Meister Eckhart

Eckhart von Hochheim

Other names	"Meister Eckhart"
Born	Around 1260 Near Gotha, Holy Roman Empire
Died	1327 or 1328 Avignon?
Era	Medieval philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
Influenced by Bible, Pseudo-Dionysius, Augustinus, Proclus, Albertus Magnus, Avicenna, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, School of Saint Victor, Johannes Scottus Eriugena
Influenced John Tauler, Henry Suso, Nicholas of Cusa, Martin Heidegger, Eckhart Tolle

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13th and 14th centuries Dominican mysticism Dominic de Guzmán German mysticism Meister Eckhart Johannes Tauler Henry Suso Flemish mysticism John of Ruysbroeck Franciscan mysticism Francis of Assisi Anthony of Padua Bonaventure Jacopone da Todi Angela of Foligno Female mysticism Bridget of Sweden Catherine of Siena
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20th century Pio of Pietrelcina Maria Valtorta Therese Neumann Marthe Robin Adrienne von Speyr Faustina Kowalska Lúcia Santos Thomas Merton
Contemporary Papal views Aspects of meditation Reflection on the New Age

Eckhart von Hochheim O.P. (c. 1260 – c. 1327), commonly known as Meister Eckhart [ˈmaɪ̯stɐ ˈɛkʰaʀt], was a German theologian, philosopher and mystic, born near Gotha, in the Landgraviate of Thuringia in the Holy Roman Empire.

Eckhart came into prominence during the Avignon Papacy, at a time of increased tensions between the Franciscan Order and Eckhart's Dominican Order of Preachers. In later life he was accused of heresy and brought up before the local Franciscan-led Inquisition, and tried as a heretic by Pope John XXII. He probably died before his verdict was received.^{[citation needed]}

He was well known for his work with pious lay groups such as the Friends of God and succeeded by his more circumspect disciples of John Tauler and Henry Suso.^{[citation needed]} Since the 19th century, he has received renewed attention. Within popular spirituality he has acquired a status as a great mystic, though contemporary scholarship places him properly within the mediaeval scholastic and philosophical tradition.

Biography

Youth

Eckhart was probably born in the village of Tambach in the Landgraviate of Thuringia, approximately 1260. He was born to a noble family of landowners, but little is known about his family and early life except that he attended the University of Paris. There is no authority for giving him the Christian name of Johannes which sometimes appears in biographical sketches, his Christian name was Eckhart; his surname was von Hochheim.

Church career

Predigerkirche

Eckhart joined the Dominicans at Erfurt, and it is assumed he studied at Cologne. Later he was Prior at Erfurt and Provincial of Thuringia. In 1300, he was sent to Paris to lecture and take the academic degrees, and remained there till 1303. At this point he returned to Erfurt, and was made Provincial for Saxony, a province which reached at that time from the Netherlands to Livonia. Complaints made against him and the provincial of Teutonia at the general chapter held in Paris in 1306, concerning irregularities among the ternaries, must have been trivial, because the general, Aymeric of Piacenza, appointed him in the following year his vicar-general for Bohemia with full power to set the demoralized monasteries there in order.

In 1311, Eckhart was appointed by the general chapter of Naples as teacher at Paris. Then follows a long period of which it is known only that he spent part of the time at Strasbourg. A passage in a chronicle of the year 1320, extant in manuscript (cf. Wilhelm Preger, i. 352–399), speaks of a prior Eckhart at Frankfurt who was suspected of heresy, and some have referred this to Meister Eckhart. It is unusual that a man under suspicion of heresy would have been appointed teacher in one of the most famous schools of the order, but Eckhart's distinctive expository style could well have already been under scrutiny by his Franciscan detractors.

Accusation of heresy

The Meister Eckhart portal of the Erfurt Church

The Meister Eckhart portal of the Erfurt Church

Eckhart next appears as teacher at Cologne, where the archbishop, Hermann von Virneburg, eventually accused him of heresy before the Pope. Eckhardt addressed his sermons during a time of disarray among the clergy and monastic orders, rapid growth of numerous pious lay groups, and the Inquisition's continuing concerns over "heretical" movements throughout Europe.

But Nicholas of Strasburg, to whom the pope had given the temporary charge of the Dominican monasteries in Germany, promptly exonerated him. The archbishop, however, further pressed his charges against Eckhart and against Nicholas before his own court, forcing them to deny the competency of the archepiscopal inquisition and demanded litterce dimissorix (apostoli) for an appeal to the Pope.

On 13 February 1327, he stated in his protest, which was read publicly, that he had always detested everything wrong, and should anything of the kind be found in his writings, he now retracts. Of the further progress of the case there is no information, except that Pope John XXII issued a bull (In agro dominico), 27 March 1329, in which a series of statements from Eckhart is characterized as heretical; another as suspected of heresy (the bull is given complete in ALKG, ii. 636–640). At the close, it is stated that Eckhart recanted before his death everything which he had falsely taught, by subjecting himself and his writing to the decision of the Apostolic See. By this is no doubt meant the statement of 13 February 1327, and it may be inferred that Eckhart's death, concerning which no information or burial site exists, took place shortly after that event.

In 1328, the general chapter of the order at Toulouse decided to proceed against preachers who "endeavor to preach subtle things which not only do (not) advance morals, but easily lead the people into error". Eckhart's disciples were admonished to be more cautious, but nevertheless they cherished the memory of their master. The lay group, Friends of God, followers of Eckhart, existed in communities across the region and carried on his ideas under the leadership of such priests as John Tauler and Henry Suso.

Pfeiffer puts it like this:

Nikolaus of Strassburg was appointed Meister Eckhart's special Inquisitor and his case came before the Inquisition in Venice. He delivered his protest in person before that body on 24 Jan 1327 and on 13 Feb following made his public Declaration of orthodoxy in the Dominican church at Cologne. This was the last date on which he was known to have been alive. The Inquisition refused to accept his appellation, their refusal is dated 22 Feb 1327. Eckhart was excommunicated by the Bull of John XXII, 27 March 1329. After his excommunication his writings were kept alive in monasteries and groups both orally and by transcriptions with the names of other authors on them.

Disappearence

Eckhart disappeared from the public arena before the papal verdict, and is suspected by some of continuing his ministry in anonymity, but there is no single medieval source that supports this suspicion.^{[citation needed]}

Works

Main article: Doctrines of Meister Eckhart

Manuscript Soest, Stadtarchiv und Wissenschaftliche Stadtbibliothek, Codex Nr. 33, folium 57 verso, a–b

Eckhart wrote on metaphysics and spiritual psychology, drawing extensively on mythic imagery, and was notable for his sermons communicating the metaphorical content of the gospels to laymen and clergy alike. His work has influenced major German philosophers.^{[citation needed]}

Eckhart expressed himself both in learned Latin for the clergy in his tractates, and more famously in a contemporary Middle High German vernacular in his sermons.^{[citation needed]} As he said in his trial defence, his sermons were meant to inspire in listeners the desire above all to do some good.^{[citation needed]} In this, he frequently used unusual language or seemed to stray from the path of orthodoxy, which made him suspect to the Church during the tension-filled years of the Avignon Papacy.^{[citation needed]}

Rediscovery

For centuries none of Eckhart's writings were known except a number of sermons, found in the old editions of Johann Tauler's sermons, published by Kachelouen (Leipzig, 1498) and by Adam Petri (Basel, 1521 and 1522). In 1857 Franz Pfeiffer in the second volume of his Deutsche Mystiker (Stuttgart), which is wholly devoted to Eckhart, added considerable manuscript material. Pfeiffer was followed by others, especially Franz Jostes, Meister Eckhart und seine Junger, ungedruckte Texte zur Geschichte der deutschen Mystik (Collectanea Friburgensia, iv., Freiburg, 1895). But some pieces are of doubtful genuineness, and the tradition concerning others is very unsatisfactory.

Sermons

Although he was an accomplished academic theologian, Eckhart's best-remembered works are his highly unusual sermons in the vernacular. Eckhart as a preaching friar attempted to guide his flock, as well as monks and nuns under his jurisdiction with practical sermons on spiritual/psychological transformation and New Testament metaphorical content related to the creative power inherent in disinterest (dispassion or detachment).^{[citation needed]}

Opus tripartitum

It was a great surprise when in 1880 and 1886 Denifle discovered at Erfurt and Kues two manuscripts with Latin works of Eckhart, the existence of which Nicholas of Cusa and Trittenheim had indeed mentioned, but which had since then been considered lost. There can be no doubt as to their genuineness, but thus far only the (comparatively extensive) specimens which Denifle had published (in ALKG, ii.) are known.

The extant writings appear to be only parts of a very large work, the Opus tripartitum, which, to judge from the prologue in the first part treated of more than 1,000 propositions, in the second part debated a number of special questions, and in the third part, first expounded Biblical texts (opus sermonum) and afterward explained the books of the Bible in their order with special reference to the important passages. Entirely unknown at present are the contents of the more important manuscript of Cues, especially the exposition of the Gospel of John.

Teachings

Sermons

The central theme of Eckhart's German sermons is the presence of God in the individual soul, and the dignity of the soul of the just man. Although he elaborated on this theme, he rarely departed from it. In one sermon, Eckhart gives the following summary of his message:^{[citation needed]}

When I preach, I usually speak of detachment and say that a man should be empty of self and all things; and secondly, that he should be reconstructed in the simple good that God is; and thirdly, that he should consider the great aristocracy which God has set up in the soul, such that by means of it man may wonderfully attain to God; and fourthly, of the purity of the divine nature.

Theology

Novel concepts Eckhart introduced into Christian metaphysics clearly deviate from the common scholastic canon.^{[citation needed]}

Abundance of Being

In Eckhart's vision, God is primarily fecund. Out of overabundance of love the fertile God gives birth to the Son, the Word in all of us. Clearly, this is rooted in the Neoplatonic notion of "ebullience; boiling over" of the One that cannot hold back its abundance of Being. Eckhart had imagined the creation not as a "compulsory" overflowing (a metaphor based on a common hydrodynamic picture), but as the free act of will of the triune nature of Deity (refer Trinitarianism).

Gott und Gottheit

Another bold assertion is Eckhart's distinction between God and Godhead (Gottheit in German). These notions had been present in Pseudo-Dionysius's writings and John the Scot's De divisione naturae, but Eckhart, with characteristic vigor and audacity, reshaped the germinal metaphors into profound images of polarity between the Unmanifest and Manifest Absolute.

Influence

Eckhart was one of the most influential 13th-century Christian Neoplatonists, although technically a faithful Thomist (as a prominent member of the Dominican Order).^{[citation needed]} In his study of medieval humanism, Richard Southern includes him along with Saint Bede the Venerable and Saint Anselm as emblematic of the intellectual spirit of the Middle Ages.

Johannes Tauler and Rulman Merswin

Eckhart is considered by some to have been the inspirational "layman" referred to in Johannes Tauler's and Rulman Merswin's later writings in Strasbourg where he is known to have spent time (although it is doubtful that he authored the simplistic "Book of the Nine Rocks" published by Merswin and attributed to the layman knight from the north). On the other hand most scholars consider the "layman" to be a pure fiction invented by Rulman Merswin to hide his authorship because of the intimidating tactics of the Inquisition at the time.^{[citation needed]}

Theologia Germanica and the Reformation

It has been suspected that his practical communication of the mystical path is behind the influential 14th-century "anonymous" Theologia Germanica which was disseminated after his disappearance. According to the medieval introduction of the document, its author was an unnamed member of the Teutonic Order of Knights living in Frankfurt.^{[citation needed]}

The lack of imprimatur from the Church and anonymity of the author of the "Theologia germanica" did not lessen its influence for the next two centuries — including Martin Luther at the peak of public and clerical resistance to Catholic indulgences — and was viewed by some historians of the early 20th century as pivotal in provoking Luther's actions and the subsequent Protestant Reformation.^{[citation needed]}

The following quite from the Theologia Germanica depicts the conflict between wordly and ecclesiastical affairs:^{[citation needed]}

The two eyes of the soul of man cannot both perform their work at once: but if the soul shall see with the right eye into eternity, then the left eye must close itself and refrain from working, and be as though it were dead. For if the left eye be fulfilling its office toward outward things, that is holding converse with time and the creatures; then must the right eye be hindered in its working; that is, in its contemplation. Therefore, whosoever will have the one must let the other go; for ‘no man can serve two masters.’"

Modern popularisation

In the 19th century Eckhardt was rediscovered, and integrated into "the post-Kantian tradition of modern German Idealism", especially by Franz von Baader in the 19th century and Matthew Fox in the 20th century. Another major influence was the interplay between western Orientalism, the modernisation of Eastern religions, and the export of the modernised versions of those religions to the west.

Modern theology

Franz von Baader

Franz von Baader (1765–1841) was a German Roman Catholic philosopher and theologian. He studied under Abraham Gottlob Werner at Freiberg, travelled through several of the mining districts in north Germany, and for four years, 1792–1796, resided in England. There he became acquainted with the ideas of David Hume, David Hartley and William Godwin, which were all distasteful to him. But he also came into contact with the mystical speculations of Meister Eckhart, Louis Claude de Saint-Martin (1743–1803), and above all those of Jakob Boehme, which were more to his liking. In 1796 he returned from England, and came into contact with Friedrich Schelling, and the works he published during this period were manifestly influenced by that philosopher.

Matthew Fox

Matthew Fox (born 1940) is an American priest and theologian. Formerly a member of the Dominican Order within the Roman Catholic Church, he is now a member of the Episcopal Church. Fox was an early and influential exponent of a movement that came to be known as Creation Spirituality. The movement draws inspiration from the mystical philosophies of such medieval Catholic visionaries as Hildegard of Bingen, Thomas Aquinas, Saint Francis of Assisi, Julian of Norwich, Dante Alighieri, Meister Eckhart and Nicholas of Cusa, as well as the wisdom traditions of Christian scriptures. Creation Spirituality is also strongly aligned with ecological and environmental movements of the late 20th century and embraces numerous spiritual traditions around the world, including Buddhism, Judaism, Sufism, and Native American spirituality, with a focus on "deep ecumenism".

Fox draws heavily on Eckhart for his own theology and whose "Breakthrough" presents an alternative and substantially different view of the nature and significance of Eckhart's thinking from that taken in earlier sections of this article.

Modern philosophy

The postmodern French theorist and philosopher Jacques Derrida uses Eckhart's Negative Theology to describe his own concept of différance.

Modern spirituality

Meister Eckhardt has become one of the timeless heroes of modern spirituality, which thrives on an all-inclusive syncretism. This syncretism started with the colonisation of Asia, and the search of similarities between eastern and western religions. Western monotheism was projected onto eastern religiosity by western orientalists, trying to acommodate eastern religiosity to a western understanding, whereafter Asian intellectuals used these projections as a starting point to propose the superiority of those eastern religions. Early on, the figure of meister Eckhardt has played a role in those "culture battles".

Schopenhauer

The first translation of Upanishads appeared in two parts in 1801 and 1802. The 19th-century philosopher Schopenhauer was influenced by the early translations of the Upanishads, which he called "the consolation of my life". Schopenhauer compared Eckhart's views to the teachings of Indian, Christian and Islamic mystics and ascetics:

If we turn from the forms, produced by external circumstances, and go to the root of things, we shall find that Sakyamuni and Meister Eckhart teach the same thing; only that the former dared to express his ideas plainly and positively, whereas Eckhart is obliged to clothe them in the garment of the Christian myth, and to adapt his expressions thereto.

Schopenhauer also stated:

Buddha, Eckhardt and I all teach the same.

Theosophical Society

A major force in the mutual influence of eastern and western ideas and religiosity was the Theosophical Society., which also incorporated Mesyer Eckhardt in its notion of Theosophy. It searched for ancient wisdom in the east, spreading eastern religious ideas in the west. One of it's salient features was the belief in "Masters of Wisdom", "beings, human or once human, who have transcended the normal frontiers of knowledge, and who make their wisdom available to others". The Theosophical Society also spread western ideas in the east, aiding a modernisation of eastern traditions, and contributing to a growing nationalism in the Asian colonies.

Neo-Vedanta

Main article: Neo-Vedanta

The Theosophical Society had a major influence on Hindu reform movements. A major proponent of this "neo-Hinduism", also called "neo-Vedanta", was Vivekananda who popularised his modernised inerpretation of Advaita Vedanta in the 19th and early 20th century in both India and the west, emphasising anubhava ("personal experience") over scriptural authority. Vivekanda's teachings have been compared to Eckhardt's teachings.

In the 20th century, Eckhart's thoughts were also compared to Shankara's Advaita Vedanta by Rudolf Otto in his Mysticism East and West. According to King, The aim of this work was to redeem Eckhart's mysticism in Protestant circles, attempting "to establish the superiority of the German mysticism of Eckhart over the Indian mysticism of Sankara".

Buddhist Modernism

Main article: Buddhist modernism

The Theosophical Society also had a major influence on Buddhist modernism, and the spread of this modernised Buddhism in the west. Along with H. S. Olcott and Anagarika Dharmapala, Blavatsky was instrumental in the Western transmission and revival of Theravada Buddhism.

In 1891, Karl Eugen Neumann, who translated large parts of the Tripitaka, found parallels between Eckhart and Buddhism, which he published in Zwei buddhistische Suttas und ein Traktat Meister Eckharts ("Two Buddhist Suttas and a treatise of Meister Eckhart"). D.T. Suzuki, who joined the Theosophical Society Adyar and was an active Theosophist, discerned parallels between Eckhart's teachings and Zen Buddhism in his Mysticism:Christian and Buddhist, drawing similarities between Eckhart's "pure nothingness" (ein bloss niht) and sunyata. Shizuteru Ueda, a third generation Kyoto School philosopher and scholar in medieval philosophy showed similarities between Eckhart's soteriology and Zen Buddhism in an article.

Reiner Schurmann, a Professor of Philosophy, while agreeing with Daisetz T. Suzuki that there exist certain similarities between Zen Buddhism and Meister Eckhart's teaching, also disputed Suzuki's contention that the ideas expounded in Eckhart's sermons closely approach Buddhist thought, "so closely indeed, that one could stamp them almost definitely as coming out of Buddhist speculations". Schurmann's several clarifications included:

1. On the question of "Time" and Eckhart's view (claimed as parallel to Buddhism in reducing awakening to instantaneity) that the birth of the Word in the ground of the mind must accomplish itself in an instant, in "the eternal now", that in fact Eckhart in this respect is rooted directly in the catechisis of the Fathers of the Church rather than merely derived from Buddhism;
2. On the question of "Isness" and Suzuki's contention that the "Christian experiences are not after all different from those of the Buddhist; terminology is all that divides us", that in Eckhart "the Godhead's istigkeit [translated as "isness" by Suzuki] is a negation of all quiddities; it says that God, rather than non-being, is at the heart of all things" thereby demonstrating with Eckhart's theocentrism that "the istigkeit of the Godhead and the isness of a thing then refer to two opposite experiences in Meister Eckhart and Suzuki: in the former, to God, and in the latter, to `our ordinary state of the mind'" and Buddhism's attempts to think "pure nothingness";
3. On the question of "Emptiness" and Eckhart's view (claimed as parallel to Buddhist emphasis "on the emptiness of all 'composite things'") that only a perfectly released person, devoid of all, comprehends, "seizes", God, that the Buddhist "emptiness" seems to concern man's relation to things while Eckhart's concern is with what is "at the end of the road opened by detachment [which is] the mind espouses the very movement of the divine dehiscence; it does what the Godhead does: it lets all things be; not only must God also abandon all of his own—names and attributes if he is to reach into the ground of the mind (this is already a step beyond the recognition of the emptiness of all composite things), but God's essential being - releasement - becomes the being of a released man."

Modern spirituality

Main articles: Spirituality and Nondualism

Eckhart has become one of the timeless heroes of modern spirituality.

The notable humanistic psychoanalyst and philosopher Erich Fromm was another scholar who brought renewed attention in the west to Eckhart's writings, drawing upon many of the latters themes in his large corpus of work. Eckhart was a significant influence in developing United Nations Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld's conception of spiritual growth through selfless service to humanity, as detailed in his book of contemplations called Vägmärken ('Markings').

Renewed academic attention to Eckhart has attracted favorable attention to his work from contemporary non-Christian mystics. Eckhart's most famous single quote, "The Eye with which I see God is the same Eye with which God sees me", is commonly cited by thinkers within neopaganism and ultimatist Buddhism as a point of contact between these traditions and Christian mysticism.

The popular writer Eckhart Tolle changed his name in acknowledgement of Eckhart's influence on his philosophy.

Rubin's Jacob's Ladder

In Jacob's Ladder, Louis, the main character's friend, attributes the following quote to Eckhart:

You know what he [Eckhart] said? The only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of your life; your memories, your attachments. They burn 'em all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. [...] If you're frightened of dying and holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the Earth.^{[citation needed]}

Davidson's The Gargoyle

In the book The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson, Eckhart is mentioned in a story Marianne Engel recounts to the (unnamed) protagonist about her days in the Engelthal Monastery:

[...] Meister Eckhart would not even admit that God was good [...] Eckhart's position was that anything that was good can become better, and whatever may become better may become best. God cannot be referred to as "good", "better", or best because He is above all things. If a man says that God is wise, the man is lying because anything that is wise can become wiser. Anything that a man might say about God is incorrect, even calling Him by the name of God. God is "superessential nothingness" and "transcendent Being" [...] beyond all words and beyond all understanding. The best a man can do is remain silent, because anytime he prates on about God, he is committing the sin of lying. The true master knows that if he had a God he could understand, He would never hold Him to be God.

Salinger's Franny and Zooey

Eckhart is also referenced in J. D. Salinger's Franny and Zooey. In a letter to Zooey, Buddy says,

I can't help thinking you'd make a damn site better-adjusted actor if Seymour and I hadn't thrown in the Upanishads and the Diamond Sutra and Eckhart and all our other old loves with the rest of your recommended reading when you were small.

Adam's Harmonielehre

The third movement of John Adams' Harmonielehre symphony (1985) is titled 'Meister Eckhardt and Quackie', which imagines the mystic floating through space with his baby daughter on his back whispering secrets of grace in his ear.

Eckhart as a mystic

Since the 1960's debate has been going on in Germany whether Eckhart should be called a "mystic". The philosopher Karl Albert had already argued that Eckhart had to be placed in the tradition of philosophical mysticism of Parmenides, Plato, Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus and other neo-Platonistic thinkers. Heribert Fischer argued in the 1960's that Eckhart was a mediaeval theologian.

Kurt Flasch, a member of the so-called Bochum-school of medieaval philosophy, strongly reacted against the influence of New Age mysticism and "all kinds of emotional subjective mysticism", arguing for the need to free Eckhart from "the Mystical Flood". He sees Eckhart strictly as a philosopher. Flasch argues that the opposition between "mystic" and "scholastic" is not relevant because this mysticism (in Eckhart's context) is penetrated by the spirit of the University, in which it occurred.^{[citation needed]}

According to Hackett, Eckhart is to be understood as an "original hermeneutical thinker in the Latin tradition". To understand Eckhart, he has to be properly placed within the western philosophical tradition of which he was a part.

Rehabilitation

Eckhart's status in the contemporary Catholic Church has been uncertain. The Dominican Order pressed in the last decade of the 20th century for his full rehabilitation and confirmation of his theological orthodoxy. Pope John Paul II voiced favorable opinion on this initiative, even going as far as quoting from Eckhart's writings, but the affair is still confined to the corridors of the Vatican. In the spring of 2010, it was revealed that there was finally a response from the Vatican in a letter dated 1992. Timothy Radcliffe, then Master of the Dominicans and recipient of the letter, summarized the contents as follows:

We tried to have the censure lifted on Eckhart', writes Timothy Radcliffe, 'and were told that there was really no need since he had never been condemned by name, just some propositions which he was supposed to have held, and so we are perfectly free to say that he is a good and orthodox theologian.

Professor Winfried Trusen of Würzburg, a correspondent of Radcliffe, wrote in part of a defence of Eckhart to Cardinal Ratzinger, stating

Only 28 propositions were censured, but they were taken out of their context and impossible to verify, since there were no manuscripts in Avignon.

Translations and commentaries

• Meister Eckhart: A Modern Translation, trans. Raymond B. Blakney, New York: Harper and Row, 1941, ISBN 0-06-130008-X, about one-half the works including treatises, 28 sermons, Defense against heresy
• Meister Eckhart, The Essential Sermons, Commentaries, Treatises and Defense, trans. and ed. by Bernard McGinn and Edmund Colledge, New York: Paulist Press, 1981.
• Meister Eckhart: Teacher and Preacher, trans. and ed. by Bernard McGinn and Frank Tobin, New York and London: Paulist Press / SPCK, 1987.
• Meister Eckhart, Sermons and Treatises, trans. by M. O'C. Walshe, 3 vols., (London: Watkins, 1979-1981; lated printed at Longmead, Shaftesbury, Dorset: Element Books, 1979-1990).
• James Midgely Clark, Meister Eckhart: An Introduction to the Study of His Works with an Anthology of His Sermons, Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson, 1957.
• James M. Clark and John V. Skinner, eds. and trans., Treatises and Sermons of Meister Eckhart, New York: Octagon Books, 1983. (Reprint of Harper and Row ed., 1958 / London: Faber & Faber, 1958.)
• Meister Eckhart: Selected Writings, ed. and trans. by Oliver Davies, London: Penguin, 1994.
• C. de B. Evans, Meister Eckhart by Franz Pfeiffer, 2 vols., London: Watkins, 1924 and 1931.
• Ursula Fleming, Meister Eckhart: The Man from whom God Hid Nothing, Leominster, Herefordshire: Gracewing, 1995.
• Matthew Fox, O.P., ed., Breakthrough: Meister Eckhart's Creation Spirituality in New Translation, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1980.
• Armand Maurer, ed., Master Eckhart: Parisian Questions and Prologues, Toronto, Canada: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1974.
• Reiner Schürmann, Meister Eckhart: Mystic and Philosopher, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1978.
• Otto Karrer Meister Eckhart Speaks The Philosophical Library, Inc. New York, 1957.
• Shizuteru Ueda, Die Gottesgeburt in der Seele und der Durchbruch zur Gottheit. Die mystische Anthropologie Meister Eckharts und ihre Konfrontation mit der Mystik des Zen-Buddhismus, Gütersloh: Mohn, 1965.

See also

• Brethren of the Free Spirit
• Heresy of the Free Spirit
• Sister Catherine Treatise
• Theologia Germanica

Sources

• Meister Eckhart: Die deutschen und lateinischen Werke. Herausgegeben im Auftrage der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft. Stuttgart and Berlin: Verlag W. Kohlhammer, 11 Vols., 1936.
• Akhilananda Swami (2012), Hindu Psychology: Its Meaning for the West, Routledge 
• Algeo, Adele S. (July 2005), "Beatrice Lane Suzuki and Theosophy in Japan", Theosophical History XI 
• Algeo, Adele S. (January–February 2007), "Beatrice Lane Suzuki: An American Theosophist in Japan", Quest 95 (1): 13–17 
• Boyd-MacMillan, Eolene M (2006), Transformation: James Loder, Mystical Spirituality, and James Hillman, Peter Lang 
• Herman Büttner, ed., Schriften und Predigten, vol. 1. Jena: Eugen Diederichs, 1903.
• Herman Büttner, ed., Schriften und Predigten, vol. 2. Jena: Eugen Diederichs, 1909.
• Augustine Daniels, O.S.B., ed., "Eine lateinische Rechtfertigungsschrift des Meister Eckharts", Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, 23, 5 (Münster, 1923): 1 - 4, 12 - 13, 34 - 35, 65 - 66.
• Fields, Rick (1992), How the Swans Came to the Lake. A Narrative History of Buddhism in America, Boston & London: Shambhala 
• Ffytche, Matt (2011), The Foundation of the Unconscious: Schelling, Freud and the Birth of the Modern Psyche, Cambridge University Press 
• Ganapathy (2003), The Way of the Siddhas. In: K. R. Sundararajan, Bithika Mukerji (2003), Hindu Spirituality, Motilal Banarsidass Publ. 
• Gilchrist, Cherry (1996), Theosophy. The Wisdom of the Ages, HarperSanFrancisco 
• Gombrich, Richard F. (1996), Theravāda Buddhism. A Social History from Ancient Benares to Modern Colombo, London and New York: Routledge 
• Hackett, Jeremiah (2012), A Companion to Meister Eckhart, Brill 
• Hanegraaff, Wouter J. (1996), New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought, Boston, Massachusetts, US: Brill Academic Publishers, ISBN 978-90-04-10696-3 
• Johnson, K. Paul (1994), The masters revealed: Madam Blavatsky and the myth of the Great White Lodge, SUNY Press, ISBN 0-7914-2063-9 
• Franz Jostes, ed., Meister Eckhart und seine Jünger: Ungedruckte Texte zur Geschichte der deutschen Mystik. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1972 (Series: Deutsche Neudrucke Texte des Mittelalters).
• Thomas Kaepelli, O.P., "Kurze Mitteilungen über mittelalterliche Dominikanerschriftsteller", Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 10, (1940), pp. 293 – 94.
• Thomas Kaepelli, O.P., Scriptores ordinis Praedicatorum medii aevi. Vol. I (A-F). Rome, 1970.
• King, Richard (2002), Orientalism and Religion: Post-Colonial Theory, India and "The Mystic East", Routledge 
• Gustav Landauer, ed. and trans. Meister Echkarts mystische Schriften. Berlin: Karl Schnabel, 1903.
• M.H. Laurent, "Autour du procés de Maître Eckhart. Les documents des Archives Vaticanes", Divus Thomas (Piacenza) 39 (1936), pp. 331 – 48, 430 - 47.
• Lavoie, Jeffrey D. (2012), The Theosophical Society: The History of a Spiritualist Movement, Universal-Publishers 
• McMahan, David L. (2008), The Making of Buddhist Modernism, Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780195183276 
• Michaelson, Jay (2009), Everything Is God: The Radical Path of Nondual Judaism, Shambhala 
• Moran, Dermot (2012), Meister Eckhart in 20th Century Philosophy. In: Jeremiah Hacket (2012), A Companion to Meister Eckhart, Brill 
• Partridge, Christipher Hugh (2006), Understanding the Dark Side: Western Demonology, Satanic Panics and Alien Abduction, University of Chester 
• Franz Pelster, S.J., ed., Articuli contra Fratrem Aychardum Alamannum, Vat. lat. 3899, f. 123r - 130v, in "Ein Gutachten aus dem Eckehart-Prozess in Avignon", Aus der Geistewelt des Mittelalters, Festgabe Martin Grabmann, Beiträge Supplement 3, Munster, 1935, pp. 1099–1124.
• Franz Pfeiffer, ed. Deutsche Mystiker des vierzehnten Jahrhunderts, vol. II: Meister Eckhart. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck, 1906.
• Josef Quint, ed. and trans. Meister Eckehart: Deutsche Predigten und Traktate, Munich: Carl Hanser, 1955.
• Josef Quint, ed., Textbuch zur Mystik des deutschen Mittelalters: Meister Eckhart, Johannes Tauler, Heinrich Seuse, Halle/Saale: M. Niemeyer, 1952.
• Rambachan, Anatanand (1994), The Limits of Scripture: Vivekananda's Reinterpretation of the Vedas, University of Hawaii Press 
• Renard, Philip (2010), Non-Dualisme. De directe bevrijdingsweg, Cothen: Uitgeverij Juwelenschip 
• Rubin, Bruce Joel, Jacob's Ladder. Mark Mixson, general editor, The Applause Screenplay Series, Applause Theatre Book Publishers, 1990. ISBN 1-55783-086-X.
• Schurmann, Reiner (2001), Wandering Joy: Meister Eckhart's Mystical Philosophy, Lindisfarne Books 
• Sinari, Ramakant (2000), Advaita and Contemporary Indian Philosophy. In: Chattopadhyana (gen.ed.), "History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization. Volume II Part 2: Advaita Vedanta", Delhi: Centre for Studies in Civilizations 
• Gabriel Théry, O.P., "Édition critique des piéces relatives au procés d'Eckhart continues dans le manuscrit 33b de la Bibliothèque de Soest", Archives d'histoire littéraire et doctrinal du moyen âge, 1 (1926), pp. 129 – 268.
• Tweed, Thomas A. (2005), "American Occultism and Japanese Buddhism. Albert J. Edmunds, D. T. Suzuki, and Translocative History", Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 32 (2): 249–281 

Further reading

• Jeanne Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart and the Rhineland Mystics, New York and London: Harper and Row/ Longmans, 1957.
• Leonardo Vittorio Arena, The Shadows of the Masters, ebook, 2013.
• James M. Clark, The Great German Mystics, New York: Russell and Russell, 1970 (reprint of Basil Blackwell edition, Oxford: 1949.)
• James M. Clark, trans., Henry Suso: Little Book of Eternal Wisdom and Little Book of Truth, London: Faber, 1953.
• Cesare Catà, Il Cardinale e l'Eretico. Nicola Cusano e il problema della eredità "eterodossa" di Meister Eckhart nel suo pensiero, in "Viator. Medieval and Renaissance Studies", UCLA University, Volume 41, No.2 (2010), pp. 269–291.
• Oliver Davies, God Within: The Mystical Tradition of Northern Europe, London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1988.
• Oliver Davies, Meister Eckhart: Mystical Theologian, London: SPCK, 1991.
• Eckardus Theutonicus, homo doctus et sanctus, Fribourg: University of Fribourg, 1993.
• Robert K. Forman, Meister Eckhart: Mystic as Theologian, Rockport, Massachusetts / Shaftesbury, Dorset: Element Books, 1991.
• Gundolf Gieraths, O.P., '"Life in Abundance: Meister Eckhart and the German Dominican Mystics of the 14th Century", Spirituality Today Supplement, Autumn, 1986.
• Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy: An Interpretation of the Great Mystics, East and West, New York: HarperCollins, 1945.
• Amy Hollywood, The Soul as Virgin Wife: Mechthild of Magdeburg, Marguerite Porete, and Meister Eckhart, Notre Dame and London: University of Notre Dame Press, 1996.
• Rufus Jones, The Flowering of Mysticism in the Fourteenth Century, New York: Hafner Publishing Co., 1971 (facsimile of 1939 ed.).
• Bernard McGinn, "Eckhart's Condemnation Reconsidered" in The Thomist, vol. 44, 1980.
• Bernard McGinn, ed., Meister Eckhart and the Beguine Mystics Hadewijch of Brabant, Mechthild of Magdeburg, and Marguerite Porete, New York: Continuum, 1994.
• Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, Vol. II, ISBN 0-486-21762-0
• Cyprian Smith, The Way of Paradox: Spiritual Life as Taught by Meister Eckhart, New York: Paulist Press, 1988.
• Frank Tobin, Meister Eckhart: Thought and Language, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986.
• Denys Turner, The Darkness of God: Negativity in Christian Mysticism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
• Winfried Trusen, Der Prozess gegen Meister Eckhart, Fribourg: University of Fribourg, 1988.
• Andrew Weeks, German Mysticism from Hildegard of Bingen to Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Literary and Intellectual History, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993.
• Richard Woods, O.P., Eckhart's Way, Wilmington, Delaware: Glazier, 1986 (Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 1991).
• Richard Woods, O.P., Meister Eckhart: The Gospel of Peace and Justice, Tape Cassette Program, Chicago: Center for Religion & Society, 1993.
• Richard Woods, O.P., Meister Eckhart: Master of Mystics (London, Continuum, 2010).

External links

• The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume V. Published 1909. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Nihil Obstat, 1 May 1909. Remy Lafort, Censor. Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York
• Meister Eckhart's Sermons translated into English by Claud Field, at Christian Classics Ethereal Library.
• Meister Eckhart und seine Zeit German Website, most texts in German translation, some in Latin
• Meister Eckhart Bibliography (1800-1997)
• Meister Eckhart Bibliography (1997-)
• Meister Eckhart entry by B. Mojsisch & O.F. Summerell in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• "Meister Eckhart (1260—1328)" article in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Brown, Arthur, "The Man From Whom God Hid Nothing."
• The Eckhart Society. Research by catholic scholars
• The Meister Eckhart Site, including full text of the papal bull against Meister Eckhart.