The gracious power of prayer. According to the works of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninova)

Contents Holy Fathers on the prayer of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) Preface Prayer is the mother of virtues The feeling of repentance is the soul of our prayers The sign of perfection is unceasing prayer Holy Fathers on the prayer of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) This work is a collection of sayings of St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) about prayer, taken from his numerous creations. In them he shows that the essence of achievement and the support of a Christian’s life is prayer—the aspiration of the soul to God, and ideally, communion with God. But to successfully complete the feat of prayer, important conditions must be observed - the acquisition of humility, a repentant spirit, reading the Holy Scripture, about which the saint writes a lot in his works. The publication is intended for a wide circle of Orthodox readers. One of the luminaries of Russian monasticism - Saint Ignatius (in the world - Dmitry Alexandrovich Bryanchaninov) was born on February 5 (18), 1807 in the village of Pokrovskoye, Gryazovets district, Vologda region. By his origin, he belonged to the old noble family of the Brianchaninovs, whose ancestor at one time was the boyar Mikhail Brenko, who was the squire of the holy noble prince Dimitry Donskoy. The father of Saint Ignatius, Alexander Semenovich, was a deeply religious man and kept the traditions of his family. He built a church in the village, of which he was a parishioner. The mother of the future saint, Sofia Afanasyevna, was an educated and modest woman, devoting herself entirely to the household. At the age of fifteen, his father took Dmitry to the Military Engineering School in St. Petersburg, but the young man himself wanted to serve not in the army, but in God, since even then he expressed a desire to “become a monk.” Nevertheless, Dmitry had to complete the course at the school, and he did it brilliantly - in 1826 he passed the exams first on the list. While studying at the school, Dmitry became the head of a circle of admirers of “holiness and honor,” which attracted not only his associates to him, but also teachers and even professors. It is known that Emperor Nicholas I himself treated the young man with love and attention. In 1827, Dmitry received his resignation and immediately entered the Alexander-Svirsky Monastery as a novice under the spiritual guidance of Hieromonk Leonid (the future Elder Leo of Optina). At the end of 1830 - beginning of 1831, Dmitry visited the Semigorodnaya Assumption Hermitage, where he wrote one of his first spiritual masterpieces, “The Lament of a Monk.” Some time later, in June 1831, he was tonsured a monk with the name Ignatius, in honor of the Hieromartyr Ignatius the God-Bearer. Another six months later, already in the rank of hieromonk, Saint Ignatius became rector of the Pelshem Lopotov Monastery. He managed the monastery until 1833, when, by the personal decision of Emperor Nicholas I, he received the Trinity-Sergius Monastery near St. Petersburg for management. The following year, 1834, Saint Ignatius was elevated to the rank of archimandrite, and he ruled the monastery until 1857. During this time, he turned the once neglected desert into a real source of spiritual life. Also during these years, Saint Ignatius retired to the Nikolo-Babaevsky Monastery for 11 months, but later returned to the hermitage again. The first printed works of the saint appeared only in 1847. In April 1851 he was awarded the Order of St. Vladimir, III degree. Saint Ignatius received his main assignment in life in October 1857 - at that time he was ordained Bishop of the Caucasus and Black Sea. He spent four years in this ministry. During this time, Saint Ignatius put in a lot of work to organize the life of the diocese, both in material, everyday, and spiritual senses. However, concerns about the diocese did not distract the saint from the main thing - monastic work. It was during the years of service in the Caucasus that Saint Ignatius most carefully comprehended monasticism, asceticism, and the practice of acquiring holiness. During these years, he wrote such works as “An Offering to Modern Monasticism”, “On the Various States of Human Nature in Relation to Good and Evil”, “On the Sensual and Spiritual Vision of Spirits”, “On Salvation and Christian Perfection”, “The Teaching of the Orthodox Church about the Mother of God”. For services to the Fatherland, Saint Ignatius was awarded once again - he was awarded the Order of St. Anna, 1st degree. By the will of God, he had to concentrate even more strongly on monastic work and writing spiritual works. In 1861, due to illness, Bishop Ignatius was again transferred to the Nikolo-Babaevsky Monastery of the Kostroma diocese. Here he wrote his famous works: “The Word on Death”, “The Fatherland”, “Ascetic Experiences”. On April 30 (May 13), 1867, Bishop Ignatius departed to the Lord. He was canonized as a saint by the Russian Orthodox Church on June 6, 1988. In the same year, his relics were solemnly transferred to the Holy Vvedensky Tolga Monastery in the city of Yaroslavl, where they now reside. The saint is commemorated on April 30 (May 13). In his works devoted to prayer, Saint Ignatius emphasized the need to be prepared for such a responsible feat. As preparation, special conditions for performing true, pure prayer, the saint drew attention to the need for repentance, confession of sins, and the acquisition of humility. Also, in his opinion, reading and studying the Holy Scriptures, primarily the Gospel, is important. It is precisely this kind of preparation, of course, together with a sincere desire, a thirst for communication with God, according to St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov), that can lead a person to a genuine spiritual dialogue with his Creator. Prayer is the mother of virtues Timeless activities should be rejected, preferring prayer to them, especially those activities that lead us to many expenses and the accumulation of unnecessary property. (1, p. 171) Prayer is the head, the source, the mother of all virtues. (1, p. 191) Let your main work be prayer and reading holy books, give other matters secondary importance, and earthly affairs [here: petty, vain - ed. ] be cool, if possible, alien to them. (1, p. 262) All the saints of God took upon themselves and bore the good yoke of the prayer rule: by imitation of them, you too should follow in this case our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, having become man and showing us His way of behavior, acted as His Father acted (John 5:19), said what the Father commanded Him (John 12:49), and had the goal of fulfilling the will of the Father in everything (John 5:30). The will of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit is one. In relation to people, it consists in saving people. (1, p. 201) The mouth and tongue, which often exercise in prayer and reading the word of God, acquire sanctification and become incapable of idle talk, laughter, or uttering comic, shameful and rotten words. (1, p. 212) The essential work... is prayer, as the work that connects a person with God. All other works serve either as preparatory or facilitating means for prayer, or are given to those who, due to moral weakness or lack of mental abilities, cannot fully engage in prayer. (1, p. 169) “Go into your closet, and when you have shut your doors, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you in reality” (Matthew 6:6). This is the Lord Himself’s establishment of solitary prayer. The Lord, who commanded solitary prayer, very often Himself, during His earthly wanderings, as the Gospel narrates, remained in it. (1, p. 193) Due to the most soul-saving effect on us of prayer in general and the memory of God or the Jesus Prayer in particular, as a means to remain in constant union with God and to constantly repel the attacks of the enemy, practicing the Jesus Prayer is especially hateful to the devil. (1, p. 342) The basis for your feat is the grace of holy baptism; the weapon is prayer in the name of Jesus. (1, p. 284) Teaching kills in a person sympathy for the world and passions, revives in him sympathy for God, for everything spiritual and holy, for blissful eternity. “What is there in heaven? - He cries out, intoxicated with teaching, - Nothing. “And what did You want on earth? Only so that I can constantly cleave to You in silent PRAYER. Some desire wealth, others desire glory, but I desire to cleave to my God and place the trust of my dispassion in Him” (Ps. 72:25-28). (1, p. 227) Let us not be afraid, workers of the Jesus Prayer, of neither winds nor disturbances! I call demonic thoughts and dreams winds, and excitement the rebellion of passions excited by thoughts and dreams. From the midst of a raging storm, with constancy, courage and weeping, let us cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ: He will rebuke the winds and waves, and we, having experienced the omnipotence of Jesus, will give Him due worship, saying: Truly you are the Son of God (Matthew 14:33). We are fighting for our salvation. Our eternal fate depends on our victory or defeat. (1, p. 282) In the difficult struggle against the invisible enemies of our salvation, the most excellent weapon is the Jesus Prayer. All the pagans - the many-verbal and many-wily demons are called pagans - have cheated me, says David, and in the name of the Lord you have resisted them, having cheated me, and in the name of the Lord you have resisted them; they have gone around me like bees on a honeycomb, and burned like fire among thorns, and in the name of the Lord they have resisted them (Ps. 118:10-12). (1, p. 274) Having learned the meaning and power of spiritual weapons - almsgiving, fasting and prayer, let us hasten to gird ourselves with these weapons. (2, p. 133) The quality of prayer, the fathers said, certainly leads to quantity. Prayer, having declared a person, gradually changes him, makes him spiritual by uniting with the Holy Spirit, as the apostle says: Cling to the Lord, for you are one spirit with the Lord (1 Cor. 6:17). The mysteries of Christianity are revealed to the confidant of the Spirit. (1, p. 250) This is the property of the Jesus Prayer: it raises its worker from earth to heaven and includes him among the inhabitants of heaven. (1, p. 284) Rule [prayer – ed.]! What a precise name, borrowed from the very effect produced on a person by prayers called the rule! The prayer rule guides the soul correctly and holy, teaches it to worship God in spirit and truth (John 4:23), while the soul, left to itself, could not follow the correct path of prayer. (1, pp. 195–196) Having chosen for yourself a prayer rule commensurate with your strengths and spiritual needs, try to fulfill it carefully and unfailingly: this is necessary to maintain the moral strength of your soul, just as sufficient consumption of healthy food at certain times of the day is necessary to maintain bodily strength. (1, p. 200) Stock up in good time with an omnipotent weapon - prayer: learn to use it in good time. Prayer is omnipotent because of the omnipotent God at work in it. She is the spiritual sword, which is the word of God. (3, p. 96) Oral and vocal prayer is indicated to us by the Holy Scriptures; the example of both it and vocal singing was given by the Savior Himself, and by the holy apostles by succession from the Lord. And having sung, at the end of the Last Supper, the holy evangelist Matthew tells about the Lord and His apostles, “going out to the Mount of Olives” (Matthew 26:30). The Lord prayed in the hearing of all before the resurrection of the four-day-old Lazarus (John 11:41–42). The holy Apostle Paul and his companion Silas, imprisoned in prison, prayed and sang to God at the midnight hour: the other prisoners listened to them. (1, p. 209) In important circumstances and difficulties of life, before the beginning of great deeds, and during the onset of great sorrows, the saints of God intensified their fasting and their prayers. Our Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, showed us an example of both. (2, pp. 129–130) David depicts the grace-filled effect of the Jesus Prayer in a successful Christian this way: “Bless my soul the Lord, and all that is within me, His holy name” (Ps. 103:1). Exactly! With the abundant effect of the Jesus Prayer, all the powers of the soul, the body itself, take part in it. Saint David, or rather the Holy Spirit through the mouth of David, offers the exercise of the Jesus Prayer to all Christians without exception: “the kings of the earth and all the people, the princes and all the judges of the earth, young men and maidens, old men with young men. Let them praise the name of the Lord, for the name of Him alone is exalted” (Ps. 149:11-13). A literal understanding of the states listed here will be completely infallible, but their essential meaning is spiritual. (1, pp. 276–277) Prayer gives birth to virtues from the union of the human spirit with the Spirit of the Lord. The virtues that give rise to prayer are distinguished from the virtues that are born from prayer: the first are spiritual, the second are spiritual. (3, pp. 91–92) Let us try to remove all worldly cares from ourselves through hope and prayer. If we are unable to fulfill this as we should, then we will bring confession to God in our impoverishments; Let us not allow ourselves to retreat from the exercise of prayer. (1, p. 171) It is useful to practice the Jesus Prayer: it, by keeping the mind from being distracted, helps it to listen to church singing and reading. (3, p. 107) “Be sober in your prayers,” says the holy Apostle Peter, repeating the Lord’s commandment to the believers. “Be sober, be vigilant, the devil is your adversary, like a lion he walks about roaring, seeking whom he may devour, whom you resist in the firmament by faith” (1 Peter 5:8-9). Repeating and confirming this all-holy, saving commandment, the holy Apostle Paul says: “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17). “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made to God” (Phil. 4:6). “Be patient in prayer” (abide), watchful in it with thanksgiving (Col. 4:2). “I want men to say prayers in every place, lifting up their holy hands, without anger or reflection” (1 Tim. 2:8). “Be cleave to the Lord by unceasing prayer; one spirit is with the Lord” (1 Cor. 6:17). The Lord delivers the one who cleaves to the Lord and unites with the Lord through unceasing prayer from enslavement and service to sin and the devil: “But God,” the Savior proclaims to us, “should not take vengeance on His chosen ones, who cry out to Him day and night, and be patient for them? I tell you that he will take their vengeance quickly” (Luke 18:7-8). (1, pp. 216–217) Sobriety is acquired gradually; acquired through long time and labor; is born mainly from careful reading and prayer. (3, p. 272) Before the election of the apostles, the Lord had no need for prayer, but turned to prayer and remained in it the whole night, showing, according to the mind of the holy fathers, by His actions an image for our actions, showing us that God accepts our short prayer, but that before important occasions and undertakings, especially long and especially intense prayer is useful, necessary, necessary for us (2, p. 130) Prayer is the mother of virtues and the door to all spiritual gifts. By carefully performing attentive prayer with patience and forcing oneself, both grace-filled prayer and grace-filled humility are acquired. Their giver is the Holy Spirit, their giver is Christ: how can they not be so similar to each other when their source is the same? How can all the virtues not appear from such a source, in wonderful harmony and correlation with each other? Suddenly they appear in that Christian into whose inner cage Christ entered to attend to the crying of the prisoner in the cage and to take away the causes of the crying. (1, p. 259) Practice in prayer, in soul-edifying reading, and this exercise will be an exercise in thinking about God correctly, safely, and pleasing to God. (3, p. 115) The state into which fasting and prayer bring a person is especially capable of receiving God's blessings and Divine revelations. Thus, the alms, prayers and fasting of Cornelius the centurion appeared before God and brought him the greatest benefit: the knowledge of Christ. (2, p. 132) The fruit of prayer consists in enlightening the mind and tenderness of the heart, in reviving the soul with the life of the Spirit. (3, p. 95) Staying with your mind and heart in heaven and in God is the main fruit, this is the goal of prayer; repelling and trampling on enemies who oppose the achievement of the goal is a secondary matter: it should not attract all attention to itself, so that through the consciousness and contemplation of victory it does not allow arrogance and conceit to enter into oneself, and does not suffer a terrible defeat regarding the victory itself. (1, pp. 284–285) Among the incomprehensible, wonderful properties of the name of Jesus is the property and power to cast out demons. This property was declared by the Lord Himself. He said that those who believe in Him “in His name will give birth to demons” (Mark 16:17). It is necessary to pay special attention to this property of the name of Jesus, because it is of utmost importance for those who practice the Jesus Prayer. (1, p. 277) The Lord showed us a means by which we can and must strengthen the weakness of human nature during the onset of adversity. He turned to intense prayer. To the disciples overcome by sleep, He commanded: “Watch and pray, so that you do not fall into misfortune” (Matthew 26:41). So that the attack that comes does not seize a person, does not take possession of him, does not consume him, prayer is necessary. In times of adversity, what is needed to overcome adversity is that spiritual strength, that Divine unshakable peace that is brought through prayer. To defeat Satan, who strives with thoughts of sadness, hopelessness and despair to shake and destroy a person who has been subjected to adversity by God’s definition, so that our faith does not become weak during adversity, prayer is needed. We need it so that in the midst of the sorrow itself we can feel, according to the apostle’s will, all the joy that he commanded us to have when we fall into various temptations (James 1:2). (2, p. 131) Church prayers contain extensive Christian dogmatic and moral theology: one who regularly attends church and carefully listens to its reading and chanting can clearly learn everything necessary for an Orthodox Christian in the field of faith. (1, p. 207) Prayer is the highest exercise for the mind. (1, p. 191) For the sake of the name of Jesus, used by the one praying, help comes to him from God and he is granted remission of sins; For this reason, Saint David, presenting to the view of God the devastation and disastrous state of the soul of every person caused by a sinful life, begging on behalf of all people for mercy, says: “Help us, O God, our Savior, for the glory of Your name, Lord, deliver us, and cleanse our sins for Your name” (Ps. 78:9). For the sake of the name of the Lord, our prayer is heard, salvation is granted to us; Based on the conviction of this, David again prays: “God, in Thy name save me, and in Thy power judge me: O God, hear my prayer, inspire the words of my mouth” (Ps. 53:3-4). (1, p. 275) Continuous prayer destroys curiosity, suspiciousness, and suspicion. This makes all people seem kind; and from such a heartfelt commitment to people, love for them is born. (1, pp. 221–222) The great mercy of God towards man is the establishment of public prayer services in God’s holy churches. These prayers were established by the apostles, their holy disciples and the holy fathers of the first centuries of Christianity by revelation from above. Every Christian can take part in these prayers, and the illiterate assimilates the knowledge, eloquence, poetry of the spiritual, holy vitas and scribes of Christianity. With these prayers, anyone who wishes can very comfortably learn mental prayer. (1, p. 207) Attentive prayer can be likened to beneficial rain, irrigating a sown field, giving nourishment to the plants and preparing a rich harvest. (2, p. 38) Practice the Jesus Prayer: it will keep your mind from wandering, you will become much more focused, deeper, you will listen much better to the readings and church hymns, in an inconspicuous way, and you will gradually learn mental prayer. (1, pp. 305–306) Whenever a thought of malicious malice appears against a neighbor, we will immediately turn to God in prayer for that neighbor, asking him for God’s mercy in time and in eternity. (3, p. 367) Satan abides morally in a person when a person becomes an executor of the will of the devil... The spirits that have entered in this way are again driven out by the Jesus Prayer, while living in constant and thorough repentance. Let's undertake a feat that will save us! Let us take care to drive out the spirits that have entered us due to our negligence, through the Jesus Prayer. It has the ability to revive those killed by sin, it has the ability to cast out demons. (1, p. 278) A person, being in a state of peace in Christ and prayer, is not accessible to any sinful thoughts - the same person for whom previously every battle with sin was a sure victory. The soul feels that an adversary is approaching it, but the prayerful power that fills it does not allow the enemy to approach and desecrate the church of God. The person praying knows that the enemy came to him, but does not know with what thought, with what type of sin. (1, pp. 260–261) When prayer is heard by the power and action of the name of Jesus, when Divine help descends to man, when enemies are repelled and retreat from him, when he is granted remission of sins, when he is healed and returned to an immaculate natural state, when his spirit is restored in its power, then repentance will follow in the name of the Lord, grace-filled gifts, spiritual property and treasures, the guarantee of a blessed eternity, “for you, O God, have heard My prayers, Thou hast given wealth to those who fear Thy name. Add days to the days of the king, his years until the day of generation and generation. He will remain forever before God" (Ps. 60:6-8). Then a person becomes able to sing the Lord’s new song: he is excluded from the ranks of the carnal and spiritual, is numbered among the spiritual and praises the Lord in the church of the venerables. (1, pp. 275–276) He who ascends to God through pure and frequent prayer acquires a living faith in God, sees Him with it and flies like a winged one through all the vicissitudes and disasters of earthly life. He will see his vengeance from his rival and will rejoice not only at the forgiveness of his sins, but also at his cleansing from sinful passions. The holy fathers call this state holiness, blissful dispassion, Christian perfection. In this state, he will be worthy to escape all the disasters that want to be, and stand before the Son of Man, when he will be demanded before Him both by death and by that trumpet that will gather the living and the dead for judgment before the Son of God. (2, p. 435) The Savior's first words to fallen humanity were: “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is drawing near” (Matthew 4:17). Why, until you enter this Kingdom, knock on its gates with repentance and prayer. (1, p. 184) Reverence and prudence teach us to remain in attentive prayer, the prayer of repentance at the doors of the church. Attention and contrition of spirit - this is the cage that is given as a refuge to repentant sinners. (1, p. 302) With the simplicity and trustfulness of infants, let us accept the teaching of prayer in the name of Jesus; with the simplicity and trustfulness of infants, let us begin to exercise this prayer: God alone, who fully knows its mystery, will teach it to us to the extent accessible to us. Let us please God with labor and success in the service that He taught and commanded us. (1, p. 285) The fear of God is a gift from God. As a gift, it is requested through prayer. The holy prophet David wanted to be worthy of this gift and therefore begged God: Place Thy word in fear of Thy servant, nail to Thy fear my flesh, that is, my carnal desires. (1, p. 70) The feeling of peace in Christ, as well as of all grace-given gifts in general, begins, first of all, to manifest itself during prayer, as in that activity in which the ascetic is most prepared by reverence and attention to receiving divine impressions. Subsequently, having become, as it were, an accessory of a Christian, it constantly accompanies him, constantly and everywhere rousing him to prayer, performed in the spiritual cage, pointing out from afar mental enemies and slanderers, repelling and striking them with his omnipotent right hand. (1, p. 252) A prayer rule is for a person, and not a person for the rule: it should help a person achieve spiritual success, and not serve as an unbearable burden, crushing bodily strength and confusing the soul. Moreover, it should not serve as a reason for proud and harmful conceit, for harmful condemnation and humiliation of others. (1, pp. 198–199) The Jesus Prayer both reveals the presence of demons in a person and drives them out of a person. At the same time, something similar happens to what happened during the expulsion of a demon from a raging youth, after the Transfiguration of the Lord. When the youth saw the Lord come, “the spirit shook the youth, and his mother-in-law fell to the ground, lying in the foam.” When the Lord commanded the spirit to come out of the boy, the spirit, from the malice and cruelty of the movement at which he came out, cried out, shook the boy strongly and for a long time, from which the boy became as if dead (Mark 9:17-27). (1, p. 279) The Holy Eastern Orthodox Church offers to all illiterate people, instead of all prayers, the Jesus Prayer [Psalter followed by - ed.], offers it not as an innovation, but as a well-known exercise. This decree, together with other traditions of the Eastern Church, passed from Greece to Russia, and many of the common people, illiterate and even illiterate, were imbued with the power of the Jesus Prayer for salvation and eternal life, many achieved great spiritual success. (1, pp. 286–287) Those who are in obedience and engaged in ... labors should in no way consider themselves free from the exercise of prayer: without this, the very labors and even obedience will be fruitless, moreover, they will bring the harmful fruit of vanity and other sins, which will certainly appear in that soul in which there will be a disastrous emptiness, in which the power and fragrance of prayer do not live. (1, p. 181) It [prayer – ed.] is a means of unifying the human spirit with the spirit of God. (1, p. 349) The Jesus Prayer was in general use among Christians of the first centuries, as we said above. It couldn't have been any other way. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, the most amazing signs were performed in front of the entire Christian society, which aroused faith in the unlimited power of the name of Jesus throughout the entire Christian society. (1, pp. 285–286) The choice of the Jesus Prayer for teaching is very thorough, both because the name of the Lord Jesus Christ contains a special Divine power, and because when practicing the Jesus Prayer, the memory of death, of torment from the spirits of the air, of God’s utterance of the final determination, of eternal torment, begins to come in due time by itself, and so vividly that it will lead the ascetic into copious incessant tears and bitter weeping for himself, as a dead man, already buried and stinking, awaiting revival from the omnipotent word of God (John 11:39, 43–44). (1, p. 220) I call mental and heartfelt prayer a spiritual supply. May the merciful Lord grant us... before departing from earthly life, to move in mind and heart to heaven. Prayer can lift us there when Divine grace overshadows it, and prayer in man becomes no longer the prayer of man, but the prayer of the Holy Spirit, interceding for man with groanings that cannot be uttered (Rom. 8:27). (1, p. 208) The word of the cross, proclaimed through the mouth of the apostles to all people who are perishing, is foolishness; it remains as foolishness when it is proclaimed by the mind to the heart and the whole being of the old man through prayer; but to those who are being saved it is the power of God (1 Cor. 1:18). Greeks who have not known Christianity, and Greeks who have returned from Christianity to Hellenism, seek, according to their mood, wisdom in mental prayer and find madness; but true Christians, through the weak and seemingly insignificant feat of mental prayer, gain Christ, God’s power and God’s wisdom. “For God's sake man is wise, and God's weakness is stronger than man” (1 Cor. 1:22-26). (1, pp. 349–350) The exercise of prayer is the testament of the apostle: “pray without ceasing,” the apostle tells us (1 Thess. 5:17). The exercise of prayer is a commandment of the Lord Himself, a commandment combined with a promise: ask, the Lord invites us, the Lord commands us, and it will be given to you: “Seek, and you will find: press, and it will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7). “He will not sleep, he will fall asleep” (Ps. 120:4) prayer, until he shows the one who loves it and constantly practices in it the palace of eternal pleasures, until he leads him into heaven. There she will be transformed into a constant sacrifice of praise. This praise will be unceasingly brought, the chosen ones of God will incessantly proclaim from the unceasing feeling of bliss in eternity, vegetated here on earth and in time, from the seeds of repentance sown by attentive and diligent prayer. (1, p. 192) The blessed Apostle Peter says: be wise and sober in your prayers, casting all your care upon Nan, as He cares for you (1 Pet. 4:7; 5:7). Firstly, the Lord Himself, knowing that everything is confirmed by prayer, says: “Do not worry about what you eat, or what you drink, or what you wear; but seek rather the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these will be added to you” (Matthew 6:31, 33). (1, p. 170) To the Monk Pachomius the Great, for the large society of monks under his jurisdiction, the Angel of God taught a prayer rule. The monks, subordinate to the spiritual leadership of the Monk Pachomius, had to perform the rule every hour; those who had achieved perfection and the unceasing prayer associated with it were exempted from fulfilling the rule. The rule taught by the Angel consisted of the Trisagion, the Lord's Prayer, Psalm 50, the Creed and one hundred Jesus prayers. (1, p. 287) The benefits of the teaching or memory of God are innumerable: it is above words, above comprehension. And those who felt it are unable to fully explain it. Continuous prayer, as a commandment of God and a gift of God, is inexplicable by human reason and words. A short prayer gathers the mind, which, if it is not attached to teaching, said one of the fathers, cannot stop floating and wandering everywhere. An ascetic can pray a short prayer in any place, at any time, during any activity, especially physical activity. Even when attending a church service, it is useful to engage in it, not only when reading is not quite intelligible, but also when reading clearly. It helps one to listen to reading, especially when it takes root in the soul and becomes, as it were, natural to a person. (1, p. 220) The power of Satan, which resides in man during his distracted life, unnoticed and incomprehensible, when he hears the name of the Lord Jesus called upon by the one praying, he becomes confused. (1, p. 279) The fruits of true prayer: holy peace of the soul, combined with a quiet, silent joy, alien to daydreaming, conceit and heated impulses and movements, love for neighbors, which does not distinguish good from evil, worthy from unworthy, but intercedes for everyone before God as for itself, as for its own members. From such love for others, the purest love for God will shine forth. These fruits are a gift from God. They are attracted to the soul by its attention and humility, and are preserved by its faithfulness to God. (1, p. 190) Prayer is the offering of our petitions to God. (1, p. 183) Prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus was universal and common in the Universal Church. (1, p. 288) Cornelius [the centurion mentioned in the book of Acts - ed.], although he was a pagan, but, leaving idols, he prayed diligently to the one true God and gave abundant alms. One day, during prayer, an Angel of God appeared to him and said: Cornelius! Your prayers and your alms are raised as a memorial before God. And now send men to Joppa, and call Simon, called Peter (apostle); He speaks to you verbs, in which you and your whole house will be saved (Acts 10:3-7). Cornelius's prayers and alms were so strong that the merciful Lord looked upon them; but they, of themselves, did not bring salvation to Cornelius. They made him able to believe in Christ, and faith in Christ brought him salvation. (1, pp. 379–380) The common use and well-known nature of the Jesus Prayer is clearly evident from the decree of the Church, which commands the illiterate to replace all prayers for themselves with the Jesus Prayer [Psalter with the following - ed.]. The antiquity of this ruling is undoubted. Subsequently, it was replenished as new prayer books appeared in the Church. Saint Basil the Great set out the prayer rule in a letter for his flock, which is why some attribute the very establishment of the rule to him. It is by no means an invention or institution of the great saint; the saint only replaced the oral tradition with a written one. (1, p. 267) The Holy Prophet David invites all, without exception, the people of God to pray in the name of the Lord and... by decree of the Holy Church it is lawful for all illiterate people and those who do not know the Holy Scriptures by heart to replace prayers and psalmody with the Jesus Prayer. (1, p. 291) The prayer of the God-man, pronounced by Him before going into suffering, is a spiritual, precious heritage for the entire Christian tribe: it is capable of shedding consolation into a soul languishing under the burden of the most severe sorrows. “My Father,” said the Lord in His prayer, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me, not as I will, but as You will; neither, not My will, but Yours, be done.” (1, pp. 117–118) Teaching in general, especially the Jesus Prayer, serves as an excellent weapon against sinful thoughts. (1, p. 220) Praying the Jesus Prayer is a Divine institution. It was established not through the medium of a prophet, not through the medium of an apostle, not through the medium of an Angel - it was established by the Son of God and God Himself. After the Last Supper, among other sublime, final commandments and testaments, the Lord Jesus Christ established prayer in His name, gave this method of prayer as a new, unusual gift, a gift of immeasurable value. The apostles already knew in part the power of the name of Jesus: they healed incurable ailments with it, brought demons into obedience, defeated, bound, and drove them away. The Lord commands this most powerful, wonderful name to be used in prayers, promising from it a special reality for prayer. “Whatever you ask,” He said to the holy apostles, “I will do from the Father in My name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. And whatever you ask in My name, I will do it” (John 14:13–14). (1, pp. 265–266) Prayer is the mother of all true, divine virtues. (1, p. 192) We are overthrown by natural weakness, and weakness of will, and the darkening of the mind caused by a former sinful life, and the disorder of the heart, which has acquired vicious habits, and the desires of the body, which has tasted bestial pleasures and is infected with their lust; Fallen spirits are attacking us, wanting to keep us enslaved. This is the narrow and regrettable path, covered with thorns, along which prayerful crying before God leads the sinner to reconciliation with God. (1, p. 78) Anyone who, according to Scripture, desires to become a perfect husband, to the extent of the age of fulfillment of Christ (Eph. 4:13), should not prefer various services to prayer. (1, pp. 170–171) The demon is cast out by faith, prayer and fasting. (1, p. 163) From the Gospel, Acts and Epistles of the Apostles we see unlimited faith in the name of the Lord Jesus and unlimited reverence for this name of the holy apostles. In the name of the Lord Jesus they performed the most amazing signs. There is no case from which one could learn how they prayed in the name of the Lord, but they prayed to them without fail. How could they not pray to them when this prayer was taught and commanded by the Lord Himself, when the commandment was strengthened by twice repeating and confirming it? If Scripture is silent about this, it is silent only because this prayer was in general use, not requiring special inclusion in Scripture due to its popularity and common use. (1, p. 267) The basis of prayer is that man is a fallen creature. He strives to receive the bliss that he had, but lost, and therefore he prays (1, p. 183) We must be attentive and careful: only when absolutely necessary, especially at the request of assigned obedience, can you give the time designated for prayer to another activity. Do not leave your prayers without the most important reason, beloved brother! He who abandons prayer abandons his salvation; he who neglects prayer neglects salvation; he who abandoned prayer denied his salvation. (3, pp. 362–363) Sinful images, and their existence, and beauty are deception and seduction; but together they are alive, and nothing - neither time itself, nor decrepit old age - can kill them. They are washed away from the imagination by a tear of repentance... They are washed away from the imagination by humble prayer, combined with the cry of the heart. (1, p. 126) The gracious power of the Jesus Prayer lies in the very Divine name of the God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ. (1, pp. 270–271) It is impossible, no spiritual success is possible for one who has rejected humility, who has not bothered to enter into a sacred union with prayer. (1, p. 192) As soon as a person says prayerfully to God with all his heart: “Let Thy will be done to me, my Lord,” then the excitement of the heart subsides. From these words, spoken sincerely, the most severe sorrows are deprived of their dominance over a person. (1, p. 110) Not every service is always performed, but in its own time, and the service of prayer is ordained for us to be unceasing, which is why we should prefer it to activities for which there is no immediate need. All the apostles, teaching this distinction to the people who wanted to attract them to service, said: “We who have abandoned the word of God do not want to eat and serve meals. Behold, brethren, there are seven men who have testified from you, and we will appoint them over this service. We will continue in prayer and the ministry of the word. And this word was acceptable in the sight of all the people” (Acts 6:2–5). (1, p. 172) The great ministry of prayer, which brings people into close communion with God, has appeared on earth on a vast scale since the time of the reconciliation of people with God through the mediation of the God-man. This service embraced the universe. It settled in cities and villages; it flourished in wild, hitherto uninhabited deserts; it shone in dark dens, in gorges, in abysses and on mountain tops, in the depths of dense forests. The name of the God-man received the most important significance in the service of prayer, being the name of the Savior of men, the Creator of men and Angels, being the name of God incarnate, the Conqueror of indignant slaves and creatures - demons. (1, p. 272) The reflection of sinful thoughts and sensations is accomplished through prayer: it is an activity connected with prayer, inseparable from prayer, constantly in need of assistance and the action of prayer. (1, p. 179) He who constantly delves into Scripture studies it in humility of spirit, asking God for understanding through prayer; whoever directs all his deeds, all the hidden movements of his soul according to the Gospel commandments, will certainly become a partaker of the Holy Spirit living in them. (1, p. 9) Three main things...: fear God, pray to God and do good to your neighbor. (1, p. 74) The feeling of repentance is the soul of our prayers Nothing promotes prayer more than obedience, which mortifies us to the world and to ourselves. (1, p. 181) Everyone who wants his prayer to be accepted by God must bring it from the consciousness of his sinfulness and extreme insufficiency in relation to virtue, must bring it, rejecting the consciousness of his merits, as if insignificant before the incomprehensible dignity of God; must bring it from a heart that has humbled itself before all its neighbors, from a heart that has loved all its neighbors, from a heart that has forgiven its neighbors all insults and insults. (1, pp. 206–207) Stand in your prayer before the invisible God, as if you saw Him and with the confidence that He sees you, looks attentively at you; stand before the invisible God, as a criminal stands, convicted of countless atrocities, sentenced to death, before a formidable, impartial judge. (3, pp. 93–94) Having laid the basis for the feat of prayer on freedom from anger, love and mercy towards others, commanded by the Gospel, with decisiveness rejecting all conversation with thoughts and all daydreaming. To meet all your thoughts and dreams, say: “I have completely surrendered myself to the will of my God, and therefore there is no need for me to rant, assume, predict, for the Lord is near. “Be anxious about nothing,” the Holy Spirit instructs me, together with all true believers in Christ, “but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made to God” (Phil. 4:6). (1, p. 241) In order to succeed in the feat of prayer, so that in due time, by the inexpressible mercy of God, to taste the sweetest fruit of prayer, which consists in the renewal of the whole person by the Holy Spirit, one must pray constantly, one must courageously endure the difficulties and sorrows with which the feat of prayer is associated. This is what the Lord commanded us, as we heard... in the Gospel. It is appropriate to always pray, and not to become cold (Luke 18:1), that is, not to lose heart. (2, p. 426) Let us renounce our souls, that is, the search for human glory, the search for an overly comfortable earthly position, the search for all earthly advantages, and we surrender ourselves entirely to the will of God, thanking and glorifying God for our past and present, placing our future on Him. Let such behavior and our direction be a preparation for our prayer, the basis for our prayer. (3, pp. 367–368) The refuge of prayer is in the great mercy of God towards the human race. The Son of God, to save us, offered Himself to His Father as a propitiatory, reconciling sacrifice: on this basis, wanting to engage in prayer, reject doubt and double-mindedness (James 1:6-8). Don’t say to yourself: “I am a sinner, will God really hear me?” If you are a sinner, then the consoling words of the Savior apply to you: “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Matthew 9:13). (1, p. 183) Stand in prayer with your head bowed, your eyes directed to the ground, on both legs equally and motionless: assist your prayer with weeping hearts, sighs from the depths of your soul, and copious tears. (3, p. 94) When true repentance festers in the soul, when humility and contrition of spirit appear in it due to the sinfulness that has been revealed to its eyes, then verbosity becomes unusual and impossible for it. Concentrating within herself, directing all her attention to her plight, she begins to cry out to God with some brief prayer. (2, p. 33) According to the importance of prayer, before practicing it, you need to prepare yourself for it... The first preparation consists of rejecting the memory of malice and condemnation of your neighbors. This preparation is commanded by the Lord Himself. “When you stand praying,” He commands, forgive whatever you have against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will forgive you your sins. If you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:25-26). Further preparation is the rejection of care through the power of faith in God, the power of obedience and devotion to the will of God, the consciousness of one’s sinfulness and the contrition and humility of spirit flowing from this consciousness. (3, p. 93) The Peace of Christ is the source of unceasing mental, heartfelt, spiritual, grace-filled, spiritual prayer, prayer brought from the entire human being through the action of the Holy Spirit; the peace of Christ is a constant source of grace-filled humility of Christ, which surpasses the human mind. (1, p. 257) When reading prayers slowly, it is possible... attention; when reading hastily, there is no room for attention. Prayer, devoid of attention, is devoid of its essence, devoid of life. (2, p. 39) External reverent standing in prayer is very necessary and very useful for everyone who struggles in the feat of prayer, especially for the novice, in whom the disposition of the soul is most consistent with the position of the body. (3, p. 94) A necessary, essential condition for success in the Jesus Prayer is staying in the commandments of the Lord Jesus. “Be in My love” (John 15:9), He said to His disciples. What does it mean to be in love with the Lord? This means constantly remembering Him, constantly remaining in unity with Him in spirit. The first without the last is dead and cannot even be realized. “If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love” (John 15:10); If we constantly keep the commandments of the Lord, then in our spirit we will unite with Him. If we unite with Him in spirit, then we will strive towards Him with all our being, we will constantly remember Him. (1, p. 352) It is known that forgiveness of insults and insults, replacing condemnation of neighbors with a merciful apology for them, and blaming oneself serve as the basis for successful prayer. (3, p. 365) The gracious consolation of prayer can only be received by those who have been purified by fasting and can only be preserved by those who maintain their purity by fasting. (2, p. 131) Without attention, prayer is not prayer. She's dead! She is useless, soul-harming, God-insulting idle talk! He who prays attentively will certainly pray more or less in this way. If attention increases and intensifies during prayer, the image of prayer offered by the divine John will certainly appear. “Ask with weeping,” he says, “seek with obedience, and seek with longsuffering: in this way you ask and he receives, and he who seeks finds, and it will be opened to the one who asks” (Matthew 7:8). (1, p. 307) Before starting prayer, let us humble ourselves before our neighbors, accuse ourselves as having seduced and seduced them with our sins, begin our prayer by praying for our enemies, unite ourselves in prayer with all humanity and beg God to have mercy on us together with all people, not because we are worthy to pray for humanity, but to fulfill the commandment of love, which lays down the law: pray for one another (James 5:16). (3, p. 368) Let us give our prayer two properties: attention and repentance. With them, like two wings, may she fly to heaven, may she appear before the face of God, may she grant us mercy. The prayer of the blessed publican had these two properties. Imbued with the consciousness of his sinfulness, he did not find in his deeds any hope of receiving salvation, he saw this hope in the sole mercy of God, calling all sinners to repentance, and granting salvation for one repentance. As a sinner who does not have any good of his own, the publican took the last place in the church; as a sinner unworthy of heaven, he did not dare to raise his eyes to heaven. He directed them to the ground, and, striking with repentance in the heart, from the depths of the heart, with all his soul he uttered a prayer combined with confession: God, be merciful to me, a sinner. (2, p. 39) Attention, which completely observes prayer from entertainment or from extraneous thoughts and dreams, is a gift of God’s grace. We prove our sincere desire to receive the gift of grace, the soul-saving gift of attention, by forcing ourselves to pay attention during every prayer. (3, p. 96) Humility is the only altar on which we are permitted by spiritual law to offer the sacrifice of prayer, on which the sacrifice of prayer ascends to God and appears before His face. Humility is the only vessel into which grace-filled gifts are placed by the finger of God. (1, p. 357) Sobriety is inseparable from unceasing prayer: it is born from it and gives birth to it; from mutual birth of each other, these two virtues are combined with each other in an inextricable union. (3, p. 271) Be sober, that is, reject satiety and pleasure, reject deceptive thoughts and dreams, and be sober in prayer, casting all your care Nan (on God), as He cares for you (1 Pet. 4:7; 5:7). I want men, that is, Christians who have perfected the feat of prayer, to say prayers in every place, lifting up their holy hands, mind and heart, cleansed from passions, filled with humility and love, without anger and reflection, that is, being alien to any malice towards their neighbor, alien to the addition of thoughts and delight in dreams (1 Tim. 2:8). (1, p. 241) Just as seeds sown in a field not cultivated with agricultural tools are lost without bearing any fruit, so prayer remains fruitless if the flesh is not prepared for it, the heart is not prepared through fasting. Entertainment and aggravation of thoughts, coldness, hardness of heart, vain and sinful dreams, constantly arising in the imagination, destroy the prayer of the satiated. (2, p. 126) We prove that we want to acquire the gift of prayer by patiently sitting down in prayer at the door of prayer. For patience and constancy we receive the gift of prayer. Lord, says the Scripture, give grace-filled prayer to the one who prays patiently with one’s own effort. (1, pp. 190–191) Anyone who, without curbing the carnal desires of the heart and the carnal thoughts of the mind with appropriate bodily deeds, would decide to engage in mental prayer and planting the commandments of Christ in the heart, will not only work in vain, but may also be subject to spiritual distress, self-delusion and demonic deception, incur the wrath of God, as he was brought upon by the one who came to the wedding feast in non-wedding clothes ( Matthew 22:12). (3, p. 278) “Let everyone depart from unrighteousness, calling the name of the Lord” (2 Tim. 2:19), bequeaths the apostle. This testament, which applies to all Christians, applies especially to those who intend to practice unceasing prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus. The Most Pure Name of Jesus does not tolerate being in the midst of uncleanness - it demands that all unclean things be cast out and cast out from the vessel of the soul; entering the vessel according to the degree of its purity, it itself begins to act in it and perform further purification, for which a person’s own efforts are insufficient and which is required in order for the vessel to become a worthy container for a spiritual treasure, an all-holy shrine. Let us avoid satiety and even saturation, let us make a rule of moderate, constant abstinence in food and drink, deny ourselves the enjoyment of tasty foods and drinks, let us soothe ourselves with sleep satisfactorily, but not excessively, let us renounce idle talk, laughter, jokes, blasphemy... Let us give up daydreaming and vain thoughts that arise in us because of our unbelief, because of reckless care, because of vanity, memory, irritability and other passions of ours. With the fullness of faith, let us cast everything on the Lord and replace our many thoughts and empty dreams with uninterrupted prayer to the Lord Jesus. (1, pp. 351–352) The Apostle commands thanksgiving during prayer: “endure in prayer,” he says, “being watchful in it with thanksgiving” (Col. 4:2; see Phil. 4:6). The Apostle testifies that thanksgiving is commanded by God Himself: “Pray without ceasing, give thanks in everything; For this is the will of God regarding Christ Jesus in you” (1 Thess. 5:17–18). What does thanksgiving mean? This is the praise of God for His countless blessings poured out on all humanity and on every person. With such thanksgiving a wonderful calmness is introduced into the soul; joy is introduced, despite the fact that sorrow surrounds you from everywhere; a living faith is introduced, due to which a person rejects all concerns about himself, tramples upon human and demonic fear, and surrenders himself entirely to the will of God. This disposition of the soul is an excellent preparatory disposition for prayer. (3, pp. 94–95) The prayer of an ascetic who combines fasting with mercy will be immediately heard. (2, p. 127) Night time is especially conducive, due to its silence and darkness, to the exercise of the Jesus Prayer; At night, the great ascetic of prayer, David, occupied himself with the memory of God: I remembered Your name in the night, O Lord, he says; At night I tuned my soul into a divine mood and, having acquired this mood, in the activities of the next day I preserved Your law (Ps. 119:55). (1, pp. 273–274) You can pray standing, sitting, or lying down; those who are strong in health and strength pray standing and sitting, the weak can pray lying down, because in this prayer it is not the feat of the body that dominates, but the feat of the spirit. (1, p. 318) Prayer requires constant co-presence and the assistance of attention. With attention, prayer is the inalienable property of the one praying; in the absence of attention, it is alien to the person praying. With attention it bears abundant fruit; without attention it bears thorns and thistles. (3, p. 95) Do not hate your slanderer, scolder, robber, or murderer: they crucify you at the right hand of the Lord, according to the incomprehensible arrangement of God’s destinies, so that you, from your heartfelt consciousness and conviction, can say in your prayer to the Lord: “I accept what is worthy of deeds; remember me, Lord, in Your Kingdom.” (1, p. 253) The path of untruth is conversation with thoughts and daydreaming. He who rejects this conversation and dreaming can inherit all the commandments of God, can accomplish the will of God in the midst of his heart (Ps. 39:9), constantly clinging to the Lord in prayer, inspiring his prayer with humility and love. “Lovers of the Lord! you hate evil” (Ps. 97:10), the Holy Spirit admonishes us. (1, p. 241) In silence and at night you can pray more attentively. The Lord chose primarily solitude and the night for His prayer; He chose them so that we would not only obey His commandment about prayer, but also follow His example. (1, p. 194) Everywhere the Holy Spirit establishes the law of combining fasting with prayer. “Turn to Me with all your heart,” the Lord calls to sinners through the mouth of another prophet, exhorting and encouraging them to repentance, “with fasting and weeping and mourning, and rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God. Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify the fast, preach celibacy” (Joel 2:12-15). The repentant Ninevites demonstrated the power of fasting and prayer. God had already spoken the decree against them, it had already been announced to them by the prophet Jonah; Already the prophet, having retired outside the city, looked intently at the city and hourly expected the fulfillment of the formidable prophecy. But the Ninevites resorted to repentance, proving the genuineness of repentance by abandoning evil deeds, intensified fasting, and intensified prayer - “and God repented of the evil that he said to do to them, and do not do it” (John 3:10). (2, pp. 127–128) No one who wants to succeed in prayer dares to think lightly and judge prayer, pronounced with the lips and voice with the attention of the mind, as an insignificant act that does not deserve respect. If the holy fathers speak about the futility of oral and public prayer, not combined with attention, then it should not be concluded from this that they reject or disparage oral prayer itself. No! They just demand attention from her. (1, p. 209) Fasting is the basis of all... exploits, without it it is impossible to maintain solitude, nor to curb the tongue, nor to lead a sober, attentive life, nor to succeed in prayer and vigil, nor to acquire memories of death, nor to see the multitude of one’s sins and infirmities. (1, p. 406) The person doing the prayer needs to know and see the effect of passions and spirits on his blood. It is not without reason that the Holy Scripture says that not only flesh, but also blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15:50). (1, p. 242) The practice of repentance and prayer is one thing, but it combines two different types of virtue. (1, p. 179) All the saints of God spent their earthly lives in fasting and prayer. Thus, according to the testimony of the Gospel, Saint Anna, the prophetess, daughter of Phanuel, did not leave the church, serving God with fasting and prayers day and night (Luke 2:37). The Holy Scripture tells about the great Judith that she, having fasted all the days of her widowhood, had an experienced understanding of prayer, knew its power, through prayer achieved a living faith in God, and by faith accomplished a wonderful feat (Judith.8-13). I covered my soul with fasting (Ps. 69:11), says the divinely inspired David, so strong is this feat; humble my soul with fasting (Ps. 34:13) - this is how this feat counteracts self-satisfaction and pompousness, which arise from satiety! Through fasting, my prayer will return to my depths; without him, she is a sad victim of mental entertainment, inseparable from satiety. (2, pp. 128–129) Divine Scripture says: “God will not despise a broken and humble heart” (Ps. 50:19). And you, if you pray with the consciousness of your sinfulness and poverty, then God will hear your voice from His holy church, and your cry of prayer before Him will enter His ears (Ps. 17:7): He will pour out His rich mercy on you. (1, pp. 205–206) With... a selfless mood one must begin to pray in the name of Jesus and remain in this prayer; constancy and thoroughness in prayer should be similar to the incessant striving of a baby for its mother's nipples: then prayer in the name of Jesus can be crowned with complete success, invisible enemies can be trampled underfoot, the enemy and the local (avenger) can be finally crushed. The enemy is called a localist because from those who pray, especially from time to time, and not constantly, he tries to take away after prayer what they acquired during prayer. For decisive victory, unceasing prayer and unceasing vigilance over oneself are necessary. (1, pp. 272–273). Even if someone stood at the very height of virtues, if he does not pray as a sinner, his prayer is rejected by God. (1, p. 185) The Holy Fathers offer as a common practice to everyone... especially those engaged in prayer and those who want to succeed in it, holy repentance, which acts directly against vanity, bringing spiritual poverty to the soul. (1, p. 244) The one who prays must see himself mutilated, distorted, tormented by sinfulness, thrown out of the natural state by it, plunged into the unnatural, and from this disastrous state cry out to the all-merciful and almighty Jesus, the Renewer of human nature: have mercy on me. (1, p. 335) Such was the life of the apostles! Such was the life of the martyrs! Such is the life of the monks! It was and is the combination of unceasing prayer with constant fasting. Their mercy and love for their brethren, for those who love and those who hate, was divine, as exceeding human nature, as borrowed from the breasts of the Lord Himself. They not only had compassion for everyone in need of mental and physical needs, not only did they forgive all insults and grave insults; They joyfully laid down their souls for the salvation of their neighbors, for the salvation of their enemies. (2, p. 129) The soul of our prayers and other pious deeds should be a feeling of repentance. (1, p. 86) Constantly remaining in prayer, although it constitutes an essential work... but it requires preparatory training. (1, pp. 180–181) Set yourself the sole purpose of life to fulfill the will of Jesus in every circumstance, no matter how important or trivial it may seem; try to do the only deeds that are pleasing to Jesus, and all your deeds will be equally worthy of heaven. Love the will of Jesus more than the desires of your flesh, more than your peace and comfort, more than life, more than your soul. Read the Gospel as often as possible, study in it the will of the Lord and your Savior. Do not leave without attention the slightest feature from the Gospel, no apparently unimportant commandment. Curb and mortify all your own movements, not only sinful, but, apparently, also good, belonging to fallen human nature, often very developed among pagans and heretics, separated from the virtues of the Gospel, like the west from the east. May all your old things be silent in you! May Jesus alone act in you with His most holy commandments, thoughts and sensations flowing from these commandments. If you live in this way, the Jesus Prayer will certainly flourish in you... because the place of infusion and peace of this prayer is the mind and heart, renewed by the knowledge, tasting, and fulfillment of the will of God, good, acceptable and perfect (Rom. 12:2). (1, p. 353) Let us put at the foundation of the feat of prayer... for which all other feats are carried out, attentive, verbal and vocal prayer, for which the merciful Lord in due time grants to the constant, patient, humble ascetic prayer of the mind, heartfelt, and grace-filled. (1, p. 214) One can also discern the time appropriate for mental, heartfelt prayer. To engage in it, a mature age is appropriate, at which the impulses in a person are naturally tamed. Youth is not rejected when it has the quality of maturity, especially when it has a leader. But for maturity, the number of years from birth is not enough...; maturity should most flow from a long preliminary examination of oneself, consideration not arbitrary, but about the Lord Jesus Christ, in the light of the Gospel, in which the new man and all the shades of the ailments of the old are depicted - when studying the writings of the holy fathers of the Orthodox Eastern Church, who instruct us to use the light of the Gospel infallibly. (1, pp. 245–246) Blessed are the poor in spirit who pray with a deep consciousness of their poverty, for these are the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 5:3). Blessed are those who weep in their prayers from the feeling of their poverty, for they will be comforted (Matthew 5:4) by the gracious consolation of the Holy Spirit, which consists in the peace of Christ and in the love of Christ for all their neighbors. Then none of his neighbors, even his worst enemy, are excluded from the embrace of love of the one praying, then the one praying is reconciled with all the most painful circumstances of earthly life. (1, p. 184) To help beginners practice the Jesus Prayer, there are various other aids. Let's list the main ones. 1) Rosary or ladder. The rosary usually consists of a hundred grains, and the ladder consists of a hundred steps, since as a rule, performed with the Jesus Prayer, it is usually calculated in a hundred prayers. Bows are counted according to the rosary, and also while sitting... they practice the Jesus Prayer initially according to the rosary. When attention intensifies during prayer, then the ability to pray the rosary and count the spoken prayers ceases: all attention turns to prayer. 2) It is very useful to learn the Jesus Prayer, performing it with bows to the ground and from the waist, making these bows slowly and with a feeling of repentance, as the blessed young man George believed them, about whom St. Simeon the New Theologian narrates in the “Sermon on Faith” [Philokalia, part 1 – ed.]. 3) In church and in general when practicing the Jesus Prayer, it is useful to have your eyes closed, and 4) to hold your left hand near your chest, above the left nipple of the chest, slightly higher than it: the latter mechanism contributes to the feeling of the power of literature located in the chest... Those who are silent [holy fathers - ed.] are advised to sit on a low chair, firstly, because attentive prayer requires a calm position, and secondly, because the image of the blind beggar mentioned in the Gospel, who, sitting along the way, cried out to the Lord: Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me (Mark 10:47), was heard and had mercy. Also, this low chair represents the rotting place on which Job was cast down, outside the city, when the devil struck him from head to toe with a cruel disease (Job.2:8). (1, pp. 334–335) As much as fasting is needed for someone who wants to engage in and succeed in mental prayer, so much does he need silence or extreme solitude - generally possible withdrawal from wandering. (1, p. 233) The act of repentance must be combined with the act of prayer into one act. The Lord united them: let no man separate. (1, p. 177) Let us be attentive in our oral and public prayers, which we say during church services and in solitude... We will not make our work and life... fruitless by our inattention and negligence in the work of God. Negligence in prayer is harmful! (1, p. 214) To those who pray alone and intensely, demons appear in the form of monsters, in the form of tempting objects, sometimes in the form of bright Angels, martyrs, saints and Christ Himself; One should not be afraid of demonic threats, but one should be very distrustful of all phenomena in general. In such cases, which, however, are infrequent, our first duty is to resort to God, surrendering entirely to His will and asking for His help: not to pay attention to the phenomena and not to enter into communication and conversation with them, recognizing ourselves as weak for communication with hostile spirits, unworthy of communication with the holy spirits. (1, p. 343) The more a person delves into himself, the more he knows himself, the more he knows his passions, their varied action, means of struggle, his weakness, the more he tries to destroy in himself the sinful properties instilled by the fall, and acquire the properties indicated by the Gospel, the stronger the foundation for the building of prayer will be. (1, p. 246) When... looking at the fatherly books in the initial reading... those who wish to become acquainted with the inner feat of prayer can be offered the instructions of Seraphim of Sarov, the writings of Paisius Nyametsky and his friend, schemamonk Vasily. The holiness of these persons and the correctness of their teaching are undoubted. After studying these scriptures, you can turn to the book of St. Nilus of Sora. This book is small in appearance, but its spiritual volume is of extraordinary size. It is difficult to find a question about smart doing that would not be resolved in it. Everything is presented with extraordinary simplicity, clarity and satisfaction. This is how the method of practicing the Jesus Prayer is outlined. However, both the method and the entire book are intended for monks who are already capable of silence. (1, p. 317) Choose for yourself a rule that corresponds to your strengths. What the Lord said about the Sabbath, that it is for man, and not man for it (Mark 2:27), can and should be applied to all pious deeds and between them and to the prayer rule. (1, p. 198) Practicing the Jesus Prayer, by the very nature of this exercise, requires continuous vigilance over oneself... One must constantly watch oneself so that sin does not somehow creep in and devastate the soul. This is not enough, one must constantly observe that the mind and heart remain in the will of Jesus and follow His holy commands, so that carnal wisdom does not supplant spiritual wisdom with some evil trick, so as not to be carried away by any kind of heated blood, so as to remain, if possible, in constant deadness, in some subtle coldness (1 Kings 19:12). When the sensation of this subtle coolness appears, then from it the will of God is seen more clearly and is carried out more freely. When the will of God is seen more clearly, then hunger and thirst for divine truth are aroused with particular force, and the ascetic, in the deep consciousness of his poverty and in tears, tries with new effort to reveal this truth within himself through the most attentive, most reverent prayer. (1, p. 354) Oral, public prayer, like any other, must certainly be accompanied by attention. With attention, the benefits of verbal prayer are innumerable. The ascetic must begin with it. It is first taught by the Holy Church to its children. (1, p. 211) The preparation for prayer is: an unsatiated belly, cutting off cares with the sword of faith, forgiveness from the sincerity of the heart of all offenses, thanksgiving to God for all the sorrowful incidents of life, removing absent-mindedness and daydreaming from oneself, the reverent fear that is so characteristic of a creature when it is allowed to have a conversation with its Creator due to the ineffable goodness of the Creator to the creature. (1, p. 184) When praying, work is required from a strong body; without it, the heart will not be broken, prayer will be powerless and untrue. (1, p. 186) Prayer of grace did not remain in St. George of Zadonsk without its usual consequences, not at all known and not characteristic of the carnal and mental state. The abundant manifestation of spiritual fire in the heart, the fire of Divine love, is described by George, the Zadonsk recluse, from his own experience. But before this, the Divine gift of repentance was sent to him, prepurifying his heart for love, a gift that acted like fire, destroying everything that desecrated the courts of the Holy and Strong Lord, and plunged the body itself into exhaustion. (1, pp. 312–313) In your prayerful feat, rely completely on God, without Whom even the slightest success is impossible. Every step towards success in this feat is a gift from God. Deny yourself and surrender to God, let him do with you what he wants. But He, the All-Good One, wants to give you something that has never entered our minds or hearts (1 Cor. 2:9): He wants to grant such blessings as our mind and heart, in their fallen state, cannot even imagine. (1, pp. 230–231) Humility is the only altar on which people are allowed to offer prayer sacrifices to God - the only altar from which prayer sacrifices are accepted by God. (1, p. 192) The gift of prayer is given to those who humble themselves and humble themselves before the greatness of the gift; the gift is given to those who have renounced their will and surrendered to the will of God; The gift is given to the one who tames and mortifies the flesh and blood within himself, who tames and mortifies the carnal wisdom within himself with the commandments of the Gospel. (1, pp. 309–310) Preparatory training for unceasing prayer is accomplished through obedience. (1, p. 181) Those who practice prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus are subject to special persecution by the devil... For this reason, he who has dedicated himself to the true service of God through the unceasing Jesus Prayer must especially guard himself from distraction of thoughts, not in any way allowing himself idle mental talk, but, ignoring the thoughts and dreams that appear, constantly return to praying in the name of Jesus, as if in refuge, believing that Jesus constantly cares for that His servant who is constantly with him. With vigilant remembrance of Him. (1, p. 342) When reading the Holy Scriptures and the books of the Fathers... it should unite the mind with the soul - the reading will be much more fruitful. (1, p. 261) The Holy Fathers mention that many, having begun to do prayer incorrectly, in ways for which they were not ripe and incapable, fell into self-delusion and mental harm. (1, p. 315) “Work for the Lord with fear and rejoice in Him with trembling” (Ps. 2:11), says the prophet, and another prophet speaks on behalf of God: “On whom will I look, only to the meek and silent, and trembling at My words” (Is. 66:2). The Lord respects the prayer of the humble, and do not despise their prayers” (Ps. 101:18). He is the One who gives life, that is, salvation, to the brokenhearted (Is. 57:15). (1, p. 185) To acquire deep heartfelt prayer, significant preparation is required: it must consist in a satisfactory study of the experience of monastic life, in accustoming oneself to activity according to the Gospel commandments: holy prayer is based on the dispensation of the soul, produced by activity according to the commandments, rests in this dispensation, cannot remain in the soul when it is not in such a dispensation. Preparation should consist of a satisfactory study of the New Testament and the patristic writings on prayer. The final preparation is all the more necessary because, in the absence of spirit-bearing leaders, our only guide should be the fatherly writings and prayerful lamentation before God. (1, pp. 293–294) The feeling of REPENTANCE IS THE SOUL OF OUR PRAYERS. The feeling of repentance protects a praying person from all the wiles of the devil: the devil flees from ascetics who emit the fragrance of humility that is born in the hearts of those who repent. (1, p. 186) Achieving unparalleled heartfelt prayer requires both a lot of time and a lot of effort. (1, p. 331) The one who says that grace-filled prayer is grace-filled humility, and grace-filled humility is unceasing prayer, will not be mistaken. We recognize the need to outline here the closest union of prayer with humility. What is humility? “Humility,” said the fathers, “is divine and incomprehensible.” Doesn’t this mean the same as what the apostle said: “the peace of God surpasses all understanding?” (Phil.4:7). We will unmistakably define humility if we say: humility is an incomprehensible action of the incomprehensible world of God, incomprehensibly comprehended by blessed experience alone. In drawing up such a definition of humility, we have the Lord Himself as our guide. “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden,” said the Lord, “and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28–29). (1, p. 257) Go into your closet and, having shut your doors, pray to your Father who is in secret. Let no fool of yours know about your prayer! Neither your friend, nor your relative, nor the vanity itself that cohabits your heart and incites you to tell someone about your feat of prayer, to hint about it. (1, p. 194) It is impossible to lay any other basis for praying in the name of Jesus than what is laid down: it is our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, the God-Man, who incomprehensibly covered the unlimited nature of God with the limited nature of man and from the limited human nature manifests the actions of the unlimited God. Since our infancy, the holy fathers teach some methods... to more conveniently accustom ourselves to the Jesus Prayer. These methods are nothing more than methods that do not contain anything special. They should not be dwelled on with undue attention, they should not be given undue importance. All the power and all the effect of the Jesus Prayer flows from the worshiped and omnipotent name Jesus, the only name under heaven, in which it is fitting for us to be saved. In order to become capable of discovering this action in us, we must be cultivated by the Gospel commandments, as the Lord said: Not everyone who says to Me: Lord, Lord, will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, both that which awaits us after our blessed death, and that which is revealed in us during our earthly life, but do the will of My Father who is in heaven (Matthew 7:21). (1, p. 355) Let us take care to free the church - soul and body - from idols, from sacrifices to idols, from things sacrificed to idols, from everything that belongs to idolatry. Just as the holy prophet Elijah brought all the priests and prophets of Baal to the stream of Kiss and there put them to death, so we will plunge into the cry of repentance and on this blessed stream we will kill all the principles that force our heart to make sacrifices to sin, all the justifications that justify and excuse such a sacrifice. Let us wash the altar and everything that surrounds it with tears: we will double, triple the washing, because spiritual impurity requires copious tears to wash itself. Let the altar be built from stones in the name of the Lord - from sensations borrowed solely from the Gospel; let there be no place here for the feelings of the old man, no matter how innocent and graceful they may seem (see 1 Kings 18). Then the great God will bring down His all-holy fire into our hearts and make our hearts a church of grace-filled prayer, as He spoke with His Divine lips: “My church will be called the church of prayer” (Matthew 21:13). (1, pp. 231–232) To perform... [prayer - ed.], you need self-sacrifice, you need to abandon worldly cares, not to mention entertainment, amusements and pleasures, you need to live according to the Gospel commandments, you need purity of mind and heart, which alone is seen and understood as the spiritual, holy, mysterious teaching of the Spirit, according to the degree of purification. (1, p. 316) Deep, true humility! It alone is worthy to stand before God, it alone is worthy to converse with God: it is never abandoned by God. God mercifully listens to him, pouring out abundant bounties on the one praying with humility. (1, p. 15) The merciful fathers, seeing that I want to engage in the Jesus Prayer, moreover, seeing that I am quite alive to the world, that it strongly affects me through my feelings, advise me to enter a solitary, dark cell to pray, so that in this way my feelings would become inactive, my communication with the world would be interrupted, and it would be easier for me to deepen into myself. They advise sitting while practicing the Jesus Prayer on a low chair, so that my body has the position of a beggar begging for alms, and I can more comfortably feel the poverty of my soul. When I am present at a divine service and during it I am engaged in the Jesus Prayer, the fathers advise me to close my eyes to save myself from distraction, because my vision is alive to matter, and as soon as I open my eyes, the objects I see will immediately begin to be imprinted on my mind, distracting me from prayer. There are many other external ways found by practitioners of prayer to materially assist spiritual achievement. These methods can be used to advantage; but when using them, one must take into account the mental and physical properties of each: any mechanical method that works very well for one ascetic may be useless and even harmful for another. (1, p. 356) True prayer is the voice of true repentance. When prayer is not animated by repentance, then it does not fulfill its purpose, then God is not pleased with it. He will not despise a broken spirit, a contrite and humble heart (Ps. 50:19). (1, p. 184) The sign of perfection is unceasing prayer Those who have reached manhood for Christ receive unceasing prayer, which they perform in the secret of the spiritual cage in every place and at every time. (1, p. 158) The mind, enclosed in the words of prayer, attracts the heart to compassion for itself. This sympathy of the heart with the mind is expressed by tenderness, which is a pious feeling that combines sadness with quiet, meek consolation (1, p. 187) It is essential for one and all to begin learning to pray in the name of the Lord Jesus by performing the Jesus Prayer orally while enclosing the mind in the words of the prayer. By enclosing the mind in the words of prayer, the strictest attention to these words is depicted, without which prayer is like a body without a soul. Let us leave it to the Lord Himself to transform our attentive verbal prayer into mental, heartfelt and spiritual prayer. He will certainly do this when he sees us somewhat purified, educated, nurtured, prepared by doing the Gospel commandments. (1, pp. 356–357) If the mind, due to its news in the feat of prayer, comes out of its conclusion into words, then it must again introduce it into them. Characteristic of the mind, in its states of fall, inconsistency and disposition to float everywhere. But God can grant him steadfastness and grants it in due time for constancy and patience in his struggle. (3, p. 96) Close the doors of your mind from extraneous thoughts that appear to distract you from prayer; close the doors of your heart from sinful sensations that try to confuse and defile you, and pray. (1, p. 194) Enclose your mind in the spoken words of prayer and you will keep it attentive. Keep your eyes on your lips or closed: this will help connect your mind with your heart. Pronounce the words with extreme leisurelyness and you will be more comfortable enclosing your mind in the words of prayer: not a single word of your prayer will be uttered without being animated by attention. (1, pp. 186–187) Particularly helpful in maintaining attention during prayer is the very leisurely pronunciation of the words of the prayer. Pronounce the words slowly, so that the mind can more easily retain its conclusion in the words of the prayer, so that it does not escape from a single word of it. Saying the words a few times out loud when you are praying alone will help maintain your attention. (3, p. 96) Prayer is distinguished from prayer; another is to pray to God with a non-soaring thought, and another is to stand in prayer with the body and soar with the thought. Again: it is another thing to pray at certain times and begin prayer at the end of worldly conversations and activities, and another thing is to prefer and submit prayer, as much as possible, to worldly concerns, according to the instruction of the same apostle: The Lord is near: do not worry about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, let your requests be made known to God (Phil. 4:6). (1, p. 170) The Lord, teaching us to pray, likens a praying soul to a widow, offended by a rival, sitting relentlessly before an impartial and impartial judge (Luke 18:1–8). When praying, do not move away from this likeness in your soul. Let your prayer be, so to speak, a constant complaint against the sin that oppresses you. Go deep into yourself, open yourself with attentive prayer: you will see that you are definitely a widow in relation to Christ because of the sin living in you, hostile to you, causing internal struggle and torment in you, making you alien to God. (1, pp. 184–185) Do not dare to bring to God multi-verbal and eloquent prayers composed by you, no matter how strong and touching they may seem to you: they are the product of a fallen mind and, being a desecrated victim, cannot be accepted on the spiritual altar of God. And you, admiring the elegant expressions of the prayers you have composed and recognizing the refined effect of vanity and voluptuousness as a consolation of conscience and even grace, will be carried away far from prayer. You will be carried away far from prayer at the very time when it seems to you that you are praying abundantly and have already achieved a certain degree of pleasing God. (1, p. 194) The quality of true prayer is when the mind is attentive during prayer, and the heart sympathizes with the mind. (1, p. 186) Renounce everything in order to inherit prayer and, raised from the earth on the cross of self-denial, hand over your spirit, soul and body to God, and from Him receive holy prayer, which, according to the teaching of the Apostle and the Universal Church, is the action of the Holy Spirit in a person, when the Spirit dwells in a person. (1, pp. 191–192) A necessary accessory to prayer is waiting. When you feel dryness and bitterness, do not give up prayer: for your longing and struggle against heartfelt insensibility, God’s mercy, consisting of tenderness, will descend upon you. Tenderness is a gift of God, sent down to those who remain and endure in prayer (Rom. 12:12; Col. 4:2), constantly growing in them, guiding them to spiritual perfection. (1, p. 187) How sublime and deep are the prayers for Holy Communion! What excellent preparation they provide to those approaching the holy Mysteries of Christ! They clean and decorate the house of the soul with wonderful thoughts and sensations that are so pleasing to the Lord. The greatest of the Christian Sacraments is majestically depicted and explained in these prayers; In contrast to this height, man’s shortcomings are vividly and accurately calculated, his weakness and unworthiness are shown. From these prayers the incomprehensible goodness of God shines like the sun from the sky, because of which He deigns to unite closely with man, despite the insignificance of man. (1, p. 196) A Christian then receives unceasing prayer when his will and the activity dependent on the will are absorbed in understanding, desire and fulfillment of the will of God. This establishes living faith, evangelical simplicity, and the peace of God, alien to any disturbance, in the heart. Such a rational child constantly sees his weakness, constantly believes, constantly hungers and thirsts for divine truth, and therefore, constantly prays. (1, p. 158) While engaged in... labors and handicrafts, pray often, if you cannot yet pray incessantly; return to prayer, no matter how you remember it: prayer will gradually turn into a habit, and frequent prayer will imperceptibly turn into incessant prayer. (1, p. 181) The mind, standing before the invisible God in attentive prayer, must itself be invisible, like the image of the invisible Divinity: that is, the mind must not represent any form either in itself, or from itself, or in front of itself, it must be completely formless. Otherwise: the mind must be completely alien to daydreaming, no matter how immaculate and holy this dream may seem (1, p. 187) Bring to God a humble prayer for the virtues and pious deeds you perform: cleanse and perfect them through prayer and repentance. Say about them in your prayer what righteous Job said in his daily prayer about his children: When my sons sinned, and in their thoughts they thought evil thoughts against God. Malice is cunning: it inconspicuously mixes with virtue, defiles, poisons it. (1, p. 191) Prayer rules keep the person praying in a saving disposition of humility and repentance, teaching him constant self-condemnation, feeding him with tenderness, strengthening him with hope in the all-good and all-merciful God, delighting him with the peace of Christ, love for God and his neighbors. (1, p. 196) Through this doing [the Jesus Prayer – ed.] one gains experienced and essential knowledge of fallen spirits; Having come to know them, we acquire hatred and resentment towards them, we enter into constant warfare with them, we raise up natural jealousy against them, we persecute them, defeat them, and destroy them. (1, p. 174) The virtue of prayer lies solely in quality, and not in quantity: Then quantity is commendable when it leads to quality. Quality always leads to quantity; quantity leads to quality when the worshiper prays carefully. (1, p. 186) Attentive prayer, free from distraction and daydreaming, is a vision of the invisible God, drawing to Himself the vision of the mind and the desire of the heart. Then the mind sees without form and completely satisfies itself with non-seeing, which surpasses all vision. The reason for this blissful invisibility is the infinite subtlety and incomprehensibility of the Object to which vision is directed. The invisible Sun of truth - God - also emits rays that are invisible, but cognizable by the clear sensation of the soul: they fill the heart with wonderful calmness, faith, courage, meekness, mercy, love for neighbors and God. By these actions, visible in the inner heart cell, a person undoubtedly recognizes that his prayer is accepted by God, begins to believe with living faith and firmly trust in the Lover and Beloved. This is the beginning of the revival of the soul for God and blissful eternity. (1, p. 190) The oral prayer of the saints was animated by attention and Divine grace, uniting the powers of man divided by sin into one: that is why it breathed such supernatural power and made such a wonderful impression on the listeners. The saints sang to God in heartfelt confession; they sang and confessed to God unwaveringly, that is, without distraction, they sang to God intelligently (Ps. 46:8). (1, p. 213) To the extent that one limits them [vain affairs - ed.] and rejects their objects, to the extent one will keep the thought from soaring, to the extent one will keep the thought, to the extent one will give place to pure prayer and prove faith in Christ. (1, p. 171) During prayer, do not look for delight, do not set your nerves in motion, do not get your blood hot. On the contrary, keep your heart in deep calm, into which it is brought by a feeling of repentance: material fire, the fire of the fallen nature, is rejected by God. Your heart needs to be cleansed by crying repentance and prayer of repentance; when it is cleansed, then God Himself will send His all-holy spiritual fire into it. (1, p. 187) When intending to do something or wanting something, also in difficult circumstances of life, cast your thoughts in prayer before God: ask for what you consider necessary and useful for yourself; but leave the fulfillment and non-fulfillment of your request to the will of God in faith and trust in the omnipotence, wisdom and goodness of the will of God. This excellent image of prayer was given to us by the One who prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, that the cup appointed for Him might pass by. Neither is My will, He concluded His prayer to the Father, but Yours be done. (1, p. 191) The feeling of the fear of God is high and desirable! When it acts, the mind often dulls its eyes, ceases to utter words, to produce thoughts: with reverent silence, which surpasses words, it expresses the consciousness of its insignificance and the inexpressible prayer that is born from this consciousness. (1, p. 70) The prayerful reading of the Akathist to Sweetest Jesus, in addition to its own dignity, serves as an excellent preparation for the exercise of the Jesus Prayer, which reads like this: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. This prayer is almost the only exercise of successful ascetics who have achieved simplicity and purity, for whom all much thinking and verbosity serves as a burdensome entertainment. The Akathist shows what thoughts can accompany the Jesus Prayer, which seems extremely dry for beginners. Throughout its entire space, it depicts one sinner’s request for mercy by the Lord Jesus Christ; but this petition is given various forms, in accordance with the infancy of the minds of the beginners. This is how babies are given food that has been previously softened. (1, p. 197) The soul that begins the path of God is immersed in deep ignorance of everything divine and spiritual, even if it is rich in the wisdom of this world. Because of this ignorance, she does not know how and how much she should pray. To help the infant soul, the Holy Church established prayer rules. A prayer rule is a collection of several prayers composed by the Divinely inspired holy fathers, adapted to a certain circumstance and time. The purpose of the rule is to provide the soul with the amount of prayerful thoughts and feelings it lacks, moreover, thoughts and feelings that are correct, holy, and truly pleasing to God. The grace-filled prayers of the holy fathers are filled with such thoughts and feelings. (1, p. 195) Spiritual mind, the mind of God, promotes prayer, concentrates a person in himself, immerses him in attention and tenderness, brings to mind reverent silence, fear and surprise, born from the feeling of the presence and greatness of God. This feeling in due time can become very intensified and make prayer for the one praying a terrible judgment seat of God. (1, p. 189) Be wise in your prayer. Do not ask for anything corruptible or vain in it, remembering the Savior’s commandment: Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all this, that is, all the needs for temporary life, will be added to you. (1, p. 191) When performing the rules and bows, one should not rush in any way: one should perform both the rules and bows with as much leisure and attention as possible. It is better to read fewer prayers and bow less, but with attention, than a lot without attention. (1, p. 198) Pray to God in contrition of spirit, not recognizing any dignity, no virtue, admitting yourself guilty of countless sins, known and unknown to you. (1, p. 205) A baby expresses all its desires by crying, and let your prayer always be accompanied by crying. Not only with the words of prayer, but also with prayerful silence, let your desire for repentance and reconciliation with God, your extreme need for God’s mercy, be expressed through crying. (1, p. 186) The Akathist to the Mother of God glorifies the incarnation of God the Word and the greatness of the Mother of God, Who is blessed by all generations for the birth of the God incarnate (Luke 1:48). As if in a vast picture, the great mystery of the incarnation of God the Word is depicted in the Akathist with countless wondrous features, colors, and shades. Successful lighting enlivens every picture, and the Akathist to the Mother of God is illuminated with the extraordinary light of grace. This light acts purely: it enlightens the mind, from it the heart is filled with joy and information. The incomprehensible is accepted, as if completely comprehended, by the wonderful effect it has on the mind and heart. (1, p. 197) Prayer, alien to thoughts and dreams, is called pure, unvapor. An ascetic who has achieved pure prayer begins to devote a lot of time to practicing it, often without noticing it. His whole life, all his activities turn into prayer. (1, p. 250) For beginners, short and frequent prayers are more useful than long ones, separated from each other by a significant amount of time. (1, p. 191) If you have acquired the village of repentance, go into the weeping of a child before God. Do not ask, if you can not ask, anything from God; surrender yourself with selflessness to His will. Understand, feel that you are a creature, and God is the Creator. Surrender yourself unconsciously to the will of the Creator, bring Him one infant cry, bring Him a silent heart, ready to follow His will and be imprinted by His will. If, due to your infancy, you cannot immerse yourself in prayerful silence and weeping before God, say a humble prayer before Him, a prayer for forgiveness of sins and healing from sinful passions - these terrible moral ailments resulting from arbitrary sins repeated over a considerable period of time. (1, p. 142) Do you want to succeed in mental and heartfelt prayer? Learn to pay attention verbally and vocally: attentive oral prayer automatically turns into mental and heartfelt prayer. Do you want to learn to quickly and forcefully drive away the thoughts planted by the common enemy of humanity? Drive them away when you are alone in your cell, with a loud, attentive prayer, pronouncing its words slowly, with tenderness. The air is filled with attentive, verbal and vocal prayer - and the awe of the princes of the air envelops them, their muscles relax, their nets decay and collapse! The air is filled with attentive oral and vocal prayer - and the holy Angels approach those praying and singing, stand in their faces, participate in their spiritual chants, as some saints of God were honored to witness this, and among others, our contemporary, the blessed elder Seraphim of Sarov. (1, p. 212) Called by heartfelt prayer, Christ sends down into the heart a spiritual power called the peace of Christ, incomprehensible to the mind, inexpressible in words, incomprehensibly comprehended by blissful experience alone. “The peace of God,” says the apostle to Christians, “surpasses all understanding, so that it may guard your hearts and your minds on Jesus Christ” (Phil. 4:7). Such is the power of the peace of Christ. It is superior to all understanding. This means: it is superior to every mind of creation, and the mind of man, and the mind of the angels of light, and the mind of the fallen angels. He, as the action of God, sovereignly, Divinely disposes thoughts and feelings of the heart (1, p. 251) Many reverent Christians... perform the evening rule for a very long time, taking advantage of the silence and darkness of the night. To their bedtime prayers they add reading kathismas, reading the Gospel, the Apostle, reading akathists and bowing with the Jesus Prayer. In those hours in which the blind world indulges in riotous and noisy amusements, the servants of Christ weep in the silence of their cells, pouring out fervent prayers before the Lord. Having spent the night in a mad vigil, the sons of the world meet the coming day in gloom and despondency of spirit; in joy and good spirits, in the consciousness and feeling of an extraordinary ability for the thought of God and for all good deeds, the servants of God greet the day for which they spent the previous night in a feat of prayer. (1, pp. 197–198) The Jesus Prayer is pronounced like this: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Initially it was pronounced without adding the word sinner; this word is added to the other words of the prayer subsequently. “This word, which contains the consciousness and confession of fall,” notes the Monk Nil of Sorsky, “is fitting for us, favorable to God, who commanded us to send prayers to Him out of consciousness and confession of our sinfulness.” For beginners, tolerating their weaknesses, the fathers allow the prayer to be divided into two halves, sometimes saying: Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me a sinner, and sometimes Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. However, this is only permission and condescension, and is by no means an order or an establishment that requires indispensable execution. It is much better to constantly perform a uniform, integral prayer, without occupying or entertaining the mind with change and concern for change. And the one who finds the need for his weakness to change should not allow it often. Approximately: you can pray one half of the prayer before lunch, the other after lunch. (1, p. 265) He who prays unceasingly abides unceasingly in the Lord, knows the Lord as the Lord, acquires the fear of the Lord, through fear he enters into purity, through purity into Divine love. The love of God fills its church with the gifts of the Spirit. (1, p. 222) Initially... the work [Jesus Prayer - ed.] seems unusually dry, not promising any fruit. The mind, trying to unite with the heart, first encounters impenetrable darkness, hardness and deadness of the heart, which is not suddenly awakened to sympathy with the mind. This should not lead the worker to despondency and cowardice and is mentioned here for the purpose that the worker should be forewarned and warned. A patient and careful worker will certainly be satisfied and comforted: he will rejoice in the immeasurable abundance of such spiritual fruits, which he cannot even imagine in his carnal and spiritual state. (1, pp. 282–283) [King and Psalmist - ed.] David invites all Christians to... prayer. Praise the Lord, fathers, praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord from now to eternity. From the east of the sun to the west His name is praised (Ps. 112:1-3). Bring to the Lord the glory of His name: worship the Lord in His holy court (Ps. 28:2); pray so that the greatness of the name of Jesus appears in your prayers, and you, by His power, ascend into the church of the heart not made by hands to worship in spirit and truth; pray carefully and constantly; pray in fear and trembling before the greatness of the name of Jesus, and let them trust in Thee, the almighty and all-good Jesus, who know Thy name from their blessed experience, for Thou hast not forsaken those who seek Thee, O Lord (Ps. 9:11). (1, p. 273) Attention during prayer brings calm to the nerves and blood, and helps the heart to plunge into repentance and remain in it. Divine fire does not disturb the silence of the heart if it descends into the chamber of the heart, when the disciples of Christ are gathered in it - thoughts and feelings borrowed from the Gospel. This fire does not scorch or heat the heart; on the contrary, it irrigates and cools it, reconciles a person with all people and with all circumstances, and draws the heart into ineffable love for God and neighbors. (1, pp. 187–188) The action of the Jesus Prayer has its own gradualness: first it acts on one mind, bringing it into a state of silence and attention, then it will begin to penetrate the heart, awakening it from the sleep of death and signifying its revival by the appearance in it of feelings of tenderness and crying. Deepening even further, it little by little begins to act in all members of the soul and body, to drive out sin from everywhere, to destroy everywhere the dominion, influence and poison of demons. (1, p. 283) A person who prays incessantly gradually loses the habit of daydreaming, absent-mindedness, vain care and much care, and loses it all the more as the more holy and humble teaching deepens into his soul and takes root in it. Finally, he can come to the state of infancy commanded by the Gospel, become exuberant for the sake of Christ, that is, lose the false mind of the world and receive spiritual mind from God. (1, p. 221) The prayer of one healed, united, reconciled within himself and with himself is alien to the thoughts and dreams of demons. The fiery weapon of the fallen Cherub ceases to act: the blood, held by the power from above, ceases to boil and worry. This sea becomes motionless, the breath of the winds - the thoughts and dreams of demons - no longer affect it. (1, p. 250) During prayer, crucify yourself again, crucify yourself on the cross of prayer. Reject from yourself all the memories, the most important ones, that come to you during prayer, neglect them. Do not theologize, do not get carried away by considering brilliant, new and strong thoughts if they suddenly begin to multiply in you. Sacred silence, brought to the mind during prayer by a sense of the greatness of God, speaks about God more sublimely and more powerfully than any word. “If you truly pray,” the fathers said, “then you are a theologian” (1, p. 263) A prudently chosen prayer rule, according to one’s strengths and type of life, serves as a great aid for one who strives for his salvation. Performing it at the prescribed hours turns into a skill, a necessary natural need. He who has acquired this blessed skill, barely approaches the usual place of performing the rule, when his soul is already filled with a prayerful mood: he has not yet had time to utter a single word of the prayers he reads, and already tenderness is pouring out of his heart and his mind has gone completely deep into the inner cell. (1, p. 199) The apostles had only two spiritual exploits: prayer and preaching the word of God: from prayer they moved to proclaiming the word of God to people, from preaching the word they returned to prayer. They were in constant spiritual conversation: they either talked in prayer with God, or talked on behalf of God with people. The same Holy Spirit acted in both conversations (Acts 6:2–4). What can we learn from the example of the holy apostles? The one who, following obedience, active obedience to the word of God, must concentrate all his activity in unceasing prayer, because unceasing prayer brings a Christian to a state capable of receiving the Holy Spirit. (1, pp. 217–218) The gracious peace of Christ, by which the ascetic is introduced into pure prayer, is completely different from the ordinary calm, pleasant disposition of people: having settled in the heart, it fetters the outrageous movements of the passions, takes away fear not by removing the terrible, but by a blessed, valiant state in Christ, in which the terrible is not scary, as the Lord said: “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you, not as the world gives, I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27). (1, pp. 250–251) Whoever, while working and doing handicraft, allows himself to have vain thoughts and conversations, when he gets up to pray, he cannot cope with his mind, which is constantly being pulled out of his power, constantly turning to those objects that attracted him to himself before the time of prayer. (1, p. 182) All Christians can and should practice the Jesus Prayer with the goal of repentance and calling on the Lord for help, practice with the fear of God and faith, with the greatest attention to the thoughts and words of the prayer, with contrition of spirit; but not everyone is allowed to begin the sacred act of prayer with the mind, in the cell of the heart. First of all, not only monks living in monasteries and engaged in obediences, but also lay people can and should engage in the Jesus Prayer. Such attentive prayer can be called both mental and heartfelt, as it is often performed with the mind alone and in careful work, always with the participation of the heart, expressed by a feeling of crying and tears due to tenderness. The prayerful sacred act of the mind in the heart requires preliminary exercise in the first form of prayer, satisfactory success in this prayer. The grace of God itself, at a time known to it, according to its good pleasure, transfers the ascetic of prayer from the first image to the second. (1, p. 292) There are seven church prayers, but they are combined into three sections: 1) Vespers; 2) Compline; 3) Midnight Office; 4) Matins with the first hour; 5) third hour; 6) sixth hour and 7) ninth hour. Vespers, with which the service of each day begins, is celebrated together with Compline and the ninth hour; the ninth hour is read before Vespers. Matins departs with the first hour and midnight office; The Midnight Office is read before Matins, the first hour after Matins. The third and sixth hours are read along with the figurative ones, which are read after the hours. When Matins is combined with Vespers or Great Compline, then the prayer is called an all-night vigil. It is sent before the great holidays, in honor of the holidays. The effect of the all-night vigil on the ascetic is that he who spends a significant part of the night in prayer with due reverence and attention feels the next day a special lightness, freshness, purity of mind, and the ability to think of God... The Divine Liturgy is not counted among the seven prayers; it is outside their number, as a special, most sacred prayer, which surrounds the bloodless divine sacrifice. (1, pp. 204–205) Mental, heartfelt, spiritual prayer is commanded to man by God in both the Old and New Testaments. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, commands God, with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, with all thy strength. This is the first commandment” (Mk.12:30; Deut.6:5). It is obvious that the fulfillment of the greatest, most sublime commandment of all commandments cannot be achieved otherwise than by mental, heartfelt and spiritual prayer, by which the one praying is separated from all creation, and with his whole being, rushes to God. Being in this aspiration towards God, the person praying suddenly unites with himself and sees himself healed by the touch of the finger of God. The mind, heart, soul, body, hitherto cut by sin, are suddenly united together in the Lord. Since the union took place in the Lord, was produced by the Lord, it is both the union of man with himself and his union with the Lord. The union, or together with the union, will be followed by the manifestation of spiritual gifts. More correctly: connection is a gift of the Spirit. The first of the spiritual gifts, which produces a wonderful union, is the peace of Christ. The peace of Christ will be followed by the whole face of the gifts of Christ and the fruits of the Holy Spirit, which the Apostle numbers as follows: love, joy, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, self-control (Gal. 5:22-23). (1, pp. 249-250) If it pleases God to leave the ascetic during the prayer of repentance, then let him remain with it, let him not seek a higher state, let him not seek it in the firm conviction that it is not acquired by human effort - it is bestowed by God. (1, pp. 292–293) When uniting the mind with the soul, it is most convenient to engage in the memory of God, especially the Jesus Prayer: with it, bodily feelings can remain inactive, and such inaction greatly contributes to the deepest attention and its consequences. Reading prayerful psalms and other prayers is not only possible, but should also be done with connection, as it is especially conducive to attention. But just as during psalmody the mind is presented with various thoughts, so during psalmody it cannot be as free from distraction as during short, uniform prayer. (1, p. 261) Continuous prayer destroys wickedness through hope in God, introduces it into holy simplicity, weaning the mind from various thoughts, from forming plans for oneself and others, always keeping it in the poverty and humility of the thoughts that make up its teaching. (1, p. 221) In general, it is recognized that until the acquisition of sterility, not deceptive or short-term, but constant and essential, it is useful to exercise the Jesus Prayer... assisting the exercise of prayer with the active fulfillment of the Gospel commandments, or, what is the same, humility. After receiving the gift of non-parency, one is allowed to touch silence. This is what Saints Basil the Great and Gregory the Theologian did. They, according to the story of Saint Isaac the Syrian, first engaged in fulfilling those commandments that apply to those living in human society, going through prayer corresponding to this position; from this residence their mind began to feel stillness, or stagnation; Then they withdrew into the solitude of the desert, there they began to work in the inner man and achieved speculation. (1, p. 330) The name of the Lord is more than any name: it is a source of delight, a source of joy, a source of life; it is Spirit; it gives life, changes, melts, idolizes. For the illiterate, it satisfactorily replaces prayer and psalmody: those who are literate, having succeeded in the Jesus Prayer, abandon the variety of psalmody and begin to primarily practice the Jesus Prayer, for the sake of the abundant strength and nutrition inherent in it. (1, p. 286) Attentive oral and vocal prayer is the beginning and reason for smart prayer. Attentive oral and public prayer are also mental prayer. Let us first learn to pray attentively with verbal and vocal prayer, then we will conveniently learn to pray with our mind alone. (1, p. 209) One who leads an attentive life should not look at anything closely and not listen to anything with special care, but see as if not seeing, and hear in passing, so that memory and the power of attention are always free, alien to the impressions of the world, capable and ready to receive divine impressions. (1, p. 306) It is impossible to reveal grace-filled, mental and heartfelt prayer within oneself through one’s own efforts, because uniting the mind with the heart and soul, separated in us by the fall, belongs to one God. If we force ourselves recklessly and seek to reveal through our own effort those gifts that are bestowed only by God, then we will endure futile labors. (1, p. 229) Heartfelt prayer is desirable, heartfelt silence is desirable. (1, p. 294) All movements of the blood [during prayer - ed.] must hold and contain the soul and body in a calm position, in a position of silence, reverence and fear of God. Without this, spiritual action cannot appear in us: it appears when all blood movements and impulses subside. Experience will soon teach that holding the breath, that is, infrequently and gently producing the breath, is very helpful in bringing oneself into a state of silence and in collecting the mind from wandering. (1, pp. 318–319) From unceasing prayer, the ascetic falls into spiritual poverty: learning to constantly ask for God's help, he gradually loses confidence in himself; if he does something successfully, he sees in it not his own success, but the mercy of God, for which he constantly begs God. (1, p. 221) The Lord knelt down during His prayer: and you should not neglect kneeling if you have enough strength to perform it. By worshiping to the face of the earth, according to the explanation of the fathers, our fall is depicted, and by rising from the earth our redemption. Before starting the evening rule, it is especially useful to make a feasible number of bows: from them the body will become somewhat tired and warm, and the heart will impart a feeling of pious sadness; Both will be prepared to read the rule diligently and attentively. (1, p. 198) In prayerful prosperity, the power and grace of God operate - they accomplish everything: the methods remain the methods that our weakness needs, and are rejected as unnecessary and superfluous after achieving prosperity. Placing hope in these methods is very dangerous: it reduces one to a material, incorrect understanding of prayer, distracting from the understanding of the spiritual, the only true one. A false understanding of prayer always results in either fruitless or spiritually harmful exercise. (1, p. 328) When uniting the mind with the soul, it is most convenient to engage in the memory of God, especially the Jesus Prayer: with it, bodily feelings can remain inactive, and such inaction greatly contributes to the deepest attention and its consequences. (1, p. 261) By the name of teaching or remembrance of God, the holy fathers mean some short prayer or even some short spiritual thought to which they became accustomed and which they tried to assimilate to the mind and memory instead of any thought. (1, p. 215) Deep weeping, the weeping of the human spirit, moved to weeping by the Spirit of God, is an integral companion of heartfelt prayer; spiritual prayer is accompanied by a spiritual feeling of the fear of God, reverence and tenderness. In perfect Christians, both of these feelings turn into love. But these sensations also belong to the category of blessed ones. They are gifts of God, given in their own time, alien even to the comprehension of the one who strives in their area, even if he struggles correctly. Heartfelt prayer is most effective when praying in the name of the Lord Jesus; those who have received heartfelt prayer pray with spiritual prayer when they engage in prayer and psalmody. (1, p. 249) We must pray with our hearts, we must also pray with our lips when we are alone. If anyone is in the market place or in company with others, he should not pray with his lips, but with one thought. One must watch one's eyesight and always look down to protect oneself from distraction and from the snares of the enemy. The perfection of prayer lies in when it is said to God without the mind deviating into entertainment, when all a person’s thoughts and feelings are gathered into a single prayer. Prayer and psalmody must be performed not only with the mind, but also with the lips, as the prophet David says: “Lord, you have opened my mouth, and my mouth will proclaim Your praise” (Ps. 50:17). And the apostle, showing that lips are also required, said: “We offer a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of the lips of those who confess to His name” (Heb. 13:15). (1, pp. 307–308) It is not good for you to receive heartfelt, grace-filled prayer prematurely! A premature feeling of spiritual sweetness is not good for you! Having received them prematurely, without acquiring preliminary information with what reverence and with what caution the gift of God’s grace should be preserved, you can use this gift for evil, to the harm and destruction of your soul. (1, p. 229) Let us listen to what our blessed worker of the Jesus Prayer, Seraphim of Sarov, says about seeing the light of Christ: “In order to receive and see the light of Christ in the heart, you must distract yourself as much as possible from visible objects, having first cleansed your soul with repentance, good deeds and faith in Him who was crucified for us, close your bodily eyes, immerse your mind inside your heart, where you cry out invoking the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; then, as the zeal and ardor of the spirit towards the Beloved, a person finds in the name he calls upon, a delight that arouses the desire to seek higher enlightenment. When, through such an exercise, the mind is fixed in the heart, then the light of Christ will shine, sanctifying the church of the soul with its Divine radiance, as the prophet Malachi says: and the sun of righteousness will shine upon you who fear My name (Mal.4:2). This light is also life according to the Gospel word: in Him is life, and life is the light of man” (John 1:4). (1, p. 347) When we see a special excitement and effervescence of passions during the exercise of the Jesus Prayer, we will not become despondent and bewildered because of this. On the contrary, let us take heart and prepare for feat, for the most thorough prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus, as having received a clear sign that the Jesus Prayer has begun to produce in us its characteristic effect. (1, p. 279) In people, in their ordinary state, the spirit, struck by the fall, sleeps in a deep sleep, identical with death: it is not capable of the spiritual exercises indicated here, and awakens for them only when the mind is constantly and intensely engaged in arousing it through the life-giving name of Jesus. (1, p. 327) The great fathers, who remained in constant prayer from the abundant action of God's grace, did not abandon their rules, which they were accustomed to perform at certain hours of the night. We see many proofs of this in their lives: Anthony the Great, fulfilling the rules of the ninth hour - the church ninth hour corresponds to the third hour in the afternoon - was honored with Divine revelation; when the Monk Sergius of Radonezh was engaged in prayerful reading of the Akathist to the Mother of God, the Most Holy Virgin appeared to him, accompanied by the apostles Peter and John. (1, pp. 200–201) It is very useful to know that the fruit of pure, unparalleled prayer is the renewal of nature, that the renewed nature is supplied and adorned with the gifts of Divine grace, but the desire for the premature acquisition of these gifts, the desire by which, prompted by self-conceit, prevents God’s good will towards us, is extremely harmful and leads only to delusion. For this reason, all the fathers speak very briefly about the gifts of grace, and speak in great detail about the acquisition of pure prayer, the consequence of which is gifts of grace. The feat of prayer requires careful training, and the gifts of grace appear by themselves, as properties of a renewed nature, when this nature, after cleansing by repentance, is sanctified by the overshadowing of the Spirit. (1, p. 348) In psalmody and oral prayer, do not bind yourself, but do as much as the Lord gives you. Do not give up reading and inner prayer either. A few of this, a few of that - and so you will spend the day pleasing God. Our perfect fathers did not have a specific rule, but throughout the whole day they fulfilled their rule: they practiced a little psalmody, they read a few prayers orally, they tested their thoughts a little, but they also cared a little about food; yet they did it with the fear of God.” (1, pp. 308–309) The prayer of Saint Anna, the mother of the prophet Samuel, often cited by the holy fathers as a model of prayer, was not the only intelligent one. “She,” says Scripture, “speaks in her heart, only her mouth moves, but her voice is not heard” (1 Samuel 1:13). This prayer, although it was not public, was also heartfelt and oral. (1, p. 210) By knowing and confessing the justice of God, by justifying the destinies of God (Ps. 19:10), the ascetic of prayer enters into the knowledge of the infinite goodness of God, inseparable from His justice. In the union of God’s goodness with His justice, His all-holy truth appears: “mercy and truth were met, righteousness and peace were embraced” (Ps. 85:1-10). (1, p. 374) Reject apparently good thoughts and apparently bright understandings that come to you during prayer, distracting you from prayer. They leave the realm of the false mind and sit, like riders on horses, on vanity. Their gloomy faces are hidden so that the mind of the person praying cannot recognize them as his enemies. But precisely because they are hostile to prayer, distract the mind from it, lead it into captivity and painful enslavement, expose and empty the soul, precisely because they are recognized as enemies and from the realm of the ruler of the world. (1, p. 189) By thoroughly studying the Scriptures, with the greatest caution, constantly asking for God's help through prayer and weeping, out of poverty of spirit one can also touch on those deeds that lead to perfection. (1, p. 316) If you have not yet felt the connection of mind, soul and body, then engage in attentive prayer, connecting verbal and at times vowel prayer with the mind. (1, p. 261) From the feeling of God’s goodness, spiritual sweetness pours into the prayer of the one praying with pure prayer, plunging the human spirit into the abyss of humility, simultaneously lifting it from earth to heaven. Such a man of prayer is also the most solitary man of silence. This silent person remains unceasingly with God according to the action of God in him, outside the world, outside thoughts about the transitory, outside of sympathy for the transitory. The heart, revived by its feeling for God and for everything that belongs to God, dies for the world, dies for everything that is hostile to God and that is alien to God. In this death there is life, and in this destruction there is salvation. (1, p. 374) First of all, pray for your enemies and bless them (see Matt. 5:44), as instruments of Divine Providence, with which you were rewarded for your sins during your short earthly life, in order to save you from the reward you deserve in eternity with the torments of hell. When you do this, when you love your enemies and pray for them that all blessings, temporary and eternal, will be granted to them, then only God will come to your aid, and you will trample all your adversaries with your prayer, you will enter with your mind the church of your heart to worship the Father in spirit and truth (see John 4:24). But if you allow your heart to be hardened by remembrance of malice and justify your anger with your pride, then the Lord your God will turn away from you and you will be given over to be trampled under the feet of Satan. He will trample you with all his bad thoughts and feelings, you will not be able to resist him. If the Lord deigns to place kindness, love, non-judgment of your neighbors, and merciful apology for them as the basis of your prayerful deed, then with particular ease and speed you will defeat your opponents and you will achieve pure prayer. (1, p. 240) Experience will teach anyone who practices prayer that saying the Jesus Prayer aloud and all prayers in general greatly helps to keep the mind from being plundered by entertainment. In the event of an intensified enemy attack, when one feels a weakening of the will and a clouding of the mind, vocal prayer is necessary. Attentive vocal prayer is both mental and heartfelt. (1, p. 309) The struggle [against demonic temptations during prayer - ed.] is so difficult that the prayer cry of the elect constantly intensifies because of it, because of it it does not stop day or night, the distance between prayers is destroyed, and God’s servants begin to oppress God with incessant prayer and crying, produced by that humble concept of oneself, which appears from the sight of one’s sinfulness. “I walked around lamenting all day,” says the holy prophet David, “for my body was filled with reproaches, and there was no healing in my flesh. I would be embittered by my passions and the spirits of malice and humbled to the core” (Ps. 37:7-9). (2, pp. 433–434) With a special material effort towards heartfelt prayer, warmth begins to act in the heart. This warmth is a direct consequence of such a feat: every member of the human body that is subjected to friction becomes hot, and the same happens to the heart from constant, prolonged tension. The heat that comes from intensified, material achievement is also material. This is carnal, blood warmth, in the region of fallen nature. An inexperienced person... having felt this warmth, will certainly imagine something about it, find in it pleasantness, pleasure, which is the beginning of self-delusion. Not only should one not think anything special about this warmth, but on the contrary, one should take special precautions when it appears. Precaution is necessary for the reason that this heat, like blood, not only passes to different places in the chest, but can very easily fall on the lower parts of the womb, causing a strong combustion in them. Naturally, in this case, carnal lust, characteristic of these parts in a state of heat, begins to act. Some, having come to this state and not understanding what was happening to them, fell into confusion, despondency, despair, as is known from experience... Meanwhile, this terrible delusion is nothing more than a rush of blood resulting from the increased, ignorant use of material benefits. This flush can easily be cured in two or three days by applying a cloth soaked in summer water to the inflamed parts. (1, pp. 336–337) Our mind prays or is in contemplation and pious intention, but various vicious desires move in the heart and body, various passionate aspirations force the mind from its exercise and for the most part carry away! The very bodily senses, especially sight and hearing, counteract the mind: by delivering to it constant impressions of the material world, they lead it into distraction and distraction. When, by the ineffable mercy of God, the mind begins to unite in prayer with the heart and soul, then the soul, first little by little, and then the whole will begin to rush together with the mind into prayer. Finally, our most perishable body, created with the lust of God, and from the fall infected with bestial lust, will rush into prayer. Then the bodily senses remain inactive: the eyes look and do not see, the ears hear but do not hear. Then the whole person is enveloped in prayer: his very hands, feet and fingers, unspeakably, but quite clearly and tangibly, participate in prayer and are filled with power inexplicable in words. (1, p. 260) First acquire attentive prayer: to those who have been purified and prepared by attentive prayer, formed, strengthened by the commandments of the Gospel, based on them in due time, God, the all-merciful God, will grant grace-filled prayer. (1, p. 310) For the prayer exercise in the morning there is a special collection of prayers called morning prayers, or morning rule; for night prayer before going to bed - another collection of prayers, called prayers for bedtime, or evening rule. A special collection of prayers is read by those preparing to receive the Holy Mysteries of Christ and is called the rule for Holy Communion. Those who devote a large part of their time to pious exercises read at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon a special collection of prayers called the daily ... rule. Others read several kathismas every day, several chapters from the New Testament, make several bows: all this is called the rule. (1, p. 195) It is much closer to delusion when [the person praying - ed.], feeling the bloody warmth in the heart or chest, considers it to be blessed, imagines something about it, and therefore something about himself, begins to invent pleasure for himself, to darken, deceive, entangle, and destroy himself with conceit. The more compulsion and tension in the body of an ascetic, the more intensely the blood heat flares up. That's how it should be! In order to moderate this warmth, in order to prevent it from falling down, one must not press the mind with special effort on the heart, one must not strain the heart, not produce heat in it by excessively holding the breath and straining the heart; on the contrary, one must hold one’s breath quietly and bring the mind to unite with the heart very quietly; one must try to ensure that prayer acts at the very top of the heart, where verbal power resides, according to the teachings of the fathers, and where, for this reason, worship should be performed. (1, pp. 337–338) Spiritual prayer is called... prayer moved by Divine grace, and bodily prayer is prayer performed by a person with his own effort, without the obvious assistance of grace. A second kind of prayer is needed... so that prayer of grace may be granted in due time. How does the prayer of grace mark its coming? She marks her coming with a supreme cry, and man enters the gates of the sanctuary of God, his heart, in an ineffable confession. (1, p. 313) Let us engage in the Jesus Prayer unselfishly, with simplicity and directness of intention, with the goal of repentance, with faith in God, with perfect devotion to the will of God, with hope in the wisdom, goodness, and omnipotence of this holy will. When choosing mechanical methods, we will try to act with all possible prudence and prudence, without being carried away by empty inquisitiveness, unconscious jealousy, which to the inexperienced seems to be a virtue, and the holy fathers call it proud audacity, insane ardor. Let us primarily turn to the simplest and humblest methods, as the safest... All mechanical methods should be considered nothing more than methods that have become useful to us due to our weakness. Let us not place our trust either in them or in the quantity of our work, lest our trust in the Lord be thus stolen, so that in the essence of the matter we find ourselves trusting in ourselves or in something material and vain. Let us not seek pleasure or visions: we are sinners, unworthy of spiritual pleasures and visions, incapable of them due to our old age. (1, pp. 357–358) From perfect humility and from perfect submission to the will of God, the purest, holy prayer is born. It cannot be born otherwise and from other works: just as it is natural for grapes to be born on one vine, not on any other tree. This prayer is called singing, because the prayer of the spirit is a holy, mysterious song with which God is glorified. (1, p. 373) A Christian is reconciled to everything and everyone through a strange, humble and at the same time high spiritual reasoning, unknown and inaccessible to the carnal and spiritual state. He begins to feel compassion for all humanity and for each person in particular. Compassion turns into love. Then his attention begins to deepen during prayer: the words of prayer begin to make a strong, unusual impression on the soul, to shake it. Finally, little by little the heart and the whole soul will move into union with the mind, and after the soul the body itself will be drawn into this union. Such a prayer is called smart when it is pronounced with the mind with deep attention, with the sympathy of the heart; heartfelt, when pronounced by the mind and heart united, and the mind, as it were, descends into the heart and sends up a prayer from the depths of the heart; spiritual, when it is done with the whole soul, with the participation of the body itself, when it is done from the whole being, and the whole being is made as if by one mouth saying a prayer. (1, pp. 247–248) Due to the greatest benefit delivered by short, attentive, concentrated prayer, the Holy Church bequeaths to her children the timely need to learn some short prayer. Anyone who has learned such prayer has a ready-made prayer book in every place and at every time. And while traveling, and sitting at a meal, and doing handicrafts, and being in human society, he can cry out to God. If it is impossible to pray with your lips, it is possible to pray with your mind. In this regard, the convenience of short prayer is obvious: when practicing, it is very easy to lose the meaning and consistency of long prayers; but the short prayer is always preserved intact. After leaving it for a while, you can return to it again without any difficulty. Even during divine services, it is useful to repeat a short prayer in the spiritual cell: it not only does not interfere with attention to the prayers read and sung in the church of God, but also promotes especially careful attention to them, keeping the mind from being distracted. (2, pp. 34–35) The teacher of prayer is God, true prayer is the gift of God. To those who pray in contrition of spirit, constantly, with the fear of God, with attention, God Himself gives gradual success in prayer. From attentive and humble prayer comes spiritual action and spiritual warmth, from which the heart comes alive. The revived heart attracts the mind to itself, becomes a church of grace-filled prayer and a treasury of spiritual gifts delivered by it, according to its nature. (1, p. 310) After driving away the enemies [demons - ed.], who cause absent-mindedness, weaken and desecrate prayer, the mind enters the darkness of not seeing anything and stands before the face of God without any mediation. Mental darkness is that cover, that curtain with which the face of God is covered. This cover is the incomprehensibility of God for all created minds. The tenderness of the heart then becomes so strong that it is called confession. (1, p. 276) When Divine grace overshadows the feat of prayer and begins to unite the mind with the heart, then the material warmth of the blood will completely disappear. The prayerful ritual then completely changes: it becomes as if natural, completely free and easy. Then another warmth appears in the heart, subtle, immaterial, spiritual, not producing any kindling - on the contrary, cooling, enlightening, irrigating, acting as a healing, spiritual, anointing anointing, attracting to the ineffable love of God and people. (1, p. 338) It is precisely in order to receive the ineffable wealth of heartfelt prayer in due time that a warning is given against acting prematurely, erroneously, and impudently. A reckless, heated desire to discover grace-filled heartfelt prayer within oneself is forbidden; this desire is forbidden because it is caused by ignorance or insufficient knowledge and proud recognition of oneself as capable of grace-filled prayer and worthy of it; This desire is forbidden because discovering grace-filled prayer within oneself through one’s own efforts is impossible; This desire is forbidden, breaking furiously at the gates of the mysterious church of God, so that it does not prevent the goodness of God from ever having mercy on us, recognizing the unworthy as worthy, giving a gift to those who do not expect a gift, dooming themselves to eternal execution in the prisons of hell. (1, p. 309) Inviting... to pay attention to the information gained through experience, we testify that not only doing mental prayer, but also carefully reading the deep paternal writings about it produces headaches. Heart contrition, due to the sinfulness, captivity and death revealed by prayer, is so strong that it produces suffering and illness in the body, the existence and possibility of which is completely unknown to those not familiar with the feat of prayer. When the heart confesses to the Lord its sinfulness, its wretched state, then the body is crucified. (1, pp. 322–323) The Lord commands us not to lose heart if, after being engaged in a feat of prayer for a long time, we do not notice the desired success; if our mind, instead of praying attentively, is plundered by various vain thoughts and dreams; if our heart, instead of being filled with tenderness, which is almost always accompanied by consoling tears, is cold and hard; if during prayer obscene and violent passions suddenly flare up in us, vicious memories are brought; if our prayer is denounced by circumstances and people; if our prayer is slandered by the worst enemies of prayer - demons. All obstacles encountered in the field of prayer are overcome by constancy in prayer. (2, p. 426) Do not force yourself prematurely to discover the heartfelt action of prayer. Prudent caution is needed, especially in our time, when it is almost impossible to find a satisfactory mentor for these subjects, when the ascetic must make his way, gropingly, with the guidance of the writings of the holy fathers, into the treasury of spiritual knowledge, and also gropingly choose from them what is characteristic of himself. (1, p. 338) Why is unceasing prayer or unceasing remembrance of God called teaching? – Because the ascetics, upon whose work the dew of Divine grace descended, found in the short prayer they repeated a spiritual, deepest, inexhaustible meaning, which constantly attracted and aggravated their attention with its spiritual novelty. And for them a short verse became the most extensive science, the science of sciences, and their occupation in the precise sense of teaching. (1, p. 225) When praying with a short prayer turns into a habit from frequent and constant use, then it becomes as if natural to a person. When listening attentively to something that particularly interests us, we make various exclamations that not only do not interfere with attention, but also aggravate it: in the same way, having acquired the skill of short prayer, we express through it our sympathy and attention to the prayers and psalmody we hear. (2, p. 35) Only the poor in spirit, who constantly clings to the Lord in prayer because of the incessant feeling of his poverty, is able to reveal within himself the greatness of the name of Jesus. The humble and disgraced will not return from the approach of his prayer, but will offer it entirely to God, not plundered by entertainment: the poor and needy will praise Your name (Ps. 73:21). Blessed is the man for whom the name of the Lord is his hope, and does not look upon vanity and false confusion (Ps. 39:5): he will not pay attention during his prayer to the seductive effect of vain cares and addictions that attempt to defile and corrupt prayer. (1, p. 273) There are countless proofs and examples that all the saints of God are then honored with Divine revelations when... through pure prayer, with naked minds, not clogged by any dream, not entertained by any extraneous thought, they appear in deep reverence and peace to the invisible and unknown God. (2, pp. 132–133) Another thing is to pray with attention, with the participation of the heart, another thing is to descend with the mind into the church of the heart and from there bring a mysterious prayer, filled with the power and grace of the Divine. The second comes from the first. The attention of the mind in prayer attracts the heart to sympathy; with increased attention, the heart's sympathy for the mind turns into a union of the heart with the mind: finally, with attention acquired by prayer, the mind descends into the heart for the deepest prayerful sacred service. All this is accomplished under the guidance of God’s grace, according to her good will and discretion. (1, p. 299) Prayer in its quality is a person’s presence with God and the union of a person with God; in terms of its action, it is the reconciliation of man with God, the mother and daughter of tears, the bridge over which they cross temptations, the wall that protects from sorrows, the contrition of battles, endless work, the source of virtues, the cause of spiritual gifts, invisible prosperity, food for the soul, enlightenment of the mind, cutting off despair, indicating hope, resolving sadness. (3, p. 96) God listens to the prayers of some widows, that is, some poor in spirit, filled with the consciousness of their sinfulness, their weakness, their fall, alien to conceit, which consists in recognizing one’s merits, virtues, and righteousness. (2, p. 429) Through attentive prayer, let us seek to turn the mind’s gaze to ourselves in order to discover our sinfulness within ourselves. When we open it, let us stand mentally before our Lord Jesus Christ in the face of the lepers, the blind, the deaf, the lame, the paralytic, the demoniac, and let us begin before Him from the poverty of our spirit, from a heart crushed by illness about our sinfulness, a lamentable cry of prayer. Let this cry be unlimited in abundance! Let all verbosity and all variety of words prove incapable of expressing it. Because of its abundance and inexpressibility, let it be continually clothed, let it be clothed in the laconic but broad-meaning prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. (1, p. 358) Having enslaved the body to the spirit through fasting, making our spirit angel-like in goodness, let us inspire it with prayer: may our spirit acquire the blessed skill of quickly and often flying to God and asking for God’s blessing on our endeavors, God’s help for our actions. (2, p. 133) When living according to the Gospel commandments, engage in attentive Jesus Prayer according to the method of St. John Climacus, combining prayer with crying, having repentance as the beginning and goal of prayer. In due time, known to God, the action of heartfelt prayer will reveal itself. Such an action, revealed by the touch of the finger of God, is superior to that achieved by intense self-force through material benefits. It is superior in many respects: it is much broader, more plentiful, it is completely safe from delusion and other damage, the one who has received in this way sees in receiving only the mercy of God, the gift of God, and the one who has achieved through the intensive use of material benefits, seeing the gift of God, cannot help but see his feat, cannot help but see the very mechanical method he used, cannot help but attribute special importance to it. This, on the subtle mental path, is a significant shortcoming, a significant stumbling block, a significant obstacle to the development of spiritual success. There is no end or limits to the development of spiritual prosperity. An insignificant, imperceptible hope in something outside of God can stop the course of prosperity, in which both the leader, the legs, and the wings are faith in God. (1, pp. 338–339) The Holy Fathers command that the words of both short prayers and all prayers in general be pronounced with particular leisurelyness, with careful attention to the words of the prayer. (2, pp. 38–39) First one must be compelled to pray; soon she will begin to provide consolation and with this consolation to ease the compulsion, to encourage herself to compel herself. But prayer requires compulsion throughout life, and rare ascetics have been freed, due to the most abundant grace-filled consolation, from forcing themselves: prayer has a deadly effect on our old man; as long as he is alive in us, he resists prayer as a taste of death. (3, pp. 96–97) The... Gospel depicts the prayer of a publican, which attracted God's mercy to him. This prayer consisted of the following few words: God, be merciful to me, a sinner (Luke 18:13). It is worthy of attention that such a short prayer was heard by God, and that it was pronounced in the church during public worship, during the reading and singing of psalms and other prayers. This prayer is approved by the Gospel and is presented as a model of prayer. (2, p. 33) A sign... of perfection is unceasing prayer... Exercise in unceasing prayer, accustoming oneself to it is necessary for anyone... who wants to achieve Christian perfection. Practicing unceasing prayer and accustoming oneself to it is the duty of everyone... entrusted to him by the commandment of God. (1, p. 217) If we are still surrounded by enemies, then we will cry out with strong weeping and screaming to the King of kings, as the offended and oppressed cry out from the crowd of people; if we are admitted into the inner chamber of the King, then we will bring Him a complaint and ask for His mercy with the greatest quietness and humility, from the very depths of our souls. Such a prayer is especially powerful: it is completely spiritual, pronounced directly to the very ear of the King, to His heart. (1, p. 352) The general rule for a prayer rule is that it should not in any way exceed the ascetic’s strength, should not deplete these strength, should not upset his health, and thus should not force the ascetic to abandon any rule. Abandoning a prayer rule is usually a consequence of a rule adopted or imposed beyond one’s strength. (3, p. 97) Continuous prayer leads to the acquisition of faith, because the one who prays incessantly begins to gradually sense the presence of God. This feeling can gradually increase and intensify to the point that the eye of the mind will see God in His Providence more clearly than the sensory eye sees the material objects of the world; the heart will feel the presence of God. One who has seen God in this way and felt His presence cannot help but believe in Him through living faith, manifested by works. (1, p. 221) The attention of the mind during prayer is reflected in the heart by blessed sadness for sins, which is repentance commanded by God. When the heart is filled with a feeling of repentance, then it, in turn, attracts the mind to special attention. Following attention and tenderness, all the gifts of the Holy Spirit enter the soul, making it the church of God. (2, p. 39) By the power of the name of Jesus, the mind is freed from hesitation, the will is strengthened, the correctness of jealousy and other spiritual properties is brought, thoughts and feelings pleasing to God, thoughts and feelings belonging to the immaculate human nature - only such thoughts and feelings are allowed to reside in the soul; there is no place in it for thoughts and feelings that are alien, for God will save Zion, and the cities of Judea will be built, and they will dwell there, and inherit and; and the seed of thy servants shall they hold, and they that love thy name shall dwell in him (Ps. 69:36-37). (1, p. 275) The moderate, prudent rule remains the property of the monk for his entire life; towards the end of his life it develops and multiplies as if naturally, taking on both in appearance and inner dignity a character corresponding to success. (3, p. 97) Direct your actions, all your behavior according to the commandments of the Lord Jesus, direct your words according to them, direct your thoughts and feelings according to them - and you will know the properties of Jesus. Having felt these properties in yourself through the action of Divine grace and from this feeling acquired an experimental knowledge of them, you will enjoy an incorruptible sweetness that does not belong to the world and this age, a quiet sweetness, but strong, destroying the heart’s disposition to all earthly pleasures. Having delighted in the properties of Jesus, you will love Him and desire that He should fully dwell in you; without Him you will consider yourself lost and lost. Then you will cry out unceasingly, crying out from the fullness of conviction, with all your soul: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. The Jesus Prayer will replace all other prayers for you. (1, pp. 352–353) The Savior of the world, who approved the prayer of the publican, subsequently allowed and granted us to pray in His all-holy name. Prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus and by His name, and as established by Him, is called the Jesus Prayer. (2, p. 36) It is obvious that the holy apostles, who personally received from the Lord the commandment about unceasing prayer and passed it on to the believers, themselves were constantly engaged in prayer. Before receiving the Holy Spirit, they remained in the same house, engaged in prayer and supplication (Acts 1:14). The name of prayer here refers to those prayers that they performed together, and the name of prayer is the constant prayerful direction of their spirit, unceasing prayer. When the Holy Spirit descended on the apostles, he made them churches of God and made them together churches of unceasing prayer, as Scripture says: My house will be called a house of prayer (Is. 56:7). (1, p. 217) Bows are divided into ground and waist bows; They usually rely on the evening rule, before repose to sleep. It is best to bow before reading the evening prayers, that is, to begin the rule with bows. From bowing, the body will become somewhat tired and warm, and the heart will come into a state of contrition: from such a state, the ascetic will pray more fervently, warmly, and more attentively. You will feel a completely different taste in prayers when they are read after bowing. (3, p. 98) The Old Testament prayer, God, be merciful to me, a sinner, is equivalent to the New Testament prayer, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. The Old Testament servants of God used the first prayer; The New Testament, using the first, most use the second, because it pleased the God-man to combine with His human name a special miraculous spiritual power. (2, p. 36) The Holy Fathers in their Scriptures often include both heartfelt and spiritual prayer under the same name of mental prayer, and sometimes distinguish between them. (1, p. 248) For constant prayer, we use... the prayer, Lord, have mercy. It is an abbreviated Jesus Prayer and replaces it in those cases when saying the whole Jesus Prayer becomes difficult, such as: during fright, during unexpected joy, during a serious illness, during a spiritual vision. In the latter case, the exclamation “Lord, have mercy” serves as an echo for the mind to those gracious understandings that appear to him after his purification, exceed his comprehension and cannot be expressed in words. (2, p. 36) As long as prayer is plundered by alien thoughts, as long as the feat of prayer is accomplished with difficulty, with sorrow, with coercion and self-violence, the one praying is not allowed before the face of God. When prayer begins to be pronounced from the whole being, then its feat is filled with spiritual pleasure. This pleasure draws the ascetic to the feat, encourages him, strengthens him, keeps him in the feat, the feat of prayer becomes the most important, unceasing, and only feat of the ascetic. (1, pp. 370–371) Concluding your mind in words, say a prayer from a contrite and humble heart: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Having said your prayer, slowly bow to the ground, with reverence and fear of God, without heat, with the feeling of a sinner repenting and begging for forgiveness, as if at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Do not imagine in your mind an image or image of the Lord, but have conviction in His presence; have the conviction that He is looking at you, at your mind and heart, and that His reward is in His hand: the first is an impermissible dream leading to disastrous self-delusion, and conviction in the presence of the omnipresent God is conviction in the all-holy truth. (3, pp. 98–99) One who has entered into a true feat of prayer is guided in it by God Himself, with wisdom incomprehensible to those who are not initiated into its mysteries. (2, p. 430) The gift of attentive prayer is usually preceded by special sorrows and mental shocks, which reduce our spirit to the depths of consciousness of poverty and insignificance. The gift of God is attracted by humility and fidelity to God, expressed by zealous rejection of all sinful thoughts at their very appearance. Loyalty is the reason for purity. Purity and humility are given the gifts of the Spirit. (1, p. 323) It is impossible for a person to strive with all his thoughts, with all his strength, with all his being towards God except through the action of prayer, when it rises from the dead and is revived, as it were, by the soul, by the power of grace. (3, p. 92) The words of teaching must initially be pronounced in the tongue, in a very quiet voice, slowly, with all possible attention, enclosing... the mind in the words of teaching. Little by little, oral prayer will turn into mental, and then into heartfelt. But this transition takes many years. One should not seek it prematurely; let it happen by itself, or more correctly, let God grant it at a time known to Him, depending on the spiritual age and circumstances of the ascetic. (1, pp. 227–228) Having bowed to the ground... bring your body into reverence and calmness and... slowly say the [Jesus - ed.] prayer; Having said it, bow again in the above manner. Do not worry about the number of bows: pay all attention to the quality of the prayer performed with kneeling. (3, p. 99) In unspeakable joy, workers of unceasing prayer enter in spirit before the invisible face of God and stand before the face of God. They appear before this person because the alien thoughts and dreams that formed the impenetrable curtain have been taken away. There is no obstruction to vision! (1, p. 371) If the mind is not kept in self-contemplation by short prayer, filling the soul with a feeling of repentance, then it will easily succumb to absent-mindedness; During the service, leaving church reading and singing unattended, he will deviate into empty thoughts and dreams. This happened to the Pharisee: the Pharisee superficially listened to the divine service and was carried away by sinful thoughts. Sinful thoughts not only deprived his prayer, which was already weak, of all dignity, but also turned it into a reason for condemning the one who prayed. The Pharisee's prayer was rejected by God - the Pharisee left the church sealed with the seal of God's wrath, not understanding or feeling his spiritual distress for the reason that his heart, being dead to repentance, was filled with self-satisfaction and self-delusion. (2, p. 35) The correctness of prayer and success in it are opposed by our damaged nature and fallen angels, who are trying to keep us in their enslavement, in the fall and rejection from God, common to humans and fallen angels. (3, p. 92) Heartfelt prayer comes from the union of mind and spirit, separated by the fall, united by the grace of redemption. (1, p. 341) Actually, prayer is what the holy fathers call the Jesus Prayer, which is pronounced like this: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. (3, p. 104) Temptations are a sign of our calling by God, a sign of election, a sign of adoption. From among them we will lift up praise to God, as the righteous, long-suffering Job did from the midst of various disasters that surrounded him everywhere (Job 1:21; 2:10). From among them we will bring thanksgiving to God, filling the heart of the one giving thanks with spiritual consolation and the strength of patience, thanksgiving commanded by God Himself. Give thanks in everything, the apostle commands, for this is the will of God for Christ Jesus in you (1 Thess. 5:18). (1, p. 398) The Holy Apostle Paul called oral prayer the fruit of the lips, - he commands to “offer a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips confessing to His name” (Heb. 13:15), commands to speak to oneself in psalms, songs and spiritual songs, along with vocal and oral prayer and hymns, “making melody and singing in the hearts of the Lord” ( Eph.5:19). He condemns inattentiveness in verbal and public prayer. If the trumpet sounds unknown (unknown, incomprehensible), he says, “who will prepare for battle? So, if you do not give a word wisely (i.e., something that is not understood) with your tongue, how can the verb be understood? You will be speaking into the air” (1 Cor. 14:8-9). Although the apostle said these words specifically about those who pray and proclaim the promptings of the Holy Spirit in foreign languages, the holy fathers with justice apply them to those who pray without attention. (1, p. 210) The Jesus Prayer is divided into two types: oral and mental. The ascetic moves from oral prayer to mental prayer by himself, provided that the oral prayer is attentive. (3, p. 104) According to the distribution of Divine wisdom, the one who has entered into the feat of prayer is initially given the opportunity to taste the consolation of prayer. Thus, a successfully chosen medicine for any long-standing disease, touching its surface, immediately at the first doses brings relief. The same medicine, with further use, begins to penetrate the body, disturbs the disease and, gradually expelling it, intensifies the pain, sometimes leading the patient into a painful state. With such phenomena, an inexperienced patient can easily doubt the beneficialness of the medicine, but skilled doctors see its beneficialness in these very phenomena. Exactly the same thing happens during prayer. When a Christian constantly and carefully engages in it, then little by little it will begin to reveal in him his passions, the existence of which he had not previously known in himself. She will reveal to him in a striking picture the fall of human nature and its captivity. When a Christian intends to emerge from the fall and free himself from captivity, then those spirits who have enslaved us to themselves will come and stubbornly rebel against prayer, which is intensifying to bring spiritual freedom to the Christian. This serves as proof of the validity of the prayer. (2, pp. 430–431) Those who truly decide to serve God must practice the memory of God and unceasing prayer to the Lord Jesus Christ, saying with their minds: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. By such an exercise, while protecting oneself from distraction and maintaining peace of conscience, one can draw closer to God and unite with Him. We cannot get closer to God except through unceasing prayer. (1, p. 305) Following confession is a non-vague prayer. She is a gift from God. By the right hand of this gift, the one praying is received from the environment of surrounding and captivating entertainment, and is presented, beyond any entertainment, to the face of God in the church of God not made by hands. (1, p. 373) Whoever with constancy and reverence engages in attentive prayer, pronouncing its words loudly or in a whisper, depending on the need, and enclosing his mind in words, who, during the feat of prayer, constantly rejects all thoughts and dreams, not only sinful and vain, but, apparently, also good, the merciful Lord will grant him in due time mental, heartfelt and spiritual prayer. (1, p. 229) The Jesus Prayer is performed while standing; when exhausted, sit and even lie down. The essential accessories of this prayer should be: attention, confinement of the mind in the words of the prayer, extreme slowness in pronouncing it and contrition of the spirit. Although these conditions are necessary for any prayer, they are more conveniently preserved and more required when performing the Jesus Prayer. (3, pp. 104–105) In some, mental prayer is more effective, in others it is heartfelt, and in others it is spiritual, depending on how each is endowed by the Distributor of all benefits, both natural and grace-filled; sometimes in one and the same ascetic one prayer or another is active. Such prayer is very often and for the most part accompanied by tears. A person then partially knows what blissful dispassion means. He begins to feel purity, and from purity there is a living fear of God, consuming the plumpness of the flesh with a strange horror hitherto unknown to man, from a clear sense of his standing before God, as before God. A Christian enters into a new life and a new feat, corresponding to his renewed state of mind: the old milk for nourishment is no longer there. All his deeds flow together... “into blissful unceasing repentance.” (1, p. 248) What is the meaning in... prayers of the verb have mercy or be merciful? This is a person’s consciousness of his destruction; this is a feeling of that mercy, that self-pity that the Lord commanded us to feel for ourselves and which is felt by very few; it is a denial of one's own dignity; this is a request for God’s mercy, without which there is no hope of salvation for the lost. The mercy of God is nothing other than the grace of the all-holy Spirit; we sinners must constantly, relentlessly ask God for it. (2, pp. 36–37) In the human spirit, feelings of conscience, humility, meekness, love for God and neighbor and other similar properties are concentrated; When praying, it is necessary that the action of these properties be combined with the action of the mind. All the attention of the person doing the prayer should be directed to this. The union is accomplished by the finger of God, which alone can heal the wound of the fall; the worker of prayer proves the sincerity of his will to receive healing by constantly remaining in prayer, confining his mind in the words of prayer, by external and internal activity according to the commandments of the Gospel, making the spirit capable of uniting with the praying mind. At the same time, the artistic direction of the mind towards literature and the upper part of the heart contributes somewhat. In general, excessive tension when using this material aid, as it stimulates material warmth, is harmful: the warmth of flesh and blood should not have a place in prayer. (1, pp. 341–342) During the Jesus Prayer, the mind is concentrated in one thought: the thought of Jesus having mercy on the sinner. Outwardly, work is the driest, but in experience it turns out to be the most fruitful of all spiritual works. Strength and dignity are given to him by the all-powerful, all-holy name of the Lord Jesus Christ. (3, p. 105) It is not useful for us, even harmful, to quickly and easily acquire spiritual wealth: having easily received it, we will not be able to preserve it; it can serve as a reason for us to vanity, to contempt and condemnation of our neighbors, which leads the ascetic to heavy falls, which usually follow pride and serve as punishment and admonition for those carried away by the most destructive passion that cast fallen angels from Heaven. For this reason, God leaves devotees of prayer to languish for a long time in an unresolved struggle with passions and spirits, in the midst of hope and hopelessness, in the midst of frequent victories and defeats. (2, p. 432) 1. St. Ignatius Brianchaninov. Collected works. T. 2. Ascetic experiences. M.: Blagovest, 2001. – 496 p. 2. St. Ignatius Brianchaninov. Collected works. T. 4. Sermons. M.: Blagovest, 2001. – 560 p. 3. St. Ignatius Brianchaninov. Collected works. T. 5. Offering to modern monasticism. M.: Blagovest, 2001. – 528 p.