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On Ascesis
Our pious God-bearing father Peter the Athonite, the first hesychast on
Mount Athos, lived in a cave in the southern part of the peninsula. There he
led a truly angelic, heavenly existence. Without clothes, barefoot, and
suffering many varied temptations launched against him by Satan, he for
fifty-three years was fed only with heavenly bread.
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Righteous Gerontios, the founder of St. Anne's Skete, was the first hegumen
to serve in the monastery of Vouleftirion. At first he lived in caves near
the sea. Later, because of the threat of pirate attacks, he moved higher up
the rugged cliffs of Athos, where to this day there is a chapel in honour of
St. Panteleimon. Many ascetics lived in desolate huts near him.
With absolutely no possessions and free of worldly cares, they gave
themselves entirely to the labour of prayer.
In order to bring some consolation to his brothers, the saintly Gerontios
prayed, and holy water appeared on the spot where he did his ascetic
labours. His successor gath- ered up all the water from this miraculous
spring, because he wanted a small garden and he needed the water for it.
According to the fathers, our Panagia did not like this and dried up the
spring, although another one appeared at another spot below the original
one. The Lady Theotokos wanted ascetics to be free of worldly affairs, to
devote themselves only to prayer, and not to cultivate gardens
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The newly manifested St. Gerasimos, who laboured on Athos, stayed in Kapsala
for five years as an ascetic. He ate only boiled zucchini with no oil. Then
he went to Homala of Kefallinia Island to his ascetic cell and there built a
holy monastery.
During the time he lived on Mt. Athos, he gained many spiritual experiences,
met pious and saintly men, and completed his monastic training. He became a
vessel of grace through ceaseless prayer and fasting. That is why all evil
spirits were afraid of him and were cast out by him. His nickname was "Kapsalis,"
after the desolate place of Kapsala. The demons would cry out: "Kapsalis,
you have burned us."
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During one very cold winter in which snow fell heavily, our righteous and
God-inspired father Akakios the Kafsokalyvitan lit a fire to warm himself.
But as he drew nearer the fire, he felt colder. Then he realised that it was
abnormal to feel cold by the fire, and that the cold must be caused by
demonic influence. So he put out the fire, went out of his cave and, naked,
fell into the snow, whereupon he immediately felt very warm, as if he were
in a steam bath. We were amazed and surprised each time we visited this
saint's cave and saw his bed, which is preserved to this very day. It was
made of thick, untrimmed branches nailed in such a way that wide spaces
remained between them. It would have been impossible for anyone to rest well
on them.
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St. Savvas the Agioritan, an ascetic who was sanctified on the island of
Kalymnos, loved ascesis and suffering. He ate food cooked in oil only on
weekends. He did the ninth hour prayer every day. When he slept, he slept on
a plank, but most nights he spent entirely in prayer. He confessed God's
people like a good shepherd who "gives his life for his sheep" (John 10:1
1). He was also clairvoyant.
He left Mount Athos for Aegina, in order to place himself under obedience to
St. Nectarios, the miracle worker. St. Nectarios gave him a set of priest's
vestments which he wore only on great feasts. It was St. Savvas who served
the burial of St. Nectarios.
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My elder's spiritual father was the Karouliatan hermit and hieromonk
Christophoros. He lived ascetically in a hut which resembled an eagle's
nest. It had a tin roof and was surrounded by steep, bare rocks,
disappearing into the abyss of the Aegean. There was an endless, cleansing
stillness everywhere, interrupted only by the sweet, joyful cries of wild
birds. It was a totally isolated place. Only a few cactus fig bushes and
some wild almond trees scattered about decorated with a bit of greenery the
barren landscape. In these desolate surroundings, one could admire and
contemplate how this crippled spiritual father Christophoros came to live
near such precipitous and unapproachable ravines. Despite his having only
one leg, he would climb, like an athletic mountaineer, up the truly awesome
and forbidding Karoulia.
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My ever memorable elder many times told me that the fathers in past times
used to travel by sea from both the desolate places and from the
monasteries, rowing all the way to Daphni and back. Because this way took a
long time, they brought books and incense along with them in order to be
able to chant their matins. They chanted or prayed with the prayer ropes as
they rowed.
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In the desert of St. Basil, next to Kerasia, lived Elder Theophylaktos, a
solid gem of asceticism and endurance. He had two monks under obedience to
him. He frequently went for all-night vigils to a cave. One night after a
heavy snowfall, everything was covered by a foot of snow. When morning came,
his monks went looking for him everywhere. After a long search they saw from
a distance a dark object on a cliff. As they came closer, they realised it
was their elder, and they feared that he had frozen to death. As soon as
they touched him, however, he moved. This was a great surprise, and they
observed that not only was he alive but, in fact, he was emitting such a
warmth that it was as if his whole body were aflame. And indeed all the snow
had melted around him.
This same holy ascetic at another time was taken by demons and carried over
to St. Basil's desert in Karoulia.
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An elder said:
"These days we try to become righteous with very little effort. We have
abandoned tradition. We do not look up to those at the top, and how they
came first in the race. We see only those who came last. "
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The marvellous hesychast Varnavas had neither a room of his own nor any
possessions. He used one corner of the reception room to rest. Hermit elder
Damaskinos told me all about him.
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We have been greatly attracted to Dionysiou because of its ascetic,
monastic, liturgical and pioneer Athonite tradition. We feel this bond not
only because of its wise and revered Abbot Gabriel and the elder Theokletos
Dionysiates, who is known for his many scholarly writings, but above all
because of the presence of the most pious elder Lazaros. Each time we
visited Elder Lazaros at his cell for spiritual assistance, we would leave
there full of spiritual fruit, as if we had gathered the mystical grapes of
monastic experience. The holy hegumen Gabriel gave us some brief
biographical in- formation reflecting the life and experience of this great
ascetic and cenobiac:
Father Lazaros came from Melivia of Agia Larisa. He was born in 1892, came
to Athos in 1916, and died on December 28, 1974. He was the monastery's
infirmarian for thirty years and served as the typikaris [the monk in charge
of making sure the order of services is followed correctly] for ten years
and as a proistamenos [the monk who supervises the practical running of the
monastery's routines] for thirty years. Before beginning the monastic life,
he had received a high school education and had served as secretary to the
Justice of the Peace in Dotion-Agias-Larisis. At the age of twenty he
immigrated to the U.S.A. Then he came to Mount Athos when he was
twenty-four, and was tonsured a monk in 1917.
He was pious and honest in the extreme, a zealot for cenobitic monastic
life. Very ascetic, he would receive communion every week with the
monastery's blessings. He lived in Niphon's hut for three years, higher up
from the monastery, where he observed a strict fast and self-restraint.
Proof of all this was that in the period of Great Lent for all the years
until 1965, he fasted totally on Mondays and Tuesdays, and on Wednesdays
until he had received communion at the Pre-sanctified Liturgy. After
partaking with the fathers of the supper which followed this liturgy, he
would then eat nothing else until the following Saturday.
When serving in the hospital, he took care not only of the body, but also of
the soul, preparing those who were about to depart to the Lord.
He had a stroke on Christmas day and lived for three days following that. He
received Holy Unction and communicated every day until he lapsed into a
coma. Soon afterwards, in the afternoon, he reposed in the Lord. Everyone in
the brotherhood mourned him, and to this day his memory has remained vivid
among them.
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St. Nikodemos the Agioritan was great in the Kingdom of God because he not
only taught but also practiced asceticism, fasting, deprivation, and blessed
poverty—all of which constitute the beauty of monastic life. Here is what
his biographer tells us about him: "His love for hesychia brought him to the
wilderness where he bought the kalyve across from St. Basil's desert. He
would get his bread from us and then spend the rest of his time in hesychia.
Other foods he ate were boiled rice, water with honey, and most of the time
he would also eat olives and fava beans."
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There is now a half-ruined hut in Koutloumousiou's skete dedicated to St.
loannikios. Here lived a group of six fathers under a very strict geronda.
The hut had only two rooms and a small church. None of the fathers had a
room of his own. They all rested during the night by leaning on the upright
benches in the church. Such was their deprivation and victory over sleep,
these athletes of asceticism.
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Elder A. the Kafsokalyvitan is still living. We met him many times. In the
past the fathers did not use animals to transport their loads. Everything
was carried on their backs, even up the steepest paths to the sketes. One
night Elder A., with Panagia's help, carried on his back from the docks to
their living quarters a ton of grapes. He struggled with the many loads
until morning. Another time he carried five hundred containers of sand for
building. Forty-two times he climbed to Athos' peak, either to help with the
building of the Transfiguration church at the peak or to take part in the
vigil which takes place there each August 6.
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The ever memorable Lavriotan father A. celebrated a liturgy daily for
seventy years. His knees had callouses from many prostrations. He foresaw
his own death, although he was never ill, even to the end. He blessed the
trapeza for the last time, said goodbye to the fathers and brothers, and
reposed in the Lord.
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What can we say about the hermit Chrysogonos, especially regarding his
fasting and his passion-eliminating ascesis? This blessed man, who lived in
a hut for workers near the Koutloumousian cell of the Holy Apostles, had for
his daily food only bread or toast dipped in water with a bit of sugar. His
clothes were old and for bedding he used burlap sacks. He wore five or six
of these sacks and thus went through the whole winter next to the fireplace.
He was a simple, quiet monk.
A similar impoverished monk was another ascetic in Vigla whose name is not
known. He lived like "the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap
nor gather into barns; yet the heavenly Father feeds them" (Matthew 6:26).
He lived in great deprivation in a small hut without a chapel. During the
evening services, he would go around to different fathers, carrying his lit
oil lamp. Only when he had no more oil would he go to the Romanian skete
belonging to Great Lavra. As soon as the fathers there saw his empty lamp,
without his having to say anything they would understand and fill it with
oil and give him alms. After the Divine Liturgy, bashfully he would eat a
very small amount and then depart quickly in prayer. In his hut he lived
like an angel.
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Once only, when I was with my ever memorable elder, I saw Father Avimelech,
whose meek and quiet countenance remains still vivid in my memory. He lived
to be over one hundred years old and was a contemporary of St. Nectarios and
a co-ascetic with Elder Joseph the Cave-dweller. His hermitage was in the
desert of St. Basil above Katounakia, in Small St. Anne's, in a cave which
now is used as a cooler room. He would ask that no one be named after him,
since he did not honour himself. For his spiritual benefit, he visited
several monasteries in Constantinople, Pontos, Jerusalem, and mainland
Greece. If anyone asked, "What are you doing, Father?" he would reply, "We
are watchful," meaning that he was in constant vigilance and prayer.
----------------------------
The life of Monk John from the Church of the Archangel at Edessa was equal
to the ancient athletes of ascesis. He lived his holy life forcefully
wearing chains beneath his clothes to create hardship. He avoided contact
with people, staying in his small living quarters most of the time, in peace
and voluntary poverty. He offered his guests a very tasty rye bread as if it
were the best cake. He also gave them cold rain water which he had gathered
in his reservoir. He did not eat fresh tomatoes or fresh figs and other
garden vegetables for over three years, because he would not leave his home
to go to Lavra or to St. Anne's Skete. And he would never ask for anything
from his neighbours. Over a period of fifteen years, when he had to go to
Karyes to buy rye or other necessary supplies, he would not stay and be a
burden to any of the brothers. He would spend the night outdoors.
------------------------------
The ex-bandit Nikitas from St. Basil's, who was like the grateful robber
crucified with Christ, used to say: "Praise and thanks be to God and Panagia
who never abandoned me." He had been tonsured by the famous spiritual father
Chariton.
"How do you manage with no money, since you are not making any crafts?" the
ever memorable loakim used to ask him.
"Praise and thanks be to God! I go to the monastery and ask for a pita
bread. When 1 come back to the hut I find two or three more there!" he would
reply in an amazingly candid manner, for which reason he was graced
miraculously.
When he fell sick and was bedridden his neighbours — the hermit Damaskenos
and his accompanying monks — took care of him. Near his end he was infested
with lice. No sooner was he cleaned by the fathers than he would be covered
again from head to toe with them.
"I was a bandit while in the world," he would frequently say, "and I have
asked God to let me pay Him back for all the things I did. Let lice eat me
alive!"
---------------------------------
We were blessed to meet the ever memorable hermit Gabriel from Karoulia, a
tough fighter and a victorious athlete of self-restraint. Frequently we came
across him at St. Anne's kyriakon or on the way there. He was always either
silent or in prayer, saying little. To people who did not know him very
well, he appeared to be repulsive and removed from the world. But he was
removed in a spiritual sense only.
Toward the end of his life, we visited him for the last time at his
hermitage on formidable Karoulia. There we saw Christ's prize winner who,
insistently and despite his pain, refused to eat anything cooked in oil. He
found a way to make tasteless even the oiless food brought to him by the
Danielite fathers.
He was old when he came to Mount Athos, having been a policeman in his
former civilian life. He lived with his elder for twenty years, and they
never ate oil — even on the feast day of Pascha. He communicated the Holy
Mysteries frequently, always with compunction and tears. He kept his shroud
bundled up and ready, placed it on a shelf, and labelled it "my shroud."
During the twenty days prior to his death, the Danielites cared for him with
true love and brotherly sacrifice. They begged him to eat some food cooked
in oil, but in spite of the fact that he was dying and had lost most of his
strength, he did not break his fasting rule. He tasted no food with oil, and
passed away in peace.
Just before the end he asked for communion. He was peaceful and full of joy.
When he was left alone for a few minutes, he lifted his head up to heaven
and cried out, "There are flowers! Many flowers! How beautiful is paradise!
Is the soul worthy of so many beautiful things of such pleasure?"
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0 what patience had the wonderful St. Simeon, who went barefoot and had only
one tunic to wear. He did his ascetic labours first near the holy monastery
of Philotheou and after that went to Pilion, where he built the Phlamouriou
monastery.
He was made of either stone or steel! He was the most patient,
possessionless, but rich-in-virtues servant of God, this Simeon. Indeed he
was stronger than a diamond in spirituality, in patience, and in ascesis.
That is why he managed to go barefoot, and wearing the same tunic in winter
or summer, until the day he reposed in peace.
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Hermit Philaretos of Karoulia wore no shoes. His feet were hardened and his
soles looked like a turtle's shell. On the cliffs he planted wherever he
could find some soil. He raised potatoes, greens, cabbage and lettuce. These
vegetables were his food and he gave some away as alms to other brothers and
fathers. His wooden bed was always made, for he slept mostly on the floor,
as was verified after his death. A piece of wood was found under his bed
which he used as a pillow during his short periods of sleep.
He had been a lieutenant in the army. Leaving behind all worldly glory
honour, and vanity, he slept on the floor in Karoulia for twenty years.
Known not only for his kindness but also for his poverty and ascesis, he
wore the same cassock from the time of his tonsure as a monk to the time he
slept in the Lord. This garment was patched so many times that its original
cloth no longer existed.
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Elder Eulogios died in 1948. He was from the cell of St. George the Miracle
Worker, the cell called Phaneromenou. When still young, Father Eulogios
fasted without oil for seven years, and when he was elderly for six years.
He had a
great love for Panagia. While he was a young boy still living in his
village, she appeared to him and said: "Go, and I will always be with you."
He lived eighty years of his life on the Holy Mountain.
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The well-known ascetic Hadjigiorgis of Athos, when still a novice, spent
four years labouring in the cave of the righteous Niphon the Kafsokalyvitan.
There in total quietness, fasting and prayer, he was instructed by his
spiritual father Neophytos, who lived in St. George's hut and frequently
visited him to give him Holy Communion.
The ascetic conduct of Hadjigiorgis, in Kafsokalyvia and later in Kerasia
with his group of monks, made history. Because of his fasting at great
lengths, he was called "the fasting one." Both he and his monks never cooked
or ate non-fasting foods. They ate mainly nuts and honey. At Pascha they
coloured boiled potatoes instead of eggs.
He never used medication. When any of the brothers had a cold, he lightly
warmed up the oven which was made of bricks and mud and placed the brother
in it, and he would be cured. If anyone had any other ailment, he would
stand him in front of Panagia's icon, and together they would pray all
night. At the end of the Divine Liturgy, the sick person took communion and
was cured. He had a large group of pious labouring monks around him.
Hadjigiorgis owned only one garment and went barefoot. He wore thick woolen
socks onl when he was in church.
----------------------
There was a Russian ascetic on Mount Athos whose feet were badly infected,
and he never took any medicine for his illness, nor accepted any other
treatment. "I am a monk," he would often say in his Russian style of
speaking; "I must suffer. "
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The famous spiritual father Ilarion the Iviritan never ate or drank on
Fridays, to honour Christ's crucifixion.
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Spiritual father Savvas, Ilarion's obedient disciple, was his equal in
ascesis. He ate only once a day and for the last two years of his life was
sustained daily only from the Holy Communion left after each Liturgy and
with a cup of coffee every afternoon. Every night he prayed in his cell with
suspensions.'
----------------------
The ever memorable loakim Spetsieris, knowing the benefits of ascetic
hardship, never used heat in the church nor in his cell, even in mid-winter.
His obedient subordinate Theophylaktos, whom we met several times at New
Skete, told us about his spiritual father, who used to say to him, "Father
Theophylaktos, how did the fathers endure ascesis sitting on top of poles
under difficult conditions? Did they not feel the cold? Yet we, wrapped in
our clothes, feel the cold even in our homes!"
--------------------------------
In these present eschatological times we are not making brave decisions and
superhuman efforts in the ascetic arena of spiritual heroic contestants.
Such a contestant in endurance, patience, ascesis and hardship is our
contemporary Romanian ascetic Heriodionos, who for forty years has been in
seclusion in his tiny cell, unclothed, impoverished, but happy and blessed.
His entire existence, like a burning candle, is consumed by prayer, silence,
and vision. He communicates with his visitors through a small window. Some
loving, charitable fathers supply him with what is necessary to live on,
this spiritual bird of the sky.
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An elder once said to some sisters:
Ascesis should be done to the point that one stays healthy and able to
complete any task assigned. Anything done in excess affects the body, and
then a person cannot do what is necessary. One should let her spiritual
mother know the number of prostrations she is doing. Vigil is superior to
fasting, as it helps to purify the mind and creates sweetness in the heart.
Sleeping makes one lethargic.
We ought to force ourselves in the spiritual life, since we frequently may
lose our spiritual appetite. When we make ourselves eat a little bit, we get
our appetite back. The same applies when one's arm is dislocated. It won't
heal unless it is exercised. A dislocated arm must be forced suddenly back
into place. We should not resemble the tortoise that started to go to a
wedding and arrived when the first-born baby was baptized.
---------------------------
I once met two Russian ascetics, Nikodemos and Seraphim, in the Holy
Mountain's most formidable desert, Karoulia, where the strictest ascetics
live. They were known for their Great Lenten fasting, partaking of only one
coffee a day and some water. Indeed works of supermen!
There are also many other unknown athletes of the fast who quenched all
passions, who existed and still to this day exist in the Athonite arena of
purification of the passions, and who are the marvel of both angels and men.
In 1969 I received a letter from the hermit D., whom I had asked to provide
information to me about what he knew concerning the ascetic endeavours on
Athos, so that my readers could see that even in the present age, there are
giants of asceticism on the Holy Mountain who are no different from those of
old. In his letter he says the following:
Certainly in our times such figures exist, as we ourselves have witnessed:
men who exert such an influence that they could be a powerful cure to our
perverted generation. For example, one author and theologian, a wise
scholar, has written about an Athonite monk who for fifty days ate nothing
at. all, in addition to all his other ascetic labours. The author admired
this and praised God for such contestants still existing in our time, men
like those we read about in the writings of the desert fathers. 'Moreover,'
this wise scholar continues, 'Glory be to God that even now He provides such
contestants.' I did not doubt when I read such things, Father loannikios. I
wondered, though, and was asking myself, 'How is it possible for a man to
survive without food for fifty days?'
Fortunately for me, even as I was pondering this, something happened that
convinced me that it is possible. An elderly ascetic, possessionless and
simple, a little bit older than sixty, came to my hut during Cheesefare Week
and fell asleep there after we had dinner together. Next morning, the first
day of Great. Lent, a matter came up and, as I could not go myself, I sent
him instead. He gladly went to Vigla, a distance of five hours' walk from
here. After he had accomplished his mission, he returned to the hut at
night, and I begged him to accept some food and drink because he was an old
man and tired; but he refused. I asked him again to eat something on the
third day, but he still refused. Then I was amazed and wanted to know how,
since he was old and tired from the long walk, he could not feel hungry or
thirsty. He replied simply, 'I did not eat anything last year during the
whole of Great Lent until Palm Sunday and then only the Holy Communion.' I
would have been less astounded at that moment if a bomb had exploded in
front of me, but 1 had no reason to doubt his word, since I had talked with
him many times and knew him to be a man of truthfulness, modesty, and
innocence. He did not suspect that I was going to make this matter known and
so did not try to hide anything from me. I personally attribute this to
Divine Providence: it was revealed to me so that others might benefit from
it, especially me — in order to make me humble, I who am unable to fast for
even one day.
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Elder Avimelech from Logovarda's holy monastery in Paros was an ascetic at
various locations on Mount Athos. He had lived near the shore of St. Anne's
in a cave where he built a church in honour of the ninety-nine holy fathers
of Crete. Then he went to St. Basil's desert for great ascesis and finally
settled in the Dormition of the Theotokos hut of Small St. Anne's, above
Dionysiou and the Mitrophanis cave. There he laboured to the day of his
repose at the age of one hundred and seven.
--------------------------
Elder Germanos from Kafsokalyvia slept in the Lord at the age of one hundred
and five in 1875. He had arrived on Mount Athos in 1830 and was under
obedience to the Elder Daniel who was lame and lived in the hut of the
Archangels. When Father Germanos first arrived there on a Tues- day, there
was nothing for him to eat. "My child," said one of the spiritual fathers,
"go to Elder Daniel who is ill and has nothing."
"Yes, Father," Elder Germanos replied. "He may have nothing and be poor and
lame, but I do not need an elder to feed me. I need an elder to guide my
soul." So Father Germanos went to Elder Daniel and stayed with him, enduring
patiently and with love the many hardships of their life. Two years later,
in addition to being handicapped, Elder Daniel lost his sight. Like a good,
obedient monk, Father Germanos cared for him in his old age, and finally
buried him. After thirty years in Kafsokalyvia he went to Chairi, to the
hermitage where the Romanian Gerasimos led his ascetic life.
---------------------------------
The Russian hierornonk Parthenios, despite his royal descent, led a strict
ascetic life in Karoulia. He did not cook but ate only dry foods. He used no
heat in winter and had no bed. Instead, he slept on a hide and for a pillow
he used a tree stump. He was polite, friendly and above all, charitable.
------------------------------
Spiritual father B. used to say that fasting is the mother of good health,
and he once said to a doctor, "I fast, and you do not. Let us have a race
walking. Spirituality changes a man, turns him into steel!" He ate only once
a day. A hot drink was his only sustenance at night. He fasted for all of
Great Lent, drinking only broth from boiled greens and one glass of wine. He
lived in Aegina near St. Nectaries for twelveycars. He used to harness
himself to the well-wheel in order to draw water.
---------------------------------
I remember that the most pious Iviritan hieromonk Athanasios never wore
heavy socks over the course of the whole winter. He lived the idiorythmic
style of monasticism, where each monk cooks his own meals separately, but he
never actually cooked at all. Instead, he simply ate a small portion of
whatever was served to guests in the reception room.
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Before he received an inner spiritual illumination and as a result returned
to his homeland of Cyprus, Hieromonk Kyprianos (1880-1955) lived on Athos
for a thousand days, beginning in 1905. While on the Holy Mountain he led a
very ascetic life, with voluntary suffering and deprivation, in
Simonopetra's monastery and then in Katounakia. He slept only four hours a
day. His north-facing room had no heat, nor did he have extra blankets. He
owned just one pair of slippers his entire life. He did not wash for fifty
years. He was sanctified through illness and nurtured by pain. After he lost
his voice, he prayed endlessly with raised arms until they would fall down
from his exhaustion.
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In the desolate hut which is part of the cave of St. Peter, the j first
Athonite, lived the hermits Chrysostomos and his obedient monk, who led
there an unsurpassed ascetic life. They wore tattered clothes, went
barefoot, and fed on dry bread and chestnuts or whatever else was sent to
them from Lavra, In spite of their unkempt and sad appearance, their faces
shone with heavenly radiance and sweetness. All this was witnessed and
recorded by Dionysios the Lavriotan, the Bishop of Trikes and Stagon, who
ordained me as deacon and who frequently with his elder visited the
spiritual arena of St. Peter's cave.
----------------------------
New Skete's elder Chrysostomos endured ascesis and illness patiently. In
spite of the doctor's orders for him to take some meat broth, he replied:
"I'd rather die! It is not allowed by the skete's rules." Finally, by God's
grace, he recovered.
---------------------------------
St. Silouanos the Athonite used to tell us,
Here is what happened to me in the metochion: I would eat until I was full.
Two hours later I would be hungry again. I began to weigh myself and
strangely enough, I saw what I had gained, three okas in three days! I
realized then that this was a temptation, for we monks ought to starve our
bodies. There are passions of the body which hinder prayer, and God's spirit
is not present when one's stomach is full. One ought to know from experience
the limits of fasting so that his body is not weakened to the point of being
unable to fulfil his obedience.
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Father Euthymios, who had been previously married, lived with his obedient
monk Father Matthew for sixteen year in the unapproachable cave of St.
Neilos the Myrrh-gusher. After his wife had reposed, he had come to Mount
Athos to become a monk. At first he served as Lavra's spiritual father,
labouring in the cave of St. Athanasios the Athonite. Then he went to St.
Neilos the Myrrh-gusher's cave. He had come from Konitsa in Epirus. Elder
Methodios, now an aged man, had served him. He told us the following-.
"father Euthymios used to wear an undershirt coated with wax." Elder
Methodios would carry him on his back up the steep steps to St. Neilos' holy
kellion.
---------------------------
What can we say about Philaretos, who exercised great force on himself? Even
on the feast day of Pascha he never omitted reading the Ninth Hour.
------------------------------
His Eminence Archbishop Timotheos of Crete wrote about hermit elder
Avimelech: "He was as solemn as a prophet, as meek as an Apostle, and he
stood tall, this heavy-set ascetic. He reminded us with his presence of
those great desert fathers who were filled with grace."
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There was a monk of St. Paul's named Gerasimos. He worked as a tireless
typikaris for forty years. The most amazing thing about him was that he
never sat down during any of the long services and vigils. He remained a
steadfast pillar of patience in spite of the fact that he suffered from a
double hernia. What was the reason for this diamond-hard attitude? For many
days he had observed a tame sparrow up on a tree limb standing on one leg,
singing melodiously all day long, praising the Creator of all things, but
always standing on one leg.
This ever memorable one used to say, "If a disabled and weak bird can stand
on only one leg all its life, what then ought I to do during the Divine
Liturgy when praises are sung to the Lord?" Such was his awareness and
watchfulness of himself that he would not undress for bed at night but would
sleep in his monastic habit.
------------------------------
Elder Joseph the Hesychast was like a catapult against any self-love. He
never spared himself, persevering in all ascetic labours. Usually each year
immediately after the feast day of Pascha was over, following a winter of
seclusion in their hut, he and his ascetic companion Father Arsenios would
go to the top of Athos. Most of the time while there they stayed in their
beloved chapel of Panagia below the mountain's peak. Their drinking water
was snow boiled in the copper pot they had brought in their knapsack. They
fed on boiled greens and bulbs. At that location, two thousand metres above
the sea, the winds were very strong; to protect themselves, they spent the
night sheltered in ravines and caves where, if necessary, they used the
capes they wore instead of rasos as blankets. Father Arsenios told us that
they often did their prostrations standing barefoot in the snow in order to
overcome sleepiness.
Once during these ascetic wanderings they stayed in the remote chapel above
Great Lavra where St. Gregory Palamas—teacher of the Jesus Prayer, preacher
of grace, and defender of monasticism—did his ascetic labours. One night
while they were praying, demons started a great disturbance, shouting "You
have burned us, you have burned us, go away from here!" and swearing with
vile words. Father Arsenios, who had heard them this time as well, asked in
his usual simple manner, "What are they screaming about? Who are they?"
"They are temptations," Elder Joseph replied. "I not only hear them. I also
see them. Be calm! They are bothered by what we are doing."
-------------------------------
In Kerasia we met and were blessed by the most reverend spiritual father
Hierotheos, who succeeded Hadjigiorgis, the one famous for fasting. He told
us all about Hadjigiorgis letter to the Bishop of Chios, in which was an
account of his and his disciple's ascetic endeavours. In that letter the
great ascetic insistently explained his views to the Bishop that by fasting
on Saturday and Sunday as well as on the feast day of Pascha, he did not
ignore the Holy Canons.
--------------------------------
I take the following from my diary:
October 5, 1968: This morning I set out from St. Anne's Skete to visit the
Karouliotan ascetic elder Gabriel, who for two months now has been
bedridden. His hut is suspended in Karoulia like an eternal oil lamp in the
sanctuary of the Holy Mountain's desert.
I entered through the first door carefully. Beneath the small landing, there
was a chasm, a precipice. I opened the second door, saying, 'Through the
prayers of our holy fathers,' and entered. Now I came across not the Father
Gabriel I had always known—never still, always energetic, as if he were made
of steel, who carried all the gravel during the night to cover the desolate
path. Now he groaned constantly. He was paralysed from the waist down. He
tried to say something but barely managed to utter a word. He was in
unbearable pain. 'What can I say to you now, my father?'
'I am in pain!' he replied to my request that he say something beneficial to
me.
'Make no effort, Elder. I understand. I came for your blessing and a
promise. If you find a presence before God, do not forget me.'
'I to find a presence? The unworthy Gabriel? Such a thing would not be
possible,' and he continued moaning in pain.
He was like a skeleton. He refused to eat some food cooked in oil which
might have strengthened him. I saw a plate with boiled potatoes, which the
Danielite fathers had brought to him, placed on a barrel filled with feces!
I tried to remove it from there.
'Leave it there,' he ordered sternly. It appeared that he always did things
this way, this philosopher of the desert, so that he might resist gluttony.
He simply would not eat, so as not to break his fast. His food had been
oiless for years, so that he could receive communion three or four times a
week.
I dared to say to him, 'Geronda, if you could have an injection it might
help.'
'An injection?' he said, and looked at me sternly, with his eyes wide open.
He had never taken any medication. He
trusted himself entirely to the hands of his beloved God,
and waited in great suffering to meet Him. 'I am waiting for death at any
moment.' 'May our Panagia grant you patience, Elder,' I replied. I
received his blessing, was filled with emotion, and all the
way back prayed for heroic Elder Gabriel.
----------------------------
Pious elder Nikandros from Konstamonitou refused to become an administrator,
because he was a humble man who wanted no position of authority. When he
came to Mount Athos he brought a lot of money with him by which he was
tempted a great deal. He felt better as soon as he got rid of it. He became
free. He persevered in ascesis. He was an infirmarian and a helper in the
kitchen, surprising everyone: though he was old, he worked hard, with
enthusiasm and energy. Despite the fact that he was aged and sick, even when
he was in St. Antonios' Kathisma, he would read Vespers lying in bed under
his covers, and during the night he would sense his guardian angel near him,
holding him and urging him saying, "Keep on with your rule of obedience."
----------------------------
Our contemporary hermit of Kapsala, Elder Methodios, a disciple of the great
ascetic father Tychon, used to tell me: "Father Tychon would not allow us to
throw out the fish bones. He would use them over and over again, boiling
them, and making the broth into a soup."
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