St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh Part 7

[155] _Virus uirtutum._

[156] Armagh. See - 4.

[157] Cp. Virg. _Aen._ vi. 465.

[158] 1 Kings viii. 22, 54.

[159] _Fortiori._

[160] Luke ii. 40, 52.

[161] John ii. 25.

[162] 1 Cor. xv. 10.

[163] 1 Kings xi. 28.

[164] 1 John v. 19.

[165] 1 Cor. ii. 12.

[166] Cp. John ii. 4 (vg.).

[167] 2 Cor. vi. 14.

[168] 1 Cor. ii. 12.

[169] Cp. Matt. v. 6.

[170] 2 Cor. i. 12 (vg.).

[171] John xiv. 30, etc.

[172] 2 Cor. iv. 7.

[173] Ps. xlv. 7.

[174] Collect of Ma.s.s for Travellers.

[175] Ps. xxi. 3.

[176] Matt. x. 39.

[177] Ps. cx.x.xviii. 3 (vg.).

[178] Ps. xciv. 11.

[179] His name was Imar (- 5). He was no doubt Imar O'Hagan, who founded the monastery of St. Paul and St. Peter at Armagh, and built a stone church for it which was consecrated on October 21, 1126. It was placed, either at its foundation or subsequently, under the rule of the regular canons of St. Augustine. Imar died on pilgrimage at Rome in 1134, and is commemorated in Gorman on August 13, and in Usuard on November 12. He was at this time evidently leading the life of an anch.o.r.et. Reeves (_Churches_, p. 28) inferred from his Christian name that he had some Danish blood in his veins. There is no certain indication of Malachy's age when he became his disciple. But he had reached adolescence (- 3), and was old enough to choose his own teachers (- 2). In 1112 he was seventeen years of age. We shall see that he long acknowledged Imar as his master: -- 5, 6, 8, 12, 14, 16.

[180] 1 Cor. ix. 27 (vg.).

[181] That is, apparently, the great stone church (_daimliac mor_), on which Cellach put a s.h.i.+ngle roof in 1125. According to Reeves (_Churches_, pp. 14, 28) it was probably on the site of the present Cathedral, from which the Abbey of St. Paul and St. Peter was distant 130 yards to the north. It was the princ.i.p.al church of Armagh till 1268. For an account of the life of such recluses as Imar the reader may be referred to B. MacCarthy, _Codex Palatino-Vatica.n.u.s No. 830_, p. 5 f.

[182] Luke ii. 37.

[183] _Formam._ The word, as used by St. Bernard, seems to include the two notions of rule and example. It would seem that Malachy received some sort of monastic rule from Imar. Cp. - 7, "his monastery," and the reference to "the first day of his conversion" in - 43. Both pa.s.sages imply that he belonged to a religious order. So in - 5 he is said to have been before the other disciples of Imar "in conversion."

On later occasions he was subject to Imar's "command" (-- 14, 16). It is not improbable that the disciples who gathered round Imar were the nucleus of the community which he founded at Armagh (note 1). If so, the inference is reasonable that Malachy became a regular canon of St.

Augustine.

[184] Matt. xi. 29.

[185] Cp. 2 Tim. iv. 3.

[186] Matt. xv. 14.

[187] Isa. liv. 13; John vi. 45.

[188] 1 Cor. iv. 3.

[189] Gal. i. 11, 12.

[190] Gal. ii. 2.

[191] Printed text, _hoc scit_. I read _sit_ with K (_hec sit_), and two of de Backer's MSS.

[192] Luke ii. 35.

[193] Lam. iii. 27, 28 (inexact quotation).

[194] Heb. v. 8.

[195] The rule of silence was very strictly observed by the Cistercians. This explains the stress laid by St. Bernard, here and elsewhere, on Malachy's practice. Cp. the Preface of Philip of Clairvaux to _V.P._ vi.: "In truth I have learned nothing that can more effectively deserve the riches of the grace of the Lord than to sit and be silent, and always to condescend to men of low estate."

[196] Isa. x.x.xii. 17 (vg.).

[197] Ps. cxix. 141 (vg.).

[198] Lam. iii. 28.

[199] John i. 14, 18.

[200] Rom. viii. 29.

[201] The technical word for entry into a religious order.

[202] Cellach, archbishop of Armagh (- 19), son of Aedh, and grandson of Maelisa, who was abbot of Armagh 1064-1091. He was born early in 1080. Of his childhood and youth we know nothing, for the statement of Meredith Hanmer (_Chron. of Ireland_ (1633), p. 101) that he is said to have been "brought up at Oxford" is probably as inaccurate as other a.s.sertions which he makes about him. Cellach was elected abbot of Armagh in August, 1105, and in the following month (September 23) he received Holy Orders. In 1106, while engaged on a visitation of Munster, he was consecrated bishop. Thus he departed from the precedent set by his eight predecessors, who were without orders (- 19). He was one of the leaders of the Romanizing party in Ireland, and attended the Synod of Rathbreasail in 1110 (Keating, iii. 307). He died in his fiftieth year, at Ardpatrick, in co. Limerick, on April 1, 1129, and was buried on April 4 at Lismore. These facts are mainly gathered from the Annals. For more about Cellach, see p. x.x.xiv.

[203] Imar. See above p. 11, n. 1.