John Cassian

John Cassian was born around 360, probably in the region of Scythia Minor, near the mouth of the Danube. As a young man he entered a monastery in Bethlehem with his friend Germanus, and the two then spent some fifteen years among the monks of Egypt, listening to the great abbas of Scetis and the other desert centres.

He later went to Constantinople, where John Chrysostom ordained him deacon, and then to Rome. Around 415 he settled in Marseilles, where he founded monasteries for men and women. At the request of bishops in Gaul he wrote the Institutes, on the outward life and the eight principal vices, and the Conferences, presented as conversations he and Germanus had held with the Egyptian elders.

His teaching on grace and free will in the thirteenth Conference was criticized by followers of Augustine, and he was later counted among the so-called semi-Pelagians. But his works were read in every Western monastery; the Rule of Benedict commends them, and they carried the desert’s teaching on thoughts, discretion and prayer into the whole Latin tradition. He died around 435.