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Saint Anthony the Great (251–356) was a Christian saint, also known as Saint Anthony of Egypt, Saint Anthony of the Desert, Saint Anthony the Anchorite, and honorifically as the Father of All Monks. He was a leader among the Desert Fathers, Christian monks in the Egyptian desert in the 3rd and 4th centuries A.D.
From St. Athanasius' Life of St. Antony
- If we would despise the enemy, our thoughts must always be of God and our souls always glad with hope.
- Book II, Chapter 10
- To one whose mind is sound, letters are needless.
- Book IV, Chapter 17
- To those who have an active belief, reasoned proofs are needless and probably useless.
- Book IV, Chapter 17
- I am going the way of my fathers, as the Scripture says, for I see myself called by the Lord. Be you wary and undo not your long service of God, but be earnest to keep your strong purpose, as though you were but now beginning. You know the demons who plot against you, you know how savage they are and how powerless; therefore, fear them not. Let Christ be as the breath you breathe; in Him put your trust. Live as dying daily, heeding yourselves and remembering the counsels you have heard from me. … So do you also be earnest always to be in union first with the Lord and then with the Saints, that after death, they also may receive you into everlasting tabernacles as known friends. Ponder these things, and mean them. … And now God save you, children, for Antony departs and is with you no more.
- Book IV, Chapter 20 (his last words), St. Athanasius. Trans. Dom J.B. McLaughlin, O.S.B. St. Antony of the Desert. Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc, 1995.
- Whoever hammers a lump of iron, first decides what he is going to make of it, a scythe, a sword, or an axe. Even so we ought to make up our minds what kind of virtue we want to forge or we labour in vain.
- The Living Testament: The Essential Writings of Christianity Since the Bible (1985), p. 66.
From Apophthegmata Patrum
- Wortley, John (2014). Give Me a Word: The Alphabetical Sayings of the Desert Fathers. Yonkers, New York: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press. ISBN 978-0-88141-497-4.
- He also said: “Just as fish die if they are on dry land for some time, so do monks who loiter outside their cells or waste time with worldlings release themselves from the tension of hesychia. So we should hasten back to the cell (like the fish to the sea) lest while loitering outside we forget to keep a watch on the inner self.”
- Saying 10
- Abba Antony said: “A time is coming when people will rave, and when they see somebody who is not raving, they will attack him, saying: ‘You are raving [mad]’; for he is not like them.”
- Saying 25
- The same [elder] said: “Always have the fear of God before your eyes. Remember him who gives death and life. Hate the world and all that is in it. Hate all physical repose. Renounce this life so you may live for God. Remember what you promised to God, for he will be looking for it from you on the Day of Judgment. Be hungry and thirsty, endure nakedness, keep watch; sorrow, weep, and groan in your hearts. Examine whether you are worthy of God. Despise the flesh in order to save your souls.”
- Saying 33
- Abba Antony said: “He who is hammering a piece of iron first takes note in his logismos what he is going to make: a scythe, a sword, or an axe. So ought we to consider what kind of virtue we are seeking, so that we do not labor in vain.”
- Saying 35
Quotes about Anthony the Great
- As soon as this earth's great elder, the blessed Antony, who prayed for the whole world, departed, everything has been torn apart and is in anguish, and the Wrath devastates Egypt. While he was truly on earth, he extended his hands and prayed and spoke with God all day long. He did not let the Wrath descend on us. Lifting up his thoughts, he kept it from coming down. But now that those hands are closed, no one else can be found who might halt the violence of the Wrath that may devastate the whole region. I write to you therefore because the churches are filled with desolation, and the city streets are filled with blasphemies. Many crimes, fornication, all sorts of filth fill our city. The source of the corruption: the mad minds of the Arians. The Church of God has no ministers, the sanctuaries stand deserted. People have left the churches deserted, empty.
- Serapion of Thmuis, Ep. ad discipulos Antonii 5, 7–8, 19–20. Translation and adaptation by Harmless, William (2004). Desert Christians: An Introduction to the Literature of Early Monasticism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-516222-6.
See also
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