History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps

The “Quietists” Jeanne Guyon and François Fénelon argue that self-love can be overcome by cultivating a “pure love” for God. Their reward: to be accused of heresy.

Yes, there were Spanish Protestants! Andrew (Andrés) Messmer joins us to explain how they drew on humanism and philosophy to argue for their religious agenda.

Ignatius of Loyola’s movement begins modestly, but winds up having a global impact on education and philosophy.

Teresa of Ávila and John of the Cross push the boundaries of individual spirituality and offer philosophically informed accounts of mystical experience.

Our last figure of the English Renaissance undertakes daring investigations of chemistry, medicine, agriculture, and cosmology – and gets accused of magic and Rosicrucianism.

Science, intrigue, exploration, angelic seances! It's the life and thought of Elizabethan mathematician and magician John Dee.

How women’s writing in England changed from the early fifteenth century, the time of Margery Kempe, to the late sixteenth century, the time of Anne Lock.

Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples and Julius Caesar Scaliger fuse Aristotelianism with humanism to address problems in logic and literary aesthetics.

A Renaissance queen supports philosophical humanism and produces literary works on spirituality, love, and the soul.

Learned ignorance, coincidence of opposites and religious peace: Paul Richard Blum discusses the central ideas of Nicholas Cusanus.

The radical negative theology of Nicholas of Cusa, and his hope of establishing peace between the religions of the world.

Jewish philosophers in Renaissance Italy, focusing on Leone Ebreo’s Dialogues of Love, the Averroism of Elijah del Medigo, and Italian Kabbalah.

Gregory Palamas and the controversy over his teaching that we can go beyond human reason by grasping God through his activities or “energies”.

Jean Gerson’s role in the political disputes of his day, the spread of lay devotion and affective mysticism, and the debate over the Romance of the Rose initiated by Christine de Pizan.

Julian of Norwich’s Shewings and the Cloud of Unknowing lay out challenging paths to knowledge of, and union with, God.

Dietrich of Freiberg, Berthold of Moosburg, John Tauler and Henry Suso explore Neoplatonism and mysticism.

The scholastic and mystic Meister Eckhart sets out his daring speculations about God and humankind in both Latin and German.

Marguerite Porete is put to death for her exploration of the love of God, The Mirror of Simple Souls.