Three Kinds of Souls

According to the statements of Scripture there are three kinds of souls: the first is the carnal, the second the natural, and the third the spiritual. We find them described this way by the apostle. Of the carnal he says: “I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you were not yet able to take it. And even now you are not able, for you are still carnal.” And again: “For since there is envy and strife among you, are you not carnal?” Of the natural he speaks as follows: “But the natural man does not perceive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him.” And of the spiritual: “But the spiritual man judges all things, and he himself is judged by no one.” And again: “You who are spiritual, instruct such people in a spirit of gentleness.” [a]

And so, though at our renunciation we ceased to be carnal—that is, we began to separate ourselves from dealings with people in the world and to have nothing to do with open defilement of the flesh—we must still take care to strive with all our might to reach a spiritual state without delay. Otherwise we may flatter ourselves that, because outwardly we seem to have renounced this world and got rid of the defilement of fleshly sexual immorality, we have by this reached the heights of perfection. Then we would become careless and indifferent about purifying ourselves from our other passions, and so, held back between these two, we would be unable to reach the stage of spiritual progress. This could happen either because we think it quite enough for our perfection that we seem, as far as the outward man is concerned, to have separated ourselves from dealings with this world and from its pleasures, or because we are free from corruption and from intercourse of the flesh. And so we find ourselves in that lukewarm state which is counted the worst of all, and discover that we are spat out of the mouth of the Lord, according to these words of his: “I wish you were hot or cold. But now you are lukewarm, and I will begin to spit you out of my mouth.”

And not without good reason does the Lord declare that those whom he had first taken into the depths of his love, and who have become shamefully lukewarm, will be spat out and cast from his bosom. For though they might have given him some wholesome nourishment, they chose to be torn away from his heart. In this they became far worse than those who had never found their way into the Lord’s mouth as food at all, just as we turn away in loathing from what nausea forces us to bring up. For whatever is cold is warmed when it is taken into the mouth, and is received with satisfaction and to good effect. But whatever has once been rejected because of its miserable lukewarmness, we cannot even look at from a distance—I will not say touch with our lips—without the greatest disgust.

Rightly, then, is he said to be worse. For the carnal man, that is, the worldly man and the pagan, is more readily brought to saving conversion and to the heights of perfection than one who has been professed as a monk but has not laid hold of the way of perfection as his rule directs, and so has once for all drawn back from that fire of spiritual fervor. For the former is at last broken down by the sins of the flesh and acknowledges his uncleanness, and in his heartfelt sorrow he hurries from the defilement of the flesh to the fountain of true cleansing and to the heights of perfection. Horrified at the cold state of unbelief in which he finds himself, he is set on fire with the fire of the spirit and flies all the more readily to perfection. But take one who has, as we said, once started with a lukewarm beginning, and has begun to misuse the name of monk, and has not laid hold of the way of this profession with the humility and fervor he ought. Once he is infected by this miserable plague and, as it were, unstrung by it, he can no longer discern for himself what is perfect, or learn from another’s warnings. For he says in his heart what the Lord tells us: “Because I am rich and wealthy and need nothing.” And so what follows is at once applied to him: “But you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.” He is in a worse condition than a worldly man to this extent: he has no idea that he is wretched or blind or naked, or that he needs cleansing, or that he needs anyone to guide and teach him. And for this reason he accepts no sound advice, since he does not realize that he is weighed down by the name of monk and lowered in everyone’s judgment; for though everyone believes him to be a saint and regards him as a servant of God, he must hereafter be subjected to a stricter judgment and punishment.

Finally, why should we linger any longer over things we have sufficiently discovered and proved by experience? We have often seen cold and carnal men, that is, worldly men and pagans, reach spiritual warmth; but the lukewarm and “natural,” never. And we read in the prophet that these too are hated by the Lord, so much that spiritual and learned men are charged to stop warning and teaching them, and not to sow the seed of the life-giving word in ground that is barren and unfruitful and choked by harmful thorns. Rather, they should scorn this and cultivate fallow ground instead: that is, they should transfer all their care and teaching, and their zeal for the life-giving word, to pagans and worldly men. For so we read: “Thus says the Lord to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns.”