Anthony of Egypt withdrew alone into the desert at twenty, giving away his inheritance to live a life of total simplicity and prayer
Antony's turn to solitude began as an ordinary act of piety in a Sunday liturgy rather than a dramatic vision, which is part of why Athanasius's account became a template for later Christian withdrawal.
Athanasius of Alexandria wrote his Life of Antony not long after Antony's death in 356 CE, and it became the single most influential biography in the formation of Christian monasticism. Chapters 2 and 3 describe how Antony, orphaned in his late teens and left a substantial inheritance, heard a Gospel passage read in church and took it as addressed directly to himself. He gave away his land, provided for his sister, and lived an ascetic life on the edge of his village before withdrawing further into the Egyptian desert around age twenty. Athanasius frames this not as escape but as deliberate spiritual athletics, describing Antony's subsequent years of solitude and struggle with temptation using the term askesis — the root of the word "ascetic" — and the biography's wide circulation across the Mediterranean world made Antony's total renunciation the founding image of Christian monastic celibacy.
If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor.
Athanasius's biography directly influenced Augustine's own account of his conversion in the Confessions, making it one of the most consequential works in early Christian literature.
The Life of Antony
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- What celibate traditions say about money and property
Antony of Egypt heard a verse read at a Sunday liturgy, gave away what he had inherited, and went into the desert at twenty. The account became the template for a great deal that followed.
- What the celibate traditions say about loneliness
Antony's withdrawal began with an ordinary church reading, not a vision — Athanasius says he heard the Gospel verse and took it as addressed to him personally. The word Athanasius uses for what came next is askesis, the root of "ascetic": in this tradition, being alone is something you go and do, not something that happens to you.