Kindle Notes & Highlights
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July 13 - July 24, 2017
its basic character is oppositional as well as verbal—the monk speaks the biblical text in the context of warfare with the demonic—
In Talking Back Evagrius surely seeks constructively to form the monk as a virtuous person, but this self-forming discipline takes place within a determinedly polemical, anti-demonic context, in which the vast majority of excerpts are directed toward agents external to the monk, whether hostile (the demons, armed with thoughts) or supportive (God, assisted by angels).
David and Jesus,
thus places the verbal refutation of the demons at the core of the monastic struggle against vice and for virtue.
Gregory taught that the demons attacked baptized Christians and composed a series of what Dayna Kalleres has called “prayer texts,” in which attacking demons are addressed and refuted.
against the demons, and they draw on the rites that attended baptism, which included exorcisms and verbal renunciations of Satan and his demons.
Athanasius has Antony attribute the anti-demonic power not to the biblical words themselves, but to “the Lord,” who first used them.
biblical verses, especially from the Psalms, are his most frequent spiritual weapons.
The Psalms can help to ameliorate the individual’s vulnerability to the passions and form him or her into a virtuous subject thanks to their double character.
“the melody that is applied to the Psalms alters the condition of the body”
The words that the monk speaks have such power that the speaker need not understand their “force,” that is, both their meaning and their effectiveness, for them to repel the demons.
one should refute an evil thought as soon as possible after it occurs to one,
Evagrius inherited the idea behind this practice from his predecessor Origen (ca. 185–254) and his contemporary Didymus the Blind (ca. 313–98),
All people are subject to involuntary “first movements,” which we may either control and use to good ends or allow to develop into a morally culpable passion.
could explain, for example, biblical passages that appeared to attribute emotions to Jesus or other virtuous persons.
the tricks of the mocking demons, which imitate both perception and memory
Talking Back’s arsenal of biblical verses provides a means for preventing a demonically inspired first movement from developing into a full-fledged passion and thus into sin.
free even from thoughts of sin.
the term “cut off”
In antirrhēsis, then, the monk deliberately sets in motion a process that would otherwise take place inevitably by consciously using good thoughts drawn from the Bible to cut off bad ones suggested by the demons. antirrhēsis works because it corresponds with how the fallen human intellect works.
Evagrius indicates that he understands the biblical passages in these terms when in the Prologue he uses the technical term “cut off” to describe their effect on demonic thoughts.
angelic thought that leads the monk to consider why gold was created and what it symbolizes in the Bible is good, whereas the demonic thought that suggests acquiring gold is bad, enflaming the passion of love of money.
persistent thoughts cause representations to persist in the intellect.
by causing impassioned representations to persist in the intellect, damage the intellect,
it applies also to the more advanced stage of the monastic “gnostic” (gnōstikos), in which the monk contemplates the material world and rational beings on his path to knowledge of God.
the role of the compiler.
it presents Evagrius as an experienced and successful fighter with demons, an heir to a long tradition of monastic teachers, and a perceptive reader of the Scriptures.
Evagrius’s firsthand experience of demonic combat forms the primary source of his authority here:
Evagrius more explicitly invests authority in the monastic tradition that he has inherited from older monks and that he claims to be transmitting.
Finally, Evagrius appears as an authoritative reader of the Bible, study of which emerges as an advanced ascetic practice.
The evidence of Talking Back suggests that many of the monks with whom Evagrius consulted came from relatively privileged social backgrounds.
bread and oil (1.8); to abstain from oil was a severe ascetic discipline (1.18). Wine was available, although discouraged (1.22, 26, 35, 67); vegetables and fruits appear as special treats or temptations
especially for the advanced monk the danger of harshly or unfairly condemning other monks and believing oneself to be morally superior was very grave
the tricks of the mocking demons, which imitate both perception and memory in order to deceive the rational soul that strives for the knowledge of Christ.
enlisted in this army
disce...
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It is not because of the severity of the enemies’ power, nor because of negligence on the part of the assistants, but because of slackening on the part of the fighters that knowledge of God disappears and perishes from them.
when the demons make war against us and hurl their arrows at us [cf. Eph 6:16], let us answer them from the Holy Scriptures,
the words that are required for speaking against our enemies, that is, the cruel demons, cannot be found quickly in the hour of conflict, because they are scattered throughout the Scriptures and so are difficult to find.
warriors and soldiers
not merely as a monastic man but as a monastic intellect. For a monastic man is one who has departed from the sin that consists of deeds and action, while a monastic intellect is one who has departed from the sin that arises from the thoughts that are in our intellect and who at the time of prayer sees the light of the Holy Trinity.
thoughts that approach us from each of these eight demons.
the beloved one
From LXX. Hebrew has "Yesherun," a poetic name for Israel. But Hebrew doesn't have the Jacob part of the verse. It's in Samaritan and LXX.
vigil”:
vigil
oil
vigils
wine
feast day
wine
