RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Hume Humility
about 1159), who is said to have established the first house of the Humiliati about the middle of the twelfth century at Rondenario, near Como. The first actual Humiliate monastery was probably the house established about 1178 near Milan, where male and female penitents lived and worked together. They were laymen, and many who were closely affiliated with them still maintained .the family life. Refusing at the command of Alexander III. to refrain from holding conventicles and preaching in public, many of them were excommunicated in 1179 and developed into the Lombard division of the Waldenses, while the remainder were faithful to the Church and became the Ordo Humiliatorum. In the beginning of the thirteenth century the Humiliati formed three divisions, the first of which, the original lay community, lived in their own houses, married, and engaged in manual labor, although they observed certain ascetic and religious principles, abstaining from oaths and receiving spiritual instruction on Sunday from one of their number under the supervision of the bishop of their diocese. The second division was the Humiliate monks and nuns, who led a celibate cloister life, and the third was the Humiliate canons, both these classes differing from the lay brethren only in their monastic and priestly character.
All three classes were confirmed by Innocent III. (d. 1216). Although theoretically the lowest, the lay Humiliati were the most numerous and the most influential, and they were later regarded as tertiaries of the order. In the sixteenth century the corruption of the Humiliati led Pius V. to attempt their reform, but in 1569 an attempt was made on the life of Carlo Borromeo, who had been commissioned to carry out the wishes of the pope, and in 1571 the order was suppressed, a portion of its monasteries being given to the Barnabites.
The Humiliate nuns (also called Blassonite Nuns after their supposed first head, Clara Blassoni, of Milan, who flourished about the middle of the twelfth century; and likewise termed Observantine Hospitaller Nuns) were exempted from the papal condemnation and still exist, having five convents in Italy, all independent of each other. Their habit is white, with a black veil in Rome and Vercelli, and that of the lay sisters is gray.
(O. Zockler-J".) Bibliography: Vita S. Johannis de Meda, ASB, Sept., vii. 343-360; H. Tiraboschi, Vetera Humiliatorum monumenta, 3 vols., Milan, 1766-69; Helyot, Ordres monastiques, vi. 152 sqq., K. M uller, Die Anfange des Minoritenordens, PP. 162-167, Freiburg, 1885; Heimbucher, Orden und Kongregalionen, i. 262-263.
HUMILIATION OF CHRIST. See Christology; Kenosis; Jesus Christ, Twofold State of.
HUMILITY: A virtue opposed to pride and arrogance, , best defined, according to St. Augustine, by Matt. xi. 29. It is clear from this passage that the model of mankind is humility in Jesus, who brought it to the world as a new virtue, whereas humility in the sense of mere self-abasement did not first appear in Christ, but forms a part both of all genuine religion and also of mysticism. Accord-
ing to St. Augustine, humilitas implies the complete bowing of the sinner and the creature before God. Religiously speaking, this can only be Augustine's a work of God in man, for inasmuch as Definition, it is dependent on God, it can become intelligible to man only when God reveals it. Yet even in St. Augustine humility is construed not alone as contemplation of God, but also as study of self. This is, however, a fictitious humility, and not the attitude of the " lowly in heart," of whom Jesus speaks. Nevertheless, this very definition of humility as self-abasement produced through self-knowledge, taught both by St. Augustine and St. Bernard, has become the prevalent view, despite its divergence from the words of Christ.
The New Testament clearly shows that Jesus gave his disciples an entirely new teaching regarding humility. The phrase " lowly in Teaching heart " does not designate merely the of the pious, for in the few passages in the New New Testament in which humility is Testament, mentioned stress is laid upon abasement. Little that is definite, however, can be gained from this until it is determined how far Jesus voluntarily abased himself. It is clear, in the first place, that Jesus did not practise introspection, which would have been far different from the simple consciousness of his divine mission. His life was the recognition and the performance of the will of God, and he who loves God with all his heart is above conscious self-examination. Only when it becomes difficult for him to perform the divine will does the thought arise that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. In the second place, the humility which the disciples learned from Jesus was a joyous devotion to humility, but such a feeling could not result from horror at one's own sin. The joyous desire of humility, in the third place, taught in the New Testament is by no means the result of selfknowledge. Despite the current definition of humility as the consciousness of falling short of the perfection of God, as well as of absolute dependence on divine grace and might, this does not imply the " lowly in heart." This connotes a task of the will which is solved in the following of Jesus, but the mental attitude produced by the self-knowledge resulting from the revelation of God can not be feigned.
If the impulse toward humility, of which Jesus was conscious and which he wished his disciples to learn from him, is not the joyous submission Humility to the command of God, it can imply Defined as only that Jesus desired them to have Service, the same wish to serve God as he himself possessed. This is a humility springing from the heart, by which man seeks nothing for himself, but only to be a means to something higher. Such humility characterized the activity of Jesus and formed the thought and purpose of his life. An imitation in this sense is by no means impossible, and such humility is declared by Christ to be the measure of greatness in the kingdom of heaven. While it is true that the man of humility is not inclined to think highly of himself, this is not because he consciously endeavors to
Humility
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