15 sept

What a guy, Bernard of Clairvaux. He was in some accounts the most important man of the twelfth century. He definetely inspired a new sense of austerity in Benedictine monasteries, which were in his case the Cistercians.

At the age of 25 he founded the abbaye of Clairvaux we visited yesterday. Austerity was the theme. With eleven other monks from Citeaux he travelled to the Vallee d’Absinthe, which he renamed Clairvaux, the clear valley.
He took his ascetic drive so far that it was it a Don Quichot like form according to the dutch writer Anton van Duinkerken, whose book about st Bernard I read today. The twelve monks had to build the first abbey on a diet of mainly leaves of bushes. In the winter they would have some carrots too. This information was based on an account from the 17th century which might make it unreliable in the eyes of some people. The same biographer writes about Bernard sleeping for the first twenty years in an open barn on only a little bed of straw. No protection fron wind or weather, and both can be beastly as we found out today, about which later.
Bernard austerity drive was enormously succesfull. By the end of the century hundreds of abbeys had been followed, following the Cistercian rule. Bernard was the most important adviser of the King of France, the King of England – who ruled over half of France, those were the days (he was nine tenths french, of course)- and most importantly the pope. He was the driver behind the disastrous second crusade that killed millions. For this reason I always think Bernard resembles George W Bush, whic is extremely unfair to the intellectual abilities of Bernard. And it is difficult to imagine how George W. would ever survive the eating habits of Bernard. Even though he later relaxed his extreme diet, his stomach and whole digestive system was so shot that he hardly could hold any food. He threw up 90% of what he ate, and had extreme stomach pains from digesting the rest. In the abbey church there was a special spot where Bernard could throw up, without disturbing the mass or his prayer session.
He disliked the example of Cluny, by far the most important monastery of the beginning twelfth century. He wrote a fascinating polemic with Cluny’s abbot Peter Venerabilis. The end result was that both of them accepted each others opinions. According to the British historian Kenneth Clarke this polemic and its result is the main reason that the Christian tradition is as varied as it is and not as ‘narrwminded’ as for example islam.
Bernard thought Cluny was too relaxed in its eating and dressing habits, too excesive in the decoration of the church the monks didnt spend enough time doing work with their hands.
Peter wrote back that the farizee like interpretation of the Benedict Rule by Bernard was far fetched and his attitude arrogant.
They became lifelong friends, without watering down their own visions too much, which is proof of course that friendship has nothing to do with agreement of opinions. I implore all my friends to disagreewith me on this.