⛪ Saint of the Day : January 7
⛪ Other Names :
• Reinhold of Koln • Reinhold of Dortmund • Rainald, • Reinold • Reinout • Reynold • Rinaldo • Rinold
⛪ Memorial :
• 7 January • Formerly 7 March
⛪ Died :
• Beaten to death with hammers by stone masons in 960 at Cologne, Germany • Body thrown in the Rhine River • Body later found through divine revelation • Relics transferred to the church of Saint Rheinold in Dortmund, Germany in 1059 • Some relics transferred to Cologne, Germany • Some relics transferred to Toledo, Spain in 1616.
⛪ Patronage :
•Against plague • Sculptors • Stone masons • Stonecutters • Dortmund, Germany
⛪ Symbols :
• Monk with a stone mason‘s hammer • Monk being killed by the stone masons • Dead monk being thrown into water • Knight holding a hammer
His life is based purely on legend. When one tries to find out some facts, one arrives at the next reconstruction of his life.
He would be of noble origin. According to the legend, even from the lineage of Charlemagne. That same legend counts him as one of the Four Heemskinderen, of whom there was indeed one Reinhold, but presumably the legend here wants to connect different things. At a good time in his life he would have given the weapons to become a hermit.
Because in those years it was just built at the cathedral in Cologne, he offered himself as a simple mason to the bishop under whose leadership the construction was. In this way he believed he could contribute to the building of God's church in this world. For someone of nobility, doing manual work was indeed an act of great humility: the nobility did not work; there she stood up, literally ...
To see how the legend represents these facts and for the rest of the story, let us follow the literal text of the legend.
Saint Reinhold was born from noble parents. He came to Cologne and became a Benedictine monk in the monastery named after St. Pantaleon. There he served God from the bottom of his heart and even performed a good number of miracles. By order of his abbot, our man became a mason. He worked harder and thus produced more than the other stone mason. So they began to give him a heart full of hatred, and they discussed among themselves how they could make him from alive to death. And they made a mutual agreement for that. Our servant of God had the habit of regularly visiting all monasteries and churches in the neighborhood; in doing so he always gave alms to the poor, who were already waiting for him. When the bunch of villains got air, they were intensely satisfied, because that gave them the opportunity to carry out their misdeeds. So on one of those days they got hold of him in a quiet place, and hit him with hammer so hard on his head that his brain was dripping on the ground. They took off his clothes so that no one could recognize him. To exclude any suspicion against them, they threw him into the depths of the Rhine. Meanwhile, his abbot had instructed all his monks and fellow brothers to seek him. But in vain.
Some time later it happened that a woman became seriously ill on her mind, which continued for many years. There was no doctor who knew what to do, and finally she began to wish she was dead, and she prayed that God would put an end to her life and pain. Only after midnight did she finally fall asleep, asleep. In her sleep she had a dream face: A beaming male came to her and said to her: "Go to the water where Saint Reinhold was killed by the stonemasons, then you will feel better." He pointed out her a place just outside the city. Woke up she remembered her dream and told her friends about it. Those friends immediately brought her to the designated place in the hope that she would regain her health there. Once there, the corpse of the saint appeared on the surface of the water and indeed that woman became healthy at that moment. She immediately got up from her bed, started helping the others who were trying to get rid of the corpse and carried it with the others to his monastery.
Much later, the believers from Dortmund came to the bishop of Cologne and asked for the body of a saint. Then the bishop gathered all his clergy around him with the question: "What saint will we give these people?" While still waiting and weighing, the reliquary of Saint Reinhold himself came there and prepared himself at the door of the church. Everyone understood that he was the designated saint to protect the people out there. Now all the clergy and all the believers came together, they made a much nicer reliquary for the saint and then brought him from Cologne to Dortmund. And the Cologne people walked along with them for another three miles with great praise and other expressions of heartfelt piety.
[Fre.1964p: 209]
The transfer of his relics to the Sankt-Reinoldikirche in Dortmund took place in 1059. There are also several Cologne churches and since 1616 there are also in Toledo.
At Solingen there is a chapel where the hammer was thrown into the air according to the popular belief in Reinouts in Cologne.