Benedictine Studies Collection (11 vols.)
Overview
This collection is not only a key resource for studying the Benedictine Order, but a pivotal look at one of the most powerful influences in Western Christianity. St. Benedict’s monastic Rule guided the minds that led Europe out of the early middle ages, the “dark night in history” (according to Pope Benedict XVI) following the dissolution of the Roman empire. Throughout history, Benedict’s Rule guided Christians more than any other monastic writing—even today, 1,500 years after its writing, Regula Sancti Benedicti is the most widely used monastic rule used by monks and monasteries. For this, Benedict is remembered as the protector of Europe.
With both primary and secondary sources on Benedict’s Rule, this collection contains everything needed for an exegetical or spiritual study on the Rule. Meticulous commentaries accompany English and Latin translations of the Rule, expounding on each of the 73 chapters. The anonymously-written sixth-century Rule of the Master, which profoundly inspired Benedict’s Rule, also packs this historic collection. Additionally, St. Jerome’s earliest translation of the Psalms from Greek to Latin, used for the Liturgy of the Hours and other forms of meditation, is included. A bibliography of historic and contemporary resources will help to take your studies even further.
Logos gives you unique and intelligent ways to study these texts. With the exegetical and linguistic prowess of Logos Bible Software, every word in every text becomes a link to Latin and English dictionaries, commentaries, and other original-language resources.
Key Features
- Two translations and three commentaries on Benedict’s Rule
- The Latin and English text of the anonymous Rule of the Master
- St. Jerome’s Latin translation of the Psalms, the earliest ever written
Individual Titles
- Benedict’s Rule: A Commentary, by Terrence Kardong
- Benedict’s Rule: A Translation, by Terrence Kardong
- Early Monastic Rules: The Rules of the Fathers and the Regula Orientalis, edited by Carmela Vircillo Franklin
- Early Monastic Rules: The Rules of the Fathers and the Regula Orientalis, Latin Edition, edited by Carmela Vircillo Franklin
- A Life-Giving Way: A Commentary on the Rule of St. Benedict, by Esther de Waal
- The Roman Psalter, by St. Jerome
- Regula Sancti Benedicti, edited by Timothy Fry
- RB 1980: The Rule of St. Benedict in English with Notes, by Timothy Fry
- The Rule of the Master, edited by Adalbert de Vogüé
- The Rule of the Master, Latin Edition, edited by Adalbert de Vogüé
- A Selected Bibliography of Monastic and Related Topics
A line-by-line exegesis of the entire Rule—the first such in the English language. This commentary—predominately a literary and historical criticism—is based on a new translation, and it is accompanied by essays on Benedict’s spiritual doctrine.
Written by a monk who has striven to live according to the Rule of Benedict for 35 years, this commentary relates the ancient rules to modern monastic life while examining the sources (Cassian, Augustine, and Basil) Benedict used to establish his Rule. Generously indexed, this volume contains thorough overviews, which summarize the source criticism, structural criticism, and other notes that follow.
Terrence provides his readers with a history of interpretation of significant themes in the chapters; the intuitive perceptions of patristic exegesis which undergirds the spirituality of words, motifs, whole chapters; explanations of literary patterns, grammatical anomalies and rhetorical devices through which the rich tones and rhythms of RB are expressed; and penetrating insights into the various approaches of modern scholars to the chapters of the Rule.
—Mary Forman, OSB
. . . stands as a monument to the Rule’s richness and depth, the product of the author’s decades of research, publication, and, perhaps most important of all, living out this Rule as a reliable compass for journeying with God.
—Ashland Theological Journal
Terrence G. Kardong is a scholar and priest at Assumption Abbey in North Dakota, a modern day monastery that follows the Order of St. Benedict.
This is Terrence Kardong’s popular and widely-used translation of the Latin Rule of St. Benedict. Used in contemporary monasteries around the world, this volume is essential for reading the Rule of St. Benedict in scholarly or practical settings.
Terrence G. Kardong is a scholar and priest at Assumption Abbey in North Dakota, a modern day monastery that follows the Order of St. Benedict.
This treasury of early Western monastic thought, which is no longer available in the print edition, contains five rules from the tradition that produced the Rule of St. Benedict. These rules reveal the early evolution of cenobitic monasticism in the West. As such, they help document the appropriation of the original general of Christian cenobitic monastic literature—the Rules of Basil, Pachomius, and Augustine—to a new setting and circumstance.
Three of the rules precede Benedict’s Rule. These are the Rule of the Holy Fathers Serapion, Macarius, Paphnutius, and Another Macarius, the Second Rule of the Fathers, and the Rule of Macarius. The Third Rule of the Fathers and the Regula Orientalis are contemporary with the Rule of St. Benedict. This is an English translation of these ancient rules.
Carmela Vircillo Franklin is a professor at Columbia University in New York. She received her BA and PhD in Classics and Medieval Latin from Harvard University. She served for five years as the director of the American Academy in Rome, and is widely published in medieval Latin literature studies.
Early Monastic Rules: The Rules of the Fathers and the Regula Orientalis, Latin Edition
- Editor: Carmela Vircillo Franklin
- Publisher: Liturgical Press
- Publication Date: 1982
- Pages: 80
This treasury of early Western monastic thought, which is no longer available in the print edition, contains five rules from the tradition that produced the Rule of St. Benedict. These rules reveal the early evolution of cenobitic monasticism in the West. As such, they help document the appropriation of the original general of Christian cenobitic monastic literature—the Rules of Basil, Pachomius, and Augustine—to a new setting and circumstance.
Three of the rules precede Benedict’s Rule. These are the Rule of the Holy Fathers Serapion, Macarius, Paphnutius, and Another Macarius, the Second Rule of the Fathers, and the Rule of Macarius. The Third Rule of the Fathers and the Regula Orientalis are contemporary with the Rule of St. Benedict. This is the original Latin of these ancient rules.
Carmela Vircillo Franklin is a professor at Columbia University in New York. She received her BA and PhD in Classics and Medieval Latin from Harvard University. She served for five years as the director of the American Academy in Rome, and is widely published in medieval Latin literature studies.
A Life-Giving Way is a guide to life and prayer written for lay people by a lay person. Crafted with the same attention to scholarship that is evident in the other titles in the collection, Esther de Waal has written an accessible commentary offering an excellent introduction to the Rule of St. Benedict. De Waal is able to draw on her study of the Benedictine tradition and its influence on Anglicanism and to share a wisdom perspective born of her own experience living in Canterbury and introducing ecumenical groups around the world to Benedictine practice.
She invites the reader to enter into her own reflection, which concentrates always on the universal issues and the perspectives of the word of God which underlie and are woven into the text. . . . Anyone who reads in the spirit in which it is written will be brought closer to the gospel message.
—Patrick Barry, OSB, abbot, Ampleforth Abbey
Authoritatively yet sensitively, the author explores this sixth-century Rule, in which Benedict invites us to ‘come home to ourselves,’ accepting and blending body, mind, and spirit in daily service to God.
—The Universe
The author’s limpid prose is a joy to read. She draws out of the Rule each of the crucial elements in Benedict’s teaching: the use of Scripture in the practice of the lectio divina is set out in its four stages and the three vows are also elucidated and their implications outlined.
—Stephen Platten, Norwich Cathedral, England
Esther de Waal is a popular spiritual writer for Anglican, Orthodox, and Catholic audiences. She often speaks at retreats and has written extensively on the application of monastic spirituality in lay life.
The Roman Psalter
- Author: St. Jerome
- Publisher: Liturgical Press
- Publication Date: 1999
- Pages: 358
The Roman Psalter has been widely considered Jerome’s first revision of the translation of the Psalms into Latin in 384 AD. Still used in the Roman Missal, its translation of Psalm 94 is still used in the Liturgy of the Hours.
This is the original Latin of the Rule of St. Benedict, perhaps the most influential monastic document ever written. All 73 rules provide instruction on Christian living, brotherly relationships, and order in the monastic lifestyle.
This compendium of scholarship on Benedictine monasticism and the Rule of St. Benedict is the foremost single-volume resource for serious study of the teaching and tradition of St. Benedict of Nursia. Published in print to celebrate the 1,500th anniversary of the date traditionally held to be the birth of Benedict, it includes a historical overview, essays on core monastic concepts, and the Rule in Dom Jean Neufville’s critical Latin edition and in a contemporary English translation. It also includes a thematic index and concordances linking the Rule to Scripture, patristic, and other ancient works.
Timothy Fry is a priest at St. Benedict’s Abbey in Atchison, Kansas.
Of all the Christian monastic literature available to Benedict, it is the Rule of the Master which left the strongest impact on the shape and structure of Benedict’s Rule. Three times longer than St. Benedict’s Rule, the Regula Magistri establishes every facet—spiritual as well as physical—of the monastic community and its monks. This volume presents the Rule of the Master in Luke Eberle’s English translation.
Adalbert de Vogüé (1924–2011) was a French Benedictine historian who wrote extensively on monastic history. He received his ThD in Paris in 1959 and taught as a professor at St. Anselm College in Rome. Many of his books have been translated into various languages. His magnum opus is his massive 12 volume history of monasticism between 356 and 830 AD.
The Rule of the Master, Latin Edition
- Editor: Adalbert de Vogüé
- Publisher: Liturgical Press
- Publication Date: 1999
- Pages: 448
Of all the Christian monastic literature available to Benedict, it is the Rule of the Master which left the strongest impact on the shape and structure of Benedict’s Rule. Three times longer than St. Benedict’s Rule, the Regula Magistri establishes every facet—spiritual as well as physical—of the monastic community and its monks. This volume presents the Rule of the Master in Adalbert de Vogüé’s critical Latin edition, with notes.
Adalbert de Vogüé (1924–2011) was a French Benedictine historian who wrote extensively on monastic history. He received his ThD in Paris in 1959 and taught as a professor at St. Anselm College in Rome. Many of his books have been translated into various languages. His magnum opus is his massive 12 volume history of monasticism between 356 and 830 AD.
This is a hefty bibliography of resources, both modern and ancient, which have contributed and developed our understanding of monasticism. Arranged both categorically and alphabetically, these citations link to resources in your library, and can be copied directly into your Logos 5 Bibliography Document. With hundreds of volumes listed, this volume helps you bring your research deeper.
Product Details
- Title: Benedictine Studies Collection
- Publisher: Liturgical Press
- Volumes: 11
- Pages: 2,912
Key Features
- Two translations and three commentaries on Benedict’s Rule
- The Latin and English text of the anonymous Rule of the Master
- St. Jerome’s Latin translation of the Psalms, the earliest ever written
Product Details
- Title: Benedictine Studies Collection
- Publisher: Liturgical Press
- Volumes: 11
- Pages: 2,912
Partially includedReviews
1 rating
Harry Hagan
4/5/2019
I have owned this collection for more than ten years, and I have found it invaluable for both teaching and scholarship. I can't imagine trying to do scholarship on the Rule without this. I highly recommend it.
Rt Rev. Benedict Churchill, Ph.D.
9/24/2014
