results corresponding to itself... The Babaevsky monastery is like a separate world. This dignity is given to him by his extraordinary solitude. Letter 477. About preparation for eternal life May God arrange you according to His holy Will! Earthly life means nothing compared to eternal life. The first is given solely to prepare for the second. There should be no time wasted, otherwise death will creep up unnoticeably and snatch you up to God’s judgment unprepared. However, I repeat: you must rely on the will of God. Nowadays you cannot understand or foresee what needs to be done and how you should act. “Do not consider what the present day will give birth to” (Proverbs 27:1), says the Holy Scripture. With the current direction of minds, it is unknown how long the monasteries will last and how reliable the shelter in them is. For this reason, I look with condolences at Alexei! We are elders, we are outliving our century, and he is beginning to live. We must pray to God that He will do His holy will over us, and not persist in following ours, although She is also well-intentioned. Mr. Shchapov was appointed here to admonish him. What a late measure! When his works spread throughout Russia, they were read, and, probably, are still read by the majority with delight and enthusiasm; when Shchapov has completely completed his work, then they send him to the monastery. A monastery for the face, if there is God's mercy towards it, can be useful; but this person is already alien to his work, which has acquired its own meaning and independence. Both students of the Caucasian Seminary, sent with me to the Kazan Academy, are involved in the case. These are sacrifices; priests aside... The direction has become universal. The peasant question has become an all-Russian question. The depletion of funds from the landowners affected the well-being of the merchants; the rise in the price of bread and other supplies of life, prices that are constantly rising and must rise, affect the situation of all city residents... Be healthy and prosperous. May God's mercy protect you. Guard and protect your soul amid the general moral flood. Letter 478. Concerning the contemporary social life of His Eminence Ignatius Everything has been done by You on Your part; may the Merciful Lord arrange the rest according to His Holy Will. “The days are evil” (Eph. 5:16), says the Holy Scripture. Inconspicuously they flow away one after another. Nowadays the century moves quickly; It seems that since the fall, since my arrival here, it has gone even faster; The autumn events gave a great impetus and made a significant revolution. Ignatiev, Putyatin, were replaced by people of a different direction. The old direction gives way to a new direction; the new one has not yet been determined. You don't know what to do or how to be. Nothing positive has been heard about the progress of Prince Baryatinsky’s illness; All you can hear is that he is incurably ill. How wrong everything in life is! Just see that he, or someone like him, and those like him will leave the stage. Bread prices are rising. In St. Petersburg, merchants selling luxury and convenience items do not know what to do: there are no buyers. Necessary items are available, but prices for everything are very high. Labor costs have risen. The great work of liberating the peasants is fraught with significant difficulties, to overcome which, firstly, the special help of God is needed, and then the wisest, most vigilant human activity. I don’t go out anywhere: I’m in very bad health. I have gotten used to this condition, and therefore it does not seem very difficult to me. Since it is obvious that bread will rise in price more and more, I want to strengthen the monastic farming. What God will give; everything is wrong; every position is wrong; nothing serious that requires time can be done. – We need to think about Alexei. We are old, we are becoming obsolete; – the child is just entering life. Letter 479. About changes in society I see that the hand of God is leading you out of the Caucasus. N.N. wrote to you under the influence of modern circumstances, which, since the time of his letter, have moved far forward. Nothing has been heard about a change of power in the Caucasus; but change must certainly follow, as a logical consequence of other changes. I don’t write anything about St. Petersburg news. The pace incessantly accelerates and takes on a decisive character. What has barely begun can be considered finished. The people of the previous direction have almost all left the official field; they are being replaced by people of a new direction, young, capable of their work, full of energy, acting unanimously. Probably our good friend Neverov will also come into play. These are difficult times! Letter 480. About his life in the Babayevsky Monastery In this mail I received an order from the Cabinet to give me 3,000 rubles as a pension. ser. from the Yaroslavl Treasury. I would like to give something to the monastery from this money, but setting up a shelter with furniture requires more than this amount. I don’t leave the room and with the strictest diet I feel an extraordinary increase in blood. The solitude here is very comforting; it produces a saving influence on the soul, little by little erasing worldly memories. Whatever God pleases will happen to us in this difficult age! Letter 481. About “unmistakable congratulations” and about your position Thank you for the birthday wishes in temporary life. Exactly: there is nothing to congratulate! It is not known what will cause this birth - eternal joy or eternal grief. When the soul, having passed, by the grace of God, the demonic ordeal, enters heaven, then the inhabitants of heaven greet it with love and joy and bring it congratulations. Here is a correct, unmistakable congratulation... Things are moving extremely quickly. It seems like ten years have passed since You were here. My position is tricky. But with God even the tricky is not tricky. Pray, Father, to God for me, that He may grant me to behave as a servant of Christ should, and not allow me to be carried away by the suggestions of Satan. Let us surrender ourselves, each other and our whole life to Christ our God. Letter 482. About Peter Alexandrovich’s intention to retire from the world to the Babaevsky Monastery Dearest Friend and Brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! If God's permission follows, then some Bogomolets has the desire to enter the Babaevsky monastery to cohabit with me and prepare himself for the transition to eternity, to which transition I am called by my constantly growing and multiplying infirmities. The Holy Fathers affirm that anyone who wishes to enter a monastery must choose a way of life that would correspond to his spiritual goal and lead to it. Discussing the position that would befit the most mentioned Bogomolets, I consider it best for him to enter into a relationship with the monastery’s monastic patron. Remaining in secular rank and clothing, he can live in the monastery: making a feasible arbitrary monetary contribution, managing the agriculture of the monastery, which must certainly improve, managing buildings, attending to the affairs of the monastery in the capitals and neighboring cities; the ktitor will have the character of a benefactor before the monastic brotherhood and in general before the clergy. This external position also corresponds to the spiritual needs of those who have re-entered the monastery and are in need of material pursuits. The transition from secular entertainment to indestructible deep silence must be gradual. After classes involving some generally useful work that is useful for the monastery and brotherhood, God will create a very calm situation, based on previous work associated with entertainment. This general order is indicated by St. Fathers in the ordinary course of affairs. But during social upheavals and misadventures it happens differently, and it is impossible to predict what will follow, how and how the earthly wandering will end. We must fulfill ours and leave it to God to fulfill His unknown destiny. Looking at the present prosperity and general peace, the disasters from Batu or the Lithuanians seem fabulous. However, they were; They came when they were not expected at all, and found the people unprepared for them. It seems that the disasters from the Lithuanians were worse than from Batu. This one passed through Russia like a fleeting storm, destroying almost only cities, while the Lithuanians nested for a long time, destroying cities and villages. In the Cheremenetsky Monastery of St. Petersburg. The diocese has preserved information that they massacred the entire brotherhood of this monastery. This is what they did with many monasteries. A death that appears unfortunate on the outside may actually be the most blessed. Of course, in these difficult times, many of the Orthodox were crowned. Alexey P. communed with St. Tyne. After communion, his face acquired an unusually pleasant expression. [...] Be healthy and prosperous. May God's blessing rest upon You. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 483. On the need to surrender to the will of God and on other subjects Dearest Friend and Brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! I received your letter dated February 14th on March 10th. Since this answer should come to You around March 23, I congratulate You on your birthday, earnestly wishing that the day of your entry into existence would be a truly happy day for You, as a guarantee of eternal bliss. The newly-minted saint of God Tikhon spoke about his time that it was very difficult for those who were being saved by the increased number of people in the opposite direction; what can I say now? May the will of the All-Holy God be accomplished, both in His actions and in His allowances. Money for panagia 3125 rub. ser. I received it on March 4th. I gave 1000 to the monastery, and I keep the rest until Your arrival or until Your position is certain, what direction they will take. Rely on the will of God. You've done yours. We don't know the future; we judge according to our short-sightedness, and therefore in solving matters we must rely on God, who provides for everything and often does not give us what we recognize as good for us, and which, being in itself definitely good, is not given to us, because for us it can have other consequences. Surrender to the will of God and be peaceful. [...] Be healthy and prosperous. May God's abundant blessing rest upon You. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 484. About Alexei Petrovich Aleksey worries me the most. Child! He wanted to be tonsured into the cassock, but I postponed it until Your arrival. Times are difficult! Further even more difficult! He does not see this and does not suspect that when acting for the present, one must think very seriously about the future. Morally it is comforting. Has a very soft heart. May the merciful Lord grant You to complete Your affairs successfully. You have nothing in this world. One son! and he is in the monastery. Letter 485. About his refusal to enter public service again The new young ministers are busy with activity, and success is likely to crown their work. The Synod has a new Chief Prosecutor, Akhmatov, a good friend of Andrei Muravyov, who wrote to me, expressing his desire that I would enter public service again, after my health had improved. I answered with a decisive refusal, but due to the ability of circumstances to revolutionize, you won’t know anything in the future, and therefore you can’t make any guesses. Also, nothing real can be accepted as true. May the merciful Lord arrange Your circumstances according to His All-Holy will and His great mercy. The ineffable mercy of God, when God calls someone during this life to repentance and to careful preparation for eternity. Letter 486. About dying visions and proper attitude towards them Dearest Friend and Brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! With heartfelt sympathy I heard the news of the death of Alexandra Ivanovna Markova, for whom I was very pleased. Take the trouble to convey to Sergei Alexandrovich my blessing and zealous bow. God, according to His unsearchable destinies, having allowed him severe grief, is also able to send spiritual consolation. In temporary sorrows it is often brought, especially at the death of loved ones, by the thought of one’s own death. It is not useful to be curious about near-death phenomena. If God wanted to show something clearly, then it would be shown that way. All people, without exception, enter the world of spirits by death. This world opens up to others earlier, to others later. In St. Petersburg, one secular lady, when I was the rector of the Sergius Hermitage, was tortured for three days in the hearing of all those present. The ways of God cannot be understood. Sometimes a miracle is given to the most unbelieving and bitter people, and they remain in their unbelief and bitterness. Judging by what you write, we must understand that the deceased had a vision before her death. The same can be concluded regarding the late Fr. Alexandra - Andryusha, who died in my presence; I was sitting by his bed at the time of his death. What is unclear, as I said, is best left without interpretation, because an attempt at interpretation can be harmful to the soul, can serve as a reason for inconspicuously leading oneself into deception, for obtaining a mood capable of deceiving oneself. I’m very sorry for Prince Baryatinsky as a person. Here is one of the sad examples of earthly happiness. How vain, perverse, fragile, insignificant everything here is! The prince - in the midst of happiness - is unlucky, in the midst of pleasures - a sufferer. All brilliant earthly situations are similar in their variability to his position, with the insignificant difference that some situations collapse more quickly, while others not so quickly. In comparison with eternity, both the quick and the slow earthly are equally quick. We are doing well. For a long time no news from the noisy world came to our quiet abode. My health seems to be better. Homeopathy began to have a beneficial effect on me after bloodletting, which was nothing more than a consequence of treatment with waters. However, my companions say that my face has changed a lot. I surrender to the will and mercy of God. May God's blessing rest upon You. Letter 487. On the need for repentance and other subjects Dearest Friend and Brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! I bring You my sincere gratitude for your congratulations on the Feast of Holidays in Your letter... The Holy Fathers liken the life of a Christian to the sailing of a ship at sea, and retirement into solitude to the entry of a ship into a pier. While you are at sea, says St. Barsanuphius, wait for the winds and storms; There is rarely silence or a completely tailwind there. Consequently, one cannot and should not demand from the heart a constant presence in holy sensations: and it is good that these sensations are given at least for a while, then leaving information in the soul about their existence. In your affairs, rely on the will of God. It won't be long for both of us to wander on earth. Pray to God to grant you to spend the rest of your earthly life in repentance; this is a great gift of God, an eternal gift, as having a decisive influence on our destiny in eternity. Before his death, St. Tikhon of Voronezh especially thanked God for giving him this gift. Exactly: at death the whole preciousness of this gift will be reflected. This is how we reason, and this is how we should pray. But, says St. Isaac of Syria, if you pray to God for something, and He hesitates in granting what you ask, then do not grieve; You are no wiser than God. This happens for various reasons, incomprehensible to a limited person. Therefore, it is quite fair, with the best desires and undertakings, to surrender oneself to the will of God. [...] Alexey Petrovich is growing. Your remark is correct that God’s special mercy was upon him, bringing him to the monastery at the most difficult time of his life in moral terms. The local monastery is especially precious for its solitude from objects of temptation; In addition, the young man entered into close and frequent communication with his confessor, Father Theophan, who both consoles him and scolds him: both are beneficial. It is impossible to demand from Alexei that he understand modernity, but it is my duty, especially yours: to protect him from the abyss into which he can easily fall due to his blindness. May the merciful Lord, who began to arrange his path, arrange it to the end. Mikhail Chikhachev, they write to me, is beginning to lose his health and is falling apart. For all your time. We are all guests on earth. May the blessing and mercy of God rest upon You. Your most devoted brother, Bishop Ignatius. Letter 488. On the need for repentance and other subjects Dearest Friend and Brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! [...] It is good that You did everything concerning yourself that depended on You; the rest you entrust to the Lord God. The insurance that comes to you comes from the left side. This will be proven by the fact that it will depart from the thoughts of faith when you place your trust in God, in Whose will is our life and death. Each of us must die. Timely preparation for death is a precious gift of God, and therefore our invisible enemies are intensifying to steal it from us. May the merciful Lord abolish them, sending us the correct view of temporary and eternal life, so that we, in order to gain bliss in the second, properly use the first, which in itself, as quickly passing, would not have any meaning if it did not decide our eternal fate. Saint Tikhon, when he left the Diocese and entered a monastery, imagining to him that he could be useful among the world, evil thoughts lured him out of the monastery for a year. When the Saint realized that this was an enemy plot, attempting, under a plausible pretext, to steal from him the time given by God for repentance, then he calmed down and turned all his attention to taking advantage of God’s gift. [...] Definitely wait until you resign. Faith must be combined with prudence, which is recognized as the greatest Christian virtue. Do not demand righteousness from yourself and do not be embarrassed by sinful thoughts and feelings that arise; otherwise, all Your activities will take a false direction. We must resist sin and not get carried away by it. Act wisely and cautiously. You see for yourself that in general things are becoming confusing. “Beware how dangerously you walk” (Eph. 5:15), says the Holy Scripture. May the merciful Lord enlighten and bless You. Letter 489. About allowing God to complete the printing work [...] Things in general are such that one must act for the sake of God, guided by God-given law and reason, leaving the rest to God; for there is no way to recognize any reasonable consideration as correct, everything is so shaky. There are rumors here, which should be considered credible, that the Sovereign Emperor wants to bestow a lot on his subjects on the occasion of the coming millennium of Russia. Following the solution of the peasant question, there must be a solution to another and other issues, no less important, and which ones I don’t know, and I’m not interested in knowing, being primarily occupied with my own pain. [...] May God's mercy cover Russia! It seems that I wrote to You that we should not transgress the will of God by our own will, but, having done what is due on our part, leave the rest to God. Your child and other brothers most earnestly bow to You... Letter 490. About sinful thoughts In the Word about the various relationships of human nature to good and evil, it is described in detail how in a person who begins a truly godly life, various sinful thoughts begin to arise, through this the state of fall in which all humanity finds itself is actually revealed to him. This view of oneself leads to true repentance. Therefore, one should not be at all embarrassed by the multitude of thoughts that arise. This is a cloud of dust blown by the wind. The wind from the other side will carry it away. Letter 491. Instructions for those walking the path of salvation, borrowed from St. Isaac Sirskago The merciful Lord will arrange Your path and bring You salvation, through His destinies. I repeat the saying of Isaac Sirsky: “If you pray to God for something, and He is slow to hear You, do not grieve about it: You are not smarter than God. This is done this way according to the wisest Providence of God, incomprehensible to the human mind.” And the fact that God loves us incomparably more than how much we love and can love ourselves must be believed without a doubt. “Everything,” the Saint concludes his judgment on this subject, “is conveniently achieved and is quickly lost. However, everything acquired with heart disease is carefully stored.” Let everything pleasing to God be accomplished over everyone, everything that God allows, but we must pay attention to ourselves and not look at the outside, for our migration into eternity has approached. There is no point in staring at the hotel-land and what is happening on it. Letter 492. About the departure of Pyotr Alexandrovich from the world Blessed be God, who freed You from the bonds of the world and gave You the opportunity to prepare through repentance for the transition to eternity. The Babaevsky Monastery is a very convenient place for such a life, for such a purpose, for the purpose of preparing oneself for eternity. The monastery is very secluded, not only in winter, but also in summer. While you are in Moscow, it does not bother you to visit the Metropolitan and the Vicar and accept their blessing as the saints. Letter 493. Testament of Bishop Ignatius Your Excellency, dear brother, Pyotr Alexandrovich! Seeing myself in extreme exhaustion and soreness, marking the approach of the common migration of all people from the hotel-earth to eternity, I humbly ask you to take upon yourself, in the event of my death, the disposal of all my, however very small, property, in accordance with the attached copy of my proposal to the Kostroma Spiritual Consistory and in accordance with the verbal will I made to you. – Having received a significant monetary allowance from you during my stay at the Caucasian department, I ask you to accept those things that you find necessary and useful for yourself and for your son, Alexei Petrovich, into your and his property; give others to the abbot and distribute to the brethren, especially to those of them who served me personally. The main items of my property consist of: 1) a library, 2) linen, fur coats and various dresses, from which colored and velvet robes are intended by me for the sacristy of the Babayevsky Monastery, 3) carriages: dormez; carriage and winter wax. “My works, which remain in manuscript, I transfer in full to your ownership and disposal. You know my way of thinking: why it is clear to you that my desire is that the property remaining after me, as acquired through my poor service to the Church, and not from relatives, would go to the benefit of the Church, its ministers and the poor brethren. I am convinced that you will fulfill my desire more clearly and better than I would have fulfilled it myself, and therefore I stop from any petty orders that could unexpectedly complicate you in your action. May the merciful Lord, by His sole mercy, open the gates of His mercy for me, may He accept my orphaned and poor soul from the midst of this multi-rebellious world, may He rest it in His Kingdom. In your turn, which certainly comes for every earthly wanderer, you will also be called to appear before God. With all my soul I wish that this appeal will be heard by you with joy, as a calling to eternal joy, not slandered and unstoppable by any sorrow. Your Excellency's most humble servant and brother Letter 494. On the publication of the works of Bishop Ignatius May the merciful Lord bless Your journey and grant from His spiritual treasury the wisdom and wisdom to do everything according to His holy will, for the glory of His holy name and for the benefit of our souls. When I lived in the Sergius Hermitage, they did not favor my works being published in print, having their own reasons for this. Perhaps these reasons still exist. As for me, I in no way seek the publication of my works, I do not in any way recognize them as worthy of publication or capable of edifying Christian society. Therefore, if you encounter an obstacle to printing, then do not try to get it printed. At first they didn’t tell me directly: we used our own technique for refusal. Namely: they scribbled the manuscript in such a way and changed the essay in such a way that the manuscript became worthless, and the essay became alien to me and acquired a distorted appearance that could seduce the reader and make the author the laughing stock of the public. Subsequently, one censor was so kind as to say that there was a secret order regarding my works, after which I did not bother the censorship by submitting my works there. And now I will be completely peaceful if they refuse to publish it. In general, the writings of people who lived an ascetic life are much more convenient to print after their death. So, if they agree in advance, then let those works be published that I have appointed for publication. If you see doubts and hesitations, then this is a sure sign of reluctance. Do not allow, my father, to spoil the manuscript of the “Teachings.” We have only one, and it can be useful for our private use. May God make it better! Perhaps the refusal to publish will serve me, and us in general, for the good; will protect you from many troubles that may arise from the publication itself, according to the spirit of the times and due to the many ill-wishers. Our age is very wise and requires special wisdom in behavior. However, may the Lord grant you to act with wisdom. In my opinion, we must guard with the greatest care our position, created and given to us by God Himself for our preparation for the transition to eternity, to the edges of which we have both approached, and I have especially approached. Letter 495. About his life in the Babayevsky monastery My health is as it was. Either it will give you away, then it will press you again, so that you involuntarily begin to think about death. Thick chintz curtains were hung in my bedroom, which is why this cell took on the character of a recluse. “I have never been so pleased with my premises!” Sometimes you look at my two rooms, and they seem like heaven. In general, my situation on Babayki is the most consistent with the state of my health and mental mood, and therefore the most satisfactory. It is noticeable that it is getting better and better! this leads us to assume that we will be very calm when we settle down and get settled - when those who fear us are convinced that there is nothing to fear. Letter 496. On the writings of Bishop Ignatius and on other subjects Firstly: may God’s mercy and blessing cover us and grant You to arrange everything according to the holy will of God for our salvation and peace; to the salvation and peace of our cohabiting fathers and brothers. About my writings. It is not without the Providence of God that their publication, which had hitherto encountered difficulties, was arranged. We recently spoke with Fr. Justin that the ancient patristic books for monks cannot in any way be fully applied to modern Russian monasticism. The most applicable book is Rev. Nila Sorskago, but even that one was written specifically for the speechless. Well, I saw recently, while reviewing what I had written for correspondence with Fr. Moses. I saw that my sinful writings contain an adaptation of the teachings of St. Nilus to modern monasticism, namely “Ascetic Experiences” can satisfy this goal. Fr. rewrites them. Moses. [...] Don’t be surprised at Akhmatov’s technique: people who know the world well are usually distrustful, and this is very smart; and whoever is trusting will be taught by bitter experiences to be distrustful. [...] I will be very glad to personally meet P.I. and his family if they visit the Babaevsky Monastery, which is very similar to Optina in terms of the direction of the brotherhood and the charter. The monastery here is less visited, and the brotherhood is simpler. About Fr. Justina and the elder brethren. I consider P.I.’s advice to be very thorough, and therefore I will not make much of an introduction. We must give time for them to look at us and make sure of us. St. Tikhon of Voronezh writes in his cell letters that people judge by themselves. Do you think we are not suspected of any earthly purpose, those who have no other purpose besides the earthly one? They suspect, you know for sure. Give alms little by little, so as not to upset those asking with a refusal. Regarding yourself, be complacent. Ave. Barsanuphius the Great wrote to St. John, who, before entering into silence, had to bother and work for the organization of the monastery, for which he traveled from Palestine to Egypt: “Do not lose heart in the sorrows and physical labors that you bear, working for us and for the sake of our community, for this also means laying down your soul for the brothers. I hope that the reward for this work will be great” (Response 9). Your future is based on your present entertainment - the strength of your peace of mind. Letter 497. About dreams Today I received your letter dated the 20th. Accept Your dream as a reminder of death, without attributing anything special to it and without rejecting it: this is what St. Fathers. On Valaam, an Angel appeared to the Hieroschemamonk Cleopas in reality and told him to prepare for death, which the Hieroschemamonk did, but died nine years later. “With God one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day” (2 Pet. 3:8), said the Apostle. Letter 498. About complete removal from care You rightly and very justly say that the indifference shown to us can be turned to our special benefit - it will allow us, as forgotten and withdrawn from society, to calmly finish the rest of our earthly wanderings in preparation for the future life. Expressed participation could draw us into the world. Cessation of relations with P.P. can also lead to an increase in peace, blocking the opportunity to discuss with him about the position of the Church, about which the Almighty Lord cares, which He invisibly controls, allowing what it pleases Him to allow. The Holy Fathers do not command the silent ones to engage in the apparently good care of the Church, since they are not called to this, but to pay attention to themselves. Letter 499. About the inclination of Bishop. Ignatius to solitude; about death I am very grateful to You for giving everyone the correct understanding of my situation. I hope that P.P. will also be convinced that public service is impossible for me and that it is possible to be useful to Christian society from solitude, if a person is called to solitude by God. The “Experiments” would never have turned out the way they do now if they had not been the fruit of solitude. The modern need for the “Experiments” will be clearly seen by everyone who understands practical Christian, especially monastic life. With special sympathy I read the news of the death of A. A. Sukharev and the dangerous illness of Prince Baratinsky. On the path on which one has gone and another is going, it is certainly appropriate for all of us to go at the time appointed by God. At the sight of approaching death, all earthly acquisitions lose all meaning. Letter 500. About Fr. Macarius of Optina, etc. The beginning of my letter will be a response to the end of yours, dated November 8th. It is impossible to keep your mood in the same position amidst rumors, as is possible in solitude. However, even in solitude, deviations occur, caused by the passions of fallen nature, which cannot but manifest their presence in man. One should look at these changes prudently, as if at changes in the weather, in comparison made by St. Macarius the Great, and not remain long in a hobby, rather get out of it. Take the trouble to convey to P.V. that although I don’t know her personally, I am very familiar in spirit and am very happy about her acquaintance with the Optina elders. The destinies of God are incomprehensible, but according to human judgment one cannot but regret the death of Fr. Macarius of Optina. This man was an invaluable treasure for Christians living in the midst of the world. He was prepared and destined for the service he was undergoing. Simplicity and freedom in circulation, innate love and humility, self-education by reading the Fatherly books, obedience to skillful elders gave him the opportunity to early become a confessor and mentor, and long-term experience perfected him in this service. His advice to A.V. would be significantly useful. My path was completely different: I was often sick for a long time, did not leave my cell for a long time, and suffered a lot of troubles. All this separated me from human society and concentrated me within myself. This mental state deprived me of knowledge of people. The further I walk along the path of life, the more this knowledge moves away from me, because I walk very alone. You know that a monk can only enter into intercourse with me when he takes a very, very close look at me. Strange thing! When my self-view is seen written, then it is liked. Why? Because it also attracts self-concept. I believe that Fr. Antony Bochkov can be much more satisfactory than me: he is much more familiar with people than I am. If A.V. wants to write something to me through P.V., then I will consider it my duty to respond in the same way, whatever God pleases to grant in response. Turnip juice very strongly drives away scrofulous and rheumatic sputum. I’m postponing consultations with doctors until spring. I would like not to undergo treatment at all - it distracts me from spiritual work. Letter 501. About the writings of Bishop Ignatius Today I finished the correspondence “A Word about the Fear of God and the Love of God.” Correction gives articles written at different times and long ago, very long ago, the character of maturity and the character of wholeness. Just as I entered into real work not spontaneously, but was somehow brought in by a coincidence of circumstances, and while I see that something special is coming out, I allow myself to believe that what is happening is not happening without the Providence of God. When you return here and start reading what has been rewritten, you will see for yourself the meaning that the “Experiments” receive. I do not attribute their compilation to myself, but to the mercy of God, firstly, to me, and secondly, to my neighbors. My open life in St. Petersburg, in which suffering was covered up with external brilliance, seduced many and still keeps many in temptation: “Experiments” can significantly heal those who were tempted, and remove from me the sin, at least partially, of the temptation of my neighbors. Moreover, this book can be very useful, as I wrote to you, for all monks, even laymen, who want to be Christians in reality, practically. No matter how meager the book is in comparison with the works of Spiritual Men, it is borrowed from them, and this weak borrowing was bought by me at the cost of my life. St. John of Damascus, when he returned as an old man to live in the monastery of St. Savva, where he began his monasticism, then began revising and correcting his writings. St. Augustine in his old age compiled a separate book, which he called “Retractions.” In it, he outlined those changes that he recognized as necessary in his writings, since for this reason it was impossible to correct the writings that had already spread throughout the world. Reading now the works that I wrote when I was forty years old, I find a lot that is immature, insufficiently understood, and therefore insufficiently explained. Letter 502. About paying attention to yourself Living in St. Petersburg. The printing of the “Word” took place according to the special providence of God. This same Providence of God can protect books from malicious intentions. Place your troubles on God, who foretold that temptations were coming. We need to pay attention to ourselves, to our salvation, and to know that the prophecy of the Holy Scriptures about the general apostasy from the Orthodox faith must take place in due time. Letter 503. Advice to “understand the spirit of the times and not get carried away by old concepts” and about the spiritual benefits of reading his works Monk Abel, who predicted the capture of Moscow by the French, said that the time would come when the monks would be driven into several monasteries, and other monasteries would be destroyed. We must understand the spirit of the times and not get carried away by previous concepts and impressions, which are currently impossible to realize. The importance is in Christianity, not in monasticism; monasticism is important to the extent that it leads to perfect Christianity. Even the most church disasters cannot happen without God’s permission. “Ascetic Experiences” and “Ascetic Sermon” should constitute extremely useful reading for modern true Christians, extremely necessary for them in modern spirit and mood. We must repent, pray and be protected from delusion, because at present the majority of those who want to live piously and think of themselves that they live piously are heated by material fervor and are in more or less self-delusion. Letter 504. On external and internal calm, attacks on the writings of Bishop Ignatius and characteristics of that time We are all under the Providence of God. The arrangement of external affairs at the present time is to prepare calmness for the time when external calmness will be needed due to the acquired internal calmness. Now You need to study the fall of man within yourself. “Repay your debt to passions,” said St. Isaac of Syria. I know little about external affairs, and my mind, being directed towards self-conception from youth, is little capable of creating a satisfactory image of the external, temporary, earthly environment of a person. I hear that my writings, borrowed from the study of the Fathers, have met with criticism and some persecution: this is a good sign. God is righteous and measures in the same measure as man measures to his neighbors. For saturating souls with spiritual food, your soul will be filled with it. This is not my word, this is the word of the Gospel. If only the matter was done not for man-pleasing and not for vanity, but for the glory of God and for the benefit of Christianity. Many many have been offended: let them be healed, by the grace of God, with an edifying word for their salvation and mine. All that remains for you and your son is to thank God and preserve the desire for salvation that God has given you, as all earthly things pass by, and eternal salvation acquired over time accompanies a person to the afterlife and leads him into heaven. The internal disorder in the monasteries is so ripe that it needs to break out in the most terrible adventures. General moral disorder and loss of faith are predicted in Holy Scripture; we need to listen to ourselves. What times! There is no one to turn to with a power of attorney. The mercy of God led us to the most secluded corner, and, moreover, when I had already lost all hope of seeing a living Vessel of the Holy Spirit on earth, it opened such a Vessel and brought us into close communication with Him. Letter 505. About cutting off one’s own will, etc. The Lord does not abandon those who give themselves up to serve Him; allowing them to overflow with sorrow for their training and education. He holds them in His right hand, keeping them like the apple of his eye. From time to time, abuse comes: who doesn’t? They are necessary for spiritual success. Carnal feelings, flowing from carnal kinship, prevent the assimilation of spiritual feelings and the very activity according to the spiritual law, which requires crucifixion for carnal wisdom. You must seek spiritual success by cutting off your will. This work mortifies passions and removes, as if from hell, from carnal wisdom. In one who cuts off his own will, the action of prayer appears by itself when he exercises attentive prayer with the conclusion of the mind in the words of prayer. If a person is not first purified by cutting off his will, then true prayerful action will never be revealed in him. When the prayer action is revealed, then it will become clear that it is nothing more than a complete rejection of one’s will for the sake of the will of God. Letter 506. Brief recollection of my entry into the monastery Now I should have an all-night vigil. At these hours, in 1827, I arrived at the Alexander-Svirsky Monastery to live, straight from my officer’s uniform. Letter 507. About the writings of Bishop Ignatius In the conversation about monasticism, I completely deleted the place that was changed when published in “Home Conversation”, replacing ten pages with two, piously and edifyingly (in a private sense), refusing to judge about putting monasteries in order, although recently, in the writings of St. Anthony the Great, I read exactly the same prediction about monasteries and the reason for their decline, which was written by me. I don’t want a mean, evasive and wavering testimony of the truth to come out from me. Don't want to listen? it's better to remain silent. Events will be announced. A contagious deadly disease, when it is not treated correctly, but only covered up, gets stronger and stronger. It must burst out. "Experiments" have proven this. The dark and abstract concept of spirits, borrowed from Western scholastics, amounts to a complete rejection of them and can decisively confuse true ascetics, as do many of the newest works, written from the same knowledge in letter, in appearance they belong to the Orthodox Church, but in spirit they are more or less separated from it. The goal of Matveevsky (critic of “The Tale of Death”) and his party was and is to distract readers from the works of the definitely Orthodox, and to achieve the goal it was necessary to throw mud at the works. This does not bother me; on the contrary, I am encouraged and comforted. Scolding serves as a cleansing for me. Moreover, from Church History it is clear that the persons and writings of the Church were met and persecuted by the hatred of the sons of the world. But the power of God appeared from human weakness, and then the persecuted and oppressed won victory over their strong persecutors as a result of the struggle. Monastic life reveals to a person his weaknesses. St. Isaac of Syria said about himself that in this life he received countless wounds from the enemy. It is none other than God who allows the enemy to strike us for our humility. Be peaceful and calm, guarding yourself from intrusions and not demanding non-inclination from yourself. Letter 508. About cutting off your own will I told You about the need to cut off Your will. This applies specifically to the feat of prayer. You must renounce within yourself any consciousness of dignity for prosperity and in poverty of spirit (which is the cutting off of the will), in attention to the words and fear of God, stand mentally before God, cry out for mercy and expect everything from the mercy of God. He will do with us according to His will and according to His mercy: then it will be clear that the good given by God is completely different from what man expected to receive. For those who have not renounced their will, delusion is dangerous. I am saying what is essential for You. Who should support the Church? This requires people with grace, and carnal wisdom can only damage and destroy. Although in its pride and blindness it dreams and proclaims about creation. Letter 509. About his writings, the magazine “Strannik” and the difference between his direction and other bishops The writings do not belong to me, but to the mercy of God, which wanted either to reward my wretched will, given by it, or for those fierce sorrows and persecutions that were allowed to me and from which the Lord delivered me, to bring me out of the sea of \u200b\u200blife into a haven of solitude. "The Wanderer", a magazine harmful to the clergy, as separating them from the people into a caste, and not only not taming, but also inciting hatred of the caste towards other classes. For sheep, wolf weapons are unnatural. The sheep conquered the wolves with love and meekness, and if teeth were used, then the sheep could not resist, especially with the current cooling of the laity towards religion, and even more so towards the clergy. It is impossible for me to think about the diocese due to my poor health and my completely separate character from all the bishops. They are graduates of the Academies, and I am a graduate of the monastery, therefore, I am a decidedly backward person, in no way suitable for the whole composition. My current situation is the most normal. Letter 510. About printing your works and studying Christianity letter by letter The publication of my works is obviously the work of Providence. And I, and You, and Father Photius, and V.I. Askochensky, and Glazunov, and S.I. are tools. Everyone is given a task for the common benefit, and therefore for their own. Those who study Christianity literally and have lost its active study have one teaching for themselves, and another for others. When praying, you need to deny yourself, i.e. not to recognize oneself as worthy of any success, but to resolutely rely on God. One should not even think about success, but take care that the prayer is performed with attention. Subsequently, you will see that all your aspirations for success were nothing more than hobbies due to material fervor, which is impossible for anyone who is once again beginning a prayerful feat, in which they focus and for which all other feats are undertaken as serving him. Conceit is always associated with passion. From self-sacrifice, which is explained above, comes true humility of spirit, poverty of spirit, and such humility attracts the mercy of God to a person. When a person is worthy to feel something spiritual, i.e. sensation from God, then he will understand that all his own sensations are insignificant and are associated with self-delusion. To get to the promised land you have to go through the desert. Walking through this desert, you need to know that it is a desert, and not a promised land, so as not to mistake any desert oasis with luxurious and rich nature for the promised land and for this reason not to lose the promised land. Oases are those consolations and especially clear self-views that are given from time to time to a beginner in the feat of prayer. You shouldn't pay special attention to them. The first spiritual gift is grace-filled attention during prayer, which is impossible to have with one’s own effort. Letter 512. On the unreasonable behavior of “old people” and on the connection of sorrows with virtue When old people with wasted health, leaving the direction they have followed for centuries, begin to walk alongside the young, their situation becomes strange. They just get in the way! Good deeds are associated with labor and sorrow. “Virtue,” said one father, “unaccompanied by sorrow is not virtue.” Letter 513. About the writings of Bishop Ignatius I very much agree to publish “The View” in “Home Conversation”, as well as “Additional quotations to the “Word on Death” and the location of heaven and hell.” These articles can serve as material or reference for those who want to start compiling a systematic essay on this subject. They are so announced in the liturgical books and in general Church books, published by determination or approval of the Holy Synod, that the proclamation against this teaching made by priest Matveevsky aroused the indignation of many Orthodox Christians, about which many wrote to me, offering to cast their vote. At the same time, questions were asked: what will we be ordered to believe, when we are ordered to reject what we learn to believe from our Divine services and from reading the books of St. Fathers of the Orthodox Church. In St. Petersburg, fifty priests were seduced by the “Review” in a moment of heat, and in Russia all those who worship Orthodoxy were seduced by the priest’s proclamation, seduced both by it and by the image of the presentation. The pastors of St. Petersburg need to be more far-sighted, to understand that the transitional state is transitional for everyone, and not to alienate from themselves the flock, of which the upper layer is inclined more than towards indifference, and the lower layer is inclined to fall away into schism. Both the first and second are subject to unfavorable influences on them for the reason that they do not see faith and its fruits where they should be seen. What else is there when a voice is heard against the Church? I know the St. Petersburg clergy. They are very kind people and this is not the first time they have been angry with me. I can treat them as acquaintances, which is why I ask V.I. to pass on the information reported here to them. Law, caution and prudence are needed. Infatuation can be very damaging. What was published in Domestic Conversation that a certain monsieur promised his son that by the time he entered into marriage there would be no priests is said by many monsieurs. Take the trouble to convey from me to V.N. that he is an ascetic, as the only modern voice opposing the reformation principle in the matter of faith and the Church, and for this he is subjected to sorrows and reproaches, which put him in an honorable and high place in the eyes of the Orthodox. This is not my review exclusively: it is a general review. Virtue, the Fathers said, untested by adversity is not virtue. Looking at what is happening in the world, looking at the appointment of certain persons, at this or that place, let us rely, father, on God and reverence His very permission. He provides for everyone. For example, look at yourself: Your efforts about spiritual books have opened Your eyes! And this is necessary at the basis of spiritual life. The blind righteous man will immediately fall into the pit. You yourself can already understand how blindness and wrong views are harmful. They ruin the whole thing. Letter 514. On the issue of the controversy regarding the “Tale of Death” I am sending “The View” and additional quotes to “The Word on Death.” They constitute material for developing the issue without any polemics. In essence, this material is such that it will stop the lips that open against the direct and open teaching of the church. From “The View” it is clear that all the concepts were borrowed by the reviewer from Western teaching, which is contrary to the Eastern Church. Letter 515. Regarding the choice of residence for those who wish to be saved There is little hope for the monasteries: they have withered away and been destroyed inside, they are still supported by the hand of God for the sake of several well-intentioned monks, as God promised to spare Sodom and Gomora if ten righteous people were found in them. Hieromonk I. was recently at a big dinner at the Seminary, and when the conversation about monasticism began, they say he raised his voice and fluttered that it was necessary to destroy this useless class of parasites. Also, a certain archimandrite, high in the diocese, said about himself that he would certainly have left monasticism if his regulations had not made it difficult for those leaving it. Not everyone is so frank, but most think so, i.e. Most of the abbots are predominantly from the clergy. Many monasteries have turned from havens of morality and piety into abysses of immorality and wickedness: the strongest character cannot withstand. For this reason, prayer is needed, fervent prayer to God, so that He will guide N. on His path according to His holy will. The opinion of the heated blind people, who see everything in full bloom, should not have any weight. All deeds that are done for the sake of God are associated with sorrows. The Holy Fathers recognize virtue that is not associated with sorrows, rejected by God. True prayer is based on the impression made in the soul by good deeds associated with sorrows. The Scriptures of the Fathers were sealed with the sorrows of the Fathers who wrote them. St. Maximus' hand was cut off for his writings against the Monothelites. So, do not be surprised at our small sorrows and do not be discouraged by them, but rather look at them as evidence of God’s mercy. Letter 516. About the writings of Bishop Ignatius Matveevsky's pamphlet (this abusive and malicious review cannot be called otherwise) was published without hindrance, despite the fact that it rejects the teaching taught in Orthodox Theology, generally accepted in theological educational institutions, as defined by St. Synod. A “review” of this pamphlet was also published to reassure the remaining children of the Orthodox Church. If “Quotes” and “View” are published, then nothing more is needed to calm the children of the Church. The exclamations of the priests, even if they are published, will not have any meaning for the children of the Church, except for the meaning that these priests have deviated from the teachings of the Church. The polemic on our part can be considered over. If the spiritual authorities want to take measures to stop the temptation, then this is their good will. Temptation flows from the actions of the “Wanderer,” but we should not get involved in this matter. Probably, if they do anything, they will do it at hand. The publication of “Quotes” and “View” will be useful for everyone, because rarely does anyone know that in our liturgical books the location of heaven and hell is expressed with such certainty. The verses and troparia in which this teaching is set forth are read most quickly and without attention, and therefore remain unnoticed by the majority of even the clergy. From a sorrowful and unpleasant matter, perhaps, by the grace of God, a matter of general benefit can emerge. Please do me a favor and do not tell anyone, any of the spiritual people about the “Review”: it will only worry them and will certainly bring harm to us. It was as if nothing had happened. The matter should not appear serious. They will read “Quotes” and “View” and they themselves will understand that it is not clever for them to present themselves to the public as apostates from the Church. In this way, the matter will calm down, and in the future they will be more careful for fear of “Review.” I know them: the kindest people. Letter 517. About the departure of Alexei Petrovich from the monastery The monastery brought N. undoubted benefit, gave him a pious direction, which usually remains for the rest of his life, sometimes falling asleep for a while, but then awakening again. Don’t be at all embarrassed by N.’s exit from the monastery. His forced and false position in the monastery was bound to have some outcome. Thank God that the outcome is reasonable and not comic or tragic. I belong to the most zealous monks and recognize monasticism as a Divine institution. What to do when people, according to their carnal wisdom, transformed it into a caricature, and they wanted to replace true monasticism in human eyes with acting, the thought of God and His omnipresence and perfection, surveying everything and the depths of the heart, leaving it aside and forgotten. Let us rely on God, who foretold that temptations and apostasies would come. When this is God’s permission, then we have nothing to say and should not be embarrassed. Let everything be done the way God allows everything to be done. We must revere His destinies. Do not be embarrassed because of this sorrowful circumstance, but with humility, without impulses, pour out Your sorrow before God, pray to God to cover Your son with His mercy and surrender him to the will of God, and take care of the salvation of Your soul; This is all the more necessary since little time remains for you to wander on earth and to prepare yourself for eternity. We are going through a difficult time spiritually! A hundred years before us, St. Tikhon said: “Nowadays there is almost no true piety, but only hypocrisy.” Vices mature over time. Nowadays hypocrisy has reached incredible impudence and shamelessness. Spiritual experience comes at a price. It is better to leave the monastery and lead a life in the world in accordance with one’s disposition, rather than, living in a monastery with a feeling of hostility towards it, to lead a life that is not at all in accordance with the monastic rules, the inevitable consequence of which is usually the most terrible debauchery. Letter 519. About A.P.’s departure from the monastery and the need to follow the teachings of the Holy Fathers Thank God for everything! May His all-holy will be done over us, and may we be granted the reverence and submission that we are obliged to have for the destinies of God. Do not be embarrassed by what is happening, but rely on God for Your son, who needs the special mercy of God. I continue to talk with him over afternoon tea: my goal in these conversations is the desire to give him the right direction as he enters a new life and to strengthen in him the faith to which his heart began to open and which he did not understand before. At the same time, I recommend II. bring repentance before God in order to receive forgiveness from God and attract God's blessing to your next life. I speak with love, even with gaiety, albeit positively: he listens with attention, and, perhaps, with spiritual benefit. Saint Job said that a person’s entire earthly life is a continuous temptation. When it is so determined by God, then we must humbly endure the sorrows of the temptations that befall us, and be admonished by them for our further activities. The Monk Nilus of Sorsky says: “Many hate this great thing, cutting off their own will according to God, but everyone now deprives himself of his own justification.” About such in the “Divine Ladder” it is said: “It is better to drive away from the Abode than to leave the novice to do his will: having driven away the most humble one who has been driven away, teach him to cut off the will of the rest,” and whoever, under the guise of love for mankind, condescends to such people, leads them to the point that they terribly curse him during the exodus. In the same article, the Monk Neil says that it is certainly appropriate for a monastic to live according to the tradition of St. Fathers: although we cannot compare with the Fathers, we must certainly live in their direction and achieve unity with them in spirit. (Ibid.). The Holy Fathers looked at the residence of a father and son in a monastery as follows: “The Monk Mukiy wished to live with his eight-year-old son in a certain episcopal dormitory, of which the abbot was a gracious husband. He realized that there was a special mercy of God for Mukiy, and he accepted both, father and son. Upon acceptance, they were separated, and in order to introduce Mukiy to the experimental knowledge of self-sacrifice, his son was and is constantly subjected to various sorrows, especially when he was in the eyes of his father. The torment remained firm, with the help of the elder to whom he was given, and began to feel spiritual success due to his selflessness. The abbot, having seen this, wanted to elevate him to a more difficult feat. One day, appearing angry with his son, he ordered his father to throw him into the river. The father immediately carried out this, but was detained at the very shore by the brothers who had previously been planted here. At the same time, the Divine Revelation about Mukiya followed to the abbot, and when the abbot ended, he appointed no one else, but Mukiya, as his successor, as having reached the highest degree of self-sacrifice, obedience and faith. This story is conveyed by the Monk Cassian for the general edification of monastics. To act exactly like this, you must have the grace of St. The abbot on the one hand and the power of Mukiy’s will on the other, but it is necessary to act in this spirit. An action contrary to this is spiritually recognized as adultery and is included among actions for the salvation of the soul in this world, for its destruction in eternity, contrary to the commandment of the Savior, Who commanded to destroy one’s soul in this world for its salvation in eternity. This is the carnal mercy mentioned by the Monk Nile: this is that blind mercy that destroys both itself and the one for whom it is merciful. I am writing this so that you will understand the wiles of the enemy. Monastic life is a tricky business: in it the enemy tries to catch and damage the ascetic with his obscene truths. An enemy action is recognized by the removal of calm from the heart and by the state of bewilderment into which a person is brought. “Be sober, be vigilant,” says the Holy Apostle Peter, “for your adversary the devil, like a lion, roars, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). The devil acts precisely against those who want to be saved, and not against those who are given over to sin and vanity, as if they are self-caught. God allows all this for our humility, so that we can see how easily we are mocked by the invisible enemy and how convenient our destruction is for him because of our feeble-mindedness and lack of firmness in faith: then the Lord takes us away with His Providence and thereby reveals His inexpressible love and mercy for us, and the enemy’s network is dissolved, like a cobweb. This is all clearly visible from the former temptation. You see now how important for salvation the direction provided by the teaching of the Holy Fathers is, how rare it is and how strong and irresistible it has hitherto been. You see how subtle the demonic machinations are, how they entangle a person without him noticing; You see how modern people are deceitful, how easily one who is saved (who, by the nature of his life, usually acquires simplicity of heart) can be deceived. Woe to one, said the Holy Fathers, but brother from brother we strengthen, as the city is established. I pray to the merciful Lord that He will bless your intention and mine not to separate us until death. Father Justin is the only person who has entered into unity with me in spirit, who has self-sacrifice and is able to bear the infirmities of his neighbors. He understands You with perfect correctness and sees Your ability for self-sacrifice. This is the person who, after me, is most likely to be close to You. He is of a weak character and is deeply overcome by delusion, which he captured in Nikiforovskaya, seeking pleasure before repentance. He has upset his spirit with this, distorted his mind, but conceit and pride maintain the charm in him. Here in Russia people are more Orthodox in their hearts than in their mental convictions. Letter 520. About the proper attitude towards temptations The first word of this letter is about N. He continues to talk with me at afternoon tea. Consciousness, to whatever degree it was, brought him out of a false, tense state into a more correct, and therefore calmer, state. My advice that it is necessary to bring repentance to God in a dramatic entry into the monastery and in a dramatic stay in the monastery in order to ward off the wrath of God and to attract God's blessing for the next life, he accepted and is currently busy with this with obvious benefit for himself. God bless! As for me, I look at allowing temptation as my own, in the words of St. Fathers, i.e. as something that was necessary for my spiritual benefit, and therefore was allowed by the Providence of God. For this reason, I have no claims against anyone, especially against N., and my concern is focused on ensuring that the fruit of temptation is turned to the benefit of both him and all those whom the temptation touched. O. Justin, unanimously with me, is in the same mood as me. Regarding N., the essence of the matter is that his residence in the monastery leaves a good impression on him. This should have an impact on his whole life, on his faith, on his salvation. In communicating this to You, I wish that You too would enter into the same mood with me, i.e. I realized that the temptation was necessary for You, that it was very useful to You, as it opened Your eyes to people and to the modern religious trend. Then, Your behavior regarding N. must be prudent and God-pleasing. Without the first there can be no second. It is necessary to abandon carnal tenderness as a means of seduction, and act according to the rules of love commanded by the Word of God. The past must be left behind without going into detail with subtle inquiries and questions, which will involve him in lies and deceptions and destroy the good fruits that appeared in the soul from some consciousness of which he was capable. The ability to become conscious does not appear suddenly, but from forcing oneself to constant consciousness and from skill. We must provide everything we need to God, begging Him for mercy. In these cases, prayer is stronger than one’s own actions. Do not grieve that some of Your colleagues are cold towards You. Saint Tikhon wrote from his experience that when a person has dedicated himself to God, then his acquaintances and neighbors become distant from him, and the closer he gets to God, the more they will move away. We don't have long to live on earth! It is a great mercy that He gave You the desire for knowledge of God and salvation, which is the only thing you need and which will accompany You beyond the grave. Letter 521. About the need to surrender to the will of God, about the view of Bishop. Ignatius on his writings, on other subjects Constant reverence for the destinies of God is necessary for the correctness of spiritual life. One must bring oneself into this reverence and obedience to God by faith. Everything that happens will happen either by the grace of God, or by God’s permission, i.e. everything that happens is accomplished according to the destinies of God, incomprehensible to man. The three holy youths in the cave of Babylon confessed God, confessed that all the civil and spiritual disasters allowed to them and the people of Israel were allowed according to the righteous judgment of God. Such a view attracts peace into the soul, does not allow one to get carried away by excitement, directs the vision of the mind to eternity, and brings patience in sorrows, which seem to be short-lived, insignificant accidents and trifles. Anyone called by God to salvation must thank God for the calling and try to take advantage of it. The words spoken by the Lord to His Apostles: “You did not choose Me, but I chose you” (John 15:16) apply to all those called to salvation. I verify this from my own life, and from the lives of those who are saved through experiences known to me. “Recall of the Orthodox” has done its job and has its purpose. He explained to the Orthodox the Church Tradition, which is especially important for ascetics, and stopped the lips of people of opposing opinions. Matveevsky, although he had the intention of undermining the opinion of the “Word” of the reading public, served to publicize and improve the “Word”, which, in addition to the dignity of an ascetic, received the dignity of a theological work, the first on this subject in the Russian language, as Matveevsky says in his review. The providence of God arranged the printing of the “Tale of Death” and “Experiments” in the same way as it arranged the writing of them. I do not recognize these works as belonging to me. They flowed from the Fatherly Scriptures and from the mercy of God, and it was granted to me to write them for the benefit of many souls, and therefore for the benefit of my soul. You too have been given the gift of working in this matter for the salvation of Your soul. You yourself see what a need arises for the active teaching of the Fathers, the moral tradition of the Church, almost completely forgotten, to be recalled. Serving the Word of God has always been associated with sorrows, as being contrary to the Spirit of the world. But even over the allowance of sorrows, the Providence of God is vigilant, which allows each worker to grieve so much and in such a way that God’s work is accomplished with great humility and is purified from the admixture of vanity and exaltation. By the special grace of God, N. begins to see all the wrongness of his entry into the monastery and his behavior in the monastery. I try to help him in the repentance that is necessary for him, showing exactly as I wrote to you the falsity and darkness of his actions, so that his repentance is true and serves as a solid foundation for the course set before him in the field of earthly life. Having opened the doors into his heart for my wretched words through the slightest consciousness, he gradually moves to a greater consciousness, which provides him with saving self-perception. Because of this self-perception, he came into the right state of mind, for which I thank God. He realized that my words, despite their outward sorrow, were significantly useful for him. It has come to the point that he asks me not to leave him in the future, because of the beneficial rapprochement to which his sincerity led, which I promised him. Consciousness must be kept in a person as the greatest spiritual treasure, as the basis of all spiritual blessings. I'm sorry that I bothered You with concerns about the construction of the Church. You know how I did not want to start any construction in the monastery, but necessity leads to care. We do not live as we would like, but as God leads us to live. He knows what is most useful, and the present situation should recognize Him with great mercy. Letter 522. About persons who did not understand the direction of Bishop Ignatius May the will of our God, Who governs both the fate of societies and the fate of each person in particular, be done, and therefore glory to God both in His actions and in His allowances! People from St. Petersburg usually have a so-called arriére pensee in their gaze, which gives their gaze distrust and suspicion, which in a certain respect has its basis. But well-intentioned people, who always have simplicity and straightforwardness in their hearts, no matter how smart and capable they are for business, suffer more from arriére pensee than ill-intentioned and self-interested people, who are usually cunning, no matter how limited they are. I was convinced of this by long-term observations. Therefore, if possible, try to give someone a correct view of my situation. I am sure that many in St. Petersburg suspect me of seeking and plans. Having no idea about true monasticism, they find monasticism where there is only hypocrisy and hypocrisy and do not see it where it exactly exists, or judging by themselves, not even understanding that the search for the eternal can exist. I am sure that many people do not believe that I am as terribly ill and exhausted as I am definitely ill and exhausted, they compose moods for me, in accordance with their mood, and take their own measures against these intentions they have composed. I have proof of this. We need to do what depends on us. Then: God's will be done! When priest Krasnotsvetov published “The History of the New Testament,” which said that the Mother of God ceased to be a Virgin after the Birth of the God-Man, and many similar blasphemies, many of the St. Petersburg clergy were terribly angry with me because I stopped this book in the Sergius Desert and forwarded it to the highest authorities. A similar thing can be seen in Church History: the confessor Constantius, an Arian, constantly acted against St. Athanasius, Patriarch of Alexandria; so the Arians constantly directed the Empress Justina against St. Ambrose of Midiolansky. Champions of the Church have always been persecuted. God bless! Letter 523. About the danger of staying in a monastery without a sincere desire to lead a monastic life Staying in a monastery without a sincere desire to lead a monastic life, and therefore eliminating from oneself the behavior that is required by the rules of St. Fathers, can only serve as harm and will lead the raped person to such a life with the most tragic consequences. Letter 524. About joining the monastery Monasticism is a Divine institution through which Christianity reaches its highest development. Among the rules of this Divine institution is that people should enter into monasticism with true will and subject this will to strict examination and testing before taking vows. Those who have a cold and wavering will are strictly prohibited from entering monasticism. I see, as I saw before, that N. was not at all prepared for monastic life, that he could not have a correct and thorough will towards it, having no idea about it. That his heart has now softened from the consciousness of this, and as a result of such softening, he is disposed to follow my advice, then such a disposition cannot in any way be recognized as a will to monasticism. It is only a consequence of consciousness and that trust that usually appears in everyone who has received relief and tranquility from consciousness. To take advantage of such a temporary feeling to incline towards monasticism would be criminal on my part. Why do I recognize leaving the monastery for P. as a necessity, due to his lack of will, and therefore the necessary abilities for monastic life. The exodus, with a feeling of consciousness of all the sinfulness of my behavior in the monastery, with a feeling of repentance, I recognize the special mercy of God. This can serve as a basis for God's blessing on his future life. If now he were stopped in the monastery, then later, and even very soon, the lack of true will would arouse in him the most unpleasant feeling towards the monastery and towards those who would take advantage recklessly and contrary to the holy rules of the young man’s momentary heartfelt gentleness. Then, I consider placement in V. near people who can support N. to be the best for him. Letter 525. About the internal state of his nephew Alexei Petrovich N. needs life experiences. Experiences always have their sorrow and their work. But without them, a person remains an empty doll for the rest of his life. Experiences during life in V. will be the easiest. There are no such storms and abysses as there are in the noisy light. It is necessary that we act according to the will of God, and not according to feelings of deceptive and destructive tenderness; God will arrange the rest with His destinies. N.'s way out of temptation was arranged by the grace of God for the benefit of his soul, leading him to consciousness and to the fruits of consciousness that everything was previously unknown to him. After consciousness, having acted on my advice, he felt especially relieved. This is a sign of the action of truth. You will do well not to allow yourself detailed questions, because the Holy Fathers forbid them to be done by those who have touched the saving consciousness. It is obvious: from shy questions, a person who has only confessed and confessed with great economy can again move from consciousness to denial and deception, and all the good effects produced by consciousness will be erased from the soul. It is absolutely necessary that it remains. He himself will probably tell you something from which you can conclude everything. The rough construction of the church takes three years. Oh, so much time for the old and sick! And for everyone in general! At such a time, many completely unexpected things can happen. Let us do what we can and what our duty to our neighbors requires, and leave the rest to God. Your calling to inherit salvation is obvious. Do you remember how long in Stavropol I stopped to tell you a lot about Christianity, generally not wanting to waste words about this holy subject in vain. But Your heart was warmed by the mercy of God, and the consequence of Your attention and zeal is God’s granting to You of Your one and tenth hour to assimilate Him. Letter 526. Advice not to trivialize your sins When they sweep the room, they don’t look at the rubbish, but just throw it all in a heap and that’s it. Do the same. Confess your sins to your confessor, and that’s all, but don’t go into looking at them. The Holy Fathers strongly forbid this to those who cannot examine themselves correctly: such examination confuses, leads to relaxation and disorder. Beware of sins committed out of weakness and passion, repent, not allowing yourself to become bewildered and despondent when repenting, and do not expect sinlessness from yourself. Letter 527. About A.P.’s departure from the monastery N. flourished; obviously from the cessation of internal confusion. Your remark is correct that he will later regret his action; but the matter is done according to his will, according to the demands of conscience and Fatherly decrees; if it were the will to rape, then such violence would soon lead him into disorder, which could no longer be corrected. Letter 528. On the beneficial effects of sorrows Every person whom God has deigned to bring closer to Himself learns through sorrows. Sorrows act in a similar way, spewing out evil from the inside and exposing it to the ascetic, so that he may be healed by repentance. Letter 529. About Alexei Petrovich and his brother’s efforts to publish “Ascetic Experiences” N. has gained a lot of weight and is very cheerful, despite Lent. A heavy burden has been lifted from the soul! He did not and does not have the will to lead a monastic life; at the same time, the monastery brought him significant benefits, giving him a savingly long rest from the disastrous revelry and introducing him to the Christian faith. According to his own consciousness, he did not believe anything when he left the Caucasus. You will do very well by celebrating Easter in St. Petersburg, otherwise the rest of the fast will be lost both for you and for N.: it will be taken away by conversations and explanations that disturb the spiritual mood. May the blessing of God rest upon You for Your labors regarding the affairs of the monastery and the printing of books essential for Christianity. Do not think that these labors were arranged for You without the Providence of God: these labors and the sorrows associated with them were quite useful for You, opening Your eyes to many things and giving You many opportunities to humble yourself. You have not yet matured for cell silence. Letter 530. About the rescue of 14 people from drowning by the brethren of the Babayev monastery For No. 101, the Synod was informed about the rescue of 14 people from drowning. They were brought to the monastery on Tikhvinka and covered with ice closer to the opposite bank. A cry arose from the people who were on the ship and saw the danger of their situation; some stood with their hands raised to the sky, as seen in prayer. Help seemed impossible because the river was covered with ice blocks. One self-sacrifice known to You, Fr. Justin may have inspired some of the brethren. They, with the Abbot at their head, went to the river, and exposing themselves to obvious danger, saved the lives of 14 people. Hieromonk and Hierodeacon Nikodim especially distinguished themselves. Letter 531. On the works preceding silence and on other subjects The Providence of God has brought You such labors as are necessary to prepare true, heartfelt, spiritual silence, based on the service of the spirit, and therefore alien to delusion; the labors by which such silence is given a solid foundation. You can notice for yourself that in these labors sorrow is combined with consolation, and the labors themselves are combined with humility, and not with vainglorious splendor. An example of such works can be seen in the correspondence of the Monk Barsanuphius the Great with John. The book of Barsanuphius begins with this correspondence. N., after realizing this, becomes closer and closer to me. He grieves that he must leave the monastery, but he also sees the necessity of this, having neither the will nor the vocation for monastic life. Time helps a lot in establishing a correct view of objects. I can say this in relation to “Ascetic Experiences”. Their printing was arranged by the Providence of God. Comparing them with the writings of St. Fathers, I see that the “Experiments” teach the very beginning of spiritual work, in a varied literary form, making it easier to read and interesting in it, which is extremely necessary and useful for the present Christian generation. The Fathers, due to their loftiness, despite the simplicity of the style, are little understood by this generation, in which Christianity is extremely weak. Letter 532. On naming his works “Ascetic Experiences” I received the books “Patrology”. What a pity that our Church is deprived of such a treasure, for the acquisition of which enormous amounts of money were spent. Apparently, this is God’s permission! We were busy not glorifying God, but vainly glorifying ourselves, and the “frost” of our face covered us. Regarding the title of my book “Ascetic Experiences”, I remain with my previous opinion. Now, after revision, significant corrections and a huge addition of articles of a different kind, it does not seem possible to change the serious and precise title: this is required by the nature of the book. - This is the book of a martyr! A martyr for his sins and from his sins, but a martyr. The book is light in spirit, but the thoughts and feelings in it are deep and lofty. A light name, a gentle name, does not suit her serious character: she should have a strict name. Letter 533. On the construction of the Church of the Mother of God and on other subjects Above the construction of the church of Our Lady, the finger of Our Lady is obvious; given to people who work in business; together they are granted the opportunity to struggle with obstacles and grieve for their own spiritual benefit, in order to cleanse the matter from the admixture of vanity and other hobbies, so that it is accomplished in God-pleasing humility. This is the usual course of affairs protected by God. The Apostle Paul writes that Satan twice forbade him to come to Thessalonians for the gospel of Christ. The Jerusalem Temple was built the second time under many obstacles, and the first time with the success of all circumstances; but the spiritual glory of the first church was far surpassed by the glory of the second church, which was worthy to receive into its bosom the incarnate God. The Monk Anthony of Pechersk said that many rich princes and boyars, with a sense of arrogance and vanity, built monasteries and churches at their own expense, without difficulty; but the churches and monasteries, built with the tears of monks, their prayers and the zeal of persons who had a humble position in the world, turned out to be much superior to the first. God does not like heat and does not like for a work pleasing to Him to be done with heat, but He loves for it to be done with trust in Him, the Almighty and All-Good, with patience and humility, with prudence, which is impossible to observe when carried away into heat. “A house is built with wisdom,” says Scripture, “and with understanding it is corrected” (Proverbs 24:3). We must follow the instruction of Scripture: haste can ruin the matter. N. is very peaceful and very peaceful in spirit, but he is concerned about the upcoming change in life. Consciousness, so new to his soul, produced a strong revolution in him. In the monastery, and precisely in the Babaevsky monastery, he acquired faith, which he did not have before entering this monastery. He became very close to me and the other day again asked me not to interrupt relations with him, which I promised him. He saw many things in a different form than in which it had appeared to him before. His further fate is in the hand of God, like each of us. Letter 534. About the mood of Alexei Petrovich N. went from the consciousness that he entered the monastery frivolously and behaved incorrectly in it to the correct and lasting mood of a Christian, as far as I can understand. The feeling that he felt is usually not forgotten throughout his life and is a Guardian Angel even during hobbies, drawing a blissful memory of himself from the very abyss. May God's will be done over all of us! Letter 535. Surrendering all concerns to the will of God May the will of God be done in relation to the church of God in the Babaevsky monastery! May the will of God be accomplished in all God’s deeds and in all God’s permissions. We must listen to ourselves and pray to God that He will allow us to end our days in repentance. Letter 536. About the “removal” of Christianity from society and about the positive influence on many of its creations Devotion to the will of God in the very permissions of God is necessary. It is obvious that Christianity - this mysterious spiritual gift to people - is removed in an inconspicuous way from human society for those who do not pay attention to their salvation, who have neglected this gift. One must see this so as not to be deceived by actors and the acting of piety; Having seen, we must turn our gaze away from the sad sight, so as not to be subjected to the vice of condemning our neighbors, we must turn our gaze to ourselves, take care of our own salvation, because God's mercy still grants the opportunity to be saved to those who choose to be saved. N.B. "Experiments", being a purely spiritual book, should be useful to the fatherland in a civil sense. The book makes a strong impression on many, an impression completely separate from the impression made by modern spiritual writings. It places the attentive reader in the ranks of true Orthodox Christians and gives him a decisive, one-sided, saving direction. The energy of our people and the independence of their spirit depend on the development of the ideas of Orthodoxy and on firmness in Orthodoxy. Letter 537. About the benefits of sorrows encountered during the labor of publishing “Ascetic Experiences” Thank God for everything! I congratulate You on the completion of Your labors, which were entrusted to You by the Providence of God, carried out under the protection of God, and ended by the grace of God. We hope that God’s mercy will cover us for the future, allowing us the necessary sorrows for our learning and admonition and wonderfully bringing us out of them with the fruit of patience and humility. Letter 538. About judging yourself and “judging” yourself and advice not to abandon the work you started Regarding Your troubles due to your possessions, it is nothing more than a temptation, similar to other temptations. Judging yourself is useful: it leads to humility. Judging yourself is harmful: it plunges you into despondency and relaxation. The case should not be abandoned, especially since You set the intention to use the money for good deeds, and leaving the case to the arbitrariness of those acting incorrectly is, as it were, taking part in a wrong action, to the harm of their souls and to the harm of Your soul. Letter 539. On the cooling of society towards piety Our time is a difficult time for true Christians due to the general cooling of the people towards faith and piety. Our collectors arrived from the Caucasus, having collected only 100 rubles. They conveyed to me the words of some pious people: “Only three years have passed since Vladyka left the Caucasus, but if he had returned now, he would not have recognized the direction of the people, who were striving entirely towards “secularism.” On the way back, the pickers saw the same direction. The prophecy of Scripture about the apostasy from Christianity of peoples who switched to Christianity from paganism is being fulfilled. N.B. The book “Experiments” will provide significant benefit to those who want to be saved (in recent times) - the teaching about prayer and other Christian virtues that promote prayer is essential for them. Letter 540. On the religious state of the society of his time The scant news coming to our monastery about the state of the Christian faith in Russia is extremely disappointing. On the one hand there is a split, on the other there is decisive apostasy. General immorality prepares apostasy on an enormous scale. Save, let him save his soul! Today's ascetics are given the path of sorrows, external and internal, as the most reliable. Letter 541. About the modern Bishop. Ignatius of social life, etc. An archpriest from the village in which Susanin’s descendants live, a rather smart man, came to see me. He said that the peasants were drunk and impoverished, that nothing could be done to stop this current, because those who fell into drunkenness would drink vodka even when they decided to raise the price for it. This has been proven by experiments. Along with the riotous life, a special cooling towards the Church and the clergy appeared. The revelers among the peasants are carousing and have fallen into indifferentism towards religion; Nekutils turn in large numbers to the schism. The nobility is poor and cannot help the churches and clergy as they did before. The clergy is getting smaller and smaller. The archpriest, who had a practical view, said that there was no outcome in sight for this situation, and that the consequences of this situation should be prolific. “Progress” is moving at amazingly fast pace. Who will stop him? P.S. I'm working on Sayings. What a time it was for monasticism! What an abundance of spiritual elders! How many there were then who created their neighbors! and now how many destroy and destroy their neighbors! We need to thank God for the mercy He has poured out on us, which is rare in our time, and may His mercy complete this mercy to the end. I largely agree with S.I.’s comments. I look for comments that come from true disposition and knowledge, like treasures. I would like to review the last two volumes most and almost exclusively for the syllable. The “Experiments” themselves require revision, which is what I intend to do, just in case. I have always recognized strict criticism, careful revision and merciless purification as the best means for achieving perfection in works. In general, conversations such as: About the Jesus Prayer, about humility and about monasticism have been discontentedly revised and purified. Their style is different and should be different from that of poetic works such as “Lamentation,” “Blessed is the Man,” “The Cup,” and “Seeing Your Sin.” Again, theological articles have a different style (for example, about the Gospel commandments), and articles belonging to Christian morality and philosophy, for example, have a different style. about true and false humility. The “Ascetic Sermon” has its own separate syllable, but in general this “Sermon” has not been sufficiently revised and cleaned up. I find variety of syllable inevitable; being natural, it constitutes one of the merits of the collected works. Health has a great influence on the syllable: a sick person has a sick syllable. It is obvious that the departure from the Orthodox faith is universal among the people: some are open atheists, some are deists, some are Protestants, some are indifferentists, some are schismatics. There is no cure or healing for this ulcer. Save, let him save his soul! It is noticeable that now tribulations are sent to everyone who wants to be saved. This also happens to A.V.Zh. Letter 543. On submitting further publication of one’s works to the will of God And I am very glad that the publication of my works will now end with “Experiments.” It is necessary to wait for a more favorable situation. If God wants the printing to take place, He will arrange it. If it is not pleasing to God, then I do not desire it either. What is most precious to us is to be under the guidance of the will of God, and not to do anything outside of it, no matter what the ideas of the carnal wisdom of ours and other people may be. The other day I carefully read “The Word on the Jesus Prayer.” It clearly states that prayer with the mind enclosed in the words of prayer is the most useful and safest, that the mechanism through nostril breathing with an effort to ascend with the mind into the heart is forbidden by the Holy Fathers for those who are not mature enough for such prayer! You need to pray in the first way, taking into account the general rule and not accepting exceptions to the general rule, which took place according to the special care of God. I try to get used to the first method only, as necessary for attention. Attention is the soul of prayer. I even try to eliminate everything else, so that the work is completely selfless, so that success is completely left to the will of God. Letter 545. On the publication of the works of Bishop. Ignatius, on the correct understanding of prayer, etc. The other day I looked at the book of Barsanuphius the Great: The book opened on page 362, where the very first line said: “Goodness is certainly resisted by sorrow from the devil’s envy, but through prayer this goodness is multiplied.” This can also be attributed to the publication of “Experiments”. One can see both the action against printing and the action promoting printing, arranged by the Providence of God. Remember, my Father, what labors and sorrows everyone suffered who spread the Word of God and the true teaching about God. Sorrows serve as evidence of following the truth in this matter. On the contrary, with success not forbidden by the ruler of the world, with a reward from the world, books are published in the spirit and views of the ruler of the world, even if they bear a name borrowed from Christianity. At the present time there is a significant need for correct prayer, but they don’t even know it! They do not know that it should be an instrument and expression of repentance, they seek pleasure and delight, they flatter themselves; and with the instrument given for salvation they kill their souls. A correct understanding of prayer in our time is essential! She is the essential, the only leader in our time towards salvation. There are no mentors! – The best, as far as we know, are the Optinsky mentors. I liked John, due to his openness, more than the academicians of his time, and then many bar admired his sermons aimed at the liberation of the peasants, not realizing that John was by no means a spiritual preacher, but a zealous class fanatic and that he had a disguised thought about the massacre of nobles and about giving his flock primacy in both civil and church service. Others, having the same thought, hide it better, and therefore John, as he speaks out more openly than others, is morally superior to others. In the book “Christian Reading” for December there is a remarkable article “New publications on schism” by N. Nilskago. Here the deviations of the Great Russian Church are boldly exposed. Filaret was greatly offended by his participation in Masonic teachings. We all, whether we want it or not, are in the hand of God. Why, acting according to the degree of reason and conscience given by God, the rest should be entrusted to God, our Provider. Letter 546. About my only desire - repentance and forgiveness of sins I bring you my sincere gratitude for congratulating me, a sinner, on Angel’s Day. My only desire: may the merciful Lord grant me repentance and forgiveness of my sins, but I am unworthy of spiritual gifts and am unable to properly preserve them - (the way of thinking on which all the activities of a Christian who desires and seeks salvation should be based). Whether we want it or not, we are in the almighty will of God. The most correct consequence of such a concept is that we submit to the will of our God and, from this feeling of submission, beg Him to show mercy to us. I wrote to You that You really need to read the “Word” about the Jesus Prayer (Ascetic. Experiences. Volume 2). It is clearly stated there which mechanism is appropriate for whom. Stay resolute in confining your mind to the words of prayer. If at the same time some other mechanism appears by itself, then let it act until it goes away. If he moves away, don’t be embarrassed. Your prayer is still quite material. And therefore the very mechanisms that you previously held incorrectly can be corrected by confining your mind in the words of prayer. With this last mechanism, an invaluable prayer action appears in its time, completely spiritual. Your search for a place of heart is very mistaken! If you enclose your mind in words, your heart will come into sympathy with the mind. First you need to pray with this sympathy. Such a prayer is a prayer of repentance. When a person is cleansed through repentance, the place of the heart will be designated by itself. When you feel insensibility during prayer, then, despite this state of insensibility, it is useful to force yourself to attentive prayer, and not give up the effort of prayer, praying loudly and slowly, because after insensibility, the grace of God suddenly touches the heart and it comes into tenderness. The period of struggle with passions should not be burdened in any way. This period is appointed by God according to His wise discretion. Scripture says: “I endured the Lord, and he listened to me” (Ps. 39:2). Also: “I will stir up the wrath of the Lord because those who have sinned against Him” (Mic. 7:9). Premature liberation from internal struggles is harmful to the soul. Letter 548. About correct prayer, the position of the Church and Monasticism You have chosen good honor, abandoning all mechanisms, and being content to enclose your mind in words: this will lead to the most correct results, without any admixture of delusion, which You could be subjected to, and in part have already been subjected to, using mechanisms that do not suit You. For myself, I hold on, when I hold on, to the sole conclusion of the mind in the words of prayer: everything else appears, when it appears, by itself. Regarding my reconciliation with the Most Reverend John, if it happens, it will be a most pleasant event for me. I am very pleased with his disposition towards monasticism and I find that, due to the openness and directness of his character, he is very capable of accepting true monasticism and even of the gracious feeling of God’s mercy, from which living faith appears in a person. I did not quarrel with John, but only gave a review of Mr. Shchapov’s articles, which heated up so much in the Caucasus that they “demanded blood.” How much wrong and harmful the way of thinking is in these articles has been proven by experiments and will continue to be proven. Namely, the articles have been forgotten, but it is in their spirit that they are written and spoken - the spirit and direction receive a huge volume. Those under the leadership of the elder should not leave his system of guidance. This is what I demand from those who are guided by my advice, especially in relation to reading books, even paternal ones. One must be at peace with the position of the Church, although one must also understand it. This is permission from Above, which we cannot understand. Elder Isaiah told me: “Understand the time. Do not expect improvement in the general composition of the church, but be content with what is provided in particular for salvation for people who want to be saved.” As far as I can understand: I do not foresee, in the spirit of the time and in general in the morality of the entire people, that there could be a restoration of the Church in its ancient beauty, as well as monasticism. And this should be considered a great mercy of God if no heavy blow to the monasteries soon follows. Letter 549. About correct prayer, about temptations, about the writings of Bishop Ignatius, etc. For those who have entered into the service of God, special temptations begin. “Repay your debt to the passions,” said St. Isaac of Syria - by fighting them." In the field of struggle there are victories and defeats. Victories must be healed by repentance. It heals them with all satisfaction. To succeed in prayer and to avoid delusion, self-sacrifice is necessary, which teaches one to seek only attention in prayer. Then the feat of prayer will become simpler and easier; Temptations, which, however, always accompany feat, will also be alleviated. If someone prematurely strives to reveal in himself the actions of heartfelt prayer, “to him,” says St. Nil of Sorsky, “in agreement with the other Holy Fathers, “he is allowed to suffer severe temptations from demons that exceed the powers.” Second word. Read it. Such aspiration is based on misunderstood exaltation and arrogance, which appears to be zeal. Considering the book of “Experiments” and the influence that it has on others, I believe that its second edition is inevitable. When and how it will be arranged is God’s work, and my duty is to provide the book with the possible satisfaction and improvement. My relationship with the book is set out in a letter to the brethren of the Optina Hermitage, a list of which I attach below. To Alexei Petrovich, don’t put every bastard on the line; warn him lightly: it will be more effective. I recognize S.I.’s dreams as God’s mercy towards her, calling her to a truly pious life. They are not out of charm and not of their own making. – Acquaintance with St. I. showed both you and me the position of the Church. In its highest shepherds there remained a weak, dark, confused, incorrect understanding of the letter, which kills spiritual life in Christian society, destroys Christianity, which is a deed, not a letter. I. – more openly than others – only. There is nothing to look for in anyone! Must run to the mountains - to isolated positions! God has given us this position. It is obvious that reconciliation can only be external, and not in spirit. And that's enough. For external reconciliation, a bound book is needed. It is also obvious that one should not be bothered by a request to write a comment on the book, especially since I am not responding to Matveevsky’s last article, despite the fact that the answer to it is very simple; he imposed on the Fathers Descartes' understanding of the immateriality of spirits, took away their own understanding of them, and on this founded clashes between them and heteroglossia that do not exist. Give this to Ignatius. Polemics can tempt pious people whose way of thinking was formed by reading the Chetya-Menai and other similar books. The academic journal "Christian Reading" is higher than "The Wanderer", which contains two articles by Matveevsky against my writings, and many articles about modern cases of the appearance of spirits, for my writings. The idea of ​​analyzing my works in “Christian Reading” must be abandoned, although it will be impossible to say in print what he said during the meeting. He doesn't know his fathers. My father! Bear Your work graciously in the capital. Complete this work with completeness. You work for the benefit and true need of the remnant of true Christians. For this reason, the envy of the devil acts against the book, serving as evidence of God’s mercy both to the book and to Your work. Now about. Justin reads articles from the “Experiments” to the brothers and sees their effect, that everyone who wants to be saved will firmly grasp the book and hold on to it. Justin is a rare monk and abbot in our time, far superior to Ignatius of Sergius, who, however, has a special ability and resourcefulness in his relations with secular people. Letter 550. About the correct feat of prayer If you abandon all desire for imaginary success, entrusting the work of Your success to God and entrusting Your temporary and eternal fate to the will of God, and during Your prayer you will only care about attention, from which it usually comes and which is usually facilitated by tenderness, then Your prayer feat will receive correctness. This will calm you down significantly. Calmness will be a sign of God's mercy. Also, I would not advise you to go too deep into examining your sinfulness. It's enough if you know this. Spiritual achievement should be as less difficult as possible. Letter 551. Instructions on how to properly engage in smart work I bring you my most sincere congratulations on your upcoming birthday. I sincerely wish You that this birth into earthly life will also be a birth into eternal life, into eternal bliss. As a gift, I send you one of the sayings of St. Pimen the Great, a great practitioner of mental prayer. Warning his disciples against the wiles of the devil, he says: “Everything that exceeds measure is from demons.” What the demons bring is recognized by confusion - this indispensable and inevitable fruit of their action. In smart work, in repentance itself, one must avoid excess. It must be done in great silence. The correctness of such doing is evidenced by the peace brought to the soul. Letter 552. On the question of the nature of Angels The great mercy of God is the publication of “Experiments”. God's mercy to all who have worked in this matter for the benefit of Christian society. The “look” comes out in its present form much stronger than in its primitive form. The definition of the word Spirit of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem is important. Not all academicians stubbornly adhere to Descartes' opinion about spirits: the most solid of them are on my side. And it was not long before I received the concept that I have now. For a long time my understanding of spirits remained very dark and vague. Letter 553. About the feat of prayer and other subjects The modern religious and moral direction of the people is sad. During our three-year stay in the Babayevsky Monastery, this unhappy mood moved with giant steps forward and assumed the most extensive dimensions. Let everything that happens be done under the eyes of God. [...] A feat of prayer, my Father, is a feat. We have to work hard. Whoever patiently prays his defiled prayer, said St. John Climacus, and does not leave her, having become bored with her filth, God gives him true prayer in due time. Pay attention to yourself, i.e. words of prayer, and do not listen to the thoughts that come during it. Don't get into trouble with yourself. Replace this investigation with reading articles about prayer in the “Experiences.” You should really avoid that detailed analysis to which you are accustomed and on the basis of which the enemy confuses you with his thoughts. To your question about the wanderer Glinka (“Conversation of F.N. Glinka with the Wanderer,” published in “House. Conversation” of 1865), I will tell you that I read this article, but did not find anything special, very likely for the reason that I was brought up by the teachings of the Holy Monks and avoid any special path. A saint of God can follow a special path, according to a special election and calling of God, which happens very rarely. The people who take the most special path are either those who are in self-delusion, or those who are heading towards self-delusion. We must stay away and be careful from everyone who follows a special, mysterious path. Father Justin accepted the refusal to elevate him to the rank of archimandrite with such complacency as befits a monk. The providence of God leads him not along the flowers, but along the path of regret, in the midst of human reproach, which marks a person loved by God. This refusal is spiritually beneficial both for him and for me. We accept it as from the hand of God. The position of the Metropolitan in the Synod is very sad. It is sad not for the individual, but for the metropolitan and as an advantage taken by the priests over the bishops. The matter of the Orthodox faith can be recognized as approaching a decisive denouement. The fall of the monasteries, which has already taken place, is inevitable. One special mercy of God can stop a moral, all-destroying epidemic, stop it for a while, because it is necessary to fulfill what is predicted by Scripture. Letter 554. On the situation of the Church The situation of the Church and Christianity is most sad, sad everywhere. What was predicted in Scripture is coming true: a cooling of the faith has come over our people and all the countries in which Orthodoxy has hitherto clung. It was preserved in particular purity in Moldova, Wallachia, and Serbia. [...] Thank God that “Ascetic Experiences” was published. They contain great help for those who want to truly pray and truly struggle. Letter 555. Regarding the slanderous article of the Odessa Vestnik, in which P. A. B. was unfairly accused of dishonest actions The temptation that befell You is nothing more than a temptation that, by the grace of God, passes by. This temptation testifies to the path You have chosen. The practice of patience has its own measures and degrees. The perfect ones maintain complete silence when faced with accusations, corresponding to the degree of their self-sacrifice and suffer all the consequences of such silence, such as, for example, St. Andrew and Simeon, holy fools for Christ's sake. This activity is not only unsuitable for you, as it exceeds your standards, but it is also extremely harmful to your soul, because you cannot stand it. For a review, make a printed review without getting excited; give your review the power of facts; Conduct the matter lawfully and with firmness, calling upon God’s help. Fight the heartfelt feelings of anger and vengeance. It is in such cases that the memory of malice is dulled by the fight against it; unaffected by anything, it remains to live in the heart unnoticed. The purification of Your name is necessary for You and for Your son, according to your position as pious laymen. And the Apostle Paul asked for trial and appeal from Caesar. Calm down, my Father, the Lord will not leave you. May God's blessing rest upon You. Letter 556: Warning Against False Prophets Hume cannot be trusted. Such gentlemen sometimes speak and predict successfully for the purpose of gaining the trust of people and, all the more likely, harming them. This is what St. Anthony the Great instructs. God changed his definitions, announced and through the holy Prophets, such as the prophecy of the prophet Jonah about the Ninevites, Elijah about Ahab (1 Kings 21:29), Isaiah about Hezekiah (2 Kings 20:1-11); the more convenient it is for the prediction of the false prophets not to come true, even if it had any basis. He who has surrendered himself and everything to the will of God does not need to know anything in advance. May the will and mercy of God be upon us all. Letter 557. On measures to correct monasteries and on the general decline of morality in Christian society May the merciful Lord cover the remnant of those who believe in Him! But this remainder is meager; it becomes poorer and poorer. N. Ya. Sh. could not pacify himself and finally left the monastery. I did not consider myself to have the right to restrain him by persuasion: it would be against my conscience; and advised him to enter into a legal marriage and live piously in the world. Monasteries are attacked from the outside, but they have also decayed within themselves. [...] The Patriarch of Constantinople answered very correctly to the Lutherans who informed him of their actions: “You did well in rejecting the errors of the papists, but you did badly in replacing these errors with your own errors: You should have turned to the tradition of the universal primacy of the Church.” The same can be said about monasteries: to correct deviations, one must return to the rules of the Holy Fathers. The defenders of monasticism from the host of Philaret will not want to do this; they need to maintain many evasions to protect their benefits. And therefore sophistry is generated on both sides. There will be no result for the work of God, except perhaps that through this measure the Lord will tolerate a few more times of our weakness, our relaxation, our sinfulness. And for this – thank God. In "Home" Conversation” for 1865, in the 50th issue there was an article “The New Missionary Society of Russia”. I read it deliberately in order to become familiar with the spirit of the modern activities of the Synod. A fiery jealousy is visible, which we cannot keep up with, and therefore we must be very careful and pious. Now Matthew came to me and confessed that he had brought my letters back here with him and burned them in the oven. This is the general state of morality in Christian society. What can be demanded from monasteries when the world brings them corrupt people, when they are surrounded by immorality everywhere, when immorality oppresses them from above? An ulcer that is healed by death alone. Letter 558. About the writings of Bishop Ignatius The information I receive about how the “Experiments” are received by individuals truly seeking salvation greatly consoles me. “Ascetic Sermon” and “Advice” add to the edifying reading, giving readers a decidedly Orthodox direction. It becomes clear that these books are distributed and placed between the mentioned individuals. From Bezhetsk they write: “Experiments” were received with great love, this book replaces the “Philokalia” for us, being much more understandable than the “Philokalia” and containing everything that is said in the “Philokalia”. This view is very correct, and on it I base my opinion that the book will be established. They will read and re-read it to nourish, verify and support their asceticism. Now it turns out to be very important to publish the 3rd and 4th volumes, which explain asceticism even more satisfactorily, more precisely. Letter 559. About the chief prosecutor's power On the 24th I received both Your letters: I thank You from the bottom of my heart for Your feat. Glory to God, who pours out his mercies on me. Towards the end of my life, when I essentially need peace, when my nerves can no longer withstand shocks, when I need to prepare for the transition to eternity in a peaceful mood of my soul, the Chief Prosecutor came for the first time to express sympathy for me. The Count will be located, the members of the Synod will be located. What a time! To maintain the Church, it is necessary for a secular person to be at the head of the administration, because the overwhelming salt can only be trampled underfoot by people. However, St. Athanasius the Great says that one of the signs of the approaching coming of the Antichrist will be the transfer of church government from the hands of archpastors to the hands of secular dignitaries. The sign is very true! This cannot happen otherwise than when the clergy loses its essential spiritual meaning, its energy generated by a decisive renunciation from the world. The Count rightly noted that the bureaucracy has destroyed the essential significance of the Hierarchy in the Church, the connection between the shepherds and the flock has been destroyed, and the love of peace, the insatiable desire for vain honors, for the accumulation of capital has destroyed Christians in the shepherds, leaving in them only despicable, hated policemen due to their hatred of the people, abuse and immorality. Letter 560. About the death of Hierodeacon Nicodemus and the decline of the monasteries Hierodeacon Nikodim, a precious man for the monastery and in the prime of his life, has passed away. Guts intertwined, then Antonov fire followed. During our time, not a single trustworthy person entered here, but from the previous brotherhood, Nicodemus came closer than all the others and had the disposition to serve the monastery. Be the will of God! But in my opinion, everything in the monasteries, even the most comfortable ones, is heading towards decline. The essence of the matter is that trustworthy and capable people are becoming extremely rare. Naturally: the devil sees this and attacks from the outside. I wrote to Sukharev via this mail. Sent him a copy of “Experiments” from Moscow. A book can leave a decisive stamp on new soil, which has been stirred by sorrow. Letter 561. On the situation of the Church and other issues May the will of God and the mercy of God be over all of you! The mercy of God and the Providence of God can grant a way of salvation to those Christians who wish to be truly saved, and do not strive for earthly prosperity, hiding behind the guise of piety. The servants and supreme servants of the word remain without a word and are happy to hide under the cover of the word, which has the exclusive nature of private protection in a private matter. Judging by the spirit of the times and the ferment of minds, it must be assumed that the building of the Church, which has been shaking for a long time, will shake terribly and quickly. There is no one to stop and resist. The measures of support being taken are borrowed from the elements of the world, hostile to the Church, and are more likely to accelerate its fall than to stop it. I will say again: God’s will be done! What they sow, so shall they reap! What they sow is what they reap! The latter can be said about spiritual journals and about the teaching of the law of God by the Malovs and the brethren. Letter 562. Temporary life is needed to prepare for eternity and other issues Thank you for remembering my 59th birthday! Lived enough; There is very little time left to live, judging by the ever-increasing exhaustion of strength. On the 12th and 13th I went to Church; looked at the brethren and rejoiced at God’s mercy towards us at the time in which we live. Everything is moving very quickly. Be the will of God! Take the trouble to convey my most ardent bow to S.I. I hope in the mercy of God that she will recover. She needs life for the same reason I need it - to prepare for eternity. Despite all the difficulties of our time, the almighty right hand of God does not abandon those people who have placed their trust in God to serve Him to the best of their ability. Letter 563. Regarding attacks on monasteries In “A Conversation between a Layman and a Monk,” it is foretold that touching the monasteries in the way that the newspapers preach will lead to the final destruction of the monasteries, which were already destroyed when their estates were taken away a hundred years before. In general, there is no one to build monasteries. The monk must arrange it. What should I say to the monk? There is nothing and no one. Some monasteries must be fenced off due to some special request, as happened over a hundred years. Letter 564. About the fall of monasticism [...] I look with heartfelt regret at the inevitable fall of monasticism, which serves as a sign of the fall of Christianity. Who comes to the monastery? People are from the lower class almost exclusively; almost all those who come have already lost their morality in the midst of the world. There are no conditions among the people themselves for the existence of monasticism to last; so in a dried tree there are no conditions for it to produce leaves and fruit! Moreover, storms from outside are intensifying to tear it off the face of the earth. Due to the direction accepted by the highest strata of society, and due to the poverty of the alms sent, do not bother printing invitations in the statements. The Sarov desert received the “Experiments” with special love. From M.D.’s letter you will see how “Ask. Experiments" in the Sarov desert and what significance is given to them there. This shows the importance that volumes 3 and 4 should have. The 4th volume depicts monastic life with certainty, and the first three volumes serve as a kind of shading of the picture. The Finger of God acts here, benefiting all those participating in both the publication and reading of the “Experiments.” I will take the trouble to tell S.I.S. that the best article about monasticism, about the benefits brought by monasticism to Christianity and humanity, is placed in the “Dictionnaire de theologie” volume 5 articlë Moine, Monasteres etat Monastique. The author shows what harm European sovereigns caused to states by destroying monasteries, in the assumption that by this measure they would enrich the state. In the manual “Conversation between a monk and a layman” in “Ascetic. Experience”, where the spiritual side of monasticism is more clearly analyzed, the mentioned article by Bergier can have the best effect on modern society, on a frivolous, ill-informed society. Bergier wrote on the eve of the coup in France. We must also look at the articles in the same lexicon; Anachorete, celibat, etc. They are indicated in the main article. We successfully used extracts from this article after 1825. The opponents of monasticism gave in. Letter 566. About the illness of Bishop Ignatius and the difficulties of that time, the purpose of his relations with other people I had Kuehne, a doctor I had never met before. He found scrofula and colds to be my secondary illness, but the main one, from which a general disorder occurs, damage to the heart, which he positively proved by feeling the sore spots and talking about such attacks that I did not tell him about. Initially, he prescribed a wash made from water and Carlsbad salt, which should be dissolved in a glass of water and drunk as one drinks mineral water. He recognized the disease as incurable, very similar in consequences to consumption, but acting very slowly, which is why, provided there is complete calm, he believes that life can last a long time. He considered service impossible for me, as well as any other quick and strenuous movement and activity; Especially harmful are mental shocks, from which the illness arose. The bishops of Kostroma and Nizhny Novgorod were given vicars, mainly for the conversion of schismatics. God grant that the well-meaning count will at least somewhat slow down the terrible spread of depravity and unbelief among the people. Evil is easily grafted and grafted onto humanity, and only God can heal humanity from evil. Take the trouble to convey to A.V. my zealous bow and my wretched blessing. I wish her courage and patience in the sorrows that befall her. In my relationships I try to convey spiritual and moral concepts drawn from the teachings of the Orthodox Church, but I do not touch upon external affairs or touch them very superficially. Letter 567. To friend Schemamonk Mikhail (Chikhachev): About his stay in the Semigorodskaya hermitage, the impossibility of coming to him at the moment, the poverty of the monastery, advice to be a subject of edification for others, and not of temptation Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us. Dearest Mikhail Vasilievich in Christ! I received your letter, sent with the brother of Nikolai Ivanovich Vedeneev, while in Vologda on the way from Pokrovsky to Korbanka - the village of Dimitri Ivanovich Samarin. I didn’t answer this for a long time: because I didn’t want to write from the world, but from the monastery. In the twenties of August I left Korbanka and now live in the Semigorodnaya Hermitage in the abbot’s cells. Thank God, I’m quite healthy, but I often end up in extreme relaxation. You can’t go to me right away, that is, this very minute, but when I see that the hour is approaching, what should I send you? – money for the journey and how much, – or horses? - Consult and write. In our home they are getting married and trespassing. Peter goes on vacation for six months. I could write to you a lot, but I don’t want to make you too happy ahead of time and maybe for nothing. To those interested in the local desert, tell me this: there is never fresh fish and fish soup in the meal, tea and sugar are not given to anyone at all; and on Sundays the abbot calls the brethren to him, gives four cups of tea to the monks, and two cups of tea to the novices. Clothing is very scanty and in general the ground is very rocky. You, as a prudent and prudent person, derive for yourself some useful result from your stay in Novoezersky (for it is not easy) and draw up some God-loving plan for a good life, so that you can be an object of edification for your neighbors, and not an object of temptation - especially since here they will look at you much more closely than they have looked at you anywhere before. Do you understand my words? - I think they are clear. Forgive and pray to the merciful God for the great sinner Demetrius. [...] My benefactor Fr. Don't forget Sergius. Also Father Nifont, Ignatius, Feldvebel, Nik. Ivanovich, etc. Letter 568. About alms for the soul ...Property is tempting: it is rare that a person can resist the temptation it produces. Show the old man in the “Word to the Shepherd” of St. John the Climacus the place where this saint says that alms given to souls is as much higher than alms given to bodies as the soul is higher than the body. Our invisible enemies will try in every possible way to steal such alms, or the intention to perform such alms, which can open the way for the old man through ordeals and bring about a blessed death and eternity, either by instilling in the old man himself plausible thoughts that delay him from actually fulfilling his plans, or by acting through people. We must notice this and beware, contrasting the thoughts of demons and human speech, which delay from fulfillment, with the above-mentioned saying of Scripture, which is precisely said as a precaution against evil thoughts brought by the devil, teaching to delay the intended good in order to completely steal it from a person. Letter 569. On the necessity of sorrows for salvation ...I read the letter sent to O.I. and was glad that during your illness the thought of death came to you and that you understood the danger of your illness. The memory of death does not bring one closer to death, but only prepares one for it, disposing one to repentance. Your wound and the pain from it is a fatherly punishment from God, who loves him and punishes him. I spent my whole life in illnesses and sorrows, as you know: but now, if there are no sorrows, there is nothing to save yourself. There are no exploits, no true monasticism, no leaders: only sorrows replace everything. The feat is associated with vanity: vanity is difficult to notice in oneself, much less to cleanse oneself of it; grief is alien to vanity, and therefore provides a person with a godly involuntary feat, which is sent by our Provider in accordance with his will... At my age and with my sickness, I need to seek repentance, and not before earthly lordships. Everything will come in its own way into the darkness of the grave of oblivion: only service to God and repentance before Him will have eternal value. It seems a big war is brewing on earth; but the struggle with passions and lusts is completely abandoned. The general weakening in faith is very noticeable. Be comforted! May the Lord comfort you and cover you with His mercy. Letter 570. About bodily illnesses God bless you for your letter of August 14th. We live very calmly and quietly. O. Alexander (formerly Andryusha), according to the consciousness of all doctors, is hopeless in relation to recovery. But this does not upset us! We rely on the will of God, we often talk about salvation and death, reasoning that it is much better for a young person to die with repentance and with proper preparation than for an old person without repentance and without preparation. Now temptations have multiplied to such an extent, even in the depths of the holy monasteries, that everyone who wants to be saved is overwhelmed by fear and bewilderment due to the many machinations of the enemy: such a death as God will give. Alexandra, I must acknowledge the special mercy of God... Now it’s your turn to get sick. Get sick, father, with patience and self-reproach; illness is a teacher of many good things; Moreover, she is God’s message in return and replenishment of our insufficient exploits. Letter 571. About the need to rely on the will of God and thank God for everything I thank you for your letter of September 1 and sincerely wish that your health gets better; I know from my own experience that a sick person is not a servant to himself or others. Health is easy to lose, but difficult to regain. Having been treated here for two seasons, I am only now beginning to feel significant relief after a long rash, and that relief, not recovery. My health was ruined in childhood by secretive scrofula, which was not understood and therefore not treated, and then by a cold. Thank God for everything! for me, illness was like chains that curbed the ardor of my character and build; it hindered activity, and at the same time prevented the greater development of pride, which often develops from successful activity. Glory to God, our Provider for everything. I know about the intention to submit a request to the king of one of the locals... it is difficult for such a request to succeed. Yes, even if she had some success, then I rely on the will of God, which often arranges salvation for a person through various opposites, about which I should think and think about in my years. Be the will of God, and for everything that happens, glory to God. Father Alexander is very weak, but he is in good spirits and talks with me every day about death and the need for a person to surrender to the will of God. Letter 572. On the glorification of God by man Thank you for the information about the consecration of the church of St. Sergius, which gave me great comfort. May the name of God be glorified on earth by the poor creation of God - man, and may this poor creature achieve the vision of the eternal glory of God in heaven. O. Alexander is melting gradually, extremely weak. I admire him as if he were a heavenly dweller; his face is angelic. Letter 573. About the relationship between the bishop. Ignatius and Schemamonk Michael The providence of God is vigilantly vigilant over the destinies of His Church and over the destinies of the world. God's will be done! You live with my closest disciple and in the monastery, which was almost founded by me: therefore, you did not move away from me and did not diverge from me. He didn’t wander off somewhere out of the fascination of a stupid fantasy, but arrived in his own place and was obedient to me as a correspondent. Leonid and Juvenaly chose their own path, rejecting the offer that was made to them. May God give them all the best! you can and should wish them all the best, but it is impossible to interfere with any of your proposals or advice. May the Lord grant everyone everything for temporary and eternal benefit! Letter 574. On the proper attitude towards bodily illnesses The destinies of God help those who have a sincere, albeit weak, intention to be saved. You know how early illnesses were sent to me, which gradually took away the possibility of achievement and destroyed the ability to study. I see that my sickness is a gift from God: it curbed me, and, depriving me of temporary prosperity, attracted the eternal mercy of God to me. Now it's time for you to get sick too. I rejoice that you are enduring your illness properly, repeating the words of the thief who was crucified at the right hand of the Lord and received entry into heaven for his consciousness. Your illness is a God-given penance. May the merciful Lord grant you to endure penance with thanksgiving to God... Both from illness and from treatment, I am so weak that I should go to some monastery for rest, i.e. with the management of the monastery. Send me a book where Russian monasteries are described, and collect what information you can about the Zadonsk and Kolyazin monasteries. The latter would be more convenient: as less visited by the nobility. However: these are human thoughts, and God knows what he does with his creatures. Take the trouble to convey my regards to P.P.-chu and tell him that it’s time to stop being angry with me and forgive me. Give my regards to all the brethren. Letter 575. About the vicissitudes of earthly life God bless you for all your love for me, a sinner. For everything, thank God! – We do not begin to live, but end our earthly life. We have seen enough of everything earthly: it seems that we need to learn and firmly know that everything earthly is wrong, that every sorrow and joy of earthly moments, like a deceptive dream, passes away and does not return. Letter 576. About bodily illnesses and Chikhachev’s intention to take monastic vows Your illness must be recognized as the mercy of God. The All-Good Lord, with His fatherly punishment, complements the lack of voluntary human achievement. You write that Fr. Justin is a man of rare soul. Exactly: there is a special mercy of God towards him. I must thank God that He, in His great mercy, sent me in my old age, in my extreme weakness, a man who would bear my burden in the Lord. And Callistus is very nice, he becomes respectable. The matter of tonsure into the schema must begin after the completion of the matter of treatment. Treatment greatly entertains the thoughts of those being treated, I know this from my own experience; After tonsure, a schema-monk must certainly have a thought concentrated within himself: the initial disposition of spirit, perceived after tonsure, will act for the rest of his life. Letter 577. Consolation in illness God arranged for you to get sick in your old age and sit in your cell in order to remember the sins of your youth, and bring repentance to God for them, and receive forgiveness from God. Glory to God, who arranges for our salvation through His wise destinies. From the illness that has befallen you, you should understand that God accepted your will in relation to your entry into the monastery and rewards you for your feasible service to Him in the monastery. The Apostle says that God “beats every son whom He accepts” (Heb. 12:6). And so, although beatings now occur, they are a sign of acceptance, and should be accepted with joy and thanksgiving. From thanksgiving comes patience; from patience comes the hope of salvation. Letter 578. About preparation for eternal life Thank you for the notification about the deceased Bishop and about the departing one. Such news is instructive: we also have a path to the same place. We need to get ready. And the Lord prepares with his destinies those who prepare themselves according to their strength. Letter 579. Regarding the notification of the death of Metropolitan Gregory and the impossibility of Fr. Mikhail to come to the Caucasus God bless you for notifying me of the death of Metropolitan Gregory. Although this is sad news, the destinies of God are unsearchable, and we must submit to them. May God grant you to live safely under the decree. I myself found your trip here unnecessary. We are not worldly people! I would only have enough time to talk to you for five minutes. It is much better to pay attention to yourself, without leaving the space given by God for salvation. The hour of calling into eternity is unknown for each of us, but it will certainly happen, and for the most part it creeps up like a thief in the night. Letter 580. About the acquisition of the village of repentance I recently came across the will of St. Tikhon of Voronezh. In this testament, among many thanksgivings, the righteous man gives thanks to God for having given him, before his death, the village of repentance, in which the precious pearl of salvation is hidden. But in order to buy a village of repentance, according to the instructions of the Gospel, one must sell all one’s property, that is, sacrifice one’s prominent earthly position, which leads to distraction, and all earthly pleasant relationships, which entertain the heart and prevent one from deepening into repentance. In this disposition of our souls, we will surrender ourselves, each other and our entire life to Christ our God. Letter 581. On the acquisition of repentance I pray to God to grant me a path of repentance. In my opinion: I have not yet begun repentance, and I fully share the opinion of the Monk Isaiah the Hermit, expressed by him in a letter to his disciple, Abba Peter, that as long as a person is in entertainment and care, he cannot achieve repentance. Letter 582. About earthly well-being and earthly sorrows, about publishing one’s own works, etc. The Lord shows His mercy to His servants not in earthly prosperity, but in earthly sorrows. This idea is expressed very comfortingly in the life of the Great Martyr Eustathius Placidas: it says that if the Lord gives earthly prosperity to his servants, it will be for a short time, so that they do not become spoiled. Constant well-being spoils the heart. Given the current changes, I can expect that they will offer me rest: I must consider this as the great mercy of God, giving me time for thorough repentance. Forgive me to A.S. for not starting correspondence with them, although I retain all my former love. I have completely stopped correspondence with everyone, and write only when absolutely necessary. At my age and with the weakness of my health, I have no time for correspondence or earthly thoughts, but rather remember death more often and bring repentance to God until the field of repentance is taken away. Regarding my writings, tell Fr. Archimandrite, that I do not want them to be published now, for many reasons, among other things, because I am correcting and adding to them. So the “Rules for the outward behavior of beginners” have been corrected and the other half, five times larger than the first, has been added to them, about spiritual work for beginners. I corrected the “Tale of Death” and sent it to the Moscow Metropolitan with a request for permission to publish it as an experience of my ascetic labors. What will happen? Don't know! – If God wills, then I would like to publish a collection of my works, having revised them carefully and published them under my own supervision. If this does not please God, then the corrected manuscript may remain after my death to the one into whose hands God will bring it, and may be printed, or even unprinted it may serve someone for spiritual benefit. U o. Archimandrite has a photograph of many of my writings in memory of me, a sinner, and in memory of the fact that, although I myself knew little, I communicated what I knew to the brethren for the common salvation. Why do I ask and pray about. Archimandrite should not publish my works either in their entirety, or in extracts, or in altered form. Elder Isaiah used to tell me: don’t write! not for anyone! Letter 583. About the splendor of the Sergius Hermitage and his life in the Caucasus This is already the truth, said in the Holy Scriptures, that every person blossoms for earthly life for a short time! You look: it will bloom, bloom, and then fade. And the hero Prince. O. leaves. Hieroschemamonk Macarius Ivanov, a famous elder, died in Optina on September 7: he constantly corresponded with me from the time I was in the Caucasus. Tell Sh-vu that I sincerely rejoice at the monastery he erected for monks; for this, in all likelihood, he will find in that life the eternal abode prepared by God. The words of Christ cannot remain without fulfillment: “Measure accordingly, and it will be measured back to you” (Matthew 7:2). I believe that on the 25th the Metropolitan was with you in the desert: I sincerely wish that he would allow Fr. to live. Ignatius and the brethren in the monastery which they entered when it was in ruins, and when, by the grace of God, it turned into a most magnificent monastery with such beautiful buildings as are not found in any other monastery. God judges decency and good morals. But in this respect, Sergius Hermitage is far superior to many other monasteries, even those famous for their holiness. However, God's will be done! if any temptation follows Ignatyushka, it will serve as a sign of God’s special favor. I lead a very solitary life. I cannot sufficiently thank God for taking me out of the St. Petersburg whirlpool: it seems that I was deliberately put there in order to see up close all the vanity of the world, to know its deceptive charm, and to finally hate it... Glory to God, who gives time for repentance and to become familiar with the future before entering the future. Letter 584. About the death of Fr. Macarius of Optina I received your letter dated October 31, and rejoiced at the news that the new metropolitan has favored the Sergius Hermitage and its abbot; I sincerely wish that this disposition will be strengthened for the good of the monastery, for the peace and salvation of those living in it, and for the saint himself, who for the first time in his life is dealing with monastics who understand monasticism. It is very easy to push monks away from you and disperse them, but to gather and form them is very difficult, even impossible without a special gift from God. Fr. Archimandrite Moses informed me about the death of the elder Hieroschemamonk Macarius and asked for a brochure of the work of Fr. Leonid Kavelin. Optina lost her soul. Father Macarius, although he was the most physical fulfiller of the commandments, had love for his neighbor and supported brotherhood with it. He is irreplaceable in my opinion and view!... St. Isaac of Syria said that physical activity without spiritual activity cannot approach the mind of God, but is very capable of conveying an opinion about oneself... Monasticism has become impoverished, and should become even more impoverished. Let him save his soul. My deepest bow to all the brethren. November 15, 1860 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 585. Caring for the Sick I feel sorry for the ladies who got married abroad. Such a century! it tastes so good! such pledges! I am very sorry about the former K.E. I love their whole family so much that their pleasantries and troubles touch me vividly. Letter 586. Wish of Fr. Michael to take on the angelic form, and end his life in solitude I earnestly wish you to accept the holy angelic image for the salvation of your soul and final renunciation from the world. Regarding myself, I will tell you directly that I do not want any visible place for myself, and I am not able, due to illness and exhaustion from illness, to serve in prominent places, but I sincerely wish to end my days somewhere in solitude and obscurity in self-attention and repentance. Letter 587. About one’s own sinfulness, about the deceitfulness of earthly well-being and about other subjects God bless you for everything, and for your testimony about me that I was exhausted from a long illness. This is absolutely true. I forgot my whole sinful life; write what you know and want, but all I know and remember is that my life was and is a chain of sins. Rightly, the Holy Fathers call earthly life deceptive, and happiness, which does not remain a person’s property for eternity, self-delusion. How many examples of earthly contentment and greatness crumbling before our eyes! And now a living example of K.O. - He is both rich and famous, but in his mind he is in a childish state, and therefore both fame and wealth constitute a situation devoid of almost any meaning, which death will completely take away. Great is God’s mercy for us, which brought us to the monastery. This is a blessing above all earthly blessings. There are serious rumors about me here that they will transfer me. Well? The whole earth belongs equally to God, and I surrender myself entirely to His will and guidance. God often arranges for those who have entrusted themselves to Him a spiritually beneficial situation, under circumstances that are contrary to them. Tikhon of Voronezh was accused of excessive ardor; Because of such an accusation, he had to retire to a monastery, where he was honored with the special mercy of God. In his dying will, the Saint brings special gratitude to God for the fact that he was granted to prepare for the transition to eternity through thorough repentance. This is what is considered a spiritual husband to be a blessing from God: expulsion from the pulpit and a humble stay in the monastery. The most correct judgment! Take the trouble to convey my most ardent bow to Father Archimandrite and all the brethren. Be healthy and prosperous. Pray for me. January 30, 1861 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 588. On the need to surrender oneself to the will of God God bless you for your letter of January 31st. St. John Chrysostom and other holy Fathers, when starting to talk about something, always tried to start with the following words: “God's will be over us all! Glory to God for everything that happens, even if what happens is difficult and bitter.” God is both abundantly merciful in His benefits and abundantly merciful in His punishments. It is up to every Christian to understand and acknowledge this truth. It often happens that, according to God’s will, something material and temporary is taken away, and in its place something moral and spiritual, eternal, is given. And people attached to matter and temporary life grieve, not realizing that they are being elevated to priceless, highest goods. Surrendering oneself to the will of God brings peace and consolation to the heart in all sorrows. I say this from my frequent experiences; but I am sure that the experiences of every person will confirm the same if he tunes himself in the spirit of the Holy Fathers. Rumors about my movement here continue; but don’t talk about them for idle talk and with everyone. Having heard about the death of Metropolitan Gregory, I realized that I had to receive another appointment, because with a change in the highest power there is usually a significant change in administrative plans. February 16, 1861 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 589. About my pain I find the appointment of the Right Reverend Leonidas to consecrate the church in Paris very reasonable, and I find the desire of some that I be used for this to be completely unfounded; I thank you for the love. I was very old, I had lost my physical strength and mental faculties, I came here half-dead, not realizing that I was terribly ill. Treatment on the waters revealed the full importance of my illness, which was even accompanied by a nervous disorder. Now, although I feel some relief, I am not so relieved that I should appear in prominent positions for which I do not have the slightest sympathy. The share of Pr Tikhon of Voronezh is a share worthy of sympathy and competition! Letter 590. About one’s own desire for solitude ...I, seeing that my days were slipping away like a shadow, and my strength was weakening extremely, moreover, having a long-standing desire to end my days in solitude, I submitted a petition to the Holy Synod to dismiss me from the management of the diocese and to give me the management of the cenobitic Babayevsky Monastery of Bonfire. diocese. Having done this, I felt in my soul a special feeling of calm and even quiet joy, as if I had fulfilled my duty. It is not in my direction to live in prominent places and occupy prominent positions. And now - and not with my strength and health. If you waver from double-mindedness and put off the good intention of leaving for repentance day after day, to which the enemy of our salvation attracts with flattery, under various plausible pretexts, then you can spend your entire earthly life in such double-mindedness and indecision and be caught by death in unpreparedness. Babayki is a secluded place, little visited, especially not visited at all in winter, dry and healthy, next to the Volga River. If God grants me this shelter, then it can become a shelter for many who truly want salvation away from the noisy world. Ask from me about. Arch. I., so that he would talk about me to the Metropolitan, and if not directly, then through the Most Reverend Vicar. The reason is that many learned monks have the most wrong idea about me, judging by themselves. The Monk Isaiah the Hermit said: “Just as a canvas retains the mark of the paint with which it was painted for the first time, no matter how many times it is repainted, so a monk retains within himself for the rest of his life the imprint of the direction that he initially received when entering the monastery.” Perfect truth! I see this in myself and in others. Academic monks, entering monasticism for the purpose of serving the Church in academic and administrative relations, retain this direction, and the newly-minted Pleasant of God, Saint Tikhon, having left the episcopal see, was at first bored in monastic solitude, being deprived of administrative activities. The same thing was noticed in others. I, on the contrary, having spent the beginning of my monasticism in the most secluded monasteries and imbued with the concepts of the strictest asceticism, maintained this direction in the Sergius Hermitage, so that in my living room I was a representative archimandrite, and in my study a hermit. Here the same thing continues, only to a greater extent: I have become so close to the cell that I can hardly force myself to go out into the garden in order to provide myself with the solitude necessary for my health. Many people do not suspect this direction of mine, and therefore they compose a direction for me that is completely alien to me, which is what the late Metropolitan Gregory wrote to me. Having satisfied my request, they will deliver double payment: 1) they will not only reassure me, they will benefit me by providing me with a residence that suits my direction; 2) will reassure those who see in me various plans that are dangerous or unpleasant for them. And the second point is very important to me. The Venerable Pimen the Great said: “Do not live in places where your residence brings confusion to your neighbors, otherwise you too will be deprived of spiritual fruit for the sole reason that your residence brings confusion to your neighbors.” In addition to the request in the Synod, I also wrote letters of petition to the Metropolitans of Moscow and St. Petersburg and the Chief Prosecutor. The request was sent on July 24th, so we need to hurry up with the negotiations. July 31, 1861 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 591. About your mental and physical state upon receiving the news of your dismissal God bless you for your letter of August 8th and the notification. I have already received a formal notification from the Chief Prosecutor on Monday, August 21st. A special feeling of joy and tranquility fills me, and the depletion of bodily strength is extraordinary. By October 1st, take the trouble to write to me at the Nikolo-Babaevsky Monastery, in Nerekhta. Letter 592. About the Nikolo-Babaevsky Monastery Arriving on October 14 at the Desert Monastery of St. Nicholas, Babaevskaya, I found there your letter dated September 29. I made the journey with difficulty due to the weakness of my body, exhausted by illness, and in Moscow I fell seriously ill. He left Moscow sick and came here sick, despite the fact that 120 leeches were applied to his sick leg in Moscow. The Babaevsky Monastery is a semi-staff, communal construction building. For their many merits, abbots are elevated to abbot and, occasionally, to archimandrite. There are 36 monastic vacancies, but only 18 monks are present. The monastery is in decline both morally and materially; located on a very healthy and quite pleasant area, very convenient for monastic life. The future of the monastery is in the power of God. Never in my life have I been so pleased with my position as I am now. It seems my Guardian Angel, by command of God, dictated to St. The Synod has a decree about me - so this decree satisfies the requirements of my mental mood and physical health. The Emperor, being in the Caucasus, sent me an order. If to 1000 rubles. pensions have been increased by another 500, then I no longer know what to say about such an abundance of favors. My address is in Yaroslavl... October 18, 1861 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 593. About his life in the Babaevsky monastery I can’t get enough of my current situation. After much suffering in the stormy sea of ​​life, God brought me to a quiet refuge. Everything worked out just fine. Even before my arrival, the local abbot applied for another abbot’s position, and therefore it is natural that Justin took his place to the general pleasure of the brotherhood, of which there are more than 80 people. The monastery is especially convenient for monastic life in all respects! The air and water are healthy. Letter 594. Expression of complete satisfaction with life in the Babaevsky Monastery and about his health I am very pleased with what they gave me; I thought they would give me nothing at all. When what is given is enough, then it is not in accordance with the monastic conscience to bother about more. If we hold back anything here, we will meet it multiplied in the next century. The time has come when it is most necessary to think about eternity: the years have passed, health and strength have left. You won't see how death will creep up. I am very pleased with the place: the most secluded! no one bothers. I cannot expect recovery: because I am very exhausted from both illness and treatment. Will some special miracle follow according to the Providence of God? One should not flatter oneself with the assumption of a long earthly life, or rather, by frequently remembering death, try to make it less terrible at the hour of its arrival. Mineral waters strongly drove away colds and scrofula from me: this continues even now, always keeps me in a difficult situation, and at times leads to very difficult ones. For everything, thank God! While passing through Moscow, I looked at those who had achieved earthly success. There is nothing enviable; on the contrary, much seemed worthy of regret. Letter 595. About your health I am, as usual, ill; I’ve only been to church 4 times, I’m sitting hopelessly in my cell; I never took a walk, either on foot or in a carriage. Letter 596. About my position In general, I am very pleased with everything, and what is missing, I hope the merciful Lord will arrange for a sinner for me. Take the trouble to convey my letters to Chernyavsky and Rudavsky. It doesn’t matter that these children remembered me, the important thing is that they remembered themselves; without the latter, the first would not have happened. February 26, 1862 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 597. The desire to see your friends with spiritual eyes and thanksgiving to God for life in the Babaevsky monastery God bless you for your letter and for the complacency with which you endure what you find. Everything passes by, both good and bad, but neither humans nor demons can do what God does not allow. If you encounter difficulty in getting a vacation, then it’s better not to start, especially since there is no extreme in the trip. In particular, Fr. The archimandrite must be careful both for himself and for the monastery. I do not at all want to see you with sensual eyes, but I want to see you with spiritual eyes in pious prosperity, in living in the fear of God. This is enough for me. Today, for the 4th time during the winter, I left my cell for church. Thank God for everything! In 1856, it seems, I renewed my acquaintance with the Optinskys precisely for this purpose, in order to diverge even more from them. God's providence also delivered me from Juvenal, who would not have borne my infirmities. Now I'm in my circle! among the brethren who bear my infirmities. I got along very well with Fr. Feofan, the former Nikiforovsky, who is little by little aging here. And the old Babayevsky brotherhood, simple, with a deserted direction, suits me, an old man. The monastery is secluded, especially in winter. Glory to God, who gave me peace after a long period of distress. Health is very weak. And for that thank God! March 10, 1862 Bishop Ignatius Letter 598. About earthly and future life May the merciful Lord grant you patience, which appears in the soul when we surrender ourselves to the will of God, and thank God for the sorrow sent to cleanse our sins. Well said St. Martyr Tivortius about earthly life (Cheti - Menaion November 22) “seems to be and not to be.” Exactly! It’s as if she’s before your eyes and in your hands, but everything is slipping away. About the future life, Tivortius said: “it seems not to be, but it is.” Exactly, when we live here, it seems that we will always stay here; the future life seems non-existent. But no! you won’t see how it will come, but it will certainly come. Blessed are those whom God prepares for eternity through illnesses and other sorrows, who, out of the midst of their sorrows, confess to God. “What is worthy of our deeds is acceptable! Remember us, Lord, in Your Kingdom!” (Luke 23:41–42). My arms and legs hurt, my right leg hurts especially; I have a very bad headache, but the main pain is in the left side, along the entire lower part of the chest and ribs even to the left shoulder, especially near the heart. In this place, from time to time I feel pain, as if from a spear ulcer, which makes me extremely exhausted, and I feel like I’m dying. God bless you for announcing the death of Sheremetyev. The Lord visited him with a serious illness. It is useful to hear about the death of acquaintances; such news reminds one of one’s own death. How suddenly, without any particular apparent reason, the freshest blood and flesh conceive the germ of death in and out of themselves! This embryo begins to develop, and suddenly develops into an incurable disease that puts a person in a coffin. April 22, 1862 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 599. About the sorrows that befell the capital, and about his trip to Kostroma and Yaroslavl And news of the sorrows that befell the capital reaches here. It's a pity, it's a pity. People have multiplied, neglecting the law of God and not stopping to plunge their neighbors into troubles and misfortunes. It's a pity and oh. Heraclius, who decided to raise his voice against his brethren. May the merciful Lord block the sources of temptation if we become weak. The other day I went to Yaroslavl and Kostroma to visit the saints there and was received very favorably - I greeted everyone and said goodbye to everyone, saying that I had the intention not to leave the monastery, which was required by extreme health problems and the corresponding spiritual mood. The trip was a difficult feat for me. Letter 600. About the death of his loved ones, a secluded monastery, the inability to work with his superiors due to poor health Currently I live in the cells of Fr. Abbot, because they provide me with the necessary comfort according to my health, which is very bad. Here we received news of the death of our neighbor and my good friend N.P. Polozov. Almost everyone close to me has moved into eternity; my turn has come or will come. Here, since June, the weather has been good, it rains, but there is no dirt around the monastery; bread and herbs are good. The monastery has almost no visitors; In summer the privacy is almost the same as in winter. Commoners visit the monastery in significant numbers, but they come to the Divine service, and after it go to their villages or to an inn, without disturbing the brethren with whimsical demands. To A. I wrote a formal statement that I have no opportunity to deal with the subordinates whom Gr. decided to send to me. T., due to the complete breakdown of my health. This is quite fair! and now I feel a terrible pain in my left side: apparently, a severe aneurysm has formed, which requires being in complete peace and solitude. It is clear: the time has come to start correcting ourselves, and not others, and preparing for the transition to eternity. June 27, 1863 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 601. About the special character of one’s own writings and the reasons for this Regarding my works, you know that I wrote them for myself and for short, few acquaintances of mine, out of the mood received and assimilated by monastic life. It is not surprising that this mood in some shades seems to be separated from the mood of pious monks, even saints, but who borrowed their mood from theological schools. As an example, I will point to the excellent works of St. Tikhon of Voronezh in all respects. My writings, despite their many shortcomings in spiritual and academic terms, are of a different nature. I believe it is necessary to preserve this character, and not reshape them to the Academic model; otherwise, leave them unpublished, especially since they were not written for this purpose and I myself consider them unworthy. Here, in solitude, looking back at my past life and strengthened by repentance to weaken the power of my sins, I bring repentance in the written works, recognizing them as sinners before God, and their words unworthy of the subject. With all this, and for many monks, famous for their ascetic life, for example, for the Optina ones, my mood remains very unclear: for their mood was formed from an active physical life, so visible to the world and glorified by it, and mine from a retreat forced by illness and other circumstances and the mental activity and feat associated with it, invisible and incomprehensible to the world. It is this mood that manifests itself everywhere in my writings, no matter how insufficient they may be, and makes them unique. Their character matches the writings of ancient ascetics. Autumn has come; They close the windows for the winter, and I close my rooms out of necessity, not just arbitrarily. What to do? one must follow the path indicated by God's Providence. The one asking for your Holy prayers is unworthy Letter 602. The desire to die with repentance God bless you for your letter of July 6 and for your good wishes. Both I and Pyotr Alexandrovich are looking for the same thing: to end our days in repentance. This is the only thing we ask of God; We leave the development of the monastery or non-development to the all-holy will of God, which alone leads to what is useful. We are afraid of material cares and rumors, as if they distract us from caring for the soul. The Babaevsky Monastery, very secluded in winter, turns out to be very secluded in the summer. My health is very weak: I have no strength, and I have seizures of a paralytic nature. God bless you for taking care of me. About death: a person cannot choose which disease to die with: to die with the one that God sends. Saint Tikhon, the newly-minted Pleasant of God, fell ill with paralysis from a stroke. I stopped having open hemorrhoids a long time ago and from that time on I started having paralytic seizures. No matter how you die, God forbid you die with repentance. O. Gideon, hierodeacon, dies with very good preparation. July 19, 1862 Bishop Ignatius. Letter 603. About my health and gratitude for private letters My health is very weak. Most of all, my strength is completely exhausted. Changes happen not by the day, but by the hour: it will give away, then it will grab again. I cannot get enough of the calm shelter that God has given me and which suits my situation so much. God bless you, my Father, for the work you took upon yourself by writing to me quite often. Don't bother yourself so much anymore. I will be very grateful if you write occasionally or for any special need. Letter 604. About his solitude and the severity of life in the Babaevsky Monastery God bless you for your letter of January 5th. You rightly say that God gave me in His own time, known to God, something that I had long and constantly been waiting for, but for which I was not ready. “Silence,” says St. John Climacus, destroys the inexperienced.” I ask for your prayers that I may be given the wisdom to properly use the time given for repentance and preparing myself for eternity. Talk about yourself with caution. This place is not the Sergius Hermitage. The so-called talents, in which they allow themselves pride, self-will and other indulgences, are not valued here, but the preservation of the monastic direction is valued. A violator of monastic rules and deanery, no matter who he is, is certainly given a ticket to find another place. Therefore, anyone who wants to live here must first prepare for repentance, which is determined by St. John Climacus: “repentance consists in constant oppression of the belly and contrition of the spirit.” It is better not to enter here with any other preparation. The place here is secluded, conducive to self-attention and repentance; The brethren are not allowed to go to cities and villages, they do not go to a hotel without asking, and they do not accept females into their cells. I will be very glad to visit Fr. Archimandrite, but I can say in advance that I have lost the ability to give advice, even if I had it. Take the trouble to convey my zealous bow and blessing to the brethren and to the sick John Dementievich, to whom I wish to end his earthly course in repentance and hope for our only hope - the Lord Jesus Christ, our God and Redeemer. [...] Bishop Ignatius. And again I ask for your holy prayers. Letter 605. To my friend P.P. Yakovlev: About P.P.’s disposition towards himself, his ability to see his heart with a feeling, writing an essay Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! Thank you for not forgetting me. I very much feel the greatness of your disposition towards me and thank the merciful God who has given it to me (for he who has acquired the love of his neighbor has acquired a treasure). I am all the more glad and comforted by your love for me because I notice constancy in it, and that it is constantly growing. Can you believe that in my madness it seems to me that with a spiritual feeling I clearly see your heart and its sensations, and I don’t need anyone to tell me this or that about you. ABOUT! Bear with me: I’ll tell you something else. It seems to me that there is no one in the world towards whom you would feel such affection and such analysis as you feel towards me. Is there anything else that seems to be happening? It seems! But I’ll keep quiet for the time being. Nowadays I often have occasions to talk with you in absentia: for, taking advantage of solitude and freedom, I am composing a small (but not inconsiderable) essay - I want to fulfill my promise and satisfy your desire to the best of my ability. [...] Sorry about that! May God grant you all the best; pray for the great sinner Demetrius. Letter 606. About writing some kind of essay and your influence on people Dearest in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! [...] Imagine that after your departure the essay began to pour out of me, and if I had known that you were in Vologda, then it would already be in your hands. – A number of sheets have been published from the chapter of Theognostus. – Having received it, do not judge it by its appearance, but by the feeling that should appear in you after reading it: for its appearance is somewhat stern, but full of mercy. After reading it, you will see that it was not without the Providence of God that my hand was stopped for such a long time. Thank God, I feel much healthier than before. Instead of Fedosya, Pavel, whom you saw fishing, lives with me and is extremely devoted to me. When I wanted to take him, all the brothers (and Kostya) began to dissuade me, calling him a rogue, a thief, and a dissolute one; however, my heart spoke differently. And now everyone is amazed that in such a short time he has changed so much, not realizing that I am a contagious person. And Zacchaeus, the “old tax collector” from sinners, the sinner changed in one minute. “Behold, Lord,” he said to the Knower of the Heart, “I will give half of my property to the poor, and if I have offended any virtue, I will return it with fourfold repentance” (Luke 19:2–8). So it happened with my new child, and now I am very comforted by him, and I feel in myself incomparably more power over him than over Theodosius, and therefore I am thinking of abandoning this latter, especially since he himself does not want to live with me. [...] For this I remain your most sincere brother, the great sinner Dimitri. Letter 607. Notice of intention to take monastic vows and other issues Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us. Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! I most earnestly wish you health and joy in the Lord. [...] I inform you, as one who takes great part in me, that I have decided to take monastic vows, that a proposal is already being made about me to the Synod for the mantle, and the Bishop gives the Seven-City Hermitage, from which I was forced to leave due to the oppression of the Builder. I am very happy about this event, which can bring me a piece of bread, without burdening my parents and other neighbors, and for some who love me in the Lord, a calm shelter. I know that you will also rejoice at this, from your abundant love for me. However, some work is expected at first, due to the small number of well-intentioned brethren. [...] Since arriving in Vologda I have been feeling worse, and I notice from everything that the climate in Semigorodnaya is especially healthy. [...] I didn’t start adding to the essay, because my mental eye was confused due to various unfortunate circumstances and the silence of my heart turned up in waves, like the surface of water from a blowing breeze. [...] Finally, it remains for me, beloved Pavel Petrovich, to wish you all the best from the Merciful Lord and congratulate you on the upcoming Holy Pentecost. Farewell, and remember the great sinner Demetrius in your prayers. I remain forever sincerely devoted to you and pray that our love for the Lord will increase for the common good. Letter 608. A message about tonsure and ordination as a hieromonk and his experiences at the same time Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! I don’t know where to start this letter. Because I feel very guilty before you. Exactly, it’s my fault that I was so slow in responding to your most pleasant lines, which reveal your sincere and abundant kindness towards me. I will not justify myself to you - love will justify the beloved, even if he were guilty. It's done! I have been tonsured and ordained as a hieromonk. When they tonsured me: it seemed to me that I had died; when they dedicated it, it seemed that he had risen. I live some new life; very calm; no desire disturbs me; During each mass I feel that I have reached the end of my desires, I feel that I receive more than I could wish for. “I don’t want to describe to you the external circumstances that accompanied my tonsure and initiation, I assume others will tell you.” I tell everyone about myself what others know and cannot say about me: “I am happy!” The Reverend does not clearly reveal his intentions regarding me. But I am calm: I rely on the will and mercy of my Creator and God. Write to me from time to time and do not forget in holy prayers. I remain, as was your most devoted servant and unworthy Bogomolet Hieromonk Ignatius. Letter 609. A message about your reluctance to go to St. Petersburg, about the unfriendly attitude of some people Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! I most earnestly wish you good health in the Lord. [...] I told you in passing about St. Petersburg, because some people are trying to persuade you to go there, which I really would not like to do. I am sick and tired, looking for peace! “But it will almost be necessary if I don’t find a quiet corner here.” He himself told everyone who came to him that the Right Reverend intended to make me rector of the Seven-City Hermitage. [...] Whoever asks me about this subject, I tell the whole truth as I know it, observing, so that in my words I may be truthful and not hypocritical. I find no reason in my heart for hypocrisy. True rumors reach me that Archimandrite Eutychian of Prilutsk is strongly acting against me, despite the fact that he led me to tonsure, and to my horror and grief I see that the cause of all these inconsistencies is greed. I am very pleased with my circumstances, and you would find me as joyful as you saw in Novoyezersk and during that illness. – I believe that all creation obeys the incomprehensible intentions of the Creator, and fulfills them, although it seems that apparently they resist them. It would be nice if I could say about God what someone said: “He loves me too, and His consolations rejoice my heart” (Ps. 93:19). God will bring me to see you again, but meanwhile I remain sincerely loving you and wishing you all possible blessings. September 27, 1831 Hieromonk Ignatius. Letter 610. Briefly about the Lopotov Monastery and my mood Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us. Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! I most earnestly wish you good health in the Lord. I received your most pleasant letter, but I wrote to you a long time ago, not having any special urgent needs and due to various monastic concerns, of which there are enough, especially since I am confident in your disposition; I hope that you are in mine too. Farewell. There may be a lot of things to write about, maybe it’s not the time for you and for me, I ask for your prayers and remain Your humble Bogomolets Hegumen Ignatius. ...Our monastery seems to be some kind of hermitage, in the manner of the southern deserts. - Quiet! silently! Simple! Lovingly! Joyful! - The publican's word! Let's not have tea and don't despair! Blessed is he who can say: Let us flow and comprehend (1 Cor. 9:24). God is with us! Understand and submit, Gentiles! Are we standing? We stand before God! Are we lying down? - God is with us! Strong to lift us up! I'll calm down; I rest: for you, Lord, have given me hope of repentance! Although I must say: my heart is troubled when I think about the multitude of my sins. And do not enter into judgment with your servant: for not only one who has been killed by sins, but also who is alive because of the grace that dwells in him, will not be justified before You, and those who have our righteousness will judge our righteousness. ABOUT! Forgive my madness, however, God is with us! Letter 611. About his attitude towards the brethren of the monastery Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! [...] I work around my monastery, and little by little I try to bring it into good condition; I could hope to live more peacefully by the fall, for by this time the Construction Cells should be finished; and now I’m quite cramped - and it’s fortunate that I managed to build an outbuilding with seven cells, of which I live in one, although not spacious, but with warmth. I am sick very often. They say that I am expected to be transferred to the Corniliev Monastery - the Abbot. My brethren, by the grace of God, are extremely humble; and I try to be as merciful as possible with them, and remember this Gospel word: “The Son of man did not come and let them serve Him, but serve Him” (Matthew 20:28). For this I have the honor to be Your humble Bogomolets Letter 612. About the revision and correction of some biographies and conversations of the elders, about his illness and the desire of the brethren of many monasteries to have him as their abbot Dearest beloved in the Lord, Pavel Petrovich! According to your last letter, your notebooks are being forwarded to you, about which you would like to hear the following: [...] 3) Being aware that the life of Fr. I have corrected Feofan quite carefully - and as you wish - but beware of replacing the good with the mediocre. Know that his Moral Teachings in his Life, added by me, have received such a form that for people with taste and knowledge it seems a very coherent, simple and strong passage. This moral teaching, together with the description of his morality and death, constitutes the entire beauty of this biography. The fence, the sacristy, etc. These are the least interesting things in the life of a person, famous for his lofty morality, humility, and contempt for all vanity! [...] Here I have a rather strange fate: the Semigorodnaya brethren are waiting for me in Semigorodnaya; Totemskaya to Totma; Kornilevskaya to Korniliev and so on. [...] For that, forgive me. Your sincerely loving and humble servant Hegumen Ignatius. Letter 613. Description of one of his travels to the monasteries of the deanery We are traveling safely through the 27th. Having said goodbye to you, we arrived at Shlisselburg at 12 o’clock, and the next day at 6 pm in Staraya Ladoga. My companions on the road liked everything, and I was pleased to look at them. Curiosity is a feeling of a living person, a feeling that a half-dead person does not have. The location of Ladoga, its antiquities, its Volkhov, its springs, its fishermen, its fish alternately occupied the attention of visitors. On the 26th, early in the morning, we left Staraya Ladoga in pouring rain and at 7 pm we arrived in Vvedensky, where we found Fr. The builder is sick. During this journey my companions were especially cheerful, and I was especially sad; - the wound inflicted on me by a person known to you is deep, for “my poisonous bread, magnify my stumbling” (Ps. 40:10). ...Like elder travelers, they look after me and serve me! The right to such attention can be expected from only the closest relatives. How sweet they are to each other! [...] Letter 614. About the superiorities of the Sergius Hermitage over other monasteries Dearest to my heart, Pavel Petrovich! Our monastery, Sergius Hermitage, is an extraordinary phenomenon, with a completely different character, among other monasteries of its kind. In appearance, it has a purity that cannot be found anywhere else; according to the internal structure, nowhere is there such well-intentioned brotherhood, alien hypocrisy and immorality. We have one drawback, and that is if we compare the Sergius Hermitage with secluded monasteries: it is a lot of visitors and entertainment. I am very pleased with the Babaev monastery; I was given the mezzanine above the Rector's chambers.[...] Christ is with you! Be healthy and contribute to the common good and peace. Your devoted friend Arch. Ignatius. Letter 615. Gratitude for clerical work Dear Pavel Petrovich! I need to thank you for your work on putting the inventories of the Sergius Hermitage in order, as well as its entire written part, as well as the written part of all the Monasteries of the St. Petersburg Diocese. The top management doesn’t see this, can’t see it, doesn’t want to see it – so what! God knows! And your works are not forgotten before Him! Although their subject is matter, but you, having occupied yourself with matter, gave others time and the opportunity to engage in spiritual objects - the ministry of the word and prayers, which they could not have done if you had not replaced them with yourself in material labors. And studies about the temporal are beautiful, pleasing to God, they prepare heavenly and eternal rewards for the practitioner, when they are done for the purpose of pleasing God, for the purpose of serving others for the sake of God, for the sake of holy love for the Lord and common benefit. I really like the Apostle’s likening of the Christian community to the human body, of which different members perform such diverse ministries and actions, but all together make up one common action: the ministry of the body, and one member cannot say to another, for example, the ear to the eye, “I don’t need you” (1 Cor. 12:12-21). Be healthy! I'm getting better and better! January 6, 1848 Your most devoted Arch. Ignatius. Letter 616. About the attitude of the authorities towards the Sergius Hermitage and about your health Dear Pavel Petrovich! Here everything is the same as before. The diocesan authorities in relation to our monastery always show their displeasure. [...] My health is getting better and better; but I continue to be treated and for this reason I cannot serve. My illness is chronic and is cured very slowly; Meanwhile, the treatment makes me very sick and takes away all my abilities. [...] I invoke God’s blessing on you, with feelings of complete devotion I remain forever Your most humble friend Archimandrite Ignatius. September 2, 1848 Letter 617. About the desire to move to the Ladoga Monastery ...I wish you a full recovery: health is a great blessing! with it you can be useful to yourself and your neighbors; Without it, both are difficult. Let me know when you can leave: because you need to finish the construction work and the answer to it. This is all the more necessary because I intend, if my health does not improve and the authorities do not stop oppressing me, to apply to the St. Nicholas Ladoga Monastery with the management of this monastery. And for the brethren, morally, it is much better there than here: they will have less fun and intrigue against their Superior to please their passions. [...] He who calls upon you God's blessing is unworthy Letter 618. Earthly life is a test My heart felt, Dear Pavel Petrovich, that you were sick! Be healthy! My dearest. Our life on earth is a test. Blessed is the man whom the Lord will tempt and teach from His law. This is what I wish for myself and why I strive for solitude. May God grant that this enterprise be organized thoroughly. Although at present, perhaps, they will only be released on vacation.[...] Letter 619. About the writing and effect on readers of the article “The Lament of a Monk...” I bring you my sincere gratitude for your memory of me and for your congratulations on the Feast of Holidays, on which I mutually congratulate you, wish you all the true blessings, and greet you with an all-joyful greeting: Christ is Risen! The strange fate of the last article of the 4th volume. It took 36 years for it to mature and then appear in print. Now her action is strange! From the letters I received I see that she attracted the special attention of many and made a great impression on many. Many, from different places, responded to me that they read and delve into it, weep over it, and each recognizes it as if it had been written for themselves. I ask for your prayers and invoke God’s blessing on you. With a feeling of sincere devotion and respect, I have the honor to be Your most humble servant, Bishop Ignatius. You might be interested in: