As attentive and vigilant as the nous may be, without divine strength and the invocation of the name of the Lord Jesus, “the rotating sword,” it is unable to be guarded from harmful thoughts.
The vigilance, therefore, or the watchfulness or attentiveness of the nous is accompanied by prayer. On its own, the nous does not have the power for pure prayer unless it uses the salt of watchfulness that drives away impure and wicked thoughts. (Philokalia Vol. l)
A hermit, his body withered away from a life of ascetic practices, was asked:
-How do you spend your time, Elder in the desert?
– Here, my child, we “uphold the nous”, he answered.
How though can someone make a start in the watching of the nous? ”The flower is the beginning of fruit-bearing, and the beginning of watching over the nous is temperance in food and drink, the rejection of different thoughts, and peace of heart”. (Philokalia Vol. 1)
Indeed. Fasting and temperance, which contemporary man has discarded as a rule, assist not only in subjecting the flesh but also in liberating the body from the oppressive ties of the flesh, and simultaneously illuminating the nous. Nowadays we have become “flesh” because increasingly we eat flesh. This is why our nous is mostly “flesh”. People do not fast or pray, they do not partake in church services, they have become intemperate, and because the body is linked with the soul and nous, the one influences the other. An intemperate stomach will have as a consequence an intemperate nous, and a person that does not participate in services will have intemperate and untamed flesh. A prayerful and simple nous will have an enlightened body (that is, luminous with pure thoughts.)
Holy Communion of the life-giving mysteries has the strength, to enlighten through the body, the nous. Prayer through the nous purifies the body also.
The Body of God both deifieth and nourisheth me, deifieth my soul and wondrously nourisheth my mind.3
St Hesychios the Priest writes: “For when that fire enters into us, it at once drives the demons from our heart and remits the sins we have previously committed, leaving the nous free from the turbulence of wicked thoughts. And, if in this way, standing at the entrance to our heart, we keep strict watch over the nous, when we are again permitted to receive Holy Communion, the divine Body will illuminate our nous still more and make it shine like a star.4
In this blessed state the no us imitates the bodiless angels of the Creator, and just as they do not care for food and every other material need, so the immaterial nous does not care for material things until it reaches the “heaven of peace”. Just as the bodiless powers (angels of God) do not care for money and wealth, so also all those who have purified the “eye of the soul” do not care for the harm which the demons may cause, because they rise until they reach the Seraphim with the intense longing of perfect love. (Philokalia Vol. 1)
All these are attainable from luminous and burning watchfulness of the nous which makes it alive and a vigilant gate-keeper of the soul by the uncreated grace of prayer.
~ The Nous, Themes from the Philokalia, Number 2, 2nd Edition, Publications of the Holy Monastery of St Gregory Palamas, Koufalia, Thessaloniki, Hellas
3. Prayers of Preparation for Holy Communion.
4. The Philokalia Vol. 1 St Hesychios the Priest, London Faber & Faber Ltd. 1979.
