Nothing Called One’s Own

Among their other practices I think it hardly necessary even to mention this virtue: that no one is allowed to own a box or basket as his special property, nor anything of the kind that he could keep as his own and secure with his own seal. For we know well that they are stripped so bare in every respect that they have nothing at all except their shirt, cloak, shoes, sheepskin and rush mat. Even in other monasteries, where some indulgence and relaxation is allowed, we see that this rule is still most strictly kept, so that no one dares to say even in words that anything is his own. It is a great offense if such an expression as “my book,” “my writing tablets,” “my pen,” “my coat” or “my shoes” drops from a monk’s mouth. If some such expression happened to escape his lips through thoughtlessness or ignorance, he would have to make amends for it by a fitting penance. [a]