73 Commandments
Benedict of Nursia (480-550) spent his life building and reforming monasteries and developing a manual, known as a Rule, which would stabilize the life of monks. Yet, although his “Rule” was intended for monks, the fourth chapter gives instructions on how to live a godly life which would apply to all Christians. [Some are directed to those living in the middle ages, such as 17, when not everyone received this, while others are beautiful brief statements of wisdom, such as 50.]
From chapter 4 of 73 chapters of the Rule of St. Benedict:
- In the first place to love the Lord God with the whole heart, the whole soul, the whole strength.
- Then, one’s neighbor as one’s self.
- Then, not to kill.
- Not to commit adultery.
- Not to steal.
- Not to covet.
- Not to bear false witness.
- To honor all people.
- And what one would not have done to himself, not to do to another.
- To deny one’s self in order to follow Christ.
- To chastise the body.
- Not to seek after pleasures.
- To love fasting.
- To relieve the poor.
- To clothe the naked.
- To visit the sick.
- To bury the dead.
- To help those in trouble.
- To console the sorrowing.
- To hold one’s self aloof from world ways.
- To prefer nothing to the love of Christ.
- Not to give way to anger.
- Not to foster a desire for revenge.
- Not to entertain deceit in the heart.
- Not to make a false peace.
- Not to forsake charity.
- Not to swear, lest one swear falsely.
- To speak the truth with heart and tongue.
- Not to return evil for evil.
- To do no injury, even more, to bear patiently the injury done to us.
- To love one’s enemies.
- Not to curse them that curse us, but rather to bless them.
- To bear persecution for justice sake.
- Not to be proud.
- Not to be given to wine.
- Not to be a great eater.
- Not to be drowsy.
- Not to be slothful.
- Not to be a murmurer.
- Not to be a detractor.
- To put one’s trust in God.
- To refer what good one sees in himself, not to self, but to God.
- But as to any evil in himself, let him be convinced that it is his own and charge it to himself.
- To fear the day of judgment.
- To be in dread of hell.
- To desire eternal life with all spiritual longing.
- To keep death before one’s eyes daily.
- To keep a constant watch over the actions of our life.
- To hold as certain that God sees us everywhere.
- To dash at once against Christ the evil thoughts which rise in one’s heart.
- And to disclose them to our spiritual father.
- To guard one’s tongue against bad and wicked speech.
- Not to love much speaking.
- Not to speak useless words and such as provoke laughter.
- Not to love much or boisterous laughter.
- To listen willingly to holy reading.
- To apply one’s self often to prayer.
- To confess one’s past sins to God daily in prayer with sighs and tears, and to amend them for the future.
- Not to fulfill the desires of the flesh.
- To hate one’s own will.
- To obey the commands of the Abbot [the leader of the monks] in all matters, even though he himself (which Heaven forbid) act otherwise, mindful of that precept of the Lord: ‘What they say, do; what they do, do not do’ (Mat 23:3).
- Not to desire to be called holy before one is; but to be holy first, that one may be truly so called.
- To fulfill daily the commandments of God by works.
- To love chastity.
- To hate no one.
- Not to be jealous; not to entertain envy.
- Not to love strive.
- Not to love pride.
- To honor the aged.
- To love the younger.
- To pray for one’s enemies in the love of Christ.
- To make peace with an adversary before the setting of the sun.
- And never to despair of God’s mercy.
©2006 Mark Nickens All Rights Reserved