Voluntary Poverty (To the Deaconess Magna) 17–36

Who prepared the ravens to bring food to Elijah twice a day in the famine? Who made the handful of meal in the jar, though it was poured out, last for so long a time? How did [Elisha] satisfy a hundred men with ten loaves, using the leftovers as witnesses that they were filled? Or how, again, did he change the stew in the pot, made bitter by a poisonous herb, into something fit to eat, so that the need of those who then wanted food might be met? These men had no ox, no ploughland, none of the rest of the farmer's equipment; and how was the body's need always met for them without any lack? Others always have at hand everything suited to working the land, and nothing that human effort contributes to the growing of crops is neglected by them. And how is it that they mostly remain in want, tending their sown fields with all their strength and reaping no fruit at all from their labor? Because the outcome of hope in God is secure, but the aim of human confidence is false. Such a one trusts in what seems reasonable and fittingly fails of his expectation; he judges the extraordinary impossible and reckons the customary certain, and is later persuaded by experience that whatever seems to be [won] by our own skill has an uncertain and doubtful presence, while the use of whatever comes from the divine [bounty] is admittedly present, since these things are abundant and incorruptible streams from the ever-flowing fountain of providence. The Lord said well somewhere, and David the psalmist in agreement with him: the one, “The worker is worthy of his food”; the other, “The rich have become poor and gone hungry, but those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.” They show that those who are free for the service of God have the supply of food ready from there. It is a wage before the principal wage, meanwhile fittingly due to the work and owed to the service of the body. For the principal wage, matched to the labor, remains kept for the soul in the future; the other is given to the living body for the sake of virtue itself and of godliness, and it is truly fed like a beast of burden, which carries the part that acts and needs care to last in its service, as long as it is yoked and serves the bondage to which it was subjected by the Creator.

These are the advantages of the first having-nothing; these are the rewards of the undistracted life. This is the way of life fitting for the rational creature: to be free for God and to receive what is needed as from the storehouse of his providence; to hope in that alone and to reap its help in all things; to despise earthly things and to have the earth bringing its good things as gifts for enjoyment in due measure; to possess nothing in the world, and yet with authority, when needed, to use its good things while serving the Creator truly, and to levy tribute on creation for what is needed; to sojourn here as he wills, and to choose one's dwelling where there truly is a dwelling; to count nothing that stays here as important, and to make much of whatever contributes to that life. This is the life that the Creator ordained for human beings from the beginning, and in obedience to him all the saints lived it. They had not even the smallest measure of land as their own by title of possession, and yet they reaped the whole earth like masters, its necessaries wherever they happened to be found. They were not distinguished among people by wealth and power, and yet they were [held] in reverence for the dignity of their virtue. They had no household servants supplying menial work for the body's luxury, and yet the parts of creation served them for what was necessary. They had no service of pack animals to carry their goods, and yet ravens brought these things, meeting their need more swiftly.

By their purity they strove to become friends of Christ, and among the creatures of their friend they gave orders with boldness, as they wished. They commanded heaven to give food to those in need, and it brought down manna to them as it was ordered. At other times they shut heaven to chastise the ungrateful, and though it was eager to give its usual rain, it held it back, bearing its burden for three years and [six] months, gradually growing heavy with it, as one pregnant, because of those who had commanded it. Once it also rained by night, when ordered, to burn up certain wicked men, and at another time it rained hail with well-aimed throws on other lawless men and wrought much death among them, taught this by the nod of those righteous men. They split the earth with a great [chasm] and brought the rebels down to the recesses beneath the earth, together with their tents and the cattle of a great herd. They made the deep dry land, a highway, and the [dry] land … waterless, into an abundant supply of water that before was scarce. They crossed rivers with dry feet; they walked about in a furnace of fire and knew no harm from the fire, fighting the flame with their bodies as though with cold water and conquering the destroyer with what is perishable. They were handed over to the rage of beasts to be eaten and did not experience their savagery, for they calmed them by prayer as by a charm that tames to gentleness. They lit up lightless darkness with a pillar of fire; they kept off the noonday heat, shading the open sky with a cloud. Water that was bitter and made the land barren they made drinkable for the thirsty and fit for the growing of crops, for those who lived in that country. They gave barren women the bearing of children, and their dead … they gave back to them alive. They withstood tyrants … escorted by great crowds; they laughed at battle lines; they routed opposing phalanxes of enemies; they passed unharmed through ambushes contrived by plotters; they were rescued from prisons, the doors opened for them by an invisible power; they were freed from bonds, the fetters that held them loosed beyond expectation; they passed safely through the murderous threats of rulers and the rage of maddened mobs, never at all experiencing anything terrible.

All these things, and more than these, belonged to those righteous men because, freed from the tangled cares of the world, they worshipped God with undistracted attendance, and through their boldness toward him became revered by all creation, so that they could command it. Who they were, the history of Scripture [shows], making known their names, each in its place, from their deeds, each by its miracle, to those who wish to learn. It would be long, and at the same time superfluous, to list them now in this discourse, since they are plain even to those who read the divine Scripture without much diligence; [but they profit] those who make it their study, and are perhaps also a diversion from sad thoughts. For to those who labor at the work with attention, the words are useful also for contemplation, enriching the mind with their meanings and leading it by the hand, now to one saying, now to another, toward understanding of each as it comes, each in turn always taking over the care of the one before and drawing it out further, until the things that stir the thought, broadening philosophy as it advances day by day, bring it lawfully to the end toward which it hastens.

You know also those of the new covenant who had nothing: John the forerunner of Christ, and the choir of the apostles with him, with whom the monastic life began. The one chose of his own accord to live in the desert, eating locusts and wild honey and wearing clothing woven of camel's hair; the others, obeying the Lord, kept to a single tunic and to food found for the hour from wherever it came, acquiring nothing at all, as they had been taught, not even a staff and a wallet, which are among the things most useful to travellers for many purposes, so that they might not seem perhaps to trust in these and so blunt their hope in God, disregarding the power that works with them unseen. That power does not allow its grace to be shared with things that are reasonable and plausible, but wishes to show it bare of every veil, turning to itself the readiness of human beings, which is divided alike between what is likely and what is true, and not letting them be drawn about by things thought to work together with it for … security. This is surely not the idleness that comes from Adelphius of Mesopotamia and from Alexander, who for a short time troubled the imperial city of Constantinople, people who made the appearance of persevering continually in prayer a door to idleness and a cloak for laziness about work: both young boys and men vigorous in bodily strength, who ought to wear that strength down with many labors. By not working, through their ease, they gave their passions and their reasoning license to revel in the material of these things, until the seeming prayer, which is not what it is called, perishes altogether,

and becomes a burden of fleshly desires, which not only does not let one converse with God, but even soils with images of shameful thoughts the mind that seems to be praying. For it is good to persevere in prayer and to train the mind for converse with God, but only so far as not to turn the time of peace into a time of war, nor, by stretching the time beyond what is due, to give entry to the hostile passions. They are accustomed to take the thoughts captive to strange notions, dragging them out of prayer as out of a sacred sanctuary and leading them by force to the mind of the flesh, so that the thoughts go over the very things that this mind, once it prevails, compels them to say. Who of sensible people, then, will call this prayer: this battle of thoughts opposed to and contending with one another, when one gainsays what the other proposes, and the other tries to persuade as it wishes, and each sets itself against the other until one wins a clear victory? Is it not rather a boxing match or an all-in fight? And would that it were so; for it would be good to stand and struggle against what troubles us, and not to be dragged like bought slaves without any resistance. For often, drawn away from the words of prayer, we follow the thoughts that lead us, without shaking them off or being vexed, as though our will did not agree with what urges us toward unfitting things. Our body shows the posture of prayer, for, bent on our knees, we appear to onlookers to be praying; but in thought we picture pleasant things: talking kindly with friends, railing angrily at enemies, feasting with banqueters, building houses for our relatives, planting, travelling, trading, being dragged by force to the priesthood, administering with great reverence the affairs of the churches entrusted to us. And we go through more of these than have been named, each one as the passion knows how to dispose the mind toward each.

But prayer does not want this. It wants … the mind pure of every such thought, not [only] thinking of …, but [of anything], however venerable, beside what is set before it; it does not even take notice of any earthly thing. Possessed by God, it has as it were gone out of its usual concerns and of what is dear to the body, to where it has resolved to be occupied, making its petition with reverence. And let occupation with prayer have so much measure as practice can provide for each to attend to it without distraction. So let them not be allowed to deceive the simpler sort, those who are equally inexperienced in prayer and in ascetic practice, and who, with the fancy of a greater work, command them to refrain from what seems lesser. For their aim, it seems, is rather to eat what others provide with idle hands, decently collecting provisions for the body under the respectable pretext of prayer, than to live as benefits both soul and body. For the one who divides his time between work and prayer, according as he is suited to the one or the other, tames the body by toil and its unruly impulses toward greater gentleness; and he leads the soul, which has toiled with the body and longs for rest, eagerly to prayer as to another task, its strength again at its height. For the soul is refreshed by changing its very work, passing from one task to another, not lingering in a single monotonous one, but rejoicing in the variety of labor, as though laying aside the toil of the task that seems to be ending and approaching the next fresh, as one who is just beginning.

But the one who loves ease feeds his passions with idleness and gives his desires freedom to stir toward what they naturally tend to, especially at the time of prayer, when the mind, drawn in on itself, becomes [the prey] of what troubles it. He goes over in his thoughts what the passion that dwells within [suggests], and instead of conversing with God and asking him for what is profitable, he stirs up thoughts of dishonor, turning aside from the words of prayer to words of wickedness or impurity, or to whatever has gained the mastery over his mind and, having used it up, has given it its color. Paul knew that this happens to such people, and so he condemns idleness, methodically checking the evils born of it. For he said, “We command you, brothers, [and exhort you] in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from every brother who walks in disorder and not according to the tradition that they received from us. For you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us: that we were not disorderly among you, nor did we eat anyone's bread for nothing, but in toil and labor we worked night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you; not because we do not have the right, but to give ourselves to you as an example, so that you might imitate us. For even when we were with you, we gave you this command: if anyone will not work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you are walking in disorder, doing no work but being busybodies. Such people we command and exhort through the Lord Jesus Christ to work quietly and eat their own bread.”

He makes the rebuke severe with many proofs. He called idleness disorder; he added, “Let him not eat who does not work”; he gave himself, toiling day and night at his work, as an example and pattern; he does not reproach those people directly but speaks to others about them; and he bids the healthy keep away from them as from people in the grip of a disease. In this way he displayed great and unbearable indignation. For idleness is truly the cause of many evils for many: by leisure it increases the evils they are used to and teaches those they did not yet know; for it is an innovator and very apt at devising new wickedness. And Paul rightly shows it to be abominable and to be fled, by the words quoted and by many others, exhorting, being angry, grieving, rebuking, and using every means to shame those whom he himself called disorderly into working quietly and walking decently toward those outside. He knew that work is the mind's anchor, enabling it to ride safely at its moorings. Even if gales and whirlwinds threaten shipwreck from every side with violent winds, the mind stands unmoved, held by work as by an anchor; it is washed over a little by unsettling thoughts, but it is not torn away into danger, since the cable is stronger than the winds that drive against it.

So those who refuse the work of their hands on the pretext that they must persevere in prayer do not pray either, since the mind cannot stretch toward what it longs for; they are distracted, beyond the measure of their own strength, by many unfitting things, and by feeding the body delicately they make it unfit for prayer by the very means by which they think, through idleness, to give the soul freedom from care, entangling it in a labyrinth of thoughts that has no way out. For the body, wearied by work, holds the mind to itself, since the mind must be present to the task no less than the eyes and must work with them so that the activity proceeds without stumbling; but when the body is relaxed it gives the mind freedom to wander, for the passions are roused in the ease, and at each reminder of desire they drag the mind about, alone, like a captive.

If, then, the mind, when present to the work, makes the labor complete, and when absent shows it faulty and far short of what is needed, how will it have intensity and freedom from distraction in prayer, when the one who should direct prayer is distracted by [many things] and continually falls away, I do not mean from complete ecstasy, but even from the prayer of words? For the chief attention of the perfect is a kind of rapture of the mind and a complete [withdrawal] from the things of sense, when the Spirit intercedes with God with groanings that cannot be uttered, before God who sees the disposition of the heart unfolded like a written book and showing its will in voiceless figures. So Paul was caught up to the third heaven, not knowing whether he was in the body or out of the body. So at another time in the temple he came to be [in ecstasy] and heard with the [ear] of the heart (for the body's hearing, with the other senses, [was suspended] through the ecstasy) the Lord saying, “Go out from here quickly, for they will not receive your testimony about me.” So Peter, going up on the roof to pray, saw the vision of the sheet, in which were all the wild beasts and the cattle and the creeping things of the earth and the birds of heaven, showing the differences among the conditions of human beings. So the hawk shown by God to Job, spreading its wings motionless and looking toward the south, signifies by its posture the composure of one who prays, and by its name his holy mind.

Second after the first kind of prayer is to say the words with the mind following them in compunction and knowing to whom it offers its petition. But prayer that is interrupted by thoughts and cut through by bodily cares stands far from the state of one who prays. For if the one praying does not hear himself, distracted as he is by many things, and does not know what he seemed to say, how will he have the divine hearing attending to words that he himself, being distracted, has not been able to attend to? Those who say, “Attend to my petition, give ear to my prayer,” and, “Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my petition,” had their whole mind earnestly gathered there, not poured out over the things on which the mind of the careless is accustomed, as it wanders, to dwell and be scattered.

Such, then, was the saints' having-nothing, as was said a little earlier, and it provided them with all the things that have been listed in their place. The middle way, too, coming far after it, has its usefulness, being suited to the times and to the body's necessity. It cannot lay claim to the first prizes, nor does it boast of equal honor with the higher way of life; but it holds the second rank of honor and will not endure to yield it to the third and fourth rank of those who live more carelessly, for it falls short not so much of perfection as of the difference in the way of life. For the first saints lived for the soul alone and for God who made it, taking no account of the body; and so they had their needs met without care, fittingly, at the right time, not laid up in storehouses but arriving as from a treasury at the hour, by the divine will. But those who came after them, taking thought for the body's necessary comfort, so that the living creature might not perish against the will of him who bound soul and body together, give their hands to work … only so far as to serve unavoidable necessity, and give the greater part of their time to the care of the soul, to prayers and readings and the exercise of what is fitting, pursuing their progress in good things as is right.

The last of these, being entirely men of the flesh, have given themselves wholly to the service of the statue: they farm, raise cattle, trade, and follow every money-making art, not acquiring as much as they need for life in the flesh, but as much as shows them to be not inferior to the elegant among the wealthy, so that by this too they may be seen to be eager for display. Since they have not won renown by their way of life, they woo distinction for themselves by extravagance; and in this they clearly put their own folly on public display, thinking an accusation to be praise and supposing that they are admired for things for which they deserve mockery and laughter. For just as what suits each calling reasonably gives grounds for approval, so what does not fit it, even if it is praiseworthy in another, incurs great condemnation in the one to which it does not belong. No one, at any rate, has approved of a man adorned with a golden hair-clasp and precious things, nor of a woman wearing a brooch and a man's cloak. For the adornment that nature has assigned to each becomes, when it is changed, an occasion for mockery.

To which of those on either side, then, are those on the border more akin? Surely to those whom they come nearer in their work, and to the kinship of those to whom they are eager to be near in their way of life. For it is not because they hold the middle rank that they are related equally to both. They are followers of those who lead, going after them and stepping in their track while it is fresh; but from those who lag behind they are as far apart as runners, little by little, are separated from those who walk or stand still. For what fellowship do those of many possessions … have with those who have nothing? What agreement do those who mind the things of the flesh have with those who mind the things of the Spirit? What share have those entangled in business with those who serve God without care? These left what they had, as the apostles did, even if it was little; those acquired even what they did not have. The one live quietly within, caring for gentleness and dignity; the others fight it out for money, battling over possessions. The one wrestle lawfully for the heavenly goods against the spiritual forces of wickedness; the others fight over earthly goods with those who share their possessions and are fought by them in turn. The one spend their time caring for the salvation of souls; for the others a whole lifetime is not enough, divided as it is among the many occupations of the body. The one, living free of business, move those who see them to give thanks; the others become a cause of [blasphemy] to them, doing nothing worthy of their profession.

Of the first Paul says, “You shine as stars in the world,” shining, that is, by the distinction of their way of life, and becoming promoters of good zeal for those who see them; of the others, “Because of you my name is blasphemed,” since, plainly, they do the opposite of what they profess and carry about a habit that contradicts their works. So it is fitting that the one are admired and the others spat upon, the one called blessed and the others wretched, the one loved justly and the others hated with a hatred that is not unjust. For who would not rightly [admire] the one who has wholly renounced the tumults outside and chosen the quiet life free of business? Who would not love with amazement the one who turns away from the occasions of quarrel with those who share possessions and with fellow craftsmen, and who, by his solitude at home, stands aside alike from doing something irreparable and from suffering it: neither troubling nor troubled, neither wronging nor wishing to wrong, nor able to be wronged? The first he does not choose by his will even if he could; the second he does not undergo, since there is no material in which he could be wronged.

And who would not loathe the one who says he has been released from life and yet is entangled in its distractions; who boasts of having despised the world and madly [pursues] its affairs; who professes to look down on earthly things and belies his promise by his works; who counts human things, as he says, a mockery, and yet is seen to strive for them more than other people; who has bidden farewell to vanity and is not separated from it; who [professes] renunciation to be cross and death alike, and shows no proof of mortification? You have come out of Egypt, man: what have you to do with brick-making any more? You are travelling through the desert, hastening to the land of promise: why do you linger in vain labors and become a slow traveller on the long journey? The race set before you calls for much zeal, so that you may not wander in trackless places and fall away from the rest. You have put your hand to the plough-handle: why do you turn back and become unfit for the kingdom of heaven? You have left the burning of the Pentapolis: why do you long to see what is happening [and turn back?]

You took up the cross: follow Christ, having left everything, father, boat, nets and all the tools of your trade, and with them every attachment and every memory of kin; for Christ, to whom you pledged yourself, wants to be loved more than all these. You died with him; you were buried with him in the blessed burial of dispassion. Why do you again undergo the passions of the living, making much provision for the flesh to satisfy its desires? Care for the body with a little comfort, since for the present you are bound to it, so that you may have it as a fellow worker in the labor of virtue and the soul's progress may not be hindered; for the soul wants to have nearly all the time, and scarcely thinks a little of it worth giving to necessity. But one who looks after oxen, counts flocks of sheep every day, and is always tending vineyards, groves, cornfields and gardens, when the whole day is not enough for their service: where or when will he remember God? When will he sing psalms? When will he pray? When will he exercise himself in ethical, natural and theological contemplation? And if, among his many labors, he is able now and then to make this a side task, how will he offer his petition to the Master, when his mind is not torn away from the things that claim so much of his care and attention? How [will he watch] the movements of the passions, so as to know the difference between [yesterday] and today, the change toward better or worse? How will he discover the interweaving of thoughts, as they come in one upon another in various ways and make watchfulness difficult?

… For some thoughts come first looking venerable: those of the avaricious appear compassionate and merciful; those of the resentful promise the correction of the one who causes the grievance; those of the vainglorious and proud promise the perfection of virtue; and, in short, the thoughts that seem respectable go ahead of all the wicked ones, beguiling those inexperienced in such deception with the image of the good they long for, but afterwards handing them over, routed, to the opposite thoughts, and … no longer able at all [to escape] the deception. For the mind, once colored by what it has already reasoned, even if it perceives its error, withdraws from it with difficulty, drawn more by the pleasure of what is sweet than it hastens to flee the harm of what is unprofitable. Since things stand so and call for so much zeal, where is there any time left to you suitable for labor spent in vain beyond what is needed? Do you not see how by day your affairs afflict you, and by night the memories of them, turning the time of rest into one of pain? For then these memories bring before you, one by one, those who moved your boundary stones, those who damaged your crops, those who blocked your share of the water, those who grazed down your grass, and those who did you any other harm or wrong, so that the angry part of the soul fights for revenge; and they give no time for rest in sleep, still less for prayer, which needs much quiet on every side and leisure, and gives freedom from care in return.

For what does Paul say? “I want you to be free of care.” And he adds, “The unmarried man cares for the things of the Lord, how he may please him; but the married man cares for the things of the world, how he may please his wife.” If, then, it is not possible to serve God free of care, and those who do not take wives nevertheless bear the burden of care, being not free of care, how [will they please] the Lord? For they differ in nothing from the married, caring for the things of the world as they do, and they do not incur the same blame in this, but a much greater condemnation. For to the married the Preacher grants some pardon, since they take on labor in vain in order to pass on a little comfort for life to their children, who may perhaps face early orphanhood, so that these may not, perhaps through the loss of their parents and worn down by want, endure every pain from every side in their affliction. But of the others he declared the plain folly, saying, “There is one, and there is no second; he has no son or brother, and yet he toils” … “for the wind.” Very reasonably is this said to such a person, who is free of heirs, for whose sake [the married man] perhaps has a plausible excuse; he ought rather to use his release as is fitting and make the time wasted by most people useful to himself for laying up the goods of the soul. For let [the command] stand for him: “Do not be anxious for your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or what you will put on”; and let him not waver, doubting whether the things he needs will or will not be there for one who serves God. Why does he not [say], “Having food and covering, with these we shall be content,” and sow in the fields of the Spirit the labors that those who care for the world sow in the works of the flesh, so that from them he may reap [eternal life], toiling at all times in these with all his strength? How much leisure would he have, and how little would the body's need require, if he looked to it only for necessity and were not scattered by extravagance into the sea of pleasures! … but wholly on earthly things …