ON ST. CAEDMON, MONK AND DIVINELY TAUGHT SINGER, AT STREANESHEALH IN ENGLAND
CIRCA AD 680.
PrefaceCaedmon, monk and singer, in England (St.)
By I. B.
[1] Streaneshealh was a monastery of holy Virgins, afterward called Whitby, in the northern district of the county of York, on the eastern shore, founded by St. Hilda around the year of Christ 658, chiefly at the expense of King Oswiu, at Streaneshealh, nuns and monks: as was said on February 8 in the Life of St. Elfleda the Virgin, who was the second Abbess of that place after Hilda; and mention of the same was made on February 10, when the discussion concerned St. Trumwine the Bishop, who, driven from the bishopric of the Picts by the calamity of war, spent the remainder of his life there in the profession of the monastic life. For at that time, to the monasteries of women, especially the large and numerous ones, were joined communities of men, who administered sacred services to them and instructed the rest of the household; yet all obeyed the same Abbess.
[2] Among these, under St. Hilda (who died at last on November 17 in the year 680), there lived a monk, among these, St. Caedmon the singer: Caedmon by name, endowed with outstanding piety and a divinely infused skill of singing; called Cedmon by some, by others Ceadman. Bede describes his Life in book 4, chapter 24, and from him Capgrave in the Life of St. Hilda, Edward Maihew in the English Trophies, Jerome Porter in the Flowers, and others. Most conjecture that he died around the year 670 or a little later.
[3] Concerning his Relics and those of other Saints, Malmesbury treats in book 3 of the Deeds of the English Bishops, whom we also cited above on February 8 in the Life of St. Elfleda: his Translation, Newly discovered (he says, writing at the beginning of the twelfth century) and raised to a prominent place were the bodies of the Saints: of Trumwine the Bishop, of Oswiu the King, and of Elfleda his daughter, who presided over that monastery after Hilda; and also of that monk who, Bede relates, received the knowledge of song by a divine gift. That his merit before God was not commonplace, miracles, many miracles now divinely sent down (as they say) demonstrate as evidence. Harpsfield, century 7, chapter 36, and Jerome Porter mention this discovery and elevation of the Relics of St. Caedmon.
[4] feast day The feast day of this Saint is recorded in the English Martyrology of John Wilson on February 11, as also in the Index of Jerome Porter, although afterward (perhaps by the carelessness of the printer) the date February 10 was written in the margin. Hugh Menard and Edward Maihew placed it on February 10.
[5] John Bale, century 1, and John Pits, age 7, reckon him among the illustrious writers of England; but in this both err, did he compose all his songs while sleeping? in that they relate that he pronounced divine poems while sleeping, which certain persons copied from his mouth while he was awake. But Bede does not write this. Arnold Wion, book 2 of the Wood of Life, chapter 64, does not mention the singing but the sacred poems written by him. Whether he himself wrote them or dictated them is uncertain; did he write poems? as also whether he was a Benedictine, which the same Wion, Menard, Maihew, and Porter assert, or of another Scottish institute, as we have said elsewhere of Saints Trumwine, Hilda, and Elfleda. was he a Benedictine? Bale, Pits, and Wion assign him the surname "the Simple," for which I find no basis was he called "the Simple"? except that Bede writes he served God with a simple and pure mind. Nor is it altogether certain, as Bale writes, that he was first a cowherd. a cowherd? Bede only says that on the night when the knowledge of song was infused in him, the care of the beasts of burden had been assigned to him.
LIFE BY ST. BEDE.
Caedmon, monk and singer, in England (St.)
BHL Number: 1501
[1] In the monastery of the Abbess St. Hilda, there was a certain Brother, specially distinguished by divine grace, Caedmon, an outstanding English poet. who was accustomed to compose poems suited to religion and piety; so that whatever he learned from the divine Scriptures through interpreters, this he himself after a little while brought forth in poetic words composed with the greatest sweetness and compunction, in his own, that is, the English, language. By his poems the minds of many were often kindled to contempt of the world and to the desire of the heavenly life. moving to piety, And indeed others after him among the English nation attempted to compose religious poems; but none could equal him. For he himself, not taught by men nor through a man, learned the art of singing; divinely taught, but divinely aided, he freely received the gift of singing. Whence he was never able to compose any frivolous or superfluous poem; unable to sing anything profane: but only those things that pertain to religion were fitting for his religious tongue.
[2] Indeed, established in the secular habit until the time of a more advanced age, he had never learned anything of songs. previously ignorant of singing, Whence sometimes at a feast, when it had been decreed for the sake of joy that all should sing in turn, when he saw the harp approaching him, he would rise from the middle of the supper and, going out, return to his own house. and therefore withdrawing from the feast of singers, When he did this on a certain occasion and, having left the house of the feast, had gone out to the stables of the beasts of burden, the care of which had been assigned to him that night, and there at the proper hour had given his limbs to sleep, someone stood before him in a dream and, greeting him and calling him by name, said: Caedmon, sing me something. commanded in a dream to sing, And he answered: I do not know how to sing; for it was for this reason that I left the feast and withdrew here, because I could not sing. Again the one who was speaking with him said: Nevertheless, you must sing to me. What, he said, ought I to sing? And he said: Sing the beginning of creation. Having received this response, he immediately began to sing verses in praise of God the Creator which he had never heard, he sings sacred songs, the sense of which is this: Now we ought to praise the Author of the heavenly kingdom, the power of the Creator and his counsel, the deeds of the Father of glory; how he, being the eternal God, was the Author of all wonders; who first created heaven as a roof for the children of men, then earth, the almighty Guardian of the human race. This is the sense, but not the very order of the words which he sang while sleeping. For poems, however excellently composed, cannot be transferred literally from one language into another without loss of their beauty and dignity.
[3] Rising from sleep, he retained in memory all that he had sung while sleeping, and retains them when awake, and to these he soon added more words of God-worthy song in the same manner. Coming in the morning to the steward who was set over him, he told him what gift he had received. And being brought before the Abbess, he was commanded, in the presence of many learned men, tested by the learned, to tell his dream and recite the song, so that by the judgment of all it might be proved what it was he told and whence it came. It seemed to all that a heavenly grace had been granted to him by the Lord. They then expounded to him a certain passage of sacred history or doctrine, and he composes more: commanding him, if he could, to transform it into the melody of song. And he, having undertaken the task, departed and, returning in the morning, delivered what was commanded, composed in the best verse. Whence the Abbess, immediately embracing the grace of God in the man, instructed him to leave his secular habit he becomes a monk: and to assume the monastic profession; and receiving him into the monastery with all his belongings, she associated him with the company of the Brethren, and commanded that he be taught the course of sacred history.
[4] And he, turning all things that he could learn by hearing, remembering them within himself and, like a clean animal, ruminating on them, converted them into the sweetest song; what did he chiefly sing? and by singing more sweetly, he in turn made his teachers his listeners. He sang about the creation of the world and the origin of the human race, and the entire history of Genesis; about the exodus of Israel from Egypt and their entry into the Promised Land; about many other histories of Sacred Scripture; about the Lord's Incarnation, and his passion and resurrection and ascension into heaven; about the coming of the Holy Spirit and the doctrine of the Apostles; likewise about the terror of the future judgment and the horror of the punishment of hell and the sweetness of the heavenly kingdom he composed many songs; but also very many others about the benefits and judgments of God, in all of which he strove to draw men away from the love of sin and to stir them to the love and diligence of good action.
[5] he rebukes the undisciplined: For he was a very religious man and humbly subject to regular discipline; but against those who wished to act otherwise, he was inflamed with the zeal of great fervor. Whence he also concluded his life with a beautiful end. For as the hour of his departure drew near, he was pressed for fourteen days by a preceding bodily infirmity, he foresees his death: yet so moderately that he could both speak and walk throughout that whole time. Now there was nearby a house in which the weaker and those who seemed about to die were accustomed to be brought. He therefore asked his attendant in the evening, he voluntarily goes to the infirmary of the dying, on the night on which he was to depart from the world, to prepare a place of rest for him in that house. His attendant, wondering why he asked this, since he did not at all seem about to die, nevertheless did as he was told.
[6] And when those who had been placed there were talking pleasantly with one another with cheerful spirits, together with those who had been there before, he asks for the Eucharist, and the time of midnight had already passed, he asked them all whether they had the Eucharist within. They answered: What need is there of the Eucharist? For you are not about to die, who speak to us so cheerfully as if in good health. Again he said: Nevertheless, bring me the Eucharist. Which when he had received and having carefully received it, in his hand, he asked whether they all had a peaceful spirit toward him and were without complaint of controversy or rancor. They all answered that they held a most peaceful mind toward him and one remote from all anger. And they asked him in turn whether he held a peaceful mind toward them. He immediately answered: I bear a peaceful mind, my little sons, toward all the servants of God. And thus fortifying himself with the heavenly viaticum, he prepared himself for the entrance into the other life.
[7] And he asked how near was the hour at which the Brethren should be awakened to sing the nocturnal praises of the Lord. They answered: It is not far off. And he said: Good then, let us await that hour. And signing himself with the sign of the holy Cross, he laid his head upon the pillow, signing himself with the Cross, he dies. and sleeping a little, he thus ended his life in silence. And so it came to pass that, just as he had served the Lord with a simple and pure mind and tranquil devotion, so also, now leaving the world with a tranquil death, he came to his vision; and that tongue which had composed so many salutary words in praise of the Creator also closed its last words in his praise, signing himself and commending his spirit into his hands; who also seems to have had foreknowledge of his death, from the things we have narrated.
Annotations