Apologia ad Guillelmum

Bernard of Clairvaux's Apologia ad Guillelmum was written in 1125 at the ostensible request of his friend William of Saint-Thierry.

[1] While the use of religious art gradually came to be accepted by the mainstream, its rejection within certain limits remained a constant throughout the Middle Ages.

Since Benedictines were one of the richest and most influential segments of society, the controversy was not limited to aesthetic questions, but the monks' influence in general.

In this criticism, what he most objects to is not monumental sculpture and painting but rather liturgical art, that is, works often of gold, silver, and jewels that were used in the liturgy and often in the Cult of Relics.

Following in the patristic tradition, Bernard also sees art as in opposition to the care of the poor, his most significant social objection external to monasticism properly speaking.