Citing Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical Laudato Si’ as his primary inspiration, Samuel Torvend presents an ecocritical reading of monastic Christian thought and practice through the figure of St. Benedict of Nursia. Using St. Benedict as a touchstone through which to examine both the Christian past and present, Torvend traces the presence of ecological awareness in the faith from early Christianity through the present day. Torvend lends his reading an enlightening personal perspective through his experiences as a Benedictine oblate, an Episcopalian priest, and a scholar of religion.
In his introduction, Torvend frames his argument by positioning monastic communities as places “where we find thoughtful stewardship of the land, water sources, forests, orchards, wetlands, buildings, and diverse creatures—communities whose shared monastic values inform ecological practice” (xi). He finds particular ecological awareness in the figure of St. Benedict in the construction of his monastic Rule, “establishing a pattern of daily and seasonal prayer tied to solar and lunar rhythms and the changing season of the year” (xii). Torvend is especially interested in Benedict’s role as a reformer, and he uses the saint’s words and life story as models of rethinking the relationship between Christian faith and practice and the environment.
Chapter 1 focuses on the ecological underpinnings of early Christianity. He begins with the Roman context surrounding the birth of the new religion and its resistance to the imperial designs on both the landscape and people’s souls. Torvend cites the militaristic expansionism of the Roman Empire as a force of ecological and cultural devastation, wreaking havoc on the environment and humanity alike. In this framework, the Christian faith emerges as a source of resistance, not only to the Roman practice of venerating of a human “lord” (e.g., an emperor) in both the secular and sacred meanings of the word, but also to the subjugation of the natural world to human rule. In contrast, Torvend finds “that early Christians used the things of the earth in their worship,” and focused on “the materiality of this earth present in [the] gospels and thus in the life of Jesus” (25). For Torvend, early Christianity is run through with an appreciation of the natural world.
The second chapter expands upon these beginnings and details the practices of the early Church as driven “by a distinctive ethic of care for others” (33), especially in the face of Roman persecution. However, as the Roman emperors eventually turn to accept Christianity, Torvend notes that the faith is also transformed into an “imperial Christianity” (42) in which, among other tokens of secularization, Christ comes to be portrayed as more of an earthly ruler than a humble shepherd. The chapter ends with Benedict’s advent and his ultimate rejection of such secularizing forces on the faith, leaving Rome and its imperial brand of Christianity behind.
Torvend illustrates Benedict’s flight from Rome to Sublacus (present-day Subiaco) as establishing the ecological foundation of the saint’s faith and Rule in Chapter 3. Here, Torvend blends contemporary Latin texts, including Pope Gregory’s life of the saint in his Dialogues, with modern archaeological and ecological texts to paint a picture of Benedict’s new home. Of especial significance to Torvend’s argument is the story of Benedict’s hermitage in a cave in which the saint appears “within nature, rather than above it, allow[ing] one to see beasts, birds, vegetation—God’s creation—not as mere backdrop but as primary actors with the young hermit and soon-to-be abbot” (63). To this end, the chapter is organized around the impact of specific elements of Benedict’s natural surroundings on his faith and the ultimate creation of his Rule, from the nearby river and his cave to animals and the products they provide humanity.
Chapter 4 investigates the impact of larger environmental currents of time on Benedict and his Rule. Torvend posits that Benedict’s call for communal prayer in the Rule was “informed by ecophilic poetry and [...] gave thanks to the Creator for the natural world and oriented the gathered community toward its common labor in the hortus of God” (95-96). Citing Christian texts and practices keyed to the day (e.g., Scripture celebrating Christ as the sun), the week (e.g., a seven-day monastic schedule reflective of Creation as described in the book of Genesis), and the seasons (e.g., the agricultural alignment of Christian holidays), Torvend supplies numerous examples of the presence of natural time in Benedict’s Rule. He gives particular attention to texts devoted to the Christian stories of Creation because they “shape the consciousness of a community turned to God rather than the isolated self” (90), serving the communal mission of monastic life as embodied in the Rule.
Torvend turns to Benedict’s Rule specifically in Chapter 5. He presents four underlying tenets of the Rule—a sense of place, labor, stability, and self-sufficiency—in an ecological context, often in terms of the agricultural functions of a monastery, “gathering and cultivating food, securing a reliable water source, and obtaining clothing” (100). All of these functions require a knowledge of and an investment in the local environment. However, Torvend argues that this investment is more than mere materiality, but part and parcel with “a holistic vision [of Creation] in which all things reveal the presence of God” (114). Ultimately, Torvend claims that Benedict’s Rule may not be an ecological treatise in itself but is informed by “an ecophilic spirit that would cultivate a form of life in harmony with the natural landscape” (116).
With Chapter 6, Torvend takes his thesis of an ecophilic Christianity embodied in Benedict’sRule and calls for its implementation in the everyday lives of the faith’s followers. He believes that such “an ecophilic perspective can thus focus one’s attention on the earth’s presence in Christian faith and life” (124). According to Torvend, this perspective depends upon an attention to local ecologies, care for other beings, humility in character, and simplicity in material goods. By way of example, he describes how the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, located some 75 miles northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico, was constructed and operates in concert with its desert environment. From the natural building materials to its reliance on solar energy, Torvend promotes the monastery as an example of how devotion to a life of faith can work in harmony with the environment. This harmony, more broadly speaking, is the focus of the final chapter, in which Torvend declares that in the fundamental Christian command to love one’s neighbor, “neighbor” should be “understood here as humankind, other-than-human-creatures, and the earth itself” (142), encompassing the totality of the faith’s environmental contexts.
While a slim volume, Samuel Torvend’s text makes a compelling argument for reexamining the ecological perspective woven within early Christian faith and practice, especially in the form of St. Benedict’s Rule. Assiduous close readings of Christian, historical, and scientific texts bolster his argument, providing ample evidence of what Torvend calls an “ecophilic” bent to early and medieval Christianity. His call to continue this tradition of ecological awareness, explicitly, into the future is both important and timely. As such, his study provides an important example of medieval ecocriticism which illuminates the past even as it lights a way forward.