Tag: St. Benedict

• July 6, 2013

  Benedict’s abbot as guide

  Benedict’s abbot is a discerning man. Different means are to be employed with the undisciplined and the disciplined.  The undisciplined monks are to be reprimanded and taught by example, less by words. The disciplined, receptive to words, are to be entreated gently ‘to do better.’ Benedict’s abbot is self-integrated. His words converge with his deeds,…
• July 5, 2013

  Taciturnitas

  In an endnote to Chapter 6 entitled ‘Silence,’ the editor Bruce L. Venarde tells us that ‘Taciturnitas traditionally means limited speech, but Benedict generally uses it to signify silence.’ The senses are not unrelated. Silence can lend its ear to limited speech, and limited speech rests and resounds more readily than it wriggles. In the Chapter…
• July 3, 2013

  ‘Inclining the ear of the heart…’

  ‘Listen carefully, my son, to the teachings of a master and incline the ear of your heart.’ So begins the Prologue of St. Benedict’s Rule. How carefully must one listen to incline the ear of the heart. To what? To the teachings. Of whom? Of the master whose words come from elsewhere, the teachings he imparts. But…
• October 31, 2011

  On invitations to have philosophical conversations, disciplines of eating, smallholding farming, and much more on Pindar and St. Benedict

  In the spirit of giving, I’d like to invite you to have a philosophical conversation with me. Let’s call it philosophical conversation as gift giving. I’ve been meeting a lot of people this way in the past couple weeks. My strolling card is filling up, but let’s see if we can make it work. What’s…