REL 275

Dr. Versluis

Meister Eckhart is known as one of the greatest Christian mystics and German theologists. He was born Johannes Eckhart around 1260, to a noble family of knights, in the province of Thuringia. At the age of fifteen he joined the Dominican Order at Erfurt, near his native village of Hocheim. While in the Order, he went through the required training of a Dominican preacher: one year as a novitiate, two years of studying the Divine Office and the Constitutions of the Order, five years of philosophy, and three years of theology. Eckhart was a very promising student. He was sent to pursue higher education at the Dominican studium generale located in Cologne.

By 1278, Eckhart was named as the Dominican friar at Erfurt, and Vicar of Thurungia. These are honorable positions where one only gets if they are highly praised. James Clark describes how Eckhart's peers felt: The fact that his brethren at Erfurt chose him as their head testifies to the respect in which Eckhart was held. His appointment as Vicar of Thuringia shows his administrative talent. "His brilliant intellectual gifts also attracted attention." (Clark, 1957)

Eckhart's honorary positions didn't stop there. He was also selected to study in Paris for the Master of Theology degree. He accepted the same chair of theology that Thomas Aquinas had once occupied. Later, as a professor at Saint Jacques and a teacher at the University of Paris, he became known as "Master Eckhart," or German- Meister Eckhart. This name was to distinguish him from other friars of the same name. This honorable tittle also showed how much respect he received from his pupils and friends.

In 1326, Meister Eckhart was charged with heresy by the archbishop Herman von Virneburg of Cologne. Eckhart demanded for an appeal to the pope; he stated that if there was anything wrong found in his writings, he wished to retract them. According to Harrison, "He claimed that he may have erred, but he was not a heretic (1999). Eckhart died in 1328 and even after his death he was still in trouble with the church. They claimed his work "was like Buddha," (Versluis, 1999). In 1329, Pope John XXII published a bull condemning twenty-eight propositions from Eckhart's works. After this, his disciples were warned to be more cautious, and yet they still cherished the memory of their master.

There is much controversy over the purpose of Eckhart's life and his work. Many who have tried to study him call him an Aristotelian, a Platonist, or a pantheist. Modern scholars consider Eckhart's mysticism as generally orthodox. Matthew Fox agrees with this view. He believes Eckhart is a "biblical theologian, a biblical preacher, a biblical spiritual thinker." He also says that those commentators who have written about Eckhart and missed the point of his works, have been deprived of a theological background that included Scripture.

Meister Eckhart was a very influential mystic an theologist with a firm doctrine on God. He believed that only God exists and any being exists only of their soul is in contact with God. He explains that this contact can only be accomplished when that being/individual is freed from sin. Similar views off this doctrine can be found in the following sermon by Eckhart, "Sequere Me." This sermon is based on the following of Christ where he suggests that those who follow God are "perfect" and those who try to run in front of God are "wicked." It is works like this that give Meister Eckhart

his reputation of being an important figure in Western spirituality.

WORKS CITED

1. Clark, James. Meister Eckhart: An Introduction to the Study of his Works With an Anthology of his Sermons. New York, 1957.

2. Fox, Matthew. Breakthrough: Meister Eckhart's Creation Spirituality In New Translation. New York, 1980.

3. Harrison, Paul. "Meister Eckhart- passing beyond God." Scientific Pantheism. http://members.aol.com/heraaklitl/eckhart.htm. (November 26, 1999.)

4. Versluis, Arthur. "Lecture: Important Mystics." REL 275, Fall Semester. November 10, 1999.

OTHER SOURCES

1, Grolier. "Encyclopedia of Knowledge." Volume 6, pg. 322. Grolier, Inc 1994.

2.._______. "Meister Eckhart." Encarta Online Concise. http://encarta.msn.com/find. (November 25, 1999).

SELECTION SOURCE

1. Clark, James and Skinner John. "Sequere Me." Treatises and Sermons of Meister Eckhart. New York, 1983.

Sequere Me

In the first place, then, it should be known that God in creating all creatures instructs and enjoins, advises and commands them, by the very fact that He creates them, to follow Him and conform themselves to him, to turn and hasten back too Him as the first cause of their entire being, in accordance with the passage in Ecclesiastes (I, 7): "Unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again." This is why the creature has a natural tendency to love God and loves Him more even than he loves himself. For this reason, too, the damned have a natural desire for being, which they have immediately from God, and consequently for God Himself, as Augustine says, notably in the third book of the De Libera Arbitrio. Moreover, "all things seek the good," according to the Ethics. But God is "the Good of all good,: as Augustiine says in the eighth book of his De Trinitate. For being is the word whereby God speaks and addresses all things, as has been expounded above in dealing with the text "In the beginnings was the word." Moreover the beginning and the end, the good and the end, are the same thing. Therefore, just as every created thing follows and pursues its end, so likewise it follows its beginning.

Secondly, let us expound the above text in the manner of a sermon. Here let me observe in advance that I shall touch on a few points only, both from a desire on my own part to avoid prolixity in my sermons and because many things may be found much more attractively set forth in examples by many other men. We may say, then, that in these words, "Follow Me," we are first exhorted to the act of following by the use of the word "follow" and secondly are instructed as too end or object. "Me," he says: "follow Me." Let us observe first, therefore, that there are some who follow God: these are the perfect. Others walk close by God, at His side: theses are the imperfect. But there are others who run in front of God, and these are the wicked.

Meister Eckhart

(1260 -1328)