The Great Paradox of Medieval Monasticism

Solitude leads to community, and community to solitude.

Monasticism was so central to medieval culture that to study one without the other is simply impossible. The spiritual, architectural, agricultural, intellectual, and artistic achievements of the Middle Ages were inseparable from the lives of men and women from all over Europe who chose to own nothing, renounce self-will, subdue the flesh, exalt the spirit, and give themselves entirely to God. They sought to build for themselves a peaceful, secluded, sanctifying world of prayer, study, and manual labor. In so doing, they built up an entire civilization.

This is a situation where pictures tell a story that you can’t quite put into words.

Image copyright Oxford University Press.

This is a map of monasteries that existed in a period roughly corresponding to the High Middle Ages (AD 1000–1300). It’s striking even before you consider that the population density at this time was perhaps one-tenth of what it is now.

However, take a careful look at the legend: this map includes only institutions associated with change from the established Benedictine model of monasticism. In other words, it identifies centers of Benedictine reform and houses belonging to the new orders (namely, Dominicans and Franciscans, known as mendicant orders, and Premonstratensians, who technically were canons regular rather than monks). If the map had dots for all types of monastic institutions, it would look very different—according to one estimate, there were well over ten thousand monasteries in Europe during this period.