Temperance is one of the Christian virtues that make a person pleasing to God through self-control, discernment or sound judgement, through self-restraint and the power to control one’s passions and distinguish between thoughts, being defined by the idea of moderation, of soundness of mind and thought, so as to receive ‘the mind of Christ’ (Philippians 2:5; 1 Corinthians 16:2) and to fulfil His will.
Temperance may also be regarded as the art of living a balanced life, with moderation in food and drink, in dress and in all behaviour, avoiding both deprivation and excess, whilst also directing one’s life towards its fulfilment in the truest sense, giving rise to gentleness, humility, propriety in speech and behaviour, and spiritual and physical health. It becomes a necessary and effective means of attaining holiness, of union with God through grace, so that ‘the surpassing riches of His grace may be made known in the ages to come’ (Ephesians 2:7), and of His love for mankind. Ultimately, every virtue is a form of manifestation of love. St Basil the Great says that God is the One ‘whom all who live virtuously desire’1), whilst St Gregory the Wonderworker considered that both the goal and the condition for attaining virtue are the connection with the true God 2.
The virtue of temperance existed in human nature in a potential sense from the moment of creation, but it was only through obedience to God that it could become an actual act; therefore, it was associated with self-control, restraint and fasting, and the use of desire 3 for its good and perfect purpose, as a means of attaining a virtuous life, which could lead one to the likeness of God. This goal could only be attained through discernment. However, through the Fall, man strayed from the purpose of his creation and experienced the division that the Fall brought about between the awareness of good and the actualisation of it. Although ‘he receives love from God, he chooses himself, not God. The life given by God for communion with Him was taken by man for himself’4, and, instead of his deification, he ended up in the torment of the struggle for survival, acquiring lust, lust, and insatiability, which led him to experience all manner of pleasures, often with disastrous consequences. Adam, having turned away from God and, consequently, having been deprived of divine grace of his own volition, found himself deprived of all the blessings he had enjoyed in the paradisiacal state 5 and, consequently, introduced into the world, through all his descendants, the series of ‘evils contrary’ to these blessings 6. No longer knowing the purpose of his life, he became increasingly preoccupied with sensory knowledge of external things, paving the way for a life of intemperance. Thus, through the Fall, good and evil for humankind ‘were limited to what is good and evil for the body, that is, to the sensible world, and he no longer considered that good lies in the spiritual realm, nor did he regard evil as a lack of spiritual goods’7.
Through the Fall into sin, man strayed from the purpose of his creation and experienced the division brought about by the Fall between the awareness of good and its actual practice. Instead of becoming like God, he ended up in the torment of the struggle for survival, acquiring desire, lust and insatiability, which led him to experience all manner of pleasures.
To foster an inner understanding of things and to help man keep his mind fixed on God, and to restrain that part of him that craves, whose sins are the love of money, gluttony and all carnal desires, God gave His law and commandments concerning certain restrictions on food and social relations, so that, in this way, man might practise exercising control over his desires and cravings and, thus, strengthen his discernment of good and evil, and to attain self-control, for: ‘Like a city with a breach and without a wall, so is a man who lacks self-control’ (Proverbs XXV, 28). Therefore, the exhortation is given: ‘In all your affairs be moderate, and no misfortune will befall you!’ (The Book of the Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach 31:26).
God has given us more than just an exhortation to a virtuous, temperate life, for, being the One who possesses virtue by nature 8, He became man and, thus, He ‘works in us both to will and to act’ (Philippians 2:13), as the One who is the Source of all virtue and ‘reveals Himself from afar in this way and becomes our co-worker in temperance and fortitude’9). Christ the Saviour ‘helps us to grow in virtue through His power, through His reason, which strengthens our own reason that forms virtue, and through His word’10.
Thus, in the New Testament, virtue is “the mirror and shadow of truth”11 and “manifests itself through the moral effort of self-control, driving away, by a mind enlightened by faith and strengthened by grace, the blind desires of the flesh, so that order and balance may be established. It is the rejection of gluttony, insatiability and greed; it is a bulwark against the onslaught of desires that set the nature ablaze; it is ‘gradual abstinence, practised with the aim of subduing bodily passions, attaining piety and understanding the highest ideals. Anyone striving to acquire virtues needs temperance’12 which is ‘the crucifixion of the desires’ (Galatians 5:24)13.
It is the middle way, the right path, the guardian of the mind and body against the defilement of sin. Defilement “manifests itself as anything that isolates or disturbs, blocks and diverts the forces of life, preventing man from realising that he needs to be saved”14; and, therefore, the role of temperance remains that of a constant state of vigilance to preserve spiritual and bodily purity: ‘Take heed to yourselves!’ (Luke 21:34).
The role of temperance remains that of a constant state of vigilance to preserve purity of soul and body.
In this regard, Saint Peter the Apostle says: ‘Keep yourselves from the fleshly desires that wage war against the soul’ (1 Peter 2:11) and urges Christians to be ‘sober-minded and watchful in prayer’ (1 Peter 4:7). Temperance supports prayer and dispels the whole host of thoughts and ideas that surround it, being linked also to ‘humble reflection, like unceasing prayer, accompanied by tears and sorrow. For this, by constantly calling upon God for help, does not allow a person to place foolish trust in their own strength and wisdom, nor to exalt themselves above others—things which are dreadful maladies of the passion of pride’15). Through sound judgement, it discerns those things that are truly beneficial to life, ‘which will make evident one’s growth and strengthening in divine matters’16; growth in virtue, which was naturally bestowed upon man by God, so that he might become a practitioner of virtue.
The attainment of this depends on the way in which man makes use of God’s gifts, which are good, and ‘nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving’ (1 Timothy 4:4). Food, like all things necessary for life, offers endless ways in which we are assured of God’s care for His creation; yet, when these are abused, we lose our self-control and become enslaved, and we see how passion becomes irrational. Desire is passionate because it tends towards sensory pleasure, rather than towards spiritual goods; for this reason, Saint John Cassian says that it is not so much a matter of abstaining from the things themselves, but of restraining, with regard to them, the passionate impulse that leads us towards sensory pleasure 17.
Thus, temperance appears as a manifestation of self-control, which King Solomon regarded as a companion to wisdom 18. At the same time, temperance becomes the spiritual strength of virtue, being linked to faith, hope, love, wisdom and justice, for ‘the virtues balance one another, and all come together as one and are fulfilled in a single order and in a single form of virtue. For there are virtues proper and virtues greater than the virtues, which encompass and sustain most or even all of them, such as divine love, humility and divine patience’19 For this reason, Saint Basil the Great regarded it as ‘the principle of the spiritual life 20’, whilst Saint Nectarius called it ‘the foundation of all virtues and the first to prepare souls for the work of the virtues’21’, contributing to their authentic fulfilment.
At the same time, temperance becomes the spiritual strength of righteousness, being linked to faith, hope, love, wisdom and justice, for ‘the virtues balance one another, and all come together as one and are fulfilled in a single order and in a single form of virtue.’
The principle of temperance is not to seek pleasure when we make use of things 22, which is why Saint Ephrem the Syrian, speaking of the arduous struggle against desires, offers this exhortation: ‘be stern from the outset towards every desire, lest you be overcome and become accustomed to being overcome!’23 Thus, the beginning of self-restraint is determined by the orientation of every deed and action towards the goal appropriate to its nature, towards God, so that we may partake of spiritual blessings. “Temperance is virtuous only to the extent that it is inspired by God”24 says Clement of Alexandria, and, at the same time, it is “devotion to the Lord”25, for its purpose is none other than man’s union with God. To fulfil its purpose, it is necessary to subject desire and passion to reason 26, to regulate them 27, through ‘self-control’, which must be independent and free 28. Saint Gregory of Nyssa, in his Ninth Homily on the Song of Songs, shows that ‘virtue lies between deficiency and excess’29. ‘By using sound judgement in understanding the nature of things, we acquire temperance, love and knowledge,’ teaches Saint Maximus the Confessor. And by using them without discernment, we fall into intemperance, hatred and ignorance’30 Thus, the temperate person, wisely assessing their own capacities and without exaggeration in any respect, adorns himself with all the virtues of decency and modesty, in the struggle to master desires, impulses and the passionate stirrings of the body 31, ‘any lust contrary to nature’32, and any form of subjugation of nature.
As one progresses in the spiritual life, self-restraint gradually takes on the all-encompassing form of goodness, as the natural state of fulfilling the commandments and the will of God. This, of course, does not happen instantly, but requires time, spiritual effort and prayer, in the words of Abba Zosima: ‘Every virtue requires effort, and time, and our own will, but, above all, it requires God’s cooperation. For if God does not work together with our will, all our labour is in vain’33
We understand, therefore, that the virtue of temperance can grow ‘through long practice in the renunciation of pleasures and through engagement with divine matters’34, but also through our cooperation with God, in which ‘we see Christ ever more clearly. Our virtues and our reason become ever more transparent to Christ, or Christ is ever more manifestly present in them’10. Temperance is not practised merely for the cultivation of one’s own person, but out of a constant quest to fulfil God’s will, so that it becomes ‘the royal road’ through which we are protected from deception, according to the words of Holy Scripture: ‘We shall travel along the royal road, turning neither to the right nor to the left’ (Numbers 20:17), in order to know and experience Him 35.
And in this there must be a spiritual balance, a state of moderation, for ‘godliness is great gain when one is content with what one has’ (1 Timothy 6:6). If a person excludes God’s work and imagines that they can overcome their passions through their own strength, they thereby give rise to self-conceit, behind which lies a lack of humility. Therefore, an effort is required to overcome self-importance and to acquire humility, for ‘from humility spring the meekness and self-restraint that constitute the temperance of the senses’36).
If a person excludes God’s work and imagines that they can overcome their passions through their own strength, they thereby give rise to self-conceit, behind which lies a lack of humility.
Perfection is an endeavour of those who strive of their own free will to attain a life that transcends visible things, a life of communion with God. The temperate person is a new person, a spiritual person filled, enlivened and guided by the gift and grace of the Holy Spirit, and in his life are now manifested ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control’ (Galatians 5:22).
Experiencing God’s presence and His works provides the spiritual perspective on how to utilise ‘the all-encompassing powers of the mind, directing them all towards the path of salvation and accompanying them with understanding and righteousness, with the virtue that “has prepared a chariot of fire to carry him to heaven”37’.
Thus, the temperate and pure person, free from all passion, is ‘the faithful and truthful witness to the heights of divine honour and glory, bestowed upon mankind by God’38.
The Sins of Intemperance
Sins, like spiritual illnesses, develop and take on various forms; in the case of intemperance, these are linked, amongst other things, to gluttony, greed for wealth or sexual immorality, which is why Holy Scripture recommends the practical wisdom of self-restraint in many aspects of life: ‘Do not give in to your passions, lest you be dragged along by them as by a raging bull’ (The Book of the Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach VI, 2) and ‘Do not rejoice in excessive pleasure, nor be weighed down by its burden’ (The Book of the Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach, XVIII, 32).
Matter, possessions and food are not condemned, for He who created man from the dust of the earth and endowed him with the breath of life (Genesis 2:7) has made him dependent on both material and spiritual nourishment, as Saint Nicholas Velimirovich points out: ‘He who gives the body also gives the soul, and He who gives the air also gives bread. Your children, O Merciful Giver, await from You all that they need!”39
The cause of human nature’s descent into sin and passions was desire satisfied through disobedience to God’s commandment; this, even though in the Garden of Eden, where ‘everything was very good’ (Genesis 1:31), all that was necessary for life existed. ‘Man believed that, by relying on food, he would be able to receive what he can only receive directly from God. Food offered man the prospect of emancipation, of being free from God, but it was also food that turned him into a slave to nutrition. Thus, man became dependent on food and a slave to the material world, which implicitly means also a slave to death, because food, which grants him physical life, cannot grant him that freedom from the world and from death which only God can bestow. Thus, food, the symbol and source of life, has become the symbol of death, for if man does not eat, he dies’40
Moreover, following the Expulsion from Paradise, man realised that although food is natural, when it becomes an excessive preoccupation with satisfying the ‘insatiable appetite of the belly’41 it turns into excess, an abuse of the body, which can be corrected only with great difficulty, because gluttony weakens the rational power of the human mind. In this regard, Saint Paul the Apostle says that the god of such people is their belly (Philippians 3:19).
With regard to food, Holy Scripture teaches us that we must ask for ‘our daily bread’ (Matthew 6:11), yet we find numerous references to food: ‘Behold, I give you every herb bearing seed on the face of the whole earth, and every tree with fruit bearing seed in it. These shall be your food!’ (Genesis 1:29), as well as advice on guarding against excessive eating and drinking: ‘Do not be among those who get drunk on wine or among those who indulge in sexual immorality’ (Proverbs 23:20); ‘He who eats much honey does not fare well’ (Proverbs XXV, 25); ‘Woe to him who gives his friend drink from his cup until he is drunk’ (Habakkuk II, 15); ‘He who loves merriment will come to want; he who delights in wine and perfumes will not grow rich’ (Proverbs XXI, 17); ‘but he who sins against Me destroys his own life’ (Proverbs VIII, 27); “Take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness” (Luke 21:34); ‘Food is for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy both. But the body is not for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body’ (1 Corinthians 6:13), for the body is ‘the temple of the Holy Spirit’ (1 Corinthians 6:19), and ‘life is more than food, and the body more than clothing’ (Luke 12:22–23).
In the wilderness, God fed the chosen people for 40 years with manna, and urged them to exercise self-restraint in its use, so that “neither did he who had gathered much have any left over, nor did he who had gathered little, but each had just enough for those with them” (Exodus 16:18). Those who did not obey God and gathered more manna than was needed for a single day, in order to secure food for the following day as well, found that overnight the surplus manna would spoil, become infested with worms and then melt away in the sun.
As food for the body, yet sent down from heaven, the manna took on a spiritual meaning as early as the Old Law, but God will bestow an entirely new and spiritual food upon those who overcome sin and inherit His Kingdom, as He promises: ‘To the victor I will give some of the hidden manna’ (Revelation 2:17). It was of this food of the heavenly Kingdom that the Lord Jesus Christ spoke, He who hungered (Matthew 4:2; 21:18) and thirsted (John 4:7; 19, 28) for our sake, saying: ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God’ (Matthew 4:4). The Son of God has freed us from the bondage of death and has given us a new, heavenly nourishment, to receive which man must show moderation in all things, guarding against, amongst other things, the gluttony of the belly, which is linked to the other passions 42. In this regard, Saint John Cassian says: ‘The quantity of food dulls the sharpness of the mind and, by weighing down both the spirit and the body, stokes the dangerous fire of the passions. A belly stuffed with all manner of food sows the seeds of lust, and the mind, weighed down by the heaviness of food, can no longer hold the helm of right judgement. What are we to think of those who, whilst in good health, indulge in excessive consumption of meat and wine, using them not according to the needs of their body’s frailty, but according to the promptings of their heart’s desire?’43
The Son of God has freed us from the bondage of death and has given us a new, heavenly food, to receive which man must show moderation in all things, shunning, amongst other things, the greed of the belly, which is linked to the other passions.
Intemperance is thus synonymous with gluttony, drunkenness and all that pertains to the enslavement of the stomach, which represents a weakness in man and the cause of the body’s rebellion, through illness. It is greed that distorts the purpose of food and drink, transforming them from necessities of life into means of satisfying desires and passions, to the point of insatiability, for, as St John Climacus says: ‘often the devil takes up residence in the stomach and does not allow a person to be satisfied, even if they were to eat all of Egypt and drink the whole of the Nile’44.
The remedy for the gluttony of the belly is fasting, which ‘is nothing but a means of overcoming the discontent generated by insatiable desire’45.
Linked to the greed of the stomach is the greed for wealth, which, according to Saint John Chrysostom, ‘is like bad leaven, which spoils the whole dough. If, by committing injustice, you gain even a little money, your entire wealth is tainted. That is why, on many occasions, a few coins earned have been the cause of a person’s ruin’46. Through greed, a person becomes obsessed with their own possessions and, instead of sharing with gratitude the gifts they have received, becomes intemperate, exploiting themselves, nature and others, towards whom they display stinginess and constant discontent, thereby giving rise to theft and envy. In this way, intemperance, as a form of sustaining greed, is detrimental to the spiritual life. The remedy for this passion is philanthropy.
As the name suggests, lust is a loss of ‘restraint’, of self-control, a disease of intemperance, condemned in the Decalogue, because, through ‘shameful passions’ (Romans 1:24–27), man degrades himself to the lowest level, even below the animal state. Lust is a passion that defiles both body and soul; being equivalent to spiritual death, it is a betrayal of ‘the mystery of God’ within man, an apostasy, a denial of one’s own being, of God’s creation, transforming the body from a temple of the Holy Spirit into an idol of pleasure to be worshipped. Therefore, the virtue of temperance requires self-control over one’s desires: ‘Flee from the desires of the flesh, which wage war against the soul’ (1 Peter 2:11).
In conclusion, through the practice of the virtue of temperance we find the path that leads us to the purification of the mind by subjecting the appetitive and irascible parts to reason, as man’s response to the love shown by God through the beauty and goodness of His creation. The virtuous use of creation and of God’s gifts through the practice of goodness elevates man to a true understanding of the reasons behind things. It causes ‘the pure light of the knowledge of His divinity to shine in our hearts and opens the eyes of our mind to understanding’, as we entrust ourselves in the secret prayers of the Divine Liturgy. For this we have received the grace of adoption, through the bath of the second birth, so that we may receive the pledge of the inheritance to come, the beginning of eternal blessings, the life-giving power 47. Without the sanctifying work of grace, without ascetic endeavour, man ends up being dominated and led by irrational desires, the desires of deceit, living amidst the heavy stench of sins, which become signs of rejection of God’s work and love and which deprive him of the joy of the Spirit.
Therefore, recognising the benefit of self-restraint, man must seek to guard his mind through self-control and the power to master his passions and discern his thoughts, so as to become a dwelling place of holiness. It is a task that requires sustained effort, so that darkness may recede and the light of grace may descend upon the workings of the mind, yet we discover in the lives of the saints that God opens and enlightens the eyes of the soul of the temperate person, so that they may gain sight of divine beauty in all creatures.
The virtuous use of creation and of God’s gifts, through the practice of goodness, elevates man to a true understanding of the reasons behind things. It causes ‘the pure light to shine in our hearts’.
- 1
St Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit to Amphilochius of Iconium, Chapter IX, PG 32, 108.
- 2
Saint Gregory the Wonder-Worker, Panegyric Addressed to Origen, XIII, PG10, 1085AC.
- 3
Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, Complete Works and the Scholia of Saint Maximus the Confessor, II, 4, trans. Fr. Dumitru Stăniloae, Paideia Publishing House, Bucharest, 1996, p. 18: ‘We must understand by “desire” that uncontrollable, intense and irrevocable feeling, which nothing can hinder, for God, of unchanging and unmixed love for divine beauty and the total inclination towards that which is truly worthy of desire... It is possible to conceive of forms that are not contrary to the heavenly hosts, even starting from the lowest parts of matter, since even it derives its existence from the One who is truly good and, in all its aspects, displays beautiful traits of rational beings’. In a scholia on this passage, Saint Maximus the Confessor says: ‘Desire is unrestrained love for God, which he calls alien to matter’ (p. 44).
- 4
Alexandre Schmemann, The Eucharist: The Mystery of the Kingdom, Anastasia Publishing, Bucharest, pp. 211–212.
- 5
St Gregory of Nyssa, The Great Catechetical Oration, V, 11. St John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis, XVI, 4. St John of Damascus, Dogmatics, II, 30. St Gregory Palamas, 150 Chapters on Natural Knowledge, on the Knowledge of God, on the Moral Life and on Creation, 46, 48, 66.
- 6
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, The Great Catechetical Oration, VIII, 19.
- 7
Saint Maximus the Confessor, in The Philokalia, vol. III, p. 16.
- 8
St Basil the Great, Oration III: Against Eunomius on the Holy Spirit, PG 29, 660.
- 9
Patriarch Callistus, Philokalia VIII, pp. 233–237.
- 10a10b
Saint Dumitru Stăniloae, note 541 on the Venerable Nichita Stithatul, The 300 Chapters on Creation, in Philokalia VI, Humanitas Publishing House, Bucharest, 2009, p. 287.
- 11
St Basil the Great, Homily XXII: To Young People, PG 31, 565D.
- 12
Saint Nectarius the Wonderworker, Saint Nectarius the Wonderworker, Egumenița Publishing House, pp. 58–60.
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Sorin Cosma, Temperance in Ancient Philosophical Ethics and Christian Morality: An Attempt at Christian Sophrology, Helicon Publishing, 1999, p. 140.
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Olivier Clement, Three Prayers..., p. 58.
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Philokalia, vol. II, p. 121; Archimandrite Sophrony, Prayer – The Experience of Eternal Life, DEISIS Publishing, Sibiu, 1998, pp. 135–136.
- 16
Philokalia, vol. V, p. 310.
- 17
Saint John Cassian, Spiritual Conversations, V, 19.
- 18
“The foolish despise wisdom and self-control” (Proverbs 1:7).
- 19
Philokalia, vol. VII, p. 123.
- 20
St Basil the Great, The Great Rules, 17.
- 21
Saint Nectarius the Wonderworker, Saint Nectarius the Wonderworker, Egumenița Publishing House, p. 58.
- 22
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, On Virginity, XXI, 2.
- 23
Saint Ephrem the Syrian, Words and Teachings, Bunavestire Publishing House, Bacău, 1997, p. 245.
- 24
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, III, 6.
- 25
St Basil the Great, Epistles, 366.
- 26
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, III, 7.
- 27
Saint Maximus the Confessor, Chapters on Love, IV, 15.
- 28
St Athanasius the Great, Against the Greeks, XXXII. St Gregory of Nyssa, Dialogue on the Soul and the Resurrection. Nemesius of Emessa, On the Nature of Man, III, XXII. St John of Damascus, Dogmatics, II, 12.
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Migne, PG 44, col. 972 A.
- 30
Saint Maximus the Confessor, Chapters on Love, 1.
- 31
St Basil the Great, The Great Rules, 17. Epistles, 366.
- 32
Herma, The Shepherd, Vision III, 16 (8), 5.
- 33
The Great Paterikon, I. On Progress towards Perfection, 151, j, trans. Fr. Constantin Coman, Bizantină Publishing House, Bucharest, 2016, p. 191.
- 34
Saint Maximus the Confessor, Chapters on Love, III, 71–72.
- 35
Saint Maximus the Confessor: ‘He who fights for the truth in accordance with the law, with the weapons of the right and the left, renews the strength of endurance of the flocks of Sefila, that is to say, the movements of the soul devoted to the body, which are exercised in bearing trials against their will, watering them with the foundations of endurance drawn from the various practices of virtue and knowledge, as from dug wells; whilst those on the plain—that is to say, the movements of the soul that flourish in the right path or in the breadth of the virtues—are nourished with the principles of humility and self-restraint, so that they may neither fall into the left-hand path nor be led astray from the right-hand path’, in Philokalia 3, pp. 168–176.
- 36
Father Iustin Popovici, The Orthodox Faith and Life in Christ, translated by Prof. Paul Bălan, Bunavestire Publishing House, Galați, 2003, p. 59.
- 37
The Venerable Nichita Stithatul, The 300 Chapters on Creation, Nature and Knowledge, p. 190.
- 38
Saint Nectarios of Aegina, Know Thyself. On Virtue, trans. Laura and Gabriel Mândrilă, Sophia Publishing, Metafraze, Bucharest, 2012, pp. 396–397.
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Saint Nicholas Velimirović, Commentaries on the Lord’s Prayer, p. 18.
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Fr Alexander Schmemann, Our Father, p. 56.
- 41
Saint John Cassian, Selected Writings, The Monastic Rules, Chapter V, no. 3, in the PSB series, vol. 57, translated by Vasile Cojocaru and David Popescu, EIBMBOR, Bucharest, 1990, p. 165.
- 42
Hieromonk Gabriel Bunge, Gastrimargia or the Madness of the Belly – the science and teachings of the Desert Fathers on eating and fasting, based on the writings of Abba Evagrius Ponticus, translated by Fr. Ioan Moga, Deisis Publishing House, Sibiu, 2014, p. 78.
- 43
St John Cassian, op. cit., chaps. 5–6, pp. 166–167.
- 44
St John Climacus, The Ladder, XIV, 2; 23, in The Philokalia, vol. 9, Bucharest, 1980, pp. 212, 217.
- 45
Hieromonk Gabriel Bunge, Gastrimargia or the Madness of the Belly – the science and teachings of the Desert Fathers on eating and fasting, based on the writings of Abba Evagrius of Pontus, translated by Father Ioan Moga, Deisis Publishing House, Sibiu, 2014, p. 27.
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St John Chrysostom, The Problems of Life, Egumenița Publishing House, p. 223.
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Liturgy Book, IBMO Publishing House, Bucharest, 2012, p. 248.