The Name of the Rose

Kristopher Rodriguez

August 1, 2009

English 3

  1. The Rules of St. Benedict are basically 73 rules monks used when they lived in an abbey under an abbot. In this particular novel, the Rule is referring to Cenobites, which are monks living in a monastery under an abbot. Some of the monks follow the Rule, but some of the other monks sometimes break the Rule. For example, in the Rule of St. Benedict, it says that monks are not to act violent towards other monks. Malachi the librarian broke this because the book says, “And Malachi has struck him with the armillary sphere because it was the only thing he found handy,” (Eco 470). He broke one of the rules, which was not a good thing. The cellarer also broke one of the rules as well, the book says, “That he didn’t want the cellarer, who was powerful, or me, young and handsome, to enjoy the love of the village girls anymore,” (Eco 308). What that quote is saying is that the cellarer slept with the women from the village and that is against what the monks believe in. The abbot of the abbey was basically the only one out of the three mentioned who followed the Rule. He was never going against the rule, all he wanted was for the abbey to maintain wealthy and safe. The monks justified them altering for a very obvious reason. They did not want people to think badly about them and they didn’t want to be humiliated by what they did. They altered the rules so that it would be better for them and they wouldn’t get in trouble with anyone. These flaws in the important people of the abbey basically led to the abbey’s destruction. These were the people that the monks looked up to and they were flawed in bad ways. The whole abbey burned to the ground because of a lot of ruckus these people caused the abbey.
  2. When William and Adso come upon Nicholas, the master glazier, William and Nicholas engage in a conversation about job stereotypes and of William’s glasses. The metaphor, “knowing is seeing” is basically saying that... [continues]

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