Notes for  12 July 2026

Some laws and prescriptions of the Torah can at first glance appear not only strange and paradoxical, but even plainly absurd. Indeed, everyone knows that in wartime everyone capable of bearing arms is treated with utmost strictness and given no indulgences. War is war, mobilization is mobilization, and during war it is necessarily universal; here no allowances are made for moral or psychological unreadiness. Any act of cowardice is regarded as desertion, with all the consequences that follow from it in wartime.

The Torah, meanwhile, prescribes something directly opposite: it requires that everyone who is "fearful in heart" have the opportunity calmly to leave the battlefield - to leave altogether, return home, and remain there until the end of the war, and without any punishment, even without any public reproach; the Torah by no means considers these people worthy of contempt.

What is this: pacifism? Clearly not: the matter is not a refusal of war, but only those who are weak for it. Weak above all spiritually: the expression "fearful in heart" means precisely this. And the matter is not necessarily fear and the cowardice that flows from it, although this is significant too: everyone who imagines what panic on the battlefield is knows perfectly well what the appearance of even one panicker in the ranks of fighters can lead to. But spiritual weakness can express itself differently as well: a person can simply become brutalized by war, turn into a killing machine, enter such a spiritual state that he begins to enjoy killing. And even if the matter concerns killing an armed enemy on the battlefield, such a spiritual state is still destructive for a person. Any war will end someday, but the habit of killing and, still worse, enjoying the fear that a person experiences before the face of inevitable death, will remain. And the former soldier will carry it home, into peaceful life. If so, then pacifism is better.

Can one be a pacifist before the face of an enemy during war? Perhaps, but not for very long. Or for long enough, but then already at someone else's expense - at the expense of those who reject pacifism and take up weapons in order to defend both themselves and those who cannot defend themselves, or do not want to, like the pacifists themselves. But if a person knows with certainty that war will break him, turning him not into a coward, no, but into a killing machine, if a person knows that he will not be able to remain human in war, then his pacifism is justified. To remain human before God is more important than to become a hero in the eyes of this world. In the end, God needs our heart, not our heroism.

Sometimes there is no strength to begin some task, no strength to reassess one's position - civic, religious, whatever it may be - and simply no strength to get up. There is no strength because we have spent it on something or because an illness torments us; it does not matter. Sin or sickness - does it matter? Perhaps sin, perhaps sickness. Often no line can be drawn between them.

We very much want this, we very much want clarity, but we do not have it - and we do not need it, for there is only good and evil, and only between them is a strict demarcation line needed. But there is no need to classify either one or the other. We will be told: we do not know whom to go to - a doctor or a priest. It is worth going to both, but it is important to remember: we are going to God so that He may heal us.

Today people speak much about cooperation between the priest and the psychologist. And this is good: the time of divergence between types of activity has passed, since a fundamental limit has been reached, and before us is a time when convergence slowly begins again. This will enrich everyone, for in every phenomenon of the visible world there is the imprint of the Creator - but it is revealed from different angles. To see here not a "flat" picture, but a "three-dimensional" one, costs great labor - but this labor is blessed

Among the parables about the Kingdom, the parables of the sower occupy a special place. In today's Gospel reading Jesus speaks of what prevents a person from entering the Kingdom. And the first obstacle on this path is the "road," the lack of attention to the words of the One who bears witness to the Kingdom (vv. 4, 19). It would seem that distraction is not characteristic of everyone. But in this case the matter is evidently attention of a special kind, that inner sensitivity which makes a person listen and stop before what he usually passes by without thinking.

In the Gospel period, words about the Kingdom and about the Messiah sounded often, and for many people, especially those living an intense religious life, they had probably already become somewhat stale. Perhaps this is precisely what moved Jesus to address the people in parables: such language always attracts attention, often forcing people to look at well-known and familiar things from an unexpected side, allowing them to see what would otherwise have remained unnoticed. But it is not enough merely to notice and turn; one must also remain faithful even when the enthusiasm of the newly converted passes and the world demands its own, so that the matter may even come to persecution (vv. 5-6, 20-21). Here feelings alone will not suffice, nor reason alone; faith not rooted in the will will hardly withstand strong external pressure, for feelings pass away and reason is pliable.

Yet there is something in the world more dangerous for spiritual life than pressure and even persecution, although compared with them this danger appears unserious: worldly cares and everyday bustle (vv. 7, 22). Can cares and bustle break those whom persecutions did not break?

But during persecutions the situation usually looks completely clear, and the will gathers itself into one by itself. Times of peace and quiet are another matter, when there seems to be no danger and one can relax, drifting with a current that promises no rapids or whirlpools ahead. Meanwhile everyday bustle quietly shifts attention to itself and, if one does not catch oneself in time, easily swallows a person whole, gradually forcing him, if not entirely to forget God and spiritual life, then at least to push them into the background. Only the one who can withstand both persecutions and everyday bustle becomes good soil that bears abundant spiritual fruit (vv. 8, 23).