La regola della vita monastica nei sermoni di Cesario d’Arles

The collection of sermons by the sixth-century Gallic bishop Caesarius of Arles (469/70-542) is a valid instrument for showing the relationship between word and law as one of the most important tools for truly understanding how any Christian (or simply, religious) society may be built. These pages will describe how the monastic form of life is not “naturally/ontologically” linked to (or determined by) the law of Christian society because the rules – which we sometimes call monastic law – are closer to a custom, a way of life according to the gospel. Caesarius, as any other bishop, must find a place for the monastic form of life in the Christian society he wishes to define, because only in that way can his principles of vision and division of the world function; that is his theodicy can become a sociodicy.