AELREDO (AELRED, ALRED, ALRED, EALRED, ETHELRED), of HEXHAM, saint. — English writer, Cistercian abbot of Rievaulx, born in 1110 at Hexham (Yorkshire) to a noble family, died on 12 January 1167 at Rievaulx.
He spent his youth (1124–33) as a page at the court of David I, king of Scotland, while nevertheless remaining always profoundly English. Sent (1133) by King David on a mission to Rievaulx (Yorkshire), he immediately embraced the monastic life in the abbey of Rievaulx, the second Cistercian foundation in England (1131), established through the efforts of Walter Espec and with the assistance of s. Bernard. His favourite reading became the Fourth Gospel and the Confessions of Augustine. In 1141, on his return from Rome, where he had accompanied Abbot William, he became master of the novices. But already in 1142, at the age of thirty-two, he was chosen as the first abbot of Revesby (Lincolnshire), a daughter house of Rievaulx.
In 1146 he was appointed head of the mother house at Rievaulx, which he governed until his death. In 1164 he went to Scotland to convert the barbarous populations of Galloway.
He succeeded in attracting even the chief of the Picts to the monastic ideal. He suffered from gout during the last ten years of his life. Canonized in 1191, he is commemorated on 12 January (Acta SS. Ianuarii, I, Antwerp 1643, pp. 748–51).
Writings (PL 195, cols. 195–798):
A) Historical and biographical: 1) De bello Stansfordi, an account of the battle of Cutton Moor (22 August 1138) between David’s defeated army and the English barons of the North; 2) Genealogia Regum Anglorum, with details concerning the royal family of the Malcolms of Scotland; 3) Vita Sancti Edwardi regis, dedicated to Henry II, king of England (Acta SS. Ianuarii, I, ed. cit., pp. 293–302); 4) Vita s. Niniam, of little value; 5) De sanctimoniali de Witton; 6) De fundatione monasteriorum S. Mariae Eborac. et de Fontibus, a manuscript in the library of Christ Church College (Cambridge); 7) The pamphlet De Sanctis Ecclesiae Hangustaldensis et eorum miraculis also appears to be his; it was published anonymously by Mabillon (Acta SS. O.S.B., vol. III, 1, Paris 1672, p. 228 ff.).
B) More interesting are the theological-ascetical works, which earned him, in the Cistercian tradition, the praise: Bernardo prope par Aelredus noster.
1) Speculum charitatis, his principal spiritual work, a practical treatise on Christian perfection, judged by his contemporaries to be the finest of its kind. The Compendium speculi charitatis would, according to some, be an initial draft of it; Wilmart, however, considers it an extract. 2) De spirituali amicitia, in dialogue form, one of A.’s most expressive pamphlets, which gives a Christian completion to Cicero’s analogous treatise. 3) Regula sive Institutu Inclusarum or De Vita eremitica ad sororem, for his religious sister, published in an appendix to the works of s. Augustine (PL 32, 1451–74) and partly incorporated among the Meditationes s. Anselmi (15–17: PL 138, 784–98): chapters 47–65 propose meditating on the mysteries of the Lord by the method later developed in the Meditationes Vitae Christi (fourteenth century) of pseudo-Bonaventure; 4) De Iesu puero duodenni, an ascetical treatise inspired by Lk. 2:42–52, formerly attributed to s. Bernard (PL 184, 849–70); 5) Sermones de Oneribus, 32 sermons on Is. 13–16, forming a treatise on the various obstacles (onus, id est pondus) to Christian perfection; 6) Sermones de Tempore et de Sanctis, addressed to his religious; only 25 have been published in PL; 7) L’Oratio pastoralis (O boné Pastor Iesu), filled with biblical quotations in the manner of s. Bernard, a synthesis of pastoral duties; 8) De natura animos, a psychological pamphlet, left unfinished and unpublished (ms. 32 of the Bodleian Library of Oxford).
Other works, such as the Epistolary, have been lost.
A. is the principal representative of the medieval Cistercian school in England. A scholar of s. Augustine and a contemporary of s. Bernard, he was their worthy disciple. Le Bail lists the characteristics of his spiritual doctrine as follows: the Christian life must reproduce the mysteries of Christ; Jesus Christ communicates himself to the soul through the Church; Mary’s mediation is necessary (s. Benedict exercises an analogous mission toward his monks); asceticism must take account of God’s immediate action, or the “visitations of the Lord,” in the soul; the crowning of charity lies in contemplation, or the “sabbath” of the soul; divine friendship must be the beginning and the end of human friendship.