Anthropological Significance of the Hesychastic Method of Prayer. Some Historico-Religious Aspects of a Morphology of the Ascetic P r a k t i k é
Anthropological Significance of the Hesychastic Method of Prayer. Some Historico-Religious Aspects of a Morphology of the Ascetic P r a k t i k é

Summary/Abstract: Hesychasm is an Eastern Christian method based on the invocation of the Name of Jesus and on the “descent of the noûs (Greek for “intellect”) into the heart”. This spiritual discipline, the method of which emerged in its most explicit form between the 13th and the 14th century on Mount Athos, is the core of Christianity, since it consists in the inner practice of the fervent and continuous repetition of the holy Name and aims to achieve metánoia (Greek for “change of the noûs”) for the entire human being and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ through an incessant militia super terram comparable to the Muslim jihâd al-akbar (Arabic for “great holy war”). A meditated comparison between some central components of Hesychasm, Sufism and yoga may be an adequate way to understand more deeply the spiritual and anthropological aspects of this eminently “paradoxical” ascetic discipline

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