St Benedict is the father of western monasticism and has a rich and fruitful legacy both through the Rule he wrote as well as through the lives of his spiritual sons and daughters down to the present day. But what makes such a man? St Benedict loved God and all of his decisions flowed from this love of God. When he was on the very threshold of a worldly life he paused and drew back, rejecting the vain curiosities of the world for a life dedicated to God. Living as we do in an age which rejects God for the sake of material pleasure, we can learn much from the example of St Benedict, no matter our state in life.

This work retells all the famous incidents the St Gregory the Great includes in his biography, such as the encounter with the thorn bushes, the attempted poisoning of St Benedict, his defiance of Totila, the king of the Goths and many more, while also drawing on other contemporary sources, such as Mark, the monk poet who lived as a monk under St Benedict.