The Way of Martha and the Way of Mary/Part 2/Chapter 6
Although self-laceration and being wilfully gloomy are frequent in Russian life the idea of repentance is not popular, there being no particular passion for righteousness and consequently no insistence on sin as something deadly in itself. In Russia you never hear that the wages of sin is death. The man who sins is even thought to be nearer to grace than he who never sins, the prodigal nearer than his elder brother. "Sin committed is nothing to grieve over. What is done can't be helped. Hurry on and do something else, don't waste time in penance or repentance." There is no idea of penance in connection with the Russian Church, and consequently no "indulgences." Russia has escaped the evil of thinking that it is possible to pay for past actions and neutralise their effect. Even in asceticism the Russian has no idea of paying for sins by fasting and praying and mortifying the flesh. And he who sets out on pilgrimage does not do so as a penance for sin, he is not trying in any way to make up to God for sin. His act is an act of praise, a promise, his asceticism is a denial of this world in honour of the world to come, a denial of the world's peace in praise of the peace which passeth understanding, a denial of the world's truth in allegiance to the Holy Ghost, a showing forth in symbolic act of the glory of man's heavenly destiny.
The story of two hermits given by the Russian philosopher Solovyof gives a Russian point of view.
In the desert in Egypt two hermits were saving their souls. Their caves were quite near one another but they never entered into conversation unless it were to sing psalms at one another or call one another by name now and then. In this way of life they passed many years, and the fame of their sanctity spread beyond Egypt and into many lands. But in course of time the devil, mortified by their holiness, succeeded in tempting them. He snared them both at the same time, and, not saying a word to one another, they gathered the baskets and pallets which in their long spare time they had plaited from grasses and palm leaves, and they set off together for Alexandria. There they sold their work, and on the money they got for it they spent three gay days and nights with drunkards and sinners, and on the fourth morning, having spent everything, they returned to their cells in the desert.
One of them wept bitterly and howled aloud. The other walked at his side with bright morning face and sang psalms joyfully to himself. The first cried:
"Accursed that I am, now am I lost for ever. I shall never out-pray my hideous sin, never, never. All my fasts and hymns and prayers have been in vain. I might as well have sinned all the time; all lost in one foul moment! Alas! alas!"
But the other hermit went on singing, quietly, joyfully.
"What!" cried the first hermit. "Have you gone out of your mind?"
"Why?" asked the joyful one.
"Why don't you repent?"
"What is there for me to repent of?" asked the joyful one.
"And Alexandria, have you forgotten it?" asked his companion.
"What of Alexandria? Glory be to the Almighty who preserves that famous and honourable town!"
"But what did we do in Alexandria?"
"What did we do? Why we sold our baskets of course, prayed upon the ikon of holy St. Mark, visited several churches, walked a little in the town hall, conversed with the virtuous and Christly Leonila. . . ."
The repentant hermit stared at the other in pale stupefaction.
"And the house of ill-fame in which we spent the night . . . " said he.
"God preserve us!" said the other. "The evening and night we spent in the guest-house of the patriarch."
"Holy martyrs! God has already blasted his reason," cried the repentant hermit. "And with whom did we get drunk on Tuesday night? Tell me that."
"We partook of wine and viands in the refectory of the patriarchate, Tuesday being the festival of the Presentation of the most Blessed Mother of God."
"Poor fellow! And whom did we kiss, eh?"
"We were honoured at parting with a holy kiss from that father of fathers, the most blessed Archbishop of the great city of Alexandria and of all Egypt, yes and of Libya, and of Pentapolis, and of Kur-Timothee with its spiritual court, and with all the fathers and brothers of his divinely appointed clergy."
"Ah, why do you make a mock of me? Does it mean that after yesterday's abominations the devil has entered into possession of you. You embraced sinners, you accursed one."
"I can't say in whom the devil has found a home, in me or in you," said the other, "in me when I rejoice in the God's gifts and His holy will, when I praise the Creator and all His works, or in you who rave and call the house of our most blessed father and pastor a house of ill-fame, and defame the God-loving clergy, calling them sinners as it were."
"Ah, you heretic!" screamed the repentant hermit. "Arian monster! Thrice accursed lips of the abominable Appollonion!"
And the repentant hermit threw himself upon his companion and tried to kill him. But failing to do that he grew tired of his efforts, and the two resumed their journey to their caves. The repentant one beat his head on the rock all night and tore his hair and made the desert echo with his howls and shrieks. The other calmly and joyfully went on singing psalms.
In the morning the repentant hermit made the following reflections:
"Just think of it. I had earned from Heaven especial blessings and holy power by my fasts and my podvigs.[1] This has already become evident by the miracles and wonders I have lately been enabled to perform, but after this that has happened, all is lost. By giving myself up to fleshly abomination I have sinned against the Holy Ghost, and that sin, according to the word of God, will be forgiven me neither in this life nor in the life to come. I have thrown the pearl of heavenly purity to be trampled under feet by swine, by devils. The devils have taken my pearl, and, no doubt, having stamped it into the mire, they will come after me and tear me. Well, well, if I am irrecoverably lost whatever is there for me to do out here in the desert?" And he returned to Alexandria and gave himself up to a life of debauch. Eventually, on one occasion when he was hard up he conspired with other vagabonds, fell upon a rich merchant, killed him, and robbed him. He was tracked down, caught and tried in the courts. The judge condemned him to death and he died without repentance.
But his old companion continued his holy life, his podvizhnitchestvo[2] attained a high degree of sanctity and became famous through the many miracles wrought at his cave-mouth. At a word from his holy lips a woman past the age of child-bearing yet conceived and brought forth a male child. When at last the good man died, his shrivelled and worn-out body, suddenly as it were, blossomed in beauty and youth, becoming translucent and filling the air with a heavenly perfume. Over his holy relics a monastery was built, and his name went forth from the church of Alexandria to Byzantium and thence to the shrines of Kief and Moscow.
The lesson of this story is, according to Varsonophy, who told it, that there are no sins of any importance except despondency. Did not both these hermits sin alike and yet but one of them was lost, namely, he who desponded?
Varsonophy was a pilgrim from Mount Athos, who used to say, "Eh, eh, don't grieve about your sins, be done with them, they don't count. Sin 539 times in a day but don't grieve about it, that's the chief thing. If to sin is evil, then to remember sin is evil. There is nothing worse than to call to mind one's own sins. . . . There is only one deadly sin and that is despondency, from despondency comes despair, that is more than sin, it is spiritual death.