Introduction
INTRODUCTION
Who was John Cassian?
There are, unfortunately, many details about the life of John Cassian that are lost to us—such as the precise dates of his birth and death (reckoned to be c. 360-435)—and a few other claims that cannot be settled decisively such as his place of birth (with Dobrujea in Romania and Marseilles as the chief contenders for the honour of claiming him).1 What is generally agreed is that Cassian together with Germanus, his travelling-companion and (as it were) spokesman, spent a considerable amount of time in the company of the monks of Lower Egypt in the last decade of the fourth century; it is also widely accepted that Cassian was, if not bilingual in Latin and Greek, then at least certainly proficient in Greek. This unusual experience and linguistic proficiency enabled Cassian to play an important role in the transmission of the culture of Egyptian monasticism into the early medieval west.2
One of the reasons why these points are subject to controversy is because scholars have recently reacted against an earlier approach to Cassian, whereby Cassian’s writings tended to be taken as authoritative, historical claims about Egyptian monasticism. More will need to be said about that in due course, but for the moment it is as well to say that for centuries Cassian has been valued first and foremost for his two major monastic writings, the Institutes and the Conferences; the works here translated are taken from the first section (out of three) of Cassian’s Conferences. In the Institutes, Cassian set out his programme for monastic renewal in Gaul so as to bring local customs in line with the practices of the pre-eminent monks, the Fathers of the Egyptian Desert. In the Conferences, Cassian directed his attention chiefly to the inner significance of those practices and in that way came to dedicate much of his energy to describing the theology of the desert saints.
As western Christians were increasingly cut off from Egypt, Cassian’s books filled the gap. An anecdote from the Life of Fulgentius of Ruspe makes this clear: Eulalius, Bishop of Syracuse, encouraged Fulgentius (468-533) to read the Conferences when he announced to Eulalius his intention of going on a pilgrimage to Egypt; the Conferences were actually much sounder, according to the bishop, because the Egyptians were now non-Chalcedonian heretics!3 Clearly, Cassian’s works within a few decades of his death had already attained to a level of recognition that would undoubtedly have gratified him, even if in some instances this meant he was sharply criticised.4 It seems highly probable that, in his time and for generations thereafter, Cassian was regarded as the foremost Latin interpreter of the Desert Fathers.
Cassian’s tradition
Here it needs to be said that, contrary to the perspective of some critics,5 Cassian never claimed to present a ‘history’ of monasticism, nor indeed did he offer a dispassionate account of the fathers of the Egyptian desert. Rather, Cassian’s avowed purpose was to modify the rules and instructions of the Egyptian and Palestinian monks for the benefit of his readers in Gaul.6 In other words, Cassian’s presentation is anything but disinterested. For example, in Conference 10, Cassian is keen to denounce any concept of God that is anthropomorphic. His vivid description of the plight of Abba Serapion is justly famous, but it must not escape our notice that Cassian is not observing any of the proprieties that one might expect of a modern historiographer; specifically, he completely omits to mention that the view which he is championing and which Archbishop Theophilus propounded in his festal letter suffered a devastating blow when Theophilus subsequently rounded on the so-called ‘intellectuals’ (like Cassian, Abba Isaac and the otherwise unknown Deacon Photinus) and drove most of them out of Egypt.7 Cassian has come in for criticism for failing to mention that historically significant sequel to the event. But such criticism flies wide of the mark, because Cassian’s goal is not to relate a sequence of events; it is not even to report the very words of the abbas.8 Cassian’s writings are accordingly partisan and fully engaged. By them, he aims to foster a particular mindset and, sometimes, to eliminate competing views.
It is not insignificant that one of Cassian’s favoured words is traditio (‘tradition’), including its verbal forms, since Cassian’s primary goal is to ‘tradition’, that is, to hand down, the teachings and instructions from Egypt in a way that is topical and appropriate some three decades later. For precisely this reason, it is important for modern readers with a special concern for the history of Egyptian monasticism to be critical in their reading of Cassian; but then, that is always good practice. If we are respectful of Cassian’s intentions, we will be less likely to fault him for failing to deliver an ‘unedited’ account (which, at the risk of being repetitive, he never promised to do in any case) and more receptive to the works as a vehicle for propagating a view of monasticism—and indeed of Christianity—that stands in continuity with the message of the school of thought that is broadly represented amongst the abbas of the Egyptian desert.9 For our purposes, two of the abbas are particularly important, albeit for different reasons: Isaac and Evagrius.
Abba Isaac and Abba Evagrius
Abba Isaac is the main speaker in both of the conferences here translated. Unlike some of Cassian’s interlocutors, Isaac is otherwise known to us as the ‘priest of Kellia’ (or, ‘the Cells’).10 Even though the two conferences that are translated below are far and away the longest reports of Isaac’s teaching, it is probable that their account is accurate in its essentials. We are able to conclude this on the strength of other ancient testimonies that situate Isaac within a network of articulate monks who promoted a spiritual interpretation of Scripture the roots of which even in Cassian’s day were already sunk deep in Egyptian history.11 Isaac was the disciple of Cronius (who was himself reportedly a disciple of Anthony the Great) and his successor as priest at Kellia; he is cited a dozen times in the alphabetic collection of the Sayings of the Desert Fathers; he was renowned for his learning and his hospitality; but, like many others, he was eventually driven from Egypt in his old age by Theophilus. All of these indications point to Isaac’s connections with those abbas whose spiritual pursuits have resulted in their sometimes being characterised as ‘intellectuals’ or ‘allegorists’ (which is evidently an even worse thing in the eyes of the critics). Because one of the most prominent Christian proponents of this approach was Origen of Alexandria, Isaac and others of his generation are sometimes referred as ‘Origenists’—but this practice is probably best avoided for four reasons. First, Origen for all his greatness was hardly the originator of this approach; certainly Philo of Alexandria had already prepared the way for him. Second, the term appears to originate as a term of abuse applied in a time of controversy, in which respect it can be compared to its counterpart, ‘Anthropomorphites’: Isaac would no more have called himself an ‘Origenist’ than Serapion would have called himself an ‘Anthropomorphite’. Third, Origen’s influence on subsequent generations of Greek Christians was so widespread and variegated that it does not clarify matters at all to use his name in this way. Fourth, much of what is conventionally assumed to have been ‘Origenism’ cannot be securely dated earlier than the sixth century, when there erupted a second crisis in which Origen’s name was unmistakably reduced to a term of abuse.12 So we do well to forego that unhelpful term.
The second abba who will figure prominently in what follows is Evagrius. Born in Ibora, Pontus (and therefore often called Evagrius of Pontus or, to use the Latin form, Ponticus) around 345, Evagrius eventually made his way to the Egyptian desert, c. 382, where he was apprentice to both Macarius the Great and Macarius the Alexandrian. He appears to have died there in 399. According to Palladius, the author of the Lausiac History, Evagrius in time had a circle of his own followers. Palladius was himself a member of that circle and was influenced by Evagrius’ thinking, even in writing his Lausiac History.13 It is altogether likely that Cassian was also a disciple of Evagrius. This claim, first advanced systematically by the Benedictine scholar Salvatore Marsili, is based upon the literary dependence of some of Cassian’s writings upon Evagrius’ works.14 Scholars have adopted Marsili’s findings but, in some cases, extended them well beyond the support of solid evidence.15 In fact, it may be imprudent to make too many assumptions about the nature of Evagrius’ influence upon Cassian; certainly, there remains much work to be done on that front. What can be said with confidence, however, is that Evagrius’ writings (which are very numerous) frequently provide valuable and illuminating points of comparison with Cassian’s writings. Because Evagrius (like Isaac) is connected to several prominent abbas and his teaching is parallel to theirs in a number of instances,16 it will be convenient for us to look at various pointers to Evagrius’ writings for corroboration of the traditional teaching on prayer advanced in these two brief works.
Ceaseless prayer, imageless prayer
Much could be said about the teaching of prayer that is characteristic of this tradition. Abba Isaac’s discussions embrace the four generic types of prayer, the place of tears and compunction in praying, an exegesis of the Lord’s Prayer, the instability of one’s thoughts and how to overcome it in prayer, the usefulness of formulaic prayer, and other topics. But it would perhaps be presumptuous to say much here since the translator’s chief aim is that the source material should be read. Even so, it might not be amiss to comment briefly on the great emphasis on unceasing prayer and its practical corollary, imageless prayer.
The teaching on ceaseless prayer expounded in these conferences is motivated not least by a sense that St Paul did not idly enjoin Christians to ‘pray without ceasing’ (I Thess. 5: 17); monks, such as the intrepid Germanus and Cassian, would presumably be in an enviable position to satisfy this requirement, so it is unsurprising to find that verse recurring in their conversations with Isaac. His teaching is simple in essence, if rather more challenging in application: Isaac encourages them to inculcate the habit of constantly responding prayerfully to all circumstances. To promote the successful implementation of this advice, Isaac recommends an all-purpose verse (Ps 69: 2: ‘O God, come unto my aid; O Lord, hasten to help me’), thereby eliminating the need to cast about for the right response in a given situation. Ultimately, one’s conscious mind (and, to judge from scattered references to dreaming in Cassian’s writings, even one’s subconscious mind) will be altered by this experience: in all things, one will be aware of God and act accordingly. Yet this is not to say that Cassian was promoting self-conscious religiosity; on the contrary, he reports Isaac’s citation of an otherwise unknown comment by Anthony the Great: ‘It is not a true prayer when the monk knows himself, or the very thing that he prays’. Through observing Isaac’s teaching, one is suffused by a radical sense of God’s nearness. We can appreciate the extent of the transformation that Isaac’s teaching entails from the following passage:
So it shall be, when our every love, desire, eagerness, effort and thought, all that we live, speak, breathe will be God. And that unity which is now the Father’s with the Son and the Son’s with the Father will have transfused our perception and mind, that is, so that just as with a sincere and pure and indissoluble love He loves us, we too will be joined to Him by perpetual and inseparable delight, so linked to Him, to be sure, that whatever we breathe, understand, say would be God.
Such are the fruits of ceaseless prayer. But it is worth considering that this goal is unattainable without taking quite seriously Isaac’s categorical denunciation of anthropomorphic tendencies in one’s prayer. Although Cassian devotes a significant portion of the tenth conference to a pitiless description of Abba Serapion’s fall into despair, he does not say much about the theoretical considerations that inform Serapion’s pernicious mistake. In point of fact, he also says very little about the underlying principles of Isaac’s teaching. What he does say, however, by way of reporting Photinus’ teaching, makes it quite clear why Serapion was mistaken: ‘nothing of the sort could befall that infinite, incomprehensible and invisible majesty with the result that it could be encompassed in a human shape and likeness (since that which is by nature incorporeal, uncompounded and simple cannot be conceived by the mind any more than it can be detected by the eyes)’. The adjectives piled on here, ‘incorporeal’, ‘uncompounded’ and ‘simple’, all refer to the divine nature, rather than to one of the persons of the Trinity—a point that is reinforced by Cassian’s use of terms like ‘Godhead’ (Latin: numen) in this passage.
By aligning himself with this criticism of anthropomorphism, Cassian is strictly criticising a mistake about conceiving of the divine nature; he is in no sense commenting upon the divine persons. Consequently, Christ is not being discussed here and therefore meditating upon Christ is not precluded by Cassian’s position. Maintaining a proper distinction between the nature of God and the divine persons enables Cassian to criticise Serapion and simultaneously to talk about Christ in an orthodox manner as a divine person ‘encompassed in a human shape and likeness’. By contrast, since Serapion has formed a habit of envisaging a figure of the Godhead to hold on to whilst praying, he has a fundamentally bankrupt view of what God is and therefore he has eliminated the possibility of understanding God in an orthodox way. Because Cassian’s teaching depends upon a close integration of right belief and sound practice, an error as basic as Serapion’s (regardless of how understandable it might be) is simply unacceptable.
Cassian does not articulate his position further, but it is certainly consistent with what we have here to suppose that the insurmountable problem with Serapion’s ill-considered piety is precisely that it encourages thinking of the divine nature as being corporeal and therefore compounded of elements. In other words, Serapion’s style of devotion substitutes a thing and addresses prayer to that thing in the place of God. By failing in this way to engage with God in prayer, it removes the possibility of cultivating a relationship with God that permeates the whole of one’s being along the lines described earlier. It is only through rejecting any images of the Godhead (that is, only through imageless prayer) that we can by prayer be so joined to God that everything we do would be God.17
Other translations
These two conferences have been translated into English several times. The earliest modern translation is Edgar Gibson’s in volume 11 of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series (Oxford: Parker, 1894; subsequently reprinted by T & T Clark of Edinburgh and Wm. Eerdmans of Grand Rapids, MI). Owen Chadwick included these conferences, with a few others, in Western Asceticism, a volume of texts in translation that he edited for the Library of Christian Classics (London: SCM, 1958). Similarly, Colm Luibhéid presented these two conferences amongst others in his volume John Cassian: Conferences for the Classics of Western Spirituality series (New York: Paulist Press, 1985). Most recently, Boniface Ramsey’s contribution to the Ancient Christian Writers series, John Cassian: The Conferences (New York: Paulist Press, 1997) features these Conferences—along with all the other twenty-two conferences (thus making it the first complete English translation). I regret that Luibhéid’s translation was not available to me in preparing this one; as for the others, Gibson’s and Ramsey’s cleave closely to the Latin. Gibson’s is such a faithful representation of the Latin that the tortuous structure of Cassian’s typically long periods is retained; Ramsey rather sensibly opted to divide some of the lengthiest sentences to make for more intelligible English, and I have done likewise. Ramsey also provides extensive annotation, to which the keen reader is referred. My debt to him in this respect is considerable. Chadwick’s translation is probably the best English version available (apart from his decision to include some of Cassian’s asides as footnotes and to insert his own footnotes without distinguishing between the two kinds), but its elegance sometimes obscures the underlying Latin and it seems desirable to produce a translation here that will be readable and at the same time a useful support to those who would undertake to read Cassian’s Latin (which is eminently worth doing).
Comparable to Chadwick’s excellent English translation is the French translation by Eugene Pichery that faces his edition of the Latin text in Sources chrétiennes volumes 42, 54 and 64 (Paris: Cerf, 1955-59), though the notes are very sparse. Likewise, Alfons Kemmer has produced a sturdy German translation of extracts from these Conferences and others, Johannes Cassianus. Weisheit der Wüste (Einsiedlen: Benziger, 1947), though his notes are in no sense comprehensive. For a continental translation that features notes to rival Ramsey’s (or indeed Gibson’s), we can but be grateful to Mario Degli Innocenti, whose admirable little book Giovanni Cassiano. Abba, cos’è la preghiera? (Magnano: Qiqajon, 2000) has proved extremely useful to me.
The critical work of Michael Petschenig in the Corpus scriptorium ecclesiasticorum latinorum, volume 13 (Vienna: Gerold, 1866), is the basis of all modern editions of Cassian. Pichery’s edition made some improvements, which were taken up in the recent second edition of Petschenig’s text (CSEL 13, editio altera [Vienna: Verlag der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2004]). That edition, which is the work of Gottfried Kreuz, also incorporated numerous references to Evagrius, Basil the Great and other Greek authors. Those references consolidated and advanced upon research into Cassian since Salvatore Marsili’s landmark study, Giovanni Cassiano ed Evagrio Pontico (Rome: Sant’ Anselmo, 1936) and is by that standard alone tremendously valuable. I have based this translation on that text.