How Christian Life is Accomplished, Matures, and Grows Strong in Us

Let us fix our attention on this: that a man has only just turned from darkness to light, from the domain of Satan to God, has only just entered a new path on which he has not yet taken a single step, yet burns with zeal to do everything that proves necessary to stand firm in what he has begun and not yield again to his former masters, who pulled him away from God and his Savior and led him into perdition.

The question now arises: where must he go and what must he do in order to arrive where he should, and to arrive truly, straight, swiftly, successfully? The goal to which the converted man must direct all his attention and all his labors is the final goal of man and the economy of salvation itself—namely, communion with God, a living union with God, the grace of his indwelling. Only then will the seeking and zealous spirit find rest, when he has acquired God, tasted Him, and been satisfied. Therefore his first law is: “seek” God, “seek his face continually” (cf. Ps 104:4). What this good consists in is incomprehensible to man. He would never have thought of such a height on his own. But when God was pleased to appoint him to this rank, it would be bold of man to reject it through unbelief, inattention, or forgetfulness of it, even amid labors. “I will dwell in them”, says God, and this by all Persons of the Most Holy Trinity (2 Cor 6:16). Regarding God the Father and himself, the Lord says: “to him” (the believer and lover) “we will come, and make our home with him” (Jn 14:23). Regarding himself alone: “I will come in to him and dine with him” (Rev 3:20); and more plainly still: “I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you” (Jn 14:20). Of the Holy Spirit the Apostle says: “God’s Spirit lives in you” (Rom 8:9).

It must be noted that this indwelling of God is not merely mental, such as occurs in meditation on God from man’s side and in God’s good pleasure from His side, but is living and vital, for which those must be reckoned only as means. Intelligent and heartfelt longing toward God, under God’s good pleasure, prepares man to receive God in truth; it is such a union in which, without absorbing the powers and person of man, God appears “working” in him “both to will and to do” (Phil 2:13); and man, according to the Apostle, “no longer” lives “by himself, but” “Christ” lives “in him” (cf. Gal 2:20). This is the goal not only of man but of God himself. All that is created stands in God and by God. Free creatures are left to themselves, but not finally and not altogether; they are intended to give themselves to the all-acting God, not constituting within themselves a kingdom in God’s Kingdom that is independent of God. It may seem strange that communion with God must still be attained when it already exists or is given in the Mystery of baptism or repentance, for it is said: “as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal 3:27); or: “You died, and your life is hidden with Christ” “in God” (Col 3:3). And by ordinary reasoning, God is everywhere, “not far from any of us, so that we might feel” “for him” (Acts 17:27), and ready to dwell in anyone willing to receive him. Only unwillingness, carelessness, and sinfulness separate us from him. Now, when the penitent has rejected all and gives himself to God—what stands in the way of God’s indwelling in him?

In resolving such a confusion, we must distinguish different kinds of communion with God. It begins from the moment of awakening and is manifest, on man’s side, in seeking and striving toward God, and on God’s side, in his good pleasure, help, and protection. But God is still outside man and man outside God; they do not interpenetrate, are not mutually interpermeable. In the Mystery of baptism or repentance the Lord by His grace enters within man, communicates with him in a living way, and gives him to taste all the sweetness of divinity as fully and perceptibly as is fitting for the perfect; but then He again hides this revelation of His communion, renewing it only at times—and then lightly, as in a reflection only, not in reality—leaving man in ignorance of Him and His abiding in him until a definite measure of maturity or training according to His wise guidance. After this, the Lord manifestly shows His indwelling in the spirit of man, who then becomes the temple of the Three-Hypostatic Godhead that fills him.

Thus there are three kinds of communion with God: one is mental, occurring during the period of conversion, and the other two are actual, but one of them is hidden and invisible to others and unknown even to the recipient himself, while the other is evident to others as well. The first kind of communion, the most intelligible and universal, does not cease even in the second stage and even in the third, because spiritual life is intelligent life; yet in these stages it differs from its first character characteristically, though it is quite impossible to explain this by words. All spiritual life consists in the transition from mental communion with God to actual, living, perceptible, and manifest communion.

We look at the penitent man—that is, at one who has truly entered into communion with God, but still hidden, secret, not manifest—and has the goal of attaining full, perceptible, tangible communion. We must define this more precisely and assure ourselves, because all the activity of the penitent for salvation must be built on these concepts; namely: that in the Mystery of repentance (or baptism) grace descends perceptibly to the spirit, but then hides itself from consciousness, though it does not depart in deed—and this is until the heart is purified, when it dwells visibly and finally. It is evident that our teachers in this matter can only be the holy fathers. Of all of them, none depicted this as well as St Diadochos, bishop of Photike, and St Makarios of Egypt. Let us adduce their testimonies to our propositions.

Grace indwells in man and is present with him from the moment of receiving the Mystery. “Grace,” says St Diadochos, “from the very moment in which we receive baptism (or repentance) dwells in the very depths of the mind.” Again: “Divine grace through holy baptism unites itself with an incomprehensible sort of love, by the marks of the divine image, as a pledge of likeness. St Makarios says: “Grace is continually present with man, having been united and rooted since childhood, as it were something natural and inseparable in his heart, having become one being with him.”

At its first indwelling through the Mysteries, this grace grants man full tasting of blessedness from communion with God. “The All-Holy Spirit,” says St Diadochos, “in the beginning of perfection, if we zealously love God’s virtue, gives the soul to taste the sweetness of God with all its feeling and abundantly, so that the mind might have true knowledge of the final reward of God-pleasing labors. Again: “Grace at first usually illumines the soul with its light so that it can abundantly feel it.” This perceptible overshadowing of grace at first is portrayed by the white garment in which the baptized are clothed for seven days. That this is not merely a rite is evident from examples of converted saints, for some were manifestly clothed in light, on others descended a dove, some’s faces were illumined. In general, all who truly drew near to the Lord felt this in a certain exultation of their spirit, like that with which the Lord’s Forerunner exulted in Elizabeth’s womb at the approach of the Mother of God and in her the Lord. In the life of Simeon and John (July 21) it is said that they saw light around their brother as he was baptized and received the monastic habit—and this for seven days. Having felt, upon receiving the habit, this special action of God within themselves, they sought to preserve it forever, and for this reason immediately departed to seclusion—the mode of ascetical striving most suited to this.

Then grace hides itself from the one being saved, and though it remains in him and works, it does so in such a way that he does not notice it, and so completely fails to notice that he often considers himself abandoned by God and perishing, from which he falls into sorrow, lamentation, and even mild despair. Thus St Diadochos, continuing after the passages cited above, says: “But for a long time afterward it hides the preciousness of this life-giving gift, so that we, though we might fulfill all virtues, might consider ourselves utterly nothing, because we have not yet turned holy love into a habit for ourselves. But in the course of struggles, it produces its secret actions in the soul that theologizes in a way unknown to it, so that in the first case it might persuade us, called from ignorance to knowledge, to joyfully enter upon the path of divine contemplation, and in the second, amid struggles, to protect our knowledge from vainglory.” In another place he explains how grace works in general: “Grace at first conceals its presence, waiting for the soul’s will, and as soon as man turns wholly to the Lord, then it reveals its presence to the heart by some inexpressible feeling and again waits for the movement of the soul, meanwhile allowing demonic arrows to reach the deep feeling of it, so that with the most zealous will and with the humblest disposition she might seek God. Nevertheless, it must be known that, though grace conceals its presence from the soul, it nonetheless gives it help in a hidden way, to show the enemies that victory belongs solely to the soul. Therefore the soul then finds itself in despondency, sorrow, abasement, and even moderate despair.” And St Makarios of Egypt says that “the power of God’s grace, being in man (which already is, is given), and the gift of the Holy Spirit, which a faithful soul is granted to receive through great labor, much waiting, patience, trials and testings,” meaning not its first reception but its full indwelling and action, as is clear from his words where he says that grace, with great patience, wisdom, and mysterious testing of the mind in a man who has for a long time been struggling in various circumstances, begins to work. He also explains this through examples of Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and David, who, having received great promises, then had to suffer for a long time in obscurity until they finally saw the fulfillment of the promises. It must be noted that this hiddenness and imperceptibility is not continuous, but from time to time becomes interspersed with consolations, though these consolations are quite different from those which come later, at the indwelling of the Spirit.

Finally, when this period of hidden communion with God and of God’s action in the soul comes to an end—a duration that is not in man’s hands but in the guiding wisdom of the grace that saves man—God dwells in man in a special way, manifestly fills him, unites and communes with him, and this constitutes the goal of all ascetical striving and of all man’s labors, and of all God’s economy of salvation, and of everything that befalls each man in this present life from birth to the grave. St Makarios says that the work of grace, after long trials, finally becomes completely evident, and the soul receives full adoption by the Spirit. God himself entrusts himself to the heart, and man is granted to become one spirit with the Lord. The tested man, according to Diadochos, becomes a perfect dwelling of the Holy Spirit. Grace illumines all his being in some deep feeling. This action reveals itself or is accompanied by different means in different people.

These two modes of actual communion with God are beautifully depicted and described by the wise Sirach, speaking of Wisdom, which is God’s saving grace to us: “she will walk with him in a roundabout way and bring fear and terror upon him, and she will torment him with the discipline of her law until she trusts him; then she will return to him on the straight path and gladden him, and reveal her secrets to him” (Sir 4:18–21).

“She will walk with him in a roundabout way”—that is, severely, strictly, without mercy, as it were without love.

“And she will bring fear and terror upon him”—fear of abandonment by God and constant threat of terrible enemies; and in this, according to Diadochos, grace acts like a mother hiding from her child, who from fear therefore begins to cry and seek his mother, especially when he sees strangers around him.

“And she will torment him with the discipline of her law”—she will keep him for a long time in this hidden and strict teaching of hers. According to St Makarios, “grace in many different ways, according to its will and in accordance with man’s benefit, arranges everything, holds him in many trials and mysterious testing of the mind and so forth.”

“Until she trusts him and he proves himself in her judgments”—that is, until she brings him to the point where he can be relied upon completely, as tested and faithful. St Makarios says: “When the will, after much trial, appears pleasing to the Holy Spirit and through long time shows itself therein patient and unshakable; when the soul does not grieve the Spirit in anything, but in all commandments is in agreement with grace,” then “She will return to him on the straight path”—that is, openly, face to face, will appear to him as it were anew after separation and absence. Then, according to St Makarios, the work of grace in him is completely revealed—he receives full adoption; or, according to Diadochos, grace illumines all his being in a certain deep feeling, and he becomes a perfect dwelling of the Holy Spirit: the light of God’s face is marked upon him (see Ps 4:7); the Lord and God comes and makes his dwelling in him (see Jn 14:23).

“And she will gladden him”—“Your heart will rejoice”, says the Lord, “and no one will take your joy from you” (Jn 16:22). The Kingdom of God is “joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 14:17). The light shining in man, says St Makarios, so pierces through all his inwardness that he, wholly immersed in this sweetness and pleasant feeling, is outside himself from the overabundance of love and the hidden Mysteries he contemplates. “The soul then burns,” says St Diadochos, “and with an inexpressible sort of joy and love then strives to go out of the body and depart to the Lord and as it were not to know this temporal life.”

“And she will reveal her secrets to him”—the secrets of divine wisdom, the worthy-of-worship Trinity, the economy of salvation, its appropriation to us, the secrets of sin and virtue, divine care for rational and material creatures, and in general all the divine order of things, as this is depicted in detail by St Isaac the Syrian in his letter to Simeon. “When the mind is renewed and the heart is sanctified, then spiritual knowledge of creations is felt, the contemplation of the mysteries of the Holy Trinity shines forth in him with the mysteries of the worthy-of-worship dispensation concerning us, and then he obtains the most complete knowledge of the hope of the future. Such a one does not learn, does not investigate, but contemplates the glory of Christ, enjoys the pleasure of the contemplation of the mysteries of the new world. Such perfection of knowledge comes with the reception of the Spirit, who leads our spirit into that world, order, or realm of contemplations.” The Holy Spirit removes from the soul a veil, ravishes it into that age, and shows it all marvels.

Thus it is now evident that the grace coming to the converted through the Mysteries unites with him and at first gives him to taste all the sweetness of life lived according to God, and then hides its presence from him, leaving him to act as it were alone, amid labors, sweat, confusion, and even falling; finally, after the passage of this testing period, it dwells in him openly, effectively, powerfully, perceptibly.

The question arises: what is the reason that God’s grace does not dwell completely all at once, or in other words, why does the triumph of full communion of the soul with God not reveal itself all at once? One must know this reason in order to act against it and to act more successfully, because only by removing it can complete indwelling of grace be attained.

To understand why this happens, let us turn to the inner structure of the converted person. Sin has taken hold of man and drawn his attention to itself, and all his striving and all his powers. Acting under the influence of sin, man saturates himself completely with it and trains all parts of his being and all his powers to act at its prompting. This foreign activity, imposed from without, from its long residence, becomes so natural to us that it turns into nature itself, takes on the appearance of what is natural, and therefore unchangeable and necessary. Thus kichenie attaches to the mind, self-interest to desire, lust to the heart, and self-regard and a certain animosity toward others to all our undertakings. In this way, in his consciousness and will, in the powers of the soul—mind, will, and feeling—in all the functions of the body, in all his external deeds, in his conduct, relationships, rules, and customs—man is wholly permeated with sin, that is, with self-regard, passion, and self-pleasing. According to St Makarios, this is depicted as: sin, having entered into us at the fall, takes on the whole form of man, which is why he is called a fleshly, soulish, external man, and has clothed its parts with the corresponding parts of our nature: the mind with mind, the will with will, and so forth, and, suppressing our natural activity of powers, put forth its own unnatural activity in place of them, while keeping man in the assurance that it was natural. In this darkness, under the weight of sin, in the domain of Satan dwells every man not converted, not repentant, not come to the resolve to serve God in spirit and in truth.

The coming divine grace—first through awakening, then through the period of conversion—divides man into a man, brings him into consciousness of this duality, into the vision of what is unnatural and what should be natural, and brings him to the resolve to tear away or cleanse all that is unnatural, so that the divine-like nature appears in full light. But it is evident that such resolve is only the beginning of the work. In it man has only in consciousness and will come out of the realm of the alien unnaturalness existing in him, has rejected it and attached himself to the naturalness expected and desired; but in reality throughout his whole being he remains still as he was, that is, saturated with sin, and in the soul in all powers and in the body in all functions passions still exist as before, with the only difference that previously all this was desired, chosen, and acted upon by man with desire and pleasure, now it is not desired, not chosen, but hated, trampled, pursued. Man in this has gone out of himself as it were from a stinking corpse, and sees what sort of passion-stench each part of him gives off, and against his will sometimes smells, to the point of dimming his mind, all the stench given off by himself.

Thus true grace-given life in man at first is only a seed, a spark; but a seed sown amid thorns, a spark covered from all sides with ashes. This is still a weak candle, shining in the densest fog. In consciousness and will man has clung to God, and God has received him, united with him in this self-conscious and willing power, or mind and spirit, as is spoken of by the holy Antony and Makarios the Great. And all that is good, saved, and pleasing to God in man is only this. All the other parts are still in captivity and neither wish nor are able yet to yield to the demands of the new life: the mind does not know how to think in a new way but thinks in the old way; the will does not know how to will in a new way but wills in the old way; the heart does not know how to feel in a new way but feels in the old way. The same is true in the body in all its functions. Consequently he is wholly unclean except for the one point constituted by the conscious and free power—mind or spirit. God the most pure unites with this one part only; all the other parts, as unclean, remain outside him, strange to him, though he is ready to fill all of man, but does not do so because man is unclean. Then, as soon as he is cleansed, God immediately shows his complete indwelling. St Gregory of Sinai writes: “If our nature is not preserved through the Spirit from defilement and does not become clean as it was, then neither in this life nor in the future life will it be able to unite with Christ in one body and spirit; for the all-encompassing and uniting power of the Spirit is not accustomed to sew a new garment of grace in restoration to worn-out rags of passion.” The Lord cannot dwell completely—the dwelling is not yet prepared; grace cannot pour forth into him completely—the vessel is still flawed. To do this would mean to squander and ruin spiritual treasures. “For what do light and darkness have in common, or what fellowship” “has Christ with Belial?” (2 Cor 6:14–15). And the Lord, when promising to come with the Father and make his dwelling, sets as an indispensable condition the fulfillment of the commandments—of course, all the commandments; otherwise, right activity in all things, which is impossible without the righteousness of the powers, and the righteousness of the powers without the removal from them of the coming unrighteousness, or the casting away of sinfulness and passion. To this can be somewhat applied the following passage: “If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not live according to the truth; but if we walk in light, as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another” (1 Jn 1:6–7). This darkness is the darkness of passions, for afterward John in similar places uses animosity and threefold lust in place of it (see 1 Jn 2:10–11, 16). Light, by contrast, is the light of virtues; and again for the same reason, for afterward light is replaced by virtues in his usage. From this it is evident that true standing in the perfection of communion with God is only possible when the darkness of passions has been driven away and the light of virtues has shone forth, when they have been inscribed and have grown together as it were with our being, have clothed and penetrated our powers, expelling and driving out passions from them so as to be no longer merely reflected but self-luminous. Until then communion with God is so hidden, so unknown, that it may seem non-existent and to a certain degree must be considered unreliable, uncertain, incomplete, or not corresponding to itself.

Thus the fact that the Lord, having come into union with man’s spirit, does not immediately fill or dwell completely in him depends not on him, ready to fill all, but on us, namely on the passions mixed with our nature’s powers, not yet removed from them and not yet replaced by opposite virtues. “Sinful passions,” says St Anthony the Great, “do not allow God to shine in us.” If then the chief goal to which the penitent must strive is complete communion with God, luminous and blessed, and the chief obstacle to this is the presence of passions still existing and acting within him, the imprinting of virtues and the wrongness of the powers, then it is evident that his chief work, immediately after conversion and repentance, must be the eradication of passions and the imprinting of virtues—in a word, the correction of himself. The removal of all that is wrong and the taking or placing of what is right, the expulsion of sinful passions, habits, defects, even those seeming natural, and other wrongs, and the appropriation of virtues, good character, rules, and complete correctness in all respects, while not losing sight of the ultimate goal, but striving against passions with all zeal, keeping meanwhile the eyes of the mind turned toward God—in this consists the initial principle that must be held in building up the entire order of a life pleasing to God, by which the straight and crooked of invented rules and undertaken labors must be measured. One must assure oneself of this as fully as possible, because all working errors seem to proceed from ignorance of this principle. Not understanding its power, some stop at mere external practice and striving, others at good works alone and habit in them, going no further, and still others go straight to contemplation. All this is necessary, but each has its time. At first all is seed; then it develops not exclusively but predominantly in one or another part, yet graduality is inevitable—ascent from external labors to internal, and from both these to contemplation, not the reverse.

Having assured ourselves of this, we can now easily extract guiding rules for a life pleasing to God, or the spirit and character of ascetical practice.

Let us turn back a little and again stand in attention before the man who has devoted himself to God and made a vow to act always and in all things according to his will, for his glory, to grow truly rich in good works. Having decided on this, by what else can he act in this manner, when, as we have seen, neither one nor the other of our parts is capable of it? Sin is hated in the spirit, but the body and soul sympathize with it, cling to it, because they are clothed in passions. Good or God’s will is loved in the spirit, but the body and soul do not sympathize with it, turn away from it, or, if not that, do not know how to do it. Therefore one who has decided, from his zeal, to remain faithful to his vow and, from conscious necessity, to remain in good, must inevitably in every good deed (and there should be no bad ones for him) oppose the demands of his body and soul and, refusing them, compel them to the contrary. And since the body and soul do not leave him but constitute him, this is the same as opposing oneself in what is evil and compelling oneself toward good. Self-opposition and self-compulsion—these are two forms of the zeal reborn in the spirit, the formal principles as it were of ascetical practice. Both constitute man’s struggle with himself, or in other words, labor.

From this the converted penitent, from the first moments of the new life, inevitably enters into labor, into struggle, into toil, and begins to bear weight and a yoke. And this is so essential that the only true path of virtue recognized by all saints is its painfulness and ardorousness, while the ease contrary to it is a sign of a false path: “The Kingdom” of God “is forcefully entered, and violent men seize it” (Mt 11:12). Whoever is not in struggle, not in labor, is in delusion. The Apostle says: whoever does not endure is not a son (see Heb 12:7–8).

Thus the one striving zealously strives in the labors of self-compulsion and self-opposition for the purpose of self-correction, or bringing himself to the purity of the first-created state, so as to the sooner be granted communion with God. It is evident that the more vigorously, carefully, and swiftly he does this, the more successfully he attains his goal. It is the same as to say: the more hateful and hostile he goes against himself, the more sharply and decisively he acts, the sooner he enters into purity. For this reason we see that all saints who have ascended to the height of Christian perfection, immediately after conversion, began the strictest labors of self-mortification—fasts, vigils, lying on a hard bed, solitude, and so forth. This was a consciously chosen, grace-inspired measure, adopted for the quicker ripening, and it indeed came quickly. On the contrary, ease, stops, self-pity, even if not constant, always slowed and slow the pace of spiritual ripening.

Thus the task of one who has decided: strive, take up the labors more decidedly, the same more decisive and well-suited ones—after all, among them some contribute more and others less to the mortification of passions and the imprinting of virtues. If this suffering state is unavoidable, though temporary, what sense is there in dragging out this work through mere carelessness? Indecision, carelessness, sluggishness—these are great obstacles.

You have decided, so do not stand still but fight; this is from man’s side. But in doing so, one must constantly keep in mind that, though merciless zeal toward oneself is salvific for the converted, nonetheless the success and fruit of his labors and works, that is, their working and influence on the cleansing of passions and the formation of true virtue—is not from him. The fruit of works is sown and ripens under them, but not by them and not through them alone, but from grace. “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth” (1 Cor 3:6). As spiritual life began through God’s grace, so it can only be preserved and ripened by it. He who began a good work in you, says the Apostle, “will carry it on to completion” (cf. Phil 1:6). The first seed of the new life consists of the union of freedom and grace, and its ripening will be the development of these same elements. As there, in making a vow to live according to God’s will, for his glory, the penitent said: “Only you strengthen and confirm me,” so at all subsequent times he must constantly place himself, as it were, in God’s hand with the prayer: “You yourself complete what is pleasing to your will,” so that thus, as in consciousness and will, so also in reality God might be “working in us both to will and to do according to his good pleasure” (Phil 2:13). The moment in which man believes he can produce something in himself and in his own being is the moment of the extinction of true, spiritual, grace-filled life. In this state, despite immense labors, there is no true fruit. There are consequences which cannot be called bad if looked at separately; but in the course of the work they are a stop and a deviation, and often evil, for they lead to pride and conceit, which are Satan’s seed, sown by him and kindred with him. And in this, something not God’s is mixed into God’s work in us and corrupts it, so that instead of uplifting the repenting man, grace will first need to purify and cast away that which has been corrupted by self-doing. “Do” you not know “that Christ is in you”—teaches the Apostle—“unless indeed you fail the test” (cf. 2 Cor 13:5). Having united with the Lord in the Mystery of repentance or baptism, we should give ourselves to him, so that, having entered into us himself, as Lord of all, he, “by the judgments he knows,” might arrange our salvation. The Lord said: “Apart from me you can do nothing” (Jn 15:5)—we must believe and ask that he work in us, that he cleanse us of passions, imprint virtues in us, and do all that is healing. This is the essential disposition of the penitent: “By the judgments you know, save me, Lord, and I will labor and sincerely, without deflection, without evasion, by pure conscience do all that I understand and am able to do.” Whoever so disposes himself within is truly received by the Lord and he works in him as a king. His teacher is God, his intercessor is God, his willer and doer is God, his fruitbearer is God, his ruler is God. This is the seed and heart of the heavenly tree of life in him. But for this an immaterial-material enclosure is absolutely necessary. This enclosure is constituted by a guide and rules.

The penitent, having given himself to God, immediately comes under his direct guidance and is received by him. Whoever accomplishes this as it should be at the beginning, is led swiftly, evenly, and with good hope by God’s grace to perfection. But in reality there are very few such people. These are God’s chosen ones, who with an incredible rush from themselves placed themselves in God’s hands, were received and guided by him. Such were, for example, Mary of Egypt, Paul of Thebes, Marcus the Fantastic, and others. What saved them was one decisive surrender of themselves to God. For Mary of Egypt, in all her fierce struggles with passions, the rule was to cast herself into God’s hand, and the passions departed, as is known, through the work. She doubtless did the same in other cases: turned, for example, to him for understanding and received it.

But such a path was not and could not be universal. It belonged and belongs to God’s special chosen ones. All the others ripen under the visible guidance of experienced men. Standing in the faith that only God causes growth, the penitent, in order to succeed, must absolutely give himself to a father-guide. The necessity of this appears because there is no complete surrender of oneself to God—a deficiency belonging to the majority. Many experiences must precede it and growth through it, and until it is formed there is no point where the guiding hand of the Lord could touch—no as it were bridle by which he should be led. Consequently, without this condition, the beginner who himself does the work of salvation will inevitably walk a path about which one cannot decisively say that it is the true path, and this is both dangerous and agonizing for the spirit. St Anthony the Great, when he came to the thought of whether his rules were correct, immediately began to cry out: “Tell me, Lord, the way,” and having received assurance, was comforted. One entering the spiritual life is like one entering an ordinary path. Since this path is unknown to us, someone must guide us. It would be presumptuous to stop at the thought that I myself can…. No, here neither rank nor learning—nothing helps. It is no less presumptuous if someone, without extreme necessity, having the opportunity to find a guide, does not choose him, thinking that God will lead him directly. Indeed, the guidance to perfection belongs to God, who has received us, but under the guidance of a father. The father does not raise us to degrees, but helps us to be raised by God. Yet in the ordinary order, God leads us through others, grants us understanding, cleanses us, tells us his will. Left alone with himself, one is in extreme danger, not to mention that he will strike and thresh on one spot almost without any fruit. Not knowing either the spiritual labors and exercises, nor the order in them, he will only make and redo, like one undertaking work without knowledge. Often for this reason many get stuck, grow cold, and lose zeal. But the chief danger for him is from internal disorder and Satan’s deception. In the beginner there is within—fog, as if from the exhalations of the stinking passions and wrong issuing from himself, from the corrupted powers. It is in everyone, more or less dense, depending on the preceding corruption. But in the fog how well and truly can one distinguish objects? One wandering in fog often sees a small stand of grass as a forest or a village—so too the beginner in spiritual activity will inevitably see much where nothing actually exists. Only the experienced eye can clarify and explain what is the matter. And again, he is sick: how will he be a physician to himself? He will exhaust and strangle himself from mere love of himself: after all, the sick do not heal themselves. But the chief danger is from Satan. Since he himself is chiefly self-opinionated, among men he especially loves those guided by their own mind—on this he especially tangles and destroys them. And one can say that this alone gives him access to us, or the possibility of hurling us into ruin. Whoever does not trust his reason and heart but instead offers everything in his feeling and thought to the judgment of another, will not suffer, even if the devil has sown something dangerous and ruinous, because the experience and reason of another will see through the delusion and warn him. Therefore they say: whoever has a guide and trusts him is not approached by Satan, so as not to be constantly shamed and have all his schemes exposed. On the contrary, he is constantly with one who trusts only himself or places his reason and relies on it. Such a one, through various fair appearances stamped through imagination or the faculty of fancy, he leads along various byways, until at last he destroys him completely.

Judging by these weighty reasons, the beginner must agree to have a guide, choose him, and give himself to him. Under him he is safe, as under cover and protection—he will be answerable both to God and to men for infidelities. But it is wonderful that to one seeking sincerely the true guide is always given. And a guide, whoever he might be, always gives exact and true guidance as soon as the one being guided gives himself to him with all his soul and faith. The Lord himself already watches over such a committed one. Pray—and the Lord will show you a guide; give yourself to the guide—and the Lord will teach him how to guide you.

Another thing absolutely necessary for the penitent who has decided is rules. A rule is a determination or manner, form, and institution of some activity—whether inner or outer. It gives direction and determines the entire course—the beginning, time, place, turns, end of action. So, for example, one must read—this is one of the ascetical practices. The rule must determine: what books to read, at what time, how much, how to prepare, how to begin, continue and end, what to do with what has been read. The same applies to prayer, consideration, and other practices. It is evident that rules embrace every practice, constitute its outer shell, as it were its body. They must be applied to all our powers, to all expressions of our activity in such a way that no movement is performed without its proper rule.

The necessity of this is self-evident. A completely new, unusual life begins, in which we have not yet exercised ourselves, to which our powers are unaccustomed. In order to accustom ourselves to this or that practice and strengthen ourselves in it, one must set definite rules—what to do and how, just as a young soldier is shown how to stand, take his rifle, and so forth. Without them the powers will not develop, and there will be no correct activity. One will not know how to pray who has no rule for prayer, or to fast without a fasting rule; in general, one without rules will not know how to do anything properly, and consequently his life will not be a life, despite labor and sweat, for life is made up of our activities. Moreover, life without rules cannot be even, and smoothly and harmoniously developed. A child is swaddled so that he does not become a cripple or humpbacked: so too all spiritual activity must be wrapped in rules, purposefully, so that the entire life develops under them evenly and harmoniously, no single activity takes on, through ignorance, a direction standing out from others and harmful to the whole structure, nor does it itself fall into a false path, as, for example, fasting might. A young plant is braced or tied to a strong one so it will stand and grow straight. One developing without rules by himself is uneducated, unskilled, unable to do some things, doing others wrongly, and still others rightly but inopportunely or unsuitably. Finally, there is no small danger: without rules, as without support, one inevitably falls and errs. For such a person all activity hangs on the presence of spirit, deliberation, and desire. But can one rely on such foundations? One cannot always preserve the presence of spirit; deliberation must be educated and, besides, it is not always active, keen, and grows dull; and who can control desire constantly? Therefore, without rules, gaps, errors, and stops are inevitable. With rules, it is one thing: whether one wishes it or not, do as established, and it will be done; there will be no stop, and one will move forward. And moreover: how else to bridle arbitrariness and self-direction—these most dangerous dispositions?

Thus with rules, under the guidance of a father, the one striving zealously, laboring in self-compulsion and self-opposition or remaining in unceasing struggle, will day by day advance in perfection, approach purity through the eradication of his passions and the acquisition of virtues. But one must know that this ascent to perfection is invisible to him: he labors in sweat but as if without fruit—grace builds its work under a covering. Human vision eats up the good. What remains for man is the vision of his own worthlessness. The path to perfection is the path to the consciousness that I am blind, poor, and naked, standing in unbroken connection with which is brokenness of spirit, or sickness and sorrow over one’s uncleanness, poured out before God, or, which is the same, unceasing repentance. Repentant feelings are the distinctive signs of true ascetical practice. Whoever turns away from them and avoids them has turned away from the path. At the beginning of the new life was repentance; it should also be in growth and should mature together with it. The one maturing matures in the knowledge of his corruption and sinfulness and deepens into the broken feelings of repentance. Tears are the measure of progress, and unceasing tears are a sign of approaching purification. That this should be so is evident from the fact that we are in a fall, in exile, outside the hearth of home, and moreover for our own fault. The exile weeps and laments for home; so too those beginning to journey toward purification should mourn and lament and in tears seek return to the paradise of purity. Moreover, the laboring one is constantly in struggle, now with unwillingness, now with reluctance; moment after moment thoughts, desires, passions, even unintentional sin, cloud the purity of his mind and remind him that within himself he harbors only uncleanness, sinfulness, opposition to God. He sees himself like a stinking corpse lying before him and tormenting the sense of smell to the point of dimming the head. “Set your sins before you,” says Anthony the Great, “and see through them toward God.” Finally, frequent falls and stumbles in beginners from inexperience, ignorance, lack of skill, and sometimes from weakness, lie heavily on his conscience and perhaps more heavily than before: in carelessness large sins go unnoticed. He resembles a child learning to walk and falling. Falls require purification, and therefore brokenness, repentance, tears; therefore everyone is commanded daily and even every minute repentance. “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”—this should be the unceasing prayer of the laborer.

Thus the beginner with ardent and swift zeal gives himself to the very decisive labors, expecting everything, however, from the strength and help of God and giving himself to him, in the hope of success but not of seeing it, and therefore in unceasing beginning, under the guidance of a father, amid rules, always holding to the humblest part.

In such a spirit and character the ascetic can hopefully begin his work—the work of eradicating passions, or cleansing his nature from the admixture of unnatural passion. In his spirit there is strong, firm ardor; but even the strongest ardor needs a plan to go truly toward the intended goal. In its exposition will consist all the rules for one entering upon labor. It will be nothing other than the exposition of those rules whose necessity has been shown above. Knowledge of this above all should belong to the guide of general theory and, applying himself to the person guided, can and should change them in circumstances that admit change.

To construct such rules, let us again confirm in our thought the state of the penitent-laborer. The spirit in him is resurrected and enlivened by the action of grace received in the Mysteries. But only he alone is the healed part, hidden in the very depths of our being. It is as if a healing remedy, taken by one part of a body wholly diseased. Then, outside him, his soul in all its powers and his body in all its functions, and he himself as a person in all his external relations, are filled through and through and saturated with passion, not dead but living and active in them. The chief task of the labors is to mortify passion in all its shades and restore nature to its proper purity, so that through this grace from within, as purification progresses, might emerge, as if penetrating in man one part after another, with wise graduality and purposefulness. From this is immediately evident the whole order of the rules that are to be constructed, or the thread by which to conduct and draw them. Thus:

The seed of life has been sown: keep it with all vigilance; otherwise there is nothing to which to apply labors and nothing with which to bear them. You have received the Spirit—do not quench the Spirit; you are zealous—be zealous for greater. Guard what has been given, what has been acquired—this acquisition is the coin with which to buy treasures. It will be lost—and the whole work is lost. As in time of war one greatly cares to hold one’s position by all means, so too here.

One must tear away passion that has grown together and mixed with the powers of our nature. Since this growing together is like the growing together of chemical compounds, the means of separation must be applied to the means of chemical decomposition. Namely, to free an element from its constrained state in combination with another, it is brought into contact with a third, outside, external one, with which it would be in stronger affinity than with the previous one. When this truly happens, the element binding it falls away, and with this new one it unites and receives together with it a new form. Applying this to our case, we must apply something to all powers of soul and body and all our activity, held captive by passion and kept in a constrained, unnatural state, with which they would be in closest affinity and kinship, so that thus in applying and as it were cleaving to it, proportionately with this they might be freed from the bonds of passion and take on a new natural form of being. This will be the rule of practices or occupations, imposed on the powers. Walking in them, while preserving that inner acquisition of the Divine grace Spirit, kindred with them and with the powers of our nature, man will increasingly be filled with this Spirit, whose fire, receiving thus greater freedom to penetrate within, will the faster burn away uncleanness, the greater the expansion of nature it encounters.

These two points exhaust the order of positive practices of the laborer, or in other words, exercises in self-compulsion. With them alone one could suffice if the despised and forsaken passion in favor of good would remain at rest or peacefully evaporate from our nature; but since it, partly from the natural stubbornness of sin, partly from its strong support either from its strong originating source—the devil—or from the storehouse of kindred to him elements of the world, does not tolerate peaceful, compliant submission, and even after falling away and as it were separating, arises again and seeks to occupy its former place, powerful and binding—one cannot by that activity alone suffice, but with it one must also act directly against the passions, stand against them face to face, fight them and vanquish them both in ourselves and in their sources and supporters. The determination of rules relating to this will constitute the depiction of internal, or spiritual, warfare, both in its general outline and in its parts. These are the labors of self-opposition.

Thus all rules must be reduced to one following initial rule: keep the inner spirit of life, zeal and fervor, walk in practices and exercises, which on the one hand assist in reviving the mortified powers and on the other hand mortify or suppress the passions. Consequently, everything relating to this must be embraced in these three points: rules for preserving the inner spirit of fervor, rules for exercising the powers in good, or self-compulsion, and rules for warfare with the passions, or exercise in self-opposition.