Abbot is bewildered by William's response and asks why the diabolical cause
of the act is not mentioned. William reaffirms his belief that evil is not to
be judged by man: "I believe that the only judge of that can be God."
William rejects Abo's interpration
of evil and reiterates that the judgment should only be done by God.
he feels that the monks, no matter how high in power, do not have the right to
do this (Romans 14:10).
Adelmo of Otranto, the master illuminator
(pp. 31-32):
The Benedictine Rule makes provision for artists in Chapter 57,
"Of the Artists in the Monastery." "Otranto" is an
allusion to Horace Walpole's Castle of Otranto: a Gothic
Story (1764), often regarded as the first of the "Gothic
novels" and thus alluding to the Gothic novel as one of the
constituent genres of The Name of the Rose.
Adelmo "had been decorating the manuscripts of the library
with the most beautiful images" (p. 31) [comment by Holly
Spuckler]: According to Lowrie J. Daly, S.J., Benedictine
Monasticism (St. Louis, MO: Sheed & Ward, 1965), pp. 308-14,
the art of preparing manuscripts was a direct contribution
of monasticism. Monastic scriptoria occupied a majority
of the working hours at most monasteries. It was an art
practiced by the classical world of antiquity and
preserved by the Byzantine world. Byzantine influence is
especially apparent in manuscripts with gold lettering and
purple vellum, found later in Carolingian books. Thus, this art was
honed differently in different regions. The Danish invasions
hindered the development of manuscript illumination in England,
due to the destruction of monasteries, but during the reforms
of St. Dunstan (after ca. 950 AD), the Winchester scriptorium
maintained produced manuscripts of high quality, richly
illuminated.
"vegetable garden" (p. 32): The Carolingian
(9th century) "Plan of St. Gall" shows the vegetable garden adjacent to the cemetery, as
it is in the monastery in The Name of the Rose. The
"Plan of St. Gall" also shows the vegetable garden
as separate from the medicinal herb garden, which is located
next to the physicians' house. Modern scholars often mention
that Benedictine monasteries maintained separate gardens for
vegetables and medicinal herbs, but the only sourse for this
is the "Plan of St. Gall." There is not archeological evidence
to prove that it was usual to maintain separate gardens.
It is possible that many monasteries maintained a single garden.
The separate gardens in The Name of the Rose, then,
illustrates the influence of "The Plan of St. Gall" on the
novel.
Suicide and "...an equally terrible sin" (p. 33) [Michael Almony
comments]: This quotation from the Abbot seems to
foreshadow (at an early stage in the
novel) the issue of homosexuality and the idea of sodomy as the peccatum
contra naturam or "sin against nature." "Latin
Christians classified homosexual behavior under the deadly sin
of luxuria (lust” or “lechery): Vern L. Bullough and
James A. Brundage. Handbook of Medieval Sexuality. New York: Garland
Publishing, 1996. Abbot Abo's circumlocution, a "luxury
of words," illustrates that sodomy was the "unmentionable
vice." The passage reflects what Alan of Lille has to say in his Complaint of
Nature: “In one of the most extensive homiletical treatments of various
vices against nature, the Sermones de peccatis
capitalibus, Alan introduces
the view that the two most serious crimes are sodomy
and homicide, both of
which are described in scripture as creating a loud disturbance that calls
forth God’s eternal wrath: Michael Goodich, The
Unmentionable Vice: Homosexuality in the Later
Medieval Period (Dorset
Press, 1979.) In this passage, “self-inflicted homicide” or suicide
is aligned and compared with sodomy as “equally terrible”.
"Eris sacerdos in aeternum" (p. 34): You will be a
priest forever. William's phrase is a quotation from
Psalm 110:4,
which represents Jahweh declaring to the psalmist, "Thou art a priest
forever after the order of Melchizedek." Melchizedik was
a king of Salem (= Jerusalem) and priest of Jahweh, who welcomed Abram (Abraham),
offering him bread and wine and a blessing, after his return
from a military campaign against Chedorlaomer and his Babylonian
allies (Genesis 14:17-20).
The priesthood of Melchizedek is interpreted typologically
as a foretelling of the role of Christ as "priest" in the
sense of a "mediator" between God the Father and mankind,
in Hebrews 5:5-10,
where we read that Christ was "called of God an high priest
after the order of Melchizedek" (verse 5). The medieval
Christian interpretation of Melchizedek was that he was
a type or antecdent of Christ. By means of his
biblical quotation, William is praising Adso for his
priestly discretion in dealing with Adelmo's death.
"coram monachis" (p. 34): in the presence of the
monks. William is rightly concerned that he will not have
the monk's cooperation during his investigation.
Decline of learning (pp. 35-36): This is a
recurring topos in medieval literature. An early source
is King Alfred's Preface to the Old English translation of
Gregory the Great's Cura pastoralis ("Pastoral Care"),
where Alfred states that the motivation for his translation
program is to compensate for the decline in knowledge of Latin
grammar in England. Roger Bacon develops a similar theme in his
Compendium studii philosophiae.
"Monasterium sine libris" (p. 36): A monastery without
books . . . is like a city without prosperity, a fortress
without troops, a kitchen without utensils, a table without
food, a garden without herbs, a meadow without flowers,
a tree without leaves (quoting Jakob Louber, of the Carthusian
monastery in Basel, Switzerland).
Honorius . . . "Mundus senescit" (p. 36): "The world grows old,"
an explicit statement of the theme of the "ageing of the world,"
which in apocalyticism is interpreted as a sign of the
end of the world.
Honorius of Autun (Augustodunensis) was
a 12th-century Benedictine monk (ca. 1085 - 1145 or 1156) who spent most of his career in southern Germany.
His voluminous writing included four apocalyptic works:
Elucidarium (ca. 1107), the Gem of the Soul
(ca. 1115), the Mirror of the Church (ca. 1120),
and Exposition of the Song of Songs (after 1132).
"Translatio imperii" and translatio studii" as apocalyptic signs (p. 36):
For a synopsis of this theme in the 12th and 13th centuries, see
Earl R. Anderson, Cynewulf: Structure, Style, and Theme
in His Poetry (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University
Press, 1983), pp. 121-22, and references.
"the library may not be visited" (p. 37): [comments
by Marilyn Sutton] Abbot Abo's restriction of library access to only two monks - the
librarian and the assistant librarian - violates Benedictine Rule, Ch. 2,
which forbids an abbot from differentiating between monks in his
charge. "Let him [the abbot] make no distinction of persons in the
monastery." These special privileges of the librarians - their free
access to all the books and their power to grant or deny any monk's
request for books - gives them special power and demonstrates the
abbot's lack of trust in a monk's ability to discern between truth and
falsehood: ". . . not all truths are for all ears, not all falsehoods can
be recognized as such by a pious soul . . ."
[Rosann Bilek comments] During the conversation in which William asks the abbot if he can visit the
library, the abbott attempts to explain William's observation, that according
to the abbott, "there are also books containing falsehoods" in the library
(NR 37). The abbott then conveys to William a medieval notion of proportion
in order to rationalize the inclusion of these manuscripts in the library.
He says: "Monsters exist because they are part of the divine plan, and in
the horrible features of those same monsters the power of the Creator is
revealed" (NR 37). The abbot has already explained to William that the
existance of these books, is the reason that the literature is regulated by
the librarian ("Because not all truths are for all ears" ( NR 37)). However,
the abbots comments about "monsters" are also an attempt to establish an
order for things. According to Eco's Art and Beauty in the Middle Ages,
"even uglisness found its place" in "visions of cosmic harmony" (34). In the
Middle Ages there was an attempt to clarify the relationship between the good
and the beautiful. William of Conches, in the thirteenth century theorized
that things are beautiful when they are found in their own elements (birds in
the sky, man on earth). The Scholastics commonly believed that through
contrast, beauty was created. In such a way,"even monsters acquired a
certain justification and dignity" (35). Therefore, as Eco says, "evil
itself became good and beautiful, for good was born from it and shone out
more brightly by contrast" (35). What the abbot is saying, is that the power
of God is shows "more brightly" when a book of God is compared to a book
containing "falsehoods" because this is the order of things in the universe
and as it pertains to "cosmic harmony." The abbot uses the order of the
universe as created by God to rationalize his censorship of certain materials
to people that he believes who cannot see the power of God through the
"falsehoods" of evil.
On the restricted use of the library, [Unoma Azuah comments]
In the middle ages books were highly valued especially in monasteries.
That period had a saying that " A monastery without books is like a
castle without soldiers" A quotation from Wycliffite text has it that "
Books filled with truth are manifold, but they have been imprisoned and
chained up by ...religious communities"
The Wycliffite texts such as Fifty Heresies and Errors of the Friars,
though anonymous were written around 1382. They treat how friars were
covetous and greedy with their books. This is reflected in the abbott's
response to William when he indicated his interest to see the abbey's
library, page 37; "You see, Brother William" the abbot said, "...devout
men have toiled for centuries, observing iron rules. The library was
laid out on a plan which has remained obscure to all over the centuries,
and which none of the monk's is called upon to know. Only the librarian
has received the secret,from the librarian who preced him, and he
communicates it, while still alive, to the assistant librarian, so that
death will not take him by surprise and rob the community of that
knoeledge. And the secret seals the lips of both men.
Only the librarian has in addition to that knowledge, the right to move
through the labyrinth of the books, he alone knows where to find them
and where to place them, he alone is responsible for their safekeeping."
The Library as a labyrinth (pp. 37-39): Eco's source
for this is Jorge Luis Borges' Labyrinths.
The "forbidden knowledge" topos (p. 39; cf. p. 158): Among
other places, this appears in Alanus de Insulis, De planctu natura (p. 29).
The slaughter of pigs in November (p. 39): As they
enter the monastery, William and Adso hear the sounds
of pigs being slaughtered in the background. Abbot Abo
assures them that this is not their concern, as it is a job
for swineherds. In medieval Benedictine monasteries (at least,
in the wealthier ones),
the slaughter of pigs was undertaken by servants, not by
the monks themselves. When Abbot Abo says, "At this time
of year they slaughter the pigs," he is alluding to
medieval calendars, which depict various agricultural
"labors of the months." In depictions of the slaughter
of pigs, two-thirds of the time this scene is associated
with December, but one-third of the time it is associated
with November: see James Fowler: On Mediaeval Representations
of the Months and Seasons," Archaeologia 44 (1873):137-224.
Three days later, the slaughter of pigs becomes William's
concern, when Venantius' body is found in a tub of
pigs' blood that was being collected to make blood pudding:
this scene is in Fourth Day:
Compline (pp. 307-9).
"A job for the swineherds" (p. 39: This is the first of
many indications in The Name of the Rose that the
monks in this monastery do not perform manual labor, but,
rather, have servants for such tasks.
The problem of manual labor in the monasteries is alluded to,
but never discussed explicitly, in The Name of the Rose.
The Benedictine monasteries cultivated scribal activity and the
study of books as forms of "labor," but agricultural work
was commonly undertaken by the monks at most monasteries.
This particular monastery is unusual in having so many servants that the
monks perform specialized work only, and virtually no manual
labor.
The topic of manual labor emerged in the 1250s, during a ]
controversy at the University of Paris, when the Franciscan and
Dominican Orders were attempting to gain faculty status
for their scholarly friars, who were teaching theology courses
in the mendicant halls in Paris. From the beginning of the
13th century, the University of Paris faculty was staffed with
diocesan priests, who resisted the new influences coming in
from the Franciscans and Dominicans. Among other charges, the
"secular" (diocesan) faculty claimed that the Franciscans
and Dominicans, by taking up the life of a scholar, were
unfaithful to their mendicant vows, which included the obligation
of manual labor.
In Quodlibital Questions VII, art. 17-18, St. Thomas
Aquinas discusses "Manual Labor for Religious." His remarks
probably were part of a formal disputation. St. Thomas
argues that the religious requirement of manual labor has
three proposes: (1) to combat idleness, (2) to control
sensuality, and (3) to provide for the necessities of life.
But these ends may be achieved by other means besides manual
labor.
Then, as a principle in natural law, manual labor is imposed
on humankind as a species, but not on each member of the human
species individually. By analogy, the human species have
an obligation to propagate their numbers, but this obligation
may be fulfilled by some members of the species, without
applying to each individual.
Furthermore, "manual" labor does not necessarily mean work
with one's hands exclusively. It would be unreasonable to deny
food to a mechanic because he himself does not grow food.
By the same principle, a master of liberal arts, or a lawyer, is entitled
to a living from his work.
St. Thomas then askes "whether those who devote themselves to spiritual ]
works are excused from manual labor." He makes a distinction between spiritual work that
serves the common good (preaching, scholarship, scribal
work), and spiritual work that serves only the individual
participant (private meditation and prayer). Thomas argues that
manual labor is required by some people; even monks and friars,
under some circumstances, may be obligated to work with their hands.
However, the social principle of the division of labor
provides that not everyone must be a farmer or an artisan.
The next study page is Day One: Sext .