Декабрь 1868 г.

December 8th. I thank the Lord my God, who through my prayer has granted me the grace to perform without fail the early Sunday Divine Liturgy and the prayer service to the Mother of God after the liturgy with the blessing of water - all completely with the spirit of piety and fear of God. Glory to Him who sits on the throne, glory to the life-giving Mysteries! (The temptation was due to the failure to pronounce all the persons of the royal family, and I secretly prayed to the Lord to forgive me my sin and may He Himself remember each person by name.) After mass at home there was a temptation when Brother Konstantin came to me. He was deeply stung by the sting of sweets and completely lost interest in his brother, and even in the Lord Himself, the endless belly and the all-hearted giver of all good things. It was necessary to pray a lot so that the Lord would heal the ulcer of the soul caused by voluptuousness. These are the empty means by which the enemy achieves such disastrous consequences for our souls! Blessed are you, holy men of God, who have despised all the sweets and all the red things of this world! That is why you deeply loved God and your neighbors! Don't eat fish if you want chastity: fish produces voluptuousness, and especially salted herring. It is not for nothing that the holy fathers prohibited fish during Lent. If a person does not sincerely humble himself before God, his virtues are unclean and displeasing before God. Irrigate your prayer with sincere tears of tenderness, as rain waters a thirsty land, and your prayer will smell like a meadow after rain. Lust and satiety are weakness for the soul, abstinence is its strength. A fly gets stuck with one leg in honey - and often sacrifices its life for its voluptuousness, but we, constantly seeing the dangers from the enemy who destroys us through voluptuousness, satiety and drunkenness, still continue to indulge in voluptuousness, become satiated and drunk, and are not admonished by the approaching misfortune to abandon our addiction. I sinned against the Lord by being satiated with the food and love of my wife, her caresses, her services, and upset her by rejecting her kind and persistent offer to eat fish, which I did not want to eat, feeling full. I thank the Lord, who heard me three times and had mercy when I fell into grave guilt and cried out in repentance and groaning of my heart with tears for mercy. Bless, my soul, the Lord, and all that is within me, His holy name... who cleanses all your iniquities, who heals all your ailments... bless, my soul, the Lord, and do not forget all His rewards [Ps. 102, 1, 3, 2]. To pride and voluptuousness, the sweet piece in the hands of a brother always seems very large, and his own smaller, and with envy and zeal he looks at his neighbor’s property. Seeing his own excesses, he rejoices in his abundance and seeks even more, and seeing his neighbor’s excesses, he grieves over the fact that he has much. Such is our gluttony and malice! What kind of absurdity is this? The heart, the source of life of which is God, cleaves to soulless substances or animate creatures, as if they could serve as the source of its life! And at least it received from them some shadow of life! No, it dies from them: it is overcome by darkness, cramped conditions, and spiritual paralysis. And it is natural - because through addiction to creatures it falls away from the Source of life. For it is impossible for two masters to work [Matt. 6, 24; OK. 16, 13]. My heart! Cling to the one God, consider all earthly things as rubbish, and do not be seduced by sweetness, beauty, splendor, or wealth. If somewhere, then in the divine service one soon becomes ill, and haste is inappropriate. Every day on earth is war, every day fight and win in the power of the fortress of the Lord [Eph. 6, 10 ]; go to bed every night a winner, not a loser. Let not the sun go down on your anger [Eph. 4, 26]. Consume, brother, as much as you like: it is given for consumption - this is how you should talk within yourself about food and drink or about sweets, when your heart will feel sorry for them for your neighbor. Neglect about sweets and do not consume them greedily; despise them precisely because you do not feel sorry for them to anyone. How wisely a Christian should live! He constantly doubles in himself: he has a constant enemy - his own flesh and his own heart; she constantly seduces him and seeks to destroy his spirit in every possible way; she, having completely given herself over to the earthly, wants to nail to the earth his spirit, which comes from God and was created in the image and likeness of God; Having become through sin the dwelling and work of Satan, it constantly intensifies to give rise to vicious passions in the soul - the offspring of Satan: malice, anger, envy, pride, blasphemy, murmuring, despondency, impatience, fornication, theft, slander, lies; incites to voluptuousness. He who wants to please God must constantly pay attention to himself and fight against sin living in the flesh, or against the wisdom of the flesh, and what it considers an acquisition must be considered a loss, for example: eating and drinking sweetly and a lot it considers an acquisition, and this is in the essence of the thing a loss for a person; he considers buying shiny, rich, expensive clothes an acquisition, but this is a loss; considers giving alms a loss, but this is a gain; to serve his neighbor, to humble himself before him, [to humiliate himself] is considered a loss, but this is a gain; He considers it a loss not to avenge an insult with an insult, but this is a gain; He considers being kind to the enemy and praying for him stupidity, but this is wisdom; to eat lean food during Lent, to fast in general is considered stupidity, and to eat light, meaty, nutritious food is prudence, while in the order of piety it is the opposite; the flesh considers the Church and its statutes unnecessary, and theaters and other entertainments necessary, but faith and spirit say the opposite; The flesh considers secular learning to be wisdom, and spiritual learning to be madness, 35 but faith and spirit, on the contrary, consider worldly learning to be madness, and spiritual learning to be wisdom. The flesh considers eating sweets a gain, and the spirit a loss both for itself and for the flesh itself, for sweets relax the soul and body; giving away one's flesh considers it a loss, and the spirit a gain; the flesh is angry at those who take ours, but the spirit gives it away with joy; equally, again, the flesh considers pleasure, entertainment, amusement as gain, and the spirit as loss and prefers solitude, work, vigil, and prayer. Whoever is negligent about abstinence and says that it makes no difference whether one eats fast food or fast food, whether one eats well or not to the full, tasty or simple food, meat or fish or fish and vegetables, shows both his addiction to the stomach and ignorance of the consequences that occur from abstinence and incontinence. The more well-fed a person is, the further he is from God in his thoughts, feelings, dispositions, the more he approaches the state of dumb animals, the more capable, under certain circumstances and temptations, of becoming bestial - hard-hearted, stingy, unmerciful, lazy, deceitful. A satiated person is an evil stench 36 for God, the Mother of God, Angels and Saints; he is a stinking corpse, a living dead, because his soul is enslaved to sweets and bound by them, like a captive. Didn't all the troubles in the world come from addiction to the belly? Isn't the womb a lever in the world of all evil? Isn’t it for the sake of the belly that wealth is accumulated, foreign lands are conquered and our own are cramped? Is it not because of the womb that half-bloods quarrel? Is it not because of the womb that children often persecute their parents? Is it not because of satiety that pride, anger, envy, despondency, and despair arise? God! Enlighten the heartfelt eyes of the descendants of the primordial man and mine, may we not be slaves to the belly, may we be zealous for abstinence, fasting, prayer, for the enlightenment of our nature darkened by sins and addictions, for the exhaustion and mortification of sin-loving flesh. (What is the need, for example, for you to eat and drink in the morning and give up the time, especially convenient for prayer and study, to gluttony? If you have not eaten anything in the evening, then in the morning you can have a few light meals and, if necessary, drink; and if you have eaten in the evening, in the morning you should not eat anything until one o’clock or until noon.) Give glory to God: do not elevate a sinner before the face of God with false exaltation because of his family, rank, intelligence, wealth, strength; remember, O priest, that he is a sinner and so are you, and both or all of you deeply humble yourself before the Lord and work for Him with fear and trembling. Let all human flesh be silent... and let all earthly things think within themselves 37 before the face of the Lord, in His church. May our hearts be exalted towards You, the Word, and may nothing sweeten us from worldly beauties to weakness! 38 What is the innocent child's fault? And this is also the reason for my temptation. This means that the reason is in me, and not in others, and we must condemn our unclean and evil heart. By the grace of the Lord, I myself publish a magazine about alms. What do I need other magazines for? The best of them should talk about alms. God! Create me above the merging of the world 39 . December 14. Having completed the early liturgy successfully, he received Holy Communion without condemnation, in the world of spiritual strength. After mass, I read the rule for confession and confessed to the Countess maiden Alexandra Rebleder. What I feared happened. The heart became relaxed and confused; Where did the spiritual energy go? I barely gathered my strength! It was necessary to talk a lot with her about the superiority of the Christian Orthodox faith over the Lutheran faith, which she considered better; about the incorruptibility of holy relics, which she made dependent on the soil of the earth, and not on the supernatural power of God; about the veneration of saints whom she did not consider necessary to worship and call on them in prayer. I told her about the Lutheran faith that it was a sect, a schism, a heresy, a torn branch from the living tree of the One, Holy, Apostolic Church, that this branch was lifeless: proof of this is the absence of relics in Lutheranism and in general the saving and miraculous manifestations of the power of God, of which we have so many in the Orthodox Church; proof of the vitality and saving power of our faith and the Church are the relics of the saints, like fragrant fresh flowers or the fruits of Christ’s paradise, life-giving and healing for everyone who comes to them with faith. It was hard for me to read to this girl and two others - a girl and a lady - the rule for communion while reading the hours. Embarrassment took possession of me, an incomprehensible fear: if only I had not seen this white dress - it seduced me so much! But we had to look more boldly—directly, openly. The governor's wife, her aunt, stood behind. Before reading the rule, it seemed to me that I was speaking awkwardly with an unfamiliar lady, who seemed to me to be some kind of princess. Human fear before the eyes of God! Why am I afraid of people? Are they animals? But I was confused by the beast of hell, the beast of the abyss. God! Grant me the only one to be afraid of You and none of the people - even the one who wears a diadem. I also remind you about the beggars: do not be angry, do not be irritated with them, but have compassion for them when they persistently and with effort ask you for alms, because extreme need makes them chase after you: after all, they want to eat and drink like you, dress, put on shoes like you; you have to pay them for the apartment, which is government-owned. I am the vine, you are the birth [Russian: branches] [John. 15, 5]. Lutheranism, Armenianism, Catholicism, Anglicanism, Nestorianism, Monophysitism fell away from this vine; Orthodoxy, or true Orthodox Christians, are born on the Life-Giving Vine - Jesus Christ. That is why in Lutheranism, Armenianism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Nestorianism, Monophysitism there is no life of Jesus, there are no incorruptible and miraculous relics, but in the Orthodox Church there is. Whose faith is true? Obviously. God is the Lord, and appear to us [Ps. 117, 27]. The character of a Christian is heavenly wisdom, and not addiction to earthly sweets and wealth. God came down to earth and will take us to heaven. Oh, how the spirit of earthly addictions rapes us - to food, clothing, money, home decorations, in general to everything earthly and temporary. What tyranny! And everything, however, is due to our voluptuousness and satiety! Oh, what an enemy of faith and piety - gluttony and satiety, what enmity it instills in the hearts of others! I held back [Russian: surrounded them] with their pride to the end [Ps. 72, 6]. Why don’t I want to walk next to the clerk of Kamenogradsky? From [my] pride and his arrogance. I walk alongside Yaroslavtsev with pleasure, because of his humility and maturity. But we are all equally brothers. December 15, 1868. I thank the Lord, who granted me on this Sunday to perform Matins and the Liturgy without stumbling, after many and fierce temptations, especially those that occurred at Matins. (The old worthless cloth in the altar on the floor caused me so much confusion, cramping, violence from the enemy. I could not pray freely and calmly. This is what confusion the enemy causes because of decay, because of earthly things. Is it not in the church, is it not in the altar that I should especially remember that everything here is perishable, and not cling to anything. And why did I want to spread the best cloth, which at my request Was it bought for the church? Was it not for human tastes? Was it not for the sake of vanity and people-pleasing?) He performed the Liturgy reverently, with many tears. The habit of pleasing oneself in everything (one’s taste, hearing, sight, smell, touch) and seeing respect for oneself in everyone makes a person capricious, stubborn, irritable: he gets angry almost every time he encounters something contrary to his taste, hearing, sight, smell, touch; and on the other hand, he can be very voluptuous and effeminate and adulterous. Who looks at women to lust after them [Matt. 5, 28 ]? Someone who is used to staring at beautiful faces. Who is fighting over elegant, soft and expensive clothes? The one who is used to pleasing his heart, the sense of touch with beautiful and soft clothes and so on. What happens to plants if you over-fertilize and over-water them? They get too sick and rot - first at the root, and then in the trunk. What happens to a person if he eats and drinks a lot? He develops excessive plumpness, thinness, and illnesses. It's in the body. What about in the shower? Spiritual death, darkness, sorrow, cramped conditions, powerlessness for prayer, contemplation of God, and for any virtue are established in it. (Against Lutherans and Reformed people who reject fasting.) What happens to plants that are moderately fertilized and watered? They grow steadily, turn green, smell fragrant, and bloom. The same thing happens with those who fast: they grow spiritually during their lifetime, are fragrant with various virtues - meekness, humility, purity and chastity, mercy, obedience, and after death the bodies of many of them are fragrant and bloom, free from corruption, and exude various healings, being themselves full of the life-giving grace of the Holy Spirit. Do not speak against the fasts of the Orthodox Church and do not praise your omnipotence. I thank You, Lord Jesus Christ, as when I was in the cramped state of sin that bound me in the Maritime Library, I cried out to You in faith with the cry of my heart, You soon heard and out of the cramped condition You brought my soul into peace and space and You rejoiced my unworthiness with the joy of deliverance. I thank You, for You are everywhere, and You hear me everywhere, and You save me mercifully everywhere. December 16, 1868. Evening. ...Insensible, Most Immaculate, sin 40. We don’t feel our sins: we sin a lot and seriously – and we don’t feel it, we don’t realize it! Oh, petrified insensibility! Oh, our new misfortune to all other troubles. It is also good for those who feel their sins vividly, for God will not despise a contrite and humble heart [Ps. 50, 19]. Food and drink taken internally, into the belly, is the material from which nature produces vital juices and blood. If these vital juices and blood are not wasted, as happens with married people or those leading an unchaste life, then you need to eat and drink very little, because the body is full of vital principles and forces. This is why monks need to eat very little. Otherwise the flesh will rage. Those who smoke tobacco often have toothache, because through smoking the blood rushes to the head and, being sharp, as if saturated with narcotic and pungent tobacco smoke, seeks an outlet. Teeth hurt from eating and drinking too much. Heavy smokers are very susceptible to colds because they constantly have hot things in their mouths. I sinned against the Lord: I greedily ate cold fish on Tuesday (December 17), roast bream with porridge, especially sweet jelly with almond milk, and looked askance at my brother for taking a lot of cucumbers and jelly. The greedy person thinks that his neighbor will eat who knows how much, but how much is needed? I ate - both heavily and satiated. You need to eat and drink slowly, without greed. Do not give in to the malice of your heart against a rude or faulty brother, for malice is a grave sin and malice cannot correct a person, for when has a demon ever wanted and been able to correct someone? Is it not for this purpose that he outrages us with anger at our neighbor in order to further increase the evil, that is, to outrage us and make the faulty even more faulty? We must meekly admonish the disorderly and in every possible way stop the confusion and anger that has occurred through fervent prayer. Today, December 17th, during Vespers, anger suddenly flared up in me against the sexton Vasily Kamenogradsky, who came to help the navigator’s sexton at Vespers and began to shout outrageously and, in the end, read Compline in the roughest voice, as if drumming without any feeling, with some kind of insolence. I should not have been embarrassed and meekly told him about this, but I was inflamed with anger and could not serve calmly. What was at work in me? On the one hand, righteous indignation, on the other hand, willfulness and anger. And the navigator’s sexton reads very quietly, meekly and calmly: it infuses calm into the soul; sometimes, however, it is sluggish and inarticulate. You have to get used to everything and adjust. In a forest, trees are not all the same. To cast out every sin from oneself means to cast out from oneself every illness, every sorrow. Experience. This is how beneficial the shrine is! To Lutheran and Reformed pastors: how do you want to sanctify people without the spirit-bearing priesthood of Christ, how do you dare to appropriate for yourself a flock into which the Holy Spirit does not place you? Where will you get the wisdom and power of love needed for shepherding? How will you forgive sins when Jesus Christ did not give you this power? How will you perform the Body and Blood of Christ, when you, through the laying on of hands of each other, have not received from the apostles the authority to do this in remembrance of the Lord? Turn and convert your parishioners to the One Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, in which alone the sanctification of its members, its true children, is carried out without restraint. December 18. I thank the Lord, who accepted my warm repentance for the sin of anger towards the poor and cruel treatment of them. (I was painfully irritable; at home in the evening after a prayer of repentance I fell asleep and after sleep and tea I became completely alert and healthy.) Do not please people during prayer, but please only God, who leads the hearts. Do you see what people are like and is it worth pleasing them, is it fair to please them when they do not please God and work for wealth and different passions? Do not spare them - let them endure, for the sake of Christ and for the salvation of their souls, cold, hunger, sorrow, and illness, and let them humble themselves. Do your work of prayer calmly. Be ashamed to commit sins, but do not be ashamed to announce them - expose them, it is said, mercilessly [Tit. 1, 13]. The shame of revealing sins or loudly announcing them is caused by Satan. Likewise, do not be ashamed and do not be afraid to utter certain words and expressions that, due to the devil’s actions and dreams, for some reason you are ashamed of. Don't be afraid of ghosts. The foolish things of God are wiser than men [1 Cor. 1, 25]. Give away all the gold you have, so that your heart does not cleave to it. He who loves to look at his own face and admire it also loves to look at the beautiful faces of other people and is wounded in his heart by the kindness of others, 42 and despises the ugly ones, although very often a beautiful soul is hidden under an ugly face. Do not highly value fading beauty, but value imperishable, unfading beauty, the beauty of the soul, consisting of meekness, humility, chastity, submission, patience, and trust. Every day, engage in the correction and education of your spirit in virtues: meekness, humility, kindness, patience, purity and chastity, abstinence, non-covetousness, mortification of sensuality. Passions fight daily in our members, and he is not a Christian who does not tame them, but gives them food and indulgence, for example, irritability, pride, revenge, impatience, impurity, delicacy and intemperance or love of money. Those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and lusts [Gal. 5, 24]. If, for example, you lent money to someone for a certain period of time and the debtor does not repay it to you, then do not have enmity towards him, but treat him kindly, as if he had lent you, and not you to him: in this way you will crucify the passion of malice and the passion of covetousness, or the wisdom of the flesh. If you reprimanded someone in anger and thereby offended your neighbor, then call him to you and talk to him kindly or apologize for your mistake - and henceforth restrain your outbursts of anger as much as possible. He who does not have meekness toward those who sin is not a disciple of Christ. Learn from Me, says Jesus Christ, for I am meek and lowly in heart [Matt. 11, 29]. A Christian must be a lamb. The beast is Satan; Put aside brutal properties in every possible way, that is, anger, cruelty, envy, greed. Vices and virtues have a close connection with each other: for example, voluptuousness and satiety have a close connection with malice, pride and covetousness. Who is distinguished by the greatest pride and malice? - Sated, well-fed, pampered. Who is characterized by humility? - Those who are hungry, poor [or] generally abstinent in food, drink and modest in clothing and in all the external surroundings of everyday life. One sinful thought, a word depicting any sin, especially carnal uncleanness, said with a sly intention, in a certain tone, infects a person’s soul with sinful poison, and this poison spreads in a burning, unclean stream throughout the bodily components; Therefore, you must take care yourself and protect others, especially innocent children, from these thoughts and words. Innocence is a precious treasure before God. Woe to the man through whom temptation comes [Matt. 18, 7]. If we are angry with each other and catch each other in a word or an offense, then, of course, we will soon catch each other, for we are all with weaknesses and sins. But this catching is a property of the devil. Thus, the enemies of the zealot of truth, Chrysostom, caught him and drove him into exile. Didn't you wish evil and destruction on your real or only imaginary enemy? Absolutely renounce malice and, according to the commandment of the Savior Christ, love your enemies and do good to those who hate you [Matt. 5:44] to soften them and incline them to peace. If they slander you to your face or do harm to you, persecute you, weave lies against you - and then do not be embittered at those who do this, but endure, bless, pray, saying: Father, let them go, for they know not what they are doing [Lk. 23, 34]. (Today I sinned towards the Lord: at the end of the prayer service to the Iveron Mother of God I became embittered against Father Matthew’s brother for his alleged wickedness, pride, malice, covetousness, stinginess, and unsociability, although first of all I myself am wicked, proud, angry, stingy and uncommunicative: in my brother’s eye we see a bitch, but in ourselves we do not see a log [Matthew 7: 3 – 5; Luke 6, 41 – 42]. And all because we do not have love: love covers everything [1 Cor. 13, 7]. Appreciate your wife’s great love for you, invested in her by God, and thank the Lord for this gift. At the prayer service after mass today (December 21), while reading the water blessing prayer, I became embarrassed and therefore confused - because of what? Due to the presence of nobles (the navigation inspector [...]). How long will there be partiality? How long will I degrade the works of God's service with confusion and cowardice? You, O priest, during divine services, avoid in every possible way adapting to human tastes, to carnal, ungodly tastes, but please the only Lord, as it should be; By pleasing Him, you will please everyone, and by not pleasing Him, you will not please anyone. Read your prayers in full, don’t stop speaking [Russian: don’t diminish a word] [Jer. 26:2], do not be ashamed of any word or expression. The word of the Lord is pure, silver is kindled, the earth is tempted, purified by the sevenfold [Ps. 11, 7]. Do not listen to the spirit of deceit and pride. Do not humiliate the works of God before secular, learned, noble people, but even more so boldly raise the voice of prayer, so that you yourself will not tolerate humiliation according to this word: he who humiliates Me will be dishonest [1 Sam. 2, 30]. Let everyone humble themselves before God: the noble, the bureaucratic, the learned, the rich, and let all human flesh remain silent and think of nothing earthly in itself; let all human, vain wisdom humble itself before the Divine wisdom. When physical beauty seduces you, say to yourself: spiritual beauty is incomparably better; Moreover, physical beauty is some expression of spiritual beauty, and physical beauty is perishable, but spiritual beauty is incorruptible; enjoying physical beauty is sinful, but enjoying spiritual beauty is holy; This is associated with slavery, and this is free. Everything in the world passes away like smoke, but the Christian faith, but the Church, its Sacraments, prayers, the truth contained in them, stands firmly and unshakably. Therefore, when performing the Sacraments and prayers, do not rush and do not please vain people, their opinions, customs, for they will disappear like smoke. Next to virtue, our enemy always tries to place sin: for example, with the fear of God - his own fear, demonic; or instead of virtue he tries to put vice: instead of abstinence - intemperance, greed and drunkenness, instead of chastity - fornication, instead of meekness and gentleness - irritability and malice, instead of humility - pride, instead of goodwill - envy, instead of generosity - stinginess, instead of courage - cowardice, instead of joy - despondency, instead of the space of the heart - tightness, instead of calmness - anxiety, embarrassment, instead indifference to earthly goods - addiction to them, instead of heavenly things - more, and thus tries to turn our life upside down. In our earthly passions there is a great injustice regarding the Lord God and our soul: seeing beautiful creatures (for example, people, animals, birds, plants) or beautiful products of human hands, for example, silver and gold items, precious fabrics, generally beautiful products of human hands, or wanting to get rich in money and greedily collecting, hoarding them, preserving them and sparing them, if not for ourselves, then for our poor brethren, we fall away in heart from God, the source of all beauty, all wealth, and we cleave our hearts to creatures and to the works of human hands, we leave the source of living water and dig for ourselves leaky wells that cannot contain living water 43; We enslave the immortal soul to corruption and vanity, from a free soul we make it a slave, from a heavenly, luminous citizen - an earthly slave, reptiles in the darkness and smoke of passions. Therefore, seeing beautiful creatures that attract our hearts to themselves, or beautiful things in general, we must immediately raise the eyes of the heart to the Source of all beauty, all brilliance, every artistic work, who produced such creatures or made man wise - this king of creatures created by Him in His image and likeness - to do such beautiful things, and not be blinded by visible creatures, not cleave to them, but only to the One who created all things from non-existence or from dust and again turns them into dust. So, man, serve [certainly] the Creator, and not the creatures, cleave to Him, and not to that which, having been created from dust by the almighty, wise and all-good Creator, turns into dust. This truth is known to almost everyone, but in reality we see that rarely, rarely does anyone fulfill it. Brethren! We have had enough of chasing after earthly things: draw near to us 44 the Kingdom of Heaven. Many people love theatres, clubs, operas, and card games - but these are broken treasures that cannot contain water [Jer. 2, 13 ]; this is idolatry in Christianity, the corrupt customs of a corrupt nature; Oblivion of God, neglect of the Holy Church, oblivion of all the commandments of the Gospel and the truths: the resurrection of the dead, the Judgment of the future, eternal torment, the bliss of the righteous. I did not mortify my flesh by fasting in order to revive my soul, so that Christ and His Divine properties would be resurrected in me; I pleased my adulterous and sinful flesh. I have sinned against the Lord! December 25, 1868. Temptation during Christmas Matins. Before Matins, Father Deacon Pyotr Sofronov, in the presence of his former school friend Father Alexander Perov, the priest of the prison companies, casually accepted the blessing and did not kiss his hand, ashamed of his imaginary humiliation. This upset me so much, it created such a malignant suspiciousness that I spent the whole morning in fire, cramped conditions and some kind of darkness, due to the action of an evil force; I spent the entire early mass in the Duma church on my knees before the altar, begging the Lord for forgiveness, mercy, and salvation. I thought: Is Father Deacon angry with me because of something, does he despise me for something? These thoughts greatly disturbed me and created in me extreme dislike and even hostility towards him, as a frivolous and changeable person (although which of us is not frivolous and not changeable?). Subsequently it turned out that all this was nothing more than the machinations of the enemy. Father Deacon did not even think of being angry with me or despising me and was still respectful (why do I crave respect, a sinner unrespectful in my deeds?). Here, by the way, it’s worth mentioning the connection that exists between gluttony and malice. Why couldn’t I quickly overcome satanic anger and pride in myself and succumbed to it somewhat? - From gluttony and violation of fasting on the eve of the Nativity of Christ, which occurred first from ignorance, and then from knowledge: I ate with gusto the quick pancakes at Korenev’s wake and drank a glass of vodka, and jam, and caviar - my soul relaxed, and if it had been tempered or humbled by fasting, mortified, then my heart would have reflected the anger conveniently, would have overcome opposing forces or they would not even dare to touch the soul, protected by fasting and thought of God. In general, a well-fed, voluptuous person is not capable of fighting the spirits of evil. This is why fasting is necessary for a spiritual fighter. December 26. Today, having come to Matins and meeting the same Father Deacon in the altar, he was again stung by enmity, remembering yesterday’s temptation because of him and seeing the same reluctance. With heartfelt repentance and self-condemnation, I repelled a new attack from the spirit of malice, saying within myself: I see your tricks, your intrigues; away, you damned one, I want to live in love and peace with my brethren. Moreover, I am not worthy to have my hand kissed. Whoever wants [will] kiss for the sake of Christ and out of respect for my dignity or for zeal for my unworthiness, and whoever does not want - God be with him, according to the beautiful Russian expression: free will. You can’t put everyone in your own way. And many, many do not fulfill God’s desires – and I, the accursed one, am among them. Resurrection Day reminds all Christians of death and resurrection from the dead, of the General Judgment, of the decision of eternal fate, of future bliss and future endless torment, and inspires everyone with the duty to prepare for death, to prepare for themselves through virtue a blessed resurrection, a good answer at the Last Judgment of Christ and eternal life - about temporary life and here wealth, here pleasures, sweets, honors, as temporary and like a ghost, inspires not to care. How elevates the spirit and what joy the weekly remembrance of Christ’s resurrection brings to the soul! But for many, alas! the word resurrection has turned into one empty sound, without meaning, without meaning, without inner strength! It is necessary to reflect on the basis of the word of God about Christian holidays! The Kronstadt society, full of self-love, love of money, vanity, pride, plunges me into fierce temptation! How can I respect him! And to this day I was sometimes embarrassed before him - before the military, before the merchants, and the officials! What does the mania for newspapers, magazines and various, various books and little books mean and what does it lead to? It leads to the book of the Gospel being completely closed and not being read, and only secular books, magazines and newspapers being read. Who knows? God! I thank Thee, because through my prayer you drove away from me the storm and the demonic oppression, when guests came to me - the wife of the fireman 45 with her daughters and the orphan girls of Zhukovsky; I thank you for taking away from my heart the vain enmity against the Zhukovskys because of their frequent visits; I thank you for granting me to reverently and unfailingly read a prayer to You, the Father of all flesh, and bless the meal and sit at the meal in peace of mind. Oh, how the enemy confuses and pushes us away from each other, arms us against each other! Grant me, Lord, the grace of keenness of attention to my sins, and not to the sins of my brother, which his soul knows and the Lord knows the heart, rewarding everyone according to his deeds and undertakings. Today I came to church for mass and, seeing my brother Father Matthew serving, I was indignant at him and despised him for his covetousness and accumulation of great wealth - forgetting about my countless sins, about my covetousness, about my delicacy and gluttony, satiety, heavy drinking, covetousness and pride, envy, malice, cowardice, despondency, murmuring, laziness, negligence, especially regarding the flock of souls and the salvation of one’s soul, desolation, fornication, theft, lies, idle talk, disobedience, insolence, partiality, false shame, hypocrisy, vanity (clothing), addiction to earthly things, indifference to heavenly things, one’s stinginess, greed, laughter and many others. Oh, how grievously I have sinned before God! I thank You, Lord, for through my heartfelt prayer you took away my sin and healed my heart, wounded by sins, for your mercy is endless. Amen. December 31, 1868 In the new summer, grant, Lord, to begin a new life for the glory of Your name and for the salvation of me and my neighbors, before whom may Your light shine in me! I don’t depend on anyone except God, and therefore I don’t fear anyone but God. The words of the Church are words of the highest spiritual understanding, not subject to criticism by worldly people. You must pronounce them firmly, solemnly, loudly. They are pure words, kindled silver... purified by the sevenfold [Ps. 11, 7 ], dear ones are much more honorable than gold and stone 46 [ Ps. 18, 11]. If you know for sure that the poor use the money you give them for evil, do not be angry with them, but remain meek and gentle, [laughing at them], like Paul the Great 47. For is money - these ashes - worth getting angry over? After all, the poor are, after all, in the image and likeness of God, all members of Christ, all your brethren. But look at your lifestyle: what you eat and drink and how much, what you wear, what rooms you live in, what you eat. what bed you sleep on, what you sit on, compare your life with the life of the poor - and you will understand that you should feel sorry for them, and not be angry with them, because, in contrast to you, they have nothing, they are poor, which is why they are called poor. You suffer from severe toothache or severe pain in your legs; your illness burns you like fire; you almost scream. This is a consequence of your overeating and satiety; but this illness is good for your soul. You ate with great greed, with great pleasure, and your flesh began to be enraged by fornication - you began to look at women with lust, and here is the Knower of the Heart, test the hearts and wombs [Jer. 11:20], sent you a fiery test: endure it for the purification and pacification of your soul and flesh, and thank God for the patience sent down, for he who suffers in the flesh ceases to sin [1 Pet. 4, 1]. Whether food is consumed much or little, of this or that quality, whether it is cheap or expensive, do not worry about it, for food is dust, but always think about the things above. Do not spare food for anyone, just as you do not spare yourself. When you feel anger, or envy, or lust and other passions in yourself, then do not consider them to be the fault of your neighbor, but yourself alone and say: oh, how much stench there is in me, the feces of sin! When will I be fragrant with kindness, humility, good will to everyone, purity and chastity! My unclean soul reflects in itself only the bad properties - real or imaginary - of my neighbor. A pure-hearted, good person reflects only the good, sees only the good, and does not see or does not notice the bad, covering it with love. And blessed is he! I thank the Lord my God, who graciously, victoriously, powerfully saved me from my enemy, who entangled me in his sinful net and who raped me and oppressed me. The Lord saved me through the communion of His holy, most pure, heavenly and life-giving Mysteries, January 2, 1869. Funeral mass for Elder Mikhail Rusanov. From lust, satiety and long sleep, our heart and flesh become prodigal, proud and arrogant and lazy; therefore, to correct and cleanse them, strong sorrows are needed, like a cleansing fire, consuming and destroying the impurities of the heart, rudeness and rust of passions. Embrace yourself with grief over your sins and shed sincere tears about them - and you will feel peace and space in your heart; otherwise your sins will crush you to death, and your strength and the light of your eyes will leave you [Ps. 37, 11]. No matter how sweet sin is for the flesh, do not deign to indulge in it, for the devil, like a fox, pleasantly drags his tail through his entrails, incites, compels, in order to seduce into sin; on the other hand, no matter how bitter or grave sin is, do not be discouraged, do not be faint-hearted, do not complain, but endure, knowing that sooner or later it will end. To do this is to truly love God. If you are poor in spirit, you will be the fulfillment of Him who fulfills all things in all [Eph. 1, 23]. But the proud and arrogant will never be the fullness of Him who fulfills everything in everyone. Fill those who hunger with good things and those who are rich let go of their goods [Lk. 1, 53]. Keep it in your heart and thoughts and chew your spiritual cud, that is, constantly philosophize spiritually. Riot (church glory) – madness, ignorance. Stink (Church Glav.) – smell. Stichera at the Great Entrance, tone 8; sung instead of the Cherubic Song at the liturgy on Holy Saturday. Wed. Antiphon 3 at Matins, tone 4. Prayer 7, to the Most Holy Theotokos “I sing of Thy grace, O Lady...”, from the sequence of morning prayers. Right there. “Create me again, having promised insensible, Most Immaculate, sins,” that is, “renew me, Most Immaculate, having promised from sins that I do not feel.” Receptive to each other (Church Glav.) - successively, one after the other. Kindness (church glory) – beauty, grace. Wed: I left the source of water alive, and dug up for myself broken treasures [Russian: broken reservoirs], which cannot contain water (Jer. 2:13). The fire chief is the head of the fire brigade. Honest (church glory) - here: precious. St. Paul the Most Holy (IV century) was a disciple of St. Anthony the Great and was distinguished by his holy simplicity, gentleness, and humility, for which he received from the Lord the gift of clairvoyance and casting out demons. Memory 7/20 March and 4/17 October. You might be interested in: