Spiritual Fatherhood: Evagrius Ponticus on the Role of Spiritual Father by Bunge Gabriel

Author:Bunge, Gabriel [Bunge, Gabriel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Vladimirs Seminary Press
Published: 2018-03-11T16:00:00+00:00

chapter ix

Spiritual Discretion

I f the guidance of others—that is, their “direction to the knowledge of God” and, for the gnostic, also the fulfillment of a divine obligation—is to take place, it must nevertheless occur with the greatest discretion. The teaching must be guided in its content by the measure of the spiritual capacity of the student. We may not commit everything to anyone and everyone at an arbitrary time. Evagrius is particularly strict on this point and rightly insists that we should not make “books like these” (i.e., mainly the Kephalaia Gnostika ) accessible to the immature. 1

Here we are touching on the delicate problem of what is frequently called Evagrian “esotericism.” In my opinion, we should speak rather of pedagogical arcane discipline; in a later chapter we will delve into this question extensively. 2 Here the preceding assessment may suffice to show that such a scaled initiation into the mysteries of revelation was most common in ancient Christianity, since it can be found in the case of Christ himself and of Paul, on whom Evagrius leans most often.

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So, one may not commit everything to anyone and everyone at an arbitrary time. The modern reader often assesses this restraint as merely the sign of a calculating precaution, but according to Gregory of Nazianzus, whom Evagrius invokes as a witness here, it is rather about an essential characteristic of the virtue of justice. “The task of justice is to distribute the meanings (logoi ) in proportion to the worthiness 3 of each, by which it gives something obscure to note to some, or it suggests something else through riddles, but also clearly says something else for the use of the simple.” 4

Evagrius did this also, as he clearly establishes in his trilogy of the Praktikos, Gnostikos, and Kephalaia Gnostika , 5 a fact too seldom considered in modern interpretations of his teaching. It simply runs counter to the scientifically oriented mind to grant that there are things that will elude the grasp of analytical understanding, unless one steps into the footsteps of the fathers 6 and takes the toils of praxis upon oneself.

The discretion demanded by justice must be guided by the worthiness or, as it is also called, the “condition” or spiritual “state” ( katastasis ) of the hearer, as did Paul, on whom Evagrius calls here.

“A clever house servant will rule over dimwitted lords and divide the portions among the brothers”: If “everyone who does sin is the slave of sin,” 7 then everyone who has kept away from vice and rules over the demons through the virtues “rules the foolish lord.” 8 This person will also become a “steward of the mysteries of God” 9 who distributes spiritual knowledge to each of the brothers in proportion to his condition by giving the “Corinthian” “milk” to drink 10 but feeding the “Ephesian” with “solid nourishment” 11 and speaking 12 with him about “height, breadth, length, and depth.” 13

The “measurements” detailed at the end pertain to that “higher teaching concerning the judgment” (of God), which one should conceal before young people and worldly people.

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