The Roots of Christian Mysticism Session 6
Summary of Kim Nataraja's
"The Desert Fathers and Mothers" talk, The London Christian
Meditation Centre, St Mark's, Clerkenwell, 01 November 2005.
Historical Context
Christianity in Egypt
Legend has it that St. Mark brought Christianity to Egypt sometime
during the reign of Nero in the first century and was even martyred
in 68 A.D. in Alexandria.
The evidence that we have shows again a great diversity within
early Christianity in Alexandria in the second and third centuries,
when first Clement and then Origen was head of the Catechetical
School there – a most influential institution of Christian
learning that had been founded by Pantaenus around 190 A.D. It is
clear from their writings that when they were speaking they kept
in mind the two distinct groupings within Christianity we have met
already, those with a simple faith and those of a more intellectual
disposition. Seeming inconsistencies in their writings can sometimes
be explained by the fact that they are adapting their teaching to
their audience’s needs.
When Constantine declared tolerance for the Christian religion
in the fourth century the number of practising Christians rose from
3 to 30 million. It was at Constantine’s instigation that
the first ecumenical Council of Nicaea was called in 325. Constantine
gave his patronage to the form of Christianity that was increasingly
becoming the mainstream and the church became party political.
Athanasius, who had been present at this council as a deacon is
the next major figure in Egyptian Christianity. He was bishop of
Alexandria 327-373. He was heavily embroiled in Church politics
and mistrusted all things Greek and therefore the atmosphere of
Christian philosophy that had prevailed with Clement and Origen.
As far as we know he was the first major theologian to preach in
Coptic.
Men and women began to opt out of an increasingly decadent church.
John Chrysostom said “Plagues teeming with untold mischief
have come upon the churches. The primary offices have become marketable.
Excessive wealth, enormous power, and luxury are destroying the
integrity of the Church. (St John Chrysostom - Homilies in Ephesus)
They were also opting out of an increasingly decadent society:
“Society was regarded (by the Desert Fathers) as a shipwreck
from which each individual man had to swim for his life. (Thomas
Merton)
Instead they went to live out the gospel message in the solitude
of the Egyptian desert “Do not be conformed to this world
but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. (Romans 12:2).
To begin with it was the Christians of simple faith who fled to
the desert. The Life of Antony written in Coptic (357) and attributed
to Athanasius illustrates the kind of life they attempted to live.
Athanasius presents the life as a battle with demons. This follows
from his theology of an unbridgeable gulf between God and Man, one
that could only be crossed by God’s grace and a life fighting
demons. The Desert Fathers and Mothers saw going into the desert
and giving up all we consider to be essential in life: family, marriage,
a role in society and owning property as a kind of martyrdom –
‘White Martyrdom’ as opposed to the ‘Red Martyrdom’
of the real martyrs.
The Life of Pachomius bears witness to the effect that the martyrs
had on faith: “Faith increased greatly in the churches in
every land and monasteries and places for ascetics began to appear
for those who were the first monks had seen the endurance of the
martyrs.”
St. Antony, like Athanasius, was a native Egyptian (or Copt derived
from Greek word “Aiguptious” meaning Egyptian) and an
orphan. His parents had been Christians. He was not interested in
learning his letters but was interested in going to church and committed
everything to memory. Sometime after his parents died he heard the
passage of scripture, “sell what you own and give the money
to the poor…..then come and follow me.” (Matthew 19:21)
Antony took this as a word addressed to him and literally sold most
of his possessions, keeping some for his younger sister. He then
later heard “Be not anxious for the morrow” (Matthew
6:34) and he sold the rest and made provision for his sister to
be taken care of by nuns.
St. Anthony learnt the ascetic life from others in neighbouring
villages. He was not the first, but the most influential figure
however to go into the desert. According to tradition the first
Christian anchorite was actually Paul of Thebes. There is a story
of Antony visiting Paul of Thebes. A raven used to take Paul his
bread. On the day that Antony visited, the raven took enough for
two people!
According to Athanasius, “Antony’s words “persuaded
many to take up the solitary life. And so, from then on, there were
monasteries in the mountains and the desert was made a city by monks.”
Monasteries there were really only a collection of dwellings. The
Greek ‘mone’ meant dwelling or lodge.
The ascetic ideal was presented to educated and uneducated alike
as an appealing way of life and at the level of experience, if not
theology, the different groups of Christians were united:
Abba Poemen said that Abba John said that the saints are like a
group of trees, each bearing different fruit, but watered from the
same source. The practices of one saint differ from those of another,
but it is the same Spirit that works in all of them.
By the end of the fourth century there were 30,000 monks and nuns
living in the deserts of Lower and in Upper Egypt. The famous sites
in Lower Egypt were Nitria, Kellia and Scetis. Antony himself lived
further into the desert. It all began at Nitria with Amoun who was
trying to escape from an arranged marriage. After 18 years of living
together as brother and sister he and his wife began to live the
ascetic life apart. They were gradually joined by a growing number
of monks at Nitria. When life there eight years later had become
too crowded and noisy, Amoun and Antony established Kellia for those
who were ready for a quieter life. Scetis was founded at the same
time by Macarius the Egyptian.
Around the same time that Amoun founded Nitira Pachomius, a former
Roman soldier, established monasteries in Upper Egypt and wrote
the first monastic rule, which become very influential in Western
Monasticism until superseded by the Rule of St Benedict.
By the end of the fifth century there were also monks in Palestine
and Syria, many of whom were Origenist monks who had been driven
from Egypt in a controversy with the majority of monks who understood
God in a more anthropomorphic way. Some of the Syrian monks were
Stylites regarded by the desert fathers as too extreme. Simeon the
Stylite is renowned for having sat on a pillar for 40 years. They
were regarded by people as intermediaries between heaven and earth.
What was daily life like for the desert fathers and mothers?
Scripture was read aloud at weekly gatherings – ‘synaxis’.
There was psalmody, sometimes the monks managed to get through all
the psalms in twenty-four hours! They engaged in meditation. This
was the solitary repetition of a phrase without reflection on meaning
- which is a modern approach. They also engaged in prostrations.
“Stand up and pray and make a metanoia, while saying: ‘Son
of God, have mercy on me.’ (Abba Nau) (metanoia – here:
prostration)
They earned their living making baskets and ropes, weaving flax
or working in the fields as labourers. Antony had stressed ‘work
and pray’.
There were three set periods of prayer corresponding to 9am, 12
noon and 3pm. There was also a two hour prayer session at sundown
followed by a four or six hour sleep and four hours’ prayer
until sunrise. This lifestyle has left its mark for we have the
following saying:
Some elders came to see Abba Poemen to ask him, “If we see
some brothers dozing in the congregation, do you want us to reprove
them so that they stay awake?” he said to them, “For
my part, when I see a brother dozing, I lay his head on my lap and
let him rest.”
Such stories and the advice that was given by the Abba were collected
by disciples and written down, first in the ‘Paterikon’
(saying of the Fathers) and ‘Meterikon’ (sayings of
the Mothers). Later they were copied into ‘The Sayings of
the Desert Fathers’ (or Apopthegmata Patrum). Although there
were as many Mothers as Fathers the Sayings disproportionately reflect
the Fathers’ wisdom.
What did the desert mean to the early Christians?
The desert features in the stories of Elijah, Moses, John the Baptist
and Jesus. As a symbol of the divine it is a manifestation of the
Unmanifest, immense, unending, unfathomless, empty, challenging.
It is a meeting-place with God.
Evagrius divided the spiritual life into Praxis (the practical
life of prayer) and Theoria (the vision of God). The vision of God
he divided into Physike (seeing the world as a manifestation of
the Unmanifest):
As for those who are far from God…God has made it possible
for them to come near to the knowledge of him and his love for them
through the medium of creatures. These he has produced, as the letters
of the alphabet so to speak, by his power and wisdom, that is to
say, by his Son and by his Spirit. The whole of this ministry is
performed by creatures for the benefit of those who are far from
God. (Evagrius Letter to Melania)
This form of contemplation is therefore possible for every one.
And Theologike (the pure vision of God)
Essential qualities
We must not forget that Christianity is a Desert religion and therefore
shaped by this environment. The essential qualities of the prayer
of the desert fathers are all the qualities of the desert. (and
as Christian Meditation is based on it also of our way of prayer).
The desert is honed down to essentials and requires the same of
those living there. Faced with the ‘nothingness’ of
the desert we can only let go of our usual activities and preoccupations.
The Desert Fathers and Mothers did not just flee the external world
but more the temptations this world presented to them.
In the words of Thomas Merton, “What the Fathers sought most
of all was their own true self, in Christ. And on order to do this,
they had to reject completely the false, formal self, fabricated
under social compulsion in ‘the world’.”
Discussion of the collection of saying. (See separate sheet):
1) Solitude. The solitude of the desert leads to the interior solitude.
(Sayings 7, 8, 9)
2) Silence – even more important than solitude
(Saying 10,11,12)
3) Attention, detachment. Both these qualities are essential in
the desert. You need to be attentive to the environment –
very dangerous otherwise – and pay attention to your feelings
and moods; in the desert they are indicative of possible tiredness
and dehydration. In meditation attention to your word and detachment
from your thoughts and attention also to feelings, e.g. resistance
in the form of boredom.
(Sayings13, 14 and 15)
Other qualities can be summed up by what became the three vows:
‘Poverty, Chastity and Obedience’.
4) Poverty of goods, poverty of speech.
Both are a form of fasting – fasting of acquisitiveness and
need to possess; (possessiveness causes conflict) and fasting of
words – unnecessary words that are a mere distraction. To
be able to do this requires faith and trust. This leads to ‘poverty
of spirit’ i.e. knowing one’s need of God.
(Sayings 16, 17,18 and 21)
5) Letting go of thoughts and images
(19, 20) Emphasized by both groups, but Origenists added letting
go of thoughts about God. (Remember Copts had an anthropomorphic
view of God!)
(Sayings 19 and 20)
6) Fasting not to be done for its own sake but for lessening distractions
as aid to prayer
(Sayings 22, 23 and 24)
7) Obedience and humility. This meant obedience to God, to Commandments
(i.e. Beatitudes) and to the Abba.
(Saying 25) (meaning of ‘obedience’ is ‘to listen
intently’)
The aim was ‘to leave self behind’, i.e. one’s
ego-centric needs. Again obedience is closely linked with ‘poverty’.
Obedience to the Abba: the Abba taught by example and a word here
or there meant for a particular individual. This connection is lost
in the collection of sayings) ‘Father, give me a word that
I may live by. Very psychologically sound and wise. They taught
with understanding and compassion. They took the words from Scripture
‘Do not judge’ very seriously. And stressed Perseverance
(Saying 26 and 27)
8) Moderation
(28 and 29)
9) Few words Important aspect for Christian Meditation
(Sayings 30, 31, 32, 33)
10) Continuous prayer and ‘Ora et Labora’
(Sayings 34,35,36)
11) Transformation
(Saying 37)
Prayer is to effect the whole person and will lead to ‘purity
of heart’, change and transformation.
Evagrius integrated and expressed the teaching of the desert –
as we will see next week and Cassian, his pupil, passed it on to
the West.
To conclude here is the cosmology that has come from Origen through
the Cappadocians to Evagrius about demons in preparation for next
week’s session on Evagrius:
Originally we were all spirits; pure intuitive intelligence (nous)
in the presence of God. For some reason we fell away and as an act
of mercy God gave us material bodies so we could make our way back
to him. There are three levels of being-angels, humans and demons.
To which level you fell depended on the degree of your self-assertion.
However, ultimately all will be saved even the demons.
Demons however rejected the opportunity to make their way back
to God and they work against men’s efforts to get back. We
have the angels and Christ on our side. Christ is the one soul which
did not fall away from God. This story is the reason why so much
stress is placed on warfare with demons:
(Saying 39,40 and 41)
Click here to read a recommended reading list for this talk.
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