CHAPTER 39
72 The Rule, Chapter 39 cur if the table reader approached the lectern on an empty stomach and under the influence of undiluted wine.
St. Benedict ends the chapter by asking that only those monks who have the ability to read well should be assigned the job. He wants to be certain that the hearers are benefited by the table reading.
Although chapter 38 is addressed to the table reader of the week, St. Benedict reminds us of the concern we should have for the people who are seated at table with us for a meal. "The brothers should by turn serve one another's needs as they eat and drink, so that no one need ask for anything." Serving one another at table is a courtesy that applies in my home and yours. St. Benedict's Rule reminds us to be courteous.
CHAPTER 39
The Proper Amount of Food In chapter 39 we see once more how St. Benedict legislates with common sense and moderation. "Two kinds of cooked food, therefore, should suffice for all the brothers, and if fruit or fresh vegetables are available, a third dish may also be added. A generous pound of bread is enough ... for both dinner and supper."
I'm sure preparing meals in St. Benedict's day was much easier than cooking for monks in our day. The monks ate only two meals and sometimes, depending on the season of the year, only one. What were the cooked foods they ate? St. Benedict does not name them in chapter 39, but we do know that the cook at Monte Cassino never burned the community's roast. "Let everyone, except the sick who are very weak, abstain entirely from eating the meat of four-footed animals.'
The Rule, Chapter 39 73 Some commentators on monastic observance believe that it was legitimate for monks to eat fowl. Birds have only two legs. Fowl, along with fish, was regarded as suitable abstinence fare in the Middle Ages and for many years after. St. Benedict, however, says nothing about bipeds in the Rule, and it seems likely that he would have followed the practices of earlier monastic legislators who banned meat in any form.
If the work "is heavier than usual/7 the abbot may allow something additional. St. Benedict wants no one to go away from the table hungry. The reason for having two cooked dishes is that "the person who may not be able to eat one kind of food may partake of the other." There will always be something for the monks to eat, even the finicky and those with delicate stomachs. No doubt St. Benedict had them in his monastery too.
In the late Middle Ages, monks, unfortunately, came to be caricaturized as gluttons. Monks were often portrayed as corpulent fanciers of gourmet foods. Gout was a monastic disease.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux wrote to a young man who had abandoned the Cistercians' strict interpretation of the Rule and had gone to the Benedictines at Cluny where observance had become lax:
"Wine and white bread, honeyed wine, and rich foods cater to the body, not the soul. The body but not the soul is fattened from frying pans. Many fathers in Egypt served God over long stretches without even fish. Pepper, ginger, cumin, sage and a thousand other such spices delight the palate but they inflame the passions. Will you place your safety on such things, will you spend your teenage years safely in their midst?"1
For a long time many people believed that eating too much meat and spicy food caused the arousal of the passions. This was a good reason for monks to stick to a well-balanced, bland diet. When I came to the monastery, there was a bag of saltpeter on our kitchen shelf. It has since disappeared.