Letter 267: Theodore Studite, Letter 267; Greek heading: Ἰγνατίῳ ἐπισκόπῳ Μιλήτου.

Because I did not know exactly the place of exile of your paternal holiness, I have not been counted worthy to write to you until the present moment, although I had the desire to do so and was distressed in spirit on this very account. But just now, when our brother Dionysius arrived from those parts and reported to us that he had both seen your holiness and held converse with it in our nothingness [i.e., spoken of our lowly selves], and what and what manner of place it is that holds you, then we, the humble ones, rejoiced with joy and have gladly traced out this letter. For we, most honored one, have long been held captive by your love, and we revere you not only as an acquaintance and one of like habit [a fellow monk], but indeed also as a confessor of Christ, for whom and on account of whom comes the persecution and the banishment. But thanks be to the Lord, who has made you known in the present time as a pillar and bulwark of the truth, not shaken by the assaults of the adversaries, but preserving the mystery of piety unadulterated in the might of the Holy Spirit. For surely you have come to know how many and how great are those who, by reason of my sins, have stumbled; over whom who would not groan a tear? And indeed over the man of Medikion [the monastery of Medikion], who was carried off by the party of Joseph into impiety against Christ for the sake of dispensation [oikonomia: a relaxation of strictness justified as a concession]. But this, O man taught of God, is utterly discordant and out of place; for if anyone does evil under the pretext of good, he works the sin doubly, in that he both does what is not good and uses, as it were as a screen, the name of the good—this is a saying of the divine Basil [Basil of Caesarea]. So then those men, in addition to their own fall, became a stumbling-block to many others; except that the man of Medikion, having recognized his defeat, has both confessed that he stumbled and has repented exceedingly, as I have learned, and on this account he went off into flight, leaving behind a very great proof of repentance and benefit to his own disciples and to those who are right-minded. But there stand firm, fixed fast by the grace of Christ, among the bishops those who have contended of old in the Lord; among the abbots, the abbot of Kathara, of Pikridion, of Paulopetrion, of Agros, the abbot of Dalmatos, Macarius of Pelekete. Pray therefore, O most longed-for father, for the peace of the Church, and then also for me the sinner and the least, that together with you the holy fathers I may attain to God, being deemed worthy to walk behind you.