I monaci di fronte alla malattia fisica e spirituale

The speech focuses on how disease and care are perceived and lived inside the monastic tradition. The sources, which have been used (hagiographies and monastic rules), show how in eastern monasticism, hermits and anchorites accept physical illness as a tool to reach the individual ascetic perfection, while the complex organisation of the coenobitic life introduces “diagnosis” as a new practice in order to distinguish the physical disease from the spiritual illness, and to uncover simulations. As a matter of fact, some monks pretended to be sick in order to avoid work and prayer spreading envy and disappointment inside the community. Therefore, it was necessary to create a designated room, the infirmary, not only in order to treat sick monks, but also to separate them from the others. Starting with S. Benedict, western monasticism, influenced by the Basilian tradition, accepted this kind of organisation and accorded a greater value to the care of the sick brothers, recognizing in this loving attention the spiritual enrichment of the monks (both the sick and the healthy ones) and of the whole of the monastic community. The custom of Cluny, moving from this theological and humanistic conception of care, includes disease and its spaces within the complex rites, whose forms appear as a severe anticipation of death.