Fr. Rafail Noica: The greatest crisis in St. Silouan's life
In his greatest crisis, St. Silouan was able to say: “Lord, You are merciful!” and recall God’s mercy: “Lord, my soul has known you!”
As another example of theology as a state of the spirit, I would like to talk about St. Silouan the Athonite. St. Silouan is called “theologian” in one of the troparia dedicated to him - and I see in this that the Church, the conscience of the Church, accepts a fourth among its theologians [Translator’s Note: the first three being St. John the Evangelist and Theologian, St. Gregory the Theologian and St. Symeon the New Theologian]. The troparion says: “among the theologians, the most tender.” This Silouan was a peasant who spent only two winters in school in Tsarist Russia, but Fr. Sophony said, based on St. Silouan’s experiences and lectures during his monastic life, that St. Silouan was a learned man, in the monastic sense of the word.
A great theologian of our times was with us in the monastery [Translator’s Note: St. John the Baptist Monastery in Essex] in the trapeza while one of us was reading from the words of St. Silouan. When he heard these words, this theologian and hierarch of our Church told Fr. Sophrony that you could write a book for each word of this peasant who spent only two winters in school. And, of course, he was giving a testimony about himself: he would be able to write a book for each word of St. Silouan. Because both he, as an erudite man, and St. Silouan, as a simple but experienced man, lived in the same spirit, and they understood each other, I would say - even though St. Silouan had departed to the Lord a long time back; I still think St. Silouan and this eminent theologian would have understood each other well.
I would like to give an example from St. Silouan’s life: his greatest crisis, in which he receives these astonishing words from the Savior: “Keep your mind in hell and despair not!” After 15 years of extreme asceticism, to the limit, each night, so he could escape from hell, from a state of being apart from God - because this is hell, regardless if there are devils there or not, even though St. Silouan was surrounded by devils each night - but what matters here is being apart from God, from the beloved God he knew (St. Silouan had seen Christ 15 years before); 15 years of sterile asceticism, when he would only sleep two hours per night - for the greater part of his life, St. Silouan spent his nights sitting on a stool and slept only briefly, when he would fall asleep while praying. And he wouldn’t get anywhere. And at some point, wanting to show Christ his good intentions, he got up from the chair and wanted to bow before Christ’s icon, but he saw a devil in front of him, so he couldn’t bow down because he would have bowed down to the devil. So he sat down again on the stool, crushed, and asked the Lord: “Lord, You see that I want to pray with a pure mind, but the devils prevent me from doing so!”
And he receives an answer for the first time in 15 years, and he hears in his heart: “The proud always suffer from demons.”
Hearing this word, Silouan recognizes it as being divine, and instead of despairing - because he was as it were struck over the face, and was called proud - he is filled with hope and says: “Lord, You are merciful, my soul has known you; tell me what I should do to become humble.” And the Lord tells him (another strike over the face, as we would understand it): “Keep your mind in hell and despair not!”
If you allow me to paraphrase “Keep your mind in hell,” I would say:
Be realistic! Where do you want to get to? Don’t you see that you can’t? You have fought for 15 years! Assume your hell, know that this is your eternal inheritance for the sin that you inherited from Adam and that you are experiencing as well, but….don’t despair.
And the important word for St. Silouan was this: “despair not!” He experienced it as a promise, I would say apophatic, from God. “Keep your mind in hell” is very cataphatic, very positive, but for “despair not” he doesn’t explain why. And St. Silouan knew what to do. He said: “I started to do then as the Lord had taught me...My mind was purified, and my spirit confessed salvation in my heart.”
And as soon as he started to do this, the theology that lived in him brought him to enlightenment. And he became, from that moment, what we could call Silouan the Great. In the sense that these words are the same that Anthony the Great received - of whom Sisoes the Great said: “Who can bear today the words of the Great Anthony? And yet I know a man who can bear them!” The same words were experienced by Poemen the Great, who said: “You should know, brethren, that where satan is, there will be Poemen cast out too!” And they would not despair!
But the form received by Silouan is the most perfect theologically. And it is a form that is also useful for all of us - because who can think, without despairing, as Anthony did: “All will be saved, only I will perish”? But the form that Silouan received says: “Keep your mind in hell, be realistic, don’t be filled with pride, don’t think highly about who you think you are! But don’t despair!” I would paraphrase God’s words: “Don’t despair of Me, of My love!”
St. Silouan started to assume this state of hell, with hope in God. He said his favorite chant was: ‘Here I will perish, here I will burn forever in a dark flame and say: “Where are you, my Lord? Where are you, my Light? Where are you, my Life?”’
With his mind, he was in hell, and with his heart, he was in God. Who do you think was victorious? Behold, hell is not almighty! Silouan the Theologian understood what these short, apophatic words of the Lord mean: “Keep your mind in hell and despair not!” Don’t despair of the Lord’s love!
I want to emphasize that in his greatest crisis, Silouan was able to say: “Lord, You are merciful!” and recall God’s mercy: “Lord, my soul has known you!” We all know to some degree or another - today, probably, to a great degree - what a crisis is. I consider that this terminology - crisis, nervous depression, and others - which is a clinical terminology, disorients our thinking. We should reorient the whole terminology of our lives according to the terminology of our Holy Fathers and of the Church. What is a crisis or nervous depression? It is a state of the spirit, it is a spiritual state. If we limit ourselves to its clinical aspect, it is a state that is misunderstood and mistreated. And that is why I said that for Silouan, it was the deepest crisis. If people reach a state that is even slightly similar to that crisis, then, in general, they will take their own lives; they will fall into despair and commit suicide. And so, we shouldn’t read about St. Silouan and imagine it was just a moment of crisis. Who, in their crisis, can recall God’s mercy? Who, in their crisis, can find from themselves, that is, in themselves, in their theology, a word of hope so they can get out of the crisis and find life again? But we see that Silouan was permanently recalling God’s mercy, and when God talked to him, Silouan’s answer was: “Lord, you are merciful! My soul has known you!”
And I would like to point out that this is a consequence of theology as a state of the spirit. The state of Silouan’s spirit was unwavering, even to the most ultimate crisis that humankind can know in this earthly life.
Fragment from a conference held by Fr. Rafail Noica in November 2003 at a Symposium titled “Theology and Monasticism” dedicated to the Centenary of Fr. Dumitru Staniloae.
Translated from Romanian: https://siluanathonitul.wordpress.com/2019/09/24/parintele-rafail-noica-despre-sfantul-siluan-athonitul-taranul-cu-doua-ierni-de-scoala-devenitteologul-cel-prea-duios/