Abstract
This project reassesses the theological stakes of the Quietist controversy by recovering a neglected mystical-anthropological doctrine: the "division of the soul." Condemned in Pope Innocent XII's Cum alias (1699), this teaching—as defended in the mystical writings of François Fénelon (1651-1715) and Jeanne Guyon (1648-1717)—held that, in advanced stages of spiritual purification, the soul's superior and inferior parts become separated. Although long overshadowed in the scholarship by debates over Fénelon's controversial doctrine of "pure love," the division of the soul played a decisive role in the Roman censure and in the subsequent marginalization of mysticism within Catholic thought. Combining close textual analysis, historical contextualization, and archival research, the study pursues four objectives: (1) elucidating the anthropological, Christological, and moral implications of the doctrine in Fénelon and Guyon; (2) testing its alleged roots in earlier mystical authorities and its relation to shifting early modern conceptions of selfhood; (3) tracing how anti-Quietist theologians and literary authors weaponized the doctrine in their writings; and (4) examining its afterlife in the early eighteenth century. By examining this overlooked doctrine, the project offers a new account of why Quietism provoked such alarm and how it shaped the history of Catholic mysticism.
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