{"id":1361,"date":"2017-01-17T06:53:51","date_gmt":"2017-01-17T11:53:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/henrykarlson\/?p=1361"},"modified":"2017-01-17T06:53:51","modified_gmt":"2017-01-17T11:53:51","slug":"1361","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/henrykarlson\/2017\/01\/1361\/","title":{"rendered":"Never Assume"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"By<\/a>
Photo by Sumeet Moghe (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Abba Anthony heard of a very young monk who had performed a miracle on the road. Seeing the old men walking with difficulty along the road, he ordered the wild asses to come and carry them until they reached Abba Anthony Those whom they had carried told Abba Anthony about it. He said to them, \u201cThis monk seems to me to a ship loaded with goods but I do not know if he will reach harbor.\u201d After a while, Anthony suddenly began to weep, to tear his hair and lament. His disciples said to him, \u201cWhy are you weeping, Father?\u201d and the old man replied, \u201cA great pillar of the Church has just fallen (he meant the young monk) but go to him and see what has happened.\u201d So the disciples went and found the monk sitting on a mat and weeping for the sin he had committed. Seeing the disciples of the old man he said, \u201cTell the old man to pray that God will give me just ten days and I hope I will have made satisfaction.\u201d But in the space of five days he died.[1]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This saying serves as a warning against presumption. Just because someone is seen to do a miracle, we do not know their spiritual status, nor what will come after the miracle. It could have been granted to them for their sake, not because they were holy, but because God in his love hoped the miracle would encourage spiritual reform. It could be that the miracle did not come from God, but from some other source. Or it could be that someone had, up to a point, engaged in a holy walk of life, and so they were able to do something extraordinary from the grace which they embraced, only to turn away from that grace because of the pride they felt for doing such a miracle.<\/p>\n

In this saying we are told of a young monk who was able to perform a rather minor miracle. The young monk was able to have wild assess help relieve the burden of \u00a0old men, but who they are, whether they were also monks, is something which cannot be ascertained. Be it as it may, it is not the miracle, but what afterward, which represents the key element of the story.<\/p>\n

After the miracle, the young monk fell into some sin \u2013 we are not told which \u2014 and feared for his own perdition. He wanted to know if he could repent and be saved, and so he asked Anthony to pray that he would have ten days to make restitution.\u00a0 The story ends telling us that he only lived for five more days.<\/p>\n

As with the ambiguity at the beginning of the saying, with no clear indication who was helped, so we are left with ambiguity at its end. Perhaps this was done in purpose, and so the lack of clarity at the beginning is to help the audience realize that it ends with a similar lack of clarity. The story is open-ended as to what happened to the monk upon death. It is easy to assume, because he died before the ten days were up, God condemned him; but that is every bit a presumption as the kind the young monk seemed to have before he fell into sin. Mercy and grace can come immediately after compunction for sin, and the young monk, having once attained some level of holiness, would have realized more than most the loss he suffered due to his sin.\u00a0 He mourned because of the sin he committed, and he wanted to do all he could to do as penance for that sin. Because of all this, there is room to hope that he did not need the ten days, that his desire was to do penance in excess, and that God\u2019s grace was sufficient for him. He had true metanoia, and sinned no more, so God lessened his burden at the end.<\/p>\n

Certainly the monk once presumed himself to be great, thanks to the miracle he performed, and so lost his way with his pride (perhaps it was pride itself which was his sin, although it is likely it opened him up to some other, unstated sin). He presumed too much for himself, but we must also not engage such presumption and assume that because of his sin, he was incapable of being saved in such a short time.
\n<\/p>\n

\"English:<\/a>
Moses Sees the Promised Land from Afar, by James Tissot [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>While miracles can be a sign of holiness, a sign of God\u2019s presence, they do not have to be, and for the one who has some miracle happen for them, the worst thing to do is to assume salvation because of it, even as if someone sins, it is wrong to assume the person who sins, no matter how great a sin, cannot be saved, even if it seems as if they have not had enough time to make satisfaction for the sin. Spiritual delusion often forms around the performance of miracles, or worse, the assumption that someone has performed a miracle, so that one who performs a miracle will be led to pride through its execution, forgetting that whatever holiness which allowed for a miracle is something given to them graciously by God\u2019s love. By doing something great, it is easy to ignore one\u2019s own weaknesses and so to be attacked from one of them and be led to great sin as a result. Even Moses, one of God\u2019s greatest saints, is shown to have fallen to pride, and assumed too much for himself thanks to the miracles God worked through him. This is why Moses was forbidden from entering the land of Israel (prophetically indicating the limitation of the law of Moses itself,\u00a0 where it must be succeeded and fulfilled by Jesus, just as Joshua was the one to take the people of Israel into the new land).[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

Scripture itself warns us that miracles, though worthy of consideration, can be done by those who are not following after God. False prophets (cf. Deut. 13:1-2; Matt. 24:24) will come who also perform great signs and wonders. They are indication that something unusual is going on, but they do not mean the person performing them are following God, or if they are, they will continue to do so. Judas was among those sent out by Jesus performing miracles, and so at one time was touched by God\u2019s holiness but then left it due to his own pride and avarice:<\/p>\n

And he called to him his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every infirmity. The names of the twelve apostles are these: first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him (Matt. 10:1-4 RSV).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In this saying, it is clear that the monk was himself not a false prophet, but one who had attained some level of holiness, so that Anthony called him great, a great pillar of the Church, \u00a0but one who fell apart due to sin. He was therefore like a ship carrying goods, the goods being the graces God had given over to him which made him great, but he was unable to steer himself through the trials and tribulations in life; he had become too accustomed to what he had already obtained he swayed off course, crashing as it were into a spiritual iceberg which tore him apart. The goods remain good, they were of God, but the ship, the vessel in which they were put, cracked apart.<\/p>\n

We must never let ourselves be thought of great due to what we have done, even if it is some great miracle; we must always remember our sins and know that even if we have repented of them, we will be tempted throughout our life, and so it is easy to once again fall short if we are not prepared to fight daily against our inordinate desires. When others praise us, we must not take notice of it, lest we too, having become great pillars, fall down and crack apart as well; thus, St Ignatius Brianchaninov warned:<\/p>\n

Ignorant and quack ascetics think they have reached their goal when they see themselves as saints, when the world thinks and proclaims them such. They rejoice at the self-deception and self-opinion that has got into them, not understanding how fatal self-opinion is, not realizing that human praise is the sign of a false prophet. This sign is extremely important. It is given by the God-Man himself. Woe<\/em>, said the Lord, Woe betide you when all men speak well of you! For that is just what their fathers did to the false prophets. <\/em>Woe, spiritual woe and disaster, eternal misery! [3]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It is when we think great of ourselves we overburden ourselves with our own pride, and we will not be able to bear it long without either divesting ourselves of the pride, or finding it overburdening us and having it crush us from its weight, leading us to vainglory and many other sins. If we do something great, it is easy to think we have obtained greatness, ignoring all the spiritual cracks which remain within us, all the vices which still have influence over us, so that the fall will easily be explained by those who look over our way of life but will not be easy for us to prevent nor for us to pick ourselves back up once we have indeed fallen.<\/p>\n

The proper spirit is one which is humble and remorseful, looking to fight temptation to the end of life, never letting minor victories or spectacles get the best of us. We can be on the path of salvation and then depart thanks to our pride. We can afloat in the stream of life, and then sink by taking too much upon our ship. We must praise God from whom all blessings flow while never assuming much for ourselves, and let God, nor anyone else, judge the quality of person we have become.<\/p>\n

As for the monk who fell, we must remain hopeful of his salvation, because he truly mourned for his sin, and yet, because his request to have ten days to make satisfaction were not given, we must also not presume his salvation. Likewise, with ours, we must be hopeful, seeing salvation is indeed possible thanks to God\u2019s love, while realizing that the time and place of our death will never be ours to control. The ending of the story serves as a warning more than anything else, a warning which we should all heed. \u00a0The time is always right for metanoia; we must not assume we will have an extended amount of time to make things right, instead, we must find ourselves opening ourselves up to God\u2019s grace, letting it transform us in the present instead of blocking it assuming we will have the time to do so later. We will likely not know when we shall die; we should not assume we will even have ten more days to make restitution for our sins; instead, we must do penance now, for the kingdom of God is not only at hand, but with us and beside us at all times.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>The Sayings of the Desert Fathers. <\/em>trans. Benedicta Ward (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1984), 4.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Jesus and Joshua have the same name, but one is translated from the Greek, the other from the Hebrew. Typologically it shows the prophet to succeed Moses, the messiah, is to be like Joshua, taking the people of Israel (Ecclesia, the Church) to the promised land\u00a0 (heaven) which Moses was unable to do. Jesus fulfilled the law of Moses by bring salvation to the world, while Joshua, the historical type representing Jesus, fulfilled the earthly mission of Moses by bringing the people of Israel to their new homeland.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> St Ignatius Brianchaninov, The Arena: An Offering to Contemporary Monasticism. <\/em>trans. Archimandrite Lazarus (Jordanville, NT: Holy Trinity Monastery, 1997), 243.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

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