Today is the feast day of St. John “of the Ladder” (“Climacus” in Latinized Greek), whose surname comes from the title of his principal work, Klimax tou Paradeisou (Englished in a recent edition as The Ladder of Divine Ascent). In 30 chapters the book traces the ascent from attachment to the world to union with God, beginning with the defeat of commonplace vices and continuing through the acquisition of the virtues of stillness, prayer, dispassion and love. It has long been central to Orthodox spirituality and is appointed for reading aloud in monasteries during Lent. The Fourth Sunday of Lent is dedicated to the author.
About St. John’s life, our knowledge is scanty. He is now believed to have been born before 579 and to have died about 649. At age 16, after excelling as a student, he abandoned the world to live as an anchorite near Mount Sinai. At age 60, he was chosen as abbot of the mountain’s great religious house (now known as St. Catherine’s Monastery). He passed into life eternal at about age 75.
The Ladder quickly became one of the most popular spiritual tracts ever written. In ascetic circles, it is one of the fundamental expositions of hesychasm, the approach to God through continual prayer of the heart. Among laymen it is read for its striking aphorisms and insight into the spiritual struggles that afflict all Christians. Indeed, St. John has wise counsel today. For instance, in view of the emotions aroused by the court-sanctioned starvation of Terri Schiavo, we should ponder what he had to say about the remembrance of wrongs:
Remembrance of wrongs is the consummation of anger, the keeper of sin, hatred of righteousness, ruin of virtues, poison of the soul, worm of the mind, shame of prayer, cessation of supplication, estrangement of love, a nail stuck in the soul, pleasure-less feeling cherished in the sweetness of bitterness, continuous sin, unsleeping transgression, hourlymalice. . . . You will know that you have completely freed yourself of this rot, not when you pray for the person who has offended you, not when you exchange presents with him, not when you invite him to your table, but only when, on hearing that he has fallen into bodily or spiritual misfortune, you suffer and weep for him as foryourself. . . .
The forgetting of wrongs is a sign of true repentance. But he who dwells on them and thinks that he is repenting is like a man who thinks he is running while he is really asleep.
Troparion - Tone 8
By a flood of tears you made the desert fertile
And by your longing for God you brought forth fruits in abundance.
By the radiance of miracles you illuminated the whole universe.
O our holy Father John Climacus, pray to Christ our God to save our souls.
Kontakion - Tone 1
You offered us your teachings as fruits of everlasting freshness,
To sweeten the hearts of those who receive them with attention.
O blessed and wise John, they are the rungs of a ladder,
Leading the souls of those who honor you from earth to Eternal glory in Heaven!
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