Portrait of Jean Gerson

Jean Gerson

French academic

Lived
1369–1429
Country
France

Updated September 2026

About Jean Gerson

Jean Charlier de Gerson was a French Roman Catholic scholar, educator, reformer, and poet, Chancellor of the University of Paris, a guiding influence of the conciliar movement and one of the most prominent theologians at the Council of Constance. He was one of the first thinkers to develop what would later come to be called natural rights theory, and was also one of the first individuals to defend Joan of Arc and proclaim her supernatural vocation as authentic.

Biography from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Photo via Wikimedia Commons.

Sources: book lists and dates from Wikidata and Open Library, ratings from Open Library readers. Last updated September 2026.