Thinking about this question, we come to the conclusion that our spirit, soul and body have their own needs. The bodily needs of man are simple and known to everyone: food, drink, sleep, warmth - everything is the same as in animals. And the spiritual needs of a person are more complicated. And if in animals the mental needs are almost completely subordinated to the bodily ones, then in humans they are higher. The human mind is in constant motion. Various thoughts come into it or are born in it, and the mind cannot remain completely idle or closed in on itself. He demands external stimuli or impressions. A person wants to receive information about the world around him. This is a need of the rational part of the soul, and the simplest one at that. A higher need of our reason is the craving for reflection and analysis, which is characteristic of some to a greater extent, and to others to a lesser extent. The sensitive (emotional) side of the soul also requires impressions inherent in it. These are, first of all, aesthetic requests: to contemplate, to listen to something beautiful in nature or in human creativity. Some artistically gifted natures also have a need for creativity in the world of beauty: an irresistible craving to draw, sculpt or sing. A higher manifestation of the sensitive side of the soul is empathy for the joy and sorrow of other people. There are also other movements of the heart. Finally, the volitional side of the soul also has a craving for self-manifestation. For the first time, it wakes up in a child together with the first words: "I myself" (in the sense of doing this or that myself). In general, this is a natural human need - not to be someone's tool or automaton, but to make independent decisions. Our desires, being stricken with sin, require the greatest educational work in order to be directed towards good, and not towards evil. People also have spiritual needs: to know God, to communicate with Him, to do His will in accordance with the voice of conscience. Any human activity also corresponds to needs. Bodily needs are served by any productive labor, the fruit of which are things useful for bodily life. Mental activity includes the entire cultural life of mankind. Science occupies mainly the mind, the arts are conducted for the most part by the senses; Political and military activity is mainly connected with the volitional side of the soul. Finally, religious activity is called upon to satisfy spiritual needs. Of course, there are no sharp boundaries between all these spheres of activity, just as there are no boundaries between the colors of the rainbow, although we distinguish these colors.

The Relationship Between Spirit, Soul and Body

According to the Creator's plan, the body should be subordinate to the Soul, and the soul to the spirit. Or, in other words, the soul should serve as a working organ for the spirit, and the body is intended to carry out the activity of the soul. With a person undamaged by sin, this is exactly what happened: the Divine voice was heard in the very sanctuary of the spirit, the person understood this voice, sympathized with it, wished to fulfill its instruction (that is, the will of God) and fulfilled it by deed through the medium of his body. So it is now, most often, a person who has learned, with God's help, to always be guided by the voice of the Christian conscience, which is able to correctly distinguish between good and evil, thereby restoring the image of God in himself. Such a restored person is intrinsically whole, or, as they also say about him, purposeful or chaste. (In all words there is one root - whole, the same root in the word "healing." There is no internal discord in it. Conscience proclaims the will of God, the heart sympathizes with it, the mind considers the means for its implementation, the will desires and achieves, the body submits to the will without fear and murmuring. And after performing actions, conscience gives a person consolation on his morally correct path. But sin has perverted this correct order. And it is hardly possible in this life to meet a person who always lives chastely, wholeheartedly, according to his conscience. In a person who has not been reborn by God's grace in ascetic asceticism, his entire composition acts at odds. Conscience sometimes tries to insert its own word, but much louder is the voice of the soul's desires, focused mainly on carnal needs, moreover, often excessive and even perverted. The mind is directed to earthly calculations, and more often it is completely disconnected and is satisfied only with the incoming external information. The heart is guided by inconstant sympathies, which are also sinful. The person himself does not really know what he lives for, and therefore what he wants. And in all this discord, you can't understand who the commander is. Most likely, it is the body, because its needs are mostly in the first place. The soul is subordinate to the body, and the spirit and conscience are in the last place. But since such an order is clearly unnatural, it is constantly violated, and instead of wholeness in man there is a continuous internal struggle, the fruit of which is constant sinful suffering.

The Concept of Passions

This suffering arises from the fact that some forces of the soul or body claim the commanding role of the spirit in man and seize it. For example, the need for nutrition goes beyond the limits of reason and in many respects subordinates a person, forcing him to constantly take care of the quantity and quality of food. In this case, it is said that a person submits to the passion of gluttony. This is one of the most common carnal or bodily passions. Other carnal passions are: laziness, drunkenness, smoking, drug addiction, fornication (in its gross manifestation). In other words, carnal passions are perversely developed carnal needs. They often end in simple bodily disorders and illnesses. And rightly so. The body is a subordinate part. Trying to control a person, it cripples itself. More subtle, diverse, and dangerous are the passions of the soul: vanity, man-pleasing, envy, anger, idle talk... The love of money and fornication stand as it were between the physical and the mental, or rather, these are both bodily and spiritual passions. Finally, there are spiritual passions, the most indomitable and evil. They can be reduced to two. For people who do not live a spiritual life, the main passion is petrified insensibility or paralysis of the spirit. Those who try to live spiritually are beset by an equally terrible danger into which the devil once fell - this is pride, which exalts itself not just over people, but over God Himself. People sometimes try to fight their bodily and spiritual passions more or less successfully, but spiritual passions are completely incurable by our own efforts. Having developed in the soul of a person, they sometimes lead him to a complete loss of human appearance. An ordinary fallen person is a whole clot of different passions. Turning to Christ, he overcomes to a certain extent the petrified insensibility - only by the cooperation of God's grace. Further, the Christian spiritual life is a struggle with other passions, the end of which is the purification of the heart, the restoration of the image of God, the correct relationship between the spirit, soul and body. And most importantly, a person returns to the correct communion with God in Christ Jesus and in the Holy Spirit. The passionate state is essentially continuous and useless suffering. The word "passion" has the same root as the word "suffering." And the torment of passions can follow a person into eternity, if he does not have time to sincerely repent before death. And on the contrary, freedom from passions in the language of the Gospel is called blessedness, which means the absence of sinful suffering. For example, the poor in spirit and the weeping are free from petrified insensibility, the merciful are free from the love of money, and the meek and peacemakers are free from anger. In the Gospel, the Savior calls all of them blessed. And this bliss, of course, passes with them into eternity.

Freedom of man and his will

The choice between suffering and blessedness, between sin and virtue, between passions and God, is left to man himself, to his own will. Volition is a special function of the spirit, in which the whole mystery of the human personality is contained. It must be distinguished from the natural will. For example, we can say of a fasting person that he wants to eat, and we can say that he does not want to eat, but to fast. Both will be true if you understand correctly what is meant by the word "wants". He wants to eat by his natural will, but refuses food by his own will. In the same way, a martyr wants to live by his natural will, but chooses by his own will to suffer and die for Christ, in order to live eternally with Him. Our will is in a fallen, sinful state. Our desires remain unfaithful and corrupt long after we have voluntarily taken the side of God against sin. God, people, and demons act on our will, showing and inspiring us with various desires. But no one acts on our will except ourselves. That's how God arranged it. And this is one of the main mysteries of His creation, called man, that He does not want to interfere in our very sanctuary, leaving us our own choice between good and evil at our discretion. However, in a person who has conquered sinful passions and desires, the natural will does not contradict volition, and volition no longer chooses. The choice has already been made once and for all: a person has chosen the path of Christian life and strengthened himself on it, proving by his deeds where his will has inclined. Such a person has conquered only sinful temptations, not only coped with such things, he has also managed to overcome impure desires. And his natural will, in full and constant accord with his will, no longer seeks sin, as in the case of a passionate man who has not yet been cleansed. And on the contrary, the possibility of choice, the constant hesitation of this choice, testifies to the sinful fall of our will and our spirit, to our painful state of slavery to the passions. And the real freedom of a Christian is not the freedom of the present choice. It is the freedom of the past good and final choice in favor of God. In a person who is in a state of petrified insensibility, volition practically does not manifest itself independently. It is completely subordinate to the natural will, led by sinful passions. Here, too, everything was decided by the past evil choice, there is almost no freedom in sight, there is only a miserable slavery to passions. And yet, the freedom of will is not taken away from a person until death. As long as we are alive, we can repent. But even after repenting, we can return to sinful slavery again. Any choice is a matter of our free will! And now you see what a human being is according to the Divine plan and in real life: a very delicate, complex creature, standing on the verge of the visible world and the invisible; a creature corrupted by sin. How should it live in order to conform to the will of its Creator? For this purpose, the Lord left us His commandments.

On the Commandments of God

In all created things, God has established special laws that maintain beauty and harmony in the world. The same laws are predestined for our soul, and they must be strictly observed by us, so that the soul does not perish. These laws constitute the essence of God's commandments. Very conditionally, God's commandments can be compared to the operating instructions that the manufacturer issues for his product. Only the designer himself knows for what purposes he invented the machine and how it should work. In the same way, only our Creator Himself can indicate the true goal of human life – the Kingdom of Heaven, and the means to achieve this goal – His moral law. A product used for other purposes or in violation of the manufacturer's instructions becomes unusable. A soul that does not live for blessed eternity dries up, becomes entangled in passions, and eventually perishes. As a child, you probably saw and stopped in bewilderment in front of high-voltage panels or transformers with the inscription: "Don't get in, it will kill." The drawing of a skull pierced by red lightning was intended to illustrate the impending danger. You didn't understand anything about electrical engineering then, but you listened to the warnings. After all, high voltage is dangerous for the life of any person, regardless of whether he knows the mechanism of electricity action on his body or not. It is dangerous for anyone to get into a high-voltage network. This is how you treat God's commandments and prohibitions. God will not just tell a person and forbid something. On each type of human sin is inscribed by a caring hand the same inscription as on a high-voltage pole. It is another matter that the mortal defeat from sin is not always instantaneous, but even this should not be deceived and abuse God's long-suffering. God's commandments are not just good wishes or good advice, they are strict laws that draw the line between life and death. Thus God established His first commandment for people in Paradise. Concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, He spoke to them in almost the same words; Do not touch lest you die. Adam and Eve did not listen. And although their souls were separated from their bodies not at the same hour, but hundreds of years later, this does not mean that God did not tell the truth. He warned them, "You will die!" - and died, where to go. Get used to treating sin as a mortal poison and high tension: don't get involved, it will kill you! At the same time, it must be remembered that God's commandments cannot be completely reduced to a rigid set of prescriptions. They cannot be understood only as a kind of "instruction for the exploitation of man". Accordingly, in their violation lies not only suicidal human stupidity. In the same way, God cannot be blamed for setting strict rules for man, as if He could not or did not want to free man from them. God's commandments are given by the Creator who loves us, Who showered man with blessings, Who prepared even greater blessings for us for the future life, and Who expects reciprocal love from us. This love cannot be expressed in anything else but in obedience to God. So it turns out that the commandments were given by the Lord not arbitrarily, but out of His love for us. And by violating the commandments, a person not only harms himself, using the "product of God" for other purposes - he rejects God's love. And therefore he becomes guilty before the Creator. Thus, in relation to man, the commandments of God are the rules of life leading to its goal – eternal bliss. And in relation to the Lawgiver Himself, the commandments constitute a sacred covenant of Divine love for us. In both understandings, the commandments of God reflect the will of the unchangeable God, and therefore they themselves are absolute and immutable. The deadly effect of sin is not always like an electric shock. After all, God is not a soulless fate, but a living Lawgiver and Judge. He evaluates each sin and every virtue of each person individually, rewarding or punishing each person taking into account his personal human characteristics and life circumstances, and in the general plan of His providence for all people. Not every sin receives recompense on earth, in this temporal life, and even more rarely is true Christian virtue rewarded here. Therefore, we can understand the justice and mercy of God only with regard to the posthumous retribution to each according to his deeds. The Apostle Paul teaches that the law of God is spiritual. This means that it requires the correction of our very feelings and intentions, and therefore it cannot be reduced to the external fulfillment of certain prescriptions and instructions, as did the Jews, who were constantly rebuked for this by the Savior in the Gospel. God sees and judges first of all our intentions, and only then their material consequences, that is, our deeds. You can't deceive God. Even an outwardly good deed will not bear good fruit if it is done with evil intention, with secret intent or with selfish calculation.

On Innate Sinful Depravity

Every person who is just beginning to fulfill God's commandments is still in a state of sinful corruption. Sin settled in us from the moment the first people sinned in paradise. We are already born with sinful inclinations, we are drawn to sin by our very depraved, fallen nature. Is it just for all people to suffer from sin for the transgression of the commandment by one person? - so, it happens, people of little faith ask. They can be answered with a counter question: are we all justly redeemed by One Man – the God-Man Jesus Christ? Do you want to receive His justification and redemption freely? Then we will have to endure, overcoming our sinful damage in struggle and torment. In fact, it was not in vain that God bound the entire human race by the bonds of kinship, having produced all people from the same parents. This kinship is not only bodily, but also spiritual, because every soul is conceived from the parental souls, to some extent inheriting their qualities. Imagine if God had created two human pairs in the beginning, to what degree of mutual enmity would they have reached after the fall? Today's racism and Nazism would seem like childish babbling compared to that mutual hatred. But having united everyone in advance, God prepared for the future life the unity of the human race, in which each saved person will both preserve his personality and be united with other people. And our Redeemer Himself, when He came to earth, did not condense out of thin air, but was born of the Virgin Mary, taking from Her human flesh and soul, and not accepting only our sin. This is the good purpose for which all mankind is made kindred, and this is the inevitable consequence of this kinship - the inheritance of sin. Therefore, if a person simply begins to live according to the voice of his nature, if he constantly satisfies his natural physical and spiritual needs, then even for a person who believes in Christ, such a life will end on earth with a complete disorder of the soul and eternal torment after death. After all, our needs are perverted by sin and only seem natural. They must be consciously limited, educated, and transformed by two most important tools: the grace of God and one's own will. We have already said this in slightly different words when it came to the passions. Now we will give only some explanatory examples. Let's take sinful habits: smoking, drinking, gambling, or computer gambling. Do our soul or body need these addictions? -Of course not. Can a person be healthy, happy, useful to others if he has never tried tobacco or vodka in his life and has never been fond of gambling? - Of course yes, - the child will answer. On the contrary, all these habits are harmful to the body and soul. Even children know this too. What, then, draws a person to commit suicide for the very first time, when he can still have neither passion nor habit for this sin? In addition, a person already knows in advance that this is a sin and harm, and he has not yet felt a brief false pleasure from sin. What terrible evil force makes the unfortunate sinner commit such madness?! Of course, the example of others, external temptation, flattering speeches, idleness - but not only! In our very soul there lives a kind of inexplicable craving for sin, so that we must refrain from any, even obvious, even disgusting and obvious sin by the effort of our own volition. Otherwise, it will not work. Another example is our vindictiveness or vindictiveness. How much this passion can sometimes torment a person who is not even particularly evil by nature! Such a person most often understands how harmful it is to himself, how shameful it is before people and sinful before God. And at such a moment he cannot help himself, until from somewhere outside he finds some relief from passion. This means that rage itself is already living in us in some way. Since when? From the very moment we remember ourselves. Do you remember your earliest years? Have you been taught to be angry or to take revenge? - Probably not, they taught the opposite. And why is it necessary to teach a child good from the cradle? Because from birth he is inclined to evil, which has not yet been revealed and strengthened in him. Moreover, ask the parents about yourself or observe another baby, does the child know how to "show character" even before he begins to remember himself? "You'll be sure that's the case. This is how sin lives in us from birth. It awakens in both unbaptized and baptized infants, although, perhaps, in different ways. And this is not only our everyday observation. Here is what the Apostle Paul says about the same thing: "I know that good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh; for the desire for good is in me, but I do not find it to do it (Rom. 7:18). And further: According to the inner man I find pleasure in the law of God; but in my members I see another law, which is contrary to the law of my mind, and which makes me a prisoner of the law of sin, which is in my members (Romans 7:22-23). In this speech, the good law of the mind can be understood as the demand of conscience, in accordance with both the commandments of God and man's own will, and the sinful law in the flesh (members) can be understood as the passions, the demands of fallen human nature. You see, even if you voluntarily take the side of the Lord, how difficult (and impossible without outside help) it is for a person to overcome the violence of his own fallen sinful nature! The Apostle continues: "I am a wretched man! who will deliver me from this body of death (fallen nature - c. T.)? And he himself answers: "I thank my God through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 7:24-25). In other words, only by living in Christ, according to the commandments of the Gospel, can one break one's fallen nature, heal it, and straighten it out. And this succeeds only those who, according to the words of the Apostle, learn to live not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit (Romans 8:4), in other words, to subordinate the flesh to the spirit, and not to indulge it in everything.

Without a struggle with sin - death!

Without Christ, without His effective grace-filled help, we cannot overcome sin in ourselves in any way. Now another word of the Apostle will become clear to us: "There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). This decisive word is not a comparison or a figurative expression. This is the true truth, which must be understood directly and literally: do you want your soul to live? - Fight sin in yourself according to the commandments of Jesus Christ with His grace-filled help. And if you do not fight, you will perish forever. Look around you. Most people around them do not want to strain themselves to fight sin. And what happened? How many are enslaved by coarse passions: drunkenness, fornication, insensibility. These passions kill the soul and body in every way: first the will, then the feelings and reason. If a person dies in such a state, it is difficult to hope that at death the soul will come to life, and after death it will definitely never come to life. You will say: well, not everyone around is bitter drunkards. And I will add: there are also drug addicts, maniacs, sadists and others who have already lost their human appearance. But you will continue: and still, they are probably not the majority. But how can one judge the state of mind of people who live normally, who believe, but who rarely go to church and remember about the struggle with sin only occasionally? Of course, is it easy to "test for life" someone else's soul! But think for yourself, having lived your life and not burdened with memories of God, of conscience, of judgment and posthumous retribution, is it possible to learn to love God, to pray to Him constantly, to prefer His will, His closeness to all worldly objects and attachments? -Of course not. But, on the other hand, what is required of a soul that has departed into eternity, except this love for God and closeness to Him? In the Kingdom of Heaven there are no earthly occupations and entertainments, there is no eating, drinking, or entertainment. The celestials stand before the Lord, glorify Him and pray to Him. What should a soul do there, firmly attached to everything earthly and not finding the source of its life in God? Even in paradise she will not find her life in Him, and the earthly objects and attachments she loves will be inaccessible to her. Her face will remain turned to the earth, and her back to God. What awaits it in such a case, except eternal dissatisfaction and separation from the face of God? Is not this alone eternal torment? A simple and ordinary death of a soul that has not dedicated itself to God, a death without particularly grave sins and crimes. But again you may object: this is all purely speculative reasoning, and how can you see it with your own eyes? Perhaps you, like many people, will have to watch for a long time the approach to death of a person who is not a believer or a person of little faith and a true Christian - and compare. Then you will see for yourself how hard the end of the unbeliever is. Long before his death, he is seized by deep despondency, his soul is empty. However, even before it was filled with emptiness, only it was imperceptible. The true meaning and significance of earthly attachments is seen only on the edge of the grave. Nothing can console such an old man, nothing can dispel his mortal anguish. He does not need anything else on earth and is not interested. The earthly in the soul dies, but the heavenly is not born in it. Such a person no longer wants to live, and sometimes he asks for death for himself, but when death comes close to him with another attack of illness, it turns out that he is afraid to die with his spiritual baggage. It is unlikely that he is tormented by his conscience, on the contrary, he often sincerely believes that he has lived his life quite decently. At the same time, he may remember some old sins, but he does not feel particularly embarrassed by them at all. He is left with his own "righteousness," without Christ in the face of death. And, of course, it does not stand it. You will ask: what kind of soul is this? None. He does not think about anything, feels little, does not want anything. The body still demands to eat, drink and breathe, and the soul needs nothing but to drive away its mortal anguish sometimes. As the end approaches and loss of consciousness, this anguish can turn into mortal terror. The dying man speaks, sometimes sees visions, sometimes screams furiously, and not only from pain. However, such things are difficult to convey in words, a Christian will need to see all this for himself someday. Whoever has seen it asks less, reverent before the mystery of death and asking for a Christian end. And such an end, God willing, will happen to you to see. A Christian approaches death without despondency. He has something to think about, something to look forward to, and something to pray for. His heart is more and more filled with a deep mysterious content, which we, the living, cannot understand, for these are the mysteries of the heavenly world. And the very hour of death, despite the dying illnesses, the Christian meets calmly, with a kind of even unearthly joy, which can sometimes be depicted on the face of the deceased. Such a soul is alive at the hour of death, we clearly see and feel it. Is it not for this reason that some begin to treat their faith attentively only after they have the opportunity to escort someone to the grave? All this is worth thinking about now, because we will also have to die, and besides, we do not know when the Lord will call us to His judgment. For now, He gives us strength, health, the opportunity to know Himself, and the freedom to choose the path of life. It also gives us the opportunity to sin, if we want to. But the hour will come when all these advances in life will come to an end, and we will have to answer for the way we used them, not even with our heads, but with our immortal souls. There is probably not much new for you in these words. But, unfortunately, for few people, this simple truth - about our eternal responsibility for earthly life - already determines their behavior. Our innate sinfulness prevents us from acquiring a living, active faith, deeper than mere book knowledge. And here the Lord Himself comes to the rescue.

Chapter 3. Conversion to Christ