Balamand
MonasteryBalamand
Monastery
Selected Passages From The
Writtings Of Orthodox Saints
CHRISTIANITY
Christian religion is not a certain philosophic system, about which
learned men, trained in metaphysical studies, argue and then either
espouse or reject, according to the opinion each one has formed.
It is faith, established in the souls of men, which ought to be
spread to the many and be maintained in their consciousnesses.
There are truths in Christianity that are above out intellectual
comprehension, incapable of being grasped by the finite mind of
man. Our intellect takes cognizance of them, becomes convinced
of their reality, and testifies about their supernatural existence.
Christianity is a religion of revelation. The Divine reveals its glory
only to those who have been perfected through virtue. Christianity
teaches perfection through virtue and demands that its followers
become holy and perfect. It disapproves of and opposes those
who are under the influence of the imagination. He who is truly
perfect in virtue becomes through Divine help outside the flesh
and the world, and truly enters another, spiritual world; not,
however, through the imagination, but through the effulgence of
Divine grace. Without grace, without revelation, no man, even the
most virtuous, can transcend the flesh and the world.
God reveals Himself to the humble, who live in accordance with
virtue. Those who take up the wings of the imgination attempt the
flight of Ikaros and have same end. Those who harbor fantasies
do not pray; for he that prays lifts his mind and heart towrds God,
whereas he that turns to fantasies diverts himself. Those who are
addicted to the imagination have withdrawn from God's grace and
from the realm of Divine revelation. They have abandoned the
heart in which grace is revealed and have surrendered themselves
to the imagination, which is devoid of all grace. It is only the heart
that receives knowledge about things that are not apprehended by
the senses, because God, Who dwells and moves within it,
speaks within it and reveals to it the substance of things hoped
for.
SEEK GOD daily. But seek Him in your heart, not outside it.
And when you find Him, stand with fear and trembling, like the
Cherubim and the Seraphim, for your heart has become a throne
of God. But in order to find God, become humble as dust before
the Lord, for the Lord abhors the proud, whereas He visits those
that are humble in heart, wherefor He says: "To whom will I look,
but to him that is meek and humble in heart?"
THE DIVINE LIGHT illumines the pure heart and the pure
intellect, because these are susceptible to receiving light; whereas
impure hearts and intellects, not being susceptible to receiving
illumination, have an aversion to the light of knowledge, the light
of truth; they like darkness... God loves those who have a pure
heart, listens to their prayers, grants them their requests that lead
to salvation, reveals Himself to them and teaches the mysteries of
the Divine nature.
THE CHURCH
The term CHURCH, according to the strict Orthodox view, has
two meanings, one of them expressing its doctrinal and religious
character, that is, its inner, peculiarly spiritual essence, and the
other expressing its external character. Thus, according to the
Orthodox confession, the Church is defined in a twofold manner:
as a religious institution, and as a religious community (koinonia).
The definition of the CHURCH as a religious institution may be
formulated thus: The Church is a divine religious institution of the
New Testament, built by our Savior Jesus Christ through His
incarnate Dispensation, established upon faith on the day of holy
Pentecost by the descent of the All-Holy Spirit upon the holy
Disciples and Apostles of the Savior Christ, whom He rendered
instruments of Divine grace for the perpetuation of His work of
redemption. In this institution is entrusted the totality of revealed
truths; in it operates Divine grace through the Mysteries; in it are
regenerated those, who with faith, approach Christ the Savior; in
it has been preserved both the written and the unwritten Apostolic
teaching and tradition.
The definition of the CHURCH as a religious community may be
formulated thus: The CHURCH is a society of men united in the
unity of the Spirit, in the bond of peace.
The right view of the CHURCH is that the CHURCH is
distinguished into the Militant and the Triumphant; and that it is
Militant so long as it struggles against wickedness for the
prevalence of the good, the Triumphant in the heavens, where
there dwells the choir of the Righteous, who struggled and were
made perfect in the faith in God and in virtue.
TRADITION
Sacred TRADITION is the very CHURCH; without the Sacred
TRADITION the CHURCH does not exist. Those who deny the
Sacred TRADITON deny the Church and the preaching of the
Apostles.
Before the writing of the Holy Scriptures, that is, of the sacred
texts of the Gospels, the Acts and the Epistles of the Apostles,
and before they were spread to the churches of the world, the
CHURCH was based on Sacred Tradition....The holy texts are in
relation to Sacred Tradition what the part is to the whole.
The CHURCH Fathers regard Sacred Tradition as the safe guide
in the interpretation of Holy Scripture and absolutely necessary
for understanding the truths contained in the Holy Scripture. The
CHURCH received many traditions from the Apostles... The
constitution of the church services, especially of the Divine
Liturgy, the holy Mysteria themselves and the manner of
performing them, certain prayers and other institutions of the
Church go back to the Sacred Tradition of the Apostles.
In their conferences, the Holy Synods draw not only from Holy
Scriptures, but also from Sacred Tradition as from a pure fount.
Thus, the Seventh Ecumenical Synod says in the 8th Decree: "If
one violates any part of the CHURCH Tradition, either written or
unwritten, let him be anathema."
DISCOVERING GOD
It is evident that unbelief is an evil offspring of an evil heart; for the
guileless and pure heart everywhere discovers God, everywhere
discerns Him, and always unhesitatingly believes in His existence.
When the man of pure heart looks at the World of Nature, that is,
at the sky, the earth, and the sea and at all things in them, and
observes the systems constituting them, the infinite multitude of
stars of heaven, the innumerable multitudes of birds and
quadrupeds and every kind of animal of the earth, the variety of
plants on it, the abundance of fish in the sea, he is immediately
amazed and exclaims with the Prophet David: "How great are
Thy works, O Lord! In wisdom Thou made them all." Such a
man, impelled by his pure heart, discovers God also in the World
of Grace of the Church, from which the evil man is far removed.
The man of pure heart believes in the Church, admires her
spiritual system, discovers God in the Mysteria, in the heights of
the theology, in the light of the Divine revelations, in the truths of
the teachings, in the commandments of the Law, in the
achievements of the Saints, in the very good deed, in every
perfect gift, and in general in the whole of the creation. Justly then
did the Lord say in His Beatitudes of those possessing purity of
the heart: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."
SELF-KNOWLEDGE
He who does not know himself does not know God, either. And
he who does not know God does not know the truth and the
nature of things in general... He who does not know himself
continually sins against God and continually moves farther away
from Him. He who does not know the nature of things and what
they truly are in themselves is powerless to evaluate them
according to their worth and to discriminate between the mean
and the precious, the worthless and the valuable. Wherefore, such
a person wears himself out in the pursuit of vain and trivial things,
and is unconcerned about and indifferent to the things that are
eternal and most precious.
Man ought to will to know himself, to know God, and to
understand the nature of things as they are in themselves, and this
becomes an image and likeness of God.
MAN
Man is a composite being, made up of an earthly body and
celestial soul... The soul is closely united with the body, yet wholly
independent of it.
Man is not only reason but also heart. The powers of these two
centers, mutually assisting one another, render man perfect and
teach him what he could never learn through reason alone. If
reason teaches about the natural world, the heart teaches us
about the supernatural world... Man is perfect when he has
developed both his heart and his intellect. Now the heart is
developed through revealed religion
IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL
The rational soul of man has supernatural, infinite aspirations. If
the rational soul were dependent upon the body and died together
with the body, it should necessarily submit to the body and follow
it in all its appetites. Independence would have been contrary
both to the laws of nature and to reason, because it disturbs the
harmony between the body and the soul. As dependent upon the
body it should submit to the body and follow in all its appetites
and desires, whereas, on the contrary, the soul masters the body,
imposes its will upon the body. The soul subjugates and curbs the
appetites and passions of the body, and directs them as it (the
soul) wills. This phenomenon comes to the attention of every
rational man; and whoever is conscious of his own rational soul is
conscious of the souls's mastery over the body.
The mastery of the soul over the body is proved by the obedience
of the body when it is being led with self-denial to sacrifice for the
sake of the abstract ideas of the soul. The domination by the soul
for prevalence of its principles, ideas, and views would have been
entirely incomprehensible if the soul died together with the body.
But a mortal soul would never have risen to such a height, would
never have condemned itself to death along with the body for the
prevalence of abstract ideas that lacked meaning, since no noble
idea, no noble and courageous thought has any meaning for a
mortal soul.
A soul, therefore, which is capable of such things,must be
immortal.
LIFE AFTER DEATH
The Teachers of the Eastern Orthodox Church, having Holy
Scripture as their foundation, teach that those who die in the Lord
go to a place of rest, according to the statement in the
Apocalypse: "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from
henceforth. Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their
labors; and their works do follow them" (Revelation 14:13). This
place of rest is viewed as spiritual Paradise, where the souls of
those who have died in the Lord, the souls of the righteous, enjoy
the blessings of rest, while awaiting the day of rewarding and the
prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus...
About the sinners, they teach that their souls go down to Hades,
where there is suffering, sorrow, and groaning, awaiting the
dreadful day of the Judgment.
The Fathers of the Orthodox Church do not admit the existence
of another place, intermediate between Paradise and Hades, as
such a place is not mentioned in Holy Scripture.
After the end of the General Judgment, the Righteous Judge
(God) will declare the decision both to the righteous and to the
sinners. To the righteous He will say: "Come, ye blessed of my
Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation
of the world;" while to the sinners He will say: "Depart from me,
ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his
angels." And these will go away to enternal hades, while the
righteous will go to enternal life. This retribution after the General
Judgment will be complete, final, and definitive. It will complete,
because it is not the soul alone, as the Partial Judgment of man
after death, but the soul together with the body, that will receive
what is deserved. It will be final, because it will be enduring and
not temporary like that at Partial Judgment. And it will be
definitive, because both for the righteous and for the sinners it will
be unalterable and eternal.
SAINTS
Our Church honors saints not as gods, but as faithful servants, as
holy men and friends of God. It extols the struggles they engaged
in and the deeds they performed for the glory of God with the
action of His grace, in such a way that all the honor that the
Church gives them refers to the Supreme Being, Who has viewed
their life on earth with gratification. The Church honors them by
commemorating them annually through public celebrations and
through the erection of Churches in honor of their name.
The holy men of God, who were magnified on earth by the Lord,
have been honored by God's holy Church from the very time it
was founded by the Savior Christ.
REPENTANCE
Two factors are involved in man's salvation: the grace of God and
the will of man. Both must work together, if salvation is to be
attained.
Repentance is a Mysterion through which he who repents for his
sins confesses before a Spiritual Father who has been appointed
by the Church and has received the authority to forgive sins, and
receives from this Spiritual Father the remission of his sins and is
reconciled with the Deity, against Whom he sinned.
Repentance signifies regret, change of mind. The distinguishing
marks of repentance are contrition, tears, aversion towards sin,
and love of the good.
VIRTUE
We ought to do everything we can for the acquisition of virtue
and moral wisdom (phronesis), for the prize is beautiful and the
hope great.
The path of virtue is a path of effort and toil: "Straight is the gate,
and narrow is the way, leadeth unto life, and few there be that
find it;" whereas the gate of vice is wide and the way spacious,
but lead to perdition.
SPIRITUAL TRAINING
Spiritual training (pneumatike gymnasia) is askesis for peity. It is
most valuable, "having promise for the life that now is, and for that
which is to come." The efforts made for the sake of piety bring
spiritual gladness.
Theophylaktos says: "Train yourself for piety, that is, for pure faith
and the right life. Training, then, and continual efforts are
necessary; for he who trains exercises until he perspires, even
when there is no contest."
Training accustoms one to be lenient, temperate, capable of
controlling his anger, subduing his desires, doing works of charity,
showing love for his fellow men, practicing virtue. Training is
virtuous askesis, rendering one's way of life admirable.
Askesis is practice, meditation, training, self-control, love of
labor.
FASTING
Fasting is an ordinance of the Church, obliging the Christian to
observe it on sepecific days. Concerning fasting, our Savior
teaches: "When thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face;
that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father Who is
in secret: and thy Father, Who seeth in secret, shall reward thee
openly." From what the Savior teaches we learn (a) that fasting is
pleasing to God, and (b) that he who fasts for the uplifting of his
mind and heart towards God shall be rewarded by God, Who is
a most liberal bestower of Divine gifts, for his devotion.
In the New Testament fasting is recommended as a means of
preparing the mind and the heart for divine worship, for long
prayer, for rising from the earthly, and for spiritualization.
INNER ATTENTION
ATTENTION is the first teacher of truth and consequently
absolutely necessary. Attention rouses the soul to study itself and
its longings, to learn their true character and repulse those that are
unholy. Attention is the guardian angel of the intellect, always
counseling it this : be attentive. Attention awakens the soul, rouses
it from sleep... Attention examines every thought, every desire,
every memory. Thoughts, desires, and memories are engendered
by various causes, and often appear masked and with splendid
garb, in order to deceive the inattentive intellect and enter into the
soul and dominate it. Only attention can reveal their hidden form.
Often their dissimulation is so perfect that the discerrnment of
their true nature is very difficult and requires the greatest attention.
One must remember the saving words of the Lord: "Be wakeful
and pray that ye enter not into temptation." He who is wakeful
does not enter into temptation, because he is vigilant and
attentive.
PRAYER
TRUE PRAYER is undistracted, prolonged, performed with a
contrite heart an alert intellect. The vehicle of prayer is
everywhere humility, and prayer is a manifestation of humility. For
being conscious of our own weakness, we invoke the power of
GOD.
PRAYER unites one with GOD, being a divine conversation and
spiritual communion with the Being that is most beautiful and
highest.
PRAYER IS FORGETTING EARTHLY THINGS,
AN ASCENT TO HEAVEN.
THROUGH PRAYER
WE FLEE TO GOD.
PRAYER is truly a heavenly armor, and is alone can keep safe
those who have dedicated themselves to God. Prayer is the
common medicine for purifying ourselves from the passions, for
hindering sin and curing our faults. Prayer is an inexhaustible
treasure, an unruffled harbor, the foundation of serenity,the root
and mother of myriads of blessings.
HOLY COMMUNION
The MYSTERION of the Divine Eucharist that has been handed
down by the Lord is the hightest of all the MYSTERIA; it is the
most wondrous of all the miracles which the power of God has
performed; it is the highest which the wisdom of God has
conceived; it is the most precious of all the gifts which the love of
God has bestowed upon men. For all the other miracles result
through a transcendence of certain laws of Nature, but the
MYSTERION of the DIVINE EUCHARIST transcends all
these laws. Hence it may justly be called, and be viewed as, the
miracle of miracles and the MYSTERION of MYSTERIA.
DO YOU WANT TO BECOME A PARTAKER
OF THE BLESSINGS CONFERRED
BY DIVINE COMMUNION?
DO YOU WANT YOUR SALVATION?
BECOME A TRUE CHRISTIAN,
HAVE FEAR OF GOD,
FAITH IN THE MYSTERION OF DIVINE COMMUNION,
AND LOVE FOR GOD
AND FOR YOUR NEIGHBOR.
MIRACLES
MIRACLES are not impossible from a logical standpoint, and
right reason does not deny them. Natural laws do not have the
claim to be the only ones, nor are they threatened with being
overturned by the appearance of other laws, supernatural ones,
which also are conducive to the development and furtherance of
creation... Miracles are consequence of the Creator's love for his
creatures.
Source: "Modern Orthodox Saints, St. Nectarios of Aegina", by (Dr.)
Constantine Cavarnos, Insititute for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies,
Belmont, Massachusetts., 1981., pp. 154-187.