William of St-Thierry

William of Saint -Thierry, latin Guillelmus de Sancto Theodorico (c. 1075/1080 in Liege, † probably September 8, 1148 in Signy ) was an influential ecclesiastical writers. He was at first a Benedictine monk, became abbot of the monastery of Saint- Thierry and stepped over to the Cistercians in 1135.

Life

Together with Bernard of Clairvaux, Aelred of Rievaulx and Guerric of Igny he is considered one of the "Four Evangelists of Citeaux " that shape the spirituality of the Cistercians until today.

Wilhelm came from a noble family. He studied with his brother Simon, the Liberal Arts ( liberal arts ) to the cathedral schools in Liège and Reims. Around 1100, he entered the Benedictine abbey in Reims Saint- Nicaise. From there he was appointed in 1121 as abbot in the traditional abbey of Saint- Thierry at Rheims. Before taking office, he learned on a trip Bernard of Clairvaux know. This meeting was the beginning of a deep friendship. Soon after his appointment as abbot ill Wilhelm hard and went to recovery to Clairvaux. In the following years he played a leading role in the introduction and conduct of annual provincial chapters of the Benedictines, where it came to the implementation zisteriziensischer reforms in the monasteries.

In 1135, Archbishop Rainald of Reims allowed the abbot to resign his office and as a simple monk by Signy, a Cistercian foundation to withdraw in order to devote himself entirely to prayer and spiritual work, the delicatum otium. Wilhelm did not dare to spend his old age in Clairvaux, in order not to experience the disapproval of his abdication by the Saint Bernard. Five years later William appeared as the first with a diatribe publicly the doctrine of the Paris Magister Abelard contrary, with whom he had claims to be connected to a friendship in previous years. ( Disputatio adversus Petrum Abelardum ). He asked his influential friend Bernard of Clairvaux, to take measures to condemnation of Abelard's work. It was here at the initiation of a church doctrinal discipline method that should find its French domestic final with the condemnation of the doctrines of Abelard at the Council of Sens on May 25, 1141. The philosophical and theological debates here were determined by the question of how it can avoid the human reason, the divine to their level, that is, the draw down of created nature, and on the other hand remains in a position to be the divine to approach appropriate. Between 1143 and 1144 William attended the Charterhouse of Mont- Dieu.

According to a contemporary source, he died at the time of the council, which was held in Reims under Pope Eugene. This council was held in 1148, William was then about 70 years old. The necrology of his abbey dates the death on the 8th of September.

Wilhelm as a church writer

William was one of the most important ecclesiastical writers of his time. Some of his writings were attributed to Bernard of Clairvaux. His work includes essentially spiritual and monastic, dogmatic and mystical themes. The writings " De Contemplando Deo ," " De natura et dignitate amoris ", " Meditativae orationes ," " Vita Bernardi ," the pamphlet " Responsio abbatum " and the " Golden Letter " are mainly devoted to monastic spirituality. As dogmatic works are the " Liber de corpore et sanguine Domini ", the Expositio in » Epistolam ad Romanos ," the " Speculum " and " Aenigma fidei " and the font " De natura corporis et animae "; a subset of these were the pamphlets " Epistola ad Rupertum ", " Epistola ad Gaufridum et Bernardum ", " disputatio adversus Petrum Abaelardum " and " De erroribus Guillelmi de Conchis ". The mystical theology is the focus of the four works on the Song of Songs, in the " Brevis Commentatio ," the " Excerpta ex libris S. Gregorii " in " Commentarius e scriptis S. Ambrosii " and in the Expositio super Cantica Canticorum, and in » Golden letter. "

Quote

Peter Abelard teaches again novelties, writes again novelties, his books cross the seas, skip the Alps, and his new beliefs and his new beliefs spread by provinces and kingdoms, are publicly announced and freely defend and even to the Roman Curia they enjoy watching the disconcerting news ... the words in matters of faith have disturbed me, and the new inventions unheard meanings. Since I have no one else to whom I can address myself, I turn to you in the matter, the dispute - causa - God, and I call the whole Latin Church to court on ... ( Wilhelm Bernhard of Clairvaux and Bishop Geoffrey of Chartres )

Reception

On January 12, 1215, his body from the cloister was converted into the church. As collection of bones was equivalent in the presence of other abbots in the Middle Ages a beatification, Wilhelm is venerated in the Cistercian Order as Seliger.

Werkausgaben

  • Migne, Patrologia Latina belt 180, 210-726 Sp - digitized - and band 184, 307-408 Sp - digitized: at Documenta Catholica and in the Google Book Search (some among the works of Bernard of Clairvaux )
  • Les lettres de Guillaume de Saint -Thierry in Saint Bernard, ed. Jean Leclercq, in: Revue Benedictine 79, 1969, pp. 382-391

Translations

  • See God, love God. Contemplando De Deo. De natura et dignitate amoris. Transferring and introduced by W. Dittrich and HU von Balthasar, Einsiedeln 1961
  • HU von Balthasar (ed.): Wilhelm von Saint- Thierry, the mirror of faith, Einsiedeln 1981
  • Meditative prayer, Eschenbach 1983
  • Golden letter. Letter to the Brothers of the mountain of God, trans. B. Kohout Mountain Hammer, Eschenbach 1992
Order of Saint Benedict Clairvaux Abbey Klaus Berger Integrated Authority File
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