Lindsay Rudge PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

described the necessity for reform in general, for reform in Metz specifically, and the
need for bishops to take the decisions in such matters. 141 His intention was to restore
(recuperare) that which had been lost.
Evidently, the use of older spiritual authorities such as Caesarius was one of
Chrodegang’s chosen means of recovering the glories of the past. Caesarius’ sermons
were well-known and widely circulated in the eighth and ninth centuries; moreover, in his
own use of Augustine, Caesarius had shown himself to have much the same theological
loyalties as those of the later Franks. 142 In Caesarius, in short, Chrodegang may have seen
‘a model for his own actions and behaviour’. 143 It is significant that Caesarius’ sermon to
the monks of Blandiacum (Blanzac, dép. Charente) on humility (sermon 233) appears in
the very first chapter of the Regula canonicorum. The tone of Caesarius’ writing would
also help to set that of Chrodegang.
Although this extract from Caesarius is relatively short, Claussen has
demonstrated that Chrodegang relies on what would now be termed the techniques of
intertextuality to make his point. As Claussen outlines, Chrodegang’s use of fragments of
and quotations from older texts relies on pre-existing knowledge of their contents and
ethos. 144 In Claussen’s apt expression, such fragments were a form of textual shorthand
that Chrodegang’s audience would recognise. 145 Counting on this knowledge, Claussen
argues that the clerics of Metz would have been encouraged to return to the complete
Caesarian sermon on humility, originally written to a community of monks, and ‘fill in’
Chrodegang’s own ‘laconic’ instruction with Caesarius’ much fuller description of the
uses of humility. 146 In this way, the cathedral clergy of Metz were encouraged to discard
the monastic way of life but not its teachings. 147
141
Chrodegang of Metz, Regula canonicorum PL 89: 1057-1120.
142
Claussen, Reform, 180
143
Claussen, Reform, 181
144
Claussen, Reform, 166-7.
145
Claussen, Reform, 181.
146
Claussen, Reform, 180-1. The text is taken from Sermon CCXXXIII.
147 Claussen, Reform, 184.
207