An Excerpt From St. Poemen on a God-pleasing Life, the Conquest of the Passions, and the Cultivation of the Virtues

Who led you to St. Pimen, that you wish to know about him? But whoever it was, I am very glad of it. Who St. Pimen is and how he lived, you will find in the Chetyi Minei under August 27, and also in the book “Memorable Sayings on the Ascetic Life of the Holy and Blessed Fathers.” In both places you will find a great number of his teachings. He was of simple and uneducated background, but the experience of the spiritual life and God’s grace so illumined his mind that for the subtlety and precision of his knowledge of the laws of ascent to perfection in the spirit, he must be counted among the foremost among the wise and God-enlightened instructive fathers.

While you make your way to reading about him, I will copy out for you the most important points from his teachings and counsels, applicable to what I have been speaking of with you at such length.

The beginning of the path to God is repentance and weeping for sins. Here is what is found on this subject in St. Pimen. He saw a woman sitting at a grave and weeping bitterly, and said: “Even if all the pleasures of the world were to appear here, they could not free her soul from sorrow. So should we always weep” (paragraph 26)[1]. In paragraph 27 the same incident is recounted in more detail, and the words of St. Pimen are given thus: “I assure you that if a man does not mortify all the desires of the flesh and does not weep like this, he cannot become one with God. The whole soul and life of this woman were plunged in sorrow.”

One who has repented and is weeping for his sins naturally turns away from evil and does good. While in such a state, he will not commit evil in deed; but he cannot be free from bad thoughts. Therefore, his turning away from evil consists almost exclusively in the struggle with thoughts. On this there is the following from St. Pimen. A brother came to Abba Pimen and said to him: “Abba! I have many thoughts, and I am in danger because of them.” The elder led him outside into the open air and said: “Open your bosom and do not let the wind in.” “I cannot do this,” the brother replied. “If you cannot do this,” said the elder, “then neither can you stop the flood of thoughts. But your business is to resist them” (paragraph 28).

Resist—but how? First, attend to yourself and be sober. Thus, one brother, saying of himself that when he met with others he became distracted and returned to himself no longer as he had been when he went out, asked what he should do. The elder said to him: “Do you wish, when returning to yourself, to find yourself as you were when you went out? Keep watch over yourself at home, and keep watch over yourself away from home too” (paragraph 137). “And in general,” Abba Pimen used to say, “what is most needful for us is a sober mind” (paragraph 135).

As soon as, while keeping watch over yourself, you notice something passionate, pray at once, and it will depart. A brother asked Abba Pimen about the struggle with rising thoughts, and the elder answered him: “This matter is like the case of a man who has fire on one side and a vessel of water on the other. When the fire begins to burn, he takes water from the vessel and quenches the fire. The fire represents the suggestions of the enemy (the passionate ones), and the water represents fervent prayer to God” (paragraph 146).

In order to suffer less from passionate thoughts, one must avoid the occasions that stir them up. “One must avoid everything that is passionate,” said Abba Pimen. “A man who is close to what can give rise to a passion is like one standing over a deep abyss, and the enemy of man can easily cast him into this abyss. But one who keeps away from what can arouse a passion is like one standing far from the abyss. Let the enemy drag him to hurl him into the pit—but as long as the enemy drags him with compulsion, he will cry out to God, and God will help him” (paragraph 59).

Above all, contrive in every possible way not to yield to thoughts. To encourage this, in the sayings about St. Pimen we read the following. A brother asked him: “Can a person always hold back his thoughts and not yield to the enemy in a single one?” And the elder answered: “There is a man who holds back ten and yields in one.” The same brother asked Abba Sisoes about the same thing, and he said: “Indeed, there is a man who does not yield to the enemy in anything” (paragraphs 88 and 89).

And further: “Abba Anuph asked Abba Pimen about the unclean thoughts that are born in the human heart and about vain desires. Abba Pimen answered him: ’Does the axe boast against him who hews with it?’ (Isa. 10:15). Do not give them a hand—and they will do nothing.”

And what will come of such unyieldingness? The passions will die off. This is what Abba Pimen declared to Abba Isaiah when the latter asked him about unclean thoughts, saying: “If a chest of clothing is left without care, in time the clothing will rot; so too with thoughts—if we do not fulfill them in actual deed, in time they will disappear, or as it were, rot away” (paragraph 20).

Abba Joseph asked Abba Pimen about the same thing, and he said: “If someone places a serpent and a scorpion in a jug and closes it, they will certainly in time die off; so too will bad thoughts that come from the demons die away, if with patience we resist them and give them no food” (paragraph 21).

But while withdrawing from evil through such merciless resistance to passionate thoughts and desires, one must at the same time do good, planting every virtue in oneself. By both of these means the heart will quickly be cleansed. And there are many lessons in St. Pimen about the planting of virtues. Here are the chief ones. He cites the saying of Abba John the Short, who said: “I desire to have, at least in some measure, all the virtues” (paragraph 46). And later he offers his own lesson on this, saying: “When a man intends to build a house, he gathers a great quantity of materials and various kinds of substances, so that he may be able to erect a house. So we too must acquire, at least in some measure, all the virtues” (paragraph 130).

But there are virtues that are foundational and guiding, upon which, therefore, one must direct all one’s effort. St. Pimen points to them frequently. Here they are: guarding oneself, attentiveness to oneself, and discernment—these are the three virtues that guide the soul (paragraph 35).

To prostrate oneself before God, to humble oneself, and to renounce one’s own will—these are the working tools of the soul! (paragraph 36).

In Scripture it is written: ”Though these three men… Noah… Daniel and Job… as I live… they… shall deliver but their own souls by their righteousness… saith the… Lord” (Ezek. 14:14, 20). Noah represents non-possessiveness, Job represents patience, Daniel represents discernment. “If these three virtues are in a man, then the Lord dwells in him” (paragraph 60).

The fear of God, prayer, and beneficence toward one’s neighbor—these are the three foundations of perfection (paragraph 160).

Abba Pimen has a layman say the following: “I do not know how to speak from Scripture, but I will tell you a parable. One man said to his friend: ‘I wish to see the king; come with me.’ The friend replied: ‘I will go with you halfway.’ He said to a second friend: ‘Come, lead me to the king.’ He said: ‘I will bring you to the royal palace.’ He said to a third: ‘Let us go together to the king.’ ‘Let us go,’ answered the third friend; ‘I will bring you to the palace, lead you into it, announce you to the king, and present you to him.’ They asked him: ‘What does this parable mean?’ He answered: ‘The first friend is asceticism, which leads to the true path; the second is purity, which reaches to the heavens; the third friend is almsgiving, which with boldness brings one to the King Himself—to God’” (paragraph 109).

When, in this way, on the one hand no yielding is given to the passions, and on the other virtues are being planted, the heart little by little softens (paragraph 182), warms, and receives within itself the divine fire—which you need only tend, and you will be safe. Abba Pimen speaks of this: “When a pot is heated from below by fire, neither a fly nor any other creeping thing can touch it; but when it cools down, they settle upon it. The same happens with the soul: as long as it remains in spiritual work (the burning of the spirit toward God), the enemy cannot strike it” (paragraph 111).

These excerpts are enough for you. You will find for yourself from the holy abba whatever else is needed and valuable for you. I only wanted through these excerpts to renew in your memory everything I have said before. Here is the whole path you have entered upon. And whichever father you begin to read, you will find the same thing in essence in every one of them, though presented and explained differently.

Grow wise! God bless you!