Preface to the collection of Theophan the Recluse

Preface to the collection of St. Theophan the Recluse

The proposed collection owes its origin to the following incident. One of the lovers of God, who loves to listen to himself and prayerfully talk with God, told about himself that, sometimes forced to do a lot of housework and work, he always weakens in attention and cools down in prayer. No matter how sad it is, he says, I can’t control myself. But then, as soon as I find some free time, I lock myself in my room and, putting an end to all business and troubles, I just pray, read and think about God and divine things. God be merciful, the former peaceful mood returns again. At this time I read everything only about prayer, now in one book, now in another. Having said this, he expressed the wish that it would be nice if all this were collected in one small book. Then there would be no need to rummage through different books.

And here it is – collected, at least partially, but quite sufficiently for the purpose. The motivation was not just the desire of the said lover of God, but especially the fact that many other lovers of God are in similar circumstances, and do not have the books that write about prayer at hand to read and restore the prayerful mood in themselves. Meanwhile, such reading is the best means to pacify the mind and sober the heart. It reads and will warm up the desire for prayer. He will pray while his heart is warm, and then start reading again, so that, warmed by it, he will begin to pray again.

This is the reason and motivation for this collection! But even without that, in it everyone who wants to establish himself in prayer will find the necessary instruction.

It says everything about the spirit of prayer. As for the rules and order of prayer, there is no need for special instructions for this. These rules and orders are indicated in the church, and are followed by everyone, even those who do not listen so diligently to prayer. They go to church and pray at home using prayer books. And there is no one who even remembers himself in the slightest degree who does not correct prayers every day, no matter what.

With all this, one cannot help but marvel at how it happens that we have been praying for a whole century, but still do not know how to pray as we should. The proposed collection will remind you of this, depicting worthy prayer, and whoever wants to achieve perfection in it, so that it becomes worthy in his soul, will teach him how to succeed in this.

The crown of the collection is the interpretation of the Lord’s Prayer. And its origin is similar to the previous one. Several people pestered me to give an explanation of this prayer. Based on the consciousness of powerlessness, it is good to do this with your mind and word, it is proposed to collect under each word the prayers that the saints said about him. fathers, and bring it to the attention of Christ-loving prayer books. And it is offered.

This is how the two halves of the collection came about.

Others may regret that some kind of system was not given to the collection. – This was the thought. But one of the great prayer books, a Saint of God now of blessed memory, was asked, “wouldn’t it be better to give the system to the collection?” The answer received was this: the system is not doing this. The system is produced by forces that are located in a completely different area than in which prayer operates. Therefore, it will be a mixture of unrelated elements. The collection is compiled for edification, and not for speculation. Those who seek edification do not need a system, but an indication of the matter. He creates his own prayer system in his heart, and every instruction he reads immediately finds its place in his heart, and not in his head. The system will only hinder him, and even chill the work of prayer. “This cannot be contradicted,” and the collection was compiled without a system.

We accompany it with the desire that the Lord will grant to all those who read it to find in it something useful for the creation of a prayerful spirit in their hearts.

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Notes

The original title of this collection: “Patristic instructions on prayer and sobriety or attention in the heart to God.”

To the author’s text of the collection (from St. Basil the Great to St. Barsanuphius and John inclusive), the publishers added quotes about prayer from the letters of St. himself. Feofan.