PETER OF CELLE (Petrus Caeliensis). - Benedictine, writer on spirituality, b. in Champagne around 1115, d. at Chartres on 20 February 1183. He was elected, around 1145, abbot of Moutier-la-Celle (diocese of Troyes), in 1162 he received the governance of the abbey of St. Remigius at Reims, and in 1181 he was appointed bishop of Chartres. His writings, in an easy and imaginative style, the fruit of experience, make Peter of Celle a witness rather than a theoretician of Benedictine spirituality.

Among his 177 Epistolae (PL 202, 405-636), those written to friends scattered throughout all Christendom stand out. The Sermones (coll. 637-926) reflect the interior state of his devout soul; the Tractatus are an allegorical explanation of certain biblical themes: in the De panibus (coll. 929-1046) all the allusions of Holy Scripture to bread acquire the value of a sign, at least implicit, of the Eucharist; in the De tabernaculo Moysi (coll. 1047-84; also ed. Leclercq [v. bibl.], pp. 147-67) the Church becomes the vestibule of heaven; in the Commentarius in Ruth (whose conclusion Leclercq, pp. 168-73, has edited), a broad mystical exegesis of the relations of Christ with the Church and the Virgin. Notable are the monastic opuscules: the De puritate animae (ed. Leclercq, pp. 174-92), addressed to novices; the De coscientia (id., pp. 193-230), written at the request of Alcher of Clairvaux (v.), is a treatise on the process of the soul's interiorization in the imitation of Christ. He also wrote: the De afflictione et lectione (id., pp. 231-39) and the De claustrali disciplina (PL 200, coll. 1099-1146).

Bibliography4 works

BIBL.: E. Georges, Pierre de Celle. La vie et ses oeuvres, Troyes 1857; N. Jung, s. v. in DThC, XII, coll. 1896-1901; J. De Ghellinck, L'essor de la littérature latine au XIIe siècle, I. Bruxelles - Parigi 1946, p. 194; I. Leclercq, La spiritualité de Pierre de Celle, Parigi 1946 (a pp. 147-239 ed. parziale di alcune opere).

Antonio Piolanti

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Peter of Celle (Petrus Caeliensis)

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