What are air ordeals? The American Orthodox hieromonk Seraphim (Rose) will answer this question, based on the texts of Bishop Ignatius.

In this fallen world, the habitat of demons, the place where the souls of the newly departed meet them, is the air. Bishop Ignatius further describes this kingdom, which must be clearly understood in order to fully understand modern “posthumous” experiences.
“The Word of God and the Spirit who assists the word reveal to us through their chosen vessels that the space between heaven and earth, the entire azure abyss of the airs visible to us, the heavenly abyss, serves as a dwelling for the fallen angels cast out of heaven...
The Holy Apostle Paul calls the fallen angels spirits of wickedness in high places (Eph. 6:12), and their head the prince of the power of the air (Eph. 2:2). Fallen angels are scattered in multitudes throughout the transparent abyss that we see above us. They do not cease to outrage all human societies and each individual individually; there is no atrocity, there is no crime in which they would not be the instigators and participants; they incline and teach a person to sin by all kinds of means. Your adversary the devil, says the holy Apostle Peter, walks around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8) both during our earthly life and after the separation of the soul from the body. When the soul of a Christian, leaving its earthly temple, begins to strive through the air space to the mountainous fatherland, demons stop it, try to find in it affinity with themselves, their sinfulness, their fall and bring it down to hell, prepared for the devil and his angels (Matthew 25 , 41). This is how they act according to the right acquired by them” (Bishop Ignatius. Collected works, vol. 3, pp. 132-133).
After the fall of Adam, Bishop Ignatius continues, when Paradise was closed to man and a Cherub with a fiery sword was placed to guard it (Gen. 3:24), the head of the fallen angels - Satan - together with the hordes of spirits subordinate to him “became on the way from earth to paradise, and from that time until the saving suffering and life-giving death of Christ, he did not miss a single human soul separated from the body along that path. The gates of heaven are closed for man forever. Both the righteous and the sinners descended to hell.
Eternal gates and impassable paths were opened only before our Lord Jesus Christ” (pp. 134-135). After our redemption by Jesus Christ, “all who have openly rejected the Redeemer are henceforth the property of Satan; Their souls, upon separation from their bodies, descend straight to hell. But even Christians who deviate towards sin are not worthy of immediate relocation from earthly life to blissful eternity. Justice itself demands that these deviations, to the sin of the Christian soul, these betrayals of the Redeemer, be weighed and evaluated. Judgment and analysis are necessary to determine what prevails in it - eternal life or eternal death. And every Christian soul, upon its departure from the body, awaits the impartial judgment of God, as the holy Apostle Paul said: it is appointed for men to die once, and then the judgment (Heb. 9:27).
To torture souls passing through the airspace, the dark authorities have installed separate courts and guards in remarkable order. Along the layers of heaven, from the earth to the sky itself, there are guard regiments of fallen spirits. Each department is in charge of a special type of sin and torments the soul in it when the soul reaches this department. The aerial demonic guards and judgment seats are called ordeals in the patristic writings, and the spirits serving in them are called tax collectors” (vol. 3, p. 136).

1. How to understand ordeals
Perhaps no aspect of Orthodox eschatology has been more misunderstood than the aerial ordeals. Many graduates of modern modernist Orthodox seminaries tend to reject this phenomenon altogether as some kind of “late addition” to Orthodox teaching or as a “fictional” reality that has no basis either in the Holy Scriptures, or in the patristic texts, or in spiritual reality. These students are victims of a rationalist education that lacks a nuanced understanding of both the different levels of reality often described in Orthodox texts and the different levels of meaning often found in biblical and patristic texts. The modern rationalist overemphasis on the “literal” meaning of texts and the “realistic” or down-to-earth understanding of the events described in the Holy Scriptures and the lives of the saints obscures or even completely obscures the spiritual meaning and spiritual experience that often serve as the main Orthodox sources. Therefore, Bishop Ignatius, who, on the one hand, was a sophisticated modern intellectual, and on the other, a true and simple son of the Church, can serve as a good mediator with the help of which Orthodox intellectuals could find ways to return to the true Orthodox tradition.
Before further expounding the teaching of Bishop Ignatius on aerial ordeals, let us mention the warnings of two Orthodox thinkers - one modern and one ancient - to those who begin to study the otherworldly reality.
In the 19th century, Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow, speaking about the state of the soul after death, wrote: “It should, however, be noted that, just as in general in the depiction of objects of the spiritual world, for us, clothed in flesh, features are inevitable, more or less sensual, humanoid - so , in particular, they are inevitably admitted in the detailed teaching about the ordeals that the human soul goes through upon separation from the body. Therefore, we must firmly remember the instruction that the Angel gave to the Monk Macarius of Alexandria, as soon as he began to speak about the ordeals: “Take earthly things here as the weakest image of heavenly ones.” It is necessary to imagine ordeals not in a crude, sensual sense, but as much as is possible for us in a spiritual sense, and not become attached to particulars, which in different writers and in different legends of the Church itself, despite the unity of the basic thought about ordeals, are presented as different” [Metro. Macarius of Moscow. Orthodox dogmatic theology. St. Petersburg, 1883, vol. 2, p. 538.
].
Some examples of such details, which should not be interpreted rudely and sensually, are given by St. Gregory Dvoeslov in the fourth book of his “Interviews,” which, as we have already seen, are specifically devoted to the issue of life after death.
Thus, describing the posthumous vision of a certain Reperat, who saw a sinful priest standing on top of a huge fire, St. Gregory writes: “Reperat saw the preparation of fires not because wood was burning in hell; but for the most convenient story to the living, I saw in the burning of sinners that which usually supports the material fire of the living, so that, hearing about what is known, they learn to fear what is not yet known to them” (St. Gregory Dvoeslov, “Conversations”, “Blagovest”, M., 1996, IV, 31, p. 262).
And also, having described how one person was sent back after death because of a “mistake” - in fact, someone else, bearing the same name, was recalled from life (this also happened in modern “posthumous” experiments), St. Gregory adds: “When this happens, careful consideration will show that it was not an error, but a warning. In His infinite mercy, the good God allows some souls to return to their bodies soon after death, in order, by a vision of hell, to finally teach them the fear of eternal punishment, which words alone could not make them believe” (IV, 37).
And when one person in a posthumous vision was shown the golden dwellings of paradise, St. Gregory notes: “Of course, no one with common sense will understand these words literally... Since generous alms are rewarded with eternal glory, it seems quite possible to build an eternal dwelling of gold” (IV, 37).
Later we will dwell in more detail on the difference between visions of another world and real cases of leaving the body there (the experience of the ordeals and many of the modern “posthumous” experiences clearly belong to the latter category); but for now it is enough for us to be aware that we must approach all collisions with the other world carefully and soberly. No one familiar with Orthodox teaching will say that ordeals are not “real”, that in fact the soul does not go through them after death. But we must keep in mind that this does not take place in our gross material world, that although time and space exist there, they are fundamentally different from our earthly concepts, and that in our earthly language stories can never convey otherworldly reality. Anyone well acquainted with Orthodox literature will usually be able to distinguish the spiritual reality described there from the transcendent details that may sometimes be expressed in symbolic or figurative language. Thus, of course, there are no visible “houses” or “booths” in the air where “taxes” are collected; and where “scrolls” or writing instruments are mentioned with which sins are recorded, or “scales” on which virtues are weighed, or “gold” with which “debts” are paid, in all these cases we can correctly understand these images as figurative or explanatory, used to express the spiritual reality that the soul faces at that moment. Whether the soul then really sees these images, thanks to the constant habit of seeing spiritual reality in bodily form, or whether later it can remember the experience only through such images, or simply cannot express the experience in any other way - this is a secondary question, which, apparently, for the holy fathers and the descriptions of the lives of saints, where such incidents are narrated, do not seem significant. Another thing is important - that there is torture by demons, who appear in a terrible, inhuman form, accuse the newly deceased of sins and literally try to grab his subtle body, which the Angels hold tightly; all this happens in the air above us and can be seen by those whose eyes are open to spiritual reality.
Now let us return to Bishop Ignatius’ presentation of the Orthodox teaching on aerial ordeals.

2. Patristic testimony about aerial ordeals
“The teaching about ordeals is the teaching of the Church. There is no doubt that the holy Apostle Paul speaks of them when he proclaims that Christians must contend with the spirits of wickedness in high places (Eph. 6:12). We find this teaching in the most ancient church tradition and in church prayers” (p. 138).
Bishop Ignatius quotes many saints. Fathers who teach about ordeals. Here we quote some of them.
St. Athanasius the Great in his life of St. Anthony the Great describes how once St. Anthony “at the approach of the ninth hour, having begun to pray before eating food, was suddenly caught up in the Spirit and lifted up by the Angels to a height. The air demons opposed his procession; The angels, arguing with them, demanded an explanation of the reasons for their opposition, because Anthony had no sins. The demons tried to expose the sins he had committed since birth; but the Angels blocked the mouths of the slanderers, telling them that they should not count his sins from birth, already blotted out by the grace of Christ, but let them present, if they have, the sins he committed after the time he dedicated himself to God by entering monasticism. When accusing the demons, they uttered many blatant lies; but since their slander was devoid of evidence, a free path opened for Anthony. He immediately came to his senses and saw that he was standing in the very place where he stood for prayer. Forgetting about food, he spent the whole night in tears and lamentations, thinking about the multitude of human enemies, about the fight against such an army, about the difficulties of the path to heaven through the air and about the words of the Apostle, who said: our struggle is not against blood and flesh, but against principalities, against the powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against the spirits of wickedness in high places, against the prince of the power of the air (Eph. 6:12; Eph. 2:2), who (the Holy Apostle), knowing that the powers of the air are only and they seek, they take care of this with all their might, they strain and strive for this in order to deprive us of free passage to heaven, he exhorts: take on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on the evil day (Eph. 6:13), so that the enemy will be put to shame, not having anything bad to say about us” (Tit. 2, 8; St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov), vol. 3, pp. 138-139).
St. John Chrysostom, describing the hour of death, teaches: “Then we need many prayers, many helpers, many good deeds, great intercession from the Angels as they move through the air. If, when traveling to a foreign country or a foreign city, we need a guide, then how much more do we need guides and assistants to guide us past the invisible elders and authorities of the world rulers of this air, called persecutors, publicans, and tax collectors! (A word about patience and thanksgiving and that we do not cry inconsolably for the dead, which in the Orthodox Church is supposed to be read on the seventh Saturday after Easter and at the burial of the deceased.)
St. Macarius the Great writes: “Hearing that under the heavens there are rivers of serpents, mouths of lions, dark powers, a burning fire that causes confusion in all members, don’t you know that if you do not receive the pledge of the Spirit (2 Cor. 1:22), when you leave your body, they will understand your soul and prevent you from going to heaven” (Conversation 16, chapter 13).
St. Isaiah the Hermit, one of the authors of the Philokalia (6th century), teaches that Christians must “have death before their eyes every day and be concerned about how to accomplish the exodus from the body and how to pass by the powers of darkness that are about to meet us in the air.” (Word 5, 22). When the soul leaves the body it is accompanied by Angels; Dark forces come out to meet her, wanting to hold her and torturing her to see if they can find something of their own in her” (Word 17).
And again Saint Hesychius, presbyter of Jerusalem (5th century), teaches: “The hour of death will come upon us, it will come, and it will be impossible to avoid it. Oh, if only the prince of peace and air, who should then meet us, found our iniquity insignificant and insignificant and could not reprove us correctly!” (A Word on Sobriety, 161, “Philokalia”, vol. 2).
St. Gregory the Dvoeslov († 604) writes in his conversations on the Gospel: “We must thoroughly reflect on how terrible the hour of death will be for us, what horror of the soul then, what remembrance of all evils, what oblivion of past happiness, what fear and what apprehension Judges. Then the evil spirits in the departing soul look for its deeds; then they visualize the sins to which they disposed her in order to entice their accomplice to torture. But why are we talking only about the sinful soul, when they even come to the chosen dying and find theirs in them, if they have time to do anything? Among people there was only One, Who, before His suffering, fearlessly said: It is not long for me to speak with you; for the prince of this world comes, and has nothing in Me (John 14:30)” (Words on the Gospels, 39, on Luke 19, 42-47: Bishop Ignatius, vol. 3, p. 278).
St. Ephraim the Syrian († 373) describes the hour of death and judgment in the ordeal: “When terrible armies come, when the divine takers command the soul to move from the body, when, dragging us by force, they take us to the inevitable judgment seat, then, seeing them, the poor man ... everything comes into vibration, as if from an earthquake, everything trembles ... the divine withdrawers, having revealed the soul, ascend through the air, where the principalities and powers and rulers of the world of opposing forces stand. These are our evil accusers, terrible tax collectors, inventory clerks, tax collectors; they encounter on the way, describe and calculate the sins and handwritings of this person, the sins of youth and old age, voluntary and involuntary, committed by deed, word, thought. There is great fear there, great trepidation for the poor soul, the indescribable need that she then suffers from the countless number of enemies surrounding her in darkness, slandering her, in order to prevent her from ascending to heaven, settling in the light of the living, and entering the land of life. But the holy Angels, having taken the soul, take it away” (St. Ephraim the Syrian. Collected works. M., 1882, vol. 3, pp. 383-385).
The divine services of the Orthodox Church also contain numerous references to ordeals. Thus, in “Octoechos”, the work of St. John of Damascus (8th century), we read: “At the hour, O Virgin, the hands of demons snatched me up, and judgment and debate, and terrible trials, and bitter ordeals, and the cruel prince, the Mother of God, and eternal condemnation” (Tone 4, Friday, troparion of the 8th song of the canon at Matins).
Or: “Whenever my soul wants to be separated from life through carnal union, then stand before me, O Lady, and destroy the advice of the ethereal enemies, and break the jaws of those who seek to devour me mercilessly: for let the standing princes of darkness in the air, O Bride of God, pass without restraint” (voice 2 , Saturday matins, stichera on stichera). Bishop Ignatius gives seventeen similar examples from liturgical books, but this list, of course, is incomplete.
The most profound presentation of the doctrine of aerial ordeals among the early Church Fathers can be found in the “Sermon on the Exodus of the Soul” by St. Cyril of Alexandria († 444), which was always included in editions of the Slavic Followed Psalter, that is, the Psalter adapted for use in worship. Among other things, St. Cyril says in this “Word”: “The rest of your soul desires fear and trembling on this day, beholding terrible and wondrous and cruel and unmerciful and coldless demons, like the gloomy murins coming! For vision itself is the only cruelest kind of torment, in which, in vain, the soul becomes confused, worried, sick, restless and hides, resorting to God’s Angels. The soul is kept from the saints by the Angel, passing through the air, and is lifted up, finds ordeals, preserving the sunrise, and holding, and forbidding the ascending souls: every toll-house brings their sins... every passion of the soul, and every sin of its own, are tax collectors and torturers.”
Many other St. Fathers both before and after St. Kirill talk about ordeals or mention them. Having quoted many of them, the above-mentioned historian of church dogma concludes: “Such continuous, ever-present and widespread use of the doctrine of ordeals in the Church, especially among the teachers of the fourth century, indisputably testifies that it was transmitted to them from the teachers of previous centuries and is based on the apostolic tradition.” (Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow. Orthodox dogmatic theology. vol. 2, p. 535).

3. Ordeals in the Lives of the Saints
Orthodox lives of saints contain numerous and sometimes very vivid stories about how the soul goes through ordeals after death. The most detailed description can be found in the life of St. Basil the New (March 26), which contains the story of Blessed Theodora to the saint’s disciple, Gregory, about how she went through ordeals. This story mentions twenty special ordeals and tells what sins are tested for them. Bishop Ignatius sets out this story at some length (vol. 3, pp. 151-158). It does not contain anything significant that could not be found in other Orthodox sources about the ordeals, so we will omit it here in order to quote stories from other sources, which, although less detailed, follow the same outline of events.
The story of the warrior Taxi Driver (“Lives of the Saints,” March 28) tells, for example, that he returned to life after spending six hours in the grave, and said the following: “When I was dying, I saw some Ethiopians standing in front of me; their appearance was very terrible, and my soul was confused. Then I saw two young men, very handsome; my soul rushed towards them immediately, as if lifted up from the earth. We began to rise to heaven, encountering ordeals along the way that hold the soul of every person. Each one tormented her about a particular sin: one about lying, another about envy, the third about pride; so every sin in the air has its testers. And so I saw in the ark held by the Angels all my good deeds, which the Angels compared with my evil deeds. So we got past these ordeals. When we, approaching the gates of heaven, came to the ordeal of fornication, fears kept me there and began to show all my fornicating carnal deeds that I had committed from my childhood to death, and the Angels leading me said to me: “All bodily sins that God forgave you for what you did while you were in the city, since you repented of them.” But the nasty spirits said to me: “But when you left the city, you committed fornication with your farmer’s wife in the field.” Hearing this, the Angels did not find a good deed that could be opposed to that sin, and leaving me, they left. Then the evil spirits took me, began to beat me and then took me down; the earth parted, and I, being led through narrow entrances through dark and stinking wells, descended to the very depths of the dungeons of hell.”
Bishop Ignatius also cites other cases of ordeals in the lives of St. Great Martyr Eustratius (IV century, December 13), St. Niphon of Constantia of Cyprus, who saw many souls ascending through ordeals (IV century, December 23), St. Simeon, Christ for the Fool's sake, Emesa (VI century, July 21), St. John the Merciful, Patriarch of Alexandria (VII century, Prologue for December 19), St. Macarius the Great (IV century, January 19).
Bishop Ignatius was not familiar with the numerous early Orthodox Western sources, which were never translated into Greek or Russian and which are so replete with descriptions of ordeals. The name “ordeal” seems to be limited to Eastern sources, but the reality described in Western sources is identical.
For example, St. Columba, the founder of the island monastery of Iona in Scotland († 597), many times during his life saw demons fighting in the air for the souls of the dead. St. Adamnan († 704) talks about this in the life of the Saint he wrote. Here is one of the cases.
One day St. Columba called his monks and told them: “Let us help with prayer the monks of Abbot Komgel, who are drowning at this hour in the Lake of Veal, for at this moment they are fighting in the air against the forces of evil, trying to capture the soul of a stranger who is drowning with them.” Then, after prayer, he said: “Give thanks to Christ, for now the holy Angels have met these holy souls, freed that stranger and saved him in triumph from the warring demons.”

St. Boniface, the Anglo-Saxon “apostle of the Germans” (8th century), relates in one of his letters a story heard at Wenlock from the lips of a monk who died and a few hours later returned to life. When he left his body, “he was picked up by Angels of such pure beauty that he could not look at them... “They carried me,” he said, “high into the air”... He further said that during the time that he was outside bodies, so many souls left their bodies and crowded into the place where he was that it seemed to him that there were more of them than the entire population of the earth. He also said that there was a crowd of evil spirits and a glorious choir of high angels. And he said that the evil spirits and the holy Angels had a fierce dispute over the souls that had left their bodies: the demons accused them and aggravated the burden of their sins, and the Angels eased this burden and brought extenuating circumstances.
He heard how all his sins, starting from his youth, which he either did not confess, or forgot, or did not recognize as sins, cry out against him, each with their own voice, and with sorrow accuse him... Everything that he did in all his days life and refused to confess, and much that he did not consider to be a sin - they all now shouted terrible words against him. And in the same way, the evil spirits, enumerating his vices, accusing and bringing evidence, even naming the time and place, brought evidence of his evil deeds... And so, having piled up and counted all his sins, these ancient enemies declared him guilty and undeniably subject to their power .
“On the other hand,” he said, “the small, pitiful virtues that I had unworthily and imperfectly spoke in my defense... And these Angelic spirits in their boundless love protected and supported me, and the slightly exaggerated virtues seemed to me beautiful and much greater than I could ever demonstrate in my own strength” [Letters of St. Boniface, Octagon Books, New York, 1973, pp. 25-27. ].

4. Modern cases of ordeal
In the book “Incredible to many, but a true incident,” you can get acquainted with the reaction of a typical “educated” person of our time to meeting with ordeals during his 36-hour clinical death. “Taking me by the arms, the Angels carried me straight through the wall from the room to the street. It was already getting dark and heavy, quiet snow was falling. I saw him, but I didn’t feel the cold or any change between the room temperature and the outside temperature. Obviously, such things have lost their meaning for my changed body. We began to quickly climb up. And as we climbed, more and more space opened up to my gaze, and finally it assumed such terrifying proportions that I was seized with fear from the consciousness of my insignificance in front of this endless desert...
The idea of ​​time faded away in my mind, and I don’t know how long we were still going up, when suddenly some kind of unclear noise was heard, and then, floating out from somewhere, a crowd of some ugly creatures began to quickly approach us, screaming and cackling. creatures
“Demons!” - I realized with extraordinary speed and became numb from some special horror, hitherto unknown to me. Demons! Oh, how much irony, how much sincere laughter would have been evoked in me just a few days ago by someone reporting not only that he had seen demons with his own eyes, but that he admitted their existence as creatures of a certain kind!
As befitted an “educated” person of the late 19th century, by this name I meant bad inclinations, passions in a person, which is why this word itself had the meaning for me not of a name, but of a term that defined a well-known concept. And suddenly this “known definite concept” appeared to me as a living personification!..
Having surrounded us on all sides, the demons, with shouting and uproar, demanded that I be given to them; they tried to somehow grab me and tear me out of the hands of the Angels, but, obviously, they did not dare to do this. Among their unimaginable and as disgusting to the ear as they themselves were to the sight, howl and din, I sometimes caught words and whole phrases.
“He is ours, he has renounced God,” they suddenly screamed almost in unison, and at the same time they rushed at us with such impudence that all thought froze for a moment from fear.
- It's a lie! It is not true! – Having come to my senses, I wanted to shout, but an obliging memory tied my tongue. In some incomprehensible way, I suddenly remembered such a small, insignificant event, which, moreover, belonged to a long-past era of my youth, which, it seems, I could never remember.”
Here the narrator recalls an incident from his studies, when one day, during a conversation on abstract topics that students have, one of his comrades expressed his opinion: “But why should I believe when I can equally believe that there is no God. Isn't it true? And maybe He doesn’t exist?” To which he replied: “Maybe not.” Now, standing at the ordeal before the demonic accusers, he remembers:
“This phrase was in the full sense of the word “an idle verb”; The stupid speech of a friend could not raise any doubts in me about the existence of God, I didn’t even particularly follow the conversation - and now it turned out that this idle verb had not disappeared without a trace in the air, I had to justify myself, defend myself from the accusation brought against me, and so In this way, the Gospel legend was confirmed that, if not by the will of God, who knows the secrets of the heart of man, then by the malice of the enemy of our salvation, we really have to give an answer in every idle word.
This accusation, apparently, was the strongest argument of my destruction for the demons; they seemed to have drawn from it new strength to boldly attack me and with a frantic roar they were already spinning around us, blocking our further path.
I remembered prayer and began to pray, calling for help on all the saints I knew and whose names came to my mind. But this did not deter my enemies. A pitiful ignoramus, a Christian only in name, I almost for the first time remembered the One who is called the Intercessor of the Christian race.
But my impulse towards Her was probably ardent, my soul was probably so filled with horror that I, barely remembering, uttered Her name, when some kind of white fog appeared around us, which quickly began to cover the ugly host of demons. He hid it from my eyes before it could move away from us. Their roar and cackling could be heard for a long time, but by the way it gradually weakened and became muffled, I could understand that the terrible pursuit had left us” (pp. 41-47).

5. Ordeals endured before death
Thus, from numerous clear examples one can see what an important and unforgettable test for the soul after death is the meeting with demons at aerial ordeals. This, however, does not necessarily happen only immediately after death. We saw above that Rev. Anthony the Great saw ordeals while praying while outside his body. Rev. John Climacus describes an incident that happened to one monk before his death:
“The day before his death, he fell into a frenzy and with open eyes looked around first at the right and then at the left side of his bed and, as if being tortured by someone, he sometimes said out loud to everyone present: “Yes, indeed, this is true.” ; but I fasted for this for so many years”; and sometimes: “No, I didn’t do it, you’re lying”; then he said again: “So, truly so, but I cried and served the brethren”; sometimes he objected: “You are slandering me.” To another, he answered: “Yes, indeed it is, and I don’t know what to say to this; but God has mercy.” This invisible and merciless torture was truly a terrible and trembling sight; and worst of all, he was accused of something he did not do. Alas! The silent man and hermit spoke about some of his sins: “I don’t know what to say to this,” although he spent about forty years in monasticism and had the gift of tears... During this torture, his soul was separated from his body; and it remains unknown what the decision and end of this trial was and what sentence followed” (John, abbot of Mount Sinai “Ladder”, word 7, 50).
Indeed, meeting with ordeals after death is only a special and final form of that general battle that every Christian soul wages throughout its life. Vladyka Ignatius writes: “Just as the resurrection of the Christian soul from sinful death takes place during its earthly wanderings, in the same way, here on earth, its torture by the aerial authorities, its captivity by them or liberation from them is mysteriously accomplished here on earth; when walking through the air, this freedom and captivity are only revealed” (vol. 3, p. 159).
Some of the students of Rev. Macarius the Great was seen going through ordeals. From their testimony the following can be concluded. Individual saints pass by the demonic “publicans” without hindrance, because they have already fought with them in this life and won the battle. Here is the corresponding episode from the life of St. Macaria:
“When the time came for the death of the Monk Macarius the Great, the Cherub, who was his Guardian Angel, accompanied by a multitude of heavenly hosts, came for his soul. The faces of the apostles, prophets, martyrs, saints, reverends, and righteous descended with a host of Angels. Demons set up in rows and crowds at the ordeals to contemplate the procession of the spirit-bearing soul. She began to ascend. Standing far from her, the dark spirits shouted in their ordeals: “O Macarius! What glory have you earned!” “The humble husband answered them: “No! And I’m still afraid, because I don’t know if I did anything good.” “Meanwhile, he quickly rose to the sky. From other higher ordeals the air authorities again shouted: “Exactly, you escaped us, Macarius.” “No,” he answered, “and I still need to escape.” When he had already entered the heavenly gates, they, sobbing with anger and envy, shouted: “Exactly! You escaped us, Macarius!” - He answered them: “Protected by the power of my Christ, I escaped your snares” (Skete Patericon). – With such great freedom, the great saints of God overcome the aerial fears of the dark authorities because in earthly life they enter into irreconcilable warfare with them and, having won victory over them,
in the depths of the heart they acquire complete freedom from sin, becoming a temple and sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, making its verbal abode inaccessible to the fallen angel” (Bishop Ignatius. Vol. 3, pp. 158-159).

6. Private court
In Orthodox dogmatic theology, going through aerial ordeals is a stage of private judgment, through which the fate of the soul is decided until the Last Judgment. Both private judgment and the Last Judgment are carried out by Angels, who are instruments of God's justice: So it will be at the end of the age: Angels will come out and separate the wicked from among the righteous, and throw them into the fiery furnace (Matthew 13:49-50).
Happy are Orthodox Christians that they have the doctrine of aerial ordeals and private judgment, clearly set forth in numerous patristic writings and lives of saints; but in fact, any person who meditates deeply on the Holy Scriptures alone will come to a very close teaching. Thus, evangelical Protestant Billy Graham writes in his book about Angels: “At the moment of death, the spirit leaves the body and moves through the atmosphere. But Scripture teaches us that the devil lurks there. He is the prince of the power of the air (Eph. 2:2).
If the eyes of our understanding were open, we might see how the air is filled with the enemies of Christ - demons. If Satan could delay the Angel sent to Daniel on earth for three weeks, then one can imagine what kind of opposition a Christian can expect after death... The moment of death is the last opportunity for Satan to attack a true believer, but God sent his Angels to protect us in this is the time” (Billy Graham. Angels are the secret messengers of God. Doubleday, New York, 1975, pp. 150-151).

7. Ordeals as a touchstone for the authenticity of posthumous experience
It is quite clear that everything told in this chapter is not at all those “reverse frames” of life that are so often mentioned in modern “post-mortem” experiments. The latter - often also occurring before death - have nothing divine in them, nothing from judgment; they seem, rather, to be psychological experiences, a repetition of life under the control of nothing less than one's own conscience. The lack of judgment and even the much-mentioned “sense of humor” of the invisible being present in the “reverse shots” is primarily a reflection of the appalling lack of seriousness of Westerners regarding life and death. And this explains why Hindus in “backward” India have a more terrifying experience of death than most people in the Western world: even without the true light of Christianity, they still retain a more serious attitude towards life than most people in the frivolous “post-Christian” West.
Going through ordeals, which is a kind of touchstone of a genuine post-mortem experience, is not mentioned at all in modern cases, and one does not need to look far for the reason for this. By many signs - the absence of Angels coming for the soul, the absence of judgment, the frivolity of many stories, even by the very shortness of time (usually five to ten minutes instead of several hours or days, as in the lives of saints and other Orthodox sources) - it is clear that modern cases , although they are sometimes amazing and cannot be explained by natural laws known to medicine, they are not very deep. If these are indeed death experiences, then they include only the very beginning of the post-mortem journey of the soul; they occur, as it were, in the hallway of death, before God’s sentence to the soul becomes final (evidence of this is the coming of Angels for the soul), while the soul still has the opportunity to naturally return to the body.
However, we still need to find a satisfactory explanation for the experiments taking place today. What are these beautiful landscapes that so often appear in the described visions? Where is that “heavenly” city that many also saw? What is all this “out-of-body” reality with which people certainly come into contact in our time?
The answer to these questions can be found in fundamentally different literature: the already mentioned Orthodox sources - literature, also based on personal experience, in addition, much more thorough in its observations and conclusions compared to today's descriptions of “after-death” experience. This is the literature that Dr. Moody and other researchers refer to. In it they find truly amazing parallels with clinical cases that have awakened interest in life after death in our time.

8. Teachings of Bishop Theophan the Recluse on aerial ordeals
Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov) was a defender of the Orthodox teaching on aerial ordeals in Russia in the 19th century, when non-believers and modernists had already begun to laugh at him; No less staunch defender of this teaching was Bishop Theophan the Recluse, who viewed it as an integral part of the entire Orthodox teaching about invisible warfare or spiritual struggle with demons. Here we present one of his statements about ordeals, taken from the interpretation of the eightieth verse of Psalm 118: Let my heart be blameless in Your statutes, so that I am not put to shame.
“The Prophet does not mention how and where one will not be put to shame. The closest disgrace occurs during an uprising of internal battles...
The second moment of non-shame is the time of death and ordeal. No matter how wild the thought of ordeals may seem to smart people, going through them cannot be avoided. What are these Mytniks looking for in those passing by? To see if they have their product. What is their product? Passion. Therefore, whoever has an immaculate heart and is free from passions, they cannot find anything to which they could become attached; on the contrary, the virtue opposite to them will strike them themselves like lightning arrows. To this, one of the many scholars expressed another thought: ordeals seem to be something terrible; after all, it is very possible that demons, instead of something terrible, represent something lovely. Seductively charming things, according to all types of passions, they present to the passing soul one after another. When, during earthly life, passions are expelled from the heart and virtues opposite to them are implanted, then whatever charming thing you imagine, the soul, which has no sympathy for it, passes it by, turning away from it with disgust. And when the heart is not cleansed, then for which passion it most sympathizes, that’s why the soul rushes there. The demons take her as if they were friends, and then they know where to put her. This means that it is very doubtful that the soul, while it still has sympathies for the objects of any passions, will not be put to shame at the ordeal. The shame here is that the soul itself is thrown into hell.
But the final shame is at the Last Judgment, in the face of the all-seeing Judge...” [“Psalm one hundred and eighteen, interpreted by Bishop Theophan”, M., 1891. ]

The afterlife and its uncertainty is what most often leads a person to think about God and the Church. After all, according to the teachings of the Orthodox Church and any other Christian doctrines, the human soul is immortal and, unlike the body, it exists forever.

A person is always interested in the question of what will happen to him after death, where will he go? The answers to these questions can be found in the teachings of the Church.

The soul, after the death of the bodily shell, awaits the Judgment of God

Death and the Christian

Death always remains a kind of constant companion of a person: loved ones, celebrities, relatives die, and all these losses make me think about what will happen when this guest comes to me? The attitude towards the end largely determines the course of human life - waiting for it is painful or a person has lived such a life that at any moment he is ready to appear before the Creator.

Read about the afterlife in Orthodoxy:

Trying not to think about it, erasing it from your thoughts, is the wrong approach, because then life ceases to have value.

Christians believe that God gave man an eternal soul, as opposed to a corruptible body. And this determines the course of the entire Christian life - after all, the soul does not disappear, which means it will definitely see the Creator and give an answer for every deed. This constantly keeps the believer on his toes, preventing him from living his days thoughtlessly. Death in Christianity is a certain point of transition from worldly to heavenly life, and where the spirit goes after this crossroads directly depends on the quality of life on earth.

Orthodox asceticism has in its writings the expression “mortal memory” - constantly holding in thoughts the concept of the end of worldly existence and the expectation of the transition to eternity. That is why Christians lead meaningful lives, not allowing themselves to waste minutes.

The approach of death from this point of view is not something terrible, but a completely logical and expected action, joyful. As Elder Joseph of Vatopedi said: “I’ve been waiting for the train, but it still doesn’t come.”

The first days after leaving

Orthodoxy has a special concept about the first days in the afterlife. This is not a strict article of faith, but the position held by the Synod.

Death in Christianity is a certain point of transition from worldly to heavenly life

Special days after death are:

1. Third- This is traditionally a day of commemoration. This time is spiritually connected with the Resurrection of Christ, which occurred on the third day. St. Isidore Pelusiot writes that the process of Christ’s Resurrection took 3 days, hence the idea that the human spirit also passes into eternal life on the third day. Other authors write that the number 3 has a special meaning, it is called God’s number and it symbolizes faith in the Holy Trinity, therefore a person should be remembered on this day. It is in the requiem service of the third day that the Triune God is asked to forgive the deceased’s sins and forgive him;
2. Ninth- another day of remembrance of the dead. St. Simeon of Thessalonica wrote about this day as a time to remember the 9 angelic ranks, to which the spirit of the deceased can be ranked. This is exactly how many days are given to the soul of the deceased to fully understand its transition. This is mentioned by St. Paisius in his writings, comparing a sinner with a drunkard who becomes sober during this period. During this period, the soul comes to terms with its transition and says goodbye to worldly life;
3. Fortieth- This is a special day of remembrance, because according to the legends of St. Thessalonica, this number is of particular importance, because Christ was ascended on the 40th day, which means that the deceased on this day appears before the Lord. Also, the people of Israel mourned their leader Moses at such a time. On this day, not only should there be a prayer asking for mercy from God for the deceased, but also the magpie.

Important! The first month, which includes these three days, is extremely important for loved ones - they come to terms with the loss and begin to learn to live without a loved one.

The above three dates are necessary for special remembrance and prayer for the departed. During this period, their fervent prayers for the deceased reach the Lord and, in accordance with the teachings of the Church, can influence the final decision of the Creator regarding the soul.

Where does the human spirit go after life?

Where exactly does the spirit of the deceased reside? No one has an exact answer to this question, since this is a secret hidden from man by God. Everyone will know the answer to this question after their repose. The only thing that is known for sure is the transition of the human spirit from one state to another - from the worldly body to the eternal spirit.

Only the Lord can determine the eternal place of the soul

Here it is much more important to find out not “where”, but “to whom”, because it doesn’t matter where a person will be after, what’s most important is with the Lord?

Christians believe that after the transition to eternity, the Lord calls a person to judgment, where he determines his place of eternal residence - heaven with angels and other believers, or hell, with sinners and demons.

The teaching of the Orthodox Church says that only the Lord can determine the eternal place of the soul and no one can influence His sovereign will. This decision is a response to the life of the soul in the body and its actions. What did she choose during her life: good or evil, repentance or proud exaltation, mercy or cruelty? Only a person’s actions determine eternal existence and the Lord judges by them.

From the book of the Revelation of John Chrysostom, we can conclude that the human race faces two judgments - individual for each soul, and general, when all the dead are resurrected after the end of the world. Orthodox theologians are convinced that in the period between an individual trial and a general one, the soul has the opportunity to change its verdict, through the prayers of its loved ones, good deeds that are done in its memory, memories in the Divine Liturgy and commemoration with alms.

ordeals

The Orthodox Church believes that the spirit goes through certain ordeals or tests on the way to the throne of God. The traditions of the holy fathers say that ordeals consist of conviction by evil spirits that make one doubt one’s own salvation, the Lord or His Sacrifice.

The word ordeal comes from the Old Russian “mytnya” - a place for collecting fines. That is, the spirit must pay some fine or be tested by certain sins. The deceased person’s own virtues, which he acquired while on earth, can help him pass this test.

From a spiritual point of view, this is not a tribute to the Lord, but a complete awareness and recognition of everything that tormented a person during his life and with which he was not able to fully cope. Only hope in Christ and His mercy can help the soul overcome this line.

Orthodox lives of saints contain many descriptions of ordeals. Their stories are extremely vivid and written in sufficient detail so that you can vividly imagine all the pictures described.

Icon of the Ordeal of Blessed Theodora

A particularly detailed description can be found in St. Basil the New, in his life, which contains the story of Blessed Theodora about her ordeals. She mentions 20 trials of sins, including:

• a word - it can heal or kill, it is the beginning of the world, according to the Gospel of John. The sins that are contained in the word are not empty statements; they have the same sin as material, committed actions. There is no difference between cheating on your husband or saying it out loud while dreaming - the sin is the same. Such sins include rudeness, obscenity, idle talk, incitement, blasphemy;
• lie or deception - any untruth spoken by a person is a sin. This also includes perjury and perjury, which are serious sins, as well as dishonest trial and falsehood;
• gluttony is not only the pleasure of one’s belly, but also any indulgence of carnal passion: drunkenness, nicotine addiction or drug addiction;
• laziness, together with hack work and parasitism;
• theft - any act the consequence of which is the appropriation of someone else's property, this includes: theft, fraud, fraud, etc.;
• stinginess is not only greed, but also thoughtless acquisition of everything, i.e. hoarding. This category includes bribery, refusal of alms, as well as extortion and extortion;
• envy - visual theft and greed for someone else's;
• pride and anger - they destroy the soul;
• murder - both verbal and material, incitement to suicide and abortion;
• fortune telling - turning to grandmothers or psychics is a sin, it is written in Scripture;
• fornication is any lustful actions: viewing pornography, masturbation, erotic fantasies, etc.;
• adultery and the sins of Sodom.

Important! For the Lord there is no concept of death; the spirit only passes from the material world to the immaterial. But how she will appear before the Creator depends only on her actions and decisions in the world.

Memorial Days

This includes not only the first three important days (the third, ninth and fortieth), but any holidays and simple days when loved ones remember the deceased and remember him.

Read about prayer for the dead:

The word “commemoration” means remembrance, i.e. memory. And first of all, this is prayer, and not just a thought or bitterness from separation from the dead.

Advice! Prayer is performed in order to ask the Creator for mercy for the deceased and to justify him, even if he did not deserve it himself. According to the canons of the Orthodox Church, the Lord can change His decision about the deceased if his loved ones actively pray and ask for him, doing alms and good deeds in his memory.

It is especially important to do this in the first month and the 40th day, when the soul appears before God. Throughout the entire 40 days, the magpie is read, with prayer every day, and on special days a funeral service is ordered. Along with prayer, loved ones visit church and cemetery these days, give alms and distribute funeral food in memory of the deceased. Such memorial dates include subsequent anniversaries of death, as well as special church holidays commemorating the dead.

The Holy Fathers also write that the actions and good deeds of the living can also cause a change in God's verdict on the deceased. The afterlife is full of secrets and mysteries; no one alive knows exactly anything about it. But everyone’s worldly path is an indicator that can indicate the place in which a person’s spirit will spend all eternity.

What are ordeals? Archpriest Vladimir Golovin

How the soul lives after death

What are ordeals?

In the 19th century, Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow, speaking about the state of the soul after death, wrote: “It should, however, be noted that, just as in general in the depiction of objects of the spiritual world for us clothed in flesh, more or less sensual, humanoid features are inevitable, so, in particular, they are inevitably admitted in the detailed teaching about the ordeals that we undergo the human soul when separated from the body. Therefore, we must firmly remember the instruction given by the angel Venerable. Macarius of Alexandria, as soon as he began to speak about ordeals: “Take earthly things here for the weakest image of heavenly ones.” It is necessary to imagine the ordeals not in a crude, sensual sense, but as much as is possible for us in the spiritual sense, and not get attached to the particulars that are given by different writers and in different legends of the Church itself, despite the unity of the basic thought about the ordeals.” These extremely significant words of the angel cannot in any way diminish when we come into contact with messages about that world. For our human psyche is very inclined to take images for reality, as a result of which completely distorted ideas are created not only about heaven, hell, ordeals, etc., but also about God, about spiritual life, about salvation. These distortions easily lead a Christian into paganism. And a pagan Christian - what could be worse?

What earthly and heavenly things are being talked about here? About ordeals, which, despite the simplicity of their earthly depiction in Orthodox hagiographic literature, have a deep spiritual, heavenly meaning. There is nothing like this in any of the religious teachings. Even Catholicism, with its dogma of purgatory, distorted the picture of the posthumous state of man. Purgatory and ordeals are fundamentally different things. Purgatory, in the views of Catholic theologians, is a place of torment to compensate for the lack of human merit in satisfying the justice of God. Ordeal is a trial of conscience and a test of the spiritual state of the soul in the face of God’s love, on the one hand, and devilish passionate temptations, on the other.

Church tradition says that there are twenty ordeals - twenty certain tests of the state of the soul before, if you like, its home, which we call the Kingdom of God. These are twenty steps of ascent to this house, which can become the steps of a person’s fall - depending on his condition.

Somewhere in the 50s, one bishop died - an old, sweet, pleasant man, but it was difficult to call him a spiritual and ascetic. His death was very significant - he kept looking around him and saying: “Everything is wrong, everything is wrong. Not like that at all!”

His surprise is understandable. Indeed, although we all understand that “everything is wrong” there, we nevertheless involuntarily imagine that life in the image and likeness of this life. We imagine both hell and heaven according to Dante, and the ordeal, again, in accordance with those pictures that we look at with curiosity in simple brochures. Whether we want it or not, we cannot in any way renounce these earthly ideas.

And, surprisingly, modern science can provide us with some help in understanding this issue.

For example, nuclear physicists who study the world of elementary particles argue that in the macroworld - that is, in the world in which we live - there are no concepts that can adequately express the realities of the microworld. Therefore, in order to somehow present them to the general public, physicists are forced to find and invent words, names and images taken from our usual experience. True, the picture sometimes emerges as fantastic, but understandable in its constituent parts. Well, for example, imagine - time flows backwards. What does it mean - backwards, how can this time flow in reverse? First the duck falls, and then the hunter shoots? This is absurd. But one of the theories of quantum mechanics points in this way to the processes occurring in the intra-atomic world. And it seems that we are beginning to understand something... although without understanding anything.

Or take the concept of a wave particle, called “waveicle” in English. If you think about it, this is a rather absurd expression - a wave cannot be a particle, and a particle cannot be a wave. But with the help of this paradoxical concept, which does not fit into the framework of our common sense, scientists try to express the dual nature of the nature of matter at the level of the atom, the dual aspect of elementary particles (which, depending on the specific situation, appear either as particles or as waves). Modern science offers many such paradoxes. How are they useful to us? By what they show: if a person’s capabilities are so limited in knowing and expressing in “human language” the realities of this world, then, obviously, they are even more limited in understanding the world of that world. This is the main thing to keep in mind when trying to comprehend the same ordeals and, in general, the posthumous existence of the soul. The realities there are completely different, everything there is not the same as here.

Posthumous exam for goodness

According to church teaching, after a three-day stay at the tomb, the soul of the deceased contemplates the heavenly abodes from the 3rd to the 9th day, and from the 9th to the 40th day it is shown the torment of hell. How can we understand these earthly images, “earthly things”?

The soul, being by nature a resident of that world, freed from the plump body, becomes capable of seeing that world in a completely different way, characteristic of it, in contrast to the body. There everything is revealed to the soul. And if, as the Apostle Paul writes, in earthly conditions we see “as if through a glass darkly,” then there “face to face” (1 Cor. 13:12), that is, as it really is. This vision or knowledge, in contrast to earthly knowledge, which is mainly external in nature and often purely rational, after the death of the body acquires a different character - participation in what is known. In this case, participation means the unity of the knower with the known. So the soul there enters into unity with the world of spirits, for it itself is spiritual in this sense. But with what spirits does the soul unite? We can believe that each virtue has its own spirit, its own angel, just as each passion has its own spirit, its own demon. But more on that later.

For some reason, it is usually believed that the soul is tested only when it comes to its passions, that is, in the period from the 9th to the 40th day. However, there is no doubt that the soul is tested for everything: both for good and for evil.

So after three days, a kind of personality test begins. First - in the face of good. The soul follows the path of all the virtues (according to the Apostle, these are “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, goodness, mercy, meekness, self-control,” etc. - Gal. 5; 22). For example, the soul finds itself in the face of meekness. Will she perceive it as that precious quality that she strove for and that she was looking for in her earthly life, although she could not acquire it in those conditions, or, on the contrary, will she be repelled by meekness as something alien and unacceptable? Will she unite with the spirit of meekness or not? Thus, during six earthly days there will be a special test of the soul in the face of all virtues.

At the same time, I would like to note that every virtue is beautiful, for God Himself is ineffable Beauty, and the soul with all its fullness sees there the beauty of these properties of God. And in this, if you like, “exam of goodness,” the soul is tested: has it, in the conditions of earthly freedom, acquired at least some desire for this eternal Beauty?

And the exam for evil

A similar test, the same examination of the soul continues, from the 9th to the 40th day. A stage begins, which is usually called ordeals. There are twenty of them, and much more is said about them than about contemplating the beauty of virtues. The reason for this, apparently, is that the overwhelming majority of people are immeasurably more enslaved by passions than they are involved in virtues. That is why this exam requires more time. Here the soul reveals the full power of each of its passions - hatred, envy, pride, deceit, fornication, gluttony...

We all know what the fire of passion means - despite reason, despite the desire for good, despite even one’s own well-being, a person suddenly submits, for example, to insane anger, greed, lust, and so on! Submits to a “favorite” passion or passions. This very thing begins there, but in the face of not just conscience, not just convictions - but in front of that Shrine itself, in the face of that Beauty that has just been revealed to the soul in all its possible completeness. It is here that the power of passion that a person acquired during earthly life is revealed in its entirety. Therefore, the one who did not fight passion, but, moreover, served it, for whom it became the meaning of his life, will not be able to renounce it even in the face of God’s Love itself. So there is a breakdown at the ordeal and the descent of the soul into the bosom of a meaningless and unquenchable fire of burning passion. For under earthly conditions passion could sometimes still obtain food for itself for some time. There the torment of Tantalus really opens up.

By the way, they're starting ordeal from the most seemingly innocent sin. From idle talk. From something to which we usually do not attach any importance. The Apostle James says exactly the opposite: “... the tongue... is an uncontrollable evil; it is filled with deadly poison” (James 3; 8). And the Holy Fathers and even pagan sages call idleness and its natural and usual manifestation - idle talk - the mother of all vices. Rev. John of Karpafsky, for example, wrote: “Nothing upsets a usually good mood more than laughter, jokes and idle talk.”

The twenty ordeals cover, I would say, twenty categories of passions, not specific sins, but passions, each of which includes many varieties of sins. That is, each ordeal covers a whole nest of related sins. Let's say theft. It has many types: direct, when someone got into a person’s pocket, and accounting additions, and inappropriate, in one’s own interests, use of budget funds, and bribes for the purpose of profit, etc. and so on. The same applies to all other ordeals. So - twenty passions, twenty exams for sins.

In very vivid, earthly concepts and expressions it is written about the ordeals in the life of St. Basil the New, where Blessed Theodora talks about what happened to her beyond the boundaries of earthly life. And reading her story, you involuntarily remember the wonderful words of the angel: “Take earthly things here for the weakest image of heavenly ones.” Blessed Theodora saw monsters there, lakes of fire, and terrible faces, heard terrible screams, and observed the torment to which sinful souls were subjected. All these are “earthly things.” In reality, as the angel warned us, this is only a “weak image,” a weak semblance of those completely spiritual (and in this sense, “heavenly”) events that happen to a soul that is unable to reject passions. Everything is wrong there!

But why, in this case, is it shown this way? The reason is that there are no other means to warn a person still living about the suffering that awaits everyone who tramples on conscience and truth. For example, how to explain the effect of radiation to a person who has no idea about it and does not understand its destructive effect on the body? Apparently, it would be necessary to say that terrible invisible rays emanate from this place; a pagan would be more likely to understand if he was warned that evil spirits live here, or, on the contrary, this place is sacred and should not be approached...

- Do you understand, man?

- Got it.

What did he understand? Not what radiation is, not how it works, but most importantly: there is a serious danger here, you need to be extremely careful. So it is with paintings of ordeals. Yes, there is suffering, and it is caused by an unrighteous lifestyle.

But Blessed Theodora also speaks about demons who torment the soul for sins.

Uniting with the Spirit of God or with tormenting demons

Entire iconographic cycles were created based on the life of St. Theodora. Perhaps many have seen books with pictures depicting various tortures at ordeals. The artists' imagination is very strong and vivid, and therefore these pictures are impressive. When you look, what is not happening there: what torment, torture! And there really is torment there, but it is of a completely different nature. This is important to know, because it is of great importance for understanding the afterlife of all people, including non-Christians.

So, we come to the question of the action of demons on the soul in the afterlife. A very interesting thought on this issue was expressed by Saint Theophan the Recluse (Govorov) in his interpretation of the 80th verse of the 118th Psalm (“Be my heart blameless in your justification, so that I will not be ashamed”). This is how he explains the last words: “The second moment of non-shame is the time of death and going through ordeals. No matter how wild the thought of ordeals may seem to smart people, they cannot be avoided. What are these Mytniks looking for in those passing by? Whether they have their goods. What is their product? Passion. Therefore, whoever has an immaculate heart and is free from passions, they cannot find anything to which they could become attached; on the contrary, the quality opposite to them will strike them themselves like lightning arrows. To this, one of the little learned people expressed another thought: ordeals seem to be something terrible; but it is very possible that demons, instead of something terrible, represent something lovely. Seductively and charmingly, according to all types of passions, they present to the passing soul one after another. When, during earthly life, passions are expelled from the heart and virtues opposite to them are implanted, then whatever charming thing you imagine, the soul, which has no sympathy for it, passes it by, turning away from it with disgust. And when the heart is not cleansed, then for which passion it most sympathizes, that is why the soul rushes there. The demons take her as if they were friends, and then they know where to put her. This means that it is very doubtful that the soul, while it still has sympathies for the objects of any passions, will not be ashamed at the ordeal. The shame here is that the soul itself is thrown into hell.”

Thought of St. Theophan follows the instructions of St. Anthony the Great. I will quote his wonderful words: “God is good and impassive and unchanging. If anyone, recognizing that it is blessed and true that God does not change, is nevertheless perplexed as to how He (being such) rejoices over the good, turns away from the evil, is angry at sinners, and when they repent, is merciful to them; then to this it must be said that God does not rejoice and is not angry: for joy and anger are passions. It is absurd to think that the Divine would be good or bad because of human affairs. God is good and does only good things, but does not harm anyone, being always the same; and when we are good, we enter into communication with God, out of similarity with Him, and when we become evil, we separate from God, out of dissimilarity with Him. Living virtuously, we become God's, and when we become evil, we become rejected from him; and this does not mean that He has anger against us, but that our sins do not allow God to shine in us, but unite us with demons tormentors. If we then gain permission from our sins through prayers of good deeds, this does not mean that we have pleased God and changed Him, but that through such actions and our turning to God, having healed the evil that exists in us, we again become capable of tasting God’s goodness; so to say: God turns away from the wicked is the same as saying: the sun is hidden from those deprived of sight.”

In short, when we lead a correct (i.e. righteous) life, live according to the commandments and repent of violating them, then our spirit unites with the Spirit of God, and good things happen to us. When we act against our conscience and violate the commandments, our spirit becomes one with the tormenting demons, and thus we fall into their power. And according to the degree of our voluntary consent to sin, our voluntary submission to their power, they torment us. And if there is still repentance on earth, then it is already too late. But it turns out that it is not God who punishes us for our sins, but we ourselves, through our passions, give ourselves into the hands of tormentors. And their “work” begins - they are a kind of predators or sewer trucks that cleanse the environment of sewage. This is what happens to the soul after death at the ordeal.

The ordeal, therefore, is essentially nothing more than a kind of test of a person’s passions. Here a person shows himself - who he is, what he strived for, what he wanted. But they are not only a test - they are also a guarantee of the possible purification of the soul through the prayers of the Church.

“Passion a thousand times stronger than on earth...”

But, apparently, it is necessary to say once again what it is passion. We know about sin: for example, a person deceived, stumbled, this happens to everyone. Passion is something else - something that already pulls towards itself, and sometimes so irresistibly that a person cannot cope with himself. Although he understands perfectly well that this is bad, that it is bad, that it is harmful not only for the soul (although he most often forgets about the soul), but also for the body, he cannot cope with himself. In the face of conscience, in the face, if you like, of one’s own good, he cannot cope! This state is referred to as passion.

Passion is a truly terrible thing. Look what people do in the madness of passion, in the slavery of passion. They kill, maim, betray each other.

The Slavic word “passion” means, first of all, suffering, as well as a strong desire for something forbidden, sinful - that is, ultimately, also suffering. Passions are suffering. Christianity warns that all passions, being sinful, bring suffering to a person, and only suffering. Passion is a deception, it is a drug, it is a delight! After death, the real action of passions, their real cruelty, is revealed.

All our sins are committed when the soul is united with the body. A soul without a body can neither do good nor sin. The Fathers definitely say that the seat of passions is the soul, and not the body. The roots of passions are not in the body, but in the soul. Even the grossest bodily passions are rooted in the soul. That is why they do not go out, do not disappear with the death of the body. With them a person leaves this world.

How do these unresolved passions manifest themselves in that world? I will quote the thought of Abbot Nikon (Vorobiev): “Passions a thousand times stronger than on earth will burn you like fire without any possibility of quenching them.”. This is extremely serious.

Here on earth it is easier with our passions. So, I fell asleep - and all my passions fell asleep. For example, I get so angry at someone that I’m ready to tear him to pieces. But time passed and the passion gradually subsided. And soon they became friends. Here you can fight vices. In addition, passions are covered up by our physicality and therefore do not act in full force - or rather, rarely and, as a rule, they do not act this way for very long. But there a person, freed from physicality, finds himself confronted with their full action. Full! Nothing interferes with their manifestation, the body does not close them, no sleep distracts them, no fatigue extinguishes them! In a word - continuous suffering, since the person himself does not have “any opportunity to satisfy them”! Plus, demons seduce us and then inflame and multiply the effect of our passions.

I was told how during World War II, after the Leningrad blockade was lifted, a woman ran up to a huge line for bread in the rear and hysterically shouted: “I’m from Leningrad.” Everyone immediately parted when they saw her crazy eyes, her terrible state. This is what only one passion is. Passion is a serious illness, the cure of which requires a lot of work and a long time. That is why it is so dangerous not to fight sin - often repeated, it turns into passion, and then real trouble comes not only in this life, but, what is a thousand times worse, in the next. And when a person has a whole bunch of passions? What will happen to him in Eternity?! If only this one thought were deeply rooted in us, we would, without a doubt, begin to approach our lives completely differently.

That is why Christianity, as a religion of love, reminds us: remember, man, you are not a mortal, but an immortal being, and therefore prepare for immortality. And the great happiness of Christians is that they know about this and can prepare. On the contrary, what horror does the unbeliever and the ignorant face after death!

Twenty ordeals reveal the state of a person’s soul, they are nothing more than twenty kind of litmus tests, twenty, if you like, exams, at which all its spiritual content is revealed and its fate is determined. True, it is not yet final. There will be more prayers from the Church, there will be a Last Judgment.

Like connects with like. The Power of Repentance

Each stage of ordeal is a test of the strength of the rootedness of a certain passion in a person, when its full strength is revealed. The one who did not fight passion, who obeyed it, who lived this passion, cultivated it, gave all the strength of his soul to its cultivation - falls, breaks down in this ordeal. And this - either a fall or going through an ordeal - is no longer determined by the effort of a person’s will, but by the action of the spiritual state prevailing in him. Abbess Arsenia, one of the remarkable ascetics at the turn of the 20th century (1905), wrote: “When a person lives an earthly life, he cannot know how enslaved his spirit is, depending on another spirit, he cannot fully know this because he has a will with which he acts as he pleases. But when the will is taken away with death, then the soul will see to whose power it is enslaved. The Spirit of God brings the righteous into eternal abodes, enlightening them, illuminating them, idolizing them. The same souls who had communion with the devil will be possessed by it.”

In other words, if we on earth do not fight small temptations, do not resist their pressure, then we thereby weaken our will and gradually destroy it. And there, in the face of a 1000-fold greater power of passion, our will will be taken away altogether, and the soul will be in the power of the tormenting demon. It is this last point that I would like to say again.

If we turn to the description of the ordeals, we find the spirits of evil present there everywhere – in different forms. Blessed Theodora even describes the appearance of some of them, although it is clear that these are only weak semblances of their true essence. The most serious thing - we have already emphasized this - is that, as Anthony the Great writes, the soul, submitted to passion, unites there with tormenting demons. And this happens, so to speak, naturally, for like always connects with like. In the conditions of earthly life, we also unite with people of the same spirit. Sometimes they wonder - how did these people get together? Then, upon closer acquaintance, it turns out: they have the same spirit! They are unanimous. A single spirit united them.

When the soul goes through ordeals, it is tested by the passion of each ordeal, by its spirits, tormenting demons, and, according to its state, it is either torn away from them or united with them, falling into the most severe suffering.

There is another side to this suffering. That world is a world of true light, in which all our sins will be revealed to everyone; in the face of all friends, acquaintances, and relatives, everything that is crafty, base, and unscrupulous will suddenly be revealed. Just imagine such a picture! That is why the Church calls everyone to prompt repentance. Repentance in Greek is metanoia, that is, a change of mind, way of thinking, a change in the goals of one’s life, aspirations. Repentance also means hatred of sin, aversion to it.

This is how wonderfully St. speaks about this. Isaac the Syrian: “For God knew by His merciful knowledge that if absolute righteousness were required of men, then only one in ten thousand would be found who<мог бы>enter the Kingdom of Heaven, He gave them a medicine suitable for everyone,<а именно>repentance, so that every day and at every moment there will be a means of correction available to them through the power of this medicine and so that through contrition they will wash themselves at all times from any defilement that may happen, and be renewed every day through repentance.”

What does true repentance give? Take Raskolnikov from Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. Look: he was ready to go to hard labor, even to go with joy, just to atone for his evil, to return to his previous state of soul. This is what repentance is: it really is a change of the soul, its salvation.

And even a small striving for good and repentance for evil can become the drop that tips the scales towards God. This drop, or, as Barsanuphius the Great said, this “copper obol”, quite insignificant, becomes the guarantee that the Lord unites with such a soul and defeats the evil that is present in it.

This is the enormous significance of sincere repentance and sincere struggle in this life of ours. They become the key to saving the passage of ordeals.

We Christians must be infinitely grateful to God for the fact that He revealed to us in advance the posthumous secret of the ordeals, so that here we would struggle with our bad inclinations, fight and repent. For if, I repeat, a person has even a small germ of such a struggle, if there is at least some compulsion to live according to the Gospel, then the Lord Himself will fill in what is missing and free us from the hands of destroying demons. The word of Christ is true: “You have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things; enter into the joy of your Master” (Matthew 25:23).

Christianity provides the greatest means of human salvation - repentance. The Lord wants us not to suffer here, and especially after death. Therefore, the Church calls: man, before it’s too late, take care of yourself...

We are free to do good and evil

Why, when talking about a person’s posthumous path, do we constantly emphasize that it is a test of the soul - first for good, and then for evil? Why the test?

Because God, in the very creation of man, gave him His image, which presupposes such freedom that God Himself cannot touch. For He needs free individuals, not slaves. Salvation is His free election, out of love for truth, holiness and beauty, and not for the sake of “spiritual” pleasures or the threat of punishment.

Why did God humble himself to the point of the cross, and not appear to the world as an all-powerful, wisest, invincible king? Why did He come to people not as a patriarch, not a bishop, not a theologian, not a philosopher, not a Pharisee, but as a beggar, homeless, from an earthly point of view, the last person who does not have a single external advantage over any person? The reason for this is obvious: power, power, external splendor, glory would certainly captivate the whole world, everyone would slavishly worship Him and “accept” His teaching in order to receive as much as possible... bread and circuses. Christ wanted nothing but the truth to attract a person to Him, nothing external to replace it, not to stand in the way of its acceptance. It is no coincidence that the Lord uttered such meaningful words: “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth; everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice” (John 18:37). External effects are idols that throughout human history have been trying to replace God.

Unfortunately, much of church life has followed the path of external, so-called “church” splendor, or rather purely worldly splendor. This brings to mind the words of one American Protestant, who not only did not hesitate, but, on the contrary, proudly shared: “In our church, everything should be entertaining in order to attract people.” And the spiritual law is known: the more outside, the less inside. Even at the beginning of the 16th century, the Monk Nilus of Sorsky tried to defend non-covetousness in monasticism, spoke out against all luxury, wealth and estates in the Church as degrading and unnatural, but his voice was not accepted, or rather, was rejected - the process of secularization of Christian consciousness turned out to be irreversible. And it is quite obvious that it led to the split of the 17th century, Peter I, the October Revolution, and at the end of the 20th century - to the so-called “perestroika”. And it will lead to even worse. For the Church is the “leaven” of society, and its spiritual state determines the internal and external well-being of the people.

Saint Philaret of Moscow in the 19th century said with bitterness: “How boring it is to see that monasteries all want pilgrims, that is, they themselves seek entertainment and temptation. True, sometimes they lack methods, but what they lack more is non-covetousness, simplicity, hope in the Gods, and a taste for silence.” And he: “If war had to be declared on any clothing, then, in my opinion, not on the hats of priestly wives, but on the magnificent robes of bishops and priests. At least this is the first thing, but this was forgotten. “Let your priests, O Lord, be clothed with righteousness.” Perhaps even now there will be a saint who will say similar things about modern church life.

So the Lord, with his coming, showed that he is not only the greatest Love; but also the greatest Humility, and He cannot exert any, even the slightest, pressure on human freedom, therefore salvation is possible for everyone who freely accepts God and responds to Love with love. From here it becomes clear why earthly living conditions are so important. Only while in the body is a person fully human and can do good or evil, sin, break the commandments, or repent and lead a righteous life. Our freedom, our choice, is exercised on earth. After death there is no longer a choice, but the choice made on earth is realized, and the fruits of earthly life are revealed. The soul simply finds itself faced with the result of all human earthly activity. Therefore, there, in another world, a person is already powerless to change himself - he can only be helped. But more on that later.

On this day, one might say, the initial outcome of life is summed up. 40th day, if you like, is the first gathering of the fruits of a person’s earthly life. The Church teaches that the soul presents itself to the throne of God, before which God’s determination about man takes place. But it would also be correct to say: man’s self-determination occurs in the face of God. After all, God does not commit any violence against any person. God is the greatest, ultimate Love and Humility. Therefore, when on the 40th day the soul comes before God in some special way, then, apparently, here its spiritual state is fully revealed to it and its natural union occurs either with the Spirit of God or with the spirits of tormenting passions. This is what the Church calls private court, a private definition of personality.

Only this judgment is unusual - it is not God who judges and condemns man, but man, finding himself in the face of the Divine shrine, either ascends to Him, or, on the contrary, falls into the abyss. And all this no longer depends on his will, but on that spiritual state that was the result of his entire earthly life.

Modern man can do almost anything, but the mystery of death remains a mystery today. No one can say exactly what awaits after the death of the physical body, what path the soul has to overcome and whether there will be one. Nevertheless, numerous testimonies from survivors of clinical death indicate that life on the other side is real. And religion teaches how to overcome the path to Eternity and find endless joy.

In this article

Where does the soul go after death?

According to church beliefs, the soul will have to go through 20 ordeals - terrible tests of mortal sins. This will make it possible to determine whether the soul is worthy of entering the Kingdom of the Lord, where endless grace and peace await it. These ordeals are terrible, even the Holy Virgin Mary, according to biblical texts, feared them and prayed to her son for permission to avoid posthumous torment.

No newly deceased person will be able to avoid ordeal. But the soul can be helped: for this, loved ones who remain on the mortal earth light candles, fast, etc.

Consistently, the soul falls from one level of ordeal to another, each of which is more terrible and painful than the previous one. Here is their list:

1. Idle talk is a passion for empty words and excessive talk.
2. Lying is the deliberate deception of others for the sake of one’s own benefit.
3. Slander is spreading false rumors about a third party and condemning the actions of others.
4. Gluttony is an excessive love of food.
5. Idleness is laziness and a life of inaction.
6. Theft is the appropriation of someone else's property.
7. The love of money is excessive attachment to material values.
8. Covetousness is the desire to obtain valuables through dishonest means.
9. Untruth in deeds and actions is a desire to commit dishonest actions.
10. Envy is the desire to take possession of what your neighbor has.
11. Pride is considering oneself above others.
12. Anger and rage.
13. Grudge – storing in the memory of other people’s misdeeds, thirst for revenge.
14. Murder.
15. Witchcraft is the use of magic.
16. Fornication - promiscuous sexual intercourse.
17. Adultery is cheating on your spouse.
18. Sodomy – God denies unions of man and man, woman and woman.
19. Heresy is the denial of our God.
20. Cruelty is a callous heart, insensitivity to the grief of others.

7 deadly sins

Most ordeals are a standard idea of ​​human virtues prescribed to every righteous person by the law of God. The soul can reach the Paradise only after successfully passing through all the ordeals. If she does not pass at least one test, the etheric body will be stuck at this level and will be forever tormented by Demons.

Where does a person go after death?

The ordeal of the soul comes and lasts as long as the number of sins a person committed during earthly life. Only on the 40th day after death will the final decision be made about where the soul will spend eternity - in Hellfire or in Paradise, near the Lord God.

Every soul can be saved, for God is merciful: repentance will cleanse even the most fallen person from sins, if sincere.

In Paradise, the soul knows no worries, does not experience any desires, earthly passions are no longer known to it: the only emotion is the joy of being near the Lord. In hell, souls are tormented and tormented for an eternity; even after the World Resurrection, their souls, united with the flesh, will continue to suffer.

What happens 9, 40 days and six months after death

After death, everything that happens to the soul is not subject to its will: the newly deceased remains to reconcile and accept the new reality meekly and with dignity. For the first 2 days, the soul stays next to the physical shell, it says goodbye to its native places and loved ones. At this time, she is accompanied by angels and demons - each side is trying to lure the soul to its side.

Angels and demons fight for every soul

On the 3rd day, the ordeal begins; during this period, relatives should pray especially a lot and earnestly. After the end of the ordeal, the angels will take the soul to Paradise - to show the bliss that can await it in eternity. For 6 days the soul forgets about all worries and diligently repents of sins committed known and unknown.

the soul again appears before the face of God. Relatives and friends should pray for the deceased and ask for mercy for him. There is no need for tears and lamentations; only good things are remembered about the newly deceased.

It is best to dine on the 9th day with kutia flavored with honey, symbolizing the sweet life under the Lord God. After the 9th day, the angels will show the soul of the deceased Hell and the torment awaiting those who lived unrighteously.

Pastor V. I. Savchak will tell you about what happens to the soul after death on each day:

On the 40th day, the soul reaches Mount Sinai and appears before the face of the Lord for the third time: it is on this day that the question of... Remembrances and prayers of relatives can smooth out the earthly sins of the deceased.

Six months after the death of the body, the soul will visit its relatives and friends for the penultimate time: they are no longer able to change its fate in eternal life, all that remains is to remember the good things and pray earnestly for eternal peace.

Orthodoxy and death

For an Orthodox believer, life and death are inseparable. Death is perceived calmly and solemnly, as the beginning of the transition to eternity. Christians believe that everyone will be rewarded according to their deeds, therefore they are more concerned not about the number of days lived, but about being filled with good deeds and deeds. After death, the soul awaits the Last Judgment, at which it will be decided whether a person will enter the Kingdom of God or go straight to Hell of Fire for grave sins.

Icon of the Last Judgment in the Church of the Nativity of Christ

The teaching of Christ instructs his followers: do not be afraid of death, for this is not the end. Live in such a way that you will spend eternity before the face of God. This postulate contains enormous power, giving hope for endless life and humility before death.

Professor of the Moscow Theological Academy A.I. Osipov answers questions about death and the meaning of life:

Soul of a child

Saying goodbye to a child is a huge grief, but you should not grieve unnecessarily; the soul of a child unburdened by sins will go to a better place. Until the age of 14, it is believed that the child does not bear full responsibility for his actions, since he has not yet reached the age of desire. At this time, the child may be physically weak, but his soul is endowed with enormous wisdom: often children, memories of which emerge in fragments in their minds.

No one dies without their own consent– death comes at the moment when a person’s soul calls for it. The death of a child is his own choice, the soul simply decided to return home - to heaven.

Children perceive death differently than adults. After the death of a relative, the child will be perplexed - why is everyone grieving? He doesn't understand why returning to heaven is a bad thing. At the moment of his own death, the child does not feel any grief, no bitterness of parting, no regrets - he often does not even understand that he has given up his life, feeling happy as before.

After death, the child's soul lives in joy in the First Heaven.

The soul is met by a relative who loved him or simply by a bright being who loved children during his lifetime. Here life is as similar as possible to earthly life: he has a house and toys, friends and relatives. Any desire of the soul is fulfilled in the blink of an eye.

Children whose lives were interrupted in the womb - due to abortion, miscarriage or abnormal birth - also do not suffer or suffer. They remain attached to the mother, and she becomes first in line for physical embodiment during the woman’s next pregnancy.

Soul of a Suicidal Man

From time immemorial, suicide has been considered a grave sin - in this way a person violates God’s intention by taking away the life given by the Almighty. Only the Creator has the right to control destinies, and the thought of laying hands on oneself is given to those who tempt and test a person.

Gustave Dore. Suicide Forest

A person who has died a natural death experiences bliss and relief, but for a suicide, the torment is just beginning. One man could not come to terms with the death of his wife and decided to commit suicide in order to reunite with his beloved. However, he was not close at all: they managed to revive the man and ask him about that side of his life. According to him, this is something terrible, the feeling of horror never goes away, the feeling of internal torture is endless.

After death, the soul of a suicide strives for the Gates of Heaven, but they are locked. Then she tries to return to the body again - but this also turns out to be impossible. The soul is in limbo, experiencing terrible torment right up to the moment when a person was destined to die.

All people who have succeeded from suicide describe terrible pictures. The soul is in an endless fall, which is not possible to interrupt; the tongues of hellish flames tickle the skin and become closer and closer. Most of those rescued are haunted by nightmare visions for the rest of their days. If thoughts about ending your life with your own hands creep into your head, you need to remember: there is always a way out.

The Simplemagic channel will tell you about what happens to the soul of a suicide after death and how to act to calm a restless soul:

Animal souls

Regarding animals, clergy and mediums do not have a clear answer to the question of the final refuge for souls. However, some holy men speak unequivocally about the possibility of introducing the beast to the Kingdom of Heaven. The Apostle Paul directly states that after death an animal awaits deliverance from slavery and earthly suffering; Saint Simeon the New Theologian also adheres to this point of view, saying that, serving in a mortal body, together with a person, the soul of an animal will taste the highest good after physical death.

The souls of animals will find liberation from slavery after physical death.

Theophan the Recluse’s point of view on this is interesting: the saint believed that after death, all souls of living beings (except people) join the great World Soul, created by the Creator long before the creation of the world.

Time to collect stones

Thinking about death and being afraid of it is completely normal. Every person wants to look behind the veil of the eternal mystery of Life and find out what awaits beyond it. Thanatology proves that since the times of the Ancient World, death was prepared in advance, it was thought of as part of life, and this was, perhaps, the greatest wisdom of our ancestors.

Parapsychologists say that after the death of a person, the soul experiences the same feelings as a person during physical death, so it is important to remain calm and confident until the very last breath.

After death, the soul awaits exactly what a person deserves during life: what he will spend on the other side. Years lived with dignity, forgiven offenders, warm relationships with loved ones will help the soul find itself in a better place, where peace, all-consuming love and bliss await it.

Death is an inevitable reality that everyone will face sooner or later. But this is not the end - only the physical shell dies, and the human soul gains true immortality, so there is no need to be sad, it is worth letting go of your loved one with a light heart, dreaming that one day you will be able to meet again - on the other side of life.

A little about the author:

Evgeniy Tukubaev The right words and your faith are the key to success in the perfect ritual. I will provide you with information, but its implementation directly depends on you. But don’t worry, a little practice and you will succeed! Ordeals are obstacles through which every soul must go through upon separation from the body on the way to the throne of God for private judgment; this is a test (conviction of sins) of the soul carried out in the air by evil spirits. The ordeal takes place on the third day after death.

Two angels lead the soul along this path. Each of the ordeals is controlled by demons - unclean spirits who try to take the soul going through the ordeal to hell. Demons provide a list of sins related to a given ordeal (a list of lies at the ordeal of lies, etc.), and angels provide good deeds committed by the soul during life.

There are 20 ordeals in total:

1. idle talk and foul language
2. lies
3. condemnation and slander
4. binge eating and drunkenness
5. laziness
6. theft
7. love of money and stinginess
8. covetousness
9. untruths and vanity
10. envy
11. pride
12. anger
13. rancor
14. robbery
15. sorcery, charm, poisoning with herbs, summoning demons
16. fornication
17. adultery
18. sins of sodom
19. idolatry and all kinds of heresies
20. unmerciful and hard-hearted

1. Trials

St. Theophan the Recluse explains the spiritual meaning of ordeals:

"What ordeal? - This is the image of a private death court, in which the entire life of the dying person is reviewed with all sins and good deeds. Sins are recognized as atoned for by opposite good deeds or corresponding repentance.

Find "Cheti-Minei month March". There, on the 26th, the passage of the ordeals of St. Elder Theodora is described. - All unjustified sinners who die in life undergo ordeal. Only perfect Christians do not linger at ordeals, but ascend straight to heaven like a bright streak.”

Saint John (Maximovich):

“The soul...continues to live, without ceasing its existence for a single moment. Through many manifestations of the dead we have been given partial knowledge of what happens to the soul when it leaves the body. When vision with the physical eyes ceases, spiritual vision begins.

...on leaving the body the soul finds itself among other spirits, good and evil. Usually she is drawn to those who are closer to her in spirit, and if, while in the body, she was influenced by some of them, then she will remain dependent on them even after leaving the body, no matter how disgusting they turned out to be upon meeting.

During the first two days the soul enjoys relative freedom and can visit those places on earth that are dear to it, but on the third day it moves to other spheres. At this time (on the third day) the soul passes through legions of evil spirits who block its path and accuse it of various sins into which they themselves have drawn it.

According to various revelations, there are twenty such obstacles, the so-called “ordeals,” at each of which one or another sin is tortured; Having gone through one ordeal, the soul comes to the next. And only after successfully passing through all of them can the soul continue its journey without being immediately thrown into Gehenna.

How terrible these demons and ordeals are can be seen from the fact that the Mother of God Herself, when Archangel Gabriel informed Her of the approach of death, prayed to His Son to deliver Her soul from these demons, and in response to Her prayers the Lord Jesus Christ Himself appeared from Heaven accept the soul of His Most Pure Mother and take Her to Heaven. (This is visibly depicted on the traditional Orthodox icon of the Assumption.) The third day is truly terrible for the soul of the deceased, and for this reason it especially needs prayers".

Hieromonk Job (Gumerov) writes:

“After the soul separates from the body, independent life begins for it in the invisible world. The spiritual experience accumulated by the Church makes it possible to construct a clear and harmonious teaching about the afterlife of man.

Student Venerable Macarius of Alexandria(+ 395) says: “When we walked through the desert, I saw two angels who accompanied St. Macarius, one on the right side, the other on the left.” One of them talked about what the soul does in the first 40 days after death: “when on the third day there is an offering in the Church, the soul of the deceased receives from the angel guarding it relief from the grief that it feels from separation from the body; receives because praise and offerings in the Church of God have been made for her, which is why good hope is born in her. For for two days the soul, together with the angels who are with it, is allowed to walk on the earth wherever it wants. Therefore, the soul that loves the body sometimes wanders around the house in which it was separated from the body, sometimes around the coffin in which the body is laid... And the virtuous soul goes to those places in which it used to do the truth. On the third day, He who rose from the dead on the third day - the God of all - commands, in imitation of His Resurrection, every Christian soul to ascend to heaven to worship the God of all. So, the good Church is in the habit of making an offering and prayer for the soul on the third day. ... The great ascetic of our time St. John (Maksimovich) writes: “It should be borne in mind that the description of the first two days after death gives a general rule, which in no case covers all situations... the saints, who were not at all attached to worldly things, lived in constant anticipation of the transition to another world, not are drawn even to places where they did good deeds, but immediately begin their ascent to heaven.”

The Orthodox Church attaches great importance to the doctrine of aerial ordeals, which begin on the third day after the separation of the soul from the body. She passes through the airspace of the “outpost”, where evil spirits accuse her of her sins and strive to keep her as one akin to them. The holy fathers write about this (Ephraim the Syrian, Athanasius the Great, Macarius the Great, John Chrysostom, etc.). The soul of a man who lived according to the commandments of God and the statutes of St. The church passes through these “outposts” painlessly and after the fortieth day receives a temporary resting place. It is necessary for loved ones to pray in Church and at home for the departed, remembering that until the Last Judgment much depends on these prayers.“Truly, truly, I say to you, the time is coming, and has already come, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and having heard, they will live” (John 5:25).”

Monk Mitrofan writes in his book “Afterlife”:

“The immeasurable space between heaven and earth, or between the triumphant and militant Churches, this space is in ordinary spoken human language, and in St. In the Scriptures, and in the writings of the Holy Fathers, it is called air. So, here air is not called the subtle ethereal substance surrounding the earth, but space itself.

This space is filled with rejected, fallen angels, whose entire activity is to deviate a person from salvation, making him an instrument of untruth. They cunningly and hostilely act on our internal and external activities in order to make us accomplices of their destruction: “Seeking someone to devour” (1 Pet. 5:8), - Apostle Peter testifies about the devil. That the air space is the dwelling place of evil spirits is evidenced by the chosen vessels of the Holy Spirit, and we believe this truth.

From the very moment that followed the fall of our first parents and the expulsion of sweets from paradise, the Cherub was placed at the tree of life (Gen. 3:24), but another, fallen angel, in turn, stood on the way to paradise in order to prevent man from entering . The gates of heaven were closed for man, and the prince of the world from that time on did not allow a single human soul separated from the body to enter heaven.

Both the righteous, except Elijah and Enoch, and sinners descended to hell.
The first to harmlessly pass this impassable path to paradise was the Conqueror of Death, the Destroyer of Hell; and the doors of heaven opened from that time. The prudent thief followed the Lord harmlessly, and all the Old Testament righteous people, the saints brought out of hell by the Lord, walk this path harmlessly, or, if they sometimes suffer demonic stops, then their virtues outweigh their falls.

If we, being already enlightened by the light of Christ and having free will to do right or wrong, constantly become their captives, doers of unrighteousness, executors of their vile will, then much less will they leave the soul when it is separated from the body and must go to God through air space.

Of course, they will present to the soul all the rights to own it, as a faithful executor of their suggestions, thoughts, desires and feelings.

Demons present her sinful activity in its entirety, and the soul realizes the justice of this testimony.

If the soul has not recognized itself, has not fully recognized itself here on earth, then, as a spiritual and moral being, it must, of necessity, recognize itself beyond the grave; to realize what she had developed in herself, what she had adapted to, what sphere she was accustomed to, what constituted food and pleasure for her. To recognize oneself and thus pronounce judgment on oneself, before God’s judgment - this is what heavenly justice wants. Behind the coffin, in order to bring the soul to the consciousness of its sinfulness, there are fallen spirits who, being the teachers of all evil on earth, will now present the soul with its sinful activity, and will recall all the circumstances under which evil was committed. The soul realizes its sins. By this she already warns God’s judgment over her; so that the judgment of God, as it were, already determines what the soul itself has pronounced over itself.

Good angels at ordeals, for their part, represent the good deeds of the soul.”

St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov) writes that ordeals are execution of God's justice over the soul, carried out through the mediation of angels, both holy and evil, so that the soul itself knows itself:

“All who have clearly rejected the Redeemer are henceforth the property of Satan: their souls, upon separation from their bodies, descend straight to hell. But even Christians who deviate towards sin are not worthy of immediate relocation from earthly life to blissful eternity. Justice itself demands that these deviations to sin, these betrayals of the Redeemer be weighed and evaluated. Trial and analysis are necessary to determine the degree of deviation towards sin of the Christian soul, in order to determine what prevails in it - eternal life or eternal death. And every Christian soul, upon its departure from the body, awaits the impartial Judgment of God, as the holy Apostle Paul said: “it lies for man alone to die, and then comes the judgment” (Heb. 9:27).

The justice of God executes judgment on Christian souls who have departed from their bodies, through angels, both holy and evil. The former, during a person’s earthly life, notice all his good deeds, and the latter notice all his crimes. When the soul of a Christian begins to ascend to heaven, guided by the holy Angels, dark spirits expose it with its sins unerased by repentance, as victims to Satan, as guarantees of communication and the same eternal fate with him.

To torture souls passing through the airspace, the dark authorities have installed separate courts and guards in remarkable order. Along the layers of heaven, from the earth to the sky itself, there are guard regiments of fallen spirits. Each department is in charge of a special type of sin and torments the soul in it when the soul reaches this department. The aerial demonic guards and judgment seats are called “ordeals” in the patristic writings, and the spirits serving in them are called “publicans.”

In the time of Christ and in the first centuries of the Christian Church, the collector of state duties was called a publican. Since this duty, according to the simplicity of ancient customs, was entrusted to a person without positive responsibility and accountability, the tax collectors allowed themselves all the means of violence, various kinds of tricks, fault-finding, countless abuses and inhuman robbery. They usually stood at city gates, in markets and other public places, so that no one could escape their watchful observation. The behavior of the tax collectors made them a terror to the people. According to his concept, the name of the publican expressed a person without feelings, without rules, capable of any crime, of any humiliating act, breathing, living by them - a rejected person. In this sense, the Lord compared the stubborn and desperate disobedient of the Church with a pagan and a tax collector (Matthew 18:17). For the Old Testament worshipers of the true God, nothing was more disgusting than a servant of idols: the publican was just as hateful to them. The name publicans spread from people to the demons who guard the sunrise from earth to heaven, due to the similarity of the office and its performance. As sons and confidants of lies, demons convict human souls not only of the sins they have committed, but also of those they have never been subjected to. They resort to fabrications and deceptions, combining slander with shamelessness and arrogance, in order to snatch the soul from the hands of angels and multiply with it countless prisoners of hell.”

On the way to heaven the soul meets first ordeal, on which evil spirits, having stopped the soul, accompanied by good angels, present to it its sins in words (much verbosity, idle talk, idle talk, foul language, ridicule, blasphemy, singing songs and passionate hymns, disorderly exclamations, laughter, laughter, etc.).

The second ordeal - lies(any lie, perjury, excessive invocation of the name of God, failure to fulfill vows given to God, concealing sins before the confessor in confession).

The third ordeal - slander(slander of a neighbor, condemnation, destruction, dishonoring him, cursing, ridicule while forgetting one’s own sins and shortcomings, with inattention to them).

The fourth ordeal is gluttony(overeating, drunkenness, eating without prayer, breaking fasts, voluptuousness, satiety, feasting, in a word - all types of pleasing the belly). The fifth ordeal is laziness (laziness and negligence in serving God, abandonment of prayer, parasitism, mercenaries who perform their duties with negligence).

The sixth ordeal is theft(all kinds of kidnapping - gross and specious, open and secret).

The seventh ordeal is love of money and stinginess.

Eighth - usurers (usurers, extortionists and appropriators of others' property).

The ninth ordeal - untruths(unrighteous: judgment, measure, weight and all other untruths).

The tenth ordeal is envy.

Eleventh ordeal - pride(pride, vanity, conceit, self-aggrandizement, failure to give due honor to parents, spiritual and civil authorities, disobedience to them and disobedience to them).

Twelfth - rage and anger.

Thirteenth - rancor.

Fourteenth - murders.

Fifteenth - magic(witchcraft, seduction, poisoning, slander, whispers, enchantment summoning demons).

The sixteenth ordeal - prodigal(everything that relates to this defilement: thoughts, desires and deeds themselves; fornication of persons not bound by the sacrament of marriage, pleasure in sin, voluptuous views, foul touches and touches).

Seventeenth - adultery(failure to maintain marital fidelity, prodigal falls of persons who have dedicated themselves to God).

Eighteenth ordeal - Sodom(unnatural prodigal sins and incest).

Nineteenth ordeal - heresies(false wisdom about faith, doubt in faith, apostasy from the Orthodox faith, blasphemy).

And finally, the last thing, twentieth ordeal - no mercy(unmercy and cruelty).

Wherein, if a Christian confessed his sin in confession and repented of it, then he will not be remembered at the ordeal. Through repentance, sins committed are destroyed and are no longer mentioned anywhere, neither at the ordeal, nor at the trial. In the life of St. Vasily Novy we read the question of Theodora, who was undergoing ordeal, and the answer to it:

“After this, I asked the Angels who accompanied me: “For every sin that a person commits in life, he is tortured in these ordeals, after death, or, perhaps, is it possible to atone for his sin in life in order to be cleansed of it and there is no more suffering for him here. I’m just in awe of how detailed everything goes.” The angels answered me that not everyone is tested like this in ordeals, but only those like me, who did not confess sincerely before death. If I had confessed to my spiritual father without any shame or fear everything sinful and if I had received forgiveness from my spiritual father, then I would have gone through all these ordeals without hindrance and I would not have had to be tortured for a single sin. But since I did not want to sincerely confess my sins to my spiritual father, here they torture me for this.

…Anyone who diligently strives for repentance always receives forgiveness from God, and through this a free transition from this life to the blissful life after death. Evil spirits who are in ordeals along with their scriptures, having opened them, do not find anything written, for the Holy Spirit makes everything written invisible. And they see this, and know that everything written down by them has been blotted out thanks to confession, and then they grieve greatly. If the person is still alive, then they try to write some other sins in this place again. Great, truly, is the salvation of a person in confession!.. It saves him from many troubles and misfortunes, makes it possible to go through all the ordeals without hindrance and get closer to God. Others do not confess in the hope that there will still be time for salvation and forgiveness of sins; others are simply ashamed to tell their confessor their sins in confession - these are the people who will be tested strictly in the ordeals.”

Blessed Diadochos This is how he writes about the need for special care in relation to our involuntary, sometimes unknown to us sins:

“If we do not confess them enough, then during our exodus we will find an indefinite fear in ourselves.” “And we, who love the Lord, should wish and pray that at that time we may be free from any fear: for whoever is then in fear will not pass freely past the princes of hell, because they consider the fearfulness of the soul to be a sign of its complicity in their evil, as it is in them themselves.”

Knowing the afterlife state of the soul, that is, the passage of ordeals and the appearance to God for worship, corresponding to the third day, the Church and relatives, wanting to prove that they remember and love the deceased, pray to the Lord for the harmless passage of the soul through air ordeals and for the forgiveness of its sins. The liberation of the soul from sins constitutes its resurrection for a blessed, eternal life. So, following the example of the Lord Jesus Christ, who rose from the dead on the third day, a memorial service is being served for the deceased, so that he too would be resurrected on the third day for an endless, glorious life with Christ.

2. Ordeals only reveal the state of a person’s soul that has already developed during earthly life

St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov):

... Just as the resurrection of the Christian soul from sinful death takes place during its earthly wanderings, in exactly the same way it is mysteriously accomplished here on earth, its torture by the aerial authorities, its captivity by them or liberation from them; when moving through the air, this freedom and captivity are only revealed.”

Elder Paisiy Svyatogorets:

“Some are worried about when the Second Coming will be. However, for a dying person, the Second Coming, so to speak, is already coming. Because a person is judged according to the state in which death overtakes him.”

St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov):

The great saints of God, who have completely passed from the nature of the old Adam into the nature of the New Adam, our Lord Jesus Christ, in this elegant and holy newness, with their honest souls, go through the airy demonic ordeals with extraordinary speed and great glory. They are carried to Heaven by the Holy Spirit...

Saint Theophan the Recluse in the interpretation of the 80th verse of the 118th Psalm (“Let my heart be blameless in thy justifications, lest I be put to shame”), he explains the last words as follows:

"The second moment of non-shame is the time of death and going through ordeals. No matter how wild the thought of ordeals may seem to wise men, they cannot be avoided. What are these toll-takers looking for in those passing through? Whether they have their goods. What is their goods? Passions. It has become It may be that those who have an immaculate heart and are free from passions will not be able to find anything to which they could become attached: on the contrary, the goodness that is opposite to them will strike them like lightning arrows.To this, one of the little learned expressed another thought: ordeals seem to be something terrible; but it is very possible that demons, instead of something terrible, represent something lovely. Seductively charming, according to all types of passions, they present to the passing soul one after another. When, during earthly life, passions are expelled from the heart and virtues opposite to them are implanted, then whatever charming thing you imagine, the soul, which has no sympathy for it, passes it by, turning away from it with disgust. And when the heart is not cleansed, then for which passion it most sympathizes, that is why the soul rushes there. The demons take her as if they were friends, and then they know where to put her. This means that it is very doubtful that the soul, while it still has sympathies for the objects of any passions, will not be ashamed at the ordeal. The shame here is that the soul itself is thrown into hell.".

3. The doctrine of ordeals is the teaching of the Church

His Eminence Macarius writes: " Continuous, constant and widespread use in the Church of the doctrine of ordeals, especially among teachers of the fourth century, indisputably testifies that it was transmitted to them from teachers of previous centuries and is based on the apostolic tradition” (Right. Dogma. Theology. Volume 5).

St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov):

The doctrine of ordeals is the teaching of the Church. “There is no doubt” that the holy Apostle Paul speaks of them when he proclaims that Christians are destined to wage war against the spirits of wickedness in high places. We find this teaching in the most ancient church Tradition and in church prayers. Blessed Virgin, Mother of God, notified by Archangel Gabriel of her approaching repose, brought tearful prayers to the Lord for the deliverance of Her soul from the evil spirits in heaven. When the very hour of Her honorable dormition had come, when the Son Himself and Her God descended to her with tens of angels and righteous spirits, She, before betraying Her most holy soul into the all-holy hands of Christ, uttered the following words in prayer to Him: “Receive now in My spirit in the world and protect Me from the dark region, so that no aspiration of Satan meets Me.”

Saint Athanasius the Great, Patriarch of Alexandria, in the biography of St. Anthony the Great, narrates the following:

“One day he (Antony), at the approach of the ninth hour, having begun to pray before eating food, was suddenly caught up in the Spirit and lifted up by the Angels to a height. The air demons opposed his procession; The angels, arguing with them, demanded an explanation of the reasons for their opposition, because Anthony had no sins. The demons tried to expose the sins he had committed since birth; but the Angels stopped the mouths of the slanderers, telling them that they should not count his sins from birth, already blotted out by the grace of Christ, but let them present, if they have, the sins he committed after the time he dedicated himself to God by entering monasticism. When accusing the demons, they uttered many blatant lies; but since their slander was devoid of evidence, a free path opened for Anthony. He immediately came to his senses and saw that he was standing in the very place where he stood for prayer. Forgetting about food, he spent the whole night in tears and lamentations, thinking about the multitude of human enemies, about the fight against such an army, about the difficulty of the path to heaven through the air and about the words of the Apostle, who said: “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but to the beginning of the power of this air (Eph. 6:12), which, knowing that the powers of the air are only seeking this, are concerned about this with all their efforts, are straining and striving for this in order to deprive us of free passage to heaven, admonishes: “ take up all the weapons of God, that you may be able to resist in the day of cruelty" (Eph. 6:13), "so that the adversary may be put to shame, having nothing to say reproachfully against us" (Titus 2:8).

Saint John Chrysostom, having said that the dying person, even if he was a great ruler on earth, is overcome with confusion, fear, and bewilderment when he “sees the terrible angelic powers and the opposing forces that have come” to separate the soul from the body, he adds:

“Then we need many prayers, many helpers, many good deeds, great intercession from the Angels as we move through the air. If, when traveling to a foreign country or a foreign city, we need a guide, then how much more do we need guides and assistants to guide us past the invisible elders and authorities of the world rulers of this air, called persecutors, publicans, and tax collectors!

Venerable Macarius the Great speaks:

“Hearing that under the heavens there are rivers of serpents, mouths of lions, dark powers, a burning fire that throws all members into confusion, don’t you know that if you do not receive the pledge of the Holy Spirit when you leave the body, they will seize your soul and prevent you from entering heaven".

"When the human soul leaves the body, a great mystery takes place. For if she is guilty of sins, then hordes of demons come; evil angels and dark forces take this soul and drag it to their side. No one should be surprised by this. For if a person, while still alive, while still in this world, submitted, surrendered and enslaved him, then will they not possess him any more and enslave him when he leaves this world? As for the other, better part, it happens to them differently. That is, with the holy servants of God even in this life there are angels, holy spirits surround them and protect them. And when their souls are separated from their bodies, the faces of angels accept them into their society, into a bright life, and thus lead them to the Lord."

Venerable Ephraim the Syrian:

“When the sovereign forces approach, when terrible armies come, when the divine seizers command the soul to move from the body, when, dragging us by force, they take us to the inevitable judgment seat, then, seeing them, the poor man... everything begins to shake, as if from an earthquake, everyone trembles... The divine takers, having taken the soul, ascend through the air, where the rulers, powers and rulers of the world stand against the opposing forces... These are our evil accusers, terrible tax collectors, inventory clerks, tax collectors; they meet on the way, describe, examine and calculate sins and handwritings of this man, the sins of youth and old age, voluntary and involuntary, committed by deed, word, thought... There is great fear there, great trembling for the poor soul, indescribable need that she will then suffer from the countless number of darkness surrounding her enemies, slandering her so as not to give she must ascend to heaven, settle in the light of the living, enter the land of life. But the holy angels, having taken the soul, lead her away."

“Do you not know, my brethren, what fear and what suffering we are subjected to at the hour of departure from this life when the soul is separated from the body?.. Good Angels and the Heavenly Host approach the soul, as well as all... the opposing forces and princes of darkness. Both want to take the soul or assign it a place. If the soul acquired good qualities here, led an honest life and was virtuous, then on the day of its departure these virtues that it acquired here become good angels surrounding it and do not allow anyone to touch it. any opposing force. In joy and joy with the holy Angels they take it and carry it to Christ, the Lord and King of Glory, and worship Him together with it and with all the Heavenly Powers. Finally the soul is taken to a place of rest, to unspeakable joy, to eternal a light where there is no sorrow, no sighing, no tears, no worries, where there is immortal life and eternal joy in the Kingdom of Heaven with all others who pleased God.If the soul in this world lived shamefully, indulging in the passions of dishonor and being carried away by carnal pleasures and vanity of this world, then on the day of its departure, the passions and pleasures that it acquired in this life become wicked demons and surround the poor soul, and do not allow the Angels of God to approach it; but together with the opposing forces, the princes of darkness, they take her, pitiful, shedding tears, sad and lamenting, and take her to dark places, gloomy and sad, where sinners await the day of Judgment and eternal torment, when the devil and his angels will be cast down.”

The great saint of God, viewer of mysteries, Saint Niphon, Bishop of the Cyprus city of Constantius, standing one day in prayer, saw the heavens open and many Angels, some of whom descended to earth, others ascended to the mountain, lifting human souls to heavenly abodes. He began to listen to this spectacle, and behold, two Angels strived for heights, carrying their souls. When they approached the fornication ordeal, the demons came out and said with anger: “This soul is ours! How dare you carry it past us when it is ours?” The Angels answered: “On what basis do you call her yours?” - The demons said: “Until her death, she sinned, being defiled not only by natural, but also by supernatural sins, and she condemned her neighbor, and what’s worse, she died without repentance: what do you say to this?” - The angels answered: “Truly we will not believe either you or your father, Satan, until we ask the guardian angel of this soul.” The guardian angel asked said: “Exactly, this man has sinned a lot; but as soon as he became ill, he began to cry and confess his sins to God. Whether God has forgiven him, He knows. To Him is the power, To Him is glory to the righteous judgment.” Then the Angels, despising the accusation of demons, entered with their souls into the gates of heaven. - Then the Blessed One saw another soul lifted up by the Angels. The demons, running out to them, cried out: “Why are you carrying souls without our knowledge, like this gold-loving, prodigal, quarrelsome, practicing robbery?” The Angels answered: “We probably know that, although she fell into all this, she cried, sighed, confessing and giving alms, and therefore God granted her forgiveness.” The demons said: “If this soul is worthy of God’s mercy, then take the sinners of the whole world; We have no business working here.” The Angels answered them: “All sinners who confess their sins with humility and tears will accept forgiveness by the grace of God; those who die without repentance are judged by God.” Thus, having shamed the demons, they passed. Again the Holy One saw the ascended soul of a certain God-loving, pure, merciful man, loving to all. The demons stood in the distance and gnashed their teeth at this soul; The angels of God came out to meet her from the gates of heaven and, greeting her, said: “Glory to Thee, Christ God, that Thou didst not deliver her into the hands of her enemies and delivered her from the depths of hell!” - Blessed Niphon also saw that demons were drawing a certain soul to hell. This was the soul of one slave, whom the master tormented with hunger and beatings and who, unable to bear the torment, hanged himself, having been taught by the devil. The guardian angel walked in the distance and wept bitterly; The demons rejoiced. And a command came from God to the weeping Angel to go to Rome, there to take custody of the newborn baby, who was being baptized at that time. - Again the Saint saw a soul carried through the air by Angels, which was taken from them by demons at the fourth ordeal and cast into the abyss. It was the soul of a man given over to fornication, sorcery and robbery, who died suddenly without repentance.

Venerable Isaiah the Hermit in his will, he commanded his disciples “to have death before our eyes every day and to worry about how to accomplish the exodus from the body and how to pass by the powers of darkness that are about to meet us in the air.”

Venerable Abba Dorotheos, a monastic student of the same hostel of Abba Serida, writes in one of his messages: “When the soul is insensitive (cruelty), it is useful to frequently read the Divine Scripture and the touching words of the God-bearing fathers, remembering the Last Judgment of God, the departure of the soul from the body, those who will meet her terrible powers, with the complicity of which she did evil in this short and disastrous life.

The doctrine of ordeals, like the doctrine of the location of heaven and hell, is found as a teaching that is well known and generally accepted throughout the entire area of ​​worship of the Orthodox Church.».