Om de forskellige ordener og kald som findes i kirken: religiøs nytænkning i højmiddelalderen

This essay discusses various clerical and monastic reflections on the nature and content of Christian spirituality in the High Middle Ages. Guided by the classifications made in an anonymous treaty - Libellus de diversis Ordinibus et Professionibus, qui sunt Ecclesia - the essay depicts several different elements of a particularly vivid spirituality, which was exposed to serious change and development in the period from around 1050 to 1250. Thus, the essay discusses how both clerical and monastic religious institutions dealt with important religious themes in order to define themselves more narrowly as distinct religious communities. These religious institutions, which differed from one another, often expressed themselves in polemic writings. On a personal level the themes included in these writings were for instance the development and nature of an introspective, psychological capacity used in the developmental process of becoming ' a religious man'. On an institutional level, important themes for discussion between separate religious 'identities' would be the difference between e.g. canons and monks regarding their role 'in the world'. The question asked and sometimes answered in both polemic and non-polemic treaties could take the form of: "How are we to love our neighbour?" However, it is only the intention of this article to present some of these important aspects of medieval spirituality.