Category: SILENCE

  • Let us remain humble when we speak about someone else’s suffering. Only the one who has truly suffered has the right to speak.

    —Robert Sarah, The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise

  • When someone hurts you, do not answer back, but meet the hurt with silence.

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, A Whisper of Love: Poems, Prayers and Sayings

  • For he who is angry on account of the things which have been done to him, and demands satisfaction would not be able to obtain the praise of forbearance; but when a man dismisses the consideration of all past evils, although they are many and painful, but is compelled to take steps for self-defense from fear of the future and by way of providing for his own security, no one would deprive him of the rewards of moderation. 

    Nevertheless, David did not act even thus, but found a novel and strange form of moral wisdom. And neither the remembrance of things past, nor the fear of things to come, nor the instigation of the captain, nor the solitude of the place, nor the facility for slaying, nor anything else incited him to kill; but he spared the man who was his enemy and had given him pain, just as if he was some benefactor and had done him much good. What kind of indulgence then shall we have if we are mindful of past transgressions and avenge ourselves on those who have given us pain, whereas that innocent man who had undergone such great sufferings and expected more and worse evils to befall him in consequence of saving his enemy, is seen to spare him, so as to prefer incurring danger himself and to live in fear and trembling, rather than put to a just death the man who would cause him endless troubles?

    His moral wisdom then we may perceive, not only from the fact that he did not slay Saul when there was so strong a compulsion, but also that he did not utter an irreverent word against him, although he who was insulted would not have heard him. Yet we often speak evil of friends when they are absent, he on the contrary not even of the enemy who had done him such great wrong. His moral wisdom then we may perceive from these things, but his lovingkindness and tender care from what he did after these things. For when he had cut off the fringe of Saul’s garment and had taken away the bottle of water, he withdrew afar off and stood and shouted and exhibited these things to him whose life he had preserved, doing so not with a view to display and ostentation, but desiring to convince him by his deeds that he suspected him without a cause as his enemy, and aiming therefore at winning him into friendship. Nevertheless, when he had even thus failed to persuade him, and could have laid hands on him, he again chose rather to be an exile from his country and to sojourn in a strange land and suffer distress every day in procuring necessary food than to remain at home and vex his adversary. What spirit could be kinder than his? He was indeed justified in saying, “Lord remember David and all his meekness” (Ps. 131:1).

    Saint John Chrysostom
    If Thine Enemy Hunger, Feed Him
    Homilies on Profitable Subjects

  • He remained constantly with God in silence, ever ready to repel the surges of both sensuality and anger.

    [on St. John Chrysostom]

    via Saint John Chrysostom, On the Vanity of Riches

  • If one says a word to you, you could accept the word calmly, or you could think about it deeply: Why did he say this? What did he mean? Did he mean to belittle me? I cannot keep quiet. Here you have allowed the word to affect you profoundly, and so it became deeply-rooted in you. Therefore, do not ponder daily events in depth; overlook them and allow them to pass by calmly. Only those thoughts which take root in your mind and heart will bother you.

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Monastic Treasures for All of Us

  • “We learned quickly, however, that freshly picked oranges were not the best for making orange juice. The best were the ones that had been set aside for a week or ten days. These were the sweetest. The sour edge is taken off with time. 

    I have found the same thing is true about what we say—the juice of our soul, you might say. I have found that it is usually better for me to say nothing at the beginning, at the moment I feel like saying something. At that moment, it is usually best not to say anything because if I say something the very moment I feel like saying it, the juice is not sweet. It’s sour. And no matter how true or right what I have to say is, all the hearer notices is the sour, bitter, angry or judgmental note hidden in my words. Even when I do not intend to communicate anything but truth and edification, a bit of the bitterness or arrogance or prejudice of my own soul slips in and somehow sours the entire message.”
    ___

    O Lord Jesus Christ, grant me the strength to keep silent in knowledge, and the grace to know when it is necessary to speak without passion.
    —St. Barsanuphius

    On Remaining Silent, Praying in the Rain
    Fr. Michael Gillis

  • One might say that another’s action will destroy the monastery. Yet, if the action is truly wrong, it will surely be revealed; you should not necessarily be the one who reveals it. It will be revealed on its own. If you place yourself as a watchdog over the actions of others, then, as the saying goes, you will have turned from a worshipper into a judge. Did you come to work as judges, or worshippers? Each one of us should say, “I will keep to myself. What business is it of mine? What brought me into all of these affairs?”

    The wronged will be avenged by God, the peace of the monastery will be protected by God, those commissioned have their own responsibilities, and each of you should keep to yourself. If you keep to yourself, you will be respected by all, loved by all, and trusted by all, and if you do intervene on any given occasion, your word will have a positive impact.

    —Pope Shenouda III, Monastic Treasures for All of Us

  • “It is befitting that I keep silent, seeing that God has covered me. If God permitted that I be uncovered, would I be able to utter a word?”

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Before the Just Judge

  • To the extent that you pray with all your soul for the person who slanders you, God will make the truth known to those who have been scandalized by the slander.

    —St Maximos the Confessor

  • Because they understood vainglory to be a recurrent and serious problem, the early Fathers recommended several practical strategies against it—most of which did not involve sneaking off and slandering yourself before city officials. For example, you could try to avoid excessive attachment to glory by avoiding any attachments to human opinion at all. So one Desert Father offers this advice on how to make “death to the world” one’s spiritual vocation: A brother came to see Abba Macarius the Egyptian, and said to him, “Abba, give me a word.” So the old man said, “Go to the cemetery and abuse the dead.” The brother went there, abused them and threw stones at them; then he returned and told the old man about it. The latter said to him, “Didn’t they say anything to you?” He replied, “No.” The old man said, “Go back tomorrow and praise them.” So the brother went away and praised them, calling them “Apostles, saints, and righteous men.” He returned to the old man and said to him, “I have complimented them.” And the old man said to him, “Did they not answer you?” The brother said no. The old man said to him, “You know how you insulted them and they did not reply, and how you praised them and they did not speak; so you too if you wish to be saved must do the same and become a dead man. Like the dead, take no account of either the scorn of men or their praises.”

    —Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung, Vainglory: The Forgotten Vice