''Pie postulatio voluntatis'' () is a

papal bull A papal bull is a type of public decree, letters patent, or charter issued by the pope of the Catholic Church. It is named after the leaden Seal (emblem), seal (''bulla (seal), bulla'') traditionally appended to authenticate it. History Papal ...

issued on 15 February 1113 by Pope Paschal II, in which the Pope formally recognized the establishment of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), is a Catholic military order. It was founded in the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem in the 12th century and had headquarters there ...

and confirmed their independence and sovereignty. Today, the document is preserved at the National Library of Malta in

Valletta Valletta ( ; , ) is the capital city of Malta and one of its 68 Local councils of Malta, council areas. Located between the Grand Harbour to the east and Marsamxett Harbour to the west, its population as of 2021 was 5,157. As Malta’s capital ...

Malta Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya. The two ...

Background

The origins of the Knights Hospitaller go back to around 1048, when the Fatimid Caliph Al-Mustansir Billah gave permission to merchants from the Republic of Amalfi to build a hospital in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

. The community which ran the hospital became independent during the

First Crusade The First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the Middle Ages. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Muslim conquest ...

in around 1099, under the leadership of Grand Master Blessed Gerard.

The bull

Pope Paschal II granted the bull to the Blessed Gerard on 15 February 1113. In it, the Pope formally recognized the foundation of the Hospital, which became a lay-religious order under the sole protection of the Church. The bull gave the Order the right to elect its Grand Masters without interference from external authorities. The knights of the Order were bound by three vows: poverty, chastity and obedience. The bull formed the legal basis of the

independence Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...

and

sovereignty Sovereignty can generally be defined as supreme authority. Sovereignty entails hierarchy within a state as well as external autonomy for states. In any state, sovereignty is assigned to the person, body or institution that has the ultimate au ...

of the Order. The document is preserved at the National Library of Malta in

Commemorations

The 900th anniversary of the papal bull was commemorated by the

Sovereign Military Order of Malta The Sovereign Military Order of Malta (SMOM), officially the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta, and commonly known as the Order of Malta or the Knights of Malta, is a Catholic lay religious ...

(SMOM) with a two-day International Conference in

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, which was attended by around 5,000 people. The conference began on 7 February 2013, and it ended on 9 February with a mass held by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone at St. Peter's Basilica. The branches of the SMOM around the world also commemorated the anniversary with a number of initiatives. Poste Magistrali, the Order's postal service, issued a set of two stamps and Malta's postal authority MaltaPost issued a miniature sheet to commemorate the anniversary.

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References

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External links