Living Communion With God is Perfected in a State of Stillness, Leading to Dispassion

Whoever has begun to experience these involuntary impulses inward and these raptures toward God, and especially whoever has begun to practice complete self-surrender to God and unceasing prayer, is ready and capable of entering into stillness. Only such a person has the strength to bear this struggle and to practice it with fruit. It is impossible to keep such a one in community life and dwelling with others.

What drove great Arsenius away from people? This drawing inward before God. “I love you,” he said, “but I cannot be with both God and people at the same time.” “The true solitary,” says John of the Ladder, “not wishing to lose the sweetness of God, withdraws from all people without hatred for them, as earnestly as others draw close to them.”

We quote what is necessary for understanding stillness from the 27th discourse of the Ladder:

“There is outer stillness, when someone, having separated himself from all, lives alone; and there is inner stillness, when someone in spirit abides alone with God not under strain, but freely, as freely the chest breathes and the eye sees. They are compatible, but the first cannot be without the second. Therefore, a true solitary is the one who endeavors to hold his bodiless essence, his soul, within the bounds of his bodily house. Let the cell of the solitary contain his body, and let the latter contain within itself the temple of the mind.”

No one will be drawn to stillness who has not yet tasted the sweetness of God; and he will not taste this sweetness who has not yet overcome the passions. One suffering from soul-sickness of the passions and attempting stillness is like one who jumped from a ship into the abyss and thinks he will safely reach the shore on a board.

Let no one subjected to irritability and pride, hypocrisy and rancor, ever dare to see even a trace of stillness, lest he fall into madness of mind.

The one who has tasted the sweetness of God strives toward stillness to be insatiably satisfied by it, without any hindrances, and to continually give birth in himself to fire by fire, zeal by zeal, and longing by longing. Therefore “the solitary is an earthly image of an angel; on the parchment of longing, by the writing of effort, he has freed his prayer from idleness and negligence…. The solitary is the one who cries out in the movement of the Spirit: ‘My heart is ready, O God!’ (Ps. 56:8). The solitary is the one who says: ‘I sleep, but my heart keeps watch’ (Song 5:2).

Thus the entire occupation of the solitary is to be with the only Lord, with whom he converses face to face, as the king’s favorites speak to him in his ear. This core work is protected and guarded by another—the preservation of peaceful thoughts. Good order of thoughts and an undeceived mind about the Divine constitute the essence of stillness, and moreover, freedom from care. Sitting on high, keep watch, if only you know how to do this, and then you will see when and how, from whence, how many and what thieves wish to enter and steal the grapes of the vineyard. When this watchman grows weary, he rises and prays, and then sits down again and takes up the first work with new courage.

Those who have loved blessed stillness practice the works of the angelic powers and imitate the manner of their life. They will never be satisfied throughout the ages in praising the Creator; so too the one who has ascended to the heaven of stillness will never be satisfied in singing the praise of the Creator.

But neither unceasing prayer nor guarding of an undeceived heart can be possessed if perfect freedom from care has not first been established in the heart. One cannot wisely practice the first two if he has not acquired the last, just as one cannot read without learning the letters. “A small hair disturbs the eye and a small concern destroys stillness.” Whoever wishes to present to God a pure mind and disturbs himself with cares is like one who has bound his feet tightly and tries to walk quickly. Therefore true stillness begins after self-surrender to God and deep conviction of the heart in His care for us.

Only those who have joined themselves to stillness for enjoyment of God’s love, for the quenching of this thirst for love, being drawn by its sweetness, are true solitaries. Such ones, if they practice stillness with understanding, soon begin to taste its fruits, which are: an untroubled mind, purified thought, rapture toward the Lord, unceasing prayer, undeceived watchfulness, continual tears, and so forth.

Thus what draws one to stillness is the drawing inward to the sweet standing before God; the path to it is laid by cleansing from passions through all the struggles by which good is strengthened in us and evil is exhausted; its immediate threshold is self-surrender to God in freedom from care; its essence is the undisturbed prayerful standing before God in mind within the heart, from which fire is added to fire.

The burning of the spirit from God’s touch finally cleanses a person and raises him to the state of dispassion. In this fire our nature is remelted, like impure metal in a furnace, and appears shining with heavenly purity, making it ready to be God’s dwelling.

Thus, on the path to living communion with God, stands the necessary stillness, if not always as a particular form of ascetic life, then always as a state in which the spirit, gathered and deepened inward, is raised by the fire of the Divine Spirit to seraphic purity and blazing toward God and in God.

This fire is implanted in moments of conversion and begins to act as soon as, by the vow, a person enters upon labor, but this is initial warmth, appearing now, now disappearing. It acts throughout the duration of labor over heart-purification; otherwise a person could not endure these labors. But it cannot show all its strength at that time because of the cold of the passions still operative in a person. It shows all its strength only when the passions fall silent. The first warmth is like the burning of wood that is wet and soaked, while the second is like the burning of the same wood when fire has dried it and penetrated its entire substance. By another comparison, the first warmth is like that in water containing an ice floe that has not yet melted: there is warmth, but the water does not and will not boil while the ice remains unmelted. But when the ice melts, warmth, penetrating the entire mass of water, heats it ever more and more; from this the water seethes and purifies itself. This is what the second warmth is like. The latter two forms of the fire’s action depict the actions of spiritual burning in the final degrees of Christian perfection, raising one to perfect purity and dispassion.

“The substance of the passions, being consumed by divine fire, is destroyed, and as the substance is uprooted and the soul is purified, the passions likewise depart.”

Here is the meaning of dispassion, according to the Ladder in discourse 29:

“Dispassion is the resurrection of the soul before the resurrection of the body.”

The resurrection of the soul must be called the coming forth from old age, namely when the new person is born, in which there is nothing of the old person, according to the saying: “And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit” (Ezek. 36:26) (see Isaac the Syrian).

This complete and ever-growing perfection of those accomplished in the Lord so sanctifies the mind and carries it away from matter that often from bodily life it is lifted up in rapture to heaven to see.

The Apostle demonstrated dispassion by writing: “we have the mind” of the Lord (1 Cor. 2:16). A Syrian ascetic also demonstrated dispassion, who cried out: “Ease for me the waves of Your grace!” (holy Ephrem).

The dispassionate one, toward all objects that arouse and nourish the passions, has become insensitive so that they produce no effect on him, though they stand before his eyes. This is because he is wholly united with God. He comes into a place of sexual immorality—and not only does he not feel the stirrings of passion, but he also brings the prostitute to pure and ascetic life.

Whoever has been found worthy of this state becomes, even here, clothed in perishable flesh, a temple of the living God, who guides and instructs him in all words, deeds, and thoughts; and he, because of inner illumination, knows the will of the Lord as if hearing a certain voice, and, being above all human teaching, says: “When I come and appear before God’s face” (Ps. 41:3), for I can no longer bear the movements of his appetite, but seek that immortal goodness which You gave me before I fell into decay. But why speak at length! The dispassionate one “no longer” lives for himself, “but” “Christ lives” in him (Gal. 2:20), as the one who has “fought the good fight,” “finished the course,” and “kept the faith” (2 Tim. 4:7).

Dispassion is the heavenly palace of the Heavenly King. And so, at last, communion with God and God’s indwelling—the final goal of the seeking of the human spirit, when he is in God, and God is in him. At last is fulfilled the good pleasure of the Lord and His prayer that, as He is in the Father and the Father is in Him, so every believer may be one with Him (see Jn. 17:21). His comforting assurance is fulfilled: whoever keeps His word, His Father will love, and They will come to him and make their dwelling with him (see Jn. 14:23). The apostolic definition is fulfilled concerning those made dead by dispassion, that their life is hidden with Christ in God (see Col. 3:3). Such are the temple of God (see 1 Cor. 3:16), and God’s Spirit dwells in them (see Rom. 8:9).

Those who have achieved this are keepers of God’s mysteries, and their state is the same as that of the Apostles, for they too know God’s will in all things, hearing as it were a certain voice, and they, having completely united their senses with God, are secretly taught by Him His words. Such a state is marked by the flame of love, whereby they boldly affirm with confidence: “Who will separate us?” (Rom. 8:35). And love is the giver of prophecy, the cause of miracles, the abyss of illumination, the source of divine fire, which the more it flows, the more it inflames the one who thirsts.

Since such a state is the fruit of stillness, when practiced with understanding, not all solitaries are left by God in stillness forever. Those who attain dispassion through stillness and through this become worthy of the most sincere communion with God and His indwelling are brought forth from there to serve those who seek salvation, and they serve them, illuminating, guiding, and performing miracles. And great Anthony, like John in the desert, received a voice in his stillness that sent him forth to labor in guiding others on the path of salvation—and all know the fruits of his labors. The same happened with many others.

We know of no state higher than this apostolic state on earth. Here—and the survey of the order of a life pleasing to God comes to an end.