My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
ON THE EIGHT PRINCIPAL TEMPTING THOUGHTS
By Evagrius Ponticus
“Being a Theologian means first and foremost that
someone is an expert in the wiles of the
devil.”
[Fr. John S. Romanides]
There are eight principal kinds of [tempting] thoughts [logismoi], that contain within themselves every [tempting] thoughts: First, that of gluttony; and with it, that of sexual immorality; third, that of love of money; fourth, that of sadness; fifth, that of anger; sixth that of acedia; seventh, that of vainglory; eighth, that of pride. We cannot [control] whether these [tempting\ thoughts can agitate the soul or not; but whether they remain [in us] or not, and whether they arouse the passions or not–that we can[control].
THE [tempting]-thought of GLUTTONY suggests to the monk the sudden rejection of his asceticism. The stomach, liver, spleen, and [resultant] congestive heart failure are depicted, along with long sickness, lack of necessities, and unavailability of physicians…Sometimes it even deceives those who have suffered from this kind of thing to go and visit [others] who are practicing SELF-CONTROL.
THE demon of sexual immorality (porneia or porn) compels desiring for different bodies. Especially violently does it attack those who practice self-control, so that they will cease, as if achieving nothing. Contaminating the soul, it bends it down towards these sorts of deeds: it makes it speak certain words and then hear them, as if the thing were actually there to be seen.
LOVE of money (avarice) suggests: a long old age; hands powerless to work; hunger and disease yet to come; the bitterness of poverty; and the disgrace of receiving the necessities [of life] from others.
GLOOMINESS sometimes arises from frustrated desires; but sometimes it is the result of anger. When desires are frustrated it arises thus: certain [tempting] thoughts first seize the soul and remind it of home and parents and its former course of life. When they see the soul following them without resistance, and dissipating itself in mental pleasures, they take and drunk [lit baptize] it in gloom, since it is the case that these earlier things are gone and cannot be recovered due to the [monk’s] present way of life. Then the miserable soul, having been dissipated by the first [tempting] thought, is humiliated all the more by the second.
ANGER (orge) is the sharpest passion. It is said to be a boiling and movement of indignation [thymos] against a wrongdoer or a presumed wrongdoer: it causes the soul to be savage all day long, but especially in prayers it seizes the nous, reflecting back the face of the distressing person. Then sometimes it is lingering and is changed into rancor (menis0 and [thus] it causes weakness disturbances at night: bodily weakness and pallor; and attacks from poisonous beasts. These four things associated with rancor may be found to have been summoned up by many other [tempting] thoughts.
THE demon of acedia, which is also called the noonday demon [Psalm 90;6], is the most burdensome of all the demons. It besets the monk at about the fourth hour (10 AM) of the mourning, encircling his soul until about the eighth hour (2 PM).
THE thought OF VAINGLORY is especially subtle and it easily infiltrates THOSE WHOSE LIVES ARE GOING WELL, wanting to publish their efforts and go hunting for glory among men.
THE demon of PRIDE conducts the soul to its worst fall. It urges it:
[1] not to admit God’s help
[2] and to believe that the soul is responsible for its own
achievements,
[3] and to disdain the brethren as fools because they do
not all see this about it.
This demon is followed by:
[1] anger and
[2] sadness and the final evil,
[3] utter insanity and madness, and visions of mobs of
demons in the air.
IF we have memories full of passion for certain things, it is because we once welcomed these very things with passion. Whatever things we welcome with passion, these things we will later remember with passion. So, anyone who has defeated the demons which activate such things makes light of the things they activate. The immaterial battle is harder than the material battle.
THE passions of the soul originate from human beings; those of the body [originate] from the body. And while the passions of the body are cut away by self-control, those of the soul [are cut back] by spiritual love.
THE demons that preside over the passions of the soul [i.e. anger] persist obstinately until death; those that preside over the passions of the body withdraw more quickly. And other demons are like the sun that rises and sets, affecting only one part of the soul; but the noonday [demon] (i.e., acedia) generally envelops the whole soul and suffocates the nous. For this reason, the solitary life is sweet after we have emptied out the passions; then our memories are simple, and the struggle is thus not to prepare to fight, but rather to contemplate [the struggle] itself. [Source: Orthodox Heritage]
_________
“Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!”
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Divine and Glorious Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God