The Ecclesiastical Orders of Knighthood

by James Herman Van der Veldt

THE SOVEREIGN MILITARY ORDER OF ST. JOHN OF JERUSALEM

This order, also called the Order of Rhodes and more widely known as the Order of Malta, from the locations of its headquarters after it was forced to leave the Holy Land, is the oldest order of knighthood in existence, antedating even that of the Order of the Garter by more than two hundred years. It is also the most illustrious and meritorious of the religious military orders. Its origin goes back to the hospital for Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem, established in the first half of the 11th century by a group of merchantmen from Amalfi, Italy. When the crusaders captured Jerusalem in 1099 the hospital was headed by a layman named Gerard whose birthplace is variously given as Martiques in Provence, Amalfi in southern Italy and Tonco in Piedmont, all in line with the respective nationality of the historians who wrote his life.[4] This saintly man organized the hospital staff into a community of lay brothers for whom he drew up appropriate constitutions which were approved in 1113 by Pope Paschal II. The fraternity became known as the Hospitallers of St. John, after the patron saint of the church which was attached to the hospital. This patron was St. John the Almoner, Patriarch of Alexandria, who had provided the means for rebuilding the churches of the Resurrection and of Calvary in Jerusalem. Later the Hospitallers adopted the better known St. John the Baptist as their patron saint.

Whereas Gerard was the founder of the Order of St. John, his successor Raymond du Puy, a knight from Provence, became its organizer. While he was Master of the Hospital (1120-60), the community, although continuing its hospital work, began also to engage in services of a military character. The military duties consisted at first in providing armed protection for the sick and the poor and military escorts for the pilgrims. Soon the brotherhood took part in the defense of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem and in the battles against the Moslems and thus became a full-fledged military order. But the order never forsook its humble beginnings; its militarization only added a new objective to its activities, as expressed in the age-old motto: Obsequium pauperum et tuitio fidei—service of the poor and protection of the faith.

During the process of militarization three classes of brothers developed: the knights who led in the fighting and held most of the higher administrative functions at headquarters and in the other houses of the order; the chaplains who took care of the spiritual needs of the other members of the order and of the patients in the hospitals; the sergeants-at-arms, who were the serving brothers. In the beginning, persons not belonging to the military aristocracy or nobility could enter the class of knights, but as from Master Hugh Revel (1258-77) the rule was laid down that such as desired to be admitted as knights should prove nobility on both father’s and mother’s side. When occasionally a few knights were received into the order who were not fully qualified with regard to their armorial bearings, they were called Knights-of-Grace (admitted by favor) in contrast to the duly qualified members who were called Knights-of-Justice, a distinction which has prevailed until recently.

The number of professed knights was always quite limited, scarcely in excess of 500 or 600 knights. Since the order was essentially a lay organization, the number of professed priests always remained very small. The professed chaplains served mainly in the Convent, that is, the general headquarters of the order, and were therefore called Conventual Chaplains. The cura animarum in the houses outside the Convent was for the most part exercised by priests who did not belong to the order, but were engaged by the order according to its needs; since they were throughout the time of office under the jurisdiction of the grand master they were called Chaplains of Magistral Obedience.

The professed sergeants-at-arms assisted the knights; they were at first quite important and numerous but eventually almost completely faded out of the picture, being replaced by hired help. In fact, the knights employed a considerable number of men for all their enterprises, both charitable and military: physicians and other personnel in the hospital were engaged on a paid basis, the soldiers who formed the body of the order’s army were mercenary troops as were the sailors on their fleet in the days of Rhodes and Malta.

At the top of this hierarchical pyramid stood the Master. His official title, ever since the days of Blessed Gerard, was Master of the Hospital. Although often referred to, even in earlier days, as the Grand Master, he did not formally assume the latter title until 1489. After the order had settled on Malta, the Grand Master Alof de Wignacourt (1601-1622) was given the title of prince of the Holy Roman Empire by the Emperor and the Pope bestowed on him and his successors a rank equal to a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church with the title of Eminence. Besides these sonorous titles, the grand master, like all other professed members of the order, also uses the religious title Frà (Brother) which is put before his baptismal name. To date there have been seventy-six grand masters.

The monastic habit of the order was a wide black cassock with a slit on each side for the arms. In the days of Blessed Gerard a plain white cross was sewn on the breast; Master Raymond introduced the eight-pointed white cross which has become the emblem of the order down to the present day. Since these bell-like cloaks were rather cumbersome in battle, Pope Innocent IV in 1248 granted the knights permission to wear a black surcoat over armour when on active service. Pope Alexander IV in 1259 changed the color of this tunic to red, with a plain white cross. The choir dress of the professed knights is even at present a black mantle with the Maltese cross and a very elaborate maniple.

The headquarters of the order, wherever they might be, in Jerusalem, Acre, Rhodes or Malta, were called the Convent. In its developed form this Convent consisted of the palace of the grand master, the living quarters of the knights and their assistants, the stables for the horses, the church and the hospital.

Even by modern standards the hospital in Jerusalem was quite large; Master Roger des Moulins in a letter of 1178 puts the number of patients at 950. According to the statutes of 1182, the medical staff consisted of four physicians and a number of male nurses. Special regulations were laid down concerning hygiene. A wise rule was that each patient, after admittance, should hand over his valuables to the hospital authorities so as to prevent protests and reclamations in case of loss or theft. A religious in charge registered all the belongings of a patient and gave them back after he was dismissed. The statutes of the hospital in Jerusalem served as a model for, and sometimes were literally copied by, other hospital organizations in the Middle Ages.[5]

In view of the fact that before the crusades hospitals in the more modern sense of the word hardly existed, the charity work of the Knights of St. John—and to a lesser extent that of the other orders founded in the Holy Land—has been hailed as a kind of innovation. Historians agree that the Hospitallers must be credited with having created the hospital in the organized sense.

Whenever the knights of St. John had to transfer their Convent, they considered it one of their first duties to attach to it a well-equipped hospital for “our lords the sick.” The hospital in Rhodes, restored by the Italian government under Mussolini to its original condition, was a large and beautiful building. On Malta the hospital or “Sacra Infirmeria” developed into a center for medical sciences, particularly surgery and ophthalmology.

The militarization of the order had a double effect. Knights from every country in Europe enrolled under the red banner with the white cross. At the same time the military reputation of the order greatly increased the number of donations and legacies which had been given already at the time the order was devoted to charity work. These possessions scattered throughout the Near East and Europe called for administration and management. Although the supervisory system was very complicated and only gradually developed, it may be said in general that the order was divided in bailiwicks and priories which were roughly equivalent to provinces in other orders and each priory comprised a number of commanderies. The house of a commander might be a manor, a castle, a walled-in-portion or a fortified church with an annex. Each house contained, besides the chapel and the living quarters for the household, a number of rooms, to be used as a ward for travellers and as a hospital for sick pilgrims.[6]

The functions of the priors and commanders were manifold: they collected the revenues of the estates of the order, they gave protection to the pilgrims, occasionally they built or maintained roads and bridges and their “mansiones” were recruiting stations for the order. When the days of the great pilgrimages were over, several hospices of St. John grew into regular hospitals.

The territorial organization of the order achieved its final completion, when it was divided into langues or tongues. When the headquarters of the order were in Rhodes and Malta, the knights of each langue lived together in their own residence, called auberge or inn, so that the Convent consisted of a number of national “monasteries.”

Although the training of the Knights of St. John was mainly aimed at making them good fighters—a life not particularly conducive to sanctity—yet the chronicles of the order boast a number of men and women noted for their holiness. To mention a few: Gerard, the Founder, and Raymond du Puy, who have been always revered as Blessed; St. Hugh, Commander of Geneva; the sergeant-at-arms Blessed Gerard Mercati who, however, died as a Franciscan; and the most renowned among the women saints, St. Ubaldescha, St. Toscana and St. Fiora of Beaulieu.[7]

The military and political history of the Order of St. John is an eight-hundred-years-long Odyssey which can be best characterized as the road from Jerusalem to Rome by way of Acre, Rhodes, Malta, and a number of other places, including a curious detour by Russia. The Hospitallers stayed in the Holy Land for almost two centuries, until 1291; they then had their headquarters on the island of Rhodes for another two hundred years (1309-1522), and afterwards transferred to the island of Malta for two centuries and a half (1530-1798), finally moving to Rome in 1834.[8]

In the Palestinian period the Hospitallers fought for the defense of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem; together with the Templars they supplied the best-trained and disciplined troops and, especially in the times of disaster, their forces were the most stable and reliable. During the last forty years of the kingdom the defense of the country rested almost completely upon these two military orders.[9]

In the armies of the Christians in the Holy Land the knights formed a sort of division, composed of between 300 and 500 knights and a number of hired soldiers. This division was sometimes used as a flank, but more often as a vanguard or rear guard. Besides, the knights built and garrisoned an impressive number of fortresses of which the most powerful were Margat and Crac.

Only seven knights of St. John, including the master, survived the fall of Acre in 1291. They found asylum on the island of Cyprus. During their years there, the knights began to build up a naval force. With this they conquered the island of Rhodes, where they were firmly established in 1308. Thus they became known as Knights of Rhodes.[10]

At Rhodes the knights reached the peak of power and influence, never quite attained in the same measure before or after. And this is all the more remarkable because the number of knights on the island never exceeded three hundred. By building enormous fortifications they made the island an almost impregnable bastion against the attacks of the Mamelukes of Egypt and Syria and the Turks of Constantinople. With their naval power they started a new type of warfare against the old enemies. In Rhodes the knights became a sovereign power like the sea republics of Italy or the Hanseatic cities in Germany.[11] Their navy flew its own flag, a white cross on a red field, they minted their own money, they concluded treaties with other sovereign states on the basis of equality and they had their diplomatic representatives at many courts. After repulsing numerous attacks, the knights finally were overwhelmed by a strong expeditionary force under Sultan Soliman I and capitulated Dec. 21, 1522.

Once again the remaining knights drifted around in search of a dwelling place; they established their capital successively in Crete, Messina, Baia, Viterbo, and Nizza. Finally, on March 24, 1530, they obtained from Emperor Charles V, in his capacity as king of Sicily, the island of Malta and adjacent islands as a “perpetual and free feud.” The only obligation attached to this transfer was that the knights should annually, on the feast of All Saints, offer a falcon or a hawk to the King of Sicily, whoever he might be. Thus the Order of Saint John became a feudatory of the kingdom of Sicily territorially, but as a religious order it continued dependent on the authority of the Holy See. From their key position in the Mediterranean, the knights watched the movements of the Turkish fleet and engaged in battle the corsairs from Tripoli and the other Barbary States. Twice a year the order equipped a “caravan,” namely a naval expedition, to ferret out pirates along the coastline of the Mediterranean. As in Rhodes, in Malta the knights sustained several attacks from the Turks, the most memorable of which was the “Great Siege” (1565). The knights were victorious on all occasions. However, in the eighteenth century a decline in spirit and in discipline set in. What the Turks failed to achieve, Napoleon did; on his way to Egypt, without striking a blow he captured the fortress of Malta, believed to be impregnable (June 12, 1798). The weak Grand Master Ferdinand von Hompesch soon resigned and the order established a provisional headquarters at Trieste which at the time was under Austria.

A peculiar situation then arose: an orthodox emperor made himself Grand Master of this thoroughly Catholic Order of St. John. Paul I of Russia, who for some time had in mind using the Hospitallers and their island bastion for political purposes, had managed to establish a grand priory in Russia. The Russian knights in 1798 elected Paul as Grand Master, but he died in 1801 without being able to do anything on behalf of the order. With England taking Malta from the French in 1800, the old capital was lost for good.

Upon the loss of Malta the order reached the lowest point in all its glorious history. The order’s headquarters shifted from Messina to Catania to Ferrara and finally in 1834 they were established in Rome. The knights had one more grand master after Paul I, but when he died in 1805, the Pope allowed them only to elect lieutenant grand masters who were to be ratified by him. This state of affairs continued for seventy-four years until Leo XIII by a Bull of March 29, 1879, re-established the office of grand master with headquarters in Rome.[12]

From then on the order regained part of its old vitality. It had lost its territorial sovereignty, military activities had ceased, but it now reverted to its original objective: obsequium pauperum. The order became again a welfare and charity organization. Looking back over its long history one might say that at first its master was the superintendent of a hospital, then he became a commanding army general (to which office he subsequently added that of an admiral), and in this age the grand master has become the president of an international Catholic White Cross which at times collaborates with the international Red Cross.

The order has built and maintains an impressive number of hospitals—in Italy alone there are 19 with a total of 5,290 beds; it takes care of a number of children’s homes, child centers and trade schools for abandoned children. During the two world wars, the order established military hospitals and had a number of ambulance trains and airplanes for the transport of wounded soldiers; in catastrophes such as earthquakes or other disasters it provides food and medical help. It also extends financial and medical assistance to the Catholic foreign missions.[13]

Expenses involved in these activities are paid out of the revenues from the remaining properties of the order and the contributions of its members throughout the world.

The present organization of the Order of Malta consists of three large categories, each subdivided into a number of ranks.[14] They are the Knights of Justice, who take the three monastic vows and form the strictly religious nucleus of the order; the Knights of Honour and Devotion who are required to furnish proof of ancient nobility; the Knights of Magistral Grace who are affiliated to the order and are somewhat reminiscent of the old class of sergeants-at-arms. Besides, there are three other groups: the Chaplains, Dames of Honour and Devotion, and the Donates. The grand master may bestow on persons outside the order the Cross of Merit of the Order of Malta, an honour which may be conferred also on non-Catholics and consists of five classes.

The Order of Malta is divided into five grand priories and fourteen national associations, including the “Association of Master Knights of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta in the United States of America.” Those knights who do not belong to any of the priories or associations depend directly on the grand master and are called Knights in Gremio Religionis.[15]

The Order of St. John, although deprived of its territory, retains its sovereign character. The palace of the grand master and the other houses in Rome are extra-territorial, that is to say enjoy the same privilege as that accorded to the other foreign embassies and legations; the order issues its own diplomatic passports and entertains diplomatic missions and legations in several countries.[16]

Recently the legal status of the Order of Malta in the Church has been defined with greater precision. Pope Pius XII, on Dec. 10, 1951, appointed a special tribunal of five cardinals, presided over by the Dean of the Sacred College, Cardinal Eugene Tisserant, in order to determine the nature of the order and the extent of its competence both as a sovereign and as a religious institution, as well as its relationship to the Holy See. After long discussions the commission of cardinals on Jan. 24, 1953, gave the following unanimous verdict:[17]

The Order of Malta is a sovereign order, inasmuch as it enjoys certain prerogatives which, according to the principles of international law, are proper to sovereignty. These rights have been recognized by the Holy See and a number of states. However, these rights do not comprise all the powers and prerogatives that belong to sovereign states in the full sense of the word.

Insofar as the Order of Malta is composed of knights and chaplains, it is a “religio” and more precisely a religious order, approved by the Holy See, according to the Codex juris canonici, Can. 487 and 488, nn. 1 and 2. The purpose of this order is, besides the sanctification of its members, also the pursuit of religious objectives, charity, and welfare work.

The sovereign and the religious character of the order are intimately related, inasmuch as the former serves to attain the objectives of the order as a religious institution and its development in the world.

The Order of Malta depends on the Holy See and, as a religious order, on the Sacred Congregation of Religious.

Those persons who have obtained marks of distinction from the order and the associations of these persons depend on the order, and, through it, on the Holy See.

Questions concerning the institution’s character as a sovereign order are treated by the Secretariat of State of His Holiness. Those of a mixed nature are received by the Sacred Congregation of Religious in accord with the Secretariat of State.

The present decisions do not interfere with the order’s acquired rights, customs and privileges which the Popes have granted or recognized, inasfar as they are still in force according to the norms of canon law[18] and the order’s own constitutions.[19]