Preface

This book is addressed primarily to young men who received an Orthodox upbringing in childhood, in order to help them overcome the difficult barrier of youth, fraught with many temptations and temptations, and at the same time not to lose their faith, not to stain their conscience, but to become conscious Orthodox Christians. Much of what has been said here is difficult to understand for a person who has not had the appropriate spiritual experience. It is impossible to bypass and not touch on these issues at all, it is unlikely that it will be possible to convey them in all understandable language. And it's not about the age of the reader. There are people who constantly go to church, but have never experienced and will never understand the main ideological core of this book, because they have never experienced it with all their being. This central theme is man's conversion to Christ as a special supersensible experience, as a turn of the spirit, as a decisive change in volition, in self-consciousness, after which man both feels himself and truly becomes a Christian. The lives of the saints are full of examples of such conversions. The fact of such a great revolution in man is also spoken of by the Holy Fathers, of whom St. Theophan the Recluse expressed himself most closely and most clearly to us.

In the times of Christian piety, Orthodox children grew up in a completely different atmosphere than they do now, even in today's believing families and in Orthodox schools. Mip was still different, not as deeply as it is now, mired in evil. A man of Pushkin's or even Shmelev's way of life turned to Christ by his own volition, as if smoothly and imperceptibly for himself, because he did not need to leave his way of life. That is why man's conversion to Christ, his transformation from a nominal Christian into a spiritual and conscious warrior of the Heavenly Commander, was by no means always considered by church writers, and they rarely focused on it. And only St. Theophan in his work "The Path to Salvation" and St. Ignatius in his words about the sacrament of baptism spoke of conversion as the central moment of the entire spiritual life. It was a time when many Christians remained such only in name, in life, in the general state structure, but no longer in conscience, not in heart, not in fervent conviction. Faith in them weakened more and more. For our time, when the entire way of life is deliberately set in a harsh anti-Christian key, conversion is especially important and it is almost always dramatic. Along with this, the reconciliation that prevails in modern world Orthodoxy and the desire for symbiosis with the world has led to the fact that conversion has somehow been forgotten. Many are again satisfied with a faith that expresses itself only externally, which is reduced only to the fulfillment of a number of precepts. Everything else was built around what was said about conversion to Christ in the book. This topic involuntarily demanded a corresponding reader who, according to his soul, from his life story, would know what it was about. Attempts at Orthodox moral teaching for youth, undertaken by contemporary church authors, in our opinion, are not always satisfactory from this point of view. Young men are often simply taught goodness, without highlighting the fateful moment after which a person becomes a conscious Christian. The last and main question remains: to whom to address your work, if not all adults, not to mention youth, it is suitable? Let's put it this way: the book is intended for reading in the circle of the Orthodox family, In some ways you have to count on the help of the elders, who can quickly understand, learn and pass on to teenagers what is said on these pages.

Introduction

Dear young readers! To those of you who believe in God, who would like to live worthy of your faith, who know what the human soul is, that it is immortal, who have at least heard of God's commandments, who know that they teach good, who generally love this good and strive for it - our book is addressed. If for you the concepts of God, of conscience, of good and evil, are only empty and abstract, interfering with a pleasant life, then, perhaps, we should talk about the sciences that you study in school - physics, chemistry, biology - and say what is not said in textbooks, but which obviously follows from the sciences themselves studied. And the following follows from them: the world could not arise and cannot stand by itself; life is not reducible to the movement of atoms and molecules; the laws of material existence do not determine everything, but only follow from spiritual laws; And finally, the violation of these latter is destructive and dangerous for man and all life on earth. Trying at first to turn away and run away from the moral laws given by God, man returns to them again. If the convictions of morality have not worked, then the facts of objective science can have their say. Not so long ago, many people tried to hide from God by turning to physics and biology, but it was there that they suddenly became even more visible to Him. Is it possible to escape from the Omnipresent? Will it be possible to hide from God in the science, the laws of which He Himself established? External knowledge of God, to which science leads, is able to stir up a sleeping soul. But this is not enough. True faith, which leads not only to awakening, but to the healing of the soul, comes to know God not through external conviction, but through internal, heartfelt communion. The most characteristic feature of your age is that your soul unexpectedly discovers a certain inner source of knowledge and begins to look at the world with completely different eyes. This new knowledge lies not in the realm of reason, but in the realm of feeling, which is why it is said of young men and women who feel it in themselves that they are losing their heads. No matter what adults tell you, no matter what your own reflections, not so long ago, remind you of - you feel that all this was said from a completely different heartfelt mood. And so the young soul starts from everything simple and familiar. The surrounding life and people, even the closest ones, seem alien and cold, unless they are intoxicated by the same intoxicating aroma of youth. Yesterday's teenagers are aware of themselves as smarter than before, more aware of life, more understanding of its complexity. And indeed, the knowledge of life, such an inner comprehension of it as at this time, cannot be taught at the school desk. The overthrow of authority begins, everything is subject to revision and criticism. "Fathers, mothers, teachers - well, what do they understand? They give me the task: to do this and that, the fifth and the tenth, they tell me something from both areas of knowledge, but for all that they are completely incapable of understanding what is going on in my soul... And what is happening there?.. I can't say, but in any case something very big, important, to which neither dry school knowledge nor the abstract instruction of adults who teach us life are at all suitable. They teach us life, but the life of our soul is completely different now. That is why there is no authority for us, except in our own circle, among those who, like us, have rejected authority and have understood life themselves" - these are the thoughts of the young soul on the problem of fathers and sons. It is good when this young soul, instinctively directed towards high and worthy aspirations, nevertheless finds them correctly. Alas, much more often everything turns out quite differently... But do not rush, suddenly matured and wiser soul! After all, you were not yet twenty, or thirty, or forty years old, you do not know what people suffer from at such an age. And those who have already passed these years were once thirteen, fifteen, and eighteen. And it is in vain that you think that adults have forgotten these years, when they themselves, like you, "walked on their heads", not understood by anyone, with rapidly maturing feelings and with a slow growth of prudence. Try to feel and understand that adults (at least some of them) are talking to you as if from the side of the high fence that you are climbing now, and tell you what bumps they have made when they find themselves on this side. After all, the same spiritual dangers await you and those who will come after you... Many poets and writers, reflecting on youth, use such a literary image - moths flying at night to the flame of a candle. Have you ever seen poor things burn their wings easily and die? This comparison is not so much beautiful as harsh. Cognition of the nocturnal will-o'-the-wisp ends in death. And death is not a toy. What is this candle light in comparison with the sun? - Exactly the same as your new inner spiritual knowledge in comparison with the Divine reason and Christian wisdom. The light of the sun on earth is immense, it lives and does not burn. The flame of a candle is visible only in the dark, it beckons, it makes it possible to see something nearby, but for a moth that has touched the flame, it is deadly. Alas, how often youth leaves the true Sun of truth and takes instead the candle of its own inner knowledge, going deeper with it into the darkness of sin! How rarely she is able to believe the word of her elders, and if she listens sometimes, it is only under external compulsion. How many children, even being accustomed from childhood to faith, to prayer, to church piety, in these years somehow instantly lose both. Their "I" acquires more weight for them. This "I" seeks easy and quick self-assertion, self-expression. A child who has ceased to be a child suddenly sees that the world around him is rather dirty and cruel, and if earlier adults still tried not to show him this dirt, now he no longer believes them for this. And now the young soul, seeking the satiation of its mature feelings and impulses, is ready to throw itself into this whirlpool of passions, to dive into it with its head, and only then will the stench of sin reach it. A person is a creature who gets used to everything. After all, if you work in a barn for a long time, then its smell will cease to irritate. When will a person who has known sin from youth have time to come to his senses? When else will he be able to understand that sin is not sweet at all, even if you get used to it? And if he does come to his senses, will he find the strength to get up and return to the path of Christ that he once left behind - the path of truth, goodness and purity? Starting this conversation, we do not know in what state you, our young readers, are. In striving to know life, have you passed through the "fires and waters", which in fact are only the will-o'-the-wisps of temptations and the muddy swamps of passions? Do you know the sin and to what extent? And if not, how do you refrain from it? Is it only external circumstances and the prohibitions of adults (which are more and more easily overcome over time), or those internal obstacles that are called the fear of God and conscience? Do you wish, prudent soul, to look into such a mirror in which you will see yourself? You will see your growing up, your own feelings and temptations. Do you want to take a look? But first let's agree that, having known yourself and your history, you will be attentive to yourself, that you will wait to reject one, only one authority on earth. We, teachers, parents, if you don't want to, don't believe us. But how can you not believe the mirror in which you can see through your own path? Do not strive only to look into a mirror that would embellish you. Well, go and see. And the serpent said to the woman, Did God really say, Ye shall not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat the fruit of the trees, but the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, said God, do not eat it or touch it, lest you die." And the serpent said to the woman, "No, you will not die, but God knows that in the day that you eat of them, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil." And the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasing to the eyes, and desirable, because it gave knowledge; And she took of its fruit, and ate it; and she gave it also to her husband, and he ate. And the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves, and made themselves aprons (Gen. 3:1-7). Has it not yet recognized itself, O soul? Then here is a translation into modern language for you. And the whole world around it, lying in evil, said to the young soul: "Is it true that the Christian teaching has deprived you of all the joys and pleasures of life?" The soul answered: No, we are allowed to do many things, but we are forbidden to do this, that, and the third, so as not to die. And the tempter continued: you will not die, but you will become a Man with a capital letter, you will live by your own mind, and not by someone else's. You, the soul, will know that you yourself are the measure of all things, that the world exists for you, and you for your own pleasure. And the soul saw that what God forbade was beautiful in appearance and sweet in taste, that it was easily and freely tasted by others. She tasted it herself, and gave it to others... Shall I continue, young friend? Until now, you may have learned the whole story for yourself, that is, the sweet part of it. You have scarcely tasted the bitter part, it will last a lifetime, and for the unrepentant it will continue into eternity. Tell me, isn't this story about you and me? Do we not follow the bad example of our foremother? How could the person who wrote this story thousands of years ago know your soul and mine so well? So, it is probably worth listening. It was not for this reason that our foremother fell into sin, it was not for this reason that she gave birth to children in sorrow and illness, it was not for this reason that Adam mourned his fall for all 930 years of his life, and it was not for this reason that people passed on this story to their children and grandchildren for so many centuries, so that, having given us the key to understanding our own souls, it would remain idle or fabulous for us! God does not bring anyone to Himself by force, in spite of or against human will. At your age, the formation of personality is the fastest. Now you are most at the crossroads of life. Which road to choose? Of course, we are not talking about a profession or a place of residence. We have in mind the purpose and meaning of life: will it be high or low, at the level of consciousness, or of wordless instinct? A simple choice of one of two is before you: God, light, life, pure joy on one side; self-sufficient "I", sin, death, torment - on the other. When adults baptize an infant and then introduce him to the sources of grace-filled church life, they only help him in the future to choose the good for himself, to choose the path of God. But they cannot make the choice itself. Babies do not choose, they only imitate their elders and obey them. And you will have to choose the direction of life, even if you do not think about it. The soul has grown, new thoughts and feelings have been revealed in it, and new tasks arise before it. Believing young men and women need to regain their faith, to make it their own, and not their grandmother's. And for those who are untaught to believe in God, it is best to turn to it right now, before the soul becomes hardened, poisoned by grave sins. You have probably already heard such a vulgar philosophical reasoning: we live once, we need to take more from life. The holy Apostle Paul once heard it, and conveyed it even more simply: "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die" (1 Corinthians 15:32). This is the common motto of materialists, but it is they, strange as it may seem, who waste their lives in vain and do not take from it the most important and necessary. In fact, not only life, but also our youth is given to us only once. Each year of youth is unique, and its losses are irreplaceable. What is lost and not done in life at the age of 43 can be made up for at the age of 44, but what is lost at the age of 16 is much more difficult to get back at 17. And it is impossible to return to oneself a year lived thoughtlessly and mediocrely. The most precious treasure for a person is the meaning of his life, its goal, moreover, high and worthy. In youth, many things predispose a person to find it, not to make a mistake in the search and then devote his whole life to this goal. It happens that people find it only in old age and can no longer serve this purpose - how many examples of this every priest meets in the church. And if you never fall in love in all your youth, if you never laugh, even if you are bedridden all this time, but at the same time you find the faith of Christ as your own, you can confidently say that your youth was not in vain, you took the most important thing from it. On the other hand, youth, lived in revelry, is hopelessly ruined, it leaves behind a spiritual desert. So, look for more from life before you scatter over its small sweets and pranks, most often not innocent at all. And the great thing is faith in God and virtue, which allows you to be in communion with Him. In childhood, all good things come easier, almost effortlessly, but not very reliable. Now the path to virtue will become more difficult for you, but having passed it, you will become faithful sons of God, you will receive such great spiritual riches that it is now impossible for you to describe, and you will understand that only for this you should have lived. Do you wish to choose this difficult path to heavenly and eternal blessings? How to do this is what our book will talk about.

Chapter I. The Christian Worldview as the Basis of Moral Teaching

Dear young readers! To those of you who believe in God, who would like to live worthy of your faith, who know what the human soul is, that it is immortal, who have at least heard of God's commandments, who know that they teach good, who generally love this good and strive for it - our book is addressed. If for you the concepts of God, of conscience, of good and evil, are only empty and abstract, interfering with a pleasant life, then, perhaps, we should talk about the sciences that you study in school - physics, chemistry, biology - and say what is not said in textbooks, but which obviously follows from the sciences themselves studied. And the following follows from them: the world could not arise and cannot stand by itself; life is not reducible to the movement of atoms and molecules; the laws of material existence do not determine everything, but only follow from spiritual laws; And finally, the violation of these latter is destructive and dangerous for man and all life on earth. Trying at first to turn away and run away from the moral laws given by God, man returns to them again. If the convictions of morality have not worked, then the facts of objective science can have their say. Not so long ago, many people tried to hide from God by turning to physics and biology, but it was there that they suddenly became even more visible to Him. Is it possible to escape from the Omnipresent? Will it be possible to hide from God in the science, the laws of which He Himself established? External knowledge of God, to which science leads, is able to stir up a sleeping soul. But this is not enough. True faith, which leads not only to awakening, but to the healing of the soul, comes to know God not through external conviction, but through internal, heartfelt communion. The most characteristic feature of your age is that your soul unexpectedly discovers a certain inner source of knowledge and begins to look at the world with completely different eyes. This new knowledge lies not in the realm of reason, but in the realm of feeling, which is why it is said of young men and women who feel it in themselves that they are losing their heads. No matter what adults tell you, no matter what your own reflections, not so long ago, remind you of - you feel that all this was said from a completely different heartfelt mood. And so the young soul starts from everything simple and familiar. The surrounding life and people, even the closest ones, seem alien and cold, unless they are intoxicated by the same intoxicating aroma of youth. Yesterday's teenagers are aware of themselves as smarter than before, more aware of life, more understanding of its complexity. And indeed, the knowledge of life, such an inner comprehension of it as at this time, cannot be taught at the school desk. The overthrow of authority begins, everything is subject to revision and criticism. "Fathers, mothers, teachers - well, what do they understand? They give me the task: to do this and that, the fifth and the tenth, they tell me something from both areas of knowledge, but for all that they are completely incapable of understanding what is going on in my soul... And what is happening there?.. I can't say, but in any case something very big, important, to which neither dry school knowledge nor the abstract instruction of adults who teach us life are at all suitable. They teach us life, but the life of our soul is completely different now. That is why there is no authority for us, except in our own circle, among those who, like us, have rejected authority and have understood life themselves" - these are the thoughts of the young soul on the problem of fathers and sons. It is good when this young soul, instinctively directed towards high and worthy aspirations, nevertheless finds them correctly. Alas, much more often everything turns out quite differently... But do not rush, suddenly matured and wiser soul! After all, you were not yet twenty, or thirty, or forty years old, you do not know what people suffer from at such an age. And those who have already passed these years were once thirteen, fifteen, and eighteen. And it is in vain that you think that adults have forgotten these years, when they themselves, like you, "walked on their heads", not understood by anyone, with rapidly maturing feelings and with a slow growth of prudence. Try to feel and understand that adults (at least some of them) are talking to you as if from the side of the high fence that you are climbing now, and tell you what bumps they have made when they find themselves on this side. After all, the same spiritual dangers await you and those who will come after you... Many poets and writers, reflecting on youth, use such a literary image - moths flying at night to the flame of a candle. Have you ever seen poor things burn their wings easily and die? This comparison is not so much beautiful as harsh. Cognition of the nocturnal will-o'-the-wisp ends in death. And death is not a toy. What is this candle light in comparison with the sun? - Exactly the same as your new inner spiritual knowledge in comparison with the Divine reason and Christian wisdom. The light of the sun on earth is immense, it lives and does not burn. The flame of a candle is visible only in the dark, it beckons, it makes it possible to see something nearby, but for a moth that has touched the flame, it is deadly. Alas, how often youth leaves the true Sun of truth and takes instead the candle of its own inner knowledge, going deeper with it into the darkness of sin! How rarely she is able to believe the word of her elders, and if she listens sometimes, it is only under external compulsion. How many children, even being accustomed from childhood to faith, to prayer, to church piety, in these years somehow instantly lose both. Their "I" acquires more weight for them. This "I" seeks easy and quick self-assertion, self-expression. A child who has ceased to be a child suddenly sees that the world around him is rather dirty and cruel, and if earlier adults still tried not to show him this dirt, now he no longer believes them for this. And now the young soul, seeking the satiation of its mature feelings and impulses, is ready to throw itself into this whirlpool of passions, to dive into it with its head, and only then will the stench of sin reach it. A person is a creature who gets used to everything. After all, if you work in a barn for a long time, then its smell will cease to irritate. When will a person who has known sin from youth have time to come to his senses? When else will he be able to understand that sin is not sweet at all, even if you get used to it? And if he does come to his senses, will he find the strength to get up and return to the path of Christ that he once left behind - the path of truth, goodness and purity? Starting this conversation, we do not know in what state you, our young readers, are. In striving to know life, have you passed through the "fires and waters", which in fact are only the will-o'-the-wisps of temptations and the muddy swamps of passions? Do you know the sin and to what extent? And if not, how do you refrain from it? Is it only external circumstances and the prohibitions of adults (which are more and more easily overcome over time), or those internal obstacles that are called the fear of God and conscience? Do you wish, prudent soul, to look into such a mirror in which you will see yourself? You will see your growing up, your own feelings and temptations. Do you want to take a look? But first let's agree that, having known yourself and your history, you will be attentive to yourself, that you will wait to reject one, only one authority on earth. We, teachers, parents, if you don't want to, don't believe us. But how can you not believe the mirror in which you can see through your own path? Do not strive only to look into a mirror that would embellish you. Well, go and see. And the serpent said to the woman, Did God really say, Ye shall not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat the fruit of the trees, but the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, said God, do not eat it or touch it, lest you die." And the serpent said to the woman, "No, you will not die, but God knows that in the day that you eat of them, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil." And the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasing to the eyes, and desirable, because it gave knowledge; And she took of its fruit, and ate it; and she gave it also to her husband, and he ate. And the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves, and made themselves aprons (Gen. 3:1-7). Has it not yet recognized itself, O soul? Then here is a translation into modern language for you. And the whole world around it, lying in evil, said to the young soul: "Is it true that the Christian teaching has deprived you of all the joys and pleasures of life?" The soul answered: No, we are allowed to do many things, but we are forbidden to do this, that, and the third, so as not to die. And the tempter continued: you will not die, but you will become a Man with a capital letter, you will live by your own mind, and not by someone else's. You, the soul, will know that you yourself are the measure of all things, that the world exists for you, and you for your own pleasure. And the soul saw that what God forbade was beautiful in appearance and sweet in taste, that it was easily and freely tasted by others. She tasted it herself, and gave it to others... Shall I continue, young friend? Until now, you may have learned the whole story for yourself, that is, the sweet part of it. You have scarcely tasted the bitter part, it will last a lifetime, and for the unrepentant it will continue into eternity. Tell me, isn't this story about you and me? Do we not follow the bad example of our foremother? How could the person who wrote this story thousands of years ago know your soul and mine so well? So, it is probably worth listening. It was not for this reason that our foremother fell into sin, it was not for this reason that she gave birth to children in sorrow and illness, it was not for this reason that Adam mourned his fall for all 930 years of his life, and it was not for this reason that people passed on this story to their children and grandchildren for so many centuries, so that, having given us the key to understanding our own souls, it would remain idle or fabulous for us! God does not bring anyone to Himself by force, in spite of or against human will. At your age, the formation of personality is the fastest. Now you are most at the crossroads of life. Which road to choose? Of course, we are not talking about a profession or a place of residence. We have in mind the purpose and meaning of life: will it be high or low, at the level of consciousness, or of wordless instinct? A simple choice of one of two is before you: God, light, life, pure joy on one side; self-sufficient "I", sin, death, torment - on the other. When adults baptize an infant and then introduce him to the sources of grace-filled church life, they only help him in the future to choose the good for himself, to choose the path of God. But they cannot make the choice itself. Babies do not choose, they only imitate their elders and obey them. And you will have to choose the direction of life, even if you do not think about it. The soul has grown, new thoughts and feelings have been revealed in it, and new tasks arise before it. Believing young men and women need to regain their faith, to make it their own, and not their grandmother's. And for those who are untaught to believe in God, it is best to turn to it right now, before the soul becomes hardened, poisoned by grave sins. You have probably already heard such a vulgar philosophical reasoning: we live once, we need to take more from life. The holy Apostle Paul once heard it, and conveyed it even more simply: "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die" (1 Corinthians 15:32). This is the common motto of materialists, but it is they, strange as it may seem, who waste their lives in vain and do not take from it the most important and necessary. In fact, not only life, but also our youth is given to us only once. Each year of youth is unique, and its losses are irreplaceable. What is lost and not done in life at the age of 43 can be made up for at the age of 44, but what is lost at the age of 16 is much more difficult to get back at 17. And it is impossible to return to oneself a year lived thoughtlessly and mediocrely. The most precious treasure for a person is the meaning of his life, its goal, moreover, high and worthy. In youth, many things predispose a person to find it, not to make a mistake in the search and then devote his whole life to this goal. It happens that people find it only in old age and can no longer serve this purpose - how many examples of this every priest meets in the church. And if you never fall in love in all your youth, if you never laugh, even if you are bedridden all this time, but at the same time you find the faith of Christ as your own, you can confidently say that your youth was not in vain, you took the most important thing from it. On the other hand, youth, lived in revelry, is hopelessly ruined, it leaves behind a spiritual desert. So, look for more from life before you scatter over its small sweets and pranks, most often not innocent at all. And the great thing is faith in God and virtue, which allows you to be in communion with Him. In childhood, all good things come easier, almost effortlessly, but not very reliable. Now the path to virtue will become more difficult for you, but having passed it, you will become faithful sons of God, you will receive such great spiritual riches that it is now impossible for you to describe, and you will understand that only for this you should have lived. Do you wish to choose this difficult path to heavenly and eternal blessings? How to do this is what our book will talk about.

The Religious Nature of Any Moral Attitudes

Young people do not like to be lectured morals, that is, they are given abstract instructions about what is good and what is bad, what should be done and what should not be done. Only small children are quite satisfied with a simple direct instruction on how to act, and a good example. A maturing person already needs reasonable justifications why some actions are good, others are indifferent, and still others are completely sinful. Your youth, or rather, pre-adulthood, rebels of itself against moral axioms or commandments given without justification. A young mind is ready to reject everything that is not explained to it clearly and intelligibly. Young feeling rejects almost everything that is not agreed with it or is inaccessible to it. The young will also does not tolerate anything that does not agree with its desires. Christianity is not an abstract morality; This is not a dry moral code or a simple set of commandments. Christianity is real life with God in Christ Jesus, in the Holy Spirit. While you were taken to church as a child, you saw a fairy-tale world, separated from everyday life. Children are quite capable of living in such a world. But now it is time to rediscover your faith when leaving the childish world of fairy tales, so that all further adult life, with all its real difficulties and sorrows, is built on it.

For example, we can take two common worldviews that may be familiar to you, at least superficially. This is the essence of Marxism and valeosophy. For a Marxist, the answer to the first question is clear: there is no God, and the other two questions are removed by themselves. Monkey and labor gave birth to man, man is the crown of nature, and therefore the measure of all things, and not an individual, but living in a collective. Human society itself is moving towards a bright future, it is, in fact, replacing God. Hence the moral law. His first commandment is devotion to the idea of communism and progressive development. (In all religions, including Marxism, the first commandment is: love God, the only difference is what is meant by this god.) From this it follows that it is bad to kill a person, because it is the crown of nature, but the inveterate reactionary, who is against progress, can and must be eliminated, because he interferes with the communist deity, the advanced humanity. According to this philosophy, collective labor created man - from this comes the moral principle of alignment with the collective. The minority must always submit to the majority, and individual abilities that are not put at the service of the advanced collective (the god of the Marxists) can only be harmful. Man is the measure of all things, therefore the very name of this creature already sounds proud, pride becomes a virtue, if only it is not opposed to the collective. Theft is usually condemned by Marxists because it means an attack on the property of the collective (read: deities), but it is only praiseworthy to rob exploiters and reactionaries. We can continue to analyze the communist commandments, but the main thing is already visible: not a single moral norm is adopted by chance. All of them follow from a common worldview: there is no God in heaven, and a revolutionary progressive humanity ruled by an advanced party is declared to be God. By definition, service and sacrifice to this god are called good, resistance or even indifference to him is evil. Instead of Marxism, the humanistic worldview, in particular the so-called valeosophy, is becoming more and more widespread today. Here, the highest value and measure of everything is still a person, only no longer a collective, but as an individual. The existence of God, as the basis of the foundations of the entire world, is not directly denied, but the Divinity is understood not as a living person, but simply as the totality of all the laws of existence according to which this world exists. Respect these laws, learn them, adapt them to yourself and strive for health and happiness - this is all communion with God. If in Marxism advanced humanity is called God, then in valeosophy it is the health of the individual, that is, of each "I". Hence the moral law is not complicated: what contributes to my health is called good. At the same time, however, it is stipulated that causing harm to another person in some indirect way will be harmful to me as well. It is clear that in this religion such things as murder, theft, immoderate fornication, sexual perversion and other gross sins are not approved. Turning to religious rites, learning the methods of entering a certain spiritual world is not forbidden here (as in Marxism, which denies everything otherworldly), but rather is recommended. In their communication with the invisible world, valeosophists use any religious rites and techniques as a means of healing the body and maintaining vitality. Therefore, there is no special discernment about which church to go to for health. The purpose of any religious cult remains quite earthly and purely practical: I believe in what will help health. For both of the above teachings, there is no personal God who reveals Himself to people, demands worship and obedience from them, and gives them all the blessings of temporal and eternal life. The first commandment for the religions of such a non-existent or dead, impersonal god is human egoism - group (with a slight correction for the individual) in Marxism, or individual (with a slight correction for the collective) in valeosophy. It does not make much difference whether there was no God at all, or whether He served only as the primary cause of the world and the system of equations by which all the world's problems are solved - it is important that in both religions man is placed above all, as the crown of the development of nature. And all the moral precepts of both religions follow from this: first of all, it is pride, respect for oneself, independent building of one's life, whether it is the bright future of all mankind or the personal health of an individual. It is possible to combine these goals within the framework of a slightly different religious movement, and an easy transition from one religion to another. So, here are religions that deny the very existence of a personal God, or believe in a dead god, in an impersonal, abstract principle. All these religions place man himself on the divine throne and, from there, give him the rules of life. But there is also the religion of the true, living, personal God, the Creator of all that exists. Who did not abandon His creation. Who is not indifferent to it, Who performs certain actions in order to give man the opportunity to be in eternal and blessed communion with Himself. This, in brief, is the Christian faith's answer to the three questions posed at the beginning of this chapter. In Christianity, man can no longer be regarded as the measure of all things or as the crown of the development of nature. He is only the highest of God's creations in the material world, moreover, responsible for the state of all other visible creatures. But man in himself is not independent, his Creator stands above him, Who endowed him with freedom and reason and at the same time clearly showed the way how to use this freedom for good. Thus, the philosophical egoism of the man-worshiping religions in Christianity is swept away immediately, even before God utters His commandments to man. Other moral attitudes, as long as we recognize God as a living, personal, good being, acting not only in the past but also now, must be perceived by us from His own word. If, for example, a person can neither speak nor write, then we can only guess from his gestures what he wants, and we will not always understand him correctly. Such a person is like the dead gods of pagans, Marxists, and valeosophists. Those who worship them are forced to make up most of what they have "heard" on their own. But this is not the living God of Christians, and if we want to understand how to live, we must first of all listen to Him Himself.

The Revelation of Holy Scripture (Old Testament)

The Word of God is not hidden from us. This is the Bible, the Holy Scriptures. It tells the main and most important thing about God, about the history of mankind (more precisely: about the sacred history of God's relationship with people, beginning with the very creation of the world and man), about how man must live in order to achieve eternal communion with God - the highest, main and final goal of all earthly human life. But before we speak of the Word of God, it is necessary to understand whether God is really what the Bible says He is, and whether the Bible is really His Revelation. After all, all of us, the great-grandchildren of Eve, at some point (more often in adolescence) hear this fatal question for our foremother: did God really say? In other words: Is it true that it was God who said this, and did He say the truth? Here believers usually say: we believe, and that is enough for us, and non-believers declare that they do not want to blindly believe in anything. Of course, the act of faith for any person is the basis of the foundations of all knowledge. Any science begins with unprovable propositions that are taken on faith - axioms or postulates. Remember how the construction of the geometry course began - namely with axioms and indefinable concepts. Classical mechanics is based on three axioms - Newton's laws, and the theory of relativity - on the assumption that the speed of light is unchanged in all frames of reference. Materialism also begins with the belief in the unprovable assumption that the world came into existence by itself according to its natural present laws. And any religion, including Christianity, proceeds from some unprovable propositions - dogmas. And without trying to prove here that God created this world, and the Bible is His true Revelation to man, let us try to make sure to what extent these statements and conclusions from them agree with our everyday experience and knowledge, with the knowledge that mankind possesses. Of course, the knowledge of all mankind is limited, but the idea of an Omniscient Unlimited God is greater and higher. It is impossible to prove or disprove the smaller one. In the same way, in science, several theorems can follow from one general axiom, and if one of them turns out to be wrong, this does not mean that the initial axiom is wrong, because the error could have appeared somewhere else in logical reasoning. On the other hand, a multitude of obvious and correct consequences, without proving the initial axiom, confirm it indirectly. The same is true of the relationship between science and faith. Here the lesser – human knowledge – can confirm the greater – the biblical faith, and thus the faith of every Christian should not be blind. O ever-doubting youths! Let no one blame you for your doubt, if only you learn to condemn yourself for laziness in your research, for being satisfied with your own doubt. Biblical faith is not afraid of conscientious testing by any knowledge available to man. But in your heart it can collapse from carelessness, light-mindedness, from indifference to the question of truth, from unwillingness to value and cherish the truth. Here is the good advice of one well-known teacher of spiritual life, St. Theophan the Recluse, expressed by him at the end of the last century, when the majority of the reading public (except only for real scientists) was convinced that science completely overthrew the Christian faith: "Everyone should test and be convinced beyond doubt whether the faith he holds is true, and, if it turns out to be untrue, find out where the only true faith is, which truly leads to the true God and grants unquestionably eternal salvation... The Lord does not leave untestimony to Himself (Acts 14:17), as well as His one true faith; but when He allowed other faiths to exist near it on this earth, and to enter into a kind of rivalry with it, He thereby imposed on all of them the obligation to hold on to His faith, not without sense, but for indestructible reasons, for the sake of which all others are rejected with full conviction. By this trial honor is given to faith and the true dignity of man, a person who is reasonable, conscious, and conscientious, is preserved. Our faith in our faith, that is, our conviction in the truth of the Orthodox Christian confession, must be reasonable." Having understood what has been said, never believe anyone who says that the Christian faith is blind faith. And never believe in Christ by blind faith. The best years of human life, beginning in youth, are quite decently and appropriately devoted to the acquisition of seeing faith, or insight in faith. "How then can one be convinced and in what way can one be tested? - continues the saint. "There are two ways to this: one is external, scientific, and the other is internal, the path from faith." This second path of knowledge of God will constitute the main subject of our exposition. The most complete and clear, the most indisputable personal confirmation of the truth of the Gospel is provided by living according to the Gospel, the practical fulfillment of the Gospel commandments. In other words, the clearest, and moreover, accessible to everyone foundation of faith gives life according to faith, as the Apostle said: "He who believes in the Son of God has a testimony in himself" (1 John 5:10). But before proceeding to this internal, practical foundation of faith – to living according to faith – it is necessary to consider at least briefly the external ways of testing faith. The knowledge of God by faith and life according to faith is just as practical experiential knowledge as the scientific investigation of the external world. The difference is that scientific knowledge is obtained by the external senses, while the inner spiritual experience of communion with God comes in a supersensible way. But no one will even strive for the inner knowledge of God if he does not have faith in God, and this is initially based in the majority of people on external experiential knowledge from the most diverse spheres of God. Let us briefly consider only the most indisputable facts recognized by people of various convictions, which testify to the truth of the Bible, and a truth that is exceptional and profound. First of all, let us note that of all the ancient, that is, written down before the birth of Christ, sacred writings of various peoples, only the Biblical Revelation speaks of the Living One Personal God the Creator, Who created heaven and earth out of nothing. The other writings of all other ancient peoples—the Hindus, the Chinese, the Persians, the Egyptians, the Chaldeans, the Aryans, the Greeks, the Romans, the American Indians—consider the world to be generated from an original impersonal being or substance, which then no longer acts independently in history. This primordial principle may in some religions introduce the divine element into the whole of nature, in others it may give rise to many different pagan deities, but it itself no longer manifests itself anywhere, serving only as the first impulse for other things. For this reason, such a primordial deity of all religions not based on the Bible we can quite justly consider dead, or rather, dead in the birth of this world. Thus, biblical Revelation in the history of human thought from the very beginning stands apart from all other attempts to explain the world. Further, it must be admitted that only the data of the natural sciences are best in accord with the Biblical Revelation. There is no consensus among scientists about how the universe, life, and intelligence in it came to be. Nevertheless, science has discovered some objective laws of nature that cannot be disputed. For on the basis of these laws, many technical inventions have been created, which could not work if the laws themselves were not strictly and constantly observed. These laws say that no ordered structure of particles, no "unit of life", no intelligent information ever arises by itself, but on the contrary, at the first opportunity spontaneously tends to destruction. Therefore, neither the miraculous order of the planets of the solar system and the stars in the galaxies, nor life, much less mind and spirit, could have arisen by themselves as a result of the accumulation of accidental changes in nature. This vast and complex issue cannot be revealed in a few words. We will make only one note. The laws of irreversible chaos growth as applied to thermodynamics, chemistry, and information theory have been discovered only in the last 150 years. They were unknown to ancient people. And the most interesting thing is that the creation of the world from nothing, according to the description of the Bible, is quite consistent with these laws. The world could arise once in defiance of these laws, and then only gradually lose its beauty and complexity in full accordance with them. In other words, both the Bible and science offer only one scenario for the development of the world: from primitive order to disintegration and chaos. Meanwhile, ancient pagan revelations believe that the world moves in the opposite direction: from primordial chaos to order, complexity and perfection, or at least cyclically: from chaos to order, then back. Such a movement would be contrary to the existing laws of nature, it is unobservable and impossible in the present world, but the ancients did not yet know the laws of nature as we do now. Therefore, their views on the origin of the world could be based either on a true Revelation from above, or otherwise they could involuntarily turn out to be false. Sometimes it is said that science does not recognize miracles. Indeed, miracles are not the subject of its study. It deals only with reproducible or constantly observable phenomena. But at the same time, everywhere it encounters miracles in the very foundations of the phenomena under study. And he stops at them. A miracle is something that cannot appear without violating the currently existing proven laws of nature. And in this sense, a strictly scientific view of the world stops human thought at least at three main points. The origin of the cosmos is a miracle. The origin of life is a miracle. The origin of the mind is a miracle. None of these three phenomena was reproduced in nature either naturally or artificially. Moreover, none of them can happen spontaneously as long as the known laws of nature are in force. Scientists can either call a spade a spade: the Miracle-worker is God, and His action is a miracle, or go away from the question into an empty phrase, like a shell: science does not know the answer, or invent clearly contradictory and false explanations on the basis of well-known laws. A harsh alternative: miracle or absurdity. We will face the same choice later, speaking about the events of the Gospel. Here we will interrupt our excursion into science. If you have an inquisitive mind thirsting for truth, arm it with a simple and undeceitful heart and a single-minded will, and study the natural sciences, philosophy, and Christian apologetics. You will see that the biblical Revelation is not afraid of such trials, but endures them with honor. The Christian faith "does not withstand" only the tests of pride, conceit, indifference, carelessness, insincerity - in such minds and hearts it does not hold.

Testimonies of the Truth of the New Testament

Here you can recall that the first part of the Bible, that is, the Old Testament, recognizes not only Christianity, but also Judaism and Islam. At the same time, neither the Jews nor the Mohammedans recognize Jesus Christ as God and Redeemer of mankind. In refutation of these two false religions, it is difficult to adduce direct scientific evidence. Here we should rather turn to history. The origin of the world has not been seen by any person, so confirmation of the biblical account of creation can be drawn only partially from natural scientific data. And the coming of Jesus Christ into the world took place in the historical memory of mankind, in an era when there were states, and writing, and the records of historians. Therefore, it would be quite logical to compare the Gospel narrative with the historical and archaeological data known to us from other sources. First of all, let us pay attention to the fact that the very expectation of a special Divine Messenger with the goal of saving the human race from suffering and death was inherent in many peoples of the earth. As for the Jewish people, to whom was given the Revelation of the creation of the world and its early history (the only true Revelation, as we now see), along with this Revelation of the remote prehistoric past of the earth, numerous prophetic predictions were given about the future, relating directly to the coming of the Messiah, the Savior of the world. It is obvious that if God from eternity really determined to send His Son into the world and in Him to save mankind from sin and death, then He also took care to warn people about this in advance, so that they would accept the deliverance given. These prophecies of the Old Testament were, first, quite certainly, uttered several centuries before the coming of Christ; secondly, both the ancient and modern Jewish traditions refer specifically to the person of the Messiah, which excludes any other interpretation of them; thirdly, they were amazingly accurately and fully fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ, as the Gospel itself bears witness. The prophets predicted the following Gospel events: the place of the Messiah's birth (the city of Bethlehem), His descent from the royal line of David, His miraculous and never-before-seen birth from a Virgin, the time of His going out to preach. They also indicated the circumstances of His death to the smallest detail: the betrayal of the disciple, and the price of this betrayal, and the method of execution, still unknown in Judea at the time of the prophecy, and the sharing of the Messiah's garments by the executors of the execution, and much more. The prophets explain both the meaning of the suffering of the Messiah for the sins of all people, and the spiritual nature of His teaching, which will establish the New Covenant of God with men and the reasons for the rejection of the Messiah by His native people. The prophets also foretold the Resurrection of the Messiah and the eternal glory of His Kingdom. A number of non-Christian historians of the first century, including eyewitnesses of the last days of His earthly life in Jerusalem, also bear witness to the life, teaching, crucifixion, and even the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. There were very many such eyewitnesses, for on the feast of Passover in Jerusalem those who worship the One God from all corners of the world, not only Jews, but also Gentiles who believed, flocked to Jerusalem to worship. No one would invent a fable, showing the time and place of its action in front of a particularly large number of witnesses. No one would have dared to preach such a fable to its witnesses themselves, and at any rate none of the witnesses would have believed in such a sermon if it had really been based on a fable. Meanwhile, the Gospel preaching begins with the disciples of Christ immediately before the eyewitnesses of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, who are puzzled only by the miraculous disappearance of His Body from the tomb. The Apostles testify to His Resurrection, to the fact that He is the Messiah. And in the shortest possible time, this sermon acquires thousands of supporters. Eyewitnesses of those Paschal events in Jerusalem could practically do nothing to object to Christ's disciples to their testimony that their Teacher had truly risen. Crowds of people passed by the Cross on which He was crucified, many saw where and how He was buried. Knowing the prophecies of the Resurrection, the Jews who crucified Jesus sealed the burial cave and placed Roman guards over the tomb to prevent the body of the executed One from being stolen. This unheard-of affair also could not fail to attract the attention of many people. And at dawn on the third day, the whole city saw that the body had disappeared from the coffin, and the burial shrouds had been left in place in a folded form. The Roman soldiers guarding the coffin were divided. Some describe how the stone from the tomb was miraculously rolled away, others incriminate themselves, claiming that the body was stolen by the disciples of Jesus while the guards were sleeping. It is not clear, however, why such witnesses were not arrested and brought before a military court: after all, a Roman soldier was supposed to be punished by death for sleeping on duty. Nor is it possible to explain how a large stone, which could have been moved by several people, was rolled away so quickly and silently that the sleeping guards did not even hear it. Everyone who listened to the preaching of the apostles (like us, modern people) is faced with a choice: either to believe in an unparalleled and salvific miracle, or to believe in a crude, obviously fabricated for money, and not withstanding any test of plausibility, version of the enemies of Christ. Miracle or absurd? Many of those who believed in the miracle later saw the appearance of the risen Christ and could be convinced that this was not a ghost, not a hallucination, but precisely the resurrection of an incorruptible body. Later, passing through various countries, the Apostles met many people who had already heard about Christ or had even been witnesses of His last Pascha. Thanks to this, the preaching of the Gospel in the shortest possible time embraces the entire ancient world. And this was despite the fierce almost universal resistance to it from the Jews, and then from the pagans. The indisputable fact of the rapid and widespread spread of the Gospel cannot be explained if one does not believe in the truth of the Gospel and in the powerful superhuman, divine power of the word of those who preached it, the power of the Holy Spirit given to them. No other religious doctrine in the world has spread so rapidly, so freely and nonviolently, and by such simple and unlearned people, and this with the fierce resistance of virtually all other known faiths. Finally, in addition to written non-Christian testimonies about Christ, including His Resurrection, we have at our disposal a very important material evidence - the shroud (burial garment) of Jesus Christ. For a hundred years now, scientists have been studying this relic in detail. The Shroud is an ancient cloth in which was wrapped the body of a Man who had undergone scourging, carrying a heavy object (a cross) on his shoulder, crowning with a crown of thorns, crucifixion, piercing with a spear in the right side, from which blood and water flowed without mixing. Artistic production of such an image on fabric, that is, fake, is completely excluded. Few doubt that this is the original burial garment of Jesus Christ Himself. The Shroud also bears two amazing, scientifically inexplicable testimonies about the One Buried in it. In the first place, there is a perfectly correct representation of the face on the cloth, which could not be obtained by simple application, because every face is embossed and cannot give a correct flat print. Secondly, the body disappeared from the shroud in an incomprehensible way, without unwrapping the cloth. Any tissue separated from a drying wound also bears traces of such separation. These traces are not on the shroud. Moreover, the body had to disappear from the shroud no later than in two days, otherwise the imprints could not be preserved. Only the One Who was resurrected could leave his burial shroud in this way! However, of course, not all students of the shroud believe in the reality of the Resurrection. Some take these two miraculous testimonies for unsolved mysteries of science. So it should be that the Lord gives place to our faith, for without faith it is impossible to please God (Heb. 11:6). Thus, the coming of Jesus Christ, His teaching, His death on the cross are quite reliable historical facts, which today are not questioned not only by Jews and Muslims themselves, but also by many atheists. The only controversial question remains: Did Christ rise? If so, then there is nothing left but to recognize Him as the God-Man, the Savior of the world, and believing in Him, to have life in His name (John 20:31). And if not? Does this mean that instead of God, we will have to recognize Him as a deceiver, and without believing in Him, have a life in the name of fighting Him? The first path was chosen by Christians. The second path was preferred by the Jews and, to a large extent, by the Muslims. These paths determined the very face of this and the second and third religions, its spiritual problems and interests, which are also useful to compare with each other. What are the questions of the rabbis who tempted Jesus Christ and did not want to believe in Him as the Messiah? - Is it permissible to heal a person on the Sabbath (even if only on that day he could come to the synagogue and meet Jesus there)? Is it possible to rub ears of grain with your hands on Saturday? Is it possible to eat food without washing? If a woman was married to several brothers, whose wife will she be after the resurrection of the dead? All these are not questions invented by us. These and similar problems are dealt with by rabbinic wisdom even to this day. Can such a religion of ritual and bodily actions satiate a soul thirsting for God? Can it give man the meaning of life, can it reveal to man his own soul, can it give him a living experience of communion with God? Decide for yourself. In my opinion, no. Acquaintance with Judaism shows its deadening emptiness. It is not by chance that the Jews who rejected Christ are called God-killers. Not only did they crucify the Incarnate God Himself, they thereby killed in themselves all living religious feeling. Truly, having departed from the Living God, they now worship the dead god of the Talmud, almost like the pagans. Islam reveals a similar spiritual emptiness.