It’s ironic that St Anthony — an otherwise-humble loner — is known today with the epithet “the Great.” He’s also known as St Anthony of the Desert, for reasons that will become clear. But whatever name one applies to him, Anthony played a pivotal role in early Christianity, having founded the Christian monastic movement. While he was not actually the first secluded ascetic — he himself claimed that was Paul the First Hermit — he was the one with the fame and reputation for sanctity that really launched monasticism.
As noted, Anthony did not invent monasticism per se. Ascetics had existed in the region, centuries before. They were a particular phenomenon of the Hellenic world; Pythagoras, for example, was the legendary founder of a movement whose members lived in ascetic colonies. Some Greek philosophical schools also lived in ascetic communes.
While their lifestyle details varied, they all lived in sparse conditions, with no luxuries, and ate restrictive diets (often vegetarian, sometimes limited to only a few items such as the proverbial bread and water). They emphasized study, meditation, and work — everyone contributed to the community’s needs. Many were self-sufficient, growing their own food, making their own tools, etc. Generally, they denied themselves any and all “creature comforts” so that they could focus on metaphysical, rather than physical, matters.
This philosophy reached into the cultures that Hellenism contacted. The Essenes of the Levant appear to have been a Judaic sect that espoused an ascetic lifestyle. The Therepeutae described by Philo of Alexandria were ascetic hermit-scholars who lived in the outskirts of Egyptian cities. It is this Egyptian hermit tradition that appears to have inspired Paul the Hermit and St Anthony.
Anthony was born around 250 CE into a family of means, but upon reaching adulthood and inheriting his parents’ fortune, he received a message from Christ, telling him to sell all he had and give the funds to the poor; he did so. Inspired by earlier Christian hermitic ascetics like Paul the Hermit, he settled, alone, in a cave to the west of Alexandria, then moved south, to an abandoned Roman fort overlooking the Nile. In both places, he was fed by the largesse of local villagers. Presumably, this means that the ascetic-hermit custom was something they’d been exposed to.
Before moving to the Roman fort, legend has it, Anthony was wracked by demons. Initially, this was by temptation (for example, visions of women), but later in the form of animals who physically attacked him. Villagers rescued the injured hermit and nursed him back to health. In the process, they grew fond of him and prized his wisdom. Upon his return to seclusion, they began coming more frequently to receive his teaching and counsel.
It was after this that he moved to the old Roman fort, which afforded him more privacy, but locals still aided him on occasion, throwing food over a wall. After many years, he emerged from seclusion; the villagers, who’d never actually seen him, had expected he’d be a virtual skeleton, since they were aware how little he’d been provided. But Anthony was actually hale and healthy, to their astonishment. He traveled to a handful of Christian communities to inspire them, then returned to the old fort.
Over time, drawn by stories that were by now being told about him throughout northern Egypt, visitors came calling. Over time he accumulated a group of fellow hermits who learned from him. Eventually, these visiting supplicants — who came from increasingly long distances, having heard his reputation for sanctity — interfered with his meditations. Ironically enough, Anthony had a restless mind, and these contacts proved to be a nagging distraction. He left, heading further east into the desert wilderness, eventually finding a small oasis and settling there. Only occasionally did he return to the old fort for brief visits with the small community he’d attracted to it.
During the persecution of Diocletian, Anthony decided to be martyred and headed for Alexandria. He visited Christian prisoners and preached publicly. Eventually, Anthony confronted the city’s governor and tried to antagonize him into ordering his execution, but the governor and his agents didn’t fall for it. He returned to the oasis, his mission thwarted.
During a vision, Anthony was inspired to wear a distinctive, plain tunic, and spend his idle time (which was considerable) weaving palm leaves. These became symbols by which he was known, and in fact, affected later monastic tradition, such as the common monk’s robe (even though it evolved beyond Anthony’s own simple tunic).
Ultimately, Anthony was never martyred as he’d wished to be. Instead, he simply gave up his own spirit — or so it was said — at the age of 105, having ordered that his body be buried in secret so that it wouldn’t be venerated.
Anthony’s visitors carried his ideas to other Christians around Egypt, and even beyond. It appears that, by the end of his life, Anthony had attracted a small community to the Roman fort he’d lived in for so many years. Near the end of his life they began adopting his lifestyle. After his death they occupied the oasis he’d found and eventually established a monastery, in his name, which still stands.
Anthony did not, himself, make any true effort to start an ascetic Christian movement (or any other kind of movement). His asceticism was deeply personal and individual. But others were inspired by him and they picked up where he left off, creating a movement inspired by him; among them were St Serapion, the closest thing to a disciple that the reclusive Anthony had, St Marcarius, and St Pachomius. Much later, his reputation would inspire figures such as St Benedict of Nursia, who’s generally credited with establishing Western Christian monasticism.
After Anthony, other Christians lived out hermitic lifestyles, and of course monastic communities sprouted up in many regions. But over time, Christians found ways to ramp up even the secluded and ascetic ways of Anthony and other monks and hermits.
St Simeon the Stylite was born near the end of the 4th century in Cilicia. A devout Christian, he’d wanted to live as a hermit, not unlike Anthony, but in a mountain crevice. That proved not to be far enough away from others, who visited him from time to time, so after a few years he left and found another place to live: On top of a ruined pillar in Telanissa, in modern Syria.
After some time, the 10-foot high pillar proved not tall enough, to keep people from bothering him, and he moved from ruin to ruin, until he ended up on top of a 50-foot-high pillar with a platform on top. Boys climbed the pillars he lived on and delivered food, on occasion.
He lived for decades on top of the pillar, fully exposed to the elements, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. He performed ritual calisthenics, for which he became famous. People still visited him — even more than had his first, shorter pillar — but they were less of a problem for his devotions, being 50 feet below. Eventually, he died on top of the pillar.
Later in the Middle Ages, an even more drastic form of hermitic devotion was followed: being permanently walled up in a cell (typically abutting a church or chapel) with only a hole through which the hermit was fed. Such persons are called “anchorites,” however this term applies to anyone who seeks seclusion as part of a religious devotion or calling. (So yes, Anthony and Simeon are also anchorites.)
One of these was an English priest, Wulfric of Haselbury, in the 12th century. Also, Hildegard of Bingen may have spent part of her career as a nun (the earliest part) as an anchorite; however, she must have been released, since she became mother superior of her convent and it relocated, under her leadership.
Fortunately, both of these practices have more or less disappeared. No major Christian sect is known to condone people living their lives on pillars or walled up, in the name of Jesus.
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