Can a non-orthodox layman arrive to Hesychia?
Upvote:3
According to what I read from saints, you don't have to be a monk to get some gifts like prayer of heart or the seeing of uncreated light. The man from The Way of a Pilgrim wasn't a monk. Also I read about one of Optina Elders teaching a prayer of heart some sheperd girl.
However the idea of achieving these gifts while not being orthodox is strange. And how can you achieve them if you don't believe in them?
Upvote:5
I suppose the answer depends entirely on how you define success. To be an authentic Hesychast monk, you would really need to move to Mt. Athos.
But there's no reason you couldn't successfully integrate some Hesychast methods into your current life. In particular, contemplation, meditation and recital of the Jesus Prayer seems entirely within the reach of all believers and captures the core of the tradition as I understand it. Being an outsider myself, I can't say if it's possible to reach the sort of peace the tradition sets as the end state, however.
As a word of caution: like other sorts of spiritual gifts and experiences, it seems to me we go off course if we begin to pursue them for their own sake. As Paul warns:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.—1 Corinthians 13:1-3 (ESV)
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