Before they were re-visioned as “seven deadly sins,” desert monastics of the fourth century imagined eight evil thoughts, or “calculating reasons” of the mind. These Christian ascetics fled to the deserts to practice a form of interior silence, or hesychia, that focused the mind, worked through the thoughts, and centered the monk in the heart. One of the most revered—and controversial—of these desert monastics was Evagrius of Pontus, a monk who arrived from Constantinople and become one of the most astute psychological theorists of early Christian monasticism. As part of his roadmap of the psyche, Evagrius developed a highly sophisticated demonology, which can be read as a type of proto-depth psychology.
This presentation introduces clinicians and practitioners to two seminal ascetic “psychologists” of the desert: Evagrius and John Cassian, and interprets the “eight thoughts” along Jungian (“complex”), Cognitive-Behavioral (“negative core beliefs”), and protector-persecutor (“self-care system”) models. Beyond the battle with the demons lay the potential for “purity of heart,” a form of peaceful interiority envisioned as the kingdom of heaven within.
