Saint Benedict’s Theology
Saint Benedict's theology had three main principles: exactness or comprehensiveness, moderation, and order. The first one is exactness and comprehensiveness. He not only gave moral rules, but he also gave rules and detailed instructions about what to do and when to do it. The following principle was moderation. To him, everything should be done in moderation. One needed to learn how to do with a little and not be drawn into wanting more than one needs; this sometimes went to an extreme and tormented one's body. The last principle is order. This was one of Benedict's most significant concerns. He wanted everything to be done orderly, and the monk's lifestyle and daily life were to be orderly. For the monk to live orderly, their daily life needed to consist of three parts: divine praise, spiritual reading, and physical work. With this, each monk had a job assigned to do, and they were to spend ten hours a day in worship and meditation. They were also supposed to pray eight times a day, and these times for prayer were already assigned.
One thing that the modern Christian can learn from these principles is the importance of discipline. These monks were very disciplined in their daily life. They did everything that they could do to do away with their sinful nature and disciplined their bodies so that they would not become gluttons or become greedy. They were also very disciplined in their reading, studying, and prayers. As Christians today, we sometimes should place more importance on these things as these monks did. With all the entertainment we have today and being so busy, we make excuses that we do not have enough time to read, study, and pray, but we must make the time. These monks made the time for their studies and prayer life. We need to find a quiet place to go, be ready, and study. We need this quiet place to talk to God and then be silent and listen to what he has to say to us. These men got entirely away from society to grow closer to God. I am not saying that we need to get away since we need to evangelize to people ultimately, but I am saying that we need to learn from these men and find a quiet place so that we, too, can get closer to Christ.
