The letter of St. Maximus to Marinus the presbyter. Part one.

The text, preamble.

Because you have set your mark (as in a race) on acquiring friendship with God, Who is worthy of all hymns, preparing yourself, Godhonored Father, with good discipline, you complete the course.

One the one hand, by the principle (of your nature) you bring full circle the purpose, namely, the nature of all created existences, which nature is the genesis, origin, which concerns virtue.  But on the other hand,  by the mind (nous), you bring about the state which concerns the unwavering union, which marks out the movement of every age and time.   By which the longing for God comes together as more fervent:  
limitlessly,  while you long for a mutual  enlargement for the  motion of your desire,  
incomprehensibly while being longed for. 

The longing from God creates for you the incomprehensible yearning, whose end is God Himself. Who becomes the fullness of longing for those who are worthy,as the self- existent (self hypostatic trans.) enjoyment of good things. Whose principle (of enjoyment, that is. trans.) knows only the graspable (tangible) experience,because it clearly occurs above conceptual  thought, namely, a union, as occurring without any noetic impression whatsoever.

All Men Are Commanded to Pray Without Ceasing, St. Gregory Palamas

Let no one think, my brother Christians, that it is the duty only of priests and monks to pray without ceasing, and not of laymen.

No, no; it is the duty of all of us Christians to remain always in prayer.

For look what the most holy Patriarch of Constantinople, Philotheus, writes in his life of St. Gregory of Thessalonica. This saint had a beloved friend by the name of Job, a very simple but most virtuous man. Once, while conversing with him, His Eminence said of prayer that every Christian in general should strive to pray always, and to pray without ceasing, as Apostle Paul commands all Christians, "Pray without ceasing" (I Thessalonians 5:17), and as the prophet David says of himself, although he was a king and had to concern himself with his whole kingdom: "I foresaw the Lord always before my face" (Psalms 15:8), that is, in my prayer I always mentally see the Lord before me. Gregory the Theologian also teaches all Christians to say God’s name in prayer more often than to breathe.

So, my Christian brethren, I too implore you, together also with St. Chrysostom, for the sake of saving your souls, do not neglect the practice of this prayer. Imitate those I have mentioned and follow in their footsteps as far as you can.

At first it may appear very difficult to you, but be assured, as it were from Almighty God, that this very name of our Lord Jesus Christ, constantly invoked by you, will help you to overcome all difficulties, and in the course of time you will become used to this practice and will taste how sweet is the name of the Lord. Then you will learn by experience that this practice is not impossible and not difficult, but both possible and easy. This is why St. Paul, who knew better than we the great good which such prayer would bring, commanded us to pray without ceasing. He would not have imposed this obligation upon us if it were extremely difficult and impossible, for he knew beforehand that in such case, having no possibility of fulfilling it, we would inevitably prove to be disobedient and would transgress his commandment, thus incurring blame and condemnation. The Apostle could have had no such intention.

Moreover, bear in mind the method of prayer – how it is possible to pray without ceasing, namely by praying in the mind. And this we can always do if we so wish. For when we sit down to work with our hands, when we walk, when we eat, when we drink we can always pray mentally and practice this mental prayer – the true prayer pleasing to God. Let us work with the body and pray with the soul. Let our outer man perform his bodily tasks, and let the inner man be entirely dedicated to the service of God, never abandoning this spiritual practice of mental prayer, as Jesus, God and Man, commanded us, saying: "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret" (Matthew 6:6).

The closet of the soul is the body; our doors are the five bodily senses. The soul enters its closet when the mind does not wander hither and thither, roaming among things and affairs of the world, but stays within, in our heart. Our senses become closed and remain closed when we do not let them be attached to external sensory things, and in this way our mind remains free from every worldly attachment, and by secret mental prayer unites with God its Father. "And thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly," adds the Lord. God who knows all secret things sees mental prayer and rewards it openly with great gifts. For that prayer is true and perfect which fills the soul with Divine grace and spiritual gifts. As chrism perfumes the jar the more strongly the tighter it is closed, so prayer, the more fast it is imprisoned in the heart, abounds the more in Divine grace.

Blessed are those who acquire the habit of this heavenly practice, for by it they overcome every temptation of the evil demons, as David overcame the proud Goliath. It extinguishes the unruly lusts of the flesh, as the three men extinguished the flames of the furnace. This practice of inner prayer tames passions as Daniel tamed the wild beasts. By it the dew of the Holy spirit is brought down upon the heart, as Elijah brought down rain on Mount Carmel. This mental prayer reaches to the very throne of God and is preserved in golden vials, sending forth their odors before the Lord, as John the Divine saw in the Revelation, "Four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odors, which are the prayers of the saints" (Revelation 5:8).

This mental prayer is the light which illumines man’s soul and inflames his heart with the fire of love of God. It is the chain linking God with man and man with God. Oh the incomparable blessing of mental prayer! It allows a man constantly to converse with God. Oh truly wonderful and more than wonderful – to be with one’s body among men while in one’s mind conversing with God. Angels have no physical voice, but mentally never cease to sing glory to God. This is their sole occupation and all their life is dedicated to this.

So, brother, when you enter your closet and close your door, that is, when your mind is not darting hither and thither but enters within your heart, and your senses are confined and barred against things of this world, and when you pray thus always, you too are then like the holy angels, and your Father, Who sees your prayer in secret, which you bring Him in the hidden depths of your heart, will reward you openly by great spiritual gifts.

But what other and greater rewards can you wish from this when, as I said, you are mentally always before the face of God and are constantly conversing with Him – conversing with God, without Whom no man can ever be blessed either here or in another life?

Finally, my brother, whoever you may be, when you take up this book and, having read it, wish to test in practice the profit which mental prayer brings to the soul, I beg you, when you begin to pray thus, pray God with one invocation, "Lord have mercy," for the soul of him who has worked on compiling this book and of him who helped to give it to the public. For they have great need of your prayer to receive God’s mercy for their soul, as you for yours. May it be so! May it be so!

Thanks St.  Nicholas Orthodox Church for the post http://www.orthodox.net/

St Gregory Palamas, from "Early Fathers From the Philokalia," translated from the Russian text, "Dobrotolubiye," by E. Kadloubovsky and G.E.H. Palmer, eighth edition, (London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1981), pp. 412 - 415

Why St. Gregory Palamas is a Sabbath keeper

No, he didn't observe the Saturday  Judaic ordinance.  Rather,  in the biblical and patristic sense,  Christians observe the Sabbath.  Not just on  Sunday,  but every moment,  in fact,  every breath.  This is how  St.  Gregory interprets the Sabbath.  The excerpt is from  question 2,  his first Triad to a young monk beset with  bewilderment.

The Sabbath was a command to cease from work. So serious was it,  one could be stoned for violation, as did occur.  The Sabbath, doctrinally, for Christians is that Christ said "it is finished."  He has reconciled man to God  by changing human nature and deifying it. But we participate in the Sabbath  by ceasing from our own  works and thoughts.  And this makes sense.  If the last act we will ever do  is give up our breath, and enter eternity,  then  we should consciously lives reflecting this.

Consequently then, for those recently stripped down  for this contest and gathered in their mind, they continually start off for this race,  but they also need continually again to return to this practice,  as the mind eludes those who are unexercized, since it is the hardest thing to look at and moves more than anything.  Because of this, they  encourage to pay attention to the frequent scattering of the mind and  return again to oneself in inhalation and to hold it back for a little, keeping that guardedly in this (breathing) until by God’s help progressing to the better, and without much toil, having made his  own mind  unable to approach to things about him, he may be able to exactly gather into “a singular form collected.” ....this automatically occurs following the attention of the mind. For there is quietude by this entering in and going out -the spirit upon every ingoing thought, but especially in the case of those who practice stillness in body and reasoning. For those who spiritually sabbatize are these who also  rest from all their works, because it is actually easy. Everything discursive and produced by discursive reasoning and which has been elaborately reasoned about knowledge of the powers of the soul  they completely strip away, namely the work and all the aids for aiding bodily feelings, helps and quite simply every bodily activity,  which is in our power, but not in our power, even the end, exactly as respiration, so long as it is in our power. All these identical things  follow painlessly and without much care for those who make progress hesychastically. And of necessity, perfectly automatically all things occur for by same entrance of the soul to itself. 

St. Maximus' collection of sayings on the soul

St. Maximus,  the great theologian  of early Byzantium,  was original,  but  traditional.  He preferred to  support his positions from  patristic and secular quotes.  Below are some he collected, as a bee seeking honey.

 Concerning the Soul

Mt.10, “He that finds his soul shall lose it, and he that loses it for my sake, he shall find it."

2 Cor.4, “and though the outward man  perish, yet the inward man  is renewed day by day.”

Sirach 46, “child, in meekness glorify your soul, and see if there be any wickedness in it, and do not give yourself to it.  For all things are not profitable to all, and not every soul is pleasing to all.”

Proverbs 11, “a soul is blessed is completely simple (guileless).

Basil, “The treasury of the soul, is interior to the body.  The good has need of this, to be led,  which is the good of the soul."

Gregory the Theologian, “ What do you want to become? I ask my soul.  What is great to you?  Or what is  meager for mortal men? Eagerly seek only what is bright, and I will give it to you. 

Sacrifice the soul to God,  better yet,  by means of prayer.

Chrysostom, “Everything God has given in our nature is two fold, two eyes, two ears, two hands, two feet;  which ever of them one harms, we are consoled that we have use of the other.  But He has given  one soul to us, should we lose this, how  shall we flourish?"

Soul is a substance, something bodiless and immortal.

Soul is a begotten substance,  a substance living, noetic.

Philistion, “The soul of the wise is joined to God.  The soul does not perish  with death,  but an evil life does.”

Epictetus, “The soul needs to be healed more than the body, to die is better than to live poorly.”

displacing the seven wicked spirits

St.  Gregory places hesychasm  as absolutely necessary to  progress in the spiritual life.  Seven  spirits,  commonly represented as the seven wicked spirits of Mt.12,  which were also cast out of Mary Magdalene,  dwell in us. In baptism,  the wicked one is displaced.  But we forfeit the grace of the Spirit  and so need to recover it by repentance.  Since the law of sin,  as manifested by the presence of the seven  spirits,  dwells in the belly,  we are to direct our attention there, invoking the Name of God  and driving out the heathen  from the promised land.  When  they  are  displaced and the mind-nous-  presides- then the Seven Spirits of God (Is.11)  can reside in us.  Gregory's point is that if we judge ourselves,  then  we are not judged by God.  Return  to the interior then is repentance.  We are searching  the inward parts of the belly,  for David said,
"the spirit of man  is the candle of the Lord searching all the inward parts of the belly"  This descent into the heart then is actually an ascent, an ascent to God.

One last note on the excerpt.  Gregory says we are to  preside and watch over ourselves,  i.e.  the mind is like a proistamenos or episkopos,  overseeing the interior.  Each is called to  govern in their heart.  For as David again said, "he that has no rule over his spirit is like a broken  wall."

From St. Gregory, question 2 Triad 1. (posted 1-28-13)

“Take heed to yourself” Moses clearly says to all, not to certain of you, not to a particular one.  Of whom?  Of the mind. For it is not possible for anyone to take heed to everyone’s own self.  He knows then this identical keeping guard of the soul and body, for through this he easily remedies both bodily and soulish evil passions. 

Rule over yourself then,

prepare yourself,  

oversee yourself, 

better yet, preside and oversee and prove yourself. 

And to add, in this way the flesh resists subordination of the spirit,  

“the word hidden in your heart won’t ever happen.” If a  spirit of one reigns, namely, of the seven spirits and passions, “Ascend to yourself”  the Preacher says “Do not leave your place,” that is, the portion of the soul,  neither let a member of the body  be unsupervised (lit. not overseen ἀνεπίσκοπον trans.) for in this way also,  when the seven spirits from below test, he may pass through higher on to Him Who tries the hearts and reins (lit. kidneys trans.)” “when He tries the hearts and reins ” as he himself has tested them previously,   he may stand with boldness not tested (by God trans.).” “For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged.” He who says this is Paul.

And here is this saying from David experiencing- undergoing- that blessed passion,

even he himself says to God that  “darkness shall be be darkened from you, and night as day shall enlighten  me because  You shall possess my reins. ”

Fr. Romanides on Neurobiological sickness of religion

Please note section 31  of the paper.  I will  tie it in with the rest of st Gregory's triad next post,  God willing.

31. The Council Of Orange 529 Condemned Augustine's Interpretation of Romans 5:12

 Gregory Palamas (1296-14 ) summarizes the patristic tradition against mysticism as follows: "The practice of making the nous^[ 108 ] abandon, not the physical thoughts,^[ 109 ] but the body itself in order to come upon rational spectacles, is the strongest of the Greek delusions and the root and source of every erroneous opinion, the invention of demons and the punishment which gives birth to despair and is the offspring of madness."^[ 110 ]

 An inseparable part of the cure in question is that the glorified have become specialists on the thoughts of Satan since "we are not ignorant of his thoughts."^[ 111 ] The invincible weapon against the devil is the repair of the short-circuit between the noetic faculty in the heart and the brain. This cure consists of confining all thoughts, good and bad, to the brain which is brought about only when the noetic faculty in the heart returns to its natural circular motion by means of unceasing prayer. Naive are those who think it is possible to keep only good thoughts in the brain by getting rid of bad thoughts. Not only is this impossible but one is obliged to know exactly how the devil manipulates human thoughts from the environment in order to defeat him at his own game.

 Success in this contest against the devil is guaranteed by means of the circular motion of the noetic faculty in the heart. St. Gregory Palamas summarizes the patristic tradition as follows: "For indeed it did not escape their attention that the act of vision sees other things visible, but it does not see itself. So it is with the noetic faculty. It acts on the one hand upon other things, surveying what it needs, which the Great Dionysius calls motion in a straight line. When it returns to itself and acts upon itself the noetic faculty sees itself. This again the same one (Dionysius) calls circular motion. This again is the best and special motion of the noetic faculty by which it transcends itself and finds itself with God. "For the noetic faculty," he says, "not scattered outside of itself", you see that it is outside? since outside, it needs to return, so therefore he continues saying "it returns to itself, therefore by means of itself it finds itself with God" i.e. it ascends by means of the way without error. For also it is impossible for such a motion of the noetic faculty to fall into error."^[ 112 ] During this state of either illumination or glorification the brain is functioning normally in communion with the environment and adding no kind of metaphysics or ontology to this experience of "seeing (Christ) in a mirror dimly" or "or face to face" (1 Cor. 13:12). The only ecstasy involved in one's first glorification is a loss of orientation until one gets used to seeing everything saturated by Christ's uncreated glory of the Father which has no similarity whatsoever to anything created.

 The uncreated glory of God is everywhere present saturating creation and therefore in each person and his heart. This uncreated glory's ruling, creative, providential and even purifying energy is already at work in each individual and in one's heart. However, not all respond in the same way to the uncreated purifying energy of God because of the short-circuit in the heart and one's environment. That one searches like Augustine for God outside of oneself in some kind of mystical experience by sending a supposedly immaterial soul into a world of immaterial archetypes is of course nonsense and according to the Fathers demonic.

 Dionysius the Areopagite was never understood by Orthodox Fathers as a mystic. He did not write a book on Mystical Theology, but on Secret Theology, so called because there is no similarity between the created and the uncreated and therefore it is "impossible to express God and even more impossible to conceive God." In other words Dionysius has nothing to do with Neo-Platonism and nothing to do with the Franco-Latins and pseudo-Orthodox who imagine that they are his disciples.

 The reason why there is no speculative theology in the Orthodox Church is the fact that the sickness of religion is neurobiological and its cure is a tested fact. "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God."

St Gregory Palamas on the Nous, notes for Holy Trinity Faith Study Group

Forgive me if this seems catechetical  and rather introductory, but many people are new to the teaching of the Church regarding communion with God.  A particular teaching of the Church is that it preserves the biblical distinction between heart and head.  Man  is holistic.  Our whole body, soul and spirit are to be sanctified (I Thes.5:23). We have consciousness of the world through our body,  of ourselves through  our soul,  and of God through  the heart, or to use the biblical word  with a patristic baptismal  name,  the nous.  This is a word which derives from  νοιεῖν, to see. We see God not with imagination but by a spiritual  faculty the Fathers denominate the eye of the soul.  Rationalist will never find adequate proof of God.  Only direct experience of His grace suffices.  However,  this experience is only the result of painful repentance, though not exclusively.

St.  Gregory's argument for much  of this second  question  from a disciple of his, of which I will excerpt a portion,  concerns how the nous  is to  enter into  union with God's grace, His love.  Now, a word before reading.  His prose is very dense.  There is no such thing as a simple sentence.  Bear with the long  clauses.  It is the only way to translate patristic Greek, apart from  paraphrasing. My goal  is to post the whole Triad  up, in it's entirety, once I finish  the translation. It is a treasure that merits wider reading, especially since it is nearly dogmatic. The extant translation of this is deficient and a poor paraphrase,  not that mine is stellar. NB  the last sentence.  The grace will not abide unless we give ourselves continually to the Lord, our entire occupation is to be in His school of stillness in Him,  hesychia.

Note on translation: if this is copied please attribute the source,  as these do not exist elsewhere in English, and it is a labor of love.

                                               Gregory Palamas Triad  one excerpt                                                          
But the wicked one, wickedly when he pulls the bed from under us (from the best things) always manages to slip away,  and pleasure fills our souls and binds with nearly unbreakable bonds those who love irrationally.   Pleasure suggests that we spend both a long length of time on pursuits  and a multitude of things to know, as for some it is riches or  fame  for the infamous or fleshly pleasures, with the result that, by the inquiry of these things through their entire life, since they retire themselves from other matters, we will not  then fortify the soul to hold fast  to purifying paidia, whose true beginning is the fear of God, from which entreaty is begotten from continual compunction and the guarding of the evangelical  oracles, but when reconciliation toward God  has happened through these, the fear is transformed into love,  and when the pain of prayer  has been carried over into joy of illumination, the flower blossoms.

The knowledge of the mysteries of God is the fragrance of this knowledge transmitted to him that bears it. This paideia and true knowledge, of which not even the beginning, namely, the fear of God, someone strengthened in the love of empty philosophy and wrapped up twisted in their turns of argument and theories, isn’t even able to find room for.  

For how would it enter entirely into the soul,  and how, after it entered, would it be able to  stay near, overtaken and given boldness to leave  because it is made nervous by every strain and sort of reasoning,  unless the entire occupation one’s free time may  be ordered in accord with God since it has said rejoice in all things, so that  the entire love of this person may become according to the commandment?

What to do when we have a bad day

When things go bad, go south,  we find ourselves habitually reacting in the same ways. Observe yourself.  Generally these reactions  fall into one of a few.
We are panicked. We lose our cool  and don’t know  what to do. This is more a fear than anything.

We are perturbed.  We get really angry and want to  see the situation  gone and blame either God or others,  rarely ourselves.

We are persistent  We play the Stoic.  Some people find themselves putting up with the problems.  They just endure it indifferently.  Some people really don’t care what happens to them.  This indifference can kill the soul.
I believe that God calls us to something deeper. The trials  produce  four major spiritual fruits in their season:

1. Penitence
Saint Paul  said he was not less than the greatest of the Apostles, Peter,  yet he was treated as off scouring of the earth, or to use the vernacular,  treated as scum.
It caused him  to  be penitent to reflect on who he was and who God is.  Constantly in his epixtles he says he was “the least of the apostles”.  He is the “chief of sinners,”  and every other epithet he could muster.  Many of us do not know what sin  is except superficially, thinking that if we haven’t killed anyone we are alright.  However,  the essence of our fall is the introduction of evil  desire into the heart, not just for carnal  pleasure, but desire for anything to gratify ourselves rather than God.

2. Patience
The great apostle  was hated by his own  congregations.  They accused him of not being an apostle because he seemed to be unfavored by God.  He learned to endure great  things by his trials.  Spiritual  patience is like a workout.  We must work the muscle out and it hurts.  Without the extra weight on it,  it cannot grow.

3. Perfection
Trials make us perfect. Not sinless, albeit mature.  The trials of the Christian  perfect us and cause us to live more like Christ. Hear what St. James said to his congregation,

“Let patience have her perfect work, that you may be mature and complete lacking nothing.”( James 1:5)

4.  Performance
St. Paul said he was set forth  to be a theatron-  literally a theatre spectacle- for other people to behold.  We are sometimes placed in difficult situations because God wants to display  His grace in us through the world. 
Let us take courage in our our trials rather than being defeated.  Let us rejoice in Christ,  as Paul said,  “who gives us always the victory!”