Hesychios the Priest on the Nous

So we can speak of the blindness and inability of the nous to see things clearly.  And when our nous is darkened, we do not have a pure and open passage to our neighbor.  Everything is defiled and darkened, with terrible and upsetting consequences for our life.  Just as clouds hide the sun, so evil thoughts bring shadows to the mind and ruin it.  Our nous is darkened and remains unproductive either when we speak words of worldly import or, entertaining such words in our mind, we associate with them, or when our body involves itself with the nous in sensory things. Then we immediately lose our fervor, compunction, intimacy with God and spiritual knowledge. Therefore “so long as we concentrate our attention on the nous, we are enlightened; but when we are not attentive to it we are in darkness” [Hesychios the Priest, The Philokalia, Vol. 1, p. 184].

Metropolitan of Nafpaktos Hierotheos, Orthodox Psychotherapy, p. 135.

Shocked Reactions

I’m reading a book outside of my religious paradigm, and more than half-way through, it dawned on me that I should write some of my reactions down, which I decided to start today.  Don’t you just love run-on sentences?

Here’s the first “note”:

In the Protestant Church, it is true that a pastor is “only as good as his last sermon.” It always made me wonder, as a former protestant, what they do in their off hours (when they’re not giving sermons).  Maybe some counseling here and there – but not much – isn’t that what “Christian counselors” are for? Maybe some administrative duties. But it seems as though there’s nothing for a pastor to do but make his next sermon.  It’s all about teaching, learning, intellectualizing.  I didn’t realize or necessarily have a problem with this when I was a protestant, but during my searching and conversion to Orthodoxy, it was wonderful to not have my value placed on how well I could do intellectually, but in what place my heart was.  (Note that I am not perfect, or even try to be some days.)

However, in the Orthodox Church, the real admiration for a priest comes from who he is as a person. We interact more deeply with a priest (than I ever did with a protestant pastor – and sometimes it wasn’t even for a lack of my trying). We have Confession, where we offer our sins and brokenness to God in the presence of a priest, and he gives encouragement and council.  Granted, there are few who take advantage of this sacrament, but it’s wonderful.  We are aware of holiness because it’s around us all the time – in icons – and in the people around us. We have monastics in our midst, those who strive after God their entire lives. No, they’re not perfect, that’s not exactly the point, but they love God and desire communion with Him. They make little improvements here and there and eventually they will be a little closer to God. And isn’t that what we all want?

Second more shocking reaction:

The most horrible, well, maybe not the MOST, thing is that some people, some protestants see the heart as a bad thing. We need to understand that our temptations and our passions are corrupt, yes, but it is not who we are.  This is not what God meant for us. To be truly free is to be free from the things that enslave us and be in freedom in communion with God.  The nous is commonly translated “heart” and sometimes “intellect” and is the deepest part of a person (see other posts on nous).  This is where we commune with God.

Part of what I had written before was about how the western half of the world separates heart and mind because the concept of nous is very foreign to them… which I’m sure I’ve talked about elsewhere and leave that to your own reflection and infer whatever you will.

The book I was reading mentioned that ‘the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?’  which is Jeremiah 17:9, I found out as I searched for it in the ESV.  I went downstairs and got my roommate’s Orthodox Study Bible, hoping to find some sort of study note that would explain that verse.  To my surprise and utter shock, I found that Jeremiah 17:9 (17:5)says this, “the heart is deep beyond all things, and it is the man. Even so who can know him?”  I sat there in utter shock, not even knowing what to say or what I would post here.  I will leave that to your own interpretation, I suppose.  But I will add two things that might help you, if indeed anyone reads this.  The note says, “St. John Chrysostom labors the point that only God  an know men’s hearts, citing Psalm. 7:9; 1 Kings 16:7, 2 Chronicles 6:30, and Matthew 9:3,4.”  Also I should mention that the Orthodox Study Bible is using the first English translation of the Septuagint, translated by St. Athanasius Academy.  I’m not going to comment further on that because it’s complicated and I’m sure if someone wanted to know there are plenty of resources out there that are more reliable than a blog.

Romans 12: part 1

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Service (Gr. latreia, lit. “bow down”) is better translated “worship”. This is the worship of God through the whole life of the Church, beginning with a renewed mind and integrity of heart. In union with Christ, we are brought from worshipping the creature to worshipping the Creator in all we do. This worship is:
(1) Physical: Bodies suggests both the physical aspect of human nature and human nature generally – ourselves.
(2) Living: a contrast to the Old Covenant under which sacrifices were put to death. Under the New Covenant, to die is also to be resurrected. Sacrifice is not a final act but the firstfruit, the foundation, for all other spiritual fruit.
(3) Virtuous (holy, acceptable): OT sacrifice was unacceptable and temporary. Animals are not substitutes for humanity or true holiness.
(4) Reasonable, or “spiritual” (Gr. logike): Though worship of God has its logical side, it is more than this – even as Christ, the Logos, possesses reason but is far more than reason. To be reasonable  is to live according to Christ, with renewed hearts and minds.

Faithful relationship to God changes our relationship to the world. (1) We renounce the pretenses of “this present evil age.” Conformed to this world is to be identified with and shaped by the world’s values and pleasures. (2) We are transformed, starting with the inward man, the mind, by virtue, the keeping of God’s commandments. Mind here is more than the rational faculty; it is the highest faculty of human nature: “The eyes of your heart,” by which one sees and comprehends God.

Romans 8: part 1

1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus,^[a] who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Two ways of human existence are expounded. The “mind” here is far more than intellectual capacity. It is the highest knowing faculty of the soul (Gr. nous), the spirit behind all we think and do. To repent means to have ‘a change of mind” – not a change of intelligence, but a change of heart. To be carnally minded ( lit. “to have the mind of the flesh”) means to choose to have one’s whole existence, soul and body, captivated by sin. This is a turning against God and His righteousness, an enmity with God rather than peace with Him. The carnally minded cannot be subject to or please God.  “A bad tree [cannot] bear good fruit” (Matt. 7:18), but it can choose to become a good tree through repentance. To be spiritually minded (lit. “to have the mind of the Spirit”) means to choose to be liberated by the Holy Spirit, so that one’s whole nature becomes spiritual, body and soul. Christians are free to set their minds on the Holy Spirit, allowing Him to have His way (His things) and actively pursuing virtue and goodness.

When fire penetrates iron, the iron becomes fiery hot without ceasing to be iron. So our human nature, body and soul, in its union with Christ becomes like God without ceasing to be human; it is interpenetrated by the energy and grace of the Holy Spirit.  We become spiritual. Self-indulgence and sinful pleasure are scorned, and all the pains and sufferings of the Christian life may be endured with joy.

9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. 10 And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

The gift of new life is not magical, but requires the cooperation of the believe in obedience to God. For we are His children (v. 14), as He leads us by the power of the Spirit. Therefore, the body becomes the follower, not the leader. We personally choose the way of the Spirit and deliberately put to death sinful deeds.

Romans 7

1 Or do you not know, brethren (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives? 2 For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband. 3 So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man. 4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. 5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. 6 But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. 7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, “You shall not covet.”^[a] 8 But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. 9 I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. 12 Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.

If we were held knowledgeably under sin by the law, then by the fulfillment of the law and the Incarnation, death, and resurrection of Christ, we are freed from it.  So that we may participate in the life of God.

13 Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. 20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
21 I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. 22 For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. 23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

This passage I think is often quoted with confusion, probably because of the play on words that St. Paul uses and its translation into English.  I also find that verse 18 is commonly used to support the belief that there’s nothing good inside a person, however, that’s complete nonsense.  The passage is depicting a contradiction within the person to will good and to do good or evil.  The task is on our part to strengthen our will so that we may overcome our fleshly desires and act on our will, which is what God wants. This is really just a summary of the Christian life.  We constantly battle against ourselves and our passions to become more Godly and participate in the life of God, the life of the Church, etc.  Indeed, we need to thank God for his grace and mercy in helping us along this path.

By the way, the word mind, in the greek, I just looked up and it’s the word Nous.