Page:The Greek and Eastern churches.djvu/173

 

CHAPTER X

EASTERN MONASTICISM

 

(a) The Book of Paradise, by Palladius, etc., trans. by E. A. Wallis Budge; Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers; Socrates, Hist. Eccl. iv. 23; Sozomen, Hist. Eccl. i. 12–14; iii. 14; vi. 28–34; Evagrius, Hist. Eccl. iv. 33–35; vi. 23, 24; Sulpicius Severus, Dialog. i.

(b) Zöchler, Kritische Geschichte der Askek, 1863; Texts and Studies, vi., Dom Cuthbert Butler, "The Lausiac History of Palladius"; Harnack, Monasticism, 1901; Gibbon, Decline and Fall, chap, xxxvii.

 

We have seen that in the region of thought it was the Eastern branch of the Church that developed theology and settled the creed of Christendom. Now we have to observe how in matters of practice and conduct it was this same Oriental district that shaped the ideal and advanced farthest towards its attainment. After the early days of joyous liberty, not only during the patristic period, but right through the Middle Ages, asceticism is synonymous with sanctity for the bulk of the Church, both Eastern and Western. Now and again there appears a mystic, out of all relation to time and circumstance, as by its nature mysticism always is; and then we have a flash of light on the spirituality of religion realised by practical love. But in the main, the ideal of the Christian life all down the ages involved on one side renunciation of the world, castigation of the body, a crushing down of natural affections, and on the other side intense, whole-hearted devotion, stoical endurance, unflinching fidelity to creed and Church. Only a select minority seriously pursued this difficult aim.

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