From the World of Religion: SAINT ANTHONY
The origins of Christian monasticism have been traced to an Egyptian spiritual seeker who was to become St. Anthony (3rd – 4th century). He is said to have been so inspired by Mark’s statement: “”If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell all thou hast,” that he gave away to charity the home and all the possessions which he inherited from his wealthy father. His Feast Day is 17 January.
From teenage to thirty-five he tried to be a recluse, staying in a graveyard in Egypt, but there, wild beasts came and made life awful for Anthony. He interpreted this as the work of demons and withdrew to an abandoned fort. His persistent prayers were still thwarted by temptations.
Many great artists have depicted St. Anthony’s plight. The 15th century Dutch artist HieronymusBosch, whom Carl Jung described as “the master of the monstrous and the discoverer of the unconscious,” made a magnificent three-panel painting which depicts the mental and spiritual turmoil of St. Anthony most dramatically. One needs a magnifying glass to see all the details even in a large reproduction. It tellingly depicts the ancient world views of supernatural perturbations that stand in the way of ascetic discipline. The demonic creatures are poetic representations of distractions that pull us away from serious pursuits.
Anthony advised his disciples to be firm to the demons that come at night, and to tell them unequivocally, “We are angels.” For, it is by affirming emphatically our innate goodness that we can resist our proclivity for doing harm. He spent many years in seclusion, Gautama Buddha- like, on the sparse sustenance which people brought him from time to time.
In the Christian tradition, Saint Anthony is believed to have been one of the first to introduce monastic living in the spiritual quest. Hence, he is regarded as the Father of Cenobites (monastery-dwellers). After establishing a couple of monasteries, he went to Alexandria to preach and to combat the doctrine of Arianism: the heretical teaching of Arius by which Christ was a demigod rather than the Son of God.
It was Saint Anthony who buried Saint Paul the Hermit, for which reason he is regarded as the patron saint of gravediggers.
There is also a famous depiction of a bearded St. Anthony with a halo round his head in which he is standing with a tall cross. There is a pig near him, as also a dog and a hen. According to one legend, he used to treat skin infections with pork fat. Hence the association of pigs with this saint.
Cardinal Newman who wrote on Church Fathers, had this to say about Saint Anthony: “His doctrine surely was pure and unimpeachable; and his temper high and heavenly, without cowardice, without gloom, without formality, without self-complacency. Superstition is abject and crouching, it is full of thoughts of guilt; it distrusts God and dreads the powers of evil. Anthony at least had nothing of this.”
Spurts of Thought 