Philokalia of the Holy Neptic Fathers
A Greek anthology of ascetic writers, opening with Antony the Great, printed at Venice in 1782. Its preface sets out why the texts were gathered and commends the unceasing prayer of the heart to all Christians.
Read the text at archive.org ↗Record of a copy of the first edition, Venice 1782 (Onassis Library, via SearchCulture.gr) ↗
The Philokalia (“love of the beautiful”) gathers writings on watchfulness, the guarding of the mind and inner prayer, each author introduced by a short life. Its first edition was printed at Venice by Antonio Bortoli in 1782; the Onassis Library’s catalogue record of a copy names Nicodemus the Hagiorite and Macarius Notaras as its authors. The preface carries no signature in the Athens reprint. It names John Mavrogordatos as the man who paid for the printing.
The preface is the compilers’ own statement of purpose and is cited as such in the Philokalia Is Published. It says nothing of how the collection was assembled; for that a contemporary witness is a letter of Paisius Velichkovsky in Life and Writings of the Moldavian Elder Paisius Velichkovsky. The part played by Nicodemus the Hagiorite is stated in the dedication that the Athens publisher added in 1893, more than a century after the event.
Cited in
- 1782, firm date