SUMMARY: The cultural attitude, characteristic of the first franciscanism, of narrating the intimate union between God and man, is a note which it has in common with its epoch and is preceded by a high reflection of European dimensions. However, one perceives in the mysti­cal-literary testimony of the Franciscans a novelty which is here presented under some of its particular aspects. Love and knowledge constitute the form and contents of a phenomeno­logy of relationship between God and man, which, before being a speculative system, is nar­rative theology of the non fideistic escape from human nature and of the consideration of the same nature, made companion of God-Love, even in the flesh.