St. Bernard of Clairvaux: Reimagining Discipleship

Bernard of Clairvaux was, without question, one of the most powerful men of 12th-century Europe. His political influence, magnetic charisma, and rhetorical genius were such that he was able to decide the outcome of a contested papal election, succeed in getting an intellectual rival denounced as a heretic, and spark the Second Crusade.  

Bernard was a Cistercian, though not the founder of the order. The first Cistercian abbey was founded in 1098 by 21 Benedictines who desired to get back to the basics of the Rule of St. Benedict. In order to live a life of greater poverty and simplicity, they retreated to a rural valley far from any cities, lived off the work of their hands, furnished and clothed their chapels and bodies austerely, and rejected the mass stipends, rents, and tithes that had become the main source of monastic revenue in the high medieval era.  

When Bernard arrived at the new monastery in 1113, 15 years after its founding, he brought along with him 30 friends and relatives to enter the community alongside him. Within two years, he and 12 companions were sent off to found a daughter house of the community, which he named Clairvaux, or Clear Valley. The name was somewhat aspirational for the swampy, unhospitable site, but over time and with the labor of Bernard’s brethren, it grew into a flourishing house of 700 monks that spawned 68 daughter houses of its own. Bernard remained the abbot until his death 38 years later.  

The volume of Bernard’s correspondence was such that he had six scribes who worked for him, recording his dictation via shorthand onto wax tablets and then carefully inking the composition onto parchment. Around 500 letters from Bernard to kings, popes, bishops, and secular leaders still exist today.