Arnold of Brescia

ARNOLD OF BRESCIA. - Born at the end of the 11th century or at the beginning of the next in Brescia, he set out on an ecclesiastical career, but it is doubtful whether he went beyond the minor orders. Of his youth only his journey to Paris and his stay at the school of Abelard are known, of whom he became the most devoted disciple and the warmest defender. After 1119 he returned to his homeland and took part in the struggles that were agitating his city against the simoniacal clergy and the temporal authority of the bishop. At that time the consequences of the investiture struggle were making themselves felt everywhere and were stirring up not only the clergy, but above all the lower population of the cities, which made of the moral question a matter of political rebellion. In Brescia the bishop Villani was favorable to the antipope Anacletus II, while the consuls sided with Innocent II; the bishop was replaced by Manfredi, favorable to reform, who however, after an uprising, was expelled from the city. Meanwhile A., having gone very far in his anticlerical attitude, which struck at the entire Catholic hierarchical system, was denounced to the Pope for his rebellious conduct and condemned at the Second Lateran Council of 1139. He then returned to France, but there he threw himself into the very lively disputes that were raging between Abelard and St. Bernard, supporting the former; for this he was condemned along with him at the Council of Sens and shut up in a convent. Shortly afterwards he was able to open a school of moral theology on the hill of St. Geneviève, in which he resumed his invectives against the worldliness of the clergy, but he had little success. Through the work of St. Bernard, who also asked help from the king of France, he was expelled and took refuge in Switzerland with the Augustinian canons of Zurich; he also enjoyed for some time the protection of the bishop of Constance, but then St. Bernard succeeded in exposing him, and he had to move away. A., however, had a friend in Card. Guido di Castello, then papal legate in Bohemia, and was able to stay with him peacefully; here he met Gerhoh of Reichersberg, who recommended him to Celestine II. Perhaps in the cardinal's retinue, A. came to Italy and around 1145 arrived in Rome. The conditions of the city in those years were very turbulent, inasmuch as the renecatio senatus had taken place, the restoration of civic autonomy with a clearly antipapal character and with the predominance of popular elements. Some pontiffs who had tried to oppose the movement had come to a bad end, others had withdrawn from Rome. At first A. was uninvolved in the political struggles. After abjuring his errors before Pope Eugene III in Viterbo, he was sent by him (it seems) to Rome in the habit of a penitent to perform an expiatory pilgrimage. Shortly afterwards, however, political passion seized him again and he began to preach once more, soon gathering wide support around himself. The subject of his speeches was still only the reform of ecclesiastical morals, the invitation to an ascetic life more in conformity with the Gospel ideals. Nevertheless it was inevitable that an understanding should be established between the two movements, the religious one of A. and the political one of the Roman senate, given their affinity of programs, the common enemy to be fought and the identity of the historical appeals to which both referred. The point of encounter came when A. proclaimed that ecclesiastics must not possess earthly goods and that these were all the property of the laity and therefore of the prince. The clash between the Pontiff and the rebel took on tones of notable harshness: Adrian IV demanded the expulsion of A., the senate refused, undertaking to guarantee his safety, while A. swore to defend the republic with his word; in an uprising a cardinal was wounded, and then the Pope launched the interdict on the city. A. had to flee from Rome, but at this point a new protagonist entered the scene and his action was decisive: Frederick Barbarossa, recently raised to the empire and profoundly convinced of his duties as armed defender of the Church, was very glad to do something pleasing to the Pope, with whom he had instead many other grounds for conflict. In this way A. was reached by the partisans of Barbarossa, and handed over to the prefect of the city Pietro, who condemned him to death; it is very probable that he was hanged and then burned. His ashes were thrown into the Tiber so that they would not become an object of veneration on the part of the numerous and convinced followers who still remained in Rome after his death.

It has been rightly observed that A.'s criticisms against the worldly clergy are no more severe and violent than those of a St. Peter Damian and that, in the final analysis, he and his great adversary St. Bernard were fighting the same vices in apparently similar forms. And yet the difference between the two is truly radical and explains the difference in their success. It is not possible to distinguish how much was personal in A.'s preaching and how much he repeated of concepts and aspirations common to broad strata of the people. Without doubt he was very learned, of lively intellect, a warm speaker; he led an austere life and knew how to instill his sentiments in many; he wrote nothing or very little.

Paolo Brezzi

THE ARNALDISTS

This was the name given to those followers of A. who in the second half of the 12th century formed a particular heretical sect in Lombardy; they are condemned by name in the constitution Ad abolendam of Lucius III and Frederick I Barbarossa (Verona 1184). A. regarded as prevaricating and deprived of authority any clergy that did not lead a poor life, without possessions, without pomp; his disciples lived by begging; it is not proven that he taught errors concerning the Baptism of children and the Eucharist. The Arnaldists consider the evangelical virtues to be the foundation of the priestly «ordo» and of the hierarchy; they reject the Sacraments as ineffective, because administered by priests whom they consider unworthy; they teach that it is a duty to resist the abusive exercise on the part of the Church of judicial and coercive power, and that an austere and poor life gives laypeople the right to preach without ecclesiastical approval. They pushed their evangelical pauperism to heterodox doctrinal positions; through the anti-hierarchical and anti-sacerdotal character of their preaching they influenced the heretical evolution of the Italian Waldensians (v.) and of the Humiliati (v.). In the 13th century they are mentioned in the lists of condemnation of the various sects; but they did not endure as a distinct group; their errors became the leaven of other heretical currents.