“Poor in ourselves and rich in god”: Indwelling and non-identity of being (wesen) and suprabeing (overwesen) in John of Ruusbroec

It is assumed that John of Ruusbroec began his literary activities in approximately 1335-1338.1 In this period, mystical literature was confronted with considerable challenges as a result of the condemnation of a number of statements from Eckhart’s work (1329) and the condemnation of Marguerite Porete (1310).2 Ruusbroec was undoubtedly familiar with both these cases.3 It appears that Ruusbroec intended fundamentally to rethink a number of difficulties, and that he attempted to valorize the radical union with God in a period in which it was becoming increasingly unclear how best to conceive of this union. It is striking that to this end, Ruusbroec never employed polemics, but he sought to rethink the central issues. One such central issue may be found in his analysis of what he calls the wesen of the human person. The way he analyses this aspect, namely in relation to the overwesen, is decisive in discovering how he rethinks the problem of the union with God. Ruusbroec realized that the misunderstanding of the condemned texts concerned precisely this issue, and through meticulous formulation, he attempted to solve this misunderstanding.