Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 37:146 (Apr 1880)
Article: Bernard Of Clairvaux As A Preacher
Author: H. E. Jacobs

BSac 37:146 (April 1880) p. 338

Bernard Of Clairvaux As A Preacher

From The German Of Dr. A. Brömel, Superintendent Of The Duchy Of Lunenburg.

Prof. H. E. Jacobs

No one can examine closely the life of St. Bernard without astonishment at the wonderful industry and influence which this man of always infirm health exercised, by preaching and by administering the affairs of the church, both in great and in small circles. From the chapel of the cloister in which he preached to the chair of the pope and the throne of the emperor, there was no rank with which he did not come into immediate spiritual contact. He was the mediator and peace-maker between popes and princes; with all the great men of church and state he had much to do; and to all he fearlessly proclaimed the truth. But from the bustle of the world he always withdrew himself again into his cloister to preach daily to his brethren, and to advance in holiness by the reading of the Scriptures, meditation, and the performance of such duties as were prescribed by the rules of his order. Thus prepared, he went forth anew to the work which the world, or the church outside of the cloister, imposed upon him. Everything, too, that he did, he performed with the same calmness of spirit. Whether he wrote against Abelard, the greatest dialectician of his age, of whom Bernard says that he knew everything in heaven and upon earth, except only himself, or contended against heretics, or by his prayers performed miracles in healing the blind and the dumb and the lame, or converted hardened sinners, or cared for the poor and despised, in presence of mind and the calm exercise of power, Bernard at all times remained the same. All this

BSac 37:146 (April 1880) p. 339

he accomplished while in a constant struggle with unremitting disease, contracted, as he himself afterward lamented, by immoderate zeal in the mortification of his body. For forty years he exercised spiritual power in such a manner as to be the very soul of his age; and this with a clear confession he ascribes not to himself, but entirely to grace. When dying he prayed: “Dear Lord Jesus, I know that even though I have lived most perfectly, yet I have lived so as to deserve thy condemnation, but I comfort myself in this, that thou hast died for me, and hast sprinkled me with the blood from thy holy wounds. For I have, indeed, been baptized into thee, and have heard thy word through which thou hast called me, and promised me grace and life, and told me to believe; upon that I will depart hence, not in uncertain anxious doubt, and with the thought: Ah, who knows what will be the judgment of God in heaven concerning me!”

Twenty years after his death he was canonized by the Catholic church, and even the Lutheran church has joined in this testimony, and ha...