%0 Journal Article
%A Scott G. Bruce
%D 2025
%C Berlin, Germany
%I Peter Lang Verlag
%J Mediaevistik
%@ 2199-806X
%N 1
%V 37
%T The Dialogue on Miracles: Caesarius of Heisterbach. Trans. Ronald E. Pepin. Cistercian Publications 89–90, 2 vols., Collegeville MN: Liturgical Press, 2023, xi, 522 pp., viii, 461 pp.
%R 10.3726/med.2024.01.71
%U https://www.peterlang.com/document/1672656
%X Composed between 1219 and 1223, Caesarius of Heisterbach’s The Dialogue on Miracles (Dialogus miraculorum) narrates nearly 800 pithy moral tales about miraculous events (exempla) organized into twelve sections (distinctiones) divided between two books. This sprawling collection drew on oral and textual reports that circulated in Caesarius’s home institution of Heisterbach in northwestern Germany as well as those from other Cisterician communities. Written sources from late antiquity like the Vitae patrum and Gregory the Great’s Dialogues also provided inspiration and source materials. Likewise, Caesarius cited frequently from the Bible as well as from the Rule of Benedict. Like Gregory, he couched his work as a dialogue between a monk and a novice. His purpose was the edification of his brethren, especially those new to the monastic profession. The twelve sections of the books each had a dominant theme. The first six focused on the challenges of living as a monk: conversion, contrition, confession, temptation, demons, and simplicity. The second six told stories about the intercession of the saints as well as the rewards and punishments awaiting the virtuous and sinful: the blessed Virgin, visions, the eucharist, miracles, the dying, and the rewards of the afterlife. Narrated in a simple style and punctuated alternately by humor and horror, Caesarius’s Dialogue proved to be immensely popular in the later Middle Ages. It survived in sixty-five manuscripts, many of which were amplified or abridged by their owners.
%K dialogue, miracles, caesarius, heisterbach, trans, ronald, pepin, cistercian, publications, collegeville, liturgical, press