§ 33. JOHN OF RUYSBROECK. 273
The presentation is crude, and Scripture is not directly quoted. The biblical imagery, however, abounds, and, as in the case of the ancient allegory of Hennas, the principles of the Gospel are set forth in a way adapted, no doubt, to reach a certain class of minds, even as in these modern days the methods of the Salvation Army appeal to many for whom the discourses of Bernard or Gerson might have little meaning.!
Rulman Merswin is regarded ^ Denifie, Strauch and other critics a^ tlieliullior~or Hie^ works ascribed to the Friend of God from the Oberland, and the inventor of this fictitious personage. 2 The reason for this view is that no one else knows of the Oberlander and that, after Rulman's death, attempts on the part of the Strassburg brotherhood to find him, or to find out something about him, resulted in failure. On the other hand, it is difficult to understand why Rulman did not continue to keep his writings secret till after his own death, if the Oberlander was a fictitious character.^
Whatever may be the outcome of the discussion over the historic personality of the man from the Oberland, we have in the writings of these two men a witness to the part laymen were taking in the affairs of the Church.
§ 33. John of Ruysbroeck.
Independent of the Friends of God, and yet closely allied with them in spirit, was Jan von Ruysbroeck, 1293-188J.. In 1350, he sent to the Friends in Strassburg his Adornment of the Spiritual Marriage — Chierheit der gheesteleker
1 Strauch, p. 208, and others regard Merswin's works as in large part compilations from Tauler and other writers. Strauch pronounces their contents garrulous — geschwdtzig. The Nine Bocks used to be printed with Suso's works. Merswin's authorship was established by Schmidt.
^ Bulman hat den Gottesfreund einfach erfunden. Strauch, p. 217.
3 Preger and Schmidt are the chief spokesmen for the historic personality of the man from the Oberland. Rieder has recently relieved Rulman from the stain of forgery, and placed the responsibility upon Nicolas of Lowen, who entered das grime Wort in 1366. The palaeographic consideration is emphasized, that is, the resemblance between Nicolas' handwriting and the script of the reputed Oberlander.
T
274 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
Bruloeht. He forms a connecting link between them and the Brothers of the Common Life. The founder of the latter brotherhood, de Groote, and also Tauler, visited him. He was probably acquainted with Eckart's writings, which were current in the Lowlands. ^
The FlemishjnjstJ^c was born in a village of the same name near Brussels, and became vicar of St. Gudula in that city. At sixt^lie4UianilQnjed^iJie._Sficulai^4ynesthood and put on the monastic habit, identifying himself with the recently established Augustinian convent Groenendal, — Green Valley, — located near Waterloo. Here he was made prior. Ruysbroeck spent most of his time in contemplation, though he was not indifferent to practical duties. On his walks through the woods of Soignes, he believed he saw visions and he was otherwise the subject of revelations. He was not a man of the schools. Soon after his death, a fellow-Augustinian wrote his biography, which abounds in the miraculous element. The very trees under which he sat were illuminated with an aureole. At his passing away, the bells of the convent rang without hands touching them, and perfume proceeded from his dead body.
The title, doctor ecstaticus, which at an early period was associated with Ruysbroeck, well names his characteristic trait. He did not speculate upon the remote theological themes of God's being as did Eckart, nor was he a popular preacher of every-day Christian living, like Tauler. He was a master of the _contemphitiye liabit, and mused upon the soul's experiences in its states of partial or complete union with God. His writings, composed in his mothertongue, were translated into Latin by his pupils, Groote and
^ The extent to which Eckart influenced the mystics of the Lowlands is a matter of dispute. The clergy strove to keep his works from circulation. Langenberg, p. 181, quotes Gerherd Zerbold von Ziitphen's, d. 1398, tract, De lihris Teutonicalihus, which takes the position that, while wholesome books might be read in the vulgar tongue, Eckart's works and sermons were exceedingly pernicious, and not to be read by the laity. Langenberg, pp. 184-204, gives descriptions and excerpts from four MSS. of Eckart's writings in Low German, copied in the convent of Nazareth, near Brcdevoorde, and now preserved in the royal library of Berlin, but they do not give Eckart as the author.