Bernard of Clairvaux, Saint

BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX. -

I. LIFE

He was born in 1090 (1091?) in the paternal castle of Fontaines-lès-Dijon (Burgundy) to the nobles Tescelin "le Saur" and Elizabeth or Aletta of Montbard. He studied the trivium and part of the quadrivium under the Canons of Châtillon-sur-Seine; but one Christmas night, gladdened by a vision of the Child Jesus, he decided to withdraw into a monastery with the intention of observing the Rule of St. Benedict strictly. After a period of struggles and anxieties over his vocation, having also lost his mother (1106-1107), at about the age of 22, in 1112, he obtained admission to the monastery of Cîteaux, founded in 1098 by the blessed Robert, abbot of Molesme, drawing with him into the cloister numerous gentlemen, among them his uncle Gauderic, four brothers (the youngest, Nivard, would follow him later together with his father Tescelin) and friends: it was the beginning of the wonderful flourishing and expansion of the new order which later took the name Cistercian. In the Rule of St. Benedict, which assigns several hours of the day to the choral celebration of the Divine Office (opus Dei), to spiritual reading or study (lectio divina) and to manual labor, B. found great support for his ideal. The continuous and meditative study of Sacred Scripture and of the Holy Fathers made the Bible so familiar to him that he not only frequently quoted entire passages from it, but transformed his very speech into a continuous embroidery of allusions and biblical phrases. Barely three years after his entry into the monastery, he was given the task of founding at Absinthe, on the left bank of the Aube (Champagne), a new religious colony, placed under the patronage of Mary Most Holy, later called Clairvaux (Chiaravalle), which he governed for 38 years as abbot, dividing his prodigious activity between his abbey and the other foundations that followed, the Church of Rome and all Christendom. For about ten years, B. occupied himself almost exclusively with the organization of his Order: he interpreted the Rule of St. Benedict with austerity; he demanded rigorous mortifications, poverty, absolute separation from the world and full obedience, leaving much time for manual labor. In 1118 the Charter of Charity was drawn up, the fundamental statute of the Cistercian Order, officially confirmed in 1119 by Pope Callistus II. B. was to defend its austerity against the criticisms of the Cluniacs (cf. Apologia ad Guillelmum, abbot of St-Thierry): thus arose the famous literary controversy between the "white" and "black" monks, which, personified in St. B. and in Peter the Venerable, abbot of Cluny (cf. Epist., I, 28: PL 189, 112 ff.), ended in a mutual understanding. B. vigorously exhorted his monks not to stop at externals; Peter the Venerable in turn carried out a wise reform in his monasteries (cf. St. Hilpisch, Geschichte des Benediktinischen Mönchtums, Freiburg im Br. 1929, pp. 213-26). B. also concerned himself with the religious and monastic life of many other Orders (v. infra), and had friendly relations with a great number of persons eminent for holiness and learning, such as St. Hildegard of Bingen, St. Malachy, archbishop of Armagh in Ireland, and the famous theological schools of the time, especially that of Paris. He was often traveling as legate, peacemaker, counselor among emperors and kings, popes and bishops; three times he undertook the journey to Italy on behalf of Innocent II, fought for the Pontiff and for the cause of the Church, suffering anxieties, oppositions, combating various heresies and errors; he preached the Second Crusade. He was present wherever his counsel or intervention was necessary, or the good of Church and State required it; he seemed tireless. In the last years of his life, B. had much to suffer, especially after the failure of the Crusade, due to the discord of the leaders and the lack of organization. Saddened by the death of dear friends (Hugh of Auxerre; the faithful Suger, d. in 1151; Theobald, d. in 1152; and of other bishops and abbots); by the loss of Hugh, abbot of Tre Fontane, detained in Rome and elected cardinal; by the abuses and grave failings of his secretary and confidant Nicholas (cf. Epist., 284); by the disagreements with Eugene III, formerly his disciple, and above all by the weight of the labors he had borne, he was forced to rest (late 1152). He still found the strength to go to Lorraine as peacemaker between the bishop of Metz and Matthew, duke of Lorraine, finally succeeding, after violent struggles and massacres, in having the peace accepted: a last work with which he crowned an activity prodigious for his Order and for the whole Church and his age. He died indeed at Clairvaux on 20 Aug. 1153, leaving in this abbey of his no fewer than 700 persons and 165 monasteries of his Order, of which 68 were founded by himself, scattered throughout Europe. Odo, abbot of Morimond, has left us an incomparable document on the common grief for the loss of this man of God (cf. Hüffer, pp. 21-24). Dante (Par., XXI, 33), choosing him as his last guide on the journey through Paradise and putting in his mouth the sublime prayer to the Virgin, has made of B. the highest and most fitting eulogy. Innumerable then are the praises of the Pontiffs, among them notable that of Pius XI in the Constitution Unigenitus Dei Filius (AAS, 16 [1924], p. 142), which has as its subject the spiritual formation of religious; Mabillon called him ultimus inter Patres, primis certe non impar.

Cult. — Alexander III canonized B. in 1174 and Pius VIII on 23 July 1830, out of regard for the depth and purity of his doctrine, gave him the title of Doctor of the Church. His relics, in 1790, were transported to Ville-sous-la-Ferté; the head, since 1813, is found in the cathedral of Troyes (cf. Ch. Lalore, Reliques des trois tombeaux saints de Claireaux, Troyes 1877-78). The cult of St. B. is very popular, not only in his Order, which had long venerated him as a Doctor, but in the universal Church itself: he is patron of Gibraltar and of Liguria, of wax-chandlers and of bees; he is invoked on behalf of the possessed, against harmful beasts, and, in a blessing of the 15th cent., also against storms (cf. H. Bächtold-Stäubli, Handbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens, I, Berlin 1934, pp. 1087-91).

II. SCATTI

The writings of St. Bernard constitute a true summa of spirituality, whence their wide diffusion.

1. Epistolae (PL, 182, 67-662): a first corpus epistolarum was edited by Gaufridus, his secretary and later abbot of Clairvaux, with 243 letters (cf. PL 185, 526); others were rediscovered and added: at present about 540 are known, which constitute, for the variety of their content, of their recipients and for their length, one of the most interesting collections of documents of ecclesiastical history from 1120 to 1153, for pastoral theology, for ethics and for ascetics

(cf. E. Vacandard, s. v. in DThC, II, col. 737 ff.; chronological list in E. Vacandard-M. Sierp, II, pp. 611-16; P. Rassow, Die Kanzlei St. Bernhardi von Cl., in Studien und Mitteilungen aus dem Benediktinerorden, Salzburg 1913; G. Hüffer, p. 184 ff.). The principal manuscripts are 18.119 and 17.463 of the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, 242 of Grenoble, 852 of Troyes, 154 of Dijon.

2. Sermones: they were all delivered to religious communities; they constitute an extremely rich source as regards the spiritual life: PL 183; new edition: B. Gsell and L. Janauschek, Xenia Bernardina (s. voll., Vienna 1891); the principal codex is 12.323 of the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris; they were translated into various languages. They are: 86 De tempore, with an exposition of the liturgical character of the solemnities, among which the sermons Super minus est for Advent are famous; 17 on Ps. 90 for Lent; 43 De Sanctis, among which 11 on Mary with the jewel De aquaeductu and 6 for the anniversary of the dedication; 125 De diversis, generally on biblical texts, among which 8 are spurious; 86 In Cantica Canticorum, an allegorical-mystical exposition of the Canticle, chaps. 1-2, the principal source for his mysticism, with some allusions to the events of the time (25,1; 64-66; 80) and to the cloistral life of Clairvaux (3, 6; 26, 3-14).

3. Tractatus: a) ascetico-mystical: De gradibus humilitatis et superbiae (PL 182, 941 ff.), allocutions on chap. 7 of the rule of St. Benedict, composed around 1121, in which he sets against the 12 degrees of humility the 12 degrees of pride. De diligendo Deo (PL 182, 973 ff.), ca. 1126, answers the question: why and how one loves God; a masterpiece of great importance. De conversatione ad Clericae (PL 182, 833-56), a sermon delivered in Paris in 1140 against the corrupt morals of the students and their consequences (chaps. 2-9), describes the requirements and the happiness of conversion (chaps. 10-18), the responsibility of the priesthood (19-20) and ends with an admonition to leave the world and become a monk. De moribus et officiis episcoporum (PL 182, 809 ff. = Epist., 42), ca. 1127, addressed to Henry, archbishop of Sens, clearly sets forth the duties of bishops, also in the face of the lay authorities, and alludes to some abuse of the abbots. De consideratione (5 books), the most mature work (PL 182, 727 ff.; O. Malfranci, Brescia 1932), composed between 1149-53, dedicated to Eugene III, a manual of a perfect Pontiff, touches on various dogmatic truths, treats of the manner of contemplating and of the sanctification of the Pontiff and gives a vast plan of reform of the Roman clergy and of ecclesiastical discipline. — b) monastic: Apologia ad Guilelmum, abbot of St-Thierry (PL 182, 895 ff.), ca. 1126, defends the right of the various forms of monastic life, especially of the Cistercians and the Cluniacs. De laude novae militiae ad milite Templi (PL 182, 921 ff.), ca. 1132-36, dedicated to Hugh of Payens, master of the Templars, sets forth his ideas on the legitimate war of Christians against the infidels and establishes the rules, the directives and the theological principles of the Templars, who united the duties of the religious state with those of the militia. De praecepto et de dispensatione (PL 182, 859 ff.), ca. 1142, a series of solutions to questions on the obligation of the rule proposed by the monks of St. Peter of Chartres. — c) liturgical: Epistola seu dialogus super Antiphonarium Cisterciense (PL 182, 1121 ff.) referring to the edition of the Antiphonary and the Gradual of the Cistercians which he prepared by commission of the General Chapter of 1132 (cf. H. Kienle, in Gregoriuablatt, 26 [1901], p. 2 ff.; E. Vacandard, S. B. et la réforme cistercienne du chant Grégorien, in Compte rendu du Congrès scientifique, cathol., IIᵉ sect., Brussels 1894-95 pp. 305-309). De correctione Antiphonarii, ca. 1132, establishes the laws of liturgical chant in the Cistercian Order (cf. Iusgoge in musicam melliflu Doctoris s. B., Leipzig 1517; Hommey, Supplementum Patrum); Officium de S. Victore (PL 183, 371 ff.), the time of composition is uncertain; in the letter of presentation to the abbot Guido of Montiéramy, St. Bernard sets forth his principles in liturgical matters. — d) dogmatic, apologetic: De gratia et libero arbitrio (PL 182, 1001 ff.), ca. 1127, sets forth the relations between grace and freedom. Tractatus ad Hugonem de S. Victore de Baptismo aliisque quaestionibus (PL 182, 1031 ff. = Epist., 77) between 1136-40, probably against the innovations and assertions of Abelard. Contra quaedam capitula errorum Abaelardi (PL 182, 1049 ff.), dedicated to Pope Innocent II (Epist., 190), ca. 1140, especially against the Trinitarian and reconciling doctrine and the concept of faith of Abelard; a profound and often excellent exposition, in order to obtain the condemnation of the innovator. — e) hagiographic: Liber de vita et rebus gestis S. Malachiae Hiberniae Episcopi (PL 182, 1073 ff.), after 1148, his only historical work, accurate, a precious source for the conditions of Ulster in twelfth-century Ireland, with a certain credulity regarding strange miracles; also a source of some antiphons for the Office of St. Bernard.

III. THOUGHT

1. Religious life

In his spirituality St. Bernard shows himself a perfect disciple of St. Benedict, who took upon himself the task of leading souls, by the way of humility, to the highest degree of the love of God (cf. Reg. s. Bened., ch. 7 at the end). Humility was truly the fundamental virtue of St. Bernard, a virtue that he constantly spread by example and by word. He sought to preserve it through austerity of life and through the love of Christ, who by his sweetness softens the weight of austerities and makes one more generous in bearing, indeed in seeking, the crosses that are a participation in his passion and glorification. The supreme degree of humility is at the same time the first degree of truth: the individual, knowing his own misery, reaches the knowledge of his neighbor's misery with the desire to help him; he then ascends to a third degree, that is, to a love in which he loves God in every person and thing (cf. De grad. humil., 4-6). With singular clarity St. Bernard sets out the true relationship between Grace, the will and personal merits: free will is necessary, but Grace is also necessary: tolle liberum arbitrium, non est quod salvetur; tolle gratiam, non est quo salvetur. With the fall of the first parents, man did not lose his freedom (libertas a necessitate or arbitrii), but he is capable of choosing either beatitude or misery; however, the lost libertas comilii or from sin is restored to him only through Grace, and only by cooperating with Grace does man obtain freedom from misery (cf. De gratia et lib. arb.). The affections and passions, whose manifestations and struggles he describes with powerful psychological depth, follow the vicissitudes of the will. Merits, possible only with antecedent and concomitant grace, are gifts of God, and God wills to reward their use (cf. In Cant. Serm., 67, 10; De grat. et lib. arb., 13 and at the end); grace descends into the souls of the faithful through the Sacraments, and especially through the Eucharist, and, in a certain sense, makes them like Christ. The spiritual exercises that help the soul in ascending the degrees of divine love are principally meditation and prayer: the former shows us what we lack, the latter obtains it from God (cf. Serm. I in festo s. Andreae, n. 10). Famous is the Saint's mysticism: the degrees that form the mystical ladder by which one ascends in the love of God are set out in ch. 8 of De diligendo Deo (PL 182, 973); here is the list: self-love or carnalis, the lowest degree; the love of God for the many benefits that man receives from God; the love of God for himself, propter Deum; the pure love that forgets itself and loves everything and everyone in God (ibid., 2-11). Self-love «quo ante omnia homo diligit se ipsum propter se ipsum» (ibid., 8) is in its principle legitimate because natural, but too easily it goes beyond its limits and passes over into pleasures, from which man must withdraw by returning into his own conscience, by restraining curiosity and by humility; self-love, in order to be just, must strip itself of its egoistic character and become common and social. The highest degree of love, mystical union, is a divine operation that raises the soul already established in perfect charity, destroying what is proper to fallen man, and frees it from every cupidity and fear and enlightens the spirit through a more perfect understanding of Holy Scripture: adhaereus Deo anima unus spiritus est cum eo (cf. E. Gilson, La théologie mystique de s. B., Paris 1934). Characteristic of the spiritual life of St. Bernard is the Credo ut experiar and the alternation between action and contemplation (cf. J. Ries, Das geistliche Leben nach der Lehre des hl. B., Freiburg im Br. 1906).

2. Theology

Man is created in the image and likeness of God. In order to attain, after the fall, to sanctification, he therefore needs a restoration of the resemblance to God, and this is the work of the Divine Redeemer and Mediator between God and men, Jesus Christ. Before Christ only some had a clear prophetic knowledge of the Son of God and of his redemptive work; the meditation of the mysteries of the earthly life of the Incarnate Word is a most powerful means of enlivening love and at the same time offers the model to which we are to conform ourselves. Characteristic of Bernardine Christology is therefore devotion to Christ as an infant in the manger and as a victim on Calvary.

In his Mariology the abbot of Clairvaux celebrates first of all the divine motherhood, the reason for her other prerogatives (cf. Sermo in Assumpt., in Dom. infra Assumpt., In vigilia Nativ. Dom., LII de diversis); the principal virtues, by which she attracted God's complacency, are humility (cf. Sermo 3 in Annunciat., n. 9; 4 in Assumpt., n. 7) and virginity (cf. Serm. 3 in Assumpt., Serm. 2 in Adventu, n. 4). The union of the divine motherhood with virginity is exalted several times with the words of the liturgy taken from Sedulius (PL 19, 599): «Gaudia matris habens cum virginitatis honore, nec primam similem visa est nec habere sequentem». He also sets forth the universal mediation of the Virgin, which is theologically founded on the fact that Mary gave to the world in Jesus the source of every grace; Mary serves as a channel, an aqueduct, and it is the will of God that everything should come to us through Mary, an idea that the Cistercian Office «B. M. V. in sabato» was later to inculcate anew (De aquaeductu, n. 7; cf. P. Aubron, La Mariologie de s. B., in Recherches de science reli, 24 [1934], pp. 543-77; D. Nogues, La Mariologie de s. B., Paris 1934). Although yielding to the doctrinal prejudice of many of his time, and not accepting the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception (cf. E. Campana, Maria nel dogma cattolico, 3rd ed., Turin 1928, p. 437 ff.), St. Bernard is the knight and the singer of Mary; indeed the liturgical lessons of the Marian feasts are drawn by the Church in part from his sermons in honor of the Madonna.

In the doctrine on the Sacraments St. Bernard defends the theory that the children of Christian parents, like unbaptized adults who nevertheless believe, can be saved, even without Baptism, and outside of martyrdom: only contempt for the Sacrament is worthy of punishment. Moreover he thinks that sinful actions committed without consciousness of sinning are nonetheless culpable (cf. De Bapt. [1, 2: PL 183, 1032-38]; cf. E. Vacandard, s. v. in DThC, II, coll. 745 and 774).

The Church is likewise a mediator between God and man: hence in him the cult of ecclesiastical tradition, the zeal for the communion of Saints, the faith in the mission of the Angels. The union of the soul with the Divine Word is brought about only through the Church. She, with her order and her hierarchy, is a figure of the kingdom of God.

Papacy and empire must draw close to each other and support one another. The Pope possesses the supreme and full power in the Church and can, if it were necessary, depose, change, transfer, excommunicate even bishops without having to indicate the reasons; however, even inferiors, in their own sphere, have their own inalienable rights before God and their own responsibilities.

St. Bernard explicitly accepts the famous symbol of the "two swords," of which one, the spiritual, belongs entirely to the Church; the other, the temporal, must be wielded by the civil powers, not without a certain oversight and authority on the part of the Church. He resolutely defends the infallibility of the Pope against Abelard (PL 182, 1953); however, he makes clear that what is not just in itself does not become just through an approval of the Pope (cf. Epist. 7, 7. 8; 178 and 231). On theological problems cf. E. Vacandard, s. v. in DThC, II, coll. 761-84; on Bernardine political thought cf. A. Steiger, Der hl. B. v. Cl., Brünn 1908; J. von Kozlowski, Kirche, Staat und Kirchenstaat im hl. B. v. Cl., Poznan 1916; F. Millosevich, Le idee politiche di s. B. di Chiaravalle, in Boll. di Studi storico-relig., 1 (1922), nn. 5-6; Ricerche religiose, 1 (1925), nn. 4-5. On the importance of the liturgy for practical Christian life cf. A. Le Bail, S. B. docteur de la vie liturgique, in Revue Liturg. et Monast., 16 (1931), pp. 26-35. For his eschatology cf. F. Radke, Die eschatologischen Anschauungen B. v. Cl., Würzburg 1922.

IV. THE INFLUENCE

1. Religious influence

St. Bernard is the great reformer of the religious life of his time. About a quarter of his letters deal with monastic questions, because his first and principal affection was for his Order. With his noble spirit, in which virginal chastity, generosity, manliness, piety and clemency were interwoven, and with the fervor of his love of God and of his eloquence, Bernard attracted to himself men of every age, condition and profession: indeed, from each of his journeys he brought back with him to Clairvaux a great number of candidates, and he raised them to such monastic perfection that the fame of his monastery seemed to surpass that of Cluny. In this way he contributed enormously to the renewal of the religious-ecclesiastical spirit. In 1116 he carried out, for example, a fruitful preaching at Châlons-sur-Marne, with the recruitment of many novices, among whom were also religious and secular priests; in 1140 he was invited by the bishop of Paris to preach to the students; of his listeners about twenty set out at once for the novitiate. Indeed, after the crusade sermon in the Rhineland, he brought back with him to Clairvaux about 350 young aspirants. One should not therefore be surprised if Clairvaux, usually too populous, could accept multiple requests for foundations: the 68 abbeys founded by St. Bernard became in a short time new centers of light and important hearths of spiritual life in France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Belgium, England, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, etc.; in 1153, the year of St. Bernard's death, his monks were reaching the most distant and still barbarous countries. The influence of St. Bernard was alive everywhere, both by reason of his annual visits and of his presidency at abbatial elections, and through his letters and his delegates. St. Bernard also contributed greatly to improving the religious life of the other Orders; from every side advice or intervention was sought from him: by the Carthusians (his influence on the Order of St. Bruno is known from his visit to the Grande Chartreuse [cf. PL 185, 305] and from his correspondence, especially Epist. 11); by the Premonstratensians, to whom he ceded land (Epist. 253; cf. 56, 178, 355); by the Canons Regular of St. Augustine; by the Benedictines (for example, at Cluny he had certain disorders rooted out); in 1137 he settled the affairs of Montecassino. Finally he is found in Italy, in England, in the Rhineland, introducing salutary reforms in the monasteries; he favored with all his strength the expansion of the ideals of the Canons Regular of St. Victor of Paris and of Arrouaise and intervened personally among the Canons of St. Stephen of Dijon. On the occasion of the Council of Troyes (1128) he gave the Templars the Rule of St. Benedict adapted to the needs of military life; he was also a wise legislator of the Order of Calatrava. Several monasteries sought to affiliate themselves, if not through the Rule, at least in spirit, to the reform of Cîteaux: St. Mary of York in England, St-Denis in Paris, Argenteuil, Compiègne, Ste-Geneviève, St-Sépulcre of Cambrai, Ponthières and others. Other military orders, which arose in the following century, bound themselves more or less closely to Cîteaux: those of Alcántara (1156), of Aviz (1162), of St. Michael or de l'Aile (1205), of Montesa (1314), the Order of Christ (1319), of St. George of Alfama, and several more. On his third journey to Italy Bernard also founded the Third Order of the Humiliati in Lombardy.

His counsel or intervention, not only in guiding souls but also, very often, in political, diplomatic and ecclesiastical affairs, was greatly desired by bishops and Popes, by emperors and lay nobles (cf. J. Thiel, Die politische Tätigkeit des Abtes Bernhard v. Cl., Königsberg 1885). A good number of letters were addressed to bishops: he wanted the episcopate to be penetrated with sacred literature, imbued with knowledge, humility, chastity and charity, so that it might continue, thus purified, the reform of Gregory VII; he desired true pastors of souls, and therefore he often intervened for the election of worthy bishops: at Langres (1138), and shortly afterwards at Reims, he urged Bishop Henry of Verdun, on account of grave accusations, to abdicate (cf. MGH, Scriptores, X, p. 506 ff.); he intervened in 1128 in favor of the bishop of Paris with Pope Honorius III and King Louis VI of France; he obtained in 1145 the election of the bishop of York against the protection of the bishop of Winchester; he exercised a great and beneficial influence for the election of the bishop of Auxerre, Alan; in 1133 he decided the double archiepiscopal election at Tours in favor of Hugh; he reconciled the bishop of Beauvais with Louis the Younger; he was peacemaker between the bishop of Metz and Matthew duke of Lorraine, etc.

He sought with success to improve also the discipline, and especially the chastity, of the lower clergy: his famous sermon De conversione ad clericos gives an eloquent example of this. He intervened at a great number of chapters, synods and councils, always exercising a great influence on the decisions: at Troyes (1128), Châlons (1129), Etampes (1130), Reims (1131), Jouarre (1133), Pisa (1135), Sens (1140), Paris (1147), Reims (1148), to name only the principal ones. He refused the episcopate offered to him several times (at Genoa in 1130; at Milan in 1135; at Reims in 1138, etc.) and even the cardinalate.

2. Political influence

With Count Theobald of Champagne, in whose domains the lands of his Order were located, and in general with the nobility of the time, he always showed a prudent firmness, which often allowed him to intervene in favor of the weak and oppressed. In 1131 he reproached the emperor Lothair, who arrogated to himself the right to invest bishops; in 1140 he intervened in the struggle against Louis the Younger and the count of Champagne over the investitures of Aquitaine (cf. J. M. Canivez, s. v. in DHG, VIII, coll. 624-26). A peacemaker also among the great of the world, he reconciled, for example, Louis the Younger of France with the count of Anjou and with the duke of Normandy; the emperor Lothair of Germany with Conrad of Swabia, and Roger of Sicily with the Pope and with the emperor; William of Poitiers with his king, as well as the cities of Pisa and Genoa, of Milan, etc. Everywhere the apostolate of St. Bernard sought indiscriminately among the great as among the small the observance of the laws of God and of the Church. Above all Bernard sought to confirm and propagate, with all his strength, the authority of the Holy See. In the Council of Etampes (1130), in which it was discussed which of the two pontiffs elected at the same time in Rome was legitimate, Innocent II or Anacletus II, the intervention of Bernard was decisive in favor of the former: his arguments, though assailable, convinced the king of France, then that of England and that of Germany-Italy, and these with their countries recognized Innocent, in whose favor Bernard twice moved King Lothair to a military expedition into Italy (cf. ibid., coll. 626-30; and particularly now P. F. Palumbo, Lo scisma del MCXXX, Rome 1942). Bernard often carried the crowds along with his eloquent enthusiasm (cf. E. Vacandard, S. B. orateur, Rouen 1877; E. Gérouzez, Essai sur l'éloquence et la philosophie de s. B., Paris 1839); he undertook arduous journeys, struggled amid anxieties and oppositions, to support the Pontiff and the Church, until, on 29 May 1138, amid the joy of the Roman people, who proclaimed Bernard father of his country, the saint received the solemn submission of the antipope Victor IV, successor of Anacletus (cf. E. Amélineau, S. B. et le schisme d'Anaclet II, in Revue Quest. Hist., 30 [1881], p. 47 ff.). His expertise in canon law, and still more his ecclesiastical sense and his great labors for the extinction of the schism, had made him an influential counselor of the Pope.

3. Defender of the faith

Filled with fervor for the purity of the faith, and inexorable in the defense of the theoretical and moral principles of religion, having returned to France, he opposed, in France and on the Rhine, the Neo-Manichaeans who denied the Church any authority over matters of faith and morals, abolished the Priesthood and other Sacraments, and propagated the free interpretation of Holy Scripture: B. forced their leaders, Henry of Lausanne and Peter of Bruys, to submit; at the Council of Sens (1140) he also obtained the condemnation of 14 articles of Abelard (cf. Hochland, 5 [1908], pp. 527-45; P. Lasserre, Un conflit religieux au XIIᵉ siècle, Paris 1930), and, in 1148, at Reims, the condemnation of Gilbert de la Porrée (v.); he won over the heretical sects of the Apostolics and the Petrobrusians more by gentleness than by rigor, preaching and bringing back the seduced in masses, at Toulouse, Bergerac, Périgueux, Sarlat, Cahors, Albi, etc. At Mainz his intervention put an end to the bloody persecution against the Jews; he was less fortunate, however, at Cologne, Worms, Speyer, Strasbourg and elsewhere. While recognizing the necessity of an interior renewal of ecclesiastical society — his observations against certain avaricious priests are particularly well known — B. held the political rights of the Church and its goods to be untouchable on the part of the laity, and therefore fought fiercely against Arnold of Brescia (v.) and his reform, as well as against the usurpers of the goods of the Church and of the Pontiff, a struggle made grim by bloody revolts, especially at Rome in 1144.

He also turned his activity to the defense of the Church against the Muslims, and, charged by Eugene III, he preached in 1146-47 the crusade for the liberation of the Holy Places, with such zeal and success, in France and western Germany, that ca. 200,000 men, led by Conrad III and Louis VII the Younger, took up arms (cf. G. Hüffer, Die Anfänge des zweiten Kreuzzuges, in Histor. Jahrbuch, 8 [1887], p. 391 ff., K. Neumann, B. v. Cl. und die Anfänge des zweiten Kreuzzuges, dissertation, Heidelberg 1882). He wanted the entire Christian world to take part in this enterprise — it appeared to him as a realization of the moral unity of Christendom through the military cooperation of the individual states — and therefore he sought to bring England, Bohemia, Bavaria, Poland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark into the movement as well. When the first enterprise failed, he began to preach a second crusade; indeed he had already been elected head of the new expedition, when the other Cistercian abbots forbade him to carry it out. The extraordinary success of his preaching had been greatly aided, as often also on other occasions, by the fame of the miracles he performed (cf. G. Hüffer, Die Wunder des hl. B. und ihre Kritiker, in Histor. Jahrbuch, 10 [1889], pp. 23-46, 748-806).

4. Theological influence

In the intellectual renewal of the 12th century St. B. represents, together with Hugh and Richard of St. Victor, essentially the ascetic mysticism characteristic of medieval religiosity. He is not a theologian in the technical sense of the word: he was rather a magnificent exalter of the traditional values of the Church, and a great orator. A man of profound feeling, St. B. was satisfied neither with Aristotle nor with the dialectical-speculative method introduced shortly before into theological truths by St. Anselm of Canterbury, although the abbot of Clairvaux also employed it with great skill, for example, against Abelard. With his clear-sighted spirit and his sure theological judgment he grasped almost intuitively both the true and deeper meaning and the full beauty of these truths which were guaranteed to him by Holy Scripture and by the doctrine of the Holy Fathers (especially Augustine, Ambrose and Gregory the Great); with tender affection, nourished by a profound spirit of recollection and prayer, he knew how to propose them to others, so much so that from the 15th century onward he was called: Doctor mellifluus.

5. Ascetic influence

Vast and lasting was the ascetic influence of St. B. on the spirituality of the following centuries down to the present day. He was, among medieval authors, one of the most read and studied: already in 1891 the complete and partial editions of his works had reached the fine number of 500, and more than 2000 works had been written about him (cf. L. Janauschek, Bibliographia bernardina [Xenia bernard., 4], Vienna 1891); many others were added afterward. A great number of works were also attributed to him: Janauschek (op. cit., part 4, pp. IV-XIV) lists 120 in prose, 57 in poetry, among them the hymn Iesu dulcis memoria (cf. B. Haureau, Sur les poèmes latins attribués à s. B., Paris 1882 and 1890; E. Vacandard, Les poèmes latins attribués à s. B., in Revue quest. hist., 49 [1891], p. 218 ff.; M. Herold, B.'s von Clairvaux Hymnen, in Realent. f. protest. Theol. u. Kirche, II, p. 638 ff.; A. Wilmart, Le « iubilus » sur le nom de Jésus dit de s. Bernard, in Ephemerides liturgicae, 57 [1943], pp. 3-285), and a Tonale (a treatise on the 8 tones of Gregorian chant and their characteristic differences), composed in dialogue form (M. Gerbert, Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra potissimum, II, Sankt Blasien 1784). Already the Flores excerpti, collections of texts taken from the writings of the Saint, indicate that various categories of souls had taken him as a master of the spiritual life and his writings as an object of meditation; to these must also be added anonymous and apocryphal books on the life and passion of Christ and on the sorrows of the Most Holy Mary. With his considerations placed at the end of the treatise for the Templars, St. B. had in fact created a new kind of meditation: that is, to linger in considering the person and life of the Divine Redeemer; for the work of redemption is, more than any other object, capable of arousing feelings of love in the redeemed. Moreover, almost all theologians, preachers and ascetics from the 13th century down to the present day have drawn inspiration from his writings: first among them Peter Lombard, St. Thomas Aquinas, Gerson and many others; the Imitation of Christ is not only nourished with Bernardine quotations and thoughts, but in certain manuscripts even appears as his work. Even among Protestants St. B. has his admirers, beginning with Luther and Calvin down to the present day. With full right he is therefore called the father of Western mysticism, especially Christocentric mysticism, and of the mystical marriage of the soul with the Word of God. Various schools have preserved or developed his doctrine: the Cistercian School, and the famous Schola Claravallensis with the works of William, abbot of St-Thierry, of Aelred, abbot of Rievaulx in York, of Guerric, abbot of Igny, of Isaac, abbot of l'Étoile (de Stella), etc.; the moral commentaries on the Song of Songs found continuators and imitators in Gilbert of Hoyland (d. 1172), Thomas of Cistercian (ca. 1180), Baldwin, abbot of Ford and then archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1188) and many others still (cf. F. Cavallera, in DSp, I, col. 1494 ff. with bibliography; P. Pourrat, La spiritualité chrétienne, II, Paris 1928, pp. 183-92; A. Wilmart, La série et la date des ouvrages de Guillaume de St-Thierry, in Revue Mabillon, 1924, pp. 157-67; F. Bliemetzrieder, Isaac de Stella. Sa spéculation théologique, in Recherches de théol. anc. et médiévale, 4 [1932], pp. 134-59). St. Bonaventure, citing about 400 texts of the abbot of Clairvaux (cf. J. C. Didier, La dévotion à l'humanité du Christ dans la spiritualité de s. B., Paris 1920), together with the Franciscan School became the promoter of the considerations on the mortal life of Christ begun by St. Bernard (cf. St. du Chambon-Feugerolles, La dévotion à l'humanité du Christ dans la spiritualité de s. Bonaventure, Lyon 1932, ch. 11 and bibl.); as for the influence of St. Bernard on the Franciscan writings of the Middle Ages, cf. F. Vernet, La spiritualité médiévale, Paris 1929, pp. 32 and 77, and for the modern era, e.g., Father Constantino de Barbançon, Les secrets sentiers de l'amour divin, Douai 1623, new ed. Tournai 1932. The nuns of Helfta, moreover, led by St. Gertrude and St. Mechtilde, who toward St. Bernard «specialem habebant devotionem propter mellifluorum verborum ipsius praerogativam» (St. Gertrude, Legat. div. pietatis, 4, 49), completing the master's doctrine with devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, represent, at the end of the 13th century, one of those numerous communities which, with the help of liturgical texts, under the spiritual direction of St. Bernard contemplate the love of Christ, manifested to us in the mysteries of his humanity. Another nun, Beatrice of Nazareth (d. 1268), in describing the seven degrees of love, not only follows St. Bernard but uses his very formulas (cf. De seven maniere van minne, Louvain 1926, p. 3 ff.). St. Bernard's distinction in mystical experience — raptus, excessus, mystical marriage — has become classic.

Indebted to the great abbot of Clairvaux are: besides the great mystics of Germany, Eckhart, H. Seuse, J. Tauler, the celebrated French school of de Bérulle, with its principles: conformation to the Incarnate Word, interior states of Jesus, servitude of the humanity of Christ; John van Ruysbroeck, who follows St. Bernard in the seven degrees of love, as he follows him in the images he uses for the assimilation of the soul to God and especially in the description of the excessus (cf. Melline d'Asbeck, La Mystique de R. l'Admirable, Paris 1930, pp. 87-90), and the School of the devotio moderna led by Gerard Groote with his brethren of the Congregation of Windesheim (cf. H. Gleumes, Gerhard Groot und die Windesheimer als Verehrer des hl. B. v. Cl., in Zeitschrift f. Aszese und Mystik, 10 [1935], p. 90 ff.) who draw much from Bernardine inspiration (cf. I. Huijben, Aux sources de la spiritualité française au XVIIe siècle, in La Vie Spirit, 25 [1930]: part Etudes et documents, Dec. 1930, p. 126).

6. Philosophical influence

Of the philosophical problems, those which have a direct relation to the practical religious life particularly interested St. Bernard. Thus St. Bernard considers the nature of man always in intimate relation with original sin and with the grace of redemption, and therefore condemns everything that is demanded in the name of nature and recommends the mortification of the body and the senses. His theories, moreover, on Christian freedom and free will, on law and Christian morality, on intention, on conscience, and obligation; his ideas on love and its object, in particular how man knows himself and from self-love ascends through various degrees to the love of God; his psychological doctrine on seeking and finding God, on the structure of the soul and its qualities, and on the fact that man was created in the image and likeness of God and that he is therefore capable of participating in the majesty and happiness of God (anima capax Dei), all this and other philosophical-religious speculations give St. Bernard a pre-eminent place in the philosophy which he channeled toward Catholicism, preparing the ground for the great Thomistic synthesis of the following century (cf. E. Gérouzez, Essai sur l'éloquence et la philosophie de s. B., Paris 1839; E. Gilson, L'esprit de la philosophie médiévale, 2 vols., Paris 1932, passim). Not wrongly, therefore, is St. Bernard called the father of Christian philosophy.

The first printed edition of the works of St. Bernard was edited by A. Bocard, un publica mellifluì devotique doctoris s. Bernardi scripta (Paris 1508); subsequently there were others more accurate, such as those of J. Merlo Horst, S. Patris B. opera omnia (2 vols., Cologne 1641) and of J. Mabillon, S. Bernardi... opera... post V. C. I. M. Horstium ad varios codd. mss. collata (9 vols., Paris 1667), reprinted in 1690 and in 1719 (posthumous) edited by Massuet and Le Texier, reproduced by Migne (PL 182-85) where there is also found a quite complete enumeration of the manuscripts (182-83; the genuine writings; 184: false and spurious); useful is the Chrestomathia bernardina of E. Piszter (Turin 1939).

An accurate and almost complete list of the bibliography on St. Bernard up to 1891 is found in G. Hüffer, Die Wunder des hl. B., in Hist. Jahrbuch, 10 (1889), pp. 23-46, 748-807; in the appendix of L. Janauschek, Xenia Bernardina, Vienna 1891. - L. Chomton, S. B. et le château de Fontaine-lès-Dijon, 3 vols., Dijon 1891-95; J. Jobin, S. B. et sa famille, Poitiers 1891; E. Vacandard, Vie de s. B., Abbé de Clairvaux, 2 vols., Paris 1895, latest ed. 1927 (fundamental work); J. Jobin, S. B., Paris 1904 (useful anthology of the most significant passages extracted from the works of St. Bernard); J. Bernhart, Eucharische und bernhardische Mystik in ihren Beziehungen und Gegentätzen, Kempten 1912; U. Berlière, L'Ordine monastico dalle origini al sec. XII, Italian trans. M. Zappalà, Bari 1928, p. 126 ff.; G. Goyau, S. B., Italian trans. G. Decca, Brescia 1928 (popular); [Various authors], S. B. et son temps. Recueil de mémoires et communications présentés au Congrès de Dijon 1927, 2 vols., Dijon 1928; P. Miterre, S. B. de Cl. Un moine arbitre de l'Europe au XIIe siècle, Genval 1929; id., La doctrine de s. B. Le théologien, l'ascète, le mystique, le docteur de l'Église, Brussels 1932; E. Gilson, La théologie mystique de s. B., Paris 1934; W. Williams, St. B. of Clairvaux, Manchester 1935; J. Leclercq, S. B. mystique, Paris 1948.

Other works are cited by J.-M. Canivet, s. v. in DHG, VIII, coll. 610-44; by M. Mahler, s. v. in DSp, I, coll. 1454-1499; and by J. Schuck, s. v. in LThK, coll. 197-201; E. Vacandard, s. v. in DThC, II, coll. 761-84.

Filippo Oppenheim

V. ICONOGRAPHY

He almost always appears dressed as a Cistercian; only exceptionally as an abbot in pontifical vestments. His generic attributes are a book, that is, the rule of the Order, and the pastoral staff, symbol of abbatial authority; sometimes, as a famous exorcist, he is accompanied by the figure of a devil bound in a corner (canvas by Seb. del Piombo in the Vatican Picture Gallery). From the Middle Ages onward the Saint bears the emblems of the passion of Christ, signs of his voluntary mortification. Although the great reformer, outside Cistercian monasteries, never enjoyed a true and proper popularity, two scenes from his life became particularly dear to artists: the depiction of St. Bernard embraced by the Crucifix, dating from the late German Gothic (woodcuts, stained-glass windows and the panel by Wolgemut), and that of the apparition of the Madonna (paintings by Filippo Lippi, by Filippino Lippi and by Fra' Bartolomeo). Another miraculous intervention of the Madonna in the life of the Saint, the so-called lactatio, was painted by the Rhenish "Master of the Life of the Madonna" (ca. 1500) and by Murillo. Among the cyclic representations of the legend, the eight panels by Jörg Breu the Elder at Zwettl (Lower Austria, ca. 1500), the copper engravings by Antonio Tempesta (Rome 1587) and the reliefs of the choir stalls of Chiaravalle Milanese (Carlo Saravaglio, 1645) are deservedly celebrated. - See Plates XC-XCI.