THE PARACLETE

Abelard’s flight from Saint Denis was spurred by the animosity of the monks and Abbot Adam, but also by his rejection of what he considered their disregard for the austerity demanded by the Benedictine Rule. Writing in the

Historia that he was horrified by the monks’ wickedness and feeling that the whole world had conspired against him, Abelard arrived at the priory of Saint Ayoul in the town of Provins in the county of Champagne. He probably chose Saint Ayoul because its prior, Radulphus, was a friend of his, and the count of Champagne, Thibaud II, was an acquaintance as well. Abelard’s goal was to set up a school and monastery in Champagne, and he no doubt had hoped that these allies would help him. Champagne was already home to the monastery of Clairvaux, which under its famous abbot Bernard was bringing prestige, money, and people to the county. Another monastery headed by a well-known abbot would have raised the profile of the already wealthy county even further. However, as was the pattern his entire life, Abelard had left a trail of enemies behind him, and his former abbot Adam of Saint Denis would not absolve him for running away, nor would he allow the troublesome Abelard to live as a monk wherever he chose, despite Thibaud’s petition to Adam on Abelard’s behalf. A monk took a vow of obedience to his abbot, and Abelard was left without options. Adam demanded that Abelard return to Saint Denis under pain of excommunication. Yet, shortly afterward, on February, 19, 1122, the abbot of Saint Denis died and was succeeded by Suger, who, like Bernard of Clairvaux, Peter the Venerable, and Abelard himself, would become a seminal figure of the twelfth century. Abbot Suger also was not inclined to grant Abelard’s request, but the intervention of Abelard’s powerful patron, Stephen of Garlande, at this time the seneschal of France, secured the permission he sought. Confirmed in the presence of the king, Abelard was allowed to quit Saint Denis and to place himself under the authority of another monastery, and in fact go to any solitary place he wished, as long as he did not bring disrepute upon Saint Denis.

And so, Abelard relocated once again, this time to a secluded site in the parish of Quincey, near Nogent-sur-Seine, still within the county of Champagne. Abelard busied himself constructing a small dwelling from mud, sticks, and reeds, with the intention of living as a hermit. He dedicated the primitive structure to the Holy Trinity, surely a reference to his condemnation at Soissons. However, Abelard writes that his fame and the enthusiasm of his students would not allow his withdrawal. They flocked to him en masse from Paris, and the tents and huts of his adoring students destroyed the seclusion he had sought. Although Abelard asserted that he sought comfort in the solitude of a hermit, he soon resumed teaching students again because of his acute poverty. If this was the case, his fortunes were reversed by the influx of students, and a new oratory made of stone and wood replaced the original oratory of mud and wattle. He consecrated the new oratory to the Paraclete. “Paraclete” was an unusual, but surely a personally significant, name for the oratory. Paraclete is a Greek word, meaning one who helps or assists; but in the Bible, it is used to mean the Holy Spirit as comforter (in Latin, consolator). Paraclete often figures in theological discussions about the Trinity to describe how God is revealed in the world and his part in salvation. Paraclete, or Holy Spirit, is the third person of the Trinity. Abelard may well have chosen the name as a show of defiance for the condemnation at Soissons, but he writes in the Historia that the Oratory of the Paraclete was an outward manifestation of the Holy Spirit that he believed resided within him.

Moreover, although many of Abelard’s works are difficult to date with certainty, it seems that his time at the Paraclete was one of the most prolific periods in his life. He defiantly reworked the book that he had been forced to burn at Soissons, this time calling the work Theologia Christiana. He may also have written Sic et non (his work presenting conflicting theological quotations), Tractatus de intellectibus (glosses on the late third - or early fourth-century philosopher Porphyry of Tyre), the Soliloquium (an internal dialogue between Peter and Abelard), the Collationes (dialogues between a philosopher and a Jew, and between a philosopher and a Christian), and works on grammar and rhetoric that do not survive. Clearly, Abelard was better suited to the life of a writer and teacher than to that of a hermit, and he remained teaching and writing at the Paraclete from about 1122 to about 1127, one of the longest periods of sustained scholarship in his life. To allow him more time to study, his students took over the running of the Paraclete. Abelard writes that pupils were drawn by his superior reputation as a teacher, igniting the jealousy and criticism of his rivals once again.

However, these attacks mark a departure from past criticisms, which had come from rival schoolmasters or students. Now, they originated with those whom Abelard contemptuously refers to as those who boasted that they had restored the purity of the lives of monks and canons regular. Most historians believe that Abelard is referring to Bernard of Clairvaux as the monastic reformer and Norbert of Xanten as the reformer of the canons regular. Both men were associated with the reform movement, and Abelard writes that they preached avidly against him and his supporters. It does seem that the winds of change were blowing against Abelard and, perhaps more importantly, his patrons. Stephen of Garlande, who was the seneschal of King Louis VI and an archdeacon of the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, once again had fallen out of royal favor. He had intervened on Abelard’s behalf to secure permission to leave Saint Denis, thereby helping to make the Oratory of the Paraclete a reality. Although it is difficult to trace precisely what led to Stephen’s fall from grace, it seems likely that he had attracted the hostility of many of the reformers who objected to his personal wealth and temporal power, which they saw as inconsistent with the office of archdeacon of Notre Dame. Stephen’s fall resulted in his removal as the seneschal; his property was confiscated, his great house on the Ile de la Cite was demolished (though the chapel was spared), and his vineyards near the abbey of Saint Genevieve on the Left Bank, where he was dean and Abelard had established a school, were uprooted. Although Abelard was in Champagne and, as a supporter of the Garlande faction, Count Thibaud could accord him a certain amount of security, sometime between 1125 and 1127 Abelard left the sanctuary of the Oratory of the Paraclete, accepting an invitation to become the abbot of the monastery of Saint Gildas in wild and pirate-infested western Brittany.