Carmelite Identity in the Rule of St Albert

by

Elizabeth M Korves OCDS

 

            The Rule of St Albert is the first written document of the Carmelite Order.  In it we learn about how those first hermits on Mt Carmel lived and what they and St Albert, as author of the Rule, saw as important to the vocation they were living out.  By examining the Rule of St Albert, we find some of the basic elements of the Carmelite charism and vocation.

 

HISTORY OF THE RULE

            Before looking at the Carmelite charism outlined in the Rule, it may be helpful to know a bit about the history of the hermits and the Rule they lived by.  It is not known exactly when any of the hermits took up residence on Mt Carmel, just south of Haifa in modern day Israel.  We do know that they had been there long enough to form some kind of community by the time they asked Albert for a Rule[1].

            The eremetical life was fairly common in the Holy Land during this time period (late 12th, early 13th century).  The Saracens had control of Jerusalem and the Church was sponsoring the Crusades in an effort to retake the places where Jesus had lived.  Albert was elected Patriarch of Jerusalem in 1205 and arrived in the Holy Land in 1206.  Unable to make his residence in Jerusalem, Albert settled in Acre just to the north of Mt Carmel and Haifa.  In 1214, Albert was murdered during a procession by the Master of the Hospital of the Holy Spirit whom he had removed from office due to corruption.  Thus we know that he would have written the Rule sometime between 1206 and 1214 but don’t have a more specific date[2].

            We know more about Albert than we do about the hermits on Mt Carmel.  It is possible they came to the Holy Land as crusaders and chose to stay, taking up the eremitical lifestyle.  Or they may have arrived as pilgrims accompanying the Crusades.  We do know they had come from Europe and may have had contact with Orthodox hermits and monks in the area[3]. 

            These hermits were laity, not clergy.  Within 50 years of receiving the Rule from St Albert, the hermits had begun relocating to Europe due to movement of the Saracens into that area of the Holy Land.  As they adjusted to their new life in Europe, they experienced changes which lead away from the eremitical life they had known to a more mendicant way.  In that process, local bishops wanted to ordain Carmelites and have them take over certain pastoral duties.  Some among the Carmelites protested this, wanting to cling to their lay status as more in keeping with the life of a hermit[4].

            This relocation into Europe also brought about some changes to the Rule itself.  In 1247, Pope Innocent IV issued mitigations to the Rule at the request of the Carmelites.  These mitigations were meant to more closely reflect their changing way of life.  Mitigations over the next 200 years further moved the Order from its eremitical origins towards the life of mendicants[5].  Interestingly, when St Teresa of Avila reformed the Carmelite Order and returned it to the primitive rule, the version of the rule which she thought of as the primitive rule was the one with mitigations issued by Innocent IV.  It was the later mitigations against which she was reforming[6].

            For the purposes of this article, the original version of the Rule prior to the mitigations of Innocent IV will be used as will the numbering used in the Edwards translation of the Rule[7].

 

CARMELITE IDENTITY

           

            Albert indicates in the Rule that he is writing in response to a request from the hermits themselves for a formula of life (#2).  Many groups of hermits in the Holy Land during that time period adopted Rules already in existence, i.e. Benedictine or Cistercian, but the hermits on Mt Carmel asked for a new one reflective of how they were already living out their vocation[8].  Thus by looking at the Rule of St Albert, we can ascertain the hermits’ self-perception of their vocation.  The name “Carmelite” in reference to this community came later but we learn from the Rule just what it means to be a Carmelite.

 

Ecclessial

            The mere act of asking Albert for a rule, shows that the hermits wanted an official connection to the universal Church.  Mt Carmel fell under Albert’s jurisdiction.  The hermits could easily have continued their way of life without a rule or written one on their own without seeking ecclesiastical approval.  Instead, they went to Albert and purposefully asked for “a rule (that they) may hold fast to henceforward” (#2).  In so doing, they firmly placed their eremetical vocation within the structures of the Church.  They sought and received the sanction of the Church for their way of life and this sanction was later confirmed more than once by various Popes[9].  The hermits also demonstrated their ecclessial loyalties by participating in the liturgy of the Church, both through the Liturgy of the Hours and the Mass (#9, 11)

 

Christo-centric

            The Rule begins and ends with Christ.  Albert addresses the hermits as his “beloved sons in Christ” (#1).  Immediately after the greeting, he more strongly states this grounding in Christ by saying the hermit “should live a life of allegiance to Jesus Christ” and “be unswerving in service of his Master” (#2).  At the end of the Rule, Albert tells the brothers that they must keep their minds not on the Prior “but on Christ who has placed him over you”.  By keeping themselves Christ-minded, Albert reminds the hermits that they will merit eternal life(#19).  He closes the Rule with an exhortation to the hermits that “our Lord, at his second coming, will reward anyone who does more than he is obliged to do” (#20).

 

Living Solitude

            Only once in the Rule does Albert refer to the hermits as such. He does this at the beginning in his greeting (#1).  After that, he addresses and refers to them simply as brothers.  However, this reference to the brothers as hermits tells us that they lived a life of solitude.  Albert underscores this life of solitude in three more places: “Each one of you is to have a separate cell” (#5), “Each of you is to say in his own cell or nearby”(#8), and again, “As I have said, each of you is to stay in his allotted cell” (#10).  It is in the solitude of their cells that they will be able to devote themselves to a life of prayer and hear that “still small voice” (1 Kings 19:12) of God.  In their cells, the hermits will not be subject to the distractions of the outside world.  They need only be distracted with God.

 

Being Community

            It may seem a contradiction, but the Rule reflects that these hermits trying to live a life of solitude, formed a community never the less.  Throughout the Rule, Albert injects that spirit of community and even gives it a strong democratic element.  The Prior “is to be chosen for the office by common consent, or that of the greater and maturer part” (#3).  Even the decision on who shall inhabit which cell is made by “disposition of the Prior with the agreement of the other brothers, or the more mature among them” (#5).

            The hermits are to gather on Sundays for the good of the community.  Here they are to “discuss matters of discipline and your spiritual welfare” (#12).  Any individual “indiscretions and failings of the brothers, if any be found at fault” are to be “lovingly corrected” (#12).  Thus it appears that decisions of concern to the larger group rest in that group rather than in the hands of one person such as the Prior.

            Even the duties of the Prior support the well being of the larger group.  His cell is to be near the entrance in order to greet visitors and respond to “whatever has to be done in consequence” (#7).  In so doing, the Prior assures that the other hermits will not be disturbed by visitors and may continue their own prayer and work.  The Prior is also responsible for handing out “such things as the Lord may have given you”(#10) to each hermit in accord with “whatever befits his age and needs” (#10). 

            To this already existing life of community, Albert also added the requirement that the hermits were to “gather each morning to hear Mass” (#11).  (It is not known whether there was a priest among the hermits or if someone from outside their circle came to preside over these daily Masses).

 

Liturgical

            Albert’s instruction to gather for daily Mass also highlights the community’s participation in the liturgical life of the Church.  This particular call to daily Mass was apparently unusual for religious orders of that time[10]. 

            The hermits were already praying the psalms either in a manner similar to the Liturgy of the Hours or the actual Hours themselves.  Albert writes that they “should for each of the hours, say those our holy forefathers laid down and the approved custom of the Church appoints for that hour” (#9).  There were a number of versions of the Liturgy of the Hours in use throughout the Church in that time period.  It is unknown whether they followed a version local to the Church in the Holy Land or the version set forth by Benedict in his Rule which became popular wherever the Benedictine Order spread[11].

            The hermits apparently also followed a common custom of substituting multiple recitations of the Our Father for those in their midst who “do not know their letters” (#9).

 

Scripture Loving

            The liturgical life of the community incorporates Scripture through the Mass readings and the psalms of the Hours.  The Rule goes even further towards having the hermits ground their lives in Scripture.

            When reading the Rule of St Albert, it is impossible not to notice the number of times Scripture is quoted to make a point.  Forty one passages of Scripture make up close to a third of the Rule.  St Paul’s writings are used to support the need to work (#16), as well as listing the “weapons” the hermits will need for spiritual warfare (#15).  Several Old Testament passages support the call to a life of silence (#17).

            Albert writes that “the sword of the spirit, the word of God, must abound in your mouths and hearts.  Let all you do have the Lord’s word for accompaniment” (#15).  This is a further reflection on what is usually considered the heart of the Rule and of the Carmelite charism - “pondering the Lord’s law day and night and keeping watch at ... prayers unless attending to some other duty” (#8).  

 

Work

            Those other duties consisted of some type of work though the Rule and history do not tell us just what that work entailed.  In a lengthy quote, Albert repeats St Paul’s teaching that those who “are not willing to work should not be allowed to eat either” (#16).  Albert cites a commonly held concern that idleness may “give him (the devil) a chance to pierce the defenses of your souls” (#16).  Albert also views work as a way of holiness and goodness (#16).

 

Silence

            Another way of holiness according to the Rule is silence.  Lack of silence would not only be disruptive to the community but also could bring “harm to the speaker’s soul”(#17).  Both at the beginning and end of the chapter on silence, Isaiah 32 is referenced.  According to a study by the Dutch Carmelite Province, the quoted passages of Isaiah referring to silence also speak of justice.  This portion of Isaiah speaks of a community in which quiet is found in the cultivation of justice (where people are safe together, sensitive to each other, call things by their name, and support each other)[12].

 

Clothed for Spiritual Warfare

            Since they lived in the time of the Crusades, it is not surprising that the Rule borrows from St Paul and tells the hermits to don God’s armor to protect themselves.  The weapons they are to use are chastity, holy meditations, holiness, faith, salvation, and the word of God.  With these weapons they will be able to withstand the enemy’s ambush, love the Lord, quench the flaming missiles of the wicked one, and be set free from their sins (#15).  Other ascetical practices which the hermits are to practice include obedience to the Prior (#4,19), poverty (#10), fasting (#13), and abstinence from meat (#14).

 

Common Sense

            Finally, Albert and the hermits know that even these simple guidelines put forth must not be followed in a legalistic manner but governed by pastoral concern.  The Rule allows for exceptions in some sections.  Albert frankly tells the brothers that “necessity overrides every law” (#13).  The hermits are to gather for Mass each morning “if it can be done without difficulty” (#11).  Since the oratory is “to be built as conveniently as possible among the cells” (#11), one wonders what such a difficulty might have been.  However it is possible to imagine that given the lie of the land, heavy rain may have made getting from cell to oratory dangerous and under such circumstances the hermit could exercise common sense at the behest of the Rule.  The fast may be dispensed with in cases of “bodily sickness or feebleness, or some other good reason” (#13) and meat may be eaten also “as a remedy for sickness or great feebleness”(#14).  Even the silence may be broken for “some necessary or good reason”(#17).  And lest they forget the importance of it, Albert makes the final sentence of the Rule an injunction to exercise common sense.  “See that the bounds of common sense are not exceeded, however, for common sense is the guide of the virtues” (#20).

 

In the Rule of St Albert, we find the beginnings of the Carmelite charism.  That charism grew and changed some over the course of centuries but the basic elements of it that were present at the beginning, are still present today.  Through this Rule, the voice of St Albert and the first hermits on Mt Carmel still speak to Carmelites about who they are, how they are to live their vocation.  Carmelites then and now are ecclessial, Christo-centric, living solitude, being community, liturgical, Scripture loving, engaged in work, maintaining silence, clothed for spiritual warfare, and exercising common sense.  These cornerstones from the hermits have survived the test of 700 years and will continue to inspire Carmelites for years to come.

 

© Elizabeth M Korves, January 2003