Saint Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini (1808-1858)

Birth at Hardine, into a family of four vocations

Youssef Kassab was born in 1808 at Hardine, a village in North Lebanon, into a Maronite family of six children whom his parents, Girgis Kassab and Mariam Raad, raised in a demanding Christian devotion.^[18] The household would give the Church four consecrated vocations out of six children: Tanios became a secular priest, Elisee withdrew as a hermit for forty-four years, Msihieh entered as a cloistered nun at the monastery of Saint John the Baptist of Hrache, and Youssef himself would become the monk Nimatullah.^[19] As a child, the young boy frequented the monasteries of Saint Doumit and Saint George in his native village, where he absorbed the liturgical and monastic rhythm from a very early age.^[20]

The grandfather, parish priest of Tannourine, and the awakening of the vocation

After his first studies at the monastery of Saint Anthony of Houb, run by the Lebanese Maronite Order, Youssef was sent to his maternal grandfather, Youssef Raad, parish priest of the village of Tannourine, where he learned to recite the Divine Office and was initiated more deeply into the priestly life.^[21] It is this double influence — the monastic example of Houb and the priestly example of Tannourine — that his biographers present as the direct soil of his religious vocation.^[22]

The novitiate at Qozhaya, in the holy valley of Qadisha

In 1828, at the age of twenty, Youssef entered the Lebanese Maronite Order and joined the monastery of Saint Anthony of Qozhaya, nestled in the holy valley of Qadisha, a monastic high place of Maronite Christianity since late Antiquity.^[23] There he took the novice's habit under the name of Nimatullah, which means in Arabic “the grace of God”.^[24] The official biography published by the Holy See for his canonization notes that he was “quickly known for his definitive choice” and served as a model for the other novitiate candidates.^[25]

At the novitiate, the young religious was initiated into community prayer, manual labour and the binding of manuscripts according to the Constitutions of the Order.^[26] His confreres described him spending long hours “kneeling, hands raised to heaven in the form of a cross, eyes fixed on the Tabernacle without moving”^[27] — a prolonged prayer posture that would remain, all his life, one of the most reported traits of his spiritual physiognomy.

Solemn profession and studies at Kfifane

On November 14, 1830, Nimatullah pronounced his solemn vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.^[28] He was then sent to the monastery of Saints Cyprian and Justina of Kfifane, in the district of Batroun, to pursue studies in philosophy and theology, while continuing to take part in the seven hours of the choral office and the field work required by the rule.^[29] The Vatican biography specifies that “because of monastic asceticism and intensive studies”, the young religious fell ill several times during this period, without ever giving up his commitment.^[30] To spare him the fatigue of agricultural labour, his superior entrusted him with maintaining the community's clothing — a tailor's function which he exercised alongside his work binding liturgical manuscripts, a skill acquired from the novitiate onwards.^[31]

Priestly ordination on Christmas Day 1835

Nimatullah Kassab was ordained priest on December 25, 1835, at the monastery of Kfifane.^[32] He was then twenty-seven. From his ordination onwards, he was appointed director of the scholasticate and professor of moral theology, offices he would hold, with interruptions linked to his administrative duties, until his death twenty-three years later.^[33][34] His day remained structured by the Eucharist: according to the official biography, he devoted “half of it to preparing for the Eucharistic celebration and the other half to giving thanks for it”^[35] — a rhythm that left little room for anything but teaching, prayer and manual work.

The master of the future Saint Charbel Makhlouf

Among the many scholastics trained by Father Nimatullah at the monastery of Kfifane was a young monk named Charbel Makhlouf, admitted to the scholasticate in 1853.^[36] The professor discerned his pupil's holiness very early on, and it was Charbel himself who, five years later, would assist his former master in his final moments.^[37] This bond between the two men — one canonized in 1977, the other in 2004 — has remained one of the most recalled traits of Al-Hardini's biography; it is treated in more detail, from Charbel's point of view, in the article devoted to Saint Charbel Makhlouf.

The free “under the oak tree” schools

Convinced of the importance of popular instruction, Father Nimatullah founded two free schools for the children of the monastic neighbourhood: one at Kfifane, the other at Bhersaf, both nicknamed “School under the oak tree” after the great tree beneath which the lessons were held.^[38] This work of instruction, carried out alongside his teaching of theology proper, foreshadowed the educational commitment that several Maronite congregations would develop more widely in the following century.

Three terms as Assistant General, and a repeated refusal

In 1845, at thirty-seven, Nimatullah was appointed by the Holy See as Assistant General of the Lebanese Maronite Order, “on account of his zeal for the perfect observance of the monastic Rules”.^[39] During this first term, he urged the Father Abbot General to send monks to study at the Jesuits' new college of Ghazir; seven religious were finally sent there to ensure the pedagogical continuity of the scholasticate.^[40] From 1848 to 1849, he returned to ordinary community life at the monasteries of Saint Maron of Annaya and Saint Anthony of Houb, before receiving a second term as Assistant General in 1850. In 1853, he returned to Kfifane to resume teaching moral theology — it was there that he would have Charbel Makhlouf as a pupil — then received a third term as Assistant General in 1856.^[41]

Despite this constant readiness for the office of Assistant, Nimatullah systematically refused to be raised to the supreme function of Father General of the Order. His answer, which became famous among Maronite monks, never varied:

“Death rather than being Father General of the Order.” — Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini, quoted in his official biography published by the Holy See for his canonization, May 16, 2004^[42]

This humility, the same source specifies, proceeded from his deep conviction that he was incapable of the “perpetual contact with God” which that supreme service required of him, in his view.^[43] As Assistant General, he resided with the other council members around the Father General at the monastery of Our Lady of Tamiche, the generalate house of the Order, while continuing to travel regularly to Kfifane for teaching and the binding of liturgical manuscripts — a Syriac breviary bound by his hand is still kept there today.^[44]

A charity harsh towards himself, indulgent towards his brothers

His contemporaries described him as “hard and severe towards himself but merciful and indulgent towards his confreres”.^[45] He liked to sum up this rule of fraternal conduct in a maxim he repeated constantly:

“A monk's first concern must be, day and night, not to wound or grieve his confreres.” — Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini, quoted in his official biography published by the Holy See, May 16, 2004^[46]

Witness in the face of the civil wars of 1840 and 1845

Nimatullah lived through, with the whole Christian community of Mount Lebanon, the civil wars of 1840 and 1845, a period marked by the destruction of monasteries, the overturning of churches and the massacre of Maronite Christians, foreshadowing the far bloodier events of 1860.^[47] According to the official biography, he “had offered himself as a holocaust offering for his Lebanon and his Order” during those troubled years.^[48] His spiritual motto, which he then constantly repeated to his confreres to strengthen them, was summed up in one sentence:

“The wise man is the one who saves his soul.” — Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini, quoted in his official biography published by the Holy See, May 16, 2004^[49]

When his own brother, the hermit Elisee, invited him to leave community life to join eremitical solitude, Nimatullah refused and answered him with a sentence that sums up his entire spiritual choice:

“Those who struggle for virtue in community life will have the greater merit.” — Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini, answer to his brother the hermit Elisee, quoted in his official biography published by the Holy See, May 16, 2004^[50]

This deliberate choice of community life — while two of his own siblings had embraced eremitical solitude or enclosure — clearly distinguishes Nimatullah's spiritual path from that, more widely known, of his pupil Charbel Makhlouf, who on the contrary obtained leave to withdraw to a hermitage after sixteen years of conventual life.

“A man of prayer, in love with the Eucharist”

It is with these words that Pope John Paul II summed up, on the very day of his canonization, the whole axis of Nimatullah Al-Hardini's spiritual life:

“A man of prayer, in love with the Eucharist which he loved to adore at length, Saint Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini is an example for the monks of the Lebanese Maronite Order as for his Lebanese brothers and for all the Christians of the world. He gave himself totally to the Lord in a life of great renunciation, showing that the love of God is the only true source of joy and happiness for man. He devoted himself to seeking and following Christ, his Master and Lord.” — John Paul II, canonization homily, Saint Peter's Basilica, May 16, 2004^[51]

The Pope went on to stress the pastoral, and not only contemplative, dimension of this life wholly given to adoration:

“Welcoming to his brothers, he relieved and healed many wounds in the hearts of his contemporaries, bearing witness to them of God's mercy. May his example enlighten our path, and awaken in the young in particular a true desire for God and for holiness, to proclaim to our world the light of the Gospel!” — John Paul II, canonization homily, Saint Peter's Basilica, May 16, 2004^[52]

Sixteen altars for Our Lady, and the dogma of the Immaculate Conception

Nimatullah's Marian devotion holds a central place in his spiritual life: the official biography presents it as “his only support”.^[53] He recited the rosary daily with his confreres and fasted, in honour of the Virgin, every Saturday as well as on the vigils of Marian feasts.^[54] He paid particular attention to the mystery of the Immaculate Conception, proclaimed a dogma of faith by Blessed Pius IX in 1854 — a teaching whose complete doctrinal exposition will be found in the article devoted to the dogma of the Immaculate Conception — and repeated, after each Angelus, the invocation: “Blessed be the Immaculate Conception of the Most Holy Virgin.”^[55] He also encouraged the lay faithful of the surroundings to honour the Mother of God by forming Marian sodalities.^[56]

In the course of his ministry, he had sixteen altars erected consecrated to the Virgin Mary in the monasteries and villages of the region.^[57] One of them, at the monastery of Kfifane, received after his death the name of “Our Lady of Hardini”, in memory of the monk who had had it built.^[58]

Pneumonia contracted in the cold of the mountain winter

In December 1858, while still teaching at the monastery of Kfifane, Nimatullah contracted pneumonia in the harsh cold of the Mount Lebanon winter.^[59] His condition gradually worsened; he asked to be carried to a cell near the church, so that he could still hear the singing of the choral office which he no longer had the strength to attend in person.^[60]

Ten days of agony, and the last consecration to Mary

After ten days of agony, he received the sacrament of the sick holding in his hands an icon of the Virgin Mary, to whom he addressed these last words reported by his confreres:

“O Mary, I entrust my soul to you.” — Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini, last words reported by his confreres, December 14, 1858^[61]

He died on December 14, 1858, at the age of fifty, at the monastery of Saints Cyprian and Justina of Kfifane.^[62][63] His confreres reported having noticed, in the days that followed, “a splendid light in his cell and a fragrance” which embalmed it for some time.^[64]

The witness of his pupil Charbel Makhlouf at the dying man's bedside

Among the monks present at Kfifane during this agony was the young Father Charbel Makhlouf, who had received Nimatullah's teaching of moral theology five years earlier and who assisted him until his last breath, in what Charbel's biographers describe as a “deeply moving ceremony”.^[65][66] Already in his lifetime, Nimatullah was nicknamed by his contemporaries “the saint of Kfifane”, and his death was experienced by the monastic community as the loss of a “man of God and man of learning” who had devoted his entire existence to pastoral care and theological teaching.^[67]

A few years after the burial, in 1862, the opening of his tomb revealed a body found intact — a phenomenon which reinforced, within the Order, his reputation for holiness already established in his lifetime.^[68] This type of observation, frequent in the canonization processes of 19^th-century Lebanese saints — the body of Charbel Makhlouf himself would give rise, forty years later, to a far better documented dossier — is treated with its sources, its methodological limits and its theological status in the article devoted to the incorruptible bodies of the Catholic Church.

Three Lebanese causes accepted together in Rome (1926-1927)

Nimatullah Al-Hardini's cause for beatification was presented in Rome in 1926, at the same time as that of his former pupil Charbel Makhlouf and that of the nun Rafqa Pietra Choboq Ar-Rayès (1832-1914); the three dossiers were formally accepted in Rome the following year, in 1927.^[69] The table below situates these three Lebanese causes, whose outcomes would be spread over nearly forty years.

This table, already presented from Charbel Makhlouf's point of view in the article devoted to him, illustrates the exceptional spiritual density of the Lebanese Maronite Order in the 19^th century: three causes accepted in Rome in the same decade, three canonizations spread over nearly forty years, all emerging from the same monasteries of the Lebanese mountain.^[72] A notable fact: Nimatullah, the first of the three to die (1858), was yet the last to be canonized (2004) — his cause, left dormant for longer, came to fruition only after those of his two younger companions.

A healing that opens the way to beatification

After his recognition as Venerable on September 7, 1989, Nimatullah's cause took a decisive step with the examination of a healing attributed to his intercession: that of André Najm, suffering from a severe blood disorder which required repeated transfusions.^[73] According to the account gathered by several sources, Najm is said to have asked to wear the monastic habit at the blessed's tomb, then to have found himself instantly healed, never again needing a transfusion afterwards.^[74] A medical board unanimously recognized the unexplained character of this healing on February 27, 1997, and the Congregation for the Causes of Saints published its decree on July 1^st of the same year.^[75] On this basis, John Paul II beatified Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini at Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome on May 10, 1998.^[76][77]

Other healings, not formally retained by the Congregation but reported in the popular tradition of the shrine, are attributed to his intercession — notably that of an Orthodox man afflicted with blindness, who came to pray at his tomb.^[78] The second miracle required for the 2004 canonization is not documented with the same precision in the accessible sources; in honesty towards the reader, one must therefore limit oneself here to noting that the Congregation for the Causes of Saints examined and validated it according to the same rigorous procedure as for the beatification, without a detailed and verifiable account of this second case being readily available in French or English.

The canonization of May 16, 2004

On May 16, 2004, John Paul II canonized Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini at Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome, together with five other blesseds: Luigi Orione, Annibale Maria di Francia, Josep Manyanet y Vives, Paola Elisabetta Cerioli and Gianna Beretta Molla.^[79] Nimatullah was thus canonized after his former pupil Charbel Makhlouf (1977) and after Sister Rafqa (2001), herself a member of the Lebanese Maronite Order since 1871: the first of the three to die, in 1858, he is the last to be raised to the altars.^[80][81]

The monastery of Kfifane today

The monastery of Saints Cyprian and Justina of Kfifane, where Nimatullah taught, governed and died, remains today a place of particular pilgrimage in Lebanon: it is there that his remains rest, and it is there too that his pupil Charbel Makhlouf received his theological formation before leaving for the hermitage of Annaya.^[82] The monastery is sometimes designated by local tradition as “the convent of the two saints”, on account of the direct bond between the master and the disciple who lived there, a few years apart, the same community life before their respective sanctifications.

Liturgical feast and cult

His liturgical feast is celebrated on December 14, the anniversary of his death, in the proper calendar of the Maronite Church.^[83] His cult, long confined to Lebanon and the Lebanese diaspora, has extended since his 2004 canonization to many Maronite parishes in North America and Australia, where relics and images of him are now venerated alongside those of Charbel Makhlouf and Saint Rafqa.

A spiritual model for Eastern religious life

Unlike Charbel, who embodies the eremitical path pushed to its most radical end, Nimatullah Kassab Al-Hardini embodies another figure of holiness, equally demanding but turned towards teaching, fraternal government and community life assumed to the end by deliberate choice. The two paths, one eremitical and the other communal-teaching, come together in the same Eastern Catholic Church — the place of the Lebanese Maronite Order among the Eastern Catholic Churches and the liturgical usages proper to this tradition are the subject of an article dedicated to Eastern liturgy.

• Saint Charbel Makhlouf — his pupil at the scholasticate of Kfifane, canonized in 1977.
• Incorruptible bodies — the Catholic dossier of saints' bodies found intact after exhumation.
• The Eastern Catholic Churches — the place of the Maronite Church among the sui iuris Catholic Churches.
• Eastern liturgy — for understanding the Maronite liturgy in which Nimatullah lived and taught.
• The dogma of the Immaculate Conception — the Marian mystery to which Nimatullah devoted a particular devotion.