My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
ON THE FOURTH SUNDAY OF HOLY AND GREAT LENT: THE
HOLY ORTHODOX CHURCH COMMEMORATES OUR RIGHTEOUS ST. JOHN
CL.AMICUS AND AUTHOR OF "THE LADDER OF DIVINE
ASCENT."
Our holy and righteous Father John Climacus lived in the second half of the 6th century, survived into the seventh, passed forty years of solitude at a place called Tholas, that he became Egoumenos (Abbot) of the Great Monastery of Mount Sinai and that he compose there The Ladder of Divine Ascent. HIs country is unknown because, from the beginning of his renunciation of the world, he took great care to live as a stranger upon earth. "Exile" he wrote, "is a separation from everything, in order that one may hold on totally to God." We only know that from the age of sixteen, after having received a solid intellectual formation, he renounced all the pleasures of this vain life for love of God and went to Mount Sinai, to the foot of the holy mountain on which God had in former times revealed His glory to Moses, and consecrated himself to the Lord with a burning heat as a sweet-smelling sacrifice.
Setting aside, from the moment of his entry into the stadium, all self-trust and self-satisfaction through unfeigned humility. he submitted body and soul to an elder called Martyrios and set himself, free from all care, to climb that spiritual ladder (klimax) at the top of which God stands, and to "add fire each day to fire, fervour, zeal to zeal." He saw his shepherd as "the image of Christ" and, convinced that his elder was responsible for him before God, he had only on ecare to reject his own will and "with all deliberateness to put aside the capacity to make [his] own judgment," so that no interval passed between Martyrios’ commands, even those that appeared unjustified, and the obedience of his disciple. In spite of this PERFECT SUBMISSION, Martyrios kept him as a novice for four years and only tonsured him when he was twenty, after having tested his humility. Startegios, one of the monks present at the tonsure predicted that the new monk would one day become one of the great lights of the world. When, later, Martyrios and his disciple paid a visit to John the Savaite, one of the most famous ascetics of the time, the latter, ignoring the elder, poured water over John’s feet. After they had left, John the Savaite declared that he did not know the young monk but, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he had washed the feet of the Egoumenos (Abbot) of Sinai. The same prophecy was confirmed by the Great Anastasios the Sinaite (April 21st), whom they also went to visit.
In spite of his youth, John showed the maturity of an elder and great discernment. Thus one day, when he had been sent into the world on a mission, and finding himself with lay people, he had preferred to give in somewhat to vainglory by eating very little, rather than to gluttony; for, of these two evils, it as better to choose that which is less dangerous for beginners in monastic life.
He thus passed nineteen years in the blessed freedom from the care that obedience gives, freed from all conflict by the prayer of his spiritual father and on "a safe voyage, a sleeper’s journey," moved towards the harbor of impassibility. On the death of Martyrios, he resolved to continue his ascension in solitude, a type of life suitable for only a small number, who, made strong ON THE ROCK OF HUMILITY, flee from others so as not to be even for a moment deprived of the "SWEETNESS OF GOD." He did not commit himself to this path, one so full of snares, on his own judgment, but on the recommendation of the holy elder George Arsilaites, who instructed him in the way of life proper to hesychasts. As his exercise ground, he chose a solitary place called Tholas, sitauted five miles from the main monastery, where other hermits lived, each not far from others. He stayed there for 40 years, CONSUMED BY AN EVER-INCREASING LOVE OF GOD, WITHOUT THOUGHT FOR HIS OWN FLESH, FREE OF ALL CONTACT WITH MEN, HAVING UNCEASING PRAYER AND VIGILANCE AS HIS ONLY OCCUPATION, IN ORDER TO "KEEP HIS INCORPOREAL SELF SHUT UP IN THE HOUSE OF THE BODY," AS AN ANGEL CLOTHED IN BODY.
He use to eat all that was compatible with his monastic profession, but in very small quantities, thus SUBDUING THE TYRANNY OF THE FLESH while not providing a pretext for vainglory. By living in SOLITUDE and RETREAT, he put to death the mighty flame OF GREED, which under the pretext of charity and hospitality, leads negligent monks TO GLUTTONY, THE DOOR TO ALL PASSIONS, AND TO THE LOVE OF MONEY, "A WORSHIP OF IDOLS AND THE OFFSPRING OF UNBELIEF." He triumphed OVER SLOTH (ACEDIA)–THAT DEATH OF THE SOUL WHICH ATTACKS HESYCHASTS IN PARTICULAR–AND LAXITY, BY REMEMBRANCE OF DEATH. By meditating on Eternal rewards, he undid the chain of sadness; he knew only a single sadness; that "AFFLICTION WHICH LEADS TO JOY" AND MAKES US RUN WITH ARDOR ALONG THE PATH OF REPENTANCE, PURIFYING THE SOUL FROM ALL ITS IMPURITIES.
What still prevented him from arriving at impassibility (apatheia)? He had long since conquered anger BY THE SWORD OF OBEDIENCE. He had suffocated vainglory, that three-pointed thorn which forever harasses those who battle for holiness, and which entwines itself with every virtue like a leech, BY SOLITUDE AND EVEN MORE BY SILENCE. As a reward for his labors, which he took care to season constantly with self-accusation, the Lord gave him the queen of virtues, holy and precious humility: " A GRACE IN THE SOUL, AND WITH A NAME KNOWN ONLY TO THOSE WHO HAVE HAD EXPERIENCE OF IT, A GIFT FROM GOD."
As his cell was too near the others, he would often withdraw to a distant cave at the foot of the mountain, which he made an antechamber of heaven by his groans and the tears which fell heaven by his groans and the tears which fell effortlessly from his eyes like an abundant spring, transfiguring his body as with a "WEDDING GARMENT." By this blessed affliction and these continual tears, he "DID NOT CEASE TO CELEBRATE DAILY" and kept perpetual prayer in his heart, which had become like inviolable fortress against the assaults of evil thoughts (logismoi). Sometimes he was ravished in spirit in the midst of the Angelic Choirs, not knowing IF HE WAS IN THE BODY OR OUT OF IT, AND THEN WITH GREAT SIMPLICITY HE ASKED GOD TO TEACH HIM ABOUT THE MYSTERIES OF THEOLOGY. When he came out of the furnace of prayer, he sometimes felt purified as it by fire, and sometimes totally with light.
As for sleep, he allowed himself just the measure necessary to keep his spirit vigilant in prayer and, before sleeping, he prayed at length, or wrote down on tablets the fruit of his meditations ON THE INSPIRED SCRIPTURE. He took great care over many years to keep his virtues hidden form human eyes, but, when God judged that the time had come for him to transmit to others the light he had acquired for the edification of the Church, He led a young monk named Moses to John, who, thanks to the intervention of the other ascetics, succeeded in overcoming the resistance of the man of God, and was accepted as his disciple. One afternoon, when Moses had gone a long way to find earth for their little garden, and had lain down under a large rock to rest, Abba (Father) John, in his cell, received the revelation that Moses was in danger, and he immediately seized the weapon of prayer. In the evening, when Moses returned, he told John that in his sleep he had, all of sudden, heard the voice of his elder calling him, at the very moment when the rock began to break away from the moorings and threatened to crush him. [Source: The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese]
(To be continued)
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Divine and Glorious Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
Father George
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 