High Altar

Marble Group of the Passing of St. Benedict: This work was not originally intended for this church and was moved here in 1824 by Nicola, Mario and Paolo Tolomei from the Olivetan monastery of St. Benedict outside Porta Tufi, which had by then fallen into a state of neglect. This work was saved from destruction and brought here by the descendants of that Bernardo Tolomei, now a saint, founder of the Olivetan order. The move is evidenced by a plaque walled behind the altar. The marble sculptural group was made by Giovan Antonio Mazzuoli, a disciple of Bernini in 1693 and was commissioned by the Abbot General of Monte Oliveto Maggiore Ippolito de Vecchis, as mentioned in another inscription behind the altar. The sculptor here captures the moment when, according to the biography of Gregory the Great, St. Benedict, the father of Western monasticism, died standing, praying, supported by two monks here translated into two angels; at the sides two angels carry candles.

"Six days before his death, he had his tomb opened. Assailed then by fever, he began to be prostrated by burning heat. As from day to day the exhaustion became more and more severe, on the sixth day he had himself carried by the disciples to the oratory, where he strengthened himself for the great passage by receiving the Body and Blood of the Lord.

Supporting his limbs, deprived of strength, in the arms of the disciples, standing, with his hands raised to heaven, amid the words of prayer, he breathed his last." 

From: Gregory the Great, Dialogues, Book II