Question

[John Paul]

What was the very first order in the church?

[Strictlyinkblot]

Carmelites say they date back to Elijah. Otherwise I'd have to guess Benedictines

[NadaTeTurbe]

The oldest order of monks are basilian, they date back st Basile de Césarée, third century. They are eastern orthodox. 

[marigold]

Actually we maintain just the one order of all monastics, an amazing global brother- and sisterhood That's how it all began, and over time people like St. Benedict and St. Basil (and others) wrote 'rules of life' or 'canons' for their communities and they worked so well that they began to be adopted by other communities as well, eventually becoming established style of 'doing' monastic life, although not like modern Orders in the Roman Catholic Church. For example, some of the famous English abbesses of the early middle ages are recognised as having been 'Benedictines', but I believe this meant they had Benedict's Rule as a general plan for their community life, but they wouldn't have thought of themselves as belonging to a particular official group in the Church called The Benedictine Order. The Diocese of Rome went ahead and multiplied and focused on particular Orders beginning at the turn of the millennium.

[NadaTeTurbe]

In the same time, there was an Irish rule, no ? Or Scottish ? Something in the UK... I studied it this year, but I can't remember at all... 

[Egeria]

I seem to remember that the Cistercians were the first Order (and the Redemptoristines the last). As Marigold notes, the concept of an Order is linked to particular ecclesiological developments in the late Medieval West and so to apply the term to earlier monastics is rather an anachronism.

[John Paul]

The Cistercians!

[Egeria]

But please note that even with the Cistercians, the concept of Order is something of an anomaly as each monastery is autonomous and the Abbot General has rather limited powers. They are more like a communion of communities than the form of Order that developed in the mendicant Orders, and even more so in the Jesuits. (Of course, it is interesting to note how these developments mirror changes in western ecclesiology during the course of the second millennium).

[marigold]

In the same time, there was an Irish rule, no ? Or Scottish ? Something in the UK... I studied it this year, but I can't remember at all... 

​Do you mean the old Celtic forms of monasticism which existed in Ireland, Scotland and parts of England until there was a bunch of Latinisation?

[NadaTeTurbe]

I look at my lesson, and my teacher spoke about "Saint Colomban" who write a rule for irish. 

[Strictlyinkblot]

I thought St. Benedict predated Saint Colomban but I haven't done any study on it. I'm finding the answers you're all coming up with fascinating.

[Gabriela]

I thought St. Augustine's Rule of Life was the first.

[krissylou]

I think there were other Rules running around at the time of Benedict.  His became very popular (in significant part because it was much less strict than the other ones running around).  And I think it was decreed at one point, at least throughout Europe, that All Monasteries Should Use The Rule of Benedict.

So there's a clear continuity with today's OSBs, but still it doesn't really mean the same thing as today when there are some OSBs and some other things and people choose which one to enter.

If you have one order you just have "monasticism."  If you have multiple distinct ones then you have orders!  

[krissylou]

I've heard that the Carmelites and Benedictines often have a good-natured rivalry over which is older (in the Western church at least).

My thought on that is that if you're going back to Elijah, before the time of Christ, you're talking about something different in kind.

But neither of them asked me, so they keep on with their good natured rivalry.

[Nunsuch]

The Cistercians are a reform of the Benedictines, so they are medieval and far from first. The rule of Caesarius of Arles predates Benedict's, I believe, but not that of Basil. 

[Egeria]

The Cistercians are a reform of the Benedictines, so they are medieval and far from first. The rule of Caesarius of Arles predates Benedict's, I believe, but not that of Basil. 

​Nunsuch, the question was about the first Order, which, to the best of my knowledge, was the Cistercians. They were founded at the beginning of the period when Orders emerged, although my memory is hazy on the details of that. Rules are another matter entirely and given that Cistercians follow the Rule of St Benedict, they could hardly be the first. 

[Egeria]

On the subject of Rules, there is also the Rule of the Master, which was written before that of St Benedict and which influenced him although he also modified it.

Another crucial influence, together with St Basil, was St John Cassian (and St Benedict directs his disciples to both of these at the end of his Rule). Although his Institutes are not normally spoken of as a "Rule," the way a monastic rule came to be understood in the West has also developed and is seen in more formal terms to how it is seen in the East. 

[John Paul]

I read the Rule of the Master at New Melleray Abbey!

Almost the same chapter names!

[NadaTeTurbe]

Egeria, I think I do not understand, what is an order ? Why are cistercian an order and benedictine not ? 

 

[Egeria]

Nada, I don't remember all the historical details, and I never was much good at the canonical aspects, but to put it simply (and this is probably an over-simplification as I vaguely remember some exceptions to the rule), until then one simply had autonomous monasteries that followed the Rule of St Benedict but were not joined in any Order. When the Cistercians were founded, they also did not set out to found a new order, but simply a monastery - at Citeaux - in which they could live the Rule more authentically. But because of their rapid growth that led to new foundations, they sought a way of uniting the different houses in order to maintain their fervour and assist one another. This resulted in the Charter of Charity and a General Chapter of Abbots and led to the development of what became a religious order. There is a bit more on this history here that notes that "the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), pointing to the Cistercians as a model, enjoined governance by general chapter upon all religious institutions of the age that had not already adopted it." 

As for the Benedictines, I'm no expert here, but although they are called an Order, they are not really an Order in the same sense, but are rather a confederation of different monastic Congregations. (And although many Benedictines put OSB - signifying membership of an Order - after their name, I am told that this is a rather recent development).