Useful Servanthood introduces English-speaking readers to Abba Ammonas, disciple and successor of Saint Antony of the Desert and a prominent figure of fourth-century Egyptian monasticism. As a director of souls, Ammonas's approach to spiritual formation was a creative example of the spiritual gift of discernment. By examining Ammonas's writings and his ecclesial and political milieus, Dr. McNary-Zak shows how discernment functioned both in the abba-disciple relationship of the desert monks and in the life of the wider Christian community. Thus, Ammonas serves as a model for spiritual directors of the twenty-first century. The second part of the book makes available for the first time in English the entire Greek corpus of Abba Ammonas's writings. Bernadette McNary-Zak, PhD, is associate professor of religious studies at Rhodes College, Memphis, Tennessee, where she teaches courses in early Christian literature and in the humanities program. Nada Conic was trained as a classicist at the University of Toronto and has taught Ancient Greek language and literature there and at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. Brother Lawrence Morey, OCSO, is a monk of Gethsemani Abbey, Kentucky. Richard Upsher Smith, Jr., earned an MDiv from Harvard Divinity School in 1982, and a PhD in Classics from Dalhousie University in 1991. He currently teaches Classics at Franciscan University of Steubenville where he is also chairman of the Department of Classics. Dr. Smith has published scholarly articles on Classical, Medieval, and Reformation subjects, as well popular essays on theological topics. He is married with twin sons and one grandson.

`Give me a word, Father', visitors to early desert monks asked. The responses of these pioneer ascetics were remembered and in the fourth century written down in Coptic, Syriac, Greek, and later Latin. Their Sayings were collected, in this case in the alphabetical order of the monks and nuns who uttered them, and read by generations of Christians as life-giving words that would help readers along the path to salvation.

Letter collections in late antiquity give witness to the flourishing of letter-writing, with the development of the mostly formulaic exchanges between elites of the Graeco-Roman world to a more wide-ranging correspondence by bishops and monks, as well as emperors and Gothic kings. The contributors to this volume study individual collections from the first to sixth centuries CE, ranging from the Pauline and Deutero-Pauline letters through monastic letters from Egypt, bishops' letter collections and early papal collections compiled for various purposes. This is the first multi-authored study of New Testament and late antique letter collections, crossing the traditional divide between these disciplines by focusing on Latin, Greek, Coptic and Syriac epistolary sources. It draws together leading scholars in the field of late antique epistolography from Australasia, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

This book is based on my doctoral thesis, entitled The Actualisation of the Hypostatic Principle in the Theology of Archimandrite Sophrony, which was submitted at the Faculty of Theology of the University of Thessalonica in 1998. I have wanted since then to proceed to a more complete presentation of Fr Sophrony’s teaching. Perhaps even now I have not succeeded fully in this aim, but I have tried at least to set out the basic themes of his theology. I alone am responsible for any imperfections or omissions apparent in this book. For whatever good it may contain, the praise belongs to my ever-memorable Staretz, who is my life’s greatest benefactor. Above all, it is to our Lord Jesus Christ, who manifested to us in its perfection the Pattern, the Model, the Length, and Depth, and Height, of the Person of the Father, that glory is due unto all ages. Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou

`Give me a word, Father', visitors to early desert monks asked. The responses of these pioneer ascetics were remembered and in the fourth century written down in Coptic, Syriac, Greek, and later Latin. TheirSayings were collected, in this case in the alphabetical order of the monks and nuns who uttered them, and read by generations of Christians as life-giving words that would help readers along the path to salvation.

The Sayings and Stories of the Desert Fathers and Mothers offers a new translation of the Greek alphabetical Apophthegmata Patrum, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers. For the first time in an English translation, this volume provides: • extensive background and contextual notes • significant variant readings in the alphabetical manuscripts and textual differences vis-à-vis the systematic and anonymous Apophthegmata • reference notes to both quotations from Scriptures and the many allusions to Scripture in the sayings and stories. In addition, there is an extensive glossary that offers information and further resources on people, places, and significant monastic vocabulary. Perfect for students and enthusiasts of the desert tradition.