Let there be LIGHT!

Dragomirna monastery, founded 1609, outside Suceava

ME at a very snowy Dragomirna

Formidable walls surrounding the complex

Approaching the monastery

I sent some emails to professors not long ago and told one of them of my occasional frustrations and sense of futility. He assured me there would always be fits and starts in research, but you just can't let them give you fits. I recently finished a piece and I was actually quite happy with it. I've found I might be a bit too.... critical.. in researching sometimes. I read something about what someone said, and get crazed in trying to find the original document; every detail needs further investigation. Sometimes, particularly in Romanian scholarship, it's a good thing to seek constant verification of facts, but if it's inhibiting me in work, then I don't suppose it's worth it...

SO my new exciting topic is PAISIE! He is an extremely important, influential figure cast aside in Eastern scholarship and virtually unknown in Western scholarship- yes!!! A native Ukrainian, he moved to the Romanian lands seeking a religious life. At one point, he left for Mt. Athos, spending many decades there learning the monastic life there. Mt. Athos religion is based on 'hesychasm,' the constant, inward turned prayer of the heart. Monks on Athos life a life in solitude (in monasteries like Meteora, high above the ground) and spend their entire day chanting and holding a prayer in their hearts.

Paisie brought a community back with him from Athos (circa 1779, which, to orient ourselves was a time of Austrian occupation in Northern Moldavia; well past the fall of Constantinople; and the Greek Pharinot rule of Moldavia) of about 60 monks and went to Dragomirna. Among Dragomirna, Neamt, and Secu monasteries, he set up a community of over 1000 monks, living a life of hesychastic community which is they key change he brought to Moldavian hesychasm. This sense of community was important in Moldavian monasteries which were ethnically diverse and experienced tensions and segregation within the communities as a result. 

Paisie also translated the Philokalia into the first modern language, Romanian. More importantly, he translated it into Slavonic so that it was, for the first time, largely accessible to the Eastern churches. He insisted that the monks living under his care know the Scriptures and the Church Fathers. He also oversaw a new school of translation at Dragomirna. Formerly, works were being translated from Greek to Romanian to a Slavic language, and Paisie facilitated translations directly from Greek to Slavic. 

So, back to the books....!