The Rule of Saint Benedict leaves no stone unturned. It provides guidelines for monastic living on most everything–sleeping, working, traveling, entertaining guests. He even devotes two chapters to addressing day-to-day concerns about drinking (a half measure of wine each day should suffice) and eating (two kinds of cooked foods plus fruits and veggies is optimal); allowances can be made depending on locale and diet restrictions. “Above all else,” he writes, “they should live without grumbling.”
This matter of grumbling is not of secondary importance to Benedict (480-547). While he sets up procedures for lodging legitimate complaints in monastic life, he regards murmuring and whining as toxic to these “schools for the soul.” Complaining tears at the fabric of the body of Christ. That’s why he hits it hard in his seventy-three-chapter manual on community life. Just as a heart murmur can indicate a deeper heart problem, so complaining can warn of a spiritual heart defect.
The Bible has plenty to say on this matter of complaining. God’s people repeatedly murmur against Moses in the Sinai wilderness. The New Testament calls out grumbling on multiple occasions. I can attest to its deleterious effect in church life. Whining and complaining have a corrosive influence on community welfare.
Benedict’s Rule of Life has served as the gold standard in monastic living for the past fifteen hundred years for good reason. “Do not be a murmurer,” Benedict warns. ‘Nuff said. The following prayer by Benedict is a keeper: