636 Ruysbroeck, Jan van, Blessed
Longman, 1996); Thomas S. Noonan, “European Russia,
c.900–1016,” in The New Cambridge Medieval History.
Vol. 3, c. 900–c. 1024,ed. Timothy Reuter (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1999), 487–513; P. B.
Golden, “Rus ́,” Encyclopedia of Islam,8:618–629.
Ruysbroeck, Jan van, Blessed(Ruusbroec, Rus-
brochius)(1293–1381)Flemish mystic, participant in the
movement of Free Spirit
Jan van Ruysbroeck was born in 1293 at Ruusbroec, a
small town near Brussels in BRABANT. In 1304 he moved
to Brussels, where he was educated at the school of the
collegiate church. Intended for the priesthood, he was
ordained in 1317. For 25 years, he was the vicar of the
collegiate church of Saint Gudule but in close contact
with BEGUINESof Brussels. Through them he was proba-
bly exposed to the writings of HADEWIJCH OFANTWERP,
Beatrice of Nazareth (ca. 1200–68), and MARGARET
PORETTE. This led him to the ideas of the FREESPIRIT.
Under the influence of Meister ECKHART, and trying
to promote a more orthodox spirituality, yet at the
same time one critical of the institutional church, he
wrote spiritual and mystical treatises in the VERNACULAR,
Flemish or Middle Dutch. His great work, among several
others, was Adornment of Spiritual Marriage. Some of
these were later translated into LATIN.
Around Easter of 1343, Ruysbroeck moved with
some friends to Groenendaal in the forest of Soignes,
where they lived for seven years in a community without
rule. In 1350 they adopted the AUGUSTINIAN RULE
becoming a community of regular canons. There he was
perhaps visited by JOHNTauler and undoubtedly by his
disciple, Gerhard GROOTE. He died at Groenendaal on
December 2, 1381. In 1908 he was beatified by the pope,
and his feast is commemorated in dioceses in Flanders on
December 2.
See alsoDEVOTIO MODERNA;KEMPIS,THOMAS À; MYS-
TICISM,CHRISTIAN.
Further reading:Louis K. Dupré, The Common Life:
The Origins of Trinitarian Mysticism and Its Development
by Jan Ruusbroec (New York: Crossroad, 1984); Paul
Mommaers, The Land Within: The Process of Possessing
and Being Possessed by God According to the Mystic Jan van
Ruysbroeck,trans. David N. Smith (Chicago: Franciscan
Herald Press, 1975); Paul Verdeyen, Ruusbroec and His
Mysticism, trans. André Lefevere (Collegeville, Minn.:
Liturgical Press, 1994).