The theology of asceticism

Asceticism as life in Christ

We must now interpret the significance that the divinization of Christ’s human nature has for Christians.

The first step that unites us with Christ not abstractly, but in fact, we take in the sacrament of baptism. The letter of St Paul to the Romans, read during the celebration of this sacrament, says: We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life (Rm 6, 4).
In these words, as well as in the threefold immersion of the person being baptized we see an indication that an active joining to Christ occurs through our personal participation in His death and resurrection. Further on the Apostle develops this thought: So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rm 6, 11). Joined to the Body of Christ through the sacraments of baptism and chrismation we are called to assimilate and to develop the gifts of the Holy Spirit that we have received. In this consists the meaning of the asceticism of repentance, metánoia in Greek, which means “change of mind”. Our old man (Rm 6, 6) in repentance transforms his mind, so as to have the right to say together with St Paul, We have the mind of Christ (1Cor 2, 16).

From this it follows that the meaning of asceticism consists not in developing the capabilities of the “old man”, but in being joined to the new humanity in Christ. The way to this humanity lies through the struggle with the passions, which are the false essence of the “old man”. Repentance is perceived as death in connection with the necessity to renounce the way of life, the form of being of the “old man”, who in the final analysis is closed in upon himself. I believe that it is just to define such a way of being, such a form of life as individualistic, all the more so if we take into consideration the meaning of the Latin word individuum: indivisible, individual. The source of individualism resides in man’s desire himself to be god, apart from the Creator; it arises from the craving to subject the world to oneself rather than to stand in a defined hierarchical order ordained by God; it is expected to relieve the fear of losing one’s personal power in the face of the necessity of sharing it with other souls placed in the same order.

The “old man” defends himself from this fear by his pride. This is the very passion that is the tie that gathers into one the swarm of all the other passions and forms in the individual’s consciousness the illusion of equality with God. In such a condition man is not able to rejoice in the truth (1Cor 13, 6), that is, to love another human being. After all, for him another human being is always a threat to his own sovereignty. In this prideful system the coordinate “another” becomes an object of envy, irritation, and hate, feelings that among the spiritually blind not infrequently are viewed as the manifestation of a strong character. In placing the Church on a solid foundation, the Lord revealed another logic of inter-personal relations. I call to mind the words of the prayer in the divine liturgy for the fraction of the Lamb, which to my mind clearly display this logic:

The Lam of God is fragmented and divided, He who is fragmented by remains indivisible, always eaten but never consumed, He who rather sanctifies those who communicate.

Here we see the refutation of individualism, for which sharing is like death. At the same time there is here a paradox: the Lamb of God is fragmented and at the same time remains indivisible, He is eaten but is no in wise consumed. This is the paradox of sacrifice, the paradoxical character of readiness to sacrifice oneself as a mentality and a way of life. Giving up, thus, becomes the source of receiving, and dying the source of life. In following this logic we refrain from pandering to one’s own “I” in whatever way such indulgence may be expressed: in the form of interior experiences or in the striving for bodily comfort. The sense of this abstinence is the Lord Himself: we deny ourselves something for the sake of freeing a place for Gods grace. This abstinence together with the will’s aspiration towards Christ is called fasting, which, according to St John Climacus, is “the origin of dispassion, the forgiveness of sins, the gates of paradise, and heavenly delight”.

Fasting, however, will bear fruit only when it is joined with discernment. Discernment, like a sharp spear, must cut off the passions and reveal to the repentant soul its true condition.
We may say that by fasting we bring our flesh as a rational sacrifice to God. In Russian the word “flesh” (plot’) has the same root as the adjective “dense” (plotnyj), which in our context we may interpret as impenetrable to light. Thus, the dismemberment of the fleshly man with the spear of fasting with discernment leads to rendering the flesh penetrable to the light of divine grace. Then the words of the Sinai elder John Climacus about fasting as “a lamp in the darkness, the return to the right path of those who have lost their way, the illumination of those who have been blinded” take on a particular meaning.

Separating good and evil in our soul, we can gather the soul together in a new way. This newness will affect even the passions as forces of our soul. The passions, after all, appear as evil and bring suffering when they arise from man’s sinful nature. They can and should, however, have a good direction for their activity. Not by chance there exists in ascetical literature the expression “passionless passion”. By this is signified that aspiration of men to God that is not clouded by pride.
Just as the offering of a sacrifice is accompanied by the shedding of blood, so the spiritual sacrificial offering is accompanied by the shedding of tears for oneself and for the world. The fate of the world and of man are mutually bound by such inscrutable ties, such slender threads and heavy chains that no one except God can grasp their all-embracing essence. In dividing oneself in an ascetical sacrificial offering to God, hence, the individual meets the Risen God, who in an embrace has opened wide before him His pierced hands and turns to him with the words: you have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much; enter into the joy of your master (Mt 25, 21). The master’s joy is the joy of resurrection and immortality, it is eternity, shared by the Creator with all: an eternity in which, as St Paul says, Christ is all in all (Col 3, 11). Asceticism, thus, turns out not to be the withdrawal of men from the world. Through asceticism man is joined to Christ, whose human nature is the same as the nature of each one of us. This means that the joining to Christ of one man has in its perspective the unity in Christ’s Body of all transfigured humanity.

Thus, the words of St Seraphim of Sarov: “Acquire a peaceful spirit, and thousands around you will be saved” have not only a moral, but also a profound ontological meaning.
The invitation by Nicholas Cabasilas to glorify the Lord for his own sake again brings us to this: asceticism is not in itself the aim of human existence, but a way leading from humanity to humanity-divinity. The evangelical triad “way, truth, and life”, thus, is made evident in our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, to whom be glory for all ages. Amen.

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XVII International Ecumenical Conference