Dominic

Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers or Black Friars, (c.1170–1221). Recent research, mainly by Czech and English Dominicans, has considerably modified traditional accounts of this saint.

Dominic was born at Caleruega (Castile), not far from the abbey of St. Dominic of Silos, after whom he was named. The youngest of four children of the devout warden of the town, he became an Austin Canon of Osma cathedral, conspicuous for zeal for study as well as helping the poor. The two interests had come into conflict during a famine, when Dominic had sold his books to help the needy and the dying. Devoted to the common life and monastic observance, Dominic was appointed sacristan in 1199 and subprior in 1201. In the same year a new bishop, Diego, was appointed, who took Dominic with him on a mission to Denmark to negotiate a marriage for the king's son. In the course of this journey Dominic saw the disastrous results of invasions by Cumans in Germany and became aware of the difficulties of the young churches in Scandinavia, both of whom were helped substantially by Dominicans before and after Dominic's death. The actual negotiations proved unsuccessful as the intended bride became a nun, but in passing Dominic stayed in a Cathar's house in Toulouse: he stayed up all night and converted him.

This is the traditional account of his first contact with Cathars, the cause of whose conversion was to occupy him over the next ten years. The strict Cathars were Christian only in name: they were dualists, believing in co-equal powers of good and evil; they regarded Christ as a teacher, not a redemptive Saviour; they rejected the Church and the sacraments, but had their own episcopal organization. Their one sacrament was the consolamentum, received by the ‘perfect’ inner circle at a normal adult age, but by most followers only just before death. Their austerity, commitment, and organization put to shame the ill-educated and relaxed local clergy. Another important element in their set-up was the role of aristocratic women found among the ‘perfect’, sometimes established in convents.

Bishop Diego and Dominic realized that new methods were needed to cope with this dangerous sect. Hitherto the Cistercians had been deputed to preach against them, but they were unsuitable for the task, being rural monks for the most part without higher education. Even the eloquent St. Bernard was unsuccessful in a preaching capacity in southern France. What was needed was a new policy with missioners travelling in poverty, but well equipped intellectually to deal with the errors in a charitable but effective way. Diego himself, as a bishop, led this expedition but was helped substantially by Dominic, who was in charge when Diego returned to his diocese. They also founded the nunnery of Prouille as a contemplative centre for devout women and as a useful base for the preachers. Debates were organized and the orthodox frequently won the argument, but there were examples of relapse.

In 1208 Cathars assassinated the papal legate, Pierre de Castelnau; Simon de Montfort, acting as the deputy of the King of France, initiated an armed invasion of the Midi, called the Albigensian Crusade, which was militarily successful. However it understandably aroused bitter resentment for the cruelty and slaughter, sometimes perpetrated when military leaders refused exile instead of death for the obdurate. Dominic himself took no part in the violence of the crusaders nor in the later Inquisition and realized that the long-term solution to the Cathar problem was to provide a better-trained clergy as well as itinerant preachers. Toulouse was the place where Dominic founded the Order of Preachers in 1215 and laid the foundations for a new University, based on the ideals and practice of Paris, where Dominic set up a foundation of his followers.

In the last six years of his life Dominic's ideal came to fruition. This was to provide for the Church as a whole, not only southern France, a body of trained religious who would be devoted to preaching, an activity usually reserved for bishops and their delegates. Liturgical prayer was retained, but executed more briefly than by the monks: study was given higher priority and poverty emphasized. The first step towards its stable realization was the bold one of dispersing his followers two by two into Italy, Spain, and elsewhere. The University town of Bologna was specially chosen and the support of two popes, Innocent III and Honorius III, was crucial. A recent writer has even said that Dominic was the ‘midwife’ of his Order, so important were the contributions of the other friars, the bishops of Osma and Toulouse, and above all of the papacy. An important feature was the democratic rule with short-term superiors and the Constitutions agreed by the general chapter. The basic rule was the flexible one of St. Augustine.

Dominic spent his last years in journeys to Rome, Bologna, Spain, and France, keeping in touch with his followers. He sometimes promoted recent recruits with exceptional gifts to important office, emphasizing the Order's close links with the Universities, where they taught and preached and from where many novices joined them. At Rome the popes gave him the churches of S. Sabina for the friars and S. Sisto for the nuns. In 1220 Dominic, encouraged by the presence at Bologna of novices from Hungary and Scandinavia, started a preaching tour in Hungary to convert the Cumans. He sent others to start a foundation in Denmark and in England. He died at Bologna in 1221, exhausted by his austerities, overwork, and travel, not to mention the extreme heat. He preached a last sermon to his community in a borrowed habit from a bed which was not his own. He was a saint with gifts of organization, who realized the extreme importance of personal contact, delegated responsibility, and the views of others. Towards the end of his life he declared that he had always been a virgin, but that he had taken more pleasure in the company of young women than of older ones. Popular devotion arose soon after his death and he was canonised in 1234. His tomb at Bologna was built thirty years later by Nicolas Pisano and later embellished by Michelangelo and others. An early portrait by an anonymous Sienese primitive is in the Fogg Art Museum of Harvard University and there are fine cycles of his life by Fra Angelico at Fiesole and Florence. His usual emblems are a lily and a black and white dog (a punning reference to Domini canes, dogs of the Lord), holding a torch as herald of truth. Later artists depicted him with a rosary, which he was erroneously believed to have invented. Feast: 8 August. His Order multiplied exceedingly in the time soon after his death: renewed in recent years, it contributes powerfully to teaching, preaching, and missionary work.

Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.

• Primary documents edited by M.H. Laurent (1933–5); French tr. by M. H. Vicaire (1955) and English tr. by E.C. Lehner (1964). Lives by B. Jarrett (1924), P. Mandonnet (1937, Eng. tr. 1944) and M. H. Vicaire (2 vols. 1983. Eng. tr. of earlier edition 1964), S. Tugwell (1995), V. Koudelka (1997). See also W. A. Hinnebusch, The History of the Dominican Order (1966); H.S.S.C. v, 112–23

Pope Innocent III (c. 1160-1216) was one of the most powerful and certainly one of the wisest pontiffs ever to rule in Rome. Two monastic orders began under his direction. Although he was at first reluctant to grant his approval, the world is richer because he finally did. Francis of Assisi (c. 1181-1226) and the Franciscans were the first (See Francis of Assisi). Dominic and the Order of Preachers-the Dominicans-were the second.

Dominic was twelve years older than Francis, but he began his work later. Those who followed him pursued his main objective of teaching, preaching, and study. Some great minds were trained under Dominican tutelage, including one of the greatest of all, Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274).

The order spread throughout Europe and influenced the main centers of theological study in Paris and Oxford. Dominican professors in universities around the world have sparked high levels of theological training and insight.

Their success did not come without blemish, however. From the very beginning, Dominicans had launched movements to convert Jews and Muslims. Unfortunately, their methods don't stand up to the hindsight of history. Force of arms and intrigue were sometimes employed, rather than the use of pen and pulpit. Crusaders were used against Muslims in Tripoli and Jews in Spain.

On the other hand, when Spanish forces terribly abused and exploited American Indians from Santo Domingo and Peru, Dominicans such as Antonio Montesinos preached boldly against the crown and its policies. As a result, the influential writer Bartolome de Las Casas converted and became a Dominican. His books caused a great stir, exposing the economic system of immorality that was being carried out under the guise of missionary work.

Unfortunately, things went from bad to worse. When Indian labor forces began to decline from the abuses heaped upon them, it was Las Casas who, in defense of the Indians he had grown to love, suggested slaves be imported from Africa. Although he later recanted and worked just as hard to free black slaves as he had indigenous Indians, the damage was done. Throughout the Caribbean, African slaves took the place of indigenous slaves, and to this day their descendants are more numerous than the people who once ruled the islands.

Although their labors are not given a lot of space in politically correct history books-the authors of which rightly seek to expose the barbarity of early fifteenth-century Caribbean slavery-the facts are that many Dominicans saw quickly and clearly what was happening in the Americas. They fought, unsuccessfully, to right the many sins European governments committed in their attempts to exploit the wealth of the New World.

It is significant that theologians of the time who wrote against slavery usually did so not on the basis of the inherent immorality of the system, but on the logic of how wealth would be distributed.

One would think religious orders would get along fairly well, but such is not always the case. One famous dispute took place after the Protestant Reformation. The Council of Trent, which lasted from 1545 to 1563, had condemned both Luther and Calvin on their views of grace and predestination, and many feared that the much respected Augustine, beloved of the reformers, would soon be condemned as well. Late in the sixteenth century the Jesuits produced a document stating that predestination (See Calvin, John, and Jacobus Arminius) was based on God's foreknowledge. One of the best Dominican theologians of the time countered the argument by stating that the Jesuits were anti-Augustine and ought to be condemned.

The trial went all the way to the top of the Inquisition. The Dominicans accused the Jesuits of being Pelagians (believers in free will). The Jesuits countered that the Dominicans were Calvinists (believers in predestination). The Inquisition turned the whole thing over to Rome, which, after a long time and many popes, told them both to go to their rooms and stop fighting.

Today, the various orders, though still competitive in a good-natured way, are usually a lot more polite to each other.

Sources: Gonzalez, Justo L. The Story of Christianity. 2 vols. New York: Harper & Row, 1985.