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Chapter 35: Kitchen servers of the week

¹The brothers should serve one another. Consequently, no one will be excused from kitchen service unless he is sick or engaged in some important business of the monastery, ²for such service increases reward and fosters love. ³Let those who are not strong have help so that they may serve without distress, ⁴and let everyone receive help as the size of the community or local conditions warrant. ⁵If the community is rather large, the cellarer should be excused from kitchen service, and, as we have said, those should also be excused who are engaged in important business. ⁶Let all the rest serve one another in love. 

⁷On Saturday the brother who is completing his work will do the washing. ⁸He is to wash the towels which the brothers use to wipe their hands and feet. ⁹Both the one who is ending his service and the one who is about to begin are to wash the feet of everyone. ¹⁰The utensils required for the kitchen service are to be washed and returned intact to the cellarer, ¹¹who in turn issues them to the one beginning his week. In this way the cellarer will know what he hands out and what he receives back.

Chapter 53: reception of guests

¹All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for he himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me (Matt. 25:35). ²Proper honor must be shown to all, especially to those who share our faith (Gal. 6:10) and to pilgrims. ³Once a guest has been announced, the superior and the brothers are to meet him with all the courtesy of love. 

⁴First of all, they are to pray together and thus be united in peace, ⁵but prayer must always precede the kiss of peace because of the delusions of the devil. ⁶All humility should be shown in addressing a guest on arrival or departure. ⁷By a bow of the head or by a complete prostration of the body, Christ is to be adored because he is indeed welcomed in them. 

⁸After the guests have been received, they should be invited to pray; then the superior or an appointed brother will sit with them.⁹ The divine law is read to the guest for his instruction, and after that every kindness is shown to him. ¹⁰The superior may break his fast for the sake of a guest, unless it is a day of special fast which cannot be broken. ¹¹The brothers, however, observe the usual fast. ¹²The abbot shall pour water on the hands of the guests, ¹³and the abbot with the entire community shall wash their feet. ¹⁴After the washing they will recite this verse: God, we have received your mercy in the midst of your temple (Ps. 47[48]:10). ¹⁵Great care and concern are to be shown in receiving poor people and pilgrims, because in them more particularly Christ is received; our very awe of the rich guarantees them special respect. 

From The Rule of Saint Benedict (translated by the monks of The Monastery of Christ in the Desert, http://christdesert.org).

By Benedict of Nursia

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