THE ROSARY PRAYER

AND THE CARTHUSIANS

We have all heard about the Virgin Mary appearing to St Dominic, teaching him the Rosary prayer and making him its apostle. It is a wonderful story, yet one without basis… None of the early documents of the Dominican Order says anything about it, nor do any of the first seven biographers of the saint, or the countless number of witnesses who came forward to give evidence during the canonization proceedings which were opened in 1233. The legend actually appears only several centuries later. So how has the Rosary actually begun?

Let us start off by looking at the Hail Mary prayer. Even if the custom of joining Elizabeth’s greeting to that of the Angel is a very old one, the second part of this prayer is much more recent. It now looks like it was from within the Carthusian Order that it first spread around the whole Church. As a matter of fact, the prayer "Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis" ("Holy Mary, pray for us") appeared for the first time in a Carthusian breviary of the 13^th century. During the next century, yet again in Carthusian breviaries, the wording develops into: "Ora pro nobis peccatoribus. Amen" ("Pray for us sinners. Amen"), sometimes referring to "Mater Dei" ("Mother of God") after Mary. Lastly, toward 1350, there was found, still in a Carthusian breviary: "Nunc et in hora mortis. Amen." ("Now and at the hour of [our] death. Amen.").

In former times, the custom of reciting the two greetings for 150 times made it possible for illiterate persons to say this prayer instead of reciting the 150 Psalms. There later came a devotional movement which had a great desire to recite the two greetings in a more profound and recollect manner, and it reduced this ‘Marian Psalter’ (which was mostly said in the Rhine-Flemish lands) to a ‘Rosary’ with only 50 recitations. When did the Our Father prayer start being said together with the greetings to the Virgin Mary?

Towards the mid-14^th century, a Köln Charterhouse monk, Dom Henry Kalkar, introduced the recital of a Pater Noster in the ‘Marian Psalter’, before each series of ten Ave Marias. After telling the prior of the London Charterhouse of this new system, it spread rapidly from there all over England and then to the Continent.

The search for a more intimate prayer started at the beginning of the 14^th century. A few themes were added after the name of Jesus, which indicated what he did, said, underwent etc. ("Jesus who was adored by the Magi, was tempted by the devil, washed the feet of the disciples", etc.). These specific additions were made by the Cistercians of the region of Trèves, who at least proposed 98 themes of this type.

At the beginning of the following century, a young novice joined the Trèves Charterhouse, Dominic Hélion (known as ‘the Prussian’), who, following his entry in the monastery, fell in a somewhat depressive state (1409). His prior, Adolph of Essen, helped him come out of it initiating him in a contemplative way of reciting the Rosary: other than the words of greeting, he was to fix his attention on Jesus the Saviour. To accomplish this, Dominic thinks of following the name of Jesus with a series of 50 different themes of about a line or two, which brought together the whole life of Christo. Such as: "…Jesus whom John baptized in the Jordan and called him the Lamb of God; Jesus who after chosing his disciples, preached the Kingdom of God to men; who at the Last Supper instituted the sacrament of his Body and Blood, etc."

The way which had been started among the Cistercians was in this manner adopted as a system. Then, between 1435 and 1445, at the request of his Carthusian brethren living in Flemish lands who recited the "Marian Psalter", Dominic wrote out a series of 150 themes divided into three sections corresponding to the Gospels of the infancy of Christ, of his public life, and of his Passion and Resurrection.

It is Dominic of Trèves himself who expounds the spirit of his method: "One need not necessarily stop on the words used here and there in stating the meditation themes. Everyone may, as he likes, or according to his own devotion, extend, abbreviate, or even modify the subject, one way or another. For each person this depends on the time available and prevailing circumstances. It is very difficult to do something better during the brief hour consacrated to this Rosary." The ‘brief hour’ which has been mentioned clearly shows that his Rosary actually tended to move away from vocal prayer as much as possible and to become a real introduction to silent prayer.

So from that time the Carthusians established themselves apostles of this method, widely spreading it with their writings. To sustain it, they tell two tales relating to visions. The first tale takes up again a story known since the 13^th century. A Carthusian monk, who was travelling, stopped in a forest to recite the 50 Hail Mary prayers which he was accustomed to offer up each day to the Blessed Virgin. A thief came and took his horse and all that he had and was about to kill him, "when he saw a very beautiful woman who was holding a ribbon normally used for making crowns. For each Hail Mary which the monk recited, she picked a rose from his lips which she attached to the ribbon. When the crown of 50 roses was finished she wore it on her head and disappeared. The thief approached the monk and asked him about that woman. The monk told him what he was doing, but he assured him that he did not see anything at all and the other person, understanding that she could have been Our Lady, gave back everything to him."

The second tale tells of a vision which Adolph of Essen is said to have had about 1429: the Virgin was surrounded by all the heavenly court which was singing the Rosary to her, with the themes adopted by Dominic. When the name of Mary was mentioned, all bowed their head; when the name of Jesus was mentioned, they all genuflected; at the end, they concluded the singing of the themes with an Alleluia. All rendered great thanksgiving to God for all the spiritual fruit obtained from this recital, and asked Him to grant all those who have recited the Rosary in this manner the grace of great bounty for their spiritual progress.

Later still, a Dominican friar, Alain de la Roche, who was in touch with the Carthusians, discovered through them the way Dominic of Prussia said his Rosary, but confused this with the founder of his Order (!), and stories about visions which were told by the Carthusians were changed into tales of a dream which the founder of the preaching friars had… The 50 mysteries are reduced to fifteen: joyful, sorrowful e glorious, suppressing all those relating to Christ’s public life. There still had to be a long wait for Pope John Paul II and his Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae so that they might be brought back in the form of the five new ‘mysteries of light’. The practice relating to themes is this manner revived. For the record, Dominic of Prussia, was a student at Krakow University, where Pope Wojtyla was bishop. Chance or Providence?

-Dom Yves Gourdel, Le culte de la très sainte Vierge dans l’Ordre des chartreux, dans Maria, études sur la Sainte Vierge t. 2, Beauchesne, Paris, 1952.

-El santo rosario en la Cartuja, ( Analecta Cartusiana 103) , Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik universität Salzburg, 1983.