Conference Fifteen
Conference Fifteen
THE GIFTS OF GOD
/ After the evening meal we sat on the mats, as monks do, and we waited for the discussion which had been promised us. Out of deference to the old man we remained silent for a while. Then he interrupted our respectful silence with the following words.
" Fhe direction taken by our earlier discussion has brought us now to the need to state the nature of spiritual gifts, and the tradition of our elders, as we know, tells us that this takes a threefold form.
"The first cause of the gift of healing is the merit earned by holiness. 1 he grace of \v orking miracles is to be found among specially chosen and just men.
It is quite evident that the apostles and many saints worked miracles and wonders. 1 his was in accordance w ith w hat the Ivord Himself had commanded when He said, 'Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, expel the demons. You have freely received.
Give freely.' (Mt 10:8) Second, for the edification of the church or of those who bring forward their ow n patients or of those w ho have to be healed, the virtue of healing comes even from sinners and from the unworthy. Of such people the Savior had this to say in the gospel; 'They w ill say to me on that day; Hird, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and did we not drive out devils in your name, and did we not do many wonders in your name? And I w ill say out loud to them, 1 do not know' you. Leave me, you workers of iniquity' (Mt 7:22-23). But by contrast, if faith is lacking in those who bring forward the sick, then it w ill not be permitted, even to those w ith the gift of healing, to w ork a cure. The evangelist Luke had this to say: 'And Jesus could not work miracles among them because of their unbelief (Mk 6:5-6 [this is not in Luke]).
It was
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at this time that the Lord said: 'There were many lepers in Israel in the days of Elisaeus the prophet and no one of them was cured except Neman the Syrian' (Lk 4:27).
"The third kind of healing is a trick and deception worked by demons. A man caught up in obvious wrongdoing is an object of admiration because of the wonders worked by him. He acquires the reputation of being a holy man and a servant of God and he becomes, for evil spirits, the means of enticing others to imitate him even to the extent of doing wrong like him. The way is now open for scandal and even the sanctity of religion is maligned. And it is quite certainly the case that this man who credits himself with the gift of healing is brought crashing down all the harder because of the pride in his heart.
"The demons have also the following trick. They cry out the names of those whom they know to have none of the merits of holiness and to possess none of the fruits of the spirit. They pretend to be burnt up by the merits of such people and to take flight from the bodies of the possessed. Deuteronomy has this to say about such persons:
'If a prophet should arise among you or a man claiming visionary dreams, and if he foretells a sign and a portent, and if what he says should actually happen, and if he should say to you, "Let us go and follow strange gods w ho are unknown to you and let us serve them," do not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. For the Lord your God is putting you to the test, bringing out into the open whether or not you love him w ith all your heart and with all your soul' (Dt 13:1-3). And in the gospel he says this: 'Fake Christs and fake prophets w ill rise up and they w ill perform great signs and wonders so that if possible even the chosen will be led into error' (Mt 24:24).
"Therefore w e must never be admirers of those who pretend to do such things out of virtuousness. We must note, instead, w hether they have become perfect as a result of driving out their sins and because of the improvement of their way of life. This is something that is certainly not achieved through the act of faith of someone else or for reasons that are obscure to us.
It happens because of a man's ow n zeal and the divine gift of grace.
"Such, then, is the practical know ledge w hich is otherw ise called 'charity' by the apostle and which, on his apostolic authority, is to be preferred to all the speech of men and angels, to the full faith which can even move mountains, to all knowledge and prophetic power, to the
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utter abandonment of the things of the world, and, finally, even to glorious martyrdom. He listed all the types of charismatie gifts and had this to say; 'To one man the Spirit grants wisdom in preaching, to another know ledgeable discourse, to another faith, to another the gift of healing, toanothcr the working of cures' (1 (-or 1 2:8-10) and all the rest, but he will go on to speak of lov e, and notice how he put this before all the charisms:
'1 w ill show' you a w ay that is better than any of them' (1 Cor 12:31).
"In this w ay it is clearly show n that the high point of perfection and blessedness does not lie in the working of those miracles but rather in the purity of love. And not w ithout good reason. The former have to vanish and to be done away with. But love will endure forever.
1 lence w e never see the Fathers caught up in these wonderworkings.
By the grace of the Holy Spirit they w ere possessors of such capacities but they never wanted to use them unless they were coerced by utter, unavoidable necessity. i "Such was the situation when, as I remember it, abba Macarius, the first of those dwelling in Scete, raised someone from the dead.
" fhere w as a certain heretic who was a follower of the Eunomian deception and w ho tried by means of dialectical skills to undermine the purity of the Catholic faith. He deceiv ed a great number of men, so that many Catholics, w ho w ere deeply upset by the extent of the disaster, asked the blessed xMacarius to rescue the simple faith of the whole of Egypt from the shipw reck of infidelity. He came. He was set upon by the dialectical skill of the heretic w ho tried to draw' him unknow ingly onto the thorns of Aristotle. But w ith the brevity of an apostle, the ' "The kingdom of Ciod does not lie in talk but in virtuous activ ity"
(1 Cor blessed Macarius brought the long-draw n-out talk to an end:
4:20). Let us go to w here the dead are buried and let us utter the name of the Lord over the very first corpse we find and, as it is written, let us show' our faith by what we do. Here will be the clearest evidence of true faith. Empty argument will not manifest the truth but rather the miraculous power and decision of the One who cannot be deceived.'
"When the heretic heard this he was embarrassed in front of the whole crowd and therefore he pretended to agree w ith the proposed plan. He promised to be there 'tomorrow .' And on the next day everyone was waiting. They poured out toward the agreed place and they
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w ere full of eagerness for the sight that w ould be seen. But, know ing his ow n lack of faith, the heretic was frightened. He fled and immediately left Egypt.
"Macarius w aited for him amid the crowd until the ninth hour and then saw that the other man, stricken with a bad conscience, had avoided the event, and so he took command of the crow d which had been corrupted by the heretic, and he led the way to the graves w hich had been chosen.
"Now in Egypt the overflow of the river Nile sw eeps along in such a w ay that for no little part of the year the land is covered along its entire length by the invasion of the w aters and it is like a huge sea. No one can get about except by traveling on small, fast-moving boats, and the bodies of the dead, preserved in sw eet-smelling ointments, are kept in small cells on higher ground. I'he earth, because it is continually dampened, hinders the task of burial.
If it were dug to receive corpses it would be forced to disgorge them because of the excesses of the flooding.
"Blessed Macarius came to a halt beside a very old corpse, and this is what he said to him; 'O man, if that son of perdition, that heretic, had come along here w ith me, and if 1 called upon the name of Christ my Ciod, tell me if you w ould have risen before all these people w ho were close to being undermined by his deceit.' Then the dead man rose up and answ ered that he w ould most certainly have arisen. Abba Macarius asked him w hat he had been in the past when he had tasted this life, what era of man he had belonged to, and w hether in those days he had know n the name of Christ.
I he other replied that he had lived in the oldest period of the kings and that at that time he had never heard the name of Christ. And abba Macarius said to him, 'Sleep in peace until the final day, when you and those of your class will be raised up by Christ.'
"So far as he w as concerned, this pow er and this grace would probably have alw ays been hidden if the urgent need of a whole endangered province and if his own abundant devotion to Christ and his real love had not driven him to work this miracle.
I le certainly did not do it out of vain ostentation.
\\ hat dragged it out of him w as his love of (Trist and the need of all the people.
"A reading of the Book of Kings show s that blessed Elias did the same. He called fire from heaven dow n onto the sacrificial victims on the pyre so that he might set free the faith of an entire people, a faith endangered by the deceits of fake prophets.
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"Do I need to remind you of the accomplishments of abba Abraham? Abraham the Innocent they called him, because of the artlessness of his character and his simplicity.
"At the season of Pentecost he emerged from the desert and went to Egypt to do some farming. A woman tearfully begged him for help.
She carried her little child in her arms. Ehe child was wasted away and half dead because she had no milk. Abba Abraham gave her a glass of \\ ater to drink, one on which he had made the sign of the cross. As soon as she had finished her drink, her dried breasts filled up with milk and flowed abundantly.
"The same man w ent to a town, and was surrounded by a crowd of people w ho made fun of him. As they heaped ridicule upon him, they pointed out to him a man with a constricted knee w ho, for many years, had been unable to walk and who slunk around w ith his old malady.
Ehey tried to tempt him. 'Prove to us, abba Abraham, that you are a servant of God. Restore this man to his former healthy state so that we may come to believe that this name of Christ, whom you w orship, is not an empty one.' Immediately he called upon the name of Christ and he bent over, took hold of the dry foot of the man, and pulled. At the moment of his touch, the dry and twisted knee was straightened. The man recovered the use of his limbs, w hich his long malady had consigned to oblivion, and he joyfully went away.
"I'hese men did not make selfish use of the pow er to work such miracles. 1 hey proclaimed that these had been done not through any merit of their ow n but by the Lord's mercy. Paced w ith the aw e evoked by these wonders they resorted to the words of the apostles in order to ward off glory among men: 'Men, brothers, why are you amazed at this? Or w hy do you keep looking at us, as if it were our power and our piety which caused this man to walk?' (Acts 3:12). They believed that no one should draw' praise upon himself because of the gifts and the miracles of Ciod. Instead, praise should be given for the fruits of a man's virtue since these came into being from the zeal of a mind and the excellence of achievements.
"But as w as already said, it often happens that men of corrupt dis-
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position and spurious faith can drive out demons in God's name and w ork the very greatest miracles. The apostle once complained about the like: 'Master, we saw a man driving out demons in your name. We told him not to do so, because he does not go around with us' (Lk 9:49).
Christ was immediately able to say to them: 'Do not stop him. Anyone who is not against us is on our side' (Lk 9:50). However there are those w ho at the end of time w ill say, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, did we not w ork great w onders in vour name?' (Mt 7:22).
And I le says that this is w hat He will say in reply:
'I never knew' you.
Go aw ay from me, you w orkers of evil' (Mt 7:23). In this w ay He gives a w arning to those to w horn, as a rew ard for holiness. He had given this glory of working signs and miracles: 'Do not be exultant because demons have submitted to vou. Rather be delighted because vour names are w ritten in heaven' (Lk 10:20).
"Then the Author of all signs and miracles called upon His disciples to be guided by I lis teaching. He made abundantly clear what His true and verv special follow ers should learn from I lim. 'Come,' he said, 'and learn from me' (Mt
1 :28-29) not to drive out demons bv means of heavenly power, not to cleanse lepers, not to give light to the blind, not to raise the dead.
I do all this through the agency of certain of my servants. Humankind cannot be included in the praises which belong to (lod.
Ehe agent and the servant cannot take a portion of the glory belonging solelv to God. This, He said, is something for you, to 'learn from me because I am meek and humble of heart' (Mt 1 1:29).
"This is something which is capable of being learned and practiced bv all. The working of signs and miracles is not always necessary nor useful to evervone nor granted to everyone.
I lumility, therefore, is the teacher of all the virtues. It is the surest foundation for a heavenly building.
It is the personal and splendid gift of the Savior.
It achieves all the miracles w hich Christ worked and does so without risk of vanity.
It is a disciple of the gentle D)rd by virtue not of astounding miracles but bv the pov\ er of its patience and low liness. A man may w ish to control unclean spirits or to grant the gift of health to the sick or to do some astounding deed before the populace, and in his display he may call upon the name of Christ, and yet he is a stranger to Christ because his proud heart is no follower of the teacher of humility.
"W hen He was about to return to the Father, (Trist left His disciples something of a testament.
'I give you a new' command,'
I le said.
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'to love one another as I have loved you' (|n 13:34). And straightaway he added: 'Kvervone will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another' (jn 1 3:35).
I le did not say 'if you work signs and wonders like me' but rather 'if you have love for one another,' something w hich can quite definitely not be done except by the meek and the humble.
"For this reason our predecessors alw ays held that monks were neither good nor free of vainglory if they proclaimed before men that they w ere exorcists and if, filled w ith assertive pride, they proclaimed to admiring crow ds that they had this gift, w hich they had either earned or had grabbed. All of this would be empty, 'The man who depends on lies feeds the w inds. He runs after birds which fly away' (Prv
10:4).
.\nd w ithout doubt there w ill happen to him what is affirmed in Proverbs: 'Just as the w inds and the clouds and the rainfall are plain to see, so too arc those w ho make boasts about a false gift' (Prv 25:14).
"So, then, if someone w orks one of these wonders in our presence he should be praised by us not because of our amazement at his miracles but because of the goodness of his life. What we have to ask is not w hether demons yield to him but whether he possesses the elements of love described by the apostle (cf.
1 Cor 13:4f0.
"Actually, the greater miracle is to root out the tinder of luxury from one's flesh rather than to drive unclean spirits from the bodies of others. A more resplendent wonder is the restraint exercised over the w ild stirrings of anger by the virtue of patience, rather than the capacity to hold sway over the creatures of the air. iVluch more important is the exclusion of ravening gloom from one's heart than the ability to drive out the sicknesses and the bodily fevers of someone else. Lastly, it is in many wavs more remarkable and more sublime virtue to be able to heal the w eaknesses of one's own soul rather than the failings of another's body.
Fhe more exalted the soul is by comparison with the body, the more its salvation is to be preferred; the more valuable and excellent its substance, the graver and more deadly its ruin.
"4 his is w hat is said to the most blessed apostles concerning bodily cures: 'Do not rejoice because demons submit to you' (Lk 10:20).
It w as the invoked name w hich achieved this and not the power of the apostles.
Fherefore they are w arned not to dare to lay claim to blessedness
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or glory because of what is done through the pow er and the virtue of God, but rather to make such a claim because the deep purity of their lives and hearts has earned them the right to have their names written in heaven.
"1 must prove what I have been saying by means of the witness of the ancients and the oracles of God.
"Here is what the blessed Paphnutius thought about the amazement evoked by signs or about the grace of purity. (And, in particular, there was the knowledge he had acquired by an angel's revelation.)
Fhese were his words and his experiences.
"For many years he lived in great austeritv and he came to believe that he was completely free of the snares of cupidity. He had fought for a long time against all the open attacks of the demons and he felt that he had risen above their onslaughts. Some holy men came along.
While he was making a dish of lentils for them—the lentils called athera—a flame from the oven burned his hand. He was greatly upset by what happened. He began to think as follows: 'Why,' he said,
'is the fire not at peace with me.^ I lave I not won more serious battles, those with the demons? On the day of judgment when the inexhaustible fire, which tests the merits of everyone, shall enter into me, will it not burn me up if even this worldly and small fire will not spare me?'
"Tossed about by these unhappy thoughts, he was suddenly overcome by sleep, and an angel of the Lord appeared to him. 'Why are you sad, Paphnutius,' he said.
'Is it because this earthly fire is not at peace with you? There still linger in your body the urgings of the flesh, fhey have not yet been cleared out, and as long as their roots remain alive in your marrow they will not allow this worldly flame to be at peace with you. You will not cease to be open to its onslaught until the day when, by the very sign it gives you, you will find that all the urges within you are dead. Go. Find a young girl who is naked and very beautiful, l ake hold of her, and if you find that your peace of heart remains untroubled and that the surges of the flesh remain calm, then indeed will the touch of this visible flame be gentle and unharming, as happened to the three children in the Babylonian furnace.'
"The old man was deeply affected by this revelation and he had no wish to try the experiment suggested to him by (jod.
Instead he scrutinized his own conscience. He examined the purity of his heart, and he came to the conclusion that his chastity was not yet strong
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enough tor such a test.
'It is no uonder,' he said, 'that when I saw the unclean spirits falling back before me I \\ as not alert to the hostile burning fire \\ hich
I had thought of as being much less terrible than the cruel onslaughts of the demons.
It is a higher virtue and a more sublime grace to extinguish the cupidity w ithin one's own flesh than, with the sign of the Ooss and by the pow er of the Most High, to subjugate evil spirits w hose attack comes from outside and to drive the devils from the bodies of the possessed by calling upon the name of God.' "
Here abba Nesteros ended his discussion of the true working of miracles. And all the time that he w as teaching us he escorted us to the cell of the old man Joseph, a distance of some six miles.