Bernard of Clairvaux
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St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 – August 21, 1153), abbot of Clairvaux, was a highly influential French churchman and theologian. He was one of the founders of the Cistercian, or Bernardine, monastic order.
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- Bestia illa de Apocalypsi, cui datum est os loquens blasphemias, et bellum gerere cum sanctis (Apoc. XIII, 5-7), Petri cathedram occupat, tanquam leo paratus ad praedam.
- That beast of the Apocalypse, to whom is given a mouth speaking blasphemies, and to make war with the saints, is sitting on the throne of Peter, like a lion ready for his prey.
- To Magister Geoffrey of Loretto (afterwards Archbishop of Bordeaux), Letter 37 ( c. 1131), in Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux (1904), Dr. Samuel John Eales, trans., John Hodges, London, p. 139. [1]
- "That beast" to which Bernard refers is antipope Peter Leonis.
- Non est jam dicere, "Ut populus, sic sacerdos"; quia nec si populus, ut sacerdos.
- One cannot now say, the priest is as the people, for the truth is that the people are not so bad as the priest.
- In Conversione S. Pauli, Sermon 1, sect. 3; translation by James Spedding, in The Works of Francis Bacon (1860) vol. 12, p. 134.
- Ut populus, sic sacerdos is a quotation from Isaiah 24:2.
- Qui se sibi magistrum constituit, stulto se discipulum subdit.
- He that will teach himself in school, becomes a scholar to a fool.
- Epistola LXXXVII, sect. 7; translation from Notes and Queries, 3rd series, vol. 11, p. 192.
- Experto crede: aliquid amplius invenies in silvis, quam in libris. Ligna et lapides docebunt te, quod a magistris audire non possis.
- Believe me, you will find more lessons in the woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you what you cannot learn from masters.
- Epistola CVI, sect. 2; translation from Edward Churton The Early English Church ([1840] 1841) p. 324.
- Vulgo dicitur: Quod non videt oculus, cor non dolet.
- It is commonly said: What the eye doesn't see, the heart doesn't grieve.
- In Festo Omnium Sanctorum, Sermo 5, sect. 5; translation from Scottish Notes and Queries, 1st series, vol. 7, p. 59.
- Qui me amat, amat et canem meam.
- Who loves me, loves my dog.
- In Festo Sancti Michaelis, Sermo 1, sect. 3; translation from Richard Chevenix Trench, Archbishop of Dublin On the Lessons in Proverbs ([1853] 1856) p. 148.
- Bernard quotes this as being a proverb in common use.
- Ego addo et de pertinacia Græcorum, qui nobiscum sunt, et nobiscum non sunt, juncti fide, pace divisi, quanquam et in fide ipsa claudicaverint a semitis rectis.
- I, for one, shall speak about those obstinate Greeks, who are with us and against us, united in faith and divided in peace, though in truth their faith may stray from the straight path.
- De Consideratione (1149-1152), lib. III (1152), c. I; Book of Considerations, part III, ch. I.
- "Greeks" refers to the (Eastern) Orthodox Church.
- "My burden is light," said the blessed Redeemer, a light burden indeed, which carries him that bears it. I have looked through all nature for a resemblance of this, and seem to find a shadow of it in the wings of a bird, which are indeed borne by the creature, and yet support her flight towards heaven.
- Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 88.
- The true measure of loving God is to love Him without measure.
- Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 395.
- The faith of simplicity is mocked, the secrets of Christ profaned, questions on the highest things are impertinently asked, the Fathers scorned because they were disposed to conciliate rather than solve such problems. Human reason is snatching everything to itself, leaving nothing for faith. It falls upon things which are beyond it...desecrates sacred things more than clarifies them. It does not unlock mysteries and symbols, but tears them asunder; it makes nought of everything to which it cannot gain access and disdains to believe all such things.
- Reported in Walter Nigg, The Heretics: Heresy Through the Ages (1962) (who cites Adolph Hausrath 1895 as a source)
- Prostrate, see Thy cross I grasp,
And Thy pierced feet I clasp;
Gracious Jesus, spurn me not;
On me, with compassion fraught,
Let Thy glances fall.
Thy cross of agony,
My Beloved, look on me;
Turn me wholly unto Thee;
"Be thou whole," say openly:
"I forgive thee all."- Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 398.
- Our King [Jesus] is accused of treachery; it is said of him [by the Muslims] that he is not God, but that he falsely pretended to be something he was not.
- As quoted in Is the Father of Jesus the God of Muhammad? : Understanding the Differences between Christianity and Islam (2002) by Timothy George, p. 49
- Obey your bishop! “Obey those set over you [Heb 13:17],” the teachers of the Church…. I remind you, my dear friends, of what I said when I was with you: do not receive any outside or unknown preacher, unless he be sent by your bishop or preaches with the permission of the pope. For “how shall they preach unless they are sent [Rom 10:15]?”
- Bernard of Clairvaux on the Life of the Mind, John R. Sommerfeldt, Newman Press (2004) ISBN 0809142031 ISBN 9780809142033, p. 67 [2]
- Do what Jesus says,... what he commands through his ministers who are in the Church [see 1 Cor 6:4]. Be subject to his vicars, your leaders, not only those who are gentle and kind, but even those who are overbearing [see 1 Pt 2:18].
- Bernard of Clairvaux on the Life of the Mind, John R. Sommerfeldt, Newman Press (2004) ISBN 0809142031 ISBN 9780809142033, p. 67 [3]
- It’s not as if grace did one half of the work and free choice the other; each does the whole work, in its own peculiar contribution. Grace does the whole work, and so does free choice – with this one qualification: That whereas the whole is done in free choice, so is the whole done of grace.
- On grace & free choice, (de Gratia Et Libero Arbitrio), Daniel O'Donovan, trans., Introduction, Bernard McGinn, Cistercian Publications, 1988, ISBN 0879070706 ISBN 9780879070700 p. 37. [4] (Note: Fr. Harry J. McSorley, C.S.P. Commenting on this teaching of Bernard, states: "We are indebted to Bernard of Clairvaux ... for the clarification that grace and free will are not related as partial causes - which would be a false synergism - but as total causes of the act of justification, each on its own proper plane. Bernard maintains the Catholic-Augustinian tradition by insisting that man's natural freedom (liberum arbitrium) remains even after the fall. It is a wretched, but nonetheless integral free will. This natural freedom of the will, possessed by the just and sinners alike, enables us to will, but not to will what is good. It is grace alone that gives us good will." Luther, Right or Wrong, (1969), Newman Press / Augsburg Publishing House, p. 133. [5] )
- I rejoiced so greatly when I heard of your answer in the case of some who seemed to be filled with extravagant ambition for the office of legate, and to hope for it with impudence, even more than I can say. And not only I but all who love your name rejoiced with exceeding great joy. Moreover, when I read your letter written in the cause of the Church of Rodez, then was my mouth filled with laughter and my tongue with joy. Such things as these are worthy of your Apostleship, they honour the highest See, they are just what is becoming to the Bishop of the world. Whence, also, I bow my knees to the Author of your unique Primacy... In truth, you have been raised to this chair for the fall and rising again of many.
- Bernard to Pope Eugene III, letter 240:1, A.D. 1146, concerning the election of a certain unworthy bishop at the Church of Rodez (see letter 328). In The Life and works of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, John Mabillon, Samuel J. Eales, Volume 2, p. 705. [6]
- Look at those detractors. Look at those dogs. They ridicule us for baptizing infants, praying for the dead, and asking the prayers of the saints. They lose no time in cutting Christ off from all kinds of people to both sexes, young and old, living and dead. They put infants outside the sphere of grace because they are too young to receive it, and those who are full grown because they find difficulty in preserving chastity. They deprive the dead of the help of the living, and rob the living of the prayers of the saints because they have died. God forbid! The Lord will not forsake his people who are as the sands of the sea, nor will he who redeemed all be content with a few, and those heretics....
They do not believe that there remains after death the fire of purgatory, but allege that when the soul is released from the body it passes straight to rest or to damnation. Let them ask of him who said that there was a sin which should not be forgiven in this world nor in the world to come.
Now it is not to be wondered at if those who do not acknowledge the Church decry her statutes, reject her ordinances, regard the sacraments with contempt and refuse to obey her precepts. The successors of the Apostles, they say, are sinners, whether they are archbishops, bishops, or priests, and are fit therefore neither to administer nor to receive the Sacraments; for to be a bishop is incompatible with being a sinner. This is untrue. Caiaphas was a bishop, and what a great sinner he was, pronouncing the sentence of death on Our Lord. If you say he was not a bishop, the witness of John will confound you, for he records that he prophesied in the year that he was High Priest. Judas was an apostle, and chosen by the Lord, even if he was covetous and wicked. Or have you doubts about the apostolate of someone the Lord chose?- These New Heretics, Sermon 66 on The Song of Songs. [7]
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- Inter faeces et urinam nascimur, from ...et quid de nobis, fratres, qui inter faeces et urinam nascimur...
- "We are born between (or amid) feces and urine," from "...and who among us, brothers, who are born between (amid) feces and urine..."
- The probable source is a homily. [8]
[edit] Quotes about Bernard
- It is difficult now to look back across the centuries and appreciate the tremendous impact of his personality on all who knew him. The fire of his eloquence has been quenched in the written words that survive. As a theologian and a controversialist he now appears rigid and a little crude and unkind. But from the day in 1115 when, at the age of twenty-five, he was appointed Abbot of Clairvaux, till his death nearly forty years later he was the dominant influence in the religious and political life of western Europe.
- Steven Runciman, in The History of the Crusades ([1951-4] 1971) vol. 2, p. 252.
