Abba Joseph now expands on his teaching by identifying six key foundations for this kind of true friendship. I) Detachment with regard to all earthly possessions and wealth. 2) Not considering oneself wise, but deferring to the point of view of the other. 3) Seeking love and peace above all. 4) Refraining from anger at all times. 5) Calming the anger of the friend should it arise. 6) Constant reflection on the coming of death.3 There are strong parallels here between the foundations of a friendship and the key virtues that we identified in chapter one as central to the pursuit of purity of heart. In particular, one notices Abba Joseph’s emphasis on detachment, as well as mutual deferral to one another of the sort that is foundational to discernment, discretion, humility, and balance. The presence of these parallels between the virtues that lead to purity of heart and those that are necessary for friendship, of course, is unsurprising in light of what Abba Joseph understands genuine love to be. Love is nothing other than the sharing of a commitment to virtue, and so it is naturally the most essential virtues that build up a friendship of love. Conversely, where virtue is absent, love, which is shared virtue, cannot be, and so, as Abba Joseph says, “the perfect love of friendship cannot endure except between perfect men of identical virtue.” 4
Much more could be said about Abba Joseph’s understanding of friendship as a topic in itself, but our purpose here, instead, is to explore Christian life in society. In what way does Abba Joseph’s teaching bear upon that discussion? The answer is that the kind of friendship built on love that Abba Joseph presents as ideal here is, in essence, the ideal kind of relationship that is to be sought between ourselves and every human being that we encounter in the world. Everyone in the world, from strangers to acquaintances to friends, presents-in theory-an opportunity to begin a real friendship. Abba Joseph himself notes as much by saying that such love (which he refers to with the Greek term agape) can be shown to everyone.5 This is so even in our mediated relationships for, as Abba Joseph says, “with God, it is the convergence of wills, not of location, that brings brothers under one roof.” 6
Our goal through life in society, then, is to transform all of our relationships in the world into real Christian friendships-sites of genuine love. This is not to say, however, that we should actually expect to get anywhere close to reaching this goal. Even among our dearest friends, we can probably count a small handful of people (if any at all) with whom we share even a shadow of the kind of total love and mutual devotion to purity of heart that Abba Joseph describes. He, however, is entirely aware of this problem, and for this reason he spends virtually all of his time in the sixteenth conference discussing the reasons for which human relationships Jail to become what they are meant to be. For him, the essential thing that breaks down relationships of all sorts is anger. Because most of our relationships in society do not even begin to approach Abba Joseph’s ideal, understanding his teaching on anger is critical for trying to begin the work of moving these relationships toward their goal.
For Abba Joseph, anger is to be avoided by Christians at all costs.
For nothing is greater than love, and, conversely, nothing is worse than fury and anger. Indeed, anything-no matter how useful and necessary it seems-ought to be left aside, if doing this will avoid riling up anger.7
~Daniel G. Opperwall, A Layman in the Desert
3 Conf. 16.IVI-3.
4 Conf. 16.V.I.
5 Conf. 16.XIVI.
6 Conf. 16.III.5.
7 Conf. 16.VII. I.
