Orders & Societies
Movement
The Rhineland Mystics (Friends of God)
The medieval network of mystics who taught the birth of God in the ground of the soul.
Movement · Founded 1,330 · Rhineland & the Low Countries · Dissolved
Founded by (informal fellowship)
3 teachers in the Atlas
Christian Mysticism →
What it was
In the 14th century a loose fellowship of mystics across the Rhineland and Low Countries — inspired by Meister Eckhart and continued by Tauler, Suso, Ruusbroec and the Devotio Moderna of Thomas à Kempis — taught detachment, inwardness, and the soul’s union with God in its own ground. They called themselves the Friends of God.
Its place in the lineage
The medieval European seedbed of apophatic, ground-of-the-soul mysticism that anticipates much later nondual teaching.
Its tradition
Connected orders
Explore further
The circle · 3 in the Atlas
Each star is a teacher; colour marks how they were tied to the order. Tap a star to open them.
founder / leader
member · raised within
broke away
shaped by it
