Life
He was born into a Christian family in the small town of Ibora, in the Roman province of Pontus. He was educated in Neocaesarea, where he began his career in the church as a lector under Basil. Around 380 he joined Gregory of Nazianzus in Constantinople, where he was promoted to deacon and eventually to archdeacon. When Emperor Theodosius I convened the Second Ecumenical Council in 381 AD, Evagrius was present, despite Gregory's premature departure.
According to the biography written by Palladius, Constantinople offered many worldly attractions, and Evagrius's vanity was aroused by the high praise of his peers. Eventually, he became infatuated with a married woman. Amid this temptation, he is said to have had a vision in which he was imprisoned by the soldiers of the governor at the request of the woman's husband. This vision, and the warning of an attendant angel, made him flee from the capital and head for Jerusalem.
For a short time, he stayed with Melania the Elder and Tyrannius Rufinus in a monastery near Jerusalem, but even there he could not forsake his vainglory and pride. He fell gravely ill and only after he resolved to become a monk was he restored to health. After being made a monk at Jerusalem in 383, he joined a cenobitic community of monks in Nitria, but after some years moved to Kellia. There he spent the last fourteen years of his life pursuing studies under Macarios the Great and Macarius of Alexandria.
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