The Plan of St. Gall :: :: University of Virginia Library

The office of the abbot is elective, but has to be confirmed
by the local bishop, who also has the power of
correction: "Let him who is appointed be chosen for the
merits of his life and his enlightened wisdom, even though
he be the last in order of the community. But if (which God
forbid) the whole community should agree to choose a
person who acquiesces in its vices, and if these somehow
come to the knowledge of the local bishop and neighboring
abbots or Christians, let him foil this conspiracy of the
wicked and set a worthy steward over God's house."[26] In
the kingdom of the Franks there was another power to be
contended with, the secular ruler; the capitularies of Charlemagne
leave no doubt on this score:

Of the abbots and of the monks we wish and order that they be
subject to their bishops in full humility and obedience, as is ordained
by canonical law. . . . They will have to account to the bishops of
their province; if they do not mend their manners, the archbishop
will have to call them to the synod. If even then they do not correct
themselves, they must come before our presence with their bishops.[27]

A classical case of the use of these powers was the deposition
of Abbot Ratger of Fulda in 817 by Emperor Louis
the Pious.[28]

[26]

Uitae autem merito et sapientiae doctrina elegatur, qui ordinandus est,
etiam si ultimus fuerit in ordine congregationis. Quod si etiam omnis congregatio
uitiis suis, quod quidem absit, consentientem personam pari consilio
elegerit et uitia ipsa aliquatenus in notitia episcopi, ad cuius diocesim
pertinet locus ipse, uel ad abbates aut Christianos uicinos claruerint, prohibeant
praborum praeualere consensum, sed domui dei dignum constituant
dispensatorem. Benedicti regula, chap. 64, 2-5, ed. Hanslik, 1960, 148-49;
ed. McCann, 1952, 144-49; ed. Steidle, 1952, 307-11.

St. Benedict here refers to a condition which Pope Leo the Great
defines in succinct terms in a letter written in 446, namely, that in the
case of a controversial or contended election it was the prerogative of the
bishop who presided over the diocese in which the monastery was
situated to decide which party has "the more healthy insight." (Leo the
Great, Letter 14, chap. 5; ed. Migne, Patr. Lat., LIV, 1881, col. 673;
ed. Hunt, 1957, 63.) For more details on the jurisdictional relationships
between bishop and abbot, in pre-Benedictine days, see Steidle's
excursus "Die Rechtliche Lage des alten Mönchtums" in Steidle, 1952,
66ff.

[27]

Capitulare missorum generale, 802, chap. 15, ed. Boretius, in Mon.
Germ. Hist., Legum II, Capit. I, 1883, 94: "Abbates autem et monachis
omnis modis volumus et precipimus, ut episcopis suis omni humilitate et
hobhedientia sint subiecti, sicut canonica constitutione mandat . . . Et
monachi ab episcopo provinciae ipsius corripiantur; quod si se non emendent,
tunc archiepiscopus eos ad sinodum convocet; et si neque sic se correxerint,
tunc ad nostra praesentiam simul cum episcopo suo veniant."

The same idea is expressed in Capitula Francica (prior to 805?),
chap. 5, op. cit., 214: ("Et quomodo abbates vel abbatisse subiecti sunt
episcopis"); in Capitula ecclesiastica (810-813?), ch. 4, op. cit., 182 ("Ut
episcopi habeant potestatem in eorum parochia sicut canon docet faciendi
tam in vicis publicis, seu in monasteriis"); and as early as 794 in the
Concilium Francofurtense, chap. 2, in Mon. Germ. Hist., Concilia, II, 1,
166ff.

[28]

Discussed above, pp. 187ff.