The Sayings Of The Desert Fathers
Cistercian Publications
1975
"A time is coming when men will go mad, and when they see someone who is not mad, they will attack him saying, 'You are mad, you are not like us.'"
(Abba Anthony)
Anthony the Great
01. Accidie
This is the question:
What must I do to be saved?
When Saint Anthony
experienced accidie
he asked it courageously.
02. Attention
This is a question:
Why are there both rich and poor?
When Saint Anthony
received his answer to it,
he did not ask any more.
03. Ground
Have the grounding ground
under your feet at all times,
live the sacred texts,
and do not easily leave
your heuristic hermitage.
04. Work
This is the great work:
take the blame for your faults and
expect temptation
to be your dark passenger
until the end of your days.
05. Temptation
Experiencing
temptation in this life is
the sine qua non
of heavenly membership.
You can't have it without it.
06. Control
Abba Pambo asked
Abba Pambo asked
the great Abba Anthony:
"What ought I to do?"
His three-fold answer ended
with emphasis on control.
07. Humility
"Humility" was
the answer that a voice gave
to Anthony when
he (groaning) asked how to get
through all the enemy's snares.
08. Discernment
Asceticism
without discernment keeps one
far away from God.
Somatic affliction is
only part of the process.
09. Community
Gaining a brother
is the same as gaining God.
Sometimes hermitic
life can be meaningless if
cut off from community.
10. Intensity
The intensity
of hermitic life is lost
once solitary
being is slowly replaced
with secular loitering.
11. Desert
Hearing, speech, and sight
are the three conflicts that one
can simply avoid
by living in the desert
of their own isolation.
12. Hermeneutics
Only Anthony
the Great could create something
from the nothingness
of their demonic visions.
He knew his hermeneutics.
13. Brethren
The brethren will stretch
but not break only if their
own personal needs
are met by an elder who
is both older and wiser.
14. Amends
We are not told what
sin the young monk committed
that caused him to weep.
Sometimes God only gives us
five days to make our amends.
15. Better
Is it better to
be thoroughly insulted
or sincerely praised?
If you are an empty cell,
then better does not matter.
16. Hyperbole
What is great about
Saint Anthony is his use
of hyperbole.
Of course he prays for the monk,
he just does it differently.
17. Ignorance
It is not without
significance that Abba
Joseph did not know.
Those so named have found the way
through semantic ignorance.
18. Door
If you lack a door
then you do not have a cell
to be silent in.
And if you have a door make
sure that it is always closed.
19. Invalids
"We cannot do this
and we cannot do that" is
said by invalids.
Invalidity of this
kind requires food and prayer.
20. Renunciation
To reject the world
requires a radical
renunciation.
Pulling this off is next to
impossible, but worth it.
