Edified by silence – 25 September 2015

Here is one of the classic episodes from the Sayings of the Desert Fathers:  Abba Theophilus the archbishop came to Scetis one day.  The brethren who were assembled said to Abba Pambo, “Say something to the archbishop so that he may be edified.”  The old man said to them, “If he is not edified by my silence, he will not be edified by my speech.” 

Well you might think that’s a little hard on the archbishop.  Abba Pambo is not going to make even a polite and brief speech of welcome.  Imagine that on a marae.  It would be seen as rude and neglectful.  But in general, bishops were only marginally welcome out in the desert.  Bishops, church leaders, organisers, inspirational motivators, were one part of what the Desert Fathers and Mothers of the 3^rd and 4^th centuries had escaped.  Indeed, there were Desert Fathers who had been themselves bishops, once upon a time.  They fled to the desert to save their faith.  What do you think is the modern equivalent?  Anyway, Abba Pambo is altogether too unimpressed and underwhelmed to be in raptures at the episcopal presence.  Abba Pambo chooses silence.

Contemplatives have their own set of clichés about silence.  Silence is the language of God… for instance.  Or the injunction, Don’t speak unless you can improve the silence…  But these sayings, however clever, are only more or less true.  What is true is that once you have made friends with silence, so that you look forward to it, and are certainly not afraid of a time of stillness, silence, even solitude, there is often a developing impatience with nice speeches and all the warbling on most of us have had to do at times, as we thought it appropriate.  The other end of the spectrum from chosen silence may be seen at Hanmer Springs, the lovely alpine town surrounded by mountains and replete with giant trees – and yet it is thought necessary there, at the height of the tourist seasons, to provide bars, casinos, eating places everywhere with deafening amplified music, lest anyone feel bored or unentertained. 

The archbishop, poor old Theophilus, no doubt had something he wanted to say.  Abba Pambo thinks the archbishop should learn silence, and that in this regard he might be edified by the silence of Pambo and his brothers and sisters at Scetis.   In his book Silence and Honeycakes, Rowan Williams, another perhaps better informed archbishop, writes at length about the Desert tradition – and in one place he contrasts Abba Arsenius, who sat with the Holy Spirit of God in complete silence, with Abba Moses (Moses the Black, he was called, evidently an Ethiopian, and he was famous for having been at one time a highwayman).  Abba Moses was found out in a boat on the Nile with the angels of God and they were all eating honey cakes.  But Abba Moses was part of the same contemplative tradition as Abba Arsenius.  Perhaps on the boat they ate honey cakes silently, but I doubt it.  We have all types, and in contemplative life we have come to cherish the difference between discernment, which is understanding, and discrimination, which divides. 

Silence is more and more, in our kind of world, an essential part of Christian discipline -- for Abbas Arsenius, as equally for Abba Moses.  Silence is something to be learned and practised, and befriended.  Rowan Williams wrote (and he wrote this in the midst of huge turmoil in the Anglican Communion: A church without some quite demanding forms of long-term spiritual discipline – whether in traditional monastic life or not – is a frustrating place to live.  That was a heartfelt comment from a beleaguered archbishop.  He himself knew where the silent springs are to be found, but he grieved for all others, inside the church or not, as we do, who think differences are solved and healed on the level of who wins in argument or conflict.  It is not so.  It is in our hearts, and it is there we are changed and brought to silence.