11) Проф. К. Д. Попов.

Blessed Diadochos (5th century), Bishop of Photiki of Ancient Epirus, and his creation. Volume one. Creation of Bl. Diadoche. Greek text, edited from ancient Greek manuscripts, with a preface, Russian translation, discrepancies, notes and appendices. Kyiv. 1903 In this serious doctoral dissertation, which required a lot of painstaking work, prof. K. D. Popov accompanies with notes, sometimes very detailed and extensive, many terms and expressions of Bl. Diadoche, which are found in his work, known with the name Λόγος άσκητικός. These notes have as their goal, by comparing a well-known passage of the named ascetic work, which treats this or that subject, with other passages and expressions of the same work, revealing the same subject, to understand in the most complete and authentic form the actual views of Blessed. Diadoche on one issue or another. At the same time, the most respected scientist almost always - in these cases - sought to understand the place and meaning of Bl. Diadoche, along with other previous ascetic writers, in order to determine what Bl. Diadochos agrees with his predecessors, in which he is apparently original and in which the writers of subsequent times actually borrowed from him. Citing certain excerpts from Evagrius of Pontus, Anthony the Great, Macarius of Egypt, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian, Gregory of Nyssa, John Chrysostom (relatively rare), Nile of Sinai, I. Cassian, Mark the Ascetic, Isaac the Syrian (not often at all), I. Climacus, Maximus the Confessor and some others, prof. K. D. Popov in some cases comes into contact with our presentation of certain points of the ascetic worldview, so that some of our quotes from patristic ascetic literature sometimes coincide with those contained in the named dissertation. However, this does not mean at all that we used the mentioned work of Prof. K. D. Popov as a reference book. This is indisputable and completely impossible because we come into contact with K. D. Popov not in all, but only in some points and questions; Meanwhile, the patristic ascetic works indicated by us in the “Preface” were studied by us in their entirety and on all issues included in the content of our dissertation independently. Therefore, naturally, we use patristic quotations throughout the entire dissertation and on all the issues consistently addressed in it. The coincidence of some quotes and on some issues is explained simply by the commonality of some (but not all) sources, to which anyone studying Orthodox “asceticism” is naturally obliged to turn. We only had to state this certain commonality, since most of our work was almost completed when we had the opportunity to get acquainted with K. D. Popov’s dissertation. Having generally large data regarding the number of studied representatives of patristic ascetic writing, we had a different goal in disclosing even the same data, compared to the one pursued by K. D. Popov. The venerable scientist directed everything towards understanding the worldview of Bl. Diadoche; quotations from other patristic writings were used only because and to the extent that, in comparison with them, the peculiarities of the teaching of this particular ascetic were highlighted more prominently, in terms of their similarities or differences. In our dissertation, everything serves to reveal the Orthodox teaching, to clarify its general spirit and basic meaning. Orthodox "asceticism" is derived from the peculiarities of the Orthodox teaching about "salvation"; the main goal and essential content of “salvation” determine all the particular moments of “asceticism”, explain the meaning and significance of all individual feats, certain ascetic means. Here everything is revealed according to a special independent plan, from well-founded and carefully tested premises. Some coincidence of quotes relates only to some minor points and does not concern the very essence of the work. In the same place where prof. K. D. Popov makes some generalizations, communicates provisions of a more general nature, we, either having some other data or for other reasons, each time specifically indicated, sometimes directly disagree with him more or less in views. So, for example, we believe that St. The ascetic fathers distinguished between those two moments of the gradual formation of “passion” from “thought”, which they denote by the terms συγκατάθεσις and συνδυασμός, 1190 while prof. K. D. Popov categorically states that these “words are synonymous both in their meaning and in their use in the works of more ancient (compared to I. Climacus) writers; these words denote the same mental act.” 1191 Some Orthodox theologians in their research touch on certain particular issues that are closely related to “asceticism” or directly included in the scope of this concept. See our brochure: “The essence and meaning of passions, according to Orthodox ascetic teaching” (St. Petersburg, 1905, p. 41 note) and Chapter II. our essay, pp. 251–253, 256–257.