The Discernment of Spirits

The specific form of diakrisis: judging whether a thought, an impulse, a consolation, or a vision comes from God, from one’s own nature, or from the enemy. This file gives the scriptural warrant, the classic criteria — above all the marks of the good and the evil visitation set out in St. Athanasius’ Life of Antony — the practice of disclosing thoughts, the distinction between discernment and the separate gift of spiritual insight, and the tradition’s fallback where the criteria run out.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox

The Warrant

The discernment of spirits — διάκρισις πνευμάτων, Slavonic различение духов — is named by St. Paul among the gifts of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:10) and enjoined on the whole Church: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). The reason the testing is necessary is given by the same Apostle who supplies the proof-text of the entire literature: “Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14).

That verse fixes the shape of the problem. The counterfeit in question is not obviously evil; it is luminous. The danger the ascetic tradition is guarding against is not temptation to sin but the acceptance of a false good as a divine one, which is why discernment of spirits and prelest are the same subject seen from two sides (see What Plane and Prelest Name).

Three Sources, and the Money-Changer

The working framework is Cassian’s: thoughts arise from God, from the devil, and from ourselves — the last including memory, temperament, and habit (Cassian, Conferences 1.19; trans. Boniface Ramsey, Ancient Christian Writers 57, New York: Paulist Press, 1997). The ascetic is to test each thought as an expert money-changer tests a coin: is the metal genuine, is the stamped image the right one, is the weight correct, and is it minted by the right authority (Cassian, Conferences 1.20–22).

Cassian’s four tests translate directly. Is it genuine? — does the thought’s content actually accord with the faith, or does it merely sound pious? Whose image does it bear? — is what it proposes recognizably the mind of Christ, or a distortion carrying his name? What is its weight? — does it hold up when weighed against Scripture and the Fathers, or does it depend on the force of the impression it makes? Who minted it? — can its origin be traced, or does it rest on nothing but the fact that it occurred to me?

The Marks of the Visitation

The oldest and most influential set of criteria is in St. Athanasius’ Life of Antony, where Antony instructs the monks how to tell a holy appearance from a demonic one. The distinction is drawn not from the content of the appearance but from its effect on the soul: the vision of the holy ones is not turbulent but comes quietly and gently, so that joy, gladness, and courage arise at once, and the soul, beholding, is at peace; whereas the assault of the evil ones is with tumult, noise, and clamour, producing fear of soul, disturbance, confusion of thoughts, dejection, and terror of death (Athanasius, Life of Antony 35–36; trans. NPNF II/4; see St. Antony the Great: The Demons).

The criterion is therefore peace, and its counterfeit is excitement. This is the single most durable diagnostic in the tradition and it is repeated everywhere: genuine grace leaves a person quiet, humble, and able to go on with his ordinary duties; the counterfeit leaves him agitated, elated, self-important, and eager to tell someone. Diadochus of Photike develops the same test in his On Spiritual Knowledge and Discrimination, distinguishing the consolation that comes from grace from the deceptive sweetness produced by the enemy, and locating the difference in whether the experience deepens humility and love or feeds self-regard (Diadochus of Photike, On Spiritual Knowledge and Discrimination, in The Philokalia, vol. 1, trans. Palmer, Sherrard, and Ware, London: Faber and Faber, 1979).

To these the tradition adds three further tests.

Fruits. “By their fruits ye shall know them” (Matthew 7:16, 20). The fruits looked for are not powers or experiences but the ordinary ones: patience, humility, love of neighbour, obedience, willingness to be corrected. St. Silouan’s formulation is the most severe and the most often cited in the modern Athonite tradition — the presence of the Holy Spirit is known by love of enemies (see St. Silouan the Athonite: The Criterion).

Conformity. What is proposed must accord with Scripture, the dogmatic teaching of the Church, and the mind of the Fathers. A revelation that corrects the Church is refused on that ground alone, whatever its accompanying phenomena.

Survival of disclosure. A thought or experience is told to a spiritual father or confessor. The tradition observes, as a matter of experience rather than theory, that deceptive thoughts characteristically resist being spoken — they produce shame, or an urgent conviction that this particular matter need not be mentioned — and that the resistance is itself diagnostic (Barsanuphius and John, Letters, trans. John Chryssavgis, 2 vols., Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2006–07).

Disclosure of Thoughts

ἐξαγόρευσις τῶν λογισμῶν, Russian откровение помыслов, the manifestation of thoughts, is the practical instrument by which discernment is exercised on a person who does not yet have it. Its classic setting is the Gaza school of the sixth century, where Barsanuphius and John directed monks almost entirely through written answers to disclosed thoughts, and it remains the core of the elder–disciple relation in Orthodox monasticism (see Orthodox Monasticism: The Elder and the Disciple; St. Sophrony of Essex: The Spiritual Father).

Two clarifications are needed for a modern reader.

It is not identical with sacramental confession. Disclosure of thoughts is an ascetic practice, not a mystery of the Church; it concerns thoughts as well as sins, may be made to a non-ordained elder in monastic settings, and does not carry absolution. The two overlap in practice, especially where the spiritual father is also the confessor, but they are not the same thing (see Spiritual Direction).

Its rationale is epistemic, not penal. The deluded man is by definition the last to know he is deluded, and a closed inner circuit cannot be broken from inside it. Disclosure breaks the circuit. This is why the practice is not softened for advanced practitioners: the more a person has, the more he has to lose by trusting his own assessment of it.

Diakrisis and Diorasis

The two terms are distinct and are regularly conflated in popular writing.

διάκρισις (diakrisis) is discernment: the judgment described in this file, expected of every serious Christian in some degree and required of anyone guiding another.

διόρασις (diorasis), Russian прозорливость, is spiritual insight or clairvoyance — the charism by which certain elders are reported to have known the thoughts, circumstances, or futures of those who came to them. It is a gift given to few, it is not the fruit of technique, and the tradition treats its claim with great suspicion even while venerating saints in whom it is attested. The hagiographical claims are pinned to their sources rather than asserted as historical fact, per METHODOLOGY.md §3.5; the reports themselves belong to the collections on the elders (see The Optina Elders).

The practical point is that a person may have real discernment and no diorasis at all, and that discernment — not clairvoyance — is what guiding another actually requires.

Where the Criteria Run Out

The tradition is honest that the tests can fail, that a counterfeit can imitate peace, and that an experienced ascetic can be deceived — the story of Heron is told for exactly this reason (see Discernment and the Measure).

Its fallback is therefore not a better test but a policy: refuse the phenomena. Gregory of Sinai instructs the hesychast to reject even apparently good lights and forms, lest he accept something else in place of grace; and St. Ignatius Brianchaninov made the refusal absolute for his own age, teaching that a person should seek in prayer neither visions nor experiences but only repentance and the mercy of God (Gregory of Sinai, On Stillness, in The Philokalia, vol. 4, 1995; Brianchaninov, On the Prayer of Jesus, trans. Father Lazarus, London: John M. Watkins, 1965; see St. Ignatius Brianchaninov: Against Delusion).

The desert’s older and gentler version of the same policy is that the one who has the experience neither accepts nor rejects it on his own authority, but reports it and abides by the judgment of another. Either way, the tradition removes the decision from the person least able to make it.

A last word about the modern setting. Claims to prophecy, to direct guidance, and to the discernment of others’ spiritual states circulate widely, including within Orthodox circles, and the criteria above are the Church’s answer to them: peace rather than excitement, conformity to what has been handed down, ordinary fruits, submission to correction, and the refusal of a private authority that exempts itself from the Church’s judgment (see Seraphim Rose: The Charismatic Movement; Cautions for the Modern Reader).

References

Athanasius of Alexandria. The Life of Antony, 35–36. Trans. NPNF II/4.
Barsanuphius and John. Letters. Trans. John Chryssavgis. 2 vols. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2006–07.
Brianchaninov, Ignatius. On the Prayer of Jesus. Trans. Father Lazarus [Moore]. London: John M. Watkins, 1965.
Cassian, John. The Conferences, 1.19–22. Trans. Boniface Ramsey. Ancient Christian Writers 57. New York: Paulist Press, 1997.
The Philokalia: The Complete Text. Trans. Palmer, Sherrard, and Ware. Vol. 1 (1979): Diadochus of Photike, On Spiritual Knowledge and Discrimination. Vol. 4 (1995): Gregory of Sinai, On Stillness. London: Faber and Faber.
Scripture: Matthew 7:16, 20; 1 Corinthians 12:10; 2 Corinthians 11:14; 1 John 4:1.