Journey Back to Eden.pdf - St Mark Coptic Orthodox Church Chicago

38 NOVEMBERBut in their case, he assured me, it’s not just a virtue; it’s also aburden, and even more so for him because discourse along theselines is what Abuna Elia craves. They are not trained, he said, to beintellectual exponents of the monastic life or of the way of holiness.And how could they be? he sighed. Can the Copts re-open theSchool of Alexandria? No, their school is the Way of the Cross, andwhile that is the greatest of graces, it is also a way of inconsolablesilences.He finds this to be a solitude within a solitude, saying that evenwhen he is in the company of his brother monks, as he has latelycome to be, he is still very much alone. But in this case, his alonenessis tinged with a kind of regret, because when he was trulyalone, without human company, that aloneness was sweetened by asense of the divine presence. There is a certain sense of the absenceof God when one is in company wherein he cannot freely talkabout God, when he cannot fully share the mysteries he is enjoyingabout God.The New IsaacSo Abuna Elia has determined, and I don’t know from what evidence,that he can speak to me about God in the manner he longsfor. He was, I guess, very pleased to hear that I was trained in aseminary and had some years of Scripture. He was also pleased thatI knew at least some Greek and even some Hebrew theologicalterms. As it turns out, Abuna Elia learned Greek and Hebrew duringhis many—at least ten—years of almost absolute solitude in thecaves of the outer desert. During that time, he studied these twolanguages for the purpose of reading the Fathers of the Churchand the Scriptures. He is thrilled that I am able to understandsome of his terminology and that I’m taking notes on what he says.These two things he has yearned for since he has come back to themonastery.He said to me finally, in a rather poignant way, that I shall behis “Isaac.” When I asked him what he meant, he replied that Isaacwas the son of Abraham in his old age, and that Abraham becamefruitful when it was long past the time for him to be so. In thiscase, Abuna Elia believes that I am going to make him fruitful byhearing what he has to say, and by preserving the cumulative