Victory and Defeat: A Conflicted Church, 1136–1140

Abstract

This chapter explores how the autumn and early winter of 1135–36 provided sufficient time for Saint Bernard to give his first sermons on the Song of Songs at Clairvaux and also to familiarize himself and come to terms with the brothers' ambitious building program. But just when he may have felt he had returned to the routine of monastic life, he was called back to Italy. His companion now, as previously, was his brother Gerard, Clairvaux's capable cellarer whom Bernard felt he needed at his side rather than leaving him behind to deal with the material affairs of the monastery. In March or April of 1137 at Viterbo, Gerard became severely ill. Bernard's description of events emphasizes how important it was for him to restore Gerard to his monastic community so that he could die there. During the last year of Gerard's life, Bernard must have lived in fear that he soon would lose the man whose company and guidance had shepherded him since childhood. Just as the papal schism was coming to a seemingly happy end, Bernard was facing the end of the world that had made him.