Discernment of Spirits

Discernment of spirits is a term used in Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Charismatic (Evangelist) Christian theology to judge the influence of various spiritual agents on a person's morality. These agents are: from within the human soul itself, known as concupiscence (considered evil) Divine Grace (considered good) Angels (considered good) Devils (considered evil) Discernment of spirits is considered necessary to discern the cause of a given impulse. Although some people are regarded as having a special gift to discern the causes of an impulse intuitively, most people are held to require study and reflection, and possibly the direction of others, in the discernment of spirits. Judgment of discernment can be made in two ways. The first is by a charism or spiritual gift, held as divinely granted to certain individuals for the discerning of spirits by intuition (1 Corinthians 12:10). The second way to discern spirits is by reflection and theological study. This second method is by acquired human knowledge; however, it is always gained "with the assistance of grace, by the reading of the Holy Bible, of works on theology and asceticism, of autobiographies, and the correspondence of the most distinguished ascetics". Paul the Apostle mentions the gift of discerning of spirits in 1 Corinthians 12:10. John Chrysostom, in his interpretation of this passage, says that these words mean the ability to tell who is spiritual and who is not, who is a prophet and who is not, as Paul wrote at the time of many false prophets. Ephrem the Syrian, in the interpretation of the same passage, stated that the gift of discerning of spirits is good management of the church. In everyday life, the most often needed kind of discernment of spirits is discernment of thoughts (if the person analyzes their thoughts at all). Besides thoughts, discernment of spirits can be applied to the judgment of such phenomena as dreams, visions, miracles, prophecies, and other supernatural gifts.