Asceticism in the Early Church

Asceticism is from the Greek askeoo, to exercise, to strengthen through exercise. By the heathen the word was used by gymnastic exercises but by the fathers of the early church of moral self-discipline. Yet it would be a serious mistake to define asceticism simply as moral self-discipline. For moral self-discipline -- the mortification of members which are upon the earth, the crucifixion of the works of the flesh -- is a Christian duty enjoined by the Scriptures. It forms a part of the true...