Bernard of Clairvaux-Monasticism

Miller, in referring to Bernard, describes a typical day in the routine of a monastery:

At two in the morning the great bell was rung, and the monks immediately arose from their hard couches, and hastened along the dark cloisters in solemn silence to the church. A single small lamp, suspended from the roof, gave a glimmering light just sufficient to show them their way through the building. After prayer, or divine service, they retired, and after a brief repose rose again for matins [i.e., early morning prayers] which took them about two hours; then other services, partly regulated by the season of the year—summer or winter; but they were employed in various religious exercises till nine, when they went forth to work in the field. At two they dined [apparently the only meal of the day]; at night-fall they assembled to vespers [i.e., evening services]; six or eight, according to the season, they finished the day with compline [i.e., an hour of prayer to end the day], and passed at once to the dormitory.

Time given to sleep he regarded as lost, and was wont to compare sleep and death

But however severe we think these practices and austerities to have been, they were far from satisfying the zeal and spirit of self-mortification of Bernard. He spent his time in solitude and study. Time given to sleep he regarded as lost, and was wont to compare sleep and death, holding that sleepers may be regarded as dead among men, even as the dead are asleep before God. He diligently read the scriptures . . . . [1]

Broadbent makes an interesting observation concerning the cycle that developed among the various monastic orders:

Beginning with poverty and severest self-denial, they became rich and powerful, relaxed their discipline and grew into self-indulgence and worldliness. Then a reaction would induce some to begin a new order, of absolute self-humiliation, which in its turn traced the same cycle. [2]

Milman has a very picturesque way of describing this same cycle of monasticism:

Monasticism had been and was ever tracing the same cycle. Now the wilderness, the utter solitude, the utmost poverty, the contest with the stubborn forest, and unwholesome morass, the most exalted piety, the devotion which had not hours enough during the day and night for its exercise, the rule which could not be enforced too strictly, the strongly competing asceticism, the inventive self-discipline, the inexhaustible, emulous ingenuity of self-torture, the boastful servility of obedience; the fame for piety, the lavish offerings of the faithful, the grants of the repentant lord, the endowments of the remorseful king—the opulence, the power, the magnificence. The wattled hurt, the rock-hewn hermitage, is now the stately cloister; the lowly church of wood [becomes] the lofty and gorgeous abby; the wild forest [becomes] the pleasant…grove; the marsh a domain of intermingling meadow and corn-fields; the [noisy] stream or mountain torrent [gave way to] a succession of quiet tanks or pools [filled with] fattening innumerable fish. The superior, once a man bowed to the earth with humility, careworn, pale, emaciated, with a coarse habit bound with a cord, with naked feet, is become an abbot on his [saddled horse], in rich attire, with his silver cross borne before him, travelling to take his place amid the lordliest of the realm.

New orders, therefore, and new institutions were ever growing out of the old, and hosts of youthful zealots were ripe and eager for their more extreme demands of self-sacrifice, and that which appeared to be self-abandonment, but in fact was often a loftier form of self-adoration. [3]

Bernard seems to have been an exception. He was pure; the contaminating ways of the world did not have a place in him

This cycle is a strong indication that the ascetic life of the monasteries did not result in the denial of the soul. Instead, the soul life remained intact but assumed a different guise. Bernard seems to have been an exception. He was pure; the contaminating ways of the world did not have a place in him.

A New Monastery at Clairvaux

After three years at Citeaux, Bernard was sent out by the abbot to establish a new monastery. He considered what site would be suitable. He decided upon a desolate and solitary valley in Champagne called the Valley of Wormwood. It was notorious as a place for robbers. He and his companions were determined to change it into a place honoring to God. The valley’s name was changed to Clairvaux, i.e., Valley of Light. The valley was so utterly barren that at first they were forced to live on beech tree leaves. They suffered famine until food was supplied by neighboring peasants. Once the abbey was visited by the pope. Milman describes the appearance of the monks of the abbey and the reaction of the pope and his company:

. . . the poor of Christ, not clad in purple and fine linen, but in tattered raiment; not bearing Gospels or sacred books embossed in gold, but a rude stone cross. No trumpet sounded, no tumultuous shouts were heard; no one lifted his looks from the earth, no curious eye wandered abroad to gaze on the ceremony; the only sound was a soft and lowly chant. The Prelates and the Pope were moved to tears.

The Prelates and the Pope were moved to tears

The Roman clergy were equally astonished at the meanness of the Church furniture, the barrenness of the walls, not less by the hardness and scantiness of the fare, the coarsest bread and vegetables, instead of the delicacies to which they were accustomed; a single small fish had been procured for the Pope. They had little desire to sojourn long at Clairvaux. [4]

William of Champeaux, a bishop, heard of the extreme ascetic rigors that Bernard was practicing. He persuaded Bernard to leave Clairvaux for twelve months, during which time William insisted that the monk take proper food and rest. William’s efforts saved Bernard from the prolonged suicide which would have been the probable result of the excessive mortifications practiced at Clairvaux. Bernard afterward denounced that type of practice.

Soon after Bernard returned to Clairvaux, many candidates asked to be received into the monastery. The number of those living there rose to seven hundred. Bernard founded other monasteries throughout Europe. Eventually one hundred sixty of them were established by him. These were scattered all over France, Italy, Germany, England, Spain, and every country in western Europe.