The archetypal dimension of Job's paradigm, reflected in the ascetic life of St. Sophrony and St. Joseph the Hesychast

A phenomenological look at the reality of suffering

Abstract

In this analysis we start from the paradigm of Righteous Job's suffering, recapitulating the most important elements of the ordeal he went through: the loss of wealth, children and health. From the fact that suffering is an inescapable reality in human existence, the idea emerges that the suffering of the righteous Job is not an isolated case, but an archetypal one. For this reason, the assumption of Righteous Job becomes a guiding light. Since the focus of the research falls on the relationship between asceticism and suffering, we have further addressed this relationship in regard to two great ascetics, St. Sophrony of Essex and St. Joseph the Hesychast. To St. Sophrony, suffering comes in the second age of the spiritual life, when pedagogical abandonment on the part of God occurs. The suffering caused by abandoning grace is a preparatory stage for reaching the spiritual feeling of God. St. Joseph does not speak of abandonment, but of the withdrawal of God's grace, which is in fact a reality similar to abandonment. Suffering is seen by St. Joseph as superior to asceticism, because it presupposes the acceptance of what is very uncomfortable for us, implies the martyric patience of temptations or diseases, with a greater cleansing effect on the needy. Patience involves the denial of one's own will, the crucifixion of selfishness and passions. In the final part, I made a brief phenomenological assessment of the reality of suffering from the perspective of Jean Luc Marion's thought.