Love Your Neighbor

Antony said, "Our life and our death are with our neighbor. If we do good to our neighbor, we do good to God; if we cause our neighbor to stumble, we sin against Christ."

~~Fabric art, Neighbor Serving Neighbor by Vincent Crosby

Written in the Dust

At a meeting of hermits in Cellia, Evagrius made a speech. Then the priest there said, " Evagrius, we know that if you were in your own country, perhaps you would already be a bishop, ruling over many, but here you are only a pilgrim."

Evagrius was pierced to the heart at these words, but he bent his head calmly and without haste and looked at the ground, then wrote in the dust with his finger, and said, "Truly, brothers, that is right. But, as it is written, 'I have spoken once and I will no more answer' (Job 40:5)."

~~photo by Frank Logue

To Our Last Breath

Antony said to Poemon, "Our greatest work is to lay the blame for our sins upon ourselves before God, and to expect to be tempted to our last breath."

~~Painting Deep Breath by Melanie Weidner, 2005

A Word for God's Sake

Abraham came to see Ares, and while they were sitting together, a brother came and asked Ares, "Tell me, what must I do to be saved?"

The hermit said, "Go, eat bread and salt every evening for a whole year, then come back, and I will talk to you again."

So, the brother went away and did so, and at the end of a year came again to see Ares. By chance, Abraham was with him again. This time Ares said to the brother, "Go, fast for a year, and eat every second day."

When he had gone, Abraham said to Ares, "Why, when you put a light yoke on all the brothers, have you laid such a grievous burden on this brother?"

Ares replied, "Other brothers come to ask questions and go away just as they came. But this brother comes to hear a word for God's sake, and he is one who works hard for the Lord and takes the greatest trouble to do whatever I tell him. That is why I speak the word of God to him."

Do Clothes Make the Man?

Some of the hermits once came to Joseph in Panephysis, to ask him if they should break their fast when they received brothers as guests, to celebrate their coming. Before they asked their question, Joseph said to them, "Think about what I am going to do today."

He put two seats made of reeds tied in bundles, one on his left and the other on his right, and said, "Sit down."

Then he went into his cell and put on rags; he came out, and walked past them, and then went into his cell again and put on his ordinary clothes. The visitors were astonished, and asked him what it meant.

He said to them, "Did you see what I did?"

They said, "Yes."

He said, "Did the rags change me for the better?"

They said, "No."

Joseph said, "Did good clothes change me for the worse?"

They said, "No."

He said, "So I am myself whether I wear good clothes or rags. I was not changed for better or for worse because I changed my clothes. That is how we ought to be when we receive guests. It is written in the Holy Gospel, 'Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's' (Matthew 22:21). When visitors come we should welcome them and celebrate with them. It is when we are by ourselves that we ought to be sorrowful."

When they heard this they were amazed that he knew what they intended to ask him, and they praised God.

Pray to God

The brothers asked Agatho, "Abba, which virtue in our way of life needs most effort to acquire?"

He said to them, "I may be wrong, but I think nothing needs so much effort as prayer to God. If anyone wants to pray, the demons try to interrupt the prayer, for they know that prayer is the only thing that hinders them. All the other efforts in a religious life, whether they are made vehmently or gently, have room for a measure of rest. But we need to pray until our dying breath. That is the great struggle."

The Divine Within

A brother asked Arsenius to give him advice. He said to him, "As far as possible, try hard to make your inner progress as God would have it, and by this, overcome the passions of the body."

He also said, "If we seek God, He will appear to us; If we grasp Him, He will stay with us."

~~God Enthroned from the Nuremberg Chronicle. The two artists who were responsible for overseeing the design and illustration of the Chronicle were Michael Wohlgemut (1434-1519) and his stepson Wilhelm Pleydenwurff (c. 1450-1494).