Chapter 20
Prov. xv, 3). Most especially, however, shall we believe this without any doubt when we assist at the Divine Office. In this connection, therefore, let us bear in mind what the prophet says: "Serve ye the Lord in fear" (Ps. ii, 11); and again: "Sing ye wisely" (Ps. xlvi, 8);1 and: "I will sing to thee in the sight of the angels" (Ps. cxxxvi, l).2 Let us, therefore, consider in what state one must be in the sight of God and his angels; we shall then stand while chanting, so that our hearts will be in harmony with our voices.3
TWENTIETH CHAPTER
Reverence at Prayer1 1 By the phrase, "Sing ye wisely." we are to understand here first of all an out wardly dignified performance of our prayer in common and then a material grasp of the psalms, canticles, and lessons. St. Benedict meant thereby the monk's de vout awareness that the eye of God was upon him when he prayed and that the angels reported every conscious or careless mistake. This attitude of soul on the part of the monk at his prayers, (above all his whole conduct at other times) becomes fixed and stable through a profound reverence and a humble submission under the infinite majesty of God. That "school of virtue," the seventh chapter of the Rule, serves as a never-ending preparation for his first and most important task, namely, a dignified rendering, both material and spiritual, of the "Work of God." The Holy Rule again and again makes use of expressions that call for an attitude of reverence at prayer. The honor due to the omnipresent God should tolerate no errors and no carelessness. A consciousness of that ever-abiding pres ence is the strongest motive towards the proper gravity which ought to reign in the "House of God." There should be no occasion there for attitudinizing, superfi cial laughter, or loquacity. In old-monastic thinking, an awareness of the demons that are also ever present was an additional reason for interior and exterior recol lection (cf. Dialogues of St. Gregory II. iv).
2 The angels are the courtiers of God, and as such they ever minister in his divine presence. They carry out the celestial liturgy, the model and pattern for our monastic religious services on earth. And, finally, they are his messengers, who stand near his throne and are ever at his beck, observe us, report on all our doings, and at the same time support God's searching and directing omnipresence.
3 Said the desert father Elias: "If the spirit does not chant along with the body, all his efforts (that is, the monk's life and ascetic practices) are in vain." Our spirit must give its complete attention to the content of the inspired words. Compare the 22nd chapter of St. Caesarius' "Rule for Nuns" and Cassian's Institutes chap, ii, 10. The soul should be throughly wrapped up in the divine import of the text and should be altogether in empathy with it. "While you are praying to God during the chanting of the psalms and hymns, what you express with your lips should also be alive in your hearts." (Rule of St. Augustine iii). i The 19th chapter dealt explicity with prayer in common, in a word, with the "Work of God." The twentieth treats rather with private prayer. Although
When we have a petition to lay before the mighty ones of this world, we do not presume to do so except modestly and respect fully. How much more must one with humility, sincerest sub mission, and on bended knees present his petitions to the Lord
God of the universe? Let us, therefore, realize that we shall be heard not by reason of our "much speaking" (Matt, vi, 7), but for the purity and tearful compunction of our hearts.
Consequently, our prayer must be short and sincere, except one be prompted to extend it somewhat under the inspiration of God's grace. In choir assembled, however, let (the silent con cluding) prayer by all means be short, and when the superior has given the signal, let all rise together.
Excursus I.
A Prayer in the Cloister.—Rufinus of Aquileia (f 410), who made three visits to the monks in Egypt, put the following address in the mouth of the desert father Joannes, one that he claims to have heard himself: "The first task of the monk is pure prayer, a task that he must perform for God with a clean conscience, as the Lord has said: 'When you shall stand to pray, forgive from your hearts if you have aught against your brethren; . . . but if you will not forgive, neither will your Father that is in heaven forgive you your sins' (cf.
Mark xi, 25 & 26). Consequently, when we stand before God with pure hearts, freed of all our faults and evil passions, we shall be able as far as that is possible, to envision God, fix our eyes upon him in prayer, and see the un seeable in purest contemplation, but spiritually not corporeally, that is not with the eyes of the flesh."
After this there follows a polemic passage against a mere material con ception of prayer as was related of some monks. "Wherefore one must ap proach the Lord with all fear and reverence and direct the gaze of the spirit upon him, lest at any time we forget that God is so absolutely above all pos sibility of man's spirit ever being able to grasp his splendor, glory, light, or majesty. And this vision will be imparted only to a heart that is pure and un tainted by unclean or perverse desires. For which reason those especially who wish to renounce the world and give themselves to God (i.c., monks) must take pains to reach this contemplation in prayer, as it is written: 'Dedicate yourselves (to God in prayer) and recognize that I am the Lord' (Ps. xlv,
11, (as translated from the German). If, then, a man has once known both kinds of prayer have the same intrinsic dignity and the same intrinsic value, still common prayer in the cloister enjoys a definite priority, in as much as it is the monastic church's official homage to Christ. Nothing is to be preferred to this common obligation (cf. chap, xliii). And since in the Rule the monk was allotted no cell of his own, the common oratory had to serve him also for his private devotions.
God, he will also, in as far as is humanly possible, understand the rest and behold the mysteries of God; and the purer his heart, the more will God un veil and reveal to him his secrets. He will then be as a friend of God like those of whom the Savior speaks: 'I will no more call you servants . . . but friends'
(John xv, 15). And as to a dear friend, God will grant him all that he asks.
Indeed, even the powers and the courts of heaven (that is, the angels) will love him as a friend of God and hearken to his prayers. And this will be he whom
"neither death nor life, nor angels, principalities, nor powers, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord' (Romans viii, 38). Wherefore, beloved, because you have chosen this way to please God and to aspire to his love, take the necessary pains to rid yourselves of all pride, of every evil passion of the heart and of all bodily lusts.". .
In the following passage Joannes recommends the austere self-denial as practiced by the Egyptian monks and points to the earnest recommendation of the Lord: " 'Enter ye at the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction' (Matt, vii, 13.). Narrow and strait in deed is the way that leads to life. Broad, then, is the way of the soul when it gives itself up to its lusts; but strait it is if that soul withstands its perverse inclinations." Naturally, the desert father recommends the hermit's life for those who wish to arrive at perfect prayer as he has described it (History of the Monks).
In sleek and straightforward words, Joannes developes the doctrine of prayer as advocated by the Egyptian monks, foremost among them Evagrius
Ponticus (f 399), all of them still freely under the influence of Origen (f 254). It was from these hermits that Cassian derived his viewpoint on perfect prayer. St. Benedict, clearly a follower of Cassian, did not for a moment hesitate to second Abbot Joannes' address. But the Holy Rule, in any event, speaks rather with restraint of the qualities of prayer on the one hand, while on the other, it devotes an entire group of chapters to the external regulations governing the divine office (chapters viii-xvvii). In the following paragraphs, we shall endeavor to present as shortly and succinctly as possible, St. Bene dict's doctrine on prayer as it appears from his provisions and statements in the Holy Rule, as well as from the writings of the monastic patriarchs who were, so to speak, his spiritual forebears on the subject.
Prayer is the monk's specific chore, his "Work for God" (Opus Dei). The phrase. Opus Dei, as the address of Abbot Joannes shows, was in use long before St. Benedict. Abbot Horsiesi (f 380). second successor of St. Pachomius in the government of his monastic federation, said on one occasion to his assembled brethren: "My brethren, you who follow the life and ordinances of the cenobites, adhere to the resolutions you have formed and fulfill the "Work of God," so that our father (Pachomius), who was the first to found the coenobia (cloisters), may joyfully say to the Lord: 'As 1 taught them, so they live' " (Testament 13).
A concept of what it means to take pains and to spare no effort lies in the
word, "Work." The "Work of God" or the "Work tor God" meant the whole life of the monk long before St. Benedict's time. The old monks regarded their monastic calling as a life of toil, a life of hardship, and a service of bond age. An old-monastic axiom read: "A monk's life is hardship, because he must take pains with every task." "The monk must add toil to toil up to his very death," was a saying of the great Macarius (f 390). Indeed, the hard, often mercilessly hard life of those old monks, bore out the saying. Conse quently, their whole existence as all their doings were truly a "Work for God." This passage from the prophet Jeremias, "Cursed be he that doth the work of the Lord deceitfully (that is, carelessly)" (xlviii, 10), was applied to the monk who did not conscientiously live up to his vocation. The prophet understood by the work of the Lord the charge that had been given Israel to exterminate God's ancient foe, the people of Moab: "Cursed be he that withholdeth his sword from blood" (Ibid. 10)1 In using the text, did the desert fathers know or think of its literal application? In any case, the Script ural passage serves to stress the intense earnestness implied in the concept, the "Work of God" or the "Work for God."
Of the various works, or tasks, that the monk has to perform each day, prayer must take the first and foremost place, both on account of its dignity and importance as also because of the pains he must take to fulfill it. Suc cinctly and plainly stated, it is "the task" which he has to perform in the service of his Loid. Upon it he must expend every ounce of his spiritual and bodily energy. The dying Melania (f 430), as related by her biographer, the presbyter Gerontius, said to her spiritual daughters: "Take pains, I beg of you, to perform the Canon after my death with reverence and tranquillity; for it is written: 'Cursed is he who fulfills the work of the Lord negligently' "
(Jer. ut supra; Life 64). This passage is instructive. It demonstrates that the common prayer in Melania's convent on the Mount of Olives was already well laid out and regulated. This Latin translation for the Greek term kanort was "spiritual rule." It likewise shows that prayer in common was known as the "Work of God." St. Benedict thus stands wholly and solidly on the same footing with old-monastic tradition when he mainfests his great predilection for that phrase in speaking of the monks' prayers together. It was an al together common and familiar one in his day for the divine office and for divine services in general. His contemporary, Caesarius of Arles (f 542), used it in his "Rule for Nuns" (chaps, xii & xiv). And the divine office in St. Benedict's mind must definitely take the first and foremost place in all the monk's activities (cf. chap, xliii). One of the basic requirements that he demands of the novice is that he be solicitous for that "work" and capable of fulfilling it.
Prayer is not only the monk's main accomplishment, his "Work for God,' but it is also God's work in the monk, that is, it is also grace. According to old-monastic belief, one which St. Benedict also held, two factors operate in every good work: the free will of man and the help of God's grace. Prayer was not only man's work for God, but also work in man. Evagrius Ponticus
expressed this viewpoint clearly in this way: "If you wish to pray, you need God, who gives the gift of prayer to him who desires it" (cf. Prayer lxviii).
Prayer, then, is also grace, and not merely an achievement on the part of the monk. The Holy Rule says as much in the prologue, viz., that monks should not be proud by reason of their good life, "because they cannot credit them selves with the good that is in them but the Lord," and that they thereby
"glorify the Lord who works in them." Before the time of Augustine, the ancient monastic teaching, which, as we have said, the Holy Rule also fol lowed, held that the free will of the monk made the beginning (of the good work), while the grace of God brought it to completion. The same held good with regard to prayer. "If thou dost not have the God-given grace of prayer, bestir thyself, and thou wilt receive it" (Evagrius P., loc. cit., lxxxiii).
In accordance with the old monastic viewpoint on the matter, as, for ex ample, Evagrius Ponticus respresents it (loc. cit., iii & xxxv), prayer was a "conversation with God;" or, to quote Abbot Joannes, with whom many of the oriental monastic fathers were in agreement, prayer was "a contemplation of God." No one will doubt that when the monk prays, he wants to get near to God, to seek God, to speak with him, and to contemplate him. The Holy
Rule gives us no specific definition of prayer. But it demands of the novice "that he truly seek God." It means thereby primarily that he must manifest a readiness and a capacity for the "Work of God," that, is, for prayer ( cf. chap, lviii). In the ancient monastic viewpoint, again, the monk was es sentially a "man of prayer." If he does not have a readiness and a capacity for prayer, he is an intrinsic contradiction. On one occasion as Pambo, one of the more famous fathers of the desert, and his disciples came upon a group of people sitting by the roadside, he called to them: "Stand up," he said, "and greet the monks, that you may be blessed! They are in constant converse with God, and their mouths are holy." Rufinus relates the following details con cerning his model monk Joannes, with whom he began his "History of the Monks: "He remained alone in his cell, that he might devote himself solely to Gcd, and neither by day or by night did he desist from prayer or converse with him. And the more he isolated himself from human cares and intercourse with men, the closer and more familiar did God appear to him" (chap. i).
The Holy Rule likewise thinks of prayer as a "conversation with God"
(cf. chap. xx). This converse with him can mean in the first place only that intercourse which is the "praising of God," Judge of the world and Creator of the universe (cf. chap. xvi). We have already spoken of the fear of God, fear of the servant, an egoistic fear, and by the fear—better, let us say—by the loving fear of the child. Nor can a profound awe before God ever be absent from our prayers. "He who loves God always converses with him as a man speaks with his father" (Evagrius P., loc. cit., liv). The praising of God becomes a reality in psalmody, that is, in oral prayer. In a wider sense, the Holy Rule knows of another way of praising God, in as much as it conceives of all the heaven-directed activities of the monk as a kind of divine praise (cf. chap. J.vii). Indeed, the whole life of the monk is really a "Work for God."
As averse as is the Holy Rule to defining the essence of prayer, so as positively outspoken are the monastic fathers of the Orient in regard to it.
Abbot Cassian, too, devotes two of his "Conferences" to the subject of prayer (ix & x). One marvels at the daring of these old monastic mystics and at the dizzy heights of contemplation and divine vision to which they permitted the human spirit to soar in its orisons. In glowing colors they depicted the hap piness and bliss of the praying soul that had penetrated into the glorious realms of the divine. It was no longer the spirit of man who spoke there, but God himself. "If you are a man who speaks "out of God" (Theo-logos), then you truly pray; and if you truly pray, you are a man who "speaks out of God" (ex Deo) (Evagrius P. loc. cit., lx). Such prayer is Theologia (locutio ex
Deo), the highest form of prayer, or speaking "out of God." The human spirit is speechless with happiness in God's love, God's vision, God's tranquillity,
God's peace. In comparison with this, the prayer of the cenobite is mere stuttering. To none but the eremite was the gift of such prayer imparted. The cenobite generally remained only on the way to it.
That St. Benedict was acquainted with the lofty theories on prayer held by the Oriental monks, we can gather from what the Holy Rule says of the qualities which prayer should have. It has in mind rather the way towards perfect prayer than such prayer itself. Thus it is true to its unique character as a rule for beginners, a rule for cenobites (chap, lxxiii). St. Benedict's Rule has more at heart the foundation beneath the substructure of the Oriental ed ifice of prayer than its crowning heights, that is, the contemplation of the divine or the vision of God. Let us rather enumerate and describe the quali ties that prayer should have according to the Rule (cf. chaps, xx & liii).
Prayer should be short.—In old-monastic teaching, prayer was not so much a matter of quantity as a thing of quality (cf. Evagrius P., loc. cit., cli & Matt, vi, 7). Neither expenditure of voice or volume of sound had any essential part in it. Since the common prayer of the cenobite was already minutely regulated, the Holy Rule obviously had in mind here the monk's private devotions when it spoke of the shortness of his prayers. It is also understandably consistent with his vocation that he pray much and that he pray often.
Prayer should be pure.—The quality of prayer is decidedly important. When is prayer pure? The answer to that, of course, is when it comes from a "pure heart." The Rule speaks of "pure prayer" and of a "pure heart" (chap. ix).
Two passages from Holy Scripture have profoundly influenced monastic belief in pure prayer and in the pure heart: "Create a clean heart in me, O God"
(Ps. 1, 12) and "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God." (Matt, v, 8).
Pure prayer can come only from a pure heart. The heart, that is, the soul, in other words, a spirit endowed with reason and free will, is pure if it keeps itself clean and free of every defilement and contamination by the world, the demons, its sins and its evil passions, as well as its inordinate inclinations in the way of thoughts and movements of the will. The fathers of the desert found it difficult to find adequate expressions with which to describe this com-
plete renunciation, denial of self, and freedom from passion, this literal em ptying of self that touches upon the innermost recesses of the intellect and will.
The "clean heart" will be obtained only by the monk who has thoroughly realized in his life monastic asceticism as outlined for him in the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of the Rule. Once he has achieved that complete separa tion from the world, from his sins, drives, and passions, as well as from his own "ego," in other words, once he has mounted the twelve steps of humili ty, "he will presently arrive at that perfect love of God, which, because it is perfect, 'casteth out fear.' Then, by means of it (this perfect love), everything that he has heretofore observed, not without difficulty, he will now begin to keep ... no longer from the dread of hell, but for the love of Christ and as " result of this good habit and his delight in virtue. This the Lord, through the Holy Spirit, will deign to show his workman, now cleansed of his sins and vices" (end of chapter vii).
From a clean heart comes the "clean oblation" (chap, xx), which is tant amount to perfect love. "Purity of heart" and perfect love react upon each other and are placed practically on the same level by the old patriarchs. The cleaner the heart of the praying monk, the better prepared he is for the mys terious operations of the Holy Spirit. Into the soul will silently steal the wonderful peace and tranquillity of contemplation, the vision of divine things.
The monk, they said, who has once reached the heights of the pure spirit is exalted above all harmful and seductive influences from without (e.g., demons, stinging insects, and serpents) and from within (e.g., unruly thoughts of the mind and evil promptings of the will). Two angels once came to a monk "who was filled with the love of God and a zeal for prayer while he was wandering from place to place in the desert and went with him on his way, one on each side of him. But he paid little or no attention to them, fearing that he might thereby lose contact with far higher things; for he was thinking of those words of the Apostle: 'Neither angels, nor principalities, nor powers shall separate us from the love of Christ' " (Evagrius P., loc. cit., cxii).
Up out of a clean heart, then, there also wells that familiar converse with God: the happy cry of "Abba Father" and the wordless peace and quiet of contemplation. It is a wholly self-evident truth that a consistent practice of all
, the virtues is the best pledge and safeguard of a pure heart and with it of pure prayer. In the belief and teaching of the monastic fathers, pure prayer was the glorious climax of all the virtues and the crowning achievement of monastic life.
Fervor of Heart.—In addition to a "clean oblation," there is another quality that belongs to good prayer, namely, fervor of heart (HR. chap. Hi). Abbot
Cassian used the expression many times (as also pure prayer and purity of heart). The Latin word intentio implies primarily a fixing of the heart upon God, a pertinacious taking of pains for God's sake. Our word, "fervor,"
(German Inbrunst; English warmth), best conveys what the Holy Rule wishes to say along with Abbot Cassian: that is, the most earnest expenditure of energy, a fervent dedication of self, and a loving preoccupation (with the
task in hand).
Tearful Prayer.—In ancient monastic conception, tears were also one of the accompaniments of genuine prayer. Numberless times in monastic literature, we meet with the expressions, "tearful prayer" and "prayer with tears." It would be entirely misleading to see anything like sentimentalism or mawkish emotionalism in the torrential tears of those hardened fathers of the desert.
As was prayer itself, so also were his tears a work of the monk and a product of grace. Tears were looked upon as an evidence of pure prayer, and they resulted in pure prayer. "First of all, pray that you may receive (the gift of) tears" (Evagrius P., loc. cit., 5). Abbot Cassian devoted several paragraphs of his ninth Conference on Prayer (27-30) to the subject of tears.
Here, again, the Holy Rule is following closely in the wake of old-monastic tradition when it makes mention of tears (at prayer) (chaps, iv, 57; xx, xlix, & liii). The monastic fathers even enumerate the various kinds of tears. Ac cordingly, they said that tears are a natural effect of penitence, of the pangs of remorse, of compunction of heart, of the recollection of one's own sinfulness, of meditations on the ever-threatening punishment of hell, and of the menace of eternal death. Tears also well up out of a servile and egocentric fear of God.
But they stream most profusely from the eyes of the monk whose heart is clean, whose prayer is pure, and whose soul is filled with the love of God.
Tears produce a clean heart, and they come from a clean heart. Tears also go along with one's progress in prayer up to the very vision of God and to familiar converse with God. The bitterest enemy of the tears so pleasing to God is pride; for it is quite possible that the gift of tears, itself a great sign of grace, may make a monk proud and arrogant. "Do not pervert the antidote to passion back into passion again" (Evagrius Ponticus, loc. cit., viii). The ancient theology of tears drew powerful incentives from such sayings of our
Lord as: "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Matt, v, 5), and: "Blessed are you that weep now; for you shall laugh" (Luke vi, 21).
Laughter was frowned upon by the early monks. St. Basil pointed out that the Lord had indeed wept but had never laughed (Longer Rules xvii, 1). St.
John Chryostom (f 407) in one of his sermons (on Hebrews xv) remarked:
"You laugh with your whole face, you who arc a monk, a crucified one, a mourner! Where did you hear that Christ ever did such a thing? Nowhere! But You did indeed hear that he was often mournful . . . And you laugh?" His listeners on that occasion laughed the solemn preacher to scorn, but he re tracted nothing. In another sermon (on Matt, vi): "One can see that the Lord often wept, but never that he laughed, not even in a quiet chuckle." Nor is the Holy Rule favorable to laughter (chaps iv, vi, & vii). According to a saying of our Lord, laughter is a meed of the after life (Luke vi, 21). When we have reached the heights of perfect prayer, even then will our tears remind us that we have not yet attained our final goal, but that we are still on our way, still on a pilgrimage. Only when we have finally reached that objective (eternal life), will God wipe all tears from our eyes. Then shall death be no more, nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow (cf. Apoc. xxi, 4).
When the patriarch Poimen, one of the great abbas of the desert, heard of the death of Abba Arsenius after (f 410), who had been distinguished for his gift of tears, whose eyelids, in fact, had fallen away from much weeping, the hermit said: "Happy art thou, Abba Arsenius, that thou didst weep over thyself in this earthly life; for he that does not weep over himself here must weep over himself hereafter—either here voluntarily or there in torments. We must weep." Of the same Abba Poimen, the desert father Isaac related: "I sat one day with Abba Poimen and watched him while he was in an ecstasy. I asked him afterwards: Tell me, where were you? Poimen replied rather re luctantly: 'I was where the Blessed Mother stood and wept beneath the cross of the Savior. I also wished to weep so.' " True to its modest and moderate character, the Holy Rule speaks with quite some reserve of these outward manifestations of the life of perfect prayer, even when it uses the phrases,
"pure prayer," a "pure heart," a "clean oblation," and "tearful compunction"
(cf. chaps, xx & liii).
There is really no fundamental difference between prayer in common and private prayer, but either one helps to make the other fruitful. Whereas, how ever, prayer in common has been rather minutely regulated as to its proper and timely performance, the monk's private prayers are left entirely to his per sonal choice (cf. HR, chaps, xx & lii). And yet his private prayers may not prejudice the common life of the cloister or interfere with it.
Excursus II.
The Holy Eucharist in primitive Monasticism.—As we know, St. Gregory al lows the youthful hermit, Benedict, to live alone for three whole years without receiving the Eucharist (Dialogues II, i). But this description of his life could hardly have been in keeping with the reality, and must be considered rather as an evidence of the freedom which the historian of the miracle worker ex ercised in selecting the details of his story: Pope Gregory wanted to stress St.
Benedict's complete withdrawal from the world. The participation of the old monks in the Eucharist is so well established a fact that even a Protestant re searcher like Karl Heusel could say: "There may have occurred instances where an anchorite alienated himself from the reception of the Sacrament.
From the Vita Antonii of Athanasius, we may infer indirectly that these were certainly rare exceptions; had he perceived in that life any abuse of this kind, he surely would not have neglected to insert into his Vita Antonii an instruc tive paragraph or two on the matter." As unlikely as it could happen today and as unlikely as it could happen in the time of St. Athanasius, so unlikely it was around the year 500 that a monk could knowingly and in good faith remain away from the Sacrament of the Eucharist for three whole years. Even the south-Gallican synod of Agde, which met under the leadership of St. Caesarius of Arles in 506, decreed in its 18th canon: "Lay persons who do not com municate at Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost are not to be regarded as Cath olics." A precept that applied to a member of the laity was all the more bind ing upon a hermit or monk. One who alienated himself from the Eucharist un doubtedly did so from over-anxiety, an excessive consciousness of his sin-
J 70 fulness, infidelity, or out of arrogant pride, all reasons that would be rejected by (sensible) monks. Abbot Cassian had Abbot Theonas state: "We may not banish ourselves from the Table of the Lord for the reason that we regard our selves as sinners, but we must all the more hasten to it with yearning, both for the salvation of our souls as for the purification of our spirits. However, we must do so with such humility of soul and with such faith that, though we consider ourselves unworthy of so great a grace, we nevertheless do so all the more in order that we may find a remedy for the wounds of the soul. Other wise we would not be allowed to receive even annual Communion as some monks do. These so overestimate the worthiness, holiness, and merit ade quate for the reception of the heavenly mysteries as to think that they should be granted only to the saintly and the unspotted. Indeed, these men fall into much greater impertinence and presumption than they imagine they are avoid ing, because when they do partake of the Sacrament, they consider them selves worthy to do so.
"It is much more righteous, then, to receive these most sacred mysteries each Sunday as a remedy for our sicknesses than to consider ourselves worthy, arrogantly and pompously so, to receive/them after waiting for a whole year.
While doing so, of course, we must always believe and confess with a humble heart that we shall never be truly worthy to receive them through any merit of our own" (Conference xxiii, 21). Abbot Cassian, too, recommends the custo mary Sunday Communion, and firmly repudiates the reasons given for a mere annual reception. St. John Chrysostom, in his 17th sermon on St. Paul's Let ter to the Hebrews, mentions a practice in accordance with which some of the hermits of his diocese went to Communion only once a year or once in two years. Obviously, it could only have been a consciousness of their unworth iness that held these anchorites back from going oftener. But the preacher would by no means admit the validity of that reason. First of all, he stressed the fact that it was not a matter dependent upon frequency. It was rather a question of "purity of heart." Chrysostom invited all those to frequent Com munion who possessed that state of conscience. Neither frequent nor in frequent Communion would profit those who did not have it. Clearly, then,
Chrysostom did not favor the practice of the hermits whom he had mentioned a moment or two before. But he did advocate the practice of frequent recep tion of the Holy Eucharist when received with the right dispositions.
The desert father Daniel told of a monk who doubted the presence of the Lord's body and blood in the Holy Eucharist. When every argument of his brethren proved of no avail, they pleaded for a miracle to convince the doubter. As a matter of fact, the story continues, he was permitted to see how a Child was offered up during the sacred mysteries and a particle of its body was offered him at Communion time. He thereupon loudly confessed his former unbelief and from then on solemnly avowed his faith. In his "Lives of the Desert Fathers" (c. 420), Palladius relates several alarming examples of monks who refused to receive the Eucharist through arrogance. Thus the her mit Valens became so overbearing in his attitude that he no longer considered
it worth his while to take part in the sacred mysteries." No longer content with the currently accepted companionship of the angels, he went so far in his madness that he made the claim: "1 do not need to partake of these mysteries; today I have seen Christ himself." He had in reality worshipped Satan, who appeared to him in the night as a phantom, whereby the evil one had magical ly disguised himself as the glorified Christ. The fathers brought him back to sanity by means of severe chastisements (chap. xxv). The monk Heron in his mental delusion refused even to come to the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice.
This Heron had previously practiced such severe mortifications that he often "went for periods as long as three months without any nourishment other than the Eucharist and the few wild herbs that he found occasionally in the desert."
During one of his wanderings there, "he recited by heart 15 psalms, then the Letter of St. Paul to the Hebrews, the Book of isaias, a section of Jeremias, then the Gospel of St. Luke and the Book of Proverbs." Heron later went back to the world and wallowed in sin. When he came back to the fathers in the desert "he could no longer begin a new life, for he died a few days later"
(Ibid. chap. xxv). A monk by the name of Ptolemy, outwardly regarded as an ascetic hero, "estranged himself finally from the holy men (that is, the mon astic fathers), thus shunning their salutary company, and in the same way did not frequent the Sacraments; as a consequence, he departed so far from the way of righteousness that he presumed to assert that it was all of no value."
In the end he gave himself up to an unstable life, to gluttony and intemperance (lb. chap, xxvii).
St. Basil (f 379) makes this statement: "All those who led a hermit's life in the desert where there was no priest kept the Blessed Sacrament in their hermitages and received it from their own hands" (Letter xciii). He also gave this advice concerning Holy Communion: "It is good and beneficial to communicate daily and partake of the body and blood of Christ . . . We (here) receive Communion four times a week: on Sunday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, as also on other days when there is the commemoration of a saint."
Basil, who had spent some time among the hermits of the Egyptian desert, took it for granted that there was a general practice among the hermits of coming together out of the desert for the Sacrifice of the Mass, which was celebrated by a priest who was also a monk. In his work on the Fathers of the Desert mentioned previously, Palladius relates of the presbyter "Dorotheus, an eminent man of blameless life, that he had been elevated to the priesthood for that very purpose, that he might provide divine services and spiritual help for the hermits who dwelt about him in caves" (chap, lviii).
The hermits generally grouped themselves, though at quite some distance at times, around churches that were administered by presbyter-monks. They then took the Blessed Sacrament with them into the desert. Rufinus (f 410), in his Historia Monachorum (History of the Monks), reports Abbot Appolonius as saying: "Monks should receive the Mysteries of Christ daily, whenever possible, so that one who has removed himself far away from them, may not also remove himself far from God; he who receives these Mysteries
frequently, receives the Savior frequently; for the Savior said: 'he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, abideth in me, and 1 in him' (John vi, 57).
This memorial of the Lord's passion will also bring them many benefits as an object lesson in patience if it is celebrated and attended regularly. We give this admonition also that everyone may take pains to keep himself always in readi ness so as not to be found unworthy to partake of the Lord's Mysteries." He adds to this "that the faithful will also (through the Eucharist) obtain the re mission of their sins." Rufinus could truthfully report of the monastery of the same Abbot Appolonius "that the brethren did not take any nourishment until they had received Communion, which was about the ninth hour; in fact, they sometimes fasted until evening, in the meantime listening to instructions on the observance of the Commandments. After they had eaten, some of them retired into the desert, there to meditate, recalling what they had heard and learned from the Scriptures. As 1 observed myself, others remained in the general assembly place, watching, singing hymns, and praising God the whole night through. Still others came from the hills at about the ninth hour, and after they had received the 'Grace of the/Lord' ( Holy Communion), went away again, content with that spiritual nourishment alone. And this they did for many days. And through it all they remained in a state of remarkable cheerfulness and animation, which one could observe among no other group of men anywhere else on earth. No one could be met with that was sad; and did one or the other show signs of inner disturbance, Father Appolonius in quired as to the cause of the trouble. And if one tried to keep his trouble a secret, it often happened that Appolonius told him outright what he was hiding in his heart. He admonished them all that there could be no sadness for those who expected their salvation from God and placed all their hopes in heaven. The Pagans might be sad and the Jews mourn; sinners ought to la ment, but the just should rejoice." Abbot Cassian, who quoted the desert father Theonas as recommending at least the practice of weekly Communion, entered the lists himself in favor of its daily reception when he said: "With what sincerity must we safeguard the chastity of our bodies and souls, since we are to partake daily of the all-holy Flesh of the Lamb, which, according to the word of the Law, no unclean one may touch" (Institutes vi, 8).
It is to be assumed that daily Communion was practiced in St. Augustine's monasteries, although there were not wanting some with an attitude or opinion that the reception of the Holy Eucharist should not as a rule take place every day but only on those days on which one lived more mortified and more pure.
St. Augustine acknowledged that the position of the one group as well as that of the other had its good points, "in as far as each wanted to honor this
Sacrament so richly productive of grace." He adduced in this connection the publican Zachacus, who received the Lord into his house rejoicing (Luke xix,
5ff), and the centurian, who professed himself unworthy of that honor (Luke vii, 6). "Both honored the Lord, though in a different way. Both sensed the misery of sin and pleaded for mercy . . . The one out of reverence does not presume to receive the Eucharist daily; the other, likewise out of reverence,
does not want to omit its reception even for a single day. As was the disgust of the Hebrews for the Manna sent them in the desert, only disdain for this
Food is intolerable" (Letter liv, 3-4). In his own cathedral at Hippo, Augustine stood firmly in favor of daily Communion and advocated it persistently. Thus he applied the fourth petition of the Our Father, "Give us this day our daily bread," to the daily reception of the Sacrament (Sermon lvii, 7).
Although the practice of daily Communion was widespread among the monks of old, the custom of holding the Eucharistic Sacrifice (and with it, of course, the reception of Holy Communion) on Saturday and Sunday was still the prevailing practice. This, for example, was the case with the monks of St.
Pachomius. Rufinus relates of certain monks scattered about far out in the desert that "they came together at some church only on Saturdays and Sun days" (Historia Monachorum xxii). Palladius had a similar report to make:
"About the ninth hour, one could hear the chanting of psalms from all the cloisters, so that it was possible to imagine oneself transported to paradise; eight presbyters presided over them" (Vitae Patrum vii). The great Poimen put it thus: "As 'the hart panteth after the fountains of water' (Ps. xli, 2), so also the monks; in the desert they become feverish with the devil's poison. Then they long for the coming of Saturday and Sunday, so that they may go to the 'fountains of water,' that is, the Body and Blood of the Lord. There they are refreshed." According to Abbot Cassian, the Egyptian monks came together
"only on Saturdays and Sundays to receive Holy Communion (Institutes iii, 2).
Of course, there were instances in which the priest came to the hermit, in order to offer the Holy Sacrifice in his cave. "The hermit Markus, the Egypt ian, lived in his cell for thirty years without leaving it. But a priest made it a practice of coming there to celebrate Mass." The devil tried to picture the priest in the eyes of the hermit as a sinner. But as Markus himself related:
"As the priest was about to approach the altar, 1 saw an angel come down from heaven and lay his hand upon the head of the priest, so that he looked like a pillar of fire . . . And 1 heard a voice: 'If an earthy king will not permit his princes to stand disheveled and bedraggled before him, but he feels that he must deck them out in splendid raiment, how much less will the might of God permit him to do so. Will he not also cleanse the ministers (Liturgen) of his Holy Mysteries, who stand before his heavenly majesty? Markus, a valiant athlete of Christ, was found worthy of this grace, because he had not con sented to an adverse judgment upon the priest."
Rufinus also relates: "There lived in this wilderness—in the neighborhood of the presbyter Apelles, who also served the brethren humbly as a smith—a brother by the name of Joannes, already advanced in years, excelling every one in self-denial and the pursuit of virtue. When this man first came into the desert, he remained for three whole years standing under a cliff, so that he never sat or lay down, praying all the while. He took only so much sleep as he could get on his feet. On the Lord's day he partook of no food, for on that day a priest came to him and offered up Mass, and the Sacrament was his
only nourishment." The devil attempted an impersonation by disguising him self as a priest, came a little before the customary hour, and pretended that he was about to celebrate the Sacred Mysteries. But Joannes saw through the deception. He ''presevered in the program he had begun (that is, his life as a hermit) during the entire three years . . . When the three years were up, an angel of the Lord stood before him and said: 'The Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit have heard your prayer!" He therewith received a mandate to leave his solitude, to visit other hermits scattered about the desert and "to edify them through the words and teachings of the Lord. On Sundays, how ever, he came back to the same place on account of the Sacred Mysteries; but on the other days, he occupied himself with manual labor by weaving ropes from palm leaves, as was the custom in that area" (Historia Monachorum xv).
This story has many a similarity with the report given us by St. Gregory (Dial ogues 11, i). But Rufinus, who knew the Egyptian hermits from his visits and personal contacts, describes their lives more concretely and realistically than did St. Gregory, who knew of them only by reading of them or from hearsay.
The priest-monks, especially, made it their duty to watch over the worthy reception of the Eucharist among their brethren. Rufinus, again, tells of an other priest-monk, by the name of Dioscur, who had a hundred monks living with him in the same cloister. This priest exercised more than ordinary care to see that none of his brethren approached the Sacred Mysteries unworthily loc. cit., xx). A special grace enabled him at times to see into the human heart and to distinguish between the worthy and the unworthy, particularly when distributing Holy Communion. In the same way the presbyter-monk Eulogius tf Benedict, the Blessed) was noted for preventing the unworthy from ap proaching the Sacrament: "How dare you," he asked, "come near the Sacred
Mysteries when your heart or what you have in mind is bad?" He went on to say to one: "This night you gave way to unclean thoughts. But you said in your heart that it made no difference whether you approached the Holy Sacra ment free of guilt or in sin." Another harbored in his heart the doubt, "What good will Holy Communion do me?" All these he held back from the Sacra ment, but he said to them: "Wait a little while, do penance, cleanse your selves by penitence and tears so that you may be considered worthy of com munion with Christ" (loc. cit., xiv). Another priest-monk, his name was Piammon, saw, while he was saying Mass, an angel standing beside the altar and writing down in a book the names of certain monks, whereas he omitted the names of others. After the Mass was over, the priest called these latter monks to him one by one, questioned each one as to his hidden sins, and told him firmly that he had a mortal sin on his conscience. "Then he admonished him and the others with him to do penance, wept with them day and night, and persevered with them in their penances and tears until he saw the same ange standing (beside the altar) again and writing the names of the approaching monks in his book." Piammon then knew that the Lord had accepted the atonement of the penitent monks and allowed them to receive Holy Com munion (Rufinus, loc. cit., xxxii). Abbot Cassian likewise reports that this
exclusion from the reception of the Holy Eucharist on Saturdays and Sundays was one of the possible monastic penances to which a monk was liable (Con ferences xviii, 15).
As we have intimated, Pope Gregory apparently lets the youthful hermit at Subiaco overlook not only his attendance at Mass on Sundays but his duty at Easter as well. Easter was preeminently the feast of the hermits, a day on which they mitigated their ascetic austerity. The desert father Hilarion had his hair shorn once a year, and that at Easter time. (Life x). The monks of St.
Pachomius, in obedience to the precepts of their abbot, celebrated Easter, "the commemoration of the Passion of our Lord," in a body (Rule, Fore word 7). There is still extant a circular letter of Abbot Theodore (f 368), favorite disciple of Pachomius, in which he invited and summoned all the abbots of his monastic federation, his "seconds" ( his representatives), and all the other officials and monks to the common Easter festivities. Palamon, the young Pakhome's austere mentor, admonished his disciple as follows:
"Since today is the feast of all Christians, prepare for us, my brother, what is needful for a repast. Pachomius carried out his task by taking oil and pouring it over a quantity of crumbled bread, something which his master was not in the habit of doing. Yet the Easter meal was still too sumptuous for Palamon.
"He said amid tears, 'My Lord was crucified and I partake of oil!" And Pachomius had to prepare a more simple Easter repast (Second Life iv).
Rul'inus relates a story of the desert father Apollonius: "The holy feast of Easter had come, and after the celebration of the night-watches and of the Easter Mass was over," the brethren wanted to prepare the customary Paschal meal. But there was hardly anything edible on hand. "Thereupon Apollonius said to his brethren: 'If we have faith and are in truth loyal sons of Christ, let each one of us ask God for what he would like to have on this feast-day.'
Apollonius accordingly said a prayer in the name of all the brethren. After he had finished, and they had answered 'Amen,' lo! there stood at the entrance of the cave in which they had gathered several strangers, who brought them everything needed for a meal in quantity and quality so ample that the like could hardly have been found at that time and in that place. There were fruits that had not yet been seen in Egypt, such as grapes, nuts, figs, and peaches, all before their proper season, honey, sweet gum, and milk; in addition to these there were also large cakes and the finest breads, still warm, which appeared as if they had come from a strange country. The men who had brought these things, however, soon left . . . The hermits thanked the Lord for the gifts and began to eat. All this food sufficed for their daily needs until Pentecost, and they were certain that the Lord had sent it to them for their Easter feast" (loc. cit., vii).
No less likely than to day could a monk or hermit in good faith bypass the great feast of Easter in those days. Said Pope Leo the Great (f 461): "We must endeavor with all the powers of our bodies and souls to remain united to this Easter Mystery; for, although it is, to begin with, a great sin not to observe the Easter feast, it would do us still greater harm to find ourselves
(* in attendance at some church during this time and yet not want to take part in the sufferings of Christ" Sermon ixx, 4).
Besides scrupulous souls, who would surely have been constantly put to rights, only heretics, infidels, or arrogant intransigents remained away from the Eucharist; whereas the model monk, as a rule, humbly and reverently approached the Sacred Mysteries daily, or at least on Saturdays and Sundays.
The youthful hermit Benedict must have accommodated himself to this ageold monastic practice and taken part in the Eucharistic Sacrifice at least on Sunday in one of the three churches mentioned by St. Gregory. (The monk
Romanus, apparently a holy man from Gregory's description of him, would surely not have neglected to remind his protege of this duty if he had been careless or ignorant in its regard. Ignorance seem to have been out of the question, too. coming as St. Benedict did from an exemplary Christian family that produced another great Saint, his own sister Scholastica. Nor would it be too farfetched a supposition to think of Romanus as a priest-monk, who came from time to time, like some of his Egyptian forebears, to celebrate Holy Mass in St. Benedict's cave at Subiaco. The ffanslator).
At all events, St. Benedict takes it for granted that the Eucharistic Sacri fice would be celebrated regularly on Sundays, even if he refers to it only in passing (cf. chaps, xxxviii, lx, & Ixii f).
REGULATION OF MONASTIC DISCIPLINE
(Chaps, xxi to xxx) The Deans of the Monastery Should the community be rather large, let brethren of good repute and of holy life be chosen therefrom, and let them be ap pointed foremen (one over every ten),1 who shall have charge of 1 Although no longer in vogue for many centuries, the division of monasteries into deaneries (decaniae — groups of ten), with a foreman (dean — decanus) over each, was an old monastic procedure, to which we have other witnesses besides
St. Benedict. Among these should be mentioned St. Jerome (Letter xxii, 35), St.
Augustine (Sitten der katolischen Kirche I. xxxi, and Abbot Cassian (Institutes iv,
7; & x, 17). Cassian traces the institution of deaneries back to Moses in Exodus:
"Choosing able men out of all Israel, he appointed them rulers over the people, rulers over thousands, and over hundreds, and over fifties, and over tens" (xviii,
25). St. Pachomius also established a division somewhat similar to a deanery, which was called a "house," which was, of course, again subdivided into groups.
The abbot himself appointed deans over them. It is possible that the monks had certain privileges of proposal, that is, they could hand in to the abbot the nam.s of those whom they would like to have as their deans. Of course, the final deci sion lay with the abbot.
As to the manner in which the subordinate superiors, or "Seniors," of a com munity are chosen today, the monastic constitutions differ widely in the various branches or congregations of the Order throughout the world. Such congrega tions, of course, must always conform to the sacred canon of the Church. All