‘Go, sell all that you have…..and come and follow me.’ So Jesus is reported as saying by St Luke in his Gospel account. This challenge to withdraw seems, then, to have gone back to Jesus himself and beyond. The desert community which spawned the Dead Sea Scrolls aspired to a form of Jewish monasticism. Just as dramatically, in the third and fourth centuries of our own era, the monastic life, in various forms, began to flower in its fulness in the wilderness. Hermits and monks began to withdraw into the Egyptian and Syrian deserts to live a life of intentional self-isolation. The most pioneering of these was undoubtedly St Antony of Egypt. It would be not only his ‘way of life’ but the gnomic sayings it generated, which would leave their mark. These would form a treasury of spiritual nourishment from which sustenance is still gained even in this present day.
Reflecting on the significance of such self-isolation, Antony commented pithily:
‘He who sits alone and is quiet has escaped from three wars: hearing, speaking, seeing: but there is one thing against which he must continually fight: that is his own heart.’
Similarly, Father Moses, an Ethiopian, who as a freed slave had lived as a robber in Egypt, came to follow the abbot, Isidore. Moses again became a respected spiritual teacher. So, in Scetis, it was reported:
‘A brother went to Moses to ask for advice: He said to him, “Go and sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything.”’
These two sayings bring together both the challenge and the nourishment which the lives of the Desert Fathers characterised. Those seeking counsel would frequently comment on how marvellous such solitude must be – all temptations removed, but not so – Antony instead focused the challenge, and Father Moses, the fruits of isolation.
All of us, over the past months have been living in various degrees of isolation – some in families, some as couples, some entirely alone. We have effectively been living an enforced monastic life, admittedly in most cases without the spiritual discipline and patterns of prayer developed in the desert of fourth century Egypt. Nonetheless, we have begun to appreciate both the challenges and fruits of isolation. Whatever may be our starting point, we may well now appreciate the challenges to our own heart, but hopefully too, we may have learnt something of Father Moses’ gnomic utterance:
‘Go and sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything.’
The desert fathers were also compelled to face another powerful truth. This was the truth of dependence. Living in such extreme conditions, they realised their utter dependence upon food and survival in the most challenging weather conditions. In such circumstances, they were either reliant on the simple crafts by which they would earn their living or indeed on the generosity of others. This would eventually lead to individuals coming together to form primitive examples of what we now know as monasteries. Living without the immediate proximity of tradesmen or markets, they were sharply aware of the fragility of life, and of their dependence on God from whom they believed all sustenance and welfare came. They also learnt a mutual interdependence. So, a leprous monk was brought money for when he became old and ill. He replied to his unexpected visitor:
‘“Are you going to take me away from Him who has fed me for sixty years? I have been ill all that time, and have needed nothing, for God has fed me and given me all I need .” He would not accept the money.’
At the beginning of our present woes, there was the familiar panic buying. For somewhat bizarre reasons, it is always ‘loo rolls’ that suddenly take on the appearance of the most precious of all currencies. This time hand gel came a close second with almost every form of food following hard on their heels. We could no longer be certain that the supermarket or even the internet (look at the dearth of hair clippers!) could provide all. We were suddenly and almost painfully rediscovering our dependence.
Might this somewhat involuntary monastic life have something to teach us? What have we learnt in our cells? What have been the battles in our hearts? How would we have anything without others – and indeed without God?
This article was originally published in The Times on 20th June 2020
