204. What shortens our life?

"And I have come in the years that I have come, and in the way which I will not return, I will go" (Job 16:22).

With incomprehensible speed, brethren, this count is being conducted... What I say goes away; what I have said is irretrievably gone; and what I want to say, I do not know whether the Creator will give me my time and strength to say. So let us all come to the last words, and say: "In Thy hands, O Lord, we commit our spirit." With this we will end everything... and then only some faint signs of life will remain in us, just as in a clock that walks, a quiet movement is heard; that is, there will remain the heavy and slow sobbing of a cramped breast, or the last breath of an exhausted man, which, after repeated several times, subsides forever, and which already belongs to the number of life, just as the last point to the letter we have finished. And is not our life flowing like a word? That I live is gone; that he lived is irretrievably gone; that I want to live — I don't know if my Creator will allow it... And yet, what I have lived is counted by my Creator. "And the years have come, and on the way which I shall not return, I will go!"

Our life is short, my friends; and we ourselves urge God to shorten our short life again and again... Only on earth and there was a good place, that paradise. Only there was life for us that is in paradise. Paradise life could only be called life. It was spent in all the joys that the human heart could desire. Adam and his helper enjoyed everything that was sinless: they had a beautiful body, and a most beautiful soul, because it was holy and godlike; their heart rested in God and His holy will; their desires aspired only to God, the source of blessings, for the gift of which they sent thanks to Him; their conscience was clear. They were children who were portrayed as the Heavenly Father. They had no one to fear, nothing to cry about; A divine remedy has been given against old age... And what happened? Sin has changed everything! Sin made man an enemy of God and His will, and gave him another, more terrible image. He made his holy and God-loving soul the most selfish, the world turned into a hospital in which nothing is heard but lamentations, nothing is seen but misfortunes! Sin has terribly shortened life itself; He brought death not only into the world, but also into our body; And this evil mistress, reigning over people, crushes them with various diseases and, finally, destroys them to dust. The bliss of paradise passed away like a dream, and only the bitter memory of it remained with us. "But death reigned from Adam even before Moses (and before us), and over those who had not sinned in the likeness of Adam's transgression" (Romans 5:14). However, I also see God's mercy to people and goodwill to continue their lives. Methuselah lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years. Even those great people whom we call Forefathers or Patriarchs lived for several hundred years and left us an example of virtue rewarded with prosperity and longevity.

What then? Perhaps this will remain an inheritance to the human race? But no; Wickedness abounds on earth, iniquity grows, malice and inhumanity increase, iniquities pour out like a stream, sins cry out to heaven, the Most High is grieved, and, in vengeance, He determines and says: "My Spirit shall not dwell in these men for ever, for they are not flesh: but their days shall be a hundred and twenty years" (Gen. 6:3). Let our poor life at least remain on this decree of God. Let a man live a hundred and twenty years: perhaps we, having lived so many years in the fear of God and godliness, which, in the words of the Apostle Paul, "is profitable in all things, the promise which hath life now and that which is to come" (1 Tim. 4:8), would see with our own eyes God's blessing on ourselves and on the sons of our sons, and, comforted by it, would go to the grave, as in the door of the Heavenly Kingdom, to God as to his own Father. But it is not so: sin, having reigned in the hearts of men, has driven out the love and fear of God, a desperate, God-hating life has appeared in men, and such deeds as only their God-killing heart desires: forge, according to the words of Solomon, their evil hearts are forged! (Proverbs 6:18). But Thy justice, O Lord, is according to our lives, and we are already deprived of Thy mercy in righteousness and by our deeds. And if one out of a thousand is vouchsafed it, then he is a miracle: for already "the days of our years, in them seventy years, and if they are able to do it, ten years, and multiply their labor and sickness" (Psalm 89:10)... Forty years have been taken away, or are prescribed for deliberate illnesses! But as a punishment it happens that even the last prescribed number of years is taken away from us, and we die in the mid-day, and many do not even live to see the mid-day; we die in the first flower of years — in cradles; we die on the very day on which we were born, we die in the very womb of our mothers; we die so that those who give birth may see the heavenly wrath against sin, and those who die so that they may be saved from those sins in which, imitating their fathers, they would drown. Good people do not live to harm anyone, but do good to everyone as much as possible; they love everyone, and everyone loves them, and they would give them their own days. Their life is counted not by day, but by virtue: for a bad man has not done so much good to anyone in the course of seventy years as a virtuous man has done in the course of seven days. However, the good often die untimely, and are cut when no one expected it. He Who looks down on everything from heaven, seeing that the good will not be good for a long time, that the evil will make the good more evil than themselves, does not allow them to live any longer. That is why Solomon says of the virtuous: "He was caught up, lest malice change his mind, or flattery deceive his soul. Having died in a small way, he fulfilled the year of duty: for his soul was pleasing to the Lord, for this reason he sought from the midst of wickedness" (Wis. 4:11:13-14).

How long, how firmly the trees and stones remain! Only we alone are nothing in comparison with them! Many of the animals are very strong and long-lived; but man, their master, is weak, and often trembles at his own subordinates... Silver is strong, gold is durable; but the lover of money soon dies, and becomes dust.

I dare not compare our life with eternity. Eternity is a sea without shores, and our life is a raindrop that drops on the earth, and there is no trace of it. God is and remains; And we are: a ghost, and our life is a ghost. Life is as small as breathing: I breathed in, and a part of my life disappeared forever... but whether I will breathe any more, I do not know myself, for all sinners are threatened with this rebuke: if you do not listen to Me, I declare to you this day, that you will perish in destruction, and you will not be on earth for many days. If, brethren, let us also consider that man is often burdened with such troubles that he cries out with Job: "Why did he not die in the womb? but he came out of the womb, and did not perish!" (Job 3:11), then will not our life seem twice as short if we choose only happy days from it to count, which we must look for almost with a candle? I know that life is not without joys; but that is a drop of sweetness in the cup of sorrow. "Yet I am in the mouth of the feasting people, and the wrath of God has ascended upon them," says St. David about the Israelites (Psalm 77:30-31). Such are our joys in the world! If, even in the shortest duration of a miserable life, someone finds that consolation — to suffer for a short time in the world, then what will happen if we fall from a short-term torment for unrepentance into eternal torment?

My brethren! A small life is given to us so that we may prepare for a great one, and a short life is given for eternity. And we are stocking up on everything for the days to come, only for the terrible day – nothing! We have excellent dresses for holidays, but none for holidays and eternal celebrations! We remember everything, we take care of everything, but we have forgotten only one soul; and it is all the more terrible that we have only it; for according to our disposition, the evil one should have at least four souls, and having destroyed one in the love of money, another in ambition, a third in sensuality, and with the fourth, to be saved. Our thoughts are high, but they do not fly into the sky. Desires are endless, but they do not strive for an infinite life. Advice is wise, but to perdition – first someone else's, and then one's own. There are many words, but not those with which one can stand before the judgment of God. We also have love, but not for God... There is also fear, but not eternal torment... For we are oppressed by what has hitherto been... Let us take care of the soul with our souls, so that at death we may joyfully hand it over into the hands of God, worthy of these hands. The years have come, and on the path by which we shall not return, we will no longer go. Amen.

(From the words of Archpriest John Levanda)

205. Рассказ святителя Тихона Задонского о самом себе

Как я (Святитель Тихон родился в 1724 году, отцом его был дьячок села Короцка, Валдайского уезда Новгородской губернии, Савелий Кирилов) начал себя помнить, в доме, при матери нашей (отца своего я не помню), было нас четыре брата и две сестры: большой брат дьячкову должность отправлял, средний же брат взят был в военную службу, а мы все еще малы были и в великой жили бедности. Нашего же прихода ямщик, богатый, но бездетный был; он часто приходил к нам в дом; я полюбился ему. Он неоднократно просил меня у матушки и так говорил: "Отдайте мне Тиму своего (ибо до пострижения в монашество именовался я Тимофеем), я его вместо сына воспитаю и все имущество мое — его будет". Мать моя, хотя и отказывала ему (жаль ей было отдать меня), но крайний недостаток в пище понудил матушку отдать меня ямщику оному, и она, взяв за руку, повела меня к нему, — я это хорошо помню. Большего же брата в то время не было в доме; но как пришел он, то спросил у сестры: "Где матушка?" Она сказала ему: "Повела Тиму к ямщику". Брат, догнав на дороге матушку, встал перед ней на колени и сказал: "Куда вы ведете брата? Ведь ямщику отдадите, он ямщиком и будет, я лучше с сумой по миру пойду, а брата не отдам ямщику: постараемся обучить его грамоте, тогда он сможет к какой-либо церкви в дьячки или пономари определиться". И потому матушка воротилась домой. А так как в доме есть было нечего, то я у богатого мужика целыми днями, бывало, бороню пашню, чтобы только богатый мужик хлебом накормил. Вот в какой нужде воспитывался я.

Когда в Новгороде вновь учредили семинарию, то и меня повезла матушка в Новгород и, отдав в семинарию, сама скоро скончалась там. А я начал продолжать учение на казенном коште и терпел великую нужду; и так бывало: когда получу казенный хлеб, то половину из него оставляю для продовольствия себе, а другую половину продаю; куплю свечу, сяду с ней на печку и читаю книжку; а дети богатых отцов, соученики мои, играют, или найдут ошметки лаптей и начнут смеяться надо мной, и махать ими на меня, говоря: "Величаем тя"... Когда же я посвящен был в викарного епископа и приехал в Новгород, то они же и пришли ко мне, по обыкновению, для принятия благословения; я им сказал: "Вы, братцы, смеялись надо мной, когда мы были в семинарии малолетними детьми, и отопками на меня махали, теперь же и кадилами будете кадить", — в то время иные из них священниками и диаконами были. А они сказали мне: "Прости, владыко святый!" Я же сказал им: "Я шутя вам говорю, братцы".

Когда я потом учителем был, просил нас, учителей Александровского монастыря, архимандрит к себе в гости; мы и отправились к нему. По приезде в монастырь я взошел на колокольню осмотреть места вокруг монастыря, подлинно прекрасные и, не опробовав перил, оперся на них, а они вдруг и упали на землю, а меня будто кто назад толкнул, я к колоколам на пол затылком упал полумертв, едва опомниться мог и дойти до кельи архимандрита. Стали мне говорить: "Что ты лицом изменился, Тимофей Савельевич? Посмотри, братец, в зеркало, ты мертвому подобен". Я им сказал: "Пожалуйте чашку чая, после вам скажу причину моего изменения". Напившись чаю, я повел их к колокольне, и мы осмотрели перила, которые лежали вдребезги разбитыми. Я им сказал: "На этом месте и мне бы лежать так разбитым".

Я никогда и не мыслил о таком важном сане, чтобы быть мне епископом; у меня мысли были непременно куда-нибудь удалиться в пустынный монастырь, постричься в монахи и проводить уединенную жизнь; но Всевышнего судьбе так было угодно, что я, недостойный, стал епископом. Когда я был в Твери архимандритом, ректором семинарии, в день Святой Пасхи служил с архиереем Афанасием в соборе литургию. Что же случилось? Во время Херувимской песни, когда сам архиерей у жертвенника вынимал частицы о здравии, я, подойдя к жертвеннику, сказал: "Помяни мя, владыко святый!". Архиерей же хотел сказать: "священноархимандритство твое", но вместо этого сказал: "епископство твое да помянет Господь Бог во Царствии Своем", — сам улыбнулся и сказал мне: "Дай Бог вам быть епископом". Я после узнал, что в самый тот день Пасхи в Петербурге первый синодальный член, митрополит Димитрий Сеченов, метал жребий купно с Епифанием, епископом Смоленским; седмь жребиев кандидатских было написано, а Смоленский архиерей говорит митрополиту: "Прикажите написать жребий Тверского ректора Тихона". — "Он еще молод, время не ушло. Однако, напиши...", — сказал Сеченов келейному. И мой жребий был осьмой. До трех раз жребий метали, а все мой жребий вынимался, поэтому и сказал митрополит: "Ну, знать Богу так угодно — быть ему епископом".