Attala

ON SAINT ATTALA, ABBOT OF BOBBIO IN ITALY, OF THE ORDER OF SAINT COLUMBANUS, AROUND THE YEAR 626

Preliminary Commentary.

Attala, Abbot of Bobbio in Italy, of the Order of Saint Columbanus (Saint)

[1] In Cispadane Gaul among the Italians, among other rivers which flow into the Po, is the Trebia, once made famous by the defeat of the Romans which they suffered here from the Carthaginians under their general Hannibal. But now it holds a better and holier fame from the monastery of Bobbio, built by Saints Columbanus and Attala, the first Abbots of this place. Saint Attala with Saint Columbanus In which place, says Paul the Deacon in book 4 of the Deeds of the Lombards, chapter 43, many possessions were bestowed by individual Princes or Lombards, and a great congregation of monks was formed there. Pietro Maria Campi, in volume 1 of the Ecclesiastical History of Piacenza, in whose diocese Bobbio is, reports in book 6, folio 603, the diploma of King Flavius Agilulf, by which he gives to Columbanus or his companions the basilica of Saint Peter situated at Bobbio, and with it all the neighboring territory for four miles around. Saint Columbanus had previously lived with Saint Attala in the monastery of Luxeuil, he departed from Luxeuil into Italy in the year 612, which he had built for himself in the diocese of Besançon among the Burgundians. From there, as Jonas asserts in his Life on the 21st of November, when he had seen Theodebert, King of the Austrasians, defeated by his brother Theoderic, King of the Burgundians, which happened in the year of Christ 612, leaving Gaul and Germany, he came into Italy, honorably received by King Agilulf. Meanwhile King Theoderic died at Metz of a flux of the belly in the year 613, and Chlothar, having succeeded him and been made Monarch, sent Saint Eustasius, Abbot of Luxeuil, to Saint Columbanus, made Abbot of Bobbio at the death of Saint Columbanus in the year 614, through whom he desired that the same should come to him: which the holy man excused, being wholly anxious for the building of his monastery: in which, the course of a year having been completed, he departed this life in blessedness on the 9th day before the Kalends of December of the year 614, and Saint Attala, appointed in his place, carried forward the work begun. How long he presided over the monastery of Bobbio as Abbot, or in what year he departed from life, we nowhere read. Saint Bertulf succeeded him, but neither in the Acts of this one, to be given on the 19th of August, does any mark disclose the beginning of his rule. This Abbot lived in the time of Pope Honorius I and of Arioald, King of the Lombards, but both are reported to have been in that dignity from the year 626 to 638. how long he governed, uncertain. He also had a difficulty with Proculus, Bishop of Tortona, who, Ughelli asserts, presided over that Church from the year 614 until the year 660. Jonas the writer lived under Saint Attala as Abbot for nine years, but how long he had governed the monastery before is nowhere indicated.

[2] That Jonas wrote the deeds of the said four Abbots is testified, in the Prologue of the second Life of Saint Praejectus, Bishop of Clermont, published by us on the 25th of January, by a contemporary author in these words: Jonas also, in the time of our memory, an eloquent man, most brilliantly published the Life of Blessed Columbanus and of his disciples Athala, Eustasius and Bertulf. The Life written by Jonas, a disciple, Jonas was not, as Trithemius wrongly wrote in his work on Ecclesiastical Writers, a Scot by nation, nor a companion of Saint Columbanus's pilgrimage, nor his disciple: but an Italian, born at Segusium, commonly Susa, born at Susa, near the roots of Mount Cenis in the Alps: whither, below in the Life at number 9, he indicates that he was sent by Saint Attala to visit his mother and brother: which happened before the latter's death, when he had already spent a course of nine years in the monastery. who lived 9 years under him: The same Jonas, as Abbot, in the 3rd year of Chlothar III, son of Queen Balthild, that is, the year of Christ 664, when he was sent to the city of Chalon, and, passing through the monastery of Saint John which is called Réomé, rested for a few days, wrote the Life of the same Saint John, or, as we proved at that Life on the 28th of January, revised and interpolated it, and in the Prologue asserts that he was trained in the disciplines of Blessed Columbanus, where other things cited can be read. We publish the Life of Saint Attala from manuscript codices, that of Saint Martin at Trier, that of the Cathedral Church at Saint-Omer, that of the Canons Regular of Rouge-Cloître, and that of the Professed House of the Society of Jesus at Antwerp, and in this last it is contained at the 21st day of November, published from various manuscripts. and is called the second book after the Life of Saint Columbanus, and the third book contains the Life of Saint Burgundofara, Virgin, written by the same Jonas. The collector of the works of the Venerable Bede also published the same Life of Saint Attala, and attributed it to him: but without even the least examination of the Life, wrongly attributed to Bede: since he ought to have known well enough that Bede was not a monk of Bobbio, nor born at Susa in Italy. The same Life was published by Vincenzo Barrali Salerno in the Chronology of the Saints of the Isle of Lérins, and on this day by Laurentius Surius. But here and there with the style somewhat changed, though he did not indicate it. Vincent of Beauvais has an epitome of this Life in book 23 of the Speculum Historiale, chapter 20, Petrus de Natalibus in book 3 of the Catalogue, chapter 190, and the more recent writers here and there, with Ferrarius in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy.

[3] The same Jonas, in the Life of Saint Bertulf the Successor, narrates thus the journey of Saint Attala the Abbot made from Italy to Luxeuil to Saint Eustasius: When Blessed Attala was arriving from the parts of Ausonia with the good will and in the bond of peace of the venerable man Eustasius, Jonas lived 13 years under Saint Bertulf the successor Bertulf was joined to his company, because they had one heart and one soul, nor did any discord remain, so that they mutually and in turn exchanged those subject to them. He went off, therefore, after the footsteps of the venerable Attala, and, received within the borders of Ausonia, he remained in the coenobium of Bobbio under the obedience of Blessed Attala. And when the Founder of all things carried the often-mentioned Father Attala to the heavenly kingdoms after the afflictions of the world, the whole assembly of monks, with voice and mind united, said: Let us raise Bertulf to the paternal honor. He for thirteen years did not neglect with every zeal of diligence to teach the people and imbue them with salutary admonitions. Bobolenus seems to have succeeded him, then under Bobolenus: under whom as Abbot Jonas wrote the Life of Saint Columbanus: Jonas himself calls himself Abbot, which the author of the Life of Saint Walaricus the Abbot on the 2nd of April also does, who asserts that Jonas the Abbot was a disciple of the disciples of Saint Columbanus. whether he too was an Abbot? Whether he succeeded Bobolenus we have not yet read.

[4] The name of Saint Attala is inscribed in the ancient Fasti of the Martyrologies. That of Saint Jerome which we have, written almost a thousand years ago, Saint Attala entered in the sacred Fasti, has toward the end of the day the added memory of Saint Attala the Abbot; it is missing in the Blumian manuscript and in the Paris and Lucca editions. In the manuscript Martyrology of Centula, or of Saint Riquier, these words are read: In Italy, in the monastery of Bobbio, the Birthday of Saint Attala the Abbot. Notker adds: a man of great holiness, a disciple of Blessed Columbanus: in the Roman Martyrology he is called famous for miracles. Similar things are read here and there in Usuard, the printed Bede, Bellinus, Maurolycus, Felicius, Galesinius, Canisius, Saussay, Miraeus, and in other collectors of Martyrologies here and there. Trithemius assigned the same to his Benedictine Order in book 3 of Illustrious Men, chapter 71. also among the Benedictines. Wion, Dorganius, Ménard and Bucelinus followed in their Benedictine Fasti. But he lived and governed the monastery of Bobbio according to the rule and institution of Saint Columbanus, which his successors also long observed. There is extant a Codex of Rules collected under the Emperor Louis the Pious by Saint Benedict, Abbot of Aniane, arranged into three parts by Lucas Holstenius and published at the Roman press in the year 1661: in the second part of which are the Rules of Saint Benedict, Abbot of Monte Cassino, and of Saint Columbanus the Abbot, rightly? and many others: if anyone considers these, he will find that the institute of Saint Columbanus differs from the Benedictine rule just as the Constitutions of the Mendicant Orders differ among themselves at this time. Dempster does not deserve to be cited, who inscribed him in the Scottish Menology because he is thought to be a Scot. Perhaps he also judged that the Burgundians once settled not in Gaul but in Scotland.

[5] In Ferrarius, in the Topographical Index to the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, under the word Bobbio, are listed Attala, Abbot; Bertulf, Abbot; Columbanus, Abbot; and then is added: Translation of the same, 1 September. Translation of the others, Translation, 16 March. namely of Attala and Bertulf, 16 March. On which day this Translation is also inscribed in the general Catalogue of the same Ferrarius.

LIFE

by Jonas, his disciple

from four manuscript codices.

Attala, Abbot of Bobbio in Italy, of the Order of Saint Columbanus (Saint)

BHL Number: 0742

By Jonas, disciple.

CHAPTER I

The upbringing of Saint Attala, his monastic life, his office as Superior. The refractory divinely punished.

[1] When, therefore, the venerable Columba had departed from this light, Attala was appointed in his place, praiseworthy in all religion; Saint Attala, a noble Burgundian, whose virtues shone clearly after his Master. Noble by nation, of the race of the Burgundians; but nobler in holiness, he followed perfectly the footsteps of his Master. But how his rudiments, among his very beginnings, sought abundant progress, is not to be passed over. And so, when he had been imbued with liberal letters by his father's zeal, he was commended by his parent to ^a Arigius, at one time Bishop.

But when he saw that nothing useful was being accomplished, he stays with Bishop Arigius the young man's disposition began to yearn for better things, and he devoted himself to the task that, having set aside the trappings of the world, he might be joined to the company of monks. Having therefore secretly departed from his companions, then at Lerins content with two servants, he came to the monastery of Lerins. Where, leading his life for some time, since he by no means saw the others submitting their necks to the reins of regular discipline, he began anxiously to weigh where the approach of better counsel might open a way. Going forth therefore from there, he came to Blessed Columban as far as Luxeuil: and at Luxeuil. whom, when the holy man perceived he was skilled with a sharp intellect, he joined to his service and tried to instruct him in all divine admonitions.

[2] He is made Abbot, When therefore after Blessed Columban he was ruling the aforesaid monastery excellently, and instructing all in the discipline of the regular tenor, the cunning of the ancient serpent began to release the deadly poison of discord against him with noxious blows, stirring up the hearts of some of his subjects against him, who said that they could not bear the authority of his excessive fervor, and that they were not able to carry the burdens of a strict discipline. But he, shrewd in mind as he was, striving to offer pious remedies and to administer the drink of a salutary antidote, he instructs refractory subjects with pious admonitions by which the putrid infection might be cut away, endeavored to soften their swelling hearts: and having long corrected them, when he was unable to keep them with him, troubled in spirit with grief, he pursued them with many prayers together with the service of loving-kindness, that they should not leave him nor turn aside from the path of the arduous way: and that they should remember that the Fathers possessed the kingdoms of heaven through mortification and contempt of the present life.

[3] When he saw that he was now making no progress, he dismisses those hardened in evil: and had seen that he could not entangle in the reins of his fellowship minds that were drawn elsewhere, he let the obstinate go: and after they had been separated from him, some of them were received in the ^b territories by the sea, others sought a place in the wilderness in order to have liberty: and these, set there in their rashness and arrogance, soon felt the losses of being ^c covered over. For while they were staying in these places and tearing the man of God with their detractions, one of them, who was called ^d Roccolenus, who, as it was believed, also supplied the increase of the quarrels, kindled by a sudden stroke with the fire of fevers, he admits some who return, one having been carried off by sudden death: began to cry out amid the burnings of his punishment that he wished, if he were able, to come to Blessed Attala, and to soothe the injury of the crime committed with the medicine of penance. Without delay, scarcely had he been able to say these things when he fell silent and breathed his last. But those who were present, seeing the wrongs done to the man of God avenged by divine vengeance, very many of them returned to the man of God, and confessed their offenses, and promised that they would amend themselves in all things if they were received. These the holy man received with wonderful joy, as if they were sheep snatched from the mouth of wolves, and, as they acknowledged their faults, restored them to their places.

[4] But others, who, because shame ^e pressed upon them, or stained with the vice of rashness and arrogance, would not return, and disdained to come back to the place granted for penance, were snatched away by various deaths, so that it might be given to be clearly understood that they had been the companions, in stirring up the increase of contumacy, of him whom the divine vengeance had struck; three others being punished by death, and that for this reason they had not deserved pardon with the rest. For one of them, ^f Theudomundus by name, perished struck by an axe. Another, while he was crossing the bed of a small river, entangled at the knees, was killed by a very small wave. And the third, who was called ^g Theutharius, when he had entrusted himself to a ship to be carried over the sea, was drowned. Seeing these things, those who still survived, he receives others who return: putting aside their shame, made their way back after their companions to Blessed Attala, and they, as I related above, were kindly received by him and saved.

CHAPTER II

Various miracles performed by Saint Attala.

[5] Other miracles performed by him are approved by the testimony of all the Brethren in the aforesaid monastery: among whom I was placed, and was held deputed to the service of the blessed man. At a certain time the little river of which we ^a made mention above, Bobbio by name, flowing down violently and in a rapacious course with swollen masses of water, In the danger of the mill being thrown down, as torrents are wont to do that have slipped down from the summits of the Alps and been increased by the outpouring of rains, so this one, swelling with excessive force, was heaping up rocks of stones and masses of trees, and was striving with its rapid course to undermine the ^b mill of the monastery, and, shaking the whole workshop, to sink it. Hearing this crashing, the keeper of the mill, named Agibodus, went to the mill to see whether the mass of so great a crash was producing losses and damage there. When he had come there, he saw that unless they came to the rescue with swift help, everything would be torn away, and he believed it must be announced to the Father in haste, so that he might provide relief, ^c men who in the pressing necessity might free it from the floods of the waters. To him the man of God said: Go, call me Sonoald the Deacon, having sent the Deacon and you, having gone back to your bed, take sleep, and, held back by no fear, do not subject your heart to grief. For it was morning, before the dawn poured its welcome light upon the earth. Sonoald therefore came to the man of God, to whom Blessed Attala said: Take the staff by which I am supported, go to the Bobbio, and with a commanding voice, holding before you with your finger the sign of the Lord's Cross, tell it to cease digging through these banks: [he causes the river, by the sign of the Cross, to be thrown back against the opposite bank:] and not to fill up the measure of its presumptuous audacity, but, cutting into other sides, to leave these unharmed: and let it know that it will withdraw at the Lord's commands. Obeying this command of the man of God, the aforesaid man went with the support of faith: placing the staff on the bank, he commanded that, according to the precepts of the man of God, with the divine power assenting, it should move away from that place and cut into other sides of the hill with its violent effort. And at once the river, obeying, left its bed, and, cutting into the sides of the hill, sustained its streams along the steep sides of the hill as if winged, with its waters drawn together, until the hollows of the bed lay open, until they flowed with liquid. And so the dawn, breaking forth upon the world, was rising to spread its light: Sonoald began thinking within himself, I will go to see whether the violent floods have obeyed the man of God: and he came to the bank of the bed, and, seeing it empty, he looked at how it was cutting into the sides of the other hill, so as to open for itself a bed in which to flow; and hastily he came to the man of God and announced the triumph of a manifest victory. To him the man of God said: By no means, while I am living in the world, presume to tell this to anyone: doubtless so that the favor of flatterers might not stain hearts full of virtues. Which vice, although they be enriched with various virtues, he orders the deed to be kept silent: is to be zealously fled by all the Saints. For the crafty enemy strives maliciously at this, that when he cannot stain the Saints of God with greater and certain faults, he may at least pollute them in hidden ones, which seem lesser.

[6] And it happened afterward, when at a certain time one of the monks, named Fraimerus, was tilling the earth with the ploughshare to receive the grain, suddenly the roughness of the hard clod destroyed and broke the firmness of the plough-handle. When the aforesaid Brother was trying to put this together, suddenly by an unexpected stroke of the iron he cut off the thumb of his left hand, and, having hidden it in the soil with a clod placed over it, the thumb cut off while ploughing and buried in the earth, he consigned it, as it were, as a corpse to burial, and, leaving the plough, went to the monastery, and, prostrate on the ground, disclosed it to the Father by confession. Seeing this, the man of God said: Where is the part of the cut-off thumb? And he confessed that it had been hidden in the earth and buried in the furrow. You have done badly, he said: why did you not bring it to me? Go therefore with quick step, he has it brought to him: telling the cause to no one, and, taking it, bring it here. He, therefore, went out and went, and brought back the lost part of the thumb that he had been commanded to bring. For the distance, along the ridges of a steep mountain by a winding road, or by the intervening ^d Trivia, was about one mile. Then the man of God, taking up the fragment of the thumb, smeared it with his saliva and joined it to the hand, and the thumb, joined by the glue of the flesh, adhered as it had been before, he joins it, sound, to the hand. and in quiet silence he commanded him to go away. O wonderful power of almighty God, that He so glorifies His own on earth, that by their intercession He restores cold and cut-off members to their former comeliness.

[7] For the same man, when at a certain time he had come to the city of Milan, a certain little boy there, placed in the extreme anguish of fevers, was only waiting for the end of life: whose parents, having heard of the arrival of Blessed Attala, hurried to him in quick course and begged him Avoiding display, to come to their aid. When the man of God wished to pass this over, they compelled him with tears and terrible oaths to go before the harmful fever deprived him of the last breaths of air. Anxious therefore, and fleeing the rumors of popular favor, he said: Go, I will follow you as I can. Coming therefore, he went round the basilicas and the places of the Saints, and prayed for the sick boy, that he might immediately be restored to health. Then, in order to fulfill the effect of the promised faith, he came hastily to the sick boy. But lest anyone should become a herald of the giver of the gift, he secretly frees the sick boy from fever: he entered the house secretly and touched the sick boy: and at once the divine power, favoring the holy prayers, restored the sick boy to his former health. At the same time the parents gave thanks to the Creator, who thus inclines the ears of His loving-kindness to the petition of His servants. For this man was pleasing to all, of singular alacrity, singular fervor, singular charity toward pilgrims and toward the poor: he knew both how to resist the proud and to be subject to the humble: endowed with outstanding virtues: to repay the wise with what was worthy of them, and to open mystical things to the simple. Shrewd in solving and posing questions, vigorous and solid against the storms of the ^e heretics, strong in adversity, sober in prosperity: temperate in all things, discreet in everything: love and fear overflowed in his subjects, doctrine was fragrant in his disciples; no one near him was either covered with grief or lifted up by excessive joy.

CHAPTER III

The last illness and pious death of Saint Attala.

[8] When the Ruler of all things now wished to free him from the afflictions of the world, to show through a vision

he wished that, when about to depart from the world, he might have his journey ready in all things: with a space of fifty days suspended, in which he might prepare for the coming journey. He foreknows his death under an obscure revelation. But the mind of the man of God did not clearly know whether this journey was the departure from life, or whether he was about to proceed to some other place. The man of God had prepared for both: he strengthened the enclosures of the monastery, renewed the roofing, reinforced everything; so that if he should depart, he would leave nothing weak behind: he tended to the vehicles in peace, fastened the books with bindings: he ordered the furnishings to be washed, the torn things to be mended, the damaged things to be repaired, the shoes to be prepared, so that all things might be ready. He himself, however, afflicted his body with fasts and vigils and prayers, so that he was never seen before to have labored so much in prayer: and lest it seem ridiculous to anyone, I will relate what the same man did in regard to me.

[9] When I had already spent a period of nine years in the monastery, and had often not obtained from him permission, at the request of my parents, to visit them, with no one thenceforth mentioning the matter, he said: Go quickly, He sends the writer to visit his parents, son, and visit your mother and brother in the morning, and return without any delay impeding you. And when I hesitated and said that a more opportune time would come soon -- for it was a time of excessive cold, the month of February -- he said: Hasten to set out on the journey I have told you about; you do not know whether it will be possible to do so afterward. Having therefore given as companions Blidulphus the Priest and Hermenoaldus, the Deacon, of whose piety there was no doubt, we reached the destined place. For the place was the city of ^c Segusia, once a noble colony of the Taurini, distant from the monastery one hundred and forty miles. When we arrived there, we were received gladly by my mother after the intervals of so many years. But my mother did not long enjoy the wished-for gift. For that same night, seized by a fever, I began to cry out amid the burning that I was being tormented by the prayers of the man of God, lest I should stay there for a while against his prohibition; he does not allow him to linger long. that if I did not move quickly, and make my way back to the monastery with whatever effort I could, I would soon be overtaken by death. To this my mother said: It is better for me, son, to know that you are well there, than to mourn you dead here. I confess it was a long wait for the coming of day; scarcely had the dawn broken when we were eager to make our way back. Nor did I take any food for three days, until we reached the places almost halfway along the road. So, as we hurried and pressed on the journey, I recovered my health again.

[10] Coming to the monastery, we found the father already held by fevers, and near to death. Having seen us, he rejoiced. And so we clearly knew that in this the prayers of the man of God had prevailed, he lies sick of a fever: that the force of the fevers should urge me to return quickly to the monastery before his departure. When he was passing the last hours of the present life, while the breath still remained strong in him, he ordered himself to be drawn outside his cell: and rising from his bed with what effort he could, with the Brethren supporting him on every side, he went forth outside the cell: and taking the Cross which he himself had ordered to be placed in that same place, so that going out and coming into the cell he might fortify his forehead by touching it, accustomed to fortify himself by touching the Cross, he began to pour forth immense tears, and to commemorate the trophy of the Cross. Hail, he said, kindly Cross, who bore the price of the world, who, carrying the eternal banners, brought the medicine for our wounds: he greets it: you were smeared with the blood of Him who, to save the human race, descended from heaven into this valley of tears, who, the second Adam, long ago stretched you out against the wrinkle of the first Adam, washing away the old stain with a new washing. And while he was doing this, he begged all to go away and return to their cells, and to leave him a quiet place for a little while.

[11] So when all were going away, only one, named Blidemundus, stood behind the back of the man of God with silent breath, thinking that if the knees of the man of God, weary as he was, his efforts broken, should give way to a fall, he would be ready to catch him. When therefore he thought that no one remained, He pours forth prayers to God: he began to entreat the clemency of the Creator with an abundance of tears, that He would bestow on him, as on one unworthy, the gifts of His largesse, and, blotting out the old stains, restore him to full salvation, and, exercising His ancient mercy, not exclude him from the heavenly gift. Then, amid sorrowful sighs and flowing tears, looking up to the heavens, he saw them opened to him. he sees the heavens opened: Gazing on them for the space of many hours, abundant groanings of heart pressed upon him. He then gave thanks to the Almighty, who showed him the doors of heaven opened, which after a little while his soul, stripped of the members of the body, would enter.

[12] Then a sign having been made for the Brethren to come and bring him back to his cell, the aforesaid Brother related these things to us on the same day. For Christ showed this consolation to His servant, so that he might breathe his last, secure of future pardon, nay of glory. Which the man of God would have wished to conceal, having exhorted his own, if the aforesaid Blidemundus had not remained hidden behind his back. On the next day, bidding farewell to all the Brethren, he exhorted them not to abandon the journey begun, but, strengthened in better deeds, to make it firm by persevering daily. Having therefore consoled all, released from the bonds of the present life, he gave back his soul to heaven on the sixth day before the Ides of March. he dies piously on 10 March. For deservedly does the Restorer of all things adorn His Saints with an abundance of virtues, as it is written, His spirit hath adorned the heavens: because they, yearning for the heavenly life, are eager to obey His precepts: so that from the labor of obedience they may receive the fruit of eternal life. Amen. Job 26.