The Black Monks of Europe and the Benedictines' Rule

The Benedictines, commonly known as the Order of St. Benedict (Ordo Sancti Benedicti in Latin, shortened to OSB), are a monastic religious order in the Roman Catholic Church. Because of the color of their religious practices, they are frequently referred to as Black Monks.

However, because each of its monasteries is independent, the Benedictines do not, strictly speaking, form a single religious order. Monks, lay brothers, and nuns who adhere to the Rule of St. Benedict make up this order.

Over the course of its lengthy existence, the Order of St. Benedict's fortunes can be considered to have fluctuated. The order prospered throughout Europe in the centuries following the founder's passing and rose to prominence in Western Europe during the Middle Ages. Consequently, the size and richness of its monasteries increased.

Its monks eventually became decadent, which contributed to its downfall. The Benedictines suffered a severe blow and saw a significant decline in their numbers during the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century. The Benedictine Confederation, which was founded at the close of the 1800s, is the order's international governing body.

The Benedictines regard St. Benedict of Nursia as their founder, and the Order of St. Benedict bears his name. It appears that hardly much was written about St. Benedict by his contemporaries, despite his significant role in the history of Christianity and Europe.

Book II of Pope St. Gregory I's Dialogues, which is thought to have been composed some decades after St. Benedict's death at the end of the sixth century AD, contains much of the information we know about the saint's life. The author claims that four of St. Benedict's disciples provided the facts concerning the saint.

St. Benedict's Life

St. Benedict was born into a respectable family in Nursia, Italy, in 480 AD. His parents sent him to Roman schools to receive his education. Rome was deteriorating at the time and changing from the imperial city of the Caesars to the city of the medieval popes.

St. Benedict retired to Enfide (modern-day Affile) in the Simbruinian hills and later to a cave in the cliffs above Subiaco, in the foothills of the Abruzzi, approximately 40 miles (64 kilometers) east of Rome, after finding the depravity of Rome's residents intolerable.

It should be noted that the practice of withdrawing from the world was developed several centuries prior to the birth of St. Benedict and began in Eastern Christianity. In any event, Romanus, a monk from one of the numerous monasteries in the area, gave the saint food and monastic clothing while he remained alone in his cave for three years.

Despite his seclusion, St. Benedict gained notoriety for his holiness and was finally asked to join a monastery as an abbot. St. Benedict attempted to reform the monastery, but his efforts were met with opposition; on one occasion, an attempt was even made to poison him. The saint consequently departed from the monastery and went back to his cave.

However, his notoriety kept growing, and this time, he was approached by those who wanted to follow him. Consequently, St. Benedict established twelve monasteries, each with twelve monks under his general supervision.

Unfortunately, the intrigues of a nearby priest troubled St. Benedict, forcing him to depart the area. The twelve monasteries he established, however, remained intact.

A number of the saint's followers accompanied him as he moved south. They made their home on the top of Monte Cassino, a hill west of the town of Cassino, which is roughly 76 miles (123 kilometers) southeast of Rome. The Abbey of Monte Cassino, regarded as the first Benedictine monastery, was founded here in 529 AD by St. Benedict.

Over the course of its roughly 1,500-year history, the abbey has been destroyed and rebuilt multiple times. The abbey was last restored following World War II. The Allies incorrectly believed that German troops were hidden in the monastery during the famed Battle of Monte Cassino in 1944, and as a result, they blasted the structure. The abbey was actually providing refuge to citizens who had sought it out.

Going back to the tale of St. Benedict, the saint is credited with converting the local populace from paganism to Christianity through his sermons. Tradition holds that Saint Scholastica, the twin sister of Saint Benedict, also visited Monte Cassino and served as the head of a nunnery close to her brother's convent.

According to tradition, St. Benedict was buried in the abbey he built after passing away on March 21, 547 AD. In 1220, Pope Honorius III declared him to be a saint. Pope Paul VI named him Europe's patron protector in 1964.

The Rule of St. Benedict: The Benedictines' Way of Life

Following the founding of the Abbey of Monte Cassino in 529 AD, St. Benedict penned the Rule of St. Benedict (Regula Sancti Benedicti in Latin). The Rule, which has 73 chapters and a prologue, is based on St. Benedict's personal experiences as an abbot and monk. St. Benedict also used lessons from earlier monastic traditions in the Rule, particularly The Rule of the Master, which was authored anonymously.

The Rule addresses a number of facets of monastic life. For example, St. Benedict discusses the various kinds of monks in Chapter 1 and then goes on to elaborate on the ideals that an abbot should have in the next chapter. A list of 73 "instruments of good works" is given in Chapter 4 and can be used by lay Christians as well as monks. The rules pertaining to the Divine Office are covered in Chapters 8 through 19.

The Rule also takes into account how the monastery operates on a daily basis. For instance, Chapter 41 specifies the hours during which the monks should eat, whereas Chapters 39 and 40 address the amount of food and drink. Because of his Rule, St. Benedict is recognized as the founder of the Order of St. Benedict and is even called the "Father of Western Christian monasticism" by some.

However, it should be noted that there is no proof that the saint intended to form a separate religious order. Furthermore, the Rule was drafted with the Monte Cassino monastic community in mind.

The Lombard invasion destroyed the Abbey of Monte Cassino less than 50 years after it was established. Consequently, the monks escaped to Rome, where Pope Pelagius II placed them in a monastery adjacent to the Basilica of Saint John Lateran. Since the abbey was only rebuilt in the eighth century AD, the monastic community lived there for about a century and a half.

Numerous copies of the Rule have survived in Roman libraries because of the monks' time in Rome. Furthermore, St. Benedict's "brand" of monasticism may have spread throughout the rest of Europe due in large part to the monks' presence in the center of Christendom. Pope St. Gregory I's Dialogues, which extols St. Benedict and his Rule, also contributed to the rise in popularity of Benedictine monasticism.

The Mission of the Benedictines

The evangelizing of England was the first "foreign mission" assigned to the Benedictines at Rome. St. Augustine (of Canterbury), the prior of the monastery, was assigned the duty and, in 595 AD, he set off for England with forty companions. While traveling around France, St. Augustine and his companions left behind the Benedictine monastic tradition in each location they visited.

Given that Benedictine monasticism appears to have been progressively introduced to the nation's major monasteries during the 7th century AD, it is possible that some copies of the Rule were also left behind by the monks. After arriving in England in 597 AD, St. Augustine and his friends founded the first Benedictine monastery in Canterbury. Soon after, more monasteries were established all across the island.

English monks were the first "true Benedictines" by the early eighth century, claiming to have adhered exclusively to the Rule of St. Benedict. It should be noted that the abbots in France used the Rule in conjunction with the works of other monastic fathers, even if Benedictine monasticism was also growing there.

However, the other Western European monastic traditions were destined to be superseded by Benedictine monasticism. Old monasteries embraced the Rule concurrently with the founding of new Benedictine monasteries, as demonstrated in the cases of France and England. Over time, thousands of monks and hundreds of Benedictine monasteries were dispersed throughout several nations, but they were only bound together by the Rule and their loyalty to Rome.

In order to unite the empire's monasteries, the Holy Roman Empire underwent reforms under the leadership of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious. A synod of abbots convened by St. Benedict of Aniane proclaimed in 816/7 AD that the Rule of St. Benedict applied to all monks in the Holy Roman Empire, which comprised sections of Italy and Austria as well as modern-day France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Germany. As a result, the monasteries' observance spread throughout the empire.

Thanks to royal backing, these reforms of the ninth century AD not only united the Benedictines but also significantly increased their influence across Europe. This had a significant positive impact on the Benedictine monasteries, which developed into the continent's preeminent centers of study and literary and educational archives. Manuscripts were gathered, conserved, and manually copied in the Benedictine monasteries.

Due to their patronage by the secular aristocracy, the Benedictines also accumulated substantial wealth. Around the middle of the 12th century, the Benedictines started to deteriorate as a result of the monks' decadence brought on by their excessive material wealth.

The Franciscan and Dominican Orders were founded in the thirteenth century, significantly diminishing the Benedictines' power in Western Europe. However, the Benedictines continued to have a significant influence in Europe. For example, the Benedictines are thought to have possessed some 37,000 monasteries by the start of the 14th century.

The Benedictines suffered a serious setback during the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century. At that time, there were only about 5,000 monasteries. By the middle of the century, the order had completely disappeared in some nations, including Denmark, Iceland, and Sweden, and the governments of those nations had seized the monasteries' assets.

The monasteries of England suffered the same fate during Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries, while those in France fell victim to the French Revolution during the 18th century. Nevertheless, the Benedictines persisted and even prospered in Catholic nations. Additionally, Portuguese Benedictine monks founded the first Benedictine monastery outside of Europe in Brazil in 1581.

The Benedictines faced a new danger in the 18th century when new political and philosophical movements saw monasticism as impeding social advancement due to its irrational beliefs and backwardness. Over 95% of monasteries in Europe are said to have been destroyed by wars or revolutions or suppressed by governments in the decades following 1760.

Nevertheless, Benedictine monasticism was not entirely eradicated and even saw a resurgence in the mid-1800s. In addition to Europe, other regions of the world, including North and South America, also experienced this renaissance.

Like St. Benedict of Aniane more than a millennium earlier, Pope Leo XIII attempted to unite these dispersed monasteries around the close of the 19th century. As a result, the Benedictine College of Sant' Anselmo was founded atop Rome's Aventine Hill on January 4, 1888. The college served as the new Benedictine Confederation's headquarters five years later.

The pope also established the position of abbot primate to lead this federation of independent communities. The Benedictine Confederation has over 13,000 nuns and sisters and about 7,500 monks spread across 400 monasteries as of 2018.