Religiously motivated silence: opportunities for sociological study

The article explores the possibilities of studying silence in a religious context as a social practice included in the continuum of everyday actions of a monk. Understood in such a “down-to-earth”, literal sense, this type of silence can be studied through the methods of participant observation, interviews, and through the analysis of monastery charters and other relevant documents. The Christian practices of silence discussed in the article differ from other “everyday silence” in that they have not only microsociological, but also well-recognized religious, extra-ordinary meaning. The specificity of religiously motivated silence and the discourse in which it exists obliges us to recognize that silence, at least in the minds of practitioners, is divided into “external” — following the norms of silence established in the monastery — and “internal” — the internalized need for silence for one’s own realization in spiritual work. Achieving “inner” silence is the goal of all speech restrictions prescribed in the charter or operating in the monastery tacitly. Despite the need for solitary communication with God, monks most often do not live alone, but form a community. In organizing such a “silent” community, the separation of “external” restrictions and “internal” work plays a special role. Silence, together with “leaving the world”, refusal from society and communication, plays a socializing role for the monk, strengthens and accelerates the process of religious transition. Being included in monastic life as an element of obedience, silence becomes both a socializing practice and the result of the individual’s consolidation in the monastic community.

silence, religiously motivated silence, social practice, monasticism, monastic charter, sociology of everyday life, microsociology