Exercising Obedience: John Cassian and the Creation of Early Monastic Subjectivity

<p>John Cassian (360-435 CE) started his monastic career in Bethlehem. He later traveled to the Egyptian desert, living there as a monk, meeting the venerated Desert Fathers, and learning from them for about fifteen years. Much later, he would go to the region of Gaul to help establish a monastery there by writing monastic manuals, the <em>Institutes</em> and the <em>Conferences</em>. These seminal writings represent the first known attempt to bring the idealized monastic traditions from Egypt, long understood to be the cradle of monasticism, to the West.</p> <p>In his <em>Institutes</em>, Cassian comments that "a monk ought by all means to flee from women and bishops" (<em>Inst</em>. 11.18). This is indeed an odd comment from a monk, apparently casting bishops as adversaries rather than models for the Christian life. In this paper, therefore, I argue that Cassian, in both the Institutes and the Conferences, is advocating for a distinct separation between monastics and the institutional Church.</p> <p>In Cassian's writings and the larger corpus of monastic writings from his era, monks never referred to early Church fathers such as Irenaeus or Tertullian as authorities; instead they cited quotes and stories exclusively from earlier, venerated monks. In that sense, monastic discourse such as Cassian's formed a closed discursive system, consciously excluding the hierarchical institutional Church. Furthermore, Cassian argues for a separate monastic authority based not on apostolic succession but rather on what I term apostolic praxis, the notion that monastic practices such as prayer and asceticism can be traced back to the primitive church.</p> <p>I supplement my study of Cassian's writings with Michel Foucault's analysis of the creation of subjects in order to examine what I believe to be Cassian's formation of a specifically Egyptian form of monastic subjectivity for his audience, the monks of Gaul. In addition, I employ Foucault's concepts of disciplinary power and pastoral power to demonstrate the effect Cassian's rhetoric would have upon his direct audience, as well as many other monks throughout history.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Year dc:date.available

2019

Author dc:creator

• Schachterle, Joshua Daniel

Contributors dc:contributor

• Gregory A. Robbins, Ph.D.
• Thomas Nail
• Pamela Eisenbaum

• Apostolic
• Cassian
• History
• Monastic
• Praxis
• Subjectivity
• History of Religion

Statement dc:rights

• <p>Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.</p>

Language dc:language

en

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd/1615

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.du.edu:etd-2615