Mental Disorders and Spiritual Healing
by Jean-Claude Larchet reviewed by Eighth Day Books
Feast of St Crescens the Martyr; Holy Wednesday in East
Anno Domini 2020, April 15
Mental Disorders and Spiritual Healing: Teachings from the Early Christian East
by Jean-Claude Larchet
This might be the book you expected to find between the covers of Metropolitan Hierotheos’s Orthodox Psychotherapy. No doubt both books are discussions in concert with the Church Fathers concerning the healing of the soul; but while Orthodox Psychotherapy
focuses on the systematic application of the teachings of the Philokalia, Jean-Claude Larchet’s Mental Disorders
addresses the anthropological background, diagnoses, and treatment of mental illness as addressed in the teachings of the early Christian East more broadly read. Larchet stresses that while the Fathers were not overly preoccupied with this subject, the source material available to modern scholars offers a variety of resources for current practice based on the Orthodox conception of the person (body, psyche, and spirit) and the fundamentally Christian values of solicitude, respect, and integration of the mentally ill within communal life. He points out that the Fathers recognized three main origins of mental illness – somatic (or organic), demonic, and spiritual (defined as one of the passions developed to the extreme) – and he introduces a fourth unlikely and surprising category to their discussion, the fool for Christ. Juxtaposing this “folly simulated for spiritual ends” with authentic forms of madness, Larchet helpfully presents the attitude of the great saints toward “fools” (in terms of charity and social acceptance) as well as helps us understand an extinct and often misunderstood species of ascetic.
172 pp. paper $21.95
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