The Eros of Repentance: Four Homilies on Athonite Monasticism

by George Kapsanis

A call to arms for the spirit, a call to abandon our self-love and embrace the love of God, this small book speaks to our deepest longing. Its focus is the role of our yearning, our desire to be united with the divine, 'for it is the power of desire (eros) in the soul that manifests the imprint of God within us more than anything else'. Archimandrite George Kapsanis relates how the sanctified eros can guide us to change our hearts and minds, describing repentance as 'a dynamic condition, a continuous progression towards the Lord … it is the pursuit of the Living God'. Uplifting and inspiring, these four talks by the late Abbot of the Holy Monastery of Gregoriou on Mt. Athos have the power to lead us to the realisation of the true purpose of human life. Archimandrite George speaks with direct and precise language of our most mysterious and profound desire and the means by which it may be satisfied. 'Therefore we understand this eros of the psyche, at its deepest level, to be the thirst for the depths of our own being. That thirst can only be slaked when we achieve the goal for which we were union with our Archetype, with God – what the Orthodox tradition calls theosis'. First published in 2000 and long out of print, this edition has been thoroughly revised by the monks of I.M. Gregoriou on Mt Athos and represents the definitive translation into English of the Abbot's original talks.

66 pages, Paperback

Published November 24, 2016

Reviews

[Joshua Finch]

I read this on the recommendation of a young priestmonk at a monastery in America. His description compared to the actual work is sort of like a Terrence Malick trailer compared to the film. He said something like this "You can't be merely following the rules. There has to be zeal. It has to mean something to you, to you in particular. This zeal or drive was called 'eros.' Eros begins and keeps an intimate relationship. And it does have something to do with the sexual drive, which in monastic life is redirected, toward repentence. So there's this book called 'Eros of Repentence'." The trailer is wonderous. But the film's good points are at best some of the parts of the trailer, divided up into its ponderous, thinly abstract length.

This work I wouldn't recommend even as an intro, just because there are better ones, by for example Met. Hierotheos Vlachos. But it could function as an intro to someone who has never heard of monasticism. But I doubt it would be better than the orthowiki or wikipedia - printed out and stapled. No one who has burning questions should read this.