Life of Antony 17–37

So, children, let us not lose heart, nor think that we are spending a long time or doing something great. For ‘the sufferings of the present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.’ Nor, when we look at the world, let us think that we have renounced anything great; for even the whole earth is very small compared with the whole heaven. If, then, we were lords of the whole earth and renounced the whole earth, it would again be worth nothing compared with the kingdom of heaven. As someone might despise one copper drachma in order to gain a hundred gold drachmas, so he who is lord of the whole earth and renounces it gives up little and receives a hundredfold. And if the whole earth is not worth as much as heaven, then the one who has left a few arouras, as though leaving nothing, even if he leaves a house or a good deal of gold, ought not to boast or lose heart. Besides, we ought to reckon that even if we do not leave these things for virtue’s sake, we leave them afterwards when we die, often even to those we would not wish, as the Preacher recalled. Why, then, do we not leave them for virtue’s sake, so that we may also inherit a kingdom? Therefore let none of us even conceive the desire to possess. For what gain is there in possessing what we cannot take with us? Why do we not rather acquire those things which we can take with us, namely prudence, justice, self-control, courage, understanding, love, love of the poor, faith in Christ, freedom from anger, hospitality? If we acquire these, we shall find them going before us, preparing hospitality for us there, in the land of the meek.

So let each one persuade himself by such considerations not to be negligent; and especially if he reckons that he is the Lord’s servant and owes service to his master. A servant would not dare to say, ‘Since I worked yesterday, I will not work today’; nor will he measure the time that has passed and rest in the days that follow; but each day, as is written in the Gospel, he shows the same eagerness, so as to please his master and not be in danger. So let us too persevere each day in the ascetic life, knowing that if we neglect it for one day, the Lord will not pardon us for the sake of the time that has passed, but will be angry with us for our negligence. So we have heard in Ezekiel too; so too Judas, because of one night, lost the … of the time that had passed …

Let us hold fast, then, children, to the ascetic life and not grow listless. For in this we have the Lord as our fellow worker, as it is written: ‘God works together for good with everyone who chooses the good.’ And so that we may not be negligent, it is good to meditate on the Apostle’s saying, ‘I die every day.’ For if we too live as dying every day, we shall not sin. The saying means this: when we rise each day, we should think that we will not survive until evening; and again, when we are about to sleep, we should think that we will not rise, since our life is by nature uncertain and is measured out to us day by day by Providence. Disposed in this way and living in this way each day, we shall neither sin, nor desire anything, nor bear a grudge against anyone, nor store up treasure on earth; but as people who expect to die each day, we shall be without possessions and forgive everyone everything. Desire for a woman or for any other filthy pleasure we shall not entertain at all, but shall turn away from it as something that passes, always struggling and looking ahead to the day of judgment. For the greater fear and the dread of torments always dissolve the smoothness of pleasure and raise up the soul when it is falling.

Since, then, we have begun and have already set out on the road of virtue, let us strain forward all the more, so as to reach what lies ahead. And let no one turn back, like Lot’s wife, especially since the Lord has said: ‘No one who puts his hand to the plow and turns back is fit for the kingdom of heaven.’ To turn back is nothing other than to change one’s mind and to think worldly thoughts again. Do not be afraid when you hear about virtue, nor be astonished at the word; for it is not far from us, nor does it come into being outside us; the work is within us, and the thing is easy, if only we will it. The Greeks travel abroad and cross the sea to learn letters; but we have no need to travel abroad for the kingdom of heaven, nor to cross the sea for virtue. For the Lord has told us beforehand: ‘The kingdom of heaven is within you.’ Virtue, then, needs only our will, since it is in us and arises from us. For virtue exists when the soul keeps its intellectual part in its natural state. And it is in its natural state when it remains as it was made; and it was made beautiful and exceedingly straight. That is why Joshua son of Nun, giving charge to the people, said: ‘Make your heart straight toward the Lord God of Israel’; and John said: ‘Make your paths straight.’ For the soul’s being straight is this: its intellectual part being in its natural state, as it was created. When, on the other hand, it turns aside and becomes distorted from its natural state, then this is called vice of the soul. So the thing is not difficult; for if we remain as we were made, we are in virtue; but if we think evil thoughts, we are judged as evil. If, then, the thing had to be procured from outside, it would truly be difficult; but since it is in us, let us guard ourselves from filthy thoughts, and as people who have received a deposit, let us keep it …

Let it be our struggle that anger may not tyrannize over us nor desire master us. For it is written: ‘The anger of man does not work the righteousness of God’; and ‘desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.’ Living in this way, let us keep sober and safe, and, as it is written, ‘keep our heart with all vigilance.’ For we have terrible and crafty enemies, the evil demons; and against them is our wrestling, as the Apostle said: ‘not against blood and flesh, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.’ Great is their crowd in the air around us, and they are not far from us; and there is great difference among them. About their nature and their differences there would be much to say, and such an account belongs to others greater than we are; what is urgent and necessary for us now is only to know their wiles against us.

First, then, let us know this: the demons were not made as what they are now called, demons; for God made nothing evil. They too were made good; but having fallen from the heavenly wisdom, and rolling about the earth ever since, they deceived the Greeks with apparitions; and envying us Christians, they set everything in motion, wishing to hinder our ascent to heaven, so that we may not go up to the place from which they fell. Therefore there is need of much prayer and discipline, so that one may receive through the Spirit the gift of discernment of spirits and be able to know what concerns them: which of them are less wicked, and which more wicked than the others; to what pursuit each of them gives its zeal; and how each of them is overthrown and cast out. For their tricks and the movements of their plotting are many. The blessed Apostle and those with him knew such things, saying: ‘For we are not ignorant of his designs’; and we, from what we have experienced at their hands, ought to … one another from them …

These demons, then, if they see all Christians, and especially monks, toiling and making progress, first attack and tempt them, setting stumbling-blocks near the path; and their stumbling-blocks are evil thoughts. But we must not fear their suggestions; for by prayers and fasting and faith in the Lord they fall at once. Yet even when they have fallen they do not stop, but come again, craftily and deceitfully. For when they cannot deceive the heart by open and filthy pleasure, they attack again in another way, and now, fashioning apparitions, they pretend to frighten us, transforming themselves and imitating women, wild beasts, creeping things, huge bodies, and multitudes of soldiers. But not even so must we fear their apparitions; for they are nothing, and they quickly vanish, especially if one fortifies himself with faith and the sign of the cross. They are bold and utterly shameless. For if they are defeated even in this way, they attack again in another. They pretend to prophesy and to foretell what will come days later, and they show themselves tall enough to reach the roof and broad in size, so that those whom they could not deceive by thoughts they may snatch away by such apparitions … they bring in their ruler.

He said that they often appear like the devil as the Lord revealed him to Job, saying: ‘His eyes are like the appearance of the morning star. From his mouth go forth burning lamps, and hearths of fire are cast about; from his nostrils goes forth the smoke of a furnace burning with a fire of coals. His breath is coals, and a flame goes forth from his mouth.’ Appearing in this form, the prince of the demons frightens people, as I said before, the crafty one speaking great things, as the Lord again exposed him, saying to Job: ‘He counts iron as straw, and bronze as rotten wood; he counts the sea as an ointment-pot, and the tartarus of the abyss as a captive; he reckons the abyss a place to walk’; and through the prophet: ‘The enemy said, I will pursue and overtake’; and again through another: ‘I will seize the whole world in my hand like a nest, and I will take it up like eggs that are left.’ In short, they try to boast of such things and make such promises, so as to deceive the godly. But not even so must we, the faithful, fear his apparitions or pay attention to his voice. For he lies, and speaks nothing true at all. Indeed, though he speaks such and so many things and is so bold, he was drawn out with a hook by the Savior like a dragon; like a beast of burden he took a halter about his nostrils; like a runaway slave he has his nostrils bound with a ring and his lips pierced with a bracelet. He has been bound by the Lord like a sparrow, to be mocked by us; and he and the demons with him are set like scorpions and snakes, to be trodden underfoot by us Christians. A proof of this is that we now live in opposition to him. For see, he who promised to wipe out the sea and to seize the world cannot now stop your discipline, nor even me as I speak against him. Let us not attend, then, to whatever he may say (for he lies), nor fear his apparitions, since they too are false. For it is not true light that appears in them; rather, they carry the preludes and images of the fire prepared for them; and with the very things in which they are to be burned, they try to frighten people. They appear, and at once vanish again, having harmed none of the faithful, bearing …

They are crafty and ready to change and transform themselves into anything. Often, at any rate, without appearing, they pretend to sing psalms, and they recite words from the Scriptures; and sometimes, when we are reading, they at once repeat over and over, like an echo, the very things that were read. They rouse us from sleep to prayer, and do this constantly, scarcely letting us sleep at all. Sometimes, too, shaping themselves into the forms of monks, they pretend to speak like devout men, so that by the likeness of their appearance they may lead people astray and then drag those they have deceived wherever they wish. But we must not pay attention to them, even if they rouse us to prayer, even if they counsel us not to eat at all, even if they pretend to accuse and reproach us for things they once excused in us. For they do this not for the sake of devotion or of truth, but to bring the simple to despair, to call the ascetic life useless, to make people loathe the solitary life as burdensome and very heavy, and to hinder those who live in opposition to them.

The prophet sent by the Lord pronounced such beings wretched, saying: ‘Woe to him who gives his neighbor to drink a muddy overthrow.’ For such practices and thoughts overthrow the road that leads to virtue. And the Lord himself, even though the demons spoke the truth (for they did speak truly when they said, ‘You are the Son of God’), nevertheless muzzled them and forbade them to speak, lest along with the truth they should also sow their own wickedness, and to accustom us never to pay attention to such beings, even if they seem to speak the truth. For it is unfitting that we, who have the holy Scriptures and the freedom given us by the Savior, should be taught by the devil, who did not keep his own rank but turned his mind to one thing instead of another. That is why he forbids him even when he speaks the words of the Scriptures, saying: ‘But to the sinner God said: Why do you recite my statutes, and take my covenant in your mouth?’ For they do everything, they speak, make an uproar, pretend, and act, to deceive the simple. They make banging noises, laugh senselessly, and hiss; … they weep and lament as if defeated.

The Lord, then, as God, muzzled the demons; but we, having learned from the saints, ought to act toward them as the saints did and imitate their courage. For they too, seeing these things, said: ‘When the sinner stood against me, I was mute and humbled, and kept silent even from good things’; and again: ‘But I, like a deaf man, did not hear, and was like a mute who does not open his mouth; and I became like a man who does not hear.’ So let us neither listen to them, since they are strangers to us, nor obey them, even if they rouse us to prayer, even if they speak about fasting; but let us rather attend to our own purpose in the ascetic life, and not be deceived by them, since they do everything with guile. We must not fear them, even if they seem to attack us, even if they threaten death; for they are weak and can do nothing but threaten.

I have already spoken of this in passing; but now I must not shrink from speaking about them more fully, for the reminder will make you safe. Since the Lord came, the enemy has fallen and his powers have grown weak. That is why, though he can do nothing, he still does not keep quiet even after his fall, but like a tyrant he threatens, even if only in words. Let each of you reckon this, and he will be able to despise the demons. If they were bound in bodies such as ours, they could say: ‘We do not find people when they hide, but when we find them we harm them’; and we too could hide and escape them by shutting the doors against them. But they are not like this: they can come in when the doors are shut, and they are in all the air, they and their chief, the devil; they are malevolent and ready to harm; and, as the Savior said, the father of wickedness, the devil, is a murderer from the beginning. Yet we are alive now, and indeed we live in opposition to him; so it is clear that they have no strength. For no place hinders them from plotting, nor do they regard us as their friends so as to spare us, nor are they lovers of good so as to correct us; on the contrary they are wicked, and nothing is so dear to them as harming those who love virtue and revere God. But because they can do nothing, they do nothing but threaten; for if they could, they would not delay, but would at once carry out their evil, since their will is ready for it, especially against us. See, here we have come together and are speaking against them, and they know that as we advance they grow weak. If, then, they had the authority, they would not have let a single one of us Christians live; for ‘godliness is an abomination to a sinner.’ But since they can do nothing, they wound themselves all the more, because they can do none of the things they threaten. Next, one must also consider this, so as not to fear them: if they had the power, they would not come with a crowd, nor make apparitions, nor use tricks by transforming themselves; it would be enough for one alone to come and do what he can and wills. Above all, anyone who has authority does not kill by means of apparitions nor frighten with crowds, but at once uses his authority as he wishes. But the demons, being able to do nothing, play as though on a stage, changing their forms and frightening children with the appearance of crowds and with their shapes; and for this reason they ought rather to be despised as weak. The true angel, at any rate, sent by the Lord against the Assyrians, had no need of crowds, nor of outward apparitions, nor of banging or clattering; he quietly used his authority and slew …

If anyone, considering the story of Job, should say, ‘Why then did the devil go out and do everything against him, stripping him of his possessions, killing his children, and striking him with an evil sore?’ let such a person know in turn that it was not the devil who had the strength, but God who handed Job over to him to be tested. Indeed, being able to do nothing himself, the devil asked, and having received permission, he did what he did. So from this too the enemy is all the more to be condemned, because, though he wished it, he could not prevail even against one righteous man; for if he had been able, he would not have asked. And by asking not once but a second time, he is shown to be weak and able to do nothing. And it is no wonder that he did not prevail against Job, when destruction did not come even upon his cattle unless God had permitted it. He does not even have authority over pigs; for, as it is written in the Gospel, the demons begged the Lord, saying, ‘Let us go into the pigs.’ And if they do not have authority even over pigs, much less do they have it over human beings made in the image of God.

God alone, then, must be feared, while these must be despised and not dreaded at all. Indeed, the more they do these things, the more let us intensify our discipline against them. For an upright life and faith in God are a great weapon against them. They fear the ascetics’ fasting, vigils, prayers, gentleness, quietness, freedom from love of money and from vainglory, humility, love of the poor, almsgiving, freedom from anger, and above all their piety toward Christ. That is why they do everything they do, so as not to have people who trample them underfoot. For they know the grace given to the faithful against them by the Savior, who said: ‘Behold, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy.’

If, then, they pretend to foretell the future, let no one pay attention. For often they tell days beforehand of brothers who will arrive days later; and those brothers do come. They do this not out of care for those who hear, but to persuade them to trust them, and then, once they have them in their power, to destroy them. Therefore one must not attend to them, but even when they speak one must refute them, since we have no need of them. For what wonder is it if, using bodies finer than those of human beings, and having seen people who have set out on a journey, they outrun them and announce their coming? A man on horseback can also foretell this, outrunning the one who goes on foot; so we should not marvel at them for this either. For they foreknow nothing of what has not yet happened; God alone is the one who knows all things before they come to be. These, like thieves, run ahead and report what they see. How many of them are even now reporting our affairs, that we have met and are speaking against them, before any of us has gone off to tell it! A swift-running boy could do this too, outrunning a slower one. What I mean is this: if someone begins to walk from the Thebaid or from some other region, before he begins to walk they do not know whether he will walk; but having seen him walking, they run ahead, and before he arrives they announce him; and so it happens that he arrives days later. But often, when the travelers turn back, they have lied.

So too they sometimes babble about the river’s water. For having seen heavy rains falling in the regions of Ethiopia, and knowing that the river’s flood comes from them, they run ahead and tell of it before the water reaches Egypt. Human beings too would have said this, if they could run as fast as they do. And as David’s watchman, going up to a height, saw the man coming sooner than the one who stayed below; and as the runner himself told it before the others, not things that had not happened, but things already on the way and happening; so these too choose to take the trouble and signal it to others, only to deceive them. But if Providence meanwhile decides something different about the waters or the travelers (for it is free to do so), the demons have lied, and those who heeded them have been deceived.

In this way the oracles of the Greeks were set up, and in this way people were formerly led astray by the demons; but even so the error has now come to an end. For the Lord has come, who brought the demons to nothing along with their very craftiness. For they know nothing of themselves; but like thieves they pass on what they see among others, and they are guessers rather than foreknowers. Therefore, even if they sometimes say true things of this kind, let no one admire them for it. For physicians too, who have experience of diseases, when they see the same disease in others, often foretell its course, guessing from experience. Helmsmen and farmers, again, seeing the state of the sky from experience, foretell either a storm or fair weather; and no one would say for that reason that they foretell by divine inspiration, but from experience and practice. So even if the demons sometimes say the same things by guessing, let no one admire them for it, or heed them. For what use is it to the hearers to know from them days beforehand what is coming? Or what zeal should there be to know such things, even if one knows them truly? For this does not produce virtue, nor is it at all a mark of good character. None of us is judged for what he does not know, and no one is called blessed because he has learned and known; but each one will be judged on this: whether he has kept the faith and truly guarded the commandments.

Therefore we must not make much of these things, nor practice discipline and toil for their sake, in order to foreknow, but in order to please God by living well. And we must pray, not in order to foreknow, nor ask for this as the reward of our discipline, but that the Lord may be our fellow worker for victory over the devil. But if we do care at all about foreknowing, let us be pure in mind. For I believe that a soul pure in every way and standing in its natural state can, having become clear-sighted, see more and farther than the demons, since it has the Lord to reveal things to it; such was the soul of Elisha, which saw what Gehazi had done and beheld the powers standing beside him.

When, then, they come to you by night and wish to tell you the future, or say, ‘We are the angels,’ pay no attention, for they lie. And if they praise your discipline and call you blessed, do not listen to them, nor pay them any regard at all; rather, seal yourselves and the house, and pray; and you will see them vanish. For they are cowards and are greatly afraid of the sign of the Lord’s cross, since by it the Savior stripped them and made an example of them. And if they stand their ground more shamelessly, dancing about and changing their apparitions, do not be afraid or cower, nor attend to them as though they were good. For it is easy and possible, when God grants it, to distinguish the presence of the good from that of the evil. The vision of the holy ones is not turbulent; for ‘he will not quarrel nor cry out, nor will anyone hear his voice.’ It comes so quietly and gently that at once joy, gladness, and courage arise in the soul; for the Lord is with them, who is our joy and the power of God the Father; and the soul’s thoughts remain untroubled and calm, so that, illumined by them, it beholds those who appear. For a longing for divine things and for the things to come enters it, and it would wish to be wholly joined to them, if it could depart with them. And if some, being human, are afraid of the vision of the good ones, those who appear at once take away the fear by love, as Gabriel did for Zechariah, and the angel who appeared to the women at the divine tomb, and the one who said to the shepherds in the Gospel, ‘Do not be afraid.’ For their fear comes not from cowardice of soul but from recognizing the presence of higher beings. Such, then, is the vision of the holy ones.

But the assault and apparition of the evil ones is turbulent, with banging, din, and shouting, like the movement of undisciplined youths and robbers. From this at once arise cowardice of soul, confusion and disorder of thoughts, dejection, hatred of ascetics, listlessness, grief, memory of one’s family, fear of death, and then desire for evil things, neglect of virtue, and instability of character. When, then, you see something and are afraid: if the fear is at once taken away, and in its place comes unspeakable joy, cheerfulness, courage, recovery, untroubled thoughts, and the other things I mentioned, courage and love toward God, take heart and pray; for the joy and the settled state of the soul show the holiness of the one who is present. So Abraham rejoiced when he saw the Lord; and John leaped for joy when the voice of Mary, the Mother of God, came to him. But if, when some beings appear, there is confusion, banging from outside, worldly apparition, threats of death, and the other things I mentioned, know that it is an attack of the evil ones.

Let this too be a sign for you: whenever the soul remains fearful, it is the presence of the enemies. For the demons do not take away the fear of such people, as the great archangel Gabriel did for Mary and Zechariah, and the one who appeared at the tomb did for the women; on the contrary, when they see people afraid, they increase their apparitions so as to terrify them more; and then they attack and mock them, saying: ‘Fall down and worship.’ So they deceived the Greeks; for in this way they came to be regarded among them as gods, falsely so called. But the Lord did not let us be deceived by the devil; for when the devil made such apparitions against him, he rebuked him, saying: ‘Get behind me, Satan; for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’ More and more, then, let the crafty one be despised by us for these reasons; for what the Lord said … the Lord, who rebuked them with these words.