Gerard Groote was born in 1340, into a rich and worldly family. He entered the University of Paris when he was 15, and graduated with high honors a few years later into a life of  privilege and luxury. When he suddenly perceived the vanity and emptiness of his life, he resigned all his high appointments and wealth and entered (informally) a religious community for three years of poverty, prayer, and discipline. Then, with the blessing of his bretheren, he left the group to become a lay preacher, quickly becoming a sensation. He was the leading evangelist of his time until his his success led a jealous clergy to suspend his “license” to preach. He then established the religious community that Thomas à Kempis would later join. Groote died in the plague of 1386, but his followers succeeded in getting permission to formally establish a monastery near Zwolle, Holland, that Thomas à Kempis would enter in 1399.
Gerard Groote, of course, is the man that some scholars have claimed must have written the Imitation, although there is no direct evidence of this, and no rumor reaches us of the work having existed in his lifetime. What is beyond dispute is that in the monastery, Thomas à Kempis became a noted scribe and the author of several books, including a biography of Gerard Groote.
 (January 1993).iso/Files/Hyper/I-J/If Monks had Macs....cpt/If Monks had Macs.../Imitatio Christi/card_76781_render.png){kind=link}
 (January 1993).iso/Files/Hyper/I-J/If Monks had Macs....cpt/If Monks had Macs.../Imitatio Christi/card_76855_render.png){kind=link}