Bernard of Clairvaux - Böcker

Founded in 910 to return to the authentic monasticism of St Benedict, the Abbey of Cluny led a revolution in the medieval Church. Wresting secular hands from control of monastic offices and finances, the great burgundian monastery and its hundreds of daughter houses inspired eleventh-century churchmen to seize control of the Church from petty lords and outraged emperors. Powerful and respected, the Cluniac order cast a long shadow over the european Church, but it's very position of leadership brought prosperity into the cloister and, in its train, complacency. The Cistercians were founded in 1098 to revive the primitive observance of the Rule of St Benedict. Having experienced the worldly dangers threatening, even embraced by, the Black Monks of Cluny, the White Monks of Cîtwaux resolved to withdraw from, not to reform, the world. Their uncompromising asceticism attracted scores of young men, and soon the Cistercian Order outstripped the Cluniac in pious prestige and personnel. Cluniacs felt censured; Cistercians grew smug. As rumors mounted in the spring or summer of 1125, William, the Benedictine abbot of Saint-Thierry, exhorted his good friend Bernard, the Cistercian abbot of Clairvaux, to take pen in hand to check mutual rancor. This Apologia, composed by Bernard and approved by William, is the result. it excoriates monks black and white: Cistercian who had become slanderers, Cluniacs who had grown self-indulgent, Bernard's satirical wit spared no one who had lost sight of the monk's first duty, the love of God and the brethren.

Saint Bernard's On Loving God is one of his most delightful, and most widely read, works. It stands in the tradition of the Fathers of the Church, but it carries patristic teaching into the Middle Ages and into the cloister. Its famous affirmation that God is to be loved without limit, sine modo, is taken directly from the letters of Saint Augustine. While the tract is not an example of scholastic theology, it shows a typically twelfth-century love of logic and an unexpectedly precise use of terminology. In his analystic commentary, Emero Stiegman not only introduces readers to the abbot of Clairvaux's thought, but carefully analyses his language, his logic and his theology. In doing so, he demonstrates the vital importance of reading medieval authors on their own terms, without superimposing on them categories favored by later generations, even our own.

Love came more naturally to Bernard of Clairvaux than did humility. The son of burgundian nobility, 'people of rank and dignity', Bernard attracted followers and exercised authority with an easy grace. After years of struggle in the monastery, he admitted that humility remained for him one of the hardest virtues to acquire. yet the uncompromising vehemence of his love for God drew him to embrace the discipline and to learn the humility which monastic tradition taught prepared him for the perfect love of God.

The monk and the knight—the two quintessentially medieval European heroes—were combined in the Knights Templar and in the other military orders founded in the era of the Crusades. With characteristic eloquence, Bernard of Clairvaux voices the cleric's view of knights, warfare, and the conquest of the Holy Land in five chapters on the knights' vocation. Then the Cistercian abbot who never visited Palestine and discouraged monks who proposed doing so, in another eight chapters, provides a spiritual tour of the pilgrimage sites guarded by this 'new kind of knight-hood and one unknow to ages bone by'.

"Even though there is no real need for me to write this for the brothers' spiritual progress—which must always be my first concern," reflected the conscientious young abbot of Clairvaux as he began his four homilies in praise of the Virgin Mary., ". . . as long as it in no way prevents me from being at their service, it seems to me they ought not to take it amiss if I satisfy my own devotion." To sing the praises of Mary, Bernard studies and contemplates her there where God has so perfectly revealed her, in the Scriptures, taking as his text the passage from Luke, An Angel was sent to a virgin named Mary. In the company of the Church Fathers and with the help of the liturgy, he uses Holy Writ to provide both the content of what he says and the form in which he says it. Theologically the sermons are thoroughly traditional; in the beauty of their expression they are unparalleled. The Cistercians have always had a special devotion to Our Lady, dedicating each abbey to her and closing each day with the beautiful hymn-antiphon Salve Regina.

This last small group of Bernard's sermons to be published in translation by Cistercian Publications rightly goes by the title De varii in the critical edition. While most of them treat feasts on the church calendar, they do so in a somewhat hit-or-miss fashion. Three sermons also deal with God's will, God's mercies, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Two sermons for the feast of Saint Victor are a response to a request to Bernard from the monks of Montiéramey; the Bollandist Life of Saint Victor appears here as a complement to those sermons. Besides the nine sermons normally assigned to the De varii, this volume also includes a sermon on the feast of Saint Benedict that was recently added to the collection in Sources Chrétiennes. The survival of this loose assemblage of sermons outside of the organized collections of Bernard's sermons provides a reminder of Bernard as preacher and writer, able despite all his other activities to turn his hand to preaching when called upon. While they treat of disparate themes, they allow us to encounter the quintessential Bernard-speaking of the life of desire, the true meaning of holiness, and the awakening of the spiritual senses in the search for God.

For over forty years Bernard of Clairvaux composed works of theology and spiritual reflection. He became the counselor of kings, nobles, popes, and scholars. He advocated a strong, reformed papacy and was the spiritual leader of the early twelfth-century European Church.Often overlooked, these short works by Bernard may well give readers their truest insight into the saint's sermons as his monks heard them. The Parables explore the spiritual meaning of Scripture directly and dramatically. The Sentences likely represent his sermon style before he polished his work for publication.

Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) did not create a sermon collection solely in order to comment on the liturgical solemnities of the Christian year. He had a definite but very complex concept of the messages which he wanted his collection to convey: that the Word which once became incarnate in the historic Jesus is continuously present in the written words that speak of him–the word of the Gospels and also the words of preachers and writers; that the Word wants to be re-incarnate in the reader by means of the words being read. So it is that the sermons successively evoke the inner conversion of a human person who opens himself to the Word/words, external conversion in submission to the obedience of community life, and finally the personal recognition of the true nature of the divine Word.

The sermons of Bernard of Clairvaux evoke the inner conversion of the human person who is open to the Word/words, the external conversion that is submission to the obedience of community life, and, finally, the personal recognition of the true nature of the divine Word. This volume contains Saint Bernard's sermons for the liturgical seasons of Lent and Easter. Included are sermons for the Purification, Septuagesima, the feast of Saint Benedict, and the feast of the Annunciation, all of which are interpreted by Bernard in light of the paschal mystery. In the sermons for Lent, especially, one gets to know a more hesitant and searching Bernard than appears in his other liturgical sermons. This volume is the third of a projected five volumes of Bernard's liturgical sermons.

On the anniversary of the dedication of the monastery church at Clairvaux, Saint Bernard spoke to the community to explain the meaning of the feast: “What sanctity can these stones have that we should celebrate their festival? They do indeed have sanctity, but it is because of your bodies. . . . Your bodies are holy because of your souls, and this house is holy because of your bodies.”The thirty-eight sermons in this volume carry forth this theme, revealing the holiness of the monastic life as monks alternate through the rhythm of the day and the year between the opus Dei and manual labor, journeying faithfully through life to death and the transitus to glory. The twelfth-century Ecclesiastica Officia of the Cistercian Order required abbots to speak formally to their communities in chapter on seventeen fixed days, mostly liturgical feasts. This volume witnesses to Bernard’s fulfillment of this requirement and includes sermons for the Assumption and Nativity of the Virgin and the Feast of All Saints, sermons devoted to the feasts of particular saints celebrated during the autumn months, sermons for the time of harvest, and funeral sermons that look forward to the eternal joy in the communion of saints.

Saint Bernard was born in 1090 near Dijon, France. He joined the fifteen-year-old monastery of Cîteaux in 1113. In 1115 he became the founding abbot of Clairvaux Abbey, whence his name, Bernard of Clairvaux. Saint Bernard was a gifted and prolific writer of theological treatises, Scriptural commentaries, letters, and many sermons. The sermons in the collection published here, styled Sermones de diversis (Sermons about Various Topics), lack the specific point of departure that characterizes his other sermons. That is, whereas the sermons on the Song of Songs are a verse-by-verse commentary on that biblical book and his Sermons for the Year follow the liturgical calendar, this collection of sermons deals with his various pastoral concerns. Since Scripture is always Bernard’s point of departure and inspiration, the sermons often read like a Scripture study, but what comes through equally is the voice of an understanding spiritual father who is a masterful student of Scripture, biblical language, and the needs of his monks.

These eighty-six sermons are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius an entire generation found irresistible. This volume contains sermons 1 through 20.Bernard of Clairvaux towered over the society of twelfth-century Europe. A brilliant preacher and a polished writer; he counselled kings and rebuked popes. He moved in the complicated affairs of men with a dexterity which brought him acclaim and adversaries, yet he exhorted Christians to turn from worldly affairs to serve God. He remains a man of paradoxes. He crisscrossed Europe while insisting that monks have no place outside their monasteries. He inveighed against two of the most renowned scholars of his day, yet he helped support the education of numerous students. He persuaded two kings to take up a crusade against the Moslems, yet he preached that persuasion and not force should be used against unbelievers. A profound mystic, Bernard sought, above all and in all, to be with God and to bring all persons to the experience of God. His Sermons on the Song of Songs are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius which an entire generation found irresistible.

These eighty-six sermons are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius an entire generation found irresistible. This volume contains sermons 21 through 46.Bernard of Clairvaux towered over the society of twelfth-century Europe. A brilliant preacher and a polished writer; he counselled kings and rebuked popes. He moved in the complicated affairs of men with a dexterity which brought him acclaim and adversaries, yet he exhorted Christians to turn from worldly affairs to serve God. He remains a man of paradoxes. He crisscrossed Europe while insisting that monks have no place outside their monasteries. He inveighed against two of the most renowned scholars of his day, yet he helped support the education of numerous students. He persuaded two kings to take up a crusade against the Moslems, yet he preached that persuasion and not force should be used against unbelievers. A profound mystic, Bernard sought, above all and in all, to be with God and to bring all persons to the experience of God. His Sermons on the Song of Songs are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius which an entire generation found irresistible.

In 1090 St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a monk of the Cistercian order, was born. One of the great figures of his age, he travelled and preached widely; Cistercian abbeys were founded all over Europe. He left many writings which included his famous treatises on humility, on the love of God, on grace and free will, and his masterpiece on the Song of Songs. It is from these writings that this collection is drawn. Here we see, not only a compassionate, thoughtful man, not only a scholar devoted to the Bible and to the works of the Fathers, but a Christian of extraordinary vision and faith. To him God's healing power, God's love, and our acceptance of our own weakness, were central to the message of Christ. Love Without Measure brings this message newly alive to us today, in timeless words that reach across the centuries.

Always a vigorous champion of papal reforms, Bernard of Clairvaux toward the end of his life saw one of his own monks raised to the papal throne as Eugene III. While acting as the new Pope's political and spiritual counsellor, the Great Cistercian abbot was tireless in advancing Eugene's policies and in defending his authority and prestige. Both as a monk and as a strategist, Bernard realized that political astuteness needs the complement of sober and honest reflection. In Five Books on Consideration he defines 'consideration' for the Pope by examining the practical and the theological demands of the papal office. In Book One he scrutinizes an overcrowded papal schedule and exhorts his former pupil to insure for himself the leisure without which reflection is impossible. In Book Two he demands of Eugene a relentless knowledge of himself and his motives. In Book Three he exposes the abuses of the institutional church and the shortcomings of many of its leaders. In Book Four the French abbot warns the monk-pope to be wary of the intrigues of Rome and its citizens. In Book Five he sets the Church within the celestial hierarchy, treating the theological nature of the papal office and he demands that Eugene in all his actions and decisions take as his goal the knowledge of God. Five Books on Consideration is both a treatise on the politics of theocracy and a paternal admonition to a spiritual son whose very soul, Bernard believed, was imperiled by his high office.

These eighty-six sermons are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius an entire generation found irresistible. This volume contains sermons 67 through 86.Bernard of Clairvaux towered over the society of twelfth-century Europe. A brilliant preacher and a polished writer; he counselled kings and rebuked popes. He moved in the complicated affairs of men with a dexterity which brought him acclaim and adversaries, yet he exhorted Christians to turn from worldly affairs to serve God. He remains a man of paradoxes. He crisscrossed Europe while insisting that monks have no place outside their monasteries. He inveighed against two of the most renowned scholars of his day, yet he helped support the education of numerous students. He persuaded two kings to take up a crusade against the Moslems, yet he preached that persuasion and not force should be used against unbelievers. A profound mystic, Bernard sought, above all and in all, to be with God and to bring all persons to the experience of God. His Sermons on the Song of Songs are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius which an entire generation found irresistible.

The burgundian reformer abbot draws a picture of the perfect frontier bishop, and holds him up as a model for bishops everywhere. Conversion is used here not in the modern sense of transferring from on ecclesiastical body to another, but in the patristic and monastic sense of metanoia, turning one's entire being wholly to God.Contents covered:  On Conversion, a sermon to clerics Lenten sermons on the psalm 'He Who Dwells'

These eighty-six sermons are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius an entire generation found irresistible. This volume contains sermons 47 through 66.Bernard of Clairvaux towered over the society of twelfth-century Europe. A brilliant preacher and a polished writer; he counselled kings and rebuked popes. He moved in the complicated affairs of men with a dexterity which brought him acclaim and adversaries, yet he exhorted Christians to turn from worldly affairs to serve God. He remains a man of paradoxes. He crisscrossed Europe while insisting that monks have no place outside their monasteries. He inveighed against two of the most renowned scholars of his day, yet he helped support the education of numerous students. He persuaded two kings to take up a crusade against the Moslems, yet he preached that persuasion and not force should be used against unbelievers. A profound mystic, Bernard sought, above all and in all, to be with God and to bring all persons to the experience of God. His Sermons on the Song of Songs are among the most famous and most beautiful examples of medieval scriptural exegesis. In them the modern reader can catch a glimpse of the genius which an entire generation found irresistible.