NR. 1 – 2023

Indeed, the Correspondence reveals that both monks and laymen stressed that the personal relationship between an elder (geron) and his disciple was the core around which the practice of spiritual guidance developed in early Byzantine tradition. In short, the Correspondence of Saints Barsanuphius and John illustrates that the charisma of personal relationships is the fundamental landmark by which a monk assumes the role of spiritual guide.

The character of these two great elders has led us to the conclusion that a true spiritual guide takes not only the stance of a spiritual director offering advice, but especially that of an anadochos, that is, a guarantor of his disciples’ spiritual life. Thus, the expression of “burden-bearer” – based on Galatians 6:2 („Bear each other’s burdens (emphasis mine) and in this way you will fulfil the law of Christ”) – was one of the most remarkable and innovative ascetic practices in early Byzantine world. This essential text points out that there must be genuine solidarity between a spiritual guide and his disciples, they must be “one soul”.

From this perspective, the elder is not only a spiritual director, but mainly a spiritual father. Moreover, this “School of Gaza” (Lorenzo Perrone) proves that the spiritual guide is an intercessor par excellence, since he is a vehicle of grace, that is the germination medium through which the Holy Spirit operates the development of spiritual life within the disciple.

In conclusion, what has been mentioned above pleads in favor of understanding spiritual guidance as a sort of spiritual obstetrics, especially because in Eastern Christian spirituality the essential role of an elder is always to gestate and give spiri­tual birth to his disciples. Ultimately, this longue durée process reveals the aim and the essential calling of any true spiritual father.

Moreover, there are some ascetic virtues that defined the monastic education of the Gazan monasticism. All these virtues show that the Gazan monasticism can be understood as a monastic “school”.

The right motion is the outflow towards the things around the soul, and from these things it is led through symbols to simple and unified contemplations. The circular movement is the entrance of the soul into itself from things outside. This is described as a twisting, unified turning (συνέλιξις) of its intellectual powers as in a kind of circle, whereby the soul gathers itself into itself from the many external things and leads its unified self towards the beautiful and the good. The spiral movement is the movement of the soul towards the illumination of divine knowledge.

The mind, understood as soul, has also a threefold dimension (νοῦς, λόγος, πνεῦμα) after the likeness of the Holy Trinity. But there is also a depth or an interior aspect of our mind unknown to us, called the “heart” – with a gnoseological function. There is a heart as the hidden center of the mind, as its face turned towards God, (what we call the supra-conscious or trans-conscious) is the inner part of the iconostasis, in which Christ has dwelt after the sacrament of Baptism. For Father Dumitru Stăniloae, the “last step of man’ or his divine image is man’s self (das Selbst), the purest expression of the subject. The path of self-discovery is thus ‘towards Christ, through our inmost self”, through prayer which experientially fills the mind with apophaticism (the rest of the mind through the vision of divine light). All this is apprehended by man through the “intellectual feeling” (νοερᾷ αἰσθήσει), and it is called “feeling” because of the fact that the body also partakes of the working grace in the mind, with which it acquires a “common feeling” (συναίσθησιν) of the unspeakable mystery, that which is after the soul” (Tr. 1.3.30-31).

The Christological dimension of virtue (τοῦ θεοῦ μίμησις & τὸ ἔνθεο πάθος) is linked to the fact that the moral life is not a ‘Stoic’ phenomenon of self-mastery, but the fruit of communion with Christ. Taking up the μαθεῖν–παθεθεῖν relation (Dionysius, Div. Nom. 2.9, PG 3.648B), Kallistos Ware argues that “this certainly implies that mystical experience is a πάθος (suffering)”. The essential text is that of Tr. 3.1.27, “Above the flesh (ὑπὲρ ϕύσιν), therefore, and virtue (ἀρετὴν) and knowledge (γνῶσιν) is the grace of deification (θεώσεως χάρις), […] through it the whole God gets across (περιχωρεῖ) the whole of the worthy one (ἀξίοις) (Ambigua, PG 91, 1076 C), and the saints entirely get across (περιχωροῦσιν) the whole God, the whole God acquiring instead of them, and, as a reward of ascending to Him, gaining Him Alone, ‘united after the likeness of the soul with the body (ψυχῦς πρὸς σῶμα περιϕύντα τρόπον) as with His members’ (Ambigua, PG 91, 1088 BC) and making them worthy to be in Him through an enhypostasized adoption (τῆς ἐνυποστάτου υἱοθεσίας), that according to the grace and gift of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, when you hear that God comes in us by virtue, or that we have Him dwelling in ourselves through remembrance, do not count it as divinization, [that is,] the acquisition of virtue, but as the shining and the grace of God that comes by virtue […]”.

It is not a question of elimination of suffering through a preparatory discipline for moral superiority (as in Stoicism), but a deiform transformation of human suffering into fearlessness. Moreover, both this theology of the body’s participation in the experience of uncreate light and the teachings on ethics and virtue have a common basis in Christology and the theology of the Sacraments. Therefore, “true virtue”, which is man’s participation in the death and resurrection of Christ, actively covers every stage of spiritual life. As a human effort, the imitation of Christ’s virtues will not be able to offer man theosis, “for the reward of virtue [is none other than] becoming god (ἆθλον γὰρ ἀρετῆς θεὸν γενέσθαι) and shining with the most holy light” (St. Gregory the Theologian, Epistle 178, PG 37, 293A and Tr. 3.1.34). And St. Gregory Palamas says, “[…] it [could] be called a god-making virtue (ἀρετὴ θεοποιός), but [only] in the sense that it makes us capable of receiving that brightness […]” (Epistles to Athanasius of Kyzicus 13)

Virtue, on the other hand, simply prepares man for theosis, makes him receptive to grace (Tr. 3.1.27). As a human activity, prayer belongs to the category of virtues and, by itself, it is not sufficient to fulfill man’s deification. The moral life of the believer is not a ‘Stoic’ phenomenon of self-mastery, but the fruit of communion with Christ. With the phrase ἐν ἡσυχίᾳ προσέχειν ἑαυτοῖς ἑαυτοῖς προσέχειν ἡσυχίᾳ, St. Gregory Palamas provides a Hesychast reply to the Stoic saying ἐπιμέλεια ἑαυτοῦ (self-care): “having chosen to take care in silence/hesychia of themselves (ἐν ἡσυχίᾳ προσσέχειν ἑαυυτοῖς), [they] need to turn and lock their mind in the body (ἐπανάγειν καὶ ἐμπερικικλείειν τῷ σώματι τὸν νοῦν) and even in the inmost part of the body, which we call the heart” (Tr. 1.2.3 in Works III, p. 113).

By the phrase “virtue is the garment of the spiritual wedding” (Homily 41.14), St. Gregory Palamas makes a distinction between the “body”, which is the garment of the soul, and “flesh” (in the sense of ‘unbridled’), that which defiles this garment, that is, the body which thus becomes a ‘torn robe’: (Homily 41.16). But when “God is active in you, every form of virtue is added” (Homily 33.7); “for when God works in us, every image of virtue is born in us. And when God is not at work in us, all that we do is sin… and those who have the fragrance of Christ, and proclaim the virtues of him who called them out of darkness into his marvelous light (1 Pet 2:9)”.

Virtue is also likeness to God, a “too high kinship” (Homily 27.14; 27.2). Morality and virtue are thus considered far higher than a pious disposition or dry ethical standards. The revival of Aristotelianism in recent academic moral philosophy and, especially, the presentation of Aristotelian moral thought independent of its metaphysical and theological context, leads to the neglect of the role of the divine in moral philosophy. In Orthodox ethics, in reply, a redefinition of the “liturgical self-awareness” using contemporary categories of thought is needed. The principle that man has the power to walk firmly on the path of virtue is historically false. This principle leads to pride, to the denial of God and to man’s self-humiliation. Christian morality is seen as “the energy of God’s grace”: “Without me, says the Lord, you can do nothing (Jn 15:5), for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil 2:13).

Since Aristotle, virtue (dianoëtic or virtues of the intellect and the others, which he calls ethical or moral), according to its essence, is called the middle way (between a lack or defect and an exaggeration); but it is also “the highest good”. For St. Gregory Palamas, if the imitation of Christ begins with Holy Baptism as man’s participation in the death and resurrection of Christ, and if the end is the victory over passions, then the “middle” is the virtuous life lived according to the Gospel (Homily 21.5). Gregory Palamas considers virtue as a means in the spiritual life of the believer and thus establishes the parameters of virtue (ἀρετή) between Holy Baptism (υιοθεσία) and apathia (ἀπάθεια). He reveals the dynamic role played by virtue in the renewal of man (theosis or christomorphosis).

The virtues not only gather man into himself, but Christ himself shines in man through each virtue, for Christ is the being or essence of the virtues, and the power of growth in Christ is divine grace. The Stoic “self-care” is here transformed into “our groaning within ourselves,” a conversation of the self with the self in a groaning-expectation to have our body transformed into “the body of glory” (1 Cor 15:43) and the future vision of God face to face.

 Ecleziologia timpurie a părintelui Stăniloae este definită de o abordare incarnaționistă (incarnatio continua), care vede Biserica lui Hristos ca o prelungire în timp și spațiu a hristologiei: Biserica este înțeleasă ca prelungirea trupului răstignit, mort, înviat și îndumnezeit al lui Hristos în cei care cred în El, prin Tainele Bisericii. Întrucât Biserica este prelungirea evenimentului Hristos, ea este o realitate sacramentală, care transmite celor care alcătuiesc Trupul lui Hristos roadele lucrării mântuitoare ale Fiului lui Dumnezeu Întrupat. Pe de o parte, Sfintele Taine alcătuiesc sau realizează Biserica; pe de altă parte, Biserica este cea care lucrează și săvârșește Sfintele Taine. Această relație de dublă condiționare a fost exprimată în limbajul de specialitate prin formula „Tainele fac Biserica și Biserica face Tainele”.

În anii 1960, părintele Dumitru Stăniloae a făcut trecerea de la o ecleziologie definită doar pe baza hristologiei, la o ecleziologie care vorbește despre Biserică în lumina Tainei Sfintei Treimi. O astfel de ecleziologie leagă în mod intim Taina Bisericii de Taina Sfintei Treimi și propune una dintre cele mai echilibrate sinteze între lucrarea lui Hristos și lucrarea Duhului Sfânt din ecleziologie, fără a pierde din vedere faptul că Biserica este și un capitol al învățăturii despre Dumnezeu-Tatăl. În acest context, Părintele Stăniloae definește Biserica folosind termenul de „icoană a Sfintei Treimi”. În teologia părintelui Stăniloae, implicațiile unei ecleziologii în care Biserica este descrisă ca o icoană a Sfintei Treimi sunt triple. În primul rând, Sfânta Treime este înfățișată ca modelul peren al Bisericii, în sensul că aceasta ar trebui să se străduiască să întrupeze în propria ei ființă modul în care există Dumnezeu, adică modul unei comuniunii desăvârșite, chiar dacă între cele două realități există o distanță ontologică care nu va fi niciodată depășită, nici în istorie, nici în eshaton. În al doilea rând, faptul că Biserica este o icoană a Treimii arată că Biserica și Treimea nu sunt două realități paralele, care nu interacționează una cu cealaltă. Dimpotrivă, Biserica nu numai că reflectă modelul comuniunii Trinitare; totodată, Biserica este ancorată în misterul Trinitar, în măsura în care participă. prin har, la viața interioară a Dumnezeului Trinitar, care extinde comuniunea Sa veșnică de iubire înspre lume, pentru a-i cuprinde pe cei care devin prin Botez membri ai Trupului lui Hristos și Temple ale Duhului Sfânt. În al treilea rând, faptul că Biserica este icoana Sfintei Treimi arată că Biserica este o fereastră către relația de iubire dintre Tatăl, Fiul și Sfântul Duh. Acest lucru înseamnă că Sfânta Treime și comuniunea dintre Persoanele divine sunt revelate, cunoscute și contemplate în viața Bisericii.

Between 1929 and 1934, Saint John served as a professor at the St. John the Theologian Seminary in Bitola, at the same time with Saint Justin Popovich. On June 9, 1934, Saint John was consecrated a bishop for the “White Russian” community in Shanghai. The restoration of commu­nion among Orthodox communities was a missionary success, and the hierarch’s new endeavors included embellishing the cathedral dedicated to the Icon of the Mother of God called “Helper of Sinners” with frescoes and establishing an orphanage for poor children, inaugurated on February 24, 1935. After the Japanese occupation ended, a civil war erupted in China, and by the fall of 1948, the Chinese Communist Party asserted dominance. The occupation of Shanghai by communist forces would have resulted in either the killing or repatriation of Russians. Through Saint John’s intercession, approximately 5,500 refugees were evacuated to Tubabao Island (the Philippines) in the first half of 1949. A few months after arriving on the island, Saint John travelled to the United States to advocate for the exodus of his parishioners. His efforts bore fruit, and on June 16, 1950, amendments to the Deportation Act were signed, leading to the relocation of the entire refugee community in the following year. Although his stay in the United States was brief, Saint John established an orphanage and a church in San Francisco before being appointed Archbishop of the Western European Diocese in 1951. From August 14, 1963, the Synod appointed him titular archbishop in Western America. Under his guidance, the consecration of the cathedral dedicated to the icon of the Mother of God – “Joy of the Afflicted” took place in 1964. After a life lived in sacrifice, Archbishop John passed away on July 2, 1966, having celebrated the Divine Liturgy at St. Nicholas Church in Seattle. Despite guiding a community overwhelmed by the fear of death, he displayed exceptional pastoral skills, using his sermons to reassure them of God’s care. Through his speeches, the hierarch could address all believers, alleviating their suffering and the longing for their homeland and families abandoned due to communist persecution. Therefore, the themes of his sermons varied, encompassing topics such as Salvation of human beings – a divine-human act; the Holy Church, the Living Body of the Savior Christ; Repentance – the path to salvation; the end of the world and the final judgment; Care for the departed; Holy Icons. The Incarnation of the Savior Christ is a predetermined act from eternity, as God, even before the creation of the world, foresaw not only the fall of man, whom He would create, but also determined in advance how to heal him. Through the ministry of our Savior Jesus Christ, the path of salvation is opened, with human nature, tainted by sin, being cleansed from the consequences of disobedience. Simultaneously, the victory of Life over sin and death, accomplished through His Resurrection, dispels the darkness of Hades, allowing the souls of the departed to rejoice in the radiant vision of God. Through His Resurrection, the Savior reveals to man the perspective of eternity in the Kingdom of the Father, sharing with him the divine grace. The theandric nature of Salvation is revealed, as humanity is tasked with actualizing the fruits of our Savior Christ’s ministry through its own efforts. Receiving Christ entails following His sacrificial example and uniting with Him through Holy Communion, allowing both the soul and body to be permeated by His presence for the purpose of following Him. In the Church, Christians are integrated into a living organism, closely united with the Savior Christ. However, to actualize this unity, each member must submit to His will, stri­ving, through repentance, to overcome sin. Saint John Maximovitch asserts that repentance is metanoia, an inner change of man’s mind, involving turning away from sin, achievable only with God’s help. Through repentance, the darkness of sin is dispelled, and the soul is liberated and illuminated by divine rays. Before His Ascension, the Savior Christ revealed the signs that would precede His Second Coming, including wars, famine, plague, earthquakes, persecution aimed at those who confess Christ, and the appearance of false prophets. These signs will prepare humanity for the coming of the Savior Christ. The hierarch revealed the identity of Antichrist, emphasizing that he will be a man, not the incarnate devil. The word “anti” means “instead of” or “against.” This man desires to be in the place of Christ, to occupy His position, and to have what Christ should have. The end of the world becomes a transfiguring event, but the end of history as a whole will be experienced as a death, just like the end of man, not only as an uninterrupted transition from one stage of life to another but as a passage from a lower to a higher sphere. Leaving this life, the soul ascends to God, and following its examination, it will be placed, until the Last Judgment, either in the house of the Father or in a place of punishment. At the same time, death is the moment when the struggles of this life cease for the soul. Prayer to God and assistance to the needy on behalf of the departed are actions through which the soul truly experiences the esteem of those still alive, bringing forgiveness for their sins. By performing these acts, love for the departed is manifested, and their souls feel the benefit of prayers and almsgiving as if they themselves were receiving them. The final theme addressed in the study concerns Holy Icons. Following the teaching of the faith, the hierarch indicates that the icon has an anamnetic role. Icons of saints remind us of all those who followed Christ, who were faithful and devoted to Him, who burned with love for Him. Remembering the Savior Christ and His saints also implies following the example they left to us; therefore, looking at the icon, we embark on the path of honoring and imitating Christ and the saints. Before the icon, one must feel the desire for a pure life alongside the saints. To be imbued with these feelings, the iconographer must depict celestial faces that have overcome sin and pray together with us. For the making of an icon, the painter will need not only talent but also spiritual preparation.

Our brain works on the basis of electrical impulses, transmitting informatio­nal messages to organic cells through nerve pathways. Every thought, every idea, every action involves a movement of energy, which has repercussions at the level of molecular functions. Therefore, our thoughts and intentions are recorded in our own organic structure. The functionality of cells and internal organs requires energy consumption, but also an informational exchange. Neuropsychologist Dean Radin presents the influence of the mind on the body starting from the messenger cell theory, which includes the principles of quantum physics. Consequently, at the subatomic level, our cells manifest sometimes in material form, sometimes in wave form, which explains the rapid and spontaneous influence of thought/mind on matter.

There is a fundamental field of energy, a quantum field, interconnected, in which the particles of matter undergo mutual influences. This means that man, who is subjectivized matter, endowed with consciousness, can manipulate and influence the entire course of the Universe. Through the energy of his thoughts and actions, man becomes a co-participant and co-creator in the space of physical reality, which gives him the responsibility to change the entire world for better or worse. Through his will, as the factual potential of mentality, man generates his world, through his own subjective perception. At the same time, the “energy” of his thoughts is reflected in personal health and well-being, by inhibiting or activating the productive functions of the cells.

When man chooses his own pleasure and clings to the surface of external things, his will and actions take the form of compulsive and irrational desires. For most of the Holy Fathers, passion is the attachment of the mind to things. When reason yields to pleasure, it becomes subjugated to sense gratification and lives outside nature. St. Maximus the Confessor highlighted the fact that we are tributary to some passion, if we dwell with the mind on something; this way we become prisoners of our own senses. Sin diminishes and alters man’s connections with the world, because we narrow our own horizons and our own sensory reality.

Passionate thoughts are made up of a simple idea or meaning, to which a passion has been associated. From a psychological point of view, passionate thought denotes an obsessive idea that develops an intense emotional charge in relation to the object. Due to the immediate dopaminergic gratification, at the mental level there seems to be an uncompromising desire to put passionate thoughts into action: “Every great passion is like an instinct: it is an acquired automatism, which, as long as it lasts, reacts with a constant uniformity” (Théodule-Armand Ribot). Under these conditions, thoughts are energy vehicles of the mind that denote a plus or minus value on the scale of moral evaluation. That is why they can be called good or bad, virtuous or sinful, positive or negative thoughts. Negative or passionate thoughts can hurt a person to the deepest substratum of the being, resulting in a total scattering of the mind.

Until it materializes, the passionate thought involves several stages, the first being the attack or the temptation; but, with human consent, “the faces of sins appear” (St. Mark the Ascetic). Many of the temptations spring from our unconsciousness in the form of imaginative expressions at the level of the mind, but clearing the thoughts involves watching them with constant spiritual attention. Spiritual practices and the meditative state favor the concentration of the mind and stimulate attention in relation to the noetic flow, which becomes subject to conscious control. The exercise of meditation, prayer or concentration (M. Eliade) produces the power to control the sectors of psycho-mental and sensory activity. Evagrius Ponticus places a special emphasis on mental attention, and St. John the Ladder exhorts us to read the words of the prayer with great care.

The Eastern patristic tradition speaks of nepsis or guarding thoughts. These notions give a special place to mental attention during prayer, because the mind must be kept strictly in the presence of God. For the success of a unified mind trained in maintaining attention, the Philokalic Fathers recommend the need to withdraw from the world and close the sensory gates, as ways to create an environment conducive to the cleansing and renewal of thoughts. In prayer, the natural state of man is that in which he keeps the mind undivided, the heart undivided, and the will unified.

The New Testament writings insist on the need to be attentive. Repeatedly, Jesus Christ asks for our attention, for vigilance accompanied by prayer, so that we do not fall into the temptations of the enemy (Matt 26:41). Thus, an imperative exhortation is to “be always on the watch” (Lk 21:36). The act of watching means a state of constant vigilance, scanning the environment, which gives spiritual clarity and strong faith in times of trial. That is why, in the ascetic practices of the Fathers, watchfulness is more important than any other restraint. The alertness of the mind in prayer gives man a “watchful eye” that shows him cautious and boldness when confronted with impure powers and passions.

In the posture of a redoubtable guard, the mind has the “management” of psychic events. The skillful supplicant detects cunning thoughts, and thus the devil’s “bait” cannot insert passion into his thoughts. Temptations from the powers of evil pull the mind into the races of thought “like ropes”, but the hesychast, accustomed to the prayer of Jesus, penetrates his own inner forum and reaches the deepest causes of his thoughts and senses.

Watchfulness and prayer remain the tools with which man deepens the meanings of past events and the thoughts that still relate to them, placing them in the pure light of Jesus’ prayer. The spiritual mind can no longer have bad thoughts that disturb the mind, because, in its intimate depth, there is the cleansing and the burning of passions and passionate thoughts.

In divine contemplation, man’s thoughts are called “to illuminate things, to bring to light their meanings” (Panayotis Nellas) and to be directed towards a spi­ritual meaning. It is all about a bending of the thoughts to the rational meanings of things and the concentration of the mind on the things of God. The Jesus Prayer gives rise to a different way of thinking in man, and his thoughts are devoted to Christ, converting them into good thoughts, fruitful of benevolent deeds. The Jesus Prayer changes the structure of the mind in the sense that it becomes simple and pure, it condenses everything into a single word, a single thought, a single point.