The Brethren of the Common Life was a religious community founded in the 14th century by Gerard Groote, formerly a successful and worldly educator who had had a religious experience and preached a life of simple devotion. A small band of followers attached themselves to Groote and became his fellow-workers, thus becoming the first "Brethren of the Common Life". The reformer, of course, was opposed by the clergy whose evil lives he denounced, but the cry of heresy was raised in vain against one who was as zealous for purity of faith as for purity of morals. The best of the secular clergy enrolled themselves in his brotherhood, which in due course was approved by the Pope. Groote, however, did not live long enough to finish the work he had begun. He died in 1384, and was succeeded by Florence Radewyns, who two years later founded the famous monastery of Windesheim which was thenceforth the centre of the new association. (13th century - 14th century - 15th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was that century which lasted from 1301 to 1400. ... Geert Groote (also know as Gerard) was born in Deventer, Netherlands in 1340 and died there on August 20, 1384. ... The Pope is the Catholic Bishop and patriarch of Rome, and head of the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Catholic Churches. ... Events May / September 3 - Siege of Lisbon by the Castilian army, during the 1383-1385 Crisis Births Deaths December 31 - John Wyclif, theologian Categories: 1384 ...

The Confraternity of the Common Life resembled in several respects the Beghard and Beguine communities which had flourished two centuries earlier and were then decadent. The members took no vows, neither asked nor received alms; their first aim was to cultivate the interior life, and they worked for their daily bread. The houses of the brothers and sisters occupied themselves exclusively with literature and education, and priests also with preaching. When Groote began, learning in the Netherlands was rare; the University of Leuven had not yet been founded, and the fame of the schools of Liège was only a memory. Apart from some of the clergy who had studied at Paris or Cologne, there were no scholars in the land; even amongst the higher clergy there were many who were ignorant of Latin, and the burgher was quite content if when his children left school they were able to read and write. Beguines are lay sisterhoods made up of women who devote themselves to a life of religion without taking monastic vows. ... The Catholic University of Leuven, founded in 1425, is now the names of two Belgian universities, after the original university split in 1968: the Dutch-speaking Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium, and the French-speaking Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium This is a disambiguation page — a navigational... Liège ( Dutch: Luik, German: Lüttich) is a major city located in the Belgian province of Liège, of which it is the capital. ... The Eiffel Tower has become the symbol of Paris throughout the world. ... Map of Germany showing Cologne Cologne skyline at night. ... Latin is the language that was originally spoken in the region around Rome called Latium. ...

Groote determined to change all this, and his disciples accomplished much. Through their unflagging toil in the scriptorium and afterwards at the press they were able to multiply their spiritual writings and to publish them widely. Amongst them are to be found the choicest flowers of fifteenth-century Flemish prose. The Brethren spared no pains to obtain good masters, if necessary from foreign parts, for their schools, which became centres of spiritual and intellectual life; amongst those whom they trained or who were associated with them were men like Thomas à Kempis, Dierick Maertens, Gabriel Biel, and the Dutch Pope Adrian VI. Before the fifteenth century closed, the Brethren of the Common Life had placed in all Germany and the Netherlands schools in which the teaching was given for the love of God alone. A Scriptorium was a room or building, usually within a Christian monastery where, during medieval times, manuscripts were written. ... Thomas à Kempis (1380 _ 1471) was a medieval Christian monk and author of Imitation of Christ, one of the most well_known Christian books on devotion. ... The house where Adrian VI was born Adrian VI (also known as Hadrian VI or Adriano VI), born Adrian dEdel (March 2, 1459 - September 14, 1523), pope from 1522 to 1523, was born in Utrecht, the Netherlands, and studied under the Brethren of the Common Life either at Zwolle...

Gradually the course, at first elementary, embraced the humanities, philosophy, and theology. The religious orders looked askance at these Brethren, who were neither monks nor friars, but the Brethren found protectors in Pope Eugenius IV, Pope Pius II, and Pope Sixtus IV. The great Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa had been their pupil and became their stanch protector and benefactor. He was likewise the patron of Rudolph Agricola, who in his youth at Zwolle had studied under Thomas à Kempis; and so the Brethren of the Common Life, through Cusa and Agricola, influenced Erasmus and other adepts in the New Learning. More than half of the crowded schools -- in 1500, Deventer had over two thousand students -- were swept away in the religious troubles of the sixteenth century. Others languished until the French Revolution, while the rise of universities, the creation of diocesan seminaries, and the competition of new teaching orders gradually extinguished the schools that regarded Deventer and Windesheim as their parent establishments. Eugenius IV, né Gabriel Condulmer (1383 - February 23, 1447) was pope from March 3, 1431 to his death. ... Pope Pius II. Pius II, né Enea Silvio Piccolomini, in Latin Aeneas Sylvius (October 18, 1405 - August 14, 1464) was pope from 1458 to 1464. ... Sixtus IV, born Francesco della Rovere (July 21, 1414 - August 12, 1484) was Pope from 1471 to 1484, essentially a Renaissance prince, the Sixtus of the Sistine Chapel where the team of artists he brought together introduced the Early Renaissance to Rome with a masterpiece. ... Nicholas of Cusa Nicholas of Cusa (ca. ... Rodolphus Agricola (1443 - October 28, 1485), was a Dutch scholar and humanist. ... Zwolle is a municipality and the capital city of the province of Overijssel, Netherlands, 50 miles northeast of Amsterdam. ... Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (also Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam) (October 27, probably 1466 – July 12, 1536) was a Dutch humanist and theologian. ... Events Europes population was ~60 million. ... Deventer is a municipality and a city in the eastern Netherlands in the province of Overijssel on the east bank of the IJssel river. ...