When asked why he wrote The Name of the Rose, the phenomenally popular (although dense and complex) mystery novel set in a fourteenth century Benedictine Abbey, Umberto Eco is supposed to have said: "I felt like poisoning a monk." But long before Venantius of Salvemec and Berengar of Arundel succumbed to the literary toxins found in Eco's mysterious book, another, very real monk almost fell prey to his own encounter with poison: none other than Benedict of Nursia, now universally recognized as the greatest abbot in European monasticism.
A number of monastic traditions, such as the Benedictines, the Camaldolese, the Sylvestrines, and the Cistercians (including the Trappists), all follow the Rule of Saint Benedict as their guide for living out the Christian life. None of those orders can truly or fully be understood without recognizing the importance of Benedict's teachings, which cover how monasteries should be organized, the responsibilities of the abbot and other leaders, the virtues and spirituality necessary for the religious life, and advice on how to structure the monastery's daily prayers. But if the story of Benedict's life, as recounted by Pope Gregory the Great, is to be believed, then this great monastic teacher almost didn't live to write his spiritual masterpiece— in his first monastery, the monks tried to poison him.
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