You're in a Trappist monastery where somebody hurts you and you never talk to them, and the kind of crazy stuff that can linger in your mind and in your heart, they used to joke about the old chapter of faults, you know, where you accuse the other guy and somebody would accuse you where you feel unjustly and you remember it for ten years, waiting for a chance to get in and come back. Is that the monastic life? Because the possibility of communication was not open for a long time. So that is a great thing. And that there are things that come to us actually from psychology and so on, which teach us how to communicate with one another without making things worse. Sometimes it does make things worse. Sometimes it's not the right thing to do. Sometimes the only thing to do is to work it, to dissolve it within yourself, by prayer, by humility, by certain ways of reflecting too. Which

[01:17]

is putting them on the blackboard. Takes them a whole page and a half. And finally, you get to this rage, and then finally. If at the beginning of a dissension he's quoting Abba Zosima, he quotes him very often, when there is first smoke and sparks begin to fly, if a man forestalls it, the image of fire is pretty good, because you've got the first match, sort of, then you've got the spark, then you've got the tingling of the fire and the smoke, then you've got the bursting out of a kind of bonfire, and then you've got the possibility of the smoldering coal that's underneath. So the image of fire follows it right along quite accurately. If a man forestalls it by blaming himself and humbling himself, you see the connection with what's gone before. Before it gets drawn into the quarrel and gets into a temper, but the trouble is, we justify it. We say, well, it's right, he did do wrong, and so on. We justify it. It's our mind that makes it possible for

[02:22]

us to keep it. Before he gets drawn into the quarrel and gets into a temper, and so not remaining tranquil but wrangling and becoming reckless, he acts like a man who is piling wood on a fire which gets hotter and hotter until he has made a great blaze. And for the rest, so just as burning logs are reduced to cinders and get covered with ash, but do not go out for ages even if water is thrown on them. So they say that there are mines in the ground where fires are started, coal mines. So that also anger that endures for a long time becomes rancor. That's what we're talking about, nezikati, malice. And for the rest, unless a man sweats blood, he will never be free from it. Somehow it puts roots down in us, and then it's hard to uproot. Forget it at first, somehow it's looser, even though it may be more violent. So get the passion while it's young and feeble.

[03:23]

And then he quotes the psalms. And these quotations from the psalms might surprise us. The one about, if I had paid back evil for evil, let me fall down defenseless before my enemies, and so on. And I don't know how that affected you. I didn't find it very effective, very powerful in getting this idea across. The idea is that if you're paying back evil for evil, even in your heart, if you're nourishing that impulse to retaliate with evil for evil, you're calling all this down upon yourself. It's funny that he didn't quote the Arab father, because that's what the fathers usually do at this point. Saint Augustine, he says, well if you say, if you pray during Eucharist, he says, what do you pray during Eucharist? Our Father, Lord in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. He says, if you don't forgive the sins of your brother, you're calling down God's unforgiveness upon yourself. Thrust in his forgiveness from you. And I don't know why he doesn't quote that here. That's the natural thing, because the psalm verses that

[04:25]

he quotes are not quite as literally or obviously applicable. Also, you've got the fact that there are these other psalms that are calling down vengeance, right? I mean, if he quotes this psalm, somebody has to raise his hand and say, well, Father, what about that one that says, let the babies be smashed down on the rock? What about that one? He has to explain that one. The last one is interesting. Let him plant my glory in the dust. What is this glory of ours, if not the knowledge generated in the soul by the keeping of the commandments? Now, this knowledge is gnosis, G-N-O-S-I-S, which really means the knowledge of God, okay? So that's contemplative knowledge, which is being forfeited or blocked by this resentment. There's the smoke that's in front of somehow, that's in front of the eye of the mirror of the intellect. If you read Cashin, similarly, he talks about the same thing. Page 263.

[05:28]

It'll be a sure remedy for this disease if in the first place we make up our mind that we ought never to be angry at all, whether for good or for bad reasons. Now, that's dangerous now. You've got to look out. You do the right thing with that anger. Otherwise, it goes into the psychologist's mind. As we know that we shall at once lose the light of discernment and the security of good counsel. So he's talking about what happens to your mind, first of all, okay? It blocks your mind. Lose the light of discernment and the security of good counsel and our very uprightness and a temperate character of righteousness. If the main light of our heart has been darkened by its shadows, he returns again and again to that intellectual thing, the main light of our heart, the light of love which has to flow, which is the very light of our discernment, and which somehow is the very knowledge of God, the very gnosis of God, which in some way is turn of time, which is word and spirit, light and love at the same time, and which relates to the center of our own being, to the image of God in our own being. And somehow we put that out with our anger. And the Vagabonds and the others often think that we put it out more by

[06:43]

anger than by anything else, because God comes into us by its contrary, which is love. And then he talks about the fact that the purity of our soul will presently be clouded so that it cannot possibly be the temple of the Holy Ghost and so on. And then that we won't be able to pray or put out our prayer to God while we're angry. Above all, having before our eyes the uncertain condition of mankind, that we are soon to depart from the body and that our continence and chastity, our renunciation of all our possessions, our contempt of wealth, our efforts and fastings and vigils, will not help us at all, if solely on account of anger and hatred, eternal punishments are awarded to us by the Judge of the world. You may not like his language, but he's certainly so powerful a case. And of course, one of the chief remedies for this is just to think of the end of your life. How are you going to look at this business, this particular matter that you're resentful about on your last day? Or consider you and the other person to be already dead. How is this going to stand before you, the truth of it? That's very powerful.

[07:48]

It just chills the whole thing, just puts it in a different light. Because in a way, our mind has to be able to let go of it. It's not enough to push the emotion out, because the mind is the key in some way. If I think that I'm right in being angry, or if I think that he's hurt me in a way that I've really lost something, he's really taken something away from me, how can I forgive him? I can do all I want to with my will, because I can say, for the love of God, or because Jesus has died for me and forgiven me, I'm going to forgive him. But if the mind somehow doesn't click in the right way, it's hard for that emotion not to surge up again, right from very deep in us, saying, I'm right, I'm right, he's done this to me, he's hurt me in this way. It's our righteousness somehow that's in there, and the feeling that we've lost something. So somehow, just as in the Sermon on the Mount, the Sermon on the Mount can only be done in the light of the resurrection. So the key to this whole thing is the resurrection, and being able to die,

[08:49]

because somehow life is in us. Once again, I always have to blush saying these words, because it's so easy to say the words, and it's so hard to do it. But it goes back to that very simple thing once again. The only way, ultimately, to get rid of that, because otherwise we always think we're losing something, but we've lost something, or something else. Because the other way, the other way which is more universal, not particularly the Christian way, is to say, well, that's all on the level of the ego, that's all on the level of the shallow self, of the false self. Now, where I am, where I want to be, and who I am, is on the level of the true self, where those things simply don't exist. That's another way of crossing over, you see, of passing over from standing in one place to standing in the other place, because you've really got to do that in order to be able to get through this problem, ultimately. Otherwise, the remedies can be all the kind of band-aids and temporary things that will pop up again. It's really our identity, our salvation that's in question. It's where we put our hope, you know, where we're standing. And if we're standing in too shallow a place, or too flimsy or swampy a place, then

[09:54]

we can be threatened, and we can be hurt, and we won't be able to get rid of this demon of resentment. There's a way of rendering evil for evil, not only in actions, but also in words and attitude. And then, he's pretty subtle about this, there is a way of just, you know, being silently angry at somebody and letting them know it, because we want them to know it, really. And if we think we can get away with that, we're being like children, you know, we're pouting. We all have a tendency to do that sometimes. Because if we have an emotion, actually an emotion I think in itself is communicative, it's not meant just to be inside of us. We are very isolated beings, maybe, we modern Americans, but emotions are almost community facts by their very existence. So, when we're sore, when we're unhappy, we want others to know it. And generally, we let them know it, somewhat. Then he goes in these different stages of resentment, how the heavier stages, you really

[11:03]

let somebody know it. In the earlier stages, all it does is quench your rejoicing at somebody else's good fortune, or it manifests itself in the form of energy, of envy, and the inability to hear somebody else pray is the inability to share somebody else's good. Finally, there is a man who wants to rejoice that his brother is at rest, does all he can to be of service to him and arranges everything to promote his brother's tranquility. That's where we want to be. The action has a lot to do with the way of feeling, because if we serve somebody, and if we can cut through that false track of the energy into resentment, then that service itself will change our hearts. It's by doing, as the Jews say, as Jesus says, by doing it, that we can change. And then there's a lot of repetition here. And then there are three remedies. What are those three remedies? One of them is the act of humility, the quick act of humility. One of them is silence,

[12:05]

which reflects the desert brother that we have here. Everything that happens to you, the only remedy he says is silence. Be careful of the quality of that silence, because if that silence has this resentment buried under it, then it's not. If the external silence is not accompanied by the silence of the heart... What is the silence of the heart? The silence of the heart is when you don't hate anybody in your heart, or when you don't lust after anything in your heart. When you're at peace in your heart, that's the silence of the heart. Remember the saying of the father who says, well, there are some people who never say a word and they're talking all day, and there are other people who talk all day and are always silent. Those are me. There are some people who never say a word, but in their silence they're judging their brother or hating their brother all day. In other words, there's this noise inside. There are other people who talk all day in the service of God, but their hearts are quiet, and in their hearts is the peace of love and none of this resentment. So they're really silent inside. So you have to be careful of the quality of the silence. And then the act of humility, which we have to broaden that, really, whether blaming

[13:12]

yourself or whatever. The point is to get to that other level, to get to the level where life really is. Humility, or even accepting your debts. Okay, so he killed me, so I'm not... But I'm a Christian, that's the... Resurrection is my thing. It's not not being hurt. It's not the kind of Palliana life that's, you know, really, you never get back up imperfectly, which means that I get back up in my fullness, and I'm not hurt at all, really, because I rise from the dead. And also that the communal thing, that the reconciliation in community, the bond of love is, as the Saint Paul says, that vinculum caritatis is completely restored. There's no resentment left in it. There's no blemish. There's no stain, no shadow. Now, we can't do that, you know, but God's grace is trying to do it all the time. If we open ourselves, gradually it can happen. Really, the only way it can happen is when we have enough faith so that the Kingdom of God is just flowing into us, and saying, well, I used to think of everything in the wrong way. Now I think of things differently. It can only be a total conversion of viewpoint in that way. And the

[14:16]

old viewpoint is always trying to sneak back in. As soon as things get rough, it may be easy for a while to sort of surf along, coast along on the waves of good feeling, but then sooner or later we hit the beach, we hit the ground, and then we really have to call on the deeper thing. The third thing is prayer. And the Fathers say that's the strongest thing. If you can pray for your enemy, pray for the one who has hurt you, you've got the key. Now, see, of Agrius' anger is the obstacle to prayer, doesn't he? And the Fathers tell us that to pray for your enemy is the way to purity of heart. It's the best thing you can do, not only for him and not only for the relationship, but it's the best thing that you can do for spiritual growth. Which means that all of these problems are really just there for our education, for our growth. And that if we can head into this thing, head on, with our prayers in our hearts, then they're exactly what we need.

[15:21]

Of course, it's hard to believe that when you're right in the situation. And it's impossible at that moment to pray. It's like bringing your, like opening, taking your skin off and bringing your open insides into contact with stone or something. You can't do that. It takes grace. There's something that we can do, the beginning of that we can do. And that's the first step. God really has to do the rest. But it takes a lot of perseverance, I think. We could change God, or so it says in the book. The man who prays for his enemies is a man without rancor, a man without resentment. Work at this and understand clearly what you're here for. Unless you work, you're wrong and so this kind of work is the work of the heart. It's the beauty of Christ. It's really the word existential that you printed in capital letters on the first page of this book, because it really is. It's the work of everyday life. Very simple. The material is always there, but it's

[16:24]

real work. The material that's going to get changed is ourself. The stuff that gets changed is ourselves. Which means that that's the kind of work that can only be done with faith, because you can't believe of yourself being changed really, being somebody else than who you are, and having the feelings and the hurts and the reactions that you do. And that's by faith, because those reactions are us as long as we have those feelings. But let's fortify ourselves and work with enthusiasm while we have time. Okay, next time we have to go on to the next one on falsehood, which we'll probably find is in very close continuity once again. Remember that this animosity is a kind of falsehood, isn't it? It's a concealing or it's undercover hatred, undercover anger. So, Dorothy is very often working as a psychologist, a kind of depth psychologist in a certain way, working between these two levels, the external level and the internal level. And he's always saying, well, this

[17:26]

is what it looks like, but this is what's really going on underneath. The same thing will be happening in the next one. Okay, that's enough for today. No, no, no, I didn't think Dorothy was coming. I just can't... I reflect back to that time, there were various, there was various of love. It's all love. It doesn't, you know, it doesn't throw it at you, but everything he's telling me to do, the motivation for it, is love. It's working love, you see, it's working love. It's not the love which is sitting on a lotus flower, you know, just enjoying the sunshine. It's not that love, it's working love, it's love at work. It's not the taste of love, it's not the ecstasy of love, it's the work of love. Nowadays, in our society,

[18:54]

it's the only way we're going to get rid of these things, these perjuries. Not through the perfect, but through the deep, the sound. And, you know, Dorothy, if you take this, this guide, this kind of view of love, okay, this is the way I'm going to go into love, what it was in Section 7 of the Code, you know, in this kind of relationship, then you're going to argue that it's supposed to be seen as a filter, and it's an information, and it's not as an information. And Dorothy gets to the things that they're talking about, and the filter has to be recognized and dealt with. And then an inner strength comes, it gives one an individual inability to function that way. There's a lot more understanding of that now than there was in the time of Dorotheus,

[20:25]

we have to admit that, okay? That there's a lot more understanding in the fact that if you take... See, a lot of these things are in the form of rhetoric, right? In the form of preaching. I mean, one of the Fathers would give a confrontation as that were to homilies, which means it's exhortation, and it's heavily moralistic and so on. You go and do this, you know, and it'll work out the right way. Now, we have more of a sense today that if you do that, you're going to try to be perfect by doing things, okay? You're going to try to match up to a model which has been given to you, but at the same time, you're going to be pushing down a lot of yourself, a lot of yourself which is still real, it's still part of you, and what you'll do is you'll project that on other people. So, I'm not saying that Dorotheus doesn't have ways of dealing with that, but the heavy rhetorical, moralistic, exhortative tone that the Fathers used certainly for us would pile up a lot of that stuff nowadays, because this is what happens to somebody, especially young people when they come into the monastic life and they try real hard.

[21:27]

You know, they read the early monastic Fathers and they read the literature and they try real hard to match up, and so they create a very heavy, filtered persona. Persona means a mass, in the theatre. They create a very thick persona which is perfect, but they're anxious all the time because they know the thing is fragile, they know the thing is going to fall apart, and they know that there's a whole bunch of stuff in them that just is not that, that's quite the opposite. And sooner or later, they have to be able to let go of that. Now, for a while, it's necessary probably to take those steps to do that kind of thing, but as long as it's that external, you can't be real identical. They say it's identification instead of identity. We identify ourself with something, instead of really having something internally as our identity. So, but the fact is that from the beginning, we can't always relate too easily and too clearly to that which is coming from inside. It takes a while, so... It scares you to death.

[22:29]

Sure, sure. Because we get hurt when we step out of line. We get hurt by ourself, we get hurt by others. So then, there is a real danger of, you know, you hear so much about in people and self, and the way you're talking about it, there is a danger of being one's... Okay, now, the secret here, the key to this is that there are different levels of identity, okay? And you can only move to the next one when one is pretty well consolidated in some way. So a person, for instance, who doesn't... who never had a sufficient persona, a sufficient self-image in relating to others, probably will be kind of a crushed person. And you can't ask him to undertake that kind of renunciation where he goes deeper, okay? Like he's blaming himself. The person who does not have a solid ego can't be asked to go head first, to plunge into this monastic humility thing, you see? Because he'll just murder himself.

[23:32]

He'll just go around in circles. It's a question of arriving in one identity and then being able to step to the next stepping stone and go deeper, you see? Until finally, you don't need any self-image, but somehow your life is spontaneous in coming from within. Now, even the psychologists today get to that level. So you're kind of at ease with your identity. And then you don't need an image of it. See, there's nothing external. There's nothing to hang on to. In the end, you just sort of go out into the water. You're just suspended. And your identity is given to you, like that gospel this morning. Your identity... All the time I said about the gospel this morning. Your identity is received. It's not something that you got out in front of you. It's not something you can grasp, but it's received. It's received. And that's to be in the Trinity. That's to receive your being in Christ from the Father. And there's an equivalent on the human level. And that's what the deeper kinds of psychology are after today. There's a great danger with regular personalities. Yeah, because basically there's a kind of asceticism,

[24:36]

and it is in a sense a negativity, okay? Renunciation. Those are negatives. And if there isn't enough positivity, enough strength, just enough being in the person, he can get crushed. It's like David putting on Saul's armor, remember? He had to go out and fight Goliath. He could fight him with his own nature, with his own being, but when he put on an armor, it crushed him. Okay. Okay, we got as far as page 144 in the middle. And there Dorotheus makes his great principle clear. He says, we have left the straight road of blaming ourselves and taken the crooked road of blaming our neighbor. See? It's a seesaw. To the extent that we don't blame ourselves, we blame our neighbor, he says. Now, this is a very, what would you call it,

[25:37]

crude way of talking about this projection business and talking about our need for, just the way the dynamic in this works, our need for security and the way that we get it by sort of taking it from somebody else. As they say, putting a trip on somebody else. We have left the straight road of blaming ourselves and taken the crooked road of blaming our neighbor. We rankle at that kind of language because it seems like, well, how can he say that collectively, you know? Well, he can say it in the sense that it's a tendency that's in one's. But at the same time, to make that hot cannonball of blame too big, to make it as big as he's making it would be dangerous. Every one of us is negligent and keeps none of the commandments and we demand in return that our neighbor keep them. I don't know how they could talk like that in the old days. Maybe the monks sat there and they cheered, you know? Every time he'd say it with a special heaviness, you know,

[26:37]

we're really rotten and they'd cheer, you know? It must have been like that. Hit him again. We can't do that anymore. But they must have taken a real gusto in it, you know? The delight. And yet they knew in a way that it was a game. Okay, now here's the story of the two brothers. One is older, one is younger. So one has a certain authority over the other. It's a question of somebody commanding somebody else. And this is a typical situation. And the psychology here is very good. I mean, the way he observes people, the reactions. I ask him to do something and I'll change the words a little bit because arranged for him, he's not... What it means is I tell him to do something and he gets all upset. He doesn't want to obey. Thinking... And so I get upset too, because I think that if he really had any respect or any faith in me, any confidence in me, he'd do what I tell him, you know?

[27:39]

Why doesn't he trust me? Why can't he obey me? And the younger was saying, excuse me, but he doesn't speak to me with the fear of God. But he likes to dominate, you know? It's that thing. It's his ego. I feel his ego through that command. And I don't feel obedient. I won't be obeying God. I'll be obeying his ego, his will. He likes to order people around. That's a typical situation. And that's why I don't have confidence in him. So each one of them is relating to the other, sort of. And it's a vicious circle. And it's a deadlock too. And press on your minds that each blames the other for there being no trust in the situation. And then recall this thing, this problem of non-violence and the problem of nuclear disarmament and all of those things. You know, it's a similar circle. But where does the trust start? Where do... Who makes the first move? Who lays down his gun first?

[28:40]

That kind of thing. Although they're begging each other's pardon, they both remain unconvinced, as it were. Insincere, because they don't... Each one... Neither one trusts the other. My God, do you see how ridiculous it is, he says. Do you see their perverse way of thinking? One says... Peaceful. They should do just the opposite. The first ought to say, I speak with presumption and therefore God does not give my brother confidence in me. And the other ought to be thinking, my brother gives me command with humility and love, but I am unruly and have not the fear of God. Neither of them found that way and blamed himself, but each of them picks the other. And you see what Dorotheus is saying. This is a pretty good example. It's a pretty good story. Because where is the truth in the situation? It doesn't make any difference as far as Dorotheus is concerned, does it? It doesn't make any difference who is right. He says both of them should take the same attitude of self-reproach

[29:43]

and of giving the, what do they call it, the benefit of the doubt to the other, of giving the credit for goodwill to the other and reproaching his own motives. Now, with the two reactions that those two people had, you could say, well, there's some truth in that. It's true, because neither one of them is going far enough, in a sense. I think it's a great story, too, because to me it really shows how in so many of our Christian situations we don't really have to get concerned with, well, is his opinion better than my opinion? Yeah, who's right? It's like, how can I show greater charity in this situation? How can I be a better Christian in this situation? Just go with that direction. I don't have to worry about, you know, who's opinion is right or wrong. Yeah. Now, somebody else might say, well, maybe we ought to find out, you know, where is justice here? See, Dorotheus is a specialist here.

[30:44]

He's trying to do one thing. He's trying to break down that inner thing of pride. And so he takes this method. And this is a method, you see. He's using a monastic life as a method to do something. It's not a school of moral theology, okay, in which you learn exactly what the right answer is to each situation. It's not that at all. It's a practical school in which you learn the way to get past your ego to your deeper self. And so, in a sense, there's a kind of indifference as to the truth of the situation. I'm not saying this is the kind of thing we should do all the time, but it's a good thing. And Dorotheus seems to me to be using it very well. Don't you see that this is why we make no progress, why we meet here again, why we find we have not been helped towards it? We remain all the time against one another, grinding one another down, because each considers himself right and excuses himself. And, you know, there is a principle, whether it's Vipassana or whatever,

[31:46]

there's a principle of going back and looking at what's happening in your world, right? The first step is to back off from the situation, back off and look at your own reaction. And even if you don't condemn your own reaction, at least you get past it, you don't identify with it, you don't stay in it. Now, the risk in Dorotheus's thing would be to identify with the reaction and blame yourself for it, rather than stepping past it, sort of disowning it. But the beautiful thing, right, is the going forward to the brother, you see, is the movement of generosity, which not only blames oneself, but uses that as a springboard for moving towards the other brother and trust and love. And that is beautiful, you see. Even though you could be clever, you know. More sanctification. More sanctification. And then the sayings of the fathers, once again. What is the most important thing in this way of life, in the natural way of life, brother?

[32:47]

In everything, to blame oneself. And he underlined it, there is no other way than this. And remember the other saying, there's no other way but weeping, tears, penthos, compunction. That's the only way. Now, that's too strong for us. That's too heavy for us, that advice nowadays, in a sense. Or maybe it's too crude for us, I don't know. But we mustn't forget it. We can moderate it, we can work around it, we can think about it, and so on all we want, but we shouldn't forget it. It should remain a permanent element in our world. I was thinking, like, if you could say such a thing as a Christian, would it possibly... I think it would be that stepping back and looking what's going on within you, and how did others do that compunction, with, you know, with a deep heart? Because compunction, what does it always say in a situation? It always says, well, I don't know who's right in this situation, but I've got enough sin in me,

[33:48]

or I have to take so much responsibility in any way, even if I'm not thinking about that sin in me, that I can take the whole of the responsibility for this, in a sense. Because I've got such a big bank account, you know, or whatever you want to call it, of responsibility, such a big debt. But really, it's not enough. It doesn't make any sense. Well, the love of God is so great that why do we fall with these trifles? You remember what's poured out upon us is so great. Now, it's like the ocean. So why are we fighting about this? Remember the two monks on the brick? And they put the brick in between, and we're going to have a fight. We never had an argument. We've been living together for 30 years, and we never had an argument. Let's have an argument. Say, OK. So they get a brick, and they put it in between. Now he says, that's mine. And the other one says, no, it's mine. And then the first one says, OK, it's yours. So they couldn't have an argument.

[34:49]

It's as if it's yours, then take it. OK. Now, here he changes the subject, or he changes the approach. Everywhere we find that the father's kept to this rule, relating everything to God. Now, this is something. He was talking about that earlier on. Even the slightest thing, and they found peace. And then the story of the linseed oil on the biscuits. He even took a second helping. The old man was sick, and he had his toast in the morning. And instead of honey, the brother who was serving him poured linseed oil on it. He didn't say poo. He didn't say a word. In fact, he even asked for a second helping. Father, I've murdered you. Why didn't you say it? I don't know whether he's writhing on the ground now.

[35:53]

You'd have to see this. But he confided the matter to God. And then this is Dorotheos speaking. What has it to do with God? The brother made a mistake, and you say, if God wished. What has it to do with God? Yes, if God had wanted me to eat honey, the brother would have put honey on it. So immediately, it's this act of faith. Which is another way of drowning the whole thing in affirmations. Drowning the whole question of who's right, who's wrong. Is he blamable? Does he make a mistake? I don't know why he took a second helping. The old man was quite right to say, if God had wanted me to eat honey, he would even have changed the way I took it. But we, for each little thing, go and accuse our neighbor and blame him, as if he were maliciously going against his conscience. And here's the thing, you know, what do we see in somebody when we really can't forgive him? We see bad will. We see a will to hurt. We see malice.

[36:58]

The other person is really sinned. And at a certain point, we really want to pin that on him. We really want to believe that he is sinned, that he's guilty. Blame. We love blame. But we have to learn to hate blame instead of loving blame. Or, from another point of view, to know that blame is not a permanent reality. That it doesn't... I guess it's a childhood response that we've got, that we just didn't shake. That feeling of blame. It's important that somebody be blamed. It's part of life to have somebody to hate. And it plays a cycle. It's got a psychological function, I think. An emotional function to have somebody to hate.

[38:01]

It's awful, you know, but it does. There's a kind of equilibrium, the balance, for somebody to hate. But one time, I was at my grandparent's, and my grandma asked me how I liked the mashed potatoes, and I said, they're fine, but they're too lumpy. When I got home, I was told by my parents that you don't do that because you hurt somebody's feelings. And I could never come to terms with that. You don't tell the truth if you think it's going to hurt somebody's feelings. And this is flashing back at me every once in a while, and I wonder how that has interfered with relationships that I might have had with people where there was some truth that I held back because of the fear of hurting that person. But I was completely honest with them. Would that have changed the relationship? I don't know.

[39:02]

That's kind of out of context for me, but maybe not. I don't know. Because sometimes, I think your mother was right when she said that, okay? But it's that there's another truth in the situation. There's the truth of respect for another person's feelings, which outweighs the truth of the lumps in the potato at that moment, okay? The lumps in the potato are negligible in comparison with the greater truth of human relationship, you know, that you don't want it. You don't want to make your grandmother feel that the whole meal was a failure. Everybody, you know? Because that's what could happen. Okay, here's the story of Shimei. You remember this one? There's a footnote that has to be added, though. When David is running away from Absalom and Shimei goes out to curse him, remember he

[40:05]

says, you man of blood, you're all no good, you know? He throws rocks at him, you know? And David's henchmen want to go over and cut his head off. One of them says, let me go over and take the head off that dead dog or whatever he says. But David says, no, maybe God told him to curse David. And it's beautiful. You don't understand it, but it's beautiful. David is beautiful in so many times in those books of Kings. And this is one of them. It's just kind of this fear of God, which is also, there's a graciousness in David. So that's an example. He says that he's implying that God really did send Shimei to curse David, and David was a prophet, and therefore he knew that. He understood that. And so he didn't avenge himself. And then he generalizes that to say that, well, this is always true. We can say that whenever we are offended, this is a word to us from God. Not that we're to take that offense literally, but he's testing us or teaching us or trying

[41:09]

us or one thing or another. Another footnote. The only trouble is that when David was about to die, you remember, he told Solomon to take care of Shimei afterwards. He said, don't let him go down to the grave in peace. You know, I promised I wouldn't kill him, but now you. That's right. That's right. They wouldn't let them in. So we call down fire from heaven. Jesus is the same, and he teaches that in the gospel. Pray for your enemies. The whole thing at the end of the sermon. David has a touch of Jesus in him, you know, and the way it's written, you see parts of, as it were, the personality of Jesus that he doesn't show during his life because they don't come up, they can't be shown. It's a wonderful person. Nothing brings God's mercy to the soul like temptation.

[42:15]

And somehow this is allowed by God, and God is like watching and waiting. Do you see how the prophet acted with knowledge? So it's knowledge. He finally gets to that knowledge. See through the thing. You see, there are different ways of seeing through it. One way is seeing through it and seeing, well, really, there shouldn't be any blame, and this is something that's in me that's a projection of it. That's one way of seeing through it. Another way of seeing through it is in this divine light in which you say, well, God permits it. It's kind of coming straight to the core, and taking it out of that relationship with your brother, which can become overloaded with anger or whatever, and putting it into a relationship with God. Now, the only trouble is here, you can end up being mad at God. You can end up feeling resentful against God, so we have to awaken through that. But first of all, I think we have to allow ourselves sometimes to feel that resentment against God, to know it's there. Because I think often we have a lot of it, but we're afraid to let it come to this level. We have to let it come up, realize it's there, and then work through it.

[43:19]

It's not that it never happened to God before, because look in the Old Testament, it's quite a bit different. But it's, well, if they're seen in the light you're just discussing now, it seems to them, and now it seems to them, that it's a new opportunity for growth, that we might never even have, or we can have, in this new time. Remember Father Thomas, two things I should remember from his retreat. One thing he said to us, in the way that she took, that was a quantum leap for her, he said, when she took that occasion of being hurt, to relate herself straight to God, to react straight to God, and not to her parents, because she put on a whole big show for her parents, which didn't make any sense to me. The point is that she took it as an invitation to a great act of faith, and a great act of,

[44:21]

what would you call it, an act of response towards God, and only to God, in a sense. The other one was a story of the businessman in New York who went to the newsman, and who would spit at him every day, and throw his newspaper at him. And that was Father Thomas' example of the perfectly free man. I don't remember the whole framework of language in which he was talking about it, but it was that sense of being deeper, being in the true self deeper than the reactions. He said, nobody can really hurt you, in that sense. Why should I be offended by something which is somebody else's problem? That was part of his comment on it. The basic thing is that we're reacting from a place where everything does us good, in some way. Everything turns into good for us. And it could even have a rebound effect on the person who's trying to show his disappointment.

[45:25]

It should have, even. Maybe he could just say, half-time, that hurt this man, and he's just taking it. It's not worth it. You know, you never know. That's the sort of the hope of non-violence, but not his non-violence, that the violent one will be converted by the complete non-violence of the other one. But we don't come to the point of saying about it, whether the Lord told him to say it, or giving it to him. If we hear a word, we immediately react like dogs. If somebody throws a stone, they leave the one who throws it, run after the stone. Like a stoner, a frisbee or whatever. This is how we react. We leave God who throws the stone, okay? And we run after our neighbor, crying, why did you do this to me? So he wants to relate it right back, right back to God. Everything happens by the foreknowledge of God for the benefit of each of us. Okay, that's all. And in the end, what do we want to do?

[46:27]

We want to use everything as if everything was hammering down or concentrating our own being in some way. Both the positive things and the negative things, the rain and the sunshine, the good and the evil. That everything be more... This is not an image in my mind, as if everything is tamping down or further concentrating or filling our own being. Everything serves in some way the growth of that true self. Now, it could be a terrific egoism to be thinking about that all the time, but that's a step we pass through to take the sting out of it, and then we... Actually, it's important to understand what he's talking about, because the title that we have there may not carry the full meaning for you. He's not just talking about anger, he's talking about resentment. Resentment is the best word in English for this. The word in Greek is nezikakia, which literally means the memory of injuries, the memory of

[47:33]

evil which has been done to you. So it's that smoldering resentment, that anger which is under the surface and maybe not expressed, which is a real sickness, the sickness of the heart, the sickness of the soul. And you'll find that it leads us into the center of the Christian history once again, because what Christianity is about is forgiveness, according to the New Testament. And if you listen to the Charismatics, they'll tell you that the key to healing is forgiveness. If you have any resentment in you, you can't be healed, you can't be yourself. Somehow, in forgiving somebody else, we forgive ourselves. To the extent that we have resentment against somebody else, it's like harboring some kind of virus, harboring some kind of fire in you. And so it makes us ill, and somehow we're unforgiving. So there's this kind of continuity I'm turning to about the mystery of forgiveness, that if you don't forgive your brother, you can't be forgiven either, in the full sense. It's like wanting to have forgiveness or wanting not to have forgiveness.

[48:34]

It's like wanting to be in a certain place or to be in another place. And you can't be in both of those places at once. If you take with you the things of the kingdom of, call it the kingdom of the flesh, or the kingdom of hell, in a sense, you can't be in the kingdom of heaven. You can't carry the baggage of the kingdom of hell into the kingdom of heaven. It's sort of the same thing that we find in the New Testament. We find it in countless places in the New Testament. I'd like to give you some references for this first, just in a general sort of way. I was looking for biblical references first, and the first thing that pops into your mind, of course, is the Sermon on the Mount. It's Matthew 5, and that's a goldmine for this kind of thing, because it goes right to the center of it and gives the ultimate answer. But I was looking in the Dictionary of Biblical Theology, and I looked under the wrong words at first, because there's nothing in there, of course, on resentment. That's not a biblical word. And anger is not quite what we want. They don't have anger anywhere. What would you look at for a biblical thing?

[49:35]

Not that they've got wrath. That notion of the wrath of God. Where would you look if you wanted to look for this particular school? No, in biblical terms. Passion? No? Revenge. And you'd find vengeance, okay? So that's one. And what else? Belief. Yeah. See, when you do this kind of thinking, you have to sort of move around in a biblical territory until you find the biblical handle to something you're familiar with, okay? Because there's a scriptural vocabulary and a scriptural way of thinking, I think, which is not quite in the same terms as we use. Wrath. Okay, wrath. But wrath doesn't help quite as much. It overlaps with wrath. I looked under hate, okay? But hate wasn't right on. I don't think envy is...

[50:38]

Envy is not the same thing. Envy is a different shade, too. Envy means that you want something that somebody else has got. Okay, that can be... That's a kind of resentment, yes. It's a kind of branch, part of the spectrum. The other one is forgiveness. I looked under forgiveness. They have pardon, okay? So pardon and vengeance are the two key expressions in the dictionary of biblical theology for this area that we're talking about, as far as I can find. And, of course, the richer one is pardon, because that's what it's about. Now, this sentiment of resentment, resentment, I don't know, maybe it comes from the French, no? The idea of sensing, feeling something over again, no? Feeling it again, feel it again. It's a very, it's a deep word, because you feel again the hurt or the anger or the reaction that you felt at first. And what's more, you sort of nourish it. You enjoy it. It's a real mystery why we enjoy nourishing something like that.

[51:41]

It really isn't, you know, it isn't a good. What perversity, you know, says that it makes us hang on to something like that. It's akin to the question of why we judge our brother. Why do we have a compulsion to judge another person and to condemn them? Why do we have a need to nurse the memory of something that's been done to us? I think it's one side of self-love, okay? It's like you've got two sides to self-love. There's the soft side, which is self-pity. Oh, why does this have to happen to me? Oh, why does this always have to happen to me? You know, why am I the only one, you know, just, you know, sort of rolling around, swinging around, you know, and stuff. And a lot of self-pity is unexpressed. It is not verbal. It's pre-verbal. And it's a kind of goo. It's like mucus. It's, you know, I don't know what it is. It's a kind of infantile stew of feelings which are not resolved yet into words. In fact, they're too primitive to be put into words. I don't know. It's because of self-pity. Okay, it's like self-pity is the soft side.

[52:43]

Self-pity is the feminine side of this thing we're talking about. The masculine side of it is, I think, maybe resentment. It's the anger, the fire. Self-pity is like liquor. You think of it, you think of a gravy, a stew of a young gravy, young juice. But this resentment is like fire. And it's smoldering. It's not rage. The explosive fire, the fire that's visible, non-fire, is smoldering. It's buried. It's concealed. It's in all different areas. You know, it's smoldering. But Dorothy is resenting, isn't she? So I just want to dig up the biblical roots of it, because that's where we have to end up. We may not start there, but that's where we have to end up. On vengeance, first of all. God is the only avenger. But see, this thing is related to vengeance, because if you look for a feeling in the Bible, you're going to be disappointed very often. Look for a subjective reality, like resentment in the Bible, and you may not find it.

[53:46]

Where do you look? Look for something external, vengeance. Look for something... You know how these people didn't separate the act from the... Those of you who listen to B. Griffith's tape, you know, how there are these three levels, body, soul, and spirit? They didn't separate one from the other. So you get a word which refers to something physical, and it goes all the way back into the feeling that's at the bottom of it. Or all of the symbols are thought of and written, used in all of their depth. So here, vengeance also means that the feeling, the desire for vengeance is way inside. Even though you don't have a word for the subjective feeling, for the experience. So we have all kinds of refined words for feelings, not too refined, at least. We have a psychological, subjective vocabulary, which they didn't have. They had a vocabulary for the passions, the Greeks did more than the Jews. But the Jews were more apt to go think by their external names, vengeance. And that's what this is. It's the spirit of vengeance, and the spirit of revenge,

[54:48]

in some way suppressed from bursting out and really doing what it wants to do. They talk about the old testimony, no, revengeance is limited, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. The idea is not that you have to exact an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, but don't do any more than that. Because there was this guy, Lama, couldn't really say, well, I've been, I may have been wounded, but I'm going to kill. My, for Cain, it may have been, what was it, fivefold, and it would be fifty-four, and for Lama, it would be fifty. That kind of, that kind of power. So, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. And then the new law of Jesus is precisely going beyond this and wiping this out. You don't get any vengeance at all. It turns in the opposite direction. This is one of the most striking places where the Gospel just turns everything inside out. Where he asks you to do the impossible thing of loving those who hate you.

[55:52]

That's where the new law is most impossible and most magnificent. And therefore, where it most calls upon our very being in God, requires a gift. Henceforth, the believer's patterns of action, this is after the death of Jesus, will be staggered by the example of Christ, who was insulted and did not return insulted. Not only does Jesus inaugurate a new law which fulfills the principle of the talion law. Talion is eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But he goes further and commands us not to resist an evil will. He does not condemn the justice of human tribunal, but he demands that his disciples forgive offenses and hug their enemies. Above all, he suggests that only he who could bear injustice to himself will pardon the injustice of another. Recourse to divine vengeance is now not enough, for one must conquer evil with good. Thus, one heaps burning coals on the head of his enemy, whatever that means, and places himself in a situation where he must turn his hate to love.

[56:56]

Violence is very general. So what we're talking about is non-violence, it's the spirit of non-violence. Or the spirit of violence within you. But violence is a general word. And also, I don't think it's a biblical word. Here they only have violence sending you to something else. Because perhaps it's become more of a crime. Here they just refer you to power, pride, strength, wrath. Okay, pardon. I just want to do this briefly, but to see where this really is rooted in the scriptures. It doesn't have to be pointed out again. That's what the Bible is about. God's forgiveness. God's forgiveness spreads through him. Pardon for offenses. In the Old Testament, already the law not only puts a limit on vengeance

[58:07]

by the rule of retaliation. That's what we're talking about. It also forbids hatred of one's brother and vengeance and rancor towards one's neighbor. Don't hate your brother in your heart. Remember this. Ben Sirach, the sage, meditated on these prescriptions and he discovered the bond that joins pardon granted by man to his fellow man to the pardon that he asks from God. And that's what happens in the New Testament. It's almost a substantial forgiveness that comes into the world, which is the body of Christ, which is the church. Which requires that men pardon one another. Otherwise, you can't spread. Otherwise, you can't really be in it. Pardon your neighbor his wrongs. Then, at your prayer, your own sins will be forgiven. If a man bears a grudge against another, how can he ask forgiveness from God? Being without compassion for his fellow man, does he still make a treaty for his own sins? That's Sirach 27 and 28. It sounds very much like Jesus. Jesus has his parables. He is one guy who is always grudging forgiveness for the other,

[59:11]

whether it be the servant who goes out and troubles his fellow servant. After his debt is forgiven, he tells his brother and tells his son. The Book of Wisdom completes this lesson by reminding the just that in their judgments, they must take the mercy of God as their example. Jesus will take this twofold lesson and transform it. Like the writer of Ecclesiastes, he teaches that God cannot pardon one who does not pardon his brother. The parable of the unmerciful debtor forcefully inculcates this truth. That's the servant who goes out and demands payment in a small sum from his fellow servant after he has been forgiven. It inculcates this truth that Christ insists upon and prevents us from forgetting by having us repeat it daily in our Father. We must be able to say that we forgive. The Father shall repeat this. Look, you're saying, forgive us as we forgive our sins. It doesn't mean that you're only forgiven to the extent that you forgive, that God's forgiveness is measured, but it means that unless you're trying, that somehow your forgiveness is hooked to God's forgiveness of you.

[60:15]

It's the chicken and the egg, okay? When we try to use our logic and say, well, which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Which comes first, God's forgiveness of us or our forgiveness of others? That's right. Always present, especially for those of us who have believed in Christ and have received Christ. It's always there. It's always in us. It's a question about opening ourselves to what's already in us. It's as if there are two stages. The first stage is where God pours his forgiveness out, and the second stage is where you open yourself to it. But you only really open yourself to it when you open your heart both ways, to receive and to give, okay? To receive and to give. It's like it's the same door through which his forgiveness goes into your heart and

[61:39]

your forgiveness goes out to another. Unless you open that door, then you're not open to it. But that's what the New Testament's going to be saying all the time. There's only one door, not two. If you make two doors and you close this one and open this one, it's fine. It's not true. We must... No, excuse me. Excuse me. On the surface, it can appear. If the one door is open, it can appear that there's an opening that's the way when actually there isn't. Yeah. Well, which one do you mean looks like it's open? The one to God? Well, the one to the neighbor. That's the other case in which, okay, I don't want to stretch the geometry too far because I think all around it, you know, because there's another way of looking at it, I'm sure, where you'd be really open to your brother but not open to God.

[62:43]

But I would say in that case that you're not open to your brother on the deepest level. Therefore, the inner door really isn't open. The real door isn't open. An outer door is open. I mean, actually, it's just open. I would say, okay, I would say that if you're really open to your brother, I mean, really on a deep level, you're open to God because God's flowing into that relationship, okay? But there's real love in that relationship. What you're doing is when you open up to your brother, you're opening up to God. Now, on the other side, you may say, I don't believe in God. I don't believe in Christ, okay? But still, that inner door is open. That's what's called the, what do you call it? The explicit or verbal atheist who is really, on an existential level, he's a believer. Ronald makes that distinction. A very useful distinction. You can say you don't believe in God, but your life can be a witness to that. And in your relationships, you can witness to that. There are people like that today. Yeah. I mean, very good people, you know. They don't believe in the God that we put this up to.

[63:49]

So, we've got those two levels. Jesus goes further. Similar to the Book of Wisdom, he makes God the model of mercy for those whose father he is and who must imitate him to be his true children. Pardon is not only a preliminary condition of your life, but it's one of its essential elements. Therefore, Jesus stipulates to Peter that he must not tire of forgiving. Number not seven, but seventy times. This is the very opposite of the sinner who insists on his full measure of revenge. In imitation of our Lord, Stephen died while forgiving those who were stoning him. Okay. So, the basic references in the New Testament are there, but I'd like to point out this Matthew 5, which is just saturated with the Spirit. And it's as if it's all saying one thing, but it says it in different words. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall attain mercy. Blessed are the peacemakers. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake. These are all circling around at some point.

[64:52]

Blessed are you who are many a liar and persecutor, and so on. Presuming, you know, presuming that in this you don't hate them. You see them. You've heard that it was said to the men of old, you shall not kill. Whoever kills shall be liable to judgment. But I say to you, everyone who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment. This is a great statement of that New Law. Whoever insults his brother shall be liable to counseling, and so on. Make friends quickly, if your brother has something against you. All of these sayings are circling around the same. You've heard that it was said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you, do not resist one who is evil. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him and let it all spill. And if anyone will sue you and take your coke, let him have your coke as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to him revenge from you, and do not refuse him. You've heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. So that you may be sons of your father who is in heaven.

[65:54]

For he makes his sunrise on the evil and on the good, centering on the just and on the unjust. There's no right or left for you. There's a whole of our life to live on. That's our contemplative work. But if you love those who love you, what reward have you? And so on. You therefore must be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. It really, it really is impossible. It's a full statement of this. No law. Who can practice it? The idea is not that we say, well, I was able to do it today. I did it all day. But the idea that we're continually reaching towards it. And even in the littlest act of it, the littlest act of it. If we can conquer our hatred and our resentment and our self-love to the least extent, doing that, we've really done something. Well, sometimes the grace is there, you know. Like you'll be in a situation and somebody really jolts you. And all of a sudden there's this suggestion in your mind.

[66:54]

Well, suppose I didn't do it. Suppose I didn't say the wrong thing. Suppose, suppose. That may mean probably that the grace is right there waiting for us to be there. Now, in the father's, you see, the principle is very clear. But the problem is how do you do it? The theological principle is right there in front of us. But what Dorotheus is concerned with is, well, how do you do it? Not so much a question, I mean, how do you avoid getting mad. But what do you do with that lurking? Where do you cut the chain, for instance, between these thoughts? Because he traces a kind of genesis of thoughts. You see, you start, we'll go into that afterwards. But the translation of where it is, it's a little hard to penetrate through. I'd like to refer you also to some of the other fathers, but no need to do too much because they're always talking about this kind of thing. Especially the ones who write about the community. But one who is important for us is Evagrius.

[67:56]

Remember, Evagrius' chapters on prayer and the biggest obstacle to prayer, according to him, is anger. Of course, since you're alone, it's likely this lingering smoldering anger that comes up maybe from the unconscious. It's not the anger of the moment when you're with somebody. This is from Fr. John Eard's introduction, and we're talking about the demons here. This is the personality of the demons. The demons occupy the last rung on the ladder. This is the cosmology. Their bodies are the darkest, most immersed in matter, most thickened by hatred, anger, and resentment, most devoid of light. They consist of air, which being devoid of light is ice cold. Those are the demons. They're naturally resentful. And I think it's smoldering, but this is cold. Now, here's some quotations from the chapters on prayer of Evagrius.

[69:06]

If you look in the index under resentment, you'll find the two of these. First of all, there's a footnote here. This is in the introduction, the preface to the chapters on prayer. It is not merely these characters written on parchment with ink that you love, but also those which are firmly planted in the spirit by charity and by the absence of all resentment. Charity and the absence of all resentment. Now, this word in Greek is amnesikakia, amnesikakia, which means forgetfulness of evil, or it's exactly the negative with a on it, of that word which is the title of our chapter, amnesikakia. It's unresentment or forgetfulness of evil. This virtue is to have a long history and play an important part in Byzantine spirituality. Literally, it means...

[70:07]

Literally, it means the forgetting of injuries. Evagrius feels this virtue is essential to him. I didn't kill him. I just blew him away. Evagrius feels this virtue is essential to the calm necessary for contemplative prayer. And he goes back to this again and again. So, he must have had this problem. Number 20. If you desire to pray as you walk, do not sadden anyone. Otherwise, you run in vain. Now, this is the other side of the thing, this kind of relationship. Number 21. Leave your gifts before the altar and go and be reconciled with your brother. Our Lord said, and then you shall pray undisturbed. For resentment blinds the reason of the man who prays and casts a cloud over his prayer. Resentment blinds the reason and casts a cloud over his prayer. Stops both his mind and his heart. Clouds the mind and fogs the heart and keeps it from moving up to God.

[71:09]

You're going to find the same thing in Cassian. The man who stores up injuries and resentments and yet fancies that he prays might as well draw water from a well and pour it into a casket full of holes. It sounds like the thing that we're talking about, the two doors before, and it's reversed. If you think that you can contain God within you, if you think you can hold God and yet you hate your brother, you're full of holes and God is just going to run out. It's a good and a very cruel way. It's the opposite kind of thing. Draw water from a well and pour it into a casket full of holes. If you know how to practice patience for a little prayer that you're in, why is there patience with other men? Which means forgiveness. When you are praying, such matters will come to mind as would seem clearly to justify your getting angry. But anger is completely unjustified against your neighbor. If you really try, you will find some way to arrange the matter without showing anger. He's talking about a display of anger here. You see the importance of these two.

[72:12]

Number 64. No one who loves true prayer and yet gives way to anger or resentment could be absolved from the imputation of madness. For he resembles a man who wishes to see clearly, and for this purpose he scratches his eyes. In other words, in some way, anger is the contrary. It's the contrary of prayer and it makes it impossible. And notice how Evagrius always relates prayer to the intellect. For him, prayer is the highest activity of the noose, okay? Which you can call the center, you can call it in a sense. The eye of the true self. And as I say, you're scratching your eyes and trying to see at the same time. You're in love with two things, two kingdoms. This isn't prayer, it's anger. But if you have a charity, whether it's a book, you'll pray. That's right. And you would think that when one is broken and angry, that one is angry. And if you don't mind, for the sake of being happy, you don't pray.

[73:20]

In the end, it's almost like asking, who's better, the word or God's word? Is it better to have consciousness or to have love? Or is God divisible? Can you divide the son from the holy spirit? I'm being very crude, but it's something like that. They're one. Okay, that's exactly the fault in his whole thing, okay? Now, the weak side of Evagrius' whole thing is it's Greek, it's intellectualist, and it's individualist, and what we call introvert. So, he doesn't really have the shape of the Christian history. He distorts it out of shape because he puts it into a Greek mode, which puts the intellect in first place. Now, for him, it's the contemplative intellect that's marvelous, but it's still the intellect. And for him, prayer and intellect go together. See, if he had been a Semite, if he had been a Syrian,

[74:21]

he would have done it differently. Because a Syrian would go from... Where would he go? He'd go from charity to prayer without going through the intellect necessarily, wouldn't he? He could talk about the heart. He'd go through the root of the heart, from love of brother to prayer or whatever, without having to make that detour through the intellect. You wouldn't see it quite the same. Is there a difference between the Christian and the Gnostic? Yeah, it's a Gnostic Christianity. It's on the boundary of orthodoxy. He's partly sort of a heretic, and he's partly incel. These writings are mostly inside, but they still have that tinge. But he's been very influential in that tradition. And Cashin carries on some of the same. The idea is that, well, you get to charity, and then after that you get to perfect charity, and then contemplation is a bit of a state. Sometimes it slips into it. That's not what you're finding in those. St. Paul says, if I know all mysteries and I don't have love, I'm still in love.

[75:24]

But Cashin does sort of correct him somewhat, bring him back in. He does talk... He gets down to a very interesting question about necessity of becoming free. So it's your love, it purifies your love. I don't know if that word is really new to it, or if Eckhart's actually says that. The point between love and reason, and reason purifies your love. I don't know if you're loving purely... You're connecting with freedom with reason now, freedom with the mind. Okay, yeah. Well, it can be deep reason. No, it can't be. Because you can even talk about reason as being a contemplative thought. And that's what I like, this is interesting. He's not interested in reason at all, nor is such thinking. Because he's in the place where the Vipassana people are, where the Buddhist people are, at that level. Beyond thoughts.

[76:28]

It's an intellect which is deeper than thoughts. And that's the beauty of him, I guess. He's so deep in that way. Even though he's out of practice, but he's the closest thing to Buddhists in Christian tradition. Which is good. There's a lot of good stuff in Buddhism. It's amazing, because there's so much that's obviously out of balance, but there's so much that it's hard to find in other people. It's really good. Okay, a little bit from Cashin. Now, Cashin's got Institute No. 8 on anger. And especially, he talks about the remedies, maybe we'll quote him. The things that you do, you'll find that he's close to. That's in Institute 8, Chapter 22, right at the end. The remedies for anger, for example.

[77:28]

And then also he talks about the passion of anger, the different kinds of it, as Dorotheus does in Conference 5, Chapter 11. Then in the role of Saint Benedict. Chapter 4, the instruments of good work. He's got a whole string of them that relate to this subject. Handling all the different modalities of anger. To prefer nothing before the love of Christ. Not to give way to anger. Not to lay up revenge. So that's our subject. Saint Benedict sums it all up in a word. But it comes back again and again, of course, not to lay up revenge. Related also are the ones that follow. Not to cover deceit in the heart. Now, deceit is not only deceit of ideas and thoughts, but deceit is deceit of relationship. It's deceit of feeling, right? So not to pretend that you're somebody's friend when you really ain't. Not to make a pretended peace. Not to forsake charity. Not to return evil for evil. Not to do an injury, but to bear one with patience.

[78:35]

To love our enemies. Not to return curse for curse, but rather a blessing for it. To suffer persecution for righteousness. That whole big bundle of admonitions all relate to this. See how important that is, how central it is in community life. And then in, do you remember Climacus? I didn't get the book. I didn't bring it with me. Do you remember Climacus in the step of his ladder on solitude? And where he tells you about true solitude and false solitude? The solitude that's going well, that's producing its fruit. And the solitude which is not producing its fruit, which is phony and negative and destructive. And the qualities of that solitude are the remembrance of wrongs. A hoarding of anger and of injuries. Increase of resentment. A whole bunch of things that circle right around that center. So it's a question over here of community life.

[79:38]

It's a question over there of the emergence into solitude and into contemplative prayer. And how, according to Evagrius and also Climacus, that will be throttled completely if a person is still hanging on to injuries. In other words, if he's moving into solitude because he can't get along with a brethren and because he hasn't learned how to keep his peace, let us say, in the presence of the brethren, then it's not going to work for him. That's what Climacus is saying. And that's what Evagrius is implying also, even though he's talking about the concrete case of particular remembrance of wrongs. He's not talking directly about solitude. But the kind of prayer Evagrius is talking about is the contemplative prayer that relates to the interior life in a solitary context. Then you've got the sayings of the Desert Fathers. Book 16 on patience, which is patience with your brothers. And typically, this is in Western asceticism.

[80:38]

Remember the systematic correction, not the alphabetical correction. For example, Paisios, the brother of Abba Poman, loved a monk of his cell. Abba Poman did not like it. He was resentful. So he rose and fled to Abba Amonas and said to him, My brother Paisios loves some people and I do not like it. He had some friends. I don't know what he was jealous of. Abba Amonas said to him, Abba Poman, are you still alive? Go sit in your cell and put it in your heart that you have been already a year in your grave. So that's the radical treatment for him on that problem. That's one way. You're supposed to be dead to that kind of reaction. It may work or it may not work. It may work, it may really work. If it really awakens that seed of vocation, that seed of God's grace in your heart, in that, as you say, drastic way, good.

[81:43]

If it doesn't, if it just buries the fire of anger underneath and represses it when it's not working, then the sign will be in the fruits. Then there's this other one about vengeance. Remember the monk who becomes the old man and says, I'm going to avenge my son. He's hurt me. I'm going to get him. He always says, don't. He says, don't. And he says, I can't rest until I have him. I think we have this kind of thing. And the old man puts up his hands and prays. Oh God, we have no further need to think of you because we take vengeance for ourselves. My brother heard it and fell at the old man's feet saying, how long do I quarrel with my brother for the good of you? So that's the way it is. We could also get into the psychologists who talk a lot about this kind of thing. We have a little book called The Angry Book. They talk about the slush fund that we build up of anger and resentment. Just like some people will attribute all your problems to the fact that you're eating the wrong

[82:47]

food, other people that you're wearing the wrong shoes, other people will attribute all your problems to the fact that you're eating the wrong food, other people that you're wearing the wrong shoes, you're piling up anger in your heart. Because the human mind is a wonderful thing. You give it one point. You give it anything. You get the wrong kind of rug in your living room and they can tell you why your family broke up because of that wrong rug in your living room, why your dog gets sick, and why your laundry turns out gray, and all these things. All kinds of aches and pains and diseases. And so it is with this business here that can trace everything down to the center. But for sure, there's a lot. Because what happens to the wounds that we have? What happens to the wounds that we have when we're very young? Now, there's a pretty unanimous agreement that a lot of our troubles come from injuries and scares and rejections and hurts that we have when we're very young and the way that we handle them. Did we get scared right out of life? Did we get scared to the extent that we closed up?

[83:48]

Did we sort of, at that moment, stock up a kind of anger against one person that we then project on everybody else throughout our life? All kinds of things like that. How do we handle that? It seems to be like the transmission of sin. It's like original sin, but it's another conduit for it. It's another way of transmission. So anyway, so there's a lot in there. And that's why the charismatics insist so much on the need to get rid of resentment. Of course, the psychologists have other ways of doing it. They give you a foam rubber bat and you go in and hit a pillow or something and pound something right in the chapel. And meanwhile, you can relic that person. But you can look to them much the other way. You might bring those people back in here. I didn't have time to gather up any of that stuff. The one way that's not talked about by Dorotheus is the way of going and just talking it over

[84:52]

with your brother, you know, of re-establishing communication in that way. It's funny, that's the one thing that's kind of skipped around. You can go and you can make a metony to your brother. You can say, I'm sorry, you know, and bow down and prostrate. But the trouble is, as he points out right here, you can go in, you can do that all you want and you'll still have resentment in your heart. But the way that he never gets around to it is going and saying, well, look, this is how I feel and what can we do about this. He didn't mean to do that to me, did he, that kind of thing. That kind of thought that hit you. David? Wow.

[85:59]

It's like a sacrament, in a way, it's the sacrament of the world, of the earth. Sometimes you can work together with a person and we're working side-by-side, because when you don't talk, the sparks can really keep going, and sometimes it can absorb it. But if you have that setting already, if you're already working with somebody, then what it tends to do, I think, is to correct things automatically. You get in the habit of, it just changes your perspective, it changes the way you frame it. It's true. And somehow it brings back the order of priorities, in a sense, it brings back the perspective. And it takes the attention all off that little thing which got magnified so much. And it does it through our body, in a sense. The body is smarter than the mind.

[87:47]

The body is smarter than the mind, that's for sure. It doesn't get, it doesn't get blown up into these bubbles, you know, because it'll react. That's what the key is. If people, especially if people understand that, because if they want they can still hang on to the resentment, even working side-by-side, if they have an appreciation for that work and they're open to that healing, then it can happen. It can get around the mental or emotional obstacle. You'd better be open to it. Now, there's a direct continuity between this discourse and the two that went before. Number... Number... Number six was on not judging our neighbor, and this is on not hating him. And the two are very much connected.

[88:49]

And we found already cases of the question of not hating, because it's the same spark that starts both of those things. Not exactly. It starts in the same place. One is like, is like the mind, and the other is more the passion, the emotion side of it. It's more personal to us. They both are. And then self-accusation, instead of pinning it on our brother, and now we get into this business. The fathers used to say that it's foreign to a monk to be angry or to annoy other people. And again, the man who masters anger masters the devil, but the man who is worsted by this passion is a complete stranger to the master. Gosh, let's put it... That sounds like... Plimacus was saying that the person who has this resentment is just out... He's just in the wrong boat when he's in solitude. He ought to be somewhere else. He doesn't belong. It's not worth it. It can't work. It's the same kind of anger. In other words, he who is in anger, who cultivates anger, who identifies with anger...

[89:52]

Let's put it that way. He who identifies with anger, and accepting him in that way, identifies himself outside the monastic life. And while he's angry, he's not a monk. That's another way of putting it. Because it's simply incompatible. It's incompatible and incompetent. Remember when Paul talks about the fruits of the spirit and the works of the flesh? There are a lot of angry things among the works of the flesh. It's at the end of Galatians. Galatians chapter 5. But the fruits of the spirit are love, joy, and peace, and all those things which exist in the other direction. But what about us? And here he goes, laying an iron. "...who give way to violent anger, even their malice, to the point of animosity." Now, in the translation, it doesn't always come through. He's building up this crescendo. He's got four terms here. He's going to put them together afterwards. Down at the bottom of that first page. First, he quotes this case in which somebody asks forgiveness.

[90:55]

That is, he makes this metonym, which can be just a formalism. He goes and he vows to the brother of Christ, so to speak, in order to reconcile with him. But meanwhile, in his heart, there remains this thing. So you've got four things. Remembrance of evil or rancor is one thing. That's the subject. Now, that's nezikatia. Loss of temper or rage is another. Now, this is a decrescendo. He's going down from the final product, which is this lingering animosity, this lingering resentment, right back to the first spark that touched it off. So he's going backwards now. Loss of temper or rage is another. That's orge. Orge. Then, annoyance, another. And that's thumos. Thumos. Like the finest wine. Disturbance of mind is yet another. That's tereche. Disturbance is like disturbing water.

[91:56]

Now, here's caching. This is Conference 5, Chapter 11. And he's given the different categories of these passions. Of anger, there are three kinds. One which rages within, which is called in Greek thumos. Another which breaks out in word and deed and action, which they term orge, of which the Apostle speaks, saying, But now do you lay aside all anger and indignation. The third, which is not like those in boiling over and being done with in an hour, but which lasts for days and long periods, and which is called menis. Now, that's the same, comes from the same root as this nezikatia that we're talking about. So he's talking about three of our categories there in caching. And he's got the Greek words in there too. That's on page 344 in caching, in case you want to compare. But he doesn't give the first one, which is that simple disturbance of mind. Or, no, annoyance, as he calls it. What's the difference between annoyance and disturbance?

[93:02]

The difference is pretty subtle. Annoyance is He gives an example. It's as if annoyance is the instinctive thing, okay? I mean, if you come in and just bother me, the bother, the involuntary response is like the annoyance, okay? And it's nearly objective because it's nearly something natural that happened outside. But I haven't got into it with my will yet. Then, when you think about it, it's disturbance. Okay? You mull it around in your mind. Why did he do that? I know. He always does that. I know because he's got it in front of him. He's going to do it again. That whole thing. You go around like that. That's disturbance, according to him. Then, the third one is where it begins to boil. It really works itself up. You just work yourself up into a real thing, a real angry thing, and that can burst out. But the fourth one is

[94:04]

after that, maybe, when either you express it or you don't, but there's a thing that remains. So, it is pretty clear, actually, okay? Because we're involved in, not directly and voluntarily in the first one, but in the other three. And harboring the thoughts, nourishing the thoughts, sort of entertaining and enjoying and building up this thing. And the peak of that thing is orgy or rage. And then, after this subsiding, what remains, even though nothing may be seen on the surface is this resentment. And which, in a way, is the worst problem because it's the chronic thing. It's the real illness, the real disease that ruins everything, that spoils the spiritual life and makes it phony because as long as it's in there. And the religious life has not always dealt with this in the right way because the idea was, you give a person an image when it comes in, or she comes in, because this happens especially in women's communities.

[95:06]

Not all of them, but in both kinds. But this image that religious don't get mad, okay? I mean, if you're a monk or a nun, the sister, for heaven's sake, you wouldn't get mad. Of course not. Couldn't get mad. Couldn't get mad.

[95:20]

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