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Monasticism
a brief history and landmarks
of monasticism
'The
best way to penetrate Orthodox spirituality
is
to enter it through monasticism'
Paul
Evdokimov, L'Orthodoxie ( Paris 1959)
 The
monastic life first emerged as a definite institution
in Egypt and Syria during the fourth century, and from
there it spread rapidly across Christendom. It is no coincidence
that monasticism ashould have developed immediately after
Constatine's conversion, at the very time when the persecutions
ceased and Christianity became fashionable. The monks
with their austerities were martyrs in an age when martyrdom
of blood no longer existed; they formed the counterbalance
to an established Christendom. People in Byzantine society
were in danger of forgetting that Byzantium was an image
and symbol, not the reality; they ran the risk of identifying
the kingdom of God with an earthly kingdom. The monks
by their withdrawal from society into the desert fulfilled
a prophetic and eschatological ministry in the life of
the Church. They reminded Christians that the kingdom
of God is not of this world.
Monasticism
has taken three chief forms, all of which had appeared
in Egypt by the year 350, and all of which are still to
be found in the Orthodox Church today. There are first
the hermits,
ascetics leading the solitary life in huts and caves,
and even in tombs, among the branches of trees, or on
the tops of pillars. The great model of the eremitic life
is the father of monasticism himself, St Anthony of Egypt
( 251-356 ). Secondly there is community
life, where monks dwell
together under a common rule and in a regularly constituted
monastery. Here the great pioneer was St Pachomius of
Egypt ( 286-346 ), author of a rule later used by St Benedict
in the west.
...
...in Orthodoxy a monk's primary task is the life of
prayer, and it is through this that he serves others.
It is not so much what a monk does that matters,
as what he is.
Finally
there is a form of the monastic life intermediate between
the first two, the semi-eremitic
life, a 'middle way' where
instead of a single highly organized community there is
a loosely knit group of small settlements, each settlement
containing perhaps between two and six members living
together under the guidance of an elder. The great centers
of the semi-eremitic life in Egypt were Nitria and Scetis,
which by the end of the fourth century had produced many
outstanding monks - Ammon the founder of Nitria, Macarius
of Egypt and Macarius of Alexandria, Evagrius of Pontus,
and Arsenius the Great. ( This semi-eremitic system is
found not only in the east but in the far west, in Celtic
Christianity .) From its very beginnings the monastic
life was seen, in both east and west, as a vocation for
women as well as men, and throughout the Byzantine world
there were numerous communities of nuns.
Because
of its monasteries, fourth-century Egypt was regarded
as a second Holy Land, and travellers to Jerusalem felt
their pilgrimage to be incomplete unless it included the
ascetic houses of the Nile. In the fifth and sixth centuries
leadership in the monastic movement shifted to Palestine,
with St Euthymius the Great ( † 473 ) and his disciple
St Sabas ( † 532 ). The monastery founded by St Sabas
in the Jordan valley can claim an unbroken history to
the present day; it was so this community that John of
Damascus belonged. Almost as old is another important
house with an unbroken history to the present, the monastery
of St
Catherine at Mount Sinai, founded by the Emperor Justinian
( reigned 527-65 ). With Palestine and Sinai in Arab hands,
monastic pre-eminence in the Byzantine Empire passed in
the ninth century to the monastery of Stoudios in Constantinople.
St Theodore, who became Abbot here in 799, reactivated
the community and revised its rule, attracting vast numbers
of monks.
Since
the tenth century the chief centre of orthodox monasticism
has been Athos, a rocky peninsula in North Greece jutting
out into the Aegean and culminating at its tip in a peak
6,670 feet high. Known as 'the Holy Mountain', Athos contains
twenty 'ruling' monasteries and a large number os smaller
houses, as well as hermits' cells; the whole peninsula
is given up entirely to monastic settlements, and in the
days of its greatest expansion it is said to have contained
nearly forty thousand monks. The Great Lavra, the oldest
of the twenty ruling monasteries, has by itself produced
26 Patriarchs and more than 144 bishops: this gives some
idea of the importance of Athos in Orthodox history.
There
are no 'Orders' in Orthodox monasticism. In the west a
m onk belongs to the Cartusian, the Cistercian, or some
other Order; in the east he is simply a member of the
one great fellowship which includes all monks and nuns,
although of course he is attached to a particular monastic
house. Western writers simetimes refer to Orthodox monks
as 'Basilian monks' or 'monks of the Basilian Order',
but this is not correct. St Basil is and important figure
in Orthodox monasticism, but he founded no Order, and
although two of his works are known as the Longer
Rules and the Shorter Rules, these
are in no sense comparable to the Rule of
St Benedict.
A
characteristic figure in Orthodox monasticism is the 'elder'
or 'old man' ( Greek gerõn; Russian
starets, plural startsy ). The elder
is a monk of spiritual discernment and wisdom, whom others
- either monks or people in the world - adopt as their
guide and spiritual director. He is sometimes a priest,
but often a lay monk; he receives no special ordination
or appointment to the work of eldership, but is guided
to it by the direct inspiration of the Spirit. A woman
as well as a man may be called to this ministry, for Orthodoxy
has its 'spiritual mothers' as well as its 'spiritual
fathers'. The elder sees in a concrete and practical way
what the will of God is in relation is in relation to
each person who comes to consult him: this is the elder's
special gift or charisma. The earliest and
most celebrated of the monastic startsy
was St Antony himself. The first part of his life, from
eighteen to fifty-five, he spent in withdrawal and solitude;
then, though still living in the desert, he abandoned
his life of strict enclosure, and began to receive visitors.
A group of disciples gathered around him, and besides
these disciples there was a far larger circle of people
who came, often from a long distance, to ask his advice;
so great was the stream of visitors that, as Antony's
biographer Athanasius put it, he became a psysician to
all Egypt. Antony has had many successors, and in most
of them the same outward pattern of events is found -
a withdrawal in order to return. A monk
must first withdraw, and in silence must learn the truth
about himself and God. Then, after this long and rigorous
preparation in solitude, having gained the gifts of discernment
which are required of and elder, he can open the door
of his cell and admit the world from which formerly he
fled.
†Bishop
Kallistos ( Timothy ) Ware, The Orthodox Church
( New York 1983)
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