One of the most difficult problems faced in Christian life, and one that the desert monks experienced acutely, is the problem of our temptation to seek distance from the struggles of others, and to promote a sense of separation from the sins of the world around us. There is a certain passing resemblance to Christianity in doing so. Indeed, we certainly do not actively desire temptation for ourselves, nor do we approve of engaging in any sin. It might seem natural, on the surface, to seek distance from those struggling with such things-to set ourselves apart as more pure, and more holy, than others.
Yet, when we see ourselves as fundamentally different from other human beings, whether they are Christian or not, we quickly begin to resemble the foolish elder. We condemn and chastise those around us for their brokenness. Such condemnations and chastisements are, despite their outward claim to holiness, works of anger and never of love. If love is a shared commitment to purity of heart between individuals, then seeking separation from others, by its very nature, discourages love and can even make it ultimately impossible. To share the pursuit of purity of heart with another, one must share a connection with her, and in a fallen world, that means sharing a connection with a fallen person.
What is more, to see the sufferings of someone else provides another opportunity to live out the teachings of Abba Joseph on anger and love. In co-suffering compassion, we take on responsibility for the sin of other people quite literally-we accept it as our own, and so are naturally impelled to work toward its eventual healing. The distinction between the responsibility to others and the responsibility to oneself disappears, and all sin becomes our own sin. When we view other people this way, works of mercy that help them to heal from their own sins will £low easily, perhaps even miraculously, as they did for Abba Apollos. This, in turn, means that to find ourselves suffering what others suffer also means to find ourselves healed of this suffering whenever the other person is so healed. And because compassion itself is a powerful tool in effecting healing, its exercise therefore feeds back upon those who exhibit it within a relationship and begins to guide both parties to Christian love, and thus to the mutual pursuit of purity of heart. In short, compassion heals the compassionate person in the same instant as the sinner.
Perhaps most profound of all, however, is that if compassion involves accepting the sins of another as our own, then it equally involves inclusion in their repentance, should it come. By God’s mercy, the foolish elder was forced to experience co-suffering and he learned from it to go back to repenting for those things that he pridefully thought he had overcome, but from which he still suffered. Such was the effect of a miracle in his case, but it should never have needed to come to that. The moment that the young monk walked into his cell, God had already provided the foolish elder with a golden opportunity to recognize his own sin manifest in another, and repent for it. Had he done so, he could have completely avoided the painful experience of being struck by temptation, while learning to set aside spiritual pride nonetheless. Instead, he refused to suffer along with the young monk. In an act of profound and exceptional mercy, God taught the foolish elder the same lesson anyway-but this time, it was taught by way of the stinging darts of temptation. How much more bitter a pedagogy?
Far from learning the hard way, like the bad elder, compassion invites us to repent of others’ sins as though they were our own while skipping over the bitterness of sin itself. In the eleventh conference, Abba Chaeremon teaches this clearly.
A person who, by such love, draws near to the image and likeness of God, will rejoice in the good because of the joy of the good itself. Possessing the same feeling of patience and gentleness, he will not be angered by the faults of sinners, but rather, sympathizing and co-suffering with their infirmities, he will ask for mercy on them. For he remembers that he was long opposed by the impulses arising from similar passions until he was saved by the mercy of the Lord.24
Most of us are accustomed to repenting for things that we have done ourselves. Most of the time, this makes repentance a fairly bitter pill to swallow as it is accompanied by a realization of our own real guilt. Yet, compassion, as it was demonstrated by Abba Apollos, provides the opportunity for a form of repentance, discussed here by Abba Chaeremon, that is not accompanied by a feeling of personal guilt, but instead by an experience of inter-personal love. To repent in earnest for the sins of another is to turn to God without requiring that we be stung by bitter arrows first. Instead, we are invited by the sins of others to a repentance that is both absolutely earnest, and full of joy rather than tears-joy in mutual love meeting forgiveness. To repent in compassion is to realize a moment in which mercy and peace kiss one another, in the words of the psalm.
It is a great marvel indeed that a simple mental act of co-suffering could constitute so great a boon in our pursuit of Christian love, and purity of heart. What is more, it is easy to see that those of us living in the world have nearly endless opportunities for this kind of co-suffering. Saturated by sexual images in the media, surrounded by indignant and angry people, and utterly assailed with every kind of commercialist materialism one can imagine, pictures of sin make up every detail of life in modern society. What is more, the desperation and suffering caused by all this sin should be as easy for us to see as it was for Abba Apollos when he saw the face of the young monk. It is there in the agonized eyes of the homeless alcoholic, but just as much in the feeble boastings of the wealthy braggart. It is there in the absent stare of a man entertaining his lust, and in the empty arrogance of the woman inviting his gaze. What is more, it is there in our own eyes when we look in the mirror, complicit as we are in it all.
Yet, we must ask how we react to all this sin. Do we abhor it and cover our eyes? Perhaps at times, and this may not always be the worst course if we are still deep in the struggle against a particular passion ourselves. Do we sit in judgment of it? Certainly, though we should never do so. Or do we, like Abba Apollos, turn our hearts to the people whose sin we see so clearly, and accept within ourselves the burden of what they suffer? Do we look at them with genuine compassion, as though we are looking in a mirror at our own sins, and say to ourselves “yes, and this is my own transgression too”? Are we an alcoholic among alcoholics, even though we seldom drink? Are we a prostitute among prostitutes even though we are faithful to our spouse? Do we see that our pride is the same pride as the disdainful boasters on the television screen-or do we think ourselves a different kind of creature from all these?
~Daniel G. Opperwall, A Layman in the Desert
24 Conf. II.IX.2.
