COLUMBANUS (Colum, Colman, Columba, Palumba), Saint. - Abbot of Luxeuil and Bobbio, b. in Ireland in the province of Leinster around 540, d. at Bobbio on 23 November 615. A rich and ardent young man, he bade farewell to the world, and, after studying Holy Scripture under the direction of Senill, abbot of Cluain-Inis, he embraced the monastic life in the abbey of Bangor (Ulster) founded by Comgal, a disciple of St. Finnian. Around 590, a pilgrim for Christ, he left his homeland never to return, and with twelve companions crossed into France, where Gontran, king of Burgundy, received him and offered him a deserted tract of land in the Vosges region. At Annegray, deep in the forest, C. established a center of monastic life, whose reputation soon drew disciples in such great number that it became necessary to found two other monasteries in the vicinity, at Luxeuil and at Fontaine. C. fixed his residence at Luxeuil, as the more central location, while retaining governance of the other foundations.
Having come into conflict with the authoritarian Queen Brunhilda and with her lustful nephew Theodoric, king of Burgundy, C. was forced to leave Luxeuil around 610. For a short time he wandered through France with some monks, among them Potentinus, founder of a monastery at Coutances. Vocations arose along his path: at Meaux C. consecrated to God the daughter of Cagneric, Burgundofara, known under the name of St. Fara, foundress of the monastery of Evoriacum (Faremoutiers); her brothers Cagnovald, future bishop of Laon, and Faro, bishop of Meaux; as a guest of the Frankish chieftain Autarius at the villa of Vulciacum (Ussy-sur-Marne), C. blessed his three sons, Ado, Dado and Rado: the first later erected the abbey of Jouarre, the second, who would be called Audoenus (St. Ouen), established the monastery of Rebais (Seine-et-Marne) and later became bishop of Rouen; the third, Rado, founded the abbey of Roul-sur-Marne. Received with honor by Theodebert, king of Austrasia, C., accompanied by Eustasius, Atala, Gallus and other monks of Luxeuil, made his way by way of the Rhine toward Germany, where the pagans were still numerous, stopped for a short time at Bregenz on Lake Constance, leaving the monk Gallus there, and descended into northern Italy, where the Lombard king Agilulf and Queen Theodelinda permitted him to build a monastery at Bobbio (v.), in 614. There he died at the end of the following year; his relics are preserved in the crypt of the ancient abbey church.
By his character and his religious activity, C. is one of the most remarkable figures of the Church in the 6th-7th centuries. An authentic Irishman, of a temperament at once impetuous and tender, bold and independent, he was at the same time a tenacious upholder of Celtic customs concerning the form of the tonsure and the date of Easter and a Roman Catholic indissolubly bound to the Chair of Peter. A rigid ascetic and an affectionate father, compassionate toward the wretched and a fearless herald of divine vengeance before transgressing princes, this proud monk who defended the traditions of his homeland before St. Gregory the Great (600) and urged Boniface IV to preserve the Catholic faith intact, appeared to his contemporaries as a prophet sent by God to lead Frankish society back to the Christian life through self-denial and penance. His rule insists on the necessity of the most absolute renunciation and imposes rigorous fasts, prolonged vigils, harsh penances and manual labor, even painful labor. C. wanted his followers to be entirely mortified and submissive, even in thought, to the will of the superior.
The reputation of C., writes his biographer, the monk Jonas of Bobbio, spread through all the provinces of Gaul and Germany (Vita s. Columbani, I, 18). Indeed, he was not only an austere ascetic fond of solitary contemplation, but also a man of action and a leader of souls who, by example, by work and by word, promoted among the Franks a powerful movement of penance, monastic and apostolic. The Penitential that bears his name and that not only punished grave crimes but recommended the confession of light faults after a careful examination of conscience, rekindled in the souls of his contemporaries the sense of sin and the obligation of reparation, raising them to a more intense spiritual life. A fact all the more remarkable because, according to the testimony of the biographer Jonas, when he arrived in France around 590 «fides tantum manebat christiana, nam poenitentiae medicamenta et mortificationis amor vix vel paucis in ea reperiebatur locis» (Vita s. Columbani, I, 5, 10).
In all the regions of ancient Gaul, the monastic life established by C. at Luxeuil found fervent imitators: Donatus, a monk of Luxeuil who became bishop of Besançon, established a monastery for men there; his brother Romolinus erected communities of monks according to the rule of C. at Romainmoutier and Baulmes. St-Ursanne on the banks of the Doubs, and Moutier-Grandval in the valley of the Birse, are also branches of Luxeuil. At Laon, St. Salaberga, spiritual daughter of St. Eustasius, successor of C., organized the abbey of St. John the Baptist; her brother, Leudinus-Bodo, made bishop of Toul, gave his support to the foundations of Bonmoutier, St-Dié, Moyenmoutier and Senones; St. Amatus, also a disciple of St. Eustasius, with Romaricus established in the valley of the Moselle the double monastery later called Remiremont. Hautvillers and Montiérender, Bèze and Sithiu, Leuconaus (St-Valéry) and Corbie, owe their origin or their organization to the monks of Luxeuil: Bercharius, Valdelenus, Mommolinus and Bertinus, Valerius and Theodefridus. For his monastery of Solignac St. Eligius adopted the rule of C.; so too did St. Desiderius of Cahors and St. Sulpicius of Bourges; St. Wandregisel at Fontenelle (St-Wandrille) and St. Philibert at Jumièges stood under the protection of Dado (St. Ouen), a great admirer of C. To Merovingian France, Luxeuil gave several bishops: Donatus at Besançon, Mommolinus and Acharius at Noyon, Cagnovald at Laon, Ragnacharius at Basel, Audomarus at Boulogne and Thérouanne, and Theodefridus at Amiens.
Still greater would have been the influence exercised by C., had he not encountered the opposition of the Frankish bishops because of his obstinate attachment to Celtic customs regarding the form of the tonsure and the date of Easter. His successors in the governance of Luxeuil, Eustasius and Waldebert, abandoned these customs; Waldebert tempered with the Rule of St. Benedict the somewhat excessive austerities of the Columbanian rule: from this mitigation was born a mixed rule that tempered the high ideal of extreme penance, of continuous prayer and of independent apostolate promoted by C. with the discretion and the precise norms of governance introduced by St. Benedict.
The Celtic temperament, the Roman devotion and the penitential and monastic activity of C. are amply documented in his writings: 6 Letters (PL 80, 259 ff.; ed. W. Gundlach, in MGH, Epistolae, III, p. 154 ff., with the Poems); Regula monachorum, in 10 chapters (ed. O. Seebass, in Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, 15 [1895], p. 366 ff.); Regula coenobialis, in 15 chapters of penal sanctions (PL 80, 259 ff.; ed. O. Seebass, in Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, 17 [1897], p. 218 ff.); Instructiones curiae (ed. O. Seebass under the title Ordo de vita et actione monachorum, in Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, 14 [1894], p. 76 ff.); Liber de mensura paenitentiarum (PL 80, 225 ff.; O. Seebass, in Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, 14 [1894], p. 442 ff.).
Bibliography16 works
Fredegando Callaey