The Ladder of Divine Ascent by John Climacus
**The Ladder of Divine Ascent Overview**
"The Ladder of Divine Ascent," written by the sixth-century monk John Climacus, is a seminal text in Orthodox Christian asceticism and spirituality. It employs the metaphor of a ladder with thirty rungs to symbolize the journey of spiritual growth, urging individuals to ascend from earthly concerns toward divine union. The work is structured around thirty steps that reflect various aspects of monastic life, emphasizing virtues such as obedience, humility, and love, while addressing the challenges posed by passions like anger, pride, and avarice. Each step is designed to guide monks in their spiritual practices, including renunciation of worldly attachments and the cultivation of prayer and discernment.
The text draws inspiration from the biblical vision experienced by Jacob, where a ladder reaches to heaven with angels ascending and descending. John Climacus advocates for a balanced approach to monasticism, recognizing three forms of community life: solitude, small group stillness, and communal living, promoting a path that fosters both spiritual growth and obedience. Overall, "The Ladder of Divine Ascent" remains a vital spiritual guide, rich in poetic language and profound insights, encouraging readers to engage deeply with their faith and strive for a transformative relationship with God.
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The Ladder of Divine Ascent by John Climacus
First transcribed:Klimax tou paradeisou, c. 640 c.e. (English translation, 1959)
Edition(s) used:The Ladder of Divine Ascent, translated by Colm Luibheid and Norman Russell, with an introduction by Kallistos (Timothy) Ware. New York: Paulist Press, 1982
Genre(s): Nonfiction
Subgenre(s): Didactic treatise; guidebook; spiritual treatise
Core issue(s): Asceticism; attachment and detachment; humility; illumination; monasticism; obedience and disobedience; simplicity; virtue
Overview
The sixth century monk John Climacus wrote The Ladder of Divine Ascent for monks, and the book has remained a classic of Orthodox ascetic monastics since. In it, John outlines the stages of the spiritual life by use of the metaphor of a ladder of thirty rungs that reaches from earth to Heaven. The form of John’s text, with its thirty sections or steps, was suggested by the biblical image of the ladder that Patriarch Jacob saw reaching up to Heaven, with angels ascending and descending. The text has had immense influence on the formation of Eastern Christian monasticism. It is read in the monasteries during Lent and it is frequently depicted in icons, frescoes, and manuscripts. The spiritual father (oftentimes John himself) ushers monks to the foot of the ladder. As they ascend, good angels assist them and evil angels try to pull them off and drop them into the gaping jaws of hell. (Abba John’s proper name, Climacus, comes from the Greek word for ladder.)
The Ladder of Divine Ascent is composed with great subtlety and art, a rhythmic prose approaching poetry, yet there is an apparent abruptness about the text. John uses short, sharp sentences, pithy definitions, and paradoxical aphorisms:
•The growth of fear is the starting point of love, and total purity is the founding of theology.
•The Word of the Lord, being from the Lord, remains eternally pure.
•Purity makes of a disciple someone who can speak of God, and he can move on to a knowledge of the Trinity.
•He who loves the Lord has first loved his brother, for the latter is proof of the former.
John enters upon his climb without any introduction. The first three steps concern themselves with the break from the world: renunciation, detachment, and exile. This may seem very negative, but there is a strong positive element in John’s understanding of it. “All this is done by those who willingly turn from the things of this life, either for the sake of the coming kingdom, or because of the number of their sins, or on account of their love of God.” The body retains its role in the monastic life.
The monk has a body made holy, a tongue purified, a mind enlightened. Asleep or awake, the monk is a soul pained by the constant remembrance of death. Withdrawal from the world is a willing hatred of all that is materially prized, a denial of nature for the sake of what is above nature.
When the monk has reached this third step he is well on the way; he “should look neither to right nor left.” The next twenty-three steps devote themselves to the cultivation of the virtues and the extirpation of the vices, what the Fathers called the active life.
The most fundamental of the virtues for John is that of obedience. He found in the desert three forms of monastic life:
All monastic life may be said to take one of three forms. There is the road of withdrawal and solitude for the spiritual athlete, there is the life of stillness [hesychia—contemplation] shared with one or two brothers; and there is the practice of living patiently in community.
John favored the middle way, where one would not have all the distractions and cares of the large cenobitic community or the risks of being totally alone, lacking the good of obedience.
John’s treatment of obedience is followed by the steps of penitence, remembrance of death, and sorrow. Then he begins a long consideration of the passions—sixteen steps: anger, malice, slander, talkativeness, falsehood, despondency, gluttony, lust, avarice (two steps), insensitivity (three steps), fear, vainglory, and pride. The number of steps devoted to the struggle with the passions should not be misunderstood. By and large, these considerations are shorter than those given to the virtues, and within each step there is consideration of the virtues that help the monk overcome the particular passion.
Indeed, the second step concerning avarice (step sixteen) is on poverty (step seventeen), and this is one of the more beautiful and rich chapters in The Ladder of Divine Ascent. Its approach is deeply spiritual and even mystical, as is The Ladder of Divine Ascent as a whole—John’s concern is more with the spiritual than with the material and legislative aspects of monastic life:
The poverty of a monk is resignation from care. . . . The poor monk is lord of the world. He has handed all his cares over to God, and by his faith has obtained all men as his servants. If he lacks something, he does not complain to his fellows and he accepts what comes his way as if from the hand of the Lord. In his poverty he turns into a son of detachment.
The monk who has had a taste of heaven easily thinks nothing of what is below. John concludes the step: “This is the seventeenth step. He who has climbed it is traveling to heaven unburdened by material things.”
The second step concerning insensitivity (step eighteen) turns to prayer:
The man who considers with sensitivity of heart that he is standing before God will be an immovable pillar of prayer. . . . The truly obedient monk often becomes suddenly radiant and exultant during his prayers. . . . Prayer tests the zeal of a monk and his love for God.
The next chapter is on alertness.
After considering the passions, John returns to the “higher virtues” of the active life, those that lead into the contemplative life: simplicity, humility, and discernment.
Among beginners, discernment is real self-knowledge; among those midway along the road to perfection, it is a spiritual capacity to distinguish unfailingly between what is truly good and what in nature is opposed to the good; among the perfect, it is a knowledge resulting from divine illumination, which with its lamp can light up what is dark in others.
In his discussion of discernment, John offers programs of study for beginners, for the intermediate, and for teachers. He warns about spending too long in the beginner’s stage. He offers a couple of spiritual alphabets. In general, discernment is “a solid understanding of the will of God in all times, in all places, in all things, and it is found only among those who are pure in heart, in body, and in speech.”
Before entering into the third stage of his ladder (the last four steps), John offers a “Brief Summary of All the Preceding Steps” in the form of five pages of epigrams, rich in his usual concrete earthiness:
Eggs warmed in dung hatch out. Unconfessed evil thoughts hatch evil actions. . . . Galloping horses vie with each other. A zealous community encourages individual zeal. . . . A man in a fever ought not commit suicide. Right up to the moment of death we should never despair.
The chapter on stillness (step twenty-seven) is one of the most practical for monks. The following chapter outlines the way of prayer: “The beginning of prayer is the expulsion of distractions from the very start by a single thought [monologistos]; the middle stage is concentration on what is being said or thought; its conclusion is rapture in the Lord.” John concludes the rich teaching in this chapter: “You cannot discover from the teaching of others the beauty of prayer. Prayer has its own special teacher in God.” It is in the course of these chapters that John passes on the traditional teaching on the “Jesus Prayer”; he is the first to use this expression.
A short step on dispassion—“Dispassion is an uncompleted perfection of the perfect . . . a dispassionate soul is immersed in virtues as a passionate being is in pleasure”—leads to the summit of the ladder: faith, hope, and love (step thirty).
And now at last, after all that has been said, there remains that triad, faith, hope, and love, binding and securing the union of all. “But the greatest of these is love,” since that is the very name of God himself.
In the end, the “empress” (love) speaks to John’s soul: “My love, you will never be able to know how beautiful I am unless you get away from the grossness of the flesh. So let this ladder teach you the spiritual union of the virtues, and I am there on the summit.”
Christian Themes
John’s classic of ascetic monasticism advocates a withdrawal from the world, a willing rejection of all that is materially prized, in order to live the Christian life and achieve the fullness of God’s love. That life is essentially the monastic life, which takes one of three forms: There is the road of withdrawal and solitude, the life of stillness shared with one or two brothers, and the practice of living patiently in community. Fear is the starting point of love, and purity is the foundation of theology. The beginning of prayer is to rid oneself of distractions, the middle stage is concentration on what is being thought, and its conclusion is rapture in the Lord. He who loves the Lord has first loved his brother.
John’s conclusion, “A Brief Summary and Exhortation,” in many ways sums up the Christian message and purpose of The Ladder of Divine Ascent:
Ascend, my brothers, ascend eagerly. Let your hearts resolve to the climb. . . . Run, I beg you, run with him. . . . Baptized in the thirtieth year of his earthly age, Christ attained the thirtieth step on the spiritual ladder, for God indeed is love, and to him be praise, dominion, power. In him is the cause, past, present, and future, of all that is good forever and ever. Amen.
Sources for Further Study
Chryssavgis, John. John Climacus: From the Egyptian Desert to the Sinaite Mountain. Burlington, Vt.: Ashgate, 2004. Includes a biographical note and chapters headed “Soma-Sarx: The Body and the Flesh,” “Kardia: The Heart,” “Nous: The Intellect,” “Joyful Sorrow: The Double Gift of Tears,” and “Ascesis: The Ascetic Struggle of the Monk.” Bibliography, indexes.
Hausherr, Irénée. The Name of Jesus. Translated by Charles Cummings. Cistercian Studies 44. Kalamazoo, Mich.: Cistercian Publications, 1978. This study, while it does tend to play down the contribution of John, does place his teaching on the Jesus Prayer fully in context.
John Climacus. The Ladder of Divine Ascent. Translated by Archimandrite Lazarus Moore. Introduction by Muriel Heppell. London: Faber & Faber, 1959. Reprint. Willits, Calif.: Eastern Orthodox Books, 1973. This edition, besides the helpful introduction of Muriel Heppell, contains the ancient “Life of Abba John” by Daniel, monk of Raithu, and other relatively ancient documents.
John Climacus. The Ladder of Divine Ascent. Translated by Archimandrite Lazarus Moore. Boston: Holy Transfiguration Monastery, 1978. An updated edition of Moore’s translation (which has been compared with additional manuscripts); includes a translation of John’s To the Shepherd.
Mack, John. Ascending the Heights: A Laymnan’s Guide to “The Ladder of Divine Ascent.” Ben Lomond, Calif.: Conciliar Press, 1999. Although Climacus wrote his book for monks, Mack writes to help non-monks both understand the steps of the ladder and apply them to daily life. Each chapter quotes from John’s writings and offers commentary. Good introduction.
The Sayings of the Desert Fathers: The Alphabetical Collection. Translated by Benedicta Ward. Foreword by Metropolitan Anthony. Cistercian Studies 59. Kalamazoo, Mich.: Cistercian Publications, 1975. These sayings give the flavor as well as the actual source from which John Climacus drew much of his wisdom.