Love

From Monachos Patristic Quotations Index

Contents 1 St Basil the Great 2 St. Ignaty Brianchaninov 3 St. John Chrysostom 4 St John of the Ladder (6th-7th Century) 5 St Maximos the Confessor (580-662) 6 Various contemporary Elders 6.1 Elder Amphilochios Makris of Patmos

St Basil the Great

• 'I cannot persuade myself that without love to others, and without, as far as rests with me, peaceableness towards all, I can be called a worthy servant of Jesus Christ.' (Letter 203, to the bishops of the sea coast)

St. Ignaty Brianchaninov

• "By love for our neighbor we enter into love for God." The Arena, pg 59

• "Direct all your attention to the acquisition of love for your neighbour as the basis of your life..." The Arena, pg. 60

• "Love for our enemies is the highest degree of love for our neighbor ordained by the Gospel. He who has attained love for his enemies has attained perfection in the matter of love for his neighbor, and to him the gates of love for God have opened automatically." The Arena, pg. 123

St. John Chrysostom

• "For love knows not what sort of thing shame may be. Therefore it glories in those things for which another hides his face. Since the shame is, not to know how to love; not, when you love, to incur danger and endure all for the beloved." (Homily 33 on First Corintians)

St John of the Ladder (6th-7th Century)

• 'Do not search about for the words to show people you love them. Instead, ask God to show them your love without your having to talk about it. Otherwise you will never have time enough both for loving gestures and for compunction.' (The Ladder of Divine Ascent, step 6, p. 135)

St Maximos the Confessor (580-662)

• 'Nothing so much as love brings together those who have been sundered and produces in them an effective union of will and purpose. Love is distinguished by the beauty of recognizing the equal value of all men. Love is born in a man when his soul's powers - that is, his intelligence, incensive power and desire - are concentrated and unified around the divine. Those who by grace have come to recognized the equal value of all men in God's sight and who engrave His beauty on their memory, possess an ineradicable longing for divine love, for such love is always imprinting this beauty on their intellect.' (Second Century of Various Texts, 72, in the Philokalia, vol. 2, p 202.)

Various contemporary Elders

Elder Amphilochios Makris of Patmos

• I was born to love people. It doesn’t concern me if he is a Turk, black, or white. I see in the face of each person the image of God. And for this image of God I am willing to sacrifice everything.