The Ascetical Homilies of St. Isaac the Syrian - Homily III, Part II

Orthodoxy and Orthopraxis (right belief and right practice) are intimately tied together. All of the fathers and, in particular, Saint Isaac the Syrian want us to understand that our perception of revelation, who God is to us and what we have become in his Son through the Paschal mystery, and how we live our life are inseparable. God has revealed himself to us in a unique and distinctive fashion, and has made known to us our dignity and destiny in Christ. Therefore, having a clear understanding of our human nature, the sickness of sin and the passions that follow and the healing that takes place through Grace is imperative.

Isaac pushes us to understand that virtue is the natural health of the soul and the passions are an illness of the soul that follow and invade our nature and despoil its proper health. One can see how essential this is when looking at our life in this world and the struggles of the spiritual life. We can attribute sin and the hold that passions have upon us simply to human nature. However, when we do this, we lose sight of the fact that we have been created in the image and likeness of God and that sin is antecedent to that reality. We have been created for love and to manifest this love through virtue.

A faulty or incomplete understanding of human anthropology and psychology, has often been the pretext that the Evil One uses to distort our vision to the point that we willingly embrace that which enslaves us.  To understand that we have been created good, conversely, establishes a firm desire within the human heart for that which is of God. It also establishes confidence and hope in the grace of God who tells us precisely that he has come not to judge the world but to save it! 

One of the beautiful things that the desert fathers would have us understand is that Christ is the divine physician who has come to heal us. He is the Good Samaritan from the gospel who takes our burden upon himself in order that we might be nursed to the fullness of health.  Again, if Isaac makes us work to understand this, we must see it as a labor of love. To grasp these truths allows us to give free expression to our desire for God and to run towards Him with the freedom of those aided by His Grace.

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Text of chat during the group:

00:01:52 Fr. Charbel Abernethy: Page 128 paragraph 6

00:10:40 Anthony: I just read that there is a "Holy Transfiguration East" in Burnsville, NC.

00:11:43 Anthony: Gotcha thanks

00:26:20 Joshua Sander: I've missed the last couple of weeks, and so you may have already explained this, but when Isaac uses the term "passions," what exactly does he mean? I've heard the term used roughly in the sense of "emotions" (i.e. anger, sadness, etc.), but does Isaac mean it more in the sense of "temptations"? I think you may have just explained this now, but in that case, could you briefly restate this?

00:30:04 Suzanne Romano: Does Isaac distinguish between original nature and fallen nature?

00:33:15 David: I found this helpful from Fr. Maximos- So, we have five stages in the evolution of a logismos,” he concluded, spreading out the five fingers of his right hand. “Assault, interaction, consent, captivity/defeat, and passion/obsession. These are more or less all the stages. While they use the same word in translation it helped me to realize the different stages in context.

00:37:23 Myles Davidson: Reacted to "I found this helpful..." with 👍

00:37:39 Julie: Reacted to "I found this helpful…" with 👍

00:45:53 wayne: late to evening..what page?

00:46:03 Ben: Replying to "late to evening..wha..."

130

00:46:04 Catherine Opie: 130

00:46:08 Catherine Opie: Top

00:46:20 wayne: thnx

00:58:59 Anthony: I'm reading Fr John Custer's book on the Epistles.  He is a priest in Eparchy of Passaic. His description of St Paul in Romans (what I would do, I do not...) is like Isaac here about natural virtue vs foreign passions.

00:59:09 Eleana: I believe Mary was made to give to the divine  flesh, and to the flesh to become divine; to break the passion's hold since men's desire is not enough. Nicodemus asked how we born again? Our Lady!

01:01:02 Ren Witter: Going to throw this out there for anyone who is as confused as I am 🤣. Is Isaac saying that, though the Passions are not natural, they are given to us by God? Even though they are a sickness?

01:03:43 Ren Witter: What would be an example of one of the passions of the soul, given to us for our benefit, by God?

01:09:07 Catherine Opie: Sorry cant raise hand. So Fr., it is like this? For example: We have hunger to tell us we need to eat. This is a natural bodily desire that is beneficial. However, the soul needs to be in control of this and able to acknowledge this desire to eat and allay it to the appropriate time to do this, also to have faith and trust in that food will be provided so there is no need to panic about it, i.e. fear of starvation leading us to grab the food, eat more food than is necessary, steal the food or even attack someone else to desperately obtain food to quiet the fear of hunger? Otherwise we are driven by base bodily functions and raw passions? Therefore we learn to practice the virtue of temperance.

01:15:14 Jeffrey Ott: My family and I are getting chrismated this Sunday at our Ukranian church here in Oregon. Please pray for us!

01:15:16 Catherine Opie: Amen. Deo gratiats

01:15:24 Rebecca Thérèse: Thank you☺️

01:15:25 David: Thank you Father may God bless you!

01:15:28 Jeffrey Ott: Thank you Father!

01:15:29 Catherine Opie: Reacted to "Thank you Father!" with ❤️