Golden age of the French mysticism: A different perspective. The study of the spiritual literature of the late Middle Ages, from Jean Gerson to Lefevre d'Etaples

The main goal of my dissertation is to prove that at the end of the Middle Ages in France the spirituality inherited from the medieval tradition acquires new, specific, and national features that distinguish it from the spirituality of neighboring countries. Moreover, the French spiritual movement, compared to Italian and Germanic ones, gains its national character and expression as if against its own will, while aiming to preserve the universal impact of the medieval tradition.;Using diachronic and synchronic approaches, this study tries to prove that the French spirit paradoxically found its first national expression in spirituality and mysticism, which, combined with the humanistic interests of French theologians, took the form of what may be called mystical humanism, a term which seems to suit the new French spirituality of the Late Middle Ages. I use the diachronic approach on different levels of the dissertation: first of all in historical chapters, second in the chronological structure of the dissertation, and third in diachronic comparisons (1) between the return to affective theology during the fifteenth and twelve centuries, and (2) between the spirituality of Jean Gerson and Jacques Lefevre d'Etaples. In the first case, a diachronic approach is necessary in order to preserve the continuity of the Christian tradition, while in the latter case it is necessary in order to prove the continuity of thought from Gerson to Lefevre. I also use a synchronic approach on two levels of the dissertation: (1) in order to compare the early French mystical humanism of Jean Gerson to the humanism of Petrarch and the mysticism of the Germanic countries and (2) in order to compare the spirituality of Lefevre d'Etaples to Italian neoplatonism and to Germanic religious thought represented by devotio moderna and Nicolas of Cusa.;The major chapter of the dissertation is based on sermons, poems, treatises, speeches and letters of Jean Gerson and examines his spirituality. The last part of the dissertation analyzes the influence of Gerson's ideas on the writings of Jacques Lefevre d'Etaples and his collaborators.