圣帕伊希长老论祈祷2（论祈祷 第30–40页）

Mobilising for prayer

• Geronda, is there going to be a war?
• Are all of you praying? I have been requisitioning prayer - without drawing attention - since spring and through out autumn, so that God will take pity on us, and we can

avoid both the war and having to mobilise men. I have received the following information:5 “Pray intensely so that the Turks will be impeded, because they intend to attack us on Sunday, October 16.” Glory be to God, up until this very moment, Panaghia has protected us; we shall pray for her continued protection.

• Geronda, now that the danger has passed us [Greece] by, shall we continue to pray for this matter?

• Is there perhaps a place without war? What do you mean by “us, here” and “them, there”? Those “over there” cur rently in the midst of war are also our brothers. Aren’t all people descendants o f Adam and Eve? However, our family has been separated; some are here; others are there. We are brothers and sisters with Orthodox Christians, both in the flesh and in the spirit, whereas we are brothers and sisters with others only in the flesh. Consequently, yet one more reason that we should pray for them with more anguish is because they are the more beleaguered ones.

• Geronda, during these times, when Greece is in a dif ficult situation, I pray a great deal, but I also think that the salvation of Greece does not hang upon my komboschoini.6

• It is not that the salvation of Greece hangs upon your komboschoini, but that your constant thinking about the dif ficulty Greece is undergoing means that you are aggrieved for the homeland and plead for the intervention of God, Who is the only One Who can help.

Pray that God brings forth spiritual people, Macca bees ⁷ because it is a matter of urgency. The time has come for good to battle evil, because lawlessness has been made into law and sin into fashion. But even when you see calam ities in Greece, when you see the state legislating nonsensi cal laws, and that a general instability is present, do not be fearful; God will help.8

• The way you say these things, Geronda, sounds like we ought to drop everything and give all our strength over to praying.

• But, is there any room for discussion on this? The entire world boils as if it is in a cauldron. The Church, the State, all the nations are upside down! And no one knows what the result will be. May God protect us! Monastics must do a lot of praying. Even if they have urgent work, they must set it aside and turn to prayer.

As much as you can, pray humbly for the people; they have given so many rights to the devil and are suffering. Do not forget that we became monastics for the salvation of our soul, and to help people through our prayer. We should try to become good monastics, say the Jesus Prayer and do prostrations, both for ourselves and for the people, because those are the means by which a monastic provides help.

CHAPTERTHREE

In Order for God to Hear Us

The passions are parasites’ in divine communication eronda, when I am in an impassioned state, can my heart labour in prayer?

• How can your heart labour in prayer when there are passions within you? Here; take a rusty wire and con nect it to a telephone … are you able to communicate? The line is short-circuited and has static. And when one has within himself rust - passions - he has short circuits in his spiritual life; he has short-circuited himself. He must be ware of pride, egoism, wilfulness, impudence. For, if he is dominated by those passions, it is not possible that the Grace of God will visit him so that he will be able to pray. One must clean his rusty “wires” in order to become a good conducting wire and be able to communicate with God. The more one is cleansed of the passions, the more will he pro ceed in prayer. 1

34_ COMMUNICATION WITH GOD

Passions are parasites which hinder divine commu nication. If the parasites do not quit, how will one be able to communicate with God? At the Signals Corps, when one had parasites on his frequency, we reported, “Your signal is ‘zero’ or your signal is ‘one’.2 Examine equipment and repeat; your signal is incomprehensible.” He could not be heard due to the parasites. The signal had to be above a “three”. A signal o f “five” was heard very clearly; commu nication went like clockwork. Otherwise, one shouted and shouted, but could not be heard, because he did not have a good connection. It was necessary to first connect the trans mitter to its wireless receiver and then to connect to the same frequency as the Centre.

In order to connect with God in a similar manner, we have to tune in our transmitter to the frequency of love and our receiver to the frequency of humility in order for God to hear us and for us to hear God, because it is on that frequency: Love-Humility, that God works. One must work as much as he can, in order to get a hold of that frequency. Then, he will be tuned into God, and his nous ³ will be constantly on God. I pray that you will acquire this divine connection. Amen.

Selfishness hinders communication with God

• Geronda, you once told me that my battery ought to be charged with spiritual qualities. How is that done?

• You should cultivate spiritual nobility and philotimo ⁴ in order to get rid of selfishness. Selfishness hinders prayer, because it separates one from God; it creates a state of insu lation. Do you know what insulation means? It is as if God tells you, “I cannot understand you, my child!”

• Geronda, is it possible for a monastic to be consistent in his spiritual duties and be deficient in self-sacrifice, in love, for his Brothers?

• Of course he can. If he thinks only of his own self, he may offer prayers, great feats of asceticism, and so on, but he will also have a high opinion o f himself and be indif ferent about others. Even so, he will remain a poor man forever. For, as long as one occupies himself with his own self - not to uproot his passions, but to do whatever works for him, whatever pleases him - he will not be able to ad vance spiritually.

• In other words, Geronda, in both one’s diakonia ⁵ and all his conduct, one must be up to par.

• In all things! In order for you to be in contact with Christ, Christ must be comforted by your entire life. And Christ is comforted by you when you comfort your neighbours.

4. Philotimo (Greek: φιλότιμο), according to Saint Paisios, is the spon taneous, self-sacrificing love seen in humble people, from whom every trace of self has been filtered out; it is full of gratitude towards God and their fellow men. Philotimo comes from a deep, abiding connection with God, so that one is constantly moved to do and seek that which is good, right, and honourable. Out of spiritual sensitivity, such people try to repay the slightest good that others do for them.

COMMUNICATION WITH GOD in the good sense. That is why I stress spiritual nobility, self-sacrifice. For, if one undertakes spiritual work ⁶ but is inattentive to the other things, to self-sacrifice, and so forth, then, even the spiritual work he undertakes becomes useless.

When I first entered the coenobitic Monastery o f Es- phigmenou, in 1953, as a novice, I was assigned to assist in the refectory. At that time, an elderly monk of about eighty, who was completely debilitated, asked me about bringing him some soup in his cell. I would, therefore, complete my diakonia in the refectory, and then bring him his soup. One day, a Brother saw me doing that and said, “Do not spoil him, because then he will always ask for your help, and he will not allow you any peace - you will not even be able to carry out your spiritual work. Do you know what had happened to me? I went once to help him a little because he had a cold, and then he would not leave me in peace. ‘Knock, knock,’ he tapped on my wall every so often. ‘Show some love,’ he said, ‘make me some tea.’ ‘I beseech your love; turn me over a bit.’ After a little while, again, ‘Knock, knock.’ ‘I beseech your love; put a hot brick ⁷ on my aching back.’ Brick-tea; brick-tea - how could I possibly try to carry out my spiritual work! I became indipant!” Whoever heard o f such a thing! It is appalling! - That the elderly monk should poan with pain and ask for something to relieve his discomfort, and the other monk should not want to help him so as not to be interrupted in undertaking his spiritual work! Such things are completely dried-up things [spiritually

devoid]. For God, the “brick-tea” would have counted far more than his doing prostrations and komboschoinia … for the sake of his being thorough! On the one hand, he had said, “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me,” and on the other hand, “Leave me alone!”

• Geronda, how can one always have the blessing of God?

• When one has kinship with God, God bestows His blessing. Otherwise, what kind of a blessing is it? Is it right to trample upon God’s blessing? I have experienced that. When I had gone to Sinai ⁸ there had been an unrelent ing drought. For years it had not rained a drop o f water, which had caused difficulties for both the monastery and the Bedouins who lived nearby. The monks had prayed for rain, but to no avail. During the season in which the olive trees are pruned ⁹¹ also went to help out. After the Bedouins had pruned the trees, the monks gathered the thick branches for the monastery and left the thin branches at the end of the grove. The Bedouins pleaded with the monks for permission to take the thin branches in order to use them to light their fires for cooking and warming themselves at night when it got bitterly cold; the monks refused and the Bedouins left, disappointed. The next day when the Bedouins came back and again asked for the branches, I separated all the thin branches into piles and gave them all to the Bedouins. Then an elderly Bedouin came up to me and said, “You, you are a good man; it will rain.” Indeed, before I returned to the monastery, it had started to rain - and it rained a lot. The wish of the Bedouin had opened the heavens. At that time, I did not tell anyone of the incident.

God does not hear the prayer of the prideful

• Geronda, I think that my prayer is not pleasing to God after each time I have behave poorly.

• If that reflection stems from a sense of genuine humility and you say, “My bad behaviour has incensed God,” then you will sense divine solace. If, however, it is out o f ego ism that you fret and say, “How have I arrived at this sorry state?”, then you will not receive any solace, because “God resisteth the proud…”‘0 God does not hear the prayer o f the prideful because pride acts as a barrier.

In order for our prayer to be heard, it must spring from “a broken and a contrite heart.”” When we very humbly say, “My God, how can you hear from such a person as myself?”, our Good God immediately hears us.

• Geronda, when I am undergoing some temptation, why am I, at times, unable to pray?

• Whenever you undergo a temptation and cannot pray, you should know that there is egoism and vainglory within you. The temptation remains until one is disgusted by his own self. As soon as one’s own self disgusts him, Christ helps, and the temptation subsides.

• Geronda, I beseech God to help me be delivered of my impudence, but have not seen any results.

• When one strives and prays and there are no results, it means that either egoism and pride are present, or that there is a predisposition to pride, either of which’hinders the Grace o f God from acting through the prayer. If we are humble and aware of our sinfulness, the Good God will give us whatever we ask for in prayer.

• Geronda, what am I to do when, despite the anguish with which I have beseeched God to deliver me from some weakness, as well as my having undertaken the appropriate struggle. He does not help me because I am prideful?

• You should ask God for forgiveness in advance. Say, “My God, I am pridefiil and I thwart Your help; nonethe less, I implore You, enlighten me to recognise what I must do in order to overcome my weakness.” From the moment you acknowledge that you have pride and that it is the rea son why a specific weakness does not subside, God will inform you of both the source of the weakness and how to struggle in order to uproot it.

• Geronda, how should I feel whilst praying?
• You should feel humble, so that God can help you. The humble person does not have his own will; he obeys the will of God and observes His commandments; therefore, God hears his prayer and also gives him heavenly bless ings. The more one listens to God, the more our Good God listens to him.

Prayer requires perseverance and patience

• Geronda, sometimes, when I beseech God for some thing to happen and it does not, 1 ask myself, “I wonder if God hears my prayer?”

• The “I wonder” means that you have doubts about the love of God, and you therefore rescind your petition at the very moment you register it, thereby also losing your place in the line o f precedence.

• Geronda, when I ask for something from God and He does not provide it immediately, should I insist?

-Y es, you should insist. You see, even when we go to some office and are directed to the person qualified to assist us

on some matter, we sometimes have to insist that he attend to us. We say, “Please, do me this favour. I will not leave until you have attended to me.” Similarly, it is necessary that we insist in our prayer, just as the Canaanite woman had insisted with Christ ¹² and the widow had insisted with the unjust judge.11

• But, Geronda, 1 fret when time has gone by and I have not received an answer.

• When we ask for something in our prayer, we must wait patiently. There was one time when my eye had swollen and I was in pain. I went to the icon of Panaghia three times and beseeched her to heal my eye so that I could see to read the Psalms at night. I even took a little oil from her vigil oil-lamp and applied it to my eye, but it did not heal.

In a few days, the condition began to worsen; the eye had become more painful and it continued to swell. Fifteen days went by. Then, 1 went again very reservedly to the icon of Panaghia and said, “Forgive me, my Panaghia, for troubling you again.” I again took a little oil from her vigil oil-lamp and as soon as I applied it to my eye, it was immediately healed. Was it possible that Panaghia could not have healed my eye on the first day? She, however, had seen something and allowed me to suffer. You, too, should beseech hum bly and wait patiently. Prayer that is offered with faith, an guish, perseverance, and patience, as long as it is for our own good, is heard.