What a wretched state it is to repay hatred with hatred and offense with offense. What if your enemy is stronger than you? What good will your vindictiveness then serve? Will it not merely hasten your own ruin? And even with equal strength, what can one expect but mutual downfall and calamity?
Finally, even if he is unable to withstand you, are secret plots any less terrible than open attack? And the gnawing cares, the schemes, the plans, the enterprises that turn to one’s own harm, the tormenting thoughts even about impossible success on one’s own part and still more tormenting thoughts about the success of one’s opponent, and finally, the very successes accompanied by the greatest pangs of conscience, and sometimes by universal contempt? Ah, how many torments for a heart that hates! It is hell on earth, the flame of Gehenna.
On Meekness
Whoever is meek is perfect and God-like.
Never permit the weakness of allowing something to slip from your tongue or a movement to break out that shows some disorder in your soul… This always humiliates one and shows that he does not know how to control himself.
Whoever is meek is perfect and God-like; he is filled with joy and is the dwelling-place of the Spirit of God. As fire consumes great forests when you neglect it, so malice, if you allow it into your heart, will destroy your soul and defile your body, and will bring you many wrongful thoughts; it will stir up quarrels, discords, rumors, envy, hatred, and similar evil passions that weigh down the body itself and cause it diseases. Hasten to acquire the meekness and guilelessness of the saints, so that our Lord Jesus Christ may receive you to Himself and each of you may be able to say with joy: But Thou didst help me because of mine innocence, and hast established me before Thee for ever (Ps. 40:13).
As soon as an offense inflames your heart, remember Christ and His wounds; consider that what you are suffering is quite insignificant in comparison with the sufferings of the Master—and then, as with water, you will quench your grief.
Do not say: “I will take revenge on my enemy”—we have a Righteous Judge in Heaven.
Let us be forbearing toward our enemies, so that we too may find God likewise forbearing toward us.
We must pray even for our enemies; for the most part they themselves do not see what they are doing, and they are even our benefactors—for by their attacks they strengthen us in virtue, humble our spirit on earth, and weave for us heavenly crowns in Paradise.
—St. Theophile of the Kiev Caves
How to Learn Meekness
Without complete forgiveness, without the eradication of resentment, inner peace is impossible! For malice produces in the mind a storm of thoughts against one’s neighbor—a storm of passions that overturns everything within us, tears out by the roots all that is good, and destroys almost to the foundation all the shoots of the virtues. We ourselves are not glad of this unfortunate storm that arises from offense at our neighbor. And if such a storm arises, can we then perform any pious labors? The labor of fasting, or the labor of prayer, or helping our neighbors, or magnanimity and humility? No. Then no labor is possible, because the storm of malice in our heart will cast out all our good intentions, and no good will be subject to us. Such is the law of sin, and especially the sin of resentment and irritation.
That is why the great ascetics of Christ’s Church strove to destroy even the slightest manifestation of the sin of malice. For if one gives it room to move, it will, I repeat, destroy to the foundation all our good disposition. Moreover, the venerable fathers remembered the commandments of God: blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall be called sons of God and shall see God. They also honored the apostolic commandment: Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. That is why they strove to uproot the sin of malice at its very inception.
I would like these pious rules of the ascetics to become a guide in our own life as well. And if any of our neighbors offends us, let us not allow malice to rule in our heart! Remember that in such a case the enemy of the human race will immediately take advantage of our weakness. He will undoubtedly suggest that the offense is too great and unforgivable; he will inflate, as they say, a small thing into a large one, and make a mountain out of a molehill.
Once malice has entered the heart, it will give us no peace either by day or by night, neither in prayer nor at work. It will gnaw at our heart so strongly that as they say, we will be completely thrown off course.
Therefore, do not give place to the devil! And if we notice offense against our neighbor in our heart, let us hasten to reconciliation, if only it is possible.
It does happen, however, that a person asks forgiveness, but the one offended does not forgive. In such a case, leaving everything to the conscience of our neighbor, let us cleanse ourselves before God and before men.
—Metropolitan John (Snychev) of St. Petersburg and Ladoga
From: Readings For Every Day of Great Lent, Ed. N. Shaposhnikova (Moscow: Danilov Monastery, 2025).
