A spiritual man is the one who has acquired the Holy Spirit and become a temple of the Holy Spirit. “You are God’s temple, and God’s Spirit dwells in your midst.” (1 Cor. 3:16) You will know how to acquire the Holy Spirit: the Gospel and –in greater detail – the Holy Fathers speak about this.
I will mention the characteristic features of a spiritual man, as he was described by the Holy Fathers. A spiritual man is very different from a “sensual” and from “fleshly” man – the latter two are the same in essence. A spiritual man is the “new man,” whereas a sensual man is the “old man.” What “new” is there about the spiritual man? In fact, everything is new in him – his mind, heart, will, the whole of him, even the body.
The mind of the “new” or spiritual man is able to grasp distanced-off events of the past and many of those yet to come; he is able to see the essence of things, not only what they appear to be; to see the souls of people, angels and demons, as well as to comprehend a lot of what is belonging to the spiritual world – the other world. The spiritual man Apostle Paul says about spiritual people: “We have the mind of Christ.” (1 Cor.2:16)
The heart of the “new” man is able to “feel” conditions, which “no eye has seen, nor ear has heard, no have entered into the heart of man,” which is impossible for a soulful, fleshly “old man.” Perhaps, the word “feel” in this context is not quite correct. It would be better to say that the new man is able to experience and get cognition of things.
Such experiences… I’ve written the word and stopped. This word has a subjective implication, and, perhaps, it would be better to describe such condition as heart’s perception of the absolute blissfulness and ineffable joy that deeply affects man’s soul and overfills him with profound gratitude and love for God as the Source of this experience or condition, and gets him ready to endure any torments and sufferings for His sake – to reciprocate His love and to preserve these good gifts of God.
“What shall I return to the Lord for all His goodness to me?” The soul of the new man is also leaned to loving and thanking God and to seeking to fulfill God’s commandments instead of its own desires.
In other words, man, who has acquired the Holy Spirit, becomes completely renewed – in mind, heart and will.
The body of the new man also changes and becomes in some respect like the body of Adam before the fall – capable of spiritual perceptions and actions, such as walking on the water, staying without food for a long time, covering long distances at a fast speed, etc.
The condition of spirituality feels so good as to make Apostle Paul exclaim: “…the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” (Rom. 8:18) St. Seraphim, agreeing with the Early Fathers, in his turn, said that if a man had only known about that condition of blissfulness which also happens here on earth, but in a much greater degree in the future life, he would agree to live one thousand years in a pit, filled with creeps which would be gnawing his flesh, in order to experience this kind of blissfulness. This is what can be said in brief about the spiritual man and spirituality. In the sacraments of Baptism and Anointment, man pledges faithfulness to Christ and the Holy Spirit – he pledges to a life in Christ and in the Holy Spirit. It is man’s free will either to live in accordance with Gospel commandments and leaven himself with the leaven of the Kingdom of God and of the Holy Spirit and become the New Man, or to reject this possibility choosing the “old man’s” life.
The sensual (yucikoj) man “receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,” for “they are foolishness unto him.” (1 Cor. 2:14) We meet proofs to this at every step, because we ourselves are not spiritual, but sensual, still staying in the condition of the “old man.” We may at best realize what we are and try to become spiritual, but we do not try as hard as possible to achieve this goal. We also can highly appreciate spiritual people, but we are unable to understand and identify them, but acknowledging them as such, only because other people say they are, though mistakenly more often than not. The fleshly man is to be rated even lower than the sensual man. The definition of the “old man” fits both the former and the latter. Both are “old,” not yet renewed. However, the fleshly man is cruder than the sensual man, more materialistic; he has a weaker faith, if at all, in Jesus Christ; he has no idea about spiritual things.
Secular people – to use a new term standing for the “fleshly” and “sensual” people – attribute the “spiritual” definition to clergymen or sometime to anyone, who begins to do a little of the psalm-reading, go to church and read theological books. All said above proves them to be wrong. So also some books are called “spiritual” because they discuss spiritual questions, whereas in fact there are almost no books that would fit the “spiritual” quality. Only the Holy Scriptures and the works of the Holy Fathers are spiritual. Studying them, one can find out what the attribute “spiritual” implies. Compare the writings of Ignatius Brianchaninov to those of some professors of Theology. What a great difference! You know the difference only too well.
Here are more texts to prove the said: “These be they, who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit.” (Jude, 1:19)
“Such wisdom does not come down from heaven, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.” (Jam.3:15) In both cases the different words “sensual” and “unspiritual” are used in the meaning of the Greek “yucikoj.”
The Greek used “yuch” (psychic) in reference to the lower part of human soul that is similar to animal’s soul. The Greek words “noj” or “noaj” meaning “mind,” “reason” stand for the upper part of the soul.
In their writings, the Holy Fathers speak at length about spiritualty and about the deification of man, asserting that man becomes god by the gracious will of God. Their works also discuss man’s fleshly and sensual conditions.
It’s a pity that sensual and fleshly people have no taste for reading spiritual books. But when they do, only their mind is engaged in the reading leaving them cold and not satiated; and without comprehending what they are reading, give it up the reading and turn to Doctors of Theology, usually Protestant.
Please do not conclude from what I wrote that I have acquired knowledge about man’s spirituality through my own experience. No, this is not so. God, true to His word, offers a possibility for all seeking the truth, especially those at the very beginning of the way, to foretaste future good gifts in order to encourage them to go forward with the search. All involved in the search say so.
But unfortunately we, like dogs, return to our vomiting (see 2 Pet. 2:22) and lose heavenly gifts. To miss regretfully the lost paradise is what is left for at least some among the losers in a situation of the absence of deeds and efforts for retuning it. Here is yet another reason for weeping over our sinfulness and over betraying God by our doings…
Be healthy. May God save you from fleshly occupations and from the devil.
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