The
Friends of Mount Athos Book Reviews
©
2003
Messages from the Holy Mountain: Illuminating Discussion-reviews of Twenty Recent Edifying Works Authored by Monks of Athos. By Contantine Cavarnos. Belmont, MA: Institute for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, 2002. 158 pages. Price p/b £9.95. ISBN 1-884729-70-3.
Constantine Cavarnos is a Greek-American academic who has been visiting the Holy Mountain for more than half a century. He is the author of many books, two of which are specifically concerned with Athos: Anchored in God (Athens, 1959) and The Holy Mountain (Belmont, MA, 1973). The latter was the first book written in English to report the change of management at Stavronikita in 1968 heralding the renewal that was in the course of the next quarter-century to overtake the whole Mountain. Both books are still in print and are worth reading, even if they are little more than accounts of the authorÕs travels.
His new book is, as the subtitle makes clear, a collection of reviews of books written (or partly written) by Athonite monks and published between 1951 and 2000. Its chief value is to provide summaries in English of works that are not easily obtained and are mostly written in Greek. The titles reviewed are as follows:
Anthimos Hagiannanitis, Hieromonk, Saint Anna: The Sacred Tribune of Athos (in Greek). Athens, 1986.
Dionysios Hagiartemitis, Hieromonk, Akolouthia of the Supplicatory Canon to the All-glorious Mother of the Theotokos, Saint Anna (in Greek). Athens, 1989.
Ephraim, Archimandrite, ed., Holy Monastery of Philotheou (in Greek). Mount Athos, 1990.
George Kapsanis, Archimandrite, Abbot of the Monastery of Gregoriou, The Theological Testimony of the Holy Mountain (in Greek). Athens, 1981.
¾¾ Orthodoxy and Humanism, Orthodoxy and Papism (in Greek). Mount Athos, 1995.
¾¾ Saint Gregory Palamas, Teacher of Theosis (in Greek). Mount Athos, 2000.
Herouvim, Hieromonk, of the Skete of St Anna, The Salutations of the All-Holy Virgin (in Greek). Mount Athos, 1991.
Moysis, Monk, Hagiorite, The Holy Mountain, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow (in Greek). Athens, 1984.
¾¾ Hagiorite Stories of Elder Joachim (in Greek). Thessaloniki, 1989.
¾¾ Askesis and Serenity (in Greek). Athens, 1993.
¾¾ Athonite Flowers, translated from the Greek by Fr Peter A. Chamberas. Brookline, MA, 2000.
Nikon, Hermit Priest-Monk, author of the Foreword of Writings from the Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart, translated from the Russian by E. Kadloubovsky and G.E.H. Palmer. London, 1951.
Paisios, Monk, Hagiorite, Father Arsenios the Cappadocian (in Greek). Thessaloniki, 1975.
¾¾ Elder Hatzi-Georges the Athonite (in Greek). Thessaloniki, 1986.
Theocletos, Monk, Dionysiatis, Between Heaven and Earth: Hagioritic Monasticism (in Greek). Athens, 1956.
¾¾ Saint Nicodemos the Hagiorite: His Life and Works, 1749-1809 (in Greek). Athens, 1959.
Theodoretos, Monk, Hagiorite, Avvakum the Barefoot, 1894-1978 (in Greek). Athens, 1985.
Theodosios, Monk of the Monastery of St Paul, A Defense of Monasticism (in Greek). Thessaloniki, 1976.
Vasilios Gontikakis, Archimandrite, ed., The Holy Mountain and the Education of the Greek People: A Text of the Holy Community of the Holy Mountain (in Greek). Mount Athos, 1984.
Xeropotamou, Monastery of, Miracle-Working Icons of the Panagia at Athos (in Greek). Mount Athos, 1985.
GRAHAM SPEAKE