RB 1980- The Rule Of St Benedict Read online

  15 K. Prümm, Religiongeschichtliches Handbuch für den Raum der altchristlichen Umwelt (Rome: Biblical Institute Press 1954) pp. 123–128.

  16 Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana, ed. F. C. Conybeare, 2 vols. (London: Heinemann 1912); Iamblichus, De vita pythagorica liber, ed. A. Nauck (1884; rpt. Amsterdam: A. Hakkert 1965); Michael von Albrecht, Pythagoras; Legenda, Lehre, Lebensgestaltung (Zürich: Artemis 1963).

  17 Jordan “Pythagoras and Monachism” p. 437.

  18 B Steidle “Homo Dei Antonius” Antonius Magnus, Eremita 356–1956, StA 38 (Rome: Herder 1956) pp. 176–183.

  19 M. Roncaglia, Histoire de l’église copte IV (Beirut: Dar Al-Kalima 1973) pp. 191–205.

  20 Clem. strom. I,15,71,6. Cf. B. Berg “Dandamis: An Early Christian Portrait of Indian Asceticism” Classica et Mediaevalia 31 (1970) 277.

  21 Roncaglia, Histoire, pp. 200–207; Berg “Dandamis” p. 279.

  22 Berg “Dandamis” p. 280; Porph. de abstin. 4,17.

  23 B. Berg “The Letter of Palladius on India” Byzantion 44 (1974) 5–16.

  24 A Wilmart “Les textes latins de la lettre de Palladius sur les moeurs des Brahmanes” RBén 45 (1933) 29–42.

  25 Vööbus, History, 1.109f.

  26 Ibid., p. 112.

  27 Ibid., pp. 164f. Cf. Heūssi, Ursprung, pp. 287f.

  28 A. Adam, review of Vööbus in Göttingische Gelehrte Anzeigen 214 (1960) 127–145. Reprinted in Frank, Askese, pp. 230–254.

  29 Lohse, Askese, pp. 211f.

  30 Ibid., p. 179; Heussi, Ursprung, pp. 58–59.

  31 Studies of the motifs involved in the practice of fasting have been made by R. Arbesmann “Fasting and Prophecy in Pagan and Christian Antiquity” Traditio 7 (1949–51) 1–71 and H. Musurillo “The Problem of Ascetical Fasting in the Greek Patristic Writers” Traditio 12 (1956) 1–64. An interesting study of the cosmological speculation and demonology present in the ancient world may be found in J. Daniélou “Les démons de l’air dans la Vie d’Antoine” Antonius Magnus, pp. 136–147.

  32 For a discussion of the literary form, see R. T. Meyer, St. Athanasius: The Life of Antony, ACW 10 (Westminster, Md.: Newman Press 1950) Introduction, pp. 11–14.

  33 D. J. Chitty, The Letters of St. Antony the Great (Oxford: SLG Press 1975). Cf. G. Couilleau “La liberté d’Antoine” Commandements du Seigneur et Libération Évangélique, StA 70 (Rome: Editrice Anselmiana 1977) pp. 13–40, and “L’alliance aux origines du monachisme égyptien” CollCist 39 (1977) 170–193.

  34 For studies on the relationship of these various collections, see W. Bousset, Apophthegmata: Studien zur Geschichte des ältesten Mönchtums (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr 1923); J. C. Guy, Recherches sur la tradition Grecque des Apophthegmata Patrum, Subsidia Hagiographica 36 (Brussels: Société des Bollandistes 1962) and J. Quasten, Patrology, 3 vols. (Westminster, Md.: Newman Press 1950–60) 3.187–189.

  35 See note 69 below.

  36 See note 85 below.

  37 For a brief discussion of his influence, see the Preface by Jean Leclercq in Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos, Chapters on Prayer, tr. J. E. Bamberger (Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications 1970) pp. vii–xxii and A. Wathen “Methodological Considerations of the Sources of the Regula Benedicti as Instruments of Historical Interpretations” RBS 5 (1976) 101–117.

  38 On Cassian, see pp. 57–59 below.

  39 See note 66 below.

  40 See C. Peifer “The Biblical Foundations of Monasticism” CS 1 (1966) 7–31; H. Dörries “Die Bibel im ältesten Mönchtum” Theologische Literaturzeitung 72 (1947) 215–222.

  41 Musurillo “The Problem” p. 26. Musurillo quotes a letter of Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria at the time, which he construes to suggest this.

  42 H. I. Bell, Egypt, from Alexander the Great to the Arab Conquest (Oxford: The Clarendon Press 1948) pp. 109–110.

  43 See E. E. Malone, The Monk and the Martyr (Washington: Catholic Univ. Press 1950).

  44 E. E. Malone “Martyrdom and Monastic Profession as a Second Baptism” Vom Christlichen Mysterium: Gesammelte Arbeiten zum Gedächtnis von Odo Casel, O.S.B., ed. A. Mayer, J. Quasten and B. Neunheuser (Düsseldorf: Patmos 1951) pp. 115–134.

  45 Cf. K. Bihlmeyer and H. Tüchle, Church History (Westminster, Md.: Newman Press 1958) 1.128–129.

  46 A. Mirgeler, Mutations of Western Christianity (New York: Herder and Herder 1964) pp. 27–43.

  47 A.H.M. Jones, The Later Roman Empire 284–602: A Social, Economic, and Administrative Survey (Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma Press 1964) 2.912.

  48 See T. Klauser, A Short History of the Western Liturgy (London: Oxford University Press 1969) pp. 33–34 and J. Vogt, The Decline of Rome: The Metamorphosis of Ancient Civilization (New York: Praeger 1956) p. 94.

  49 Ibid., pp. 101–106.

  50 Ibid., p. 117.

  51 For a discussion of the role of the idea of reform in early Christianity, see G. B. Ladner, The Idea of Reform (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press 1959). The explanation of the rise of monasticism as a reform movement was given its classic expression by the German historian Adolf Harnack, Monasticism: Its Ideals and History (New York 1895), who regarded monasticism favorably but felt, of course, that the right answer to the problem was only the constant reform of the whole Church. The idea has been adopted by numerous historians since Harnack. Cf. Vogt, Decline, p. 123; Mohler, Heresy, p. 41.

  52 A. J. Festugière, Personal Religion Among the Greeks (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press 1954) pp. 53–67.

  53 Ibid., p. 67. In Egypt, the word anachōrēsis was also used to refer to the case of those who fled to avoid taxes. See M. Rostovtsev, Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (Oxford: The Clarendon Press 1941) pp. 578–579, 599. Later emperors would find it necessary to enact legislation against those who took up monastic life in order to avoid legal obligations. See Jones, The Later Roman Empire, 2.931. For a more thorough discussion of the literary form and background of Athanasius’ Life of Antony, see Heussi, Ursprung, pp. 78–100.

  54 Festugière, Personal Religion, p. 67.

  55 “Philosophic” is used by Eusebius as a technical term more or less synonymous with “ascetic.” He uses it of other Christian figures, such as Origen, and this usage is continued in later monastic writings. See G. Penco “La vita ascetica come ‘Filosofia’ nell’ antica tradizione monastica” SM 2 (1960) 79–93.

  56 Doubt has been cast on the existence of this figure by modern scholars as well as by Jerome’s contemporaries. See J.N.D. Kelly, Jerome (New York: Harper & Row 1975) pp. 60–61.

  57 The translation is by Musurillo “The Problem of Ascetical Fasting” p. 27.

  58 Cf. Chitty, The Desert a City, p. 4.

  59 Ibid., p. 5.

  60 Vööbus, 1.137–147, has argued that Syrian monasticism arose independently of Egyptian monasticism and that links with Egyptian figures come later.

  61 Un moine de Saint-Macaire “La monastère de Saint-Macaire au Désert de Scrété (Wâdi el Natrun)” Irenikon 51 (1978) 203–215.

  62 C.C. Walters, Monastic Archaeology in Egypt (Warmister, England, Aris and Phillips 1974) p. 104.

  63 For an account of the somewhat different form that Latin monasticism took in Palestine, see pp. 48–50 below.

  64 Kelly, Jerome, p. 173.

  65 Chitty, The Desert a City, pp. 15–16.

  66 Kelly, Jerome, pp. 46–47. The material to be found in the Historia religiosa of Theodoret of Cyrrhus (†c. 466) does not provide a reliable picture. See E. Beck “Ein Beitrag zur Terminologie des ältesten syrischen Mönchtums” Antonius Magnus, p. 254; A. J. Festugière, Antioche paienne et chrétienne: Libanius, Chrysostome, et les moines de Syrie (Paris: E. de Boccard 1959); P. Canivet, Le monachisme syrien selon Théodoret de Cyr, Théologie Historique 42 (Paris: Beauchesne 1977) and Théodoret de Cyr: Histoire des moines de Syrie, SC 234, 257 (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf 1977–78).

  67 The attempt of Vööbus (see note 11 above) to explain the origin of asceticism and monasticism in Syria in complete i
ndependence from that in Egypt and as having originated from Essene, gnostic, Manichaean and other influences has not found wide acceptance. For a critique of his methods and sources, see J. Gribomont “Le monachisme au sein de l’église” SM 7 (1965) 7–24. Gribomont also points out that the introduction of the discipline of the common life into Syrian monasticism is due to the influence of St. Basil.

  68 See L. Leloir “Saint Ephrem, moine et pasteur” Théologie de la vie monastique, Théologie 49 (Paris: Aubier 1961), and Beck “Ein Beitrag” pp. 254–267.

  69 Lives of Pachomius and his successors have survived in Coptic, Greek and Arabic. The Arabic materials remain inadequately edited. The Greek lives have been edited by F. Halkin, Sancti Pachomii Vitae Graecae, Subsidia Hagiographica 19 (Brussels: Société des Bollandistes 1932). A French translation of the Vita Prima Graeca has been published by A. J. Festugière, Les Moines d’Orient IV/2, La première vie grecque de saint Pachôme (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf 1965). An English translation of the same has been made by A. N. Athanassakis, The Life of Pachomius (Missoula, Mont.: Scholars Press 1975). The Coptic lives have been published by L. Th. Lefort, S. Pachomii Vita, Bohairice Scripta, CSCO 89 (Paris: Respublica 1925) and S. Pachomii Vitae Sahidice Scriptae, CSCO 99 (Paris: Respublica 1933). Lefort also published a French translation of all the Coptic materials, Les vies coptes de saint Pachôme et de ses premiers successeurs, Bibliothèque du Muséon 16 (Louvain: Bureaux du Muséon 1943). Extensive discussion of the relationship of the Greek, Coptic and Arabic materials may be found in the latter work as well as in the work by Festugière and in the following works: D. J. Chitty “Pachomian Sources Once More” Studia Patristica 10, TU 107 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1970) 54–64; A. Veilleux, La liturgie dans le cénobitisme pachômien au quatrième siècle, StA 57 (Rome: Herder 1968). Veilleux and Lefort favor the priority of the Coptic sources, but Chitty and Festugière favor the priority of the Greek works.

  70 E.g., P. Brown, The World of Late Antiquity: AD 150–750 (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich 1971) p. 99. This generalization is perhaps more applicable to monasticism in northern Egypt. See W. Bousset “Das Mönchtum der sketischen Wüste” ZKG 42 (1923) 1–41, and H. G. Evelyn White, The Monasteries of the Wadi ’n Natrun, Part II: The History of the Monasteries of Nitria and Scetis (1926; rpt. New York: Arno Press 1973).

  71 See H. Bacht “Antonius und Pachomius: Von der Anachorese zum Cönobitentum” Antonius Magnus, and especially Veilleux, La liturgie, pp. 167–181.

  72 A similar passage occurs in the Vita prime 136.

  73 On the notion of the monk as “pneumatophoros” or bearer of the Spirit, see Heussi, Ursprung, pp. 164–186.

  74 Veilleux, La liturgie, p. 176.

  75 Chitty, The Desert a City, p. 24, holds that the term koinōnia is a substitution in the Coptic Lives of Pachomius for the Greek word koinobion, which is used in the Vita prima to refer to the whole congregation. The reverse would seem to be more likely. In the Coptic New Testament, the term koinōnia is not translated but simply taken over into Coptic, as are a great many Greek words. As a matter of fact, in this key passage from the Vita prima 136, the term used to refer to the whole congregation is not koinobion but koinōnia.

  76 Both the Bohairic Life and the Vita prima make explicit mention of Athanasius’ Life of Antony. Cf. Lefort, Les vies coptes, p. 79 and Vita prima 2 and 22.

  77 For more detailed accounts, see Chitty, The Desert a City, pp. 20–38 and H. Bacht, “Pachôme et ses disciples” Théologie de la vie monastique, pp. 39–72.

  78 A plausible attempt to do this has been made by M. M. van Molle in two articles: “Essai de classement chronologique des premières règies de vie commune connue en chrétienté” La Vie Spirituelle Supplément 84 (1968) 108–127, and “Confrontation entre les règles et la littérature pachômienne postérieure” La Vie Spirituelle Supplément 86 (1968) 394–424. The author attempts to distinguish the different groups of rules and regulations in the Pachomian corpus and relate them to stages of development from a single house to the whole congregation, and to relate them as well to Pachomius and especially his successor Theodore. This view has been challenged by A. de Vogüé “Les pièces latines du dossier pachômien. Remarques sur quelques publications récentes” RHE 67 (1972) 22–67 and “Saint Pachôme et son oeuvre d’après plusiers études récentes” RHE 69 (1974) 425–453.

  79 This seems to be the earliest example of the monastic enclosure. It has been suggested that the enclosure wall, as well as the layout of the monastery in general, derived from Pachomius’ experience of a military camp: Chitty, The Desert a City, p. 22; or that it is based on the layout of Egyptian temples with which Pachomius was familiar: P. Nagel. Die Motivierung der Askese in der alten Kirche und der Ursprung des Mönchtums, TU 95 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1966) pp. 103–104. Both suggestions are highly speculative. It could also have been practical necessity that gave rise to the enclosure wall. This was certainly the case with the monasteries of Scetis. See White, The Monasteries, pp. 262, 327–328. H. Bacht sees the enclosure wall as theologically significant, as a means of creating the “common life” of the cenobite. See “Antonius und Pachomius: Von der Anachorese zum Cönobitentum” Antonius Magnus, pp. 70–72.

  80 On the nature and authenticity of this document, see Lefort, Les vies coptes, pp. LI–LXII and Veilleux, La liturgie. pp. 108–111.

  81 See W. E. Crum, Der Papyruscodex saec. vi–vii der Phillipsbibliothek in Cheltenham (Strassburg: Trübner 1915) pp. 132–145.

  82 These have all been collected and edited by A. Boon and L. Th. Lefort, Pachomiana Latina (Louvain: Bureaux de la Revue 1932).

  83 See van Molle “Confrontation entre les règles et la littérature pachômienne postérieure” pp. 394–424.

  84 See P. Deseille, L’esprit du monachisme pachômien, Spiritualité Orientale 2 (Nantes: Abbaye de Bellefontaine 1968).

  85 The most extensive treatment of Basil’s ascetical works is by David Amand, L’Ascèse monastique de saint Basile (Maredsous: Éditions de l’Abbaye 1948). However, this must be read in the light of the later writings by Jean Gribomont, especially Histoire du texte des Ascétiques de saint Basile, Bibliothèque du Muséon 32 (Louvain: Publications Universitaires 1953), and the articles listed in the following notes. In addition, the following may be mentioned: W. Clarke, Saint Basil the Great, A Study in Monasticism (Cambridge Univ. Press 1913); M. Murphy, St. Basil and Monasticism (Washington: Catholic Univ. Press 1930).

  86 J. Gribomont “Le monachisme en Asie-Mineur au IVe siècle, de Gangres au Messalianisme” Studia Patristica 2, TU 64 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1957) 2.400–415.

  87 See J. Gribomont “Eustathe de Sébaste” DS 4.1708–1712.

  88 See J. Gribomont “Eustathe le Philosophe et les voyages du jeune Basile de Césarée” RHE 54 (1959) 115–124, who interprets the Eustathius of Basil’s Letter 1 to refer to Eustathius of Sebaste.

  89 J. Gribomont “Les Règles Morales de saint Basile et le Nouveau Testament” Studia Patristica 2, TU 64 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1957) 2.417.

  90 J. Gribomont “Saint Basile” Théologie de la vie monastique, p. 104.

  91 Ibid. The terms “long” and “short” rules are properly used of the divisions within the large Asceticon.

  92 See J. Gribomont “Eustathe le Philosophe” p. 122.

  93 Funeral Orations by Saint Gregory Nazianzen and Saint Ambrose, tr. L. P. McCauley, FC 23 (New York: Fathers of the Church, Inc. 1953) p. 79. The word here translated as ‘monasteries’ is the Greek monastēria. It might have been better translated here as ‘cells,’ its basic meaning.

  94 J. Gribomont “Sainte Basile” Théologie, p. 106.

  95 For more extensive treatments of Origen and his works, see J. Daniélou, Origen (New York: Sheed and Ward 1955); R. Cadiou, Origen: His Life at Alexandria (St. Louis: Herder 1944); H. Crouzel “Origène, Précurseur du Monachisme” Théologie de la vie monastique, pp. 15–38. A useful collection of Origen’s ascetical writings with a helpful introduction and bibliography
may be found in R. A. Greer, Origen (New York: Paulist Press 1979).

  96 Daniélou, Origen, p. vii.

  97 Ibid., p. 295; Crouzel “Origène” p. 25.

  98 Daniélou, Origen, p. 297. For a further discussion of these types of exegesis, see Appendix 6, pp. 473–477.

  99 Ladner, The Idea of Reform, p. 330; D. Csanyi “‘Optima Pars’: Die Auslegungsgeschichte von Lk 10, 38-42 bei den Kirchenvätern der ersten vier Jahrhunderte” SM 2 (1960) 5–78; A. Kemmer “Maria und Martha. Zur Deutungsgeschichte im alten Mönchtum” EA 40 (1964) 355–367.

  100 The translation is from Daniélou, Origen, p. 305.

  101 The translation is from ibid., p. 302.

  102 On Evagrius, see Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos, Chapters on Prayer, tr. J. Bamberger (Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications 1970); O. Chadwick, John Cassian (Cambridge Univ. Press 19682); A. Guillaumont, Les ‘Kephalia gnostica’ d’Évagre le Pontique et l’histoire de l’Origénisme chez les grecs et chez les syriens, Patristica Sorbonensia 5 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil 1962); A. and C. Guillaumont, Traité Pratique ou le Moine, SC 170, 171 (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf 1971).

  103 Daniélou, Origen, p. viii.

  104 See A. and C. Guillaumont “Évagre le Pontique” DS 4.1739–1740.

  105 Chadwick, John Cassian, p. 89.

  106 Cf. Hier. epist. 133: PL 22.1151a, and Hans Urs von Balthasar “The Metaphysics and Mystical Theology of Evagrius” MS 3 (1965) 183–196.

  107 For fuller accounts of these events, see Chitty, The Desert a City, ch. 3 and especially White, The Monasteries, ch. 6, pp. 84–144.

  108 Known to later writers as John of Jerusalem, he succeeded Cyril of Jerusalem and remained bishop of Jerusalem more than thirty years.

  Pre-Benedictine Monasticism in the Western Church

  1. THE ORIGINS OF WESTERN MONASTICISM

  It has often been asserted that the monastic life in the Western Church was simply imported from the East.1 We have, in fact, little documentary proof of the existence of monasticism in the Western Church before the middle of the fourth century. By that time the movement was widespread in the East, and news of it must have entered the West, especially Rome. Egypt was a Roman colony, and there was constant traffic between Rome and Alexandria. Athanasius, the enthusiastic propagator of monasticism, spent some time at Trier during his first exile in 336–338 and was at Rome in 340, during his second exile. His laudatory description of the Egyptian monks made a profound impression, and later his Life of Antony, written expressly for admirers across the sea, was quickly translated into Latin and became popular in the West.2