Selected Writings (Eckhart, Meister) Book

BETWIXT THE CRADLE AND GRAVE
ONLY ONE SMILE CAN BE -
BUT WHEN AT LAST IT IS SMILED
THERE'S AN END TO ALL MISERY.
William Blake

The vast Panoply of Beings are continuously passing into, and out of, Eternity: with thoughts like these it's no wonder the medieval church excluded this man from its polite society!

No intent = no needs = no world = no self. Yikes! Either this guy was a fully enlightened master or a danger to the social order....

To those of us who have worked their way arduously, degree by painful degree, to a fuller and more widely-encompassing vision of the full spectrum of Christian theology, Meister Eckhart seems to stand all by himself, off in a radiant little corner of history of his own somewhere!

'Well, he sure knows how to cut corners, doesn't he?' I can hear many a dour medieval bishop mutter into their beards.

Or words to that effect.

You see, Eckhart had a (bad? Certainly unpopular) habit of speaking with a pure, naively unabashed, but modest candour.

Let me put it more poetically: he didn't believe that the coloured glass windows of churches should "stain the white radiance of eternity", as Shelley would later boldly put it.

No wonder his church elders were aghast!

But, you know, they had good reason to be wary of him.

The Ascent of Mount Carmel is no child's play, but he had attained its summit.

In his long periods of meditation, he had discovered the Abyss of Pure, Empty Peace at the heart of Divine Being. His thought grew radical.

When I was five or six, I stared into the reflection of the coloured ornaments on our Christmas tree, and saw them as doorways to a wonderful, hidden world. My mistake was, I clung to that intuition.

My immersion in Asperger's Syndrome intensified!

But Eckhart tells us we must be comfortable in Both worlds - the world of Logic - as well as that of Intuition. He was a great teacher.

And even today many a preacher in the twilight zones of religion tries to pawn off a new, improved, quicker way to Heaven like snake oil.

A dime a dozen... but Eckhart was Not one of them.

And can we chide Eckhart the Master for giving away the end of life's long, complex novel - and hinting at that faraway time when all of its loose ends will have been neatly tied up in one deeply satisfying dénouement, like The Magic Flute claims?

You know, sometimes a little spoiler inspires us to read right through to the end of all that prolixity!

So, I'll give you one of Eckhart's heavenly spoilers to inspire you to read the meister's own writings, and as your OWN help to reach your journey's end...

"Whoever has God in himself has Him in a divine manner, for He SHINES out to him in ALL things, and for that person all things TASTE of God."

And it doesn't get any more mystical than that!

(If that's Heaven, where do I sign up?!)