"The brethren asked Abba Agathon: 'Among all our different activities, father, which is the virtue that requires the greatest effort?' He answered: 'Forgive me, but I think there is no labour greater than praying to God. For every time a man wants to pray, his enemies the demons try to prevent him; for they know that nothing obstructs them so much as prayer to God. In everything else that a man undertakes, if he perserveres, he will attain rest. But in order to pray a man must struggle to his last breath.' "
-The Sayings of the Desert Fathers
3 stages along the spiritual Way (interdependent, coexisting, not successive, but simultaneous)
1. Active life (or practice of the virtues)
2. Contemplation of nature
3. Contemplation of God
1. Prayer as action...(active life)
...Each day we are to renew our relationship with god through living prayer; and to pray, as Abba Agathon reminds us, is the hardest of all tasks. Also each day we are to renew our relationship with others through imaginative sympathy, through acts of practical compassion, and through cutting off our own self-will. Take up the Cross of Christ...everyday afresh. (Luke 9:23). And yet this daily cross-bearing is at the same time a daily sharing in the Lord's Transfiguration and Resurrection: 'sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, yet possessing all things...dying, and, behold, we live' (2 Corinthians 6:9).
The active life is marked by four qualities: repentance, watchfulness, discrimination, and the guarding of the heart.
Repentance, marks the beginning, it is a change of mind.
Watchfulness, is sobriety, living in the present moment. (The present is the point at which time touches eternity)
Discrimination is discernment.
Guarding the heart is warfare against the passions. Transfigure our evil passions into virtues.
These virtues are to be practiced with body and soul, leading us to dispassion.
"When a man with such a heart as this thinks of the creatures and looks at them, his eyes are filled with tears because of the overwhelming compassion that presses upon his heart. The heart of such a man grows tender, and he cannot endure to hear of or look upon any injury, even the smallest suffering, inflicted upon anything in creation. Therefore he never ceases to pray with tears even for the dumb animals, for the enemies of truth and for all who do harm to it, asking that they may be guarded and receive God's mercy. And for the reptiles also he prays with great compassion, which rises up endlessly in his heart, after the example of God."
-St. Isaac the Syrian
2. Contemplation of nature
Understanding nature in God, or God in and through nature. (Watchfulness is key)
Like Moses discovering himself to be on Holy Ground, this contemplation helps us discover through our spiritual intellect that the whole universe is a cosmic Burning Bush, filled with the divine Fire yet not consumed.
The Elixir by George Herbert
Teach me, my God and King,
In all things thee to see,
And what I do in any thing,
To do it as for thee.
A man that looks on glasse,
On it may stay his eye;
Or if he pleaseth, though it passe,
And then the heav'n espie.
Find God in all things and in all persons.
The Lord of Nature
The Lord of Scripture
Active life is necessary, thus the interdependence of the stages.
3. Contemplation of God
From Words to Silence.
Through an active life of prayer and contemplation of nature, man realizes that God is above and beyond nature. We can begin in this life to know God not solely through the medium of creation, but in direct and unmediated union. Prayer in this sense is a laying aside of thoughts, as Evagrius puts it. For God lies beyond all human words and thoughts, and what we think about God is never the entire Truth. This prayer of stillness is known as Hesychia. One who practices this form of prayer is known as a Hesychast. The goal is to acheive a constant state of prayer even in the midst of other activities.
Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
This concept of Contemplation of God is deeper than time permits to discuss at this time on this blog. The ideas in this post are taken mostly from Bishop Kallistos Ware's work The Orthodox Way which has influenced my thinking very deeply in the past year. I hope to be able to share more about Hesychia in the future on this blog and would be interested in hearing anyone's thoughts on it. This site is dedicated to prayer, and as one can see already by this posting, the definition of prayer is much bigger than most of us once thought.
Peace to all.
-The Sayings of the Desert Fathers
3 stages along the spiritual Way (interdependent, coexisting, not successive, but simultaneous)
1. Active life (or practice of the virtues)
2. Contemplation of nature
3. Contemplation of God
1. Prayer as action...(active life)
...Each day we are to renew our relationship with god through living prayer; and to pray, as Abba Agathon reminds us, is the hardest of all tasks. Also each day we are to renew our relationship with others through imaginative sympathy, through acts of practical compassion, and through cutting off our own self-will. Take up the Cross of Christ...everyday afresh. (Luke 9:23). And yet this daily cross-bearing is at the same time a daily sharing in the Lord's Transfiguration and Resurrection: 'sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, yet possessing all things...dying, and, behold, we live' (2 Corinthians 6:9).
The active life is marked by four qualities: repentance, watchfulness, discrimination, and the guarding of the heart.
Repentance, marks the beginning, it is a change of mind.
Watchfulness, is sobriety, living in the present moment. (The present is the point at which time touches eternity)
Discrimination is discernment.
Guarding the heart is warfare against the passions. Transfigure our evil passions into virtues.
These virtues are to be practiced with body and soul, leading us to dispassion.
"When a man with such a heart as this thinks of the creatures and looks at them, his eyes are filled with tears because of the overwhelming compassion that presses upon his heart. The heart of such a man grows tender, and he cannot endure to hear of or look upon any injury, even the smallest suffering, inflicted upon anything in creation. Therefore he never ceases to pray with tears even for the dumb animals, for the enemies of truth and for all who do harm to it, asking that they may be guarded and receive God's mercy. And for the reptiles also he prays with great compassion, which rises up endlessly in his heart, after the example of God."
-St. Isaac the Syrian
2. Contemplation of nature
Understanding nature in God, or God in and through nature. (Watchfulness is key)
Like Moses discovering himself to be on Holy Ground, this contemplation helps us discover through our spiritual intellect that the whole universe is a cosmic Burning Bush, filled with the divine Fire yet not consumed.
The Elixir by George Herbert
Teach me, my God and King,
In all things thee to see,
And what I do in any thing,
To do it as for thee.
A man that looks on glasse,
On it may stay his eye;
Or if he pleaseth, though it passe,
And then the heav'n espie.
Find God in all things and in all persons.
The Lord of Nature
The Lord of Scripture
Active life is necessary, thus the interdependence of the stages.
3. Contemplation of God
From Words to Silence.
Through an active life of prayer and contemplation of nature, man realizes that God is above and beyond nature. We can begin in this life to know God not solely through the medium of creation, but in direct and unmediated union. Prayer in this sense is a laying aside of thoughts, as Evagrius puts it. For God lies beyond all human words and thoughts, and what we think about God is never the entire Truth. This prayer of stillness is known as Hesychia. One who practices this form of prayer is known as a Hesychast. The goal is to acheive a constant state of prayer even in the midst of other activities.
Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
This concept of Contemplation of God is deeper than time permits to discuss at this time on this blog. The ideas in this post are taken mostly from Bishop Kallistos Ware's work The Orthodox Way which has influenced my thinking very deeply in the past year. I hope to be able to share more about Hesychia in the future on this blog and would be interested in hearing anyone's thoughts on it. This site is dedicated to prayer, and as one can see already by this posting, the definition of prayer is much bigger than most of us once thought.
Peace to all.
posted by A Sinner at 6:49 AM
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