{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2020}} {{short description|French Benedictine and bishop}} {{Infobox Christian leader|birth_date={{circa}} 1115|birth_place=Troyes|death_date=20 February 1183|death_place=Chartres|church=Roman Catholic|diocese=Chartres|appointed=1181 }} '''Peter Cellensis''', also known as '''Peter of Celle''', '''Peter of Celles''', '''Pierre de Celle''' and '''Peter de la Celle''', (c. 1115 in Troyes<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://mercury.select-servers.com/~theseus/cc/bishops/bpetercelle.html |title=Peter of Celle, Bishop of Chartres (1181-1183) |access-date=17 February 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170810012208/http://mercury.select-servers.com/~theseus/cc/bishops/bpetercelle.html |archive-date=10 August 2017 |url-status=dead }}</ref> – 20 February 1183, at Chartres) was a French Benedictine and bishop.
==Life== He was born into an aristocratic family of Champagne and educated in the Cluniac Priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs at Paris. He spent part of his youth at Provins with his long-term friend John of Salisbury.<ref name="Haseldine, Cambridge, 1993">{{cite journal|url= https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-ecclesiastical-history/article/div-classtitlefriendship-and-rivalry-the-role-of-amicitia-in-twelfth-century-monastic-relationsdiv/9C61A8450F37D09937DF2A994BC6938B|author1= J. Haseldine|title= Friendship and Rivalry: The Role of Amicitia in Twelfth-Century Monastic Relations|journal= Journal of Ecclesiastical History|volume= 50|issue= 3|publisher= Cambridge University Press|date= 1 July 1993|pages= 390–414|doi= 10.1017/S0022046900014159|s2cid= 163021202|access-date= 22 July 2018|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20180722184436/https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-ecclesiastical-history/article/div-classtitlefriendship-and-rivalry-the-role-of-amicitia-in-twelfth-century-monastic-relationsdiv/9C61A8450F37D09937DF2A994BC6938B|archive-date= 22 July 2018|url-status= live|url-access= subscription}}: at Reference n. 11 and n. 12.</ref><ref>{{cite conference|url= https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002181029|author=McLaughin, John|title= Amicitia ''in practice: John of Salisbury ''(c. ''1220-1180) and his circle''|editor= Williams, Daniel|conference= England in the Twelfth Century: Proceedings of the 1988 Harlaxton Symposium|publisher= Woodbridge, Suffolk [England]; and Boydell Press, in 1990.|pages= 165–81|isbn= 0851155316|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20180723161238/https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002181029|archive-date= 23 July 2018|url-status= live}} , cited by {{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN0198702566|author1= Hugh M. Thomas|title= The Secular aClergy in England, 1066-1216|publisher= Oxford University Press|year= 2014|isbn= 978-0-19-870256-6|page= 200|access-date= 23 July 2018}} at reference n. 58</ref> Became a Benedictine, and in 1150 was made Abbot of "La Celle" in Saint-André-les-Vergers, near Troyes, where he got his surname, Cellensis.
In 1162 he was appointed Abbot of St. Rémy at Reims, and in 1181 he succeeded John of Salisbury as Bishop of Chartres. He was highly regarded by many other churchmen of his time such as Thomas Becket, Pope Eugene III and Pope Alexander III.<ref name=CE>[https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11762b.htm Peter Cellensis] - Catholic Encyclopedia article</ref>
==Works== His literary productions were edited by Janvier<ref>Paris, 1671</ref> and reprinted in ''Patrologia Latina'' (202:405-1146),.<ref name=CE/> They consist of 177 epistles, 95 sermons, and four treatises.<ref name=CE/> The treatises were titled: *''Epistola ad Joannem Saresberiensem''<ref>Petrus Cellensis [MED], Epistola ad Joannem Saresberiensem [v202.13] - [https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/efts/PLD/PLD.bib.html Patrologia Latina Database Bibliography]</ref> *''De panibus''<ref>Petrus Cellensis [MED], De panibus [v202.14] - [https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/efts/PLD/PLD.bib.html Patrologia Latina Database Bibliography]</ref> *''Mystica et moralis expositio Mosaici tabernaculi''<ref>Petrus Cellensis [MED], Mystica et moralis expositio Mosaici tabernaculi [v202.15] - [https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/efts/PLD/PLD.bib.html Patrologia Latina Database Bibliography]</ref> *''De conscientia''<ref>Petrus Cellensis [MED], De conscientia [v202.16] - [https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/efts/PLD/PLD.bib.html Patrologia Latina Database Bibliography]</ref> *''Tractatus de disciplina claustrali''<ref>Petrus Cellensis [MED], Tractatus de disciplina claustrali [v202.17] - [https://www.lib.uchicago.edu/efts/PLD/PLD.bib.html Patrologia Latina Database Bibliography]</ref>
His letters were edited separately and are believed to be valuable from an historical standpoint.<ref name=CE/>
According to the ''Catholic Encyclopedia'' (1913), his sermons and treatises "are extremely bombastic and allegorical".<ref name=CE/>
In addition to the four treatises (De Disciplina Claustrali, De Conscientia, De Puritate Animae and De Affiictione et Lectione), Peter of Celle composed five commentaries (two on Ruth, two on the Tabernacle of Moses and ''De Panibus'', an account of the references to bread in the Bible).<ref name="Haseldine, Cambridge, 1993" /><ref group= "Note">These works appear in PL ccii. 397–1146</ref> An account of them appears in Marcel Viller et al., ''Dictionnaire de Spiritualité'', 14 vols to date, Paris 1937.<ref name="Haseldine, Cambridge, 1993" /><ref>{{cite journal|author1=Marcel Viller|year=1950|title=Dictionnaire de spiritualité ascétique et mystique|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_lookup?title=Dictionnaire+de+Spiritualit%C3%A9&publication+year=1937&author=Viller+M.|journal=Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale|language=fr|volume=55|issue=3|pages=336}}</ref>
==Modern editions== * Peter of Celle, ''Selected Works: Sermons, the School of the Cloister, On Affliction and Reading, On Conscience'', trans Hugh Feiss, CS, (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1987) * Peter of Celle, ''The Letters of Peter of Celle'', ed. and trans. Julian Haseldine (Oxford, OUP, 2001)
==Notes== {{reflist|group=Note}}
==References== {{reflist}}
== External links == *{{CathEncy|wstitle = Peter Cellensis}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cellensis, Peter}} Category:1110s births Category:1183 deaths Category:People from Troyes Category:French Benedictines Category:Bishops of Chartres Category:12th-century French Roman Catholic bishops Category:French abbots