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Charles Ibalio Mystery of God/Human Person Prof. Cifone On Meister Eckhart: The Culling of Worldly Thought What we have documented and observed from Meister Eckhart, among many things, is that he was a man of multiple names, of several titles, and of many roles. He was born in in 1260 in Gotha, in the Holy Roman empire, as Johannes Eckhart. In his young adulthood, he would join the Dominican Order through the Friars Preacher at the young age of fifteen. Studying, traveling, and teaching, he would live those years in some of the best academic settings possible, travelling from Germany and across Paris (McGinn 10). He would write one of his first works, The Talks of Instruction, at an age where his mastery in theology had not yet come to full fruition, yet it would reveal his sheer potential as a thinker, as McGinn notes: “It is indeed striking how little change there is in the principal structures of his thought between this exciting early work and the later, more sophisticated, sermons of his maturity” (10). Moving on to administrative roles for the following decade, he would be known as Eckhart von Hochheim O.P., and would often be compared to St. Thomas Aquinas, who was recorded to achieve similar feats during his time as a Dominican (11). Following his years as an administrative chair, he would become a Vicar­General in Strasburg, sent to tackle the spreading “heresy” among Beguines, a religious community of women at the time (11). The Council of Vienne saw the increasing threat of the Beguines spreading as a result of their loose affiliation with the Franciscan and Dominican Orders, so it can be said that Eckhart was essentially sent to perform ‘damage control’ and preserve the interests of his order (11).

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With the risk that any theologian takes in writing profound works, Eckhart would encounter much criticism in the following years in the early 1320s, even writing Liber Benedictus as a direct response to those that cast down his views (12). In 1326, Eckhart, despite achieving status and recognition among the Dominican Order, would be charged with heresy by the Archbishop of Cologne. This was seen as an extreme move, since in all other cases (Eckhart was the only Dominican in history to be directly charged with heresy), the accused were first given a trial period for their faiths to be examined (12). What is most interesting is that Eckhart was essentially charged with presenting teachings that people saw as attempting to trump and oppose the doctrines of the Catholic Church, when in reality Eckhart, in his own defense, was simply presenting new angles (13). Eckart died in Avignon in 1328 (15). Throughout the majority of his adult years as well as posthumously, the world refers to him primarily as ‘Meister’ Eckhart. He is regarded as a mystic that has a powerful influence in today’s fundamental, speculative realm of Christian theology. While Eckhart’s background has had significant influence on his career and mysticism, the sheer depth of his analysis is enough to stand on its own, untainted by external classifications that only serve to obscure the true value of his works. In understanding and analyzing the complexities of Eckhart’s teachings, it is useful to approach it as one would approach mysticism as a whole. We shall identify his teachings and appropriate background, as well as negate some of the more challenging misconceptions that one would run into when approaching his works: “The failure to see any single part of Eckhart’s work within the context of the whole, and the whole in the context of his intellectual and social world, remains as much a danger now as it was then” (McGinn 15).

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A distinct characteristic of Eckhart’s prose is that he prioritizes an accurate description of God in the sense that he is extremely careful not to categorize Him. He has a firm belief that describing God is dangerous because it simply is impossible to do so accurately from our perspective as temporal communicators: “[Language] gets in the way by making an object of him, clothing him in concepts and images which are inappropriate to his uncreated nature. But if language is the obstacle, it is also paradoxically the place of our redemption” (33). It is crucial to keep in mind that Eckhart is very conscious that all of his teachings are simply externalizations of divinity. This actually works to his advantage, for he is able to produce a multitude of teachings from many angles. While Eckhart’s strong background as a Dominican does not precede his mysticism, it is clear that his passion for intelligence and his inquisitive, complex analyses were cultivated during his years as a scholar. And though he was privileged to study at the highest institutions, his work does not appeal exclusively to the privileged, but rather speaks to a universal audience. However, throughout his sermons, he has a distinct focus on our higher faculties, and stresses the importance of intelligence. Also, the complexity of his concepts in it of themselves, impart a necessary intellectual capacity to understand him comprehensively. In other words, though Eckhart’s goal is to educate and enlighten on a universal level, the sheer quality of his thoughts would always be more easily discerned by those who could better comprehend his language (though when it comes to application, no sufficient guess could be given as to who is fundamentally better off). Like other mystics, Eckhart acts with the intent to move his audience towards Oneness with God and beyond. However, unlike Marguerite and Bonaventure who use itineraries, and St.

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Antony and Moses who exemplify themselves through their acts, Eckhart revolves more around creating a philosophy. Throughout his works, he commands a dialectical approach in which certain phrases and a particular diction is used to unite all of his points to the wholesome collection of his work (as McGinn describes). It is challenging, therefore, to find a single, optimum starting point to approach all of Eckhart’s teachings, since often all or most of his concepts are naturally weaved together. This is not a mere subjective evaluation, but rather, it is this which makes Eckhart’s work distinct and significantly valuable on the map of mystics. An integral part of Eckhart’s mysticism is the manner in which he speaks ‘in degrees’. That is, in describing something in human nature, he will assess its value “in so far as” it is a certain way towards God. This diction, stylistically and conceptually, is pivotal to understanding Eckhart’s wholesome works, and is very commonly encountered in his sermons and other writings. Eckhart’s focus on intelligence, mentioned above, is a versatile example for comprehending not only this concept, but several of his dialectic “tools”: “Thus Scripture always urges us to abandon the world, to abandon ourselves, to forget our house and the house of our birth, our land and our relations, in order that we may grow to be a great people in which all peoples are blessed. This is brought about most excellently in the domain of the intellect where, in so far as they are intellect and nothing else, all things are without doubt in all things” ­ Sermon 2 (McGinn 294). The above excerpt in it of itself is a very hefty example. Not only does it include Eckhart’s ‘degree’ description on intellect, it is also crafted with his principles of detachment, Oneness, and higher faculties (and that is only scratching the surface). But in order to grasp at this concept, one must know that Eckhart believed that the Intellect (along with the Will and

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Wisdom) is one of the three higher faculties that connects us directly with God. In so far as we utilize our intellect, whether through prayer and/or good works, we essentially become more one with God as opposed to this temporal world (17). Indeed, upon first contact and out of context, Eckhart’s words could easily confuse; What does it mean to abandon oneself and how do we do it? While Eckhart’s words are complex on the surface, at their core they are actually more sound and applicable than one would initially believe: “I say further that all suffering comes from attachment and affection. Therefore, if I suffer on account of transitory things, my heart still has attachment to and affection for transitory things, so that I do not love God with all my heart nor that which God wants me to love together with himself” ­ from Part 2 of The Book of Divine Consolation (McGinn 97). Essentially, Eckhart conveys that a life pleasing in the eyes of God all rests upon the act of sacrifice, in which we will discover that our frequent misfortunes and grievances are, in reality, opportunities that are perpetually coming to us in amounts we too often overlook. When addressing our common, human woes towards pain, insecurity, desire, and loneliness, Eckhart suggests that a mere shift in focus can be utterly life­changing: “...everything which the good person suffers for the sake of God, he or she endures in God and God suffers with them in their suffering” ­ The Book of Divine Consolation (125). The Unity with God that mystics often describe is often something they say is achieved through meditation, or through a divine “ascent” or “descent into the desert”. But for Eckhart, Unity with God can be achieved even in the commonplace of our daily troubles. In so far as we sacrifice for God’s sake, we achieve unity, and in achieving unity with God, we subsequently remove ourselves from a worldly, lesser plane of existence, and transcend our human shortcomings.

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Another name for this concept, and it is one of Eckhart’s more prominent claims­to­fame, is Detachment, in the context of the mind. We can achieve freedom in the soul, towards infinite levels, through realizing that fruit can come from misfortune: “I affirm too that God so wishes to suffer with us and for us when we suffer only for his sake, that [a person] suffers without suffering. Suffering is so blissful for [such person] that suffering is not suffering at all. And so, if we were rightly disposed, suffering would not be suffering for us either, but rather delight and consolation” ­ The Book of Divine Consolation (123). Eckhart provides a truly thought provoking paradox in imparting that strength can be drawn from weakness. What’s more is that he conveys it in such a logical progression that an air of confidence naturally exudes from his words. Though someone who wishes to apply Eckhart’s teachings may desire more situational context (which he does provide in certain sermons), one can agree that from a psychological standpoint, Eckhart is successful in “declawing” perceived harmful experiences in a manner that glorifies God’s mystery. Because Eckhart is able to wield language with such grace, at a level in which most, if not all of his teachings carry an introspective element, it is worth looking into his background of philosophical knowledge (which he often alludes to in his works). In consistency with the excerpts already presented, it is revealed that Plato’s work has had some influence on Eckhart’s thought: “...note that according to Plato the soul is immortal since she can know Wisdom. How much more shall she be immortal if she can know God! Therefore every cognitive faculty from the family of the Intellect is beyond suffering and is accordingly from and in itself immortal” ­ Sermon 1 (289). Here, Eckhart presents somewhat of a negation of a negation. He initially introduces Intellect as a vehicle by which we can endure suffering, but now says that through it,

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we can be beyond suffering, to the point of immortality. The underlying complexity can be traced to Eckhart’s own negation of negation of God, effectively acting as a microcosm (a concept worth investigating but down the line as it will only clutter the thoughts currently being observed). Eckhart also infuses his work with Socratic thought, referenced both directly and indirectly: “Socrates, a pagan master, says that virtues make impossible things possible, even pleasant and easy to do” (129). Again, this idea resonates with Eckhart’s advice on suffering mentioned earlier. The more sermons and works that one should read from Eckhart, the more one will discover that the meister’s thought process is not at all removed from the fundamental contributions of our greater philosophers. In fact, one of Eckhart’s more perplexing points can be interpreted in a Socratic context to make more sense: “If we are to have true poverty, then we must be so free of our own created will as we were before we were created. I tell you by the eternal truth that as long as you have the will to perform God’s will, and a desire for eternity and for God, you are not yet poor. They alone are poor who will nothing and desire nothing…For if God finds us this poor, then God performs his own active work and we passively receive God in ourselves and God becomes the place of his work in us since God works within himself” ­ Sermon 22 (238, 241). Eckhart proposes that we strive towards an impossible level of purity in poverty. Being already tainted by the transitory world simply by being alive, how can one even fathom achieving a state of being before actually being? Socrates himself was respected and glorified for knowing nothing (which Eckhart also mentions is a quality of true poverty) (240). It was Socrates who would do nothing but ask questions, simply because he desired true wisdom, which he passionately and

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tragically knew he wouldn’t achieve in his lifetime. But he did it so frequently and committedly that it eventually became part of his being, both instinctively during his lifetime and in history’s memory of him. Eckhart reveals that unity can be found in the absolute perpetuation of a quality or virtue, to the point that it is no longer bound by time: “Therefore I am my own self­cause according to my essence, which is eternal, and not according to my becoming , which is in time” ­ Sermon 22 (242). It is here where some foundational knowledge in philosophy can be quite helpful. For someone without prior knowledge would find Eckhart’s thoughts on poverty infinitely perplexing, while someone who knows at least a little about Socrates and knows that Eckhart knows about Socrates, would find the same thoughts instead pointing towards a unifying concept: erotic desire. A tragic, erotic desire for Wisdom is what both trapped Socrates and liberated him from the limited nature of this world. But his persistence, in acting upon his love of Wisdom, is what made him United with it. The perpetuity of his effort serves primarily as an illustration of Oneness. Sure, we perceive that at any point in time, Socrates could have deviated from his consistency, but even up until death he never did. His track record in striving towards perfection was so consistent that, though he never achieved it, the record became perfect in it of itself. This is what Eckhart imparts to us in setting an impossible goal, throughout his works. We may never attain true poverty, but it is humanly possible for us to be like Socrates and strive for a perfect effort. Having desire, according to Eckhart’s words, is a sign of imperfection, but like it was for Socrates, it is a necessary impetus in the teleological path towards perfection and oneness. Consistency will eventually engender naturality, which would allow us to perform acts

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without consciously knowing or desiring or willing throughout them, which essentially means that we are allowing a force to passively work within us, which is, indeed, Oneness and Unity with God. An article in Philosophy East and West: A Quarterly of Comparative Philosophy discusses Eckhart’s “chief metaphor”, which is the ground in which we achieve union with God: “The innermost in God is identical with the innermost in us. At this level, there is an ‘absolute unity’ of God and the human person. In this sense, we are already divine, already one with God” (Carter 4). The ground illustrates how we are essentially divine vessels. The idea of Detachment is manifest in Eckhart’s metaphor of the ground, for in so far as we perform altruistic works, we sever our worldliness in exchange for employing God’s will. McGinn provides a useful summation: “In one passage of great rhetorical brilliance Eckhart urges us to enter our own 'ground of humility', which is our lowest part, but it is also our highest part, since God is present there and raises us up, and it is no less our innermost part, for it is our own essence" (McGinn 28). We unlock our transcendental potential in our submission to God. We can better understand this by simply considering "the lowest" and "the highest" in its absolute; they can be achieved simultaneously because regardless if one is 'ascending' or 'descending', the soul travels the same distance. The degree to which our submission to God is realized. The ‘directional’ diction (highs and lows, towards a ground) is a nod to the desirable concept of ‘nothingness’ that is a common theme in mysticism. Professor Carter’s article in Philosophy East and West even identifies Eckhart as “a major source of insight for the positive use of the term ‘nothingness’ in Western literature” (Carter 3). Throughout Eckhart’s works, nothingness, paradoxically carries significant weight and value, and is even held opposite to and

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in much higher regard to ‘somethingness’. For one thing, nothingness is a quality cultivated at the shared ‘ground’: “You should sink your ‘being­you’ into his ‘being­him’, and your ‘you’ and his ‘him’ should become a single ‘me’ so that with him you shall know in eternity his unbecome ‘isnesss’ and his unnameable ‘nothingness’” ­ Sermon 28 (McGinn 271). This is essentially Eckhart illustrating his concept as if to ensure that even the densest of audiences understands. It is worthy to note here that throughout Eckhart’s work, he will often re­iterate or repeat a concept previously covered. This may seem excessive at first, but behind every iteration is a new angle and application, which only showcases Eckhart’s prolificity and mastery of his knowledge. In a similar iteration, nothingness evolves from a quality to an ultimate goal and destination: “And so the soul cannot find God’s somethingness unless first she is reduced to nothingness wherever she may be, whether created or uncreated, as has been said of the eternal image”­ Sermon 30 (McGinn 280­281). The themes of detachment and the ground resonate here. When taken to an extreme, we humble ourselves, becoming so poor in spirit (the theme of ultimate poverty), so lowered, to the point where we are reduced towards nothingness. This is a perpetual, infinite, and eternal process. Nothingness is one of Eckhart’s most difficult concepts to tackle. One problem that many audience members and readers of his work will encounter in reading his collection of sermons is that he will often contradict himself from one sermon to the next. Unfortunately, this frequently happens in his discussions about nothingness, which only adds to the struggle: “What is a pure heart? That heart is pure which is detached from all creatures, for all creatures cause impurity since they are nothingness and nothingness is a deficiency which sullies the soul...They

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touch all things and cause impurity, since they are made of thingness. They are and were nothingness. Nothingness is what is counter to all creatures and displeasing to them” ­ Sermon 19 (223­224). Here, nothingness is considered a negative quality that opposes purity. Nothingness, which was previously established to be something that the soul should strive towards, is instead seen as something detrimental. If both Sermon 30 and 19 were spoken or read in the same sitting, surely confusion would be justified. This problem, however, exemplifies the importance of understanding Eckhart’s words in the context of the whole. This string of seemingly contradictory content is actually consistent with some things that Eckhart establishes. Nothingness is, in fact, counter to creatures because God is not bound by time: “Do you know how God is God? God is God because there is nothing of the creature in him. He has never been named within time. Creatures, sin and death belong to time” ­ Sermon 2 (151). Nothingness is labeled as a deficiency and this does seem ‘negative’, but in reality, Eckhart wants to convey that it is in our human nature, as creatures, to feel struggle against nothingness and lowering of ourselves. This does not eliminate the necessity to desire nothingness, but instead we must seek to abandon our nature as creatures and follow our divine essences, instead. In this case, this becomes simply another iteration of detachment, but the initial confusion itself seems to suggest that Eckhart himself speaks from a detached state, assessing humanity as if distant from it. This subtle implication is tricky to confirm, but if it is the case, it is astounding. By now Eckhart’s use of paradox should be incredibly apparent. What has already been mentioned is challenging material, and in most if not all of Eckhart’s contradictory explanations, it has always been helpful to take a step outwards and look at the bigger picture. This is why, in

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the spirit of “encompassing” his work (without dangerously generalizing, of course), a look at one of Eckhart’s grandest, yet difficult paradoxes is fitting as we finalize this particular analysis of his work: “..that distinction, which is to say distinction within the Trinity, comes from its unity. The unity is the distinction, and the distinction is the unity. The greater the distinction, the greater the unity, since this is the distinction without distinction. If there were a thousand Persons, there would still be only unity” ­ Semon 15 (208). Readers of Eckhart will often note such repetition in his diction (A is B, B is A; A is in B, B is in A). Here, Eckhart invites the audience to stretch their minds and challenges the conventional uses of language. This is striking example of negation, and negation of negation. Ultimately, what he conveys is that Oneness is absolute. Being absolute means remaining Oneself, even growing stronger as Oneself, even if a contrast is presented, for the contrast is simply part of the essence, or what determines Oneself. Oneness, once defined, will always be maintained. What meaning does Eckhart’s words have if it cannot be applied? Where do his teachings leave us, those who are bound by our nature as creatures?: “The action of all creatures is directed towards a final end. The final end is always the first in intention but the last in execution…[God] intends that he should draw the soul, with all her faculties, to this final end, that is, to himself” ­ Sermon 24 (252). At this point, despite my limited knowledge, I shall wager a metaphor to transpose words on a page to images of life. If life were to be represented in One thing, in regards to Eckhart’s work, it would be a terminal. “Terminal”, by definition, is being, or being situated at an end or boundary. But a terminal, like that of an airport, is also a necessary station for departure, or beginning. Contrast, like in the example above, is a necessary element

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of the whole. What something is is necessary, but the existence of what may seem counter to it is also necessary, in order to highlight the true essence using contrast as a reference. To distinguish between what is God and what is not God, we were given an opportunity, in this life, to learn: “Now there is a master who says that all creatures have received their being directly from God; that is why creatures love God by nature more than they do their own selves. If the spirit were to know its own pure state of detachment, then it would not be able to incline to any thing but would remain in its own detached state” ­ Sermon 15 (207). No matter the amount of suffering it may contain, life is essentially a gift. We could have remained uncreated, perfect, and One with God, but he chose for us to go out simply so we could come back. It is a necessary journey that starts and ends at the same horizon, the same ground, the same terminal. We can choose to be enlightened during our lives, or to remain in ignorance. But in the end, nothing changes the fact that nothing but a journey is all that we have before us.

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1. 2.

Sources: Eckhart, Meister, and Oliver Davies. Meister Eckhart: Selected Writings. London: Penguin, 1994. Print. Carter, Robert Edgar. "God And Nothingness." Philosophy East And West: A Quarterly Of Comparative Philosophy 59.1 (2009): 1­21. MLA International Bibliography. Web. 3 Nov. 2014.