The Monastic Rules of Visigothic Iberia - eTheses Repository ...

century monastic rule shows just how far such an influence can make itself felt. The
continuance of a system of rhetorical education in Visigothic Iberia has already been alluded
to, and employment of the tumor is indicative of this. Second, it is important because it
serves to re-define perceptions of monastic rules as being „un-literary‟. Any stylistic features
associated with a monastic rule are normally those of a technical text, facile to relate to
similar low-register examples found in earlier Roman writings. However, as a literary
technique associated with the Second Sophistic in particular, the appearance of the tumor
leads to the necessity of reinterpreting a monastic rule as being something more than a mere
„textbook‟.
4.10 Biblical Borrowings
In common with so many other early Christian texts, all monastic rules quote from the
Bible, and the Visigothic examples are no exception. The reason for this is to be found in the
central position that the Bible occupied in Christian life and teaching: “s‟il est vrai que la
Bible est souvent la source littéraire et la plus fréquemment citée dans les texts normatifs”
(Chartier 1984: 306). The biblical quotes can count amongst them: the Rule of Isidore,
eleven quotations; the Rule of Fructuosus, four; and the Common Rule, twenty-four.
The pattern of preferred choice is to quote primarily from the New Testament, and this
is a pattern followed in all of the monastic rules. The reason for this phenomenon is probably
due to the preference for the New Testament in Late Antique writers. Although the Old
Testament certainly constitutes a larger part of scripture than the New Testament and it is
highly likely that both were available to the authors, the reason is hinted at by Leander when
he talks about the difficulties of Old Testament exegesis and the fact that it must not be read
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