The great Desert Father Antony, also known as Antony the Great (c. 251–356), was an Egyptian Christian monk and is often called the ‘father of monasticism.’
Seeing beyond the illusion of certainty
The great Desert Father Antony, also known as Antony the Great (c. 251–356), was an Egyptian Christian monk and is often called the ‘father of monasticism.’
The life of Desert Father Antony
Born into a wealthy Christian family, after the death of his parents when he was 54, his life was turned around after hearing the Gospel read in church as he heard the words, ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor’ (Mark 10:21).
He gave away his inheritance and withdrew into the desert in search of a life of prayer, simplicity, and complete devotion to God. His solitary life attracted many disciples, and he became a spiritual father to generations of monks. His life was recorded by Athanasius of Alexandria in The Life of Antony, which became one of the most influential works in the history of Christian spirituality.
A story of Antony records:
Once some brothers came to visit Antony, and Joseph was with them. Antony, wanting to test them, began to speak about holy Scripture.
He asked the younger monks first the meaning of text after text, and each of them answered as well as he could. To each he said, ‘You have not yet found the right answer.’
Then he said to Joseph, ‘What do you think is the meaning of this word?’ He replied, ‘I don’t know.’
Antony said, ‘Indeed Joseph alone has found the true way, for he said he did not know.’
Wisdom from Rowan Williams
In chapter 9 of the Gospel according to John, we find a story of Jesus healing a blind man. At the end of the story, Jesus tells the Pharisees that because they say, ‘We see,’ their blindness remains. Reflecting on this story, Rowan Williams writes, ‘I can’t think of anywhere better to start in trying to spell out…what the Christian story of seeing looks and feels like… Jesus is addressing the religious experts of the day and effectively saying, ‘Your problem is that you can’t see that you can’t see. You can’t see what it is that your habits, your status and your skill prevent you engaging with.’ (1)
As the story unfolds, writes Williams, it becomes clearer what it is that these religious experts can’t see:
They can’t see the mechanisms that drive them…which lead them to be deeply afraid…which allow them to use violence to protect their safe and self-justified positions…that allow scapegoating, that seek security at the expense of others. They can’t see all of that horrible, noisy, mechanical stuff going on inside them and they are stuck… They don’t know they can’t see.’ (2)
The ‘training programme’ of the Desert Mothers and Fathers
Coming to see clearly was central to what you might call the ‘training programme’ of the Desert Mothers and Fathers. The first stage focuses on training the mind, cultivating disciplined attention and the skills to observe and unmask the multiple false versions of identity we construct, to understand the various energies (‘passions’) of our being and bring about greater interior harmony, integration, and stability.
Following Jesus, the wisdom teachings of the desert contemplatives tell us that coming to see is not primarily about accumulating, but following a path of divesting. We are invited to release our ideas and concepts, and open to ‘the radiance and the beauty’ that is the deepest truth of everything. ‘In the light of that radiance,’ writes Williams, ‘you can’t be like the religious experts and say, ‘I see, I’ve got it,’ and put the experience and knowledge in a package in your pocket.’ (3)
Abba Antony recognised that Joseph had found the way because he said, ‘I do not know.’ In other words, if you think you’ve got it all nailed down, you haven’t. You will come to see, says Jesus, when you know you can’t see.
Why do we follow a path that can seem at first so paradoxical?
To see more clearly. To live more peacefully. Without harming ourselves and those around us.
‘Do not let [the soul] be distracted or torn this way or that by thoughts,’ says the fourth-century Pseudo-Macarius, but ‘let it become…completely a waiting upon Christ,’ until ‘the soul that seeks God – or rather, the soul that is sought by God – is no longer anything but gazing.’ (4)
‘It is only by unfailing and focused gazing that the spirit gravitates to God,’ says the seventh-century Sahdona the Syrian, ‘but when the luminous ray of the simple eye of the soul is flooded with those intense rays of light that flash down on us from on high, then it is that the fire of God flares up in a great blaze within our hearts.’ (5)
We come to see, not through mastering the truth, but because we have become more willing to accept it.
This blog is based on one of the teachings given in a recent online meditation group gathering. You are warmly welcome to join one of our future gatherings.