THE BASICS OF SPIRITUAL
LIFE,
BASED ON THE WRITINGS OF ST. IGNATIUS (BRIANCHANINOV)
Part I
For the commemoration of
St. Ignatius Brianchaninov,
The essence of any
religion is contained in the spiritual life, which is its most sacred side. Any
entrance into this life demands not only zeal, but also knowledge of the laws
of spiritual life. Zeal not according to knowledge is a poor helper, as we know.
Vague, indistinct conceptions of this main side of religious life lead the
Christian, and especially the ascetic, to grievous consequences; in the best
case to fruitless labors, but more often to self-opinion and spiritual, moral,
and psychological illness.
The most widespread mistake in religious life is the
substitution of its spiritual side (fulfillment of the Gospel commandments,
repentance, struggle with the passions, love for neighbor) with the external
side—fulfillment of Church customs and rites. As a rule, such an approach to
religion makes a person outwardly righteous, but inwardly a prideful Pharisee,
hypocrite, and rejected by God—a “saint of satan.” Therefore it is necessary to
know the basic principles of spiritual life in Orthodoxy.
Of great help in this is
an experienced guide who sees the human soul. But such guides were very rare
even in ancient times, as the Fathers testify. It is even more difficult to
find such guides in our times. The Holy Fathers foresaw that in the latter
times there would be a famine of the word of God (even though the Gospels are
now printed abundantly!) and instructed sincere seekers in advance to conduct
their spiritual lives by means of “living under the guidance of
patristic writings, with the counsel of their contemporary brothers who are
successfully progressing [in spiritual life].”
These words belong to one
of the most authoritative Russian spiritual instructors and writers of the
nineteenth century, Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov (1807–1867). His writings are a
kind of Orthodox ascetical encyclopedia representing those very patristic
writings, but are of particular value to the modern-day Christian.
This value comes from the
fact that his writings are based upon his scrupulous study of patristic
writings, tried in the furnace of personal ascetical experience, and provide a
clear exposition of all the most important questions of spiritual life,
including the dangers that can be met along the way. They set forth the
patristic experience of the knowledge of God applicable to the psychology and
strength of people living in an epoch closer to us both in time and degree of
secularization.[1]
Here we shall present only
a few of the more important precepts of his teaching on the question of correct
spiritual life.
1. Correct Thoughts
“People usually consider
thought to be something of little importance, and therefore they are very
undiscerning in their acceptance of thoughts. However, everything good comes
from the acceptance of correct thoughts, while everything evil comes from the acceptance of deceitful thoughts. Thought is like the helm of a ship. A small wheel and an
insignificant board dragging behind a great vessel decide its direction and,
more often than not, its fate” (4:509).[2] Thus wrote Saint Ignatius,
emphasizing the exceptional significance that our thoughts, views, and
theoretical knowledge as a whole have for spiritual life. Not only correct
dogmatic faith and Gospel morals, but also knowledge and rigorous observation
of spiritual laws determine success in the complex process of true rebirth of
the passionate, “fleshly” (Rom 8:5),old man (Eph 4:22) into the new
man (Eph 4:24).
However, a theoretical
understanding of this question is not as simple as it would seem at first
glance. The many different so-called “spiritual ways of life” that are now
being offered to man from all sides are one of the illustrations of the
complexity of this problem.
Therefore, a task of the
utmost importance arises: finding the more essential indications and qualities
of true spirituality, which would allow one to differentiate it from all the
possible forms of false spirituality, mysticism, andprelest. This
has been sufficiently explained by the Church’s 2,000 years of experience in
the person of its saints; but modern man, raised in a materialistic and
unspiritual civilization, runs up against no little difficulty in assimilating
it.
Patristic teachings have
always corresponded to the level of those to whom they are directed. The Fathers of the Church never wrote “just for the sake of it” or “for science.”
Many of their counsels, directed at ascetics of high contemplative life and
even to so-called beginners, no longer even remotely
correspond to the spiritual strength of the modern Christian. Furthermore, the
variety, ambiguity, and at times even contradictoriness of these counsels that
naturally occur due to the varying spiritual levels of those who seek them can
disorient the inexperienced. It is very difficult to avoid these dangers when
studying the Holy Fathers without knowing at least the more important
principles of spiritual life. On the other hand, a correct spiritual life is
unthinkable without patristic guidance. Before this seemingly insurmountable
impasse, we can see the full significance of the spiritual inheritance of those
fathers, most of whom are closer to us in time, who “restated” this earlier
patristic experience of spiritual life in a language more accessible to a
modern man little acquainted with this life, who usually has neither a capable
guide nor sufficient strength.
The works of Saint
Ignatius Brianchaninov are among the best of these “restatements,” which
provide an impeccably reliable “key” to understanding the teachings of great
laborers in the science of sciences—the ascetics.
2. What is the Meaning of
Faith in Christ?
Here is what Saint
Ignatius writes about this:
The beginning of
conversion to Christ consists in coming to know one’s own sinfulness and
fallenness. Through this view of himself, a person recognizes his need for a
Redeemer, and approaches Christ through humility, faith, and repentance
(4:277). He who does not recognize his sinfulness, fallenness, and peril cannot
accept Christ or believe in Christ; he cannot be a Christian. Of what need is
Christ to the person who himself is wise and virtuous, who is pleased with
himself, and considers himself worthy of all earthly and heavenly rewards?
(4:378).
Within these words the
thought involuntarily draws attention to itself thatthe awareness of one’s own sinfulness andthe repentance proceeding from it are
the first conditions for receiving Christ—that is, the belief that Christ
came, suffered, and was resurrected is the beginning of conversion to Christ,
for the devils also believe, and tremble (Jas 2:19), and from
the knowledge of one’s sinfulness comes true faith in Him.
The holy hierarch’s
thought shows the first and main position of spiritual life, which so often
slips away from the attention of the faithful and shows the true depth of its
Orthodox understanding. The Christian, as it happens, is not at all the one who
believes according to tradition or who is convinced of the existence of God
through some form of evidence, and, of course, the Christian is not at all one
who goes to Church and feels that he is “higher than all sinners, atheists, and
non-Christians.” No, the Christian is the one who see his own spiritual and
moral impurity, his own sinfulness, sees that he is perishing, suffers over
this, and therefore he is inwardly free to receive the Savior and true faith in
Christ. This is why, for example, Saint Justin the Philosopher wrote, “He is
the Logos in Whom the whole human race participates. Those who live according
to the Logos are Christians in essence, although they consider themselves to be
godless: such were Socrates and Heraclites, and others among the Hellenes.… In
the same way those who lived before us in opposition to the Logos were
dishonorable, antagonistic to Christ … while those who lived and still live
according to Him are Christians in essence.”[3] This is why so many pagan peoples so
readily accepted Christianity.
On the contrary, whoever
sees himself as righteous and wise, who sees his own good deeds, cannot be a
Christian and is not one, no matter where he stands in the administrative and
hierarchical structure of the Church. Saint Ignatius cites the eloquent fact
from the Savior’s earthly life that He was received with tearful repentance by
simple Jews who admitted their sins, but was hatefully rejected and condemned
to a terrible death by the “intelligent,” “virtuous,” and respectable Jewish
elite—the high priests, Pharisees (zealous fulfillers of Church customs, rules,
etc.), and scribes (theologians).
They that be whole need
not a physician, but they that are sick (Mt 9:12), says the
Lord. Only those who see the sickness of their soul and know that it cannot be
cured through their own efforts come to the path of healing and salvation, because
they are able to turn to the true Doctor Who suffered for them—Christ. Outside
of this state, which is called “knowing oneself” by the Fathers, normal
spiritual life is impossible. “The entire edifice of salvation is built upon
the knowledge and awareness of our infirmity,” writes Saint Ignatius (1:532).
He repeatedly cites the remarkable words of Saint Peter of Damascus: “The
beginning of the soul’s enlightenment and mark of its health is when the mind
begins to see its own sins, numbering as the sands of the sea” (2:410).
Therefore, Saint Ignatius
exclaims over and over,
Humility and the
repentance which comes from it are the only conditions under which Christ is
received! Humility and repentance are the only price by which the knowledge of
Christ is purchased! Humility and repentance make up the only moral condition
from which one can approach Christ, to be taken in by Him! Humility and
repentance are the only sacrifice which requites, and which God accepts from
fallen man (cf. Ps 50:18–19). The Lord rejects those who are infected with
pride, with a mistaken opinion of themselves, who consider repentance to be
superfluous for them, who exclude themselves from the list of sinners. They
cannot be Christians (4:182–183).
3. Know Yourself
How does a person obtain
this saving knowledge of himself, his “oldness,” a knowledge which opens to him
the full, infinite significance of Christ’s Sacrifice? Here is how Saint
Ignatius answers this question.
I do not see my sin
because I still labor for sin. Whoever delights in sin and allows himself to
taste of it, even if only in his thoughts and sympathy of heart, cannot see his
own sin. He can only see his own sin who renounces all friendship with sin; who
has gone out to the gates of his house to guard them with bared sword—the word
of God; who with this sword deflects and cuts off sin, in whatever form it
might approach. God will grant a great gift to those who perform this great
task of establishing enmity with sin; who violently tear mind, heart, and body
away from it. This gift is the vision of one’s own sins (2:122).
In another place he gives
the following practical advice: “If one refuses to judge his neighbors, his
thoughts naturally begin to see his own sins and weaknesses which he did not
see while he was occupied with the judgment of his neighbors” (5:351). Saint
Ignatius expresses his main thought on the conditions for self-knowledge by the
following remarkable words of Saint Symeon the New Theologian: “Painstaking
fulfillment of Christ’s commandments teaches man about his infirmity” (4:9);
that is, it reveals to him the sad picture of what really resides in his soul
and what actually happens there.
The question of how to
obtain the vision of one’s sins, or the knowledge of one’s self, one’s old
man, is at the center of spiritual life. Saint Ignatius beautifully showed
its logic: only he who sees himself as one perishing has need of a Savior; on
the contrary, the “healthy” (cf. Mt 9:12) have no need of Christ. Therefore, if
one wants to believe in Christ in an Orthodox way, this vision becomes the main
purpose of his ascetic labor, and at the same time, the main criteria for its
authenticity.
4. Good Deeds
On the contrary, ascetic
labors, or podvigs—and any virtues that do not lead to such a result
are in fact false podvigs—and life becomes meaningless. The Apostle
Paul speaks of this in his epistle to Timothy, when he says, And if a
man also strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully (2
Tm 2:5). Saint Isaac the Syrian speaks about this even more specifically: “The
recompense is not for virtue, nor for toil on account of virtue, but for
humility which is born of both. If humility is lacking, then the former two are
in vain.”[4]
This statement opens yet
another important page in the understanding of spiritual life and its laws:
neither podvigs nor labors in and of themselves can bring a
person the blessings of the Kingdom of God, which is within us (Lk 17:21), but
only the humility which comes from them. If humility is not gained, all ascetic
labors and virtues are meaningless. However, only labor in the fulfillment of
Christ’s commandments teaches man humility. This is how one complex theological
question on the relationship between faith and good works in
the matter of salvation is explained.
Saint Ignatius devotes
great attention to this question. He sees it in two aspects: first, in the
sense of understanding the necessity of Christ’s sacrifice; and second, with
respect to Christian perfection. His conclusions, proceeding as they do from
patristic experience, are not ordinary subjects for classroom theology.
He writes, “If good deeds
done according to feelings of the heart brought salvation, then Christ’s coming
would have been superfluous” (1:513). “Unfortunate is the man who is satisfied
with his own human righteousness, for he does not need Christ” (4:24). “Such is
the natural quality of all bodilypodvigs and visible good deeds. If
we think that doing them is our sacrifice to God, and not just reparation for
our immeasurable debt, then our good deeds and podvigs become
the parents in us of soul-destroying pride” (4:20)
Saint Ignatius even
writes,
The doer of human
righteousness is filled with self-opinion, high-mindedness, and self-deception
… he repays with hatred and revenge anyone who dares to open his mouth to
pronounce the most well-founded and good-intentioned contradiction of his
righteousness. He considers himself worthy, most worthy of both earthly and
heavenly rewards (4:47).
From this we can
understand the saint’s call, which is:
Do not seek Christian
perfection in human virtues. It is not there; it is mystically preserved in the
Cross of Christ (4:477–478).
This thought directly
contradicts the widespread belief that so-called “good deeds” are always good
and aid us in our salvation, regardless of what motivates a person to do them.
In reality, righteousness and virtue of the oldand new man
are not mutually supplementary, but rather mutuallyexclusive. The reason
for this is sufficiently obvious. Good works are not anend, but a means for
fulfilling the supreme commandment of love. But they can also be done
calculatingly, hypocritically, and out of ambition and pride. (When a person
sees the needy but instead gilds domes on churches, or builds a church where
there no real need of one, it is clear that he is not serving God, but his own
vanity.) Deeds that are not done for the fulfillment of the commandments blind
a person by their significance, puff him up, make him great in his own eyes,
exalt his ego, and thereby separate him from Christ. But the fulfillment of the
commandments of love for neighbor reveals a person’s passions to himself, such
as: man-pleasing, self-opinion, hypocrisy, and so on. It reveals to him that he
cannot do any good deed without sin. This humbles a person and leads him to
Christ. Saint John the Prophet said, “True labor cannot be without humility,
for labor in and of itself is vain and accounted as nothing.”[5]
In other words, virtues
and podvigs can also be extremely harmful if they are not
founded upon the knowledge of hidden sin in the soul and do not lead to an even
deeper awareness of it. Saint Ignatius instructs, “One must first see his sin,
then cleanse himself of it with repentance and attain a pure heart, without
which it is impossible to perform a single good deed in all purity” (4:490).
“The ascetic,” he writes, “has only just begun to do them [good deeds] before
he sees that he does them altogether insufficiently, impurely.… His increased
activity according to the Gospels shows him ever more clearly the inadequacy of
his virtues, the multitude of his diversions and motives, the unfortunate state
of his fallen nature.… He recognizes his fulfillment of the commandments as
only a distortion and defilement of them” (1:308–309). Therefore, the saints,
he continues, “cleansed their virtues with floods of tears, as if they were
sins” (2:403).
5. Untimely Dispassion is
Dangerous.
Let us turn out attention
to yet another important law of spiritual life. It consists in “the like
interrelationship of virtues and of vices” or, to put it another way, in the
strict consequentiality and mutual conditioning of the acquisition of virtues
as well as the action of passions. Saint Ignatius writes, “Because of this like
relationship, voluntary submission to one good thought leads to the natural
submission to another good thought; acquisition of one virtue leads another
virtue into the soul which is like unto and inseparable from the first. The
reverse is also true: voluntary submission to one sinful thought brings
involuntarily submission to another; acquisition of one sinful passion leads
another passion related to it into the soul; the voluntary committing of one
sin leads to the involuntary fall into another sin born of the first. Evil, as
the fathers say, cannot bear to dwell unmarried in the heart” (5:351).
This is a serious warning!
How often do Christians, not knowing this law, carelessly regard the so-called
“minor” sins, committing themvoluntarily—that is, without being forced
into them by passion. And then they are perplexed when they painfully and
desperately, like slaves,involuntarily fall into serious sins which
lead to serious sorrows and tragedies in life.
Just how necessary it is
in spiritual life to strictly observe the law of consequentiality is shown by
the following words of a most experienced instructor of spiritual life, Saint
Isaac the Syrian (Homily 72), and cited by Saint Ignatius: “It is the good will
of the most wise Lord that we reap our spiritual bread in the sweat of our
brow. He established this law not out of spite, but rather so that we would not
suffer from indigestion and die. Every virtue is the mother of the one
following it. If you leave the mother who gives birth to the virtue and seek
after her daughter, without having first acquired the mother, then these
virtues become as vipers in the soul. If you do not turn them away, you will
soon die” (2:57–58). Saint Ignatius warns sternly in connection with this,
“Untimely dispassion is dangerous! It is dangerous to enjoy Divine grace before
the time! Supernatural gifts can destroy the ascetic who has not learned of his
own infirmity” (1:532).
These are remarkable
words! To someone who is spiritually inexperienced the very thought that a
virtue can be untimely, never mind deadly to the soul, “like a viper,” would
seem strange and almost blasphemous. But such is the very reality of spiritual
life; such is one of its strictest laws, which was revealed by the vast
experience of the saints. In the fifth volume of hisWorks, which
Saint Ignatius called An Offering to Contemporary Monasticism, in
the tenth chapter entitled, “On caution in the reading of books on monastic
life,” he states openly, “The fallen angel strives to deceive monks and draw
them to destruction, offering them not only sin in its various forms, but also
lofty virtues that are not natural to them” (5:54).
6. Correct Prayer
These thoughts have a
direct relationship to understanding a very important Christian activity:
prayer. Saying as do all the saints that “Prayer is the mother of the virtues
and the door to all spiritual gifts” (2:228), Saint Ignatius emphatically
points to the conditions that must be met in order to make prayer the mother of
the virtues. Violating these conditions makes prayer fruitless at best; but
more often, it makes it the instrument of the ascetic’s precipitous fall. Some
of these conditions are well known. Whoever does not forgive others will not be
forgiven himself. “Whoever prays with his lips but is careless about his heart
prays to the air and not to God; he labors in vain, because God heeds the mind
and heart, and not copious words,” says Hieromonk Dorotheus, a Russian ascetic
for whom Saint Ignatius had great respect (2:266).
However, Saint Ignatius
pays particular attention to the conditions for the Jesus Prayer. In light of
its great significance for every Christian, we present a brief excerpt from the
remarkable article by Saint Ignatius, “On the Jesus Prayer: A Talk with a
Disciple.”
In exercising the Jesus
prayer there is its beginning, its gradual progression, and its endless end. It
is necessary to start the exercise from the beginning, and not from the middle
or the end.…
Those who begin in the
middle are the novices who have read the instructions … given by the
hesychastic fathers … and accept this instruction as a guide in their activity,
without thinking it through. They begin in the middle who, without any sort of
preparation, try to force their minds into the temple of the heart and send up
prayers from there. They begin from the end who seek to quickly unfold in
themselves the grace-filled sweetness of prayer and its other grace-filled
actions.
One should begin at the
beginning; that is, pray with attention and reverence, with the purpose of
repentance, taking care only that these three qualities be continually present
with the prayer.… In particular, most scrupulous care should be taken to
establish morals in accordance with the teachings of the Gospels.… Only upon
morality brought into good accord with the Gospel commandments … can the
immaterial temple of God-pleasing prayer be built. A house built upon sand is
labor in vain—sand is easy morality that can be shaken (1:225–226).
From this citation it can
be seen how attentive and reverently careful one must be with respect to the
Jesus prayer. It should be prayed not just any way, but correctly. Otherwise,
its practice will not only cease to be prayer, it can even destroy the one practicing
it. In one of his letters, Saint Ignatius talks about how the soul should be
disposed during prayer: “Today I read the saying of Saint Sisoes the Great
which I have always especially liked; a saying which has always been according
to my heart. A certain monk said to him, ‘I abide in ceaseless remembrance of
God.’ Saint Sisoes replied to him, “That is not great; it will be great when
you consider yourself worse than all creatures.’ The ceaseless remembrance of
God is a great thing!” Saint Ignatius continues. “But this is a very dangerous
height when the ladder that leads to it is not founded upon the sturdy rock of
humility” (4:497).
(In connection with this
it must be noted that “the sign of ceaseless and self-moving Jesus prayer is by
no means a sign that the prayer is grace-filled, because [such qualities] do
not guarantee … those fruits that always indicate that it is grace-filled.”
“Spiritual struggle, the result and purpose of which is the acquisition of
HUMILITY … is [in this case] substituted by some [interim] purpose: the
acquisition of ceaseless and self-acting Jesus prayer, which … is not the final
goal, but only one means of attaining that goal.”[6])
From: Alexei I. Osipov, The Search for
Truth on the Path of Reason (Sretensky Monastery, Pokrov Press,
2009) 238-240.
Translation by Nun Cornelia (Rees)
[2] Not all of Saint Ignatius’ works have
been translated into English. At the present time, only the fifth volume of his
collected works, The Arena: An Offering to Contemporary Monasticism,
translated by Arch. Lazarus (Holy Trinity Monastery, 1997), is available in
English. This and all the quotes from Saint Ignatius’ writings are referenced
from the Russian 1905 publication. Here and afterwards the volume number is
shown first, the page number second. —Trans.
[4] The Ascetical Homilies of Saint
Isaac the Syrian (Moscow, 1858), Homily 34:217. English translation,
Holy Transfiguration Monastery, 57:282.
