圣帕伊希长老论祈祷3（论祈祷 第41–62页）

Preparing for Divine Communication

Humble confession to Christ

Geronda, in what way should we prepare before pray­ ing?

• It is akin to the preparation we do for Holy Com­ munion. There, we talk of Holy Communion; here, we talk of holy communication. When we receive Holy Com­ munion, we receive Christ within us, and divine Grace comes. By praying, we have constant communication with Christ and we receive divine Grace in a different way. It is not a small matter! With the one, we commune of the Body and Blood of Christ; with the other, we communicate with God. Therefore, just as one is tasked with confessing to his spiritual Father prior to Holy Communion, so is one tasked with humbly confessing to Christ prior to prayer, which is holy communication with God. “My Christ, I am in a ter­ rible state, I am such a … and such a… It is not worth Your while to bother with me; nevertheless, I beg of You, help me.” That is how divine Grace comes, and then divine com­ munication begins.

If one does not repent and does not humbly confess to God, he remains in an unsettled state. That then becomes a

barrier which obstructs his communication with God. The door remains closed, and the soul does not obtain comfort. But if one says, “I have sinned, O God,” the barrier is bro­ ken or, rather, God opens the door and one receives the Grace of divine communication.

• Geronda, in the Ladder of Divine Ascent I had read that in order to pray, one must be arrayed in the type of clothing that befits one’s presentation to a king. ¹ What type of outfit is that?

• To abase your own self before God and humbly ask for­ giveness for your errors. You should say, “I am at fault, O God; I am ungrateful. I have saddened You. Forgive me.” However, you should say it with inward contrition, not out­ ward. That is the type of outfit that is suitable for you to wear when you converse with God. If that state of abase­ ment does not precede prayer, then it is as if you say to God, “How are you doing? What’s happening?” If one ought to ask for forgiveness from those whom he has wronged, how much more ought one to ask for forgiveness from God for his daily wrongdoings?

• In other words, Geronda, should I bring the wrongdo­ ings of each passing day to mind?

• You should ask God’s forgiveness for the wrongdoings you have made during that day and afterwards, think about your sinfulness in general. That is how you are humbled and afterwards, you can begin to make your requests. As for myself, I begin to pray by saying, “God, be merciful to me a sinner.”1 2 1 say that a few times in a whisper and then, I continue with the Jesus Prayer. I had once asked the Lord

2. Lk 18:13.

to teach me how to pray. I then saw a vision of a seventeen- year-old boy praying. Oh, how that shattered me! He was crying and praying in such a way that I was overcome. He began with a confession, “I am ungrateful, incorrigible…” Then he said, “O God, now that I am in such a state, how will I be able to correct myself if You do not help me?” Then he began to make his requests.

• Geronda, it often happens that I am preoccupied with my wrongdoings whilst I am praying and unable to concen­ trate.

• We have said that we should examine ourselves and confess our wrongdoings to God before we start praying, not while we pray. Such a thing is not self-criticism; it is a conversation with the devil. Before we start praying, we will think about what it is that is wrong with our own self; we will turn our mind to that; we will aim, adjust the sight, and then … fire!

• Geronda, if, out of carelessness, I make a mistake and fail to notice it so that I can ask forgiveness from the Sister I have upset, can I communicate with God when I pray?

• In order to communicate with God and obtain comfort, you must be attentive to your own self and be continually watchful, in order to see your wrongdoings, to repent, and to ask forgiveness. Otherwise, even if you feel some joy in prayer, it will not be spiritual joy. You will not sense the spiritual soaring within that springs from communicating with God.

• Sometimes, Geronda, when I am about to pray I feel an uneasiness within.

• If you are inwardly uneasy or if you feel your heart has hardened, you should know that you have wounded some Sister, and that is why you feel guilty. If you ask her for­ giveness, the uneasiness will leave.

• Geronda, can’t prayer dispel the uneasiness? Is it abso­ lutely necessary that I ask for forgiveness?

• Look, if you have upset a Sister, you cannot settle some­ thing like that with prayer alone. You must go and do a pros­ tration before her and ask for her forgiveness. Even if you do three hundred prostrations in your own cell, they will be of no avail if you do not do a prostration before the Sister. These kinds of things cannot be settled in such a manner. The Gospel says, “First be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift,”J Nevertheless, if you cannot find the Sister at that time, and have already repented of your wrongdoing, and are determined that the moment you will see her you will ask her forgiveness, then your prayer is acceptable to God.

• Geronda, if I have a misunderstanding with a Sister, when I go to my cell, I make peace with myself and am able to pray. Afterwards, however, when I run into the Sister, I sense a hardness towards her and may even avoid her.

• I do not understand that. If you have a misunderstanding with a Sister, how can you go to your cell and make peace with yourself? If you do not do a prostration before her, how can you make peace with yourself and be able to pray? If you had the peace of God within you, your heart would have been softened after the prayer you had done in your cell, and as soon as you ran into the Sister, you would have con­ sidered it a blessing from God, and not have avoided her.

• Geronda, is it possible that I am able to pray because I justify my wrongdoing to myself? 3

• What sort of prayer is that? Only when a person takes the wrongdoing upon himself and says, “Bless,”4 5 does the Grace of God come upon him so that he is able to commu­ nicate with God.

Prayer is “the judgement… before the judgement” to come

• Geronda, Saint John Climacus says that prayer is “the judgem ent… before the judgement to come.”s

• Precisely. When a person is truly praying, then prayer is “the judgement before the judgement to come.” When one who is spiritually healthy is about to pray and senses that his heart has hardened, he will examine why that is so, in order to correct it. He will ask himself, “Why do I feel like that? Have I perhaps wounded someone with my behav­ iour? Have 1 perhaps judged someone, or has a judgement­ al thought crossed my mind without my having noticed it? Have I perhaps had some prideful thoughts, or is there some wilfiilness within me that does not allow me to communi­ cate with God?”

• And what if he cannot find any wrongdoings, Ge­ ronda?

• It cannot be; something must have happened. If one makes a thorough search of the archives, that is, if he exam­ ines his own self, he will find the right file and recognise where he went wrong.

• Geronda, should he examine his own self or confess to God?

• What can he confess if he is not aware of what he has done? He must first examine his own self. If he cannot find anything, then he must do two or three prostrations, fall on his knees and say, “O my God, surely I am to blame for something. Enlighten me so that I can understand what I have done.” As soon as he humbly says that, the fog of temptation will immediately clear, and he will find the rea­ son for the hardness of his heart. That is, God, seeing his humility, sends His Grace, and enlightens him to recall his wrongdoing exactly so that he can put his own self in order.

• Geronda, what helps one maintain steady communi­ cation with God?

• The inner peace of the soul is very helpful. When the soul is in order, prayer proceeds on its own. Therefore, you must never harbour any malice against anyone. If you have had an evil thought about anyone, you must divest yourself of it to the Gerondissa. ⁶ You must also get rid of any other evil thought you have by bringing good thoughts to mind. The road is cleared with good thoughts and then prayer pro­ ceeds smoothly.

PART TWO

THE STRUGGLE FOR PRAYER

“When one senses the great blessings of God, he is strengthened, his heart is warmed, and he even attains unceasing prayer. ”

Difficulties in Prayer

Acedia renders one useless

Geronda, what is the difference between acedia¹ and sloth?

-Acedia is spiritual laziness, whereas sloth refers to laziness of both the soul and the body. It is best, however, that neither be present Both acedia and sloth sometimes even infect those who have many prerequisite qualities for the spiritual life - sensitive, philotimo-filled souls.

The devil does not cause much harm to one who is in­ different by nature. However, if a sensitive person becomes upset, he will sense acedia afterwards. He must figure out what had upset him, and face it spiritually, so as to regain his courage and get his engine started. He should take care to not allow any wounds to remain unhealed; otherwise, later on, he will be overcome by his traumas. A breakdown in one’s soul, which, in turn, can also bring about a physical breakdown, can render a person useless. The doctors will not find anything physically wrong because the breakdown

had been instigated by the devil. How many philotimo- filled, sensitive souls have I seen rendered useless!

• Geronda, I feel exhausted and am completely unable to carry out my spiritual work. Is this due to tiredness, or is it due to sloth?

• “Out of the great multitude of my sins, ill am I in my body, ill am I also in my soul.”2 Are those not the words? It is not physical weariness; it is a breakdown of the soul. That is worse than physical weariness. A breakdown of the soul “loosens one’s screws”; he becomes like a vehicle with all its components intact and its motor in pieces.

• Geronda, I see that although I had loved undertaking spiritual work at first, I am now unable to do any of them.

• Why can you not do any of them? Do you not have the strength? I see that you do. Do you recall how, in the past, you had carried out so much spiritual work, despite having laboured all day long at the construction site, when the monastery was being built?

• Geronda, maybe the fault lies in my having given all of my self over to doing chores?

• The greater fault lies in your having allowed your own self to be slack. Make sure that you toughen it up, that you learn to love asceticism. I, who have only one lung - do you know how many deep prostrations I do? I cannot tell you. Speaking only about the komboschoinia that I do with small prostrations, I can tell you that when one arm gets tired do­ ing the sign of the cross, I do the sign of the cross with the other. I tell you these things out of love. Others do not have the prerequisite qualities that you have; yet, do you know how they struggle, how they wage war? You, you are fit to

be a Green Beret! How have you allowed your very self to become like this? I will pray for you, but, in order for you to be helped, you must also make an effort. Do you under­ stand? You must give your entire self over to spiritual work, and then your diakonia will also have a good yield.

• Geronda, when I am in my cell, I am sometimes over­ whelmed by acedia.

• Do you not pray; do you not study in your cell? As much as possible, do not let time go by without doing something. You cannot pray? Then study something that helps you at that hour. Otherwise, the devil will take advantage of your grave condition and completely crush you.

We should not cut the rope¹

• Geronda, at night, you appear to be very much worn out after your having been in contact with so many people throughout the day, yet in the morning, there is no trace of it whatsoever in your face; you are radiant. How does that happen?

• Well, I do not cut the rope!
• Sometimes, Geronda, I do not attend the Apodeipnon³ 4 Service because of my diakonia, and also, when I am very tired. And so I tell myself, “I will lie down and say the Jesus Prayer.” But ultimately, I fall asleep without having done a thing.

• No, blessed one; even when you are very tired, you should not lie on the bed without having prayed at all. You should

say the Trisagion and the fifty-first Psalm;5 venerate the icon of Christ and of Panaghia; make the sign of the cross over your pillow, and then lie down. Also, set the alarm clock for one hour before the morning Church Service of Orthros, so that you can rise in order to fulfil your prayer rule in your cell. You have to force yourself; however, you must consider forcing yourself to be a necessity, and you must do so with all your heart. “God loveth the cheerful giver.”6

• And what should I do when I have no stamina at all, Geronda?

-Y ou must force yourself to do at least something spirit­ ual. You must arrange to study a little and pray a little every day. Study, prayer, psalmody are the vitamins that the soul requires every day.

We should never let a day go by without having prayed at all. During the war, 1 remember that when days went by without our having launched an offensive, we fired a few rounds with our guns. Otherwise, the enemy would have thought that we were asleep at the switch and taken us by surprise. We must do the same thing in our spiritual strug­ gle. When we sometimes feel worn out and cannot fulfil all of our spiritual work, we should not cut the rope - the communication with God. We should do a few prostrations, count a few knots of the komboschoini whilst saying the Jesus Prayer. In other words, we should “fire off a round or two” so that the devil will not capture us. And as soon as we have straightened ourselves out, we should resume our regular spiritual struggle.

When one neglects spiritual work, if one does not do even a few prostrations or a few rounds with the komboschoini.

he will become unruly. He is able to do chores, but not prayer. I see monks who constantly do chores, but neglect study and prayer. “Let me do this, and let me do that as well,” they say, and prayer is pushed aside, and in the end they become unruly; they become like worldly people. I have seen workers who chisel stones in the sun or cut wood all day long. Nevertheless, even if you give them triple their wages, they cannot stand in church for even half an hour; they go out and smoke. I have taken note of such behaviour.

When one does not pray, he distances himself from God and becomes like an ox - he works, he eats, he sleeps. And the more one distances himself from God, the more difficult things become. His heart becomes cold and after­ wards, he cannot pray at all. In order to straighten himself out, his heart must soften; it must turn towards repentance; it must be shaken.

Be disposed to making a start

• Geronda, why am I remiss?
• Re-miss? Because you are missing … “the honey”! Apparently, you have not yet been sweetened up by the spiritual things.

• Geronda, after a period of having been remiss about spiritual work, is it helpful to start gradually, by praying one komboschoini the first day, two the next day, and so on?

-Y ou should be disposed to making a start and to forcing yourself a little in order to get going. Even if one is tired, if he forces himself a little, the tiredness goes away and he feels good. The small effort that he makes is of tremendous significance, because God wants one to have just such a disposition so that He can intervene - and that is what will save us, divine intervention.

• Geronda, even when I have the time, I am not in­ clined to do spiritual work.

• Well, sometimes this lack of appetite does happen; so it needs to be forced a little. When one is ill, he usually has no appetite for food, but he forces himself to eat. Regardless of whether he has an appetite, he eats something light in the beginning, because his stomach will not be able to take anything too heavy, and then gradually, his appetite returns. If he does not eat, how will he shore himself up? The same goes for you; you must not allow the self to while away the time, because that is how it will be destroyed. Give light, spiritual food to the self, so that it slowly comes to its sens­ es. To get started, make the effort little by little.

• Indeed, Geronda; my difficulty is in starting my spir­ itual work.

• Yes, because your engine’s oil is cold. Do some prostra­ tions, study a little, say the Jesus Prayer a little, in order to warm up your heart. Say to yourself, “I will do only five prostrations.” Once the engine gets started, then you will not be able to stop it; you will need to apply the brakes.

Give the soul the food it desires

• Geronda, when I have no appetite for spiritual work, how can I get started?

• Do whatever is spiritual that pleases you, and the ap­ petite will grow for the others as well. In your mind, lay out the spiritual banquet table, and choose whatever appeals to your appetite. Do you want to read a little? Do you want to do one komboschoinfl Do you want to chant a Supplicatory Canon to Panaghia? Do you want to read the Book of

Psalms, or to do some prostrations? If you have no appetite

for anything at all, well then, you just need to be spanked with a wet plank.

• Geronda, can I get started by doing a handicraft?
• You can, but at the same time, you must say the Jesus Prayer.

• Geronda, am I perhaps enacting my own will by doing whatever pleases me?

• Look, for spiritual work, we must give the soul the food it desires and asks for on its own. That is how the soul is sweetened, fed, and motivated to do more spiritual things. You see, even when we are ill and our constitution requests something, wc furnish it, so as to become well. When I was little, I was taken ill with anaemia and had asked to eat a lemon. Since my family did not know if I should eat a lem­ on, however, they refused to give it to me, and waited for the doctor instead. When all was said and done and the doc­ tor had come, he recommended that I eat lemons because my constitution was in need of the vitamins contained in lemons.

• Geronda, in order to confront my current negligence, I made an effort to implement a programme.

• The programme is good, but the heart has to be launched first, and then the programme.

• Geronda, could you, perhaps, appoint a programme for me?

• The programme that I will appoint for you is to do what­ ever spiritual duty pleases you. Do not cram your own self full of anxiety; instead, investigate what type of spiritual food your soul has need of and then, give it that food. When you yearn to chant, you should chant; when you are drawn to study, you should study; when you gravitate to the invocation of the Jesus Prayer, say the Prayer. Do whatever other spiritual work you desire, as long as you do not overly

pressure yourself. I believe you have understood. This is what will happen now at the beginning of your spiritual life, until your soul has been sweetened up; afterwards, you will enter upon a spiritual course that will carry you along on its own. Therefore, do not be troubled; through the Grace of God, your engine will start up and you will move along swiftly.

We should pray out of philotimo

• Geronda, how can you pray when you are so tired?
• Prayer puts me at ease. And I have realised that only prayer truly puts a person at ease. When one prays with the heart, tiredness, sleep, and hunger are driven away because the soul is warmed up, and afterwards, he wants neither to sleep nor to eat. He lives in a supernatural state and is fed in a different manner; he is fed by what is spiritual.

• Geronda, I have no love for prayer.
• Your heart has not yet been warmed, so the prayer is not coming from within you. You are doing all things out of a sense of military discipline, in a dried-up way. How do you start your prayer?

• I start, Geronda, with the thought that I must pray for myself and for everyone.

• Ah, what a peculiar person you are! You begin with an “I must; I must pray; I must do spiritual work; I must; I m ust…” and you thereby constrain yourself. It is good that you have such strength within you, but you should begin by bringing a humble thought to mind, with a kind of anguish. Let your heart labour and be in anguish, and then you will not constrain yourself. You will feel joy; there will be an inner exultation within you.

• Geronda, I feel some kind of constriction; there is no sense of spiritual soaring within me.

• Do you feel joyful when you pray? Because I think you are somewhat pressuring yourself. You start to do something out oiphilotimo; but, without you realising it, a bit of egoism also comes into play. “I should do this many prostrations,” you say, “I should pray this many komboschoinia·, I should increase the number of prostrations; I should increase the komboschoinia.” And you do all that - not out of love for Christ or for one who is in need, but for the sake of doing more, for the sake of becoming sanctified. In other words, you do not humbly say, “Since God said, ‘Be ye holy,’71, in turn, will do as much as I can.” Instead, you start off from a dried-up line of reasoning: “I must become holy.”

• Geronda, how should I constrain myself to pray?
• Why should you constrain yourself to pray and not pray out of philotimo?

• How can that be achieved, Geronda?
• If you think of the benefactions of God, you will also think of God, your Benefactor, and you will also become aware of your ingratitude and your sinfulness and ask for His mercy. When one senses the prodigious blessings of God, he is strengthened; his heart is warmed, and he even attains the state of unceasing prayer.

Disruptions and distractions during prayer

• Geronda, when I am praying in my cell, I worry that some Sister may open the door, and that causes me to be distracted.

• Speaking for myself, if I am in a stale of prayer and someone opens the door, 1 prefer to be struck on the head with an axe rather than to be seen at the time that I am praying. It is like you are flying and someone comes along and breaks your wings. You have not yet experienced spir­ itual states during prayer in order to realise just how much it costs one to be disrupted whilst he is praying. You have not felt the type of contact with God whereby one somehow slips away from this earth. If you had had such experiences, you would have respect for others when they are praying. If such spiritual sensitivity were present, you would think, “How can I interrupt one while he is praying?” You would recognise the great harm you arc doing the other person and you would be careful. I am not saying that you should be careful by becoming anxious and constraining yourself, but that you should have respect for the other person who is communicating with God. However, if that type of spir­ itual sensitivity is not present, at least try to have worldly sensitivity, in the good sense. Make a habit of knocking on the door and loudly saying, “Through the prayers of our holy Fathers,” so that the other person can be at ease and not be constantly on guard. It is one thing to be in a state of spiritual watchfulness and another thing to be constantly on guard just in case someone might open the door; such a state is tiring, crushing.

• Is it possible, Geronda, that a Sister does that out of her own artlcssncss?

• It is not out of artlcssncss that a Sister knocks on the door of another Sister, and without hearing the “Amen”, opens it and enters. I am astounded that you can do such a thing! Perhaps the Sister sheds tears when she prays and does not want to be seen by others. Speaking for myself.

whenever I visit a neighbouring Kelli¹ and hear the Fathers therein reading the Service of Vespers, I spend perhaps an hour saying the Jesus Prayer outside in the cold, so that I will not interrupt them and cause them to cut the Service short. Since I can hear them chanting, how can 1 open the door? How can 1 enter? If I should enter, it is as if I have a right to do so. Perhaps they are willing to grant me the right, but I will not do that; it is egotistical, as if I consider myself to be something special and do not consider others. An inner sensitivity must be present. When I was at Sinai, I once saw two Bedouin children, a little boy and a little girl, who were on the footpath and saying their prayers with worry beads. I quietly turned back to let the poor things finish their prayer and afterwards, continued on my way, since there was no other passage.

• Geronda, as soon as I begin to pray, thoughts of tasks I have yet to do with regard to my diakonia come to mind.

• Me, too; I cannot be at peace when I have tasks pend­ ing. Therefore, if you do not want to be distracted during prayer, you should quickly take care of all your pending tasks and afterwards, begin your prayers with the following thought: “All matters have now been put in an order better than that of my soul. Let me now tend to putting my soul in order as well.”

• Geronda, I think that my prayer would be helped if I had some difficulty in my life.

• What are these things you are saying? Will a war have to occur in order for you to seek out Christ? A good outer state of being is the best prerequisite for a good inner state ^* of being. Prayer calls for one to be free of disruptions from outside and to be sorted-out on the inside. Being undistracted is very helpful in the spiritual life.

Send slumber to those who are unable to sleep

• Geronda, why do I get sleepy when I pray? -You do not live life intensely. You have allowed yourself to be slack and now you move along by pushing yourself. Can you fall asleep if you are agonising over something that concerns you? Look, out of gratitude for his benefactor, one may stay awake all night in order to pray for him. However, after that, he should think, “It is well and good that I kept a vigil for my benefactor; should I not keep a vigil in order to thank God, Who was crucified for me?”

• Geronda, can sleepiness be caused by physical weak­ ness?

• Yes, sometimes sleepiness is caused by fatigue, by low blood pressure, or hypothermia, and so on. One should de­ termine why he is sleepy and take appropriate measures.

• Geronda, how is it that one falls asleep even while he is praying in anguish about something?

• If, indeed, one is in anguish over some matter, then he does not get sleepy during prayer. Nevertheless, it is neces­ sary that he force himself a little. If he is in his cell, he should splash a little water on his face to dispel the sleepiness.

• I get very sleepy during the all-night vigils. What should I do?

• You should break that sleepiness. In church, one gets sleepy because he calms down in mind and soul, and also be­ comes physically tired. However, if one is determined about not falling asleep, then the sleepiness is broken and departs. Of course, after one or two hours, you may get sleepy again.

This time, however, it is a heavier sleepiness that cannot be easily dispelled; nevertheless, with persistence, it can also be broken. If the first and second “express trains to sleep” have departed, then sleep has indeed gone for good.

• Geronda, I might be trying to get rid of my sleepi­ ness for as long as two hours during a vigil.

• Why do you not send that sleep to the hospitals, to psy­ chiatric wards? You should say, “My God, grant sleep to those who are unable to sleep, either because they are in pain or because their nerves are shot.” Turn your sleepiness into a pill and prayerfully send it to those who are unable to sleep and are thereby tormented, the poor things - and you, day and night, should glorify God.

The Devil Battles the One Who Prays

We should not strike up a conversation with the devil

Geronda, although I feel the need to communicate with God, I am unable to pray. — If you feel the need to communicate with God, I do not understand why you are unable to pray. Perhaps this comes from the tempter, the devil. The tempter always trips one up so that he is unable to pray.

• Geronda, whilst I am praying, thoughts of various tasks occupy my mind.

• You should say to yourself, “I will think about this later…” and continue to pray.

• I am more upset, Geronda, because most of the time, the thoughts are about non-essential things.

• That is precisely why you should leave them for later, because, if you interrupt your prayer and occupy yourself with those things, the evil one will set those non-essential things aside and occupy your thoughts with essential things in order to put an end to your praying. We must put our own self into its place. For, do you know what the devil does? To worldly people, he brings filthy thoughts, and they realise it