In this recording, St. Cleopa of Sihăstria Monastery, Romania, expounds the patristic doctrine of spiritual warfare, tracing how an ordinary suggestion of the mind gradually develops into full enslavement through twelve distinct stages. He shows why guarding the mind through inner vigilance and the Jesus Prayer is essential before a stray thought solidifies into passion and despair.
The Romanian Orthodox Church has approved the canonization of 16 new saints during the synodal sessions held on July 11-12th 2024. Venerable Cleopa of Sihastria Monastery is one of them.
Video source: DrumulSpreInviere / Sihastria Monastery 1994-1996
St. Cleopa:
Father Abbot, sin has twelve steps. The first step of sin is not doing a good deed. We are bound to cultivate it. The second: doing good, but not rightly, as says Saint John of Damascus. Behold what is written there: “Good is not good if it is not done rightly.” Saint John of Damascus. I told them to write it thus… A good deed has both ‘body’ and ‘soul’, brethren. The ‘body’ of a good deed is its practice: I fast, I pray, I give alms, I practice temperance, I keep vigil, I offer prayer.
The ‘soul’ of a good deed, or its life, is the aim with which I do it. The Apostle Paul tells us: “Do all things unto the glory of God.” The God-bearing Father Isaac the Syrian says: “When the mind has lost the purpose of true faith, all good deeds are no longer of benefit.” Someone runs and labors so that someone else might praise him. Another gives alms with an ulterior motive. Another does so to receive praise. Another with the aim of befriending someone, acting kindly toward someone with passion… Another does such… Saint Maximus the Confessor:
there is virginity, and almsgiving, and temperance, and vigil, which are an abomination before God (says Saint Maximus), when these are not performed with the aim of pleasing God, but to please men.” This is the second step of sin, when we do good, we struggle, yet not for the purpose of pleasing God. The third step of sin: it is the provocation of the simple thought of sin. It crosses your mind: a woman, money, glory, yet simply, without dwelling on it.
If it is a bare thought, there is no sin. No, not a single prostration must one make for it. Because it just passed, but at this step, what does Satan do? “Listen, a woman, money, and glory are not enough.” You begin to dwell on them passionately: “If I had a purse, if I had a… if that woman spoke with me, if we became friends, if I did such and such, if I drew near to…” Behold, have you seen that ivy clinging to trees, and the briar clinging to beanstalks? It is just like that in the fourth step: communing. When the soul begins to converse with the simple thought: “What if it were with that woman, what if I spoke with them, what if I did this…” And where does this lead?
This is the fourth step, when you converse and engage with the impassioned thought that has attached itself immediately around the simple thought. The fifth step is the struggle; for the warfare is waged up to the twelfth step. The person sees that this thought is not good and begins prayer, contemplating hell, remembering death, pondering his unworthiness. The struggle is fought on all steps up to the twelfth step. The sixth step is consent. He struggles so much, and in the end consents: “Well, what of it if I dwell passionately on that woman, or on that money, or on glory, or on that matter?” He allows himself to converse further…
This is the sixth step of sin, when you allow yourself to converse with sin longer… That is this step. He has not yet fallen into mental sin. You have merely consented and are conversing with it, and so forth. That is the sixth step. The seventh step of sin. Above all, spiritual fathers should know this by heart, like the “Our Father.” It is sinning in the mind, mental sin… Saint Basil the Great says: the octopus of the soul appears—the imagination. Ah, octopus… I ate it on the Holy Mountain; I didn’t like it, but the Abbot loved it dearly… 🙂
An octopus has eight arms, and he says: “the imagination is an octopus; it ensnares.” It does not ensnare our mind merely with what we have seen, but also with what we have heard, and what we have smelled, and with what we have tasted, and what we have touched. So the seventh step is mental sin, wherein we bring sin into the imagination and picture it… either picturing the face of one who hates us: “how I will mock him, what I will say to him, how I will take revenge…” or of the one loved with passion, with a woman, or money, or theft… he begins to picture the sin, and if he tarries long in this, hear what Saint Maximus says: “Guard thy thoughts, O man, for if thou guardest not thy thoughts now, later thou shalt not be able to guard thy deeds.”
For from this step of mental sin, if you call the Jesus Prayer to help you, one immediately reaches the eighth step: falling into sin in deed. This whole stench of a carcass—behold, [the human body] you have surrendered it unto sin. And the carcass will not answer for it. You will answer; God endowed you with a discerning mind. The flesh burns unto the ages of ages because the soul is not watchful; it lacks vigilance, sobriety. Thus, the eighth step of sin is falling into deed. The ninth step is habit.
From here onward, the spiritual father must struggle mightily to turn the sinner back. Behold, someone comes to confession… “Old man, why do you smoke?” He tells you plainly: “Father, I have grown accustomed to it.” “Old man, why do you drink?” “Father, I am used to it.” “Brother, or sister, why do you judge others?” “I am used to it, Father.” Now sin has turned into habit. It is far harder to turn back from the stage of habit. Man has become accustomed to sin, and habit is more burdensome than the sin in deed.
For he did not sin once and repent; rather Satan continually casts him down, he falls, and becomes habituated to sin. The tenth step is heavier than the ninth. The tenth step of sin is inveterate habit. God forbid… Inveterate habit is a second nature. One commits sin willy-nilly. He awakens to find himself sinning. This is the hardest stage before despair. A person becomes enslaved to sin. Willy-nilly, it drives him into sin.
Either into gluttony, or drunkenness, or fornication, or theft, or greed, or into… evil speaking, slandering, lying… he finds himself doing it. The ninth step is very grave, for habit becomes inveterate passion, a second nature. Willy-nilly, you suddenly see he has run into sin. And the eleventh step is even heavier, as Saint Isaac says: despair… He says: “Nothing is fiercer or worse than despair,” Saint Isaac the Syrian. Do you know what the devil whispers then? “Listen, God will not forgive you anymore; indulge in earthly pleasures, live it up, for what lies beyond is uncertain, God will no longer forgive you…
No, as for the afterlife… you know how it is: there the fire will burn anyway, so indulge while you live here.” Despair. Do you know how one arrives here? Have you heard what the Holy Spirit says in the Psalter? “With rebukes for iniquity hast Thou chastened man, and Thou hast made his soul to consume away like a spider’s web.” [Ps. 38:11] The conscience, which is the voice of God in man, severely rebukes a man for his sin… “and Thou hast made to consume away like a spider’s web…” It wears away his hope like a spider’s thread.
Conscience warns: “Take heed, for you are perishing! Turn back, for you are forfeiting your soul…” And then he falls into despair. And the twelfth step is suicide. The one who goes and does as Judas…
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