* * *
The White Dove
THE CONSTRUCTION on the west-work was making excellent progress, since the weather had turned mild and dry early on in the year. The building would be completed by the date set for its dedication.
“It is an exceptional year,” thought Tradolf, the cellarer, when the buds and the green leaves began to appear as early as February, and no frost brought a setback.
“An exceptional year,” thought Hermann of Altshausen, when he wrote with his own hand in his notes for his World Chronicle: “Anno Domini 1048.”1
The Emperor Henry III, the benevolent friend and patron of the abbey and of its abbot, would come to the dedication of the west-work, thereby setting a triumphant conclusion to the life-work of the Lord Berno. The sick man had an anxious premonition. Would this be the only “completion” in the year of salvation 1048? The Lord Berno’s life-work comes to its conclusion … Would this be the case in another respect too?
Pilgrims brought bad news from Rome. The Holy Father was in very poor health. Until 1046, the news from Rome had meant nothing but misery and worry for the faithful sons of Mother Church. In Anno Domini 1045, three Popes had called themselves the “legitimate successor of Peter”: Benedict IX, Silvester III, and Gregory VI. Which one of them was to be believed? This schism had inflicted great confusion on the Catholic world. In many communities, the monks or nuns disagreed about whom they ought to acknowledge as Pope.
Finally, Henry III had intervened, though in a heavy-handed manner. At the Synod of Sutri, he had compelled the three men to abdicate, and had installed Clement, a German priest with high moral standards, as Pope. But had Henry (despite his good intentions) not gone too far? Had he not made himself higher than Peter, and thereby brought the Church into a new dependency? Although Henry III had a great thirst for power, no one could dispute his genuine faith and his love for the Church. But what would things be like under an emperor whose only concern was to increase his power?
As a historian, Hermann realized that the gate had been opened onto a perilous path. And now, Pope Clement II was dying. What would happen now?
Berthold brought his master a book, a present for the Emperor Henry III. “Father Abbot wants you to look at the book, Father.” He placed it within his reach, sat down beside him, and helped him turn the great parchment pages. The Gospel Book displayed the marvelous initials and images of the Reichenau school of painting.
Hermann gave his student a little examination: “Take a look at the majestic figure of Christ here as he heals the man born blind, Berthold. What does his sublime dignity remind you of?”
The answer came at once: “Of the frescoes in Saint George’s and Saints Peter and Paul, Father. Our figures often have a tendency to the grandiose, but they do not seem frozen. They are alive. Sometimes, they are alarmingly alive. Think of the pictures of the evangelists. Is not the one who sees them caught up directly into the supernatural?”
“The light from above falls upon them, and it takes us upward. I too have experienced this strange twofold movement as I looked at these images. But our Reichenau painters are not limited to the mighty, the majestic, and the sublime. They also have a sense of humor. Think of Saint Martha at the raising of Lazarus. She is not ashamed to hold her nose, to make it clear what she means when she says: ‘Lord, the air is foul by now.’ And the devils in Gerasa—how comical and helpless they are on the backs of the swine! When you see them, you almost think you can see the grin on the face of the good Brother who painted them.”
“Father, the little sheep in this Christmas picture seem to possess a calm dignity, as if they were …” He paused, and Hermann completed the sentence:
“High prelates, at the very least.” They both laughed so heartily at this comparison of the little sheep to church dignitaries that they did not hear the arrival of the abbot.
“And what is causing such mirth?” asked Abbot Berno.
“The Gospel Book of Brother Theodebald,” replied the sick man, ingenuously. “We noted that the little sheep in this Christmas picture have the same dignity as high prelates.”
“Aha … like me, then,” smiled Abbot Berno, and was delighted to see that the famous scholar blushed like a young student. “I have the dignity of a little sheep. But that is not a bad comparison! What else am I than a little sheep in Peter’s flock?”
“Father Abbot, what we meant was the dignity that our painting school gives its figures, even the little sheep. The Reichenau school was influenced by Byzantium, but it acquired a profile of its own with the passage of time.”
“If only there were a continuous give and take between Rome and Byzantium … Why do people not renounce their own little personal goals, their advantages and prejudices, in order to serve the one kingdom of Christ together?”
The Lord Berno sat down on the stool beside the work desk, and the young Brother left the cell quietly. “Turn over some more pages, Hermann.” They looked at many pages of the marvelously executed Gospel Book, which was the life’s work of a monk.
The sick man praised it: “A precious gift for our Lord and Emperor. No one can find any fault with it.”
The abbot bent forward on the stool. His eyes were half-closed.
“Oh, Hermann, the great men who come to the dedication will find fault with any number of things, but the emperor will not be on the lookout for things like that. The Lord Henry is a just man. He is noble. But others will come and will see—indeed, they will want to see—things in our monastery that are not good. I could tell you even now some of the things they will object to.”
The abbot passed his right hand wearily over his furrowed face. The yellow skin that covered his emaciated fingers was faded and wrinkled. His abbatial ring was loose, far too loose, and there were brown spots on the backs of his hands.
Hermann saw the many wrinkles, creases, furrows, and lines on the familiar face of the Father. He saw the hollow temples and the white hair. How he had aged recently! For many years, it had seemed that age could not affect him, but now it had suddenly overwhelmed him. The sick man was seized with an anxious presentiment.
“Let people talk as they wish, Father Abbot. Their talk does not affect the value of what we do—provided that our activity was intended to serve the Lord. Our activity always has its defects, but that is unimportant, if we have held fast to the essential point.”
The Lord Berno looked past him, at the Gnadensee. “And who … is to tell us whether our activity was intended to serve the Lord? May it not in reality have been a thirst for honor and self-importance? Perhaps the real reason I had the west-work built was an unacknowledged desire to possess the highest bell tower on German soil … Indeed, the Imperial Prelate Abbot Berno of Reichenau may well count for less in the eyes of Our Lord Jesus Christ than the last little sheep in Peter’s flock, even if …” The beginning of a smile played around the narrow lips of the seventy-year-old man. “Even if he puts on such a dignified show.”
The lame man sensed that behind the apparently serene words there lurked a great distress, an internal distress and weariness.
“Father, you have given the Lord what you were able to give him.”
“Hermann, I wish that I had your faith, your confidence, and your peace. The Lord is near to you, and you are familiar with his cross. It is a part of your life. You have said your ‘yes’ to him, and you have even learned to love that ‘yes.’ You are held fast, more firmly than any other person on earth, and at the same time, you are one of those who are most free. I am tempted to … envy you.” The abbot rose heavily to his feet.
“I cannot let him go like this,” thought Hermann in consternation, and he said: “Father, it was you who led me to God. It is you to whom I owe my freedom and my peace.”
The Lord Berno slumped back onto the stool and gave the lame man a piercing look. “You owe it to me that you are so close to God? To me? Well, it is of course true that you paid attention to Berno, your guide. But Berno himself must remain far away from the goal, far away from the Lord. One who preaches to others can himself be rejected.”
The sick man felt a new strength in himself, in response to the Father’s weakness. He had to support Abbot Berno. With the clear insight of a loving son, he recognized that the abbot’s life had entered its final and decisive phase. That gave him the strength and the courage to speak openly about his insight into the abbot’s state of mind. Once again, he ventured boldly to deploy all his love, although he was aware of the risk that the Father might misunderstand him.
“Father, you are close to the Lord, and the Lord is close to you. I have often experienced this. Your life has shown me the image of Christ. It was you who brought me to the Lord. Now he is allowing you to undertake a hard part of the journey. In such cases, he gives the hearts of those who belong to him a frightening unease. They must not tarry, nor be content with earthly things—and that is why he makes them homeless once again, and takes away the certainties they had had hitherto. Their only yearning is to be for him. They are to be on the watch for him, and for him alone, in this new wilderness. Te lucis ante terminum … ‘before the ending of the light.’”
This time, the Lord Berno did not brush him aside. Despite the boldness of Hermann’s words, he understood the reverence that prompted his internal struggle, and his desire to be of service.
“Te lucis ante terminum …”
He knew that the lame man was not referring to the declining day—not to the twilight that was slowly growing outside, down by the Gnadensee.
Hermann had folded his hands. He went on: “Father, night must come; but it will bring broad constellations with it. The soul will go on from clarity to clarity, from light to light, once it has passed through the night of solitude … And then, it will encounter the light … A radiant light arises over it, a light that will never again go out. The eternal light enfolds it in the immensely great joy of eternity, lumen Christi …2 No eye has seen, no ear has heard, what God has prepared for those who love him. But it will be light, light and joy. One will be at home in Christ Jesus, Our Lord.”
He spoke these words like a profession of faith. The thought of Christ’s coming filled his heart with a joy that rang out in his words, victorious and overwhelming.
Christ—my life, my light!
Hermann had remained faithful to himself, ever since he had found the Lord on that Good Friday night in Aachen. He had remained faithful to the flame, to the light, to Christ, and the light in him had grown.
A marvelous warmth irradiated from him, bringing consolation and conviction. The tired face of the abbot was a mild reflection of his joy. As his strength rapidly diminished in his old age, the night was hastening to meet Berno. But even this night was grace and mercy, a beginning rather than an end.
“Sing me the Salve Regina!”
The lame man sang his canticle devoutly and ardently. “Thanks be to God that I have my voice today,” he thought, gladly; there were more and more days now on which he was completely lame. When he finished singing, the old man laid his hand briefly on his lopsided shoulder. Then the abbot left the cell in silence.
“
On the following day, a great surprise awaited the good Brother Berthold. Apart from his written contribution, the sick man had played only a small part hitherto in the vast preparations for the reception of the emperor. He regarded it as much more important to finish his book De physiognomia, which he had postponed for years.3 When the students had given him enthusiastic accounts of the preparations, his only answer had been an indulgent smile. Why were they making so much fuss about a man who, after all, was mortal like every other human being?
The uninterrupted knocking and hammering and the excessively busy activity of some of his brethren had often wrung from him a sigh that spoke of an impatience he suppressed with an effort. The chants for the Mass, which were his contribution to the festival day, were exceptionally beautiful, but he found the choir practices a time-consuming burden. He wanted to finish his book, and his tense mind saw every interruption as an unwelcome disturbance. Things had not been easy for Berthold in recent weeks.
“
Hermann was a changed man after the conversation with the Lord Berno. He laid the book aside without the least regret.
“Put it away for the time being, Berthold. I had almost forgotten something that is more important.”
More important? But had not this book been very important to him? Brother Berthold was curious to know what could be more important.
The sick man asked to be helped into his wheelchair.
“Let us have a look at the preparations for the reception of the emperor.”
Berthold was astonished. “You … you want …”
Hermann interrupted him in a kind voice: “Let us begin at the west-work, my dear son.”
The craftsmen there were putting the final touches to the furnishings of the imperial loge under the apse. The prior was watching, along with some monks, and he observed, with a shrug of the shoulders, “In my opinion, the imperial loge ought to have been furnished more splendidly, but our Father Abbot holds that it is almost excessive as it is.”
His companions shook their heads in regret, but they gave a start when the sick man raised his voice and called to them: “Our Father Abbot is doubtless giving the emperor what is the emperor’s. We should never forget that even the Lord Henry is a mortal man who comes to the house of God in order to adore his highest Lord.”
“Thank you for your instruction, Brother,” replied the prior with a bow. “I do, of course, wonder whether the emperor would be happy to hear your words!”
These words sounded like a threat, and Hermann showed that he had understood them. He replied, calmly: “You will doubtless know how to find that out, Lord Prior.” He then turned to Berthold, as if nothing had happened, and said: “Take me now to Herrenbruck harbor.”
They looked at the wide gangplank that the abbey’s carpenters had made. Monastery servants were hard at work, putting up the wooden scaffolding of a triumphal arch.
“Now they have damaged our tree. That is a pity!”
At first, Berthold did not know what the Master meant by “our tree.” But then he saw the freshly heaped-up soil in the place where the half-charred willow had stood for many years.
“Christopher,” murmured the lame man.
“Father, do you really store up everything in your memory?”
“Everything that is worth giving thanks for, my son. Neither of us should ever forget that storm on the Gnadensee.”
“And what do you not give thanks for? … What are you fully entitled to forget?”
But Hermann gave him no answer to this question.
“
The lame man was a source of astonishment and turmoil for the entire community in those days. He turned up everywhere, in the cellar and in the kitchen, in the garden and in the monastery farm, in the painting school and in the carpenters’ workshop, in the imperial residence, in the guesthouse, and in the steward’s offices. The brethren told each other at recreation about the sick man’s sudden and unexpected visits. Had the abbot told him to make these visits? The Lord Berno said nothing on this subject, and Hermann did not interfere in the work of his brethren by asking them questions. He sat silently in his wheelchair and looked with his big, friendly eyes at what the others were doing. His mere presence ensured that their hands worked more quickly and carefully. The monks unconsciously sensed that a power emanated from him.
Abbot Berno was happy whenever he saw the lame man in his place in the refectory, in the chapter room, and in the monastery church. It seemed that at present, he was able to do more, much more, than usual. His crippled hands carried his spoon and his goblet to his mouth. His voice retained its fullness when he taught or dictated, when he prayed and sang the Psalms, and at choir practice. Its pleasant sound led the abbot to instruct him to alternate with the choir in singing his new Credo.
The abbot knew the power that sustained the sick man and supported him, so that he was able to support others. Not even the wild April showers could harm the lame body. That power made him invulnerable.
“
Hermann inspected the final preparations on the eve of the emperor’s visit. The flowers in the garlands shone in their full colors under the warm springtime sun that lay over Reichenau. Red carpets covered the path to Herrenbruck harbor—the same path on which the lame cripple had taken his final steps “by himself,” years ago.
With his youthful high spirits, Berthold caught a white dove and brought it to the Father. Hermann carefully cradled the delicate body of the bird in his hands, and felt the quick beating of its little heart.
“A dove of peace, Father. Now all you need is the olive branch.”
“And to whom should I send this messenger of peace?”
Abbot Berno spoke, before the Brother could reply: “To all those of good will.” He looked with pleasure at the scene before the tower of his church: a monk with a wraithlike face, bending down with a white dove in his hands.
“Perhaps it is the dove of the Spirit. She wants to float freely above the dark parapets of our earthiness and our heaviness.” The lame man meant these words seriously. He opened the cage of his hands, but the white dove remained where she was.
“She wants to remain with you, Hermann, the dove of peace, the dove of the Spirit.
“No, white dove, you must fly up to the heights. You must be free, you must fly …”
As if she had understood him, she lifted her wings and flew up, high above the yellow-brown walls of the imposing bell tower, into the light blue of the sky. The three men stood there for a long time, following her flight with their eyes.
“Would you accompany me on my tour of inspection, Hermann?” the abbot asked.
The sick man joyfully assented, and Berthold took hold of the wheelchair.
“Remain here, Brother. Today it is I who will drive your Master across Reichenau.”
And the monks and brethren, the craftsmen, farmers, and fishers saw something rare and remarkable: the Lord and Father Abbot, the Most Reverend Lord Imperial Prelate and ruler of far-flung territories, was pushing the wheelchair of his lame monk.
The contrast was great between the abbot, who remained a giant even in his old age, and the slight figure of the monk in the fragile vehicle. The prior wrinkled his brow in irritation. Did not this Hermann play much too great a role on Reichenau?
The wheels of the vehicle imprinted a double gray track on the carpet. The inhabitants of the island came from all sides to greet the abbot. They did not find it so strange that he was driving the lame man. The Lord Berno thanked each one, even the little fisherman’s child who was putting a few flowers on a garland. But otherwise, the abbot was very taciturn on this walk, and he nowhere made any comment on the preparations that had been made. A nod of approval had to suffice for even the most zealous workers. He never asked the lame man for his opinion. Why had he brought him along? In order not to be alone? Hermann did not ask. It was enough for him to know that the Father needed him.
When they came back to the monastery church, the servants were just removing the last part of the wooden framework. A white dove flew around the crest of the bell tower. Was it the same dove? “She does not want to go away from your tower, Father Abbot!”
The Lord Berno drove him through the twilit narthex into the house of God. Here too, no words were necessary, since they both loved the generous width of the arches in the west-work and the simple, relaxed austerity of the building as a whole, which united width, a buoyancy that was a source of inspiration, a noble harmony, a directness, and solidity. The ambulatories beside the imperial loge were modest additions, too modest to turn the church into something bright and playful.
This west-work, Abbot Berno’s building, had a strong symbolic power. Its builder had been like a firmly established, absolutely solid, and yet generous and bold “building of God” for the past four decades, both for his own monks and for many people outside, including popes, princes, and emperors. They often looked to him as a man completely united to this earth, yet pointing to heaven. His clarity, directness, and simplicity attracted people more than his considerable achievements in the fields of poetry and music. His artistic works decorated his life in the same way as the arcades, friezes, and pilaster strips decorated his west-work: they did not disrupt the direction his life took, nor were they a displeasing interruption of its consistency. The imperial loge above the west apse, with its modest furnishings, corresponded to the political attitude of the Lord Berno. He had served his emperors faithfully, whether they honored him (like Henry II) or despised him (like Conrad the Salian). But the kingdom of God mattered more to him than the kingdom of the emperor. On its deepest level, his service of the emperor was a service of God.
“
The abbot pushed the wheelchair into the narthex. Did he intend to bring the lame man into his cell? A white dove sat on the square before the church, as if she was waiting for them; but when the men came nearer, she flew away. The Lord Berno drove the wheelchair past the monastery gate and turned into a bumpy cart track. He steered it carefully by a circuitous route through green meadows and flowers, back to the Gnadensee. Bushes and willows protected them from inquisitive eyes on the “Emperor’s Path.” The spring day was exhilarating, and the Gnadensee smiled up at the bright sky. Abbot Berno turned the wheelchair to face the lake, and sat down beside it in the young grass on the shore.
Externally, everything was as it had been on that day, some time ago, when Hermann’s words about ruling and serving had led to a calamitous misunderstanding—which in turn, thanks to each man’s acknowledgment of his guilt, had brought about a mutual understanding and a friendship in the Lord that had not existed before.
“Was it a coincidence that Berthold caught a white dove for you, Hermann, and that a white dove met us a second time?” the abbot asked, pensively.
“Do coincidences exist, Father Abbot? Does not everything, no matter how tiny it may be, belong somehow or other to the great plan of God’s love?”
“A white dove?”
“Even a white dove!”
“Good.” The Lord Berno’s ring almost slipped off his finger, and he pushed it higher up. “Everything has its meaning in the plan of God’s love. Then let me meditate a little on the white dove …” Hermann, Hermann (he reflected), there were no coincidences—and the ring, the sign of his abbatial dignity had become much too wide for him. There were no coincidences.
But the abbot did not mention the ring. He said:
“The white dove over the dark parapets could be seen as a metaphor for a human being who rises up above the dark parapets of physical distress and afflictions, because his desiring and his loving have remained pure in the grace of the Holy Spirit. He can fly. And he ascends higher and higher in order to bring back home a blessing from the light, the love, and the peace.
“When you were a young man, Hermann, you wanted to fly away like a little bird. And now you are charged to spread out your wings. Listen to me, my dear son in Christ: You must ascend higher and higher out of the depths. No matter what may happen on Reichenau, you must not be content to remain in the depths and complain. You must ascend, you must rise above the dark parapets and bring back home a blessing for the abbey of Saint Mary on Reichenau, which needs blessing … needs it, for otherwise, the rich meadow4 will turn into a barren wilderness in which the life of grace can no longer grow.”
The lame man was shocked by the urgency of this interpretation, which sounded like a testament.
He asked, while his whole being trembled, “Father, can a dove fly if its wings are fettered?”
“Your fetters fell off a long time ago, Hermann. You are free. You must fly, and you can fly.”
Once again, the abbot found it difficult to keep hold of his ring, which threatened to slip off his finger. That is how your entire life’s work is, Berno (he told himself). It is slipping away from you. And what remains? What remains of your forty years of working, praying, and making sacrifices on Reichenau? Have I not become poorer than the young monk Berno in Pruem? Am I poor enough to be permitted to hope in God’s mercy?
The lame man looked down at the Father, at the figure that huddled in the grass, at the stooped shoulders that were almost like his own, at the white hair. What ought he to say? The Father knew that Hermann would entrust himself wholly to the will of God as long as he lived. The dove would fly, when the grace of God bore it upward.
The Lord Berno began to speak again: “You once spoke to me at a grave moment, not far from here. Only a few months have passed since then, but I have traveled a long way in that time, my son. We stood by the Gnadensee, which belongs to you in such a way that I am inclined to call you ‘Hermann of the Gnadensee.’ And you reminded me of the real task of an abbot, which is not to rule, but to serve, to serve for His sake, to serve Him in those who are His. Tomorrow, a man is coming who has been given power, and who is therefore exposed to the same temptation, the great and dangerous temptation to forget the charge he has received, the mission with which God has entrusted him.
“To rule by serving, to serve by ruling.—The proud human mind does not find it easy to get the balance right. Those who have power succumb again and again to the temptation to claim for themselves the honor that belongs only to the Most High. There is no ordination and no high office that can protect them from that temptation, not even the highest ministry in the Church of Christ, that of Peter’s successor.
It is necessary to pray, to pray a great deal, especially for those who represent Our Lord on earth and who are exposed to the temptation of power. Must they not give a very strict account of themselves? Is it not terrible that they must give an account, before the eternal Judge, of every soul that is entrusted to their care?
“I am grateful to you for having the love and the courage to speak so openly to me, Hermann! I was taking a dangerous path. I wanted to consolidate my office with harshness and force, rather than with humility and love.”
“Father Abbot, you have made up a hundredfold to the brethren whatever your excessive strictness may have failed to give them in the past. The brethren of good will are devoted to you in reverence and in grateful love, and in you they honor Our Lord.”
“No abbot will ever have the good fortune to win the hearts of all the monks. There will always be some who insist on hardening their hearts against him.”
“Is not even one monk … too many? It is of course true that they all bow down before the one to whom the external authority, the office, has been given. But are their souls bowing down before Christ, when he, in the person of the abbot, demands obedience from them? Are they serving Christ? Or are they merely motivated by human prudence when they adapt to the wishes of the powerful man—for that is all they see in the abbot—without thinking of Christ? Are they opening up to the Lord in humility and love? I see that you do not dare to tell me that the answer is ‘yes’!
“Hermann, how powerful the human will is! I would like to go down on my knees before those brethren and beg them: ‘Open up to God!’ But all I can do is to weep before the closed doors of their hearts, because their hardness and their pride degrade God to a powerless beggar …
“And then I am afraid that I may not have made use of all the possibilities I had to help them.”
“Father, God does not ask anything impossible of you. It is only human beings who do that. God wants us to do what we are capable of doing.”
The Lord Berno had closed his eyes, and he did not notice that his ring had slipped down onto the grass.
“But … who can give us the certainty that we have truly done what we are capable of doing?”
“We are not given certainty. We are permitted to hope and to trust. God is mercy …”
The abbot now felt that his right hand had become lighter. He opened his eyes in surprise, saw his empty ring-finger, and began to look for the ring in the grass on the shore. There it lay, the shining little piece of metal, decorated with a sparkling gem, the sign of his abbatial dignity. He still had his pectoral cross. He nodded.
“Yes, Hermann, we must entrust our humanity to the Lord, to his cross, to his love, and to his … mercy. Everything else …”
He lifted the ring and weighed it in the hollow of his hand, as if he wanted to estimate its weight. “Everything else that sometimes seems important to us must pass away, must be taken away from us, in order that we may experience the full truth of what I once wrote: ‘I am made for God, and God is love.’”
Slowly, the Lord Berno put the ring back on his finger and stood up, supporting himself on the wheelchair.
“There is one other thing I wish to say to you in this hour, my dear son in Christ … When one is surrounded by people who have drawn narrow boundaries for the Lord, it is good to encounter someone who has stopped drawing boundaries, and who hands himself over to God without reserve. One can entrust one’s tiredness and one’s poverty to him, so that he can bring all the distress to the Lord. Hermann, I have often thanked him for you.”
In silence, the abbot steered the wheelchair back to the abbey. The sick man felt strangely empty and exhausted. Had he not thrown his entire being onto the scales, in order that the Father might find peace? What was he required to give now?
The monastery porter was watching impatiently for their arrival. He spoke agitatedly: “The Lord and Father Abbot of Einsiedeln has just arrived.”
“Thank you, Brother. I shall go to him at once,” replied Abbot Berno calmly. Then he bent down once more to the lame man: “Are you my praying Moses in the monastery church tomorrow, while I receive the emperor at the Herrenbruck harbor, my son?” he asked quietly.
The tall figure straightened. The Lord Father Abbot and Imperial Prelate, the master of Reichenau, strode with dignity to the guesthouse.
Hermann did not follow him with his eyes. He was looking at a white dove that tirelessly circled the tower. Her plumage shimmered in the sun, and the sky above her was bright and clear, like a promise that brought consolation.
When a heart loves, everything speaks to it of God. He sensed the great coherence, the unity of all that existed.
“Without the Word came nothing that came to be.” Berthold read this sentence on the wax tablet after he had put Hermann to bed for the night and tidied up the cell. A second sentence was written below it: “In him, everything becomes so simple.”
“In him, everything becomes so simple.” The Brother would have asked for an explanation, but the great silence had already begun … In him, everything becomes so simple.
“
The island monastery awoke to the new day earlier than usual. Everyone who lived there, from the prior to the youngest scholar, was excited, with the exception of two persons. Abbot Berno and the lame man prayed and sang with complete composure, as if the emperor were not at that very moment drawing nearer and nearer to Reichenau.
A smiling spring morning shone over the blessed island when the splendid ship of the emperor approached from Constance.
The Lord Berno was pale after a sleepless night, but his voice sounded firm, and he strode rather than walked. He was almost a head taller than his monks and his guests. His right hand clutched the golden pectoral cross. His furrowed face was serene and relaxed; weariness and fear had given way to a warm joy. The one who was coming was his friend, and he would spend his monastery’s festival day with him. There were no longer any somber and heavy thoughts to oppress his soul. It sang a secret Te Deum.
The bells of the island churches began their resonant song. A mighty hymn surged up in praise of the Lord.
The solitary adorer, the sick man in his choir stall in the monastery church, felt as if the song of the bells was taking hold of him and lifting him out of the distress and narrowness of earthly existence.
The dove was flying, the white dove with the fettered wings, the dove that nevertheless was free. She was flying. Far below her were the dark parapets of physical distress and afflictions. They sank down. The darkness sank down and became an unsubstantial depth.
The light increased and became ever brighter. The dove ascended higher, until its white plumage was immersed in the dazzling light of the Godhead.
Hermann had lost all awareness of his own self. His prayer was a pure devotion to the eternal love, freed from the fetters of earthly demands, words, thoughts … light, flame. And his self-forgetfulness became a power. His self-surrender became an invitation to God’s love, and the utter powerlessness of the gift he made of himself became a penetration into the freedom and the richness of the divine grace.
“
Abbot Berno wanted to fall to his knees before the emperor, but he bent down and clasped him in his arms. “My friend!” said the Lord Henry.
And the bells of Reichenau sang their sacred song.
The Miraculum5
Bishop Theoderich of Constance consecrated the church of Saint Mark, and Abbot Berno celebrated the holy Eucharist. The emperor assisted with devotion at the celebration. He was visibly moved by the generous width and the austere dignity of the new church, and impressed by the sublime ceremonies of the consecration.
The choir of monks sang the chants of the Mass. All at once, everyone pricked up their ears, and even the less pious abandoned their vain thoughts.
“Credo in unum Deum …”6
One single male voice sang the principal parts of the creed, and the choir responded. The voice came from a distance that was not spatial. It ascended from a faith that was very ardent and profound.
A believer was adoring here, venerating the mystery of the Incarnation of God from Mary the Virgin:
“Et incarnatus est de Spiritu sancto ex Maria Virgine et homo factus est …”7
The lame man’s head was raised and his eyes shone as he sang these words.
Perhaps because the singers were too deeply moved by the exultation that was so clearly perceptible in this voice, the choir failed to come in at the proper time. The singer repeated the same words. Then he sang them a third time, and finally Gunter gave the choir the signal that they were to sing:
“Crucifixus etiam pro nobis sub Pontio Pilato …”8
The soloist fell silent, and the choir of monks finished the creed.
At the words “Crucifixus etiam pro nobis,” the sick man suddenly collapsed, although Berthold was holding him. He slumped forward in the choir stall like a dead man.
“Crucifixus etiam …”
With the unconscious man in his arms, Berthold made his way through the staring crowd. He would have liked to cry out: “Let me through!” The crowd was inquisitive; they huddled together and were unwilling to make way for him.
“Crucifixus etiam pro nobis …”
That was surely how they had stared at the Lord as he died on the cross.
“
Once he was out in the courtyard, Berthold stopped with his burden. Was the Father still alive? His head was slack and hung backward. His face was deathly pale, and the closed eyelids had a bluish color. His mouth was half-open, his lips were drained of blood. The Brother laid the lame man softly down on the flagstones, put his ear to his breast, and listened anxiously for the beating of Hermann’s heart. The heart was beating weakly and irregularly. His breath was very thin.
With some effort, Berthold lifted the unconscious man and carried him into his cell, where he laid him on his hard bed and massaged his brow with a strong-smelling essence. Many anxious minutes passed before Hermann opened his eyes. Memory returned to his eyes, and he murmured something.
Berthold bent down to him. “Do you want something, Father?”
“Poor Berthold, I have deprived you of a wonderful celebration,” whispered the monk.
Berthold was so moved and embarrassed that he moved hastily backward and overturned the little jug with the essence. A pungent smell at once filled the cell, causing them to cough and sneeze. The Brother was more strongly affected than the sick man. While he rubbed his watery eyes, he heard the sick man’s quiet whisper: “You are indeed a powerful healer, Berthold.”
Coughing and snorting, Berthold wiped up the pool of fluid and opened the door wide to let fresh air in. The Salve Regina, the closing canticle of the liturgy in the church, could be heard from the monastery church across the inner courtyard.
Despite his weakness, the lame man listened, as happy as a child that has just received a present. Then he told the Brother to go quickly to the community of monks.
“I shall recover on my own in this fresh and spicy air. Close the door of the cell, so that I may have what remains of it.”
He was joking—and that meant that the worst was over. Berthold obeyed at once. He wanted to see the emperor making his entrance into the chapter room.
It was only when Berthold had left that the sick man permitted himself a sighing groan. He had successfully deceived the Brother, who could thus take part at least in the general joy of the celebration. In reality, however, Hermann did not feel like making jokes. Once again, the waves of the Gnadensee rolled over him. The quick sequence of jolts of pain, the whirlwind of his pains that knocked the breath out of him, sent him through heights and depths. But he hoped that the Father Abbot would be joyful and strong on his great day. That would be enough, that would be enough …
He did not even wonder whether the assembled company would miss him. The breakneck journey through the waves of his Gnadensee did not allow him much time for thinking.
All he could do was to endure, to hold out, to emerge for a moment from a trough in the pains, to breathe again, and then to be submerged anew.
The pains gradually subsided, the attack lessened. Abbot Berno arrived.
“Hermann?”
“Father?” The labored answer was itself a question.
“The emperor wishes to see you and to speak with you.”
“Tomorrow … please … tomorrow. Today, I belong to the Gnadensee,” replied Hermann languidly. He attempted to smile, as if he were asking for pardon for his inability to come.
The Lord Berno felt helpless. What could he do for the sufferer? He could dry his moist brow, give him a little wine, or make his bed more comfortable.
“You have undertaken too much, my dear son,” said the abbot quietly.
“God knows his donkey, Father,” joked the sick man. “He knows how much he can and must load onto me.”
“
Abbot Berno informed the emperor that Hermann of Altshausen was unable to receive him, since he was having an audience at that moment with a much higher Lord. He had to suffer much. He asked the Lord Henry to graciously be patient until the following day.
With the secret displeasure of one who never needed to wait, Henry III furrowed his dark brows. “It is a very fragile miraculum that you have on your Reichenau, Lord Berno.”
The abbot looked musingly at the determined face of the monarch, who knew how to guide the destinies of the peoples—and, at the appropriate time, the destiny of the Church too—with such a firm hand. It was a face that spoke of the power the emperor had amassed and of his decisiveness in action. Abbot Berno addressed this face with a wise gentleness: “Are not God’s miracles greatest when they are made known in human weakness?”
The Emperor Henry shrugged uneasily. “That may be the case, Lord Berno. But do not lead me onto the field of theology, for a warrior and ruler always feels uncertain there. That is when I need my court chaplain. I am now all the more eager to see your miraculum.”
Bishop Theoderich of Constance, who had formerly been the emperor’s chancellor and confidant, felt obliged to warn him: “You will be shocked by his appearance, my Lord Emperor. Hermann is a poor wretch, crook-limbed and sick, and almost completely lame.”
Can a weak cripple be in any way congenial to the nature of a master? Does not the Lord Henry love only the strong and the healthy?
But the emperor rejected the objection. “I have already heard that. And that is precisely why I admire his great achievements in the sciences.”
The Abbot of Saint Gallen remarked casually: “Not everyone agrees that Hermann is the greatest scholar of our age.” Some names from his own monastery lay on the tip of his tongue.
Abbot Berno smiled a scarcely perceptible smile, and turned to his guest. “Is Hermann the greatest scholar of our age? Reverend Lord and Brother, that is a question I have never asked myself, because I regard it as of secondary importance. He has made the best use of his rich talents in every field. But he has never striven for greatness and fame. He studied and wrote, composed and drew, constructed his apparatuses and his musical instruments, his clocks and his astrolabe, with the joy and the self-forgetfulness of a child … and with the glowing zeal of a lover, who aims at God and seeks him through all that he does. He knows nothing at all of his greatness in the world of the intellect. That is why I do not see the miraculum in his scholarship, my Lord Emperor …”
The emperor looked at him questioningly, without attempting to conceal his expectancy. What else could the miraculum be?
“… but rather in the glorious inner freedom that allows him to triumph over the terrible fetters of his sickness. He presents a picture of bodily weakness, of helplessness, of powerlessness, of one abandoned. His appearance may at first sight be shocking, but one who truly gets to know him and who sees deeper, knows that the one who meets Hermann is receiving a gift.”
“And therefore: a miraculum, Lord Berno,” observed the Abbot of Einsiedeln.
“Your judgment amounts to a canonization,” added Bishop Theoderich.
“Yes, a miraculum, my Lord Emperor and Reverend Lord Brothers, but a miraculum of the love of God, which led him to this inner freedom—and which at the same time is this freedom. Hermann of Altshausen’s life displays to us the meaning of some words that I once wrote: ‘I am made for God, and God is love.’”
“Would it be possible for Hermann to write a world chronicle for us, a book that contains all the great events since the birth of the Lord, Abbot Berno?” asked the emperor. “The events in time are also a path from God and to God.”
“He has already begun such a work, my Lord Emperor. He has done much preliminary work, and he attempted to compose an initial chronicle. But he was not content with it, because there were difficulties in the computation of time. In order to exclude inaccuracies, he drew up for his own use tables with the events in the computation of time of the Romans, the Greeks, the Jews, the Arabs, and the Christians. I too learned a great deal from his first chronicle. He never takes sides. Where there are bad things, he calls a spade a spade, even in the Church. In the form of his expression, he makes no borrowings from the writers of classical antiquity. He has a style of his own, allowing him to make essential points in few words.”
“My Lord Abbots, your conversation about Hermann of Altshausen has made me even more eager to meet the miraculum,” said the Lord Henry. “And I shall not permit you to deprive me of that, my former Lord Chancellor Theoderich. That was surely not your intention? Well, that was how your words sounded. Lord Berno, you were the only one who let the miraculum be a miraculum.” The emperor looked at them with a slight smile, but Abbot Berno was the only one who returned his gaze without embarrassment. “Forgive me, my Lords, I am no theologian, but I do believe that one should keep one’s eyes and one’s heart open for the miracles of God, wherever and however he may wish to perform them.”
The emperor rose and asked Abbot Berno to accompany him. The other Lords bowed deeply before the monarch. When they reached the inner courtyard, Henry III breathed more freely. “Now we will have a good talk, my dear friend. I am convinced that I have left the spiritual Lords with enough topics of conversation.” He laughed.
“You have certainly succeeded in doing so, my Lord Emperor,” said Abbot Berno, with a slight note of reproof in his voice.
“Do not hold it against me! I was tired of hearing their objections to your miraculum.”
The emperor and the abbot spent a long time walking up and down in the inner courtyard. When the emperor noticed that the abbot was growing tired, he offered him his arm. They did not speak about military campaigns and conquests; they spoke about eternal matters. At one point, the emperor asked the abbot: “Whom do you consider worthy to be the next to sit on the throne of Peter? Could you give me a name?”
“That is a weighty question, my Lord Emperor. But I have reflected in silence, and prayed …” The Lord Berno hesitated.
“And which name did you discover in the presence of God?”
“The name of a young bishop. I have met him only once, and yet I know him … Bishop Bruno of Toul.”
“The son of the count of Egisheim? That is strange, Lord Berno. I too have thought of him. Bishop Bruno is pious, prudent, and energetic.”
“And he is an adherent of the reforms of Cluny.”
The emperor said, calmly: “If you were younger, Lord Berno, I would have thought of you.”
The abbot blushed and shook his head in confusion. “How absurd, my Lord Emperor … Forgive me for using that word. But such a choice would be a disaster for the entire Church of Christ.”
“I have the impression that you know your spiritual son Hermann better than you know your own self, my friend. You underestimate yourself.”
The abbot attempted to put an end to this embarrassing conversation: “Thank God I am an old man, my Lord Emperor.”
“But I hope that you have many years left for Reichenau and for me, Lord Berno. An emperor has few genuine friends.”
The abbot looked the emperor directly in the eye. “God has allowed me to exercise my ministry on Reichenau for forty years, my Lord Emperor. Today, my dearest work, the building of the monastery church, was consecrated. Have I not fulfilled what the Lord charged me to do? I almost think that the time has come … Please remain the kindly patron of our abbey, even when another abbot is in office.”
“No!” the emperor cried vehemently, taking the abbot’s two hands in his own. “Lord Berno, it is too soon for you to leave us!”
“When God calls one, one must bow to his will, no matter who one is …”
The Lord Henry fell silent and looked down at the ground. Then he said: “Yes, no matter who one is, he must leave everything and follow the call of God … even the emperor.”
“He will find in God what he leaves here.”
“
Berthold carried as many books and parchment rolls into the lame man’s cell as his arms would bear.
“What are you doing?” asked Hermann, who was at his work desk.
The Brother carefully lowered the mountain of books onto the sick man’s bed.
“The emperor is on his way to you …”
“Yes, I am aware of that. But that does not explain why you are so busy.”
The young monk was surprised. “Ought not the Lord Henry to get to know your works, Father?”
“If that is his wish, Father Abbot will show him them in the library. Do you believe that our Lord the Emperor is interested in all these writings?”
“The emperor ought to see how much you have written and to admire you …” Berthold faltered. The master’s eloquent look confused him.
“And admire me? No, that is not what he ought to do. Bring the books quickly back to the place where they belong!”
Hermann gave the order in a strict tone of voice, and the Brother hurried away with his burden, disappointed and crushed. He did not see the friendly smile on the Father’s face. “Berthold is really a big child, a good big child …”
“
Shortly after this, the emperor stood on the threshold and looked around. He was visibly moved as he noted the clean, austere poverty of the room. Abbot Berno then accompanied him to the lame man’s work desk. Like every visitor, the emperor had to move into Hermann’s field of vision, so that the lame man could see him.
The abbot had forewarned him, while they were still in the cloister: “Hermann cannot turn round to greet you, my Lord Emperor. Would you go up to him?”
The Lord Henry gave the sick man his hand, but did not allow him to kiss it. Accordingly, Hermann only bent down, and his ingenuous blue eyes, shining with reverence and gentleness, met Henry III, the Imperator mundi.9 The brilliant face almost made the emperor forget the crooked figure. The emperor thought back to the abbot’s words. He had not said too much about this Hermann. His face spoke of an inner freedom, an assured serenity and cheerfulness. This man must be sheltered in the love of God, where he was at home and free—free in spite of his suffering.
“What are you working on at the moment, Father Hermann?”
“On a Sequence for Easter, my Lord Emperor. I already have the words, but now I am working on the melody. I believe that it ought to move forward joyfully, increasing in volume and in speed. For what could give us more reason to rejoice than the fulfillment of our redemption through the resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ?”
The emperor read aloud: “Rex Regum Dei Agne, Leo Juda magne …”10 When he came to the words: “Make us worthy of this mystery …,” he interrupted his reading and looked up. “The real reason for my being here, Hermann of Altshausen, is that I wanted to thank you …”
The sick man was astonished. “You want to thank me? My Lord Emperor, what reason could you have to thank me?”
“Through your chants at the holy sacrifice of the Mass, Brother, you have given a child of the world a notion of what heaven is, above all through your Credo … and through your marvelous canticle about the Mother of mercy. Do you have a copy for me?”
Hermann looked questioningly at the abbot, who gave him permission with a sign. The crooked hands found a parchment among the various writings on the work desk and gave it to the Emperor. Henry III took it from him and handled it with care.
“Salve Regina, Mater misericordiae …,”11 he read aloud. “The words and the melody inspire the heart with confidence …”
Abbot Berno felt glad. Had he not understood the emperor better than the other prelates? For all his thirst for power, Henry was a man of deep faith.
“Are you not entitled to have an especially intimate confidence in the Mother, my Lord Emperor? It is her Son that you are serving in your high office. And that,” the lame man said simply, “is why Our Lady loves you from the heart.”
The emperor brushed his dark hair from his angular brow and hid his face in his brown hand. He seemed sunk in thought. The abbot and his lame monk prayed for him. In the poor cell, Henry examined in the presence of God what he did and what he was.
“Do I serve the Son of the most blessed Virgin Mary?” The emperor’s dark eyes looked directly at the cripple. “Hermann, you see things too simply, and you see me as nobler than I am. I had three Popes deposed in Sutri, and I appointed Clement on the basis of my own absolute power.”
“What you did was right. You wanted to save the Church from her threefold fragmentation, and you gave us a Pope of high morals and piety.”
“And I will give her a new Pope once again. I want what is good. The highest office in the Church ought not to be bartered for money, and the Pope ought not to be a plaything of the Roman aristocracy. But am I not acting in a very violent manner?”
The monk looked at his emperor as if he wished to console him. “You must act in this way, my Lord Emperor, since it is impossible for the Church of Christ at present to confer this office freely on a worthy man. This means that you are the arm of God. Since you want what is good, what you do will endure before God.”
“It is true that I want what is good … but is my intention selfless and pure?”
“Our knowledge and our action always have defects, my Lord Emperor. Often, it is only our longing that is pure. And is not our longing the only real action we human beings perform? It opens the door through which God can enter. One who wants to be good, one who wants to love, will be loved by him.”
The emperor addressed the cripple with a confidentiality that he never otherwise displayed: “Now, I must thank you once again, Brother Hermann. You have given me more in this brief hour than you can imagine … Do not forget me and the empire in your prayers. Pray for a good Pope, and ask that I may receive something of your freedom.
“Let me entrust one more request to you. Your Father Abbot has told me that you have already done much of the preliminary work for a world chronicle. Write it, Hermann, write it soon at my request and on my commission. You have already written an exquisite little book about my father, the Lord Conrad. Do you know what I most admired in that book?”
The sick man looked at him helplessly. How could he know the answer to this question? He himself did not find his little book admirable at all.
“In this account of life of the Emperor Conrad II, you did not pay him back for what he did to Reichenau and its abbot. In that respect too, you were free!”
Henry III gave the lame man his hand as he turned to leave. Then he hesitated. “You are a priest, are you not?”
Abbot Berno replied for him: “Hermann is a priest, my Lord Emperor.”
“Then give me your priestly blessing!”
The Emperor Henry III knelt down on the stone floor of the poor cell, while the sick man spoke the words of blessing and traced the sacred sign of the cross over the head that wore the imperial crown.
“
In the cloister, the abbot walked in silence beside the emperor, who likewise said nothing. When they were approaching the library, he asked: “May I show you Hermann’s works?”
“No, Lord Berno, I have seen and heard enough to know him and to agree wholeheartedly with your judgment. He is a miraculum. I felt just now that he was looking through me, down into the depths of my soul.”
“He saw you in the love of God.”
“And that is precisely why I felt small before him. The criteria of human greatness disappear in the love of God. All that remains is a human being stripped of all his earthly dignity, a human being in the presence of God.”
The emperor looked absently at the sunny inner courtyard and the columns that gave shade in the cloister.
“Your spiritual son, this poor, distorted man, possesses the gift of bringing out the best in us. The pure longing for God is awakened. With his gentleness, he overwhelms the rigid rules that our self-seeking employs to keep the door anxiously closed against the Lord.”
The Emperor Henry III walked toward the monastery church. Before they entered the west wing through the side entrance, he turned once more to the abbot.
“Lord Berno, I thank you for bringing me to him! This meeting was both painful and joyful. It embarrassed me, and it consoled me. I will never forget it In my good hours, when I am close to God, it will be present to me, and I will compare the fetters on my existence with the freedom of your son.”
“
The sick man laid the Easter Sequence aside. He had to yield to the urgent pleading of his heart, and sing a new canticle to his Mother Mary. It was she who opened in human hearts the doors that were closed to the Lord. For the Lord, she was the gate that opened onto the earth. For human beings, she was the porta caeli, the gate of heaven.
The canticle was also meant as a gift for Father Abbot, who had stood behind the young emperor like a silent shadow …
“
The Brother waited expectantly for his Master to tell him about the emperor’s visit. Instead, he heard the request: “Could you write down a canticle for me, my son? I will dictate it to you first for the wax tablet, but then you must write it very beautifully and decorate it with an elaborate initial. Take the best parchment for it!”
Berthold thought: “No doubt, the canticle is for the emperor.”
With lengthy pauses, Hermann dictated a new Marian canticle to him.
“Alma Redemptoris Mater, quae pervia caeli porta manes et stella maris … Loving Mother of the Redeemer, you who remain the gate that gives access to heaven, and the star of the sea, help the people that falls down and tries to rise up again.”
This petition was followed by a praise of Mary’s dignity as the inviolate and virgin Mother of God, who had once been greeted by Gabriel in Nazareth and the request that she might now obtain mercy for the sinners …
While Berthold transferred the canticle onto the parchment, Hermann gave the words a tenderly wafting melody.
“The melody is virginal, like the words,” said Berthold admiringly.
“Thank you for your help, my son. Now please bring the canticle to …”
The Brother’s enthusiasm led him to interrupt too hastily: “To the emperor!”
Hermann corrected him calmly: “To Father Abbot.”
The young monk departed shamefacedly. The Lord Bruno was in his apartment. The emperor had already gone to bed, and the abbot wanted to make use of the long evening for study. But he showed no displeasure when Hermann’s messenger entered.
“Do you bring me news from your Master, Brother?”
“Master Hermann sends you this canticle, Father Abbot,” replied Berthold respectfully, as he handed him the parchment.
The old man’s eyes looked kindly at the young man. How faithfully and selflessly Berthold served the lame man! A faithfulness of that kind was not an everyday virtue, even in a monastery. When Hermann’s attacks became frequent, the Brother was often obliged to stay away from the fellowship of the brethren for days on end, and to devote himself exclusively to the care of the sick man.
Abbot Berno looked steadily at Berthold, until the young monk felt uncomfortable. The abbot’s eyes tested him and weighed him up, as if he was pondering some grave matter.
“You have an excellent teacher in theology, do you not?”
“Lord and Father Abbot, the Master continually showers gifts on me out of the rich treasury of his knowledge. I must, of course, add that I am not always as good at receiving as he would wish me to be.”
“That is not how I see it, Brother. You have done your honest best, and you are certainly not poor in knowledge. That is why I believe that the time has come to confer the sacred ordination to the priesthood on the professed monk Berthold.”
Berthold could hardly believe his ears. “Father Abbot, I … I …” he stammered. “I thank you with all my heart, and I am ready with all my joyful heart.”
“Good, then hurry to tell your Master.”
Berthold had seldom carried out a command so literally. He hurried: he ran through the cloister and only just avoided bumping into an older monk.
“Excuse me, Father …,” he gasped, and ran on. The old monk shook his head as he looked after him. These young monks nowadays …
“
Without knocking, Berthold rushed into the corner cell.
“What a hurry you are in …!”
“Father, Father, I am to be ordained,” he cried, breathless and overjoyed. “And I am to be allowed to take my vows!”
“Sit down beside me first, and then tell me everything.”
Berthold obeyed, and told him what the abbot had said. He also mentioned his discomfort under the abbot’s scrutinizing look. Hermann listened attentively. Berthold seemed unaware that he had spoken to the abbot on his behalf: he wanted his most faithful pupil to be ordained.
“I look forward to … your first priestly blessing, my dear son.”
“You want me to bless you? But that is impossible!” stuttered the Brother.
The lame man laughed heartily at the confusion of his companion. “Why should that be impossible? Ah, I know! You have just realized that I am too much of a sinner. Before you bless me, I would like you to hear my confession.”
“Never!” cried Berthold, with unusual vehemence.
“Let me stop joking … Berthold, you will soon be a priest, and then you will be allowed to perform a different service. A priest should not be a nurse who carries out the most menial services for a lame man. Be quiet, my son. You will obey. You will do what the abbot charges you to do—and you will do it with at least a supernatural joy.”
“You want to have another helper, Father,” muttered Berthold darkly.
“You foolish young man, if only you knew …” Hermann pretended to be angry as he berated him. “What you do know is that it would be a great sacrifice for me, if I had to do without you!”
The Brother’s face lit up. “And do you truly suppose that our good Father Abbot would demand such a sacrifice of you? No, I am convinced that he will not ask it of you, if I tell him what you have just said.”
“You are too clever for your own good!” The sick man laughed as he shook his finger at Berthold. “Woe betide you, if you say one single word of this to the abbot! And a willful young man like this wants to become a priest soon!”
Berthold nodded pensively. “Yes … And strangely enough, Father, I ask myself all the time who suggested to Father Abbot that I should be ordained now. Do you know anything about this?”
The lame man did not reply. The two monks smiled at each other, each knowing that the other knew.
“
In the meantime, Abbot Berno had read the lame man’s canticle to the sublime Mother of the Lord. He understood what Hermann had meant by giving him this gift. He was pointing the abbot to Mary and telling him to entrust himself completely to her “before the ending of the light,” lucis ante terminum …
When the monks sang these words at Compline, the aged abbot lifted his head and looked for the little figure in the choir stall on the other side.
“Your evening prayer to Our Lady came just at the right time. The light of my day will soon be over, Hermann. I can feel it … the shadows are growing longer.”
1. [“The Year of the Lord.”]
2. [“the light of Christ.”]
3. [Title: “On physiognomy.”]
4. [The name “Reichenau” means “rich meadow.”]
5. [“miracle.”]
6. [“I believe in one God …”]
7. [“And he was made incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and became man …”]
8. [“And he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate …”]
9. [“Ruler of the world.”]
10. [“King of kings, Lamb of God, great Lion of Judah …”]
11. [“Hail, O Queen, Mother of mercy …”]