Identity and Difference in the Spiritual Life: Hesychasts, Yogis, and
Sufis
Opposition and Dialogue
Such is the best approach: not to contrast formal systems of doctrine, taken
in isolation, but to consider how doctrine is lived out in personal devotion
and mystical experience. Once we adopt this “existential” approach, we shall
quickly discover a remarkable fact. Opposition and dialogue can frequently
coexist. Religious groups that diverge sharply in their doctrinal formulae
often agree at many points in their spirituality. Confrontation on one level
is combined on another level with openness and the willingness to borrow
from each other. Outward hostility is mitigated by inner convergence.
Orthodox and Catholics in the Eighteenth Century
Thus, in a sweeping and comprehensive fashion, the 1755
Definition denied the presence of any sacramental grace among
the non-Orthodox. Roman Catholics, on this view, lack valid baptism, and
therefore
a fortiori they possess no valid priesthood and
no genuine eucharist. They are outside the Church.
[3]
Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain, in his classic collection of the church
canons entitled
Pidalion (“Rudder”), first
published at Leipzig in 1800, adheres closely to the 1755
Definition, declaring that all Roman Catholics must be
rebaptized. He is aware, however, that in the early Church rebaptism of
heretics had not always been required, and that the Ecumenical Patriarchate
itself, prior to 1755, had received Roman Catholics through anointing with
the Holy Chrism, without requiring a new baptism. This variation in practice
he explains by invoking the double principle of “strictness” or “exactness”
(
akriveia ) and “economy” (
oikonomia ) or pastoral flexibility. “Economy”
means, in this context, that the rigorous application of the canons may be
moderated, if this will assist the salvation of human persons.
[4]
From the viewpoint of “strictness,” Nikodimos argues, non-Orthodox sacraments
are null and void; and therefore, according to
akriveia, converts to the Church require to be rebaptized. Sometimes, however, outward circumstances make it advisable to apply
“economy” and to treat the baptism of non-Orthodox converts as valid. Prior
to 1755, Nikodimos continues, the Church of Constantinople had applied to
Latin baptism the principle of “economy”; for, because of the weakness of
the Byzantine Empire, the Orthodox dared not offend the Papacy and the
Western powers. But now “Divine providence has set a guardian over
us”—Nikodimos means the Ottoman Empire—and so the Orthodox have no longer
any need to fear the Pope.“Economy, therefore, should be set aside and its
place taken by strictness and the Apostolic Canons.”
[5] Here Nikodimos has in mind Apostolic
Canon 46: “Any bishop, priest, or deacon who accepts the baptism or
sacrifice [i.e.eucharist] of heretics we order to be deposed; for what
agreement has Christ with Belial, or what does a believer share with an
unbeliever?”
[6] Thus Nikodimos reaches an uncompromising conclusion: “Latin baptism is
baptism falsely so called, and for this reason cannot be accepted, either on
the principle of strictness or on that of economy.”
[7]
So speaks Nikodimos the canonist. But when, on the other hand, he was
concerned with prayer and the spiritual life, he adopted a far more positive
attitude towards the Latin West. Despite the fact that he considered the
Roman Catholics to be unbaptized and altogether deprived of sacramental
grace, he was yet willing to make their works of devotion available in Greek
and to circulate them among the Orthodox faithful.
[8] The best known of these translations
is the work
Unseen Warfare, based on the
Combattimento Spirituale of Lorenzo Scupoli (c. 1530–1610), a member of the Roman Catholic Theatine Order (Nikodimos 1952). This work, which enjoyed great popularity in the West, is a classic
expression of Counter-Reformation spirituality. The Greek version of
Nikodimos was translated into Russian by St. Theophan the Recluse
(1815–1894); and in both the Greek and the Slavic worlds the book has
continued to be widely read up to the present day. Nikodimos and Theophan
both made changes in Scupoli’s text, but alike in the Greek and in the
Russian version it remains substantially Scupoli’s work.
[9] Nikodimos nowhere claimed to be
himself the author, but merely stated on the title page that it was
“composed some time ago by a certain wise man.”
[10] He was of course well aware that
the “wise man” in question was Roman Catholic, not Orthodox, but he
refrained from pointing this out to his Orthodox readers.
This was not the only adaptation of a Catholic work that Nikodimos undertook. More surprisingly—in view of the marked suspicion with which Greek Orthodox
customarily view the Jesuits—he also edited a Greek translation of the
Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius Loyola
(1491–1556), in the expanded version of Giampetro Pinamonti (1632–1703). Furthermore, Nikodimos’s widely respected book on confession,
Exomologitarion, is for the most part a direct
translation of two works by another Jesuit, Paolo Segneri the Elder
(1624–1694),
Il penitente istruito and
Il confessore istruito. On the other hand, the
well-known work
On Continual Communion, first
published in 1777, and then—with extensive revisions and additions by
Nikodimos—reissued in 1783, does not seem to be based on any single Western
prototype, although it makes heavy use of Roman Catholic sources.
Modern Orthodox spokesmen have been perplexed by this readiness on the part
of Nikodimos to draw on Roman Catholic texts. Greek authors, honouring
Nikodimos as a champion of pure and unadulterated Orthodoxy, have often
denied all possibility of such borrowing; but the evidence of his debt to
the West is in fact clear and convincing. Other Orthodox writers, while
accepting the fact that he did indeed make use of Catholic works, have
trenchantly censured him for this. Thus the French Orthodox scholar
Archimandrite Lev Gillet (1893–1980), reviewing the English edition of
Unseen Warfare, accuses Nikodimos and Theophan
of “literary and spiritual piracy.” Dismissing their efforts to give an
Orthodox colouring to Scupoli’s book, Fr. Lev complains, “Far from obtaining
a harmonious fusion we are confronted, as I think, with a clumsy mixture. The thoroughly ascetical text of the
Combat … had
to suffer mutilations, interpolations, additions, in order to make place for
the mystical methods of Mount Athos. The result is a building where
different styles have been tastelessly mixed. The
Combat and Nicodemus, each taken apart, are interesting.Put
together they lose their originality.”
[11] Not everyone would agree with this
harsh verdict.Professor Hodges, for example, in his introduction to the
English edition of
Unseen Warfare, as revised by
Nikodimos and Theophan, speaks of it as “a genuinely Orthodox work, a worthy
modern companion to the
Philokalia .”
[12]
Why did Nikodimos draw as he did on Roman Catholic sources? Certainly this
cannot have been due to any ignorance on his part of the riches of Greek
patristic spirituality, of which he had in fact an unrivalled knowledge, as
is evident from his editions of the
Philokalia and
the
Evergetinos, and of such classic writers as
Barsanouphios, Symeon the New Theologian, and Gregory Palamas. If, then, he
chose to make use of material from the Counter-Reformation West, it was not
because he had nothing else available. He must have done this because he
felt that the Catholic works embodied something of distinctive value not to
be found in the Orthodox sources.
What this element of distinctive value may have been, Nikodimos nowhere
explained. Possibly he valued the acute psychological insight displayed by
the western authors, along with their warmly affective tone. He may also
have considered that the techniques of discursive, imaginative meditation
set forth in particular by Ignatius Loyola would help those Orthodox who
found the imageless, “apophatic” prayer recommended in the
Philokalia to be largely beyond their capacity. Here, in view
of Nikodimos’s silence, we can do no more than speculate.
One thing, however, remains clear. Despite the animosity felt by most Greek
Orthodox towards Roman Catholicism in Nikodimos’s day—and despite the fact
that, following the accepted view held by the Greek Orthodox authorities at
that time, he believed Catholics to be outside the Church, unbaptized and
deprived of sacramental grace—he was willing to make use of their devotional
writings. This he could scarcely have done, had he believed these writings
to be erroneous and harmful. In this way he provides a striking example of
the “coincidence of contradictories.” He shows how conflict on the level of
official doctrine and ecclesiastical politics does not necessarily exclude
constructive openness and the discovery of common ground on the level of
spirituality. Opposition and dialogue can indeed coexist.
Glorify God in Your Body
The terms “Hesychasm” and “Hesychast” are derived from the Greek word
hesychia, meaning quietness, silence,
and inner stillness.
[13] In this way, Hesychasm signifies the quest for union with God through
“apophatic” or “noniconic” prayer, that is to say, prayer that is free from
images and discursive thinking. Such prayer, according to the Hesychasts,
leads the initiate to a vision of Divine Light. From the fifth century
onwards, one of the chief means for fostering such Hesychast meditation has
been the constant repetition of the Jesus Prayer, a short invocation said
most commonly in the form “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.”
There are, however, many variations in the precise formula employed, and in
modern practice the words “the sinner” are often added at the end.
[14] By the late
thirteenth century, if not before, the recitation of the Jesus Prayer had
come to be accompanied by a specific bodily technique or psychosomatic
method.
[15]
Fundamental to this tradition of prayer is a sense of profound reverence for
the Holy Name “Jesus.”
[16] There is, it is believed, an integral connection between
the name and the person named. To invoke the Son of God by name is to render
Him directly and dynamically present. Thus the Holy Name is felt to act in a
semi-sacramental way as a means of grace and a source of strength. Hesychasm
has flourished chiefly in certain monastic centres, above all on the Holy
Mountain of Athos, but it has never been limited exclusively to monks and
nuns. It is in principle a universal path, accessible to all, whether living
in the “desert” or in the “world.”
In the Orthodox Church, teaching concerning the Jesus Prayer, and more
particularly concerning the bodily technique, has been transmitted for the
most part by word of mouth through direct contact between the spiritual
guide and the disciple. Displaying a deliberate reserve, Hesychast masters
have tended to be reluctant to convey detailed instructions in written form,
in case someone who lacks personal direction should misapply what they say. St. Kallistos and St. Ignatios Xanthopoulos (late fourteenth century) are
expressing a typical caution when they state in their
Directions to Hesychasts, “Since, however, I heard about these
matters from a living voice, you too will hear about them in the same way at
the right time.But now is not the right time.”
[17] When, therefore, allusions in the
sources to the physical method strike the modern reader as puzzling and
incomplete, this imprecision is probably intentional. It was assumed that
written instructions would be supplemented by oral teaching.
Cryptic references to some kind of bodily technique occur in Sinaite authors
during the seventh to the ninth centuries, and also in the Coptic Makarian
cycle dating from the same period.
[18] But it is only in the later Byzantine era that the
evidence becomes more explicit. Descriptions are provided by four writers in
particular, whose works are all contained in the
Philokalia, edited by St. Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain:
- St. Nikiphoros the Hesychast, On Watchfulness and the
Guarding of the Heart (second half of the thirteenth
century).
- The text attributed to St. Symeon the New Theologian (959–1022),
entitled The Three Methods of Prayer, also
known as The Method of Sacred Prayer and
Attentiveness (probably dating likewise from the later
thirteenth century; sometimes attributed to Nikiphoros, although this is
open to question).
- The treatises of St. Gregory of Sinai (died 1346).
- St. Kallistos and St. Ignatios Xanthopoulos, Directions to Hesychasts, also known as Century (late fourteenth century).
The physical technique, as described in these four sources, involves three
elements: first, a particular bodily posture (a crouching or foetal
position, on a low stool); second, control of the breathing (coordination of
the Jesus Prayer with the rhythm of the breathing); third, inner exploration
(descent of the intellect [
nous ] into the
heart [
kardia ]). In addition to this
physical technique, a chaplet or prayer rope may be used with the Jesus
Prayer. This is known in Greek as
komvoschoinion, and in the Slavic languages as
vervitsa or
tchotki . It is similar
to the Roman Catholic rosary, but not altogether identical. There is no
mention of the prayer rope in the fourteenth-century sources, but it has
been used in Orthodoxy since at least the seventeenth century, and probably
from an earlier date. Let us consider more fully the three aspects of
the physical technique.
(1)
Bodily posture. “Sit down on a quiet cell, in a corner by
yourself,” states Pseudo-Symeon.“Rest your beard on your chest, and focus
your physical gaze, together with the whole of your intellect, upon the
centre of your belly or your navel.”
[23] Gregory of Sinai is somewhat more
precise: “Sit on a seat one span high,” that is, about nine inches in
height. He warns the spiritual aspirant that the crouching position will
quickly become uncomfortable: “Keeping your head forcibly bent downwards,
[you will suffer] acute pain in your chest, shoulders and neck”;
nevertheless, it is necessary to persevere (Nikodimos 1995:264).Sometimes a
Biblical precedent is noted: Elijah, praying on Mount Carmel, “bowed himself
down upon the earth and put his face between his knees.”
[24] Pseudo-Symeon’s reference to
gazing upon the navel led the Hesychasts to be ridiculed as
omphalopsychoi , “navel-psychics,” people who
locate the soul in the navel. But more often the Hesychast texts speak of
concentrating the gaze upon the place of the heart.
(2)
Control of breathing. While not always precise or consistent
with one another, the Hesychast sources envisage some kind of correlation
between the tempo of the Jesus Prayer and the rhythm of the breathing. The
basic point in their instructions is that the speed of our inhalation and
exhalation is to be deliberately slowed down. “Restrain the drawing-in of
breath through your nostrils, so as not to breathe easily,” writes
Pseudo-Symeon.
[25] Gregory of Sinai speaks in similar terms of the need to “restrain” or “hold
back” our breath. The act of breathing out, he believes, produces a
dissipation of our attentiveness, and so we should delay it as long as
possible.“Restrain your breathing,” he insists, “so as not to breath
unimpededly; for when you exhale, the air, rising from the heart, beclouds
the intellect and ruffles your thinking, keeping the intellect away from the
heart.”
[26] At the
same time, Gregory warns the Hesychast not to hold back his breath to an
excessive degree, for such violence will prove injurious: “Excess in
anything easily leads to conceit, and conceit induces self-delusion.Keep
the intellect at rest by gently pressing your lips together when you pray,
but do not impede your nasal breathing, as the ignorant do, in case you harm
yourself by building up the pressure.”
[27] In any case, Gregory considers
that control of the breathing possesses only a limited value; what matters
much more is to control our intellect.“Holding the breath,” he says, “also
helps to stabilize the intellect, but only temporarily, for after a little
while it lapses into distraction again.”
[28]
Nikiphoros and Pseudo-Symeon envisage this control of breathing as a
preliminary exercise that precedes the actual recitation of the Jesus
Prayer.In Gregory of Sinai, however, it does not just precede but
accompanies the prayer: “Restraining your breathing as much as possible and
enclosing your intellect in your heart, invoke the Lord Jesus continuously
and diligently.”
[29] This is somewhat vague—perhaps on purpose—but it may mean that the Jesus
Prayer is to be recited in its entirety as we hold our breath, that is to
say, between breathing in and breathing out.That, at any rate, is the
practice advocated by Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain in his
Handbook of Spiritual Counsel : “Do not breathe continually as
is natural to our nature, but hold your breath until your inner
consciousness has a chance to say the Prayer once.”
[30]
Kallistos and Ignatios Xanthopoulos likewise regard control of the breathing
not as a preliminary exercise but as a direct accompaniment of the Jesus
Prayer: “As you draw in your breath, introduce at the same time the words of
the Prayer, uniting them in some way with your breathing.”
[31] As with Gregory of
Sinai, this is unclear. What do the Xanthopouloi mean by saying “in some
way”? Possibly their intention is that the
whole of the Jesus
Prayer is to be said while breathing in; if so, to the best of my knowledge
this is a technique not to be found elsewhere. But perhaps they intend that
the first half of the prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God,” is to be said
while breathing in, and the second half, “have mercy on me [the sinner],” is
to be said while breathing out. This is in fact the practice recommended in
the anonymous work from nineteenth-century Russia,
The Way
of a Pilgrim (also known as
The Pilgrim’s
Tale ).
[32] Contemporary Orthodox teachers likewise propose this method. At the same
time they insist that any more elaborate form of breathing control should
only be attempted under the personal direction of an experienced spiritual
guide.
In
The Way of a Pilgrim it is suggested that the
rhythm of the Jesus Prayer may be coordinated not only with the breathing
but with the beating of the heart.
Form an image of your heart.…
Direct your eyes toward it as though you were looking at it. Listen
attentively with your mind to its beating and how it pounds, one beat
after another.… When you have mastered this, begin to fit the words of
the prayer to every beat of the heart, all the while looking at it. Thus, with the first beat, say or think “Lord”; with the second,
“Jesus”; with the third, “Christ”; with the fourth, “have mercy”; and
with the fifth, “on me.” Repeat this over and over again.
[33] A
“heart-beat technique” of this kind cannot, however, be found in
fourteenth-century Greek sources, and it is not recommended by contemporary
Orthodox guides. Many of them, indeed, consider it to be dangerous. As
Franny’s boyfriend Lane objects, in J. D. Salinger’s novel
Franny and Zooey , “All this synchronization business and
mumbo-jumbo.You get heart trouble?”
[34] But, while absent from Hesychasm,
such a technique is used, as we shall see, by the Sufis.
(3)
Inner exploration. In Pseudo-Symeon, control of the
breathing is closely associated with an interior search for the place of the
heart. In words already quoted, he says: “Restrain the drawing-in of breath
through your nostrils, so as not to breathe easily”; and then immediately he
continues: “and search inside yourself with your intellect so as to find the
place of the heart, where all the powers of the soul reside.” Initially the
results will be disappointing: “To start with you will find there darkness
and an impenetrable density.” But if a person persists, he will discover,
“as though miraculously, unceasing joy.” Entry into the heart leads to a
vision of light: “For as soon as the intellect attains the place of the
heart, at once it sees things of which it previously knew nothing. It sees
the open space within the heart and it beholds itself entirely luminous.”
From this point onwards the spiritual aspirant will be able to pray with
full attentiveness, at once expelling every distractive thought.
[35] Here
Pseudo-Symeon, in common with other patristic authors, pictures the heart
not as a pump but as a receptacle or vessel containing “open space.”
Nikiphoros offers a more developed rationale of this inner exploration,
placing emphasis on the passage of air through the lungs.
You know
that what we breathe is air. When we exhale it, this is for the heart’s
sake, for the heart is the source of life and warmth for the body. The
heart draws towards itself the air inhaled when breathing, so that by
discharging some of its heat when the air is exhaled it may maintain an
even temperature. The cause of this process or, rather, its agent, are
the lungs. The Creator has made these capable of expanding and
contracting, like bellows, so that they can easily draw in and expel
their contents.
Nikiphoros continues by saying that, at the same
time as our breath passes through our nostrils, down the lungs, and so into
the heart, we are to make the intellect pass downwards together with our
breath, so that we descend in this way from the head into the
heart.
Seat yourself, then, concentrate your intellect, and lead
it into the respiratory passage through which your breath passes into
your heart. Put pressure on your intellect and compel it to descend with
your inhaled breath into your heart.
At first this will prove
difficult and even disagreeable; but, once the intellect has grown
accustomed to dwell in the heart, it will be “filled with indescribable
delight,” like a traveller long absent from his home, who returns at last to
his wife and family.
[36]
Gregory of Sinai and the Xanthopouloi also advocate the practice of inner
exploration, but without going into details.
Nikiphoros recommends this technique of inner exploration as an aid to those
who cannot find a spiritual father. Most Orthodox teachers in the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries, however, express a directly opposite opinion: in
their view, no one should attempt this inner exploration without personal
guidance from an expert “elder” (Greek
geronta ; Slavonic
starets ). For this
reason St. Theophan the Recluse, editor of the
Dobrotolubiye —the Russian translation of the
Philokalia —drastically abbreviates the descriptions of the
bodily technique provided by Pseudo-Symeon and Nikiphoros. In a footnote
Theophan explains: “Here St. Symeon [=Pseudo-Symeon] describes certain
exterior methods which scandalize some and lead them to abandon all practice
of the prayer, while in the case of others such methods bring about a
distortion in their actual use of the prayer. Since, owing to the scarcity
of instructors, these methods may lead to evil effects, while in themselves
they are nothing more than external predispositions for inner work and have
no essential value, we omit them.The essential thing is to acquire the
habit of making the intellect stand on guard in the heart—in the physical
heart, but not in a physical way.”
[37]
It is not at once clear what Theophan has in mind when he speaks of dwelling
“in the physical heart, but not in a physical way.” To appreciate his
meaning, and also to understand what Orthodox writers intend when they refer
to “finding the place of the heart,” “entering the heart,” or “descending
with intellect (
nous ) into the heart,” it
has to be remembered that for them the term “heart” (
kardia ) indicates in the first instance the
physical heart, the bodily organ situated in the chest, but has also a
broader symbolic sense.
[38] In Greek Hesychast texts, as in the Hebrew Scriptures
and in the New Testament, the heart denotes the moral and spiritual centre
of the total human person. It signifies, not primarily the emotions and
affections, as in the modern usage of the word, but rather the focal point
of our spiritual nature in its entirety. This double character of the heart,
as a reality both physical and spiritual, is evident from the passages cited
above: the heart is, on the physical level, “the source of life and warmth
for the body” (Nikiphoros), but it is also spiritually “the place … where
all the powers of the soul reside” (Pseudo-Symeon). The heart is thus the
seat of thought, intelligence, and wisdom, the determinant of our moral
action, the place where the voice of the conscience is heard. It is moreover
the point of encounter between the human and the divine, the secret
sanctuary where we experience divine grace and where we know ourselves as
created in God’s image and likeness.
[39]
St. Gregory Palamas (1296–1359), the chief theologian of Hesychasm, when
defending the physical method, uses the term “heart” in precisely this
all-embracing sense. He speaks of “that innermost body within the body that
we term the heart,” and he calls it “the ruling organ, the throne of grace.”
In this context he quotes the
Homilies of Makarios
(? late fourth century): “The heart rules over the whole bodily organism,
and when grace takes possession of the pastures of the heart, it reigns over
all our thoughts and members. For the intellect and all the thoughts of the
soul are located there.” Developing this theme, Palamas continues:
Our
heart is, therefore, the shrine of the intelligence and the chief
intellectual organ of the body.When, therefore, we strive to scrutinize
and to amend our intelligence through rigorous watchfulness, how could
we do this if we did not collect our intellect, outwardly dispersed
through the senses, and bring it back within ourselves—back to the heart
itself, the shrine of the thoughts?”
[40] If we understand the
heart in this comprehensive way, it is possible to “demythologize” the
method described by Nikiphoros, dissociating it from the outdated physiology
which it presupposes. When Hesychast texts speak of “finding the place of
the heart” and the like, they do indeed mean in the first instance that we
are to concentrate our attention upon the region of the physical heart. But,
since the heart is at the same time the spiritual centre of the total human
being, through this concentration upon our physical heart we are enabled to
enter into relationship with our deep self and so to discover the true
dimensions of our personhood in God. To make the intellect “descend from the
head into the heart” is to achieve integration, to realize oneself as a
unified whole formed in the divine image. The outer concentration upon the
movement of the breath through the nostrils and down the lungs is
signum efficax , an effective sign,
symbolizing and actualizing our inner journey from dispersal to
single-pointedness, from fragmentation to unity in Christ.
The psychosomatic technique of the Hesychasts, especially in the account
given by Nikiphoros, has often been criticized as crude and unsophisticated.
Irénée Hausherr even dismisses it as a “
déformation ,” due
to “
l’humaine bêtise .”
[41] Yet in its defence it may be said
that the physical method embodies a principle of the utmost importance: the
body constitutes an essential element in our human personhood, and therefore
it can and should play an active part in the working-out of our meditation
and contemplative prayer. I do not merely “have” a body, but I
am my body and my body
is me, viewed from a
particular point of view. The spiritual life, then, is not simply an affair
of the soul, while the body is regarded as, at best, a passive lump of
matter to be ignored so far as possible, and at worst as an active
impediment. To repudiate the body in this way is directly to contradict the
Biblical view, as expressed notably by St. Paul. “Your body is a temple of
the Holy Spirit,” he affirms.“Glorify God in your body”; “Present your
bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.”
[42] Paul makes a
careful distinction between “flesh” (
sarx ) and “body” (
soma ). “Flesh” denotes not our physicality but the total human person, in a fallen
and sinful state. As Fr.Sergii Bulgakov (1871–1944) used to say, “Kill the
flesh so as to acquire a body.”
[43] Palamas rightly points out that what Paul condemns is
not the body in itself but “the body of this death,”
[44] that is to say our body in its
present sinful condition, alienated from God and subject to the dominion of
death. It is the great merit of the psychosomatic technique that it
endeavours to apply the holistic anthropology of Paul in a practical manner,
assigning to the body a positive role in the spiritual journey.
Palamas sums up the rationale of the psychosomatic technique by saying “After
the Fall, our inner being naturally adapts itself to outward forms.”
[45] Between our bodily
organism and our inner activities there exists what Jacques-Albert Cuttat
styles an “analogy-participation.” The physical and the psychic are joined
together by an “organic connection” or “exact correspondence,” by an “inner
continuity,” and it is this connection or continuity that the Hesychast
method seeks to develop and exploit.
[46] Every alteration in our physical
condition affects our psychic state, and conversely each change in our
psychic state has physical consequences. When we grow angry, the rhythm of
our breathing accelerates; when we are engaged in deep reflection, it slows
down. The Hesychast method is simply an application of this obvious
interrelation. Anyone who closes his eyes when praying, who raises his hands
to heaven, who kneels or makes prostrations, has already admitted the basic
axiom determining the physical technique of the Hesychasts.
While Palamas in this way defended the legitimacy of the Hesychast method, as
expressing a unitary and holistic view of human nature, neither he nor any
of the other leading Hesychasts treated it as the essence of the Jesus
Prayer. On the contrary, it was for them no more than an “exterior method,”
to use Theophan’s phrase, an optional accessory, useful to some but in no
sense obligatory upon all. Palamas suggested that it is chiefly suitable for
“beginners,” whereas the more advanced can dispense with such exercises.
[47] He and his
colleagues in the Hesychast movement believed that the Jesus Prayer can be
practised in its full integrity, simply through the invocation of the Holy
Name accompanied by fervent faith, without the employment of any physical
method at all. The only essential “technique” is love and obedience.
Byzantine Yogis?
The Polish steward has a point. There are indeed parallels between Hesychasm
and non-Christian methods of meditation. He thinks that the Hesychasts have
borrowed from yoga and Sufism, while the Pilgrim believes that the borrowing
has been the other way round. Of course it is also possible that there has
been no direct influence, for the same idea might arise independently in
separated religious groups. The practice of maintaining inner recollection,
for example, through the repetition of a short formula such as the Jesus
Prayer or any other, is something natural and even obvious, that might
easily occur in an unrelated way within different traditions. The same is
true of the further practice of linking this repetition with the rhythm of
the breathing. Is the resemblance between the Hesychasts, on the one side,
and yogis and Sufis on the other, in fact so close that some kind of direct
interaction becomes highly probable?
As regards the Hindu world, the yogis, in common with the Hesychasts, employ
habitually a short formula of invocation or
mantra , often
using a chaplet. Their aim is samadhi (stillness,
hesychia ), and they may experience a vision of light. The
need for an experienced guide or
guru is emphasized, as
in Hesychasm. More specifically, we find in yoga, as among the
fourteenth-century Hesychasts:
-
The recommendation of specific bodily postures
(āsanas).
-
Control of the respiration (prāṇāyāma): the
breathing is to be slowed down; the adept is told to breathe quietly
through the nose, and in general to restrain his breath.
-
Concentration of the attention upon particular psychosomatic centres
(chakras).
Yet, if there are evident similarities, there are also differences. The
Hesychast sits with head bowed and chin resting on his chest; in the “lotus”
position of yoga the back is upright, although there may be other postures
in yoga that involve a crouching position. The breathing exercises in yoga
are far more complex and elaborate than anything suggested in the Byzantine
tradition; the Hesychast method corresponds only to the first and simplest
exercises in yoga. Furthermore, in yoga the inner exploration is extended to
regions below the heart, but in Hesychast teaching this is forbidden. In
yoga, there is not only a movement of descent but also a corresponding
movement of ascent from the
kundalini centre up the
vertebral column to the
chakra in the forehead between
the two eyes (the “third eye”), and then to the supreme
chakra at the top of the head. There is no equivalent
to this in the psychosomatic symbolism of the Hesychasts. Having once
descended into the place of the heart, the Hesychast seeks to remain there
and does not reascend. Most important of all, the Jesus Prayer is
specifically an invocation addressed to Christ as incarnate God. In yoga, on
the other hand, we do not find the idea of an encounter with a transcendent,
personal God. Yoga is a technique for concentration, not a conversation
face-to-face with another person.
Taking all this into account, Abbé Jules Monchanin concludes, “Direct
borrowing is unlikely.”
[49] If there has been any direct borrowing, then it must be
the Hesychasts who have borrowed from yoga, not vice versa, for the Indian
practices date back to the pre-Christian era, long before the emergence of
Hesychasm. It is also possible that, while there was no direct influence, a
knowledge of Indian yoga was transmitted through the intermediary of the
Sufis. Yet, even if the parallels between yoga and Hesychasm are due to
independent convergence, they are nonetheless not without interest. In both
the Indian and the Byzantine teaching, it is clearly affirmed that there is
indeed an “analogy-participation” between the physical and the psychic
levels, such that the body can and should play a positive part in meditation
and prayer.
When we turn from yoga to Sufism, we are on firmer ground. Here some kind of
immediate interaction does indeed seem probable. Islam shares far more with
Christianity than does Hinduism. Muslims and Christians are “People of the
Book,” with common roots in the Old Testament. Both believe in a single God,
transcendent and personal: in Islam, exclusively one; in Christianity, one
in three. When a Sufi practises
dhikr —the memory and
repeated invocation of the Name of God, “Allah”—he is addressing a
particular person in prayer, just as the Christian is doing through the
Jesus Prayer, in a way that is not necessarily the case when a yogi repeats
a
mantra . Moreover, in their doctrine of the human
person, and above all in their understanding of the heart, Hesychasts and
Sufis are in close agreement.
It is against this common background that the more particular similarities
and differences between the Jesus Prayer and
dhikr are to
be assessed.
Dhikr is often performed collectively,
whereas the Jesus Prayer is normally recited by the Hesychast alone in the
seclusion of his cell. (An exception here is to be found in the Orthodox
Monastery of St. John the Baptist at Tolleshunt Knights in Essex, where the
Jesus Prayer is said communally in church, for two hours each morning and
for another two hours each evening.) But otherwise Hesychasm and Sufism
share many features. In
dhikr , as with the Jesus
Prayer, guidance from an experienced master is considered highly desirable,
if not essential. A chaplet may be used. The practice of
dhikr involves the same three features already noted in the
bodily method of Hesychasts:
-
Specific bodily postures are recommended, including the resting of
the head upon the chest, and sometimes the placing of the head
between the knees. But in dhikr, as in yoga, the
postures are often highly elaborate, far more than is the case in
Hesychasm.
-
In dhikr the initiate practises breathing control,
coordinating the invocation of the Name with the movement of the
respiration. Once more, the exercises employed by the Sufis are more
complex than anything found in Hesychasm. At a more advanced stage,
the Sufi may synchronize the invocation with the beating of the
heart. This is something mentioned, as we have seen, in The Way of a Pilgrim, but not found in
Byzantine Hesychast sources.
-
The Sufi is taught to take note of the movement of the prayer from
the lips, by way of the breathing, down to the heart, this last
being understood, as in Hesychasm, to signify the spiritual centre
of the total person. Here, due to shared Biblical roots,
dhikr is far closer to Hesychast anthropology
than is the case with yoga.
Weighty though these points of similarity undoubtedly are, research into the
origins of the two traditions has not yet disclosed exactly how mutual
influence may have been exercised. We do not know at what date and in what
places the two sides came first into contact, nor which side was influencing
the other. Perhaps the Arab and Persian Sufis, drawing on yoga, transmitted
the Indian observances to the Greek Orthodox world. On the other hand, the
Sufis may have been influenced by Byzantine texts or teachers. The writings
of the Syriac Father St. Isaac of Nineveh (died c. 700), for example, were
studied by ascetic and mystical groups in early Islam. Even though Isaac
himself says nothing about the invocation of the name of Jesus or about
breathing techniques in prayer, may there not have been other Christian
ascetics who spoke of these things to the Muslim Arabs? As mentioned above,
Coptic sources dating from the seventh and eighth centuries link the
invocation of Jesus to the breathing: may not these texts have been known in
Muslim circles? Unfortunately, in all this we can do no more than guess;
firm evidence is lacking.
It is, however, beyond question that there existed many possibilities for
mutual contact. The Byzantines were often at war with the Arabs and the
Turks, but there were also opportunities for friendly relations. Christian
pilgrims to the Holy Land, for instance, might sometimes have talked with
Muslims about their respective ways of prayer. It is interesting to note
that in 1354 the Hesychast theologian Gregory Palamas, on his way from
Thessalonica to Constantinople, was captured by the Turks and remained for
one year in custody before he could be ransomed. During this time he had
conversations, in a courteous and reasonably constructive spirit, with local
Muslim religious leaders. It is at least possible that they spoke to each
other about the Sufi use of
dhikr , even though the
surviving records say nothing of this.
[50]
Hesychasm and Sufism have in fact evolved in opposite directions during the
recent past. Over the last 150 years Russian Orthodox teachers such as St. Theophan the Recluse and St. Ignatii Brianchaninov (1807–1867) have
minimised the role of the bodily techniques, and even discouraged their use
altogether.
[51] On
the other hand, in Muslim confraternities during the twentieth century the
physical exercises have been greatly emphasized. Muslim masters, however,
agree with their Orthodox counterparts that there can be no external
techniques leading automatically to union with God. For both traditions, the
essence of the spiritual way consists not in physical exercises but in the
inner attentiveness of the heart. For both, union with God is entirely a
free gift of grace.
At this point, however, despite all the similarities between Hesychasm and
dhikr , we are confronted with a definite divergence. In both traditions, as we have just said, what matters is not bodily
techniques but the encounter with God. Yet is this personal encounter the
same in Hesychasm and in Sufism? One who prays the Jesus Prayer is not
simply invoking God, but he or she is specifically addressing Jesus Christ,
the Second Person of the Holy Trinity. A religion such as Islam, which
rejects the doctrine of the Trinity and the Godhead of Jesus Christ, cannot
be invoking the deity in the same way as Hesychasm does. The Jesus Prayer is
not just one among a number of possible
mantras , but it
is an explicit confession of faith in Jesus Christ as Son of God and
Saviour.
The decisive criterion, that is to say, is not just outer technique but inner
content, not just
how we pray but
to whom. Most
pictures have frames, and all picture frames have features in common. What
matters is not the frames but the portraits within the frames; and the
latter may be altogether diverse. Physical techniques are no more than a
frame for our prayer; it is the One invoked who is the portrait. Despite the
striking resemblances between the frame of the Hesychast Jesus Prayer and
the frame in Sufi
dhikr , full weight needs to be given to
the uniqueness, from a Christian standpoint, of the portrait within the
frame.
Notwithstanding this important reservation, it still remains true that there
is a remarkable affinity between Hesychasm and Sufism, and likewise, albeit
to a lesser degree, between Hesychasm and yoga. Divergence in theology is
counterbalanced by convergence in spirituality. Dialogue does indeed coexist
with opposition.“How necessary it is for me,” says Nicholas of Cusa, “to
enter into the darkness and to admit the coincidence of opposites.… This is
the wall of Paradise, and it is there in Paradise that You, O God,
reside.”
[52] Though spoken in a different context, his words have a definite relevance to
our present theme. Hesychasm, yoga, and Sufism are not exactly “opposites,”
but they are certainly distinct and in their formal expression of doctrine
at variance with one another; yet there is between them a genuine
“coincidence,” not indeed complete, yet certainly far-reaching. What all
three share is not only a recognition of the value of the body in prayer and
contemplation, but also a detailed concurrence about the way in which we may
in practice glorify God in and with our body.
Bibliography
Agapios, Hieromonachos, and Nikodimos of the
Holy Mountain, eds. 1864 (third ed., reprinted
1970). Pidalion tis noitis nios tis mias
hagias katholikis kai apostolikis ton Orthodoxon ekklisias itoi
hapantes hoi hieroi kai theioi kanones. Athens.
Agapius, a Hieromonach, and Nicodemus, a
Monk, eds. 1957. The Rudder
(Pedalion) of the Metaphorical Ship of the One Holy Catholic and
Apostolic Church of the Orthodox Christians or All the Sacred and
Divine Canons. Trans. D.
Cummings. Chicago.
Alfeyev, H.
2007. Le Nom grand et glorieux. La
vénération du Nom de Dieu et la prière de Jésus dans la tradition
orthodoxe. Paris.
Allchin, A. M., ed. 1967. Sacrament and Image. Essays in the Christian Understanding
of Man. London.
Anawati, G. C., and L. Gardet.
1961. Mystique musulmane: aspects et
tendances—expériences et techniques. Paris.
Bobrinskoy, B.
1989. “Encounter of Traditions in Greece: St Nicodemus of
the Holy Mountain (1749-1809).” In Dupré and Saliers
1989:447–457.
Citterio, E.
2002. “Nicodemo Agioreta.” In Conticello and Conticello
2002:905–978.
Citterio, I. [=E.] 1987. L’orientamento ascetico-spirituale di Nicodemo
Aghiorita. Alessandria.
Conomos, D., and G. Speake, eds.
2005. Mount Athos the Sacred Bridge.
The Spirituality of the Holy Mountain. Oxford/Bern.
Conticello, C. G., and V. Conticello,
eds. 2002. La théologie byzantine
et sa tradition II. Turnhout.
Cuttat, J.-A.
1960. The Encounter of Religions: A
Dialogue between the West and the Orient, with an Essay on the
Prayer of Jesus. New York.
Dupré, L., and D. E.
Saliers, eds. 1989. “Christian
Spirituality: Post-Reformation and Modern.” World
Spirituality: An Encyclopedic History of the Religious Quest
18. New York.
Erickson, J. H.
1991. The Challenge of Our Past: Studies
in Orthodox Canon Law and Church History. Crestwood, NY.
Gardet, L.
1952-1953. “Un problème de mystique comparée: la mention du
nom divin (dhikr) dans la mystique musulmane.” Revue
Thomiste 52:642–679; 53:197–216. Reprinted in Anawati and
Gardet 1961:187–256.
Gillet, L. 1952. Review of Nikodimos
1952. Sobornost (The
Fellowship of S. Alban and S. Sergius) series 3, no. 12:584–586.
Hausherr, I.
1927. “La méthode d’oraison hésychaste.” Orientalia Christiana IX, 2 (36):101–210.
———. 1956. “L’hésychasme. Étude de spiritualité.” Orientalia Christiana Periodica 22:5–40, 247–285.
Reprinted in Hausherr 1966:163–237.
———. 1960. “Noms du Christ et voies d’oraison.” Orientalia Christiana Analecta 157. Rome. Trans.
C. Cummings, 1978. “The Name of Jesus.” Cistercian
Studies Series 44. Kalamazoo, MI.
———. 1966. “Hésychasme et prière.” Orientalia Christiana Analecta 176. Rome.
Hodges, H. A.
1952. “Introduction.” In Nikodimos 1952:13–67.
Ioannou, P. P., ed. 1962. Discipline générale antique (IVe-IXe S.) I, 2. Les canons
des synodes particuliers. Grottaferrata.
Ladas, G. G., and A. D. Chatzidimou.
1973. Elliniki vivliographia ton eton
1796–1799. Athens.
Marnellos, G. E.
2002. “Saint Nicodème l’Hagiorite (1749–1809) maître et
pédagogue de la nation grecque et de l’église orthodoxe.” Analecta Vlatadon 64. Thessaloniki.
Meyendorff, J.
1959a. “Grégoire Palamas, Défense des saints hésychastes.”
Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense 30–31.
Louvain.
———. 1959b. “Introduction à l’étude de Grégoire Palamas.”
Patristica Sorbonensia 3. Paris. Trans. G.
Lawrence, 1964. A Study of Gregory Palamas.
Leighton Buzzard, UK.
Monchanin, J.
1975. “Yoga and Hesychasm.” Cistercian
Studies 10, 2:85–92.
Nicholas of Cusa
1997. Selected Spiritual Writings.
Trans. H. L. Bond. The Classics of Western
Spirituality 89. New York.
Nikodimos
1951. Writings from the Philokalia on
Prayer of the Heart. Trans. E.
Kadloubovsky and G. E. H.
Palmer. London.
Nikodimos
1952. Unseen Warfare Being the Spiritual
Combat and Path to Paradise of Lorenzo Scupoli as Edited by
Nicodemus of the Holy Mountain and Revised by Theophan the
Recluse. Trans. E.
Kadloubovsky and G. E. H.
Palmer. London.
Nikodimos
1989. A Handbook of Spiritual
Counsel. Trans. P. A.
Chamberas. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New
York.
Nikodimos
1995. The Philokalia. The Complete Text compiled by St. Nikodimos of the Holy
Mountain and St. Makarios of Corinth IV. Trans. G. E. H. Palmer, P. Sherrard, and K. Ware. London.
Pentkovsky, A., ed. 1999. The Pilgrim’s Tale. Trans. T. Allan Smith. The
Classics of Western Spirituality. New York/Mahwah, NJ.
Philippides-Braat, A.
1979. “La captivité de Palamas chez les Turcs: dossier et
commentaire.” Travaux et mémoires
7:109–222.
Phrangiskos, E. N.
2001. “La questione della conoscenza delle lingue straniere
in Nicodemo l’Aghiorita.” In Rigo 2001:205–222.
Psarev, A. V.
2007. “The 19th Canonical Answer of Timothy of Alexandria:
On the History of Sacramental Oikonomia.” St.
Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 51:297–320.
Rigo, A.
2001. Nicodimo l’Aghiorita e la Filocalia. Atti dell’ VIII convegno ecumenico internazionale di spiritualità
ortodossa, sessione bizantina, Bose, 16–19 settembre 2000.
Magnano.
Sahas, D. J.
1980. “Captivity and Dialogue: Gregory Palamas (1296–1360)
and the Muslims.” The Greek Orthodox Theological
Review 25:409–436.
Thomson, F. J.
1965. “Economy.” Journal of Theological
Studies 16:368–420.
Viller, M.
1924. “Nicodème l’Hagiorite et ses emprunts à la
littérature spirituelle occidentale. Le Combat Spirituel et Les
Exercises de S. Ignace dans l’église byzantine.” Revue
d’Ascétique et de Mystique 5:174–177, 416.
Waller, R., and B. Ward, eds.
1999. An Introduction to Christian
Spirituality. London.
Ward, B., and R. Waller, eds.
2003. Joy of Heaven: Springs of
Christian Spirituality. London.
Ware, T. [=K.] 1964. Eustratios Argenti: A Study of the Greek Church under Turkish
Rule. Oxford.
Ware, K.
1992. “Praying with the Body: The Hesychast Method and
Non-Christian Parallels.” Sobornost Incorporating
Eastern Churches Review (The Fellowship of St Alban and St
Sergius) 14, 2:6–35.
———. 1995. A Fourteenth-Century Manual
of Hesychast Prayer : The Century of St Kallistos and St Ignatios
Xanthopoulos. Canadian Institute of Balkan Studies. Toronto.
———. 1999. “Prayer in Evagrius of Pontus and the Macarian
Homilies.” In Waller and Ward 1999:14–31.
———. 2000. The Inner Kingdom.
Crestwood, NY.
———. 2003. “The Beginnings of the Jesus Prayer.” In Ward
and Waller 2003:1–29.
———. 2005. “St. Nikodimos and the Philokalia.” In Conomos
and Speake 2005:69–121.
Footnotes
Note 3
As regards the reception of converts, there was at this time a curious
discrepancy in practice between Greek and Russian Orthodoxy. In the
early seventeenth century the Russian Church rebaptized Roman Catholics,
but in 1666–1667 it stopped doing so, under Greek pressure, and only
required converts to be received through anointing with the Holy Chrism.
Then from 1757, at the very time when the Greeks had begun to practise
rebaptism, the Russian Church ceased to use even chrismation at the
reception of Roman Catholics, and admitted them simply through
profession of faith and absolution. This marked divergence between the
Churches of Constantinople and Russia does not seem to have greatly
disturbed either party: such was the mutual isolation in which the
various Orthodox Churches existed at that time (and more recently). In
the second half of the nineteenth century the Greeks began to suspend
the application of the 1755 Definition, and in
1888 the Holy Synod at Constantinople laid down as a general rule that
in future the rebaptism of converts should no longer be required: “Let
economy be used” (see Ware 1964:101, 106). Rebaptism of converts,
however, is still sometimes practised today, in particular on the Holy
Mountain of Athos.
Note 4
On the different, and often conflicting, ways in which “economy” is
understood, see Thomson 1965; Psarev 2007.
Note 5
Agapios and Nikodimos 1864:56–57; Agapius and Nicodemus 1957:73-74. I
have made my own translation from the Greek. Although the name of
Agapios appears on the title page of the Pidalion, the editor of the book is in fact exclusively
Nikodimos: see Marnellos 2002:69–70.
Note 6
Ioannou 1962:31. Cf. 2 Corinthians 6:15. The Apostolic Canons, Syrian in
provenance, date from the late fourth century.
Note 7
Agapios and Nikodimos 1864:55; Agapius and Nicodemus 1957:72. It should
be noted that many Orthodox canonists today disagree with the way in
which Nikodimos applies the principle of “economy” to the reception of
converts: see Erickson 1991:115–132.
Note 8
On the use made by Nikodimos of spiritual works by Roman Catholics, see
Viller 1924; Citterio 1987:112–136; Bobrinskoy 1989; Citterio
2002:943–955. It was once thought that Nikodimos had himself translated
the works in question, but doubts have now been expressed about his
knowledge of Italian; he may have used existing translations made by
Emmanuel Romanitis of Patmos. See Phrangiskos 2001.
Note 9
On the changes made by Nikodimos and Theophan, see Hodges 1952:47–56,
60–67.
Note 10
The title page of the first edition of Unseen
Warfare (Venice, 1796) is reproduced in Ladas and
Chatzidimou 1973:16.
Note 11
Gillet 1952:586.
Note 12
Hodges 1952:67.
Note 13
See Hausherr 1956; Ware 2000:89–110.
Note 14
See Hausherr 1960; Ware 2003; Alfeyev 2007.
Note 15
On the physical technique of the Hesychasts and its non-Christian
parallels, see Hausherr 1927; Gardet 1952; Cuttat 1960:85–159; Monchanin
1975; Ware 1992.
Note 16
Cf. John 16:23–24; Acts 4:10–12; Philippians 2:10.
Note 17
Century ( Directions to Hesychasts ) 63. The
English translation (Nikodimos 1951:234) omits this sentence.
Note 18
See Ware 1992:9–10.
Note 23
Nikodimos 1995:72.
Note 24
1 Kings 18:42. For an illustration of this, see MS Vaticanus Graecus
1754, in Ware 1992:11.
Note 25
Nikodimos 1995:72.
Note 26
Nikodimos 1995:264.
Note 27
Nikodimos 1995:285.
Note 28
Nikodimos 1995:277.
Note 29
Nikodimos 1995:264.
Note 30
Nikodimos 1989:60.
Note 31
Nikodimos 1951:196; translation altered.
Note 32
Pentkovsky 1999:126.
Note 33
Pentkovsky 1999:126.
Note 34
Salinger 1964:36.
Note 35
Nikodimos 1995:72–73.
Note 36
Nikodimos 1995:205.
Note 37
Nikodimos 1951:158n33 (translation modified). Cf. Ware 1992:22–24.
Note 38
On the meaning of the terms nous and
kardia , see Ware 1999:16–22.
Note 39
Genesis 1:26–27.
Note 40
Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.2.3, quoting
Makarios, Homilies 15.20. In Meyendorff
1959a:80–81.
Note 41
Hausherr 1927:142, 146.
Note 42
1 Corinthians 6:19–20 and Romans 12:1, respectively.
Note 43
Quoted by Metropolitan Anthony (Bloom), in Allchin 1967:41. I have
modified the translation.
Note 44
Triads 1.2.1: in Meyendorff 1959a:76–77.
Palamas, referring to Romans 7:24, actually says “this death of the
body.”
Note 45
Triads 1.2.8: in Meyendorff 1959a:90–91.
Note 46
Cuttat 1960:92–93.
Note 47
Triads 1.2.7: in Meyendorff 1959a:86–89. Cf. Ware 1992:21.
Note 49
Monchanin 1975:85–92.
Note 50
See Meyendorff 1959b:157–62; Philippidis-Braat 1979; Sahas 1980.
Note 51
See Ware 1992:22–24.
Note 52
The Vision of God X (36–37): in Nicholas of
Cusa 1997:252–252 (translation altered).