The Holy Tradition of Love
St Lyubov of Ryazan
An Unusual Prophet
St Lyubov was born to Semeon and Maria Sukhanovsky in Pronsk (a city in Ryazan) on August 28th, 1852. She was baptized in St Nicholas, the church where Fr Peter Pavlov, father of the famous Ivan Pavlov, served.
St Lyubov was invalid for the first fifteen years of her life. All the men in her family reposed early on, leaving St Lyubov with her mother and younger sister (Olga). Without her father to provide, and no brothers who could grow to fill in the gap, St Lyubov and her mother and sister were one of the poorest families in all of Ryazan.
But Maria was a good mother, and St Lyubov was resilient. Maria taught her daughter how to pray, read, and write. This education allowed St Lyubov to invest the majority of her bedridden life digesting spiritual books. She developed a strong devotion to St Nicholas and would often pray before his icon.
When St Lyubov turned fifteen, St Nicholas appeared to her and called her by name to stand up, walk, and to become a fool for Christ.
Though there are many other things about St Lyubov, which you can read in Holy Fools by Oswin Craton, I want to focus on her spiritual gift of love and of prophecy.
My illustration of St Lyubov in Holy Fools puts her love and the unusual expression of her prophetic gift on display. When people would come to St Lyubov seeking advice, she would often respond by using scissors to cut out an image of their future from a piece of paper or fabric rather than speaking in words.
Excel in Edifying the Church
St Paul links the gift of prophecy with love in 1 Corinthians:
If I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging symbol. If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and have all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but I do not have love, I am nothing. If I give out all my goods to feed the poor, and give my body so that I will burn but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
Love is patient and is kind; love does not envy. Love does not brag, it is not proud, it does not behave inappropriately, it is not self-oriented. Love does not take offence and does not keep track of evil, it does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.
But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. We know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when that which is complete comes, then that which is incomplete will be done away with. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become full-grown, I have put away childish things. Now indeed, we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we shall see face to face. Now I know only in part, but then, I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. But now, faith, hope, and love remain: these three, and the greatest of these is love.
Pursue love, and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy… Whoever prophesies speaks to others for their edification, exhortation, and consolation… try to excel in what edifies the Church.
~ 1 Corinthians 13.1-14.1, 3, 12b
Notice that although St Paul speaks of a day when prophecies, and other certain gifts will end, he still encourages the Christians in Corinth to pursue love and desire to acquire spiritual gifts. He especially encourages them to seek the spiritual gift of prophecy, but only for the sake of love.
The gift of prophecy, St Paul says, is particularly suitable for edifying, exhorting, and consoling fellow Christians. The spiritual gift of prophecy is inherently other-centric, and this is the connection between this gift and the higher spiritual gift of love.
The other-centric character of the gift of prophecy is likely the reason this gift has continued in the Church. Corinthian glossolalia (the gift of tongues), in contrast to the glossolalia at Pentecost (Acts 2), had become a problem for them. Everyone was speaking in languages only intelligible by God (1 Cor. 14.2) and all at once. Imagine the chaotic noise at the Tower of Babel. This is the behavior of the “noisy gong” that was disrupting the life and worship of the Corinthian Christians.
Once again, St Paul is not saying glossolalia is bad or even undesirable. In fact, St Paul explicitly says that he desires for all of them to be able to speak in other tongues. The central issue for St Paul is that the Corinthians lacked love.
If the Corinthians had love, they would not have been speaking over one another to only exhort themselves. They would have given preference to others before themselves, and this would have resulted in the manifestation of the greatest spiritual gifts: faith, hope, and love. Furthermore, those greater gifts would be suitably accompanied by the other-centric gift of prophecy.
Love Is Not Self-Oriented
Although St Lyubov may be best known for her unusual mode of prophecy, I think it’s important to emphasize the heavenly grandeur of her neighborly love. Remember that St Paul taught, “If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and have all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but I do not have love, I am nothing.” St Lyubov lived according to the same Spirit, regarding herself as nothing unless filled with the love of God.
Despite her great poverty, St Lyubov managed to always find what she needed in order to love others. Perhaps due to her childlikeness and whimsical appearance (she enjoyed dressing plainly and with bright colors, especially pink), local shop owners would allow her to collect items without paying for them. Because she was a local prophet, she always knew in advance who she would be giving the items to and what exactly they needed. When she collected the items from the shops, she only ever took what was needed to fulfill her mission of love.
I give thanks to my God: I speak in tongues more than all of you. However, in the Church, I would rather speak five words with my mind than ten thousand words in another tongue, in order to instruct others.
~ 1 Corinthians 14.18-19
When St Paul says, “I would rather speak five words with my mind,” he is probably referring to a state of ecstasy experienced by those speaking in tongues. The local Dionysiac influence probably had those young Corinthian Christians believing the soul was united to the deity during states of ecstasy (this is what the pagan orgies in which they once participated appealing to them). Even if this were true, it’s notable that later mystics describing states of ecstasy in the context of worship presented the experience as intelligible. This is in contrast to what St Paul is describing of the Corinthians. That said, St Paul still never denies the ecstatic state. Rather, he ranks the ecstatic experience of the gift of tongues as the lowest rung of spiritual gifts.
The highest rung of spirituality for St Paul is love. Love can do more than any of the other spiritual gifts. If a person has the gift of God’s love, they have everything.
St Lyubov, then, never really saw herself as poor. She saw herself as overflowing with the greatest treasure, and this is evident in the fact that she did nothing but give to and edify and encourage and comfort everyone around her. She was St Nicholas’ gift—God’s gift—to the Church in Ryazan.
St Paul said he would rather speak five intelligible words in order to instruct others than to speak ten thousand words in unintelligible tongues. St Lyubov spoke silently, yet intelligibly, instructing others through images and her own way of life.
The particular image in my illustration of St Lyubov concerns a woman discerning the monastic vocation. She was uncertain what to do with her life. St Lyubov cut out an intricate image of a monastery and a church. By this the woman was encouraged to pursue the monastic life, and the Church was edified by her prophecy.
Prophets of the New Testament
The Didache covers prophecy, as well as ecstatic states, and a number of other concerns in the right ordering of the Church. Prophets were understood in the Didache as a teaching class, and they were ranked below the classes of apostle and doctor.
Prophets could be of the laity, itinerate and/or residential, and their calling was specifically after the instruction of St Paul: they were to use their charism to instruct, comfort, encourage, and rebuke their fellow Christians for the edification of the Church.
Didache 11.7 mentions the possibility of a visiting prophet to speak while in a state of ecstasy, and that no one should cast doubts on them lest they become guilty of the unforgiveable sin (blasphemy against the Holy Spirit). However, the chapter also explains that not everyone who speaks in the state of ecstasy is a true prophet. If they are a true prophet, they will have “the ways of the Lord about him” (Didache 11.8a; see also Phil. 2.21 for the meaning of “the ways of the Lord”). Furthermore, all the Old Testament definitions of a true versus a false prophet apply (e.g. If the words of a prophet do not come to pass, they are a false prophet and should be put away).
What is most relevant to us from the Didache for this post is 11.12 and 15.1:
…If anyone says in ecstasy, “Give me money,” or something else, you must not listen to him. However, should he tell you to give something for others who are in need, let no one condemn him.
***
…Elect for yourselves bishops and deacons, men who are an honor to the Lord, of gentle disposition, not attached to money, honest and well-tried; for they, too, render you the sacred service of the prophets and teachers.
Notice how Didache 11.12 reveals that a sign of a true prophet is that they will instruct Christians to care for others in need rather than instructing Christians to serve them. Prophets are other-centric in their instruction, and this is the primary characteristic of St Lyubov.
Notice, too, how Didache 15.1 describes bishops and deacons as rendering the sacred service of prophets. We tend to think of “prophecy” as words spoken truthfully about the future, but that is not the only thing prophets do. Consider the Old Testament prophets. While they certainly spoke truthfully about the future in various ways, they spent much more of their time edifying the people of God.
The prophet Isaiah is a great example. The book opens with a vision given to Isaiah concerning Judah and Jerusalem. God tells Isaiah, “Israel does not know, My people does not understand [that I am the Master against Whom they’ve rebelled].” The basic problem is that God’s people needed to learn and understand the severe nature of their rebellion against God and how to repent and return to God. The evidence of this problem was that they had become like a besieged city, polluted with the false spirituality of Sodom and Gomorrah, and offered their sacrifices in vanity (Isa. 1.8-11). Their sacrifices were vain because they were morally and ritually polluted. They had to be cleansed, purified, before they could make sacrifices acceptable to God (Ps. 50/51).
In chapter 2, Isaiah calls the people to “walk in the light of the LORD” by turning away from idolatry and all the ways of life which go along with it. Idolatry was not merely a problem on the individual level, but a societal problem. It was a problem which brought evils upon everyone and amplified the suffering of the poor, the faithful and the sojourners and the widows and the orphans.
This diagnosis of a spiritual problem followed by the spiritual remedy is precisely the kind of thing bishops do. They write pastoral letters, visit and instruct the parishes entrusted to them, ordain priests and deacons to serve and build up the Church. When needed, bishops will also correct and exhort and rebuke churches and those he has tasked for their care.
Deacons, in their ministry of teaching (deacons will often provide catechetical instruction to parishes to help the priest, and even preach homilies on occasion), can also be described as prophets. Their service, after all, is derived from the authority of Christ through the bishop. In other words, a deacon who teaches faithfully will not be found teaching contrary to his bishop (assuming his bishop, too, is a true prophet). In this way, the deacon becomes an image—the presence—of the bishop among the faithful.
Now I mention all of this, concerning how bishops and deacons and St Lyubov can all be considered prophets, because it helps connect the Orthodox Church of the present to the apostolic age. It also helps us understand the nature of prophecy and its role in the ministry of the Orthodox Church in our own time. At the same time, it also demonstrates that the gift of prophecy is (1) not for everyone and (2) the gift of love is better.
The Holy Tradition of Love
I wrote about St John the Theologian in the last paid subscriber post. One of the notable characteristics of St John’s writings is the emphasis on acquiring the love of God. Go ahead and read St John’s Gospel and Epistles to see for yourself. St John himself was a prophet of the New Testament (ever heard of the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ to the Holy Apostle John?), and yet as a prophet he can’t stop calling Christians to acquire the love of God.
What we should love from St Lyubov, and all the saints, is that the Holy Tradition of Love endures to the end. There are many members in the Church, but not one of them is called to relax in their endeavor to become the means by which God’s love is experienced by their neighbors. Members of the Church are called, however, to relax in anything—even spiritual gifts—which hinders the growth of faith, hope, and love in a parish.
This is quite an interesting framing of spiritual gifts. They are presented to us as a hierarchy of gifts. What is more interesting, and concerning, to me is that many people probably find the gift of speaking in tongues in ecstasy much more appealing than being silently present with someone who is suffering. Being the means by which God’s love is experienced by others seems to be held in much lower esteem than being a noisy gong.
But there is a story that I find to be a wonderful remedy for anyone who, like me, has ever felt as though they’re not enough because they lack the charism of tongues or prophecy, or lack in extraordinary works:
Abba Ischyrion once told his monks, “We have fulfilled the commandments of God.” But the monks were concerned by this and asked, “What about those who come after us… what will they do?” Abba Ischyrion replied, “They’ll do half as much.” “What about those who come after them,” the monks asked. Abba Ischyrion replied, “Before the end of time, they will not keep the monastic rule, but such misfortunes and temptations will befall them that, through their patience during those assaults and temptations, they will prove themselves greater than us and our fathers in the Kingdom of God (The Prologue of Ohrid, February 5th).
The lesson is this: We can become greater than Abba Ischyrion and all the monks and fathers in the Kingdom of God by enduring our temptations to the end. How does one endure to the end? “Anyone who loves his brother [or sister] remains in the light, and there is no occasion for stumbling in such a person. But whoever hates a brother [or sister] is in the darkness and lives in the darkness; such a person does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes” (1 John 2.10-11).