Ot 1-2004

Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies
orthodox
tradition
ORYODOJOS
PARADOSIS
Volume XXI
Number 1
2004
ORTHODOX TRADITION
Published with the blessing of His Eminence,
Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili
_____________________________________________________________
Editor: Bishop Auxentios Volume XXI (2004)
Managing Editor: Archimandrite Akakios Number 1
Art and Design: Chrestos Spontylides ISSN 0742-4019
_____________________________________________________________
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Scholarly Imprudence 2
On Holy Pascha 16
Fanaticism and Syncretism 23
A Terrible Blunder 27
Obedience in Monastic Practice 30
Synod News 41
Book Reviews 46
Publications and a New Book from C.T.O.S. 48
“The Old Calendar movement is neither a heresy nor a schism,

and those who follow it are neither heretics nor schismatics, but
are Orthodox Christians.”
Archbishop Dorotheos of Athens (1956-57)
State (New Calendar) Church of Greece
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SCHOLARLY IMPRUDENCE

Comments on Contemporary Trends in
Orthodox Spiritual Writing and
Byzantine Historiography
by Archbishop Chrysostomos of Etna
IMPRUDENCE is a mounting spiritual and intellectual disease in

our age. With the advent of the Internet, any fool or panjandrum with
an opinion, to restate an old ditty, has a readily available forum to ex-
press the most absurd and detestable views—free from the peer re-
view which is de rigueur in traditional publishing and wholly uncon-
strained by the traditional assumption that one should educate himself
in a subject before offering an opinion or evaluation of it. Not only has
the scholarly world suffered because of the consequent lowering of
standards of excellence, but largely unlearned ideas and bold preju-
dices which were on the fringe of scholarship in the past now com-
mand attention and reflection, as though they were worthy of such.
Imprudence and the relinquishment of scholarly circumspection have
in many instances prevailed in areas of scholarly investigation where
academic stringency and ostensive skills were once the primary lines
of defense against superficiality and banality.
As a result of this lamentable trend, the mere defense of what was
once conventional and careful scholarship often earns one the ugly ac-
cusation of intellectual elitism. This is largely because imprudence in-
evitably carries with it a corollary ill: the vexatious arrogance of those
who garner self-importance through the sometimes pugnacious pro-
mulgation of their personal and unlearned opinions. I cannot say why
such pride so ineluctably follows on the heels of scholarly impru-
dence; but a pithy remark made by the Mexican television journalist
and writer, Jorge Ramos, in the introduction to his recent and fasci-
nating autobiography, may provide a clue: “Escribo con la culpabili-
dad de que hay otras cosas mas importante que hacer” [“I write with
the guilt that there are other, more important things to do”].1 This la-
____________
1. Jorge Ramos, Atravesando Frontera [Crossing Over the Border]
(New York: Rayo [Harper Collins Publishers], 2002), p. xxi.
Volume XXI, Number 1 3
conic sentence is tremendously profound. It tells us that an intelligent

thinker or writer is absorbed by his intellectual efforts; he does not ap-
propriate these efforts for himself in an act of self-important expres-
sion. I suspect that, in affirming that there is a disarming humility of
purpose in sober rumination and good writing, Mr. Ramos’ comment
also tells us why unwarranted, self-proclaimed importance is incom-
patible with, and properly foreign to, intellectual excellence.
It is to scholarly imprudence, superficiality, and a diminution of
academic rigor in the realm of spiritual or religious writing, as well as
those fields of scholarship thereto attendant, that I would like to direct
my specific observations in this short essay. It is in such areas that we
see these ills in a very pronounced way, today: in poor historiography,
theology of the lowest possible calibre, and an almost causal associa-
tion of spiritual principles with scientific data or theories that distorts,
by over-simplification, both the increasingly striking relationship be-
tween more abstruse or recondite scientific views and the foundation-
al elements of religious thought. As a result, both religion and science
are portrayed from a very base perspective. This is particularly dan-
gerous, since contemporary science has reached such a level of so-
phistication that understanding it at any level beyond dilettantism de-
mands intense study and perspicacity. Imprudent scholarly superfi-
ciality, reinforced by arrogance, thus deteriorates into pedestrian prat-
tle about religion and science and, likewise, the historical and philo-
sophical study of religious ideas. The loftiness of genuine spiritual in-
sight and serious thought about the sacred and profane are totally lost.
I should also note that the emphasis on the ascendency of person-
al conscience in the formation of religious views, when it degener-
ates—as it frequently does—into the acclivity of unstudied personal
opinions, poses a peculiar danger to the area of theology, which de-
mands a modicum of credentials, good intentions, objective method-
ologies, and even a certain personal probity: those things which, when
present in good secular scholarship and writing, characterize the pro-
verbial “gentleman and scholar,” and the absence of which, in spiri-
tual thought and writing, once prompted St. Basil the Great to grouse,
along with other gifted and enlightened Church Fathers (and quite jus-
tifiably so), that “[e]veryone is a theologian, even one who has his
soul blemished with more spots than can be counted” (Patrologia
Graeca, Vol. XXXII, col. 213D). We can add that, in our own times,
“everyone” is not only a theologian, but also a scientist and pundit in
the history of ideas and religious thought. This observation, of course,
brings us back to the primary theme of my essay; that is, the menace
of mere unformed and uninformed opinion passing as knowledge or
of amateur or inadequate scholarship entering into the body of knowl-
edge without, in fact, belonging there and without having undergone
the scrutiny of traditional peer review and scholarly approbation.
4 Orthodox Tradition
I would like to illustrate what I have said about this contemporary

trend towards imprudence and superficiality by commenting briefly
on a series of books on so-called “Orthodox psychotherapy”2 by a
gifted Greek religious writer, Metropolitan Hierotheos of Navpaktos;
on a companion volume (of sorts), Heavenly Wisdom from God-Illu-
mined Teachers on Conquering Depression, conceived in a similar
spirit and published by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood and the
St. Paisius Abbey;3 and a well-known work on daily life in Byzantium
by the late and distinguished Byzantinist, Tamara Talbot Rice.4 Met-
ropolitan Hierotheos’ books I have been reading with spiritually and
intellectually salubrious results for a number of years. The volume by
the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood I read earlier this year, finding
some good points, but also noting a great many inchoate and techni-
cally inaccurate claims. And Rice’s work, first published nearly three
decades ago, when I was studying Byzantine history, I recently reread.
One certainly cannot characterize either Metropolitan Hierotheos or
Professor Rice as untrained, superficial, or given to dilettantism. Nor
would I call the volume by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood,
which is essentially a compendium of Patristic and pious writings,
shallow or insubstantial as such. I am simply using these examples to
demonstrate that, while all students and scholars (myself assuredly
included) from time to time fall, by indeliberation, to the intellectual
ills of superficiality and scholarly imprudence (the perpetuation of
mere opinions and personal prejudices and the promulgation of ill-
drawn and ill-advised comparisons and juxtapositions of materials
taken out of context and wrongly applied to matters to which they do
not, in fact, apply), this phenomenon (indeed, temptation) has become
almost omnipresent, today, affecting even the very best of scholars.
I should also say that it is not adventitiously that I have selected
the two authors in question or the volume Conquering Depression.
One of these two authors, Metropolitan Hierotheos, writes from with-
in the Orthodox spiritual tradition, while the other, Tamara Rice, was
a scholar who, despite her sympathies for, and attachments to, the Or-
thodox Church and its traditions, and despite her considerable and no-
____________
2. See, for example, his ÉOryÒdojh Cuxoyerape¤a (Orthodox Psycho-
therapy), CuxikØ ÉAsy°neia ka‹ ÑUge¤a (Psychic Illness and Health), and his
interesting comparison of sin and restoration in the Neptic Fathers and the
Orthodox Patristic corpus with the psychotherapeutic “Logotherapy” of Dr.
Victor Frankl. Some of Metropolitan Hierotheos’ books are available in Eng-
lish translation, though the translations are of unfortunately uneven quality.
3. Heavenly Wisdom from God-Illumined Teachers on Conquering De-
pression (Forestville and Platina, CA: St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood &
St. Paisius Abbey, 1998 [second printing]).
4. Tamara Talbot Rice, Everyday Life in Byzantium (New York: Barnes
and Noble, 1994 [reprinted]).
table academic and linguistic skills, at times wrote in the style of Wes-
tern scholars. She frequently sees Orthodoxy through the prism of an
inadequate historiography which, notwithstanding more recent and
positive strides in the direction of balance and objectivity, lives under
the shadow of Western scholars who not only coined the word “By-
zantine” in order to obfuscate Byzantium’s roots in the ancient Roman
Empire, but who have made the term synonymous with “intrigue,” at-
taching to it a plethora of pejorative epithets. Offering my observation
with no negative intentions or implications, I would thus say that Pro-
fessor Rice wrote from outside the Orthodox spiritual life. The book
on depression published by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood un-
deniably comes from within the Orthodox spiritual tradition, both by
virtue of the Patristic quotations and references that it contains and by
virtue of the fact that it was published by a monastic institution with
experience in the spiritual life. As such, I have placed it, again, to-
gether with the writings of Metropolitan Hierotheos; and, indeed,
many of the critical observations which I will make about His Emi-
nence’s writings apply also to Conquering Depression, and vice versa.
In the case of the two foregoing examples of spiritual writing, I
would like to address, first, Metropolitan Hierotheos’ use of psycho-
therapeutic imagery to speak of human restoration in the Orthodox
Fathers and the possible dangers posed, in his soteriological “medical
model,” both for a proper and deeper understanding of theology and
of psychology or psychiatry—dangers posed, not by His Eminence’s
own observations, but by the maladroit conclusions drawn from his
thinking by those who grasp his useful analogical approach at a liter-
al level.5 Secondly, the book Conquering Depression, it seems to me,
approaches a very complex issue in psychology and human behav-
ior—as well as Orthodox spiritual life—with an imprecision in termi-
____________
5. The dangers of this uncareful parallelism have also led individuals
well-trained in medical psychology, though poorly trained in theology, to
find connections between certain “New Age” sectarian figures and the Or-
thodox Fathers. One individual, in fact, a fervent advocate of Orthodox
“psychotherapeutic ‘methodology,’” has spoken of a connection between the
“scientific” views of the French cultist and advocate of cloning, Claude Vo-
rilhon (“Rael”), and Orthodox cosmology. While this is perhaps an egregious
case of parallelism gone awry, it should still clearly signal to us that we must
be chary about all efforts to link Orthodoxy and contemporary trends, even
at the analogical level. Suffice it to say that a sect which believes—as one
French journal recently observed (see Lectures Françaises, XLVI, 550 [Feb-
ruary 2003], p. 27)—that humans were “créés en laboratoires et transportés
sur Terre” [“created in laboratories and transported to Earth”] or that cloning
is “la clé de la vie eternelle” [“the key to life eternal”], and whose leader calls
himself the “demi-frère” [“half-brother”] of Christ, is not at all in the tradi-
tion of the Fathers. To imagine so is to abuse parallelism wholly.
nology and application that is a cause for some concern. Again, I do

not impugn the quality of the Patristic and spiritual materials con-
tained in this work; but I would like to express serious reservations
with regard to their suitability and applicability to the book’s stated
purpose and theme (depression). Finally, with regard to historiogra-
phical issues, certain imprecise comments on Byzantine asceticism,
and the Stylites specifically, found in Rice’s otherwise more-balanced
book on everyday life in Byzantium also represent, I believe, the su-
perficies which good scholars can unwittingly embrace when they
forego caution and relinquish the traditional rubrics of scholarly re-
search—underscoring, once more, the greater and more menacing
danger of what are the deliberately superficial inanities of unskilled,
untrained, and self-appointed commentators on subjects and issues
that call for deliberation, for wisdom captured in nuance, for mental
pliability, and for spiritual discretion.
With specific regard to Metropolitan Hierotheos’ clearly brilliant
and thought-provoking books on the healing of the soul, in which he
uses the imagery of medical psychology to explain sin as a disease of
the psyche, the Church as a spiritual hospital, and the ascetic and He-
sychastic practices of the Church (e.g., fasting, the “Jesus Prayer,” the
cleansing of the mind, and the purification and restoration of the emo-
tions and passions through ascetic labor) as salvific therapies, these
are, at the theological level, a wonderful corrective to the Western so-
teriological model of sin as a transgression of Divine law, the Church
as an intermediary in the process of restitutio in integrum through per-
sonal requital for sin, and salvation or damnation as just recompense.
His works are vitally important, in this sense, since many Orthodox
theologians—not only as a result of Western influence, but because
they have much overstated the juridical model of salvation that can be
found, here and there, even in the Greek Fathers—have substantially
divagated from the pastoral images of Christianity as a therapeutic,
healing pursuit and of the Church and Her Mysteries as spiritual med-
icines and cures, which images are undoubtedly prevalent in the writ-
ings and thought of the Greek Fathers and of the Orthodox Church.
In writing about this restoration of the human soul in Christ, His
Eminence quite rightly does not separate the soul and body (or the
mind and the body), as though there were no interaction between the
two. There is an irrefragable link between the physical and spiritual,
as evidenced by the fact that fasting, which is centered on the sharp-
ening of the spiritual sensitivities, not only helps to cleanse and focus
the mind, but also benefits the body. Indeed, the Hesychastic resto-
ration of the human being is a restoration of the proper functioning of
the mind and the body to an inner harmony that works to restore the
image of God within man. But this does not mean, as some imagine,
that cognitive and organic dysfunctions in the brain are necessarily or
automatically cured in the process of spiritual restoration, any more

than physical diseases without psychological symptoms suddenly dis-
appear when one is restored to spiritual health. This can, of course
occur, and the occurrence of such miracles is recorded throughout
Church history; however, these miracles are not, again, foreordained.
There are mental diseases of purely physiological and psychological
origin—occurring in the brain or entailing deficits in cognitive func-
tioning—which are properly treated by the various schools of of psy-
chotherapy, employing everything from psychoanalytic techniques to
behavioral modification to psychopharmacological intervention.
Orthodox psychotherapy, or the cure of the soul, then, does not—
to be sure, cannot possibly—wholly encompass or replace psycho-
therapy of this latter kind. A misunderstanding, or overstatement, of
Metropolitan Hierotheos’ soteriological model has led some individu-
als, as I noted above, to think that Orthodox psychotherapy is a Chris-
tian counterpart of medical psychology and that it can replace it.
Specifically, various fundamentalists, possessed by a spirit of resis-
tance to progress and science and positing an artificial tension be-
tween religion and medical psychology, have even at times advised
Orthodox Christians against consulting psychologists and psychia-
trists, arguing, and unjustifiably so, on the basis of His Eminence’s
writings, that the Church’s spiritual therapies are sufficient. This is not
unlike telling a diabetic that insulin is not a necessary part of his med-
ical routine, as long as he Communes regularly. Short of Divine in-
tervention, such advice is dangerous and foolish. As I said earlier, one
certainly cannot attribute wrong intentions to Metropolitan Hierothe-
os or hold him responsible for misapplications of his writings. How-
ever, given the preëminence of unenlightened opinion today, this mis-
use would suggest that there is great danger in coining language and
promulgating otherwise very insightful models for understanding the
Faith. It thus behooves us to keep this danger constantly in mind. In
fact, I would go so far as to say that a clergyman writing about psy-
chotherapy at any level should, heeding what I have said, be careful
to investigate, study, and educate himself thoroughly in the science of
psychology, before drawing parallels between theological precepts
and psychotherapy, even if he does so only at an analogical level. Oth-
erwise, the risk of being misunderstood is magnified many times.
I should also say, with all due respect and acknowledging that
Metropolitan Hierotheos is undoubtedly acutely unaware of this mat-
ter, that there is a certain imprudence, given the intellectual ethos of
our age as I have characterized it, in failing to distinguish with great
limpidity between the rôle of the spiritual doctor (the pastor) and the
psychotherapist. That it is incumbent both on the clergyman and the
psychotherapist to make this distinction was brought home to me by
an incident that occurred some years ago, when I was a student of psy-
chology and immensely fascinated by the late Dr. Viktor E. Frankl, a

renowned medical doctor, psychologist, and the father of Logothera-
py (about whose school of psychotherapy Metropolitan Hierotheos, as
I observed above [see note 2], has written a very interesting book). At
the time, Frankl was Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology at the
University of Vienna and Distinguished Professor of Logotherapy at
the U.S. International University. I decided to apply for doctoral study
at the latter institution, with the goal of working with him. As part of
the application process to the university, I was required to interview
with a small group of analysts. Though I was accepted into the pro-
gram, I decided instead, at the advice of one of my more memorable
mentors, the Russian psychological researcher, Dr. Nikolai Khokhlov,
to accept an offer from Princeton. Nonetheless, I remember to this day
my interview and one of the issues that came up during it.
In the course of my relating some of my life experiences, person-
al background, and academic aspirations, one of the interviewers, a
kind but intrepid inquisitor, touched on the issue of religion, since I
had mentioned this subject in passing. Thinking that she was curious
about the effects of being reared in a religiously pluralistic and multi-
cultural household, I began to speak about the Orthodox, Roman Ca-
tholic, and Protestant confessions held by the various ethnic groups in
my family. She immediately and abruptly interrupted me and said:
“No, I am interested in knowing whether you consider a psychother-
apist a kind of secular priest.” I replied—apparently to her satisfac-
tion, given the positive outcome of my interview—that I did not. She
then noted that Frankl—a non-practicing Jew and a survivor of the
horrors of Auschwitz—, though open-minded and deeply interested in
spiritual issues, was adamant in insisting that the psychologist should
not “play” Priest. In fact, I later found a statement of his that con-
firmed what she had told me. Frankl asserts, in his book The Doctor
and the Soul, that “Medical Ministry is not ultimately concerned with
the ‘soul’s salvation.’ This could not and should not be its business.”6
He affirms, here, what I said above about the distinction between the
therapy of the soul and psychotherapy. But more importantly, this in-
sightful declaration leads me to the inescapable conclusion that, if the
salvation, or cure, of the soul is not the business of psychology, so,
too, the Priest must be cautious not to take upon himself, without suf-
ficient training in the psychological sciences (or those special cha-
risms that certain spiritual Fathers naturally exhibit), the role of psy-
chologist. Once more, aside from the unusual case of the spiritually
____________
6. Viktor E. Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul (New York: Vintage Books,
1973), p. 277. It goes without saying, given his respect for the role of spiri-
tual life in healthy living, that Dr. Frankl does not offer these words in a way
derogatory to religion. He simply avers that these concerns are distinct ones.
gifted, we return to the question of credentials and the necessity of

setting, and attaining to, proper standards in any area of endeavor.7
Much of what I have said about Metropolitan Hierotheos’ re-
markable books on Orthodox psychotherapy applies to the book Con-
quering Depression, just as some of my comments on the latter work
will apply to His Eminence’s writings. I earlier characterized both the
Metropolitan’s works and Conquering Depression as coming “from
within” Orthodoxy. I did not necessarily mean this as a positive en-
dorsement; rather, it seems to be that, because such works carry with
them the implicit approbation of what comes from within the Church,
the unwary Orthodox reader may attribute to them an authoritative
character that obscures the reservations that I have raised. Moreover,
____________
7. As an aside, let me note that efforts to subsume all areas of knowledge
under some exhaustive philosophical, or even theological, system or image
are fraught with danger and often arise, not just out of the enthusiasm of the
genuine polymath, but sometimes out of a closed intellectual system that has
its origin in psychological predispositions or certain personality traits. In his
compelling portrait of no less a figure than Sigmund Freud, the psychiatrist
and writer, Anthony Storr, describes Freud—most assuredly a brilliant poly-
histor, of course—as a “system builder” who made incursions into many in-
tellectual disciplines, in his desire to bring all human experience, from reli-
gion to literature, under the umbrella of his psychoanalytic theories. Dr. Storr
attributes this predilection to Freud’s “psychological needs,” opining that
Freud’s “obsessional habits” led him to “excessive generalization,” which, in
turn, reinforced his need to build a system that would explain “everything”
(a “TOE,” in the contemporary lexicon, or a “Theory of Everything”). In his
correspondence with C.G. Jung, Freud confirms this diagnosis, describing
himself as an “‘obsessional’ type.” (See Anthony Storr & Anthony Stevens,
Freud and Jung: A Dual Introduction [New York: Barnes and Noble/Oxford
University Press, 1998], pp. 5-9 pass.)
The futile endeavor to encompass “everything” within a single system,
or within the confines of some specific model, is especially dangerous in the-
ology, where fundamentalistic thinkers attribute to Scripture, for example,
knowledge and authority in every human field of inquiry, when in actuality
this is a fatuous vision of the nature of Scripture. Theology, like all intellec-
tual pursuits, more properly aims at an approximation of the truth and that
elusive vision of what lies beyond our imagery and methodology. (Thus,
even in science, naive empiricism has today succumbed to nuanced notions
of what is “real.”) Attempts by various religious writers to explain every phe-
nomenon known to man in a unified, single theological theory—as in as-
suming that spiritual therapy totally overshadows or even obviates the need
for psychological intervention in the treatment of mental disorders—stems, I
think, not only from a certain dilettantism, but also from the psychology of
the literalist, who, ironically enough, would like to attribute to a human sys-
tem of knowledge the integrative and universal enlightenment which the
Christian Patristic tradition attributes to a lofty noetic revelation that ulti-
mately transcends the methods and content of theological mentation.
this book, in particular, suggests that the language of spiritual life and
medical psychology are necessarily identic; that is, that the depression
(melancholia) often experienced in the course of ascetic and spiritual
struggles is the same thing as clinical depression as a psychologist un-
derstands it. Admittedly, the symptoms often seem similar, but the eti-
ology of each is more often than not quite different. Here, again, we
come to the issue of superficial and specious associations between
phenomena in spiritual therapy which, while we may model them
after what we see in psychological pathology, involve both noetic and
dianoetic processes of a wholly unique and special kind. They are not
phenomena attendant to the symptomology of psychological disor-
ders. To suppose that they are is to misrepresent spiritual “disorders,”
which frequently arise from demonic and psychic attacks and tempta-
tions and which, though they may play a role in psychological disor-
ders, act and operate in a wholly different manner in the process of
spiritual restoration than they do in the course of mental illnesses.
By way of illustration, I might cite, out of the many different de-
finitions and connotative definitions of depression found in Conquer-
ing Depression, just a few: “All the demons teach the soul to love
pleasures; only the demon of dejection refrains...from this” (Abba Ev-
agrios the Hermit);8 “Our major struggle is against the demon of
gloom” (St. John Cassian);9 “When the evil spirit of sorrow seizes the
soul, it fills it with distress and unpleasantness” (St. Seraphim of Sa-
rov);10 “Despondency first of all comes from faintheartedness and
from seeking comfort out of temporal or worldly consolation” (Father
Adrian of New Diveyevo).11 It is immediately apparent, from these
few quotations, that these writers are speaking of depression of demo-
nic origin or of despondency within the spiritual (and, more specifi-
cally, monastic) life, as evidenced by the fact that Abba Evagrios, in a
continuation of his comments on despondency, describes the process
by which a monastic is slowly separated from his vocation through
the action of this “noon-day demon.”12 St. John Cassian is likewise ad-
dressing monastics, when he speaks of the effects of the demon of
gloom in thwarting the ascetic’s attainment of spiritual virtues. St.
Seraphim refers to an evil spirit of sorrow that leads to alienation from
spiritual practices. And Father Adrian allows that faintheartedness and
despondency of the kind that he describes have their root in Divine
Providence, assigned by God to the struggling Christian as a means to
evoke salutary resistance and struggle on his part.
____________
8. Conquering Depression, op. cit., pp. 21.
9. Ibid., pp. 19ff.
10. Ibid., p. 29.
11. Ibid., p. 25.
12. Ibid., pp. 25f.
Clinical depression as a psychologist diagnoses and treats it may

have distinct and immediate spiritual consequences for the patient;
however, it is quite distinct in its causes (e.g., chemical imbalances,
personality and social deficits, etc.), dimensions, and technical attrib-
utes from spiritual depression or despondency as we have just por-
trayed it. These elements in clinical depression are, in fact, very care-
fully described and catalogued in classical nosology. Agitated depres-
sion, involutional melancholia, or the depression associated with
bipolar disorders, for instance, are specific in their etiology, their pro-
gressive effects on cognitive functioning, and their consequences for
various physiological systems. By contrast, though many of the symp-
toms of these disorders can be seen, once more, in cases of spiritual
depression or despondency, they do not resemble the former in any
definitive or technical way. Nor, indeed, do the “existential” disorders
that psychologists and psychiatrists or other psychotherapists with a
“spiritual bent,” such as Frankl, associate with psycho-spiritual defi-
cits correspond in etiology and development to spiritual illnesses as
they are classified and described in Patristic literature. Drawing such
parallels is, as I have said, unjustified, unwise, and unwarranted.
Finally, whereas Metropolitan Hierotheos describes the therapy of
the soul in the language of medical psychology, he does not imply that
Orthodox psychotherapy can conquer or cure psychological disorders
(even if, as I have observed, some, grossly overstating his analogical
approach, may conclude this). However, this claim, whether by inten-
tion or not, is nonetheless implicit in the title of the volume on de-
pression published by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood. In a
section of the book entitled “Preface to the ‘Caught Fishes,’”13 follow-
ing his Introduction14 and a beautiful essay by the physician and ex-
traordinary man of letters, I.M. Andreyev,15 on the New Martyr Maria
of Gatchina (who suffered horribly from Parkinson’s disease—paral-
ysis agitans, or “shaking palsy”—and who, fortunately spared from
the debilitating psychological symptoms which sometimes accompa-
ny the disease [depression among them], was granted the preternatur-
al gift of comforting those suffering from sorrow and despondency),
Father Herman acknowledges that “the sin of grave despair” is given
to Christians by God “in order to strengthen their spiritual and psy-
chological powers.” He also ties despondency to the neophyte mo-
nastic who “loses heart because of a lack of patience.” Yet, he imme-
diately thereafter links, as in his Introduction, depression with “mod-
ern man” and “his Western psychological attitude towards life”16 and
____________
13. Ibid., pp. 17f.
14. Ibid., pp. 7-9.
15. Ibid., pp. 11-14.
16. Ibid., p. 17.
the malaise of disbelief. As a result, one is left with the impression

that the book in question is about the conquest or cure of both spiri-
tual depression and what I have called clinical depression—again, a
cause for some concern.
My concern is further heightened in the face of the following ob-
servation by Abbot Herman:
Depression, ‘gloom and doom,’ although an ancient enemy, is espe-
cially prevalent in modern times. Modern man is raised on the ever-pre-
sent heresy of chiliasm (that Christ will establish His thousand-year
reign on earth, contrary to the Orthodox teaching that now is the thou-
sand years wherein the devil’s power is bound), which is a substitute for
sober faith in God and man. Therefore, modern man is weak.... This in
turn undermines his faith in God and in himself.... The result is depres-
sion when he sees that he is weak.17
I am not entirely sure, in the first place, that Chiliasm (Millenarian-
ism) has any ascendency whatever in America or Western Europe, ex-
cept in some very small and isolated sects. Why this heresy under-
mines man’s faith in God and himself, at least in the intellectual sense,
is also unclear to me. If the argument is that heresy weakens the hu-
man and that the failure of the utopian fantasy of a coming Christian
millennium to manifest itself will cause despair among the Chiliast
sectarians, perhaps there is some merit to the observation. But to link
this to depression, and especially when that term is used in an unde-
fined and confusing manner, as it is in Conquering Depression—these
things serve to underscore my misgivings about the popular associa-
tion of psychotherapeutic language and models with Orthodox spiri-
tuality in a non-technical, often tendentious, and improvident manner.
I do not for a moment, of course, question the good intentions of the
authors and compilers of this volume. I simply think that, much more
so than the works of Metropolitan Hierotheos, the book per se poses
all of the risks that I have enumerated in this essay.
Now, turning to Byzantine historiography and Rice’s book on
everyday life in Byzantium, I would like to restate and reinforce my
emphasis on the need to understand and study the issues at hand and
to avoid imprudent and, at times, superficial observations about areas
in which one is not an expert. What I have to say specifically about
Professor Rice’s book is not, in fact, unrelated to what I have said in
addressing the precision and care necessary for an accurate, intelligent
assessment of the nexus between spiritual and psychological therapies
or spiritual despondency and clinical depression. In her work, Every-
day Life in Byzantium, Rice naturally touches on the Church and pop-
ular spirituality, since the life of the Orthodox Church was, for the
Byzantine, integrally woven into the fabric of society and the politi-
____________
17. Ibid.
cal life. As Rice correctly observes, “the Byzantine people...were in

the habit of comparing the Empire and the Church to the human body
and its soul,” showing at all times a “passionate...interest in religion
and the Church.”18 The Byzantines, she goes on to point out,
attach[ed] more importance, throughout their history, to the salvation of
their souls than to physical or material well-being, an outlook which col-
ored their attitude to life and dictated their behavior, making them look
to the Church in all things.19
However, despite the excellence of her historical research and analy-
sis of the religiosity of Byzantine society, when she speaks of popular
spiritual piety, she shows an uncharacteristic and dolorous lack of un-
derstanding of the Orthodox Faith and its practice, and especially with
regard to the veneration of Saints and the rôle of asceticism in the
Church’s spiritual life. In particular, she speaks with an obvious lack
of theological percipience or basic reading in hagiographical texts
about the Stylites (or Saint Symeon the Stylite [† 493] and his emula-
tors and successors, who took upon themselves the ascetic feat of
standing for long periods of time on a pillar or elevated platform and
who will be the particular focus of my comments).
Professor Rice’s work is not a book sui generis in its careless ap-
proach to spiritual and historical issues in Byzantine history; there-
fore, my criticisms of her work are not ad hominem in nature. In point
of fact, her carelessness in approaching theological and spiritual is-
sues is part of an historiographical weakness in Byzantine scholar-
ship—and especially in the West—that is at times perplexing, if not
appalling. Writing with a spirit foreign to Orthodox spirituality, from
outside that tradition, Rice asserts that the anchorites of the first cen-
turies of Byzantium found it “more important to insure the salvation
of their own souls, and, by their example, that of others than to im-
prove the earthly existence of their fellow-men.” She further describes
their asceticism as concerned “not so much...on behalf of others as in
ridding themselves of evil by mortifying their flesh.” The main goal
of the ascetic monks, in her view, was “to save their souls from perdi-
tion.”20 Concerning the Stylites in particular, she notes that they
spent their lives standing on columns some 40 cubits high and enclosed
at the top by a rail to preserve them from falling when asleep. ...They en-
dured the extremities of heat and cold, sometimes blinded by the sun, at
other times covered by a coating of ice; in an age when cleanliness made
no claim to godliness, such men as these lived in evil-smelling filth.21
In assessing the experiences of the Stylites and early Christian as-
____________
18. Tamara Talbot Rice, Everyday Life in Byzantium, op cit., p. 57.
19. Ibid., p. 71.
20. Ibid., p. 75.
21. Ibid., p. 76.
cetics, Rice turns to Bishop Palladios (365-425), who composed the

famous Lausaic History, a treatise on the history of early Christian
monasticism. She cites his accounts of the “hallucinations, tempta-
tions and sufferings” of these ascetics; in her words, “half-starved,
tormented creatures.”22 In the same vein, but in less sympathetic lan-
guage, no less a scholar than the Oxford Byzantinist Cyril Mango says
of the “oriental monks” and ascetics—and the Stylites in particular—
that much of their behavior was meant to draw attention to them-
selves, thus becoming “attraction[s]” with such things as the “column
trick,” as he says of St. Daniel the Stylite, successor to St. Symeon.23
In general, Professor Mango observes, the ascetic monks were “witch
doctors” of sorts, who “basked in the notoriety they were meant to
avoid.”24 Both in Rice’s empathetic pity for the tortured victims of as-
ceticism and Mango’s acerbity and utter disdain for Orthodox monas-
ticism, we find those immense lapses in historiographical objectivity
endemic to histories of the spiritual traditions of the Byzantine Em-
pire generally available to a Western audience—once more because
an historian who speculates on the domain of theology and spirituali-
ty, but who does so in a superficial way, fails at the task of presenting
the whole spirit of the Byzantine people and their age.
In contrast to what we are told by Professor Rice, the Stylites
were not impervious to the plight of their fellow men. In fact, Eliza-
beth Dawes and Norman Baynes, in their introduction to the life of St.
Symeon the Stylite, asseverate that, while the Saint spent “the night
and the greater part of the day...in prayer, ...twice a day he addressed
the folk who thronged about the column.” At these times, the authors
note, he gave the Faithful “moral counsel,” settled “their disputes,”
and “healed their diseases.”25 As well, in the Saint’s life, mention is
made even of his tremendous love for animals.26 All of this suggests
that St. Symeon—and a similar observation can be made about many
other ascetic figures—was not a selfish crank driven by a fear of dam-
nation and unconcerned about the world around him. Moreover, de-
spite the asceticism of these Saints, the fact that St. Symeon is said to
have lived to be a hundred years of age, and spent only several
decades of his life on his pillar,27 provides us with evidence that there
were a purpose and limits to such ascetic feats that transcend the mere
____________
22. Ibid., p. 77.
23. Cyril Mango, Byzantium: The Empire of New Rome (New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1980), p. 111.
24. Ibid., 112f.
25. Elizabeth Dawes & Norman H. Baynes, Three Byzantine Saints
(Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1977), p. 3.
26. See “The Life of St. Simeon the Stylite,” Orthodox Life, Vol. XXIII,
No. 5 (September-October 1983), p. 9.
27. Ibid., p. 11.
“mortification of the flesh.” Moreover, unless we supplement Bishop

Palladius’ descriptions of the torments and the sufferings of the early
monastic ascetics with his comments about the transformation of soul
and character that such ascetic efforts effected, we have a very unclear
picture of spiritual heroism in Byzantium and the nature and goals of
the public struggles which they undertook.
Finally, nowhere in the theology of the Orthodox Church do we
find the idea that sanctity rises out of a self-centered or selfish pursuit
of deliverance from perdition by the mortification of the flesh. Ascetic
labors are not directed against the supposed “evil” of the body; rather,
they serve as examples of the cleansing of evil passions and, I should
emphasize, victory over selfishness. They are undertaken to restore
and depurate the emotions, the physical body, and even the passions.
In the case of the Stylites and other exemplary ascetics, the very pur-
pose of their extreme and even seemingly grotesque sacrifices was to
evoke sobriety and attention to the spiritual aspects of man and of life.
And this was not meant to denigrate and demean the world, but to
give it a fullness and a sense of meaning. Even a cursory understand-
ing of the rôle and goal of asceticism in the Orthodox Church would
lead an objective historian away from precisely the conclusions which
Rice—too imprudently and rashly overstepping the boundaries of
good history—draws when she comments, without sufficient reading
and preparation in the pertinent theological and hagiographic litera-
ture, on the popular spiritual life in Byzantium, in general, and on
matters of sanctity and ascetic practice, in particular. Reinforced by a
prevailing historiographical ethos in Byzantine historical studies, she
succumbs to ideas and views that, hackneyed though they may be, are
faulty, misleading, imprudent, and typical of a contemporary scholar-
ly mediocrity that is not representative of her otherwise superb stud-
ies and writings.
It is without arrogance, and surely faulting myself for the same
lapses that I have so severely criticized in this essay, that I have made
the foregoing observations. My purpose has been to express alarm and
concern about the trends which I see, since they do irreparable dam-
age to our understanding of the Orthodox Faith and its history and de-
velopment. They also harm souls by leading to a literalism and fun-
damentalism that are inimical to the spirit of the Fathers; to a view of
Church history which spawns cynicism and disbelief; and to a certain
intellectual smugness or academic petulance that rests on the sand of
poor scholarship, inadequately-formed thought, and faulty presuppo-
sitions. Since what is built on sand soon collapses, these occasional
scholarly peccadillos—seemingly innocent foibles—are part of a
process of decay that threatens human knowledge and the spiritual
wisdom to which it can lead us. The catholicon for this ailment is an
enduring respect for true learning and prudent scholarship.
A Homily on Holy Pascha*
by our Father Among the Saints,
St. John Chrysostomos
1. It is opportune for us all to exclaim today, as did the blessed

David: “Who shall tell of the mighty acts of the Lord? Who shall
make all His praises to be heard?” (Psalm 105:2, Septuaginta). For
behold, we have arrived at the saving Feast for which we have been
longing, the day of the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
basis of peace, the cause of reconciliation, the abolition of wars, the
destruction of death, and the defeat of the Devil. Today men join com-
pany with the Angels and those clothed in bodies henceforth offer up
hymns with the Bodiless Powers. Today the tyranny of the Devil is an-
nihilated; today the bonds of death are loosed, and the victory of
Hades is annulled. Today is the right time for us to utter again those
words of the Prophet: “O death, where is thy sting? O Hades, where
is thy victory?” (Hosea 13:14; I Corinthians 15:55). Today our Mas-
ter Christ has crushed the gates of brass and destroyed the very char-
acter of death. Why do I say “character”? Because it has changed its
name; it is no longer called “death,” but “repose” and “sleep.” For, be-
fore the coming of Christ and the œconomy of the Cross, the very
name of death was fearful. Indeed, the first man was gravely chas-
tened when he heard the following sentence: “In whatsoever day ye
eat [of the forbidden Tree], ye shall surely die” (Genesis 2:17). The
blessed Job called it by this name when he said: “Death is rest for a
man” (Job 3:23). The Prophet David said: “The death of sinners is
evil” (Psalm 33:22, Septuaginta). The dissolution of the soul from the
body was called not only “death,” but also “Hades.” Listen to what the
Patriarch Jacob says: “Ye shall bring down mine old age with sorrow
to Hades” (Genesis 42:38); and also the Prophet Isaiah: “Hades hath
opened wide its mouth” (Isaiah 5:14); and another Prophet: “Thou
hast delivered my soul from the nethermost Hades” (Psalm 85:13,
Septuaginta). In many places in the Old Testament you will find our
passage from this world called “death” and “Hades.” But since Christ
our God was offered as a sacrifice and rose from the dead, He, the
Master Who loves mankind, has done away with these appellations
and has introduced a new and extraordinary way of life into our
world. Our passage from this life is now called “repose” and “sleep”
instead of “death.” Now, what is the evidence for this? Listen to what
Christ says: “Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake
him out of sleep” (St. John 11:11). For, just as it is easy for us to awak-
en and arouse one who is asleep, so also is it easy for the common
Master of us all to raise men from the dead. And since what Christ
said was novel and unprecedented, not even the Disciples understood
it until, condescending to their weakness, He stated it more clearly.
The blessed Paul, the teacher of the inhabited earth, writing to the
Thessalonians, says: “But I would not have you to be ignorant,
brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even
as others which have no hope” (I Thessalonians 4:13); and again, in
another place: “Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ have
perished” (I Corinthians 15:18); and again: “We which are alive and
remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are
asleep” (I Thessalonians 4:15); and again, in another place: “For if we
believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which
sleep...will God bring with Him” (I Thessalonians 4:14).
2. Do you see, therefore, how death is everywhere called “repose”
and “sleep,” and how that which was previously terrible has now, after
the Resurrection, become worthy of contempt? Do you see the splen-
did trophy of the Resurrection? On account of the Resurrection, innu-
merable good things have befallen us; on account of this, the decep-
tion of the demons has been undone; on account of this, we laugh at
death; on account of this, we disdain the present life; on account of
this, we are urged on to a desire for things to come; on account of this,
clad in bodies as we are, we are in no way inferior to the Bodiless
Powers, if only we wish to be so. Today we celebrate a splendid vic-
tory. Today our Master, having set up a trophy of victory over death
and destroyed the tyranny of the Devil, has bestowed on us the path
to salvation through the Resurrection. Therefore, let us all rejoice,
exult, and make glad. For, even though our Master has conquered and
set up the trophy, yet His gladness and joy are ours, too. He has done
all of this for the sake of our salvation. As for those things by which
the Devil overthrew us, it is through these that Christ overcame him.
Christ took up these weapons and therewith laid low the Devil. Hear
how He did so: a virgin, wood, and death were the symbols of our de-
feat. For, Eve was a virgin; she had not yet known her husband when
she was deceived. The wood was the tree; death was the chastisement
imposed on Adam. Do you see how a virgin, a tree, and death were
the symbols of our defeat? See, then, how they also became, in turn,
causes of our victory. Instead of Eve, Mary; instead of the Tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, the Tree of the Cross; instead of Adam’s
death, the Master’s death. Do you see how the Devil was defeated
through the same means through which he conquered us? Through the
Tree the Devil laid Adam low; through the Cross Christ vanquished
the Devil. The former Tree sent mankind to Hades, whereas the latter
Tree, the Tree of the Cross, recalled the departed from Hades. The for-
mer Tree concealed defeated Adam as one captive and naked, where-
as the latter Tree revealed to all the Victor nailed naked to it on high.
The former death condemned all who came after it, but the latter death
truly raised up those who came before it. “Who shall tell of the mighty
acts of the Lord? Who shall make all His praises to be heard?” (Psalm
105:2, Septuaginta). From being dead we have become immortal,
from a fall we have been raised up, and from being defeated we have
become victors.
3. These are the achievements of the Cross, and they constitute
the greatest proof of the Resurrection. Today the Angels exult and all
of the Heavenly Powers make glad, rejoicing over the common sal-
vation of the human race. For, if there is joy in Heaven and on earth
over one repentant sinner (St. Luke 15:7), how much more is there joy
over the salvation of the entire world. Today Christ has freed human
nature from the tyranny of the Devil and restored it to its former no-
bility. For, when I behold my Firstfruits (I Corinthians 15:23) prevail-
ing thus over death, no longer am I afraid, no longer do I dread the
combat; and I do not regard my infirmity, but I think of the ineffable
power that will fight on my side in the future. For, He Who overcame
the tyranny of death and deprived it of all its strength, what will He
not henceforth do for the sake of His kin, whose form He deigned to
assume in His great love for mankind, that very form whereby He also
deigned to contend against the Devil? Today there is joy and spiritual
gladness throughout the inhabited earth. Today the assembly of An-
gels and the chorus of all the Hosts on high rejoice over the salvation
of mankind. Therefore, consider, my beloved, the magnitude of this
joy, that the Hosts on high celebrate the Feast together with us; they
rejoice with us over the good things that befall us. For, even though
the Grace that comes from the Master is ours, yet the delight also be-
longs to them. For this reason, they are not ashamed to celebrate with
us. Why do I say that our fellow-servants are not ashamed to celebrate
with us? Because the Master Himself, Who is both their Master and
ours, is not ashamed to celebrate with us. Why do I say that He is not
ashamed? Because He even desires to celebrate with us. My evidence
for this? Hear what He Himself says: “With desire I have desired to
eat this Passover with you” (St. Luke 22:15). If He desired to eat the
Passover, it is clear that He also desires to celebrate the Feast with us.
And so, when you behold not only Angels and the assembly of all the
Heavenly Powers, but also the Master of the Angels Himself cele-
brating with us, what ground for gladness do you lack henceforth? Let
no one, therefore, be downcast today on account of his poverty, for
this is a spiritual Feast.
Let no rich man be puffed up on account of his wealth; for he can-
not contribute anything to this Feast from his money. In the case of
secular—I mean worldly—feasts, where there is much ostentation in
clothing and in the sumptuousness of the table, in such a case it is nat-
ural that a poor man should be despondent and dejected, while the rich
man is filled with pleasure and good cheer. And why is this? Because
the rich man is clad in splendid garments and sets a more lavish fare
before himself, whereas the poor man is prevented by his poverty
from displaying the same opulence. Here, there is no such thing; all
of this inequality is absent, and there is a single table for both rich and
poor, for both slave and freeman. If you are rich, you will have no
more than the poor man; if you are poor, you will have no less than
the rich man, and the abundance of the spiritual banquet is in no way
diminished because of your poverty; for the Grace is Divine and
knows no distinction of persons. Why do I say that the same table is
set before rich and poor man alike? A single table is set before him
who wears a diadem and a purple robe and possesses sovereignty over
the entire world, and before the pauper who sits begging for alms.
Such is the nature of spiritual gifts; participation in them is appor-
tioned, not in accordance with rank, but in accordance with will and
intention. Both king and pauper set out with the same boldness and
honor to enjoy and commune of these Divine Mysteries. But why do
I say, “with the same honor”? Oftentimes the poor man communes
with greater boldness. Why so? Because the king, surrounded by ad-
ministrative cares and beset by a multitude of exigencies, as if tossing
on the ocean, is sprayed by successive waves and afflicted by many
sins, whereas the pauper, being free of all these cares and being con-
cerned only about gaining the necessary sustenance, leads a easy-
going and quiet life, sitting, as it were, in a tranquil harbor, and ap-
proaches the Holy Table with great devotion.
4. And not only this, but different kinds of despondency are en-
gendered from many other causes by those who occupy their time
with worldly feasting. For there, the poor man is dejected, while the
rich man is cheerful, not only on account of the repast and its lavish-
ness, but also on account of the splendor and ostentation of his rai-
ment. For, the suffering which the poor man experiences over the rich
man’s fare he also experiences over the latter’s clothing. Therefore,
when the poor man sees the rich man clad in expensive garments, he
is smitten with grief, reckons himself miserable, and utters innumer-
able curses. Here, at the Lord’s Table, this despondency is eliminated;
for, all have the same garment, namely, the robe of salvation, as Paul
exclaims: “For as many of you as have been Baptized into Christ have
put on Christ” (Galatians 3:27). Let us, then, not be ashamed at such
a Feast, I beseech you, but let us rather assume an attitude worthy of
the gifts bestowed upon us by the Grace of Christ. Let us not give our-
selves over to inebriation and gluttony. No rather, let us bear in mind
the munificence of our Master, that He honors both rich and poor, both
slaves and freemen alike and pours out a common bounty for all, and
let us repay our Benefactor for His good will towards us. A God-
pleasing way of life and a vigilant and alert soul would constitute a
sufficient repayment on our part. This Feast, this Festival does not re-
quire money or expenditure, but only intention and a pure mind.
Nothing corporeal can be purchased here; rather, everything about it
is spiritual—the hearing of the Divine Scriptures, the prayers of the
Fathers, the blessings of the Priests, communion of the Divine and in-
effable Mysteries, peace and harmony, and spiritual gifts worthy of
the munificence of their Giver. Let us, therefore, celebrate this Feast
whereon our Lord arose. For, He arose and raised up the entire world
with Himself. He arose and burst the bonds of death; He arose and
broke the cords of our sins. Adam sinned and died; Christ did not sin,
and yet, He died. This is new and paradoxical: the one sinned and
died; the Other did not sin, and yet, He died. For what cause and for
what reason? In order that he who sinned and died could, through Him
Who did not sin and yet died, be freed from the bonds of death. This
is how it often happens in the case of those who owe money: some-
one owes money to someone else and cannot pay the amount he owes,
and so he is put in bonds; another man, who does not owe anything,
is able to make the payment; he deposits the amount in question and
releases the one liable to punishment. This is what happened also in
Adam’s case. Adam had incurred death and was held in bonds by the
Devil; Christ was not a debtor, nor was He in bonds; He came and
paid the debt of death on behalf of him who was fettered, in order to
release him from the bonds of death. Do you see the triumph of the
Resurrection? Do you see the Master’s love for mankind? Do you see
the magnitude of His Providence?
Therefore, let us not be ungrateful towards such a Benefactor, nor
let us become sluggish just because the Fast has passed. But now,
more than before, let us be more solicitous for our souls, lest the flesh
become fattened and the soul become weaker, lest by caring for the
handmaid we neglect the mistress. For, tell me, what profit is there in
bursting through overeating and exceeding the bounds of moderation?
This both harms the body and degrades the nobility of the soul. No,
let us be moderate and eat only as much as we need, so as to satisfy
both soul and body as is fitting, lest we squander in one fell swoop all
that we have gathered through fasting. Am I prohibiting you from en-
joying food and relaxing? I do not forbid this, but I exhort you to eat
according to need and to cut off excessive luxury, and not to impair
the health of your soul by going beyond due measure. One who ex-
ceeds the limits of what is necessary will not derive any pleasure from
it, as those who have had experience of this know very well, for there-
by they have brought innumerable kinds of illness upon themselves,
to the point of utter nausea. I do not doubt that you will be persuaded
by my exhortations; for, I know how docile you are.
5. For this reason, now that I have concluded my exhortation on
this subject, I wish to direct my remarks to those deemed worthy, dur-
ing this light-bearing night, of the gift of Divine Baptism, namely, to
these fair plants of the Church, the spiritual flowers, the new soldiers
of Christ. The day before yesterday, the Master hung upon the Cross,
but now He is risen. In the same way, the day before yesterday, these
people were held fast by sin, but are now risen with Christ. He died in
the body and rose, while they who were dead in sin rose from sin. In
this season of spring, the earth brings forth roses, violets, and other
flowers for us; however, the Baptismal waters today show us a mead-
ow more delightful than the earth. Do not be surprised, my beloved,
that flower-decked meadows have sprung forth from these waters; for,
not even in the beginning did the earth produce plants in accordance
with its own nature, but in obedience to the Master’s command. Back
then, the waters brought forth animals endowed with motion when
they heard these words: “Let the waters bring forth reptiles with liv-
ing souls” (Genesis 1:20); and the command became deed: the inani-
mate substance produced animate creatures. Thus, even now, has the
same command accomplished all of these things. Back then, God
said: “Let the waters bring forth reptiles with living souls”; now, the
waters have yielded not reptiles, but spiritual gifts. Back then, the wa-
ters brought forth irrational fish; now, they have borne for us rational
and spiritual fish, which have been caught by the Apostles. “Follow
Me,” Christ said, “and I will make you fishers of men” (St. Matthew
4:19). The manner of this fishing is truly new. For, fishermen remove
fish from the waters and kill what they have caught, whereas we put
fish in the waters and those whom we catch are given life. In the Jew-
ish era there was once a pool of water; now, learn what it was able to
do, so that you may realize precisely how poverty-stricken Judaism is
and come to know the richness of our Faith. “An Angel went down
[into the pool] and troubled the water; whosoever then first after the
troubling of the water descended into it received healing” (cf. St. John
5:4). The Master of the Angels descended into the streams of the Jor-
dan, and, by sanctifying the nature of the waters, healed the entire in-
habited earth. In the case of the pool, he who descended after the first
man could no longer be healed; for, Grace was given to the Jews who
were infirm, who crawled on the ground; but in the case of the Jordan,
after the first man, a second man descends, and after the second, a
third and a fourth; even if you were to say “ten thousand,” even if you
were to put the entire world into these spiritual streams, the Grace is
not depleted, the gift is not exhausted, the streams are not defiled, and
the munificence is not diminished. Do you see the magnitude of the
gift? Hearken, you who have been enrolled today, this very night, as
citizens of the Jerusalem on high, and display a heedfulness worthy of

the greatness of this gift, so that you may attract more abundant Grace
to yourselves; for, gratitude for a gift already received elicits the mu-
nificence of the Master. Henceforth, my beloved, it is not possible for
you to live indifferently; rather, prescribe laws and rules for yourself,
so that you may accomplish everything scrupulously and exhibit great
watchfulness even in matters which are considered unimportant. The
whole of our present life is a contest and a struggle, and it behooves
those who have entered the arena at any moment always to exercise
self-control. For, “every man that striveth for the mastery is temper-
ate in all things” (I Corinthians 9:25). Do you not see how in gym-
nastic contests those who have undertaken to contend against other
men take great care of themselves and with what great continence
they exercise their bodies? So it is in this case, too. Because our fight
is not against human beings, but against the spirits of evil, let our ex-
ercise and our self-control also be spiritual; for, the weapons in which
the Master has clad us are spiritual, too. Therefore, let the eye have its
own limits and rules, so that it does not lightly rush towards every-
thing that comes its way; and let the tongue have its own fence, so that
it does not outrun the mind. For this is why the teeth and the lips were
created, to safeguard the tongue, in order that the tongue might never
indiscreetly throw open its doors and sally forth, but that, whenever it
has properly composed itself, it might then proceed with all decorum
and utter such words as impart grace to those who hear them and say
those things which contribute to their edification. You must altogeth-
er eschew unrestrained laughter; your gait should be calm and digni-
fied and you should keep your clothing tidy. Quite simply, it behooves
one who has enrolled in the arena of virtue to be self-disciplined in all
things; for the good order of one’s external members is an image of
the state of one’s soul.
6. If we conform ourselves to such habits from the outset, walk-
ing with ease henceforth along this path, we will acquire every virtue;
we will not need much toil, and we will attract great help from on
High. For, in this way we shall be able to pass safely through the
waves of the present life and, overcoming the snares of the Devil, to
attain to eternal good things, by the Grace and love for mankind of our
Lord Jesus Christ, unto Whom, together with the Father and the Holy
Spirit, be glory, dominion, and honor, now and ever, and unto the ages
of ages. Amen.
* The Greek original of this homily is found in the Patrologia Græca, Vol.
LII, cols. 765-772. (Though sections of this homily have heretofore appeared
in English, ours is the first complete English translation of the work—Eds.)
Fanaticism and Syncretism*
Two Dangerous Extremes and the
“Royal Path” of Orthodoxy
New Year Encyclical
for 2003
Beloved children in the Lord:

At the outset of the New Year of Salvation 2003, I pray whole-
heartedly that this period of time will be pleasing to God and that we
will all feel an ever-increasing sense of responsibility and reverence
towards the truth of our Faith; may there also be a constant increase
in our participation in the life in Christ, through the intercessions of
our Lady Theotokos and of all the Saints.
The events that have occurred since the tragedy of September 11,
2001, to date, as well as those which are still unfolding, confirm an as-
sertion that I made last year: that “humanity has clearly entered into a
new and critical era, which gives rise to pointed and agonizing is-
sues.”1 In the globalized society of our day and, in particular, at the
very dawn of a new century and the third millennium, two very omi-
nous dangers have come to the forefront: fanaticism and syncretism,
both of which appear in many forms.
On the right is found fanaticism, which is typically politicized,
extremist, and xenophobic. With its recourse to violence, aggressive-
ness, and bigotry, it completely destroys the Orthodox ethos, which is
an ethos of love, compassion, receptivity, reconciliation, hospitable-
ness, freedom, and moderation. On the left, we find syncretism, which
is excessively permissive, compromising, dialectical, contrived, and
worldly. It minimizes the importance of Orthodox dogma, which lim-
pidly demarcates the realms of truth and error, of the Church and the
world, of Light and darkness, of Christ and Satan.
Our most holy Orthodox Church, as the “Royal Path,”2 is situat-
ed precisely in the middle, steadfastly avoiding temptations and dan-
gers from the right and from the left, which threaten to adulterate her
charismatic witness, that veritable “Truth and Life” which the God-
Man affirms Himself to be.3
Fanaticism, aggressive and bigoted, is not a product of some lack
of coöperation between religions; nor will interfaith coöperation suc-
ceed in confronting it effectively, or at its roots, as some suppose. Tol-
erance per se is not what is asked of the Church, the duty of which is
to maintain a missionary outlook towards the religions of the world—

though it certainly must be encouraged at the level of governments
and humanitarian movements. And there, too, we should not foster
any illusions; indeed, toleration is neither easy to attain nor to pre-
serve, since there will always be two uncertain factors to reckon
with—namely, human passions and the Devil.
The Orthodox Church knows only one kind of peace: that which
proceeds from the cleansing, illuminating, and sanctifying Grace of
the Holy Spirit, which heals the passions and puts the Devil to flight.
It behooves Shepherds of the Church, instead of pursuing some chi-
mæra by means of interfaith coöperation, to work night and day to
make their flocks truly Christian.
Patristic teaching on this subject is unanimous: When a Christian
has the peace of God in his heart, then the entire world around him is
at peace.
Today, the teaching of St. Seraphim of Sarov, deriving from his
own experience, is timely as never before:
I beseech you, my joy—said the peace-loving Staretz—I beseech you,
acquire the spirit of peace.... It brings peace to the soul, and, at the same
time, it brings peace to all mankind and to nature, as well.... Acquire
inner peace, and thousands of souls around you will find peace.4
St. John Chrysostomos also abruptly awakens us from the lethargy of
spiritual negligence by his preëminently social and missionary mes-
sage:
No one would be a pagan—thunders the Saint—if we were such Chris-
tians as we ought to be. If we kept the commandments of Christ, if we
suffered injury, if we allowed advantage to be taken of us, if being re-
viled we blessed, if being ill-treated we did good. If this were the gen-
eral practice among us, no one would be so brutish as not to rush to em-
brace the true Faith.5
Orthodox Christians should have a heightened sense of responsi-
bility and reverence towards the Truth of the Faith, as well as “a con-
sciousness of the exclusivity of the truth: we believe in the only truth
and participate experientially in the only saving Faith.”6 This con-
sciousness of exclusivity will never give rise to fanaticism, because a
genuine Mysteriological union with the Theanthropos makes us true
Christians, engendering genuine feelings of love, humility, and guile-
lessness towards our fellow man.
It was this attitude towards the truth that enabled Orthodox anti-
ecumenists to detect, from the very outset, the syncretistic nature of
the ecumenical movement and the calendar innovation of 1924. It
should not escape us that the official inauguration of ecumenism in the
Orthodox East also entailed syncretism vis-à-vis the Festal Calendar,
insofar as it foresaw the acceptance by Orthodox and heterodox “of a
unified calendar for the simultaneous celebration of the great Christ-
ian feasts by all of the Churches.”7

Moreover, within the purview of this festal syncretism, the so-
called Pan-Orthodox Congress of Constantinople was convened, in
1923, as the final step towards the calendar innovation. Those partic-
ipating in the congress emphasized, in particular, the necessity “of the
simultaneous celebration of the [two] major Christian feasts of Christ-
mas and Pascha by all Christians,” so as to effect “the rapprochement
of the two Christian worlds of the East and the West in the celebration
of [all of] the major Christian feasts.”8
It is quite obvious, therefore, that the adoption of the calendar in-
novation in 1924, as the practical first-step of ecumenism, reflected a
diminished sense of responsibility towards the truth and a syncretistic
mentality. This was confirmed by steps taken subsequently, thus con-
firming as eminently true the opinion of a distinguished Hierarch of
our day, who maintains that inter-Christian and interfaith ecumenism
“is the greatest error of our age, the greatest and most powerful temp-
tation.”9
I would like to conclude with a message of hope and love.
From what I have said above, it follows that the negative attitude
of Old Calendarist Orthodox anti-ecumenists towards inter-Christian
and interfaith ecumenism does not constitute fanaticism, but repre-
sents, rather, a rejection of syncretism and a God-pleasing adherence
to the exclusivity of the truth.
The Holy Synod in Resistance is not indifferent to the truly sacred
demand for the union of divided Christians; nor does it oppose efforts
to bring about reconciliation in a severely fragmented world.
What we do radically reject is the ethos of the syncretistic ecu-
menical movement, which is literally a “defilement of dialogue,”10 as
a well-known university professor has stated.
Our responsibility for the Truth, our union with the Truth, and our
witness to the Truth constitute the most fundamental expression of
love for the world and preserve the hope of both East and West. This
is why we struggle, and this is why we will continue to struggle, by
the Grace of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
† Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili,

President of the Holy Synod in Resistance
* Translated from the Greek periodical AÜ giow KuprianÒw, No. 312 (January-
February 2003), pp. 193-195, 199. Though somewhat dated, the importance of
this Encyclical has nonetheless prompted us to publish it on the cusp of 2004.
Notes
1. See “New Year Encyclical for 2002.”
2. Cf. Numbers 20:17-21:22.
3. Cf. St. John 14:6.

4. Irina Gorainoff, A
Ü giow Serafe‹m toË Sãrvf (1759-1833) [St. Seraphim
of Sarov (1759-1833)] (Athens: “Tinos” Publications, n.d.), p. 255.
5. Homily 10 on the First Epistle to St. Timothy, §3, Patrologia Græca, Vol.
LXII, col. 551.
6. Stylianos G. Papadopoulos, ÉOryodÒjvn Pore¤a^ÉEkklhs¤a ka‹
Yeolog¤a stØn tr¤th xiliet¤a [The Course of the Orthodox: Church and Theol-
ogy in the Third Millennium] (Athens: 2000), p. 134.
7. “Synodal Encyclical of the Church of Constantinople to the Churches of
Christ Everywhere” (January 1920), in Basil K. Stavrides, ÑIstor¤a t∞w Oﬁ-
koumenik∞w KinÆsevw [A History of the Ecumenical Movement], Analekta of the
Vlatadon Monastery, No. 47 (Thessaloniki: Patriarchal Institute for Patristic
Studies, 1996); 3rd ed., p. 334.
8. Dionysios M. Batistatos (ed.), Praktikå ka‹ ÉApofãseiw toË §n Kvn-
stantinoupÒlei PanoryodÒjou Sunedr¤ou, 10 Ma˝ou-8 ÉIoun¤ou 1923 [Pro-
ceedings and Decisions of the Pan-Orthodox Congress in Constantinople, 10
May-8 June 1923] (Athens: 1982), pp. 56, 57.
9. Metropolitan Hierotheos of Navpaktos and Hagios Vlasios, “Diaxris-
tianikÚw ka‹ diayrhskeiakÚw sugkrhtismÒw” [“Inter-Christian and Interfaith
Syncretism”], ÉEkklhsiastikØ Par°mbash, No. 71 (December 2001), p. 11.
10. Chrestos Yannaras, “ÑH bebÆlvsh toË dialÒgou” [“The Defilement of
Dialogue”], ÑH KayhmerinÆ, 17 March 2002, p. 10.
A Terrible Blunder
A Critical Commentary on Section 840 of
the Catechism of the Catholic Church
by Archimandrite Sergius
Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ begins and

finishes His sermon about the end of the world
with some alarming warnings for us: “Take heed
that no man deceive you. For many shall come in
My Name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive
many”;1 “Watch therefore, for ye know neither the
day nor the hour wherein the Son of man com-
eth”;2 “Take ye heed, watch and pray; for ye know
not when the time is”;3 “Behold, I have foretold
you all things”;4 “And what I say unto you I say
unto all, Watch.”5
St. Cyril, Archbishop of Jerusalem (†387),
also issues similar warnings in his fifteenth Catechetical Lecture:
The true Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God, comes no more from
the earth. If any come making false shows in the wilderness, go not forth;
if they say, ‘Lo, here is the Christ, Lo, there,’6 believe it not. Look no longer
downwards and to the earth; for the Lord descends from Heaven; not alone
as before, but with many, escorted by tens of thousands of Angels; nor se-
cretly as the dew on the fleece; but shining forth openly as the lightning.
For He Himself has said: ‘As the lightning cometh out of the east, and
shineth even unto the west, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man
be.’7,8 ...But this aforesaid Antichrist is to come when the times of the
Roman empire shall have been fulfilled, and the end of the world is then
drawing near.9 ...And who is this, and from what sort of working? ...‘His
coming...is after the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying
wonders.’10,11 ...Guard yourself then, O man; you have the signs of An-
tichrist; and remember them not only yourself, but impart them also freely
to all.12
However, in Section 840 of the new official Catechism of the
Catholic Church, we read:
God’s people of the Old Covenant and the new People of God tend to-
THE VERY REVEREND SERGIUS is a former Assistant Professor at the Faculty of

Theology of the University of Sofia, Bulgaria. He was dismissed from his professor-
ship when, at the time of the adoption of the Papal (or so-called “Revised Julian”)
Calendar by the Church of Bulgaria, he refused to accept this innovation. He now
serves at the Protection of the Mother of God Convent in Sofia, under the omophori-
on of Bishop Photii of Triaditza, Chief Hierarch of the Old Calendar Orthodox
Church of Bulgaria and also a former assistant professor at the University of Sofia.
wards similar goals: expectation of the coming (or the return) of the Messi-
ah. But one awaits the return of the Messiah who died and rose from the
dead and is recognized as Lord and Son of God; the other awaits the com-
ing of a Messiah, whose features remain hidden till the end of time.13
The first error of this text is that it places God’s people of the Old
Covenant and the new People of God on the same level. The Israelites
were chosen as a people to preserve the true faith in the One God, so
that the promised Savior of mankind might be born from among
them.14 However, after the advent of Christ the Savior, the majority of
the Israelites of His time renounced Christ, not recognizing Him as
Messiah, and became a deliberate tool in His Crucifixion, even call-
ing eternal damnation upon themselves when they declared before Pi-
late: “His blood be on us and on our children.”15 There and then the
Israelites ceased to be God’s people; they were superseded as such by
Orthodox Christians, by virtue of the faith of the latter. St. Peter called
the latter “an holy nation, a peculiar people,”16 without regard to na-
tionality, but solely according to their faith in Christ. The Lord Him-
self foretold this in His parable about the evil vine-growers who re-
fused to offer the Lord the fruit of His vineyard: “Therefore say I unto
you, The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a na-
tion bringing forth the fruits thereof.”17
Nevertheless, the French Catholic bishops, in their “Pastoral Di-
rections Concerning the Position of Christians in Relation to Ju-
daism,”18 claim that, “It is not possible to conclude, on the basis of the
New Testament, that the Jewish nation is deprived of its elect status.”
The Second Vatican Council also stated, in its Declaration Nostra
Ætate (chapter 4), that, despite the fact that the Israelites do not be-
lieve in Christ, they are still dear to God as His people.
The second fundamental error in this section of the Catholic Cat-
echism is that the Orthodox Christian expectation of the Second Ad-
vent of Christ—the real Messiah—is blasphemously identified with
the Judaic expectation of Antichrist, the pseudo-messiah, who stands
in place of the Lord Whom they renounced. As Christ said to them: “I
am come in My Father’s name, and ye receive Me not; if another shall
come in his own name, him ye will receive.”19
These incongruous and mutually exclusive ideas are reduced in
the new Roman Catholic Catechism to a common denominator and
are unified in one and the same expectation, the Christian expectation
being enclosed in brackets after the Judaic. The authors of Catechism
must be fully aware that these two expectations are in diametrical op-
position: Christians look forward to the return of the Messiah, Who is
already the Judge of the living and the dead, Whom they recognize as
their Lord and the Son of God, and Who died and rose from the dead
for our salvation, as we confess in the Symbol of Faith; whereas the
Israelites await the coming of a “messiah” “whose features remain
hidden till the end of time.” Nevertheless, the two expectations are
combined together in the new Roman Catholic Catechism, as if they
concern one and the same Messiah.
This fatal phrase is untenable from both a logical and especially
a theological point of view and is a terrible blunder. A harbinger of
this error was clear in the words of Cardinal Lustiger, the Archbishop
of Paris, who is of Jewish origin, in a 1981 press interview.20 Lustiger
declared:
The image of the Messiah is a hidden image. Christians often forget that
they expect the fullness of the time to come, the glorious advent of the Mes-
siah whose disciples they are.... To Judaism, Christianity is a kind of anti-
cipation and precipitation. Thus, Judaism is entitled to some sort of control
over Christianity.21
In essence, Section 840 of the new official Catechism of the
Catholic Church opens the way for that serious confusion—prophe-
sied to come at the end of time—between the hidden pseudo-messiah,
the Antichrist, and the true Messiah, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
Whose Second Advent the Angels at the Lord’s Ascension proclaimed
to the Apostles: “This same Jesus, Which is taken up from you into
Heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into
Heaven.”22
Notes
1. St. Matthew 24:4-5; cf. St. Mark 13:5-6, St. Luke 21:8.
2. St. Matthew 25:13.
3. St. Mark 13:33.
4. St. Mark 13:23.
5. St. Mark 13:37.
6. St. Mark 13:21.
8. Patrologia Græca, Vol. XXXIII.
9. Ibid.
10. II Thessalonians 2:9.
11. Patrologia Græca, Vol. XXXIII.
12. Ibid.
13. Catechism of the Catholic Church (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical
Press, 1994), p. 223 [emphasis ours].
14. Cf. Genesis 3:15.
16. I St. Peter 2:9.
18. See La Documentation Catholique, No. 1631 (6 May 1973).
19. St. John 5:43.
20. See the Russian Uniate periodical, Symbol, No. 9 (June 1983).
21. See my article, “Is Cardinal Lustiger a Christian?,” Orthodox Tradition,
Vol. XIII, No. 2 (1996), p. 16 [emphasis ours].
22. Acts 1:11 [emphasis ours].
Obedience in
Monastic Practice
by Bishop Ambrose of Methone
“Obedience is life, disobedience is death” is a saying often heard

in monasteries, and one which has much theological as well as prac-
tical wisdom. It immediately brings our minds back to the point where
death entered into human experience—the point where Adam’s dis-
obedience to the Divine commandment made him an exile from Par-
adise, to the point that his pride and self-confidence would not permit
him to accept in all simplicity the one restriction that his Creator had
laid on him. Through the Fall, man’s distorted will came to dominate
all the other functions of his being; and so it is that only by denying
the fallen will, through obedience, can he reattain his original state of
unity within himself and with the will of God. Once more, we see in
the history of the Old Testament that it is exactly their disobedience
which led to the withdrawal of God’s blessing on the people of Israel
and turned them from being a holy people, a people blessed with so
many manifestations of Grace, into a nation wholly captive. The
corollary, that obedience is life, is equally manifest to the attentive
reader of the New Testament; for when, exactly, was it that the Divine
Savior became man for our salvation? When the Mother of God re-
versed Adam’s decision of old, when she accepted in all simplicity the
will of God, saying: “Be it done to me according to thy word.” Obe-
dience freely-given opened the path for the Incarnation, while obedi-
ence in its highest form is demonstrated to us in the earthly life of our
Lord, Who “became obedient unto death, death on the cross”; Who
came “not to perform My will, but that of the Father Who sent Me”;
Who, in the supreme hour of his agony in Gethsemane, said: “If it be
possible, let this cup pass from Me, but not as I will, but as Thou
wilt.” This is the example that every monastic has before him in his
struggle to free himself from his own fallen will and to bow himself
under the yoke of obedience to God’s will: the example which fills
him with hope that he will truly find, even in his life here on earth, the
HIS GRACE, THE RIGHT REVEREND AMBROSE is a brother of the Holy Monastery
of Sts. Cyprian and Justina in Fili, Greece, and assistant to Metropolitan Cyprian of
Oropos and Fili. A native of Great Britain and a convert to the Orthodox Faith, he pur-
sued his graduate studies at the University of London’s renowned Courtauld Institute
of Art and his theological studies at the monastery in Fili. He was also awarded the
Licentiate in Orthodox Theological Studies from the Center for Traditionalist Ortho-
dox Studies. The present essay originally appeared in the book Obedience, written by
Archbishop Chrysostomos of Etna and published by the Holy Cross Orthodox Press
(Brookline, MA: 1984). It is reprinted here by permission of the publisher.
Paradise from which our first ancestors were driven for their disobe-
dience. The Fathers summarize this in a single phrase: “the obedient
monastic becomes a Christ according to Grace.”
Since, for the remaining part of this essay, we will be describing
the practical aspects of obedience, we have appended this introduction
in order to show what exactly is the theological and Scriptural, rather
than practical, foundation on which we base our knowledge that obe-
dience is the essence of the monastic life—indeed, the highest of all
the virtues to which a monk may attain. For the Christian layman,
obedience has primarily the significance of the fulfillment of the com-
mandments of the Gospels and the injunctions of the Church; but to
the monk, it is, as we hope to show, much more. For obedience is es-
sentially a monastic virtue, the one virtue which distinguishes the
monastic from the pious Christian layman. In our experience, we have
known some admirable laymen who have exceeded most monks in
their ascetic labors of fasting, chastity, poverty, and acts of charity. Yet
they do not reach the level of a monk who may not have these virtues,
but who is obedient in all things; for, the layman wishes to do good
works and performs them following his will, whereas the monk cuts
off his will at all points and does nothing without the knowledge of
his Superior. (The terms “spiritual Father,” “Abbot,” “Elder,” or “Su-
perior,” as used here, all have the same significance: that of the indi-
vidual under whom the monk places himself in obedience. Similarly,
the inclusive term “monk, which we use for convenience, includes fe-
male monastics, or nuns”, whose monasticism is in all respects iden-
tical to that of the male monastic; moreover, it even applies to that rare
layman who piously lives in strict obedience to his spiritual Father.)
The life of the monk is, therefore, a voluntary martyrdom, in which
the fallen human will undergoes a violent death in order to recover
again the paradisiacal state of integrity and unity with God.
Every monk under obedience—an hypotaktikos in Greek—will
begin any task he has to do with this brief prayer: “Through the pray-
ers of my holy Father, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on
me.” And it is with these words that I set out on the task of this essay,
most especially since all that I have to write is from the teaching of
my own spiritual Father and his gleanings from the works of the Fa-
thers. This prayer expresses one of the basic aspects of monastic obe-
dience—the absolute trust of the disciple in the saving prayer of his
spiritual Father. This confidence can, and often does, work miracles.
It is perhaps fitting, then, to start on this monastic voyage with just
such a miraculous occurrence, which happened to a Father who re-
posed in the Lord here in Greece ten years ago. In his youth, this Fa-
ther was a monk at the Monastery of Saint Sabbas in the Judean
wilderness. One day, as he was returning from an errand in Jerusalem,
he was attacked by a lion, which instantly killed his mule and was
about to set upon him also. He cried to God with the words: “Through
the prayers of my holy Father, Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me!”
And at that instant he found himself, without knowing how, standing
before the gates of his monastery, which was several miles away. So
pleasing to God was the confidence of this disciple in his Elder, that
He saved him from a certain and terrible death.
The Apostle Paul, in his Epistles, several times recommends
slaves to be obedient to their masters and Christians, in general, to be
obedient to the civil authorities. This is not only because he foresaw
in the Roman Empire a vehicle for the triumph of Christianity, but
even more because public order and peace are essential to the pur-
suance of Christian virtues; indeed, they are virtues in themselves.
This observation may lead us to an aspect of obedience which would
probably be the first to occur to one who has not yet carefully consid-
ered the question: the obvious fact that, without obedience in the ex-
ternal sense—that is, the obeying of the orders of superiors by inferi-
ors—, it would be impossible to regulate not only a monastery, but
any organization whatsoever. It would simply break up of its own ac-
cord and dissolve into anarchy. While this is evidently true, I hope that
we will be able to demonstrate that it is the very least important func-
tion of obedience.
In our examination of how obedience forms and shapes the life of
a monk, let us start at the beginning of his monastic course, with the
moment that he decides to dedicate his life to God and chooses a cer-
tain monastery or a certain spiritual Father to be his own. Both of
these decisions, needless to say, must be made with great considera-
tion, as they are decisions for life. Indeed, his dedication must be ab-
solute and unconditional; otherwise, the monastic life he will lead will
be less than blessed and less than perfect. If he has possessions, he
must give them all away before entering the monastery, or give them
to his spiritual Father to dispose of. What is left—himself alone—he
dedicates to God. Therefore, just as he is no longer master of his for-
mer material possessions, he is no longer master of himself; from now
on, it is for God to direct him—not only in his actions, but in his
thoughts and feelings also—on the course of His will. And as God al-
most always acts not directly, but through the agency of men, so it is
in this case. In the monastic life, it is the spiritual Father who is illu-
minated by God’s Grace to guide his disciples in all things. The monk
dedicates his entire being to God’s service, and hence, just as it is an
act of sacrilege to appropriate for some other use an item which has
been dedicated specifically to the service of God and his Church, so it
is an act of sacrilege for the monk, once he has dedicated himself, to
take back what he has given over into God’s hands in the person of his
spiritual Father. It is a fault on his part to use even temporarily this gift
which is no longer his, the greatest gift which God has bestowed on
man, and which the monk in gratitude returns to his Savior: his self-
determination and free will. In a practical sense, this signifies that he
will no longer undertake any action, however laudable, necessary, or
even mundane, without the blessing of his Abbot. The blessing, which
is so much a part of the everyday life of the monk, means simply that
the monk submits whatever he considers necessary to be done to the
Elder, accepting the response in all confidence. Similarly, the disciple
should reply to some command: “May it be blessed” (“na einai
evlogemenon” or “nanai evlogemeno,” in Greek)—that is, blessed by
God through the Elder. This process is described succinctly in the Fa-
thers by the expression, “cutting off the will.” This is an expression
well chosen, for to control the will is often as difficult as cutting off a
part of the body; but it is essential for the monk who has the aim of
freeing himself from himself, his fallen will, and his egoism. The per-
son who is free of his own will is truly free, and, moving ever towards
the perfection of God’s will, becomes an instrument for His glory. As
the Fathers express it, our will becomes a wall which separates us
from God and we have to demolish it in order to let His Glory shine
on us and in us.
In this process of cutting off the will, even apparently laudable ac-
tions, as we have said above, must receive the Elder’s blessing before
the monk may consider executing them. For instance, I well remem-
ber the advice of a Priestmonk on Mount Athos to a monk who was
visiting him and who complained that he wished to dedicate himself
to writing in the defense of the Orthodox Faith, but that his Elder
would not give him his blessing to do so. The Priestmonk’s response
was quite simply: “You became a monk to deny yourself, not to de-
fend Orthodoxy.” We might perhaps add to this very correct response
that, had the monk undertaken to write without his Elder’s blessing,
not only would he have damaged his own soul through disobedience,
but also his writings would have been useless, deprived of Divine en-
lightenment, and even harmful. Similarly, as we mentioned above, the
monk seeks a blessing for quite mundane, everyday activities; and
even this, which may seem like a boring routine, may work miracles.
Let me cite, in this vein, an example which occurred in Greece some
five years ago:
The cook of a convent one day asked her Abbess’s permission to
go to collect firewood from a cave in which it was piled, opposite the
convent, in order to light the stove for the midday meal. The Abbess
replied, quite unexpectedly, “No.” The nun retired; but as the time for
the meal approached, the food being yet uncooked, she decided she
would have to go to get the wood, even without a blessing. So she set
out. But halfway, she recalled herself with the thought: “What on
earth am I doing without a blessing?” She immediately turned back.
At exactly that moment, part of the cliff collapsed and the cave where
the wood was kept was buried. Had she been there, she would un-
doubtedly have been killed. We see here that the Abbess, when she
said, “No,” did not consciously understand why she had said this at
that moment, nor did the nun comprehend; but God acted through the
bond of obedience for the good of both, by enlightening the Abbess as
to how to reply. The Fathers and the lives of the Saints have innu-
merable such examples, which demonstrate that obedience is not
merely a functional necessity, but a means whereby God Himself acts
through the spiritual Father for the direction and salvation of his dis-
ciples.
The monk, in seeking a blessing for all his actions, insures him-
self against dangers both spiritual and physical and, at the same time,
teaches himself to deny his own volition: to forego his own impulses
and his own intelligence. The true disciple lives this process until the
very last breath of his life. To illustrate, we refer to one touching in-
stance which was related to me by one who was an eyewitness. Some
forty years ago, a certain young monk on Mount Athos, who was out-
standing above all for his obedience, came down with tuberculosis,
which rapidly devoured his health. Understanding that his end was
fast approaching, he sought his Elder’s blessing to depart to the other
world; the Elder, however, in the agony of losing his most beloved
disciple, hearing this, fainted away. The monk looking around, asked:
“Where is our Elder? Saint John the Baptist is waiting for me. Where
is our Elder, so that I can ask for his blessing to leave?” The other
monks present helped the Elder to come around and brought him to
the monk’s bedside. The dying monk rejoiced and, kissing his Elder’s
hand, gave up his soul into the hands of the awaiting Angels. This is,
indeed, the perfection of obedience: to deny even the Saints who were
awaiting him, lest he do anything without the blessing of his Elder.
The monk who lives in this way is able to ascribe any good action
he may achieve to his spiritual Father’s prayers and blessing. As Saint
John Klimakos (St. John of the Ladder) expresses it, in his epigram-
matic way: “The true disciple, if he raises the dead, if he acquires
tears, if he is delivered from all warfare, reasons that his Father’s
blessing worked this.” Saint Symeon the New Theologian, in his “In-
structions,” provides us an example from his own life, while he was
still a layman, in which God deigned to teach him this truth. He re-
lates that his Elder one evening, seeing that he was tired, instructed
him simply to say the Trisagion (the “Thrice-holy Hymn”), and so to
retire to bed. Saint Symeon, who, as a man of prayer, would have
wished to pray more, obeyed implicitly, and, as he said the Trisagion,
was granted an ecstatic vision of the Divine and Uncreated Light. As
he approached the center of the overwhelming Light, he saw his Elder
praying within the Light and reasoned that it was through his spiritu-
al Father’s prayers that he was found worthy of this great revelation
of the Glory of God—by virtue of his obedience to a simple com-

mand. Indeed, everyday life in a monastery often gives us instances
of monks who, in obedience to their Abbot’s commands, are able to
perform with dexterity works (let us say Icon-painting or chanting)
for which they have no natural ability.
Because obedience is absolute, it may sometimes demand things
which to ordinary logic seem mad. In this case, the monk has before
him the astonishing example of our forefather Abraham. God pro-
mised him that in his son Isaac, his seed, would be multiplied as the
stars of heaven; yet, a short while later He ordered Abraham to sacri-
fice that same son, still a small child. Human logic rebels. But Abra-
ham surpassed that logic with faith and obedience, and in his unques-
tioning submission was doubly blessed. The monk, moreover, knows
that it is his Elder who will answer to God for the command, not he.
The monk will answer for his obedience. Perhaps here we may refer
to another contemporary example. A certain holy Bishop—one whom
I know well—, when a young man, was sent by his spiritual Father
one day to an island to sell Icons, with the order to be back on a cer-
tain day. When the day arrived, the monk descended to the harbor,
only to find that there was no boat that day. Without any further
thought but that of obedience to his Elder’s command, he therefore
decided to fling himself into the sea, trusting that the power of obedi-
ence, which had sent him there, would bring him safely home. Just as
he was preparing himself to jump, a boat appeared distantly on the
horizon, bound for the island. On arriving, the captain explained that
he had had an inexplicable feeling that he must stop at the island, even
though it was not on the schedule. The power of absolute obedience
had worked in another way.
For obedience to be complete, the monk must lay his soul open to
his Elder and hide nothing from him, confessing his thoughts, actions,
and feelings with complete honesty. In the case of an Abbess, or an
Elder who is not a Priest, this will not take the sacramental form of
Confession, and the Elder will afterwards direct the monk to a Priest
for the Service of Absolution. But in this case also, the Abbess or El-
der must be exactly informed of everything, for it is she or he that
bears the entire responsibility of confession. In this way, the monk
places himself fully in his Elder’s hands for him to form him and to
mold him, as he would a piece of clay, into a vessel fired in the flame
of obedience, that will be of service to God and his fellow man. Any
failure of the monk, whether through shame or some other reason, to
reveal all his thoughts cuts into the golden chain of Grace and dam-
ages the Divine relationship which should exist between the Elder and
his disciple. In this particular labor of obedience, it is quite possible
for the layman, who has found a spiritual Father to whom he may con-
fess himself regularly, to make considerable progress as well.
Though it is not strictly our subject here, it would be an omission

not to mention what is the most significant function of obedience in
the Church at large, for this function is closely related to monasticism.
Obedience is the guardian of Tradition; indeed, it is almost synony-
mous with Tradition: the acceptance of the wisdom and experience of
those who have gone before us and the avoidance of any deviation
from the way that they have shown us. It is, therefore, only natural
that we find in the history of the Church that, at all those times when
traditional or doctrinal teachings were endangered by innovation or
heresy, it was the monks who were always at the forefront of the
struggle for the preservation of Orthodoxy; for obedience is their way
of life. There is no need to illustrate the point here, since any study of
Byzantine ecclesiastical history will demonstrate this fact. Even in
our days, when monasticism is weak and feeble, it is the Fathers of
monastic centers who are at the head of the traditionalist movement.
Indeed, it is almost impossible, historically, to conceive of the preser-
vation of Orthodoxy without monasticism, and it is doubtless for this
reason that we see today that the Orthodox ecclesiastical groups
which have little or no monasticism are the very ones who have
strayed farthest from traditional Orthodoxy. Obedience, therefore, is
the guardian of Tradition, and it is no surprise that many disobedient
monks have thus fallen into delusion and heresy.
So far, we have discussed only external obedience; that is, the un-
questioning execution of the orders of the Superior by his disciples
and the avoidance of any action undertaken without his blessing. But
this is only one aspect of obedience—and not the most significant
one; more important is internal obedience. Let us explain. An action
performed physically, in obedience to a command, but with internal
complaints or misgivings, is, after all, imperfect at best, hypocrisy at
worst. So, it is essential for the disciple to have a clear understanding
that, in the scheme of Grace, his Elder is for him in the place of Christ
Himself, and that when he has placed himself under obedience, the re-
spect he owes to his Superior must be as absolute as his submission.
He must love his spiritual Father and fear him (in the sense of re-
specting him). To a person in the world, the expression of this respect
may seem absurd, even pernicious; and it is essential that it be under-
stood by the disciple, too, not as absurd flattery, but as a means of of-
fering his obeisance to Christ in the person of His representation in
our lives. Thus, Saint Symeon the New Theologian, who above all Fa-
thers is distinguished for the honor which he demonstrated to the
memory of his own Elder (honor for which he was savagely perse-
cuted by the ecclesiastical authorities of the time), tells the monk, in
his “Instructions,” to kiss the ground where his Elder has stood be-
cause it is sanctified. And though it may seem unbelievable, I have
known monks who secretly do just that. Abba Dorotheos, another Fa-
ther of obedience, tells us that when he was a monk in the monastery,

every time he passed the door of his Elder, Saint John the Prophet, he
would kiss it, believing that he received every blessing from this sim-
ple gesture.
Again, for instance, some item given by an Elder to his disciple,
or even the possessions and quarters of the Elder, will be especially
precious. I have known monks, who, albeit when unobserved, pros-
trate themselves to the ground when they pass their Abbot’s quarters.
And the experience of centuries shows that the higher they place their
Elder in their hearts and their consciences, even if he is in fact not a
paradigm of holiness, the more God works through him for their ben-
efit. On the contrary, the less respect they have, be it even to a true
Saint, the less God enlightens the Elder’s heart for their benefit and
guidance. Of the first case, we have examples of monks who, by their
obedience and humility, not only were not harmed by having worth-
less Elders, but rather saved their Elders through their own example
and prayers. (This is not a course that one could recommend to this
weak generation; indeed, we should examine very carefully before-
hand the person to whom we will offer obedience, lest we be ship-
wrecked in the harbor of monasticism.) Of the second case, that is, of
monks who have not been aided by truly holy Elders through their
own lack of reverence, we have all too many examples, as, for in-
stance, the three hundred and sixty monks who drove Saint Sabbas the
Sanctified from the monastery he had founded for them. But in this
case, most striking of all is the example of the disciple, who, failing
to show submission and faith to the most perfect Teacher, earned him-
self perdition and eternal ignominy.
In the spiritual relationship he has with his Elder, if it is as it
should be, the monk will inevitably be attacked by the adversary of
his salvation. It is Satan’s most insistent warfare against a monk under
obedience to make him judge his Elder in his heart; if he achieves this,
he will bring between them that spiritual disruption which leads even-
tually to the forsaking of the vows of obedience and monastic stabil-
ity. The Fathers tell us at all costs to avoid thoughts of judgment
against our Elder. Saint Symeon the New Theologian writes that even
should we see our leader fall into grievous sins, we should attribute
his sin to ourselves and weep for it, while continuing to regard him as
holy and calling on his prayers. Saint John Klimakos similarly tells us
to smite the mouth of one who speaks against our Abbot, the only oc-
casion on which such advice is given by this gentle Father. Indeed, all
the Fathers of monasticism tell us that there are only two occasions
which permit, or even oblige, the monk to criticize or leave his Elder,
after having placed himself under obedience: first, if the Elder should
fall into heresy and remain unrepentant; and second, if he deliberate-
ly provides occasions for temptation or encourages his monks to seri-
ous sins of moral turpitude. These two exceptions are even noted in
the Holy Canons of the Orthodox Church, which are extremely severe
to the monk who abandons his monastery. We have hesitated to write
the words of this paragraph, knowing they will be hard to grasp, or
even scandalous, to one who does not live this life or who has not read
the Fathers of Orthodox monasticism, whether Eastern or Western.
However, what we relate is, and always has been, a reality of the mo-
nastic life, and it is that reality that we seek to describe.
Obedience has a further stage. Beyond denial of the personal will,
of which we have been speaking, is the denial of the personal mental-
ity, personal idea—nootropia, in Greek. This, it should be empha-
sized, is not a denial of the individual personality, but rather a refor-
mation of the way of thinking and of observing reality. Abba Doroth-
eos gives us an illustration of this process from his own life. One day
he happened to see a woman, and the thought occurred to him that she
was a prostitute. He confessed this thought to his Elder, and thereupon
resolved never to believe in his own thoughts and trust in his own dis-
cernment. As he himself expresses it: “Thereafter, if my thoughts said
of the sun that it is the sun, or of night that it is night, I believed it
not.” If he pursues this course, the monk distrusts his own observa-
tions and his own qualitative judgments and struggles above all to at-
tain simplicity of ideas; he avoids criticizing the course of events; he
suppresses the thought, “No, that is not good, it should be so...”; he
accepts all that occurs with equanimity; and he places everything with
confidence before his Elder’s judgment, coming to see with his eyes,
to embrace his mentality, and to avoid all that he knows would be of-
fensive to his Elder—even though it may never explicitly have been
forbidden him. The monk who has reached this stage has indeed ad-
vanced far in obedience.
But there is yet a further stage of development, exemplified for all
ages in the beautiful and moving life of Saint Dositheos, when the
monk reaches the point where he opposes himself at every move. That
is, wishing something, he does the opposite, regarding his own will as
deceptive and fallen. The life of Saint Dositheos provides an amazing
example. As the Saint lay dying of tuberculosis, he remembered that
raw eggs were said to be good for the ailment; so, at once he called
his Elder and begged him not to give him raw eggs, as he had thought
of himself first. His Elder, moved by this self-denial, sought to pro-
vide him with other remedies. The disciple who has reached this stage
has evidently nothing more to fear from his fallen will, whose incli-
nation to evil he has, with God’s grace, conquered. He has indeed ar-
rived at a state where outer obedience is no longer essential for him,
as he is capable alone of cutting off his will. We find that there are
some rare souls who have this Divine gift naturally and, thus, when
they enter the monastic life they are able to begin on their own, with-
out necessarily having to pass through the purification of obedience.

Obedience finally becomes the means whereby the monk may
achieve the highest expression of two supreme Christian virtues. The
first of these is humility, for nothing so humbles our conceit as sub-
mission to the will and opinion of others, even if it is painful at the be-
ginning. It is thus that, in the service of monastic tonsure, the new
monk promises obedience not only to his Abbot, but to “all his broth-
erhood in Christ.” Indeed, obedience to all, in the sense of deference
to another’s will, is essential to anyone who is striving to acquire hu-
mility, be he a monk or a layman. No person is free of the vice of pride
and the war against it is, to use a simile, like weeding a garden: we
think we have cleaned one area of weeds, but the moment we turn our
backs and forget about it, the weeds spring up again. The monk who
lives in obedience, however, has always the tools ready in his hands
and others to help him in the labor of weeding out the roots of pride.
Humility and obedience then combine together to save him from the
particular temptation which in Greek is called plane—illusion or
delusion—, that demonic state in which we come to believe some
delusion as truth, a state which, when not intercepted, leads to spiri-
tual death. We often see in practice that this state regularly overtakes
the monk who flees from the yoke of obedience, while the obedient
monk has nothing to fear from this fatal trap.
The second great virtue to which obedience introduces us is pure
and undistracted prayer. The monk who has acquired obedience is lit-
erally liberated from all worldly cares. He is not tormented by anxi-
ety or frustration when his will is crossed. He has placed all responsi-
bility for his salvation on his spiritual Father. He has attained to a Di-
vine simplicity of thought. And, in this perfect state, he has reached a
stage where all that occurs is according to his wishes, since his will
has been mortified to the extent that he is able to accept every event
with complete equanimity, as though it were just as he desired it.
Every situation, however adverse, can then be seen as a God-given
opportunity for some good end. In this state of mind, the monk is able
to pray without any distraction or turbulence and to reach heights of
spiritual vision. Indeed, for the Fathers of the Philokalia and other
such spiritual works, obedience is a prerequisite for pure prayer so ob-
vious to them, that they rarely even mention it.
The monk must work continually at perfecting himself in obedi-
ence, for it is a labor which in most cases—though not quite all, since
there are some souls which are naturally humble and obedient—de-
mands a struggle until the last breath. Constantly, even after years, the
monk will find that the fallen will rebels and that he has to force him-
self to submission. Certainly, this becomes a habit which, little by lit-
tle, gets easier; but he must be vigilant lest he slip, for the fall of a
monk almost always comes through disobedience. Any other fall,
even a serious moral one, can easily be corrected and healed within
the monastery with the prayers and kindness of his brothers; howev-
er, disobedience, because it is based on pride, is difficult to cure and
will eventually lead to the monk fleeing from his monastery. In brief,
we can say that the path of monastic fall will usually follow these
stages: the monk starts to have doubts about his Elder and to judge
him internally. He does not oppose these thoughts, but revolves them
in his mind, even though they bring to him a state of nervousness and
anxiety. He begins to see his brother monks, who have obedience and
devotion to their Elder, as hypocrites and flatterers. He begins to have
confidence in his own views and no longer submits them to his
Abbot’s judgment. He ceases to confess his thoughts with sincerity
and becomes negligent in the acts of external obedience. Slowly, he
builds up an idea of himself, until he believes that he is better and
wiser than his Abbot. He may begin to perform acts of asceticism
which are above his measure, without having his Elder’s blessing. He
may begin to see his monastery, which formerly was a paradise for
him, as a place for torment, unethical and evil. He begins to create dif-
ficulties, to speak openly of his opposition, even to stir up rebellion.
And finally he leaves, or the Abbot is obliged to remove him. In ex-
treme cases, he may be overtaken, through his pride, by the state of
demonic delusion of which we have spoken above. When the monk in
this state goes out into the world, unless God has pity on him and per-
mits some serious moral fall so as to humble his pride, he is bound for
spiritual destruction. We may summarize this whole development in
the laconic words of Abba Dorotheos: “I know no other fall of a monk
but which comes of believing in his own thoughts [ideas].”
With this warning note, we close. I have written very little of what
could—and perhaps should—be said about obedience. However, I
hope that I have written enough to illustrate how central a place it oc-
cupies in the life of a monk and how it becomes a means whereby he
is drawn ever closer into the will of God, away from his fallen state
into a reintegrated state of deification. It will be clear that his path,
like that of all Christian virtue, is “straight and narrow” and that there
will be few who attain to perfection in it, especially in our times, when
self-love and self-indulgence are the norms of upbringing, education,
and behavior. Yet the Church cannot stand strong in her traditions
without monasticism, and monasticism cannot exist without obedi-
ence: Christ is ever calling those who wish to follow Him to take up
their cross of voluntary martyrdom.
As an epilogue, I ask those who read these words to pray for the
worthless person who wrote them, for he is the least obedient of
monks and himself is most in need of the advice he seeks to give to
others. Like the Pharisees, he “says and does not.” To those who wish
to follow this life, therefore, he can only repeat the Savior’s counsel
to act not according to what the Pharisees do, but what they say.
Synod News
Publications
The Fall 2003 issue (No. 15) of the Romanian scholarly quarter-
ly, Clouds, contains an article by Archbishop Chrysostomos of Etna,
entitled, “Byzantine Liturgical Vesture: The
Inadequacy of Prevailing Western Historio-
graphical Paradigms.”
Also, the Bunavestire Press in Galati,
Romania, has released a book of essays by
His Eminence on pastoral psychology. Orig-
inally published in 2002 by the Alexandru
Ion Cuza University Press in Iasi, this reprint
appeared in the Autumn of 2003, under the
title, Elemente de Psihologie Pastoralä Or-
todoxä (Elements of Orthodox Pastoral Psy-
chology) in a slightly revised edition of the
original. An English version of the book is
slated for future publication by the C.T.O.S.
New Appointment
At the invitation of Hieromonk Dr. Patapios, Academic Director
of the Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, Dr. Augustin Ioan,
Associate Professor of the History and Theory of Architecture at the
Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism (formerly the In-
stitute of Architecture) in Bucharest, Romania, has been appointed to
the Center’s Board of Advisors, effective January 1, 2004. Professor
Ioan, a distinguished scholar and practicing architect, is a former Ju-
nior Fulbright Scholar at the University of Cincinnati, where he re-
ceived his M.A. degree in architecture and, in 1994, was honored as
“Outstanding Graduate Student.” He recently returned to the Univer-
sity of Cincinnati as a Senior Fulbright Scholar, with a visiting re-
search appointment at Harvard University’s prestigious Dumbarton
Oaks Research Library and Collection in Washington, DC. He also
holds an M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in architecture from the Ion Mincu
University and a second doctorate in philosophy from the University
of Bucharest.
Professor Ioan, who is Associate Editor and Editor, respectively,
of the Romanian journals Octogon and Arhitectura, editorial advisor
for Art Margins (University of California, Santa Barbara), and Senior
Editor of Virtualia (www.virtualia.org), is also the Vice-President of
the Romanian Union of Architects; winner, last year, of the national

competition for the design of Romania’s new Patriarchal Cathedral; a
recipient of numerous scholarly grants and research awards; and, in
1996, was a Visiting Associate of the Martin Centre for Architectural
and Urban Studies at Cambridge University. He has authored or co-
authored more than a dozen books (including Sacred Space, which
was published by the C.T.O.S. in 2002) and numerous scholarly arti-
cles and reviews. He lives with his wife, Simona, also a scholar of
note, in Bucharest.
Parish Feast Day in Etna

On October 2, 2003 (Old Style), the parish Church of Sts. Cypri-
an and Justina in Etna, CA, celebrated its annual Feast Day. Proto-
presbyter David Cownie and Father Jerome Zubricky, who both serve
the Church, celebrated a full cycle of festal services. As a special trib-
ute to the parish, the choir of the Convent of St. Elizabeth chanted the
Divine Liturgy and presented the community with a beautiful Icon of
the Mother of God, the “Platut°ra t«n OÈran«n” (“More Spaci-
ous Than the Heavens”), painted at the Convent Icon studio and the
first wall mural to decorate the Church since its construction (see
below; looking into the Altar from the Beautiful Gates).
Visiting Scholar
On October 4, 2003, Dr. Anand A. Young, Director of the Henry
M. Jackson School of International Studies and Stanley D. Golub Pro-
fessor of International Studies at the University of Washington at
Seattle, informed Archbishop Chrysostomos of Etna that, “On behalf
of the University of Washington, I am pleased to extend an invitation
to you as a Visiting Scholar in the Comparative Religion Program of
the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies.” His Eminence
will be at the University of Washington from March through June,
2004, conducting research for a forthcoming book on the Hesychastic
controversy and its rôle in Orthodox-Roman Catholic relations in the
mid-fourteenth century through the early fifteenth century.
Feast Day of Sts. Cyprian and Justina

In conjunction with a meeting of the Holy Synod, a week of spe-
cial events marking the Feast of the Holy Monastery of Sts. Cyprian
and Justina and the Nameday of Metropolitan Cyprian, President of
our Synod of Bishops, was observed in mid-October last year in Fili
(Athens) Greece. Present at the festivities were Metropolitan Cyprian,
his assistant Bishops in Greece (Bishop Ambrose of Methoni and
Bishop Chrysostomos of Christianoupolis) and from various parts of
the world—Bishop Symeon from Austria, Bishop Michael from Sar-
dinia, Bishop Johannes from Sweden, and Archbishop Chrysostomos
and Bishop Auxentios from the U.S. (the Synodal Exarch in Australia,
Bishop Chrysostomos, was unable to attend because of pressing ad-
ministrative duties)—, as well as Hierarchs from our Sister Churches
in Romania (Metropolitan Vlasie, Bishop Demosten, Bishop Pa-
homie, and Bishop Sofronie) and Bulgaria (Bishop Photii), along with
clergy and Faithful from throughout Greece, from Romania and Bul-
garia, and from Italy and Russia.
The festal services of the monastery in Fili, celebrated on Octo-
ber 1 and 2 (Old Style) (the eve and the Feast Day of Sts. Cyprian and
Justina), were held in the temporary Chapel in the basement of the
beautiful new Cathedral under construction on the monastery
grounds. They were followed on the Sunday after the Feast Day by a
magnificent tribute to Metropolitan Cyprian at the Convention Center
of the Novotel in downtown Athens, where a packed hall listened to
traditional Byzantine hymns, executed superbly by the monastery
choir, traditional Greek folk music, a talk on Christian kindness by the
Secretary of the Holy Synod, Archimandite Cyprian, a brother of the
Holy Monastery of Sts. Cyprian and Justina, in honor of the Metro-
politan’s Nameday, and a feature presentation on Orthodox piety by
the Swedish film maker, Marjo Marthin, a member of our Synod’s
Cathedral Church of Sts. Constantine and Helen in Stockholm.
• Above, a portion of
the crowd at services
honoring Sts. Cyprian
and Justina, celebrated
in the basement of the
immense new monaste-
ry Cathedral (at left),
which is under con-
struction. To date, the
skeletal frame, base-
ment, and central
domes of the Cathedral
have been completed.
Above, Bishops gathered for Festal Vespers. At center, Metropolitan

Cyprian; at his left, Metropolitan Vlasie; and at his right Bishop Photii.
Above, left, Metropolitan Cyprian at his Nameday celebration in down-

town Athens, at the Novotel Convention Center; at right, the Metropoli-
tan with some of the Bishops gathered for the festivities.
Above, a view of those attending the Nameday tribute for Metropolitan

Cyprian, including a number of local and national political dignitaries.
T
Book Reviews
__________________________________________
CONSTANTINE CAVARNOS, Orthodoxy and Philosophy. Belmont, MA:

Institute for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, 2003. Pp. ix +
237.
Those who have read Dr. Cavarnos’ superb account of the rela-
tionship between classical Greek philosophy and Patristic thought,
The Hellenic-Christian Philosophical Tradition, will find his latest
book, Orthodoxy and Philosophy, equally impressive. Based on lec-
tures originally delivered by the author at St. Tikhon’s Orthodox The-
ological Seminary in Pennsylvania, it covers some of the same ground
as its predecessor, but explains in greater detail how individual Fa-
thers made use of Platonic, Aristotelian, and Stoic philosophical cate-
gories and terminology in articulating their theological ideas. Thus,
there are chapters dealing with the Apostolic Fathers, the Apologists,
Clement of Alexandria, the Cappadocian Fathers, St. John Chrysosto-
mos, St. Macarios of Egypt, St. Ephraim the Syrian, St. John Clima-
cos, St. John of Damascus, St. Photios the Great, St. Symeon the New
Theologian, St. Gregory Palamas, Patriarch Meletios (Pegas) of Alex-
andria, St. Nicodemos the Hagiorite, St. Nectarios of Aegina, and the
twentieth-century Greek philosopher and religious thinker Nikolaos
Louvaris. In the final chapter, the author surveys modern Western phi-
losophy and evaluates it from an Orthodox perspective.
The chapter on St. Gregory Palamas is particularly important,
since it provides a valuable corrective to the erroneous notion that St.
Gregory was an obscurantist who dismissed secular learning as irrel-
evant to or inconsistent with Orthodox theology. The overall picture
that emerges from Dr. Cavarnos’ masterly analysis of the aforemen-
tioned Patristic writers is that they were generally more indebted to
Plato than to Aristotle or the Stoics. To a greater or lesser extent, they
all incorporated Aristotle’s Categories into their theological thinking,
but they seem otherwise to have found Plato’s thought more conge-
nial, especially in the areas of metaphysics and psychology. As Dr.
Cavarnos points out, they do not call Aristotle “Divine,” whereas they
do, at times, apply this epithet to Plato; nor do they consider Aristotle
superior to Plato, as Western Latin theologians typically did in the
past. According to Louvaris, the centrality of the human soul in Pla-
tonic philosophy and the strong contrast that Plato makes between the
sensible world and the spiritual world tend to render his thought more
suitable than that of Aristotle as a vehicle for expressing the truths of
the Orthodox Faith.

I would like to make a few observations regarding the chapter on
Western philosophy. Dr. Cavarnos has, in the past, written widely and
perspicaciously on such seminal modern philosophers as Henri Berg-
son and G.E. Moore. In view of this, it is a pity that he did not devote
a separate book to the subject of Western philosophy. The chapter in
question is filled with important and provocative insights, and this
makes one wish that the author had set forth his views on modern phi-
losophy at much greater length. Instead, Dr. Cavarnos singles out, for
instance, what he sees as the pervasive vainglory that characterizes so
much of European philosophy since the seventeenth century. He cites,
for example, what George Santayana said about the thought of Kant,
Hegel, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche, among others; that is, that their
philosophy is vitiated by a pervasive egotism. Santayana defines ego-
tism, in this context, as “subjectivity in thought and willfulness in
morals” (p. 182). While this may be true of Hegel, Schopenhauer, and
Nietzsche, Kant, an intensely private and unassuming man who
scarcely ever left his native Königsberg, would be difficult to place, at
least unequivocally, in such company. A more expansive treatment of
Western philosophy by Dr. Cavarnos would be very helpful, since it
would no doubt provide the refinements and precision, with regard to
these subtler issues in the Western philosophical tradition, for which
he is so celebrated.
I have always found Dr. Cavarnos’ writings to be immensely in-
spiring and instructive. Thus, I wholeheartedly recommend this new
book to those interested in the nexus between philosophy and Ortho-
doxy. I also venture to hope, as I said, that Dr. Cavarnos will someday
give us a more systematic assessment of modern Western philosophy
from an Orthodox perspective. This would be of immense value and
interest.
HIEROMONK PATAPIOS
Center for Traditionalist
Orthodox Studies
Publications
The Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies has published
more than than forty-five books, thirty-four monographs, and numer-
ous booklets on themes in Orthodox theology, Patristics, Byzantine
history, pastoral psychology, and Orthodox spirituality, as well as var-
ious original translations of classical Patristic texts and the lives of the
Saints. A catalogue of publications is available from:
C.T.O.S. Publications
Post Office Box 398
Etna, CA 96027-0398
U.S.A.
For online orders, see our website at:
www.sisqtel.net/~sgpm/ctos
____________________________________________________________________________
A New Book from C.T.O.S.

RESISTING UNTO BLOOD
Sixty-Five Years of Persecution of the True
(Old Calendar) Orthodox Church of Romania (1924-1989)
by Constantine Bujor
Translated from the Romanian by Deacon Father Ioan Comanescu
with a Preface by His Eminence, Metropolitan Vlasie
$9.95 – 260 pp. (paperbound)
with numerous photographs of historical interest
“Though an indictment of the regrettable abuse of an Or-

thodox minority often vilified and misrepresented for its fi-
delity to the Romanian Orthodox spiritual traditions, this
book contains an objective and irenic presentation of the
truth about the Romanian Old Calendarists—a narrative of
moving struggles for integrity that will inspire any sincere
Orthodox believer and all good Christians.” The Witness
CENTER FOR TRADITIONALIST ORTHODOX STUDIES
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able. Subscribers who plan to move or to change address should arrange
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Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies

“The Old Calendar movement is neither a heresy nor a schism,

IMPRUDENCE is a mounting spiritual and intellectual disease in

conic sentence is tremendously profound. It tells us that an intelligent

I would like to illustrate what I have said about this contemporary

nology and application that is a cause for some concern. Again, I do

automatically cured in the process of spiritual restoration, any more

chology and immensely fascinated by the late Dr. Viktor E. Frankl, a

gifted, we return to the question of credentials and the necessity of

Clinical depression as a psychologist diagnoses and treats it may

the malaise of disbelief. As a result, one is left with the impression

cal life. As Rice correctly observes, “the Byzantine people...were in

cetics, Rice turns to Bishop Palladios (365-425), who composed the

“mortification of the flesh.” Moreover, unless we supplement Bishop

1. It is opportune for us all to exclaim today, as did the blessed

citizens of the Jerusalem on high, and display a heedfulness worthy of

Beloved children in the Lord:

to maintain a missionary outlook towards the religions of the world—

ian feasts by all of the Churches.”7

† Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili,

3. Cf. St. John 14:6.

Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ begins and

THE VERY REVEREND SERGIUS is a former Assistant Professor at the Faculty of

“Obedience is life, disobedience is death” is a saying often heard

of the Glory of God—by virtue of his obedience to a simple com-

Though it is not strictly our subject here, it would be an omission

ther of obedience, tells us that when he was a monk in the monastery,

out necessarily having to pass through the purification of obedience.

the Romanian Union of Architects; winner, last year, of the national

Parish Feast Day in Etna

Feast Day of Sts. Cyprian and Justina

Above, Bishops gathered for Festal Vespers. At center, Metropolitan

Above, left, Metropolitan Cyprian at his Nameday celebration in down-

Above, a view of those attending the Nameday tribute for Metropolitan

CONSTANTINE CAVARNOS, Orthodoxy and Philosophy. Belmont, MA:

the Orthodox Faith.

A New Book from C.T.O.S.

“Though an indictment of the regrettable abuse of an Or-

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