Abba Poemen said, “In Abba Pambo we see three bodily activities; abstinence from food until the evening every day, silence, and much manual work.”26 A brother asked Abba Poemen, “Is it better to speak or to be silent?” The old man said to him, “The man who speaks for God’s sake does well; but he who is silent for God’s sake also does well.”27
Stillness provides an environment for silence. Abba Poemen understands silence as one of the bodily disciplines, recognizing that the body, itself, is involved in the monk’s path to transformation. This is important because the “emptiness” of silence could be seen as a way to transcend bodily existence. The desert elders are clear that the whole being of the monk is a sacred gift involved in his or her path to holiness. This is both a sacramental and incarnational understanding of the body’s place in the path toward sanctification. “The body is not left behind or ignored in the pursuit of purity of heart but becomes an essential and even sacramental element of God’s transformation of the whole person.”28 Abba Poemen declares that silence takes place, also, in the context of other bodily virtues such as fasting and labor. Its practice should not exclude other activities that become opportunities for prayer and love of neighbor that lead to humility. In the second saying, Poemen stresses that silence is not an end in itself. Its purpose is not to eliminate speech because silence is a higher virtue. Silence is not fleeing from words. It makes words of integrity and charity possible. When balanced, silence and speech are colleagues rather than competitors. The absence of spoken words makes hearing the Word of God (the Logos) possible. When a person is able to hear God’s voice in the silence of the cell or in meditation, he or she is able, also, to hear God’s voice in the other activities of daily life and to speak in a charitable and helpful manner. In this way both silence and speech are used “for God’s sake.”
What is monastic silence? The desert elders experienced silence as a withdrawal from exterior speech, conversations and the noises of daily human activities. They limited their hearing to engage in a more intentional dialog with God, and themselves, as they progressed toward other virtues of holiness.
Why did the abbas and ammas want to avoid speech and noise? They were acutely aware of four dimensions of human speech that could produce both positive and negative consequences.29
- Abba Poemen said, “If man remembered that it is written: ‘By your words you will be justified and by your words you will be condemned’ (Matt 12:37), he would choose to remain silent.”30
Obviously, Poemen is not advocating a boycott on speech. He used words in teaching, prayer, and necessary conversations. He quoted words of Jesus in this saying. He is reminding other monks of the tremendous freedom speech gives a human being. We are free to say anything we desire. At the same time, what we say will have consequences that can either justify or condemn us. This freedom of speech carries such an awesome responsibility that we should consider remaining silent rather than speaking words that will harm others and bring judgment on us. Abba Poemen is using hyperbole to challenge his disciples to be good stewards of their freedom of speech.
- Abba Agathon said, “Freedom of speech, or familiarity, is like a period of intense heat. When it comes, everyone takes shelter from it, and it shrivels up the fruit of the trees.”31 And “It was said of Abba Ammoes that when he went to church, he did not allow his disciple to walk beside him but only at a certain distance; and if the latter came to ask him about his thoughts, he would move away from him as soon as he had replied, saying to him, ‘It is for fear that, after edifying words, irrelevant conversation should slip in, that I do not keep you with me.”’32
~David G.R. Keller, Oasis of Wisdom: The Worlds of the Desert Fathers and Mothers
26 Ibid., Poemen 150, 188.
27 Ibid., Poemen 147, 188.
28 Harriet A. Luckman and Linda Kulzer, eds. Purity of Heart in Early Ascetic and Monastic Literature (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1999) 14.
29 My descriptions of these four dimensions are influenced by a similar discussion in Ramfos, Pelican, 74-78.
30 Ward, Sayings, Poemen 42, 173.
31 Gerontikon, Agathon l, 109A.
32 Ward, Sayings, Ammoes 1, 30.
