Content area
Full text
Even before his conversion, Saint Augustine was desirous of finding a way in which he and a group of his friends and colleagues could pursue true wisdom through the study of philosophy. While in Milan, he contrived with some friends to establish a form of secular community life. For a variety of reasons this community never materialized, but the idea of the common life itself was one that would remain with Augustine throughout the remainder of his life and he would strive to incarnate it, now grounded in a firm Christian religious belief, at Cassiciacum, Tagaste, and Hippo. During all this time, Augustine strove to formulate and refine his ideas on religious life lived in common. His thought and writings on this unique aspect of Christian life eventually came to exert an extraordinary influence down the centuries on numerous religious legislators and practioners.1 Monks, nuns, and secular clergy in Augustine's own time and afterward have come under the sway of his teachings. The principal texts of Augustine in this regard are his rules for monks and nuns as well as other works such as The Work of Monks, several sermons, sections in the Expositions on the Psalms, and numerous letters.2
Among the receivers of the Augustinian monastic tradition of religious life are two sixth-century authors of monastic rules: the Master3 and Saint Benedict.4 Indeed the principal source that Saint Benedict used in composing a rule for his monastic community at Monte Cassino was The Rule of the Master (RM). Although Benedict generally followed the basic outline and content of RM, at the same time he clearly did not simply copy wholesale the structure or uncritically represent all of RM's content but rather molded this source to his own purposes.5 First, Benedict severely edited RM, for The Rule of Saint Benedict (RB) is only about one third the length of RM. second, Benedict re-arranged the order of some chapters and whole sections of chapters, notably the liturgical section (RB 8-20), the penal code (RB 23-30, 43-46), and his final seven chapters. Third, and most importantly, Benedict infused his rule with a more positive view of human nature than the Master. For example, in RM 13, the chapter on the treatment of a brother who has been...