Rule of St Benedict
In order to understand St Benedict's character and spirit, and to discover the secret of the success of his institute, it is necessary, as St Gregory says, to turn to his Rule. St Gregory's characterization of the Rule as "conspicuous for its discretion" touches the most essential quality. The relation of St Benedict's Rule to earlier monastic rules, and of his institute to the prevailing monachism of his day, is explained in the article Monasticism. Here it is enough to say that nowadays it is commonly recognized by students that the manner of life instituted by St Benedict was not intended to be, and as a matter of fact was not, one of any great austerity, when judged by the standard of his own day (see E. C. Butler, Lausiac History of Palladius, part i. pp. 251-256). His monks were allowed proper clothes, sufficient food, ample sleep. The only bodily austerities were the abstinence from flesh meat and the unbroken fast till mid-day or even 3 P.M., but neither would appear so onerous in Italy even now, as to us in northern climes. Midnight office was no part of St Benedict's Rule: the time for rising for the night office varied from 1.30 to 3.o, according to the season, and the monks had had unbroken sleep for 7 or even 8 hours, except in the hot weather, when in compensation they were allowed the traditional Italian summer siesta after the mid-day meal. The canonical office was chanted throughout, but the directly religious duties of the day can hardly have taken more than 4 or 5 hours - perhaps 8 on Sundays. The remaining hours of the day were divided between work and reading, in the proportion (on the average of the whole year) of about 6 and 4 hours respectively. The "reading" in St Benedict's time was probably confined to the Bible and the Fathers. The "work" contemplated by St Benedict was ordinarily field work, as was natural in view of the conditions of the time and best suited to the majority of the monks; but the principle laid down is that the monks should do whatever work is most useful. There were from the beginning young boys in the monastery, who were educated by the monks according to the ideas of the time. We have seen St Benedict evangelizing the pagan population round Monte Cassino; and a considerable time each day is assigned to the reading of the Fathers. Thus the germs of all the chief works carried on by his monks in later ages were to be found in his own monastery.
The Rule consists of a prologue and 73 chapters. Though it has resisted all attempts to reduce it to an ordered scheme, and probably was not written on any set plan, still it is possible roughly to indicate its contents: after the prologue and introductory chapter setting forth St Benedict's intention, follow instructions to the abbot on the manner in which he should govern his monastery (2, 3); next comes the ascetical portion of the Rule, on the chief monastic virtues (4-7); then the regulations for the celebration of the canonical office, which St Benedict calls "the Work of God" or "the divine work," his monks' first duty, "of which nothing is to take precedence" (8-20); faults and punishments (23-30); the cellarer and property of the monastery (31,32); community of goods (33, 34); various officials and daily life (21, 22, 35-57); reception of monks (58-61); miscellaneous (62-73).
Continued on page three.
This article is from the 1911 edition of an encyclopedia, which is out of copyright here in the U.S. It is in the public domain and you may copy, download, print and distribute this work as you see fit.
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