Get your own Free Home PageTemptations of the flesh, confronting and firmly repelled by Worcester's most famous saint, are recounted in arresting detail in a recently released book.
And what makes the racy narrative even more exceptional is that it was written almost ... nine centuries ago!
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The Life of St Wulstan was originally the work of one William of Malmesbury who wrote it down in Latin between the years 1124 and 1143.
In fact, even his account of the life's work of the remarkable Worcester saint was simply an extended version of that written by a monk named Coleman who had been St Wulstan's friend and chaplain.
| The full translation from Latin of William of Malmesbury's Life of Saint Wulstan was undertaken earlier this century by a former Archdeacon of Worcester, the Ven JHF Peile who published it as a book in 1934. The new publication of this full text comes from Llanerch Publishers, of Felinfach, near Lampeter, in Wales, price £7.95. It is available in some local bookstores or from the publishers. I can strongly recommend it as extremely absorbing reading, particulary to those wanting to discover more about the remarkable life of Worcester's most famous saint. |
Wulstan, who lived 87 years from 1008 to 1095, was Prior of the Worcester Monastery and then Bishop of the diocese. It was he who put in hand the building of the present Worcester cathedral.
He was born in the Warwickshire village of Itchington, the son of Aethelstan and Wulfgifu who both later gave up the worldly life to enter monasteries at Worcester, he as a monk and she as a nun. Wulstan "was first taught his letters" at Evesham before "being trained in more perfect learning" at Peterborough.
He set himself upon a harsh, self-sacrificing religious life of chastity but had to
endure some early strong temptations. William of Malmesbury explained:
"When he returned from Peterborough to his parents, a damsel of the neighbourhood set
herself to make a shipwreck of his modesty and tempt him into sinful pleasures. She would
ever be pressing his hand, beckoning with her eyes, and tempting him with wanton gestures
which foretell the death of virginity."
Wulstan was clearly a strong athletic type and, one evening, easily won a race with young men of the area. "Wulstan shone out among the rest - and, by common consent, bore off the prize. The rustic throng shouted his praises, and the aforesaid damsel began to dance before Wulstan with lascivious movements apt to take the eyes of a lover. "And he, whom touches and glances had not moved, yielded to her seductive gestures, and panted with desire. But in a moment he came to a better mind, burst into tears, and took flight into rough thickets and thorny places."
William of Malmesbury recounts that Wulstan fell asleep and had some sort of divine apparition from a bright cloud which descended upon him.
He told his friends: "I was burning fiercely with the desire of the flesh but now, watered with divine dew, I am cool through all my being. I hope that henceforth I shall be free from the prickings of the flesh."
Wulstan then entered the household of Brihtheah, the bishop of Worcester, who quickly realised his great qualities and offered to advance him to the priesthood in charge of a parish near Worcester. However, the young man declined, saying he was determined to become a monk.
"Happy," he said, "is the man who grows sick of the attractions of the world: pleasure of them passes in a moment of time: the tooth of conscience gnaws as long as a man lives."
Thus Wulstan became a monk at the Worcester monastery and, before long, it was widely said that "never in our days has there been a monk more free of faults and more perfect in virtues".
He endured many self-imposed hardships, including little sleep and lying prostrate for many hours on the bare floor in front of the altar.
He was later appointed as Prior of the Worcester monastery, but temptations of the flesh were still not at and end.
William of Malmesbury wrote: "There was in the city a wife who often came to Church and would court the Prior with words of flattery. At last her desire grew stronger than her shame and, as the Prior chanced to be standing near her in the Church, she took hold of his garment.
"He checked her with a stern glance, but the woman, seizing her opportunity, began to whisper in the holy man's ears words of evil counsel savouring of the wiles of woman and the serpent's cunning. She had a home abounding in riches, with no man to govern it, as her husband was far away."
However, to cut a long story short, Wulstan advised her to give her monies to the poor and to take the veil but, undeterred, she pleaded with him to give up his priestly strictness and "to consent to share her bed". This proved the last straw to Wulstan, who loudly chastised her and landed a blow on her face with his open hand.
The Prior continued his saintly life, "scattering the seed of his loving kindness". He would stand for hours at the door of the Church so that he could help those who had suffered violence or to baptise the children of the poor. His good deeds came to the attention of the Cardinals and, when they had to appoint a new Bishop of Worcester, his name immediately came to the fore.
Reluctantly, he accepted the appointment in 1061, and ordered the building of a new Cathedral Church at Worcester, work upon which started in 1084.
William of Malmesbury wrote down a series of miracles attributed to Bishop Wulstan. A workman fell 40ft from the roof of the Cathedral but Wulstan, standing nearby, made a holy gesture as the man was tumbling, and he stood up unhurt, blessing the bishop.
Visiting Evesham, Wulstan received a plea from a monk named Eigelric who lay dying from a fever and who desired the bishop's absolution.
Wulstan prayed at the monk's bedside and gave a blessing - and suddenly "all the pains and weakness of the sufferer fled, and health abounded to drive out the disease". Eigelric never ceased to bless God and the bishop for his healing.
Among Wulstan's many other "miracles" was the laying of healing hands on a woman at Evesham who had become a violent and frenzied idiot, on a leper at Kempsey whose flesh "came again like that of a little child", and on Gunnilda, daughter of King Harold, whose eyesight had been attacked by a malignant tumour. Wulstan made the sign of the Cross before her eyes and "straightway she was able to ... receive the light of day".
Eventually, "the fame of Wulstan's holiness had gone through all the land and even to the ends of the world".
"The Kings of Ireland paid him many signs of reverence. Malcolm, King of Scotland commended himself to his prayers. The Pope of Rome, the Archbishop of Bari and the Patriarch of Jerusalem, in letters, besought his advocacy with God."
Wulstan "breathed forth his last breath a little after midnight on Saturday the nineteenth day of January in the year of the Incarnation of Our Lord, one thousand and ninety-five when he had been Bishop for 34 years".
For centuries after his death, St Wulstan's tomb in the Cathedral brought pilgrims flocking to Worcester, but, alas, the saint's shrine was destroyed by order of Henry VIII.
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© 2001 - Andy Morrall
Last updated 2th November 2003.
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