Conclusions From What Has Been Said About the Three Dimensions of Human Life. The Possibility of Moving From One State to Another and of One Dimension Predominating. The Predominance of the Soulish and the Fleshly as a Sinful Condition. The Dominance of the Spiritual Life as the Norm of True Human Life

Let us now settle accounts together, or draw conclusions from everything that has been said. Do you see how many aspects, or rather degrees, of life we have? There is the spiritual aspect and degree of life, there is the spiritual-soulish, there is the properly soulish, there is the soulish-bodily (I think I did not delineate it as distinctly as I should—to it belong observation together with imagination and memory, desires arising from bodily needs, and the feelings of bodily states and impressions), and there is the bodily. Five tiers—yet there is but one human person, and this single person lives now one, now another, now a third kind of life; and depending on what kind of life he lives, he takes on a particular character that is reflected in his views, his principles, and his feelings. That is, he is either spiritual—with spiritual views, principles, and feelings—or soulish—with soulish concepts, principles, and feelings—or carnal—with carnal thoughts, deeds, and feelings. (I will not include the intermediate states—the soulish-spiritual and the soulish-bodily—so as not to subdivide too finely.) This does not mean that when a person is spiritual, soulishness and carnality no longer have any place in him—it means rather that in him spirituality is then dominant, subjecting soulishness and carnality to itself and permeating them. Nor does it mean that when a person is soulish, his spirituality and carnality no longer exist—it means rather that soulishness is then dominant, governs everything, sets its tone on everything, and even clothes spirituality in the veil of soulishness. Likewise, it does not mean that when a person is carnal, his spirituality and soulishness have vanished—it means rather that everything in him is then carnalized: spirituality and soulishness alike become carnal, subjugated to the flesh, trampled by it and held in bondage to it.

Since, whatever degree a person stands on, the other aspects of his life remain present in him, at no degree is he so bound in servitude that he cannot free himself from that bondage; he always has the possibility of moving from one degree to another by weakening one aspect of his life and strengthening another. Thus the spiritual person can fall into soulishness and carnality, and the carnal person can rise to spirituality—when the former comes to love the soulish and carnal, and the latter seeks the spiritual. Man is always free. Freedom is given to him together with self-awareness, and together with it constitutes the essence of the spirit and the norm of humanity. Extinguish self-awareness and freedom—and you extinguish the spirit, and the man is no longer a man.

But in affirming that a person has the freedom to move up and down through the degrees of his life, I do not simultaneously affirm that it is equally easy and convenient for him to move, whether going from top to bottom or from bottom to top, or that these movements can take place in him as quickly and frequently as the passing from one room to another, which may happen several times a day. I wished only to say that a person who is self-aware and free is responsible for his own inner state, and that if, having fallen into a state that cannot be approved, he remains in it, he is himself to blame and is answerable before God and men.

Each of the degrees, or manifestations, of our life shown above is natural in us and therefore cannot be condemned in itself. What is unnatural, and therefore not to be approved in itself, is the state in which thoughts wander, soar, and churn; desires are inconstant, being stirred up by passions—which are not natural to us but are foreign accretions; and the feelings of the heart are agitated and troubled on account of these same passions. I deliberately drew attention to these unnatural elements within us when speaking about the life of the soul, so as to fix your attention upon them. I mention it deliberately now as well, to make you reflect more carefully on the matter and relate to it according to its true worth. The wandering of thoughts, the inconstancy of passionate desires, and the unrest of the heart constantly disturb us, not allowing a single deed to be done as it should be, and almost always throwing us off course. This is a disease—universal and pervasive, it is true, but not natural; it is something we have acquired voluntarily. The enemy knows how useful it is to him, and when he attempts to tempt someone, his very first step is to plunge him into this whirlpool—specifically: he first draws him into a stream of thoughts, then beneath them kindles passionate desires, and with those agitates the heart.

Whoever has been brought to that point—in him the temptation has ripened. If he does not come to his senses, he falls; and having fallen, he is swept into the maelstrom of churning movements of thoughts, desires, and feelings—sometimes briefly, sometimes at length, and not infrequently forever. That life, a little taste of which you once experienced, passes entirely in this maelstrom—more turbulent in some circles, calmer in others, more restrained in some, brazen in others, in its full nakedness and shame. But even apart from this, rarely is anyone free from those inner commotions. Now and then they break through. As for wandering of thoughts and imaginings, I do not know whether anyone is free from them. So please take note of this disease of ours (and you have already noticed it in part, complaining of the uncontrollability of your thoughts)—and having noticed it, take up the work of healing. Never let slip from your mind that within you there constantly dwells something adverse, always ready to knock you off the right path and steer you onto the wrong one.

As for soulishness and carnality—they are in themselves, as has already been noted, without sin, being natural to us. But a person who has formed himself according to soulishness, or worse still according to carnality, is not without sin. He is guilty of having given dominance within himself to what was not appointed to rule and ought to occupy a subordinate position. And so it turns out that, although soulishness is natural, it is unnatural for a person to be soulish; and likewise, carnality is natural, but it is unnatural for a person to be carnal. The fault here lies in the exclusive predominance of what ought to stand in subordination.

But when in someone spirituality is dominant, then, even if it becomes his exclusive character and disposition, he does not sin—first, because spirituality is the norm of human life, and consequently one who is spiritual is a genuine human being, whereas the soulish and carnal person is not a genuine human being; and second, because however spiritual a person may be, he cannot fail to give due place to soulishness and carnality—only he keeps them lean, so to speak, and subordinate to the spirit. Let his soulishness be narrow (in scholarly knowledge, in the arts, and in other activities) and his carnality strictly curbed—he is still a genuine, complete human being. But the soulish person (the learned, the skilled artisan, the man of affairs) and all the more the carnal person is not a genuine human being, however fine he may appear outwardly. He is headless. Hence a simple person who fears God is higher than one who is highly educated and polished yet has no aim of pleasing God in his goals and strivings. Judge by the same standard the works of literature and the arts. Works in which everything is carnal are thoroughly bad; but even those in which soulishness predominates do not answer their purpose, though they stand higher than the carnal ones. Such is the judgment only of those works that are devoid of spiritual elements; as for those which stand openly hostile to all things spiritual—that is, to God and divine things—these are directly the promptings of the enemy and must not be tolerated.

From all this you see that, according to man’s natural calling, he must live in the spirit, subordinate all that is soulish to the spirit and permeate it with the spirit—and all the more so what is bodily—and after these, all his external life as well, that is, his family and social life. This is the norm!

I will not press upon you any exhortation to live in the spirit and subordinate everything to it, assuming that if you have thought through everything that has been said, the resolve to live in this way is already present in you. You have already expressed your decisive desire to stand on the level of human life as it is meant to be. You see now what it is meant to be, and of course you wish to make it so. After all, you have been living all along in your family and among your relatives in just the manner I have described—that is, according to the spirit—even while pursuing your studies, managing the household, and excelling in music and singing. What lies before you is not to establish spirituality in yourself from the start, but to sustain and preserve it, guarding yourself against the influences and attractions of the soulish-carnal life, into whose whirlpools you have begun to be drawn. That is precisely what you and I agreed to discuss. And of course you are waiting impatiently for the answer: so what is one to do?