Certainly, a unified picture of Byzantine ethics throughout 12 centuries is misleading; the same is true for a dualaspect approach that distinguishes sharply between an ascetic and a ‘‘humanistic’’ current. There are differences and tensions between monks, clergymen, and intellectuals; they depend on many factors, like the writers’ intellectual and religious background and milieu, their apprehension of ecclesiastical and historical realities, and their intended audience. The texts produced mostly in Constantinople, in monastic circles or in the imperial court and addressed to the Emperor, monks, intellectuals, laypersons, or ordinary people.
Secular ethics as such could not exist in Byzantium and the superiority of ‘‘extreme philosophy,’’ that is, ascetic morality, is stressed in many Patristic texts. We can discern two aspects of religious ideal behavior, the ascetic ideal (the mortification of the flesh and the life of a hermit) and the monastic ideal (the virtue of humility and the communal life). The majority of early theological literature and treatises like On Virginity emphasized these ideals. The same line of thought continued in early Byzantium with Maximus the Confessor’s various Chapters, John of Climacus’ Heavenly Ladder; later with topically arranged florilegia like John of Damascus’ Sacra Parallela; and, finally, with Symeon’s the New Theologian Ethics and Catecheses, Nicetas Stethatos’ Three Hundred Practical Chapters (on the purification of the intellect, on love, and on the perfection of life), and the Hesychastic movement with Gregory Palamas. Nicholas Kabasilas’ On the Life in Christ is a landmark in Byzantine spirituality. Although this rigorous discipline was addressed mainly to monks, it played a decisive role in the formation of Byzantine ethics.
A few reactions against the unqualified acceptance of these ideals were noted; intellectuals such as Bishop Eustathios of Thessalonike (twelfth century) praised also virtuous married people and Plethon attacked Christian monasticism in general. There are also moderate views that are not antireligious but relatively independent from the Orthodox learning and influenced by Greek philosophy (Psellos, Metochites’ Ethical Discourse). Subversive texts like the Lifes of Fools in Christ (St. Symeon, St. Andrew) and the Didactic Admonitions (known as Spaneas) or the idiosyncratic case of anti-Christian ethics (Plethon). The primacy of religious ethics did not prevent several forms of secular ideals of behavior to emerge in texts of Psellos, Kekaumenos, or Eustathios concerning family and women, the moderate enjoyment of life, the knightly ideal, etc. The optimistic view trusted God, no matter how weak human nature was considered to be, but many intellectuals held a pessimistic attitude - especially in the Empire’s hard times - and were reluctant to endorse Christian virtues without qualification, while expressing a feeling of vanity not calmed by the acknowledgment of God’s providence.
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