The Formula of the Institute

$11.50

The document called the Formula of the Institute is the basic "rule" of the Society of Jesus. It laid down the fundamental structure of what was to be a new religious order, providing for its general to write, with the advice of his companions, the fuller statutes which became known as the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. The present book, then, deals with the text which expresses the fundamental, original inspiration of the Society.

The Formula arose out of the deliberations of Ignatius of Loyola and his companions in 1539 as a "First Sketch of the Institute of the Society of Jesus." That sketch consisted of five "chapters," or paragraphs, which, with some minor revisions, became the substance of the two papal documents which formally approved the Society: Regimini militantis (1540) of Pope Paul III and Exposcit debitum (1550) of Pope Julius III. In modern editions of the Constitutions, the Formula is regularly printed as a kind of preface which sets forth the original expression of the way of life envisioned for the Society by Ignatius and his companions. Fr. Aldama's commentary presents for its readers the sources, development, and meaning of this "whole essence of our way of life," as one of the contemporaries of Ignatius characterized the Formula.

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