abbotArticle Free Pass abbot, Late Latin and Greek Abbas, the
superior of a monastic community that follows the Benedictine
Rule (Benedictines, Cistercians, Camaldolese, Trappists) and of
certain other orders (Premonstratensians, canons regular of the
Lateran). The word derives from the Aramaic ab (“father”), or
aba (“my father”), which in the Septuagint (the Greek
translation of the Old Testament) and in New Testament Greek was
written abbas. Early Christian Egyptian monks renowned for age
and sanctity were called abbas by their disciples, but, when
monasticism became more organized, superiors were called
proestos (“he who rules”) in the East and the Latin equivalent,
praepositus, in the West. St. Benedict of Nursia (c. 480–c. 547)
restored the word abbas in his rule, and to this early concept
of spiritual fatherhood through teaching he added the concept of
patria potestas, authority wielded by a father according to
Roman law. Thus, the abbot has full authority to rule the
monastery in both temporal and spir