The Philokalia Vol 1 - here translated and edited by G. E. H. Palmer - is the most influential book besides the bible in the recent history of the Orthodox church.

The Philokalia is a collection of texts written between the fourth and fifteenth centuries by spiritual masters of the Orthodox Christian tradition. First published in Greek in 1782, translated into Slavonic and later into Russian, The Philokalia has exercised an influence far greater than that of any book other than the Bible in the recent history of the Orthodox Church.