In the Heart of the Desert: The Spirituality of the Desert Fathers and Mothers

This book is hard to put down, and I intend to re-read it. The stories of the 'Abbas' and 'Ammas' and their interactions with the brethren and sisters in the context of spiritual direction are insightful and have great spiritual depth and meaning. So many lessons! I especially loved the stories of Abba Zosimas and Abba Poemen. The section on Zosimas is newly translated material. This book is a treasure. All of the stories are generally great storehouses of Wisdom--and give insight into how to live in the Kingdom of Heaven...whether or not you presently dwell in the desert. After all, the desert is a spiritual metaphor...isn't it?

The revised edition of In the Heart of the Desert: The Spirituality of the Desert Fathers and Mothers provides an excellent introduction to the world of the Desert Mothers and Fathers, surveying basic matters of God, death, and loneliness and considering translations and basic introductions to the sources themselves. Libraries strong in Christian analysis will find it a winning analysis.

I like the two aphorisms that Chryssavgis uses to introduce the overall message of the fourth century desert monastics. From W.H. Auden's In Memory of W.B. Yeats, "In the deserts of the heart, let the healing fountain start." Then, from Isaiah 35:8 (LXX), "The road of cleansing goes through that desert. It shall be named the way of holiness." The desert was the laboratory of Christian discipleship for these saints, and we have much to learn from their experiment. Chryssavgis, Professor of Theology and former Dean at Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology, has not only studied the desert fathers as a scholar, he has spent time with them as a fellow Christian pilgrim. The result is a wonderful introduction to these early ascetics, similar to Where God Happens (2005) by Rowan Williams. His 18 chapters are brief and to the point. They cover all the pertinent themes you would expect--patience, silence, tears, guidance, detachment, and so on, and then three that are pleasant surprises--the body, the environment, and gender. He quotes copiously from the desert "sayings." The book is complimented by color plates of icons, a simple map of the area, a timeline of people, bibliography, and then the Reflections of Abba Zosimas (6th century) that are translated here for the first time. The monastics commend themselves for a number of reasons. John the Baptist announced the coming kingdom in the desert. Jesus fled to Egypt as a baby (Matthew 2:12-23), and in Luke's Gospel our first glimpse of him as an adult was when the Holy Spirit drove him into the desert to be tempted by Satan (Luke 4:1). Second, these desert dwellers were practitioners of healing, not abstract theoreticians. They sought personal transformation, not theological information. They believed the wisdom of Diadochos of Photiki (5th century) that "nothing is so destitute as a mind philosophizing about God when it is without him." Third, the desert monastics might strike us as anachronistic oddballs today, and certainly no one would accuse them of being well-adjusted to society, then or now. But we misunderstand them if we construe their bizarre lifestyles as a spirituality of superficial techniques. What they modeled, and what we should emulate, is a transformation of the interior geography of the heart whatever one's exterior circumstances. For them the desert was a specific place, but for us today it can also be a spiritual way. Fourth, I honor the desert mothers and fathers because I want to place myself in the mix of saints who have gone before me. Tradition, said Chesterton, "means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death." Finally, I love the desert monastics mos

'In the Heart of the Desert' is a very thoroughly researched book on the writings of the Desert Fathers and Mothers of Christian tradition going back to the time of St. Antony. What makes it really special is how well it is written for lay-reader or scholar alike. This is a book that you will enjoy whether you know a little or a lot about the subject, and it is easy to understand, follow and benefit from irregardless of your prior knowledge of the subject.Chryssavgis captures the peace of the desert fathers and makes it accessible to those of us living in the modern day world, who would like to bring a bit of the 'desert' tradition into our every day lives. Thank you, Father Chryssavgis, this book has been a wonderful read, and an inspiring journey into the desert.

In the Heart of the Desert: The Spirituality Of The Desert Fathers And Mothers by Fr. John Chryssavigis (Professor of Theology at Hellenic College & Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology) surveys a treasury of ancient texts regarding Christianity, particularly those written by earliest Christian peoples who lived and survived in the desert as an act of Christian faith. Their exhortations, spiritual guidances, prayers, encounters with God, internal struggles, and testimonies have survived down the centuries, and here they are presented in an informative overview enhanced with extensive thought, wisdom, and meditation concerning the lives that have worshiped God throughout the centuries. An especially welcome contribution to Christian studies and reference shelves, In The Heart Of The Desert is a work of considerable scholarship and easily accessible by non-specialist general readers.