"The Rule of Saint Benedict" is a guide for early communities of a spiritual nature. While this book is still in use today by the order of St. Benedict and rules their day to day life in the monastery, it is interesting that such a structured approach was never the intention of Saint Benedict. This is also evident within the book. One of the main concepts that is repeated over and over again is the focus on a self-sufficient community that is completely separate from the outside world. This goes against the modern structure of a connected order of St. Benedict. However, analyzing the rule in itself requires two viewpoints. At first the spiritual concept underlying the rule and secondly the historical reality of these communities need to be assessed.
The Christian belief with the Catholic church as its ruler was, at this time, the only accepted and institutionalized religion in Europe. Every ruler who wanted to gain any believable power needed to go through the Catholic Church. Conflicts were often won with religious condemnation. It was the time of the crusades. In this context, it is understandable that a spiritual man like Benedict of Nursia tried to create an opportunity to be religious without having to be part of the scheming of the outside world. The communities he created were, in his eyes, the purest form of contemplation on God. Within these communities the knowledge of a thousand years prevailed.
The second aspect is the historical background. In the aforementioned political and religious climate, anything that contained any form of wealth was a welcome target for raiders and other crime. It was, therefore, not only a spiritual but also a safety issue to exclude oneself from the rest of the world. Monasteries, while in their original concept not a treasure chest, always contained some form of reliquary or other valuable object. This needed to be protected by thick walls and an air of religious mysticism. This complete exclusion, however, created different issues for those that lived within the walls. The community was small and it was impossible to not know almost every detail of your brother's life. This created the necessity for the strict rule book that is known as "The Rule of Saint Bernard".
