Guidance from the text of a homily from 1901

A Sermon Preached on the Fourth Sunday of Great Lent
by St. Tikhon of Moscow and America
San Francisco ~ Spring, 1901

“Set a watch, O Lord, before my  mouth;  keep the door of my lips” (Ps.  140:3)

 This is how the Holy Church prays on our behalf during the present days of the fast. But we ourselves, brethren, do not realize, it seems, the necessity to ask the Lord for this. On the contrary, we desire and seek not a limit for our lips, but complete freedom and absence of any restraint for our words. Yet, you know, it is said that our word is as though an imprint of the Heavenly creative word; a reflection of the image of God is in it. It is the greatest gift of God, by which God distinguished man and elevated him above the other creatures.

For what purpose is this gift given to us, other than to develop it and perfect it? In it is our strength and power; it is the conductor of our thoughts, feelings, needs, endeavors, and advancements. Knowledge, science, and law live and progress through words.

Is there any sense, then, to limit one’s lips and restrain the word of man?! On the contrary, should we not give complete and wide freedom to it, as to the greatest and most noble gift of God?

But the very merit of this gift itself should already dispose us to highly appreciate and solemnly protect it – not to corrupt it, and not to befoul it. And the fact that by his sin the man brought deep discord into his nature, and that that distortion became reflected in the gift of the word as well, should dispose us even more to cautious and careful use of the gift of speech. The tongue has quite often come to serve as the weapon of sin, “full of deadly poison” (James 3:8). Lies, flattery, slyness, deceit, curse words, offenses, talk full of temptation and sinful poison have started frequently coming from our lips.

Thus, along with the beneficial influence and the salutary power of the human word, a different, opposite side of it is revealed as well after the fall into sin. With our tongue we started, according to the words of the Apostle James, to “bless God; and therewith to curse men, who are made after the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?” (James 3:9-11).

This should not be taking place, especially since the other, opposite action of the word brought great harm and destruction into human life. “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword: but not so many,” says the most wise son of Sirach, “as have fallen by the tongue. Well is he that is protected from it, who has not endured its anger; who hath not drawn the yoke thereof, nor hath been bound in its bands. For the yoke thereof is a yoke of iron, and the bands thereof are bands of brass. Its death is an evil death, and hell is better than it” (Sir. 28:18-21).

How could one after that not follow the wise advice of the son of Sirach – “make for your words a balance and a weight, make a door and a bar for your mouth” (Sir. 28:25). And how could one not exclaim with him, “Who shall set a watch before my mouth and a seal of wisdom upon my lips, that I fall not suddenly by them, and that my tongue destroy me not! O Lord, leave me not to their will!” (Sir. 22:27 - 23:1).

Quite often some say, what bad is in it that we allow ourselves to say an extra word, to joke, to laugh – without evil intent, of course – since we are not saints, not monks, and we live in the world, “and who is he that hath not offended with his tongue?” (Sir. 19:16). And yet the Holy Church prays on our behalf – “drive away the spirit of idle talk!”[1] After all, we attribute an important meaning to the human word ourselves, and since this is the case, should one then use words idly, purposelessly? With our loose tongue we bankrupt our soul; we make ourselves careless, frivolous, and unstable. “He,” says the most wise Solomon, “who keepeth his mouth, keepeth his life; but he that openeth wide his lips shall have destruction” (Prov. 13:3). “In the multitude of words there lacketh not sin” (Prov. 10:20); “In all labor there is profit: but the talk of the lips tendeth only to penury” (Prov. 14:23, KJV).

We should not fail to take into account the fact that our words do not disappear in the air and vanish without a trace, but they are collected and preserved for the day of the terrible judgment, when we will be held accountable for every idle word; and by our words we will be either acquitted or condemned (cf. Matt. 12:36-37).

Having said this, how can we not be careful with our words?! And is it really true that there is nothing insulting for others in our jokes? Do they not contain sometimes the “adder's poison”? (Ps. 140:3, KJV) and “fiery darts” (Eph. 6:16) that strike harder than a whip’s blow? (cf. Sir. 28:17). That is indeed why they cause arguments and quarrels between people who are closest to one another, and sometimes a friendship of many years is destroyed because of one word, like the whole building that goes up in flame from one spark. “Who will count,” asks St. Gregory the Theologian, “all the insults caused by the tongue? If it wishes it can easily, in one instant, make one house be at enmity with another, one town with another, the people with the ruler, the king with his subjects, like a spark that sets hay on fire.”

All of this forces us to turn our attention to our tongue, to think and take measures to restrain it. What measures would these be?

For the purpose of restraining the tongue, the holy champions of piousness sometimes engaged themselves for years in the practice of quietude – silence in which they saw, according to the saying of the venerable John of the Ladder,[2] whom the Church commemorates today, “the preservation within oneself of fire, an imperceptible advance and a secret ascent up the ladder of virtues.” In order to make themselves accustomed to the most strict restraint of the tongue, they quite often took exceptional measures. The venerable Agathon,[3] for example, for three years kept a pebble in his mouth for this purpose.

Of course, it is difficult for us to imitate these “heroes of the spirit” in our weakness. Nevertheless, let us at least learn their instructions and advice concerning restraint of one's tongue.

One monk asked an elder, “What should I do? My tongue bothers me; whenever I am with people I cannot restrain it, but I judge and condemn them even in a good undertaking.” The elder replied, “This is an infirmity. If you cannot restrain yourself, run to seclusion.” And indeed in seclusion there are no reasons for idle talk and a loose tongue. The necessity for seclusion was even recognized by wise men from among the heathen. One of them (Seneca) says that “every time I spend time with people, I return to myself being less humane.” And we ourselves quite often have a similar experience after conversations, which are often empty and only disperse our spirit.

The holy fathers most often went into seclusion and isolated themselves from company for the time of Great Lent. Nothing, brethren, prevents us from secluding ourselves either, and spending in silence if not the whole fast, at least a few hours every day, devoting them to prayer, pious contemplation, introspection, and examination of one’s conscience.

And the fast as well, aside from seclusion, according to St. Gregory the Theologian, helps one to restrict his tongue. It is observed that our talkativeness arises often from gluttony and especially from drinking wine, which loosens our tongue without measure. To the contrary, the fast leads us to restriction of the tongue, and suppression of anger, slander, and lies, since it suppresses in us lusts which “set our tongue on fire” (James 3:6).

To succeed in restricting one’s tongue, it is also necessary, according to the words of the same St. Gregory, to ask God for help. This feat is hard for a person who is inattentive and inclined to sin. And if David, the son of Sirach, the venerable Ephrem the Syrian, and other holy men who were strong in spirit, asked God for help in this matter, then all the more is it necessary for us, the weak ones, to pray: “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth, keep the door of my lips” (Ps. 140:3, LXX; Ps. 141:3, KJV).[4]

* Printed in Amerikansky Pravoslavny Vestnik, 1901, # 6, pp. 108-110.

[1]               From the Lenten prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian; see footnote 50 above.
[2]               See footnote 39 above.
[3]               Abba Agathon was another of the Desert Fathers of Egypt.
[4]               These words are sung often in the some of the Lenten services.