Today’s Chapter: Content with the Rule
Chapter 7: Of Humility (v. 55)
The eighth degree of humility is, for a monk to do nothing except what is authorised by the common rule of the monastery, or the example of his seniors.
The inner conviction of one’s lowliness that is reached in the 7th Degree of Humility manifests itself in all the degrees that follow. The first such manifestation is in today’s 8th Degree, the shortest of them all. The text itself, in its unadorned simplicity, serves to illustrate what it teaches: the humble monk, who realises that he is nothing special, who refuses to see himself with the Pharisee as ‘not like the rest of men’, is content to conform all of his actions to the rule of the monastery and the example of those who have come before him.
Our Lady and her Son lived this degree in an exemplary way. While the manner of Our Lord’s Conception and Birth was miraculous, He chose to be born into a human family founded upon the true marriage of Our Lady and Saint Joseph, so that in all things He would be seen to conform to the laws of life in this world. While being Himself the Author of the Law, Our Lord submitted to the law of circumcision on the eighth day, and Our Lady, Whose purity was not lost but sanctified by Our Lord’s Birth, nonetheless submitted to the law of ritual purification on the fortieth day.
So too throughout their lives we see Our Lady and her Son ever obedient to the Law, even though Our Lord would have to endure calumnies from the Pharisees who made a law of their own interpretations. He proclaimed that He had come not to abolish but to fulfill the Law, and as His earthly life drew to a close He continue to fulfill it perfectly, as Saint Thomas Aquinas’ hymn for Corpus Christi sings: Observata lege plene, cibis in legalibus [Having fully observe the law, by the foods the law prescribes]. Thus He set an example of humility for the monk who, recognising that he has no claim to be better than his brethren, does not try to invent his own path to holiness, but gratefully accepts the guidance of the Rule and of holy men who have gone before him. It is a path that will not earn the world’s attention, but will unite him deeply to the Mother of God, whose seemingly ordinary life was the setting for a truly extraordinary holiness.