For the mind, this immaterial nature and light, akin, one might say, to that first supreme light, from which everything is and which is above everything, is wholly directed towards that existential light, in an immaterial persistent and sincere prayer recklessly rushing towards God, transformed in this impulse even to angelic dignity and, like an angel, illuminated by the First Light
[St. Gregory the Theologian. Conversation 40, 5: PG 36, 364 B. ]
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of Those Who Practice Sacred Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Answer 3, 39)
... The spiritual sweetness that passes from the mind to the body is itself not in the least worsened by communication with the body and transforms the body, making it spiritual, so that it casts off evil carnal desires and no longer pulls the soul down, but rises with it, from which the whole person then becomes “spirit,” as it is written: “He who is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3:6, 8).
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of Those Who Practice Sacred Hesychia.
Part 2 of the Triad II. Answer 2, 9)
What are these actions? Spiritual ones, going not from the body to the mind, ... but passing from the mind to the body, which through these energies and passions is transformed for the better and deified
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
2nd part of the triad II. The second answer, 12)
“Blessed Moses, with the spiritual glory that shone upon his face, which no man could behold, showed a prototype of how at the resurrection of the righteous the bodies of the saints will be glorified; this glory the faithful souls of the saints are already now deemed worthy to have according to the inner man, for, as it is said in the Gospel, with unveiled face (2 Cor. 3:18), that is, in the inner man, we contemplate the glory of the Lord, being transformed into the same image from glory to glory”
[Symeon Metaphrastes. On the Exaltation of the Mind 1: PG 34, 889 C; [An arrangement of the Macarius Homilies V II: PG 34, 516 BC.]
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Hesychasts.
1st Part of Triad III. First Response, 10)
The God of all came in the body to earth in order to transform and renew man and bless all creation, which was cursed because of man.
(St. Symeon the New Theologian. 6th Catechetical Address)
The soul's mad desire for God
In a mad prayer the soul strives for this wondrous God
(To see God... P. 180).
We are fools for Christ's sake (1 Cor. 4:10).
... Be a fool to be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God (1 Cor. 3:18).
"The foolishness of God is wiser than men" (1 Cor. 1:25).
Anyone who presumes skill in mathematics will never be deemed worthy of
penetrating the mysteries of God, unless he first desires to be humble, and becomes a fool. (St. Simeon the New Theologian. Divinely Reasonable and Practical Chapters, 84)
Self-hatred
We hate ourselves as we are
(Seeing God... p. 180).
He who loves his life will lose it; but he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life (John 12:25).
... If anyone comes to Me and does not hate ... even his own life, he cannot be My disciple (Luke 14:26)
If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it (Matthew 16:24-25)
Until someone truly hates the causes of sin from the heart, he is not freed from the pleasure produced by the action of sin. This is the most fierce struggle, resisting man even to the point of blood...
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 71).
He who hates his sins ceases to sin...
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Word 71).
If we do not hate what is worthy of blame, then, as long as we carry it in our souls, we will not be able to sense the stench and fetidness of its effectiveness.
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Word 71).
... If a person does not hate his life in the world, because of the desire for the future and blessed life, then he cannot fully bear all kinds of sorrows and griefs that befall him every hour.
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Word 21).
Hate not your brother, but the passions that war against him.
(St. Simeon the New Theologian. Divinely Reasonable and Practical Chapters, 3)
The Lord Himself prays in us
... He [the Lord] Himself prays in us, making us partakers of His beginningless life.
(Seeing God... p. 180)
... When the Spirit enters into any man, he will not cease to pray: for the Spirit himself prays always (Rom. 8:26)
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 21).
... The divine and heavenly Spirit himself hears and groans, prays and knows and truly carries out the will of God
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
Part 2 of Triad III. Second Response, 2)
Union with Christ in prayer
Through... prayer, given by God, we are united with Christ: first in His inscrutable, mysterious exhaustion and condescension even to the underworld, and then in His Divine Omnipotence
(Seeing God... p. 180).
The beginning, middle and end of this [mental] life consists of the following: cutting off everything (removal from everything) by uniting with Christ
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Homilies 55).
...By dwelling close to the inner man [in inner prayerful work] we will come to perfect union with the knowledge of our hope, Christ living in us
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Homilies 54).
"Similarity to God and union with Him, teaches the divine Scripture, is achieved only by love for the venerable commandments and their holy fulfillment" [8].
(St. Dionysius the Areopagite. On the Church Hierarchy II: PG 3, 392 A).
Whoever rejects this union [supernatural union with the Most Radiant Divine Light] rejects at the same time all virtue and truth.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response Three, 15)
... Those who have risen to this height of vision know that they see the light with their intellectual sense and that this light is God, who in unity secretly illuminates with grace His chosen ones
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response Three, 24)
A person who, for the sake of the Gospel life, has renounced the acquisition of riches, human glory and bodily pleasures and has strengthened this renunciation through submission to those who “have come to the measure of the stature of Christ” (Eph. 4:13), sees how dispassionate, holy divine love is ever more strongly blazing within him and he is drawn in a wondrous impulse to God and to supra-mundane union with Him.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response 3, 44)
[The Lord] unites with us in a union that surpasses reason
(Dionysius the Areopagite. On the Divine Names IV 3: PG3, 712 AB; cf. Maximus the Confessor. Perplexed Questions: PG 91, 1413 AB)
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response 3, 47)
... Those of the ... believers whom God's love has raised to true union with the Lord of the universe, they, remaining in prayer without food and breath, according to paternal instruction, bring their mind inward and through this attunement to divine union are deemed worthy of the mysterious, ineffable spiritual gift prayers, which constantly abides with them
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
1st Part of the Triad II. First Response, 31)
... The light of contemplation is contemplated hypostatically, acts mentally and ineffably spiritually converses with the deified... There is the union of the mind with God and what the Fathers said: "The goal of prayer is rapture to the Lord" [Cf.: John of Sinai. Ladder 28: PG 88, 1132 D]. It is not without reason that the great Dionysius says that through it we are united with God [On the Divine Names III 1.].
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of Those Who Practice Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad II. Response Three, 35)
... There is no union yet, unless the Comforter enlightens the one who prays from above...
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of Those Who Practice Holy Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad II. Response Three, 35)
Whenever...
You add weeping to tears,
Then let me also remember beautiful humility,
As union with God to the end,
And boldness before Him that does not cause shame.
(St. Symeon the New Theologian. Practical and God-wise Chapters, 100)
What then is most useful and necessary? Union with God and communication with Him through love
(St. Seraphim of Sarov. - Munich; Moscow: Monastery of St. Job of Pochaev; Sunday, 1993. 31. On illnesses)
Hypostasis (persona) as the highest state of man
... The Russian term “person” is identical to the theological Greek term “hypostasis” and the Latin term “persona”
(Seeing God... P. 180).
Faith, the fear of God, and the keeping of His commandments,
bring rewards as we purify ourselves.
For as we purify ourselves,
so too are we drawn away from fear of Him to the love of God.
And so we move from fear only as we progress, to love God. And then we hear from Him: "He who has My commandments and keeps them is he who loves Me." And so let us add struggles to struggles, that we may demonstrate our love by our works. When this happens, He Himself, as the One who raised us, loves us. And when He loves us, His Father also loves us, and, of course, the Spirit paves the way, and prepares the temple, that we may be a dwelling place in one assembly of hypostases— the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. (St. Symeon the New Theologian. Practical and God-Informed Chapters, 6) I have loved You from such memory, And in myself You, revealed in hypostasis, Love (St. Symeon the New Theologian. Thanksgiving to God (II), 11) ... True contemplation of sensory and supersensible natures, and of the Holy Trinity Itself, comes in the revelation of Christ. Christ taught it and pointed it out to men when, initially in His Hypostasis, He accomplished the renewal of human nature, returned and gave it its first freedom and paved the way for us to ascend to the truth through His life-giving commandments (St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Word 55). Perfect spiritual illumination is not simply some kind of revelation of thoughts, but a reliable and constant shining of the hypostatic light in souls [St. Macarius the Great. On the Freedom of the Mind 22: PC 34, 956 D - 957 A] (Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia. Part 3 of the Triad I. Answer Three, 7) Macarius the Great says that “the soul, united with the light of the heavenly image, is already now in its hypostasis [in its essence] initiated into the knowledge of the mysteries, and on the great day of the Resurrection its body will be illuminated by the same heavenly image of glory” [St. Macarius the Great. On the Freedom of the Mind 23–24: PG 34, 957 B] (Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia. Part 3 of the Triad I. Answer 3, 43) ... The divine and heavenly life of those who live worthily in communion with the inseparable life of the Spirit—just as Paul, according to the divine Maximus, “lived the divine and eternal life of the One Who indwelt”—such a life exists eternally, being inherent in the nature of the Spirit...; and it is a light revealed in a mysterious illumination and known only to the worthy, hypostatic, not because it has its own hypostasis, but because the Spirit sends this life “into the hypostasis of another,” where it is contemplated. Such is, in the proper sense, the enupostatic (enupostaton), contemplated, and not in itself and not in essence, but in hypostasis.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
1st Part of Triad III. First Response, 9)
... Natural divinity, the beginning of deification, from which, as from an incommunicable cause, it is given to the deified to be deified, the highest, transcendental, divinely originating bliss, is in itself invisible to the senses, to the mind, to the body, to the incorporeal, even if any of them, having been deified, departs from itself to greater perfection; for according to our faith it can be visible and has become visible only in the mind and body that have achieved hypostatic union, although not in proportion to their own nature
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 1 of the Triad III. The First Response, 33)
... The radiance of the Spirit is not simply, as it were, a certain revelation of thoughts and the grace of enlightenment, as has been said, but a stable and constant shining of the hypostatic light in souls
(St. Symeon Metaphrastes. On Freedom of the Mind, 22: PG 34, 956 D-957 A)
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychia.
Part 2 of the Triad III. The Second Response, 1)
The spirit of man is amazed by the greatness of God
... The spirit of man, entering the world of God’s eternity, is shocked by the grandeur of the vision revealed to him
(Seeing God... p. 180).
... Behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and behold, a voice from the cloud, saying, This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; listen to Him. And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid (Matthew 17:5-6).
I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago (whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know: God knows) was caught up to the third heaven. And I know of such a man (only I do not know whether in the body or out of the body: God knows) that he was caught up into paradise and heard inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to retell (2 Cor. 12:2-4).
... comparing his weakness with God's help, he immediately recognizes its (God's help) greatness
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 61).
... (The ascetic) forgets himself and his nature and becomes like a man who has fallen into a trance, completely forgetting about this age, primarily occupied with thoughts of the greatness of God ...
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 21).
... In accordance with the greatness of grace, to the same extent does God lead the soul into the sorrow of temptations ...
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 78).
... Through the cruel sorrows sent upon you by God's Providence, your soul comprehends what an honor it has received from the greatness of God.
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 78).
... We must be vigilant in hymns, prayers, and supplications to our Creator, God and Lord, ... thus raising our heart and mind to the incomprehensible heights of God's greatness, ... so as not to be immediately condemned for useless preoccupation with empty things
[Gregory of Agrigentum. Commentary on Ecclesiastes 118: PG 98, 796 CD].
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
Part 1 of the Triad I. First Response, 23)
Saints are bearers of Divine eternity
Saved in Christ, the saints are the bearers of God's eternity: they receive the beginningless, uncreated life into their inalienable possession, but by their nature they still invariably remain creatures
(Seeing God... p. 181).
The human mind could not rise to the level of perceiving God’s illumination if God Himself had not drawn it, illuminating it with His rays [St. Maximus the Confessor. Theological and Economic Chapters 1, 31: PG 90, 1096 A
(Cf. Works of St. Maximus the Confessor, book 1, Moscow: Martis, 1993, p. 220)].
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response Three, 7)
... God's gifts are comprehensible to the senses, although we add – "mental," since they are above the natural senses, since the mind perceives them first of all, and since our mind strives to the First Mind, divinely partaking of which, to the extent of its gifts, it itself, and through it the body connected with it, draw closer to God, demonstrating and anticipating the absorption of the flesh by the spirit in the age to come.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response Three, 33)
Freedom of self-determination without God is evil.
A dual movement is observed in the spiritual world of humanity. One is negative. The crude form of this is expressed in the ever-increasing dynamics of decline: in banal nihilism and moral decay. The sublimated form is Luciferic, introduced to us by the Book of Genesis (3:5). The essence of this latter, a creature endowed with the gift of free self-determination, rejects God's commandment: it views it as a kind of externally imposed limitation, striving for absolute self-affirmation, self-deification
(Seeing God... p. 181).
The tempter has a habit of distorting everything and has now begun to deceive everyone with some kind of illusory freedom. But untimely freedom, according to St. Isaac the Syrian, leads to bitter slavery.
(Quoted from: St. Ambrose of Optina, Letters to Monastics. Letter 194)
Man's attraction to God
Another movement [of the spiritual world of humanity] is positive, ascending, and manifests itself as the attraction of love to an infinite union with the Father, “who is not in heaven”
(Seeing God... p. 181).
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before the face of God?
(Psalm 41:3)
“We do not want to be unclothed, but to be clothed, that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life”
(2 Cor. 5:4).
Weeping for God is a lamentation of the soul, such a disposition of the ailing heart, which frantically seeks what it thirsts for, and not finding it, strives after it with difficulty and weeps bitterly after it
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 7:1).
I have seen hesychasts who insatiably satisfied their ardent desire for God with silence
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 27:16)
... A person first becomes convinced of God's providence for man, is enlightened by His love for creation ... From this begins in him Divine sweetness, the ignition of love for God, kindling in the heart and consuming the passions of the soul and body ...
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 87).
He who is outside the whole world,
understands himself to be as in an impassable desert full of wild animals.
Therefore, overcome by ineffable fear and inscrutable trembling,
He cries out to God like Jonah from the whale and the sea of life,
like Daniel from the pit of wild passions and lions...
(St. Simeon the New Theologian. Chapters Practical and God-wise, 76)
Persona, the likeness of man to God, is the basis of all that exists.
... It is the person that lies at the basis of all that exists
(Seeing God... P. 181).
"Because I live, you will live also"
(John 14:19).
You may say that there are no monks now who would pray for the whole world; but I will tell you that when there are no more intercessors on earth, the world will end, great calamities will follow... The world stands by the prayers of the Saints
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 169).
The perfection of man lies in his striving to become like God.
The personal, individual principle of man contains, first and foremost, a likeness to the One who revealed Himself to us with the Name "I Am." In the act of deification, the human personality is enraptured from the dimensions and forms of earth into the dimensions and forms of Divine Life. In other words, man hypostasizes divine attributes such as eternity, love, light, wisdom, and truth
(Seeing God... pp. 182-183).
Man was brought into being by the Creator in order to be an animated likeness of the Divine and supreme power.
(The Works of Our Holy Father Gregory of Nyssa, Bishop. Moscow, 1863. Part 5. P. 338).
... If the Divinity is the fullness of goodness, and man is His image, then it follows that the image has a likeness to the Prototype in that it is filled with every good. Consequently, we contain everything beautiful, every virtue and wisdom, everything that can only be thought of as perfect.
(The Works of Our Holy Father Gregory of Nyssa, Bishop. Moscow, 1861. Part I. P. 140).
... The Master ... does not consider His servants unworthy of being like Him, but is comforted and rejoices when He sees us, who have come from men, such by grace as He was and is by nature. Since He is a benefactor, He desires that we be like Him. For if we are not like Him, not exactly like Him, then how can we unite with Him, as He said, how can we abide in Him if we are not like Him? And how can He abide in us if we are not like Him?
(Divine Hymns of St. Simeon the New Theologian. Sergiev Posad, 1917. pp. 146-152).
Through ... wisdom from God it is possible for us to become and to remain like God after death
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Silence.
Part 1 of the Triad I. Response One, 22)
The all-merciful Lord was pleased to deify all men, but human unbelief hinders this
(Venerable Ambrose of Optina. Letters to Monastics.
Letter 37. Explanation of the words of the psalm: Our God is in heaven and on earth (1889))
God the Trinity, in the redemption of His image - man, gave such an opportunity for success in the perfection of the likeness, that the likeness turns into a union of the image with the Original, of the poor creature with its all-perfect Creator
(Works of Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Vol. 2. Ascetic Experiences. 3rd ed. St. Petersburg, 1905. P. 135).
Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ promotes our union in the flesh with Christ.
Through His incarnation, the eternal Logos of the Father allows us to partake of His Blood and Flesh, so that in this way His beginningless Life may be poured into our veins; so that we may become His children, flesh of His Flesh, and bone of His Bone
(Seeing God... P. 183).
... The soul, according to Saint Maximus, "through participation in God's grace itself becomes God, ceasing in itself every thought and sensation and simultaneously ceasing the natural actions of the body, which is deified together with it to the extent of its access to communion with the Divinity, so that both soul and body then reveal only God and the abundance of glory overcomes their natural properties"
[St. Maximus the Confessor. Theological and Economic Chapters II 88: PG 90, 1168 A].
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
3rd part of the triad I. Third answer, 37)
... The Son of God not only united us with our nature - oh, the immensity of His love for mankind! — His Divine essence and, having assumed an animate body and a rational soul, “appeared on earth and walked among men” (Bar. 3:38), but — oh, the abundance of miracle! — mixing Himself through the communion of His holy body with each of the believers, He unites with human existences themselves, becoming one body with us and making us the temple of the entire Divinity...
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychasts.
3rd part of the triad I. Third answer, 38)
Love is the content of life in God
The essential content of this life [in God] is Love
(Seeing God... P. 184).
"God is love"
(1 John 4:8).
... The first of all the commandments is: Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment! The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these
(Mark 12:29-31).
... Each one will see this glory according to the measure of his love. He who loves more, strives more strongly to be with the Beloved Lord, and therefore will draw closer to Him. He who loves little, desires little, and he who does not love neither desires nor strives to see the Lord, and will abide forever in darkness (Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 160).
An ascetic is never alone
Born of God in prayer, man is never alone. The persona knows no loneliness: it is always in the presence of the Omnipresent God
(Seeing God... Page 187).
The persona also knows no loneliness because, no matter what the desert, it prays for the whole world, be it in suffering or in prosperity
(Seeing God... Page 187).
A soul united with God through purity has no need of the words of others for its instruction; for this blessed one bears within itself the ever-present Word, which is its secret guide, instructor, and enlightenment
(St. John Climacus. A special sermon to a shepherd, teaching what kind of a teacher of rational sheep should be. 15).
Of those deemed worthy to stand with God in the union of the Spirit,
and to taste His ineffable goodness,
not one desires the glory, dishonor, and disdain
brought to him by people
(St. Simeon the New Theologian. Divinely Reasonable and Practical Chapters, 78)
Desperate Prayer. Suffering. Transformation Sickness.
I experienced a long period of desperate prayer. The Lord did not disdain me and graciously condescended even to me. At first, His Gospel word had an impact on me. This word, coming from the Father, penetrated my heart with its roots, tearing apart its hardened tissue. In my illnesses, my new life was born
(Seeing God... p. 187).
“What characterizes it [the sacrament of repentance] most of all is the painful fracture of the will. Man... has offended God; now he must burn in the fire of unwashed judgment. The penitent experiences the pains of those giving birth, and in the feelings of the heart, in some way, touches the torments of hell... In the penitent -... now the horrors of almost despair, now the breath of the consolation of mercy, replace one another”
[Theophan the Recluse, St. The Path to Salvation (A Brief Essay on Asceticism). Outlines of Christian Moral Teaching. - M., 1908. P. 72].
... Through many sorrows we must enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
(St. Ambrose of Optina. Letters to Monastics.
Letter 160. It is through many sorrows that one must enter the Kingdom of God.)
... For our testing, even in monasteries, God's Providence allows deprivations and shortcomings for a time, but they are then replenished. By both, we learn to surrender ourselves in everything to God's Providence and His all-holy will.
(St. Ambrose of Optina. Letters to Monastics.
Letter 203. The Lord will give strength to His people.)
The unnaturalness of Divine love for fallen man
If the love commanded in the Gospel were natural to us in our fall, then it would be superfluous to call: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind... love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-9)
(Seeing God... Page 188).
If by nature, and not by freedom, you did good, then why did God prepare inexpressible crowns?
(St. Cyril of Jerusalem)
(Quoted from: Priest Gregory Dyachenko. Lessons and Examples of the Christian Faith. An Essay on a Catechetical Reader. St. Petersburg, 1900. P. 240).
Dead and not dead,
He who has attained the measure of perfection exists.
Living, he abides in Him, God,
As if not living to himself.
Blind, as not looking by nature,
Having become higher than all natural sight,
Like new eyes, and better,
Having accepted incomparably beyond those of nature,
And seeing above nature.
(St. Symeon the New Theologian. Theological and Contemplative Chapters, 19)
He who has come to this land
does not think to gain power over desire or love for God within himself,
but as one who does not love God disposes himself,
unable to embrace the fullness of love.
(St. Symeon the New Theologian. Practical and God-Prudent Chapters, 8)
No one can understand the love of Christ unless he tastes the grace of the Holy Spirit.
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 204).
The vision of God by the grace of God
When that love touches the heart, then our spirit sees God in the Light, and lives by Him, and in Him
(Seeing God... Page 188).
"We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is"
(1 John 3:2).
Beloved! We are now God's children; but it has not yet been revealed what we shall be. We only know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is
(1 John 3:2)
... Those who have been purified by the love of God see Him now, and in the Kingdom of God they see Him "face to face" (1 Cor. 13:12). People who, having not experienced God and not seen Him, in no way believe that He can be contemplated as some kind of most radiant light, and think that He is accessible only to rational contemplation, are like the blind who, feeling only the warmth of the sun, do not believe that the sun also shines, as those who see. If the blind begin to dissuade the sighted, saying that the sun, the brightest of all sensory things, is not light, they will become a laughingstock for those with sensory sight. And not only the intellectually sighted, but also those who simply believe them, should mourn those who behave in the same way toward the Sun of Righteousness set over the universe (Mal. 4:2).
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Hesychasts.
Part 3 of the Triad. Response Three, 10)
Indescribable, stunning abysses open up before the ascetics
People of exceptional courage - our Fathers, who went into the desert, in solitude far from the world, wept, of course, not because they were deprived of something earthly, but because before them opened up stunning abysses that cannot be described in ordinary language
(Seeing God... Pp. 188-189).
... Love is an abyss of radiance...
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 30:35)
Some [ascetics] said that they descended into the abyss of humility, by which they forever repelled every battle...
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 4:20)
I saw there that some, from great sorrow [for God], were as if in a frenzy; from much lamentation they were speechless, completely immersed in darkness, and as if insensitive to everything concerning earthly life, they descended with their minds into the abyss of humility, and with the fire of sorrow they dried up the tears from their eyes.
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 5:10)
When we have fallen into the pit of lawlessness, we cannot get out of it unless we plunge into the abyss of humility of the repentant
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 5:28)
Our era is an era of decline
We live in an era when, due to the events of our century, the tragedy of our fall is becoming obvious
(Seeing God... Page 189).
In our age, proud of its success, the majority of people, proclaiming themselves both Christians and doers of abundant good, have rushed to perfect the righteousness of fallen nature, rejecting with contempt the truth of the Gospel.
(St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov). On Delusion. Section. On Preserving Oneself from the Good Belonging to Fallen Human Nature)
The experience of personhood, the likeness of man to God, comes through prayer for the whole world.
The living experience of the person is rarely given to people in this world: it comes through Christ-like prayer for the whole world, as for “oneself”
(Seeing God... Page 190).
"Love your neighbor as yourself," according to the commandment
(Matthew 12:31).
... Christianity is a certain imitation of the nature of God
(St. Gregory of Nyssa. PG, vol. 46, col. 244 C)
(Quoted from: Lossky V.N. Essay on the Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. Moscow, 1991. P. 95).
Blessed is the soul that loves its brother: the Spirit of the Lord tangibly lives in it, and gives it peace and joy, and it weeps for the whole world
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 154).
By the grace of the Holy Spirit, the ascetic who prays unceasingly for the whole world experiences the experience of the unity of the Holy Trinity.
Introduced by the action of the Holy Spirit into such a prayer [for the whole world], a person lives the image of the Trinity
(Seeing God... Page 190).
The mind's transition from the visible to the invisible,
And from the sensory to that
Which is above this sense, a willing abode, -
Creates oblivion of all that has gone before.
This I truly call silence,
And the land and possibility of silence...
But it is good to be established there,
Will never return to the lower ones,
Becoming the House of the Trinity here,
And himself will dwell in the Trinity, as in the very essence of Her heavenly Kingdom,
Namely, Love, which upholds him and does not allow him to fall.
(St. Simeon the New Theologian. Practical and God-informed Chapters, 79)
The Holy Trinity, extending through all,
From first to last,
As from a certain head to the feet,
Consists of all, fastens and unites,
And binds to Itself,
And, consolidating, makes firm and indestructible.
In each of them the One and the Same is revealed, Proclaimed,
It is God.
(St. Simeon the New Theologian. Chapters, God-wise and Practical, 2)
Many try to reduce the Gospel to the level of a moralistic doctrine.
There are many who love Christ, but too often they try to reduce the Gospel to the level of a moralistic doctrine
(Seeing God... Page 190).
He who wishes to struggle with his flesh and conquer it by his own strength strives in vain; for if the Lord does not destroy the house of carnal lust and does not build up the house of the soul, then he who thinks to destroy it watches and fasts in vain
(St. John Climacus. Ladder 15:25).
Even if a farmer labors immeasurably on clearing, cultivating, and sowing, if God does not send rain for his sowing, then all his labor is in vain. So we too, if we do something good, must cover it with humility and cast our weakness on God, praying to Him that He will look upon our labor: for otherwise it will be in vain
(Abba Dorotheus. Soul-Profiting Instructions, 12)
... Blessed is the man who has come to know that only with the help of the grace of Christ can every good thing be perfect...
(Homilies of St. Simeon the New Theologian. 2nd ed. Moscow, 1892. Vol. I. Pp. 168-169).
Vain is the labor of one who builds on sand: on light, wavering morality (Matt. 7:26)
(St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Conversation of an Elder with a Disciple about the Jesus Prayer. Moscow: UNIK, 1999. P. 23)
School, academic theology is sometimes accompanied by the presence of extensive erudition in the absence of living faith
Centuries of experience in academic theology have convincingly demonstrated that it is possible to possess extensive erudition in scholarly theology without a living faith—in other words, with complete ignorance of God. In such a case, theology becomes an intellectual profession, similar to jurisprudence, varying in each country, just as theology varies among the many divided denominations
(Seeing God... p. 191).
The true beginning of wisdom is "to know wisdom" (Prov. 1:7), in order to learn to distinguish and prefer the wisdom that creeps, earthly, and fruitless, to the much-beneficial, heavenly, and spiritual wisdom that comes from God and to God and makes those who acquire it godlike.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts.
Part 1 of the Triad I. Response One, 2)
... Some people, considering the goal facing Christians, the untold blessings promised to us in the future age, to be unimportant, have exchanged the knowledge of God for peaceful wisdom and want to introduce it into the council of philosophizing in Christ.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts.
Part 1 of the Triad I. Response One, 4)
Man's connection with this world and his simultaneous striving for God
We are connected with this world as it is after the fall, and, at the same time, we are forced to fight for our freedom in God
(Seeing God... Page 193).
On the one hand, one who has received the Holy Spirit is delivered from passionate desires and pleasures .
On the other hand,
one is not separated from nature by bodily needs.
And, being freed from the bonds of passionate lust
and united to immortal glory and fulfillment,
one is continually compelled to be higher and to pass with God,
nor
to abandon for a short time the understanding of Him, nor the insatiable sweetness.
As one bound by the body and corruption,
one is pulled and drawn by it, and returns to earthly things.
Because of this, one experiences the same sorrow,
which, I believe, a sinner experiences
when his soul is separated from the body.
(St. Symeon the New Theologian. Divinely Reasonable and Practical Chapters, 60)
If the mind were not turned entirely and always to the lower, it too could rise to its own inherent action and become established in it, although of course with much greater difficulty than a rider [controls a horse], because it is by nature connected with the body and mixed with bodily perceptions and various extremely addictive states of the body that come from earthly life. But having achieved this inherent action - and this is turning to oneself and observing oneself - and having surpassed itself in it, the mind can also be united with God.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of Those Who Practice Sacred Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Answer Three, 45)
The Lord said: "If the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed" (John 8:36). Here is freedom! The mind is bound by the bonds of ignorance, error, superstition, and perplexity; it struggles, but cannot free itself. Cling to the Lord, and He will illuminate your darkness and break all the bonds that languish your mind. The will is bound by passions, not allowing it room to act; it thrashes, as if bound hand and foot, but cannot break free. But cling to the Lord, and He will give you Samson's strength and break all the bonds of unrighteousness that bind you. The heart is filled with constant anxiety and is not allowed rest, but cling to the Lord, and He will give you rest. And you will be at peace within yourself and seeing everything around you as bright, walking unhindered and unstumbling with the Lord through the darkness and gloom of this life, towards the all-blessed, full of joy and spaciousness Eternity
(St. Theophan the Recluse. Thoughts for each day of the year based on church readings from the word of God. Moscow, 1890. Pp. 132-133).
The message to us of the uncreated Energy adores us
The communication of uncreated Energy to us makes us like the Creator: it adores us
(Seeing God... Page 194).
... To find God within ourselves, to adhere to Him in purity and to merge with His most unmerged light, as far as is accessible to human nature, is impossible, unless, in addition to purification through virtue, we become external, or rather higher than ourselves, leaving behind everything sensory along with sensation, rising above thoughts, reasoning and rational knowledge, giving ourselves up entirely in prayer to immaterial spiritual actions [energies]...
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
3rd part of the triad I. Answer three, 42)
Spiritual, ... passing from the mind to the body, which through these energies and passions is transformed for the better and deified: just as the divinity of the incarnate Word of God is one for body and soul, which through the soul deified the flesh and through it divine deeds were accomplished, so in spiritual men spiritual grace, having passed through the soul to the body, gives He too experiences divine passions and is blessed to sympathize with a divinely suffering soul.
(St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Silent Priests.
Part 2 of the Triad II. Response Two, 12)
God's gift can be taken away from us
...The gift [of God] is not yet fully our acquisition and can be taken away, like "unrighteous wealth." Even an attentive ascetic does not always remain in the same strength of grace. After a period of visitations, it—grace—can diminish, and then we are again covered by some shadow
(Seeing God... pp. 194-195).
If then you have not been faithful with the unrighteous riches, who will commit to your trust the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what is another man's, who will give you what is your own?
(Luke 16:11-12)
To everyone who has will be given, but from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away
(Luke 19:26)
... People who have excellent gifts by nature are deprived of them if they are lazy; through inactivity they lose their gifts; and the reward promised to them goes to those who, although less gifted, have compensated for their natural deficiency through work and diligence. One can understand them this way: a person who has faith and strives to please the Lord receives from Him the strength to fulfill his desire. But one who does not have faith will lose even the virtues that he seemed to have from birth.
(Blessed Jerome)
(Quoted from: Barsov M. V. Collection of articles on the interpretative and edifying reading of the Four Gospels. 2nd ed. St. Petersburg, 1893. Vol. 2. pp. 430-432).
The sin of condemnation is so repugnant to God that He becomes angry and turns away even from His saints when they allow themselves to condemn their neighbor: He takes away His grace from them
(Works of Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Vol. I. Ascetic Experiences. 3rd ed. St. Petersburg, 1905. p. 426).
The Lord ascended to heaven without being separated from human nature.
We believe that the Lord ascended to heaven without being separated from human nature. In eternity, He exists in two natures, which have not been transformed into one another
(Seeing God... Page 196).
The Most Holy Virgin Mary gave birth to the One who, being true God, at the very moment of conception in her womb assumed human nature into the unity of His Hypostasis. Thus, both in His incarnation from her He was, and after His incarnation remains, the one Divine Person, as He existed from the ages before the incarnation. She gave birth to the Lord Jesus Christ—not according to His Divinity, but according to His humanity, which, however, from the very moment of His incarnation, became inseparably and hypostatically united in Him with His Divinity
(St. John of Damascus)
(Quoted from: Priest Gregory Dyachenko. Lessons and Examples of the Christian Faith. An Essay on a Catechetical Reader. St. Petersburg, 1900. P. 253)).
For this reason, God became man, so that the Holy Spirit, Who abides in Him from Whom He was never separated, might descend into him as into God. And so that later, through union with Him, the Divinity would be united with each person who communicates with Him and unites into one...
(Words of the Venerable Simeon the New Theologian. 2nd ed. Moscow, 1892. Issue I. Pp. 46-47).
Only God knows the limits of human nature.
God created our nature, and, of course, He alone knows the limits of its capabilities. Our hypostases are created within a given natural element. We, however, do not know it as we should. It is gradually revealed to us [by God], becoming the content of the personality, called to complete mastery of its nature
(Seeing God... p. 196).
Grace knows what is good for us, and our nature is known to it; it knows the measure of each one and gives according to this measure
(Works of Our Holy Father Ephraim the Syrian. 3rd ed. Moscow, 1881. Part 2. P. 639).
We must submit to the Creator of our nature and accept with pleasure and great joy whatever He determines; and look not at what events seem to us to be, but at what is pleasing to God. He knows better than we do what is good for us; He also knows how to arrange our salvation
(Works of Our Holy Father John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople. 2nd ed., St. Petersburg, 1898. Vol. 4. P. 322).
Loving God to the point of self-hatred
God's love is kenotic. He revealed to us the mystery of His Being by commanding us to love God to the point of self-hatred
(Seeing God... Page 201).
If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yea, and his own life too, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and follow Me cannot be My disciple... So too, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be My disciple
(Luke 14:26-27, 33).
But if anyone clothes himself with the love of the world for this world and this life, he will not clothe himself with God until he forsakes it. For God Himself testified to this, saying, "Unless anyone forsakes all and hates his own life, he cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:26). One must not only forsake it, but also hate it. And if anyone cannot be the Lord's disciple, how will the Lord dwell in him?
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 48).
“... Thanks to His boundless goodness, the Great and Superessential One humbles Himself in order to unite with His intelligent creations, that is, with the souls of the saints and with the angels, so that they too might partake of immortal life through His divinity”
[St. Macarius the Great. On the Elevation of the Mind 6: PG 34, 893].
(Quoted from: St. Gregory Palamas. Triads in Defense of the Sacred Hesychia.
Part 3 of the Triad I. Response Three, 47)
Without the power of God no man can follow Christ.
No man can follow Christ unless the Father's power is with him
(Seeing God... Page 201).
For this reason I have told you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him by My Father
(John 6:65).
To choose the good will is the work of the one who desires, but to complete the choice of the good will is the work of God. For this, man has need of God's help.
(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Homilies. Sermon 33).
Just as a perfectly healthy eye cannot see without light, so a person, even completely justified, cannot live righteously without help from above, the Eternal Light of truth
(Blessed Augustine)
(Quoted from: Priest Gregory Dyachenko. Lessons and Examples of the Christian Faith. An Essay on a Catechetical Reader. St. Petersburg, 1900. P. 427).
In spiritual matters, man without the help of God's grace is like a withered branch that bears no fruit...
(Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk)
(Quoted from: Archimandrite John (Maslov). Symphony based on the works of Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk. - Zagorsk, 1981. P. 64).
Human efforts without God's help are powerless
(Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk)
(Quoted from: Archimandrite John (Maslov). Symphony based on the works of Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk. - Zagorsk, 1981. P. 1826).
The fullness of love for God is connected with self-denial and holy self-hatred.
The fullness of incorruptible love for God and neighbor is miraculously linked with self-repulsion, even to the point of hatred. But this is holy hatred: it is God's gift to us. It overcomes our death, acquired in the fall of Adam
(Seeing God... p. 203).
If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it
(Matthew 16:24-25).
Whoever does not love God with all his soul and does not show this love by denying himself and the whole world will not be granted a mysterious vision of Him through the revelation of the Holy Spirit, nor will he have Him as his head, but will remain a body, dead and immobile in spiritual matters, deprived of the life of all - Christ.
(Homilies of St. Simeon the New Theologian. 2nd ed. Moscow, 1892. Vol. 2. P. 416).
Love for God must be based on a living knowledge of the highest perfections of God and the blessings sent down to us from God. ...An essential quality of our love for God must be that we love Him above all else—with a love that is complete and constant, with all our heart and soul. Our love is such when we find no one and nothing higher than God, neither in heaven nor on earth, and we are ready to sacrifice everything for Him—even our very lives
(St. Theophan the Recluse. A Brief Teaching on the Worship of God. Moscow, 1908, pp. 23, 24).
Salvation through faith alone
We are saved only through faith in Christ, as the eternal Truth of the indestructible Being
(Seeing God... Page 205).
... A man is not justified by the works of the law, but only by faith in Jesus Christ. And we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law. For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified
(Gal. 2:16).
... By grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God
(Eph. 2:1-8).
We have shown what kind of self-control remains in us after we have become slaves to sin, namely, that it is preserved only in our desire for liberation, and in nothing more. Therefore, we must bring this desire to Christ, combining with it spiritual concern, a heartfelt search not through good deeds, but through faith alone, so that Christ, who gave Himself as a ransom for our souls, would see how with all our soul, all our thoughts, and all our strength we desire and seek liberation from the evil tyranny of sin, and would free us from it by His divine grace.
(St. Simeon the New Theologian (Homilies of St. Simeon the New Theologian. 2nd ed. Moscow, 1892. Vol. I. pp. 57-63)).
According to the measure of faith, grace also dwells in the soul
(Works of Our Saintly Father Ephraim the Syrian. 3rd ed. Moscow, 1881. Part I. p. 193).
The unity of deified humanity in the likeness of the Holy Trinity
"Returning" from pure prayer to the corpulence of the flesh of this world, we fall away from the experience of a single person and again see with sadness that people are not entirely transparent to one another. The boundary between human persons does not disappear to the same extent as it is revealed in the Divine Trinity, where each Hypostasis is completely open to the others; where kenotic love is the fundamental character of Divine Life, thereby making the unity of the Trinity absolutely absolute, expressed in theology by the concept of "interpenetration" (perichorisis). In the image of this Trinitarian unity, humanity is called to become one person
(Seeing God... p. 210).
I and the Father are one
(John 10:30).
... That they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they also may be one in Us
(John 17:21)
. In Christ, Who is God and the Word of the Father, by essence dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily (Col. 2:9); but in us this fullness of the Godhead dwells by grace, ... for by reason of our adoption as sons by God it seems quite natural (and it also seems) that the fullness of the Godhead dwells in us...
(St. Maximus the Confessor. Chapters on Theology. 2:21. PG 90:1133 D; Works. Vol. 1. Moscow, 1993. P. 238).
(Quoted from: Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov). Birth into the Unshakable Kingdom. Moscow, 2000. P. 88).
... For the true disciples of Christ the Savior, a certain likeness of Divine unity in plurality appears in their own lives, and thus their minds are freed from the extreme opposition between their own personality and the personalities of their loved ones... His [the Lord's] followers, through mutual love, under the special influence of Divine grace and the sanctification of true knowledge of God, will be imbued with such a close inner unity as the Father and the Son are in relation to each other
(Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky). The Moral Idea of the Dogma of the Holy Trinity // His. Moral Ideas of the Most Important Christian Orthodox Dogmas. Montreal, 1963. P. 11).
The personality becomes the perfect image of God and acquires His likeness, which is the perfection of nature common to all people. The distinction between personalities and nature reproduces in humanity the structure of Divine life, expressed by the trinitarian dogma
(Lossky V.N. Essay on the Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. Moscow, 1991. P. 95).
The attainment of Divine love is the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit.
The attainment of [Divine] love is, in essence, “the acquisition of the grace of the Holy Spirit”
(Seeing God... Page 212).
... The true goal of our Christian life lies in the acquisition of this Spirit of God, and prayer, vigil, fasting, almsgiving and other virtues done for the sake of Christ are only means to the acquisition of the Spirit of God
(Saint Seraphim of Sarov the Wonderworker. - M.: PS; Moscow Patriarchate, 1990. P. 51).
The first stage of acquiring the grace of the Holy Spirit is union with God as a gift of God's favor.
The process of acquiring [the grace of the Holy Spirit] goes through three stages: the first union with God is possible as a gift of favor at a certain moment which God finds favorable: when a person receives the visitation with love
(Seeing God... Page 212).
The Lord desires to save everyone, and in His goodness He calls the whole world. The Lord does not take away the soul's will, but by His grace He impels it toward goodness and draws it to His love
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 201).
... No one can understand the love of Christ unless they taste the grace of the Holy Spirit
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. P. 204).
The second stage of acquiring the grace of the Holy Spirit is the period of God-abandonment
The second stage: a prolonged period of abandonment by God, varying in intensity. In its extreme forms, this is terrifying: the soul experiences its fall from the Light as death on the spiritual plane
(Seeing God... Page 212).
Everything that grace has ever taught must be done until the end of life... The Lord sometimes leaves the soul to test it, so that the soul may show its reason and its own will. But if a person does not force himself to do something, he will lose grace; but if he shows his own will, then grace will love him and will no longer leave him
(Elder Silouan. - Paris, 1952. P. 103).
And suddenly the soul loses such grace from the Lord; and then thinks: I have somehow offended the Master; I will ask His mercy; perhaps He will give me this grace again, for my soul no longer wants anything in this world except the Lord
(Elder Silouan. - Paris, 1952. P. 135).
The third stage of acquiring the grace of the Holy Spirit is that the grace of God constantly abides in a person and no longer leaves him.
Grace will love a person and will no longer abandon him"—the completion of the feat of acquiring grace. This is the third stage, the final one
(Seeing God... Page 212).
Christian souls, while they voluntarily indulge in lust and other bodily passions, are like the mangers of animals, concerned only with feeding, nourishment, and other bodily pleasures; but when they turn to God with sincere repentance and strive for abstinence and lead a pious life, then they become like the heavenly receptacle in which dwells Christ God, Whom the heavens cannot contain.
(St. Ambrose of Optina. Letters to Monastics.
Letter 24. Explanation of the Nativity Irmos: A Strange Mystery (1882))
Be obedient, self-controlled, do not judge, and guard your mind and heart from evil thoughts, but remember that all people are good, and the Lord loves them. For these humble thoughts, the grace of the Holy Spirit will live in you
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. p. 138).
Blessed is he who does not lose the grace of God, but rises from strength to strength.
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. p. 139).
... What rewards for victories does a monk receive from the Lord while still on earth ... Seventh, the soul feels the grace of God in its thoughts. Eighth, the soul feels grace in its heart. Ninth, the soul feels the grace of God in its body. Tenth, from the love of God the Kingdom of Heaven is revealed, and the soul, by the Holy Spirit, knows what kind of Lord ours is
(Elder Silouan. Paris, 1952. p. 204).
Spiritual growth through trials
We are subjected to a wide variety of trials, and through them we grow spiritually. We must rise from the reasoning of infancy to the understanding of a "perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ," to the ability to make a free, rational "choice" for self-determination, which determines our entire destiny. Freedom without a full understanding easily becomes evil
(Seeing God... p. 213).
A God-loving soul is subjected to many trials and temptations. By courageously enduring sorrows, it becomes purer and more suitable for spiritual work and is finally deemed worthy to inherit the heavenly realm of the Kingdom
(Works of Our Holy Father Ephraim the Syrian. 3rd ed. Moscow, 1881. Part 2. P. 526).
Even calamities are beneficial to those who endure them with faith: for the remission of sins, for exercise, testing, for a real understanding of the calamity of this life, for the awakening of a strong spiritual thirst and a constant search for that which abides forever, adoption and redemption, a truly new life and blessedness
(St. Gregory Palamas. Homilies. Montreal. 1965. P. 170).
The earthly life of a Christian is interspersed with consolations and temptations. Thus ordained by Divine Providence. Consolations support one on the path of God, and temptations make one wise
(Works of Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov). Vol. 4. Ascetic sermon and letters to the laity. 3rd ed. St. Petersburg, 1905. P. 454).