The Ten Virtues

Real healing of the broken person happens when the virtues are courageously embraced and applied in every aspect of one’s life. If we distill the long list of virtues down, we come up with a manageable list that would include: Wisdom, love, humility (meekness), patience (diligence), faith, hope, self-control (temperance), honesty, kindness (generosity), and gratitude (contentment). The basis of this list is essentially what St. Paul called the fruits of the spirit, which was expanded upon over time by Church teachers. When one tries to apply these in all interactions throughout the day, along with all thoughts and feelings, one can transform oneself and even the world around them. All anxiety, sadness, anger, fear, grudges, resentments, and lusts are slowly destroyed. In this process, God reveals Himself and makes His home in the soul. 

Wisdom

The combination of knowledge and good judgement (virtuous thinking) can be called wisdom. This virtue avoids operating out of emotions or feelings, but is grounded in seeing all things with clarity and truth. Those who are not interested in wisdom live a haphazard life following all whims, desires and fantasies, wallowing in ignorance. The phrase, “ignorance is bliss” is flatly untrue. The one seeking wisdom in life is seeking a deeper meaning and understanding, which can produce a profound understanding of purpose. When we understand our purpose, wisdom can come naturally. With wisdom, everything in life, including times of difficulty and suffering, and times of calm and joy, can be processed and understood, and therefore fully embraced and lived.

Love

Love is born of wisdom. It is the pinnacle and summit of the virtues; after all it is the key to all human experience and to God. Love is that one thing that all of us long for, and it is the one virtue that can heal all wounds, resolve all differences, and can even sanctify a person. 

The depths of love can be hard for modern man to comprehend because, tragically, we have relegated love to a feeling. Since feelings are fleeting and are always changing, our concept of love is not stable. Real love is much deeper as it is an action of the soul; an act of the will that finds its power in the heart. Love becomes something much greater than a feeling. It becomes sacrificial and unstoppable. 

Jesus Christ placed love at the center of all things when he said: 

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these. (Mark 12:30) 

St. Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians provided us with one of the greatest explanations of love:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.

Love is not an easy thing to practice as it requires much of us. It asks that we never judge, gossip or speak negatively of others, and it requires us to unwaveringly forgive others when they hurt us. The hardest commission of love is to choose to love one’s enemies. This teaching of Christ is hard for most to accept and put into practice. It seems almost against our nature to respond to wounds from others with forgiveness and Love. The reason behind this is simple. Hatred and anger only exacerbate the hurt and suffering in both the deliverer and the recipient of the offense, while a response of this higher form of transcendent self-sacrificial compassion has the uncanny power of dispelling the hurt and suffering in both parties. Love conquers all.

Humility

Next to love, humility is the greatest of virtues. The word humility comes from the Latin word humus which means “earth” or “from the earth”. Therefore, humility a disposition that understands that we not only come from the earth, but this is where we will return. In light of this, humility is letting go of oneself and fully embracing God. 

Learning humility can be very challenging as it requires an all-out war with self-centeredness and pride, which is stubborn in us, and is very hard to see. It’s like fighting with the air, or like fighting in the pitch black of night, as your enemy is not only unseen, but we often don’t believe he exists within us. St John Climacus says, “Repentance lifts a man up. Mourning knocks at heaven’s gate. Holy humility opens it.” Here he stresses the importance of humility. 

Without humility love can become a self-serving illusion and all the other virtues have no foundation. Without humility we are unable to obtain knowledge and therefore acquiring wisdom is impossible. humility provides one with true, meaningful and peaceful consolation. It provides total interior freedom. The person who has obtained some assemblance of humility is not shaken by anything that people or life throws at him.

This virtue is learned by way of trials, afflictions and even temptations. These are the teachers of humility. Through suffering we learn that we are absolutely helpless without God and learn to let His grace and providence guide us. Through temptations we can see our weeknesses so do the necessary work to grown in godliness.

Patience

The virtue of patience is necessary as it can proceed many of the other virtues. Afterall, without patience we can easily give up, concede defeat, surrender to the enemy, forfeit everything, and become a prisoner of our own war. Along with spiritual warfare, this virtue can be applied to many aspects of our life such as relationships, with our daily labors, with hardships and suffering that visit us, and with all the ups and downs of life. We especially must apply patience with ourselves. 

St Augustine linked this virtue with wisdom: “Patience is the companion of wisdom.” Without patience wisdom is lost as all the passions swiftly rush in. The impatient person is quick to anger, quick to dejection, and quick to despair. In unseen warfare, patience is the starting block.

The Church Fathers often refer to this virtue as “patient endurance,” which is a key component to success in the spiritual life. Progress in the spiritual life is never quick, but requires patient endurance. This is famously expressed in the fable, The Tortoise and the Hare, written by ancient Greek writer Aesop († BC 564): “Slow and steady wins the race.” In unseen warfare, patient endurance is a commitment to persevering to the end; that is unto death.

Faith:

The first conclusion in the spiritual life must be one of faith. Faith is a deliberate movement of the intellect, and for this reason it is the first virtue necessary for union with God. “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1), but as faith develops in a person it can mature into knowledge.  St. Maxumus the Confessor:

To the devout believer God gives something more sure than any proof: the recognition and the faith that He substantively is. Faith is true knowledge, the principles of which are beyond rational demonstration; for faith makes real for us things beyond intellect and reason.

Faith is “the door to mysteries,” as St Isaac said, and faith is the opening of the sky to all possibilities. When faith has nested in the soul, the possibilities of God’s workings in one’s life are limitless. Initially it may seem that, faith is a steeping off the edge of a cliff, but this is the miracle it contains. Once the mind and heart are no longer confined or limited by fear and rationality, God rushes in and floods the soul with grace power. What was before limited by the bodily senses is then transformed so the person can be governed by the Holy Spirit. 

Faith may start as a decision of the intellect, but in time it becomes a way of life—a way of viewing and operating in the world as an agent of God and His will.  

Hope

The natural outcome of faith is hope. When cultivated, this virtue is a light for one’s path through this vail of shadows. In warfare the fighter must relentlessly strive for hope in all things, no matter the circumstance. 

There are two kinds of hope; there is a hope in things of this world and there is a hope in God and the eternal. St. Isaac the Syrian:

There is a hope in God that comes through the faith of the heart, which is good, and which one possesses with discernment and knowledge. And there is another, a false hope, which is distorted and which derives its existence from folly.

Obviously hope in things of this temporal life is a vain and limited exercise in disappointment. The hope that we place in God is enduring and limitless. This hope will be accompanied by trials, but hope and trust in Gods providence can make even the greatest suffering something to pass through, given the context of eternity in His presence. Hope in God and the bigger picture of things is a great strength.

The opposite of hope is not an option. Despondency can lead to despair, and despair is the enemy of salvation. It is the one passion that can fully undermine and vanquish the fighter in the spiritual life. Hope is the antidote to fear and depression, and is the vanquisher of despair. When all the other virtues seem to be hard to maintain, hope can be the one lifeline that keeps the struggler from fully surrendering. At the end of this lifeline is the hand holding the rope, and this is the hand of the Lord, which is always ready to pull one up to safety and consolation.

Self-Control

All the virtues are necessary, but self-control is a defining characteristic of the spiritual fighter. In this modern era this virtue is not very popular. Love of pleasure and excess has largely replaced it. Yes, most sane people are exercising some form of self-control so as to participate in society. However, in the context of spiritual growth through unseen warfare, a greater level of intentional self-control is needed. The war that we must wage to make progress in this virtue is intense. Some believe when Jesus said, “the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force’, he was referring to the fight that we must undertake in the battle for self-mastery.

When talking about this virtue we are expressly talking about a person’s appetites and desires, some of which come from the soul and some from the soul. Where self-control is not practiced, and a person becomes accustomed to habits of self-indulgence; a person becomes subservient to his desires, whims, thoughts and feelings. The end result is slavery to many or all of the passions. As Pythagoras said, “No man is free who cannot control himself.”

This virtue starts with self-examination and ends with changing the way we think and behave. Upon honest self-examination the one glaringly obvious thing we will notice is that we are often not fully in control of many of our desires and thoughts. This realization can be scary, however, every area where we are not exhibiting self-control should viewed as opportunities for growth.

With all the passions we must implement the remedy of self-control and temperance. The scriptures say of the person who is doing this inner work: “And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.” (I Cor 9:25). The Church Fathers found value in the ancient Philosophers on this matter as they were great proponents of temperance. It is said that engraved on the façade of the Oracle of Apollo in Delphi was the short maxim: “Nothing in Excess”.

This virtue takes time to notice progress because we are all cemented in our thoughts and behaviors by the time we are young adults. We will need to lean on the virtue of patience as self-discipline and self-mastery is a life-long endeavor that requires struggle until one’s death. 

Honesty

Without the virtue of honesty, it is impossible to make progress in the spiritual life. This virtue can also be called truth, and truth is natural to a healthy soul and a well-formed intellect. Honesty builds trust, and trust provides safety, and this helps the struggler to be contrite, which results in self-awareness which leads to repentance and inner transformation. The habit or practice honesty is required to see clearly one’s own faults so as to be able to do the necessary spiritual work. 

Deception, lies and secrets undermine everything and present the great and horrible risk of self-deception. When lies are allowed to develop into habit, a false edifice is constructed in the intellect (in thinking), making it hard to see what is truth and what is fiction. This can result in spiritual delusion which can be catastrophic. 

In addition to hurting others, habits of lying always cause harm to the deceiver. The liar is a fool who wanders through the jungle of his own broken thoughts, constantly being pursued by a two-headed tiger. The beast always catches up, and both the lie and the truth always come back to bite him.

Honesty starts with the cardinal virtue of courage. One must be brave to be willing to search and see what is true inside one’s soul and to choose to be honest first to oneself. This virtue starts with converting the little lies we tell ourselves into honest thoughts. This will result in honest statements from the mouth. Overtime, honesty provides the soul relief as lies make a person restless and uneasy, for fear that one’s lies will be discovered. As Jesus said, “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Here He is clearly and simply proclaiming the correlation in honesty and freedom. 

When a person practices this virtue on a regular basis, trust is earned and one is known as a person of truth. Once these habits are formed, greater divine truths will be revealed and truly understood.

Kindness

If the world needed more of one thing, it would be kindness and generosity. Just as bitterness and negativity are contagious, so too is kindness. This virtue proceeds from the soul of a person who has made progress in the aforementioned virtues of love, patience, and humility.

Kindness is a disposition that requires much work, as the world around us often does not seem so kind. In a spirit of optimism and the belief in the potential goodness of everyone, the kind person does not care to see the defects of others. In all interactions, the kind person can’t help but default to a positive outlook, and so kills with kindness the demons of negativity. 

It has been said that, even if one is a slave to many of the passions, there is much hope for the person who can persevere in kindness and gratitude. 

Gratitude

The disposition that is needed for progress in personal contentment is gratitude. Along with improving one’s own life, this virtue can also transform the lives of those around you. Thankfulness drives out sadness, decreases anxiety, and makes the day brighter. It is the manifestation of hope, and the result of faith. 

Gratitude doesn’t end with being thankful for the many blessings we enjoy, such as that which is found in the natural world, with friends and family, with successes and even with the good circumstances that come our way. The effects of gratitude are on full display when it is present within us when things don’t go our way. When our wants and desires are not met and we still chose to thank God for even the smallest of blessing, the power of gratefulness pierces through the veil of this world and provides purpose and peace. Gratitude is deepened by trials and difficulties, and results in the power of God in our lives. 

The absence of gratitude in the face of trials and suffering can lead to resentments, bitterness, anger and hopelessness, which can lead to dejection and depression. In addition, thanklessness can lead to envy and jealousy because we tell ourselves that our life’s blessings are not enough. Then when good things do visit us, we cannot see them and persist in our ingratitude. We then grumble and remain thoroughly dissatisfied and unhappy, and this is of our own design. 

Anyone who has made progress in the virtue of gratitude knows the great power it provides the soul, for it both it is both nourishes and sustains a person through times of grace and times of suffering. It is the calm in the storm, peace in the face of chaos, it is the sun shining brightly on a cloudy day.