C. F. Kelley • Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge

Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge

Meister Eckhart on

Divine Knowledge

C. F. Kelley

N ew H av en a n d L o n d o n Yale U niversity Press

1977

Copyright © 1977 by Yale University. All rights reserved. T his book may not be reproduced , in whole o r in part, in any form (except by reviewers for the public press), w ithout w ritten perm ission from the publishers.Designed by Jo h n O. C. McCrillis and set in Baskerville type.Printed in the U nited States o f America byT h e Vail-Ballou Press, Inc., B ingham ton, New York.Published in G reat Britain, E urope, Africa, and Asia (except Jap an ) by Yale University Press, Ltd.,London. D istributed in Latin America by Kaim an & Polon, Inc., New York City; in Australia and New Zealand by Book & Film Services, A rtarm on,N.S.W., Australia; and in Jap an by H arper & Row, Publishers, Tokyo Office.Library o f Congress Cataloging in Publication DataKelley, Carl Franklin, 1914-

M eister Eckhart on divine knowledge.Includes bibliographical references and index.1. Eckhart, M eister, d. 1327. I. Title.

BV5095.F.3K44 248 '.22 '0924 77-3959ISBN 0-300-02098-8

To J. L. K.

W hen I stood in the Principle, the ground o f G odhead, no one asked me w here I was going o r what I was doing: there was no one to ask me. . . . W hen 1 go back into the Principle, the g round o f G odhead, no one will ask me whence I cam e or w hither I went. T h ere no one misses me, there G od-as-other passes away.

—M eister Eckhart

Contents

Preface xiIn troduction 1

P a r t IPreparatory Considerations

1 Difficulties and Misconceptions 23T he C hief Difficulty 24Intellectual Influences on Eckhart 27T h e Special Influence o f St. Thom as Aquinas 34T he Distinction between Prim ary and

Secondary 41Basic Misconceptions 47

2 T he Reality o f the Divine Self 55“I Am a Knower” 56T he Reality o f God 59“My T ruest / Is G od” 61“God Is N either This N or T h a t” 69This Sacred Universe 72Detached Intellectuality 77

P a r t II T h e Doctrine

1 God and the H um an Self 87Principial M anifestation 89God as Pure Spirit 93T h e Extended O rd e r o f the H um an Self 96T h e Delusive Reality o f the H um an Self 103T he Negation o f Negations Is Divine

Affirm ation 1062 T he W ord 114

T he T riune G odhead 116T h e G round o f the Intellective Soul 119Principially I Am the Son 126T h e Divine Spark 133W ithin the W ord 139

X C O N T E N T S

3 T he Primal Distinction 142T he Existential H ierarchy 143Nonduality 147Isness and W hatness 151T he Simple Now o f Eternity 160T he Reflection o f U nrestricted Isness 162

4 T he Inversion 165Inverse Analogy 167T he Primacy o f Knowledge 172Distinction and Identity 178Divine Necessity 184

5 T he Veils o f God 190T he Five VeilsPractical Awareness and Enlightened

191Awareness 197

T he Contem plative State 204T he Ultimate Realization 210

6 T he D etachm ent 215T he Pre-em inence o f Detachm ent 217Poverty o f Spirit 222T he N othingness o f the H um an Self 227T he Transposition by T ranscenden t Act 233Requisite Supports 239

Notes 247Index 279

Preface

This book on the essential teaching o f Meister Eckhart is the result o f many years o f personal study. My introduction to Eckhart’s writings came about through the suggestion o f one o f my professors at the University o f Berlin in the mid- 1930s. At that time, however, there was still m uch confusion in the minds o f scholars as to the genuineness o f the published texts. Not only were many o f the Germ an Sermons and Tractates o f the famous Pfeiffer edition held in question, but only a fraction o f the extensive and vital Latin works were in the process o f being m ade known through the publications o f the Sancta Sabina series in Rome.

W ord was out, however, that the Research Commission o f the Germ an governm ent was sponsoring professors Josef Q uint, Jo se f Koch, and their colleagues in a new and prom ising project o f Eckhartian research and scholarship. T he genuine Latin and Germ an works o f the Meister began slowly (in terrupted by W orld W ar II) to be published in the excellent ten-volum e K ohlham m er quarto edition, which, although a few portions and the indexes still rem ain to be published, is a critical and definitive production that far surpasses all previous editions. Despite the fact that the M eister never com pleted certain parts o f the Opus Triparti- tum and some o ther writings are known to have been lost, the student is at last in a position to arrive at an objective understand ing o f his teaching.

It was not until the early 1950s, when I was a Benedictine and a m em ber o f Downside Abbey in England, that my com prehensive study o f Eckhart began in earnest. I was aided in my work by Dom Raymond W ebster, the Abbey librarian, and m em bers o f the T hom as-Institu te at the University o f Cologne, w here the m ajor research work on Eckhart was in progress, and where I participated in medieval conferences. T hen came two years o f fu rth er research at the G rabm ann-Institu te o f Medieval Studies at the U niversity o f M unich, for whose Archives I wrote a lengthy two-

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volume investigation o f Eckhart’s insights into ‘Principial Knowledge’. A few o f my articles also appeared in the Downside Review and suggested the need o f an u n d erstanding and exposition o f Eckhart’s teaching that was com pletely d ifferent from those which had previously dom inated the field o f Eckhartian scholarship. T he doctrine in question definitely called for a m ode o f study that tran scended all philosophical and theological approaches, including that o f ‘mysticism’.

In o ther words, in writing this book I have m ade a concerted effort to follow Eckhart’s counsel and adopt the standpoint o f understand ing and exposition that he him self adopted. T he com prehension in my work is constituted as it were within God in his G odhead and not externally in term s o f approach toward God. For Eckhart clearly states that the doctrine he expounds m ust always be considered from that in divinis standpoint.

W hat is here presented to the reader supersedes all fo rm er interpretations o f Eckhart’s teaching. It refuses to ignore what he precisely and repeatedly says cannot be ignored, that is, his exposition o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge in term s o f the highest and most essential o f all possible considerations. Certain previous studies o f Eckh art’s teaching are valid as far as they go— but they confine themselves to understandings which he denotes as ex- ternalizations to the basis o f the doctrine. By that very fact they restrict and hence tend to distort that knowledge which is, in principle, wholly within G odhead and therefore pure and strictly divine.

Josef Q uint, Jacques Maritain, and Aldous Huxley, who as friends were familiar with my studies and papers, urged me some fifteen years ago to write and publish what they considered a much needed book on this axial them e in Eckh art’s teaching, but I regarded such a project as prem ature. T he K ohlham m er publications were then only half completed, but I had access to Eckhart’s genuine works in u n published form through the Thom as and G rabm ann institutes. Nevertheless m uch fu rth er study was needed on my part in o rd er to present an exposition o f a doctrine which,

PREFACE X l l l

if not g rounded in reflective metaphysical study, as well as in authentic sources, would otherwise run the danger o f misleading the reader. For the same reasons I then felt obliged to tu rn down requests to write special articles on Eckhart’s teaching for the Dictionnaire Spiritualite and the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

As a result o f an ignorance o f Eckhart’s Latin writings and hence a great, though understandable, overem phasis on his Germ an works, including several that are spurious, the interested public has been too long misled. W hat has for the most part, especially in English-speaking countries, been acknowledged as the teaching o f the Meister can only be considered as a travesty o f the doctrine in the nam e of which he speaks—the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge. W hat is needed, o f course, is an insightful English translation o f all the works o f Eckhart. T o date the most reliable translation into English is that published by Jam es Clark in England (about one-fourth o f the G erm an and a few excerpts o f the Latin works), though his introductory in terp retation : o f Eckhart’s teaching are largely from the point o f view o f a philologist and deficient in metaphysical understanding. And such understanding is o f prim e im portance, especially in the case o f Eckhart.

U nderstanding, not erudition, is the concern in presenting this book, and it is the tru th o f Eckhart’s p rofound insights that dem and reflective consideration. While it has seemed appropriate to supply references, this has been done simply to show that the statem ents and insights attributed to Eckhart are derived from reliable sources. In any attem pt to convey the true m eaning o f Eckhart’s words as we have them in medieval Latin and G erm an, however, literal translation into m odern English would be u n p ro fitable, if not an impossibility. H ence in working directly from the medieval Latin and Germ an texts o f Eckhart and by relying in part on the direction o f Q uint’s scholarship and translations into m odern Germ an from the Mittelhoch- deutsch, which he published separately, explicatio interclusa has been necessary when dealing with certain words, phrases, and even whole sentences. Moreover, I do not, and

xiv PREFACE

I trust the reader will not, consider the use o f the word isness pedantic, for any o ther way o f rendering into English that which Eckhart means by esse, as a noun, prom otes confusion.

O ne could quote extensively from either the Latin o r the Germ an works on nearly every im portan t point in this p re sentation. Not always have the most inciting o r eloquent passages been selected for exposition, but those which, I think, best serve the purpose o f this meditative study. Unfortunately very little o f Eckhart’s hum or, especially the deliberate, yet frequent, play on words and the subtle digs at stuffy rationalists and pious romanticists, can be conveyed in English. Even so, the reader should be aware that Eckh art is in no sense ‘heavy’ in the typical Kantian mode, nor has his teaching anything in com m on with any m odern or heterodox school o f thought. Being wholly traditional in the truest sense, and therefore perennial, the doctrine he expounds will never cease to be contem porary and always accessible to those who, naturally unsatisfied with m ere living, desire to know how to live, regardless o f time o r place.

This book, then, is not likely to appeal to those who, th rough some frustration o f intelligence and a m isdirection o f the will to know, are self-determ ined subjectivists, mystics, o r pious pretenders to a knowledge that is not divine in origin, and who present us with little m ore than caricatures o f wisdom. It is m eant, ra ther, fo r those who are dissatisfied with any teaching restricted by the m ental horizon o f m ere hum an thought, who are disturbed by the closed systematizations o f neotheologies, who are not seduced by the supposition that the grass is g reener on the oriental side o f the fence. It is likewise m eant for those who continue, despite the pervasion o f the socially irrational, to seek an abiding ground beneath the quicksand o f relative values—in o ther words, all who somehow m anage to retain a sense o f intelligent inquiry and a trace o f their innate and detached will to know. T he evidence seems to indicate that such p ersons, especially am ong the young, are countless, and p erhaps are ready to welcome a guide and teacher such as Meister Eckhart. T h ere is, however, a great d ifference between

PREFACE XV

contem porary modes o f study and knowing how to study, particularly the writings o f a g reat contem plative m etaphysician who lived seven centuries ago. This book, then, may serve at once as a guide for learning how the doctrine that Eckhart expounds should be studied and as a means toward gaining insights into that doctrine, since both are inseparable in his exposition.

A special debt o f gratitude m ust here be expressed to the editors and publishers o f the K ohlham m er edition; to the H anser publishers in Munich for Josef Q uint’s Meister Eckhart; and to all present and form er colleagues in Germany and England, especially C hristopher Butler, the form er Abbot o f Downside and now Bishop in the archdiocese o f W estminster, w ithout whose direction my study o f Eckhart would have been overexposed and hence thw arted at a c ru cial point o f developm ent.

C. F. K. August 1976

Introduction

Meister Eckhart has represented one o f the most fascinating and frustrating puzzles ever to preoccupy the interests o f research scholars. Until a hu n d red and fifty years ago the nam e o f Eckhart had rem ained clouded in suspicion and almost total mystery. T hen the Sherlock Holmeses o f m edieval history, particularly in Germany, began to apply their newly acquired skills to this enigm a, deducing here and dusting o ff there. T hough their investigative work fostered many misleading theories, as m ight be expected, it has finally rem oved much o f the mystery and practically all o f the suspicion. Still, it seems quite likely that some parts o f the puzzle will never be solved.

Be that as it may, we now know that Eckhart von Hoch- heim (b. 1260-d. 1328) m ust be ranked on a par with the most p rofound intellects and spiritual guides o f C hristendom and, indeed, o f o u r whole W estern civilization. His au thentic writings, together with his serm ons as recorded by devoted students, unfold a traditional doctrine the sublimity o f which can hardly be m atched by any o ther hum an exposition.

T h e essential doctrine, in the nam e o f which Eckhart speaks and which determ ines all particular aspects o f his teaching, is the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge.1 It is the doctrine o f “unrestricted knowledge itself” which, being un conditioned and beyond distinctions, transcends all m anifest acts o f intellection, ju s t as it transcends every possible m ode o f experience.

T hus, contrary to widely accepted opinion, the doctrine expounded by Eckhart is not to be found in the study o f mystical experience o r even in what is normally understood as mysticism.2 N or is it to be found in the disciplines o f theology o r philosophy. T o regard the doctrine u nd er any o f these aspects is to miss the m ark and assure one’s failure to gain insight into its axial content. Indeed one thereby desig

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nates oneself as an alien to a true apprehension o f knowledge in divinis, the m ode o f which is strictly transcendent to and hence inversely d ifferent from any o f these o ther modes o f knowledge, valid as they may be within their own province. A nd to emphasize this difference Eckhart will call it “unknow ing knowledge,” which characterizes the m eaning o f the term ‘Divine Knowledge,’ constituted as it necessarily is within Divinitas, o r Godhead.

In relation to Divine Knowledge even genuine religious mysticism is already an externalization. This is so by the very fact that it presupposes and m aintains th roughout a correlation between God and the self and emphasizes the experience, inexpressible as it may be, o f sensing contact with God, o f perceiving his presence in the soul and in individual manifestation. But it is not unrestricted knowledge itself, not God in his undifferen tiated G odhead, with which Eckhart is pre-em inently concerned. “U ndifferentiation,” he says, “is p ro per to Godhead, differentiation to the creatu re .” 3 Mysticism always retains a certain, though subtle, degree o f differentiation.

T hough mystical o r negative theology closely approx imates Divine Knowledge it is nevertheless to be distinguished from it, inasm uch as it implies an intellective state still g rounded in the m anifestation o f that unrestricted and unm anifested knowledge itself. T hough true as far as it goes, it is not situated as it were wholly within that purely transcendent o rd er.4 It is this latter consideration which constitutes the standpoint o f the doctrine Eckhart expounds. While he does at times speak in term s o f negative theology, which likewise far transcends his lim itation as a w riter and teacher, only confusion results if we recognize him prim arily as a mystic, even in the genuine sense o f the term .

M oreover, the p ro p e r limit o f that genuine sense o f ‘mysticism’ has in m odern times been stretched beyond the possibility o f intelligent definition. It has fallen into the absurdities o f being identified with esoteric occultism, the use o f allegory and symbol, mysteriousness, ideology, psychophysical phenom ena such as visions and ecstacies: usages that

IN T R O D U C T IO N 3have added to the difficulties o f a complex subject and b rought that h igher intellection and moral decision which it expresses into disrepute. This is another, though secondary, reason for saying that the doctrine expounded by Eckhart is not to be found in mysticism.

Theology is even m ore external than genuine religious mysticism by reason o f its form al o r cataphatic knowledge o f God, that is, knowledge o f God established in structure and individuality. Rooted though it should be, but rarely is, in structureless o r negative knowledge o f God, theology is at best only an approxim ation to unconditioned Godhead. As for philosophy, it designates a standpoint o f knowledge that is much m ore external than theology and hence is still fu rth er rem oved from the subject that Eckhart invites us to study and insists that we must study if we would understand reality as it truly is.

T he purely transcendent knowledge with which Eckhart is fundam entally concerned does not partake o f any o f these h igher or lower modes o f individualized knowledge. But in o rd er to be genuine they m ust somehow partake o f it, at least in the sense o f acknowledging it as the Principle o f which they are but m ere reflections. T hus the particular studies that go to make up these m anifold and therefore restricted modes o f knowledge cannot be regarded as containing Divine Knowledge, which in itself is unm anifested. Being all-inclusive, it cannot be contained in any distinctive m ode o f knowledge—in fact, the modes may tu rn out to be stum bling blocks by reason o f the all too frequent mental oversights that result from a secularized kind o f education.

In o rd er to apprehend the doctrine that Eckhart expounds a special inquiry undertaken externally is o f little use. It is not prim arily a question o f social science, philology, o r psychology, or, as already noted, o f philosophy, theology, o r mysticism, inasm uch as all these studies, in one degree o r another, pertain to that o rd er o f knowledge which Eckhart clearly considers as external. His consideration o f them as external is not from disdain, but simply because that is the natu re o f their modes. His u n d e rstanding o f philosophy, theology, and also the mystical the


ology o f Pseudo-Dionysius the A reopagite was very p ro found, and he was one o f the great language masters o f all time. But he regarded such understandings as really distinct from and reducible to the ultim ate objective o f the unlim ited will to know.

T he saintly Jo hn T auler, who as the forem ost student o f Eckhart undoubtedly knew and understood the Meister better than any o f his contem poraries, said in one o f his sermons: “This w onderful Master spoke o f that pure knowledge that knows no form o r creaturely way. . . . He spoke in term s o f eternity and you [regrettably} understood in term s o f tim e.” 5

Eckhart him self is quite clear concerning that “purely transcendent m ode,” wholly grounded as it is within u n re stricted knowledge itself which infinitely and eternally is. T he unassailable consideration o f that m ode he calls “pure metaphysics,” o r “detached intellection,” and for good reason. A fter all, the o rder o f knowledge thus signified as really transcending universal manifestation in every respect must involve an intellective standpoint that is supraindividual, supranature , beyond distinctions and situated as it were within the all-inclusive Principle. W hat is param ount th roughout the writings o f Eckhart is his recognition that it is only insofar as any question whatsoever is related to p rin ciples that it can be said to be treated in tru th and therefore metaphysically. Since, however, all questions fo r intelligence m ust ultimately be related to the suprem e Principle, which is unrestricted knowledge itself, then it is pure metaphysics that must be the fundam ental intention.

If o u r notion o f metaphysics is restricted to ontology and epistemology, which are respectively inquiries into ‘being’ and ‘the course o f hum an knowing’, and draw n by abstraction from the world o f ou r unregenerate , ungraced daily experience, Eckhart will rightly say that o u r notion o f m etaphysics in relatively im pure. T hough lit by the light o f reason, though true and necessary as far as it goes in via, such a consideration, according to Eckhart, obviously limits itself by a certain insufficiency o f means implied in an overvalua

IN T R O D U C T IO N 5tion o f the conceptul graspings o f the rational faculty o f the intellect. It also limits itself by not draw ing its intellection directly from within the formless light o f divine revelation, from not first o f all establishing itself in divinis, in Christ the W ord, the unrestricted act o f knowledge itself.6 It is this tru th that m ust always be kept central so long as the in tention is to treat o f pure metaphysics and not that o f philosophical metaphysics, which is limited by its standpoint in universal manifestation.

Thus the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is properly to be acknowledged as a purely metaphysical doctrine, transcending all experience, all abstractions o r conceptual graspings o f the mind and, indeed, all individual m anifestation and d eterm ined mystical states. Hence it opens up truly unlim ited possibilities o f insight. As such it can in no way be enclosed in any experience, mystical o r otherwise, o r in any system whatsoever.

Philosophy, like theology, cannot do without system. And the test o f its ongoing value is w hether o r not it is a truly open system or, better, a m ethod o r course o f questioning wholly constituted in the detached and unlim ited will to know. If it is g rounded in a participation in reality, points the unlim ited will to know in the direction o f the unlim ited act o f com prehension, and implies its own transcendence by supplying the requisite springboards, it may be regarded as open and also o f great assistance to the hum an intellect. If, on the contrary, as is the case with most m odern philosophy, it aborts the unlim ited will to know by stopping to take a m ental gaze at reality as though it were som ething ‘out the re ’ separate from the knowing subject, thus shutting o ff any possibility o f transcendence, it merits no fu rth er consideration. For then it is nothing but a closed conception, the m ore o r less restricted limits o f which are determ ined by the m ental outlook o f its author.

Already we can recognize a profound and irreducible difference, a difference in principle, distinguishing the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge from anything that is included u nd er the nam e o f ‘open ’ o r ‘participative’ philosophy, rare and deserving o f respect as that is. For in pure metaphysics,


or in the detached intellectual consideration o f unrestricted knowledge itself, even an open systematization is strictly impossible. Why? Because in pure metaphysics, as understood by Eckhart, the eternal W ord is the ‘au th o r’ and everything pertaining to individual and structural o rd er is absent.

In o th e r words, Divine Knowledge is totally detached from all contingencies and from every manifestation o f the unconditioned Principle, w hether philosophical o r o therwise. This is necessarily so because unrestricted knowledge itself is, in principle, that which God is in his G odhead, and such knowledge can in no way be enclosed within any structure, o r even in any individual mystical state, however comprehensive it may be. This explains why, as Eckhart points out, there is no question o f the individual intellect ever attaining a direct com prehension o f the substantial essence o f God when pure metaphysics is correctly considered. If this is so it is for the simple reason that in pure metaphysics God is not, in principle, app reh en ded in term s o f individuality or in term s o f the distinctions necessarily implied in the substantial essence o f an intellective objective.

T hough the term s ‘theology’ and ‘Divine Knowledge’ are in a sense etymologically equivalent, it m ust always be rem em bered that theology, when genuine, designates the fo rmal and distinctive understand ing o f God and the superna tural o rder. T hus it is an understand ing veiled in and therefore qualified by the structural m anifestation o f the ultimate Principle. T hough it may reach beyond structure toward pure Spirit o r infinite Personality, theology nonetheless cannot, o f its very nature, transcend distinctive determ ination. N or is it in its province ordained to do so.

On the o ther hand, That which Eckhart renders indica- tively as Godhead o r Divine Knowledge (for the want o f any better term unless it be “unknow ing knowledge”) is the supradeterm inate and indistinguishable Principle in itself, the unrestricted knowledge which God in his G odhead is. For the purely transcendent standpoint basically implies the consideration o f God wholly as it were within the Principle. T h at means the consideration o f God neither as an essence nor as a person, but o f that which transcends all notions

IN T R O D U C T IO N 7both o f essence and o f person; it is o f God in his und ifferentiated and indistinguishable G odhead. T h e infinite Personality in itself is indeed G od’s Self-affirmation as identically Knowledge and the Principle, But inasm uch as theology distinctly determ ines that Personality in relation to all manifestation, it by that very fact already indicates a relational understand ing and hence a consideration from without.

Genuine theology, then, is the highest o f the relational considerations and com prises the most p rofound o f all determ inations and distinctions. Still it m ust be acknowledged as constituted in qualified and distinctive knowledge. T hat which God intrinsically is in the undifferentiated G odhead is unqualified, strictly unconditioned, beyond distinctions and determ inations, and in relation to it the entire o rd er o f m anifestation as such is nothing.

Metaphysically understood, manifestation can only be app rehended from the standpoint o f its participation in and dependence upon the suprem e Principle and in the quality o f a support for the vault into that pure transcendent knowledge. As such, and therefo re when considered in the inverse o rder, the participatory ontology and theology inheren t in Eckhart’s exposition o f the doctrine, both in their positive and negative aspects, is an application o f tru th as in the suprem e Principle. In any case, nothing m ore should be expected from all that pertains to participatory u n d e rstanding—that is to say, nothing m ore than an indispensable support o r springboard primarily designed to facilitate an openness to the uncreated grace requisite for a sustained insight into the unm anifested and unrestricted knowledge which God is.

It goes without question for Eckhart that the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is signified especially and directly by the W ord, both revealed in Holy Scripture and incarnate in C hrist.7 T hus it is the sacred and traditional doctrine in its integrality, fo r this precisely is the significance o f the W ord considered as God’s unique com m unication to man. It discloses the suprem e Principle and also the common basis o f


the m ore o r less secondary and derivative aspects that com prise those diverse conceptions in which certain people have affirm ed so many rival and opposed systems.

Insofar as these conceptions are in accord with their tran scendent g round they obviously cannot in tru th contradict one another. O n the contrary, they are bound mutually to com plem ent and elucidate each other. But this in no way implies a syncretism, for the essential doctrine must be u n derstood as integrally com prised in principle within the W ord, beyond dialectic and from its primal source. M oreover, in its integrality sacred tradition, o r that which is transm itted by the W ord, form s a perfectly coherent whole; which however does not m ean to say an enclosed systematic whole. And since all the genuine interpretations that it contains can as well be considered simultaneously as in succession, there is nothing really to be gained by inquiring into the historical o rd er in which they may actually have been developed and rendered explicit.

This is why ‘Eckhartianism ’ is out o f the question. Indeed, to study Eckhart is not prim arily to study the early fo u rteenth-century teacher, but to m editate on the formless light o f transcendent knowledge with which the intellect is coincident and in which this innerm ost contem plative m etaphysics always takes its stand. It is for this reason that we are not here prim arily concerned with the life and times o f Eckhart the man. T he reader who for some reason regards biographical understand ing as helpful may easily consult o ther books on Eckhart for what little there is to be know n.8 T rue , Eckhart’s expounding o f the perennial doctrine actually began only a generation after the death o f St. Thom as Aquinas and mainly in the schools o f Paris and the Rhineland. Nevertheless he fully acknowledged that while exposition may be modified to a certain degree externally in o rder to adapt itself to this o r that personal situation, the basis o f the tradition always rem ains unchanged, and any outw ard modifications in no sense affect the essence o f the doctrine.

T he fundam ental harm ony o f a conception with the essential principles o f the tradition is the necessary and sufficient condition o f its genuineness. Since these principles

IN T R O D U C T IO N 9are wholly com prised within the W ord, which is identical with the all-inclusive G odhead, it follows that it is agreem ent with the W ord that constitutes the criterion o f unassailable tru th . In this sense it is, o f course, the New Testam ent that unfolds the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge strictly speaking inasm uch as it is directly inspired o f Jesus Christ the incarnate W ord him self and, as effected by the Holy Spirit, is a faithful recording o f God’s communication.

T he New Testam ent not only form s the latter portion o f Holy Scripture, but what is taught therein, so fa r at least as it can be taught, is the final and suprem e aim o f traditional and sacred knowledge in its entirety. In this sense it is detached from all the m ore o r less particular and contingent applications derivable from it. And if the fourth or last Gospel ranks as suprem e it is because, being the final Gospel, it pre-em inently sets forth in direct m anner the very Divine Knowledge with which Eckhart is above all concerned. T hus one cannot insist too strongly that it is the New Testam ent which here discloses the prim ordial and fundam ental trad ition and consequently constitutes, in figures o f speech and thought, pure knowledge in principle. From this it follows that in a case o f doubt as to the in terpretation o f the doctrine, it is always to the prim ary and unconditioned m eaning o f Holy Scripture, and not to philosophers and theologians, form al or mystical, that it is necessary for the authority o f the Christian Church to appeal in the last re sort.

W hat the Scriptures and the sacred tradition essentially teach goes beyond all hum anistic dimensions. What is not to be resisted is the call to vault beyond the limits o f social science, philology, anthropology, and psychology, and also the limits o f experience, conceptualization, and individuality. Not by denying their form s from without, but by transcending them within, and that can only be within the all-inclusive Principle itself.

No m anner o f scientific research can clearly and distinctly establish the com m unication o f God which reveals the mode and reality o f Divine Knowledge. This is not a miracle, not a ‘gnostic idea’, and it requires from the critic who hopes to

i o IN T R O D U C T IO N

gain insight into it som ething far m ore than secular comprehension, ontological understanding, o r mystical experience. T he miraculous can be dem ythologized, reality analysed, and the w ondrous explained, though little o f real worth is gained thereby. But the persistent com m unication o f the Scriptures will not go away. From the standpoint o f individual m anifestation the com m unication is irreducible: God intervenes in time, the infinite shatters the finite whereby the W ord becomes known to m an, and the course o f hum an knowledge is in terrup ted and is never again the same. For the com m unication o f the W ord unfolds the intrinsic natu re o f Divine Knowledge. In o ther words, the unique possibility is g ranted man to understand all things in principle from the standpoint as it were o f the unconditioned Godhead, the actual realization o f which is strictly contem plative and wholly transcendent in mode.

Eckhart makes his purpose very clear: “ It is the intention o f the w riter {Eckhart himself}—as it has been in all his works—to expound by means o f the natural dem onstrations o f the philosophers, the doctrines taught by the holy Christian faith and the Scriptures o f the Old and New T estam ents.” 9 In o ther words, well-grounded belief is seeking knowledge. Not merely the knowledge which justifies the belief, but pre-em inently that knowledge which transcends experience, hum an reason, and universal manifestation. M oreover, the means o f expounding it to o ther knowing beings m ust not, o f course, be repugnan t to philosophical intelligence. It is in this sense that the M eister’s Latin and Germ an Expositions, Treatises, Tractates, and Sermons m ust be studied in the ir integrality, for they are essentially metaphysical com m entaries on scriptural texts.

It should never be forgotten that Eckhart was wholly com m itted to the reasonable belief that Holy Scripture, “the testimony o f God’s unconditioned m eaning for man and the world through Jesus Christ,” is the direct result o f divine inspiration. T hus it is in its own right that Holy Scripture m aintains its unique authority, and in o rd er to do so it m ust be independen t o f all o ther authority. In the same stroke,

INTRODUCTION

however, Eckhart believed that in o rd er to extol and p re serve that authority, as well as to teach the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge that it contains, the Christian C hurch was established by the incarnate W ord himself. With the divine promise o f indestructibility, the C hurch is the ongoing community o f men and women cooperating in the developm ent and diffusion o f that doctrine.

Now insightful com m entaries on the Scriptures play a fundam ental part in the developm ent and diffusion o f the divine doctrine. As such they are analogous to induction in that they derive their authority outside themselves. But to avoid any m isunderstanding as to the force o f the analogy indicated between indirect and direct knowledge, it is necessary to add, says Eckhart, that like every true analogy it must be applied inversely. In o ther words, that which is finite, inasmuch as it is like that which is infinite, m ust be considered as it were from the standpoint o f the infinite in which there are no real distinctions. T hus while induction rises above sensible perception and perm its one to pass on to a h igher level, it is on the contrary direct insight alone which, by a transposition effected by uncreated grace, attains to the Principle itself. In so doing it attains to that which is first and suprem e, after which nothing rem ains but to draw the consequences and determ ine the m anifold implications.

T h ere is no disputing the profundity o f the in te rp re tations o f Holy Scripture expounded by the early Greek and Latin Fathers. M oreover, the abiding im port o f the intellections disclosed in the writings o f the medieval m etaphysicians, especially Aquinas, should never be understated . But when it is a question o f expounding the doctrine as it were from the standpoint o f unrestricted knowledge itself, no com m entary unfolds deeper insight and greater single- m inded consideration o f that transcendent m ode o f knowledge than that o f Eckhart. Since all these esteem ed com m entaries on Holy Scripture, including Eckhart’s, are trad itional in the true sense o f the term , we should not exaggerate the im portance o f their apparen t differences o f adaptation. Eckhart’s exposition distinguishes itself simply


by its persistent consideration o f all things from the standpoint as it were o f pure, infinite Intellect. So far as participative philosophy and theology go he stands squarely on the shoulders o f Aquinas. But it is not on the Summa Theo- logica that his intellect is focused. R ather it is directly on and indeed as it were within that at which Aquinas and his trad itional predecessors point: the W ord, Intellect-as-such, with which the manifest intellect is, in principle, identical—as the au thor o f the Summa rem inds us.

It is clearly incorrect to apply the term ‘liberal’ to Eckh art’s exposition o f Holy Scripture, as some persons have done. T he inadmissibility o f this expression arises especially from the fact that here the term ‘liberalism’ is a com parative and necessarily implies the correlative existence o f a ‘conservatism’. But such a division cannot be applied to a consideration o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge. Liberalism and conservatism are not to be regarded as two divorced and m ore o r less opposed doctrines but as two aspects o f the same form al and systematic dogm a, and as such have existed th roughout the sacred tradition. This, however, does not apply in the case o f the consideration o f formless and unrestricted knowledge itself. In this case one can only speak o f the m ode o f knowledge that inevitably pertains to the purely transcendent o rd er w here it is necessary always to take into account the incom m ensurable o r noncorrelative, which is indeed what is most im portant.

W ords and symbols, like concepts, ideas, and images, serve only by supplying supports for a course o f knowing that m ust necessarily begin in each person, and by acting as requisite springboards to the apprehension o f that u n m anifested and unconditioned Principle. In this regard the only app ropriate distinction to be m ade in Eckhart’s exposition is no m ore than one between the letter and the spirit. It goes without saying that the true spirit and principle o f the letter is not that m eaning which is most divorced from the letter, but that which is innerm ost in it in the sense that only the purely transcendent can be truly innerm ost.

Eckhart recognizes that the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is accessible to all those who are intellectually and spiritually

IN T R O D U C T IO N *3

qualified—in o ther words, to all who are capable o f sustaining a metaphysical insight. It is understood, however, only by those who through grace actually do sustain that insight, and who, in true humility, derive a real advantage from it for the expansion o f awareness and the enactm ent o f char-ity'If it thus appears from a hum anistic standpoint that there is a transcendent doctrine reserved for a chosen few, it is because it cannot be otherwise when one takes into consideration the actual capacities o f hum an beings in their willingness to know. T h ere is no trace here o f the nontradi- tional ‘gnostic’ sects o f earlier time. Instead o f extolling pure knowledge and the reflected h igher intellect, which the designation ‘gnostic’ should imply, the mem bers o f those sects lived in the conviction that they possessed a secret and mysterious revelation specially granted to them in conceptualizable form and inaccessible to others regardless o f their intellectual capacities. N othing is m ore abhorent to Eckhart. Yet the doctrine in the nam e o f which he speaks is indoctrinary by means o f initiation, nonform al instruction, and an intellectual and moral discipline open to grace. T hus it differs greatly in all its m ethods from the secular education which is overrated in m odern times, since there is no way in which the doctrine can be popularized.

In fact Eckhart makes it very clear that the intention in teaching the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is not to im plant that knowledge in, o r reduce it to the conceptual levels of, the m inds o f the populace o r even the minds o f a few men and women. This is an impossibility, inasm uch as that “u n knowing knowledge” transcends m ental activity and conceptualization. Rather, the very doctrine and its teaching denotes that it is o rdained essentially to destroy ignorance, and it does this by designating that whereby a vault into purely transcendent knowledge is possible.

If it is prim arily a question o f an intellectual vault, that is because transcendent knowledge is in itself strictly incom municable in hum an term s and not subject to formalization. Indeed, no person can attain it save by his own unlim ited will to know effected and sustained by the grace o f the W ord. Original sin, according to Eckhart, is an inescapable

»4 IN T R O D U C T IO N

fact so far as the hum an process is considered in individual m anifestation. No original sin, no evil; no evil, no moral choice; no moral choice and hum an freedom is meaningless and man becomes a nonknower. But original sin does not annihilate the will to know, ra ther it ‘wounds’ it in such a way that in o rd er to rem ain detached and unlim ited regeneration by the W ord is indispensable.

Yet it was precisely because Eckhart insisted on teaching the destruction o f ignorance in the Dominican church in Cologne and similar centers w here people from every walk o f life gathered that he personally came u n d er the attack o f certain systematic theologians. Indeed, there is a sense in which we can understand why his students Jo h n T au ler and H enry Suso later hinted that Eckhart’s language was possibly too subtle for a serm on to the nobles, gentry, and laborers o f the Rhine Valley.10 We also learn from T au ler and Suso why Eckhart’s adversaries did not find it too difficult a fter his death to secure from Jo hn XXII a condem nation o f some o f his statem ents. Eckhart, as is well known, had previously retracted, denied any heterodox o r purely subjectivist intentions that may be derived from any o f his elliptic assertions. At the same time he pointed out that unless certain assertions concerning the divine doctrine are elliptic in natu re there is little hope o f ever being able to teach the doctrine, since words themselves are already oblique, never direct. This is a fact, however, that the fo rmal logician is rarely able to understand.

As for speaking o f the most p rofound insights concerning Divine Knowledge in the presence o f those untrained in theology, he replied by saying that even a person without a specialized form al education may, with the help o f God, be capable o f sustaining a suprarational insight. M oreover, if the ignorant are not taught, no one will ever attain knowledge. A fter all, Christ him self said: “It is not the healthy that need a doctor.” 11 And the purpose o f teaching is to dispel ignorance by exposing all things, no t in their own delusive light, but in the light o f the W ord, o r Divine Knowledge itself. Was not St. Jo h n ’s Gospel written for all hum an beings, wise and ignorant, believers and nonbeliev

IN T R O D U C T IO N l 5ers? Yet the prologue to that Gospel contains the most p rofound and elliptic sentences that have ever been written concerning the unrestricted act o f G odhead.12

It is now adm itted by practically all Eckhartian scholars that had the fourteenth-century authorities intelligently and dispassionately investigated all the M eister’s writings, he would probably never have suffered a condem nation.13 But the flair for condem nation without intelligent cause was ju st as prevalent in the high Middle Ages as it is in o u r own twentieth century, as for exam ple the prohibitions placed on the works o f St. Thom as Aquinas only a few years after his death.

T hough jealousy and certain political issues influenced his attackers, it was clearly their d ie-hard adherence to a closed systematic theology and their insistence on the p rimacy o f a restricted ontology that primarily accounted for their determ ination to silence Eckhart. He had no quarrel with form al theology in its rightful province, but his censors failed to understand what he and his students clearly understood: form al theology, like ontology, is at best no m ore than a participation in the suprem e Principle, and if separated from or substituted for that Principle it is of no m ore perennial worth than the abstractions enjoyed by a mouse. For the W ord, like reality itself, is not even initially known by insisting on mentally gazing at it. And participatory knowledge, even at its mystical heights and no m atter how extensive, is still short o f and never to be confused with pure knowledge, from which all-inclusive standpoint every limited m ode o f knowledge is relationally naught. It is the relational ignorance o f those who confound participatory knowledge with pure knowledge, as well as the total ignorance o f those who think they know by adopting a stance o f “looking at” reality, that the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is ordained to destroy.

Eckhart makes no claim to setting forth a complete exposition o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge in its strict totality, even regarding a single point. Such an understanding would be impossible, not only in term s o f the unending labor it would involve, but prim arily because o f the very na

i 6 IN T R O D U C T IO N

tu re o f the doctrine. F urtherm ore, any such enterprise would be self-defeating in that it would inevitably take on the appearance o f systematization, which is incompatible with what is essential in the transcendent consideration. Eckhart’s exposition is such that it is intentionally designed to discourage those who by their very m ental habits are determ ined, despite all warnings, to extract systems even where none exist. His m ethod is to treat a particular them e o r one m ore o r less definite aspect o f the doctrine at a time, leaving him self free to introduce o ther equally im portan t aspects later on in o rd er to make them , in their tu rn , points for fu rth er reflective study.

It is in the light o f the foregoing rem arks that the intention o f this book is to be understood. T he purpose is to introduce the reader not only to the insights o f M eister Eckhart, but primarily to the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge which, as expounded by him, is to be found in the W ord. Likewise, and to avoid any appearance o f systematization, the six them es o r aspects o f the doctrine (which are distinctively considered in Part II, u nd er the chapter titles “God and the H um an Self,” “T h e W ord,” “T he Primal Distinction,” “T he Inversion,” “T he Veils o f G od,” and “T he Detachm ent”) are not necessarily set forth in the form o f a logical hierarchy; they may be considered in a nonsequential o rder. T hough they by no means exhaust the them es expounded by Eckhart, they are those most essentially and repeatedly m arked out by him as equivalent aspects o f the doctrine. W hen reflected upon they may best assist us in attaining a deeper understand ing o f what is the fundam ental teaching and prim ordial m eaning inheren t in G od’s communication to man.

But before these aspects o f the doctrine are presented certain preparatory rem arks and philosophical considerations should be made. If not strictly requisite, they may at least prove helpful as supports for an understand ing o f the doctrine. We in o u r time are so spiritually and intellectually crippled that we are almost rendered incapable o f u n d erstanding the essential teachings o f Eckhart. And no doubt

IN T R O D U C T IO N *7there will always be those who will make the fundam ental mistake o f adapting his insights to techniques for dealing with workaday em otional problem s without first preparing themselves philosophically and morally.

Obviously some attem pt should be made, therefore, to point out the main difficulties that ou r contem porary modes o f thought place in the way o f com prehending Eck- h art’s exposition o f the doctrine. A fter all, we are separated from him in time by almost seven centuries, and our educational system is anything but theologically o r even philosophically oriented. T he spiritual and intellectual influences on the m ind o f Eckhart, so unlike the influences that no rmally shape o u r mental attitudes, should also be brought to light, as well as the type o f misconceptions we in our day are especially prone to adopt concerning his exposition. M oreover, we should properly understand from Eckhart’s own statem ents how his arden t belief in and full intellectual acceptance o f God’s com m unication o f Divine Knowledge is to be rationally justified. This involves a consideration o f his philosophical dem onstration o f the reality o f God and, consequently, his indisputable reasons for understanding this world as a time-place continuum o f contingent and dependen t existence.

Inasm uch as they are p reparatory these rem arks and considerations will be undertaken in Part I; indeed, without them the doctrine itself would m ore likely than not rem ain alien to o u r intellectual quest. T hough im portant in their own right, they are nevertheless concessions to our present hum an situation and to a philosophical and therefore external m ode o f knowledge—“concessions” inasmuch as they may be said ultimately to derive their intelligibility from the transcendent m ode o f pure knowledge. T he fundam ental th read that binds this entire study together should be clearly evident once the relation o f the hum an self to God is theoretically understood. Eckhart’s exposition o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge unfolds step by step the requisite considerations involved in that relationship and culminates in that detachm ent which alone makes possible the re in tegration o f theoria and praxis.

i8 IN T R O D U C T IO N

For good reason references to Eckhart’s world o r to o u r own contem porary situation are intended only to assist the reader in attaining an understand ing o f his essential teaching. At the same time it should be clearly stated that the doctrine he expounds transcends com paratives and the relative generalities that historians use to designate an “age o f faith and qualitative intellectuality” in contrast to one, such as ou r own, o f “m arked quantitative and sensate tend en cies.” Any generalized a ttem pt to relate the doctrine to Eckh art’s situation, to o u r own, o r to any o ther hum an situation in the sense o f showing a special individual concern for the march o f the times would obviously tend to particularize and therefore distort its timelessness and transcendence.

It is ra th e r fo r each student o f Eckhart, regardless o f time and place, to relate him self to the doctrine and its divine source. T hus he m ust start with himself, the personal world he alone knows, and rise above his own situation and finally above the realm o f historical particularity to that o f detached intellection “in the fullness o f tim e.” In the process only he can modify and adapt the exposition o f the doctrine to a limited degree externally and for the sake o f his own personal needs.

Let it again be said that understand ing and not erudition is o u r concern. This study is not to be regarded as equivalent to what the specialists call a ‘research p aper’, because the basic metaphysical principles as affirm ed by Eckhart will be necessarily repeated and kept central throughout. T he derivitive points themselves are only to be considered as direct o r indirect applications o f those eternal principles which are all contained within the suprem e Principle from which all else derives. W hen it is a m atter o f considering the transcendent and unconditioned Principle, which is the synthesizing objective o f this study, ‘specialization’ is out o f the question. T hough there will be need to deal with o ther subjects, which initially may appear as extraneous, they will be introduced in reference to the main objective. So long as the reader keeps in m ind that the principles themselves have a range far exceeding the entire realm o f their possible applications, no objection should be found to expound

IN T R O D U C T IO N 19ing them , w henever possible, in relation to this o r that application. N or should the reader fall into the danger o f finding anything in this presentation, o r even in the writings o f Eckhart, that may be taken as the last word on the doctrine.

P a r t I

Preparatory Considerations

1

Difficulties and Misconceptions

T he general rem arks set forth in this chapter and certain considerations undertaken in the next should help prepare the way for an understand ing o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge which Eckhart expounds. These rem arks and considerations, which are concessions to o u r present hum an condition, pertain to the essential qualifications and well- g rounded judgm ents requisite fo r any genuine u n d e rstanding o f his teaching. Yet such an understand ing can only come about th rough an intellectual discipline which culminates in a realization o f “uncreated wisdom.” Inasmuch as that wisdom is always present and accessible to the person capable o f receiving it, any conception that it is specifically ancient, medieval, o r m odern is false.

Because Eckhart expounded the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge at the height o f the so-called Middle Ages and before the general breakdown o f the tradition which m aintained the pre-em inence o f “unitive knowledge,” these initial rem arks are m eant to help us place ourselves in the tradition to which he belonged. They m ight also assist us in surm ounting difficulties that m odern modes o f education and though t place in the way o f a true understanding o f the doctrine. It can even be said that by a genuine assimilation o f the essential content o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, we m ight recapture the spirit that dwells at the core o f Christianity itself. This instead o f restricting ourselves, as generally happens, to a hum anistic transcription o f the doctrine that relies for its authority almost exclusively on ‘historical facts’, thus relegating to the background the all- inclusive and eternal character o f its fundam ental tru th .

In this sense o u r present situation may be com pared to that o f the foolish virgins who, through the direction o f

23

24 PR EPA R A TO RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

their attention to individual and timely interests, allowed their lamps to go out. In o rd er to rekindle the divine fire, which in its essence is always the same w henever and w herever it may be burning, we m ust have recourse to the lamps kept alight by o u r wiser com panions am ong the contem plative faithful. But once lighted, it will still be o u r own lamps that we shall be lighted by, and all that we shall then have to do is to keep them properly fueled by ever present divine grace as is needed for that knowledge o f reality which tran scends o u r m ere hum an limitations.

T h e C h i e f D i f f i c u l t y

In o u r contem porary age many difficulties stand in the way o f any endeavqr at a serious and intim ate study o f Meister Eckhart’s teaching. Even though the student may now gain access to the genuine Latin and Germ an texts o f the Meister, these difficulties rem ain. Surely the greatest obstacles originate not from Eckhart but from ourselves; or ra the r from o u r own m ental attitudes, which are grounded in prejudices and limitations wholly foreign to him.

Obviously the first condition for such a study, and the most necessary, is to possess the intellectual qualifications for understanding the doctrine in question, and by this we m ean for understand ing it essentially and in tru th . In the prologue o f his m ajor work, the Opus Tripartitum, Eckhart cautions his readers not to rest on the app aren t sense o f his words, but' to exert g reat effort to apprehend the true m eaning: “It should be noted that some o f the following propositions, inquiries, and expositions will appear at first monstrous, doubtful, o r false, but not if they are studied with detached understand ing and consideration.” 1

It is this aptitude o f detached intellection which, with very few exceptions, is lacking am ong would-be students o f a doctrine which by its very nature is transcendent to ou r hum an and therefore restricted modes o f understanding. On the o ther hand, the fulfillment o f this one necessary condition can be considered a sufficient qualification, for once it is actualized there is no m ajor difficulty in grasping the integrality o f Eckhart’s teaching.

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 25But if there is really no o ther serious obstacle to the study

o f his exposition except this failure to understand in term s o f detached intellection, how is it that so far most scholars who devote themselves to this subject have not m anaged to overcome the difficulty? O ne could hardly be accused o f exaggeration in m aintaining that they have not actually overcome it, since so far they have only succeeded in producing specialized works o f erud ition .2 T hough these works are no doubt valuable from a certain standpoint, they are o f little interest when it comes to the question o f understand ing the most direct o f all true intellections.

For instance, take one o f many examples to be found in Eckhart’s writings: “W hen I flowed out o f God, then all things proclaim ed ‘T here is a G od’. Now this cannot make me blessed, for hereby I realize myself as creature. But in the breaking th rough into Divine Knowledge I transcend all creatures and there I am neither ‘God’ nor creature; I am that which I was and shall rem ain, now and forever more. . . . By this b reak through I become so rich that God is not sufficient for me, insofar as he is only ‘God’ o r even God in his divine works. For in thus breaking through, I realize that God and I are one. T h ere I am what I was, there I neither increase nor decrease, for there my innerm ost I is the im m utable Principle o f all things.” 3

Much m ore than a knowledge o f words and gram m ar, m ore than the use o f textual criticism, m ore than the so- called historical m ethod, even m ore than philosophical scholarship is needed to understand such statements. T he habits that grow with the use o f such m ethods, the relative value o f which should not be disputed, tend to narrow the intellectual horizon. They introduce preconceived notions that go to make up a m ental attitude with the m anifest intention o f forcing the doctrine u nd er study into the fram ework o f m odern thought. In short, questions o f specialized m ethod apart, the chief e rro r on the part o f many who attem pt to understand Eckhart’s teaching is to consider everything from an individual standpoint, whereas the first condition for the true understand ing o f the doctrine is to make an effo rt to assimilate it by placing oneself as far as possible


at the intellectual standpoint o f the one who expounds it.Eckhart speaks essentially and intentionally, as he him self

indicates, “in term s o f pure Intellect,” that is, “as it were from the sum m it o f eternity” o r “as from within the infinite Principle.” In o ther words, he speaks prim arily from the standpoint o f principial 4 knowledge. I f he is able to do this, it is because the intellectual tradition in which he grew and m atured was one that placed no serious obstacles in the way o f cultivating the habit o f considering everything, not from the points o f view o f restricted com prehension, but as it were from there within the Godhead. With others in the tradition to which he adhered he was able to affirm: “T h ere is a principle in the intellective soul, untouched by time and corporeality, flowing from pure Intellect, rem aining in pure Intellect, itself wholly intellectual. In this principle is God, ever verdant, ever flowering in all the fullness and glory o f his actual Self. . . . It is free o f all nam es and void o f all structures. It is one and unconditioned, as God is one and unconditioned, and no m an can in any way behold it m entally.” 5

No, the Principle cannot be mentally beheld, looked at, o r conceived, and any attem pt to do so, as though it were “out there som ewhere o r in here som ewhere,” is illusory. T he Principle, which is unrestricted Intellect itself, o r God in se, is that in which we either choose to participate o r not. But by participating in it we may come to realize that o u r truest identity is with it, ra ther than with o u r outw ard o r inner self. We choose to participate in the Principle insofar as o u r unlim ited will to know, o r o u r intellectual desire, is m aintained. We may understand o u r true identity with the Principle once we gain direct knowledge o f the tru th that “in the innerm ost Intellect G od’s ground is my ground and my ground is G od’s g round .” A fter all, “the knower and the known are one in knowledge. . . . Some people think that they shall know God as standing there and they here. Not so. God and I, we are one in pure knowledge.” 6 But such an understand ing is actualized, insists Eckhart, only by the com plete com m unication o f God him self in his W ord.

D IF FIC U L T IE S A ND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 27

I n t e l l e c t u a l I n f l u e n c e s o n E c k h a r t

If we are 10 place ourselves as far as possible at the standpoint from which Eckhart expounds the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, it may be o f initial help to understand something o f the intellectual tradition in which he was g rounded and the m ajor spiritual influences that m ade it not u nn a tu ral for him to consider “all things eternal wise.”

Eckhart’s adult life spans the last q uarte r o f the thirteen th century and m ore than the first quarte r o f the fourteenth . He was a fully com m itted Christian, a p rom inent m em ber o f the Dominican O rd e r o f the Church, and one o f the forem ost metaphysicians o f his time. To a Christian, Holy Scripture totally preceded in im port and influence all o ther writings o r speculations. As a Dominican and in the direct line o f St. Albert the G reat and St. Thom as Aquinas, Eckhart was a chief upho lder o f the teaching on “the primacy o f intellect,” which was the distinguishing m ark o f that o rder. And for Eckhart, with a genuine tradition to support him, the primacy o f intellect m eant not only the primacy o f knowledge over action, but the primacy o f G odhead or pure Intellect itself, o f which everything else is in function. Otherwise the Scriptures would have only an extrinsic ra th er than an intrinsic m eaning. But the very fact that they actually reveal the W ord o f God signifies the assured disclosure o f the primacy o f pure Intellect.7

T hat Eckhart knew the Scriptures backwards and forwards and acknowledged their suprem e authority is well attested to by a study o f his Latin works in particular. In his com m entary In Sapientiae, thirty-six books o f the Bible are quoted to substantiate his exposition. In one short Latin treatise alone at least twenty scriptural texts are au thoritatively cited from ten d ifferent books o f the Old and New Testam ents.8 I f ‘originality’ is recognized in many o f his interpretations it is because his exposition is intended sub specie aeternitatis, which necessitates a transposition from the ordinarily accepted m eaning, but a transposition that in no way contradicts it. For instance, in the first chapter o f St. Jo h n ’s Gospel we are told that “the light shines in dark

28 PR EPA R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

ness.” U nderstood by Eckhart to indicate the light o f God the Father shining in “the darkness o r unknow ing o f the unm anifest G odhead” 9 signifies a clear transposition to a purely metaphysical o rd er o f knowledge.

A part from Holy Scripture the main intellectual influences on Eckhart were St. Thom as (d. 1274), St. Augustine (d. 430), and Pseudo-Dionysius the A reopagite (writing c. 500). Schooled on St. T hom as’s writings and later professor at both St. Jacques in Paris and the fam ous Studium Generale in Cologne, at which schools both St. Albert and the Angelic Doctor had lived and taught, it is u n d e rstandable that he should be greatly im bued with their teachings. But St. A ugustine was still acknowledged as the Father o f W estern C hristendom and the voice o f theological au thority. O ne could not become a professor o f theology at that time unless he was well g rounded in A ugustine’s teaching. As for the Pseudo-Dionysius, he not only pointed out the responsibility o f theologians for all time to discover the hierarchical structure o f m anifest reality, but suggested p recise term inology to be em ployed when designating the o rd er o f transcendence.

Eckhart was well acquainted with the doctrines o f Plato and the neo-Platonists such as Plotinus, Proclus, and the autho r o f the Book o f Causes, and he does not hesitate to quote from them frequently. But as m ight be expected, he is far m ore indebted to Aristotle. His familiarity with the peripatetic philosopher’s m ajor works was extensive, especially his Metaphysics, Posterior Analytics, and the De Anima, De Caelo, and De Mundi. With Eckhart, as with St. Thom as, it was never a question o f ‘Christianizing’ e ither Plato o r Aristotle; ra ther it was a m atter o f completely transform ing the concepts and term inology o f the Greek thinkers by new and p ro founder insights and h igher principles m ade known by the revelation o f the W ord o f God.

In the same way Eckhart did not refrain from citing the Stoics and the Latin Classics as represented by Seneca, Cicero, Ovid, and even Virgil. He was also fam iliar with the works o f Boethius, Macrobius, Jo hn Scotus Erigena, and Alanus de Insules. He often refers with acute u nd er

D IF FIC U L T IE S A ND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 29standing to the great Arabic thinkers, Avicenna and Aver- roes, and also adm its his indebtedness to the Jewish theologians, Avencebron and especially Moses Maimonides. But although he absorbed many o f the genuine insights o f these men, he at once applied them in term s o f h igher principles.

N or was Eckhart’s knowledge slight o f both the Greek and Latin Fathers o f the Church. O rigen, St. Chrysostom, St. G regory o f Nyssa, St. Gregory o f Naziensus, and St. Jo hn Damascus are particularly referred to in his writings. Likewise we often find him quoting from St. Ambrose, St. Gregory the Great, Hilary o f Poitiers, even Isodore o f Sa- ville. And there are several citations from later writers, such as St. B ernard, St. Anselm, Peter Lom bard, Richard and H ugh o f St. Victor, and o f course St. Albert o f Cologne, whom Eckhart knew personally when a young student.

Eckhart’s p ro found knowledge o f philosophy and theology was practically unm atched by any o ther person throughout his m ature years. Professor Clark is right in stating: “As regards his reading in this and o ther fields, he may have been inferior to St. Thom as in the range and extent o f his erudition, but after the death o f Duns Scotus in 1308 he had no rival in G erm any and very few in Europe.” 10 T hough Eckhart wrote no treatises on cosmology, natural science, o r mathematics, there is abundan t evidence that he was extrem ely well inform ed in these subjects and in every branch o f knowledge then available. He was very fam iliar with the then cu rren t theories o f astronom y, anatom y, physiology, and biology. He also knew the principles o f social governm ent and the details o f both civil and canon law.11 It is even possible to extract an almost com plete philosophy of art from his writings. M oreover, his high adm inistrative duties in the Dominican O rd er caused him to be well traveled throughout the Em pire and o ther parts o f Europe.

It m ust be repeated, however, that we should tu rn to St. Thom as, St. Augustine, and the Pseudo-Dionysius in o rd er to appreciate the m ajor preparatory influences on the mind o f Eckhart. He was extraordinarily im bued with the ir teachings and he acknowledged them as com plem entary in every


respect. Yet the designations o f ‘Thom ist’, ‘Augustianian’ o r ‘Neo-Platonist’ are wholly out o f place applied to Eckhart’s teaching. This becomes very clear once it is understood that the standpoint from which Eckhart essentially expounds the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge is as it were wholly within God and not as one in direction toward God, as was the intended concern o f his predecessors. His use o f their term inology, his reliance on them for supportive pointers should not mislead the student o f Eckhart.

T he Pseudo-Dionysius affirms God as Wisdom, Goodness, and Being in a theological m anner, and shows how these term s are applicable to creatures only in virtue o f their derivation from God and their degree o f participation in h im .12 W hen, in the Divine Names, he speaks of ‘O ne’ as “the most im portant title o f all,” 13 he makes it clear that God is the ultim ate Principle o f all that is. In his Mystical Theology, however, he explains the negative way o f approaching God, that is, the way o f excluding from God all the im perfections o f creatures and universal manifestation. Starting by denying o f God those things which are farthest rem oved from him, such as “drunkenness or fury,” the intellect proceeds upw ards by progressively denying o f God all the attributes and qualities known in creation until it reaches “the superessential Darkness.” 14 When all the hum an ideas and modes o f thought have been stripped away from the intellect’s quest for God, it enters upon the “darkness o f unknow ing,” wherein “it renounces all the apprehensions o f the understand ing and is w rapped in that which is wholly intangible and incom prehensible . . . and is united to him .” 15 T hen God is known as the “superessential Intellect.”

T hus when we speak o f the transcendent, all-inclusive G odhead as Unity and Trinity, it is not Unity and Trinity such as can be understood by us. T he Pseudo-Dionysius goes on to say: “We apply the titles o f ‘T rin ity’ and ‘Unity’ to that which is beyond all titles, designating under the form o f Being that which is beyond Being. . . . Godhead has no nam e, nor can it be grasped by reason,” since it is “unconditioned Knowledge in itself.” 16 T he transcendent

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 31G odhead “is not a unity o r goodness, nor a Spirit, is not Sonship nor Fatherhood . . . nor does it belong to the determ inations o f non-Being o r to that o f Being.” 17

With regard to the relation o f the world to God the Pseudo-Dionysius speaks o f the manifold m anifestation o f God in the universe o f things. At the same time God remains indivisibly O ne even in the act o f “Self-manifestation” and without differentiation even in the process o f structureless o r structured m anifestation. God is eternally “the Principle and end o f all things.” 18

With the Pseudo-Dionysius Eckhart acknowledged the indispensability o f the negative approach to God as well as the hierarchical structure o f all being. But the A reopagite’s term s ‘darkness’, ‘desert’, ‘nothing’ as applied to God are transform ed by Eckhart to indicate God as unm anifest Allpossibility and really distinct from m anifest individual reality. T h e negative approach to God is reinforced by Augustine’s assertion that “though we can know that God is, we cannot know what God is,” and also by Aquinas’s ‘way of rem otion’. As Eckhart says: “Nobody is God, no created rational being as such is God. T he dem onstration o f a knowable thing is m ade either to the senses o r to the intellect, but as to the knowledge o f what God is there can be neither a dem onstration from sense experience, since he is incorporeal, nor from intellect, since he is w ithout quality o r structure, but is known only through rem otion from structures known to us. Hence God is, so to speak, affirm ed from o ther beings by discrim ination and discrim inated by affirm ation.” 19 But, as we shall discover, the negative way, though superior to the way o f rational analogy, is still in direction toward God; it does not constitute what Eckhart discriminates as the ‘m ode’ o f knowledge in pnncipio, o r Intel- lectus in divinis.

M ention has already been m ade o f Eckhart’s g reat indebtedness to Aquinas for his understand ing o f the primacy o f intellect over reason and will. We shall fu rth er consider this particular influence in the next section and, indeed, have occasion to re fe r to it throughout. This teaching is o f prim e im portance, especially as it prepares the way for an u nd er


standing o f the full implications to be derived from Aquinas’s clues regarding inverse analogy and knowledge through identity.

First, however, we should acknowledge the fact that the teachings o f both A ugustine and Aquinas on time and e te rnity, on the finite and infinite orders, are most evident in Eckhart’s writings. These teachings have little in com m on with those o f the G reek philosophers, for whom eternity and infinite designate merely unending duration and the indefinite, ra the r than strict timelessness and the purely u n conditioned. In o ther words, the Christian notion o f tran scendence is o f that which is strictly beyond and really distinct from every possible extension o f individuality and universal manifestation.

A fter St. Thom as, Eckhart cites St. Augustine m ore than any o ther au thor for support on this them e. A ugustine insists that the world o f time and finitude reflects and m anifests eternal and infinite God. “If anything worthy o f consideration is noticed in the nature o f things, w hether it be jud g ed worthy o f slight consideration o r o f great, it m ust be applied to the most excellent and ineffable consideration o f the C reator.” “T he o rd er and stability o f the universe m anifest the Intelligence o f G od.” God transcends the finite and the indefinite, which is merely an extension o f the finite; his essence is purely unconditioned and without accidents.20

Augustine also says that “God is him self in no interval nor extension o f place, but in his im mutable, p re-em inent allpossibility is both within everything because all things are in him and without everything because he transcends all things. So too he is in no interval nor extension o f time, but in his im m utable eternity is the principle o f all things because he is [metaphysically] p rior to all things and the end o f all things because the same he is after all things.” God is pure Knowledge; he knows all that he would make m anifest, but his knowledge is not distinct acts o f knowledge, ra th e r “one eternal, im m utable, and ineffable com prehension.” 21

Contem plating his own eternal essence, God, says A ugustine, “knows him self and all-possibility,” including finite es

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 33sences, the structural reflection o f his infinite Selfhood, so that the raliones (reasons o r principles) o f things, including m anifest intellects, are present in the divine Intellect from all eternity as the “divine ideas.” These “divine ideas are architypal form s o r perm anen t and unchanging rationes o f things which are not themselves form ed but are contained in the divine Intellect eternally and are always the same. They neither arise nor pass away, but whatever arises and passes away is form ed according to them .” 22 This is the famous doctrine o f exem plarism , but in o rd er not to im pair the identity o f God and o f all things in God, Eckhart, following Aquinas, insists that the “divine ideas” are really indistinct in God, in contrast to the position held by many o f their contem porary Augustinians.

From Aquinas, who was greatly influenced by the Pseudo- Dionysius on this point, Eckhart came to understand that God is completely w ithout form and duality. From Aquinas he also learned that “we m ust go through time to come to the knowledge o f eternity. . . . T h ere is no before o r after to be reckoned with in constant changeless Reality. Eternity lies in the apprehension o f that identity. . . . Eternity is signified by these two clauses: first, that a thing in eternity cannot be closed either prospectively o r retrospectively; second, that it is all-inclusive and all at once without any successiveness.” Aquinas goes on to say that “eternity is the measure o f perm anence; time the m easure o f change.” M oreover, “the now o f time is not time; the now o f eternity is really the same as eternity .” 23

T he influence o f these teachings explains why Eckhart could say “the world has always existed,” for the term ‘existence’ pertains not to eternity and the unconditioned order, but only to the m anifest o rd er o f time and finitude. “For there never was a time when the world did not exist o r when the world did not yet exist." 24 Because eternity, or the unconditioned, simply is, it does not ex-ist, does not stand- from som ething else, nor is it m anifested in any way. R ather it is for us to consider all manifest reality in term s o f pure isness 25 if we would truly understand the relation o f time to eternity, o f the finite to the infinite.

34 PR EPA R A T O RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

But can any o f this be truly understood without first u n derstanding the distinction between intellectual knowledge and rational knowledge?

T h e S p e c i a l I n f l u e n c e o f S t . T h o m a s A q u i n a sIt has been stated that a sustained insight into “pure In

tellect” is the chief qualification necessary in o rd er to u n d e rstand the essential teaching o f M eister Eckhart. It has also been noted that the great influence o f St. Thom as Aquinas on Eckhart largely accounts for the sense o f confidence the Meister had in expounding the doctrine in term s o f pure Intellect.

St. Thom as died in 1274, only a year o r two p rio r to Eckhart’s entrance into the Dominican house o f studies in E rfu rt where he began his long years o f h igher form al study. T he young Dominican came from a well-educated family o f nobility who were large landow ners in the countryside o f nearby Gotha and benefactors o f the C hurch in this part o f central Germany. He was a gifted student and also endowed with adm inistrative ability, for after serving as Sentenzen-lektor (1293-94) at the University o f Paris his extensive form al studies were in terrup ted when he was chosen to be Prior o f E rfu rt and Vicar o f T huringia. But in 1298, o r shortly thereafter, he was again sent to the Dominican house o f St. Jacques in Paris w here the teachings o f Aquinas still held undisputed sway. H ere he studied and fulfilled his lecturing assignm ents fo r the degree o f doctor o f theology, which he received from the University o f Paris in 1302. He was to re tu rn to St. Jacques as a professor almost a decade later, at which time he began to compose his m ajor work, the Opus Tripartitum. A fter a couple years he was called back to Germany, first to S trasbourg and then to Cologne, where he taught and fulfilled o th e r adm inistrative duties.

T hough Eckhart was one o f the most erudite scholars o f his time, he insisted that erudition , no m atter how scientific o r com prehensive, is at best only ancillary to the direct knowledge gained by detached intellection.26 He never gave any p rio r claim to learning o r to the discursive operations o f reason and its objective. Priority is always placed on the

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 35objective o f the unlim ited will to know which is the unrestricted act o f knowledge itself. “O ne should be stripped o f and detached from reasoning and withdrawn into detached intellection.” T he will to know m ust be kept unlim ited and not prim arily directed toward the objects o f limited reason. M oreover, the unlim ited will to know can only be sustained by divine grace, for “there God works in the highest and purest act.” A fter all, “reason apprehends God only insofar as he is known to it. T h ere it can never com prehend him in the ocean o f his unfathom ableness.” “From this one can deduce that an unlearned man can, by means o f love o r the unlim ited will to know, obtain knowledge and teach o th ers.” 27 Recall that N athanael, who had not detached him self from his own erudition, was not chosen to be an Apostle, “for to this rank neither the m ere learned nor the hum anly wise were selected.” 28

This calls for a few additional rem arks pertaining to the special influence on the m ind o f Eckhart o f Aquinas’s u n derstanding o f both m anifest and unm anifest intellect. In fact Eckhart regarded this understand ing as fundam ental to the entire structure o f Aquinas’s teaching.

First o f all, Aquinas makes it very clear that “reason differs from intellect as m ultitude from unity, as time from eternity .” 29 But “intellect and reason are not separate faculties. T o know intellectually is to app rehend intelligible tru th directly; to reason is to proceed from one understand ing to another. Reason is com pared to intellect as activity to rest, as acquiring to already having. O ne is a process, the o th e r is an achievem ent.” By intellect “a m an is intent on things eternal, contem plating them in themselves and consulting them for rules o f action, while by reason he is in tent on things tem poral. . . . In the o rd er o f intellection we jud ge of tem poral m atters according to eternal principles. In tellect and reason are distinguished by d ifferent habits and active functions. Unitive knowledge is attributed to intellect, scientific o r discursive knowledge to reason.” 30

“Rational knowledge,” says Aquinas, “is the m iddle stage between sensation and detached intellection. . . . It is p ro p erly concerned with structures that in fact exist in ail indi


vidual beings.” Intellectual knowledge, however, “is concerned with eternal principles which are apprehended by intellectual intuition.” T h a t which is “directly known in the intellect is isness. A thing is knowable because isness is pointed to. Isness is the p ro p er object o f intellect; it is the prim ary intelligible.” And this is why “the actually known is the knower as actual.” 31

Aquinas goes on to say that intellectual knowledge “means the presence o f the known in the knower in the knower’s own way.” T h e unaided intellect, however, can only know manifest, dependen t isness, and it does so natu rally. However, “to know self-subsisting [unmanifest] isness is natural to the divine Intellect alone . . . a created intellect cannot know the divine essence [which is God’s isness} except God by his grace shows and gives himself.” 32 Nevertheless, “the intellect which is potential to all knowability [and ‘God is the suprem e, total knowability’} we term the intellectus possibilis,” that is, the intellect able to know all things and even God in himself. “T h ere is nothing that the divine Intellect does not know actually, n o r the hum an intellect potentially.” But “no potentiality is actualized save by that which is in act,” which means that only pure Act, or God, can actualize the potentiality o f the intellect to know all things and God himself. It is by this actualization that “the intellect is transposed into God” and “that which is in God is G od.” 33

It is precisely this actualization by God that makes for unrestricted knowledge through identity. Aquinas affirms that “G od’s understanding, the object understood, and the act o f understand ing are identical.” M oreover, “God knows everything sim ultaneously.” “It is the infusion o f supernatu ral light which enables the intellective soul to know everything and even to realize God him self.” 34 W ere one to consider “the intellectus possibilis as fully actualized,” then “all would be known directly as indistinct from God’s knowledge and in eternal unity.” In this sense he rem inds us how “Dionysius notes that H ierotheus was taught by actually u n dergoing divinity, not only by learning about it.” “T o the

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 37lover o f divinity is divinely given the ability to know and determ ine it directly. He is identified with it.” 35

“T he hum an soul,” says Aquinas, “is term ed intellectual because it reflects and shares in the power o f pure In tellect.” “T here is in the soul a power directly derived from transcendent Intellect itself.” “Divine Knowledge is the first Principle o f all intellectual knowledge.” 36 O ur natural “intellectual desire,” o r unlim ited will to know, “is never quieted until we know the first Principle, not from its reflection [in universal manifestation] but directly by its very essence. T he first Principle is God. T herefore the ultim ate end o f rational creatures is im m ediate knowledge o f the essence o f God.” Indeed, “this desire to know is not quieted but ra th er excited by the knowledge o f faith [in the W ord o f God], for everyone desires to know immediately what he believes. T herefore m an’s end does not consist in believing things about God but in knowing within God.” “W hen the end is attained the natural desire [to know] is stilled, for God’s knowledge united to the intellect is the principle o f knowing God and all things.” 37

T he exposition o f divine doctrine “is the reverse o f philosophical exposition,” says Aquinas. W hereas with the latter “creatures come in at the start, God at the end ,” with the fo rm er “God comes first . . . is liker to God, who in knowing him self knows creatures.” 38 Yet the highest possible exposition is that which is presented from the standpoint o f “knowing as it were within God.” And here is one o f several pointers he gives for such an exposition:

“First, with regard to knowledge, note that tem poral events stand in a d ifferent relation to a mind that is inside the time-series and to a m ind that is entirely above it. . . . Im agine many people m arching in a column along a road. Each o f them knows the men in fron t and behind him by reference to his own position. But an observer high above, while he sees how one precedes another, takes in the colum n as a whole without working from a position inside it. . . . Now God completely transcends any system m easured by time. He is the sum m it o f eternity w here all is at once en


tire and com plete. T he whole stream of things falls u nd er his single and unrestricted intellection. With one glance he sees [analogically speaking} all things that take place in time, and he sees them ju s t as they are in themselves. T he causal o rd er is appreciated, but things are not seen as past and fu ture to him. They are entirely in his presence.” “Now the intellect which, by G od’s grace, is united to the divine essence understands all things as from G od’s u n d e rstanding.” 39

T hus im bued with this unassailable teaching Eckhart had no qualms in attem pting to expound the doctrine from this highest possible standpoint. And this means no less than a consideration o f all that is in term s o f “the possible intellect as it were fully actualized” and hence as “indistinct from pure Intellect, o r God in his G odhead.” Aquinas adm its in his prologue to the Summa Theologica that he is expounding the doctrine according to St. Paul’s intention: “Even as babes unto Christ I have fed you with milk and not with m eat.” 40 Eckhart undoubtedly thought that some o f the children o f Christ whom he addressed were capable o f being fed meat. I f many still could digest only milk, there was always Aquinas and Augustine to turn to, as he him self counseled.

Aquinas stands out for Eckhart over all predecessors in the tradition because he most clearly affirm ed the isness o f Divine Knowledge as the suprem e Principle. He also insisted that Divine Knowledge is the inverse o f all manifest modes o f knowledge. T hus a consideration o f all things principially means, for Eckhart, nothing less than the transposition o f o u r natural consideration from the standpoint o f time and limitation to one o f God in his G odhead. This transposition is m ade possible through knowledge o f the W ord incarnate who, in his re tu rn to the Father, signified the inversion o f m anifest intellect into its Principle, the un manifest pure Intellect. T hus it is that when Augustine, in his De Trinitate, for exam ple, refers to knowledge sub ratione aeternitatis, o r when Aquinas in his De Veritate considers tru th in term s o f Intellectus in divinis, Eckhart gets his p ri

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 39mary inducem ents to expound the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge principially.

T h at Eckhart should be so intent on doing this in a m ann er never done before and in such a way that it is the essential g round o f all his teaching should not surprise us. T he long tradition in which he so thoroughly disciplined his intellect m ade it almost inevitable. For a genuine u n d e rstanding o f the teachings o f Aquinas, Augustine, and the Pseudo-Areopagite indicates that they well serve as su pp o rtive pointers to and springboards for a vault into that mode o f knowledge tamquam in principio infinito. And Eckhart acknowledged them as ju s t that, supportive pointers and springboards which, when united with the prim ary m eaning o f Holy Scripture, make the supports secure and the vault certain.

A nother factor should be noted regarding Eckhart’s intent in expounding the doctrine from the suprem e standpoint. With the advent o f the fourteen th century, scholarship in Europe had begun its long decline and the teachings o f Aquinas were entering upon an extended period o f almost total neglect. Masters who placed prim ary emphasis on analytical reason and theologians who preached a radical form o f fideism were on the rise. As a Dominican called to uphold the banner o f genuine learning and the torch o f intellectual knowledge, Eckhart could ascertain no tru e r way o f doing so than to throw him self w holeheartedly into the task o f dispelling ignorance by stressing the inversion o f intellect “into the Light o f eternal T ru th .”

Once we understand that no o ther m ode o f knowledge is m ore em inent o r even m ore ‘practical’ in the long run , we should not be surprised that some o f the new m asters and theologians, who minimized intellectual discipline, were d e term ined to silence Eckhart. Eckhart had m ade it clear that they were in misdirection insofar as they were intent on ‘mentally looking’ at being and at God, in e ither extroverted o r in troverted ways, ra th er than participate in being and in God. F urtherm ore, the risk involved in the chance that some will m isunderstand the doctrine and tu rn it into a

4o PR EPAR ATO RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

form o f erroneous subjectivism is not nearly as great as the risk involved in the discouragem ent o f intellectual knowledge.

“No one is so foolish as not to desire wisdom, yet why do so many rem ain ignorant?” asked Eckhart. Because, first, they forsake their unlim ited and detached will to know and think instead that reality is som ething to behold. Second, wisdom cannot be acquired without disciplined intellection sustained by divine grace. “If a man is rich [even in reasoning o r in faith], that does not make him wise. But if a m an is transform ed and conform ed [by God] to the essence and natu re o f wisdom and becomes wisdom itself, then he is wise.” 41

W hat particularly amazes, from the hum an standpoint, is that Eckhart persisted in expounding the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge in principial m ode when practically all the great m inds o f his time were preoccupied with political and ecclesiastical struggles. T h ro ug ho u t his adult life the problem of church and state was regarded by most professors in the universities and, in fact, by most people in the whole o f Christendom as upperm ost, and they had to agonize through several decades before a via media was found. Consum ed by a sense o f absolute royal power, Phillip the Fair m arked his reign from beginning to end (1285-1314) with insidious attacks against papal authority even in spiritual m atters. No less a would-be absolutist, the vacillating Em p ero r sustained an enm ity for both France and the Holy See. T hough the ministers o f England were biding their time until they could open the H undred Years W ar with France, they were patiently seeking allies on the continent. T hen there was restless Constantinople, seat o f the Eastern em pire, and just beyond the ever-m enacing Turks. M eanwhile, heretical sects, such as the Franciscan Spirituals, the Beghards, and the Free Spirits, were constantly seeking political favors and military support from rebellious princes to enhance their ideological causes.

T he papacy was in a state o f near total confusion. With the death o f C lem ent V, Christendom had to wait over two years before the various factions could elect a new pope—a

D IF FIC U L T IE S A ND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 4 1

pope, what is m ore, who was exiled in Avignon from Rome. John XXII, a hot-tem pered Frenchm an, was seventy-two years old when elected in 1316. He then proceeded to take direct charge o f the Inquisition and proclaim many acts o f excom m unication, notably that o f Ludwig the Em peror. T hough the pope him self was later accused o f heresy on purely doctrinal grounds, he retracted his dissenting opinions on his deathbed in 1334. It was this same pope who, in a frustrated and senile condition, was persuaded to condem n some o f Eckhart’s statem ents in 1329. T he Meister had gone to Avignon to defend his exposition and died— where o r how rem ains unknow n—before the condem nation was pronounced. We are m ade m indful o f the canon o f the Lateran Council o f 1215, which stated that Scripture bids us to beware o f being m ore ju st than justice.

N one o f these particular hum an situations seem to have deterred Eckhart; we search in vain th roughout his work to find reference to any political o r ecclesiastical problem . But the breakthrough into Divine Knowledge was never regarded by Eckhart as an escape from the hum an situation, from which there are no escapes. To get to eternity we must go through time, as Aquinas counseled, but we cannot stop on the way. And if we would truly understand and reply to o u r hum an situation, no m atter where o r when, we must understand it “eternal wise” and reply to it principially in term s o f “unrestricted T ru th , the Son o f the Father o f all.” 42

T h e D i s t i n c t i o n b e t w e e n P r i m a r y a n d S e c o n d a r y

As corollary to the self-affirmation o f intellect and its p rimacy over reason and action, the serious student o f Eckhart must also qualify him self by an ability to discrim inate intelligently. “Truly to discrim inate,” the Meister says, “means not the m ere distinction o f one thing from ano ther but the determ ination o f that which is prim ary and that which is secondary.” 43 A few rem arks on this point m ight prove helpful.

In expounding the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge Eckhart endeavors to dispel ignorance by ascertaining princi-


pies, priorities, and values, and his language is m eant to serve his purpose o f evaluating realities. T h ro ug ho u t his entire exposition, no m atter what aspect o f the doctrine he takes into consideration, we always find the key distinction between “that which is prim ary and that which is secondary.” This distinction becomes self-evident once the relation o f intellect to pure Intellect is truly understood.

T he prim ary is usually designated by Eckhart in affirm ative terms. For instance, Divine Knowledge means “the a c t44 o r isness o f pure knowledge itself, o r G odhead,” whereas “im perfect knowledge,” when designated o f the manifest knower, means “active, evolving, and therefore restricted knowledge.” Again, pure isness, which is identically pure knowledge, means the all-inclusive Reality itself, whereas “nothing,” when said o f the m anifest world as such, means the changing, tem poral, and contingently real, or “un-Reality.” 45

Now simply to consider “the manifest knower as such” o r “the created world as such" is, according to Eckhart, to consider them as separated from all else, that is, exclusively and independently. It is actually to regard them without their principle, for “nothing m anifested contains its original un manifested source.” T o value them exclusively in this way is to regard that which is secondary as prim ary—a regard which is “the root o f all fallacy.” Considerations solely of this kind make for their un-Reality, for “apart from pure isness itself [the prim ary Reality} there is noth ing.” 46 Secondary realities, when considered not in themselves as such but correctly as dependent upon and participating in that which is prim ary, are still only relationally real, but certainly so in participatory knowledge. A nd when they are considered wholly within the prim ary, that is to say in p rin ciple, then they are indistinct from it, for “that which is within isness is not o ther than isness.”

A fundam ental qualification laid down by Eckhart for the study o f the doctrine is the capacity to discrim inate between eternal and tem poral realities. T he student m ust acquire the habit o f distinguishing perfect from im perfect knowledge, pure isness from participative being, all-possibility

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 43from certain possibilities, all-inclusive from exclusive, p ersonality from individuality, pure spirit from composite structure, cause from effect, necessity from contingency; im portant from insignificant, excellent from pleasant. In o ther words, prim ary from secondary o r the principle from its manifestation.

W hen one considers all the goals a hum an being may have—wealth, honor, power, private enjoym ent, com m unity peace, m ultifarious experience, aesthetic awareness, scientific cognition—all o f which are delusive in their contingency, surely the pre-em inent goal is liberation from delusiveness. It alone eliminates all tension, pain, and dissatisfaction. It alone, says Eckhart, culminates the striving o f the detached and unlim ited will to know—that intellectual appetite which is innate in all knowing beings and the essential m ark o f their distinction from o ther beings.47 T he term o f the unlim ited will to know is nothing less than the actualization o f unrestricted knowledge itself. Since true knowledge alone carries its own fruit within itself, it is the ultimate end as well as the direct ‘way’; only true knowledge can dispel ignorance, which is the root o f all delusion.48 Sacram ental rites serve only as a preparation; even selfless activity can at best induce a favorable disposition. Spiritual exercises and techniques are useless except insofar as they discipline the inner self for the advent o f true knowledge. As to the love o f God, it must be directed by the light o f true knowledge if it is to preserve itself from devotion to an anthropom orphic deity o r to an idea o f God that is, by definition, less than true God.

Eckhart insists that at o u r hum an disposal there are differen t sources o f valid knowledge: sense perception, reasoning, intellection, and testimony. Sense perception comes first in time, but certainly not in tru th value. T hough superior to dream ing, it can nevertheless err; m oreover, it is only concerned with fleeting, accidental realities.49 Reasoning suffers similar defects in virtue o f its dependence on sense perception; it is restricted to com prehensible structures o f finite being and cognition in term s o f twoness.

As previously noted, intellection, o r direct insight into re

44 PR EPAR ATO RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

ality, is superior to sense perception and reasoning, though w ithout sense experience and reasoning it could not affirm or negate the isness o f anything com prehended. Intellection furnishes the hum an m ind with unchanging principles that g round reasoning in being and enable it to establish with certainty the necessity o f transcendent Reality, as well as the relation between secondary and prim ary realities. N onetheless, it is restricted in its natural ability to enjoy an u n re stricted act o f com prehension o r com prehend the natu re o f that which is ultimately prim ary and the m ode o f pure knowledge.50

As for testimony, it originates e ither from a genuine witness directly inspired by the W ord o f Divine Knowledge and effected by its Spirit, o r it does not.31 T here is the hum an tradition o f the testimony o f p rofound intellects and saints, but that tradition is defective, for all m en and women are fallible. But the Divine W ord, o r God-M an, who is infinitely m ore than a seer o r a prophet, is infallible, and the Holy Scriptures that reveal that W ord are substantially free from dependence upon the restricted capacities o f individual authors. Hence that testimony is the suprem e and p rimary source o f knowledge.

Any attem pt to rank any o ther source o f knowledge as prim ary to the testimony o f Holy Scripture must, according to Eckhart, be vigorously com batted.52 As to those who pay heartfelt allegiance to it, ou r responsibility is to evaluate their teachings by studying them in the light o f Holy Scripture. But to do this we require the guidance o f the indestructible C hurch, whose function is to preserve and teach the divine doctrine. T hus we shall be able to sift away the defects that m ar all hum an teachings and writings, including Eckhart’s. What in them conform s to the prim ary m eaning o f the Divine W ord should be retained as ancillary to o u r quest.53

Indeed, the primacy o f the teaching o f Holy Scripture— especially the New Testam ent, which fulfills and supersedes the Old— m ust be accepted on faith. But that faith, says Eckhart, requires reasonable justification.54 Not only should we study the Scriptures in such a way as to discover their

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 45prim ary m eaning and m utual harm ony, but we should avail ourselves o f all the rational means o f dialectics by drawing upon all the secondary sources o f knowledge. Only then can we refute all possible objections against that ascertained all- inclusive m eaning and establish final conclusions. By thus uniting the light o f intellect with the light o f faith we may undertake a personal process o f assimilation unim peded by any rem aining doubt, a process that culminates in a mode o f knowledge situated as it were in the infinite Principle and that is in perfect conform ity to the pure reality o f Divine Knowledge indicated by the texts. T hus the act o f faith, effected and sustained by uncreated act and fully supported by reason, becomes initially validated at the very m om ent it is transform ed into that transcendent principial knowledge and finally in the actual realization o f Godhead.

Inasm uch as the reality o f Divine Knowledge is ever p resent to us, it is not an accomplishment. Strictly speaking there are no ‘means’ as such, for ‘means’ designates effects to be accomplished and the reality o f Divine Knowledge is not an effect but the prim ary Principle o f all cause and effect. Divine Knowledge is an awakening. “W hen all individuality is asleep in you, then you are awake in God.” In fact, “directly God awakens the ground [o f the intellective soul] with tru th , light darts into the powers, and that man knows m ore than anyone could teach him .” 55 But ju s t as there are degrees between sound sleep and waking awareness, so we may find ourselves in distant o r close proxim ity to that divine awakening according to our state o f awareness, way of life, character, and inner disposition. Since, however, these conditions are not ‘m eans’, the awakening may, strictly speaking, occur to any person independen t o f his tem poral condition.

To determ ine what is prim ary in Holy Scripture, we should first o f all distinguish between indicative assertions and declaratory assertions.56 Indicative o r symbolic assertions point to the p ro per object o f Holy Scripture: “Christ the God-M an,” the “eternal Word o f God.” Declaratory or public assertions are preparatory injunctions, discussions, analects, o r recordings o f events, and therefore secondary

4 6 PREPARATO RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

and preparatory. But even in the m ultitude o f indicative assertions we find some that designate only tem poral o r finite entities, o thers that designate the principles o f sensate o r rational awareness. All such statem ents are secondary and should never be granted ultim ate value, for their concern is only with tem poral realities that can be known by hum an cognition.

It is not in Holy Scripture that we should seek knowledge and the dispelling o f ignorance in m atters that are within the range o f experience, for this double aim can be attained through sense perception and reasoning.57 N or is it the prim ary function o f Holy Scripture to inform us about ou r manifest universe and its natural ontological and cosmological structure, for we are not told by God that the ultimate well-being o f man essentially depends on such inform ation. N or have we any right to assume such a claim, inasm uch as all the passages setting forth the creation, the fall o f man, the quest for knowledge o f N ature are wholly subservient to the purpose o f com m unicating the all-inclusiveness o f God and Divine Knowledge upon which our very being is p rimarily dependent. It is ra th e r T h at about which hum an experience and intellection tell us nothing, T h at which tran scends all restriction, which is to be considered as the prim ary them e o f all scriptural texts. Only those which com municate the intrinsic reality o f God in his Godhead, which is Divine Knowledge, possess primacy and independen t au thority.

Yet even in these assertions which designate the knowledge, isness, and beatified love which God intrinsically is, we m ust seek, says Eckhart, the highest meaning, free from all imagination, conceptualization, and individuality. O therwise they can only serve as useful pointers to that true m eaning which alone satisfies the unlim ited will to know. We must, then, distinguish three modes o f divine designations: analogical, negative, and principial.58 For while designations such as knowledge, isness, and love can be expressive o f realities in finite m anifestation, they can only be indicative when considering unm anifested God.

Analogical designations o f God point to their object as to

D IF FIC U L T IE S A ND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 47that which they merely determ ine by reference to a relationship intrinsic in som ething that is known in m anifestation. But in the case o f God no relationship to anything in the m anifest universe can be said to be intrinsic.59 T h ere fore all such determ inations, to the extent that they are merely analogous relationships, must be negated. And this negation is the function o f ou r negative, o r “not this, not that,” indications, for they point to God by excluding from him all unsuitable predicates. T hus o u r quest is narrow ed down to those assertions which indicate God’s affirm ation o f him self as all-inclusive knowledge, isness, and love in principle. It is to these principial designations that all the previous steps have led us.

W hen we understand ‘isness’ according to its m eaning in m anifestation it applies to things existing, but the context makes it clear that it is not in that sense that it applies to their ultim ate Principle. Indeed, the designation o f ‘knowledge’ is there to warn us that God is not impersonal, unconscious reality, but the actuality o f pure knowledge itself, the content o f which is all-possibility; it also indicates that isness is in function o f knowledge. O r we m ight understand ‘knowledge’ in its active, m anifest sense and think that God has knowledge as one o f several qualities; but the term s ‘all- inclusive’, ‘om nipoten t’, ‘on high’ oblige us to deny this and affirm that God is Knowledge-in-itself and in Principle.60 Similarly with those texts which com municate his love and beatitude, o r his holding in oneness that which is eternally united. And since the designation o f God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the unity and identity o f his Godhead discloses the transcendent, principial mode o f Divine Knowledge, then the highest o f all meanings indicates that which otherwise could never be ascertained—that is, knowledge by identity in the suprem e Principle that God in his undifferen tiated G odhead is.61

B a s i c M i s c o n c e p t i o n s

On the basis o f direct testimony o f the W ord o f God Eckhart presents us with a truly principial doctrine o f Divine Knowledge. It is a doctrine worked out and ex


pounded in term s o f pure metaphysical intellection o f which w ell-grounded faith is the anim ating principle and reasoning the supporting instrum ent. As for a corresponding philosophy o f man and the m anifested world o f nature, we should not expect a detailed exposition. Why? Because he explicitly considered that as secondary and did not intend to produce one.62 All that he has to say on the subject o f man and the reflected o rd er o f existence is merely consequential upon what he intends to say about God and Divine Knowledge. In fact it is for the most part expressed in a relative o r negative m anner. M oreover, there is little need to repeat in term s o f philosophical m ethod what A ugustine and Aquinas have already said.

W hat he does say is this: T he entire manifest o rd er o f reflection, including man, cannot be truly understood apart from and independently o f God. This is so because it depends entirely upon him as upon its transcendent-im m anent Principle.63 F urtherm ore, inasm uch as it is universally his m anifest reflection, it is, as such, nothing in itself, yet by him it is in its im perfect way what he is in his infinitely perfect way. T hus it is neither sheer non-reality nor unconditioned Reality.

I f Eckhart speaks o f man and the existential world in a language which, for the most part, confines itself to the use o f term s in their principial sense, it is because he was convinced that it was necessary, even at the risk o f being m isunderstood. It was a language which Augustine and Aquinas also used, but which they employed sparingly, for it can mislead the unqualified intelligence. But som eone had to do it, for the simple reason that in affirm ing Knowledge- Reality as in o u r prim al Principle and final end, it grounds all o ther true expositions. It states directly what is actually implied in all true indirect statem ents, and unless that which is implied is somehow rendered explicit, the implied, which in this case is prim ary, is too easily relegated to a secondary consideration and then neglected.

O f course the unqualified intelligence is m ore likely than not to read some form o f pantheism o r philosophical m onism into Eckhart’s principial knowledge; in spite o f the fact

D IF FIC U L T IE S A ND M ISC O N C E P T IO N S 49that such form s o f thought were completely foreign to his doctrine and actually refu ted by him. But his language kept to such heights that the lower genius o f many who came to regard themselves disciples or influenced by his teaching could not keep pace with him, and so turned his doctrine o f transcendence into some heretical o r heterodox form of thought.

W hen Eckhart says that the manifest universe, including man, is to God as “the reflected light is to its uncreated source,” o r as “the production o f o u r dream s is to the world o f o u r awakened intellect,” 64 many mistakenly understand him to say that the manifest world is sheer illusion. They forget that com parisons are m eant to reach their object through a process o f purification and transposition. When he says “my innerm ost Self is God,” o r “I am the Son and not o ther,” they neglect his subtle but correct in terpretation by precise discrim ination and simply endow our finite self wath divinity. These are errors that he is most em phatic in refuting, since for him the essence o f ignorance is to superimpose finiteness upon God and divinity upon the finite.65

These rem arks should indicate w'hy it is hazardous to speak o f Eckhart’s influence on later writers and thinkers. T h at he w as a m ajor influence on those im m ediate fourteenth-century disciples such as T auler, Suso, Ruysbroeck, and others who, for practical purposes, lowered his teaching to the level o f a determ inate mystical theology is beyond dispute. T h a t this school o f religious mysticism has been the m ajor intellectual influence on subsequent mystical movements in Europe, such as in the seventeenth century, is also indisputable.66 We also recognize his influence in the m etaphysical aspects o f the workings o f Cajetan, Gerson, and Nicholas o f Cusa. But to claim that Eckhart anticipated the theology o f the Protestant Reformers, as some have asserted, is wholly mistaken and based on prejudice. O thers have tried to affirm his influence on the philosophies o f Kant and Hegel and even of m odern Existentialism, but such affirm ations are based almost entirely on mistaken attem pts to read these philosophies into Eckhart’s teachings.67

In the same way tw entieth-century students o f “mys-

5° PR EPA R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

deism” have tried to force Eckhart into conform ity with their own brand o f that subject, but these attem pts have relied almost exclusively upon the M eister’s Germ an works; even, as often as not, on writings falsely attributed to Eckh art.68 Deliberately ignoring his teachings on the indispensability o f uncreated grace and the Incarnate W ord, certain adherents o f Far Eastern traditions have tried to acknowledge him as a fellow Zen B uddhist o r as a Brahm anic seer.69 Even some Nazi apologists tried to claim him as one o f their own! Philologists, however, are on a far su rer g round when they assert Eckhart’s considerable contribution to the Germ an vocabulary, which he enriched by the addition o f many new and precise terms.

Sincere study in term s o f the requisite qualifications p re viously noted can eliminate gross m isrepresentations o f Eckh art’s teaching. It can do this to such a degree that the doctrine m ust be acknowledged as central in Christianity, inasm uch as it is a doctrine essentially situated as it were within Christ the W ord o f God. To do this, however, the student m ust first redress certain fundam ental w rong considerations which the unqualified intellect is prone to adopt. Generally speaking they are as follows:

First, there is the point o f view o f radical fideism, which reads into Eckhart a rejection as impossible o f a rational dem onstration o f the reality o f God and his infinite, unconditioned nature. Second is the viewpoint that overlooks his full recognition o f Holy Scripture as the highest source o f knowledge and the fulfillment o f o u r rational quest for transcendent T ru th . T h ird , there is the attem pt, entirely subjective, to consider Eckhart as not wholly com m itted to the Catholic C hurch as the divine dispenser and protector o f the doctrine. Fourth is the consideration that ignores his insistence on the supranatural o rd er o f divine initiative and transposition by uncreated grace, that is, by the Holy Spirit. Fifth, and consequently, is the affirm ation that pure intellection o r principial knowledge, as understood by Eckhart, is an achievem ent well within the natural power o f man, ra the r than a pure Self-gift o f God undue and inaccessible to o u r unaided effort. Sixth, there is a consideration

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 51that confuses his doctrine o f identity through knowledge with identity through natu re o r substantial being. Seventh is a viewpoint ignorant o f his precise theory o f divine causality, which is to be praised in that it maintains the u n re stricted freedom and transcendence o f God and his im manence in the m anifested effects that he originates, sustains, and directs. And finally, there is an external consideration that is wholly constituted in a mystical approach toward God, ra ther than a purely intellectual consideration situated as it were in divinis.

Once set right on these points, the student o f Eckhart’s teaching may then understand that the doctrine does not fall short in its application o f ‘personality’ e ither to all m anifest knowing subjects o r to God. For “where there is knowledge there is personality.” 70 God is not infinite Personality prim arily because man is a person. W hen we attribute this designation o f God by analogy we do so in the context o f secondary tru th . T he prim ary tru th , according to Eckhart, is the inverse o f this analogy: Man is a person because he is a direct image o f pure Personality itself, o r Intellectus in se, as indicated by the prim ary m eaning o f scriptural texts.

W hat therefore vitiates these several incorrect considerations o f the doctrine is essentially their conscious opposition to infinite transcendence. T he root o f all false o r inadequate considerations is basically e ither the notion o f the detached intellectual act as inevitably relational o r the view o f reality as exactly corresponding to the relational and contingent character o f m ere hum an judgm ent. It is at the very m om ent when we refuse to apply Eckhart’s theory o f discrim ination and principial knowledge to the enunciations o f God and Divine Knowledge that we tu rn away from the most fundam ental tru th o f the doctrine. T h at tru th is simply that God in him self can have no ways o f action o r approach, for he is identically all-inclusive Knowledge-Reality, the pure identity o f knowledge, isness, and beatified love.

We inevitably miss that tru th as long as we think o f God as a Being and therefore as approachable th rough o ther beings o r conditions o f being.71 For Eckhart such thinking “never breaks through the bounds o f creaturehood.” And

5 2 PR EPA R A T O RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

what, after all, does ‘creatu rehood’ mean? It means individuality; it means, in A quinas’s term inology, “a being divided from each and every o ther being while rem aining u n divided in itself.” 72 We m ust understand, therefore, that the designation ‘highest am ong beings’ is no m ore than a designation o f the highest individual o r creature, say the highest angel.73 Only when, as Eckhart says, the entire o rder o f individuality, o r o f “self and o ther,” is shattered by “the birth o f the W ord” is it possible to understand that in tru th we have never been outside God, “in whom there is no otherness.” For the birth o f the W ord initiates a transposition o f o u r understand ing from one limited by and attached to individuality to that o f transcendent all- inclusiveness and all-possibility. W hat externally appears as approaches to God or actions in God are recognized as delusions once the transposition is effected.

It must be repeated that perhaps the most significant factor which distinguishes Eckhart’s teaching from all o thers in the tradition to which he belonged is his persistent consideration o f pure metaphysics which completely transcends individuality and universal m anifestation in every respect. For him a metaphysics oriented externally to the revealed Word o f God is incomplete. It is com plete and pure only when its considerations are g rounded as it were wholly within the eternal W ord. W hen metaphysics, o r detached intellection, is so considered, then and only then are the last vestiges o f limitation, present in its subordinate and externalized role, removed. For divine intellection, which the term ‘pure metaphysics’ designates, pertains to God alone and only to the unrestricted knowledge which he is in his G odhead.

W hen the light o f intellect is perfectly united to the light o f well-grounded faith in the W ord o f God, the possibility o f understanding all things as it were within God is g ranted. This is axial in Eckhart’s teaching.74 For that perfect unification means the intellectual detachm ent from all considerations of time and place, from all external modes o f knowing and indeed from the entire universe o f existence and individuality. It is b rought about by the birth o f the Son, the W ord of God, in the very g round o f the intellective soul— and o ur willingness to accept it and to know.

D IF FIC U L T IE S AND M IS C O N C E P T IO N S 53Eckhart’s teaching on “the birth o f the W ord” is one o f

the most repeated them es in his exposition o f the doctrine. T he realization o f this ‘b irth ’, which is actually a realization that one eternally dwells in God, effects the knowledge o f God through identity, that is principially. Since Aquinas had taught Eckhart that from the immutable and all- inclusive standpoint o f God “there is nothing apart from God” and “that which is in God is God,” then an exposition o f Divine Knowledge from that standpoint is not only possible but indeed the prim ary mode o f exposition.

Anything short o f this, that is to say any intended external m ode o f exposition, m ust o f necessity introduce an obviously sentim ental or consoling elem ent into the doctrine. T o the degree that it does it represents a falling away from pure metaphysical insight. This, o f course, is inevitable once it is understood what pure Intellect is not. I f the doctrine was to be adapted to the mentality o f the men and women for whom it was especially being fram ed, that is, people in whom feeling and the desire for consolation were stronger than intelligence, then A ugustine and Aquinas were not w rong in taking these factors into consideration. N or was Eckhart in some o f his Sermons o r when he com posed his Book o f Divine Consolation for the Q ueen o f H ungary, who had recently undergone a g reat personal tragedy.

Nevertheless, it rem ains true that feeling and the desire for consolation are relative and contingent, so that, to the degree to which an exposition o f the doctrine makes an appeal to it, it is bound to be relative and contingent. Far m ore than any o f his predecessors Eckhart in tended his exposition o f the doctrine to be free o f such consoling elements, with the hope that perhaps a few m ight be qualified to accept it in its purity. A nd it only takes a m eager few in each generation to keep the light o f unconditioned tru th aflame. A fter all, tru th in itself has no need to be consoling. I f anyone finds it so, then obviously so much the better for him .75 But the consolation he feels em anates from him self and from the particular dispositions o f his own feelings, not from the doctrine. O n m ore than one occasion Eckhart states that the doctrine should be expounded in its purity even if it is not fully understood by those who hear it.


T he preparatory considerations to be undertaken in the next chap ter and the consideration o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge according to Eckhart’s exposition in all that follows in Part II should go a long way toward rem oving the many misconceptions outlined above to which the unqualified student o f Eckhart is subject. It should also become clear that m isdirected considerations are o f value only insofar as they indicate their own need o f correction.

As understood by Eckhart, what distinguishes true Christian doctrine from all o ther actual and possible teachings is the essential starting point. In all o ther teachings the hum an being is regarded as the starting point. T he hum an being starts thinking about God, and is inevitably misled into m isrepresenting him either as an im personal Absolute or as hiding behind innum erable myths. In true Christianity God is the starting point; he initiates the knowledge o f him self, by his Self-revelation in Jesus Christ, as the God o f unrestricted knowledge, isness, and love.

But we hum an beings in o u r unregenerate condition do not know that God is the starting point and the initiator o f true knowledge. We do not even know that God is real, that his unrestricted isness and love are identically the unrestricted knowledge which he is. Before we consider the essential doctrine as expounded by Eckhart, we m ust first seek reasonable justification for that doctrine. Or, as he says, “we m ust p repare ourselves rationally and spiritually for the eternal birth o f his W ord.” 76 We m ust first know that God is real before we can affirm him as the starter and suprem e Principle o f all that is. T hough this ‘p repara tion ’ involves a concession to philosophical considerations, it derives its im m ediate justification from tru ths known directly by reasonable jud g m en t and disciplined intellection. It derives its ultimate justification from the consideration o f pure Intellect, for after all is said that can be said, God is also responsible for the preparation.

2The Reality of the Divine Self

In undertak ing certain philosophical considerations, as is o u r concern in this chapter, it should be said that it is done in o rd er to show, as Eckhart says, “that the affirm ation o f God as the prim al source o f all being and knowledge is intellectually justified.” 1 In o ther words, blind faith, o r com m itm ent unsupported by reasonableness, is an act that the seeking intellect cannot tolerate. But any intellectual ju s tification for a doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, which is transcendently distinct from all o ther doctrines, m ust begin by considering the hum an being in his unregenerate condition.

T hus considered the hum an intellect does not have a direct and immediate knowledge o f any distinctions except those existing between his own reality and the reality o f individual beings o ther than himself, and also those distinctions which are the result o f the extensions o f the hum an self, such as general and particular concepts. As each hum an being starts with him self he cannot yet know that his cognitional activity is an externalization o f G od’s knowledge. In o ther words, the unregenerate hum an being does not have a direct and immediate knowledge that there actually is the all-inclusive God who m ust be really distinguished from the entire o rd er o f m anifest existence, including the hum an intellect.

T he acquisition o f knowledge that God is real, and hence o f the essential distinction between universal m anifestation and its nonm anifest Principle, is the conclusion o f a highly disciplined and reasoable reflection grounded in a detached and unlim ited will to know. T he unlim ited will to know, which is im m ediate in the hum an being, urges the intellect on in its search for the ultim ate principle o f all that is actually known and rem ains to be known.2 Unless the will to

55


know is aborted by o ther desires, this search continues until the intellect is able to answer the question o f the actuality o f that suprem e Principle. It m ust answer this question by a w ell-grounded affirm ation that the Principle itself necessarily, objectively, and really is, that it is transcendently distinct from the entire o rd er o f manifestation and every modality thereof, that it is the ultim ate Principle o f all m anifestation and that God is the Principle.

“ I A m a K n o w e r ”I f one’s own individual self is now considered as the start

ing point—and each hum an self m ust start with him self and on his own—then, as Eckhart rem inds us, the one p rim ordial and intelligent assertion is: “I am a know er.” Indeed, “Before all else I am a know er.” “I naturally and p re em inently desire knowledge. . . . W hat I will, that I seek, and knowledge comes first.” “T he very natu re and life o f man, as m an, is to know and be a know er.” 3 T he im m anent will to know is totally unsatisfied with any o ther initial determ ination. For if the hum an self is not a knower, then he is obliged to rem ain in b ru te ignorance and silence so far as knowing anything whatsoever goes; even contradictions, such as “I know that I am not a know er.”

Furtherm ore, knowing that he is “before all else a knower” distinguishes each hum an being from all o ther knowers and also from all nonknowing beings. As an individual knower he not only knows him self as an individual, but also knows that he is not the whole o f reality, that there are beings that are really, and not ju st mentally, o th er than himself. These o ther beings are known objectively. Not merely because the know er experiences and has concepts o f what he experiences, but prim arily because their actual existence is directly determ ined by a w ell-grounded and necessary judgm ent: a ‘yes’, an ‘it is so’, designating that ‘this (house, person, o r whatever) is’. Only thus is the knowable directly and actually known and known as real being. This is what Eckhart means when he says that “the object o f the intellect is being.” 4 In o ther words, that which makes for tru th o r conform ity o f the intellect with reality 5 is the affir

T H E REA LITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 57mation prim arily o f the isness o f ‘this’ o r ‘tha t’ knowable, and only secondarily its ‘whatness’.

“I am a knower and things o ther than myself are.” This is a determ ination that is insusceptible to any ‘p ro o f’, not because it is not true but because it is known to the reflective hum an knower as immediately given in a direct and necessarily affirm ed insight into the principle o f being (being is being). As understood by Eckhart, as indeed by Aristotle, being is p rior to any dem onstration and that upon which all dem onstrations o f anything else are to be grounded . Being, in which both the hum an self and o ther individualities are grounded by their actuality, o r isness, is neither experi- enceable n o r conceivable. It is directly known as the objective o f the unlim ited will to know which is open to all-possibility. In this sense, being designates itself as all that is known and all that is to be known,6 as that apart from which there is nothing, as that which is known by any and all true determ inations.

Being, then, is all-possible substantiality, which means that being is at once thoroughly concrete and everywhere present. It also means that being is not divided from without; ra the r it divides itself from within, such as into subject and object.7 M oreover, being and reality are identical in that the real, as also being, is not merely the object o f thought but that which is known actually to be by true d eterm inations.8 In the affirm ation o f being it is the actuality o f being, o r isness, that is fundam entally affirmed. In fact the identity o f being and the real involves a consent to the course o f the unlim ited will to know and an exclusion o f all o ther in trud ing desires, fo r only “as long as this will [to know] rem ains unm oved by creatures and creaturehood, is it free and unlim ited.” 9 And the unlimited will to know is satisfied with neither sensory nor conceptual knowledge, with which most m odern philosophy stops short, but only with w ell-grounded determ inations o f concrete facts and ultimately when all questions for intelligence are exhausted.

“T he intellect directly receives being first, even before it receives tru th , though tru th is p resen t along with being.” 10 T he knower does not “go outside him self to a know n,” for

58 PR EP A R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

being, in which both the knower and the known are constituted as real, “has no outside.” T here is no beholding o f oneself and a beholding o f som ething else. T here is simply a direction toward the knowable by participation in being, within which there are no separations but only real distinctions, and self and o ther is one o f those distinctions. O f course, if one forgets that real distinctions are not separations, o r that subject and object are not strict d ifferentiations from but divisions within being, then understanding in the direction o f the unlim ited will to know is halted and knowledge is aborted.

We know things through o u r senses, says Eckhart.11 But experiencing, thinking, com prehending, questioning as such never establish real existence. Only the reasonable determ ination ‘it is’ o r ‘this is’ does that, inasmuch as well- g rounded determ ination is the culm inating act o f the knowing course as a cum ulative increase o f sense experience, com prehension, and reflection. Yet every reasonable affirm ation raises a fu rth er question, for the ultimate term o f the unlim ited will to know is the unlim ited act o f com prehension which knows all about all. C onsidered in its fu n dam ental isness, being is not an experience, nor is it a concept o r idea pertaining to any general o r particular o rder o f individuality. R ather it is the hum an intellect’s prim ary intention o r notion o f the entire content o f the unlimited will to know, and that content is nothing less than all-possible knowability.

“Being and knowledge are all one, for whatever is not cannot be know n.” 12 Being and the knowable are identical and are reality. F urtherm ore, “knower and known are one in knowledge.” Knowing is “a participation in being,” and not a m ental gazing at it, not the result o f any attem pt to reach out there o r in here to grasp being as though it were a conceivable and analyzable essence, o r whatness, and thus d ifferentiated from som ething else. A part from being there is nothing. T he isness o f being is not a whatness,' but every essence o r whatness is in potentiality to it and therefore nothing if separated from it.13

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 59

T h e R e a l i t y o f G o d

W ere the hum an knower in him self capable o f the unlim ited act o f com prehension there would, o f course, be no questions whatsoever, for then he would be that act and know all about all. He would then be the Principle substantially and not subject to individuality in any way. However, despite the fact that he is incapable o f that unlim ited act o f com prehension, he does have an unlim ited will to know which, if sustained, grants a p rofound insight. This insight reveals that God, if he really is, m ust not only be knowable but also total knowability, that God must be unrestricted and unconditioned reality and therefore the infinite Knower, the divine Self and Principle o f all actuality and possibility. T he hum an knower is presented, then, as Eckhart says, with a twofold question: W hat is God, and w hether God is? 14 O r to pu t it ano ther way: W hat is the ultim ate Principle, and is it real?

Sooner o r later the hum an knower who wills to know without attachm ent o r the intrusion o f o ther aims must m editate on the question: Is God only a mental object, o r is God real? T o say, as some have, that Eckhart needed no dem onstration that God really is shows a com plete m isunderstanding o f his teaching. It is certainly true that he believed in the revelation o f the W ord and that the W ord told him that God is and is to be known as “ I am who I am ” and as “the Principle identical with the W ord.” 15 But believing is not knowing, and in o rd er to believe the com m unication from God it is, he says, essential to know, and not merely believe, that God really is. For “how can one believe anything about God if one does not know that he is?” 16 T he re ality o f God is not an article o f faith, n o r is it known by any hum an experience, mystical o r otherwise. God is actually known to be real only by intellection, reflection, and well- g rounded determ ination.

N or is the reality o f God to be known by any essentialist answer to the question: W hat is God? Since the hum an knower cannot conceive o r have an idea o f pure isness, he certainly cannot conceive o r have an idea o f what the unlim

6o PR EP A R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

ited act o f com prehension actually is, the full content o f which is knowing all about all. Knowledge o f what God is is not possible fo r the hum an knower, inasm uch as the whatness o f God infinitely transcends the grasp o f that which is confined to individuality.17 But if the unconditioned Knower actually is, then his isness m ust be that u n limited act o f com prehension, and it m ust be a single act for him to know what he is and that he is. As the com prehension answers the ‘what?’, so the unlim ited answers the ‘is?’. For the hum an knower there is no single answer to these two questions.18

T he hum an knower may come to know that pure isness is all-inclusive as the ground o f being, but what it is he cannot know, inasm uch as isness is not a what. Isness is simply isness, is wholly inconceivable, bu t is that w ithout which all actual knowledge is impossible, w ithout which all concepts and ideas and essences are dead, w ithout which there is noth ing.19 T he knowledge that God really is, then, m ust depend on disciplined reflection and be the conclusion o f a dem onstration, which is simply the meditative fram ew ork for a well-grounded affirm ation. In o ther words, the reflection, dem onstration, and affirm ation are dependen t upon the know er’s participation in being.

Eckhart fully accepts the traditional ways o f dem onstrating the reality o f God, and he sums them up by the necessary recognition o f the identity o f real unrestricted isness with total knowability.20 In o ther words, to affirm the total knowability o f real isness is to affirm the total knowability o f all that is to be reasonably affirm ed. Since one cannot affirm the isness o f all that is to be reasonably affirm ed without in the same stroke affirm ing unrestricted and allpossible isness, then reasonably to affirm it is to know that it is.

Now, that total knowability cannot be a knowability that is in any way CQnditioned, restricted, o r affected by any being whatsoever, for apart from total knowability there is strictly no th ing .21 It cannot be a knowability for which fu rth er questions are possible, as in the case with any limited isness o r the sum o f all individual acts o f being. Hence it m ust be

T H E REA LITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 6 l

that knowability that is purely spiritual, nondependent, nonabstract, and therefore wholly real. It m ust be the identity o f all-inclusive knowability in act with all-inclusive knowledge in act. In fact it m ust be pure unconditioned reality itself, fully self-explanatory and self-sufficient, the un limited act o f com prehension itself. Indeed, it m ust be the unrestricted Knower who cannot question because he knows all about all. Such is what is m eant by God. Thus “unrestricted isness is God, and if God is not then there is strictly nothing, which is absurd. It follows that everything that is, is through unrestricted isness. But unrestricted isness is G od.” 22

Now this o r any o ther philosophical dem onstration o f the reality o f God is, according to Eckhart, little m ore than a ra ther form alized expression o f a far m ore intim ate dem onstration which indicates the very heart o f the doctrine Eckhart expounds. Indeed the truly intimate dem onstration m ore directly unfolds the orientation o f pure metaphysics o r principial knowledge. This calls for fu rth er consideration.

“ M y T r u e s t / I s G o d ”Eckhart is constantly directing the hum an know er to re

flect on the im m aterial natu re and detached spirituality o f intelligence. This is central throughout his teaching, as already noted. He points out that in this reflection a profound insight can be gained that will lead to a knowledge that the unconditioned Principle is God, and also a knowledge o f the knower’s direct relation with God. In this most personal reflection the hum an knower is not basically intent e ither on any known fact o f experience or on any succession o f causes. R ather he is now in tent on that prelogical awareness w herein certainty unfolds in an intim ate knowledge “within the p ro p er existence o f the intellect itself.” 23

O rdinarily the hum an know er is aware o f the intellect’s developm ent insofar as it is related to hum an life as it occurs in the course o f private, social, and vocational en deavors. In this respect the activity o f the intellect consists o f a process o f operations im planted in time and hence


operations o f sense experience and sense presentations m aintained and directed by the intellect to com prehensions and actual determ inations and decisions. Yet the activity o f the intellect itself, as Eckhart points out, exists primarily and pre-em inently in a process related not to hum an life but to detached intellectuality itself. “T h ere is a pow er in the soul [the act o f intellect itself} which touches neither time nor flesh. It flows out o f the spirit and abides in the spirit and is altogether spiritual.”

In this respect intellectuality is not a series o f operations in time and o f sense and images. R ather this spiritual act is thoroughly w ithdrawn in intellection itself and constituted above sense and images. G rounded only in knowable objectivity, it is rem oved from time. “T here is this power: intellect, which is o f prim e im portance for making the self aware of, for detecting, God. It has five properties: First, it is detached from time. Next, it is like nothing sensed o r conceived. T h ird , it is pure and uncom pounded [by m ateriality o r corporeality}. Fourth, it is in itself in act and selfsearching [o r reflective, meditative}. Fifth, it is a reflection o r spiritual image.”

Now when the hum an self is wholly absorbed in such an act o f intellection, o r detached m editation, he is engaged in concentrating on a certain tru th , for instance: “A part from isness there is nothing.” N othing else enters his intellect. He is now completely at one with the act o f intellection, identified with the intellectual apprehension and the knowing o f that which is. It is now that the p ro found insight unfolds. For suddenly he is b rought up sharply with a question: “Is it possible that that which is now in the act o f detached knowing once was nothing, nonexistent?” It is then that the knower immediately realizes that he, who is now at one with the act o f intellection itself and fully aware o f his knowing, was never a strict nothing, never nonexistent. “ It is not possible that that which is now knowing and reflecting was once upon a time nothing, for this act o f intellection, with which the knower is identified, could not have come into existence.”

T H E REALITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 63T he knower is now not knowing essentially in term s o f

sense experience o r sense presentations, that is, o f o perations im planted in time. On the contrary, “he is at one with this wholly spiritual and supratem poral act o f intellection itself and thus has always been. . . . N othing could be m ore certain o r im m ediate in this timeless ‘now’.” It is only when the knower turns away from this detached reflective act o f intellection and begins to philosophize about it from a psychological standpoint that he regards the insight as strange and question-raising. In this act, however, “there is the intim ate and direct awareness o f actual knowing and knowability,” o f an intellectual reality that “transcends the series o f operations in tim e.”

O f course the knower is certain o f his hum an individuality and existence. He is “aware o f his tem poral paren ts,” his childhood, his time-space environm ent and “the fact that he was born in time.” But now in the detached intellective act he is also fully and immediately certain, inasm uch as the essential immateriality o f intelligence is in act, that his existence now as a knowing intellective act “is neither the consequence o f strict nothing nor o f som ething beginning in tim e.” T hus he is aware o f two certitudes: “he was born in tim e,” yet “he who is now the supratem poral intellective act [o r reality} is not b orn .” He is also aware o f the fact that unless his unlim ited will to know is m aintained and prom pts him to reflect in this intellectual awareness, he would not know the second certitude, for the first certitude “greatly tends to cloud it over.” But he has sustained and followed the unlim ited will to know, is now reflecting, and now gains this knowledge.

In o ther words, the knower who is now fully concentrated in detached intellection and identified with this actuality has always been. Not o f course in his tem poral self o r within the conditions o f his own distinct personality. N or has he always been in and by an im personal Being, fo r “there is no intellection o r knowledge without personality.” W here, then, has this self now identified with the act o f intellection always been? “He has always been in and by infinite and eternal In

6 4 PR EP A R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

tellect,” that is, necessarily in transcendent Personality o r pure Spirit itself, in whom all there is o f perfection in all knowing is in an unrestricted mode.

Metaphysically “prior to the existence o f the individual self, that unrestricted Knower is and is his own infinite Selfhood, knowing him self by him self.” A nd though the individual self now is, that all-inclusive Self is infinitely tran scendent, is eternal and unconditioned isness itself. “It is in pure Spirit itself, which is infinite Intellect-as-such, that this self who is now at one with the act o f intellection now is.” And it is from pure Spirit that this self “issued forth one day into tem poral existence in its own structure and personality.” Pure Spirit, unconditioned Isness, infinite Selfhood, the unlim ited Knower, we call God, o r the divine Self, which is identically the unrestricted Principle. “U nconditioned Intellect . . . as the first Principle o f all things, is entirely Intellect, transcendently pure Intelligence. In him indeed Reality and Intellect are identical.”

Once this certitude is attained, the hum an knower then realizes that he alone is not fully responsible for the attainm ent. He now knows that to actualize a firm and stable affirm ation o f God as real is not possible without the divine help that sustains the unlim ited and detached will to know and the participation in being that makes the insight true. From a nonparticipative viewpoint no dem onstration o f God’s reality is free o f ‘loopholes’, but as Eckhart has explained, such a ‘view’ is illusory to begin with inasm uch as it is “separated from the intelligibility o f being.” It is not that this fundam ental and dem onstrative knowledge o f the reality o f God is indecisive. It is simply that the hum an knower, enm eshed in dualities and the indefinite extensions o f the tem poral self, plagued by corporate selfishness and weakened by his own inward adherence to unsuccesses in willing to know, needs help to sustain him self on the level o f participatory intelligence “w herein it is realized that every actual hum an knower lives in a grace-enveloped o rd er o f being.”

To realize the significance o f the certitude o f God’s reality we must, as Eckhart says, correctly understand that “intellect is above tim e.” “Intellect is the sum m it o f the soul

T H E REA LITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 6 5

. . . time cannot touch the intellect.” W hat is time? “Tim e is the p ro per duration o f materiality.” But the intellect is immaterial, spiritual. T he intellect “enjoys a w ondrous p reem inence, so m uch so that the light o f intellect raises a stone above the realm o f sense and tem porality.” In fact, “the intellect [being wholly spiritual} has the power to know all things and never rests until it re tu rns to the first ratio, in which all things are one, that is, in God.”

Indeed, the outw ard, progressive operations o f the hum an intellect are in time, and inasm uch as the movem ents o f sense and images are restricted to m ateriality these operations are subject to time. But in themselves these operations are g rounded above time and are not subject to the flow o f m atter’s own duration. How do they then exist in themselves? They exist in a way that is “a direct reflection o f eternity ,” for their way o f existing is “the constancy in isness o f the spiritual acts o f intellection.” This way o f existence is w ithout flow, movem ent, o r series: “It consists o f a direct reflection o f eternity, o f an absence o r negation o f tim e.” Such is the nature o f detached intellection in itself, which is not in time and not subject to time.

In itself the spiritual o r intellectual act is supratem poral. “In that act knower and known are one without interval, w ithout medium , and the act itself is w ithout beginning and end .” Insofar as it is “an actual [concrete] happen ing” it occurs in time, in process, in history. But its content p ertains wholly to an o rd er transcending the materiality o f sense experience, sense presentations, o f flow, movement, and series. T he “w ord-happening as such” is allusive, a lapsus linguae, wherein m ore is m eant than meets the ear. T h at which ‘happens’ acts on stage, so to speak, for a mom ent in tem poral existence, but acts w ithout beginning and end “in the ground o f the intellective soul and in detached intellection itself.”

All operations proceed from a subject, and intellectual operations proceed from a knowing subject. And what operation is m ore truly personal than intellection itself? T he hum an knower engages in intellection. This intellection is perform ed by hum an selves, and each hum an self is


“a composite o f spirituality and materiality.” W here is this self? This self is in time and was born in time. But in that it fully engages in the spiritual and detached act o f intellection, in that it identifies itself with the spiritual act and so is capable o f being in and by the imm aterial g round o f the act o f intellection, then this self is also supratem poral, as is intellection itself. In this g round o f the intellective soul, this self transcends the limits o f time. T rue , this self began in time. But does anything begin unconditionally? Doesn’t everything that begins “exist before itself in its causes?” In sofar as it is material o r corporeal, this self “existed before itself in tim e,” that is, in the ancestral cells, the physicochemical and psychic materials and energies utilized by life all along the evolving process from which this self em erged. T h at o f it which existed before pre-existed in time.

Nevertheless, this self as spiritual, as perform ing and identified with the supratem poral act o f intelligence; it is not possible that it could have pre-existed in time. Why? Simply because “intellect can only proceed from Intellect; intellection can only proceed from Intellection itself and hence from that unrestricted isness which is supratem poral, without beginning or end .” F urtherm ore, intellection is fu n dam entally and truly personal, as previously explained. It follows, then, that when intellection is enacted as the operation o f this o r that knower born into tem poral existence, it cannot proceed from that which transcends time, sense, and images unless this self that is now perform ing the fully concentrated act o f intellection somehow is p rio r to and above time, sense, and images.

We are not, Eckhart warns, here confronted with two separate selves. This self, w'hich the hum an knower is, is born in time. But insofar as the self is now wholly absorbed in intellection, it is not born in time. “It proceeds from eternity .” It necessarily is prior in that transcendent, ultimate, and “divine Selfhood” in whom there is no tem porality o r individuality. H ence “it is not there in its own hum an n atu re ,” for in its p ro p e r nature it came to exist only by being born in time. But “all that there is in this spiritual self o f de

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 6 7

tached intellection, knowing, personality, and isness” is first there “in the unrestricted Knower” in a way “infinitely o ther to any way in itself.” This self “is thus a reflection o r image o f its object, the divine Selfhood.” But “object and image are bound up with one another so that we cannot separate them . We can think o f fire apart from heat and heat without fire. We can think o f sun apart from light and light as independen t o f the sun. But we cannot separate the image from its object.”

This is so because everything that is in individual existence is “a direct participation” in the unrestricted act o f knowledge itself, apart from which there is nothing. T h at unrestricted act o r isness “must contain all things in itself in a perfect way” and be itself personality, intellect, and isness in a strictly transcendent order. This means that un re stricted isness, o r total knowability, is the divine Knower, the infinite and eternal Selfhood, and as such “transcendently distinct from all the diversity o f individual existence.” This also means that unrestricted isness is not the act o f being (or isness) o f an individual m anifestation, “which has its isness” from nonindividualized and nonm anifested isness, but that unrestricted isness itself (esse in se) “is subsisting completely through itself.” And this is what is m eant by God.

T he divine Selfhood, from which the self now absorbed in detached intellection directly proceeds, is identically God. Hence we are directed to a w ell-grounded affirm ation o f that necessary metaphysical principle which transcends conceptualization: “U nrestricted Isness, from which proceeds every being; eternal Intellect, from which proceeds every intellection”; o r “divine Selfhood, from which proceeds every self.”

But this self that is eternally in God, in what way is it there in God? Not, o f course, as it is here in its natural or integral structure. R ather “it is there in God inasm uch as it is known to and not o ther than unconditioned Intellect.” In o ther words, “it is there in God not o ther than the divine essence itself”; it is fully “at one with the participality o f the divine essence” and thus identical with it. And the divine es


sence is the im m ediate and undifferen tiated ‘object’ o f the unlim ited act o f com prehension.

Indeed all selves, as they are in this way in God, are the divine Selfhood as unfolding its participality. W ithout existing in themselves they are in and not o ther than the Selfhood. They are there in the Selfhood “infinitely m ore p e rfect and real than in the existence they have in their p ro per natures.” T hey are in the infinite Intellect “by the very isness that God is in his unrestricted act o f knowledge.” And “that which is in God is God”; the self that is in the Selfhood, is in Selfhood.

This is em inently true o f all selves endow ed with intelligence, but it is also true o f all o ther contingent knowables. “Prior to their existing in themselves they, in their isness and knowability, are, as participations o f the divine Intellect, known to that Intellect eternally. They are in God by his very isness.” They are in God by the participality o f his essence “not as particular ideas o r universal ideas abstracted by the hum an intellect from things,” but “as the eternal and unrestricted ratio which is p rio r to the m anifestation o f things . . . and which is identically the Logos.” A nd “in the prim al Intellect [G odhead] properly speaking . . . God always knows in act [isness] and in knowing eternally begets the idea and the idea which this knowing begets is God him self.” “God speaks one word; this is his own comprehension o f him self [apart from which there is nothing}. . . . In this one com prehension he com prehends all things, he com prehends them as issuing forth from prior nothing [that is, from his unm anifest all-possibility]. . . . As subsisting eternally in him, they are without themselves [in their own p ro p er natures o r as individuals]. W hat they are w ithout themselves, is God him self.”

T herefore this knowing self can rightly affirm with Eckh art that “I, w ithout my tem poral self, always am. I am e ternally in God. A nd inasm uch as that which is in God is not o ther than God, then in principle my truest / [o r innerm ost Self] is God.”

Now it is only by p ro p e r discrim ination that we can avoid falsity and correctly understand this affirm ation. It does not

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 6 9

assert that in God this spiritual self is eternally perform ing the act of intellection. It does not assert that this self is even collaborating in the infinite act o f Divine Knowledge. This would be nonsense, for “in God the only knower who knows is God himself.” No, what is asserted is that the self that is now fully absorbed in detached intellection is eternally in God, not as distinctly perform ing any act o f intellection, but as com prehended by and known to God in his knowledge o f himself, that is to say in Divine Knowledge. This self abides there by uncreated and unm anifested personal isness, by that isness which is the eternal and infinite intellective Principle through which the divine Self knows itself. T he divine Self is not this self now engaged in the act o f intellection. O n the o ther hand, this self that proceeds from infinite In tellect, in which it eternally is as p rior nonm anifestation, and that was not born on any day, is in principle the divine Self, o r God. O ur tem poral T is not o u r prim ary o r prin cipial I. We all have what Eckhart affirms as that eternal /, “o u r t ru e s t / ,” and that eternal / is God.

“ G o d I s N e i t h e r T h i s N o r T h a t ”

First of all, the divine Self, o r God, is not this self engaged in the act o f intellection o r in any o ther act, and any such identification is a com plete aberration o f the doctrine Eckhart expounds. T he divine Self is not this self inasm uch as the divine Self is not this, not that.24 Identically God, the Principle o f all actuality and possibility, the divine Self is not an essence to be grasped by hum an intellection.

T he all-pervading significance o f the unrestricted isness o f all-inclusive knowledge which God is, is not to be this o r that, but simply to be. I f essence is in any way regarded as virtually distinct from the isness that God is, then it follows that God is w ithout essence. I f God is virtually w ithout essence, he is no virtual ‘whatness’.

T he only answer, then, to the question ‘W hat is God?’ is, as Eckhart says: “God is!” o r ra th e r “God is nothing.” 25 And in saying this he simply asserts that “God is no-thing, not this, not that.” By stressing the unconditioned isness that God is and the isness o f all that is known and knowable,

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he never for an instant doubts the reality o f God o r the relational reality o f him self and all contingent beings. In fact he tells us that if we exclude essence absolutely from isness we are then left with no intelligible relation with God o r with beings proportionate to us.26 Those who assert that God is absolutely without essence and thus conclude that God is nothingness and mean that nothing is, are, he says, “contradictory and involved in a thorough abuse o f intelligence.” For there is then no way o f knowing anything whatsoever, not even oneself as a know er.27 W hen, speaking in the nam e o f pure metaphysics, Eckhart says that God is w ithout essence, he means that God is the Reality and Principle whose essence is simply to be. God, then, is T h a t whose Knowledge o r Godhead, being unrestricted, is transcendent o f all essence, unconditioned by any ‘what’ as well as by every m ode o f general o r particular determ ination. “T he Principle itself is always pure {i.e. supradeterm inate] In tellect in which there is no reality o ther than superessential, unconditioned Knowledge.” 28

T he will to know must never cease. “T he intellect must press in; it is not content with goodness o r wisdom, nor with tru th nor yet with ‘God’ {as objective essence}. It is no m ore content with ‘God’ than with a tree o r a stone. It m ust never rest until it gets into the Principle from which tru th and goodness proceed and takes them in principle, the fount o f tru th and goodness where they are before they spring forth in m anifestation.” 29 In his Latin Com m entary on the Mosaic “I am who I am,” 30 Eckhart precisely points out what he has stated over and over again in o th e r works. “W hen God says: “I am who I am ,” he teaches us that the subject “ I am ” is identical with the predicate, the second “ I am ,” that the denom ination is that which is denom inated, the essence is the isness, the quiditas is the anitas. . . . H ere there is self- sufficiency itself. . . . Such self-sufficiency is p ro per to God alone. In everything short o f God {that is, universal m anifestation} essence itself is not self-sufficient {or self-explanatory}. . . . T h ere is {in all individuality} real distinction between substance and potency, isness and operation .” 31

All created beings have a whatness really distinct from

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 7 1their own isness, which they have from God,32 and this is why they are individuals and com prehensible. Not so with God, the divine Selfhood, whose essence o r whatness is his isness and “in whom [that is, in principle] all beings are God.” This axial principial tru th the self knows when it is now absorbed in timeless intellection, for therein the act o f intellection is known as a direct reflection o f and hence an im m ediate participation in the divine essence, which is indistinct from God the ultimate Principle.

For the hum an knower this also means that the individual self and all individual m anifestation proceed from God in his creative act as contingent knowables. C ontingent because God does not cause any o f the infinite possibilities known to him to become actually m anifest out o f necessity, inasm uch as his will is not necessarily obliged to affirm any one o f them .33 “God does not know any ‘why’ differentiated from himself.” His will is uncaused, since it is identically all- inclusive isness. Hence why God manifests him self in universal being is unanswerable, because it is not a metaphysical question. But all that is manifested is, from the consideration o f the hum an self, willed by God in his infinite goodness and so could not be a ‘better’ m anifestation.34 Only God can truly m anifest being, which is to say that God does not have isness but is all-inclusive and all-possible isness itself. T hus willed by God all m anifest beings are known to exist in virtue o f their own ends, that is, to actualize their own isnesses, which they have from God.35

T hough these individuals or contingent manifestations, are nothing in themselves, that is, apart from unrestricted isness, and are as nothing in com parison with the un m anifested reality o f God, they, com prising the entire universe o f being, are real in having their own isness from G od.36 A nd this is the only way the hum an knower can intelligently affirm him self and all known and knowable beings, for the essence he and they have is only from being o f this o r that genus o r species. The very isness o f every individual being, which it has directly from God as his m anifestation, is that which is most im m ediate in it.37 T he isness o f any knowable is at once the m anifestation o f the Principle,


the ground whereby it is knowable, and the existential dynam ism in virtue o f which everything else in the knowable, com prising its structure and essence, is its potentiality.

In o ther words, God’s innerm ost presence and operation in every manifest being is not o f the o rd er o f essence, structure, o r substance but o f the im m ediate o rd er o f isness, and to be realized principially. M oreover, his presence is innermost, not only as long as individual beings are sustained in intelligible manifestation, but also as their ultim ate end. For in being created and sustained in their p ro p er isness by the infinite isness that God is, they are directed to their ultimate end as well as to their own p ro per ends, and their ultim ate end is God himself. A fter all, “the end is universally the same as the Principle.” 38 W ithout freedom being effaced, the entire universe o f m anifestation is, then, in the direction o f em ergence toward a consciousness o f the union o f the manifest being with unm anifest isness.

T h i s S a c r e d U n i v e r s e

With Eckhart we can now reasonably affirm that “the entire created o rd er is sacred,” inasm uch as it and all individual beings that com prise it are directly involved in the assimilation o f all things to God, the Principle. Intelligence u n d e r the sway o f the unlim ited will to know assures us o f this fact. T he profane is only the result o f an unsuccess in willing to know and a failure in willing to decide intelligently. It is the result o f an unsuccess in intelligence and being; it is a contraction o f awareness.39 Insofar as the unlimited will to know is arrested by any attem pt merely to stop and gaze at m anifest being ra the r than participate in it, then this world m ust obviously appear as profane and evil.

T he very arrest o f the dynamic will to know is a contraction o f awareness, and out o f this contraction spring opinions such as the following: Since God operates in all beings as the efficacious cause o f everything in universal m anifestation, then he m ust be responsible for all evil, injustice, and m oral and organic failure. But an unsuccess in intending and participating in God makes for an inability to u nd erstand in tru th . And Eckhart says that it essentially makes for

T H E REA LITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 73an inability to understand that in evil, as in all failures in knowing and being, there is no being o r knowable to com prehend. Since evil is not a being, and hence is not an intelligible, it can only be considered as a privation o f o r an unsuccess in being and the will to know.

“All things [o r all individual manifestation} applies only to being. Sin, however, and evil in general are not being [but ‘a failure in being and thus are not intelligible’}. Consequently they are not caused by God but are without God. . . . For evil things are not [are without isness}, neither are they m ade [caused o r bestowed with a reason for existing}, because they have not been effected nor are they effects but ra the r defects o f some kind of being.” 40 As a failure o r u n success, sin and evil acts are simply the consequences o f the irrational. T he “prim ary sin,” from which all sinful and evil acts result, is nothing o ther than a failure o f the will to know without attachm ent and restriction.

But why does failure and hence privation in being occur? H ere again o u r question is nonmetaphysical, because what cannot be in knowable dependence on anything else cannot have a cause o r reason, and so God cannot in any way whatsoever be the cause o r reason o f a failure in knowledge or o f its consequences in evil. From the standpoint o f the hum an knower the freedom in God’s creative act perm its failures and evil, but God can never be correctly regarded as reasonably responsible for them . From the direct standpoint o f Divine Knowledge there is really no failure and hence no real evil, for in the Principle and in term s o f p rin cipial knowledge there is only unrestricted and perfectly unconditioned isness.41 Any principial recognition o f evil or defect in being and knowability is only oblique.

T hough from the consideration o f the divine Selfhood all m anifestation is, in a sense, equivalent, 42 this is not so in term s o f individuality. For “the creature has but one reflection, that o f not being the o ther,” and “w here there is o th erness there is difference in participation in being.” 43 From the consideration o f the hum an self all that which substantially is not God, that is, all individual m anifestation as such, contains a necessary condition o f not being nothing by


being a knowable and hence a pardcipation in all-pervasive being. On this point Eckhart is simply following through with the teachings o f Aquinas and the Pseudo-Dionysius.44

T o the degree that an individual modality is restricted by materiality, it is less an actual participation in being, since materiality, o r potentiality, is the limitation o f actuality. Conversely, the less an individual modality is restricted by its materiality, the m ore it actually participates in being. And if it is wholly unrestricted, that is, a pure intellectual structure, then its participation is total. T hus the very fact o f m ore o r less participation in being reveals a hierarchical universe o f superiors and inferiors in which the higher, m ore qualitative beings should act upon the lower and the undeveloped be for the developed.45

So true is this in term s o f manifestation, says Eckhart, that an abuse o f this law o f natu re , which is a reflection o f the eternal law, by any attem pt to distort the hierarchy o r to project a policy o f egalitarianism into it, is an unsuccess in knowing and being. As long as anyone is in any way considering the time-space world o f individual m anifestation, even in term s o f making life ‘better’ for hum an beings, egalitarianism is out o f the question. Nothing less than actual intelligence and the good will inheren t in intelligence m erit the affirm ation o f superiority over all o ther modalities o f being.46 T he abuse o f this law o f nature is a contraction o f awareness and intelligence, the consequence o f which is m ore evil, not only in oneself but th roughout the entire intraindividual dom ain.

T he Principle in which God creates or manifests individual beings is God himself, “who is without beginning o r end .” “Each being in the sacred hierarchy o f the created universe strives, inasm uch as it is, to cooperate in the assimilation o f all things to God.” 47 Eternally preordained in God prior to their “beginning in tim e,” they are never outside God. They are only regarded as outside if we, u nd er the influence o f secular philosophy that unintelligently posits a principle o f separation as fundam ental, part them from God, separated from whom there is strictly nothing. In

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 75tru th “earth has no escape from heaven. Flee it up o r flee it down, heaven invades it, energizes it, makes it sacred.” 48

T he universe o f contingent beings is not destined to strict nothingness, because strict nothingness cannot be a final cause. Inasm uch as “strict nothingness cannot be the end o f any operation ,” 49 no contingent being “naturally strives to cease totally to be.” T hough as contingent structures some o f them —that is, those composed o f structure and m ateriality—do decom pose and as particular compositions do die, there is a cessation neither o f isness nor o f potentiality. Intellectual structures are ever potential, not to nothingness but only to o ther imm aterial structures. And m aterial structures are such that their materiality is timeless and their structures are forever in the potentiality o f m atter from which they can always be developed. T hough corruptible as particular com posite entities, there is never a total annihilation, since their composite elements are indestructible. In o ther words, “in universal manifestation there is no potentiality because o f which it is possible that beings strive natu rally toward absolute nothingness.” 50

To be sacred is to have isness, to be a m anifestation o f the nonindividualized divine Self. T hus the entire universe o f individual m anifestation is sacred in its participality. Not striving toward nothingness, it and all individual beings in it ceaselessly strive toward assimilation to and ultimately identity in knowledge with the divine Self. T he innerm ost presence o f unlim ited isness in the ground o f each contingent being makes for the assimilation; the all-inclusiveness o f the unrestricted act o f knowledge, which is the ultimate term o f all striving, makes for the identification. Participating in the divine Self, the entire universe o f individuality, as m anifestation o f its Principle which is the Self, is never o ther than the Self. For in the divine Self “there is nothing whatsoever that is manifestly possible except that directly known to the infinite Selfhood.” 51 In this universe o f individuality only the failure in striving to know, o r the contraction o f awareness with its evil consequences, is profane, is not a m anifestation o f the divine Self and is impossible o f being a m ani

7 6 PR EP A R A T O R Y C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

festation. All else is sacred, and is sacred because in prim al tru th it is not o th er than the divine Self—God.

As already pointed out, it is in the infinite goodness that God is that he wills this m anifest universe, and wills it as inseparable from him self and hence as sacred in its p articipality. But Eckhart also makes it very clear that G od’s infinite goodness is also “o u r certitude that God cannot leave the questing intellect w ithout an answer to its inescapable question regarding evil and the intellect’s failure in striving to know and unite with its source.” 52 T he all-inclusiveness o f that goodness means that God would not be God if he could not com m unicate him self directly to m an and bestow on him all that is necessary in o rd er to attain the fullness o f God, o r knowledge through identity in God, to which he is called. To deny this possibility to God is to deny the all-possibility that he is, and w hatever we consequently consider ‘G od’ is som ething less than true God.53

T hat God has perfectly com m unicated him self to man is fully evident to Eckhart.54 It is fully evident in the sense that the intellect, when presented with that divine revelation and when u rged on by the detached will to know, can find no valid reasons fo r not accepting it. It is also fully evident in the sense that the intellect then realizes that nothing is wanting w hen it is truly accepted in well g rounded faith.

For Eckhart that perfect com m unication is Jesus Christ, who divinely and unconditionally affirms him self as infinitely m ore than ju s t a voice o r a prophet, infinitely m ore than a hum an intellect graced by unitive knowledge. He is God him self revealed in as well as to the entire manifested order. He is the eternal W ord m ade flesh, the God-M an who uniquely discloses the very natu re o f God and the m ode o f Divine Knowledge. T hus, “God completely gives him self to all with all that he is. For it would be foolish to rely on and expect only h alf a com m unication from God.” 55 ,

But the birth o f the W ord is not restricted to history. Being the W ord o f all-possibility its birth may also, and no less essentially fo r us, take place in the very ground o f the intellective soul. “H ere in time we celebrate a holiday

T H E REA LITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 77[Christmas} because the eternal birth which God the Father effects unceasingly in eternity is the same birth he effected here in time, in hum an nature. . . . But what benefit is that to me if it does not also occur in me? W hat is all-im portant is that it should happen in me.” 56

W hen “the b irth” does “happen” in the g round o f the soul the intellect may then realize the knowledge o f God and o f all things th rough identity. T hen it may realize its principial identity with the W ord, that is, with unrestricted Intellect itself. T hen it may also realize that “the birth o f the W ord” is only an external expression o f the eternal tru th that the intellect has never really been outside o r o ther than God. T hen , with Eckhart, the intellect can say: “I am that Son and not o ther,” o r “my innerm ost Self is God.”

D e t a c h e d I n t e l l e c t u a l i t y

From what has been said thus far it should be quite clear that the student disciplined exclusively in m odern philosophy and its secular modes o f education is ill p repared for a ready understanding o f Eckhart’s teaching. Even the person ‘well learned’ in medieval thought m ust recognize how inadequately he is qualified as long as he grants priority to external modes o f though t over the principial mode. In o ther words, the student o f Eckhart m ust acknowledge sources o f knowledge that are tru e r than reason. This in no sense implies a reaction against reason, which could only m ean an irrational reliance upon feeling, but a transcendence o f reason from within by an intellectual realization o f unitive knowledge.

It is indisputable that since Eckhart’s time there has been a progressive confusion o f intellect with m ere reason. In some academic quarters today, indeed, the term ‘intellectualist’ is derisively used to designate a person steeped in e rudition and analytical reasoning, the implication being that feeling and em otion are m ore trustw orthy. Such a confusion was foreign to those schooled in the tradition o f Christian intellectuality, as were Aquinas and Eckhart, who p ro p erly understood reason and will as distinct faculties issuing forth from intellect. For them , as we have noted, it is the

?8 PR EPA R A TO RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

higher intellect that makes for direct knowledge in contrast to the indirect knowledge o f reasoning. It does this because intellect is realized as an im m ediate reflection o f unconditioned, all-inclusive Intellect itself. And since the reflection is im m ediate the transposition into pure Intellect, which is knowledge o f all that is through identity, becomes possible.

In a Latin Com m entary Eckhart says: “While the standpoint o f approach to pure and eternal Intellect necessarily implies the intervention o f an elem ent draw n from the hum an o rd er o f sensitive attachm ent, the standpoint o f knowledge as it were in divinis is purely intellectual.” 57 T hough this statem ent would be sufficiently clear to men and women educated in the tradition o f Gregory o f Nyssa, Augustine, and Aquinas, to most people in o u r present age it m ight appear to describe the truly intellectual standpoint inadequately. Both science and philosophy, as pursued in o u r age, have pretensions toward intellectuality. But if this claim is not adm itted as well founded by the qualified studen t o f Eckhart, it is because a basic difference separates all speculations o f this kind from detached intellectuality.

T h e detached intellectuality o f which Eckhart speaks is fundam entally the knowledge o f principles belonging to the all-inclusive order. M oreover, they alone can validly lay claim to the term o f ‘principles’. This does not furnish us with a definition o f pure Intellect; in fact a definition in this case would be inaccurate by the very fact that one tried to make it.58 Only that which is restricted is capable o f definition, whereas pure, superessential Intellect is by its very natu re unrestricted. N or does the distinction between the All- inclusive and the naturally exclusive hum an o rders indicate any opposition between them . Indeed, no such opposition is really conceivable, precisely because apart from the all- inclusiveness and all-possibility o f Intellect itself, there is nothing.

“T ru th ,” says Aquinas, “is unconditionally one in the divine Intellect, but from it many tru ths flow into the hum an m ind, as one face may be m irrored with variety.” 59 M oreover, “tru th cannot contradict itself.” Fully understand ing these statem ents, Eckhart can then say that “as eternal

T H E REALITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 79truths cannot contradict tem poral tru ths, so intellect cannot contradict reason.” 60 And rational knowledge has im portance fo r Eckhart primarily as an ancillary means for the form ulation and external expression o f tru ths that lie beyond its range. Eternal tru ths can only be app rehended in the ground o f intellect where the intention is the direct consideration o f that which does not pertain to the individual o rd er o f contingency. W ere it not that many contem porary philosophers have used the term ‘intuition’ to designate a purely instinctive o r vital operation, which is really beneath reason and not above it, there would be no hesitation in applying this term to intellect.

Generally speaking it m ust be adm itted that most m odern philosophers and, indeed, practically all o u r educators have ignored the h igher intellect. Aristotle 61 affirms the intellect as intuitive, because for him it is that in us which possesses a direct and im m ediate knowledge o f tru th . Aristotle also said that “intellect is tru er than science.” 62 which means that it is m ore true than the reason that constructs the sciences. And when Eckhart says that “nothing is m ore true than detached intellection grounded in pure Intellect itself,” 63 he means that it is indefectable from the fact that its knowledge is imm ediate and because, not being really distinct from its object, it is knowledge through identity.

If Eckhart was able to affirm the essential basis o f intellectual certainty in this respect, it is because the tradition to which he belonged, and which rem ains irrefutable, neither ignored the h igher function o f intellect nor confounded it with som ething inferior. Indeed, those in the tradition granted the intellect its rightful “noble place” and acknowledged it as the ground from which rational modes o f knowledge spring forth. T hus they were able to affirm that e rro r can only enter in with the use o f reason.64 M oreover, since all rational expression is bound to be limited and imperfect, e rro r is inevitable in its form . No m atter how p re cise one tries to make the expression, what is left out is always g reater than what is kept in. But the unavoidable e rro r in reason’s expression is slight when com pared to the gross e rro r that results from the expression o f m ere feeling

8o PR EPA R A T O RY C O N S ID E R A T IO N S

or the vital functions. W hereas the form er e rro r contains noth ing positive as such and simply am ounts to an incom plete form ulation o f integral tru th , the latter e rro r is entirely positive, springing as it does from irrationality.

These rem arks perhaps show how difficult it is for the contem porary student, considering the type o f philosophical influence and schooling he has undergone, to un derstand that he does not have to choose between reason and feeling. Perhaps they also show how difficult it is for him to understand that the distinction between the all- inclusive o rd er o f pure Intellect and the individual o rd er o f hum an speculation does not essentially concern things themselves, but the standpoint from which they are considered. He may readily acknowledge that the same thing can be studied and understood by d ifferent sciences u nd er differen t aspects. Man can be studied and understood biologically, psychologically, sociologically, and philosophically. T he same student may even adm it that m an can be studied and understood theologically in e ither negative o r positive modes. But how p repared is he for an appreciation o f Eckh art’s claim?

With a tradition to back him up Eckhart insists that man and the entire o rd er o f universal m anifestation can also, by a suitable transposition, be understood principially—that is, an understanding that is as it were from the standpoint o f pure Intellect with which detached intellection is coincident. In fact he insists that such an understanding is far tru e r than any o ther, inasm uch as it is in T ru th itself and is Divine Knowledge. If the “suitable transposition” is actualized only by God himself, th rough his Self-revelation and o ur acceptance o f it, it is because the reflected intellect o f its own natu re and pow er cannot transcend itself.65

A fter all, a consideration o f all that is in principial mode, o r in terms o f “the possible intellect as it were fully actualized,” is out o f the question for the intellect illum inated by the reflected light o f natural intellection alone.66 It is made operative only by the direct light o f the W ord o f God, which discloses all that the full actualization o f the ‘possible intellect’ entails, that is, pu re Intellect itself. Because o f that

T H E REALITY OF T H E D IV IN E SELF 81

disclosure it is possible for man truly and wisely to consider all things principially and, by uncreated grace, ultimately to realize that knowledge wholly in God. This is the very essence o f detached intellectuality, for when intellectual detachm ent from time, space, and all individuality and universal being is attained, there are no longer any real distinctions. Eckhart never lets us forget that “ultimately the only Knower is God him self.”

This wholly supranatural o r purely metaphysical dom ain does not have for its direct context those things which the diverse hum an ways o f knowing have as yet failed to uncover by reason o f their present state o f incomplete developm ent. Its essential context is ra th er that which, by its very nature, lies infinitely beyond the range o f any special way of hum an knowing. And to say that it “lies infinitely beyond” is to say that it is the all-inclusive content o f knowledge in God, in com parison with which knowledge about things or even about God is external. Indeed, the field o f every external m ode o f knowledge can, insofar as it is capable o f it, be extended indefinitely w ithout ever discovering unrestricted Intellect. “O h, if only the soul’s eye were opened by God so that it could contem plate the T ru th !” 67 O ne is e ither awakened to it by transcendent act o r one is not.

W hereas the dom ain o f m ultiple external ways o f knowing are restricted by the contingent, the accidental, and the variable, the dom ain o f pure Intellect is withdrawn from the entire time-space continuun. W here pure Intellect is concerned, all that can change with time and place is the m ore o r less external form s o f exposition that it may assume and the degrees o f awakening to it to be found am ong hum ans. As for pure Intellect itself, it entirely rem ains imm utable and essentially the same inasm uch as its ‘object’ is identically itself, apart from which there is nothing. And since no external modes give us direct access to it, pure In tellect can only be studied in term s o f detached intellection, the supranatural can only be studied meta-physically o r “eternal wise.” 68 T h at is, it can only be studied and u n d erstood from a standpoint detached from all notions o f history, evolution, progress, and individuality.


T hus it becomes possible to distinguish integral knowledge from discursive o r scientific knowledge, and affirm the primacy o f the form er. T he first is immediately derived from pure Intellect, which has the All-inclusive for its domain; the second pertains to reason, which has only m anifest restricted reality for its dom ain. T h ere should be no confusion between them . And if Eckhart is able to speak with confidence in term s o f Divine Knowledge o r from the standpoint o f knowledge in God, as it were, it is because intellect, as the im m ediate reflection o f unconditioned, pure Intellect itself, is inverted into God by uncreated act. And this is simply ano ther way o f saying that the possibility o f the inversion is m ade actual by the birth o f the W ord in the ground o f the intellective soul.

Eckhart’s consistent teaching on detached intellectuality obviously indicates why he cannot be counted with those am ong the faithful who insist that they m ust before all else be agents for healing social injustice. He affirm ed not only that “action without contem plation in God is m eaningless,” but also that the social injustices over which so many people busy themselves are, a fter all, “in no way directly solvable.” 69 He goes on to say that activists who think that problem s pertaining to the purpose o f hum an life are solvable by material means alone, o r by hum an action alone, o r even that m an’s determ ination to solve them is most pleasing to God’s intrinsic will, are misled. T he idea that social or political change can satisfy m an’s intellectual o r spiritual needs is perhaps the “greatest deception” to which man is susceptible. This in no sense means that society is to be ignored; detached intellectuality does not m ean ind ifference.70 Eckhart simply knows that Christians who are merely content to adopt the activist habits o f the secular world will lose the opportunity they have o f realizing that true charity which springs from Divine Knowledge and “holds together that which is eternally bound.” 71 W hatever social good- is ever accomplished can only be the result o f men and women who, in their intellectual g round , u n d erstand that there is som ething far m ore im portan t to be actualized than ju s t trying to save this world.

T H E REALITY O F T H E D IV IN E SELF 83

I f the foregoing rem arks and considerations make some sense, then the reader should now be in a better position to understand the essential aspects o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge that Eckhart expounds. T here will be occasions when it will be necessary to refer again to several o f these issues, though in the context o f setting forth the fundam entals o f that doctrine ra ther than in a preparatory context for an understand ing o f it. We must now assume that there is no longer any m ajor reason for delaying a straightforw ard presentation o f the essentials in Eckhart’s teaching.

At this point, then, we m ust tu rn from a consideration o f the manifest o r created universe to the fullness o f God. In itself the universe, including m an, is im plenitude and indeed insignificant in its becoming o r nonbeing, yet directed to acquire that fullness. And we m ust adm it that difficult as it has been to raise ourselves to a consideration o f God and necessary as it has been to follow through with the negative way in o rd er to apprehend him, it will be no less difficult to understand all things principially and as it were from within God.

P a r t II

The Doctrine

1God and the Human Self

In expounding the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge Meister Echkart repeatedly rem inds us that “the essential p roperty o f intelligence is to app rehend all individual beings, or things, in their principles.” M oreover, “what we know we must know in its principle; we can never actually know anything in tru th until we know it in its principle. And until we realize it in the suprem e {unconditioned} Principle, there is no pure understand ing o f it.” 1 Unless we raise ourselves to this principial m ode o f intellection his exposition o f Divine Knowledge cannot be fully grasped.

For Eckhart this understanding, which unfolds the notion o f identity in knowledge, implies m ore than a theoretical consent to it. It adm its o f consequences in term s o f decision and actual realization that rem ain unsuspected by those whose insight into reality does not transcend the cognition o f structure, individuality, and substantial being. T hough this m anner o f knowing is quite foreign to those whose ed u cation is dom inated by m odern philosophy o r even by most academic philosophy, regardless o f place and time, it nevertheless is the pre-em inent way o f knowing— pre-em inent because it is constituted as it were in that suprem e Principle which is in no way contained by any particular individual being, by any o ther individual being, o r even by the totality o f individual beings.

T he doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, in the nam e o f which Eckhart speaks and as it pertains to the hum an being, the re fore dem ands from the very start the requisite o f clarifying the fundam ental and real distinction between God and the individual self. Inasm uch as the individual self, o r hum an knower, is a created manifestation, God is its Principle.2 In deed, God is the prim ordial and im m ediate Principle,

87

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whereas the individual self is only one am ong many m anifestations o f the Principle. God is the unrestricted Knower and hence the infinite Personality and Reality, not only o f all that is actually manifest but also o f all that is nonmanifest, that is, o f all-possibility. T hus one may m etaphysically employ the term s ‘Personality’ and ‘individuality’ for God and the hum an self respectively; with, however, a basic reservation that Eckhart notes m ust be kept in mind. For God in his G odhead denotes that which is the source o f the infinite Personality that he is.3

It should be clearly understood that the use o f the term ‘God’ does not here imply any identity o f intention with certain philosophers, ancient o r m odern, who may have used this term in a nonmetaphysical sense. “God,” says Eckhart, “is not som ething drawn from o r included in the totality o f things . . . he transcends all things . . . all things are in him. He is unconditioned pure isness, o r unrestricted knowledge. . . . God is the Principle and end o f all things.” 4

T he intelligibility o f God as the first and im m ediate Principle o f all actual and possible reality pertains strictly to supranatural o r detached intellectual knowledge, which is principial in m anner. It is never to be confused with a m ere logical o r mathematical understanding o f abstract principles, for God is nonabstract as well as nonindividual. In deed, from what could he be abstracted o r individualized? God is to be acknowledged as the “Selfhood o f all selves,” the “Subject o f all subjects,” the “Reality o f all realities,” the “Principle o f all true principles and o f all m anifestation.”

T he distinction between God and the hum an self is, in o ther words, the distinction between All-inclusiveness 5 and individuality, inasm uch as individuality means nothing m ore nor less than a being undivided in itself yet divided from each and every o th er being. “God is the transcedent and timeless Principle o f which all individual beings, including the hum an being, are only contingent images o r reflections.” 6 As with all reflections, which are simply modifications o f their principle, they can in no way affect the principle.7 T hus God is never individualized. “To know

G O D A ND T H E H UM AN SELF 89

pure isness I must know it as subsisting in itself, that is, in God, not parcelled out in creatures.” 8

As utterly transcendent, infinite, and all-possibility, God’s isness, which is God himself, is beyond all d ifferentiation, for “apart from isness there is strictly nothing.” 9 Inasm uch as he must always be app rehended u nd er the aspect o f e te rnity and changelessness, which are the necessary attributes o f unconditioned isness, God can never become d ifferentiated o r individualized. God, then, is in no way susceptible o f any particularization o r individualization that would cause him to be o ther than himself.

Changeless and unrestricted in him self and thus uncontained, God simply manifests o r renders intelligible certain m ultiple possibilities that he contains within himself. In the purely metaphysical sense, and hence void o f any notion o f succession, this is a relational progression from the Principle to the principiate.10 T h e progression is only relational and is not a differentiated act at all except when considered in term s o f the m anifest o rd er o f creation and the individual self. T herefore his eternal and infinite isness, which is identically unrestricted knowledge itself, is in no way affected by the progression. In o ther words, there can be only perfect similitude, so that even what is virtual in term s o f m ere hum an com prehension is nevertheless to be realized in the “eternal now.”

P r i n c i p i a l M a n i f e s t a t i o n

O u r consideration o f m anifestation is, o f course, always from a participative knowing situated in m anifestation. Manifestation is the “showing forth in being” o f the Principle, that is, o f God who in him self is unm anifested .11 And o ur participative knowing in being is already a m anifestation and hence a modification o f G od’s knowing, yet by that very fact a participation in the Principle. It follows, then, that any ‘knowing’ based on adopting a stance whereby one mentally gazes at o r beholds manifest being as som ething ‘out the re ’ and separated from one’s self can at best be only a p re tended knowledge.12 It is actually a contraction o f intelligence.

9° T H E D O C T R IN E

Universal m anifestation is never to be confused with ‘em anation’ in any Plotinian o r Neo-Platonic sense. Such an assertion o f em anation is erroneous because it restricts the allpossibility o f God. It is primarily an outcom e o f an attem pt to behold m anifestation in a separatist and essentialist mode. It is restricted by an in tent to gaze upon some sublime Essence and therefo re asserts the incorrect conclusion that all things arise necessarily out o f the substance o f G od’s being. Not so, says Eckhart, fo r whom m anifestation is nothing o ther than an “issuing forth from God or the reflection o f him self according to the exigencies o f his u n re stricted will,” 13 which is “identically his isness.” And unlim ited isness in its e lf14 is without real distinction and transcends the entire o rd er o f ontological knowing, which is limited by being constituted in individuality and the dete rm ination o f substantive being,15 o r at best distinctive isness in its relation to our apprehension .16

M anifestation itself, and all the ways o f m anifestation, be they in term s o f creativity, formless generation, o r revelation and incarnation, none o f which are contradictory to the all-possibility o f unconditioned Godhead, are a consideration from the individual and ju st hum an way o f knowing. “T he Godhead [God undifferentiated and indistinct in se], with whom all m anifestation is identical in principle, is fu n dam entally nonm anifested. . . . God [Deus ad extra} and Godhead are [intellectually] distinct as earth and heaven.. . . God and G odhead are distinguished by working and not working. God manifests and rem ains unm anifest. Gott wirt unt entwirt.” 17 T h at is, God manifests him self in being, o r actualizes certain possibilities, yet in himself, in the “divine desert” o r “p rior nothing,” he rem ains all-possibility and unm anifest isness.

T he principial o r purely intellectual apprehension o f all manifestation as being the reflection, in various stages and ways, o f the Principle in no way obviates, but includes, the created and uncreated orders. For creation is simply a determ ination o f how the Principle actually “shows itself fo rth ” in individual and contingent m anifestation while in itself rem aining wholly transcendent and unaffected

G O D A N D T H E H UM AN SELF 9 1thereby.18 It is perhaps better to say that the term ‘creation’ designates how God does not show him self forth. T hat is, it is not som ething apart from God that enters into his creative act, for apart from God there is strictly nothing; yet it does not involve a substantial em anation o f God. In o ther words, “God creates neither out o f som ething o ther than him self nor out o f som ething actual in himself, but simply out o f prior nothing.” 19

H ere it is necessary to note that when individual m anifestation is considered in term s o f G od’s creative act, we must discrim inate between what Eckhart designates as “strict nothing” and “prior nothing.” A part from God, the Principle, there is strictly noth ing.20 And ‘strict nothing’ means contradiction, nonpossibility, the total absence o f actual or possible being. Examples o f ‘strict nothing’ are statem ents such as “the fruits o f a barren tree ,” “separate from pure isness is som ething,” “there are two infinites,” and so forth. Unreality in the absolute sense is synonymous with ‘strict nothing’. Strict unreality is the outcom e o f contradiction o r nonisness, and we correctly designate it as absurd. T hat which rigorously excludes all unreality, all contradiction, all impossibility, is, then, the prim ary isness o r Reality innermost in all m anifestation, regardless o f its degrees or modalities o f existence. T h at Reality is God. It is All-possibility, the All-inclusive. It is the T ru th o f all relational truths. As infinite T ru th God neither deceives nor is deceived; as infinite Reality he excludes only ‘strict nothing’. W hatever is not sustained in the unconditioned Principle is clearly strict nothing.21

Not to be confused with ‘strict nothing’, there is ‘prior nothing’ o r ‘pre-existing possibility’.22 T he possibility o f manifest being is not som ething, is not actual. Metaphysically speaking it is “p rior o r antecedent nothing.” Now such a possibility is not ‘strict nothing’, inasm uch as it contains no contradiction, does not presuppose som ething actual but only the possibility for m anifestation o r the “m ayhap” o f creation within all-possibility. Once the possibility is actualized, the ‘p rio r noth ing’ o f what was possible is m etaphysically reconsidered with reference to the actuality that


is regarded as having “filled the place,” analogically speaking, o f that possibility. “ It should be noted that all things in the universe were not strictly nothing prior to the foundation o f the world, but had a certain possible being.” 23

Creation, therefore , and all individual m anifestation, must be considered as being out o f ‘prior noth ing’ o r ‘the possibility o f m anifestation’, and not out o f ‘strict nothing’.24 God alone, the Principle, is fully self-sufficient and self- explanatory by metaphysical necessity. Since he excludes only ‘strict noth ing’, he is the Principle o f all that is manifest and nonm anifest, o f all actual and possible being. T hus all that is m anifest and nonm anifest is, in principle, God. God is not the manifested, but principially (tamquam in principio) the manifested is God.

“All that we consider here externally in multiplicity is there [in God] wholly within and identical. . . . Yesterday evening I was thinking that all likeness here is identity in the Father, the Principle. . . . T he teaching from nature [philosophy] that God is known by likeness [analogy], by this o r by that, impresses me as being ra ther insignificant. A fter all, God is neither this nor that. . . . T here in the Principle all grass-blades, wood, and stone, all things are identical. This is the highest o f all considerations, and I have fooled myself with lesser considerations.” 25

W hen we rightly consider manifestation it may be affirm ed that God issues certain multiple possibilities forth into being from his infinite content o f all-possibility through many ways o f realization. For the integral hum an knower these am ount to so many distinct modalities o f being. Yet o f these many modalities, one alone, limited by the specific conditions that define it, constitutes the determ ination o f the individual hum an being. T he hum an being’s essential affirm ation o f him self as a knower really distinct from all o ther knowers and from all nonknowing beings conform s to that determ ination.

God is therefore the Principle by which all modalities o f intelligibility are, each in its own way. This, o f course, m ust be understood not only o f all the created modifications o f being and even o f uncreated manifestations, but also o f the

G O D A ND T H E H UM A N SELF 93unm anifested which com prises all-possibility. But God derives his intelligibility, his isness and knowledge, from him self alone. He is in fact the self-subsisting and un re stricted act o f com prehension, knowing all about all, fo r in his perfect and indivisible unity he neither has nor can have any principle o ther than himself. “He is the Principle without principle.” 26

G o d a s P u r e S p i r i t

W hen we consider God in relation to all contingent beings and particularly to the hum an being, then God is pure Spirit, o r the infinite Personality. In fact we m ust affirm it o f him as the Principle o f all conditions o f knowledge and isness, manifest and nonm anifest. Infinite Personality is a direct affirm ation o f the principle Eckhart calls Intellect- as-such, o r pure Spirit.27 This term ‘Spirit’ m ust, however, be understood as having nothing in com mon with m odern philosophical uses o f the word, whereby it is designated as a correlation o f ‘m atter’. We m ust never forget that Eckhart is p rem odern , and that m odern philosophy, in this as in o ther respects, has been consciously o r unconsciously greatly influenced by Cartesian dualism.

Eckhart metaphysically as well as theologically affirms that “God is infinite Personality, o r pure Spirit.” In doing this he is simply saying that it is always possible, when considering God in relation to contingent beings, to speak o f God ‘qualified’. This is so because God in se is the im m ediate source o f all quality, whereas there is no possible question o f God ‘quantified’.28

If quality, considered as the content o f pure Spirit, is not exclusively confined to the world o f individual m anifestation, it is because it is susceptible o f a transposition that renders its significance all-inclusive. Since in the all-inclusive o rd er essence is identically isness, there is nothing rem ark able in this. But in any such transposition quality ceases to be the correlative o f quantity which, by definition, is restricted to materiality and the lowest possible degree o f individual manifestation.

It is very im portant, therefore , that the affirm ation o f


pure Spirit m ust never be considered in term s o f ‘spirit’ as opposed to ‘m atter’. I f we insist that the two term s are meaningless except in reference to one another, we depart from both genuine theology and sound philosophy, and radically from an understand ing o f the doctrine Eckhart and his traditional teachers expound. For to understand ‘spirit’ in this way is the result o f stopping to ‘take a m ental look’ at being ra th e r than participating in it. It prom otes dem iurgic conceptions o f God and the substitution o f ‘a Being’ o r ‘a Knower’ for the nonindividualized, unconditioned, and indivisible Intellect that God is.

Eckhart’s materia is not by any means the same as ‘m atter’ as conceived by m odern physicists, ju s t as his understand ing o fforma, o r structure, has little if anything in common with o u r m odern idea o f ‘form ’. For Eckhart the material aspect o f individual m anifestation, including the integral hum an self, is prim arily its quantitative aspect. T hough ‘pure quantity’, o r materia prima, in its com plete indistinction is unrealizable, it is the principle o f individuation. He also affirms that a realizable quantity is never without some quality; that in all individual m anifestation materia and forma are inseparable as potency and act, essence and existence, are inseparable.29 T hus it m ust be insisted that materia, which signifies quantity, can never unite, that all attem pts to establish ‘un iform ity’ are downward tendencies toward quantity and are never to be confused with unification, which is an upw ard tendency tow ard quality and pure Spirit in which all being is eternally united.

T he metaphysics, or detached intellectuality, to which Eckhart attains is not only u nd er the sway o f an unlim ited will to know. In fact it principially constitutes itself in a mode o f knowledge that is quite beyond that which presents us with the oppositions o f the type existing between ‘sp iritu alism’ vs. ‘materialism ’, ‘mentalism ’ vs. ‘m echanism ’, ‘idealism’ vs. ‘pragm atism ’, and ‘essentialism’ vs. ‘existentialism’.30 These contraries, and all those o f this type, are based on particular attitudes o f m ind which, by definition, are p reju diced from the start. “Prejudiced” because they constitute themselves, not in a participatory m ode o f knowledge,

G O D A ND T H E H UM A N SELF 95which perm its distinctions only, but in a ‘beholding’ o f reality that necessarily insists on separation, a separation between the beholder and that which is beheld. A nd that is ano ther m atter altogether, for distinction within the unity o f being must in no way be confounded with separation from it.

Cognition established on the basis o f separation, no m atter how ‘spiritual’, ‘ideal’, o r ‘existential’ it may be, is no th ing o th er than pseudom etaphysics, for the simple reason that it is situated as it were outside reality (isness), apart from which there is strictly nothing. Rather than transcend the o rd er o f the m anifest self, o r individuality, it results in a g reater restriction within that o rder. M oreover, pure m etaphysics is not called upon to concern itself with the m ore or less m isdirected and usually artificial questions that such oppositions based on an idea o f separation raise—except, that is, to correct and refram e them.

Being identical with God, pure Spirit perm eates all beings which are, as it were, God’s likenesses o r modalities o f existence in the m anifestation o f himself. Hence all beings constitute, analogically speaking, the ‘environm ent’ o f pure Spirit, w hether they be knowing o r nonknowing beings— that is, beings whose integral structure is wholly intellectual, wholly corporeal, o r the composite o f intellectuality and corporeality, as in the case o f hum an beings. For these distinctions indicate only d ifferent modalities in m anifestation and make no difference whatsoever in respect o f God, the unconditioned and unm anifested Principle. As the Principle o f all that is, and regardless of any condition o r modality o f existence, God rem ains ever the same throughout the m ultiple degrees o f existence as well as in principial nonm anifestation.

In relation to any manifest being, pure Spirit transcends all real distinction and individualization. T hus it is identical with God. Inasm uch as “there are no real distinctions o r o therness in God,” 31 he is not therefore really distinct from pure Spirit, nor does he ever really become o ther from it in any way, even when we consider it ‘particularly’ in relation to ourselves as hum an beings. God cannot be o ther than


himself; thus he cannot be affected by any m anner o f our consideration o f him any m ore than by any o ther contingency.

It m ust always be rem em bered that we d ep art from the direct consideration o f God to the extent that we make this distinction between God and individuality. A nd we make this distinction only in o rder to consider his reflection in the hum an self o r in some o ther modality o f existence. W hen we directly consider God all modalities o f m anifestation are really nondiversified and are to be known in the “eternal now” in the same principial m anner. T hus pure Spirit is the divine Selfhood, and principially the self is the Selfhood, or as Eckhart also says: “My truest / is God.” 32 Principial knowledge, he rem inds us, is the realization that “there is only one First Person, one true / am,” and that it is in the lack o f this knowledge that we think, speak, and act in term s o f self-centeredness. T hen we think, speak, and act as though we were really disassociated from God.

T h e E x t e n d e d O r d e r o f t h e H u m a n S e l f

It is the self, o r hum an individuality as distinguished from but not separated from God, that presently concerns us, and the reflection that we are now considering determines what Eckhart calls “the very ground o f the self.” If separated from its principle, that is, from God, it can only have the appearance o f strict unreality. T hus separated it is meaningless, illusory, nothingness. Why? Because it is from its Principle that it derives all its reality, and it has this reality only through the participation o f its own isness in the unrestricted isness that God is.33 Which is to say that it is identified with God, not substantially, o f course, but p rin cipially. Separated from the Principle there is only nothing; distinguished within the issuing forth o f the Principle there is nothing really o ther than the Principle.

Pure Spirit, Intellect itself, Personality, belong essentially to the o rd er o f the All-inclusive. T hus they cannot correctly be considered from any way o f knowing except that o f detached intellection which is entirely constituted in the All- inclusive. Inasm uch as God is the All-inclusive, apart from

G O D A ND T H E H UM AN SELF 97which there is strictly nothing, then detached intellection, or pure metaphysics, is g rounded in God. Most m odern philosophers in particular, however, are in the habit o f confounding the all-inclusive o rd er with that which actually pertains only to the o rd er o f the self o r individuality. Perhaps it is better to say that since they are quite unfam iliar with genuine participative ontology, which may lead to metaphysics, they are wholly unacquainted with the possibility of p rin cipial knowledge. Because they lack insight into the real o rd er o f the All-inclusive and All-possibility, then that to which they designate God is usually the realm o f the general, which correctly understood is simply an extension of the self. For the general is nothing m ore nor less than the realm o f individual ideas o r limited acts o f com prehension. We are thus rem inded o f the idealists and rationalists.

Some confound their understanding much fu rther, such as certain empiricist philosophers who cannot even affirm the general. T h at with which they delegate God or the All- inclusive, if at all, is the m ere collective, which pertains correctly to the o rder o f particularity. T hus by means o f those successive degredations they end by reducing all reality to the modality o f sensate awareness, which they then are inclined to assert as the only knowledge possible. Because oversight has replaced insight, because there have been repeated failures in sustaining an unlim ited will to know—the term o f which is all-inclusive isness, o r unrestricted knowledge itself—the intellectual range o f most m odern philosophers does not extend beyond the particular and general orders. Yet they endeavor to impose on everyone else the restrictions that are the result o f their own inability and unwillingness, w hether inborn o r acquired through an overem phasized analytical form o f education.

Nevertheless the true student o f Eckhart cannot fail to acknowledge that these same philosophers have m ade worthy contributions to the unity o f m an’s intellectual quest. They have raised im portant questions that the seeking intellect cannot shun, and we can be sure that comparatively new questions will be raised by men and women in fu tu re ages. Since no true philosophical principle should be affirm ed to

9« T H E D O C T R IN E

the exclusion o f o ther principles equally true, and since these m anifest principles m ust ultimately be considered in the light o f the all-inclusive Principle, which God in his G odhead is, then many o f the questions philosophers natu rally ask may have to be refram ed and brought into conformity with the objective o f the unlim ited will to know. T hough the various restricted standpoints with which many thinkers enclose themselves m ust be recognized and acknowledged for what they are, the student o f Eckhart at the same time m ust realize that intellectual pride or snobbery can never be a factor in genuine principial knowledge. For, as Eckhart insists, “it is not by hum an effort alone that it is ever actualized.” In its actualization there is not only the realization that “no one possibility within All-possibility can ever be considered dispensable,” but also the recognition that every detached striving toward true knowledge “signifies its own need o f inversion” into “pure Intellect which does not seek.”

Eckhart continues with this them e hy clarifying his position with these statements: “Everything short o f God is this o r that being 34 [that is, individual manifestation}, not pure isness.35 Pure isness is p roper to God alone.” “Although the m anifestation in analogical relations derives from the Principle, it is nevertheless below the Principle, not with it. Moreover, it is o ther in natu re [being individual] and so is not in itself the Principle. Yet insofar as it is in the Principle it is not o ther, is identical with God.” “God is pure subsistence in himself, in whom there is neither this nor that, for whatever is in God is God.” “All things [o r modalities o f manifestation} come from God. He [as the ir Principle} is in all things and all things are in him .” 36

In o rd er to correct any m isunderstanding and at the same time acknowledge the essential distinctions requisite for an apprehension o f Divine Knowledge, which Eckhart endeavors to expound metaphysically, the following should be carefully noted. Universal ideas and concepts, which belong not to the o rd er o f the All-inclusive but to the realm o f generality, are, along with proportionate analogy, necessary fo r hum an thought and com m unication. By reason o f

G O O AND T H E H U M A N SELF 99the fact that they have a real foundation in things they are still restricted to the manifest o rd er o f individuality, which is nothing but a reflection o f the All-inclusive. It is the com plete inversion o f the reflection -that is required in pure metaphysics. T he world o f m anifestation m ust be inverted, for it, including ourselves in manifestation, is already “u p side dow n.”

Real distinction is always from that modality o f m anifestation which is the hum an self. T he fundam ental and real distinction, then, is between God and the self, between the all- inclusive, all-possible Principle and individuality. This distinction must never be regarded in term s o f correlation, for the individual self as such, being nullified in respect to God, cannot in any way be opposed to him. An image is never a correlative with its source.

“An individual structure or im age,” says Eckhart, “is not o f itself n o r is it for itself; ra ther it stems directly from that whose reflection it is and it is due to this alone that it exists at all. It does not stem from nor pertain to that which is apart from that o f which it is a reflection. An image derives its being directly from that whose reflection it is, having one being with it and is the same being [in principle}. I am here speaking o f m atters which do not belong exclusively in the schools; one may well p ropound them m ore properly from the pulp it.” 37 Since man, an intellectual being, is an image o f God, then he should live, continues Eckhart, “ju s t as the image is here said to do—even so it behooves you to live. Be his and pertaining wholly to him [God}, not to your own and pertaining to yourself nor indeed to anything o r anyone.”

In God there is no o ther and individuality is no t and never becomes an o ther, though from the reflective condition o f individuality God is really distinct and completely transcendent. On this point, which is most essential, Eckhart is simply stressing what Aquinas makes very clear when he says: “In God there is no real relation to creatures [individual manifestation}, but in creatures there is a real relation to G od.” 38

T he distinction, then, whereby God is distinct from indi

too T H E D O C T R IN E

viduality must be o f ano ther o rd er than the distinction o f individual beings am ong themselves. For Eckhart, as for Aquinas, the principle o f plurality is non diversio, sed divisio, that is to say, not separation, but distinction. God infinitely transcends any otherness, and because he is infinitely tran scendent he is also, in his infinity, not an o th er.39 As long as the following twofold tru th , pointed out by Aquinas and given special emphasis by Eckhart, is g ranted priority, there should be far less difficulty in app rehend ing the M eister’s exposition: “A part from God there is strictly nothing and that which is in God is God.”

Extending from individuality, however, there is the fu rth e r distinction between the general concept and the particular. W hereas the form er applies itself to a whole class, or genus, o f being, the latter does so only to a part o f a class. Extending now from the particular realm is still the fu rth er distinction between the collective concept, which is applicable to all m em bers o f a particular group, and the single concept, which is applicable to one single object considered in isolation. But generality and particularity are oppositions as extensions o f the self, and the same with collectivity and singularity as fu rth e r extensions o f the self through particularity.

“Reason can never com prehend God in the ocean o f his unfathom ableness.” “All that the mind can conceive, that is not God.” 40 Eckhart never ceases to stress this tru th . Fully recognizing that a concept is the content o f an act o f conceiving and that an idea is the content o f an act o f com prehension, he correctly affirms that the hum an self can have neither concept nor idea o f God, since the concepts and ideas enjoyed by the hum an self are already limited by individuality. Only God, the unlim ited act o f com prehension, realizes the idea o f all-possible knowledge, which is God himself.

But the individual knower may certainly have a notion o f God inasm uch as a notion, o r prim ary intention, is the content o f the unlim ited will to know.41 And that content is allpossibility, the knowledge o f all about all. Restricted as they are within the m anifestation o f individuality, any concept or

G O D A ND T H E H UM A N SELF l O l

idea attained by the hum an self, no m atter how universal or exalted, is never a concept o r idea o f God. And the same with ‘isness’, which is in no way conceivable o r subject to hum an com prehension, though it is that w ithout which true concepts and ideas are impossible.

To acknowledge G od’s all-inclusive isness in term s o f the most general o f ideas is an assurity that it is not God one com prehends. In fact a general idea grants us no m ore knowledge o f God than a particular, collective, o r single idea o f God, since all are restricted by individuality. In o ther words, they are restricted by ‘this’ o r ‘that’, and based, in one degree o r another, on individualizing God, who is indivisible. “For God is not this, not that.” 42 God is not an individualized actuality o r any one possibility. “God is all-possibility and all-inclusive.” T hus the unlim ited will to know has furnished the intellect with a genuine notion o f God.

T he correlation o f opposites can only arise within the extension o f the individual self. And as God and individuality are not correlatives, so the nonm anifested is not correlative to the m anifested.43 Furtherm ore, though one m ight at first surmise that the All-inclusive and the unm anifested should perfectly coincide, thus leaving the manifested wholly to the o rd er o f individuality, this would not be correct. Indeed, the nonm anifested is identical with the All-inclusive, and metaphysically it is the All-inclusive that is suprem ely essential. But there are certain modalities o f m anifestation that are totally without structure, such as the transcend e n ta l—tru th , goodness, beauty, unity, and so fo rth—and all processions from the Principle, which are structureless and hence by that very fact transcendent to the self. T hus the distinction between God and the self obliges us to assign structureless m anifestation to God, for in com parison with the self and all conditions o f individuality, structureless m anifestation is not susceptible o f individualization.

This explains why Eckhart cautions us always to rem em ber that all that is manifested, even in the o rd er o f transcendence, is necessarily conditioned by its own dete rm ination. T h e All-inclusive in itself consists not only o f the nonm anifested but also o f structureless m anifestation, that

10 2 T H E D O C T R IN E

is, o f all that transcends the o rd er o f the self and contingency. In o ther words, uncreated and noncontingent essences, inasm uch as they are structureless m anifestations o f God, pertain exclusively to the transcendent order.

However, the o rd er o f individuality encompasses all degrees o f structural manifestation. T h at is to say it comprises all conditions o r modalities of contingency in which beings are invested with structures. For what constitutes individuality and essentially qualifies itself is precisely the presence o f structure (forma) am ong the limited modalities o f existence which define and determ ine that given condition and which are contained in the designation “this o r that being.” T hus we speak o f ‘this atom ’, 'that tree’, ‘this m an’, ‘that star’, ‘this universe’, and so forth. On the o ther hand, when we refer to structureless m anifestation we corectly say ‘T ru th ’, ‘Unity’, ‘Goodness,’ and so forth .44

With Eckhart we may therefore conclude: T he u n manifested and all structureless m anifestation pertain to God and the uncreated, all-inclusive order. S tructural m anifestation, which includes all intellectual structure and also material structu re (corporeality), pertain to individuality o r the created o rd er.45

This last distinction within structural manifestation requires an explanation. The m aterial modality, o r corporeality, is, for the hum an being, simply organic existence itself, to which he belongs by only one o f his conditions, that is, his physical, chemical, and sensory constituents, and not in his integrality. T he intellectual modality includes the ex- traorganic conditions o f the hum an being and o f all o ther individual conditions o f manifest selfhood o r o f every o ther being in the condition o f contingency, inasm uch as the isness o f every being is identically the intelligible.46 Following Aquinas, Eckhart never lets us forget that isness is simply all that is known and all that is to be known.

It follows, then, that intellectuality and materiality are not. really com m ensurate. Materiality designates only a m inor p art o f one o f the conditions that constitute structural m anifestation, while intellectuality includes all the rem ainder o f contingent being as well as the prim ary intention o f all-

G O D A ND T H E H UM AN SELF 103

inclusive and all-possible isness. T hus we m ust acknowledge that the hum an being, considered in its integrality, is an intrinsic composite o f certain limited possibilities that constitute its organic modality and also an indefinite m ultitude o f possibilities that, going quite beyond quantity and materiality, constitute the intellectual and qualitative modality. Nevertheless, all these possibilities together designate but one condition o f manifestation, that is, contingent, individual existence.

T h e D e l u s i v e R e a l i t y o f t h e H u m a n S e l f

From all that we have gathered in the preceding section from Eckhart’s teaching we are obliged to conclude that the hum an self is both much m ore and much less than most philosophers in o u r age generally think. Much m ore because they tend to regard it as constituting little if anything o ther than materiality o r corporeality, which actually comprises only a m inute portion o f the hum an being’s possibilities; much less because this hum an self, far from constituting the whole o f being, is but one condition o f being am ong a m ultitude o f o ther conditions that are all limited by contingency.

F urtherm ore, the sum total o f all these modalities o f being, says Eckhart, is “as naught to God who alone is unrestricted isness.” 47 Why? Because only God is noncontingent, eternal, and unconditioned, and also because there is nothing else that can be considered as ultimately Real. All the rest is certainly real to the hum an self, but it, including the hum an self, is real only in a contingent m anner. Its reality is wholly dependent upon God the Principle; it is real only to the degree that it reflects him in some m anner. In deed, “the intellective soul which clings to multiplicity [or contingency] withdraws from God. And the m ore and m ore closely it clings, the less it really is.” 48

As the image reflected in the m irro r derives all its reality from that which it reflects and can have no existence apart from it, so it is with all m anifestation. “I take a bowl o f water and place a m irror in it and set it in the sun. T h e sun sends forth its light rays both from the ground o f the sun it


self and from the disc, and thereby loses nothing. T he reflection o f the m irror in the sun is, in the sun itself, sun; yet the m irror is what it is. T hus it is with God. God is in the soul [the intellectual structure} with his nature, with his isness, and with his G odhead, and yet he is not the soul. T he soul’s reflection is, in God, God, and yet the soul is what it is. There w here God’s u tterance is God, God is not the creature, the creature is God.” 49

But this contingent and lesser reality “is m utable and therefore delusive” in relation to ultimate reality, as the image is m utable and delusive in relation to its object. On the o ther hand, if we should attem pt in any way to separate it from the Principle, for instance by some m anner o f m entally gazing at being ra the r than participating in it, then it would become unintelligible; it would become a strict and simple nothing, a total privation o f being. In o th e r words, contingency is not strict illusion. T he unnecessary is ra ther the structural m easure and means essential to the manifestation o f individuality. In this sense, it is the experiential world o f d ifferentiated being—“by which we may be either enlightened o r deluded” according to w hether the will to know is in the direction o f the suprem e Principle o r in misdirection. T hus “in com parison with God the world is [not illusory but} delusive, bearing the shadow o f unreality.” 50

We m ust therefore acknowledge, says Eckhart, that all contingent being is at once real in one sense and delusively unreal in another. It is real according to o u r participative ontology and substantial way o f knowing, which is always in term s o f individual m anifestation. It is relatively unreal, and therefore delusive, according to principial knowledge, which is always g rounded in the All-inclusive, in God himself. This is one o f the essential insights requisite for an u n d e rstanding o f the doctrine Eckhart unfolds. However, it is one that most m odern philosophers in particular have failed to attain. Having distorted ontology by failing to acknowledge the intelligibility o f being, and hence by an incapacity to rise above m ere particularity and generality to the All-inclusive, they have shut themselves o ff from any possibility o f p rin cipial knowledge.

A nother point that m ust be rem em bered is that a prin-

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cipial relation, not being a simple relation o f ontological substances, can adm it identity in principle while affirm ing the transcendence and all-inclusiveness o f the Principle. Such a relation is neither convertible nor reversible, and every suggestion o f an identity o f the Principle with m anifestation, o r God with the hum an self, is cut o ff at the root. T he principial relation is not only essentially necessary on the part o f the restricted realities, which owe their very actuality to the Principle, but has to be understood m etaphysically as an eternal inalienable relation. This understanding o f the relation between the restricted and the All-inclusive, o r the self and God, is one in which the transcendence o f God is m aintained while fully recognizing the eternal relation which constitutes the principial bond between the limited, individual, and qualified reality o f the self and the infinite reality that God is. And this notw ithstanding G od’s independence, immutability, and transcendent all- inclusiveness.51

Such an understanding, true as far as it goes, nonetheless falls short o f Divine Knowledge, which constitutes the p u rity o f detached intellection. T he unlim ited will to know has to be regenerated and sustained by transcendent act itself. It m ust go beyond to a final consideration in which, while never disallowing the lesser reality and dependence o f the universe o f contingent m anifestation, “God alone is ap p rehended as Reality.” By identity through knowledge God is app rehend ed to be the true all-inclusive reality—necessary, transcendent, and indivisible. In regard to such an ap p rehension all m anifestation is rigorously naught if considered in any separatist mode. Because o f its intrinsic limitation and entitative dependence, the manifest reality can never stand metaphysical com parison with the infinity o f the suprem e Principle, which contains all actuality and possibility principially. For this reason Eckhart regards all creation and everything in individual m anifestation as serving its purpose as a requisite springboard and support to this highest consideration, that is, Divine Knowledge. Otherwise, he insists, the entire created universe, including the self, is nothing.52

To those whose cognitional horizon is grossly limited by

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their education in m odern philosophy, it m ust be pointed out that what Eckhart designates as the All-inclusive and individuality, o r God and the self, are in no sense what they call categories. Eckhart rem inds us that categories in the original Aristotelian m eaning o f the word are nothing but the most general o f all genera.53 In fact “all ten categories are denied o f God.” T hus they still belong to the individual o rd er o f which they at best denote the limits o f conceptualization in term s o f the hum an self. And the forem ost o f these categories is substance—a being that has existence in itself by virtue o f itself.54 It is far m ore correct to com pare with the All-inclusive, o r God in himself, what Aquinas designates as ‘transcendentals’, inasm uch as they really do tran scend all genera, including the categories.55 However, though these transcendentals belong to the o rd er o f the All- inclusive, it would be a gross e rro r to think that they constitute the pure reality o f the All-inclusive o r even that they are the most im portant consideration in pure metaphysics.

Unity, tru th , goodness, and so forth , which are convertible with being, are certainly coextensive with the being o f God. But they do not transcend that being, and it is at that being that the ontology in which they are thus constituted stops short. Substantial being (ens) is never a simple notion, inasm uch as it comprises the notions o f existence and subsistence; it ever rem ains a m anifestation o f the unrestricted and unm anifested Principle. “God is above being. . . . But if I say that God is not a being and that he is above being, I do not by so doing deny isness to God. On the contrary I enhance it in him .” 56

Although ontology is the “threshold” to metaphysics, it does not constitute metaphysics in its purity. Consequently that which is beyond substantial being is metaphysically m ore im portan t than the being o f God. In o ther words, it is God as the unrestricted isness o f Divine Knowledge itself that must be acknowledged as the ultim ate Principle o f all that is nonm anifest and manifest.

T h e N e g a t i o n o f N e g a t i o n s I s D i v i n e A f f i r m a t i o n

Following Eckhart we are now obliged, by o u r unlim ited will to know, to consider tha t which is “beyond” the being o f

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God, o r m ore precisely that which transcends any approach whatsoever. T he Meister has already m ade it clear that when considering God in him self there is nothing to be regarded as external to him.

If detached intellection o r pure metaphysics, in term s o f which Eckhart expounds the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, is not to be confounded with ontology, neither is it to be identified with any contingent form o f mysticism. Insofar as mysticism, even in its noble aspects, is a condition o f h igher awareness within the standpoint o f individuality o r some extension thereof, it is always rooted in the self and from the self toward the other. In its approach toward the o th er it regards the o ther as susceptible not o f intelligibility but only o f some incom m ensurable ‘experience’. T hus situated in via it designates anything o ther than o r beyond the knowing self as mystical.

Indeed from the condition o f individual m anifestation principial knowledge may appear as mystical. But this is only because that condition, as well as all conditions o f m anifestation, are not transcended by a metaphysical o r supraindividual consideration that is wholly constituted as it were in patria, or within the suprem e Principle. Eckhart rem inds us that “in patria there is no otherness.” “It is p roper to God and to everything divine, insofar as they are divine, to be within, to be innerm ost.” But “to be within, to be innermost,” is not to be in the self in any way. It is “to be as it were transcendently in G od.” Be there [in God] and you will know; seek to be there and there you will find.” 57

T he determ ination o f genuine mysticism, which is essentially theological and basically a mysticism o f ‘being’, is never to be degraded, since it is a corrective challenge to m ental determ inations enclosed in the modality o f general ideas. But mystical experience m ust always be recognized as a determ ination that is restricted, nonetheless, to a condition o f exstasis d ifferentiated from the instasis o f God. T hus it indicates a final unsuccess in transcending the most subtle modalities o f manifestation by a principial knowledge that renders the self and all m anifestation as such naught. It should be pointed out that a few who have been labeled ‘mystics’, but who never acknowledged themselves as such

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o r stopped short at the consideration o f some determ ined mystical state, were actually genuine metaphysicians.58

W hen God himself is acknowledged as the all-inclusive Principle there is nothing that can principially be affirm ed as mystical. For God is the unlim ited act o f com prehension, the knower o f all about all, both actual and possible. And since in God there is no otherness, then there is, in principle, no o ther that could be considered as mystical. God is no m ore a mystic than he is an ontologist, and the orientation o f pure metaphysics, which is as it were in God, is a p rin cipial transcendence o f all individual selfhood and every contingent state thereof. “In God, God is the only Selfhood, the only Subject, the only Knower who in knowing all about all is unrestricted knowledge itself.” 59

Eckhart asks, “W hat is m eant by object?” And he answers: “Man is confronted by two objects: one is o therness—not I; there is also the pure Self—the truest /. T he first is becoming, all that has come into existence; such things breed otherness and pass away. . . . T he o ther object is to realize one’s truest Self, to be identified with all perfection, with that most precious treasure—one’s first Principle {and only ultim ate Subject}. . . . He who realizes this is really perfect in the sense that he is wholly w ithout otherness in eternity .” But “as long as we find ourselves in an approach toward God, we do not yet realize God.” 60

It is true that many considerations intrinsic to pure m etaphysics can also apply from the theological standpoint. T hough the latter normally stays within all that is implied in the determ ination o f Being and Personality, its entire o rd er is rendered valid and m eaningful only when that which is understood as ‘negative theology’ is considered as its g round and only if that g round is not forgotten, that is, when only attributes that are negative in structure can rightly be designated o f God. If practically the whole theological fram ework o f Aquinas is adm itted by Eckhart, it is because that lofty endeavor is thoroughly g rounded in ‘negative theology’, as expounded particularly by Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite. And, according to Eckhart, those who fail to acknowledge this fact fail properly to understand the teachings o f Aquinas.

G O D AND T H E H UM A N SELF l o g

If, theologically speaking, anything pertaining to unconditioned God must be expressed in a negative form , it is because in thought and language every distinct affirm ation is necessarily particular and determ inate. Every determ ination is the affirm ation o f som ething that excludes something else and that therefore restricts that which is so affirmed. “Every determ ination is a restriction,” says Eckhart, “a negation.” 61 Hence it is the negation o f a determ ination (or negation) that makes possible a true insight, and the seemingly negative term s are, in their real sense, truly affirm ative.-Thus the term ‘infinite’ expresses in reality a negation o f all limit. It therefore indicates total affirm ation, which includes all particular affirm ations, but which is not any one affirm ation to the exclusion o f others, precisely because it implies them all equally and nondistinctively. It is in this way that ‘Infinite’, ‘U nconditioned’, and ‘All- inclusive’ are directly convertible, like also ‘All-possibility’, which contains strictly all possibilities.62

Everything that can be expressed by means o f an affirm ative form belongs o f necessity to the realm o f distinctive isness, since “isness is the first determ ination” 63—that from which all o ther determ inations proceed. But in the unconditioned, all-inclusive o rd er we are beyond distinctive ‘isness’ because we are beyond all determ ination, even principial. In itself, then, the All-inclusive is neither ju st manifested nor ju st unm anifested, at least so long as one only considers the unm anifested as the immediate principle o f the m anifested. R ather it is the Principle o f both and therefore transcendently nom anifested in its immutability and its impossibility o f being designated by any positive attribution whatsoever.

T hus “Godhead in itself, identically the. All-inclusive,” is “com prehensible by nothing o ther than itself,” that is, Divine Knowledge. “N either speech nor thought can ever attain it, and this explains why no man can fathom or describe it.” 64 It transcends all that is known distinctively and all that is not. It is beyond all individuality, one with und ifferentiated isness in itself, which is the affirm ation o f its unrestricted knowledge. It is that which is not manifested but by which speech and thought and everything else is

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manifested. It is not that which is considered as ‘this’ individual Being o r ‘tha t’ distinctive Being, but is God in him self, wholly undifferen tiated and without distinction.

A distinct and certain knowledge is possible in respect o f every being capable o f becom ing an object o f knowledge, but it is not possible in the unique instance o f God-in-himself who transcends distinctive isness and cannot be such an object. He in him self is the infinite Knower, and as such knows all about all in the unlim ited act o f com prehension that he is and that is identical with All-possibility. But God cannot make him self the distinct object o f his own knowledge, inasm uch as in his eternal and immutable identity he cannot cease to be him self all-knowing in o rd er to become an all-known, which would be ano ther ‘G od’. N or can it strictly be affirm ed that God-in-him self is able to become a proper object for any being distinct from himself, since the knowledge o f all knowing beings, considered relationally to God, is nothing m ore nor less than a participation in his infinite knowledge.

T hus it is that while ‘negative theology’ closely approximates Divine Knowledge insofar as it indicates Godhead as its Principle, it falls short o f finally constituting us wholly within the suprem e Principle. T h at there are fu rth er considerations in Divine Knowledge that lie beyond the content o f ‘negative theology’ is clear, inasm uch as this content is re stricted to the simple denials o f certain m ultiple possibilities o f individual determ ination. But the content o f Divine Knowledge is manifest and unm anifest All-possibility, as already explained. It is the person who, by uncreated grace, realizes “ I know God, yet I do not know him ” that Eckhart refers to as being blessed with “unknow ing knowledge,” 65 and who is truly saved by being liberated from all that is not in function o f Divine Knowledge.

Liberation, o r the final state o f the knowing being, is the ultim ate toward which the unlim ited will to know tends. Liberation differs from all hum an or posthum an states that that being may have traversed in o rd er to realize it, inasmuch as it is the realization o f the ultimate and unconditioned state. All o ther states, no m atter how elevated o r

G O D A ND T H E HUMAN SELF 1 1 1

‘mystical’, are still conditioned. T h at is to say they are subject to certain conditions that define them , making them what they are and qualifying them as distinctive states o r degrees o f clarification o f o u r knowledge o f all-inclusive God. This pertains to structureless as well as to structured states—even to the degree o f distinctive isness. A lthough distinctive isness transcends all existence, it still implies a d eterm ination that though principial is nevertheless a subtle limitation.

It is certainly through pure isness that all things in every m ode o f universal being subsist, and in this sense infinite isness subsists through itself. It determ ines all the states o f which it is the principle and it is only determ ined by itself.66 Yet “to determ ine oneself is after all to be determ ined and therefore in some respect lim ited,” so that the ultim ate all- inclusive Principle is truly infinite “unknowing, Divine Knowledge” o f which pure isness is eternally in function. Thus, doctrines that stop short at isness, even when u nd erstood to be infinite, retain a subtle degree o f incompleteness from the standpoint o f pure metaphysics. T h e result, o f course, is that “the actual realization o f knowledge in divinis {that is, in principial mode] is neglected.” As often happens with those who expound such doctrines, p rofound as indeed they are in com parison with the superficiality o f most philosophy, there is exhibited an em barrassing tendency to deny, o r at least neglect, that which actually lies beyond their dom ain. And it is “that which actually lies beyond” that is, for Eckhart, precisely the most im portan t consideration o f all.

T he attainm ent of h igher states, mystical o r otherwise, is thus only a preparation for Divine Knowledge and a partial consequence o f the seeking intellect. T hough this result may appear immense in com parison with the workaday state o f hum an individuality, it nevertheless m ust be said that in itself it am ounts to little in relation to the ultimate state. It is not Divine Knowledge, which neither seeks nor determ ines any otherness. “T he purification o f our notion o f God is incom m ensurable with the unrestricted reality o f Divine Knowledge wherein all otherness is naught.” “T he


finite [while becoming indefinite through the extension o f which it is capable, that is, th rough the developm ent o f its own possibilities) always rem ains as nothing in com parison with the Infinite.” 67

T herefore the consequence o f a h igher mystical state is o f value only by way o f preparation for that im m ediate union, o r transcendent identity. In o ther words, it is still only a means and not an end. T o mistake it for the end, as many students o f Eckhart do, is to perpetuate a delusion. For Eckhart makes it very clear that all states in question, up to and including distinctive isness, are in themselves delusive, o r “as nothing,” in the sense in which the term ‘delusive’ has already been explained. “In any state o f knowledge w here some degree o f distinction is retained, it is impossible for unrestricted knowledge itself to be fully in act.” 68 Beyond the determ ination o f pure isness one cannot speak o f distinctions o f any kind, not even o f relational or principial distinctions. Yet in that final transcendence there is no confusion o r obscurity whatsoever, for “there [in Divine Knowledge) all is w ithout otherness and without distinction.” 69

We have no way o f knowing w hether Eckhart the man ever attained any experiential realization o f a mystical state. Never does he dwell on ‘mystical experience’ o r speak in the nam e o f ‘mystical states’. N or does he ever consider him self a mystic. In fact he recognizes that the determ ination o f mystical o r negative theology is, a fter all, no m ore than a necessary corrective, within the condition o f individuality, to the realm o f general o r particular theological ideas and concepts. It simply designates a ‘negative way’ in reference to a ‘positive way’ o f cognition. But this relationship is dissolved in the purely metaphysical consideration o f Divine Knowledge, for in the Principle all individual concepts and ideas are already naught. Hence a “negation o f a negation is transcendently acknowledged as God’s affirm ation o f him self.” 70

G enuine ontology, like sound theology, points to pure metaphysics o r detached intellection, but it does not constitute it. For ways o f knowing directed toward God, w hether by so to speak “going straight tow ard” o r “backing tow ard”

G O D A ND T H E H U M A N SELF

God, w hether by ontology o r theology, m ust be inverted. They are not the same as principial knowledge which, by reason o f that inversion, is constituted as it were wholly within God in whom there is no direction. T h ere all is direct, o r directionless. “T hat which in God is transcendently direct [in recto, i.e. w ithout direction} is direction in man, because man is indirect [in obliquo} . . . G od’s isness in itself is not really e ither an end by which [terminus a quo} o r an end to which [terminus ad quern].” 71 It is wholly direct (i.e. directionless) and has never not been; it is in him the Selfhood o f all m anifestation and all individuality. Indeed, where else could it be?

2The Word

If we now consider the o rd er o f Divine Knowledge, which is all-inclusive God in his Godhead, we must understand that while principial knowledge is as it were fully constituted in this o rder, no insight into it is possible for the hum an knower unless it is revealed to him. As the hum an self cannot com prehend the natu re o f pure transcendence, “so it cannot understand the mode o f knowledge in God unless God speaks it in the ground o f the intellective soul.” 1

T he principial mode o f knowledge, which is essential in pure metaphysics, is not to be confused in any way with a m ode o f knowledge in term s o f contingent principles o r causes within the o rder o f individuality. For the hum an knower the ‘m ental w ord’, o r com prehension, by which his intellect understands som ething o ther than itself, derives from the other, represents it, and hence is really distinct from the intellect and is not the intellect’s being.2 T h e com prehension in the individual intellect has only a m ental reality and is not identical with the psychological state and activity o f the intellect. But in unrestricted Intellect isness and act are identical and thus the W ord, o r C om prehension, is within both the isness and the knowing o f that Intellect. In God, to be and to know are identical. T he W ord o f God is coessential with him. T h e W ord o f God in God is God in every respect, is identically the Principle, and w hatever may be predicated o f God may also be predicated o f the eternal W ord.3

W hen the intellective soul is “silent” and not in truded upon by desires o ther than the will to know as it were in divinis, then Christ speaks “in the tem ple, that is, in the soul.” And “W hat does the Lord Jesus say? He says that he is ‘he who is’. W hat is he then? He is the W ord o f the Fa

1 14

T H E W O RD

ther. In this W ord the Father affirm s himself, and all the divine nature and everything that God is, ju st as he knows it; and he knows it as it is. Being perfect in knowledge and in all-possibility,4 he is also perfect in utterance. W hen he speaks the W ord he speaks him self and all things in ano ther Person, and gives him the same natu re as he has himself. In this W ord he expresses all rational creatures, m aking them like the W ord.” Christ “reveals him self and everything that the Father has spoken in him, according to the m anner in which the soul [o f each hum an knower} is receptive o f it.. . . He reveals him self in the soul in boundless wisdom, which is himself. . . . W hen this wisdom [Divine Knowledge] is united to the soul . . . then God is known through God in the soul. In this way the soul knows itself and all things through this wisdom; and through God it knows this wisdom, and through this wisdom it knows the glory o f the Father in his fruitful all-possibility, and it also knows essential isness in strict unity and without any difference.” 5

W ithout the revelation o f the W ord a true metaphysical insight into this divine m ode o f knowledge would, o f course, be impossible, and Eckhart is insistent on this point. A genuine understand ing o f the principial mode, which is constituted as it were within G odhead, is an understand ing o f tru th that is beyond the potentiality o f hum an cognition, restricted as that cognition is to individuality. Insight into this tru th is a possibility only by way o f transcendent act, never by way o f potentiality.6 Yet the revelation o f the W ord is that transcendent act as assented to by the intellect when moved by the detached will to know. It discloses that “the W ord is the com prehension o r principiate o f the all- inclusive Principle and that it is identical with the Principle, that is, with the unrestricted knowledge which God is.” 7

“W here individuality ends, there God begins. God wants nothing m ore o f you than for you to go out o f yourself and all individuality and let God be God within. T he most insignificant individual structure that takes form in you is as big as God. How is that? It completely obstructs God. Once the structure appears, God and all his G odhead disappear. Once the structure is transcended, God enters.” 8

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T h e T r i u n e G o d h e a d

T he revelation o f the W ord to the hum an knower is, for Eckhart, pre-em inently the revelation of the transcendent m ode o f Divine Knowledge. W ithout that revelation this m ode o f knowledge would inevitably be confused with individualized knowing, o r m ental activity in the realm o f existential causes, the rational categories, o r general and particu lar concepts.9 T he divine m ode (or “modeless m ode”) o f knowing disclosed by the com munication o f the W ord is the T rinity o f the Godhead. Formally presented to the hum an knower it is this: A lthough God is nondual and uncom pounded in his limitless being, he is nevertheless God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and these are not three Gods, but one God. Precisely herein is to be discovered all that is essential in principial knowledge once the form in which it is presented has been inverted.

Eckhart tells us that as far as the theological enunciation o f the doctrine o f the T rinity goes, it has its orientation in being in the sense that ‘being’ and ‘essence’ are identical and affirm ed as infinite. T h ere is nothing unreasonable in this; it is certainly cogent theology and Eckhart him self frequently speaks within such a formal fram ework. This fram ework, necessary for the hum an knower, is nonetheless o f the o rd er o f individuality and hence restricted to enunciation in term s o f the categories o f substance and relation. So he rem inds us that no concept is adequate to the simplicity o f ‘being’, inasm uch as we need to combine concepts o f existence and subsistence in o rd er to affirm at once its simplicity and reality. And o f course we have no concepts that are not g rounded in being as divided by potentiality and actuality.

With Pseudo-Dionysius Eckhart will speak in term s o f ‘super-being’, but he will not say so much that the subtlety o f the analogical transposition is assisted by this approach as that it suggests ano ther mode o f knowledge in which the same things may not be said in quite the same words. “Ano ther m ode,” because what is at issue is not merely the deploying and tying up again o f concepts to express the

T H E W O RD “ 7

doctrine o f processions, relations, notions, and so forth. W hat is prim arily at issue is apprehend ing as it were the T rinity within the G odhead, apprehend ing reality as an “eternal and im m utable going out and com ing in: out o f G odhead into being and from being into G odhead.” 10 And this is true o f each o f the divine Persons as well as in the o rd er o f their proceeding.

As already stressed, Eckhart understands first and foremost God as the All-inclusive, the All-possibility. I f he goes on to identify Being with G od,11 he does not by this negate the all-inclusiveness o f God. On the contrary, he simply makes an identification o f Being with the All-inclusive, which is ano ther m atter altogether. We do not deny “the All-inclusive as such” when we affirm an ontological aspect o f it. But Eckhart would have us understand that to acknowledge the all-inclusiveness and transcendence o f God is thus to imply that which is ‘beyond Being’—in o ther words, that o f which ‘Being’ is an affirmation. Ultimately, o f course, Being is ineffable, not merely because it is one o f God’s nam es but because it is presupposed by every attem pt to define it.

Now all intellectuality depends on the preconceptual light o f the intellect, which is the effulgent instasis in which that which proceeds returns. T hough the affirm ation o f Being is necessarily and invariably a dim inution o f preconceptual intellection, it is true insofar as it is open to pure intellection, false insofar as it is shut o ff from it and substituted fo r it. Eckhart certainly realized that strictly speaking the esse (isness) o f St. Thom as Aquinas goes beyond ‘Being’—really, though the unawareness o f most Thom ists o f the law o f inverse analogy in principial knowledge leads to a ra the r crude clam ping down to the level o f ens. Some have indeed spoken o f ‘divine reality’ (res cLivina) which they, like Caje- tan, insist is “neither purely absolute nor purely relative but super-Being.” 12 But if its use is less affirm ative than ‘Being’, it is only because it conveys that which is ‘beyond’. Affirm ation is positive and, so to speak, blind to That which transcends it.

We finally have to adm it that That which is beyond affir

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mation is indicated by a step back from the total and positive affirm ation o f Being. T here is no o th er way. Eckhart’s repeated reference to the law o f inverse analogy applies here and helps to explain why such term s as ‘infinite’, ‘u n conditioned’, ‘unrestric ted’, ‘all-possibility’, ‘all-inclusive’ are used. T h ere is no implication whatever o f limitation, confusion, o r potentiality. He will say that the only answer, if an answer must be given, as to what That is that Being is not, is that That is not a ‘what’, but ultimately and principially every ‘what’ is That.13

“As the d rop poured into the ocean is the ocean, not the ocean the drop, so the soul {the m anifest intellect] drawn into God is God, not God the soul. T hen the soul loses nam e and virtue but not isness and the will to know. T here the soul is in God as God is in him self.” 14 “T he self in God is God. . . . As God is indistinct in him self according to his nature, though truly and in a special sense {from the standpoint o f individuality] distinct from all things, so the self in God is indistinct from all— for in him all things are {he being all-inclusive]—and yet distinct from all things.” 15

If the transcendent identity o f the self with God appears baffling to the discursory light o f reason, it is because reason seeks to penetrate within. Nevertheless it is evident within. Pure metaphysical intellection is knowledge within; to say that it ‘penetrates within’ is already an externalization. Principial knowledge does not deny the object from outside the triune G odhead; it transcends it within. And there within, knowledge is identity with the Principle and in the identity Eckhart discerns the threefold natu re o f Godhead: Principle, Principiate, Recession, the th ree being p recisely identity. “All possibility,” he says, “is in the Father, likeness is in the Son, nondiversity is in the Holy Spirit.” 16 T hus the three-in-one expresses expansively all-possibility and reductively identity; in the Recession, o r “negation o f negation,” the Holy Spirit abolishes that which is not G odhead and transform s everything into it. And this is essentially the threefold nature o f principial Knowledge^ “T hus it is for us,” continues Eckhart, “to expire all diversity as the Holy Spirit expires it eternally.” 17

T H E W O RD X19It is in this o rd er o f Divine Knowledge that the root o f

Eckhart’s language is prim arily grounded , an o rd er that enables him to stress that what is negation in term s o f Being is affirm ation in term s o f G odhead, which is supra-B eing.18 Were his apprehension o f Being the same as that o f philosophers who understand it as it were from ‘outside’ the T rin ity, certainly much o f what he says would be invalid. But his understanding is situated as it were within; it is g rounded in the Principle itself. “T he eye {or principial intellection, which is wholly contemplative} wherein I see God is the same eye w herein God sees me; my eye and God’s eye are one eye, one vision, one knowing, one love.” 19

In o ther words, G od’s eye, the unrestricted Intellect, “is the Subject o f all reality.” God manifests his m ultiple aspects in reality th rough the eternal affirm ation o f himself, and this is presupposed in the affirm ation o f the eternal W ord. In pure intellection, the intellective identification o f the object with the subject, God is the Subject—and love is realized by metaphysical necessity through die act o f negating self as such, o f re tu rn ing to its own Principle, the divine Selfhood.

T hus to app rehend the T rin ity within Godhead is the most significant way o f saying—and it must be repeated in o rd er to avoid confusion—that principial knowledge is as it were the m ode o f knowing in God, and not to realize that God alone knows in this m ode is to consider one’s p ro per self as God.20 Eckhart never for an instant considers his p ro per self to be God. It is the inverse o f this that is implied when he says: “My innerm ost Self is God,” o r “My truest / is God.” T he p roper self is nothing and as such is negated, for the ultim ate love o f the Holy Spirit negates all that is bound by time, sense, individuality, and differentiation, all that is not the Godhead.

T h f . G r o u n d o f t h e I n t e l l e c t i v e S o u l

If the unlim ited will to know is not quenched by o ther intrud ing desires, the hum an knower will assent to the revelation o f the W ord, which is the G od-com m unicated answer to the inescapable problem o f contracted awareness and hum an evil. T he act o f faith in the W ord is not believing


som ething that the intellect denies—it is the choice o f the highest m eaning o f metaphysical tru th accessible to intelligence when that intelligence is not restricted by any p articular observation, individualized inquiry, o r selfish motivation.

But the reasonable assent o f faith involves m ore than an objective belief in the W ord; it involves faith seeking u n d e rstanding. Yet faith seeking understanding, says Eckhart, involves m ore than considerations about the W ord; it involves considerations that are as it were wholly within the W ord, and ultimately a realization o f awareness and love that is not o ther than the knowledge and love that God is. T herefore “ ‘Come up higher, my friend ,’ 21 assume the nobler place within [the W ord in principial knowledge}. I will make o f two one. ‘Friend, come up h igher,’ is the twofold speech between God and the soul, which is consum m ated by ‘O ne God, Father o f all.’. . .22 Grace constitutes the soul in God [principially} where it has never been without.23 As long as we think we are outside God, as long as we think about the W ord, then “go up h igher,” says Eckhart. “ It is better to know in God than to believe God.” 24

In a Latin Com m entary on the verse “Put on the Lord Jesus C hrist” 25 Eckhart says: “God assumed o u r clothing so that he m ight truly, properly, and naturally be man and that man m ight be God in Christ. But the natu re assumed by God is common to all m en without distinction o f m ore o r less. T herefore it is granted to every man to become the son o f God. . . . And so we have “put on”—expressed by the passive form o f the verb, not the active as though the action were an external one, em anating from an external source, but as though it occured passively and from wholly within. For the word induitio (putting on) takes its nam e from the fact that it is within (intus).” 26 And Eckhart has already explained that within means in God, not in o u r inner self.

As God is infinite tru th , so he is all-possible goodness. Hence “G od’s G odhead consists in the full com m unication o f him self to whatever is receptive o f him; were he not to com m unicate him self he would not be G od.” 27 So long as the intellect is u n d er the sway o f the unlimited will to know,

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the all-possible goodness that God is cannot leave the intellect w ithout the answer to its unresolved questions. M oreover, that answer must necessarily transcend the mode o f all theologically and ontologically “correct” answers.

As has been noted, the W ord is never to be considered as distinct from God. T he W ord is identically God in every re spect; it is unrestricted Intellect, the divine Selfhood; it is indistinct from the all-possibility and isness that God is. T he identity o f the W ord with God is, indeed, the prim ordial identification. Knowledge o f this identity is b rought about by the com m unication and is actually realized by contem plation. It is realized through the direct and principial union o f the intellect with all-inclusive God wherein intellect and the W ord are identified in the Principle.

Despite the various interpretations, each m ore opinionated than the last, which psychologists and heterodox theologians have suggested, the p ro per m eaning o f the Christian revelation is the unique com munication o f the all-inclusive o rd er to the o rd er o f individuality. This comm unication unites individual m anifestation with its Principle, and the p roper m eaning o f contem plation is also union. W hen accepted by reasonable faith, the revelation o f the W ord unites the structural intellect with the structureless manifestation o f that com m unication “as intellect is united with Intellect-as-such”; “as the letter is united with the spirit o f the letter” ; as “the ju st man is united with Justice.” But “union is identity.” 28 And contem plation is a knowing and actual realization in that union in principial mode.

This unitive knowledge in term s o f transcendent identity is not, strictly speaking, an attainm ent; it is not acquired. It is not constituted in any potentiality whatsoever; it is not an achievem ent o r production o f a nonpre-existing intellection. “It is only by way o f act that {this} knowledge is effected, and that act can be nothing o ther than transcendent act.” 29 In o ther words, the transcendent act, o r uncreated grace, effects the knowledge that the union really is, even though that union is only virtually to be fully realized in “the fullness o f tim e,” that is, beyond tim e.30 T hus the intellect is m ade effectively aware “in its g roun d” o f what ac


tually is from all eternity and what it may otherwise not know theoretically. And this involvement in grace necessitates nothing less than the inversion o f created grace into uncreated grace.

“T here is the manifested word [which is all individuality}, namely the angels [pu re intellectual structures}, men, and all creatures [anim ate and inanim ate]. T here is a second word, thought out [the m ental word] . . . that I form within myself. But more, there is the W ord which is neither m anifested nor thought out, but is eternally in God who utters it. It proceeds eternally from the Father and it is in him. . . . T h e intellect works eternally within God [in p rin cipial knowledge}. T he m ore subtle and the m ore spiritual a thing is, the m ore powerful it works w'ithin. T h e m ore powerful and delicate the intellect is, the m ore its knowledge is united with it and the m ore its knowledge becomes one with it. . . . God’s blessedness depends on the inward working o f the intellect, in which the W ord dwells.” 31 M oreover, “T he p rophet says: ‘God spoke one [W ord] and I heard two.’ 32 T h at is to say, God eternally speaks only once. His W ord is only one. In this W ord he speaks his Son and the Holy Spirit and all creatures, and yet there is only one W ord in God. But the p rophet says ‘I heard two’; that is to say, I [this hum an self] hear God [the uncreated order] and the creatures [the o rd er o f m anifested universal being}.” 33 From the standpoint o f o u r m ere hum an m ode o f knowing there is God and universal being, including the self; from the standpoint o f the principial mode, there is only all-inclusive God, o r non-twoness.

It is only in respect o f the individual intellect that one can speak o f this unitive knowledge and virtual realization. H ence it is understandable why Eckhart says that “the W ord dwells in the very ground o f the intellective soul,” though in truest reality “it is the inverse o f this that is so.” Not only is the W ord innermostly present by its creative and sustaining isness, but pre-em inently as principle o f the active intellect, for “the principle descends in its entirety and with all its properties into the things originated.” 34 This is actually true o f every hum an being, and not only o f one who is

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united o r saved—these two words designating the same thing considered u nder different aspects, the hrst in relation to the Principle, the second in relation to conditioned existence. T he W ord is there in the ground o f the intellective soul as Principle o f the hum an being w hether o r not the will to know it and realize it is fully actuated.35

In the context o f Eckhart’s teaching this very g round is considered as corresponding analogously with the fundam ent out o f which the modalities o f the individual are manifested. It must not be confused with any substance or integral structure within o r w ithout the hum an knower, but clearly determ ined only as that wherein the Principle m anifests the materiality and intellectuality o f the hum an knower as being one integral self. This self is capable o f indefinite extension in its own sphere, which occupies, m oreover, but one degree o f existence. Yet the material m odality, which is a composition o f physical, chemical, and sensory elements, constitutes only a very small portion o f this self. T he ground o f the self is, then, to be considered not only as the proxim ate source o f life for the hum an knower but also in a far h igher sense as the direct and immediate “seat” o f the W ord, o r o f Intellect-in-itself, and hence o f that w herein the unity is actual.

Many in terp reters and translators o f Eckhart have u n fo rtunately been influenced by some m odern form o f an essentialist m ode o f philosophy, as well as by spurious or incom plete texts. But contrary to what they have said, “the ground o f the intellective soul” is not the essence o f the soul with its various faculties and operations. Rather that g round is, in Eckhart’s own words, “its very isness,” which is the direct m anifestation o f unrestricted isness itself. If Eckhart sometimes speaks o f this g round o f the intellect as a ‘pow er’, it is not only because “isness is dynamic in itself,” or because it is “the fundam ent o f possibility and the drive toward unrestricted knowledge.” It is prim arily because it is that in which the W ord, or pure Intellect, “innerm ostly dwells,” and which “is closer to me than I am to my own self.” 36

T he W ord is in the ground o f the soul with all its m ean


ing and all-possibility. “T he uncreated W ord is in the created g ro un d .” In fact it is “in all creatures insofar as they have isness, and yet it is above them . A nd it is the same in all creatures as it is above them .” 37 This is simply saying that from the consideration o f the hum an knower one m ust always re fe r to the W ord, which is God in every respect, as transcendent-im m anent. Only the transcendent can be imm anent and that which is im m anent m ust be transcendent, the two term s being inseparable. “W hen I say the innerm ost I m ean the transcendent and when I say the transcendent I m ean the innerm ost.” 38 In Divine Knowledge, however, the two term s are inadmissible, since apart from God there is strictly nothing and within God there is only God, as Eckh art has explained.

“T he W ord itself has no why o r w herefore, but is itself the why o f all things.” 39 N or is the W ord a m ediator between God and the g round o f the intellective soul, for the simple reason that “the W ord is God in every respect.” T he g round o f the intellect is the direct m anifestation o f the Principle. It is not that God manifests the W ord, which then in tu rn manifests the individual intellect.40 T he eternal triunity o f the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is totally within the unm anifested, all-inclusive order, and it is “the T rinity in consort, o r God in himself, which creates, sustains, and transform s universal being.” 41 “All beings are from the Fath e r because in him they have effective being, through the Son they have it formally, and in the Holy Spirit they are as in their final end [which is God].” 42

In o ther words, “it is not due to any im perfection in God that he operates only on what is present, and immediately, and not by interm ediary o r at a distance, as the m ore p erfect creatures seem to act. For no creature can exist without God, no m atter how far it seems to be from him [that is, how low it may be in the hierarchy o f participation in being}. F urtherm ore, there is no interm ediary between him and creatures. . . . God does no t work on anything outside him self inasm uch as there is nothing apart from him self [God being the All-inclusive}. It is because o f the sublime perfection o f God [who is w ithout any lack] . . . tha t God

T H E W O RD !25does not work by a m edium o r at a distance o r on anything o ther than him self.” 43

T he W ord does not really dwell in o r operate in anything outside itself, because there is no outside. But from the standpoint o f the hum an knower, whose intellect is a “seeking intellect” and hence as such not “Intellect which does not seek,” 44 that which is to be found is correctly regarded as really distinct from it and “dwelling within the ground of the seeking intellect.” This is a perfectly valid m ode o f re ference for the hum an knower “who hears two,” because his standpoint is in the o rd er o f individuality from which the W ord can only be affirm ed as transcendent-im m anent. T he W ord is Intellect-as-such, o r “Intellect which does not seek,” because it knows and is all-possibility.

But w here is the W ord to be found? “It is to be found only within. T hat which dwells innerm ostly in the soul is wholly within; it dwells there in the soul, in the intellect, and it does not go out [o r seek] and does not look at anything [because apart from itself there is nothing and in p erfectly knowing itself it knows everything about everything}. There in the g round all the faculties o f the soul are equally noble [for the ground is their proxim ate and unitive source].” 45

Now the faculties o f the soul, which com prise its essence, are to be distinguished from the ground, o r isness, o f the soul “from which they spring forth and in which they are roo ted .” Reason, memory, will do not act by means o f the intellect’s g round inasm uch as all the faculties o f the intellect are inoperative in the ground, activity in term s o f individuality ceases there. T here “only God is, in the truest sense, in act,” for “the g round o f the soul is accessible only to God.” 46 Hence that which is known and virtually to be realized there is oneness, o r nonduality. T he faculties pertain to creatures; the ground o f the soul does not.47 For the g round is “the holy o f holies”; it is “w here union with the W ord is effected by the operation o f the Holy Spirit.” T he end o f the intellect is the realization o f oneness with the W ord, and when this realization is actualized in the g round then all is known principially— “gleichwie 48 in the W ord.” It


is there and only there that the transposition to principial knowledge is effected.

T he W ord m ust never be confused o r identified with the g round o f the soul. T he m ore faithful we are to Eckhart’s teaching the m ore abundantly clear it becomes that the W ord is not the ground o f the soul in any sense whatsoever. Eckhart insists that the tem pting but erroneous doctrine o f ‘substantial deification’, o r the identifying o f God with the soul, m ust always be shunned. Indeed, as long as one restricts the intellect by some form o f idealism o r pseudomys- tical outlook one remains really ignorant o f the principial m ode o f pure metaphysics and the essential tru th that “the W ord is God, and God is not this, not that.” It is precisely the interest in the exaltation o f the self, both in its outw ard and inner aspects, that Eckhart insists “m ust go if the g round o f the soul is to be understood as that in which the W ord dwells.” 49

T he intellective soul is the inform ing principle o f the body and when considered m ore especially u nd er its vital aspect it is the form o f individual existence specifically determ ining the hum an condition. But the W ord is not the soul; n o r is it the ground o f the soul.50 T he ground o f the soul is an individual m anifestation and though principially that g round cannot be considered as o ther than its Principle, which is the W ord, the W ord is not and never can be m anifested individuality.51 And while the soul characterizes itself as principle of life in the realm o f individual existence and therefore in delusive m anner, it is, from the standpoint o f in divinis, identical with the W ord. For the W ord, be it never forgotten, is unconditioned Godhead, the ultimate and all-inclusive Principle, which contains all m anifestation and all-possibility within itself.

P r i n c i p i a l l y I A m t h e S o n

If it has been necessary to emphasize repeatedly the nonidentity o f the Word with the g round o f the soul, it is because it is an understanding fundam ental for Eckhart. Nonetheless the identity o f that g round with the W ord, which is a principial identity and ano ther m atter altogether,

T H E W O R D 1 2 7

is so because analogy is here applied in an inverse m anner—as we have previously noted, and shall reserve for m ore extensive consideration in a subsequent chapter. In o u r present context it need only be stated that as an image o f an object is reflection in relation to that object, then that which is first or im m ediate in the principial m ode o f knowledge is, from our hum an, in via, and contingent way of knowing, last and ultimate. “As long as we are on the way we are not there .” 52

T he ground o f the hum an knower is also re fe rred to by Eckhart as the center, the heart, the temple, the citadel o f the soul. These term s are traditional and are m eant to designate the ineffable being o f the intellect itself. T hey are, o f course, to be taken analogously and not as a strict indication. Between the two there is only a correspondence and the analogy is perfectly valid, even though many people are undoubtedly led by their habit o f thought to ignore the p rofound reasons for it. Obviously the “g ro un d ” referred to by Eckhart must be regarded symbolically, for any conception o f ‘localization’ is wholly inappropriate once the consideration o f the corporeal world as such has been overcome; that is to say, once m ere experience has been transcended by com prehension, questioning, reflection, and ju d g m en t in an act o f knowing. For all the modalities pertaining to intellectuality are not subject to time-space conditions.

T he intellect, as Eckhart has already explained, “considers all things above here and now”—and in this context “now means time and here means place.” 53 “T ru e u n d e rstanding is where there is no ‘h ere’ o r ‘now’,” and the un limited will to know “receives now here but in detached intellection [in the g round o f the intellect] w here there is neither ‘here’ nor ‘now’.” 54 Necessary as nam es fo r the soul sometimes are, the soul itself is really without nam e. No nam e is adequate, and “these nam es do not reach the g round o f the soul. God who is without nam e [in his unm anifested Selfhood] is ineffable, and the soul in its g round is ineffable, ju st as he is.” 55

It goes w ithout saying, then, that the ground o f the soul is not merely the vital center that is the principle o f all sensory


knowledge, as m ight be supposed by those who restrict themselves to the most external m eaning o f the ‘self’ as it is related to corporeal reality. T he g round does in fact play the p art o f a principle in the world o f corporeal reality, but “only in a relative sense,” inasm uch as the world o f “corporeality is em inently potential to intellection and spirituality.” 56 Hence it is precisely this corporeal determ ination that has to be transposed. W ere the hum an self a pure intellectual struc tu re ,57 it would not require “the W ord m ade flesh.” But inasm uch as the hum an being is com posite o f corporeality and intellectuality in his integral structure, he can never dispense with the Incarnation. In fact it is in the context o f “a requisite support for the transposition” that “Jesus Christ is indispensable,” in the same way that the very ground o f the hum an being is to be considered as the principle o f life. But if nothing m ore than the ground as the principle o f life were to be considered, then there would be nothing m ore to seek.

T h e will to know transcends the will to live, and the detached, unlim ited will to know seeks its own ultim ate principle in the ground o f the intellect. “T here God is app rehended as oneness.” T he faculty o f reason can apprehend only distinct aspects o f God, but “the W ord is in itself one [o r not-two}, and the faculties [o f the soul} know him only in part.” 58 “Only in the g round o f the soul is God known as he is,” for there in the apprehension o f God’s unity “the intellect knows as it were within the T rinity and without o th erness.” It is there in term s o f unity that “understand ing as in principle is effected,” and “there only one is heard .” 59

A ppropriate here is an analogy from mathematics; only because mathem atics is wholly an abstract realm within the o rd er o f individuality. T he geometrical point is quantitatively nothing and does not occupy any space. Yet the point is the principle by which space in its totality is produced, inasmuch as space is nothing o ther than the developm ent o f its intrinsic possibilities. Again, following Eckhart, if one considers unity as situated in the series o f the multiplicity o f num bers, it is the smallest, yet it is the greatest in principle because it virtually contains them all and produces the en

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tire series by the individual repetition o f itself. T he principle o f unity is not the actual series; it transcends it, though without the principle there would be no series.60

From o u r contingent, o r in via, m anner o f knowing we m ust then also say that so long as union is not actually realized, the W ord is only virtually in the intellective soul. This is why Eckhart validly designates the W ord dwelling in the ground o f the soul as a germ , a spark, o r a birth. T he intellective soul and the totality o f individual m anifestation exist th rough “the birth o f the W ord alone,” and have no reality except through participation in it. Completely tran scending all existence, the W ord is the Principle o f universal being and intelligibility.

T hus when Eckhart says: “God granted us in this world the possibility to become sons o f God, even only-begotten sons, o r ra ther the only-begotten Son [the Word} in o rd er that we may live [o r know} in him ,” 61 he is clearly designating the transposition, by transcendent act,62 to a principial m ode o f knowledge which is as it were within the W ord. “T he Father begets his Son as him self in eternity. ‘T he W ord was with God and God was the W ord.’ 63 T he W ord was the same as God and in the same nature. I will say more: He has begotten him in my soul. Not only is my soul with him but my soul is the same as he is [principially}, and he is in it. T he Father begets the W ord in the soul in the same way he begets him in eternity [without intermission, God not being subject to time o r development}, and not otherwise. . . . He begets me as his Son and the same Son . . . not only does he beget me as his Son, but he begets me as himself, and him self as me, and me as his being and his natu re [fo r apart from God there is nothing}. In the innermost spring [the Principle} I well forth in the Holy Spirit. T h ere is one knowing and one act [isness} there [in God}. All that God does is one; thus he begets me as his Son without diversity.” 64

“T he Father begets his Son in eternal knowledge and thus the Father begets his Son in the soul ju st as in his own nature. . . . Once I was asked what the Father does in heaven [in patria, the all-inclusive order}. I said that he

1 3 ° T H E D O C T R IN E

begets his own Son, and that this act is so pleasing to him and suffices him so well that he never does anything else than beget his Son and from both proceed the Holy Spirit. There in principle 65 where the Father begets his Son I am that Son and not other. Indeed we are here [in via, in our contingent and ontological mode o f knowing as hum an knowers} diverse in o u r hum anity, but there I am that Son and not o th er.” 66

Efforts on the p art o f in terp reters o f Eckhart’s teaching who struggle endlessly somehow to squeeze statem ents like these—and they are num erous—into the fram ew ork o f cognition restricted to individual m anifestation, and thus within the categories o f substance and relations, are entirely fruitless. Rather than being insights into pure metaphysics, in the nam e o f which Eckhart speaks, their understandings are gross oversights and evince an ignorance o f the p rin cipial m ode o f knowledge which he rightly insists is essential for a true understand ing o f reality.

This is the case o f those who endeavor to ‘exonorate’ Eckhart within the fram ework o f ontological cognition, as well as those who ‘condem n’ him for not always speaking within the term s o f that ontological m ode to which they have attached strict priority. But Eckhart is simply rem inding us o f what he says Christ came to rem ind us: T h e o rd er o f individuality, o r knowledge and reality in via, is reflection and hence relational to the all-inclusive o rder, o r knowledge and reality in patria. Principial knowledge is pre-em inent and is, in fact, by definition p rior to all o th e r modes. If it is ever actually to be realized, we must, by ceaselessly accepting G od’s grace, cultivate the habit o f understand ing as it were from the standpoint o f God; that is to say from the standpoint o f the full actualization o f the intellectus possibilis. And if this means becoming “sober on Divine Knowledge,” then so be it.

Thoroughly engrossed in individual m anifestation and captivated by general and particular concepts o f reality, we have “forgotten ou r true origin and principle,” “fallen from oneness with the eternal W ord.” Eckhart makes clear that the First Cause o f Aristotle is not God himself, ra ther it is

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only the ratio o f the being o f things and, for Aristotle, that ratio is pure Being.67 We are rarely, if ever, tem pted to question the reality o f the sensible world; it is the very foundation o f o u r philosophy, and before denying the world o f experience as the alpha and omega o f reality we would gladly sacrifice anything. And when we occasionally confront aspects o f reality that do not properly fit into our philosophical structure, we endeavor to force them in somehow. O r since we tell ourselves that wisdom is also humility, we confess o u r hum an weakness. But much like Aristotle, we will never su rren der the priority o f being, experience, the absolute reality o f the time-space continuum , and the rationality o f the general categories o f thought. In o rd er to make intelligible that which we refuse to deny, we will consequently affirm an active C reator, a Suprem e Being, even though o u r minds spin in trying to reconcile the creation with the immutability, perfection, and self-sufficiency o f that individualized Being.

We at times even accept Christ as the Reconcilor o f our difficulties, but we still insist on understanding the reconciliation and the revealed T rinity o f the Godhead only in term s o f substance and relations, and as it were from ‘outside’. But Christ, says Eckhart, is the one “who tells us to tu rn within,” and “that can only be in God,” not into o u r puffed- up existential selves. Eckhart says that to accept Christ fully is to cease to be prim arily concerned with the reconciliation o f the difficulties confronted in ou r world o f manifest individuality as though that were all im portant. Christ is before all else the “R em inder.” 68 He rem inds us o f the tru th that has been “forgotten” and hidden from o ur conscious and subconscious minds, but that is ever present in o u r superconsciousness, in the g round o f the soul.

“T he natu re o f a w ord,” says Eckhart, “is to reveal what is h idden .” In revealing the forgotten and hidden tru th , Christ the eternal W ord rem inds us o f true principial knowledge, wherein “all things are in God and that which is in God is God.” “T he blessedness Christ brought us was already o ur own,” but we contracted ou r awareness, failed in willing, got intoxicated on individuality and then


thoroughly inebriated on w hatever the imaginative m ind could concoct in o rd er to escape from the ensuing boredom o f individuality. “O ur Lord Christ rem inds us that our being and o ur life are eternal in divine oneness,” that the “truest reality o f all things is to be found not in created reality but in the W ord.” 69

T he “birth o f the W ord” is also the “speaking o f the W ord in the g round o f intellect.” Christ rem inds us that “the heavenly Father speaks his W ord and speaks it e te rnally . . . and in the W ord he completely expresses his divine nature, and all creatures. . . . T he W ord lies h idden in the soul in such a way that one [distracted by desires o th e r than the will to know} does not know it o r hear it.. . . T h ere [in the ground} God speaks in the soul and expresses him self completely in the soul. T h ere the Father begets his Son, and he has great joy in the W ord and has, m oreover, such great bliss that he never ceases to speak eternally the W ord that is beyond tim e.” 70

“Why has God become man? T h at I m ight be born again [in the realization o f Divine Knowledge} as God himself. T h at is why God died [in the Crucifixion}—that I m ight die to the whole world [o f individuality} and to all created things [o r universal being}. It is in this sense that we should understand o ur Lord when he says: ‘All I have heard from my Father I have m ade known to you.’ 71 W hat does the Son hear from the Father? T he Father can only beget; the Son can only be begotten. All that the Father contains and is, the incom m ensurability o f his divine isness and nature, he brings forth once and for all in his only-begotten Son [there being no h ind-thought n o r fo rethought in God}.72 This the Son ‘hears’ from the Father; this he makes known to us, in o rd er that we may realize [principially} that we are the same Son.” 73

We, o f course, are not and never shall become Christ or God substantially, not even in the beatific vision.74 T o think that possible is “obviously absurd .” Ontologically speaking “nobody as such is God, no created rational being as such is o r becomes God”; individuality as such is not and never becomes the All-inclusive. But “there w here my self and all

T H E W O RD 133things are known only in God, then I and all things are simply God.” 75

Eckhart is here again speaking not in the nam e o f knowledge constituted in the relational o rd er o f substantial being, but in the nam e o f knowledge constituted in the principial o rd er o f God and as one in whom grace is as it were p e rfectly operative. T hus in the transposition, o r inversion, o f the sense o f ‘being’ from one o f substance and relation to one o f all-inclusiveness and all-possibility, that is to say “isness itself in Divine Knowledge,” his statem ents are p e rfectly valid. They also unfold that tru th to which all o ther true statem ents are related, regardless o f the modality o f m anifestation from which they spring .76

T h e D i v i n e S p a r k

T he ‘birth o f the W ord,’ the ‘birth o f the Son,’ is a them e to which Eckhart frequently returns. T o say that the W ord is ceaselessly ‘being b o rn ’ in the ground o f intellect, and that union exists only virtually prior to its actual realization in Divine Knowledge, is to say that this is an understand ing only from the consideration o f the hum an knower. But “that whereby the soul expresses God does not in any way affect God’s intrinsic reality.” 77 Actually “the W ord is in no way affected by any contingency,” inasmuch as the W ord is pure Intellect itself, essentially unconditioned and identical with the unrestricted and necessary isness that God is. “T he W ord is entirely im m utable in its eternal actuality,” and thus is totally w ithout the potentiality o f ‘being born’.

H ere it is especially im portant to understand the difference between potentiality and possibility. Potentiality designates “a capacity for a certain developm ent”; “it p re supposes a possible actualization.” 78 As sense experience on the p art o f the hum an knower presupposes the possibility o f an actual com prehension which in tu rn presupposes the possibility o f an actual judgm ent, so sense experience is potential to an act o f knowing. Potentiality can only be applied to individual manifestation, to becoming, to ‘being born ’. However, when considered principially in the all-inclusive order, as it must eventually be considered, “possibility is

!34 T H E D O C T R IN E

devoid o f all potentiality” and is never ‘being born ’. T h ere is, in o ther words, no potentiality in the all-possibility o r the isness that God is and apart from which there is strictly nothing.

But to the hum an self all possibilities that transcend him seem to be potential. Insofar as he regards him self as differentiated from the W ord he supposes his own intellection and being to be derived from himself. T hus whatever he attains is nothing but a reflection and not those possibilities themselves. A lthough this is only a delusion, we may say that for the self these possibilities always rem ain apparently potential. Why? Simply because it is not as a m anifested being o r as ju s t a hum an knower that he can attain them , but only by and within the W ord, the divine Selfhood. And once they are actually realized in the W ord, then there is no longer any hum an self, individuality, universal being, o r otherness to com prehend .79

T he transcendence o f the hum an self is a “dying to the se lf’; it is a vault beyond individuality, o r ra th er the inversion o f all reflection. But at this point o f considering the transcendence it m ust be acknowledged that even while asserting the entire o rd er o f individuality as delusive, we m ust recognize that degree o f being which pertains to it and which it has within its own order. W hen we consider the knowing self in any way it can only be in virtue o f its real dependence upon the unrestricted act o f knowledge itself. But the orientation o f this dependence is prim arily in the vertical line o f detached intellection, so to speak, ra ther than that o f the existential causation. And this is so w hether o r not we are aware o f it. In o ther words, the sole Principle o f the hum an selfs reality, and insofar as he is virtually o r effectively an integrated knowing being, is the W ord. Metaphysically all reality m ust ultimately and therefore p rin cipially be considered as not in any way o ther than the Principle, o r all-possible Reality itself.

Eckhart’s description o f the g round o f the soul as the ‘place’ o f the W ord’s ‘b irth ’ is, as we have found, fully ju s tified. M oreover, the W ord, considered in this m anner as dwelling within the hum an knower, is also identified with

T H E W O RD »35unm anifested isness, because the W ord is innerm ostly present in the self as the sustaining act o f its very being. T hough we are dealing with the integral hum an self, and not merely with individuality limited to its materiality o r corporeal modality, one can consider the W ord in like m ann er in every o ther condition o f individual being.80

T he Meister frequently resorts to the scriptural (and perennial) symbolism o f ‘light’ to designate the W ord. T he eternal W ord as innerm ostly present in the g round o f the soul is the “effulgence” o r “spark o f the soul” {scintilla animae). This term inology is used by Eckhart on several occasions to express directly and principially what cannot be expressed by indirect reason. “ ‘Spark’ in this context means ‘principle’ o r ‘in principle’,” says Eckhart. T he “spark must always be referred to fire, o f which it has the same n atu re”; it is not the soul o r ground of the soul that is fire, analogically speaking, but God, and “the soul on fire is sparked by the fire o f God.” 81

H ere again many interpreters o f Eckhart, especially pseudotheologians and pantheistic mystics without any appreciable understand ing o f metaphysics, have wrongly identified the “divine spark” with the soul itself o r the g round o f the soul. But “it is in the g round where the spark shines.” T he spark is not the g round o f the soul, is “not a part o f the soul”; “the spark is not this, not tha t.” “T he spark is o f In- tellect-as such [the Word}, is not o ther than a spark o f the divine nature, a divine light, a ray, an im print o f divinity.” Also “the exalted spark wherein we realize Divine Knowledge, that spark never parts from God, nor is there anything between.” 82

Eckhart explains the “exalted spark” with an example from nature: “W hen fire ignites the wood the spark has the natu re o f the fire and is one with pure fire. . . . T he father o f the spark is the fire . . . the spark o f the fire lights and kindles the wood {analogously the g round o f the soul}, it makes the wood fire and unlike itself . . . and makes the wood m ore and m ore one with itself, the fire. Yet neither w arm th n or heat nor likeness will ever calm o r silence o r satisfy the fire o r the wood until the fire begets itself in the


wood and gives the wood its own natu re and its own being, so that it is all one fire.” 83 T hus the “spark in the soul” is the fiinklein Gottes, the spark o f God in the soul; it is also “uncreated grace.”

“Many times have I spoken o f that uncreated and uncreatable Light o r fiinklein that is in the [g round o f the) soul. It is this Light that I so often refer to in all my sermons. It is this Light that discloses God unveiled and unm anifested as he is in himself; indeed, it discloses him in his act o f Self-affirmation. T hus I can most truly say that this Light is indeed one with God ra the r than one with my soul- powers, which are nonetheless one with it in its isness. . . . T hus I say: If one turns from self and from all individuality, then insofar as you do this thus far are you identified with and blessed by the spark in the soul, which is never affected by time o r space. This spark negates all individuality and affirms nothing but God unveiled as he is in himself. Not enough for it to disclose the Father, o r the Son o r the Holy Spirit o r even the th ree Persons together, so far as they stand in the ir own properties. I swear that it is not enough for this Light to disclose even the unity o f the p ro cessions o f the divine nature. Indeed I will say m ore, and this may sound surprising: I say by eternal tru th tha t it is not enough for this Light to disclose the im partable, im m utable divine Being, which neither gives n o r takes; it will ra the r disclose that from which this Being comes; it will penetrate directly into its unconditioned Principle, into the silent desert, in which no distinction ever enters, neither Father, n o r Son, nor Holy Spirit. Only there in the Innerm ost, where no individualized one (or other) abides, is the Light fulfilled, and it is m ore within [the Principle) than it is in itself. For the Principle is purely unm anifested and wholly im m utable and unaffected in itself; but from this im m utable Principle are all things m anifested.” 84

“T hough we are G od’s sons, we do not realize it yet.” Present in the g round o f the soul this “spark o f pure In tellect never dies . . . though it may flare up and set the soul on fire in any mom ent. . . . How are we G od’s sons? By realizing oneness with him [through principial identification with the spark). But any knowledge o f this, that we are

T H E W O RD X3 7

the Son o f God, m ust be by understanding the distinction between extasis and instasis knowledge [that is, knowledge without and knowledge within the Principle}. . . .N o t that this instasis knowledge is the soul itself, but it is constituted in the spark o f the soul as in the Principle 85 o f the soul, the soul’s intellectual Principle, the Principle wherein a man is born G od’s Son eternally . . . for this knowledge is w ithout time, w ithout place, and without ‘here’ and ‘now’. In this Principle all things are one and all things are together all in all identified.” 86

“How is one the Son o f God, o r how can one realize that he is the Son, inasm uch as God is not like any individual? . . . W hen I realize myself in nothing and nothing in me, when I cast out everything in me, then I can be transposed into the naked isness o f God, and that is the pure principial isness. All likeness m ust be abolished if the transposition into God and identity with him is to be effected. . . . T hus is one transposed into God and is the Son o f God. T hat nothing in God be concealed from me, there m ust appear in me no likeness, no structure, o r image, for no structure o r image can show us the G odhead o r God’s isness. So long as knowledge o f structure o r likeness rem ains in you, you are never one with God.” 87

“To separate soul and body 88 is bad enough, but for the soul to be divorced from God, that is a far worse m atter.” 89 “As the soul is the principle o f the body, so God is the prin ciple o f the soul.” “W hen the spark o f Intellect-as-such is carried right into God in himself, then the m an [born e te rnally as God’s son} really lives and knows.” “T he spark in the soul is the light o f divinity [the Word} which is always intrinsic to God.” 90 M oreover, the spark in the soul, o r the “in-shining light,” is also the “synderesis” 91—a “binding” and hence the principle o f intellectual conscience which directly unites the conscience to itself and directs the conscience to “tend heavily and ceaselessly toward u n d e rstanding the Good.” It is by virtue o f the synderesis that the ground o f conscience is united to the Good and to Justice, as it is by virtue o f the spark that the g round of the soul is united to Divine Knowledge.

I f the W ord is represented as “im partable Light,” it is

T H E D O C T R IN E

because Light symbolizes Divine Knowledge. It is the source o f all o ther light which is but its reflection, since no relational knowledge, no m atter how rem ote o r indirect, is possible except by participation in the Light which is the act o f unrestricted com prehension. As the uncreated Principiate o f the nonm anifested and all-inclusive Principle, the W ord is identically that Principle in isness and knowledge. In the direct light o f this Divine Knowledge all things are in p erfect oneness and unrestricted simultaneity. For principially there cannot be anything but identity and an “eternal now,” inasmuch as Divine Knowledge excludes all otherness and immutability excludes all succession.

If, however, we choose to speak o f ‘the spark o f the soul’ as synonym ous with the natural light o f the soul, with created grace, with the ground o f the intellect, then we must, as Eckhart insists, say that it “is an image o f the divine nature and so created by God.” 92 T hen , o f course, we consider the ‘spark’ individually in term s o f each distinct intellective soul. Even so, the spark o f the soul, especially when regarded as the dynamic unlim ited and detached will to know, is in this context that which urges the seeking intellect on toward oneness with its ultim ate term , that is, the Intellect that does not seek and o f which the seeking intellect is a reflection.

But this is not the light o r spark o f which Eckhart essentially speaks, and he is usually m isunderstood on this point. W hen considered correctly the spark in the soul is “neither created nor creatable.” “T here is a somewhat (call it spark, light, principle o r whatever) in the soul that is so intrinsic to God that it is one with him. . . . It has nothing w hatever in com mon with anything that is created .” “It is pure Intellect itself.” “It is uncreated grace.” 93 “T he spark is oneness itself,” which “the intellect apprehends in its g ro un d ” and as a transcendental is intrinsic to God. It is not a structured m anifestation but a manifestation that is “structureless as oneness is structureless and wholly within God,” and hence pertains entirely to the o rd er o f the All-inclusive.

“As long as anything created can make a distinct im pression on the soul, then the soul is unsatisfied. . . . T h ere is

T H E W O RD J39that in the soul which transcends its created nature. . . . It has nothing in com m on with anything. A nything created is nothing, but to that [the spark] everything created o r m anifested in time is alien and rem ote. It is Oneness in itself, taking nothing from outside itself.” 94 “I f man were wholly o f this nature, he would be wholly uncreated and u n b e a table.” 93 He would have no direct awareness o f individuality, “but man, as m an, is greatly conscious o f self.” “T here is a power o r principle im m anent in the soul o f which I have already spoken: i f the whole soul were as it is, it would be uncreated and uncreatable, but this is not so.” 96 T he individual soul is a created m anifestation and is not its own principle.

W i t h i n t h e W o r d

Save for the divine spark “the ground o f the soul is dark, for the active light o f reason does not shine there, but only outw ard in things.” But when, by sustaining the unlim ited will to know, we turn within, into the ground o r isness o f the soul, only the W ord is known, and the known and knower are one. T herein “God makes us to know him, so his knowing is mine and as his m ode o f knowing.” 97

But in this unitive knowledge we are no longer conscious o f ou r p ro p e r selves. We are “identified as it were with the spark” o r principle, and “my knowing is really G od’s knowing.” T h ere within pure metaphysical knowledge is p rior to and so detached from the created o rd er o f m anifestation. A fter all, the doctrine o f creation ex nihilo is simply a unique way o f enunciating, for the hum an knower, the evident universal m anifestation and its relation to the Principle. A “unique way” because, from the standpoint o f individuality, it is indispensable in that it cannot be enclosed in a system o f general o r particular ideas. As an open doctrine and free from conceptualization, it p repares for and points to the principial mode “w herein all that is known is nothing o ther than the uncreated and uncreatable W ord in whom there is no otherness o r real distinction.” 98

From all this we can therefore say that the spark o f the soul is the indwelling W ord, born in, speaking to, o r glow


ing in the ground, the very isness o f the intellect. From the consideration o f the organism it is the principle o f life, and from the consideration o f the intellective soul it is the p rin ciple o f all its operations. Still we have not gone beyond the o rd er o f individual possibilities to that o f infinite possibility. To get there these operations m ust cease. We m ust tu rn within, into the g round o f the soul w here, by inversion, identity with the divine spark is effected. And it is u n created grace alone, o r the spark itself, that effects the transposition to principial knowledge—a knowledge that is as it were wholly constituted within the W ord.

T hus from the standpoint o f detached intellection all is understood as though from the sum m it o f all-possibility, which is identically God in his unconditioned Selfhood. Any o ther Weltanschauung is by definition delusive. As “innate in the soul” the unlim ited will to know ever seeks and is discontent with any Weltanschauung that the scientific o r philosophical m ind may attain. “In its first issuing forth [in the g round o f the soul] it [the unlim ited will to know] does not stop at God insofar as he is good, nor does it rest with God insofar as he is the tru th . It goes on searching for the Principle and seeks God in his identity [or nonduality} and in his desert [as unmanifest}. It seeks God in his wilderness and in his own isness. Hence it does not rest satisfied [with God as Goodness, T ru th , Unity, o r Being}, but it seeks fu rth e r to find God in his Godhead and in the very Selfhood o f his natu re [as the isness o f Divine Knowledge itself}. Now it is said that no union is g reater than that o f the th ree Persons in God. A part from this, it is said that there is no closer union than that o f the soul with God. T here [in this union} the soul is em braced by identity. In the first touch [knowing} with which God knows the soul and still knows it as uncreated [metaphysically p rior to manifestation}, the soul is as noble as God him self is [fo r it is one with him in his participatory essence}. God knows it as he knows him self.” 99

T hus in truest reality it is not the W ord who is innerm ost in o r who dwells in the m anifested soul; ra the r it is “ the soul who dwells in God and is God.” “My body is m ore in my soul than my soul is in my body. My body and my soul are

T H E W O R D 14 1

m ore in God than they are in themselves.” 100 M etaphysically p rio r to individual m anifestation, all is in the Principle. “All things come from God. He is in all things, yet p reem inently all things are in him ,” and “that which is in God is G od.” M oreover, “the reflection o f the soul in God is God himself.” T he soul “dwells in the Principle, in the stream and source o f the G odhead” and “there there is no one o ther than divine Selfhood, not even my knowing self,” for there “I is p roper to none but to God him self in his identity.” 101

T hough the searching knower may theoretically u n d e rstand this metaphysical tru th and the pre-em inence o f p rin cipial knowledge, effective awareness o f it becomes actual only when, by uncreated grace, union is realized. This actual awareness implies a freedom from all the limitations that constitute the self as such and that, in a m ore general way, condition all individual manifestation. Not an escape into some subconscious o r subjective state, which is a fu rth e r enclosure within a still m ore limited modality o f the self, this freedom is by way o f transcendence and attainable by full acceptance o f the transcendent act itself.

W hen it is said o f the W ord that it is in a certain sense indwelling in the hum an being, indeed in all m anifested beings, this means that the knower has adopted the consideration o f individual m anifestation. Nevertheless this is no th ing m ore than a concession from the standpoint o f Divine Knowledge inasm uch as it is an application in term s o f re flection and therefore delusive. For such an application is an extraction from the instasis o f the all-inclusive Reality into the exstasis o f its m anifestation in individuality and universal being, even though the self is regarded as a participant in being. To get into the W ord and understand that one has never been without, this application has to be inverted and “when fully within the W ord, the inversion is total.” 102

3The Primal Distinction

We are now obliged to undertake an intricate consideration in the doctrine that Eckhart expounds. To bypass it would no doubt lead to confusion, if not a simplification o f a teaching that is anything but simple. In fact Eckhart warns us that the desire for simplification, which runs parallel to the desire for uniform ity, is a divergence from the desire for unification. A fter all, “everything that is not strict im possibility has its place in divine all-possibility,” which “negates the exclusiveness o f any one simple possibility.” 1

If it has been m ade sufficiently clear that principial knowledge, as affirm ed by Eckhart, is as it were knowledge in God, then it should not be difficult to understand that it is g rounded in all-possibility, all-inclusiveness, and indistinction. O ur natural hum an o r individualized modes o f knowledge, which are at best to be regarded in term s o f approach toward God and hence as external to him, start as they m ust from the standpoint o f the hum an knower and objective being. Inversely, the principial m ode o f Divine Knowledge—once the revelation o f the W ord is fully accepted— starts within God and then proceeds to understand all things from the standpoint o f divine instasis.

This knowledge by identity, which is the principial mode, pre-em inently acknowledges neither the ‘mystery’ o f pure isness nor the ‘mystery’ o f Divine Knowledge, but their identity. W hatever intellectual distinctions that may, fo r the sake o f a clearer understand ing o f m anifest reality, be m ade principially are within and therefore from Divine Knowledge itself. T hus, to speak, as Eckhart does, o f isness as not really but only intellectually distinguished from Divine Knowledge is to speak o f that which is in function o f pure Intellect.

142

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N 1 4 3

It has already been noted that isness-in-itself is, as Eckhart says, “all-inclusive O ne without a second, w ithout distinction, not this, not that.” And “isness-in-itself is identically unrestricted knowledge,” 2 which is ano ther way of saying that pure Intellect is the Reality o f all realities. It is also ano ther way o f saying that the all-inclusive Principle, which the term s pure Intellect o r G odhead indicate, is not restricted by any essence o r by any determ ination o f ‘isness’. We m ust here recall that for Eckhart isness prim arily signifies knowability and infinite isness in itself signifies no th ing o ther than “unrestricted knowability.” Now inasm uch as unrestricted knowability directly dem ands the necessary reality o f the infinite Subject who immediately knows all that is o r is knowable, then Divine Knowledge o r G odhead is that Knower’s unrestricted knowledge and hence is beyond all distinctions o r determ inations regardless o f kind or mode. It is in this sense that Eckhart wisely says that isness is always in function o f knowledge.

At this point, however, it is no doubt wise to consider isness, not in itself, but in relation to m anifestation. W ithout this im portan t consideration, which we are now about to undertake, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to u n d e rstand that “isness can be regarded u n d er distinct aspects while it rem ains indivisible in truest reality.” 3 Yet once we consider m anifestation in any way, even principially, we are already in the sphere o f relations.

T h e E x i s t e n t i a l H i e r a r c h y

Inasm uch as all m anifestation issues forth from God, it may be correct to say that the isness that God is enters into a certain relation with ano ther principle. T hough such a relation is not really present in term s o f the suprem e aspect o f isness itself, since it is wholly indivisible and there cannot be any principle o ther than the ultim ate “Principle without principle,” 4 nevertheless it is there intellectually. T hus in the consideration o f m anifestation the relational principle into which we are introduced is “essence, the und ifferen tiated original quiddity o r whatness.” While isness is e te rnally in act, o r ra th er is pure act, essence is in a sense


regarded as passive. And “though both are identical in truest reality, in God {where there is no potentiality], and rem ain h idden [unm anifested] in themselves, these two are the prim ordial principles o f all that issues fo rth .” “Essence is an intellectual division within isness.” M oreover, “for all created [o r individual] beings, act and potency are divisions o f isness. Isness is the first act, the first distinction [once manifestation is considered], though in God in him self there is no distinction.” 5

In truest reality the unm anifested and undifferentiated triunity o f the Godhead in itself transcends the distinction o f isness and essence, inasm uch as the “eternal [and nonsuc- cessive] generation o f the W ord is God’s intrinsic and necessary affirm ation o f himself.” 6 Nevertheless, insofar as the T rinity is distinctively rendered knowable in revelation, it is the direct issuance o f the union o f these com plem entary principles, isness and essence. A nd this is also true o f all structureless manifestation, which belongs not to the o rd er o f individuality but to the o rd er o f the All-inclusive. In term s o f unm anifested Godhead, o r God “not in his divine works but in himself,” the W ord is the prim ordial identity o r Self-affirmation o f all-possibility. T hus it is extolled above all m anifest realities, structureless as well as structured . It is indivisible Reality itself, for “while isness is the W ord, it is in function o f Knowledge itself whereby God speaks [him self] and speaks all things.” 7 A nd “in saying that there is that in God [that is, in unconditioned knowledge o f all-possibility] o f which isness is the determ ination, I do not thereby deny him isness, but exhalt it in him [above the relational distinction o f isness and essence].” “Isness is God. A nd isness suffices itself and all things. God is the re fore the Principle o f all.” 8

But once intelligibility is considered in any state o f m anifestation, isness m ust be understood in relation to essence. For “it is only through the intellectual essence that God brings things into being.” 9

Now that which produces the integral developm ent o f the hum an being is also the union o f these intellectual principles, isness and essence, and that applies likewise in relation

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N 145

to each self. T he same may be said o f all o ther m anifest conditions in individuality, for though we are here p rimarily concerned with the hum an condition, it must be rem em bered that it is but one am ong many conditions. “Material beings are one and yet not one, since they are composites o f form and m atter [and their whatness is really distinct from their isness}. Im m aterial beings, such as those endow ed with intellect, are one and yet not one, because their isness and essence are not identical, o r ra ther because isness and understand ing are not identical [in them but re ally distinct]. They are therefore composites o f isness and intellect.” 10 T hus, “in every created being isness and essence are really distinct, the fo rm er being derived from som ething else [that is, the union o f unrestricted isness and essence] and the latter not being derived from anything as such.” 11

But the consideration o f each composite self as distinct from o ther composite selves is not the only one to be m ade within manifest reality. I f we now consider the entire o rd er form ed by a determ inate degree o f existence in which the hum an being unfolds itself and which includes all the beings that develop their corresponding possibilities o f manifestation in it, then for this realm unrestricted isness is the divine will. “T he divine will is identified with pure isness” in that it is an aspect o r expression o f God him self when regarded as “Almighty A uthority o f his entire province o f universal being.” 12 This will is also identified as the ‘eternal law’ which is reflected in each modality o f individual existence as the ‘natural law’ and holds true identically in the macrocosm o f all creation and in the microcosm o f the particular self. As a reflection the natural law is clearly that each creature “simply operates according to its own nature, o r essence.” Yet the very diversity o f natures, in their m ore and less participations in being, presupposes their inequality in the hierarchy o f universal existence. Hence it is also the natural law that “the inferior is never equal to the superio r” and “inferiors m ust by their very natu re be led by superiors.” 13

If the hum an being, in harm ony with the divine will and


the natural law, is to lead lower beings and benefit from them , he m ust do so u nd er the sway o f the unlim ited will to know, not the will to power. At the same time he m ust allow him self to be led by intellects p u rer than his own who point to pure Intellect itself, o r God. T h e divine will as reflected in the natural law “negates any duality between man and N ature.” T h e divine will asserts the com m andm ent: “Do unto others as you would that they should do unto you.” A perennial com m andm ent, says Eckhart, which applies not only to o u r relations with o u r fellow men but “to o u r relations with beasts, plants, and inanim ate things.” Otherwise the beasts, plants, and inanim ate things will do as irra tionally unto m en as man has done unto them , for “instead o f bringing tribute to man they will bring retribution upon him .” 14 T hus the relation o f isness and essence in the really distinct o rd er o f individuality and all modalities the reo f is a reflection o f the original relation o f unrestricted isness and essence in the suprem e Principle. Essence is always and in all conditions “relationally dependen t” on isness.

Ignorance o f this basic dependen t relation largely accounts for the aberrations o f the natural hierarchy o f individual m anifestation that man, both singly and collectively, commits. T he hierarchical relationship holds within each species as well as between species. While “hum an natu re is wholly present in every rational creature,” it is m anifested there in “rem arkably diverse ways according to the inheren t qualities o f each.” It is “the qualitative essence intrinsically related to the created isness o f each being” that determ ines its “superiority over inferiors and its inferiority to superiors.” T o think otherwise is to think that hum an persons— o r even all creatures—are all alike and differ am ong them selves “only num erically.” 15 “T hough liberty is in the will, it depends on reason and intellect.” 16 But egalitarianism is without intellectual foundation. H ierarchy will always p revail in the created o rder, and unless we acknowledge and sustain it according to natural law we will reap its completely aberrated form , the sum m it o f which will be occupied by a being whose roots will “spring from the bottom o f the pit o f Hell.”

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N 1 4 7

T hough all this is true in term s o f universal m anifestation, it is not so in God o r when God in him self is our prim ary consideration. In God there is no hierarchy for the simple reason that there is no real otherness in him, and hence nothing that could be affirm ed as inferior o r superior. “As in God in their prim al issuing forth from God, all things are equivalent.” Once manifested, however, “inequality is the natural o rd er o f all beings.” 17

N o n d u a l i t y

We m ust not forget that the metaphysical determ ination o f the com plem entary principles o f isness and essence has nothing whatever to do with any ‘dualistic’ conception. It is, in particular, wholly incom m ensurable with that type o f dualism , such as m ind and m atter, so prevalent in m odern philosophy, the origin o f which is really im putable to Car- tesianism and the subsequent horro rs o f which are found in the closed systems o f Hegel and Feuerbach. N or should we forget that the distinction o f isness and essence in ultim ate reality, prim ordial as it is in com parison with all o ther distinctions, is nonetheless an intellectual distinction only and therefore purely relational. For, to repeat, the distinction “does not have reality but is only understood. So where isness is not understanding , there is never unity. But only in God are isness and understand ing identical.” 18

M oreover, “essence refers to isness . . . and the relation, as it is intelligibly distinguished in God, does not pertain to the unconditioned isness that God is [in him self] but to the m utual relations [o f isness and essence to one ano ther in the consideration o f manifestation}.” 19 “The distinction between isness and essence is intellectual and [they are] taken as O ne [in reality]. It is only when the O ne is not kept within itself that it receives and confers distinction.” 20 Now, “the O ne is not kept within itself” as soon as we consider m anifestation in any degree.

Again Eckhart rem inds us that “God speaks the O ne, but we understand two.” T he distinction o f isness as the d ete rm ination o f the All-inclusive in relation to m anifestation is the first o f all distinctions. It is the distinction in which the


relationship o f isness and essence is immediate, and it is from this relationship that all o ther qualitative distinctions directly o r indirectly derive. Hence one m ust never regard this distinction o f isness and essense as the affirm ation o f any strict irreducibility, for in the Principle itself the distinction is nonexistent. It is only in relation to the manifestation o f which it is the Principle that all-inclusive isness distinguishes itself into isness and essence. And this w ithout its intrinsic identity being thereby affected, inasm uch as “God cannot be disturbed by any distinction or multiplicity.” 21 In this sense, and from the very fact that it is metaphysical, the doctrine that Eckhart, following Aquinas, expounds is fun dam entally the perennial ‘doctrine o f nonduality’.

In a Latin exposition on the them e “God is O ne” 22 Eckh art says that “all things are in the O ne by virtue o f its being One, for all m ultitude is O ne {in principle], and is in and through the One. . . . T he O ne refers, properly speaking, to what is all-inclusive and perfect in itself and for that reason lacks nothing. . . . T he O ne refers by its essence to pure isness itself [and hence is not to be confused with the ‘O ne’ o f Plotinus, which is devoid o f all-possible isness}. For essence, too, is always single and therefore it is appropriate to union and the act o f isness by virtue o f its unity. . . . [T he One] is one isness with isness itself. . . . By virtue o f being One, God is prim al and suprem e. Hence, though the O ne descends through essence into all things [as manifested reflection] and into every single thing, it always rem ains O ne and unifies things that are divided.” 23

But Eckhart takes great pains to deny that the O ne that God is should ever be considered as identical with any es- sentialized ‘one’ o r with this o r that individualized ‘one’. T he O ne is God; indeed the fulfillment, the p lenitude, o f the G odhead is O neness.24 T he “O ne without ano ther” is transcendence; it is not the ‘one’ o f a series, since every series is finite. “God is O ne w ithout the essence o f one and num ber”; is “without all num ber and supranum ber.” For “the O ne is the negation o f negations [and therefore unique].” 25 M oreover, “w hen God is called ‘O ne’, the ‘O ne’ does not re fe r to the genus o f num ber n o r does it im part

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N >49som ething to God. T hus it does not itself give rise to any series.” 26 Now a series indicates the division o f one o r one multiplying itself, making two, and so on indefinitely. But “isness in itself is indivisible, nor does it multiply itself and nothing is added to it.” Indeed, “people think that they have m ore if they have things together with God, than if they had God without things. But this is wrong, for all things added to God are not m ore than God alone.” 27

It should here be repeated that the very consideration o f manifestation, even principially, necessitates the intellectual distinction o f isness and essence. And insofar as individuality is considered, the distinction between God and the self is real for the hum an knower. Nonetheless, “real distinctions are not separations,” and “in itself isness is indivisible, is not-twoness.” ‘Not-twoness’ is simply the principial way o f affirm ing that “isness itself is beyond all limitations and manifest determ inations, even that o f oneness,” 28 and in o rd er to affirm its transcendence o f all duality as beyond any doubt, unconditioned isness must be considered as ‘not- two’. As Eckhart says: “ In truest reality there is no duality.” 29

T he finite and the infinite are certainly not to be considered as separate, for that would exclude the finite from the infinite and thus limit the infinite, which is absurd. N or is the infinite to be considered as identical with the finite, for that would make the infinite finite, which is contradictory. R ather the finite and the infinite are related as not-two, thereby involving neither contradiction nor com prom ise. U pon reflection it is found that this is the only position which, if properly understood, “allows the finite full scope to have its being in the infinite without loss o f m eaning to both .” T hus we can better understand why, in principle o r in term s o f the transcendent One, which is non-twoness, “the finite is the infinite.” 30

It should be clear, then, that the doctrine o f nonduality, which is at the very core o f pure metaphysics, is not to be confounded with what m odern philosophers ascribe as ‘m onism ’. Regardless o f the form in which monism may be clothed, it always rem ains a philosophical conception within


the category o f substance, implying a pure substantial im- m anentism and not an apprehension within the principial o rd er wherein such a determ ination is out o f the question. N or has the doctrine o f nonduality anything in com mon with ‘pantheism ’, for when properly understood ‘pantheism ’ necessarily indicates a naturalism that is basically nonm etaphysical, inasm uch as metaphysics means precisely that m ode o f knowledge which in every respect is supra totius naturae. T hus the doctrine, in the nam e o f which Eckhart speaks, has no connection with e ither Hegelianism or Spin- ozism, with any derivatives o f these philosophical conceptions o r with any similar outlooks, regardless o f place o r time.

While ‘m onotheism ’, on the o ther hand, is essentially the doctrine o f nonduality, metaphysically speaking,31 Eckhart at times intentionally speaks, as we have noticed, in term s o f nonduality. He does so because he wants to rem ain free o f the formalism which the rational faculty attaches to ‘m onotheism ’; that is, he does not want us ever to confuse ‘m ono’ with the distinct ‘one’ o f num ber, series, distinction, and otherness. For ‘m ono’ actually means ‘not-two’, ‘not-of-a- series’, inasm uch as it in itself is indivisible, all-inclusive, and beyond distinctions. T he inversion o f the determ inate ‘one’ is the unm anifested and supradeterm inate O ne o f which Eckhart speaks; it is ‘not-two’ and “not-two is the negation o f a negation.”

If the metaphysics o f Aquinas has appeared ‘dualistic’ to those who have failed to understand it, it is because their apprehension o f it stops short at the consideration o f the distinction o f isness and essence. But Eckhart correctly un derstood that this first ‘duality’, being intellectual only, does not in any way affect God o r prevent metaphysics from adm itting as possible all that transcends this distinction.

As Aquinas him self points out: “O ne [as indicating God in ic] signifies not only that which is non-twoness, but also that which is perfect [o r w ithout defect}.” W hereas “unity as the principle o f num ber is contrasted with num erical m ultitude, unity as convertible with isness is contrasted with the kind o f multiplicity that designates defect.” T herefore “taken as

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N

a principle o f num ber, oneness is not to be predicated o f God.” “Inasm uch as there is no composition o f quantitative parts in God, for he is not a body; nor a composition o f m atter and form ; n o r are his nature and complete substantiality distinct; nor his essence and isness; nor is there a composition o f genus and difference; nor o f subject and accidents, it is clear that God is altogether unconditioned and in no wise com posite.” A fter all, “God is the prim al reality, strictly speaking, and no part o f a whole can be that,” inasmuch as in “the unity o f the prim al reality, which includes all that is actual and possible, there is no twoness o r division.” Indeed “to know God as it were in him self is not to call on a m ultitude o f words (to nam e o r determ ine God); for then o u r knowledge is unconditioned as his knowledge is unconditioned.” 32

U nfortunately this insight was not fully appreciated by many followers o f Aquinas, and what occurs in the enclosed conceptions to which most m odern philosophers are especially attached is directly contrary to this metaphysical insight.

I s n e s s a n d W h a t n e s s

Having called attention to the metaphysical significance o f ‘nonduality’, to which Eckhart attaches great im portance, we should now re tu rn to fu rth er considerations o f isness and essence. Isness has to be considered p rior to essence because there is no way whereby essence, which is the substratum o r supporting principle o f all manifestation, can be endow ed with voluntary act. It is necessary, then, to clarify m ore precisely the significance o f essence, o r whatness. For essence, o r quiddity, means nothing m ore nor less than ‘what makes a being what it is’.

In itself “essence is purely non-act, o r non-isness” in the sense that it, as Eckhart says, “contains every kind o f affirmation, yet is never capable o f affirm ing itself.” In o ther words, “essence by itself can never be an efficacious cause.” 33

Essence is nonefficacious in itself and thus, being a distinction from isness and “inferio r to act,” it “requires the

J52 T H E D O C T R IN E

act,” o r ra ther “the influence o f isness.” And in o rd er to stress this point Eckhart rem inds us, as did Augustine, that “essence [essentia] even derives its nam e from esse [isness}” and being thus derivative is intellectually inferior and necessitates the impact o f isness in o rd er that there is real p ro duction.34

In explaining this point fu rth er Eckhart says: “For it is in accordance with the reality o f the intellectually h igher (which is isness) to influence essence, ju st as it is natural for the lower (which is essence) to receive such influence.” 35 In o ther words, essence m ust receive the affirm ation o f itself from isness in o rd er that production may be actualized. All m anifestation certainly issues forth from divine essence, o f which there are so many modifications, but w ithout the innerm ost presence o f the im m ediate impact o f isness, these ‘productions’ would be naught in every respect and strictly without reality.

T he philosophical view according to which essence is wholly self-sufficient as the principle o f all m anifestation can only be the result o f an entirely misdirected way o f thinking. Arising out o f stopping to ‘take a m ental look’ at reality, ra the r than knowing participation in it, such a view absolves itself from isness. It becomes enclosed in concepts o r absolute ideas that are mistaken for concrete reality, and hence fails to understand the significance o f efficacy. Yet this is a typical m anner o f much m odern philosophy, and largely explains its divorce from genuine ontology and therefore its inability to attain even a slight insight into Divine Knowledge.

T hough the principial m ode o f knowledge transcends ontology, a requisite understand ing o f ontology— not a textbook learning about it—on the part o f the hum an knower is presupposed. Eckhart never initiates a rebuke against ontology o r intellectuality. On the contrary, he is in full agreem ent with Aquinas in insisting that insofar as we are “on the way” the ‘concept’ is not only inevitable but perfectly valid. A fter all, it is the concrete reality that is known in conceptual knowledge, and it is the principle o f being, according to which we make abstraction, and not what we abstract, that is significant. W hat he does stress, however, is that knowing in

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N *53via reflects pure knowledge in patria and as such signifies an individualized principle in com parison with the all-inclusive Principle.36 Since the extasis o f all reality is from its principle, the intellect’s approxim ation to Divine Knowledge [its Principle] is nothing o ther than an inversion o f extasis into instasis. And the inversion is m ade requisite only in grace because the o rd er o f “distinct reality has been extracted from the Godhead, the Principle.” 37 Any rebuke that Eckhart initiates is only one against antiontology o r pseudointellectuality, which takes abstract representations for the presence o f concrete reality, considers essence as self-subsisting, and turns ideas in idols.

In o rd er to preclude any possible m isinterpretation, it should be added that the sense in which essence is here taken by Eckhart is not that adopted by certain latter-day students o f Aquinas. U nder rationalistic influences they tend to regard it as prior to isness, and thus designate isness as though it were ano ther ‘essence’ and answerable to the question ‘W hat?’ Not containing all-possibility, “essence,” says Eckhart, “contains only the possibilities o f m anifestation.” All-possibility is not essence; ra the r it is God wholly in himself, the Principle o f both m anifest and unm anifest possibilities. All-possibility is beyond the distinction o f isness and essence, is that apart from which there is only contradiction o r strict nothingness. “T he distinction between isness and essence is referred back to the One [indivisible and all-inclusive Principle] where essence is identical with isness. W hen Oneness is no longer in oneself [as the only consideration] then division has crept in. T o seek unity short o f the isness that God is, is to delude oneself.” 38

In truest reality, and therefore in Principle, God is his allpossibility and all-inclusive identity. He transcends the distinction o f essence and even the prim al distinction o f isness, which distinctions are necessarily m ade once isness is d ete rm ined o r once any aspect o f the m anifested principiate is considered. Being beyond all mental distinctions and d ete rminations, God nonetheless “eternally affirms himself, or ra ther negates all negations, which is pure and infinite affirm ation.” 39

W hen Eckhart says that isness is the first distinction, the

>54 T H E D O C T R IN E

consideration is in term s o f m anifestation wherein this first and highest determ ination signifies that God is not vague, indeterm inate, o r abstract. Nevertheless, distinctive isness is a negation from the standpoint o f the unm anifest Principle. H ence essence as distinguished from isness, though a necessary intellectual determ ination when considering distinct re ality, is also a negation from that transcendent and suprem e standpoint. In o ther words, the distinction o f essence from isness is subsequent upon the p rio r determ ination o f isness, “purest and most simple o f all possible determ inations.” If Eckhart apprehends God in his transcendence o f this p rimal distinction and o f all determ inations, even the purest, as Divine Knowledge itself, it is not the essence principle as such that Divine Knowledge signifies. R ather it is simply That o f which isness is in function; it is the prim ordial and necessary negation o f all negations. For “Divine Knowledge in itself is neither a ‘w hat’ nor an ‘is’,” insofar as ‘whatness’ and ‘isness’ can in any way be considered as positive. Godhead, o r Divine Knowledge in itself, is neither a d e te rmination nor a distinction but “That in virtue o f which all noncontradictory distinctions and determ inations are possible,” 40 and “isness is the first o f all.”

Still, “essence in itself is und ifferen tia ted”; it is not a com posite o f things. And while it is unm anifested and incom prehensible in itself, it nevertheless is the content o f all production without itself being a production. Essence itself is not the m anifested intellect. It is only “with us,” as Eckhart says, inasm uch as “the undifferen tiated essence itself is p ro p er to God, the d ifferentiated essence to the creatu re .” 41 But the undifferen tiated essence itself contains the differentiated, as the infinite contains the finite.

“W hen God created all creatures he had a prior-nothing o r nonproduction that was unm anifested and that contained the ratio o f all creatures. . . . This [essence] is so assimilated to God that it is a single, undifferen tiated One, passively containing the ratio o f all creatures, is structureless and super struc tu re .” 42 This is why Eckhart is able, in the same discourse, to answer both affirmatively and negatively the question: “If I am in principle the only Son whom the

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N *55

Father has eternally begotten, have I eternally been Son? I say yes and no. Yes, Son inasmuch as the Father has e te rnally begotten me; not Son in term s o f the unbegotten. ‘In the Principle’: here we are given to understand that we are the only Son whom the Father has eternally been begetting out o f the concealed darkness o f eternal nonm anifestation, and yet rem aining within the suprem e Principle o f the primal m anifestation, which is the fullness o f all perfection. H ere [in the Principle} I have eternally been at rest and asleep in the unm anifested com prehension o f the eternal Father, wholly within and unspoken.” 43

Essence is the ratio, the reason o r rationale o f all p roduction. It is the “seed” o f all manifestation, “yet it is w ithout seed,” for if it had a seed it would not be a seed. As seed it is g rounded in isness, and without this actuating o r nourish- ing ground, there would be no production whatsoever. As “the divine, passive and participative principle distinguished {intellectually] from isness,” essence is the dram atic “player” o f all structures, and hence the source o f all delusion insofar as it is separated from isness. S tructure as such is unreal in that it is always, in the knowing course, nothing m ore than a com prehended potentiality to the act o f affirmation that determ ines reality. Essence is purely intellectual, o r spiritual, but when differentiated from its g round it also discloses an extrinsic delusive tendency toward materia signata quantitate. T hus separated it finally tends toward “prim e m atter, o r the pure potentiality o f things, whereby they are not yet entities and whereby we call those things that are not as though they were.” 44

Essence is unm anifested, is not a production. But all things, from pure intellectual structures to the powers o f the intellective soul, to the individual awareness that p ro motes the notion o f ‘se lf, and on down to the fu rth e r d ete rm inations o f all things, are productions o f divine essence. They are also productive in their own modality o f existence and in relation to those things which follow. On the o ther hand, while com mon sense and the faculties o f sensation and motion, including the sensible elements, are p roductions o f essence, they are not themselves productive. Inas


m uch as all things are productions o f essence “we have, accordingly, these considerations, namely: that the thing issuing is in the producer [essence u nd er the influence o f isness}; that the thing is in essence as the offspring is in the seed, as the word is in the speaker; and that it is in it as the ratio in which and through which the product issues from the producer. We must, however, realize that by the very fact o f a th ing’s issuing from som ething else it is distinguished from it. . . . I n this connection it should be noted that in analogical relations the product is always inferior, less . . . and unequal to the producer, whereas in principial relations it is always one with it, not sharing the same nature but receiving it in its totality from its principle, simply, integrally.” 45 Principially because “in essence itself there is no division o r privation,” for “division by its very natu re is privation and nothing—no-thing, no being—exists by p rivation.” 46

Isness, however, is neither produced n o r is it alone p ro ductive. T h at is, it is not productive in itself, inasm uch as the com plem entary principle is required for production to be manifested. Nevertheless, “isness is its own act, o r ra ther it is pure act itself, as actionless actuality that fundam entally determ ines everything that is produced through essence.” 47

T hus we have four basic divisions consequent upon the prim al distinction o r determ ination o f isness, o r ra the r the consideration o f isness, not in itself, but in its relation to m anifestation. H ere Eckhart is following Jo hn Scotus Erigena, who explained: “T here is that which creates but is not created; that which is created and itself creates; that which is created and does not create; and that which is neither created nor creating in itself. . . . But the first [essence} . . . and the last [isness} . . . are one in divine reality [the unrestricted act o f knowledge}, for it can be called creative and uncreate, since being infinite [the all-inclusive Principle}, it cannot produce anything apart from itself and likewise there is no possibility o f it not being in itself and by itself.” 48

It should also be noted that while necessarily without d ifferentiation, divine essence is not only the ratio o f all p ro

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N *57duction but contains indivisibly within itself the transcend e n ta l o f tru th , goodness, and beauty which with unity “are interchangeable with being.” 49 W hen actualized u nd er the o rdering influence o f pure isness, these constitutive qualities unfold themselves for the hum an knower in the multiplicity o f determ inations and so are present in every individuality from the lowest to the highest in the hierarchy o f participative reality. In divine essence these constitutive qualities are, o f course, in perfect unity and principially coincide in the nonm anifested o rd er o f undifferentiation. But every m anifestation o r modification o f essence signifies a break in the unity, and all beings, o r participations in intelligibility, share in these qualities in d ifferent proportions.

In principial mode, o f course, all is true, good, beautiful, and united. But for the hum an knower, whose standpoint is that o f individual m anifestation and therefo re delusive, all things are not true, good, beautiful, and united. As “there is u n tru th in o u r tru th ,” 50 so there is “a lack in o u r good, ugliness along with beauty, and diversity mixed with unity.” Essence contains, therefore, “that which is conform ity to isness,” designating an expansive o r upw ard qualitative tendency toward pure knowledge. It also contains “that which is divisible and obscure,” representing a contraction or downw ard quantitative tendency toward ignorance. In o ther words, “essence has an am biguous character,” obviously, because it is already a distinction from isness and “division by its very natu re is the way toward non-being.” 51 But these aspects o f essence are not o rders o f manifestation. They are simply conditions o f existence, to which all m anifested individual beings are subject, and which must not be confused with the special conditions that limit this o r that m ode o f manifestation.

A fu rth er consideration o f isness as related to manifestation discloses the fundam ental realms between which all modes o f m anifestation are distributed. First, o f course, is transcendent isness itself which, being im m utable and infinite, pervades and sustains all manifest beings. But within the manifestation o f individuality there is the recognition o f what Eckhart designates as corruptible entity and incorrup t

i 5 8 T H E D O C T R IN E

ible entity. Both are created and therefore contingent; one o r the o ther, as indefinitely distributed am ong the multitude o f beings, is the entity o f each individuality. "God, the im m utable isness, is the Principle o f both and transcends the corruptible and incorruptible.” 52

T he corruptible entity is the existential principle o f all nonknow ing beings, which are strictly a composite o f materiality and structure and whose distinct existence is in fact transitory. T he incorruptible entity is the existential principle o f all knowing beings, the very ground o f the intellective soul and o f pure intellects.53 T hough the hum an being as such is perishable and decomposes, his one existential p rin ciple, which sustains his composite structure o f corporeality and intellectuality, is not perishable.54

It is contradictory and fallacious to think that any individual being, including the hum an being, has m ore than one substantial isness. T he isness o f each person’s integrality is the very ground o f the intellective soul, which actualizes his essence as specifically rational and which is immaterial and indestructible. As previously noted, each hum an being is one self, but free to correctly acknowledge his integrality in the ground o f the intellective soul o r incorrectly regard him self as fragm ented and separated from it. Not forgetting that infinite Personality, o r pure Spirit, is an original determ ination o f all-inclusive God, and as such really tran scends the dom ain o f individual manifestation, we are now able to understand why Eckhart affirms a personality for each hum an being and says that “when speaking o f a hum an we m ean a person.” 55 It is the g round of the intellective soul, which is wholly spiritual, that establishes the personality o f the hum an self, and “if separated from the g round the self can only be regarded as a naught, a non-entity.” 56 “T hough death {the decomposition o f the hum an being} separates soul from body and man dies,” 57 the intellective soul, being a personality and having an incorruptible existential principle as its g round, “does not die.”

W hen regarded as identical with the unrestricted isness o f Knowledge itself, the infinite Personality is, so to speak, an intrinsic aspect o f all-inclusive God, “as a ray is a portion o f

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N 159

the light, the nature o f which is present in each and every ray.” In saying this, we m ust rem em ber that God is, however, really w ithout parts, inasm uch as he is in him self “strictly indivisible and without duality.” 58 T hus the Personality, o r pure Spirit, is in no way subject to individual personality, which is but its reflection, or to the conditions that determ ine the self. Even in its relations with the self, the Personality rem ains unaffected by any individual m odifications, which are wholly contingent and not exigent to the Personality, inasm uch as they all proceed from divine essence, as from a single seed.

“T he seed needs the influential g round, but the ground does not need the seed,” and so “essence does not suffice in itself, ra the r is w anting and requires som ething o ther,” that is, “the actuality o f isness.” 59 It is “from essence,” which contains the possibilities o f m anifestation, that modifications are produced in the manifested dom ain “by the actualization o f these possibilities.” However, “since isness in itself alone directs the issuing forth o f the possibilities of essence, it is the principle o f all that is,” and “nothing that is created adds to o r takes away anything from isness.” 60 It never enters itself into m anifestation, which means that beings, insofar as they are considered individually, are really distinct from it, and nothing regarding their distinctive developm ent can affect the immutability and identity o f isness.

These rem arks should help to explain why genuine ontology always emphasizes the unity o f being even while describing it as m ultiple—despite the fact that ontology never attains to the all-inclusive isness that God is. As explained by Eckhart, ontology m ust assert no com plete whole less than universal being. This is why it points to pure metaphysics, which recognizes universal being inversely and therefore as a m anifestation o f the superessential Principle in which the only ‘com plete whole’ to be considered is all-inclusive God. “All creatures can say T , for the word is common [to self and to all beings}; but the word sum, 7 am’, signifies that which is totally all-inclusive and it is denied o f any creatu re .” 61

i 6 o T H E D O C T R IN E

T h e S i m p l e N o w o f E t e r n i t y

Eckhart has said, insofar as it can be said, that isness is the prim al distinction in knowledge once m anifestation is considered in any respect, even principially. On this point, however, we could easily be misled if we did not acquire a fu rth er understanding o f isness, an understanding that is essential in principial knowledge.

T he Meister says that “since isness is prim al and the Principle o f all things, then all the works o f God are new {that is, always fresh and present, from the standpoint o f the m anifested individual}. For what is in the Principle and whose end is always the Principle, will always be and always is. He has produced everything in principle, because he him self is the Principle. Again, he, in him self the Principle, has always p roduced, that is, always now. . . . But God, pure isness itself, is the Principle, the beginning and end. For p rior to isness nothing is, and after isness there is nothing, since isness is the term o f all becoming. Indeed, that which actually is, is not able to become, as what is already a house, though it become whitened, can no longer become a house. It is through essence [which is identically his isness, the distinction being intellectual only} that the possibility o f beings [in his essence} receive actuality from the isness that God is, and from him alone. T hus he has either produced nothing, o r he has produced all in him self as the Principle.” 62

“God has always produced, that is, always now,” designating, o f course, the nunc simplex aeternitatis 63 (the simple now o f eternity). “In eternity there is neither ‘before’ nor ‘a fte r’. For this reason what occurred a thousand years ago and what will happen a thousand years hence and what happens now are all one in eternity. T herefore what God produced a thousand years ago, what he will do in a thousand years, and what he is doing now is nothing but one single act.” 64 Consequently “production is always in the Principle—so too with us, if you do away with time, evening is m orning—and since it is always in the Principle, it is always now being produced. E ither never o r always, since the Principle, o r ‘in Principle’, is always now.” 65

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N l 6 l

Any metaphysical exposition o f Divine Knowledge is wanting if it does not focus on ‘the eternal now’, and this is why it is a recurren t them e in Eckhart’s writings. It is in respect o f the now o f eternity that he says that “the world [of manifestation] has been from eternity, for there never was a time when the world was not o r when the world did not yet exist.” T here being no time, no ‘before’ o r ‘a fter’, apart from time, “God therefore produces the world in the p rin cipial nunc aeternitatis, in which God is and which is God.” 66 As principial knowledge is always as it were in divinis, so is it always as it were in the nunc aeternitatis.

It is very im portant to be clear on this point, as Eckhart cautions. “Indeed, creation and the very act o f God is [p rin cipially} the isness that is God, yet it does not follow from this that if God created the world from eternity, the world as such [in its distinct reality] therefore is from eternity. For in the passive sense creation is not eternal, ju st as the thing created is not eternal.” 67 W hen Eckhart uses the inferior term , he will always speak o f a double isness o f the creature—in God and in itself: “It is to be noted that all creatures pertain to one isness in their principial source, namely in the W ord o f God, and this is perm anent and immutable, but the o ther isness o f things in their own p roper nature they have in themselves and from G od.” 68

But to drive hom e the correct consideration o f all m anifestation he recalls from the writings o f Isadorus that “people are always asking what God was doing before he created the heavens and the earth , o r whence there came to God the new intention to produce creatures? And I answer: no new intention ever arose in God [inasmuch as God tran scends ‘before’ and ‘a fter’, ‘o ld’ and ‘new l, for although the creature does not exist there as it does here, it is from eternity in God and in his Intellect.” 69 As St. A ugustine says: “God does not know [o r act] in a tem poral m anner and no new knowledge [intention o r act] arises in him .” 70

C onsequent upon the same question, people ask w hether o r not the procession o f the W ord and the production o f the world o f m anifestation are simultaneous. T he formal theological answer is properly that the form er precedes the


latter, and Eckhart does not dispute this. But when we consider the distinction between in via and in principio modes o f knowledge, it m ust be understood that whereas the hum an thinks in term s o f succession and therefore affirms two differen t acts, “in God there are not two or many, but one single, im mutable, and undivided act which is isness itself.” And this act is “wholly without time, multiplicity, and succession,” and so we must understand that “in the one and the same pure act [and intention} that God is, he begets his Son coeternal with him self and also creates the world.” 71 Again Eckhart rem inds us that “God has spoken once; twice have I heard this.” 72 A fter all, it is only the unwise, o r the antim etaphysician, who asks questions such as “What was God doing” o r “W here was he before m anifestation,” or “W hen was there nothing else besides him ?”— being ignoran t o f the tru th that “God was where he now is, that is, in him self and apart from whom there is nothing, for he is the self-sufficing Selfhood.” 73

As long as the intellect “hears two,” is actively knowing o r in the process o f altering its consideration from one o f time to one o f eternity, it is here on the way. “W ere the intellect always united to God in actuality it would not change. For the now wherein God created first m an and the now w herein the last man disappears and the now w herein I speak, are the same in God and not o th er than one now.” 74

T h e R e f l e c t i o n o f U n r e s t r i c t e d I s n e s s

W hen considering the relation o f the manifested world to God we m ust pre-em inently regard it as a principial relation. T hus it follows that the relation is a real one from the fact that it implies no contradiction, for it is simply a relation o f restricted isness to unrestricted isness.

It m ust therefore be carefully understood that the dependen t reality o f universal m anifestation “is a reflection.” However really related to God, it cannot without contradiction be confused with the nondependent and nonaffected reality o f the All-inclusive. “ If anyone sees a stick reflected in water, the stick appears to him to be crooked, although it is quite straight. This is due to the fact that the

T H E PR IM A L D IS T IN C T IO N

water is a coarser m edium than air. Yet the stick is both straight and not crooked in itself and also in the eye o f the man who sees it in the clarity o f the air.” 75 T he analogy is quite clear: reality appears d isordered, fluctuating, topsyturvy when understood only from the indirect standpoint o f manifestation, but when considered principially it is known as it truly is. T hough the relation is real, there are not two separate realities, for in the Principle, the reflection is not really other.

In fact the reflection o f the stick in water not only appears crooked but “may easily be mistaken for a serpent.” W hen so regarded by the self in e rro r, says Eckhart, it assumes a reality that is precarious and threatening. As long as the self does not know that it is a reflection o f the stick, but takes it seriously for a serpent, he is confused, without confidence, and im prisoned in ignorance. I f his ignorance is abolished by knowledge o f the tru th o f the stick, a change at once comes into his attitude toward the reflection. His fear is banished and full confidence is gained, though there is no change in the image, which continues to be what it was. T he reflection o f the stick does not vanish when ignorance is abolished; it is the ‘serpent’ that vanishes. As long as the hum an being does not know the real tru th o f all m anifestation, “he is disturbed and terrified by the appearance o f the world as an independen t reality and the incom parable im portance o f himself.” T he result, o f course, is that his whole approach to reality in every endeavor is grossly affected by this basic mistake o r contraction o f awareness.

W hen, however, “this ignorance is displaced by true knowledge,” he understands that “the entire world, including him self,” however real and significant, “is in no way independent, self-sufficient, o r ultimately im portant. R ather it is completely dependent, contingent, and therefore delusive in its non-Reality inasm uch as it derives all its m eaning, not from itself, but from all-inclusive isness which alone is Reality and in which the reflection is not an o th er.” 76 To regard the reflection o f the stick as a serpent is certainly the consequence o f ‘passive ignorance’. But a greater ignorance is that which is ‘positive’ when, fo r exam ple, the hum an being


uses that type o f ‘analytic reason’, which is divorced from intellect and arbitrarily constituted in an idea o f separation, as a means o f establishing the ‘serpent’ as all-inclusive reality. Metaphysics always respects reason, which is naturally constituted in the unity o f being, but it has no respect fo r its exclusive use in a separatist mode.

T hus, “the Spirit o f God moved upon the face o f the waters.” 77 Metaphysically understood by Eckhart, the ‘Spirit’ corresponds to isness and the ‘waters’ to essence. And the ground o f the intellective soul is the reflection in the water, which reflection is likewise the g round o r m anifested isness possessed by all individual beings as multibly distributed. T he prim ordial waters is the possibilities o f manifestation, insofar as the latter constitute the actualizable aspects o f substantial and universal being. M oreover, “essence is always an obediential potency to isness.” 78 But there is an o ther m eaning to the same symbolism, which is unfolded when it is carried over beyond m anifest being itself: the waters then represent “not essence but ^//-possibility, app re hended in principial m anner.” T h at is to say it em braces at the same time both the realm s o f m anifestation and nonm anifestation in its all-inclusive reality, o r God in himself. A nd the “Spirit o f G odhead {the isness o f Divine Knowledge itself} is identically all-possibility and beyond distinction.” 79

This last m eaning is, o f course, “the highest o f all.” At the degree directly below it, th rough the prim al distinction o f isness, which immediately involves its com plem ent, we have essence, with which we have still only attained the ‘seed’ o f manifestation. T hen , continuing downwards, the fu rth er basic degrees o f m anifestation may be considered, that is structureless and structured.

But without the prim al distinction o r determ ination o f isness, all considerations o f m anifestation are meaningless, fo r “isness itself is the prim al O ne, the unrestricted act o f Divine Knowledge, which is in no way affected by anything whatsoever, for apart from it there is strictly nothing.” 80

4The Inversion

Eckhart speaks prim arily to those who are capable o f sustaining a principial insight, and what he says is understood only by those who d o .1 In no sense, however, is the natural light o f the intellect to be quenched. It must be granted its full range, and in this context Eckhart has no sympathy for any anti-intellectualist tendencies whatsoever. However, since “grace does not destroy natu re but perfects it,” 2 the natural light o f intellect m ust be perfectly united with the transcendent light o f faith in the W ord. Unless that union is effected, neither intellect nor faith alone can establish true principial knowledge.

For Eckhart the first chap ter o f Genesis and the Prologue o f St. Jo h n are m ore ‘metaphysical’, though obviously less dialectical, than a peripatetic ontology. Inasm uch as both the light o f intellect and the light o f faith are identical in their com mon source; inasm uch as “all tru th , by whomsoever it be spoken [o r known], is from God,” 3 there is a sense in which it may be said that the light o f intellect derives its intelligibility from the light o f true faith. Why? Because “Christ is T ru th ,” and “believing in o rd er to u n d e rstand establishes us in h im .” 4 For the most p art Eckhart’s metaphysical writings are simply com m entaries on those scriptural texts which disclose the eternal doctrine o f Divine Knowledge, o r knowledge that is wholly within the nondual, unconditioned Selfhood.

Pure metaphysical unity, o r principial identity, cannot be stressed m ore emphatically than is done in the unrestricted divine doctrine o f Christ as revealed especially in, fo r instance, the seventeenth chapter o f St. John . This is why, according to Eckhart, we have to g round metaphysics in the doctrine o f Christ if it is to be m ade pure and if we would

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truly understand it. T he essential purpose and im portance o f that doctrine is “not to safeguard o u r intellectual insights but to perfect them .” For “Christ is the incarnate W ord o f God, eternally knowing his personal relation to and real identity with his Father, the unm anifested Principle. He is intellectually p rior to the manifestation o f universal being; he is the ineffable W ord o f God, is strictly that, is suprem e tru th .” 5

W ithout this g round metaphysics m ust always contain a certain defect, a lack o f infallible certitude, and that certitude can only proceed from God. If the all-inclusive Reality that God is gives us a term for the principial relation o f the m anifested self to infinite Selfhood, the W ord gives us the term for the essential relation o f the trinitarian Son to the trinitarian Father and thus constitutes metaphysics in allpossibility, the very content o f Divine Knowledge.

As already pointed out, the principial m ode o f knowledge is wholly in term s o f divine Subjectivity, which must in no way be confused with the type o f subjective knowledge so highly extolled by certain m odern thinkers. It is not d ifficult to understand that this latter conception, which is p resented to us as the be-all and end-all o f knowledge, is a knowing that gives prom inence to an individual point o f view. Belonging to the thinking subject, o r existential self, such knowledge emphasizes a dynamism in the hum an mind and claims to have no direct certitude o f concretely real objects but sees them only as projections o f sensations and ideas. Philosophically it is called ‘subjectivism’. Im m ediately we think o f the existential ‘lonely angst’ o f K ierkegaard on the one hand, o r o f the mentalist ‘cogito’ o f Descartes on the other, and our disciplined reflection, moved by an un limited will to know, rightly makes us wary o f such philosophical oversights.

W hen, however, Eckhart speaks in term s o f principial Subjectivity, which is divine and infinite, he is considering, as he makes perfectly clear, “a mode o f knowledge that is transcendent and pu re .” Belonging entirely to the o rd er o f the All-inclusive, “which excludes only contradiction and nothingness,” this, detached intellection is acknowledged as

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being necessarily beyond all distinctions that condition the knowledge o f individuals, w hether they be o f sense o r intelligibles. T h a t is, it is beyond all things o f which the distinction o f subject and object is the fundam ental pattern. “T h ere {in this detached intellection as identified with the purely real Subject} is found all creatures constituted in the same clarity as they are constituted in God. . . . T hus the soul enters the Primal, the Principle, w here God issues forth with his goodness [and tru th , unity, and being} into all creatures. T h ere it knows all things in God in the pure oneness in which they are in G od.” 6

T o speak with certitude in term s o f the ultimately true I, o r Self-identity, Eckhart says is to speak as one in whom grace is perfectly operative and as it were in virtue o f that operation. A nd it is always necessary to repeat that it is as it were wholly in God, o r in patria, that this standpoint is situated. Presupposed is Aquinas’s ‘way o f rem otion’, his via negativa, his ‘analogy o f intention’ as well as the em ploym ent o f inverse analogy, the principle o f which is Aquinas’s fo rmula that what the creature is secundum quid, God is per se. T he consideration o f ourselves and all o ther beings in term s o f ‘that according to which’ we and they primordially and ultimately are initiates an understand ing immeasurably m ore real and to the point o f tru th than that o f any specific determ ination o r even any experience structured by our natural habits o f mind.

I n v e r s e A n a l o g y

Eckhart insists that detached intellection, which is direct knowledge, m ust never be confused with the indirect exercise o f the rational faculty. But to affirm that it is suprarational is certainly not to regard it as irrational. Divine Knowledge never contradicts reason o r active intelligence, never renders false o r meaningless the o rd er of genuine ontology—ju st as the infinite never contradicts or falsifies the finite, o r the divine the hum an. Rational knowledge has im portance for Eckhart chiefly as the rem inder that intellectuality reflects Divine Knowledge, and also as a necessary means for the form ulation and external expression o f


tru ths that reside beyond its province. M oreover, he rightly insists that suprarational tru ths can be known in detached intellection only insofar as the instasis o f the individual intellect is apprehended as all-inclusive Intellect and hence are known in term s o f Knowledge-in-itself, which can only be identified with God. It is precisely this inversion o f the exstasis to the instasis o f knowledge that m ust be understood if insight into the principial mode is to be gained.

Not belonging to the o rd er o f individual m anifestation, this knowledge, which is o f uncreated grace and therefore as it were in God, is necessarily indisputable and indistinguishable from Divine Knowledge itself, since it is im m ediate, direct. T hus it is that when Eckhart speaks in term s o f divine Selfhood and says “My truest I is G od”; “I am the Son and not o th er”; “It is true that there, where I am in principle, there are no distinctions”; o r “While I stood in my Principle I had no G od,” 7 and so forth, he wants us always to rem em ber that these elliptic statem ents do not represent an ontological opinion. They do not represent an individual o r m ere hum an opinion at all, but the realization o f the perfect simplicity and all-inclusiveness o f primal tru th in That which, by the very realization, is divine and not o ther than the transcendent Self. For as Aquinas makes clear, only in God can the infinite capacity o f the intellect rest in the subject without having to reach out to anything.8

“In God,” says Eckhart, “there is nothing not God; in o u rselves, however, we consider all things in an ascending scale, from good to better and from better to best. But in God is neither m ore nor less. He is ju st the simple, pure, essential T ru th .” 9 It is in statem ents such as this that we are introduced into inverse analogy.

Now in the concrete o rd er all analogous perfections imply either a dependence upon the one principle o r an o rdering to the one end; also analogous perfections adm it o f degrees o f m ore o r less that are essentially dependen t upon one another. Eckhart rem inds us, however (since we invariably forget it), that the degrees o f analogous perfections that are essentially dependent upon each o ther are not literally degrees o f ‘m ore o r less’. I f we take the ‘m ore o r less’

T H E INV ER SION

literally, what we would have would be fundam entally univocal, o r what Aquinas calls “analogy according to being only” and not “according to signification.” It is not that God is more perfect; there is no ‘m ore o r less’ in the All-inclusive and “perfection is not that which is m ade m anifest,” inasmuch as the manifested “contains an intrinsic lack.” R ather the impact o f ‘proportional analogy’ is on the proportion itself.10

As the hum an self is to isness, so God is to isness. But what is here signified is: As the hum an self is to individual isness, so God is to unm anifested, all-inclusive isness. Although the middle term ‘isness’ is the same it does not mean an identity but an analogy o f proportions. On the o ther hand it must also be said: As that which has not its sufficient reason (or principle) in itself is to that in which its sufficient reason resides, so individual isness is to all-inclusive isness. So the self is to unrestricted Selfhood, and in this sense “the creature is not, only God is.” 11

T hus Eckhart can principially say: “All creatures [as such] are a m ere nothing. I do not say that they are small or something; they are a m ere nothing. W hat is without pure isness [as its sufficient reason in itself] really is not.” 12 M oreover, “In God creatures are identical in the O ne, they are God in God. In themselves they are nothing.” 13 T he same can be said o f every transcendent perfection that has its sense in m anifested individuality according to its o rder toward God, and this, o f course, is the analogy o f a ttribution. A part from this o rd er the individual as such is “pure limit and unrelated negation,” which is nothing in the sense o f a contradiction o r an impossibility. And apart from the o rd er o f attribution the analogy o f proportionality would be found to rely on a purely logical substitute for the notion o f isness.

Inverse analogy is within the o rd er o f uncreated grace, within the o rd er o f the all-inclusive Knower. Analogy is inverse as between the Principle and its m anifest reflection. And if Eckhart speaks confidently and vividly in these terms, it is because what he says depends upon insights that, with the traditional background that supports them , are

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available to us prim arily, if not solely, in the metaphysics o f “the negation o f negations.” “Every creature contains an initial denial; the one denies it is the other; even an angel denies that it is ano ther angel. But God contains the negation o f negations, and he negates all otherness, for there is no th ing apart from God. All creatures are in God; they are in his own Godhead, which means directly knowledge o f allpossibility, as I said above. He is the Father o f all divinity. I say one G odhead because there he is unm anifested, im m utable, and unthought. T hus by negating som ething o f God- — though by negating, for instance, goodness o f God I do not negate God—by negating o f God som ething that I assert that he is not—even this negation m ust go. God is One, he is the negation o f negations.” 14 H ence the inversion must be complete.

T h e ‘inversion’ expresses the discontinuity; ‘that which is inverted’ expresses the analogous identity o f an attribution, and therefore the analogy o f attribution is fully p resupposed. A focus o f inverse analogy, which for all Christians is inexhaustible, is in the crowning with thorns, the ironies o f the trial o f Jesus, the crucifixion itself, and the resurrection. O r, with Eckhart, we may consider it in ano ther way: by the very fact that o u r notions o f transcendent perfections are obtained from what is in direction, or in via, their application to what is ‘wholly d irect’ o r in divinis, involves a “reversal in a certain strict respect.” 15 For exam ple, “G od’s pure act is a rest m ore active than any striving” o r “Divine Knowledge is unknow ing knowledge w ithout activity and the need o f any object.” 16 This “certain strict respect” is total so far as o u r consideration is focused on a m ode o f being and knowledge ‘in direction’.

In the Principle, which is w ithout direction and therefore direct, the Principle is not the m anifested, but the m anifested is the Principle. Inverse analogy is not univocity; it is “the apprehension o f all things, so to speak, tu rned outside in”; it is totally within, and “that which is wholly within can only be in God, for he has not outside.” “T h erefo re the shell m ust be broken if what is in is to come out; for if you want to know reality uncovered, all likenesses [analogies]

T H E IN V ER SIO N 1 7 1

have to be shattered. W hen the intellect finds the O ne [by the negation o f negations}, in which all is included, the intellect is inverted and is the O ne.” 17

W hen considering the relation o f unconditioned isness to m anifestation, Eckhart is in no disagreem ent with Aquinas, who says that the infinite isness is distinct, definite, and determ inate. This because they rightly want to declare that God is not vague, indefinite, o r indeterm inate in o u r natu ral understand ing o f these term s, and also that God is in no sense a logical abstraction. As the individual is determ inate in its limited way, so God is determ inate in his ineffable, infinite way.

Yet in tru th this mode o f analogy, as noted in the preceding chapter, is concessive to a standpoint that is situated in the midst o f the diversity and distinction o f m anifestation.18 This is not a standpoint adopted voluntarily but the participative standpoint o f o u r very hum an condition. From our natural and rational way o f knowing we strive to transcend that condition by means o f analogies drawn from it. But at the same time we are obliged to adm it that “nature cannot transcend natu re ,” 19 and that the way in which any divine attribute is realized in God not only m ust rem ain incom prehensible but m ust involve a total inversion. For we, including all manifestation, are already inversions “as the reflection is the inversion o f its principle.” Such a striving is certainly justified so far as we acknowledge that only thus predicated o f God are the divine attributes true. W hereas the rational intellect is, in the act o f affirming, conform ing itself to God, it nevertheless does not com prehend the content o f what it affirms.

“H ere on earth we grow in likeness, but there in patria we are bound in unity.” 20 In o ther words, the striving o f the rational faculty bears the impress o f repose, affirm ations their own negations, and analogy points to its own inversion. “An analogy is an ‘outw ork’. I do not see a thing unless it has some likeness to me, nor can I know a thing unless it is analogous to me. Yet God contains all things h idden in him self—not, however, this o r that as distinct, but one in unity. T he eye receives color, the ear senses tone and the


tongue tastes. It is the case o f like to like.” But “the term o f likeness in knowledge is unity,” and “unity is identity.” T hus, “in the ‘inw ork’, o r inversion o f likeness, the intellect and God are one, there [in God} w here we are the Son.” 21 I f “nothing unites as much as likeness,” it is because ‘likeness,’ “which pertains solely to the o rd er o f participative being,” signifies its com plete inversion, which is identity in principle.

“I was once asked why one blade o f grass is so unlike another. I said, it is m ore marvelous that they are so much alike. A M aster says that the blades o f grass are all d ifferent owing to the overflowing goodness o f God which he pours out abundantly in all creatures the m ore to show his majesty. But I say it is m ore rem arkable how much alike the blades o f grass are, because ju s t as all the angels are identical in their original Principle, so all the blades o f grass are the same there and all things are identical there [w here they are the inverse o f their difference here}.” 22

T he possibility o f the inversion and its realizable tru th is g rounded in the primacy o f knowledge, which is established “in the very reality o f God who is Knowledge-in-itself, o r the unrestricted act o f Intellect-as-such,” and also “in the basic natu re o f man, which is intellect.” 23 O n this point Eckhart stresses his agreem ent with two masters: with Aquinas, who clarified the notion o f knowledge as being “essentially unitive,” and with Aristotle, who explained why intellect has “the possibility o f understanding all things.” 24 T hus “knowledge and reason unite the soul with God. Reason falls into universal being, but knowledge runs ahead; it goes on and breaks through [the ontological objective} in o rd er that the only-begotten Son o f God may be born [or ra ther that Divine Knowledge may be realized}.” 25

T h e P r i m a c y o f K n o w l e d g e

Eckhart says: “I am not blessed because God is goodness [o r tru th , beauty, unity, o r being}. Never should I desire God to bless me with his goodness, for that he cannot do. I am blessed only by the fact that God is Knowledge in itself and that I know it.” 26

T H E INV ER SION 1 7 3

Elsewhere Eckhart says that “knowledge is h igher than life and nobler than being.” 27 Indeed, knowledge is even higher than love, in the sense that “knowledge stands in itself [whereas love stands in knowledge]. For knowledge is better than love. . . . Knowledge is better inasm uch as it founds the love.” But to prevent us from confusing this direct, contem plative knowledge with o u r m ere hum an m ode o f indirect, discursive knowledge, he adds that “no distinct thought attaches to this knowledge, it stands wholly in itself, it is detached and apprehends God directly as un manifest, as he is in himself.” 28 Love is desirous o f being, but, as previously explained “God [in himself] is that which necessarily transcends being.” “T he intellective soul that does not go out to consider things externally, comes hom e to stay in unconditioned pure Intellect. It desires not, nor does it have anxiety o r concern. Knowledge is the basic principle and foundation o f all being. Love, on the o ther hand, has no hold except in knowledge.” 29

Now this coming hom e to stay in unconditioned Knowledge signifies the transposition o f knowledge in via into knowledge in God. T hus the intellect inverts itself, as it were, into its im m ediate Principle, pure Intellect itself. T hen all is known as in Divine Knowledge wherein “u n d erstanding penetrates tru th and goodness, casts itself into unrestricted isness and knows God without a nam e.” 30

To be without a nam e or beyond determ ination is to be that o f which being is in function. And that can only be “supra-being and indeed supra-isness”; in o ther words, “ineffable, unconditioned Knowledge-in-itself” 31 “Knowledge- in-itself ” is precisely that which is not and cannot be a name o r distinct determ ination, ra ther it is that by which all acts o f intelligence, names, and determ inations are actualized and rendered functional. God certainly and infinitely is, but the intellectual primacy o f knowledge must be m aintained, as it has been throughout, for being is always in function o f knowledge, and unrestricted isness is unrestricted knowability.

In raising this axial question in a renow ned disputation in Paris, Eckhart the metaphysician, fully cognizant o f u n

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created grace as the requisite actualization o f ‘inversion’, had to assert once and for all the proposition most essential to the doctrine. It is this: “God does not know because he is, ra ther he is because he knows, in the sense that God is unrestricted knowledge and understanding , and knowledge is the foundation o f his isness. For as St. Jo hn says: ‘In the Principle was the Word [Logos, Intellectus}, and the Word was with God, and God was the W ord.’ T he Evangelist did not say: In the Principle was Being and God was Being.” 32 In o ther words, the suprem e Principle is “Divine Knowledge in the isness o f itself,” the unrestricted Knower o f all about all. “W hen we apprehend God in his Being we take him in his threshold, for Being is the forecham ber in which he dw'ells. W here, then, is God in his tem ple w herein he shines in his glory? Pure Intellect, or Knowledge-in-itself, is the tem ple o f God.” 33

“To ascend, therefore [by God’s act which effects the inversion), to Knowledge-in-itself is to be united to God. To be united, to be one [and not two), is to be identical with God [principially). For God is One. All that which is except Knowledge-in-itself is distinctive, is creaturely, is distinct from God,34 is not God in himself. For in God [the nonmanifested and unrestricted act o f Divine Knowledge] there is no o ther, no distinction, no division.” 35

T hus this principial understanding o f God-as-Intellectus becomes a new starting point in pure metaphysics. But Eckhart will add that “if you want to designate Divine Knowledge as Isness, it is all right with me, only I insist all the same that if there is that in God that you call isness, it p ertains to him through Knowledge.” 36

This is the very root o f the doctrine Eckhart expounds, that is, the metaphysical affirm ation that the reflected light, in its simple regenerate o r baptized state o f intellection, ‘inworks’ the inversion. T hus it understands first o f all the transcendent, im mutable, superem inent Principle that is ever present to it as meaning, in which it contem plates and w ithout which all individual realities are inconceivable, nonexistent. “Since God is supra-being and supra-isness [insofar as being and isness are determ inations o r distinctions] he is

T H E IN V ER SIO N *75therefore the Principle o f all being and isness. God tran scends all num ber and qualification. For he is one w ithout num ber, triune without trinity, good without quality.” 37 It follows therefore that “the Principle itself is eternally pure Divine Knowledge in which there is nothing o ther than the unrestricted isness o f understand ing .” “God is Knowledge- in-itself, and his isness is total understanding .” To be is in function o f Knowledge; Knowledge is not in function o f anything. “Isness is God, but God is Knowledge-in-itself, the all-inclusive Reality.” 38

Such a consideration is, o f course, beyond the distinction o f isness and essence, and also beyond the relation o f pure isness to manifestation. “As the point is never the line, so the Principle is never the principiate.” 39 But if this consideration is effectively made, it is then, in the consideration, impossible to conceive o f a being that is not a ‘knowing’, for “knowledge is the basis and foundation o f all being.” 40 In tellection in this context o f Divine Knowledge is not a m ental activity, nor is it specifically hum an o r angelic. But in this context a stone ‘knows’ that it is not a plant, gold differs from silver by its ‘intellectual’ particularity, and “this wood has an intellectual image in God; it is not merely intellectual, it is [principially] Intellect-as-such.” 41

T he unerring ‘instinct’ o f animals is a lesser ‘intellect’, and m an’s intellect may be called a h igher ‘instinct’, for “you m ust understand that all creatures are by natu re endeavoring to attain this end: to be one with God. Heaven would cease revolving if they did not hun t and seek God, o r oneness with God.” 42 If the discursive faculty, caught as it is between instinct and intellect, is constantly in the process o f nostalgic striving, it is because it, in a sense, contains a seductive simulation o f Divine Knowledge.

“God is in all things by m ode o f intelligence and is m ore im m ediate in things than they are in themselves.” Again: “God’s making me to know is the same as my knowing [principially], so my knowing is his.” 43 And while we can make no sense o f an experience that is not a knowing, or not in function o f knowledge, we have no doubt whatsoever in recognizing knowledge itself, which is not in function o f


experience and which transcends experience. We know innately, in the immediacy o f the unlim ited and detached will to know, that what we seek is knowledge. “W ere God able to tu rn away from knowledge [which is impossible}, I would cling to knowledge and let God go; but God is pure Knowl- edge-in-itself.” 44

Eckhart knows that whereas experience is what he p recisely cannot directly desire, he cannot not desire knowledge, and when he says that this m ust be an “unknowing knowledge” he simply underlines the fact. For “this unknowing knowledge [by inversion} is wholly transform ed knowledge, not ignorance, which comes from lack o f knowing; it is by knowing that we get to this unknowing. T hen we know with divine knowing; then o u r unknowing is ennobled and adorned with supranatural, pu re meta-physical knowledge.. . . Inasm uch as God is limitless in giving, so the intellective soul is limitless in receiving; as God is all-possibility in act, so the intellect is profoundly able to accept that act; thus its inversion by God into God. God m ust act, the soul m ust suffer [o r receive that act} for God to know and love him self in the soul and for the soul to know with his knowledge and love with his love, and since the soul is far holier in him than in itself, it follows that its holiness depends on his act far m ore than on its own.” 45 M oreover, “to know God in principial mode, your knowledge m ust be inverted into dow nright unknow ing knowledge, to a forgetting o f yourself and all individuality.” 46

God, o r unm anifested Knowledge-in-itself, may be called ‘unknow ing’, but only in regard to individual manifestation. Principially the hum an knowing process is already a negation. Hence, as previously noted, the negation o f this negation is the infinite affirm ation o f Divine Knowledge, which is supraindividual as Personality is supraindividual. T he un conditioned Knower is sufficient unto him self by m etaphysical necessity. Since he excludes only contradiction o r strict nothingness, he is the first and im m ediate Principle o f all reality, w hether existing in fact or merely capable o f existing, manifest and nonm anifest, actual and possible—that is, purely principial, This is the principial starting point: the

T H E IN V ER SIO N 177divine Selfhood, the unrestricted isness o f Knowledge-in-itself. T hus Eckhart, in the nam e o f Divine Knowledge, first understands the Principle and then proceeds to explain all manifestation, all distinction, and all being in function o f That which is the All-inclusive, All-possibility, unconditioned Meaning in itself.

It should be clear that when Eckhart speaks o f the p rio rity o f knowledge and affirm s that isness is in function o f knowledge, he is speaking in the intellectual o rd er only. “ In pure isness there is no place for opposites o r correlations.” 47 Isness and knowledge are in no sense opposed but are entirely identical in God himself, who “in knowing him self knows his infinite isness.” It is the knowability o f isness that m ust be insisted upon. ‘To be’ is to be knowable, and to be knowable, manifested o r unm anifested, is to be in function o f knowledge.

N or has the doctrine o f the priority o f knowledge anything in com m on with what certain m odern philosophers extol and call ‘the necessity o f though t’, which is wholly inappropriate in metaphysics unless it directly involves the apprehension o f the ‘necessity’ in the isness o f things. For what would follow if it were a necessity o f thought only? T hen , while, for example, one could think that this tree is barren and is not barren , the tree itself might be barren or not be barren, and known to the knower as that. But to adm it this is to adm it that one can think this tree to have and not have, in identical time, place, and respect, the same character in the very act o f asserting that one cannot think it; and this is self-contradictory.

I f Eckhart also says that God is neither ‘isness’ n o r ‘nonisness’, he wants not only to emphasize the priority o f knowledge but also to indicate a correct consideration o f Divine Knowledge itself, which, being eternal and infinite, transcends all determ inations. God is not ‘strict nothingness’, nor is he in him self ‘isness’ as a first distinction. T hat is, he is not distinguishable from That o f which all true dete rm inations are in function; he is not an isness, not a God, for he is beyond all distinctions and indistinguishable in him self. No Aristotelian need be disturbed on this im portant


point, because the principle o f the excluded middle is not violated by the special sense in which Eckhart defines these terms. M oreover, Aristotelian thought does not consider the ‘infinite’ in the purely metaphysical sense o f that which is All-possibility, excluding only strict nothingness, but in the sense o f the merely indefinite. However, the metaphysics o f Aquinas and Eckhart necessarily does, for the simple reason that in their case metaphysics is constituted in the revealed W ord and the transcendent term o f the detached and un limited will to know.48

D i s t i n c t i o n a n d I d e n t i t y

It follows from Eckhart’s emphasis on the priority o f knowledge that a basic point must constantly be stressed; in fact, without it there can be only a com plete m isunderstanding o f pure metaphysics o r detached intellection. It is this: All the principles and determ inations about which we have previously spoken, and which Eckhart describes as distinct, are certainly so when considered from the standpoint o f individuality. But they are so only from this standpoint, for in truest reality they merely constitute so many m anifested modalities o f all-inclusive God. A lthough contingent o r relational insofar as they are manifested, they serve as the expression o f certain possibilities o f God, that is, those, and only those, which are possibilities o f manifestation.

Yet these possibilities, in principle and in truest reality, are indistinct from God. This is why Eckhart says they m ust prim arily be considered in the unity and identity o f God and no longer in relation to beings, not even the hum an being. And when they are so considered they are u n d e rstood as being in truest reality God himself, who is w ithout duality and apart from whom there is strictly nothing, either manifested o r unm anifested. “For he who apprehends duality o r who apprehends a distinction does not ap p re hend God.” 49

M oreover, w hatever leaves som ething apart from itself, even a possibility, cannot be the All-inclusive inasm uch as it is restricted by that which it excludes. T hus the universe o f

T H E IN V ER SIO N !79contingent m anifestation is only distinguishable from God in a delusive way, while God is really transcendently distinct from all that he perm eates. Why? Because we cannot apply to God any o f the determ inate attributes that pertain to the created universe and since universal contingency in its indefinite entirety is naught in relation to God’s infinity.

Eckhart can therefo re say that God is all-inclusive for the very reason that God is infinite. On the o ther hand, though all beings are in God and that which is in God is God, they are not ‘in God’ when considered from the standpoint o f real distinction, or ra the r in their quality o f being conditioned and relational entities. For their existence as such contains a degree o f unreality, and so they are delusive.

“It is impossible ever to have two things completely equal in the universe o r to have two things the same in every respect. For then they would no longer be two, nor would they stand in relation to one another. . . . We always find and confront diversity, difference in structure and the like, apart from the realm o f Divine Knowledge. ‘But thou are the sam e,’ we are told in the Psalms.50 For identity is unity. From what has been said one may consider how ‘he who binds him self to God is one with him spiritually.’ 51 For In- tellect-as-such [o r pure Spirit} pertains to God and ‘God is O ne.’ T o the extent, therefore, that a being has intellect, to that extent it has God and the O ne, and to that extent it is[by inversion} one and not-two with G od............... Hence Godis never and nowhere as God save in Intellect.” 52

“An exam ple 53 o f all that we have been saying [concerning inversion and principial knowledge} may be found in the consideration o f the ju s t man, insofar as he is just, in relation to justice which begets him [and o f which he is a manifestation}. T hus it is obvious that the ju st m an as ju s t is in justice. For how could he be ju s t if he were outside ju stice, if he stood w ithout, separated from justice? . . . T he ju s t man is the ‘w ord’ o f justice, by means o f which justice asserts and manifests itself. For if justice did not justify anyone, no one would know it; it would be known only to itself. . . . T he ju st man proceeding from and manifested by ju s

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tice is distinguished from it by that very fact [that he is considered as manifested}. . . . Yet the ju st m an is not differentiated from justice, since ‘ju s t’ signifies justice alone.

“It is clear from this that the ju st man is the offspring and son o f justice. He is called, and actually is, the son because he became diverse in person but not d ifferentiated in nature, since otherwise justice would not manifest the ju st man. . . . In m anifesting o r justifying the ju s t man, justice does not cease to be justice nor does it cease to be the p rin ciple o f the ju s t man. . . . T h e ju s t man as ju s t is what he is, wholly and completely, from and in justice itself as his p rin ciple. F urtherm ore, the ju s t man, insofar as he is just, knows nothing, not even himself, save in justice. Indeed, how could he know him self as a ju s t man apart from justice itself, which is in fact the principle o f the ju st man? M anifest justice is the ‘w ord’ o f justice in its principle. . . . But the ju st man in justice is no longer manifest justice, but is unm anifested justice itself. . . . M oreover, the ju s t man in justice itself, his principle, by the very fact o f being u n m anifested, the principle w ithout principle, is also light [or intellect} itself. For every single thing is light and is radiant in its prim al principle.

“O r to consider the question from a d ifferent standpoint: it is always the case that the principle is the light o f that which it originates, the superior the light o f its inferior. In versely, the thing originated and inferior, by the very fact that it is inferior and subsequent and as having its being from another, is in itself darkness [relationally speaking}, the darkness o f privation o r negation; o f privation, that is to say, in the realm o f the transient and corporeal; o f negation in the realm o f the individual intellect. . . . For every created being as such is tainted with the shadow o f no th ingness . . . and therefore delusive. . . . For the ju s t man, whom we are now discussing by way o f example, considered in him self o r fo r what he is in him self is not light. . . . T he ju s t m an o r that which is just, being dark in itself, does not shine. In justice, however, which is its principle, it does shine, and justice in turn shines in it, although by reason o f its inferiority it as such does not com prehend justice itself.

T H E IN V ER SIO N l 8 l

‘T h e light shines in darkness, and the darkness com prehended it not.’ 54 It is clear that justice is present in its entirety in every ju s t man. For half o f justice is not justice. But if it is entire in every ju s t man, it is also entirely transcend en t to every ju s t m an and everything ju s t.” 55

It has been thought im portan t here to quote extensively from this detailed exemplification o f the requisite inversion and as it arises for special com m ent in the M eister’s Latin exposition on the last Gospel. But it m ust not be forgotten that this is, for Eckhart, “only one o f many possible analogies.” A nd so it m ust be realized that “justice in itself, as here understood, is the negation o f a negation”; it is the “transposition [or inversion} o f the distinct attribute and com prehensible only in term s o f Divine Knowledge.”

T h a t which is designated o f individual beings and which cannot apply to God is simply an expression o f relationship. Insofar as this relationship is delusive, all distinctions are equally delusive, because one o f its term s disappears when brought into the presence o f the other, nothing being able to en ter into correlation with God. T he determ ination o f ‘justice’ when brought into God disappears. So the intellective soul is really distinct from God, but when brought into God and considered in Divine Knowledge, it as such vanishes. “T hus it is that whatever comes to God is inverted; however insignificant it is, when b rought into God, it turns from itself. T ake this, for instance: I f I have wisdom, I am not myself as such wisdom. I can gain wisdom, I can lose it. But w hatever is in God is God.” 56

It is the inversion that carries all things over into God, so that it is only in principle that all things are God, and it is also only God who constitutes the ir reality. “God is neither anything n o r all things, but in principle all things are God.” 57 It is precisely this that m ust always be rem em bered if there is to be a p ro p er understand ing o f the principial knowledge that Eckhart constantly expounds.

It is, then, “silly to inquire w hether God is o r is not in this o r that being. God is in all beings and all possible beings as their Principle. T h at is why God is acknowledged as all- inclusive. T h a t which wills certain possibilities to be beings is


not itself subject to the same laws as beings. T h a t which wills beings to be limited is itself unlim ited.” As for m anifestation: “God produces the succession o f its modes, but he is not that succession. He is the Principle o f all causes and effects, but he is not the causes and effects [which are particular and contingent]. He is the Principle o f expansion and contraction, o f birth and death, and o f changes o f state, but he him self neither expands nor contracts, nor does he change in any way. All being proceeds from him and is modified by and according to his will [which is identically his isness]. He is in all beings, sustaining them in reality; but he is not identical with them , being neither d ifferentiated nor limited in any way. In prim al Reality, however, all beings are in God and are God.” 58

T he unity and identity o f God are inviolable. No distinction arising in individual m anifestation, such as the distinction between knower, knowing, and known, affects the unity and identity o f God. It is as Primal that God in him self is the all-inclusive Principle and as nonprim al that the principiate is God. But it does not follow that God ceases in any way to be without duality, for the nonprim al is delusive insofar as the principiate is considered apart from the Principle.

T herefore, to speak o f God the Son as polar to God the Father is wholly inappropriate , for such an expression not only ignores the Holy Spirit, which annihilates all polarity, but presupposes a com parison o r a correlation that cannot possibly be. ‘Son’ is delusive if separated from ‘Father’. “If we are the Son, we must have the Father; no one can say he is a son unless he has a father, nor fa ther unless he has a son.” 59 T he principiate is not other, never separated or apart from its Principle, although the Principle is primal. God is O ne as truest reality, w ithout duality as suprem e Principle. He is not diversified by any limitations from his modes o f manifestation, structured as well as structureless. “He is the W ord in every possible state and the W ord in itself is God and indistinguishable from G od.” 60

This explains why it can be said principially that God freely manifests him self in diverse ways in the indefinite

T H E INV ER SION 183

multiplicity o f intelligibles without any external means and without his unity and identity being thereby affected. In o ther words, although beings exist only in effect o f his m anifestation, it is not possible to say that God is really modified. This apparen t difficulty, which plagues many interpreters o f Eckhart, is resolved once we recall that we are now considering that which is well beyond the distinction o f isness and essence, and that both isness and essence are already identical in all-inclusive Reality.61

W hen the notion o f ‘multiplicity in unity’ is transposed beyond distinctions, it is no longer with determ inate isness o r essence that we are dealing, but with infinite all-possibility. “God is indivisible and without parts, but this is no objection to [this notion o f } multiplicity in his O neness.” 62 It is not his im m utable totality that issues forth in universal m anifestation, nor is it any o f his parts, for he has none. R ather it is simply, as Eckhart adds, “God him self as considered u n d er the special aspect o f distinctive determ ination .”

If God can be so considered, it is because “God includes all-possibilities in him self w ithout these possibilities being in any sense parts o f his reality.” T o deny the possibility o f considering God in term s o f distinction, and therefore in term s o f individual m anifestation o r as ‘creative act’, is to limit God, that is, to negate that possibility as being constituted in All-possibility. N either his immutability nor his infinite isness is violated and no contradiction whatsoever is involved when a special distinction is considered and d eterm ined as real. Nonetheless, it is only one possibility within the all-possibility that God is. A fter all, “distinctions are m ade wholly within the unrestricted actuality o f Knowl- edge-in-itself; separations are always without, and it is only when separation o r partition from God is conceived that contradiction arises.” 63

“If the intellective soul would truly know God it m ust not consider anything in time, for as long as the soul is regard ing anything in time or place, o r anything external wise, it can never know God. . . . I f the soul would truly know God it m ust have nothing in com m on with nothing. T he knower o f God knows that creatures in themselves are a nothing.


Com pared one with ano ther a creature appears fair and as som ething, but com pared with God it is nothing.” 64

D i v i n e N e c e s s i t y

Since God contains all things and all-possibility in principle, he likewise may be considered as “om nipotent, capable o f every act, though actionless, without any distinctive motive o r objective end .” 65 T he inverse o f the individual act, to which distinct motive and objective pertain, is that there is in God only his will, which is identically his infinite actuality, and which eternally wills only himself. Hence, as already noted, no motive o r special end should be assigned to the determ ination o f universal manifestation.

C onsidered in itself, the divine will is God and only to be regarded intellectually, and not really, as a distinct aspect o f All-possibility. I f it is d ifferentiated from the Principle in o rd er to be separately considered, it is then nothing but illusion, that is, unreal in its exclusively contingent sense. It is this that m ust not be forgotten if there is to be a p roper understand ing o f what now follows:

“I will now say som ething I never said before. W hen God created the heavens, the earth and all creatures (in the nunc aeternitatis), God did no work. He had nothing to do; there was no activity in him. . . . God said: “Let us make a likeness—not thou Father, nor thou Son n or thou Holy Spirit, ra ther we the Holy T rinity in concert [which essentially signifies the knowledge o f all-possibility], we will make a likeness.” W hen God m ade m an [in the eternal now} he w rought in the intellective soul his like-work, his ever-abiding like-work. T h at like-work was so great that it was nothing o ther than the like-work o f God. God’s natu re necessitates that he must act in the soul. Blessed, blessed be God! As God acts in the soul he loves his act. W here the soul is now wherein God loves his act, there is the soul so great that this act is nothing o ther than love; the love in tu rn is nothing o th er than God. God loves him self and his essence and his isness and his Godhead. In his love [o r divine will] wherein God loves himself, therein he loves all creatures— not as creatures, ra th e r creatures as God.” Love in God,


however, “is the unrestricted act [isness] o f his knowledge,” is identical with knowledge itself. A nd continuing, he says: “God knows 66 himself. In the knowledge wherein he knows him self he knows all creatures, not as creatures, ra the r as God.” 67

W hen from the instasis o r inverted standpoint it is said: T he m eaning o f the intellect, which is reflected knowledge, is God, there is no implied affirm ation that God is reflected knowledge. God cannot be reflected knowledge since “he is pure, transcendent Knowledge-in-itself.” Eckhart rem inds us that “it is impossible for God to be formally all things.” T rue , God is not the intellect, is not reflected knowledge— “God is neither this nor that, God is only God.” 68 O ne must, however, say that the intellect, inasm uch as it is, signifies God, has God for its meaning; otherwise the intellect would be devoid o f any reality. This is simply saying that the Principle o f the intellect’s isness is God, that he is meaning as the Principle o f all being and o f all intelligibility.

Now the im m ediate consequence o f the intellect’s distinct reality is the presence in itself o f an inverted and transcenden t m eaning that is pure Intellect, o r Knowledge-in-itself. And transcendence indicates, as noted throughout, not a h igher scale o f being but that which is “beyond being” and therefore the inversion o f universal manifestation. T o identify infinite Intellect with the individual intellect is delusion and the source o f delusion and o f the insane works that men have w rought. It is, as Eckhart says, the reverse identification that is m ade in principial intellection and that makes for true knowledge. As Eckhart has already frequently explained, a failure to understand this p reem inent tru th is a failure to understand the m ode o f Divine Knowledge.

In the long passage that we have ju s t quoted Eckhart insists that “God’s natu re necessitates that he m ust act in the soul.” Elsewhere he will say: “To stop God loving me would be to deprive him o f his G odhead,” and “ I am more necessary to God than he is to m e.” 69 For the faculty o f reason these are disturbing statem ents, if rem oved from the context o f principial knowledge. But in his Latin com m entary

i8 6 T H E D O C T R IN E

on the first chap ter o f Genesis he will put it this way: “Given that God acts by natural necessity, then I say: God acts and produces th rough his infinite reality. But God’s infinite reality is knowledge itself and with him isness is in function o f knowledge; therefore he produces in being because he is knowledge itself.” 70 In o ther words, ‘necessity’ is taken in the o rd er o f intelligence ra ther than in the o rd er o f existence.

W hen we normally think o f ‘necessity’ we think o f “what cannot be otherwise,” 71 which in this connection asserts necessary being in an exclusive way, since the ‘otherwise’ excludes all o ther possibilities. W hat we are doing, o f course, is relating knowledge to being and apprehend ing it in function o f being. For Eckhart, however, there is ano ther and, in principial o r inverted mode, a tru e r form ula: “what cannot not be thus,” 72 which excludes nothing but what is excluded by the ‘thus’, which may in principle be every thus that does not o f itself imply lim itation or contradiction. W hereas the first form ula may be affirm ed only of God as suprem e substantial Being, Eckhart’s is applicable in principle to “every divine possibility in G odhead,” 73 o r in unrestricted knowledge itself. For ‘possibility’ here, as already explained, does not refer to the conjectures o f hum an logic, which are m ere reflections o f All-possibility from which no existential deduction can be made.

It is in virtue o f “divine necessity” in this sense, that is, in God as Knowledge-in-itself, that Eckhart understands the All-inclusive as necessitating its own affirm ation, without which it would not be all-inclusive. But affirm ation as such, by virtue o f its exclusiveness, has a character o f negation. He rem inds us how “the Son is the affirm ation o f the Father, but the Father is not the Son, although the Son and the Father are O ne.” 74 H ere again Eckhart is with Aquinas, who insists that ‘distinction’ and not ‘o therness’ is the principle o f plurality.75 In o ther words, the All-inclusive would not be transcendently infinite, would not be All-possibility, unless it also included in an unfathom able way the possibility o f its own negation and every m ode o f its negation.

T ranscenden t negation, according to Eckhart, in no way


implies ‘strict contradiction’. “God cannot contradict h im self’,” bu t “his Self-giving is a Self-negating.” H ence “there w here God works his eternal work in the soul, he negates him self in the soul.” “God negates his very being [as suprem e Substance} in his haste to disclose the whole abyss of his Godhead and the all-possibility o f his unm anifested isness.” 76 If, in principle and in a perfectly strict sense, God negates him self in the m anifested self, it is because without this divine Self-negation, God would be the m anifested self in his affirm ation.

In no sense does Eckhart conclude either that there is a kenosis o f God or that All-possibility implies an ultimate indeterm ination. He repeatedly insists that “God is not indeterm inate, not privation.” 77 T he Unconditioned is not indeterm inate. T he transcendent All-possibility is simply that which is not m ade evident by thought o r by word o r by anything whatsoever, yet is that by which thought and word as well as everything are m ade evident. Indeterm inancy does not in any way apply to the Principle, but ra ther to the m ere potentiality o f nature. Indeterm inancy is below being, u n conditioned All-possibility is above and beyond it. And if we say that this consideration o f God as Knowledge-in-itself makes for a dialectical difficulty in presenting a theory, Eckhart will ask us w hether we really have to present a theory! He does not present a theory in the philosophical sense o f the term , but only so many springboards to That in which and by which all knowledge has its intelligibility. “Since every affirm ation is a limitation and hence a negation, then the negation o f an affirm ation is a negation o f a negation and as such divine, infinite affirm ation.” 78 How frequently we find him using inverse analogy and pointing out the requisite o f negatio negationist

All words referring to the principial o rder, w hether solely mental o r audible and written, are formalizations o f that which is intrinsically without structure o r individuality.79 For this reason the individual word is delusive, not in the sense that many m odern semanticists o r linguistic analysts insist, but in the sense that the word is o f that which is a reflection o f the W ord o f God. T he word is necessary for


hum an understanding and com m unication, but though it may enlighten, it is nevertheless true that the word killeth.

T he silence o f ignorance is hardly distinguishable from the quantity o f m isdirected words. But the silence o f knowledge is indistinguishable from the W ord o f God, and that silence should never be d isturbed by words unless it can be im proved by those which signify participatory awareness and ultimately the glory o f the principial mode. In this respect hum or and elliptic utterances play an im portant role insofar as they divert the rational m ind from that overwhelming seriousness with which it considers its own p reem inence and the priority o f individuality and ontological cognition. T h ere is no direct way o f affirm ing that which is beyond affirm ation, and any dialectic leading there m ust have a quasi-symbolic value. W hatever it retains that is true, effulgent, and positive is there to indicate the leap beyond itself, that is, its inversion in strict principial ‘m ode’, assuming that such an expression is here still appropriate.

Beyond this principial “unknow ing knowledge” there is nothing to be known, inasm uch as all is realized as inverted and transform ed by it. Being the knowledge that transcends all words, symbols, and distinctions, it nonetheless, by means o f words, symbols, and distinctions, asserts the suprem e Principle as the triunity o f Persons. T hus it signifies the unity and identity o f God as containing all actuality and all possibility. Eckhart endeavors to point out that this is the pre-em inent and principial m eaning o f Divine Knowledge, o f which the Holy T rinity is an incom m ensurable sign. For situated as it were within the G odhead, this transcendent knowledge excludes only contradiction and strict nothingness. In Divine Knowledge Principle, Principiate, Recession are One, o r nondual. T hus it is that “divine necessity directly signifies principial identity in Divine Knowledge” and that “no possibility is dispensable in All-possibility.” 80

M oreover, and without any confusion with the Holy T rin ity, this inverted m ode o f knowledge also, by means o f words, symbols, and distinctions, asserts Godhead as a triunity o f aspects constituted in the unm anifested Selfhood: Knowledge,. Isness, and Beatitude. “As isness is in


function o f knowledge, so beautitude, o r divine love, p ro ceeds from the realization o f their identity.” 81

But this awareness cannot be acquired by hum an effort alone. It is im parted by God him self to those who truly will to know. Only the disciplined and regenerated intellect, “who naughts the self and all individuality,” can en ter that kingdom , where we have been in principle from all e ternity.82 No o ther light shines there but Divine Knowledge itself, which is the light o f the m anifested world w here all else shines by a reflected light. It is in that peerless light there that everything here is enlightened, and the enlightenm ent o f everything here signifies nothing o ther than its inversion. “But there one knows purely and clearly and knowledge is not clouded by anything.” 83

5The Veils of God

In this exposition o f Eckhart’s insights into Divine Knowledge the intention is to make it as synthetic as possible. Special e ffo rt is exerted to point out distinctive features o f various im portan t considerations and also their relationship to Divine Knowledge, which is the com mon ground o f all aspects o f the doctrine and the point o f departu re o f their developm ents. At the same time no opportunity should be neglected to emphasize certain considerations that bear on the doctrine when app reh en ded as a whole.

It is in this connection that these last two chapters are to be understood, since they deal respectively with degrees o f knowledge and with what is necessarily involved if final realization o f Divine Knowledge is to occur. For the doctrine not only “represents the ultim ate synopsis o f all knowledge,” 1 as Eckhart says; it is, in essence, “the principle from which all the rest is derived” as so many specifications. If any aspect o f knowledge were not dependen t in this way on what Eckhart designates as “pure and detached intellection in divine Intellect itself,” it would in fact be lacking in p rin ciple and therefo re “bereft o f all intrinsic quality.”

These rem arks show how a m ultitude o f participatory ways o f understanding can exist together within the p rin cipial unity o f the unique all-inclusive doctrine w ithout in any way affecting this unity. Since each person brings with him a way o f understand ing reality that is peculiarly his own, then Eckhart is not incorrect in saying that “there are as m any ways o f understand ing as there are hum an knowers.” 2 But in the same stroke, he points out that this is true only so far as the “just hum an” starting point is concerned, for once the realm o f the hum an self has been transcended “all these differences necessarily vanish.” This is so because

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they are all situated as it were within various degrees o f manifest intelligibility which, in descending o rd er o f specification, are rem oved from the supraindividual dom ain o f all-inclusive principles in the W ord wherein differentiation is out o f the question.

WThen God is considered as m anifesting him self in degrees o f intelligibility, Eckhart speaks o f him as “clothing him self in a succession o f veils,” representing so many realms o f manifestation. Now to think o f these ‘veils’ as bodily garm ents would, o f course, be inappropriate, for it is only the last o r outerm ost veil that pertains to corporeality. It m ust also be kept in mind that “God him self cannot be contained within such veils, inasm uch as he in himself is wholly insusceptible o f any restriction and is in no way conditioned o r affected by any condition o f being.” 3 Since apart from God there is strictly nothing o r contradiction, the veils pertain to participative intelligence and are re ferred directly to God only according as he is considered in relation to this or that realm o f intelligibility.

T h e F i v e V e i l s

T hough “God is transcendent isness itself, transcending all hum an understanding , he first assumes the veil o f tru th o r intelligibility . . . an indwelling in his own pure essence.” 4 T he initial and innerm ost veil is simply the “essence o f G od,” o r the possibilities o f m anifestation that God comprises in his eternal actuality in the principial and und ifferentiated order. It is “the realm o f blessedness,” for it is by this first veil that God manifests his fullness in actuality. Com prising all ‘structureless m anifestation,” 5 inasmuch as it is in no way really distinct from God himself, it is p rio r to all contingent being that presupposes it.

With this first veil we are therefore in the structureless o rd er o f tru th , goodness, beauty, and unity; the m anifestation as such o f the undifferen tiated triune Godhead itself; the transparen t “quiddity disclosing G od’s superessential nudity”—all o f which are directly subsisting in all-inclusive God. It is only when this veil is considered in relation to structural m anifestation, and in sofar as the latter is prin-


cipially contained within it, that this first “concealm ent” can be said to designate that by which all structures will be actualized and rendered intelligible in the succeeding realms.

T he next veil is the first in the created o rd er and is “constituted by the directly reflected light o f the Logos, which is infinite Intellect itself.” 6 “With this veil we are concerned with suprarational knowledge, the ground o f the soul, o r h igher intellect”; 7 it is knowledge in the distinctive mode, inasm uch as it implies production. “T hough the intellective soul most truly dwells in God, God is here u n d er this covering regarded as dwelling in the ground o f the soul and veiled as grace present to the soul.” 8

This is the realm o f direct insight whereby “the knowing being becomes that which he knows and realizes him self through knowledge,” and “whereby detachm ent of the intellect understands all things in itself without images and structures and without going outside itself o r a transform ation o f itself.” 9 It comprises the faculties o f “reason, m em ory, and will, not as active, but in their elem entary roots,” conceivable but not perceptible in their intellectual activity.10 T h a t is, this veil arises out o f conjunction o f the ground o f the intellective soul with the intellectual faculties o f cognition proceeding from the determ ination of things, the outw ard developm ent o f which constitutes the five senses o f corporeal individuality. This veil designates the first principles in the individual o rd er which are direct reflections o f the ultimate Principle.11

T he th ird veil, in which the constituents o f the preceding realm are jo ined in the operations o f the intellect, pertains to the faculty o f distinctive will as active o r decisive and to the faculty o f reason as analytical. W hereas the function o f the will as active “devolves on morality and art,” the function o f the faculty o f reason “is to app rehend one thing u nd er a diversity o f concepts, to distinguish those things which are in natu re and in being, and to apprehend somehow the o rd er whereby one thing is p rio r to another and one person derived from ano ther.” 12 This is “the power in the soul by means o f which it thinks; it form s within itself the things that are not present, so that I may recognize

T H E VEILS O F G OD »93these things as well as if I saw them with my own eyes, and even better— I can in fact think o f a rose in the winter.” 13

This realm refers exclusively to the individual and structural o rder, to “the veil o f abstractions, concepts, ideas, and all m ental images,” and “whereby the intellect understands rationally the images and structures o f all things with distinctions.” 14 T hough directly exposed to and linked with sense data, its developm ent depends upon its principle, the h igher intellect, and its process arises from the will to know within a determ inate individual realm that is specifically hum an.

T he fourth veil comprises the faculties that proceed from the vital principle, that is, the modalities o f the life function, the faculties o f sensation and m otion.15 These modalities and faculties compose the sensitive elem ents o f the soul u nd er its vital aspect and determ ination to preserve life. These sense faculties “receive impressions from outside [in corporeal structure], as does the eye.” 16 They initiate the knowing process which “by com prehension, questioning, and reflection culminates in reasonable determ ination.”

This realm is “the garm ent o f the outw ard self, that is, sensitivity.” It is also “the veil o f the collective sense, o f anger and concupiscence.” It is the realm o f the pain- pleasure factor, “fear also residing in this sensitive p art,” 17 and it m ust never be confounded with “either the reasoning intellect o r the h igher intellect.” These sensitive elements, o f course, already exist principially in the preceding realms o f intellectuality as purely receptive faculties, at which stage there could be no question o f outw ard action any m ore than o f perception o r experience. Sense experience enters only in this fourth realm and its data prom ote the rational course o f understand ing and the well-grounded judgm en t o f concrete existents in the light o f principles realized in the h igher intellect, thus making up the dynamics o f hum an intellectuality, w herein each determ ination raises a fu rth er question.18

It should be clear that these last three veils constitute the com pound intellectual structure in relation to the corporeal modality; which also accounts for the heterogeneous nature


o f the hum an being. T hus we again meet with the distinction between the basic modes o f structural m anifestation, the intellectual and the corporeal.

T h ere rem ains to be considered, then, the outerm ost veil, which fo r the hum an being represents the corporeal realm. It is that “physical modality whereby the souls [as vital p rin ciples} o f all living things and the souls o f men are covered by a corporeal form which, being gross with materiality, is most inferior and most potential to all that is superior and to being.” 19 This veil is m ade up o f all the material elem ents out o f which “all living bodies are constituted,” those “m aterial elem ents which are potential to form and intelligibility.” Assimilated to it are the combined organic elem ents received in nutrim ent, secreting the finer parts that rem ain in the living body, and excreting the coarser. For instance, “there is the power o f digestion, m ore active by night than by day, whereby man grows and thrives.” 20

As a result o f this assimilation engendered by the vital principle, the finer substances become the flesh, bone, blood, the nervous system, and all that makes up the physical and chemical composition. Every organic being contains, in a m ore o r less com plete degree o f developm ent, these physical, chemical, and sensitive functions, and according to their m anner o f reproduction they distinguish themselves into various organic species. Man is the highest inasm uch as he alone comprises, intrinsically with his corporeal m odality, all three realms o f intellectuality: “the sensitive, rational, and h igher intellect, being but parts of the one intellective soul [with which man is endowed}.” 21 M oreover, and for this reason, “the wise physician always considers the whole man, for any illness is the consequence o f m ore than one factor.” 22

In these considerations it is, o f course, the hum an knower with whom Eckhart is prim arily concerned. Hence, the veils o f structural manifestation, that is, the four ou ter veils, correspond to the condition o f the hum an being, which includes intellectuality and corporeality in one central structure, o r integral substance, as already explained. But these conditions m ust not be confused with that unique state

T H E VEILS O F G O D !95which is special to each hum an knower and distinguishes him as this o r that person. R ather Eckhart is referring to the d ifferent realms o r modalities to which in a general way any one hum an being is normally subject. Taken as a whole these modalities can be related to both the corporeal and intellectual realms, the form er being confined to the bodily condition and the latter com prising the great indefinite re m ainder o f the hum an being as a person.

T hat which transcends the hum an knower does not strictly belong to the individual being; that is, all that which pertains to the realm o f structureless being and, beyond being, the suprem e and unconditioned principial state. Metaphysically, however, all the modalities o f being are really related to all-inclusive God, inasm uch as it is he alone who is the Principle that constitutes the fundam ental reality o f all being and all conditions o f being, including the hum an being. A fter all, every condition o f the hum an being would be unreal and therefo re unintelligible if one attem pted to separate him from God, “for there is no doubt whatsoever that w ithout God, in whom [the hum an knower} has his being, he does not exist.” 23

T he d ifferen t realm s o f being, that is, “all that which is a composite o f isness and essence,” w hatever the nature o f any such condition, rep resen t nothing but manifest possibilities in the essence o f God. T h at is why Eckhart is able to speak correctly and consistently o f the d ifferent conditions in which being veils o r distinguishes itself as manifestations o f God, and why the hum an being can be intellectually considered as “in the conditions o f the being o f God.” T hough this is perfectly valid in the sense o f o u r present consideration, it must always be understood that “God in himself, in his nudity, is in no way affected by these conditions o f being [o r veilings} and does not on this account cease to be unconditioned.” 24 In the same way God never actually becomes manifested, although he is the transcendent Principle o f all modes o f manifestation.

I f we presently leave aside any consideration of the ultim ate supradeterm inate state w herein God is completely unveiled in his unm anifested reality, then the conditions o f


hum an intellectuality, proceeding inwardly with each un veiling, are: the condition o f sensory knowledge and practical experience, the condition o f enlightened com prehension and judgm ent, and the condition o f formless contem plation.25 Eckhart is here considering the general conditions o f the whole intellective soul, including its rational and vital powers along with its unitive function. This means that the outerm ost veil o f gross corporeality is penetrated once experience occurs by means o f the intelligence- im bued sensitive faculties, fo r they are here assimilative, not to strict corporeality, but to intellectuality.

“These three conditions signify three modes o f knowledge. T he first is sensory: for instance, the eye sees from afar things that are external [in respect to the knower}. T he second is rational and is m uch higher. T he th ird signifies a noble function o f the soul, which is so high and noble that it apprehends God in his own naked isness. This function [“the g round o f the soul” o r “h igher intellect actualized by the divine spark”} has nothing in com m on with individualization; ou t o f nothing it makes anything and everything. It knows nothing o f yesterday o r the day before, o f tom orrow o r the day after. For in eternity [the principial standpoint in which its knowledge is situated} there is neither yesterday nor tom orrow ; there is an ever-present now. . . . It apprehends God in his w ardrobe [unclothed and un manifested}. T he Scriptures say: “In him , by him, and through him ” 26: “in him ,” that is, in the Father; “by him ,” that is, in the Son; “through him ,” that is, in the Holy Spirit.” 27

It should also be noted that the posthum ous condition o f the intellective soul as well as the condition o f ‘beatific vision’ are not really distinct from pure contem plation. “All the powers o f the soul that work in the body die with the body, except contem plative knowledge and the will to know unitively; these alone rem ain in the soul.” 28 M oreover, “the highest kind o f ecstasy occurs when the contem plative intellect realizes God in God him self th rough his essence.” 29 Pure contem plation, as we shall discover, is a supraindividual state in which intellection inverts likewise into the

T H E V EILS O F GOD !97structureless o rder, “the intellective soul w ithdrawing into the bosom o f the Father in the direction which leads to the very Principle o f all, w here is the th rone o f God.” A fter all, “God is Intellect-as-such which consists in the knowledge o f itself alone. He dwells in him self alone, w here nothing has ever affected him, because he is there alone, naked in his {unmanifested] stillness. In his knowledge o f him self God knows him self in himself.” 30

P r a c t i c a l A w a r e n e s s a n d E n l i g h t e n e d A w a r e n e s s

From what Eckhart has ju st indicated in generic form we find that we are presented with the requisite possibility o f d iffering and expanding degrees o f awareness, o r stages o f unveiling. They are, o f course, accomplished by the dynamics o f the unlim ited and detached will to know, regenerated and sustained as it must be by transcendent act.31

T he first condition o f awareness has knowledge o f sensible objects, o r corporeal m anifestation, for its province. In this condition the self, as m anifestation o f ultim ate Selfhood, becomes aware o f the world o f sensible beings. It does so by means o f all the sense faculties and organs, which are “so many entrance paths o f awareness for everything belonging to this dom ain, together with the com mon sense.” But this “bodily natu re itself [com prising these sense faculties] does not distinguish between the thing and the idea, for it does not know the idea, which is only received and known by rationality.” 32 We m ust therefore include as means o f awareness in this condition the “thinking pow er” considered as the faculty that “gives form to sense presentations and associates them one with ano ther.”

This state o f practical awareness, in which the operation o f the organs and faculties in question are exercised, is acknowledged as the first condition o f the intellective soul. M oreover, the corporeal veil to which it corresponds occupies the outerm ost degree in the developing o rd er o f m anifestation, starting from its unm anifested Principle. It marks the limit o f that developm ent, at least in relation to the condition o f existence in which hum an individuality is situated. For it is in this modality that we find the basis and


starting point, initially o f individual realization in its integrality and self-identity as a knower, and afterw ards o f all fu rth er realization that transcends the individual possibilities and implies fu rth er unveilings.

This state o f practical awareness, wherein the ou ter veils are progressively rem oved insofar as the integrality o f the hum an being is determ ined by rational act, may be taken as signifying the totality o f individual manifestation. T hus it is that the state now u nd er consideration may be related to “the greatest possible {suitable to our capacities] Self-communication o f God to m an, that is, the W ord-m ade- flesh,” 33 Christ the God-man. This state is related to him and described as constituting his body, conceived by analogy with the body o f the individual man, an analogy o f the macrocosm and the microcosm.34

This state also signifies that which is com mon to all hum an beings, com prehended as the specific difference or distinguishing m ark o f the hum an species as a rational animal. “ I have sensory perception in com mon with the animals, and life is com mon to me and the trees. I have being in com mon with all creatures.” “But if I am to be a man [a reflective, determ ining knower], I cannot be a man in the being o f an animal, ra th e r I m ust be a man in the being o f a rational creatu re .” For “man is a rational animal and ‘m ankind’ lives by art and reason, that is to say practically.” 35 M oreover, it should be noted that this state is common to all individuals, whatever may be their o ther modalities in which they are capable o f developing themselves in o rd er to actualize, without going beyond the hum an level, the full range o f their respective possibilities.

W hat we have, then, in this state o f practical awareness, is the intellective soul oriented outwardly toward the sensible world. T hus “the sensitive faculties receive impressions from outside” and reason “draws things into itself, splitting o ff the coarsest [corporeal] elements. Reason is always re ceiving som ething from without that is related to time and sense experience.” 36 This is the “outw ard self” who is “served by the five senses and yet the ou ter self operates by the intellective soul.” 37 H ere the intellective soul is an

T H E VEILS OF G OD X9 9

chored in the life principle according to which “life is so desirable in itself that one [in this state} desires it for its own sake. . . . Why do you eat? Why do you sleep? In o rd er to live. Why do you wish wealth and honor? You well know. Why do you live? For the sake o f living, and yet you do not [in this state o f practical awareness} know why you live.” 38

“Merely living is one thing; learning how to live rationally is quite ano ther.” 39 To live rationally the hum an self must acquire knowledge o f the p ro per relationship between ends and means, o f social values and reasonable ideals. M oreover, he m ust acquire the habit o f decisiveness, the willingness to be unselfish. T he next condition o f awareness, then, is one o f enlightenm ent, inasm uch as it refers to knowledge o f abstract o r “inward m ental objects.” In this state “the outw ard faculties, while existing potentially, are as it were withdrawn into the inner faculty which resides in the light o f m ental structu re .” 40 H ere one is aware that “the body is m uch m ore in the soul than the soul in the body . . . that the soul contains the body ra ther than the body the soul . . . for here all things are clearer and nobler than they are in the ou ter w orld.” 41 Furtherm ore, “all creatures en te r my reason in o rd er that they may be m ade rational in me.” They are m ade “lum inous to the passive intellect in the light o f the active intellect” so that there is com prehended the universal elem ent o f the object known as a m ental concept o r idea which is “understood by the reasoning intellect.” 42

But “whatever the intellect thinks o r achieves with its reasoning powers, however bright it is in the soul, it is nevertheless m ixed.” For here in this enlightened state the self “understands rationally the images and form s o f all creatures with distinctions [the first being that between existence and essence}.” 43 Since there is no longer any question o f sensible qualities, this is the ‘world’ o f intelligible structural m anifestation, “the dom ain o f form s.” Everything perta ining to this form al realm is intimately connected with the nature o f life itself, inseparable as it is from light which gives it m eaning. M oreover, this luminosity should be regarded as “the reflection and defraction o f the intelligible Light, o r o f


unrestricted Intellect itself,” in the extrasensible modalities o f abstract structures that are drawn out o f the sense data. A fter all, abstraction means simply the elimination o f all that is not necessary for the com prehension o f a concrete object.

In this enlightened state “the individual intellect is for itself its own light and it produces concepts and ideas th rough the action o f its own will.” 44 Issuing entirely from the individual intellect itself, the world o f abstractions, a rranged in multiple com binations dependen t upon the intellectual structure o f the individual himself, are merely so many “secondary and conceptual modifications o f {concrete} reality.” Indeed, the veils o f corporeality and sense perception have here been rem oved, so much so that “the light o f the rational intellect raises a stone above the realm o f sense and above all here and now.” 45 T hough “reason receives from the senses, it strips away the sensitive elem ent and understands abstractly w here there is no time.” 46

Be that as it may, there is always som ething “incomplete and uncoordinated” about these abstract productions insofar as they as such are “essences separated from real existence.” For this reason they are very delusive, possessing an apparen t o r m ental existence. But in the concrete world w here these productions are constituted, the intellect possesses the act o f experim entally determ ining the actual existence o r nonexistence o f these essences and therefore o f acting wisely.47 T hough this proxim ate reality is also delusive when com pared to ultim ate reality itself, and is contingent and transitory like all individual manifestation, nevertheless its relational reality is sufficient for the needs o f hum an life, social enterprise, and rational endeavor.

It is not that the previous practical state is necessarily m ore effectively realistic than the enlightened state. Indeed there is a sense in which the possibilities o f the enlightened state are far m ore extensive than the practical in that they allow the hum an being to become liberated in a certain degree from many o f the restrictions to which he is subject in the corporeal modality.48 M oreover, it is by the light o freason that the hum an knower can, if he so desires, avoid%

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much that is otherwise debilitating in his intersubjective world.

But it is precisely here that we are confronted with the danger o f an aberrant condition. Indeed , the luminosity o f abstract concepts and ideas may become so attractive to the reasoning intellect that the luminosity can easily be mistaken for reality itself, o r as that o f which concrete objects are m ere projections o r copies. As the tem ptation inherent in the practical state is to absolutize sense experience for its own sake and so adopt a position o f radical empiricism, so the even g reater danger o f the enlightened state is to absolutize m ental objects and adopt an idealist position. In both cases there is always present the allurem ent o f limited and specific desires that abort the unlim ited will to know and that if extensively o r exclusively followed make for a refusal to participate in being as directly app rehended by the h igher intellect. T he nonparticipation in being is here a stopping to gaze at it as “som ething out there separated from the knower”; it is an occlusion o f the will to know. “Luminosity attracts, but reflected light attracts deceptively.” 49

T he indubitable tru th , according to Eckhart, is simply that “God in him self is the Light o f which all creaturely knowledge is a reflection.” 50 In fact all degrees o f individual knowledge m ust be considered as just that—reflections. Pure Reality is God alone, is all-inclusive. It is utterly unattainable by any sensation, experience, concept, o r idea, “confined as they are to the consideration o f outw ard o r inward objects,” the knowledge o f which constitutes respectively the practical and enlightened states. Certain nontradi- tional philosophers, in diverse times and places, have actually restricted themselves to these two states. T hus they condem n themselves to rem ain enclosed within the limits o f structural m anifestation and hum an individuality, p resenting at best nothing m ore than closed systems.

However this may be, the lum inous realm should be described as an ideal world by reason o f its assimilation to the inward m ental faculties. T hus it is to be distinguished from the sensible o r practical realm , which is the world o f struc


tural corporeality.51 In the enlightened state, however, we are still only concerned with structural ideas, inasm uch as the possibilities that this state contains do not extend beyond individual existence. T he enlightened state is confined to the realm o f reason and does not pertain to the h igher intellect, o r g round o f the soul, which is “united with the Logos.” T h ere alone the Light that shines, o r the W ord that speaks, makes for supraindividual and unitive knowledge.

T he removal o f the veils o f corporeality and sense p e rception does not m ean that reality is abolished, for the practical and enlightened states do not stand in opposition to each other. We can be sure that any notion o f such an opposition is here meaningless. Everything that is, regardless o f the modality in which it may happen to be, has for that very reason a relational degree o f reality consonant with its own nature. Insofar as “some individual being consists conceptually”—and this is the p roper m eaning o f a true concept, inasm uch as it has a real foundation in being—it is neither m ore nor less real on that account than som ething consisting corporeally. Each possibility necessarily finds its p ro p er place at the level o f the universal hierarchy dete rm ined for it by its own nature.

But since a concept is the content o f an act o f conceiving, and since the bare hum an act o f conceiving is limited by the appropriation o f the structure o f experienced objects, all concepts (and ideas) enjoyed by the rational m ind are greatly confined. T hough the hum an knower has an u n limited will to know, he is, as a hum an knower, incapable o f enjoying an unlim ited act o f com prehension, that is, a concept (or idea) o f God or o f any structureless manifestation. “God alone [being totally unrestricted in every way} enjoys the idea o f him self,” for he is the unlim ited act o f com prehension.52

Analogous to this enlightened state is “the reflected light o f the m oon.” T h e moon “gets its light directly from the sun, but owing to the fact that o f all the stars it is the nearest to the earth , it suffers from two drawbacks: being pale and speckled, and also being able to lose its light.” 53 It

T H E VEILS O F GOD 203

is, figuratively speaking, pale because it is indirect light and drawn to individuality; it loses its light because it is transitory and revolves around structure. Illum inating by a re flected light and com prehending only reflection, the intellect at this stage “does not understand all things in tru th .” Only when the ground o f intellect is realized as directly united with the transcendent Light itself does there consist the possibility for that, “since then nothing is concealed from the h igher intellect.” And Eckhart quotes St. Paul for a fu rth er analogy: “T he Scriptures say: ‘Men ought not to cover their heads, but women should be covered’.54 T he woman, that is the lum inous realm , is covered. Man is the h igher intellect, that is, bare and uncovered.” 55 Regardless o f sex, the hum an knower is endowed with both male and female principles, “both unitive and discursive functions o f knowledge.”

W hat Eckhart wants to point out, o f course, is that “the intellectual faculties ascend by a process o f abstraction. Abstraction, however, comes to a standstill in being, above which is God, the Principle o f being. Those things which rank as lower than reason exist in a nobler state in reason than they do in themselves, and the contrary is the case with those things that are o f h igher o rd er than reason.” 56

In o th er words, in this enlightened state now u nder consideration, “all knowledge o f things is obscure, dark, and gloomy until it is reduced to their principles by intelligence, since it involves the fear that the alternative view may be correct. But the dem onstration, o r syllogism, that enables us to know without fear and not ju s t as a m atter o f opinion is derived from the p ro p er principles. . . . Man obtains his knowledge from things a posteriori and proceeds to principles by the exercise o f reason.” 57 Yet here in the knowledge o f structure and individuality “nothing shines, nothing is known, nothing effects knowledge, save the quiddity, the concept o f the thing itself, its definition o r idea.” 58 O bviously the veil o f lum inous concepts and ideas m ust be peeled away if unitive o r principial knowledge o f reality is actually to be attained: “T herefore strip yourself o f all structures and unite yourself with structureless isness.” 59


M orever—and this is im portant—in this state o f enlightenm ent “a light is sometimes uncovered in the intellect and man thinks it is the Son, and yet it is only a reflected light.” 60

T h e C o n t e m p l a t i v e S t a t e

W hen the veils o f corporeality, sense perception, and structural com prehension have been successively rem oved; when the knower is aware o f no desire o ther than the u n limited will to know and is no longer the subject o f any image, concept, or idea, his condition is that o f contem plation. In this “noble state the intellect, in the very g round o f the soul where oneness is effected, becomes [in knowledge} one with all being, without differentiation and without distinction.” 61 By uncreated grace the know er has identified him self with the synthesizing Principle o f unitive knowledge. He is “filled [by assimilation} with blessedness,” actually enjoys that blessedness, and “the m ode o f knowledge is pure awareness itself.” 62 From the ground o f the soul, but no longer identified with it since the veil o f all structural re ality has been rem oved, this unitive knowledge is situated within the eternal W ord and, by inversion, the intellect is assimilated to unconditioned Intellect itself. “H ere is the T ru e M an,” “the Christ,” “the Son,” “the divine Selfhood,” and the knower truly is. For knowledge is now as it were above and beyond any special condition; it is principial in act.

T h at there are degrees o f contem plation is clear from the fact that “as long as there is progression in contem plation it is not yet p u re .” “Indeed, so long as we progress with grace it still rem ains in us as grace and it is small and we can only know God from afar. But so far as we are there, grace is no longer ‘grace’, ra ther it is the divine Light in itself. . . . T h ere within there is no approach .” 63 So far as man is there in pure contem plation “he is not this m an H enry o r this m an C onrad o r this m an so and so.” He is “godly poor” and “object free ,” for “there is the T ru e Man; in that Man all m en are one Man and that Man is Christ e ternal.” 64 Insofar as there is progression in contem plation “there are still rem nants o f distinctions in the awareness,” 65 distinctions rela

T H E VEILS O F G OD 205

tional to structureless m anifestation and to the com plem entary principles o f isness and essence.

It should be acknowledged, however, that the ‘m ode’ o f God in participatory contem plation is his essence. T hough it is referred to by Eckhart as a veil, it is not really distinct from God, since we are here beyond the realm o f real distinctions. If Eckhart refers to this state as blessed, it is because this unitive knowledge comprises all the possibilities o f individual m anifestation. For it m ust be understood that unitive knowledge is here completely transcendent to all distinctive knowledge, which is applicable only to individual o r structural cognition characterized by the preceding enlightened and practical states.

T hus when contem plation is pure, and no longer directly centered in m anifestation, “the term T o r ‘Selfhood’ refers to the Light o f Intellect-as-such” 66 inasm uch as this Light strips away all manifest and accidental qualification. H ere the contem plation is divested o f individuality and self-substantial identity, for “insofar as ‘I’ signifies individual substance, it nevertheless m ust be denied .” 67 If the Selfhood, o r the Son, with which the contem plation is identified, “enjoys this blessedness as his rightful kingdom ” it is because this kingdom is nothing o ther than the fullness o f those possibilities actualizable in the divine affirm ation o f himself.

Being essentially a structureless and supraindividual state, this realm o f contem plative knowledge has nothing in common with any psychological condition, as certain m odern interpreters o f Eckhart have supposed, o r as indeed did some o f his contem porary critics. Correctly speaking, psychology pertains to nothing m ore o r less than the structural realm o f individuality, which includes sense knowledge as potential to com prehension, questioning, and the acts o f rational determ ination and decision.

In making this assimilation the term ‘psyche’ m ust be u n derstood in its prim ary sense without confounding it with the diversified and far m ore specialized m eanings attached to it in m odern times, whereby it cannot be m ade to apply even to the whole o f the structural realm . For the most part


m odern psychology deals only with those restricted parts o f hum an individuality w here the sensitive and m ental faculties are in contact with corporeal m anifestation.68 C onsidering its m othods, which are those o f observation and evaluation, psychology is, as a science, incapable o f going beyond its objective, which is exclusively the study o f m ental phenom ena and behavioral patterns in direct relation to those particular phenom ena. Since its objective is strictly confined to a small portion o f the dom ain o f individuality, the contem plative state necessarily and completely transcends its study. In fact the contem plative state is inaccessible to psychology in a twofold way, first because it transcends the realm o f discourse and differentiated thought, and second because it transcends structural m anifestation and hence all phenom ena o f any kind.69

T he contem plative state, says Eckhart, is that o f “nonotherness, o f not-self,” wherein knowledge is integrally concentrated in the fundam ental unity o f God as the u n m anifested Principle. This unm anifested, apprehended as the seed o f the manifested, which is only its effect, is identified in this respect with the essence o f God. But it is really G od’s isness as well as his essence, since they are identical in his indistinctness, as Eckhart has explained. If in pure contem plation God is immediately known as beyond the distinction o f isness and essence, it is simply because this state o f knowledge is no longer situated in any mode o f direction toward God. T h at is, it is no longer oriented in term s o f conditioned existence o r even o f distinctive com plem entary principles. Actually pure contem plation is situated wholly within, transcendent to conditioned existence and therefore without direction and duality in every respect. It is situated “there in patria, the unrestricted and hidden [unm anifested] isness o f Knowledge itself,” o r “undifferen tiated G odhead.” “T he last and highest leave-taking [or unveiling] is leaving God fo r God . . . w here God is essentially h idden in him self.” 70

T h e relational distinction o f isness and essence must go; the veil o f all structureless m anifestation must go. “T he soul that loves God loves him u n d er the veil o f goodness, but

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{here in pure contem plation] the contem plative intellect takes away from God the veil o f goodness, o f being and all determ inations.” 71 T hus “the intellect is nobler than the will. T he will takes God u nd er the veil o f goodness. T he intellect apprehends God naked, as he is, divested o f goodness and being. Goodness [like tru th , beauty, and unity, which pertain to his essence as structureless m anifestations] is a veil u n d er which God is h idden [and u n m anifested].” 72 “Love does not unite, not in any way; what is already united it holds together and keeps bound. . . . But contem plative knowledge altogether peels o ff unity and takes God unveiled, as he is, pure [unm anifested] isness in himself.” Likewise since “God assumes the veil o f tru th , this too m ust be cast off.” 73

“T he g round o f the soul [when realized as directly united to God by transcendent act] is rem ote from the kingdom of this world [o f structural manifestation], since it is now in another world, above the faculties o f the soul, above the active intellect and will. A lthough such faculties enjoy a remarkable em inence [over the lower faculties] . . . God himself, when he enters into them , only does so u nd er the veil o f the tru th and goodness o f structured being. But no creature [o r distinctive structure] ever enters the ground o f the soul, and there God [who alone dwells therein] m ust be stripped o f every veil.” In this state o f contem plation “glory shall be revealed, because glory itself is revealed in the blessed state, every veil is rem oved—this is implied in the word ‘glory’—including even the veil o f goodness, u nd er which the will receives God, the veil o f tru th , with which the intellect receives him, and the veil o f being itself in general and even isness insofar as it is a distinction. . . . In pure contem plation every veil [o r distinction] is rem oved.” 74

Nonetheless isness and essence are realized in this pure state, and it should be acknowledged that structureless m anifestation is also known within. For, as already explained, the realm o f structureless manifestation, being supraindividual, is necessarily included within the o rd er o f Divine Knowledge. F urtherm ore, it is not to be forgotten that all realms o f m anifestation are integrally contained within the un


m anifested and unconditioned Principle, and hence are known obliquely in this pure state. “O ne should be aware that those who know God unveiled know also the creatures with him o r in him. For Knowledge-in-itself is the Light o f the soul.” 75

T he “ou ter self” 76 o f which Eckhart speaks pertains to the practical state; the “inner self” pertains to the lum inous. But the “innerm ost S e lf’ is realized in the pure contem plative state and is God, for “therein all creatureliness and differentiation have been transcended.” As eternity transcends time and the uncreated the created, so “the innerm ost Self [o r God} transcends both the ou ter and inner self.” 77 Also “when one knows the creatures in themselves that is called ‘evening knowledge’, and there one knows the creatures in images that are variously differentiated. But when the creatures are known in God that is called and is ‘m orning knowledge’ and in this [principial] m ode the creatures are known w ithout any differentiation and stripped o f all images [concepts and ideas}, and deprived o f all likenesses in the O ne, who is God him self.” 78

“T h e most insignificant thing known as in God, even a flower as it is in God, is nobler than the entire universe [as known externally}. To know the vilest thing as it is in God is better than angelic knowledge. . . . W hen creatures are known without God, that is delusive, twilight knowledge; when creatures are known in God, that is m orning knowledge. But when God is known as pure isness in itself, then that is the unrestricted knowledge o f high noon. . . . O pposites m ust be transcended. W hat are opposites? Weal and woe, white and black are in opposition and have no place in real isness. . . . T he soul knows no opposition when it enters the Light o f pure Intellect.” 79

It is therefo re im portant to note that in pure contem plation the distinctive m anifested beings, including those o f individuality, are not annihilated. R ather they subsist in p rin cipial mode, being unified by the fact that they are no longer app rehend ed according to the m ode o f contingent and real distinctions. Inasm uch as pure contem plation “is not a m en

T H E VEILS OF G OD 209

tal activity,” then “all beings necessarily disclose themselves am ong the possibilities o f the divine Selfhood which is e te rnally aware in itself o f all these possibilities as indistinct.” 80

It is with the divine Selfhood that this pure contem plation is identified. Hence it is w ithout activity, being “actionless act and totally aware o f its own immutability in the now o f eternity .” A fter all, “grace does not destroy nature, but p erfects it. T he beatific state does not destroy grace; it perfects it, for beatification is grace m ade perfect. T herefore there is nothing in God that would perm anently destroy anything that has any kind o f being {not even corruptible entity as considered from the standpoint o f individuality], but he is the perfecter o f all things.” 81

Since all the veils o f God are now rem oved, it is then p recisely this pure state that alone gives integral m eaning to the Christian doctrine o f the final “resurrection o f the dead and the glorified body.” T he doctrine as such is a form al theological exposition o f a revealed tru th known principially in pure contem plation. And the tru th is that the ‘resurrection o f the body’, o r its transposition beyond the condition o f individual existence, is the realization o f the changeless and eternal possibility o f which the body is but a conditioned manifestation in structural modality.82

Wholly actuated by God the detached contem plative state is “that wherein one is most immediately united with God, is by grace what God is by nature; wherein one is identified with the exem plar o f what he was when he was in God, when there was no difference between him and God, before {metaphysically} God has created the w orld.” 83 It is im possible to suppose that manifested individual beings do not subsist eternally in the Principle. For such a supposition would m ean that these objects would be strictly nothing; they would not exist at all, not even in a delusive m anner. M oreover, were that the case there could be no entering into the state o f contem plation and no re tu rn from it to the enlightened o r practical states o f awareness, because all structural m anifestation would be irrem ediably annihilated for the intellective soul. A re tu rn , however, is not only pos


sible for the soul that is not finally liberated o r saved from the conditioned state o f individual existence through the decomposition o f the body, but it does actually occur.

T h e U l t i m a t e R e a l i z a t i o n

It is quite clear to Eckhart that a realization o f pure contem plation is not reserved only to the final posthum ous condition o f the soul in the ‘beatific vision’, but is a present possibility. “God can be known in the same perfection and blessedness can be in the same m ode in this life as in the life to com e.” 84

Eckhart continues: “Detached intellect [in contemplation} originates from the eternal Principle as knowledge and contains in itself intelligibly that which God contains. This noble divinity, the detached intellect, principially realizes itself in itself according to the m ode o f God in its egress [from Divine Knowledge}, and in its innerm ost meaningful content it is very God; but according to the [rational] m ode o f its p ro per natu re the intellect is creature. But the detached intellect is fully as noble in us now [in pure contemplation] as in the afterlife [o r beatific vision}. Still, the question may be asked: How then does this life differ from the life to come? I answer that the detached intellect which is blessed in precisely the same way as God is, is at present virtual in us. In this life we know God according to possibility. In the afterlife, when we are quit o f the body, possibility will be transform ed into the act o f beatitude which is n o rmative to the detached intellect. T he transform ation will ren d er the fact o f beatitude no m ore perfect than it is now, for detached intellect has no accidents o r any capacity to receive m ore than it innately contains. It follows that to be beatified there is to be completely deprived o f virtuality and to realize beatitude only actually, according to the m ode o f divinity. As David said: ‘Lord, in thy Light we shall see Light’; with Divine Knowledge we shall realize the perfection o f Divine Knowledge itself, which alone is our entire blessedness, here in grace and there in perfect beatitude. Hence, were I wholly that I am I should be God.” 85

In o th er words, in this life “there can be no lasting persis

T H E VEILS OF G OD 2 1 1

tence in unwavering contem plation.” But “when you consequently stand outside it and this nascent knowledge through identity is withheld, you will think you have been robbed o f eternal bliss and then you will directly want to re tu rn into conterhplation in o rd er that this knowledge may again be realized.” 86 Eckhart certainly affirms that though in pure contem plation, o r even in the beatific vision, the possibilities o f all m anifestation are directly and principially known to the intellective soul, unm anifested All-possibility in itself rem ains forever unknow n to the soul as such. Hence there is always fo r the soul a certain incompleteness when com pared to all-inclusive knowledge in itself.87 But to speak o f the ‘soul as such’, since the soul is created and therefore individual, is not the same as speaking o f ‘divine Intellect-as-such’, which is uncreated and beyond individuality. T o speak o f the ‘soul as such’ is, as Eckhart has made clear, to speak within the form al fram ework o f individual structure, which o f course m ust be inverted when the indication is pure Divine Knowledge. T he loss o f the awareness o f self-identity o r “this burial in G od” is nothing but “the crossing over into the uncreated o rd er and this crossing is beyond the o rd er o f m ultitudinous and individualized knowledge.” 88

It m ust always be clearly recognized that the term ‘knowledge’ as applied to the contem plative state is not to be un derstood in the limited sense o f structural thought, which is but a reflection o f Divine Knowledge. R ather it is to be un derstood in the sense o f “unknow ing knowledge” as the perfect awareness o f God considered principially in his relationship with his unique ‘object’, which is his own beatific essence. T hough his beatitude, o r essence, is in a certain sense a veil o f his infinite Selfhood, as Eckhart has already explained, it is not really distinct from his Selfhood, as it indeed could not be once there is no longer any real distinction.

Despite the indiscrim inate meanings attached to the term s ‘subject’ and ‘object’ by m odern philosophers, their usage should not, when considering the divine Subject, lead to any obscurity. A fter all, Divine Knowledge transcends all


opposition and real distinction between subject and object. T he contem plative state, constituted as it is in Divine Knowledge, is a realization o f “the Knower as subject and the Known as object and Knowledge itself as the relation,” and, as Eckhart has explained, divine relations are without real distinctions. “O perative power receives all its isness from its object and receives the isness o f the object itself and the object. W hat then can be disturbing o r bitter for such a power if God is its isness, if its isness is G od’s isness, that is, if its isness is isness in God?” 89 For then “God is the power, the actionless act.” T hus “Knowledge, Isness, and Beatitude are identically O ne, and One is God,” the “perfectly Real.” God is “the Knower, Known, and Knowledge,” which are identical in him and with which the contem plative intellect is identified in principle and as considered beyond all the particular conditions that determ ine each o f G od’s multiple states o f m anifestation.

In this state o f pure contem plation the W ord, o r eternal Light, is realized directly by the detached, unitive intellect and no longer in reflection through the m ental faculty as occurs in the individual states. T he unitive o r h igher intellect “is the capacity o f suprarational and supracreaturely [o r supraindividual] knowledge when actualized by un created grace.” It is the ground o f the soul in which the W ord dwells as already present, that is, “in truest reality it is the soul already dwelling in the W ord.” In this respect, therefore, the unitive intellect as purified o f real distinctions must, by transposition, be included in the state o f contem plation. It comprises in knowledge all that transcends individual structu re and existence, including its own, and it does so transcend because “its contem plative act is fully actualized, not by itself o r its own light, but by the W ord, the Light that is Intellect-as-such.” 90

O f course, “if the spiritual self contem plates God, he also knows and is aware o f him self as the one who knows, that is to say he knows that he contem plates and knows God. Now it has appeared to some people 91 and it seems quite credible that the flower and kernel o f beatitude lie in that knowledge in which the spiritual self knows that it knows God.

T H E V EILS O F G OD 2 1 3

For if I had all joy and knew nothing o f it, o f what use would it be to me, and what kind o f joy would it be to me? Nevertheless, I decidedly say that this is not so. . . . For the first thing on which blessedness depends is that the soul should contem plate God unveiled {beyond any individualized o r distinctive condition}. In this state the soul re ceives its isness and reality from the ground o f God and knows nothing o f active knowledge nor o f love, o r o f anything at all [since that knowledge ‘transcends action, individuality, and real distinction’}. It is there wholly and completely silent and undifferentiated in the isness that God is. T here the soul knows no-thing [all individual identity having been transcended} but is one with pure isness itself, o r God who alone is the Knower. But when the self knows and is aware that he him self is contem plating, knows, and loves God, this is a breaking out [otpure contemplation} and a retu rn to the previous stage.” 92

In the ultimate realization, which is a fter all prim al, the divine Intellect is the Knower, essence is the Known, and the contem plative intellection corresponds to Knowledge itself, which is as it were a resultant o f the ‘com mon act’ o f the ‘Subject’ and ‘Object’. T hus the divine Intellect is essentially in actionless act while the unitive intellect is wholly passive and by inverted analogy the latter is realized as indistinct from the form er. “T here [in pure contemplation} in o u r passivity we are m ore perfect than in action. . . . T here God alone acts and the soul is passive.” 93 T h ere the soul is “in darkness, in the silent desert,” without direct awareness o f individuality and distinction between subject and object.

“But what is this darkness? . . . It can only be called potential receptivity. . . . Should you however re tu rn [to a lower state o f awareness} it would not be for reason o f any tru th ; it would be only because o f the senses, the world or the devil.” 94 In o ther words, all that can be said o f the W ord in itself as well as in relation to m anifestation can be said o f pure contem plation, which is principially identified with the W ord. A fall from knowing within the W ord simply means that a desire o r desires o ther than the detached and unlim ited will to know have in truded . In this respect


Eckhart rem inds us that “p rior to original sin [the failure in detached willing to know} there was original wholeness [or virtue and excellence}, but the W ord, o u r Lord Jesus Christ, not only makes possible the restoration o f that original unity, he enhances it in divine glory.” 95

Assuming, then, that all the veils o f God have been removed, we can, with Eckhart, say: Beyond the consideration o f manifestation, the unitive intellect when in pure contem plation “knows God through God.” 96 In that knowledge the soul is not really distinct from God “who knows him self by him self in the soul.” For then there is no longer any known reality that is d ifferentiated from the Knower, everything being com prised within its own possibilities.

It is in the knowledge o f divine and infinite Selfhood, the truest I o f the knower, that beatitude resides. “T he true W ord o f eternity is in act only in identity, w here individuality [or self} and otherness are deserted and alien.” 97 T h ere “the knower is the Son,” 98 the Lord o f all m anifestations unitively included in their Principle. All being is present in pure contem plative knowledge and all effects are known directly in the principial uncaused cause. Im m ediately known is the alpha o f all procession in the m ultitude o f possibilities, and the omega o f all recession from the m ultiplicity o f beings into unity.99 All the veils o f God are known, but now principially within in a reverse order, and as long as pure contem plation is in act, it is in no way affected by them . “W hen I stood in the Principle, the g round o f Godhead, no one asked me w here I was going o r what I was doing: there was no one to ask me. . . . W hen I go back into the Principle, the ground o f Godhead, no one will ask me whence I came o r w hither I went. T h ere no one misses me, there God-as-other [o r God veiled in manifestation} passes away.” 100

6The Detachment

We naturally tend to laud the hum an intellect for its piercing ability to discrim inate that which is essential and p rimary from all that is accidental and sequacious in m anifest reality. But for Eckhart it is evident that unless the intellect is always expounded in term s o f its double role of discrimination and delusiveness, pseudointellectuality is bound to result. T he intellect, as we have discovered, is delusive because o f its great luster, which is nothing o th er than the reflected light o f Intellect-as-such, the ineffable radiance by which it is lit.

T he luster o f this reflected light is indeed an effulgence that can ecstasize the self. It is the substance o f the Prom ethean dream —objective, abstract, ecstatic in its spellbound movement, and though incom m ensurable with corporeality and the sensitive parts o f the soul, it is nevertheless a created light. “He who does not put this reflected light behind him shall not find God.” And Eckhart goes on to say: “Even the Light that is truly God, if I gaze at it w here it plays upon my soul I would not do justice to it. Must I then gaze at it there where it breaks out? I cannot really see the light that shines upon the wall unless I tu rn my eyes to w here it comes from . But if I gaze at it there w here it breaks forth then I am robbed o f its effect. Must I then participate in it as it is pending in itself? Yes, and I say more: I m ust realize it w here it is neither contiguous nor breaking forth , nor yet pending in itself [that is, I m ust not gaze at it at all, and even participation in it must be tran scended}; for these are all modes o f being. God m ust be realized as modeless m ode [that is, principially} and as the unconditioned, for he is free o f modes o f being.” 1

It is obvious that intellectuality m ust affirm the principle215


that “the intellect knows all that it is”; and this is true insofar as the intellect is considered “according to its participation in the divine Light.” But if it would preserve itself from delusion, intellectuality m ust pre-em inently affirm the principle that “the intellect is all that it knows”; and this is true insofar as it certifies its principial instasis in divine Light, “insofar as it is that Light.” Unless the identification o f the intellect with pure Intellect-as-such is m ade in and by transcendent act, o r uncreated Light, the intellect can only appear as inert, flat, having the character o f a separate object. “God is not in us nor are we in God except by the Holy Spirit”; in fact, “that which is not in the Holy Spirit is relatively nothing.” 2 Knowledge in itself, the only completely real knowledge, “irradiates all things and is sufficient unto itself.” 3 T he I in pure knowledge is that knowledge; it is contem plative; it is not the T who is now thinking o r seeking.

“Pure knowledge is contem plation and not, as in passionate, seeking, penetrating thought, som ething in action.” 4 M oreover, “when the intellect enters the Light (or ‘life’, the ‘modeless m ode’) o f Intellect-as-such it knows no antithesis.” 5 Its exterior logic, necessary for one to think and talk about it, derives from and depends on this innermost “unknow ing knowledge.” T hus intellectuality reveals that it has both concentric circles and radii, both modes o f analogy and modes o f identity, and the form er is delusive if not considered in the unconditioned Principle. Not to affirm this twofold tru th is to court the danger o f intellec- tualizing badly. A nd not to revert to Divine Knowledge is tantam ount to replacing God in practice, if not in theory, by the operations and acquisitions o f the active m ind—and that is to court the danger o f idolatry.

But it is not possible for m an in his individual, unregenerate condition to understand that the pronouncem ent ‘I am apart from G od’ is false before he realizes that it is true. Eckhart is insistent on this point: “Man m ust accept the given before he can realize the gift.” 6 Man m ust know God as o ther than him self before there is a realization o f the prim al tru th that there ultimately is no otherness.

T H E D E T A C H M E N T 2 1 7

Even while all this is intellectually understood the fact rem ains that the presence in m an’s intellect o f this deepest metaphysical certainty is o f itself alone ineffective for the ultimate end. T hough intellectual certainty concerning the tru th o f Divine Knowledge is som ething o f God, it is not God, not Divine Knowledge. T hough it suffices on the doctrinal level, it is in no way sufficient on the level o f pure spirituality. T hough man may enjoy it theoretically, it does not yet pervade his whole being. “It m ust be quickened by that faith which moves m ountains, that faith which is an adherence o f one’s whole being to God.” 7 Indeed, ra ther than abolish faith, it gives it an innerm ost m eaning, and to have faith “is to act as if one were wholly within that which one knows to be tru e .” 8

Now to “act as i f ’ one were wholly within and identified with divine Selfhood has nothing in common with ‘acting’ o r ‘playing out a p art’. R ather it implies the form ing o f an enduring disposition that m ore and m ore develops into the actual realization o f being there .9 It means a ceaseless choice o f the ultimate ‘ough t’ and acting as the divine Self acts, that is, “simply being to the full in actionless act as one was when one’s p roper self did not yet exist, beyond here and now, and strictly nonattached to anything.” 10 And “fully to be is to love as God loves.” However, insofar as one is not there in patria one is here “on the way.” It is therefore most appropriate to speak o f the disposition o f detachm ent requisite if the actual realization o f “being there” is to be fully consum m ated, and this disposition is cultivated by form ing the habit o f making the moral and intellectual demands o f detachm ent upon oneself.11

T h e P r e - e m i n e n c e o f D e t a c h m e n t

If the process o f detachm ent is symbolically referred to by Eckhart as the ‘divine jou rn ey ’, it is obviously not the self that makes this journey. R ather it is “the re tu rn o f the W ord to the Father,” 12 which involves a step-by-step “dispossession o f the self,” in its inw ard as well as in its outw ard condition, until that dispossession is complete. T he ‘re tu rn ’ o f the W ord to the Father actually signifies “the going away

2 l8 T H E D O C T R IN E

from all that is not undifferen tiated G odhead” and is, o f course, an exposition that is concessive to intellectuality situated in individual m anifestation. For in tru th the W ord “never goes anyw here,” since it is totally without movem ent and potentiality. T he com m unication o f this ‘jou rn ey ’ applies at once to the realization o f pure contem plation in this life, that is, at the m om ent o f death, as well as to the posthumous destination. But the ‘jo u rn ey ’ is undertaken during the entire course o f gradual “liberation from all distinctive and individual modes o f knowing.” It is effected by standing as it were in the intelligible Light o f divine Intellect and withdrawing back into its source by a detachm ent from all that is not unconditioned.

T o speak o f the ‘divine jou rney ’, o r m ore accurately, to speak now o f the preparation for that journey, is to concern oneself with hum an conduct and virtue. This is not the place to consider in any detail Eckhart’s philosophy o f e th ics, which is clearly and consistently Christian in the scholastic mode. It is only im portan t to point out that it is thoroughly g rounded in principial knowledge and reducible to “the transcendent identity o f the soul with God, the realization o f which is effected by the union o f the unlim ited will to know with divine grace.” 13

This means that morality has a twofold aspect: that conduct which prepares one for the divine jou rn ey and that which is necessary fo r the jou rney itself, which begins once it is realized that the W ord has been heard in the g round o f the soul. For “w henever the W ord speaks in the soul and the soul answers in the living W ord, the soul begins to live in the Son.” 14 This, however, cannot occur “unless the soul is first established in right conduct and cleansed o f willful sin,” right conduct being the habitual exercise o f the natural virtues,15 and sin being nothing o ther than “the privation o f the good,” a “deprivation o r falling-off from the good o f created natu re .” 16 But hum an virtue, since it is necessarily restricted, m ust therefore be transcended, not from without but within: “You should pass through and transcend all virtues and only receive virtue in the ground o f the soul where it is one with the divine Knower.” 17

T H E D E T A C H M E N T 219

It is precisely this second aspect o f morality that presently concerns us—that which pertains exclusively to the withdrawal back into the o rd er o f principial knowledge from which all that issues forth originates. Since the divine Knower is wholly detached, “man should so live that he may be one with the only-begotten Son. . . . Between the only- begotten Son and the soul there is principially no real distinction. . . . If I were to behold God as I behold color, I should be in the w rong direction, for this beholding is tem poral and everything that is tem poral is far from God and foreign to him. W hen one takes time, if one takes even the smallest segm ent o f it, it is still time and rem ains in itself. As long as a m an has time and place and num ber and quantity and multiplicity, he is in the w rong direction, and God is separated from him and alienated from him. All creatures as such are nothing in themselves. Hence I have said: fo rsake N othing [that is, stop trying to gaze at o r behold being} and participate in perfect isness, in which the detached will to know is established. . . . All creatures receive their being without m edium from God. Hence the creatures derive from their real natu re the fact that they innately desire God m ore than themselves. I f the creature fully realized its naked detachm ent [as it is in God}, it could never tu rn aside to anything else, but would rem ain in its naked detachm ent.” 18

It should now be clear, as has been m aintained th rou gh out, that as long as one adopts the position whereby one stops to behold o r take a m ental gaze at being as though it were “som ething out the re” o r “in here ,” ra the r than participating in it, knowledge is necessarily restricted. T hen the unlim ited will to know is aborted, and morality is subjected to a particular perspective. Yet this has been the dilem m a of most m odern philosophy, and no doubt largely accounts for the extrinsic diversity o f its conflicting positions and the subsequent vacuity o f its m oral views, since they are no m ore than ‘views’. W hen we g ran t preference to the intrusion o f desires o ther than the unlim ited will to know we then choose not to culm inate o u r knowing course by d eterm inations and moral decisions rationally grounded in being.


We are then “prevented from hearing the eternal W ord by three things: the first is corporeality, the second is multiplicity, the th ird is tem porality.” 19

In o ther words, the failure to let ourselves participate in being 20 contracts o u r awareness into a separative mode o f cognition whereby all things appear as though constituted only in corporeality, multiplicity, and tem porality as separated from any g round o f isness and as self-sufficient. T hen corporeality is separated from spirit, multiplicity from unity, tem porality from timelessness.21 In fact “if a m an had passed beyond these three things [as so separated} he would be able to hear the eternal W ord and be in the right direction for dwelling in eternity, in unity, in spirit, and [u ltimately} dwelling in the G odhead. Now o u r Lord says ‘No one hears my word o r my doctrine unless he has abandoned self’.22 . . . In the eternal W ord that which hears is identically that which is heard . All that the eternal Father teaches is his isness and his natu re and all his Godhead. He reveals this fully to us in his only-begotten Son, and he teaches us that we are the same Son.” 23 And “no m atter how many sons are born as conceived rationally by the soul, there is nevertheless not m ore than the unique Son, for the birth takes place beyond time in the day o f eternity .” 24

“If one had detached him self completely, in such a way that he had become the only-begotten Son [in principle and inasm uch as being is in function o f knowledge},25 he would be detached as the only-begotten Son is detached. W hatever God manifests and whatever he teaches, he manifests and teaches it all in his only-begotten Son. . . . In o rd er that we may be the only-begotten Son . . . he reveals to us the whole abyss o f his G odhead and the all-possibility o f his isness and o f his knowledge. . . . Such a detached soul dwells in the knowledge and love that God is, and becomes none o ther than God him self in knowledge and love.” 26

God is totally detached, in fact “G od’s own nature is pu rity and unity and these come from detachm ent.” “T h a t God is God is due to his motionless detachm ent, and it is from this detachm ent that he derives his purity and his simplicity and his immutability.” In this motionless detachm ent

T H E D E T A C H M E N T 22 1

God has stood forever and does always so stand [for he is without potentiality and apart from God there is strictly nothing}. Know also that when God created the heavens and the earth he m ight not have been producing anything at all for all that it affected his detachm ent. . . . F u rth er I say that when the Son in his G odhead willed to be m ade man and became so and endured m artyrdom , God’s motionless detachm ent was affected no m ore than if he had not been m ade m an.” 27

No them e is m ore pervasive throughout the Com m entaries, Tractates, and Sermons o f Eckhart than that o f detachm ent. He wrote th ree distinct treatises on it; he em ployed it as the fundam ental doctrine in his Book o f Divine Consolation; he re tu rned to it in almost every serm on and even in his Latin dissertations and exegetical writings. Its u ltimate conclusion is spelled out in his special com m entaries on Matthew 5 : 3,28 for to be “poor in spirit” is to be as “totally detached as we are in the Principle” and “eternally poor as we were when we were not so and so.” 29

T he detachm ent o f which Eckhart speaks is not to be confused with a lack o f interest. N or does it imply that man is confronted with obstacles that have to be eluded in o rder that liberation from the restrictions o f individuality and the self may be attained. T he body cannot constitute an obstacle to liberation any m ore than multiplicity and tem porality o r any o ther type o f contingency. N othing can en te r into opposition with all-inclusive God, in the presence o f whom all particular things are as if they were not.

T hough “detachm ent is to be extolled above any love,” honored “above hum ility” and “m ore than mercy,” these virtues are all included in detachm ent, which is their root and w ithout which they are not divine in operation .30 W ithout detachm ent love is “a going out to some o ther,” hum ility is “an abasing o f oneself before an o ther,” and “mercy means nothing else but a m an’s going forth o f self by reason o f his fellow-creature’s lack.” But in Principle there is no o ther, “for you m ust know that when a free intellect is really detached it takes God as its Self and were it to rem ain structureless and free from contingency it would take on the


very knowledge that God is. . . . He who is detached into eternity is no longer affected by any transitory ‘o th e r’ nor is he aware o f any particular corruptibility; the world as such [which is the entire realm o f individuality o r otherness} is for him dead, he having no desire for any differentiated aught, for there all d ifferentiation is naught. . . . Know, then, that the intellect that is unm oved by any contingency, affection o r sorrow, honor o r disgrace, is really detached.” D etachm ent is then com pared by Eckhart to the hinge o f a door: “W hen the door opens o r closes the ou ter boards move to and fro, but the hinge rem ains immovable in one place and it is not changed at all as a result. So it is here, if you only knew how to act rightly.” 31

P o v e r t y o f S p i r i t

T he doctrine o f detachm ent is finally sum m ed up in Eck- h a rt’s com m entary on “the poor in spirit,” the keynote o f which is: “A poor m an is he who wants nothing, knows nothing, has nothing.” 32

First, in asking what is m eant by “a man who wants no th ing,” he draws attention to those who furnish an incomplete explanation: “Those who speak o f a poor m an who wants nothing as m eaning that he never follows his own will but is bent on perform ing the will o f God . . . their intention is good and we com m end them for it . . . but . . . as long as a m an has som ething toward which his will is directed, as long as it is his will to do the will o f God, he has not the poverty o f which I speak. . . . I f he is truly poor he is as free from his created wants as he was when he was not yet ‘somebody’. . . . W hen I stood in the Principle I had no God and I belonged to my truest Self; I willed not, I w anted not, for I was without destination, knowing what I was in divine tru th ; then I simply willed what I was and no other. W hat I willed, that I was; what I was, that I willed. But when I stepped out o f this freedom to take on a created nature, then I also possessed a ‘God’; for prior to creatures God was not ‘G od’ [as other}: he was what he was. Even as creatures became and as created natu re began, this God-as- o ther was not God-in-himself, but God-in-creatures. Now


we m aintain that God merely as God-as-other is not the ultim ate end o f creation, nor has this ‘G od’ even as great a plenitude o f isness as the smallest creatu re has in God-in- himself. T h a t is why we pray that we may become em pty o f ‘God’, thus knowing in tru th and enjoying eternity .” 33

Continuing, Eckhart says: “A poor m an is one who knows nothing . . . to him m ust be applied all that pertained to him when he was neither for him self nor for contingent reality, no r for ‘God’. He is so poor and em pty o f every mode o f active knowing that no conception o r idea o f God is alive in him. For while he stood in the eternal, actionless m ode o f God, there was no other; what was there in act was the Self. And so we say this m an is as free from his own individualized knowledge as he was when he was not his p roper self; he lets God be in act as he will. . . . In this sense he is so detached and free that he does not know, is even u n aware, that God is the act. . . . Being poor in spirit means being poor o f all distinctive knowledge, simply as one knows no-thing, neither ‘God’, no r creatures, no r him self in any individualized mode. H ere there is no question o f desiring to know o r being aware o f the manifestation o f God.” 34

“T h ird , the poor man has noth ing.” A fter extolling the value o f voluntary external poverty Eckhart m aintains that “one should also be detached from all things and activities inwardly as well as outwardly, so that one becomes a p roper place in which God may act.” But above this is still the ultim ate state o f detachm ent that is the essence o f the whole doctrine, for even the inward self must be transcended. T he “inner self” is in no way “absorbed” on the attainm ent o f final liberation o r “salvation from individuality,” although it may appear so from the standpoint o f universal m anifestation. But from that standpoint what appears as an absorption is really an inversion o r transform ation. Regardless o f appearances o r m ental cognition, “the Holy Spirit is actually the T ransfo rm er.” 35 For when considered from the standpoint o f reality in divinis the soul is “blown up beyond all limit,” since it has effectively realized the fullness o f its intellective possibilities.

“G ranting a man stands detached from all things, from


creatures, from himself, from ‘God’, yet rem ains so constituted that God finds in him room in which to act, then we say: as long as this is so he is not poor in innerm ost poverty. God does not intend in his act that m an should have within him a place in which he m ight act. Poverty o f spirit means above all dispossession o f ‘G od’, o f all individuality and o f self, so that if God wills to act in the soul, he him self must be the ‘place’ in which he will act. And how gladly he wants this! Finding a m an so completely poor, then God is his own work as well as his own workshop, since God is in him self the working.” To be strictly poor in spirit is to be totally without this o r that spirit, but principially identified with pure Spirit o r Intellect-as-such. “It is here in this poverty o f spirit that there is regained that eternal state o f being what has been, what now is, and what shall be forever.” 36

This strict detachm ent is the actual realization that only the Principle itself is totally and necessarily real, that everything else is derivative and ultimately superfluous. T he realization is effective only if the soul finally becomes strictly detached by renouncing all otherness and the very self. By “following Christ into this poverty,” the soul dispossesses itself o f its ‘God’. T hen true God him self is the sole act, the single /, the only Self, in the simplicity and detachm ent o f his own n atu re .37 Indeed it is precisely in nonpossessive simplicity and detachm ent that God superabounds. Since nothing excludes God, he cannot possess; “he is without p roperty” and “his compassion is w ithout passion.” 38 T hus the inversion into that divine detachm ent where there is no doubt, no effort, no desire; w here there is no awareness o f the soul having any being, but only perfect awareness or “unknow ing knowledge.” Dispossessed o f all having, the soul is wholly in God and, as Aquinas has also rem inded us, “that which is in God is God,” 39—a constantly repeated tru th in Eckhart’s teaching.

Such a doctrine takes us beyond what is formally u n d e rstood by detachm ent o r spiritual poverty—that detachm ent from all that h inders the soul from perfectly possessing its own being, o r from considering its being as dependen t on God. It is at this point that all form al as well as norm ative


religious understandings stop short. Inasm uch as these u n derstandings always re fe r to extensions o f the hum an individuality, the states o f which they give access m ust necessarily preserve some connection with m anifested being, even when they reach beyond it to distinctive isness. They are therefore not the same as this purely transcendent state to which there is no access except by way o f transcendent act itself. T he realization o f Divine Knowledge is constituted in that act, and that act in itself precludes any un-binding o r re-binding, that is any ‘re-ligion’. For “in principle nothing has ever been disunited.” 40 This statem ent is especially applicable to the religious ‘mystical states’. And as to the posthum ous states, there is precisely the same difference between ‘im m ortality’, in the religious sense, and principial liberation as there is between ‘mystical experience’ and realization in Divine Knowledge.

If we follow Eckhart and reflect on im mortality correctly, then we shall not regard it essentially as an extension o f the possibilities o f the individualized order. In term s o f detached intellection ‘im m ortality’ does not primarily consist in an indefinite prolongation o f life u nd er conditions that are to a certain degree transform ed but that always rem ain m ore o r less similar to those o f m anifested existence. In o rd er to be fully effective “immortality can only be attained beyond all conditioned states {individual o r otherwise], and in such m ode that, being strictly detached from any possible m ode o f succession, is identical with eternity itself.” 41 Im mortality, which is akin to the state o f pure contem plation and detachm ent, essentially means that there is no longer a need to pass through fu rth er conditioned states o f any kind o r to pass th rough o ther dispensations o r manifestations.

In the case w here liberation o r detachm ent is about to be obtained directly from the hum an state, the true goal, as Eckhart has explained, is no longer the being o f God but the undifferen tiated Godhead itself. “T he objective o f detachm ent is neither this nor that. . . . It m ust aim at pure no-thing (non-otherness, the not-self) in which there is allpossibility.” 42 T h at is to say, it m ust aim at the “unqualified and undifferentiated Principle in its total infinitude and


suprabeing.” Com prising the possibilities o f both m anifestation and nonm anifestation, therefore, the superessential Principle is beyond both while including both. Suprabeing, like the unm anifested, can be metaphysically understood in a total sense whereby it is identified with the infinite Principle. In any case a correlation between suprabeing and being, o r between the unm anifested and the m anifested, can only be a purely intellectual relation. From the standpoint o f pure detachm ent in Divine Knowledge, the d isproportion between the two term s does not perm it o f any real com parison between them.

T he transcendent identity therefore is the finality o f the detached and liberated knower, that is, o f the knower who is freed from the conditions o f individual existence as well as from all o ther limiting conditions, which may be considered as so many attachm ents. W hen the knower who was previously in the hum an state is thus detached and therefore saved from himself, the divine Self is fully realized in its own undifferentiated natu re and is then an om nipresent awareness. H ere there is no stopping to consider what was one’s own being in the state o f individual m anifestation; there is only com plete dispossession in the now.43 Eckhart does not say that we necessarily are m ore by having less; ra ther it is the man who intentionally has nothing, not even an inner self he can call his own, who is truly detached and therefore one with God in God.44

For Eckhart the individual self, in both its outw ard and inner orientations, designates that in the intellective soul which tends toward ownership, toward having, toward affirm ing even its own dependent existence, not to m ention its imagined autonom ous existence. To the degree that the soul merely gazes at reality and thus tends toward corporeality, multiplicity, and tem porality as such, it is greatly bound in self-centeredness. Even to the degree that it insists on having this self, this being, o r refuses to at-one itself with “divine Not-self,” that is, with the all-inclusive W ord—to that degree is the soul united to som ething o ther than God. And to that same degree “the innerm ost Self, the New Man, the divine Person, is not revealed.” 45 It is the self that con


structs an economy o f ‘self and o th e r’, that above all advocates experience, mystical o r otherwise, that stops short with a ‘God’ who is less than God-in-himself. In short, it is the self that ignores isness and in its place puts having.

Conversely, “becoming poor in spirit is letting God be God,” 46 and it is here that Eckhart introduces Aquinas’s principle o f “infallible necessity’.47 In o th er words, “if a man has become detached from him self and all things, then God necessarily fills him ,” for “God m ust give him self up .” T he very isness that God is would be restricted if he did not give him self completely to a soul p repared to receive him completely, since God is also responsible fo r the preparation.

“It is in spiritual poverty, detachm ent, simplicity, that the oneness between man and God is found. And this oneness is through grace, for it is grace that draws man away from earthly things [o r structural manifestation} and rids him of all things conditioned by mutability and corruptibility. I would have you know that to be detached from manifested things is to be full o f God, and to be full o f manifested things is to be em pty o f God.” 48 T ru e , but Eckhart does not counsel detachm ent so that God can fill us and act in us, thereby bestowing an enrichm ent on o u r selves, for “to be full o f God is to realize nothing o ther than God.” T he ‘infallible necessity’ actually means that “the detachm ent necessitates the liberation and transposition o f the intellective soul into the Divine Knowledge which God is.” 49

T h e N o t h i n g n e s s o f t h e H u m a n S e l f

Meister Eckhart illustrates the transposition into Divine Knowledge by referring to the Eucharist, and quotes what Christ said to St. Augustine: “I shall not be changed into thee as food o f thy flesh, but thou shah be changed into Me.” 50 We may be fam iliar with that which makes possible the transposition o f the individual hum an subject in itself to the hum an subjectivity in Christ.51 But that which fu rth er makes possible the subjective transposition to divine subjectivity in God transcends any point o f view available to the hum an knower as such. .

T hough this ultim ate standpoint o f knowledge, situated


as it is within God, never denies structures from without, it does transcend them within. A nd to be wholly within is to be “beyond individuality, beyond comparatives, beyond dualities, participating in the eternal com m union o f the Fath e r and the Son.” 52 It is inconceivable that the rational being which is not-real in itself should not be realized by God and determ ined by him to be transposed in his allpossibility.53 Yet that transposition explains why the hum an self m ust forgo ‘God as o ther’ and the consideration o f itself as a cotraveler in “the re tu rn o f the Son'to the Father,” even the consideration o f itself “as being realized by God.” For the ultim ate term o f that knowing which is intrinsically divine is beyond any consequent determ ination. “It is the naked supra-being o f the G odhead.” 54 Such realization does not actually ‘take place’ in the soul; it has always been, only now the detachm ent from all that is not this realization is complete.

Analogous to detachm ent, o r spiritual poverty, are such term s as ‘silence’, ‘em ptiness’, ‘nudity’; and like them detachm ent is profoundly intelligible. It is not strict nothingness, because no contradiction is involved; nor is it confined to o u r sphere o f structural m anifestation. Detachment, silence, em ptiness, nudity are not m ade; ra the r they are realized only w hen possessiveness, noise, objects, coverings are w ithdrawn. Because these latter m anifestations are relatively limited to the form er, m editation on the nonpossessive, unutterable, unfathom able Reality o f all realities is given a support by these terms. Still, even this support m ust finally be disowned, give way to unattached isness, since the root o f these m anifestations is the infinite Principle, which is in no way affected by any manifestation, structured o r structureless.55

T he detachm ent signifies, as Eckhart has explained, the actual realization o f Divine Knowledge and not just its intellectual affirm ation. It is situated there within, that is, in patria ra th e r than in via, which accounts fo r its expositions as being largely reducible to the destruction o f error. However, o u r rightly asserted antipathy to m odern subjectivist views has m ade m uch o f Eckhart’s language appear as a


hindrance to o u r understanding o f tru th in the principial m ode in which he expounds it. No doubt for this reason a lack o f discernm ent has caused some o f his in terp reters to tu rn detached intellectuality, in the nam e o f which he speaks, into a psychological and subjectivist extravaganza, and others to brand it with labels such as monism, pan theism, and immanentism. As if the unm anifested Selfhood, the principial divine /, were not transcendent!

It is too easily forgotten that transcendence is not to be confused with either philosophical absolutism or its opposite relativism, o r with unicity o r complexity.56 It is fundam entally ungraspable, since it is not the object o f any cognition. T h ere is no ontological ‘p ro o f’ o f the divine Selfhood and no existential o r empirical path tha t leads there. But there is, in tru th , no o ther reality than the divine I and there is not anything that ultimately has any o ther reality. “All creatures as such are a m ere nothing. I do not say that they are small o r ju st partially something; they are a m ere nothing. . . . I f God tu rned away for an instant they as such would be annihilated.” 57

T he link between the finite and the Infinite, o r between individual m anifestation and unm anifested God, is that the finite is in its principle Infinite, while the finite as such is not. In o ther words, “Knowledge-in-itself [the Principle] is, in effect, the g round o f universal o rder, o f distinctive knowledge, and o f experience.” 58 T h ere is obviously no com m ensurable p ro o f to be drawn from lower levels o f reality, bu t what is proved is the lack o f ultim ate reality in anything o th er than unm anifested and undifferentiated God.

F urtherm ore, it is m ade clear in Eckhart’s teaching that what one is called upon to do is not to adapt o r even reconcile points o f view, but to verify them wholly in the Principle, the key maxim being: “W hen in doubt tu rn within.” This can only be in the divine Self in whom there is no other. T h ere need be no anxiety about the agreem ent o f tru th with unconditioned T ru th . Christ, he says, has already seen to that, but we can’t have it on the surface o r in any individualized mode.


D etachm ent is the ‘means’ o f getting within, and regard less o f the degree o f inwardness it is still in Christ the W ord. “St. Jo hn says: ‘Blessed are the dead that have died in G od.’ It appears odd that it should be possible to die in him who him self said that he is the life. But reflect: the soul breaking through its eternal exem plar is plunged into the p rofound no-thingness [o r nonmanifestation} o f its eternal exem plar. This [detachment} is a spiritual death. . . . W hen the soul realizes that its eternal exem plar has been objectivized into otherness, which is a negation o f identity, the soul puts its own self to death to its eternal exem plar, and thus breaks through its eternal exem plar and abides in the nonduality o f the unm anifested divine Godhead. These are the blessed detached who are detached in God. No one can be detached and beatified in the Godhead who is not dead to self and to ‘G od’, that is, in the eternal exem plar, as I have ju s t explained. . . . Christ rose out o f God into G odhead [the u n differentiated Trinity, though in actuality triune God and Godhead are identical}, into the unity o f the Principle. T h at is to say, in Christ all intellective souls, being dead to their exem plar, rise from that divine death to be blessed with the joys above it, namely the fullness o f the Godhead w herein there is beatitude.” 59

Eckhart rem inds us that as long as the soul is considered as being situated in structural m anifestation “the presence o f God to self, o f first cause to its effects, is understood as nearness, as o f he and I,” and the beatified life as “loving and being loved as between two.” 60 But if, as he counsels, we advert to the reality into which that relationship o f love immerses us, what is now realized in that reality is neither near nor far, active nor passive, but an unqualified and u n differentiated unity. W hat is now realized in pure detachm ent is what can be given to no diversified o ther and what no diversified o ther can receive. It is an eternal and infinite I-ness, the Principle w ithout which nothing is. In this reality itself “God m ust be very I and I very God, so that he and I are one / , one is and in this isness working one eternal work.” 61 “G od’s isness is my life. I f my life is G od’s isness, then G od’s isness is my isness and God’s m ode is my mode,

T H E D ET A C H M E N T 2 3 1

neither m ore nor less. . . . In the Book o f Wisdom we read that ‘the ju st live eternally, and their rew ard is in God’— identically so!” 62

“In the eternal exem plar the soul is God and there the soul has equality with the Father, fo r the eternal exem plar, which is the Son in the Godhead, is in all respects equal with the Father. . . . But where there is still equality there is no identity, for ‘equal’ indicates a negation o f identity. . . . I am not equal with my p ro per se lf; I am here [in structural manifestation} identically my p ro p er self. Hence the Son in the Godhead, inasm uch as he is the Son, is equal with the Father, but as such he is not identical with the Father. Identity is w here Father and Son are one, that is, in the u n manifested and undifferen tiated unity o f the divine Principle. In this unity the Father knows no Son, nor does the Son know any Father, for there there is neither Father nor Son nor Holy Spirit [as differentiated}. W hen the soul is within the Son, its eternal exem plar and wherein it is equal with the Father, and then breaks th rough the eternal exem plar, it, in the Son, transcends equality, and identity with the th ree Persons is realized in the unity o f the nondual Principle.” 63

Yet in this detachm ent in the Principle, the ‘effects’ o f its trinitarian affirm ation and the m anifestation o f itself in intelligible being, and hence ourselves as distinct, are also known through their p ro p er relations. Why? Because that “unknow ing knowledge” manifests, and necessarily so, the unfolding o f God’s all-inclusive aspects in actuality through his affirm ation o f him self in his eternal act.64 “For David says: ‘Lord, in thy Light we shall see Light.’ T h a t is, in the Light o f the undifferentiated Principle the divine essence shall be known and also the whole perfection o f that essence as m anifested in the variety o f the Persons by their m ultiplicity and distinction in the unity o f their Principle. . . . T hus there shall be the transposition from m anifested light into the unm anifested effulgence o f the divine Principle and the soul shall be as it is [in the detached realization o f Divine Knowledge}; that is, it shall be that which it is in principle.” 65 T he beatitude o f the detachm ent “is to realize


all as it is and all profusion that is possibly to be desired; to know it all at once and whole in the undivided Intellect and that in God, unfolded in its perfection, in its flower, w here it first bursts forth in the Principle; and to know all w here God him self knows. Now that is the beatitude o f detachm ent.66

I f the detachm ent is altogether equivalent to a death and resurrection in Christ, it is because the divine exem plar actually signifies this essential metaphysical principle: “It is impossible fo r isness to be d ifferentiated from isness; for nothing can be d ifferentiated from isness except strict no th ingness.” 67 In tru th we are apart from God insofar as we are not. “T h a t which is considered apart from God or as som ething only in itself, neither is nor is o f God.” 68 It is always in this sense that Eckhart speaks o f the unreality and nothingness o f the hum an self.

If, when Eckhart refers to “the hum an self as such” and means that which is outside God, then precisely to that extent he is no t deluded in calling the self a “nothing,” a “naught.” A nd we understand what he means when he says that the realization o f this nothingness, not ju s t a theoretical consent to it, is a spiritual death. “W hat m ust a man be to know God? He m ust be dead. But dying to this world [o f structure and individuality} is not to die to God.” 69 “W ithdraw n from time sunrise is sunset, going up is going down, and thus isness is always in principle.” But “some people fondly think that they have attained realization within the Holy T rin ity who have never got beyond themselves”; they think they are detached in will and thought, but “they are loath to be detached from self.” 70

On the o th er hand, if Eckhart refers to the intellective soul as that which is already and eternally in God, then p re cisely to that extent he is not deluded in saying that m an’s “truest I is G od.” For from this standpoint, if a fu rth er rem inder is needed, “God is pure instasis, standing in him self, in whom there is neither this nor that, for whatever is in God is G od.” 71 “In God there can be nothing alien, n o th ing other. Heaven affords us an example: it can never receive others as other. T hus w hatever comes to God is in


verted; however insignificant it is, when brought to God it turns from its self, from all nothingness. . . . Now reflect and marvel! If God inverts and transposes insignificant things into himself, ju s t think what he does with the intellective soul which he has dignified with the direct image o f himself.” 72

T h e T r a n s p o s i t i o n b y T r a n s c e n d e n t A c t

An essential point previously noted m ust now be considered in m ore detail if we are to understand the way in which the detachm ent is effected.

Eckhart is never unm indful o f the perennial principle that the relation o f subject, w hether o f the rational intellect to the ratiocination that takes place in it, o r o f prim e m atter to the structure o f m aterial things, o r o f substance to accidental determ inations, is a relation o f potentiality to act. Transcendence, in o ther words, is only in virtue o f what already is in act at a h igher degree o f knowing and isness. And divine transcendence is only in virtue o f what eternally is in act at the incom m ensurable instasis o f the unrestricted actuality o f Divine Knowledge. A leap beyond structure by way o f potentiality is, o f course, unintelligible—a fact rarely considered in m odern philosophy. It can only be by way of act and, as Aquinas says, so far as we are knowing subjects it is effectively in virtue o f the actuality o f God.73 T ranscendence, then, necessitates in us the raising up o f the subjective principle to an unrestricted o rd er o f receptivity o f knowing and isness.

Some in terpreters o f Eckhart, ignorant o f the essentials o f metaphysics, understand his doctrine as implying a withdrawal into the indeterm inancy o f the potential principle. This, however, he clearly denies, and instead insists repeatedly that “nature cannot transcend natu re ,” 74 as we have noted several times. With Aquinas he clearly insists that there is no transcending o f the hum an self by way o f potentiality, only by way o f act.75 In o rder to attain detachm ent and “ascend to Intellect in itself,” it is requisite, says Eckhart, “to withdraw from all accidental determ inations and from every ratiocination o f the m ind.” Only thus is there ef


fected a realization o f God as divine Selfhood, the u n re stricted act o f knowledge itself—and hence the tru th signified in the statem ents “I am that Son and not o ther” o r “my truest / is God.” In o ther words, “we m ust go back into the Grund, der grundlos ist.” 76

It is clear, then, that this withdrawal from particular actualization m ust be a “recession into an axial eternal act.” And there should be no doubt as to what act that must be if there is to be a realization o f the detachm ent necessary in o rd er that pure contem plation may be attained. It cannot be the individuality o r substantial being o f the soul. T hough that is an enduring act and affords the possibility o f tran scendence in the intimacy o f God’s presence in the soul, thus denoting a possible ‘mystical condition’ that is genuinely religious, it nevertheless does not afford a transcendence o f real distinction. But going beyond real distinction is the very nature o f knowledge in divinis, o f pure contem plation. Eckhart is fully aware o f the passivity that is at the root o f action. He is also aware that the “axial eternal act” can be neither an act understood as action nor an act understood by the common analogy o f action. “W hen detachm ent attains its suprem e perfection it becomes inactive, unknow ing knowledge through Divine Knowledge.” 77 Transcendence, which is the very essence o f detachm ent, can only be by way o f act as known in the o rd er o f inversion and thus “by way o f unrestricted isness in primal act, that is, by God him self.” 78 Grace is essentially “the uncreated act” o f God, that is, the Holy Spirit itself. O r, to put it another way, “grace is the indwelling o f the soul in God.” 79

It m ust be rem em bered that the principial notion o f grace inverts the o rd er in which the connection o f created grace and uncreated grace are understood. In the transcendence to the principial o rd er Eckhart grants priority, as it were, to uncreated over created grace. He understands first God’s im m ediate Self-giving and secondarily the m anifested and therefore relational reality by which that Self-giving o f unm anifested pure act is distinct.80 Hence he considers the obediential potency—the detachm ent, the “pure virginity” 81—of the intellect’s essence with regard to u n


m anifested act, instead o f considering it with regard to the m anifested quality that is sanctifying grace.82 Indeed, since both created and uncreated grace, which intervene in the supernaturalization o f the intellect’s essence, focus upon the same obediential potency, there should be no difficulty in understand ing the intellect as directly actuated by God with whom uncreated grace is identical.

T hus God is the act o f the intellect’s essence, o r to speak formally, its “like-work,” its “quasi-form .” He is principially the actual Knower, which means no m ore than that he te rminates the relation o f the intellect’s direct union with the unm anifested and undifferen tiated Selfhood. This union is the im m ediate link o f the intellect with pure Intellect, because the “Light o f God” is not an interm ediary but that which gives reality to the intellect’s oneness with divine In tellect.83 From the standpoint o f structural manifestation, or o f the soul in via, this union signifies a real distinction; in patria, that standpoint situated within the Principle, it signifies only an intellectual relation.

“T here is a distinction between being by grace and being grace itself. . . . Grace is nothing o ther than the flowing Light o f God proceeding immediately into the soul; it is a supernatural inform ing principle o f the soul, which gives it a supernatural nature. This is what I m eant when I said that the soul was unable o f itself to transcend its own individual activity; this [transcendence} is possible only in the act o f uncreated grace, which transposes the soul above activity. . . . So long as the soul is in the process o f being transposed beyond itself into the nonindividuality o f itself and beyond its own activity, it is ‘by grace’; the soul ‘is grace’ when this transcendent flight is effected, so far as it now stands in pure detachm ent alone, aware o f nothing but o f being according to the m ode o f G od’s knowledge. . . . For to be grace itself [that is, to actually realize transcendent identity o r nondistinction} the soul m ust be detached from all activity, inward as well as outw ard, as [uncreated} grace is detached, which [being the act o r isness that God is} knows no activity. . . . Grace detaches the soul from its own activity; it detaches the soul from its own individuality. In


this supernatural transposition the soul transcends its natu ral light which is creature [and which, being reflected light, pertains to structural manifestation} and stands within in im m ediate oneness with God.” 84

I f the soul is finally to become detached from its own activity it m ust cease to seek. “T he intellect as seeker p enetrates beyond discursive thinking. It goes looking about, seeking, casting its net here and there, acquiring and losing. But above this intellect the seeker is Intellect, which does no t seek but rests in the pure and unconditioned isness o f its own divine Light. And I say that it is in this Light that all the powers o f the soul are transposed.” 85 T he hum an m ind is like a child in a room the door o f which is made to open inwards, and who habitually pushes the door in o rd er to open it. T he m ore it pushes the less the door can open, but if it stops pushing for an instant the door will open by itself.86 “Now intellect the seeker m ust recede into Intellect which does not seek,” 87 that is, into its Principle. “T he m ore one seeks God the less one finds God,” and “he who seeks o r aims at any individualization [general o r particular], seeks and aims at nothing [in com parison with the All- inclusive}.” 88

“ ‘I sought him and I found him not. . . . I sought him all n ight th rou gh ,’ says the soul in the Book o f Love.89 T h ere is no night w ithout light; it is only veiled. T hough veiled the sun is shining in the night, bu t by day it shines eclipsing all o ther lights. T h a t which we seek in creatures is all night. My m eaning is really this: all that we seek in creatures [o r in structural and individualized manifestation} is no m ore than a shadow [though a real shadow o r reflection}. . . . All that is no t the principial Light is darkness and night. T h a t is why she did not find God. ‘I rose and sought him all about and I hun ted through the broadways and alleys. . . . T h en when I passed a little by I found him whom I sought.’ This little, this insignificance that h indered h er from finding him—this has often been the point o f my teaching. He to whom all transient things are not insignificant, little and as nothing, that m an shall not find God. . . . W hen you consider God as an objective light o r a being o r a boon—whatever you


know about him, that God is not. U nderstand, one must transcend this ‘little’, discard the adventitious and realize God as O ne [without an other], . . . Anything individualized, anything that may come to your knowing, that God is not, because he is neither this nor that. W hoever says that God is this o r that, believe him not. T he Light that is God shines in darkness. God is the true Light: to realize it one must be blind and stand in God detached from every ‘what’.. . . W hen the soul stands in the O ne o f nonduality, and is set therein by the complete discarding o f its own self, then God is realized as it were in a naught [as unmanifested}.. . . T he soul that is detached from things comes hom e to stay in the undifferen tiated pure Light. It has no love, is w ithout anxiety and fear, for knowledge is the basis, the foundation o f being, and love is meaningless unless in knowledge. W hen the soul is blind and can app reh en d no other, then it realizes only God, and necessarily so. . . . God is all-inclusive.” 90

While Eckhart’s ‘m ethod’ o f detachm ent is not explicitly founded on the form al concept o f grace, it nevertheless does o f necessity lead to the lumen Dei. But grace and m ethod are not incompatible agents; they are merely two converse sides o f the one single reality. M oreover, “do not worry w hether God acts with natu re o r above nature. Both natu re and grace are his. . . . Once a man very much wanted to direct a stream into his garden, and he said: ‘If only I could have the water, I should not care th rough what kind o f channel it flowed to me, w hether it was iron, wood, bone, o r rusty metal, as long as I got the w ater.’ ” 91

T he m ethod o f detachm ent is also the ‘gift’, is in itself already the freely given grace by the fact o f its revelation. As such it is necessarily efficacious in its mode o f withdrawal from all active willing, knowing, and having, from all that is not uncreated act. W hat, a fter all, is the ‘gift’ if not the Principle inversely signified in the ground, o r isness, o f the ‘given’? T he soul’s ‘I’ reflects God’s I; nevertheless, the soul’s ‘I’ signifies nothing o ther than an inverse principle by com parison with the divine I.

All form al doctrines o f grace stop short o f this aspect o f


inversion and, by their very nature, do not consider the aspect o f identity. Indeed it is not within their province to combine aspects o f nondual Reality in a simple and structural apprehension. But w ithout the g round of Divine Knowledge, which is constituted in identity, religion and theology are meaningless. And fo r Eckhart, who speaks in the nam e o f Divine Knowledge, the inversion is already effective and “the detached unknow ing /, which knows no otherness, signifies God’s actionless act.” 92 After all, as Aquinas rem inds us, “divine isness is unqualified pure act and therefore unqualified by any activity o r otherness.” 93

“T he true I ,” says Eckhart, “indicates God’s isness, that God simply is. All things are in God; out o f him, without him, is nothing. All individualities o r creatures as such are insignificant, and as m ere nothing they are incom m ensurable with God. W hat they are in T ru th , that they are in God, for only God is the T ru th . I means the actuality o f Divine Knowledge inasm uch as it is the sign o f the All- inclusive. It affirm s that God alone truly is. Again, /, means that God is inseparable from all m anifestation, that he is m ore in things than they are in themselves. And we should be inseparate from things, not as depending on the self, but as completely detached from self. . . . So far as you are nothing to your self so far are you not o th e r from all things; and so far as you are not o ther from all things so far are you God {in principial knowledge], for God’s Godhead consists in non-otherness. T hus the m an who realizes nonotherness realizes G odhead as it is in God himself. . . . Now' God is all-possibility 94: God made you {that is, in m anifestation you are] like himself, a reflection o f his Selfhood. But like implies som ething d ifferen t and individual. Now between God and the soul there is no diversity no r any individual relationship, and hence in truest reality the soul is not to be considered ‘like’ God, ra th e r {in principle] it is identical with him and one with G od’s Self. . . .

“M ore than this I know not and cannot know, so on this point my teaching m ust stop. But on the way I was thinking that one ought to be totally detached in one’s intention, having no individuality, indeed nothing in m ind but the G od


head in itself—not happiness nor this nor that, but only God and his Godhead in itself. I f one intends o therness in any way, it is a delusion o f Godhead; therefo re apprehend Godhead as unm anifested in itself.” 95

“As truly as the Father in his unconditioned natu re begets his Son innately, so truly he begets him in the ground o f the intellect, and this is the innerm ost world. H ere is God’s Principle my Principle and my Principle God’s Principle.. . . From this innerm ost Principle you should enact all your works without why. I say fu rther: As long as you enact your works for the sake o f the heavenly kingdom , o r for God’s sake, o r for the sake o f your own eternal happiness, in o ther words from without, then truly all is not fulfilled in you. It may be tolerable and good, but it is not the best. . . . For he who seeks God according to some distinctive structure lays hold o f the structure and misses God who is concealed in the structure. But he w'ho seeks God without structure apprehends him as he is in himself.” 96

“W hen discursing about God I often shudder at how totally detached the intellective soul m ust be to attain that identity [in God}. But one m ust never regard this as impossible. It is not impossible to the soul established in G od’s grace. In fact nothing is easier for the soul established in God’s grace than to leave o ff all things.” 97

R e q u i s i t e S u p p o r t s

Action, no m atter how well in tended, cannot u n d er any condition liberate from action; it can only bear fruit within its own sphere, which is that o f hum an individuality. T hus it is not through action that it is possible to become detached from and so transcend individuality. But as long as there is a trace o f active willing, active knowing, and the having o f self, the m ethod o f detachm ent essentially requires distinctive supports, w ithout which it quickly becomes nothing m ore than a means o f autonom ous indifference and thoroughly delusive.

Eckhart is em phatic on this point and necessarily so in the nam e o f pure metaphysics. T o the extent that a man denies God’s unique com m unication to m an in the Revelation and


Christ’s C hurch ,98 to the extent that he knowingly refuses to partake o f the sacram ents,99 to the extent that he refuses to acknowledge and love God in his neighbor,100 to that extent is he separated from T ru th . “To be one with T ru th is to be all that one knows.” 101

So long as m an is bound by the cords o f existence there is always the ethical im perative o f selflessness. T h ere is also always som ething o f faith in his intellection, otherwise there would be nothing separating him from that which is known. And as long as m an is so bound, then: “Let us know only Jesus Christ who alone is o u r light, o u r support and way to the Father.” 102 Furtherm ore, “the Body o f Christ is the Church, which is built up by the unity o f the Body from the m any faithful,” and “as God’s will is in Christ so it is in the whole C hurch.” 103 As to the sacraments: “Sacram ent means a sign . . . they all point us to the underlying tru th . . . the union o f the soul with God.” And “all these signs are requisite supports as long as we are in sight o f but not yet one with what we know.” “We m ust not however stop at the enjoym ent o f the sign, but go on to the underlying reality.” 104

Eckhart asserts that the prim ary function o f the Church, “the Body o f Christ,” is the preservation and transmission o f the traditional doctrine, which is “the spirit o f Christ.” T he discharging o f this function is the fundam ental reason fo r the C hurch’s existence and fo r its establishm ent by Christ. T he real reason fo r the existence o f every hum an knower finally rests on the divine basis o f the doctrine. Hence no hum an knower can hope to find apart from it those eternal principles that alone confer m ore than “ju st hum an m eaning” and the incentive to em erge from the enclosures that that individualized m eaning entails. As the function o f a teacher is in fact a true “spiritual paren thood ,” so the function o f the Church is to make possible a “second b irth” fo r all disposed to receive the teaching. But inasmuch as this “second b irth” is a symbol essentially “signifying our prim al origin and generation in God,” then the teacher m ust before all else function as “the unfailing, requisite support and rem inder o f this essential tru th .” 105

Those who would extract Eckhart’s teaching from the


Christian faith o r p retend to reduce his insistence on participation in the Church and its sacram ents and rites to m ere psychological theraputics should be ignored. E ither they are dishonest regarding what he says—if they have studied all his genuine works—or, for some reason, are incapable o f understand ing all that is intrinsic to the m ethod o f detachm ent that he expounds. Intrinsically the Church is “the union o f the soul with God, the m arriage o f hum an and divine n atu re .” “Not in vain did God en trust the key to St. Peter, for ‘Peter’ signifies ‘knowledge’. For knowledge has the key and opens and penetrates and breaks through and finds God unveiled.” 106

“While the rites [o f the Church} are not to be cultivated at the cost o f the underlying reality, for the reality itself is inside and not in the outw ard display, they point us to the one and only T ru th .” 107 T he rites are com pared with the sails o f a ship, which help a man to reach his destination m ore easily, and without which he would have to rely on oars. Some who with valid reason are prevented from participating in the rites may indeed acquire true detachm ent and knowledge o f God, yet “only by m aintaining their attention perpetually concentrated and fixed on the W ord, in which consists the one and only indispensable preparation .” 108 In the sacram ents, which are “inform ed by the W ord,” the outw ard form s are properly speaking “supportive pointers” and these eminently contingent means produce a result that is o f quite a d ifferent o rd er from their own. It is by reason o f its very natu re and o f the hum an conditions determ ining it that the intellective soul requires such ‘supports’ as a continuing and perennial point o f d ep artu re for a realization that transcends them .

As long as the intellect is in any way bound by the cords o f existence it requires that continuing point o f departure. T he intellect requires it because the disproportion between the means and the end corresponds to no m ore than the d isproportion that pertains between the individual state, taken as the starting point for that realization, and the u n conditioned state that is its term . Speaking sub specie aetemitatis, therefore, the essential principle o f the efficacy o f the


C hurch (and its sacramental rites) is that everything that is contingent insofar as it is a m anifestation ceases to be so when realized as an eternal and im m utable possibility. Everything that participates in positive being m ust be rediscovered in the “unknow ing knowledge” and detachm ent o f nonm anifested God. It is this which allows o f a transposition, o r inversion, o f the soul into the All-inclusive, by the detachm ent from restricted, and therefore negative, conditions that are inheren t in all structural m anifestation.109

Knowledge does not have to become som ething o ther than what it is in o rd er to save; it has only to become consonant with its true, detached nature. But will m ust deny itself—in willing particulars, in willing to conceive and to possess anything in individual m anifestation—if the soul is to be brought back to its original source and Principle. “God does not compel the will; ra the r he establishes it in freedom so that it may choose to will nothing o ther than all-inclusive God him self and liberation itself. T hen the intellective spirit is incapable o f willing o ther than as God wills: this is not its nonfreedom but its principial freedom . Some people say: ‘If I have God and the love o f God then I am free to do everything according to my own will!’ 110 They understand falsely. So long as you are capable o f doing your own will or doing anything against God and against his precepts, you have no true love o f God, though you may deceive the world that you have it. T he soul established in God’s will and in the love o f God is fully willing to do all that conform s with God, leaving undone all that contradicts him .” 1,1

Pure knowledge is not at liberty to err, but will is quite free to assert its independence and do ill. It is only when will conform s to its prim ordial m ovem ent that it is effecting its true act in willing to know without restriction. T hus it is that knowledge can save only on the condition that it fosters decisiveness to opt for the ultim ate im perative— selflessness—and solicits by faith all that one truly is in principle. When it does this it engenders love; it produces an im m ediate reintegration o f the will in God and an awareness o f God in the ‘o th er’.112

T H E D ET A C H M E N T 243Eckhart has much to say about love; some o f his passages

on divine love are the most sublime ever written. Yet it all boils down to this: “Love is simply the will reintegrated into principial T ru th .” 113 “H ere in love there are not two, but one and unity; in love I am m ore in God than I am in myself.” 114 “T he soul established in God’s knowledge and in God’s love is nothing o ther than that which God is. I f you love your true Self you love all men as your true Self. So long as you love anyone less than your true Self, you have not attained to true love; you still do not love all men as your true Self, all selves in one Self: and this Self is God- Man [Christ the incarnate Word}.” 115

As previously noted, “love keeps bound that which is e ternally united in Knowledge, that is, in G odhead.” T o be sure “some people want to see God with their eyes [o r know him individually as an object} as they see a cow, and to love him as they love their cow— for the milk and cheese and profit it beings them . This is how it is with people who love God for the sake o f outw ard gain o r inward consolation. They do not rightly love God when they love him for their own advantage. Indeed, I tell you in tru th , any object [o r idea} that you hold in your m ind, however good [even objective or subjective being, for transcendence is neither by way o f extroversion nor intraversion}, will rem ain a barrier between you and the innerm ost transcendent T ru th .” 116

If a person wills to know with pure knowledge, his whole being must be brought into Godhead, and if this implies detachm ent and poverty o f spirit, it also implies und ifferen tiated love. I f love is suprem ely necessary, it is because it is not possible for a person to realize in pure knowledge the certainty that that knowledge enjoys unless the whole being is integrated in this realization. T he innerm ost Self o f pure knowledge is not realized without including the im partable ‘o th e r’ o f being. T he intellective center is not truly known in principle w ithout involving the volitive circum ference.

If the person blessed with principial knowledge does not in trude upon or abuse an ‘o th e r’, it is because the ‘o th er’, w hether it be a flower, a worm, o r a hum an, is o f God, his truest Self. Liberation, o r salvation, then, is only effective


[e ither in this life o r posthumously} insofar as it essentially constitutes “unknow ing knowledge” as it were in G odhead. Conversely, that knowledge, to be “unknow ing,” presupposes o f necessity the realization o f what has already been term ed the transcendent identity, or nonduality, which includes the reintegration o f the will in undifferen tiated love. T hus the detachm ent, liberation, undifferen tiated love, and knowledge are but one and the same. And if Eckhart says that knowledge is the means o f liberation, it m ust be added that in this case “the means and the end are inseparable, for knowledge, unlike action, carries its own fruit within itself.” 117

“Now we cannot love God without first knowing him, but the essential point o f God is in the Principle, equally tran scendent to and im m anent in all creatures, and the only way o f getting within it is for the natural intellect to be withdraw n into a light infinitely m ore intense than itself. Supposing, for exam ple, that my eye were a light and strong enough to end u re the sunlight in its glory and unite with it, then its innerm ost state would be due not to itself alone but pre-em inently to the sunlight. So the intellect. T he intellect is a light and if it is tu rned completely away from all things and is wholly in the Light o f God, then, since God is e ternally flowing with grace, my intellect is illum ined and united with love and therein knows and loves God as he is in himself. H ere we have an explanation o f how God is flowing out into all rational beings in his light o f grace and how we with o u r intellect apprehend ing this glorious light are transposed out o f ourselves and to there within the Light o f God himself. . . . T o en te r there we shall have to ascend by way o f natural light into the light o f grace and therein be inverted into the Light that is the Son in himself. T h ere in the Son all is loved by the Father with his love, the Holy Spirit, which has its eternal source in him, and having issued forth in his eternal birth, namely the Son [the W ord], is carried back to the Father as the knowledge and love o f both. T hus identified with the Son, by the Holy Spirit, the Father with the Son shall be known and loved [in the un

T H E D E T A C H M E N T 245manifested and undifferentiated Principle, the Godhead} and all that is im partably ‘o ther’ in and by him .” 118

“T o my outw ard self all creatures are known as creatures, for instance, as wine, bread, o r meat. But to my inner self all individuality is not known as creatures, ra the r as gifts o f God. T o my innerm ost Self, however, they are known not as gifts o f God, but as eternally not o ther.” 119

Notes

Unless otherwise noted all references to Meister Eckhart designate, by abbreviation and num ber o f page, the following publications:DW—Meister Eckhart. Die deutschen Werke, ed. by Jo se f Q uint, et al. Kohl-

ham m er edition, vols. I-V , except IV which is in p reparation. S tuttgart, 1938 ff.

LW—Meister Eckhart. Die lateinischen Werke, ed. by E. Benz, J . Koch, et al. K ohlham m er edition, vols. I-V . S tuttgart, 1938 ff.

Q—Meister Eckhart. Deutsche Predigten und Tractate, ed. and trans. by Josef Q uint. M unich, 1955. Reliance on Q uint is requisite f o ra correct understand ing o f some o f the M ittelhochdeutsch texts. This work is here used in conjunction with DW and Pf, and especially in reference to some G erm an Sermons not yet published in DW.

RS—Eckharts Rechtfertigungsschrift (Defense treatise in Latin). Gabriel T hery : Edition critique des pieces relatives au proc'es d’Eckhart contenues dans le manuscrit 33b de la bibliotheque de Soest. Archives d ’histoire doctrinale et litteraire du moyen age, 1926-29. (Designated by Section and Article.) For this Trial D ocum ent see LW V and the edition by A. Daniels in Beitrage zur Geschichte des Philosophic des M ittelalters, 23, 1923.

Pf—Meister Eckhart, ed. by Franz Pfeiffer. Deutsche Mystiker des 14 Jahr- hunderts. Bd. II, 1857 and 1924. U nder the direction o f Q uint my use o f these Mittelhochdeutsch texts has been carefully selective as to their reliability and re fe rred to inasm uch as they rem ain as yet u n published in DW IV.

For an Eckhart bibliography the reader may initially consult Jam es M. Clark’s Meister Eckhart, London, 1957, p. 259 ff. and his Meister Eckhart, Selected Writings, London, 1958, p. 258 ff.

Introduction1. We should understand that the word ‘divine’ is directly derived

from divinitas, the fundam ental m eaning o f which is ‘G odhead’ o r ‘that which is most excellent as the suprem e Principle’. Divine Knowledge, then, is knowledge in G odhead, in divinis, as Eckhart explains.

2. T h e word Mystik in G erm an has the m eaning o f mystical theology, o f h igher intellection o r sublime spirituality, whereas Mystizismus means merely an escapade in pseudoanalogies and images and is com m on to that em otional and impulsive faculty which is really beneath reason and not above it. Even so Eckhart can be designated a Mystiker only if that term has been purified o f all notions o f knowledge, including the unio

247

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mystica o f any experienced o r determ ined mystical state, which are ex ternal to that which is as it were wholly in G odhead.

3. LW IV, 9; cf. 103, 299.4. Cf. V ladim ir Lossky, Theologie negative et connaissance de Dieu chez

Maitre Eckhart (Paris, 1960). While pointing ou t certain aspects o f Eckh a rt’s teaching that pertain to the o rd e r o f mystical theology, enticing as that o rd e r was to Lossky’s personal involvem ent in Eastern O rthodox theology, he nevertheless tended to subordinate all o f Eckhart’s teaching to tha t o rd e r o f direction toward God and thus failed to acknowledge the purely transcendent o rd e r o f knowledge in principio, which is the essential standpoint o f the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge that Eckhart expounds. T o understand Eckhart we m ust transcend the dialectic between cataphatic and apophatic theology, both o f which are constituted not as it were in God bu t in the finite hum an know er when ap p rehend ing God as objectively o ther, e ither positively o r negatively. It is the transcendence o f this dialectic that alone grounds the wholly supranatu ra l and supradeter- m inate consideration o f Divine Knowledge and distinguishes it from any particular ‘re-ligious’ mode. W hen o u r concern is only genuine mysticism, which is focused not on knowledge in God but on the realization o f God in us and on o u r desire for o r love o f God, we can do no better than tu rn to the writings o f St. Jo hn o f the Cross and St. Francois de Sales. See my Spirit o f Love—Based on the Teachings o f St. Francois de Sales (New York and London, 1951).

5. F. Vetter, Ed., Die Predigten Taulers (Berlin, 1910), Ser. XV. p. 69.6 . LW III , 131, 233, 278. In this sense ‘pu re metaphysics’, o r ‘detached

intellection’, is not to be regarded as a branch o f philosophy. It is perhaps m ore approxim ated by what B.C. B utler calls ‘m etachronics’ than by what Aristotle designates as metaphysics. W hat Eckhart discerns from Holy Scripture is that the after-history o r end o f time underp ins and is ‘p rio r’ to history, tha t the en tire o rd e r o f tim e, the past and the fu ture, is fully consum m ated by the incarnation o f the W ord o f God in Jesus Christ (LW III, 403). But the incarnate W ord is m ore than the culm ination o f history. Pure metaphysics, situated as it is within the W ord, and therefo re wholly unrestricted , not only culm inates, underp ins, and is therefo re ‘p rio r’ to history, tim e, and physics (i.e. natural phenom ena), bu t also the en tire o rd e r o f m ind, individuality, and universal being, tha t is, Totius Naturae, the m eaning o f which is to be found in its Principle (the W ord) and o f which the totality o f N ature is a m anifestation. In his studies o f Eckh a rt J . Koch uses the term Transzendentalien-Metaphysik to designate the M eister’s pivotal consideration. See e.g. Sinn und Struktur der Schrift- auslegungen in R. Ochslin, ed., Meister Eckhart der Prediger (Freiburg, 1960). This Festschrift in com m em oration o f the seven hundred-year ann iversary o f Eckhart’s b irth contains some insightful contributions to Eck- hartian studies. See especially those by J . Koch, H. Fischer, R. Ochslin, and B. Dietsche.

7. This is also to say, as Eckhart does, tha t “Holy C hurch is inseparable

N O TES T O PA G ES 8 -2 5 249from Christ, as body is inseparable from soul” (LW IV, 45; III, 298). M an’s perennial access to Jesus Christ is “through the C hurch” and Eckhart believed, with w ell-grounded reason, tha t it is only th rough the C hurch, to which the inspired recorders o f the life and words o f the God- Man belonged, tha t it can be known that he actually was and is who he is. T hough “the speaking o f God to m an” was not and is no t wholly re stricted to the historical Jesus Christ, but “has always been in act” {yet “received only according to the receptivity o f the receiver,” in diverse times and places], “all divine com m unication is fully consum m ated and finalized [metaphysically speaking] in Christ,” in the sense that “the speaking o f God to m an [regardless o f time and place] is always the speaking o f Christ, tru e God and true m an” (LW III, 427).

8. See Jo se f Q uint, Meister Eckhart (M unich, 1955); Jam es M. Clark, The Great German Mystics (London 1949); Jam es M. Clark, Meister Eckhart (London, 1957); J . Koch, Kritischen Studien zum Leben Meister Eckharts, I and II, in Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 29 and 30 (1960).

9. LW III , 4.10. Vetter, Predigten Taulers, p. 69; Suso's Leben, ch. X X X III, K. Bihl-

meyer, Heinrich Seuse: Deutsche Schriften (Stuttgart, 1907). See also my edition o f The Book o f the Poor in Spirit—A Guide to the Rhineland Mystics (New York, and London, 1954), In troduction. It is true that some o f the M eister’s statem ents tha t were condem ned by John XXII are theologically unsound if taken in isolation, as indeed they were by the Cologne censors and Avignon judges. T hey nevertheless disclose a valid m eaning when considered in their p ro p er context. Suso warmly defends Eckhart against these charges in his Leben (last fou r chapters) and Biichlein der Wahrheit, esp. ch. VI (v. Bihlmeyer, p. 352 ff.). And if it is asked w hether Eckhart in tended to be heterodox, to initiate a distinctive ‘G erm an theology’ o r prom ote what came to be acknowledged as the Devotio Moderna (with its debasem ent o f m an’s intellectual quest as exem plified by G erard G roote and the au thors o f the Theologia Germanica and the Imitation o f Christ) the answ er is surely negative.

11. Matt. 9:12; Mark 2:17; Luke 5:31.12. DW V, 61.13. Q 17 ff. See also Meister Eckhart der Prediger.

P a r t I : P r e p a r a t o r y C o n s i d e r a t i o n s

Chapter 1: Difficulties and Misconceptions1. LW I, 152.2. W orth consulting as a docum ented critique o f certain Eckhart

scholars is I. D egenhardt, Studien zum Wandel des Eckhartbildes (Leiden, 1967). For the benefit o f the reader unfam iliar with Eckhart studies, it should be pointed out that practically all previous attem pts to expound the M eister’s teaching—from those o f Lasson, Ju n d t, and Delacroix, etc.,

250 N O TES T O PA G ES 2 5 - 3 2

o f the last century to those o f K arrer, Dem pf, and Lossky, etc., in this— should be studied with a degree o f caution. Beneficial as most o f these works are, it m ust now be acknowledged that the ir authors, in the ir concern to relate the M eister’s teaching to a particular hum an situation, either failed to consider the doctrine o f Divine Knowledge in principle, o r greatly distorted it by reducing it to som e external m ode o f u n d e rstanding o r attainm ent. Much o f this is understandable since in most cases they were w orking with unreliable and largely incom plete texts. In any case, what has been presented by these and o th er scholars has not been Eckhart’s essential teaching on Divine Knowledge, but a teaching confined at best to the hum an limits o f mystical theology in the light o f a peripatetic ontology. As to the great contribution to Eckhartian research m ade by U.S. Denifle, it m ust be stated tha t he went too fa r against some earlier studies with his m ethod o f destructive criticism. Both professors Q uint and Koch were right in saying, at the Medieval C onference at Cologne in 1958, that o u r understand ing o f Eckhart must begin com pletely anew by a consideration o f his teaching from the standpoint o f principial knowledge (see below, note 4).

3. DW II, 504-5.4. T h e principial m ode o f knowledge is the consideration o f all things

and all m anifestation as it were from within the G odhead, the unconditioned Principle, o r tamquam in principio infinilo. It is the consideration o f all reality from the standpoint o f the full actualization o f the intellectus possibilis, a consideration m ade feasible by the com m unication o f the e te rnal W ord o f God. (I.W II, 247 ff; v. Eckhart’s In Ecclesiasticus, ed. by H. Denifle in his Archiv. f u r Litteratur in Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters, II, p. 588.

5. DW I, 35-40.6 . DW I, 90; 113-14.7. LW V, 40.8. See Gabriel T hery , Archives d’histoire doctrinale et litteraire du moyen age

(Paris, 1926-29), 323-24; LW IV, 5 ff.9. LW III, 12.10. Jam es Clark, Meister Eckhart (London, 1957), p. 99.1 1. See O. K arrer, Meister Eckhart, (M unich, 1926), p. 56.12. De mystica Theologia, 2 and 3.13. De divinis Nominibus, 2,1.14. De mystica Theologia, 3; 2.15. Ibid., 1.16. De divinis Nominibtis, 13, 3.17. De mystica Theologia, 5.18. De divinis Nominilms, 5,1; 2,11; 4;35.19. LW V, 92.20. De libero Arbitrio, 11 ,5, 8 ; De civitate Dei, 11, 28; De Trinitate, 5, 2, 3;

Tractalus in Joannis Evangelium, 99, 4.

N O TES T O PA G ES 3 3 - 4 2 2 5 1

21. I)e Genesi ad litteram, 8, 26, 48; De Trinitate, 15, 7, 13.22. De Ideis, 2.23. Summa Theologica I, qlO, a l ; a4; Commentarium I Sententiarum xix,

q 1 1 , a2 .24. LW III, 181.25. ‘Isness’ (Eckhart’s istigkeit) is by far the best English term available

to convey the m eaning o f the Latin esse (‘to be’ as noun), thus ru nn ing less danger o f confusing it with ens (being) which designates ‘existence- essence’, o r tha t which derives fro m ^ se as from its principle. Only since the sixteenth century has the term existence’ been comm only used for esse, and this un fortunate usage has led to m uch confusion by actually distorting and restricting the metaphysical significance o f esse.

26. “As long as the intellect fails to find the actual tru th o f things, does not touch the bottom and find the ir principle, it rem ains in a condition o f quest and expectation, it never attains rest, but works unceasingly to find their prim al source. It spends perhaps a year o r m ore in research on some natural fact, discovering what it is, only to work as long again stripping o ff what it is not. All this time it has noth ing to go by, it makes no determ ination at all in the absence of knowledge o f the principle o f tru th . Intellect in this life never rests. However m uch God manifests him self in things, it is nothing to what he is in pure Intellect” (Pf. 20-21).

27. DW I, 120-23.28. LW III, 208.29. Opuscula xvi; De Trinitate q6 , a l.30. Summa Theologica I, q79, a8 ; a9.31. Ibid., I, q35, a l ; q5, a2; q85, a2, a d l.32. Ibid., I, q 12, a2, ad3.33. Ibid., I, q79, a2, ad2; q l 8, a4, a d l; q27, a3, ad2; q79, a3; De Veri-

tate, q2, ad4; Compendium Theologiae 37, 41.34. Summa Theologica I, q 18, a4; Compendium Theologiae 131; De anima 15.35. Summa Theologica I, q l , a6 , ad3; De Div. Nom. ii, 4.36. Summa Theologica I, q79, a4; III Contra Gentes 54.37. Compendium Theologiae 104; III Contra Gentes, 40; Compendium The

ologiae, 106.38. II Contra Gentes, 4.39. Perihermenias, 1, 14; De Veritate, q2, a l .40. I Cor. 3: 1-2; Summa Theologica, Prologue, I, q l and q2.41. DW I, 164-65.42. LW IV, 431; DW V, 207.43. LW I, 297.44. For Eckhart ‘act’ (or in aclu) has no th ing in comm on with ‘action’

but m eans actuality o r isness. Hence Pure Act m eans unconditioned isness itself in contrast to the restricted isness, o r ‘act o f being’, which all m anifest beings have. Cf. Aquinas, De Potentia, q 1, a2.

45. LW IV, 350; Q 332.

2 5 2 N O T E S T O PA G ES 4 2 - 5 0

46. LW II, 2 3 9 ; V, 4 9 , 96; II, 2 2 -2 7 .47. Q 4 2 0 -2 1 — Pf 7; LW III , 318.48. LW III , 29 7 .49. LW IV, 4 5 4 ; DW I, 5 1 -5 2 .50. LW III , 287.51. LW I, 153.52. LW I, 154.53. DW II, 4 6 7 : “ It amazes me that Holy Scripture is so completely full

and the m asters say tha t the Scriptures are not to be taken merely as they stand. T h e com m on and gross m eaning in them must be translated to a h igher plane, bu t to do this one needs symbols. . . . T h e re is none so sim ple-m inded that he cannot find m eaning there according to his m easure; there is none so wise tha t when he tries to fathom them will find that they are beyond his dep th and containing m ore to be found. All tha t we here on earth h ear from the Scriptures and all that m an may tell us about them has a prim ary, h idden meaning. For ail that we here u n de rstand o f them is unlike the prim ary m eaning they have in God, as though they did not exist.”

54. LW III , 419 ff.55. Q 427— P f 12; DW II, 100; DW II, 304 ff.56. LW III , 3 -4; see RS III, 1.57. LW IV, 356.58. LW V, 91-92.59. LW IV, 265; v. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q28, a l .60. LW V, 45 ff; DW III, 379: “If there were in God tha t which we

could affirm as nobler than another, it is Knowledge. For in Knowledge God is purely open to himself; in Knowledge God proceeds in himself; in Knowledge God manifests him self in all things; in Knowledge God creates all things. W ere God not primal Knowledge, there would be no Trinity , there would be no creatures.”

61. LW III, 7; 115-17.62. LW I, 154.63. LW III, 116; LW III, 44; “Each and every thing, w hether p ro

duced by n a tu re o r by art, has its isness o r the fact tha t it is directly from God alone.”

64. DW II, 87; III , 112.65. LW V, 39; DW II, 316.66. See my Book o f the Poor in Spirit, In troduction.67. As H ans H of, in his Scintilla Animae (Lund, 1952), p. 152 ff., cor

rectly points out, the re is no th ing in com m on between H egel’s “an tithetical dialectic and Eckhart’s analogical dialectic,” n o r between Hegel’s Absolute Idea and the G odhead o f which Eckhart speaks. An exam ple o f try ing to tu rn Eckhart into a ‘philosophical existentialist’ is Joachim Kop- per’s Die Metaphysik Meister Eckharts (Saarbriicken, 1955).

68. For exam ple: Evelyn U nderhill, Mysticism (London, 1911); W. R.Inge, The Philosophy o f Plotinus (London, 1918) and Christian Mysticism

N O TES T O PA G ES 5 0 - 5 9 253(London, 1899); Rufus Jones, The Flowering o f Mysticism (New York, 1939); Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy (New York, 1944); G. della Volpe, Eckhart 0 della filosofia mistica (Rome, 1952); O. Bolza, Meister Eckhart als Mystiker (Liibeck, 1933); R. van Marie, De mystische leer von Meister Eckhart (H aarlem , 1916); Carl Ju ng , Psychological Types (London, 1938); R. O tto, West-Ostliche Mystik (Gotha, 1926).

69. E.g. Shizuteru U eda, Die Geburt in der Seele und der Durchbruch zur Gottheil (Giitersloh, 1965); D. T . Suzuki, Mysticism— Christian and Buddhist (London, 1957); A. K. Coomaraswamy, Hinduism and Buddhism (New York, 1942).

70. LW II, 487.71. LW IV, 146: “ If I call God a Being, it would be ju s t as erroneous as

to call the sun pale o r black.”72. IV Contra Gentes, 65; Eckhart, LW IV, 278-79.73. DW I, 13; 199; DW III, 191; DW I, 12-13.74. LW III, 123; II, 78, IV, 301.75. LW I, 37; DW V, 222-23.76. LW IV, 176; Q 432.

Chapter 2: The Reality o f the Divine Self1. LW II, 371; v. Aquinas, III Contra Gentes, 38.2. LW III , 348.3. DW I, 52 ff; LW II, 353; DW III, 173 ff; LW III, 117. T h e “de

tached and unlim ited will to know” is that intellective desire o r spiritual appetite innate and im m ediate in the hum an soul. Preceding all o ther desires, it is essentially unrestricted and rem ains dynamic unless aborted by a determ inate interest in som ething less than unrestricted knowledge itself.

4. DW I, 365-66; LW III, 206: “T he intellect, which possesses nothing, has the en tire range o f isness for its object, since it has the same isness as its object, the realm o f isness.” See LW II, 331; LW III, 265-66; Aquinas, I Commentarium I Sententiarum d l9 , q5, a l .

5. adequatio intellectus et rei. Cf. Aquinas, De Trinitate, q5, a3; I Commentarium I Sententiarum XIX, q l5 , a l , ad7.

6 . LW IV, 263.7. LW I, 177.8 . LW I, 178.9. DW I, 94.10. LW IV, 114; LW III, n. 675.11. DW I, 365; LW II, 62.12. DW I, 55; LW III, 21; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q l 6 , a3. On

‘participative knowing’ see LW III, 52.13. LW III, 199.14. LW II, 24.

2 5 4 N O T E S T O PAGES 5 9 ~ 7 1

15. Exodus 3:14; Jo hn 1:1.16. LW II, 27. H ere Eckhart is in com plete agreem ent with Aquinas,

Summa Theologica I, q2, a l , a d l .17. DW I, 55. Eckhart repeatedly slates this fact: v. DW I, 331, 123;

Q 433— Pf 25; DW V, 204; Q 295; Pf 21, etc.18. I.W II, 25 ff.19. DW V, 50; LW IV, 280; DW I, 69-70.20. LW I, 156-59; LW IV, 267-68; LW V, 93.21. LW IV, 269.22. LW I, 158; I.W IV, 267-68: “In inquiring about anything I always

ask w hether o r not there is intellect o r intellection in it. I f there is not, it is d e a r that a thing which lacks intellect is not God o r the primal source o f all things, which are so clearly directed toward definite ends. If, on the o th er hand, it has intellect in it, I then inquire w hether o r not there is anybeing in it apart from intellect. I f there is not, I have now established thatit is one and unconditioned, and fu rtherm ore tha t it is uncreatable, p rimal, and so on, and hence tha t it is God. But if it has some being o th er than intellection, then it is com pounded and not simply one. It is p e rfectly clear, therefo re , tha t God alone is, in the truest sense o f the word, that he is p u re Intellect o r Intellection, and that he alone is pu re In telligence. T here fo re God alone brings things into being through In tellect, because in him alone isness is unrestricted Knowledge.”

23. T h is ‘dem onstration’ is not set fo rth in any distinct article as such, bu t it clearly unfolds itself th roughou t several o f his writings, particularly in the following from which the substance o f the a rgum ent and o u r quotations (th rough p. 68) are taken: I)W I, 34, 49 ff, 102—4, 151 ff, 249-53, 376 ff; DW II, 167, 219, 306, 323; DW III, 57, 169-79, 293; F. Jostes, Meister Eckhart und seine Jiinger, Ungedrukte Texte (Freiburg, 1895), No. 10 (Reliable), 77; Pf 185; LW I, 502; LW III, 19-20, 24, 25, 28, 36, 43; LW IV, 115, 198-200, 265-67; LW V, 47.

24. DW I, 146.25. LW II, 24; Pfeiffer, Zeitschrift f u r deutsches Altertum (Berlin, 1866

etc.) Bd 8 (2); v. DW III, Pred. no. 71.26. Cf. Aquinas, De Ente et Essentia, V; De Polentia, q7, a3.27. DW I, 185, 187.28. LW III, 32; v. In Genesis II, n. 45.29. DW III, 179.30. Exodus 3 : 14.31. LW II, 26.32. LW II, 24; LW I, 157.33. DW V, 43; LW I, 50. T hough in agreem ent with Avicenna on sev

eral points, Eckhart, like Aquinas, rejects him on this question, fo r Avicenna claimed tha t God necessarily creates o r is com pelled by his nature to m anifest certain possibilities. But A ugustine had previously rejected certain Neo-Platonists on the same question. See Avicennae Metaphysices Compendium, trans. C eram e (Rome, 1926), p. 126 ff; Aquinas, Sum m a

N O TES T O PA G ES 7 1 - 7 4 255Theologica I, q l9 , a l , 2 and 3; I Contra Genies, 80-83; De Veritate, q23, a4; A ugustine, Patrologia Latina (Migne) 40, col. 30.

34. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q25, a6 , ad3.35. LW I, 220, 272.36. DW I, 80, 185; DW III, 161. C om m enting on “All things are m ade

by H im ” in St. Jo h n ’s Gospel. Eckhart says: “He [St. John l does not deny that there are o th er causes o f things [finite o r natural causes], but he means tha t the effect does not have its isness from any o th er causes, but from God alone” (LW III, 43; see RS III, 6).

37. LW IV, 264; DW I, 66-67; DW II, 94-96; LW III , 119 and n. 549; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q 8 , a l .

38. DW III, 171-72. T his does not m ean that, in the causal o rd er, God is the only cause. God is the cause o f the isness o f all m anifest beings (v. note 36), which are in him because he is the ir ultim ate principle and end. Yet there is subjected causality within m anifestation itself insofar as individual selves are agents, fo r “every agent acts inasm uch as it is in act.” Eckhart states tha t many people falsely o r crudely think that since all creatures are dependen t on the Principle, o r God, fo r the ir own isness, they are therefo re w ithout causal pow er o f the ir own. O r they mistakenly think that God’s all-possibility implies two equal acts o f causality, God and creatures. T h e first conclusion eliminates free will; the second is pantheistic. But Eckhart, with Aquinas, rejects both: v. LW IV, 29-31; Aquinas, De Potentia, q2, a l . See also LW III , 43.

39. R eferred to as accidie, which Aquinas says “is a contraction o f the m ind” (XI de Malo, 3, ad4); and “every sin happens because o f some lack o f knowledge” (IV Contra Gentes, 70).

40. LW III, 43-44, 78; LW II, 38 ff, 336 ff.41. In this sense “what God knows he knows entirely within himself.

T herefo re God does not directly know us insofar as we are in sin [or willful contracted awareness, the prim ary sin}. Hence God knows us in the same m easure as we are in him, that is, to the ex ten t that we are without sin [i.e. w ithout that from which w rong decisions and wrong actions are fostered].” (DW I, 78; see RS IX, 28).

42. DW I, 53, 54, 99: “God issues everything forth alike, and as flowing from God all things are equivalent in him ; angels, man, and all creatures flow from God alike in their first issuing forth . T o consider things in their prim al flowing out is to consider them all alike. . . . A flea considered as it is in God is nobler in God than the highest angel in itself. All things are the same in God and are God himself.”

43. Jostes , Eckhart und seine Jiinger, No. 10.44. Summa Theologica I, q85, a2; De coelesti Hierarchia, 2, 5.45. LW IV, 192. This them e o f a hierarchical universe o f superiors

and inferiors is em phasized throughou t: v. LW III, 18, n. 531; LW IV, 143, 100, 188; LW I, 154, 229; LW II, 360, etc.

46. LW II, 364.47. LW II, 120; LW III, 189-90: “It should be understood that in

256 N O T E S T O PA G ES 7 5 - 8 2

creating all things God instructs and enjoins, advises and com m ands them . . . to participate in him and conform themselves to him , to tu rn and hu rry back to him as the prim al source o f the ir en tire isness, in accord with the words o f Ecclesiastes (1 : 7): ‘U nto the place from whence the rivers come, th ith er they re tu rn again.’ . . . M oreover, the Principle and the end, the good and the end , are identical. T herefo re , ju s t as everyth ing created follows and pursues its end , so likewise it follows and re tu rns to its Principle.”

48. DW I, 386; cf. DW I, 233.49. LW II, 37.50. LW II, 378. Even “the dam ned have a natural desire fo r being,

which they have imm ediately from God, and consequently for God him self.” (LW III, 189; cf. DW I, 105).

51. DW I, 239.52. LW V, 117.53. DW III , 265: “G od’s G odhead consists in the full com m unication

o f him self to w hatever is receptive o f him ; were he not to com m unicate him self he would not be G od.”

54. DW I, 377.55. LW IV, 377; v. DW III, 39; LW V, 197.56. Q 415— Pf 3.57. LW III, 321.58. DW I, 40.59. De Veritate, q4, a2.60. LW I, 329.61. Posterior Analytics, 100b-17.62. Ibid., 99b-25.63. LW V, 45; LW III, 27.64. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q 17, a2 and 3.65. LW IV, 240, 454.66. Speaking o f the ‘possible intellect’ as distinguished from the ‘active

intellect’ and the ‘passive intellect’, Eckhart says that “before this is begun by the intellect and com pleted by God {that is, ‘the intellect becom ing passive so tha t God him self may undertake the work o f the active intellect’} the intellect has a knowledge o f it, a possible understand ing o f all it may know and as it were fully actualized. This is the m eaning o f the ‘possible intellect’ [miigeliche vemunfC], but it is greatly neglected and so no th ing comes o f it” (Pf 14; see en tire discourse). U nfortunately certain scholars have translated miigeliche vem unft as ‘potential intellect’, thus d istorting Eckhart’s m eaning (v. LW III , 585) and also Aquinas’s, which he follows, (v. Summa Theoloenca I, q79, a2 and 7.)

67. DW II, 305.68. LW IV, 325.69. DW III , 485 ff. This discourse on M artha and Mary clarifies Eck

h a rt’s teaching on the vita activa and the vita conlemplativa. These com plem entary ways are inseparable, the fo rm er resulting directly from the lat

N O TES T O PA G ES 8 2 -9 0 257ter, and yet neither has anything in com m on with the life o f the ‘activist’ who is “engrossed in things ra th e r than in G od.” See also Q u in t’s note 23 on p. 495 and RS III , 12.

70. Ibid. 489; v. DW II, 165; DW V, 368; LW IV, 287.71. DW I, 122.

P a r t II: T h e D o c t r i n e

Chapter 1: God and the Human Self1. LW III, 34; DW I, 135 (v. note 2); also v. LW III, 10, 16, 17; DW

III , 179, 174, etc.2. T h e actual reality o f God is not here in question, for in pu re m eta

physical knowledge it is already known. This question was dealt with, according to Eckhart, when we considered the hum an self in its relative u nregenerate condition in Ch. 2 o f Part I.

3. DW II, 420; LW III , 194 ff. See also Eckhart’s Von dem Schauen Got- tes, W. Preger, Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter (1874), I, p. 484 ff. Discussions with Prof. Q uint in 1958 assured me tha t this discourse is reliably attributable to Eckhart.

4. LW III, 200.5. LW I, 187; LW IV, 263; DW III, 226.6 . LW III, 27.7. LW III , 61 : Principium semper afficit principiatum, sed principiatum nullo

sui afficit suum principium.8. DW III , 150.9. LW II, 27; LW III, 181; LW IV, 9; DW III, 339; DW I, 358.10. See LW III , 135-39.11. LW III , 5 ff. As Aquinas also makes clear: Summa Theologica I,

q33, a l .12. L W I I I , 17.13. LW I, 50; v. LW I, 189, w here Eckhart speaks “against those who

say that God creates and produces things from natural necessity.”14. esse in se.15. ens.16. LW I, 176-77; LW III, 174; v. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I—II, q4,

a5, ad2. See also DW V, 115; LW III, 27. Aquinas: “W ithin God there is no real distinction o f his absolute esse, which is his natu re [intellectus], suprem ely single and simple, bu t only o f relations within h im ” (Summa Theologica I, q78, a3; q28, a l , ad4).

17. P. Strauch, Paradisus anime intelligent in Deutsche Texte des Mittelal- ters, xxx (Berlin, 1919) (Q 272-73). This distinction is not real but only intellectual because what is here involved is not an acknow ledgm ent o f two diverse transcendent principles but simply a transposition o f considering the one unique Principle as ultim ate, indistinct Subject in itself. Eckhart makes clear tha t the “isness which God is,” o r “the unrestricted

25 8 N O T E S T O PA G ES g 1 - 1 0 2

isness o f Divine Knowledge itself” is identically his G odhead (LW IV, 263 ff).

18. LW I, 197: Creatio autem est collatio esse. Cf. LW I, 160; III, 47.19. LW I, 159 ff, 39; LW IV, 208.20. DW I, 358; LW II, 27; LW III , 181; LW IV, 9, 60, 79, 206; a m eta

physical tru th constantly em phasized by Eckhart.21. LW III , 41 ff.22. LW I, 157-60, 376; LW III, 6 .23. LW III, 37.24. O ut o f nihilum antecedens, not ou t o f nihilum absolutum. Cf. Aquinas,

De Potentia, q3, a4.25. DW II, 468-69.26. LW III, 304; DW V, 30; LW II, 43; LW III, 16.27. “W here the re is intellect, which is spiritual [i.e. noncorporeal and

nonm aterial], there is personality, for personality means completeness, and infinite personality is p u re Intellect o r p u re Spirit” (LW II, 487; v. LW III, 284 ff). See Aquinas: Commentarium I Sententiarum xxiii, q l , a2, ad4.

28. LW II, 386.29. LW I, 212 ff.30. O ne m ight also add the type o f opposition posed between ‘religion’

vs. ‘science’, o r ‘theology’ vs. ‘philosophy’. T h e recognition o f these as distinctions only and not as separations o r opposites is the recognition o f a suprem e Principle in which they have the ir com m on source.

31. LW IV, 270.32. LW III, 162-63.33. LW III , 39.34. ens.35. esse.36. LW III, 43, 7 -8 ; DW I, 56; LW IV, 22.37. D W I, 2 7 0 -7 1 ; cf. D W V , 6 0 a n d L W I I I , 19.38. Summa Theologica I, q l3 , a7, q28, a l ; LW II, 45.39. Aquinas also rem inds us that infinite esse (in se) transcends real dis

tinctions in tha t each divine perfection, known to us analogously by the distinct perfection o f creatures, is, in Deo, the divine essence itself (Summa Theologica I, q4, a2, q l2 , a4, a d l) .

40. DW I, 123; v. DW I, 55, 330; DW II, 303-4; Q 433— Pf 25, etc.41. LW I, 562.42. DW I, 146; DW I 330: “W hatever one says that God is, he is not—

not this, not that; what one does not say o f him, he is ra th e r than what one says he is.”

43. W hat is here involved is simply the consideration o f God in him self in his unm anifested and undifferen tia ted G odhead and the consideration o f G od-as-other and for us, inasm uch as we are in m anifestation. See LW II, 421.

44. LW I, 171 ff.

N O TES T O PA G ES 1 0 2 - 1 1 3 25945. DW I, 287 ff; Aquinas, II Contra Gentes, 56, 57; Summa Theologica I,

q74, a l , q84, a2.46. DW I, 55; LW III , 21, 158; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q5, a2,

q l 6 , a3, q85, a2, a d l . We are no t here concerned with the inorganic which does not directly pertain to the hum an integrality, n o r should it be in ferred tha t the hum an being is o th er than one integral structure; thus it is specifically determ ined as intellect-body, tha t is, a “rational being” (LW IV, 200; LW III, 10 ff).

47. DW III , 384, 161, cf. Pf 107.48. LW IV, 194.49. Q 273— Pf 180-81—Strauch, no. 26.50. LW I, 637.51. LW II, 478.52. DW III, 225; DW I, 69.53. See LW I, 319; II, 20, 44, 58, 67; III, 43, 89; DW I, 147, 319.54. ens in se, per se.55. Aquinas, De Veritate, q 1, a3.56. DW I, 146; v. LW I, 176; LW II, In Sapientiae, n. 260.57. LW III, 28, 201.58. T h a t a very rem arkable mystical m ovem ent developed th roughou t

the Rhineland after the death o f Eckhart is undoubtedly true. T auler, Suso, Ruysbroeck, and the ir im m ediate disciples were directly and greatly influenced by Eckhart. But if they refrained from teaching publicly the ‘pu re metaphysics’ which the ir m aster taught, it was because o f the decline in intellectuality in the schools and the climate o f ‘caution’ created by the condem nation o f some statem ents attribu ted to Eckhart in the fam ous Bull In agro Dominico, in 1329. See my Book o f the Poor in Spirit—A Guide to the Rhineland Mystics, Introduction.

59. LW III, 406.60. Jostes, No. 34; v. DW III , 196.61. LW II, 76-77; LW III, 175; LW I, 44.62. LW II, 501.63. DW I, 132; LW II, 263.64. Q 360— Pf 71 ff; v. A. Spam er, Texte aus der deutschen Mystik des 14

und 15 Jahrhunderts (Jena: 1912), B.I.65. Q 430— Pf 15; Q 433— Pf 25; Q 360—Pf 71.66. LW II, 50; v. LW I, 418.67. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 485; LW II, 487.68. LW III, 443.69. DW I, 363.70. LW II, 77; DW I, 361 (v. note 4), 363; LW III , 175: Unde deus non

est pars aliqua universi, sed aliquid extra aut potium prius et superius universo. Et propter hoc ipsi nulla privatio aut negatio convenit, sed propria est sibi, et sibi soli, negatio negationes, quae est medulla et apex purissimae affirmationis.

71. LW III , 167, 55, 36; DW I : 52; Aquinas, Summa Theologica 1, q41, a5.

2 6 o N O TES T O PA G ES U 4 - I 2 O

Chapter 2: The Word1. Q 433— Pf 25.2. LW III, 18; Pf 105; v. Aquinas, De Potentia, q 8 , a l . M oreover, the

hum an intellect knows itself, not directly, but only th rough its activities (Summa Theologica I, q87, a l) .

3. LW III, 8 -9 ; v. Aquinas, De Potentia, q3, a l ; Compendium Theologiae,41.

4. T h a t is, in siner vermiigenheit. W hen Eckhart speaks o f ‘divine pow er’ o r ‘all-mighty’ he m eans ‘all-possibility’; v. LW II, 38.

5. DW I, 15-19.6. Q 4 3 1 — Pf 15.7. LW III, 29-32.8. DW I, 92-3 .9. This is why Aquinas insists on the term ‘principle’ in this consider

ation, “since ‘cause’ is a far narrow er term than ‘principle’ we should not presum e to em ploy it, especially as ‘principle’ . . . signifies God o r origin in G od” (Contra Errores Graecorum, 1). Cause is a positive, ontological source on which an individual reality depends; principle is tha t from which anything o r any m anifestation originates and term inates in any way whatsoever.

10. DW II, 11; LW III, 133.11. LW I, 156 ff.12. Cajetan, Commentarium In Summa I, xxxv-1.13. DW I, 56-57; LW II, 24-26.14. DW III, 387.15. LW IV, 28; cf. LW IV, 26, 72, 91; LW III, n. 481. See Alanus de

Insulis, Regulae Theologicae IX, P L 210, 628: Quidquid est in deo, deus est.16. DW I, 50; v. LW III , 134; LW IV, 26.17. P f 533; v. DW II, 264.18. LW III , 18.19. DW I, 210; DW I, 78: “G od’s eye is tu rned only tow ard himself.

W hat he sees he sees wholly within him self.” See RS IX, 19. Obviously ‘eye’ and ‘seeing’ are to be understood symbolically as m eaning ‘intellect’ and ‘knowing’ (note previous sentence on p. 78 o f DW I), a symbolism tha t is universally acknowledged, no t only in the O ld and New T estam ents, bu t by U panishadic au thors and even by Plato, particularly in his fam ous allegory o f the cave.

20. LW III , 40-41: “ I f you wish to know w hether all your inn er and o u te r activity is divine o r not, and w hether it is the operation o f God within you and is done by him , then consider if the direct end o f your intention is wholly God and as it were in God. I f it is, the action is divine because the principle and the end are identical, namely God” (Cf. RS IX, 56).

21. Luke 14 : 10.22. Eph. 4 : 6 .23. DW I, 359, 366.

N O TES T O PA G ES 1 2 0 - 1 2 6 2 6 l

24. DW II, 56.25. Rom. 13 : 11-14.26. LW IV, 437-38.27. DW III , 265.28. DW II, 252-53; LW III, 13, 23; LW IV, 269: “ Identity is unity.”29. LW IV, 94. Also Q 436: “ Know that to find him [God] is not in

your pow er but in his.” DW III , 425-26: “T he soul makes headway and transcends itself, never by its own act o r by its own light, but solely by G od’s act and the light tha t he has given it.” LW IV, 94: “This grace is in the very isness o f the soul and disposes it to one actuality, one life, one w orking within G od.”

30. LW III, 245: Plenitudo temporis est, ubi nullum tempus est. DW I, 177: “T he fullness o f time is when the re is no m ore time. H e who in time has his intellect established in eternity and in whom all tem porality is as dead, in him is ‘the fullness o f tim e.’ ” DW I, 423: “T im e is fulfilled w hen it is ended , that is, in eternity. T im e ends when the re is no before and after, when all that is is presen t and when all tha t ever was and shall be is directly known in principle.”

31. DW I, 157-58.32. Psalms 61 : 62 (A.V. 62 : 11).33. DW II, 98.34. LW IV, 8 .35. LW III , 24-25: “For the Logos is certainly in the prim al Intellect, is

that Intellect properly speaking; and it is ‘with G od’, that is to say in every intellectual being that is his image o r God’s offspring.”

36. DW III, 142; LW III, 199; RS IX, 59.37. DW I, 143.38. DW II, 95; LW IV, 411.39. LW III, 41.40. H ere Eckhart rejects the doctrine o f certain medieval Islamic mas

ters who claimed that God created a First Intelligence who then p ro ceeded to create a second intelligence, etc.

41. LW IV, 7; Q 271; Aquinas, De Divinis Nominibus, 2, 2.42. LW IV, 14.43. LW IV, 59-60.44. DW III, 215.45. DW I, 173.46. LW IV, 93.47. LW IV, 114-15, 137-38.48. ‘Ju st as’, ‘as it w ere’—“I always have in m ind this little word quasi,

which m eans gleichwie (als) . . . it is this tha t I have considered u p p e rmost in all my discourses” (Q 199; cf. DW I, 154; LW II, 233). T h a t is, from the standpoint o f o u r ju s t hum an m ode o f knowledge, the p rin cipial standpoint is always an ‘as it w ere’, quasi o r gleichwie state o f consideration, im plying inverse analogy, and therefo re never to be confused with any individualized m ode o r m ode o f ontological ‘substantiality’.

49. DW II, 419; v. DW III, 21-26.

2 6 2 N O TES T O PA G ES 1 2 6 - 1 3 0

50. T he distinction implied in the g round o f the soul is simply the distinction o f the soul’s isness from its essence and operations that are wholly dependen t upon the fo rm er and w ithout which they would not be. See LW IV, 266- 6 7 ; Aquinas, Commentarium I Sententiarum, viii, q5, a2.

51. This in no way contradicts the Incarnation which, fo r the seeking intellect, is a consideration o f G od’s act from the standpoint o f m anifestation (v. DW I, Predigt No. 5b). Christ the God-M an, the W ord-made-flesh, is actualized in tim e and history by the all-possibility o f God, who effects a unique union whereby hum an natu re substantially assumes the Person o f the W ord. But this unique union is neither accidental n o r essential, but a hypostatic and personal union: the hum an and divine essences are united not in one n a tu re but in one Person. T hough essence and person are not really distinct in God, they are according to o u r hum an way o f ap p reh en sion, which m eans tha t in the Incarnation the essence o f God does not become the essence o f individuality. T h e union in the Incarnation is only in Person, m eaning that there are two essences, o r natures, in one com plete isness (LW III , 36 ff; DW I, 86-87; v. A ugustine,D e Unitate Trinita- tis, 15; Aquinas, De nnione Verbi Incarnati, 1).

52. DW III, 215.53. DW II, 306.54. DW I, 364-65.55. DW I, 284.56. LW V, 61.57. T hat is, an intellect without a body, w ithout ever having a body, an

incorporeal substance, o r an ‘angel’. See Aquinas, De Veritate, qlO, a6.58. LW IV, 436.59. DW I, 368-69; v. RS IV, 7 and III , 10.60. LW IV, 264, 278; LW II, 155. This is the case with every series,

w hether o f time, space, num ber, relations, o r com paratives. See DW I, 148; LW IV, 112; LW II, 366-67; etc.

61. LW IV, 58.62. DW I, 177.63. Jo hn 1 : 1 .64. DW I, 109-10; RS IX, 39.65. T h a t is, in patria, in divinis, in Divine Knowledge, as Eckhart notes,

but never in via. M oreover, Eckhart understands “the fullness o f tim e” (v. note 30) metaphysically as ‘beyond tim e’: “God sends his Son in the fullness o f tim e, tha t is, to the soul w'hen it has transcended tim e, when the soul is free from time and place” (DW I, 74).

66. DW I, 72-73; v. LW IV, 356. T his statem ent, and o thers like it that are principial in context, transcends A ugustine’s doctrine o f e ternal and divine ideas which all requ ire inversion because the re is no diversity in God. Eckhart will at times speak in reference to the doctrine o f divine ideas, but this is noth ing m ore than a concession to knowledge in via. T h e doctrine o f exem plarism certainly points most nobly to principial knowledge but it is still restricted by being g rounded in a subtle form o f indi

N O T E S T O PA G ES 1 3 1 - 1 3 8 263

vidualization which, o f course, is absent in the principial m ode, constituted as it is in the identity o f all-possibility with all-inclusive, indistinguishable God.

67. LW I, 187.68. LW III, 156; LW IV, 429.69. Q 421-22— Pf 8 ; Pf 253; DW I, 87; Pf 237; LW II, 476; fo r as

Aquinas notes: “the tru th o f all things is infinitely g reater in the W ord than in created reality” (De Veritate, q4, a6).

70. DW I, 312-17.71. Jo h n 15 : 15.72. DW V, 415 ff., the T ractate Von Abgescheidenheit. See also A ugus

tine, De Trinitate, X II, 4.73. DW II, 84. Eckhart prefaces these words by saying: “ I am amazed

how some priests, even those with pretensions to em inence and learning, let themselves be misled by these words [“All I have heard from my Fathe r I have m ade known to you”} and understand them to m ean tha t God com m unicates to us only the basic m im im um requisite for o u r happiness. T h a t is not w hat I understand and that surely is no t the tru th .” In o ther words, the com m unicated tru th lies in the w ord all, i.e. the totality o f Divine Knowledge o r G odhead. See RS IX, 9.

74. RS IV, 1.75. LW V, 92; Q 437.76. Cf. Aquinas, De Veritate, q4, a6 .77. DW I, 329; LW III , 353.78. LW III , 64; LW II, 38.79. LW IV, 270.80. LW IV, 263-64.81. DW II, 82.82. DW II, 211; DW I, 332; P f 79; see RS IX, 3 and M. H. Laurent,

Autor du proc'es de Maitre Eckhart, Divus T hom as (Piacenza, 1936) pp. 344^16.

83. DW V, 31-43; LW IV, 276.84. DW II, 416-20.85. Leben here m eans ‘Principle’.86. DW III , 315-17.87. DW III, 321-24.88. T h e dilem m a o f Cartesian and most m odern philosophy.89. DW II, 214. T hat is, the insisting on the priority o f knowledge in

term s o f individuality o r m entalism and the ignoring o f the true priority o f principial knowledge in term s o f the All-inclusive.

90. DW II, 53-54, 211; Pf 480; C. G reith, Die deutsche Mystik im Pre- digerorden (Freiburg, 1861), p. 102.

91. DW J , 333; v. note on synderesis by Q uint on p. 334. Cf. Aquinas, Sum m a Theologica I, q76, a l2 .

92. DW I, 348.93. DW I, 197; LW III , 417; v. RS IV, 6.

2 6 4 N O T E S T O PA G ES 139 -149

94. DW II, 88.95. DW I, 198; v. RS IX, 8.96. DW I, 220.97. DW III , 320-21.98. DW II, 237.99. DW I, 171-72; v. V, 269.100. DW I, 161; v. 288; LW II, 364; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q8 ,

a l , a d 2 .101. LW IV, 22; P f 253; Strauch no. 26—Pf 180-81; DW III, 447; DW

II, 68.102. DW III, 187.

Chapter 3: The Primal Distinction1. LW III, 468.2. LW II, 419.3. LW I, 461.4. LW III, 304. See Part II, Ch. 1, note 26.5. LW IV, 270.6. LW III, 43; LW II, 144.7. LW III , 190; v. LW III, 5 ff.8. LW II, 50, 27 ff.9. LW IV, 267-68.10. LW IV, 266-67.11. LW II, 24; LW I, 159 and note 1; v. RS III, 11.12. DW III, 119.13. LW III, 18, 192; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, a47, a2 and 3; I—II,

q93, a3.14. LW I, 473; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I I—II, q52, a3.15. LW III, 392.16. LW III, 36.17. DW I, 199.18. LW IV, 269.19. LW IV, 10.20. DW V, 115.21. DW V, 202.22. Gal. 3 : 20.23. LW IV, 264 ff. We should rem em ber that the designation esse

(isness o r act o f being) did not com e into its full significance until Aquinas expounded it in its metaphysical depth.

24. DW II, 86-87.25. LW II, 64-65; IV, 99; I, 69; v. RS I, 15.26. LW IV, 9 -10 .27. DW II, 101; v. V, 40.28. LW I, 518.29. LW IV, 267.

N O TES T O PA G ES 149 -158 265

30. LW I, 45. Cf. RS IX, 14: Humilis homo et dens non sunt duo, etc.31. Essentially so because ‘m onotheism ’ as expounded in form al theol

ogy is wholly dependen t on negative theology, as previously explained.32. Summa Theologica III , a73, a2; I, q 11, a l , q 11, a3, q3, a7, Compen

dium Theologiae 24.33. LW II, 342; RS II, 3. Efficacious o r efficient cause, fully dependen t

on the notion o f God as Ipsum esse, is tha t by which its act produces and im parts som ething o f itself to tha t o f the effect. It is essentially the preem inent cause in Christian metaphysics and is not found am ong the four causes o f Aristotle. See Aquinas, In Metaphysica V, lect. 1, n. 751.

34. LW III, 199; A ugustine, De moribus Ecclesiae, II, 2, 2.35. LW IV, 191-92.36. LW I, 154; Aquinas, III Contra Gentes, 47.37. LW IV, 95.38. DW V, 115.39. LW III , 175.40. LW I, 397.41. LW IV, 9, 98-99, 299, 321, 368.42. DW I, 380-81.43. DW I, 381-82.44. LW III , 199.45. LW III, 6 -7 .46. LW IV, 279; v. LW II, 123.47. LW II, 37; Aquinas: “Esse {isness] itself is the most perfect reality.

T h erefo re esse is the actuality o f all beings—through essentia—even o f form s [as contained potentially in essence]” (Summa Theologica I, q4, a l , ad 3).

48. Scotus Erigena, De Divisione Naturae I and III.49. LW IV, 279; LW III , 99; LW I, 47.50. DW I, 316; Pf 57; v. In Genesis II, n. 271.51. DW II, 279.52. LW II, 447.53. ‘Pure intellects’, that is, ‘pu re intellectual structures w ithout cor

poreality’, o r ‘angelic beings’, whose com posite structure is simply intellect and isness, are never to be confused with intellective souls, which in o rd e r to be, require having o r having had a body to anim ate. N or are they to be confused with Pure Intellect, o r God, who is noncom posite in every respect. See LW III, 413; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q75, a7, ad3.

54. DW II, 78.55. P f 250—G reith, p. 99 ff.56. DW II, 189. This, o f course, is the only way a hum an being can be

regarded by a com puter o r by m ere logical analysis d isoriented from being and isness, inasm uch as ‘hum an personality’ is the subsistence p ro p er to an intellectual being and which makes that person to be u n com m unicated o r unshared by the being o f another.

266 N O T E S T O PA G ES 158 -169

57. Q 439— Pf 30.58. LW IV, 279; LW III, 174; LW II, 42; Pf 133.59. LW II, 25.60. LW I, 47.61. DW III, 365-66.62. LW I, 162-64.63. LW I, 190.64. DW II, 261-62.65. LW III, 9.66. LW III , 181.67. RS III, 8.68. See Denifle, p. 460.69. DW V, 418; v. Isadorus, Sententiae, I, 8.70. Q uoted by Eckhart in his Von Abgescheidenheit, DW V, 417; A ugus

tine, De Trinitate, 26.71. LW I, 50-51.72. Psalms 61:12.73. LW III, 179.74. DW I, 34; v. also DW I, 166, 171; LW IV, 160.75. DW V, 60.76. LW III, n. 429.77. Gen. 1:2.78. See E ckhart’s com m entary on this them e: LW I, 218-29.79. Ibid; v. also LW III , 421.80. LW I, 462; DW II, 94; DW V, 203.

Chapter 4: The Inversion1. Stressing this point Eckhart once said: “ If anyone has understood

this serm on, I wish him well. I f no one had been here I should have had to speak it to this almsbox” (Q 273— Pf 181—Strauch, No. 26). T hus implying that detached intellection, being constituted wholly in Divine Knowledge, is neither dependen t on its being understood by anyone nor subject to popularization, but is to be perennially expounded by those who do—inwardly for their own understand ing and fulfillment, ou twardly for the diffusion o f the doctrine to those capable o f receiving it.

2. DW V, 288; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q l , a l , ad2.3. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I—II, q l0 9 , a l , a d l— from St. A m brose’s

gloss on I Cor. 12:3.4. LW V, 83; DW II, 317.5. LW III , 436.6 . DW I, 288-89.7. DW I, 73; DW II, 492, 66.8 . Summa Theologica I, q54, a l .9. DW III, 293; LW III, 175-76.10. See Aquinas, De Veritate, q2, a3, ad 13. T o drive this point hom e it

N O TES T O PA G ES 169 -174 267

is w orth quoting one o f Eckhart’s m ore elliptic and provocative statements, hum orously designed to shock one out o f satisfaction in the supposed priority o f form al, rational knowledge: “If I say God is good, it is not true; 1 am good, God is not good. I say fu rther: I am bette r than God, fo r what is good can become better; what is better can become best. But God is not good; hence he cannot be better and since he cannot be better, he cannot be best. For God transcends all three: good, better, and best, inasm uch as he transcends all com paratives [and every series]” (DW III , 441; v. DW I, 148; LW IV, 31). It was with statem ents like this that Eckhart’s ecclesiastical censors in Cologne and Avignon could not cope. See RS IX, 54 and Denzinger, 229.

11. LW I, 162-64; LW III, 83.12. DW I, 69-70.13. DW III , 384; DW II, 81: “T o abandon all things here in restricted

reality, in tha t they are changeable, is to regain them in God w here they are truly real [and not d ifferentiated]. Everything that is here dead o r naught is life and aught there, and all that is here m aterial is there in God spirit and is God.” See RS IX, 13.

14. DW I, 363-64; v. Aquinas, QuocLlibet X, q l . a l , ad3; Commentarium I Sententiarum xxiv, q l , a3, a d l .

15. LW III , 274; v. DW I, 52: “W hat fere is distant is there [in God] imm ediate, fo r there all is presen t [w ithout otherness]. W hat occurs on the first day and the last day is there present.”

16. DW II, 255-56; LW IV, 314; DW II, 468.17. DW II, 473; v. DW I, 212.18. LW II, 58-60.19. Pf 182; v. LW III, 390.20. LW IV, 111.21. DW II, 470; LW IV, 111; 367; 269 and note 1; DW I, 297.22. DW I, 385-86: RS IX, 1: radix similitudinis est unum ipsum. See DW

V, 30.23. In Genesis II, n. 113.24. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q l4 , a4; Aristotle, De Anima III , 8,

431b, 21.25. DW I, 48-49.26. DW I, 153; v. In Genesis II, n. 83; LW IV, 370.27. DW I, 129.28. DW I, 314-15.29. DW III, 229.30. DW I, 122.31. LW V, 49; LW IV, 111 ff.32. LW V, 40.33. DW I, 150; v. 129.34. In o th er words, “All tha t which is except Knowledge-in-itself” is

determ inate and as it were from w ithout the G odhead and therefo re distinctive. “Such determ inations as the intellect makes o f God are gotten o f

268 NOTES TO PAGES 1 7 4 - 1 8 3

its own understanding. . . . In Knowledge-in-itself, however, God remains beyond all such determ inations because he is unconditioned and without activity in his h idden stillness. He is without the determ inations applied to him ” (DW III, 381-82).

35. LW IV, 270.36. LW V, 45; v. LW III, 61.37. LW IV, 112.38. LW III, 32; LW I, 189, 195; LW III, 27, 32.39. LW V, 45.40. DW III , 229.41. DW III, 177.42. DW III, 171.43. Q 425— P f 10-11; DW III , 320.44. DW II, 24-25. We have used the term ‘knowledge’ for Warheit,

since in the context it is knowledge in se tha t is m eant in the scriptural passage and thus it should not be confused with ‘tru th ’ the transcendental.

45. Q 430—P f 15.46. Q 433— P f 25.47. DW I, 136.48. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q8, a l , ad2.49. T his them e is frequently stated by Eckhart and is quoted in the

Bull. See Denifle II, p. 636 ff. no. 23; Q 453; O tto K arrer, Meister Eckhart (M unich, 1926), p. 273 ff. T he Bull o f Jo h n XXII (In Agro Dominico) o f M arch 27, 1329, is also in Denziger, 1948, pp. 227-29; J . M. Clark, Meister Eckhart p. 253 ff. and Q 449 ff.

50. Psalms 101:28 (A.V. 102:27).51. I Cor. 6:17.52. LW IV, 269.53. An exam ple used frequently by Eckhart in both the G erm an and

Latin works.54. Jo h n 1:5.55. LW III , 13-19.56. DW I, 56-57.57. DW I, 56. See RS IX, 1 and IX, 50.58. LW III , 519-20.59. DW II, 33.60. LW III , 484.61. We m ust not forget that it is only in relation to o u r own individual

apprehension tha t isness and essence constitute two com plem entary aspects o f the ultim ate Principle. Insofar as it can be said that God m anifests himself, it is the aspect analogous to essence; insofar as it can be said tha t he is unm anifested, it is the aspect analogous to pu re isness; and the latter, o f course, answers m ore profoundly than the form er to God in his im m utable reality and unfathom able intelligence.

62. LW I, 593.

NOTES TO PAGES 1 8 3 - 1 9 1 269

63. LW I, 529.64. DW III, 148.65. LW II, 466.66. T h e w ord schmeckt (smacket) means ‘knows’ in this context—‘tastes’,

o f course, not being strictly applicable.67. Q 271-72; Pf 179-80—Strauch, No. 26.68. LW III, 63; RS III, 5; DW III, 148; LW V, 47.69. DW II, 469; DW III, 97; DW II, 97.70. LW I, 194-95; v. LW V, 37, 40; Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, 19,

a4, ad2. Eckhart’s statem ent here does not contradict what he says in note 13, ch. 1, Part II, fo r God’s perfect freedom is g rounded in the all- inclusive Knowledge that he is.

71. Non posse aliter se habere.72. Non posse sic non se habere. See I.W I, 156—58; I.W II, 37; LW III,

278-79; Aquinas, Metaphysica IX, 9.73. LW II, 40 ff. See his en tire com m entary on Omnipotent nomen eius

o f Exodus 15:3.74. LW III, 133; LW II, 61.75. Aquinas, De Trinitate, q4, a l : quia divisio non requirit utrumque con-

divisorum esse, cum divisio sit per affirmationem et negationem.76. Von dem Schauen Gottes, p. 484 ff. See DW I, 363: “H e is O ne and

negates all o therness, fo r apart from God is nothing. All creatures are in God and in his G odhead, and that means plenitude [viillede]."

77. LW III , 174; LW IV, 10.78. LW III, 175; LW V, 48; LW II, 77.79. See Part II, Ch. 1, note 37.80. LW II, 477.81. DW II, 376; v. Von dem Schauen Gottes, p. 484.82. DW III, 143-44: “G od’s kingdom is God’s Self in all its fullness

[that is, as the All-inclusive and All-possibility). God’s kingdom is no little thing: consider all the worlds tha t God could create, tha t is still not God’skingdom . T he soul conscious o f God’s fullness and aware o f how nearG od’s kingdom really is requires no serm on o r instruction; tha t soul is instructed by that awareness and affirm ed by eternal life.”

83. DW I, 51.

Chapter 5: The Veils o f God1. LW III, 422.2. LW IV, 352.3. LW II, 514; DW V, 41. As with o th er essential them es, ‘the veils o f

God’ is central in Eckhart’s teaching, though here also he refrains from form ulating it in one particular treatise—unless it is one o f those forever lost; ra th e r it is draw n upon throughou t his com m entaries.

4. DW I, 56.5. LW IV, 114; DW V, 431.

270 NOTES TO PAGES 1 9 2 - 1 9 7

6. LW I, 512.7. LW IV, 189; LW III, 72.8. LW I, 522.9. DW I, 250.10. Eckhart on occasion includes ‘m em ory’ along with reason and will

as faculties o f the hum an soul (v. LW IV, 6), thus following A ugustine (De Trinitate, X, 12, 19). But these faculties “are not operative in the g round o f the soul,” though the unlim ited desire to know is there in its dynam ic root, and these faculties are known only th rough their d iffering activities. Cf. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q87, a l .

11. LW III , 433; LW III , 26. T h a t is, principles e.g. ‘being is being’, ‘causality’, etc. See also Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q88, a3, a d l .

12. LW III, 27.13. DW I, 151.14. DW I, 249.15. LW IV, 125; LW III , 205-6; DW I, 105: “Even those who are in

eternal pain in hell would not want to lose the ir lives, ne ither the fiendsn o r fragm ented souls, since the ir life [in this case, isness] is so noble and issues forth directly from God.”

16. DW I, 364. C onsidering sight as bu t one o f the sense faculties: “T h e intellective soul also has a pow er in the eye, by reason o f which the eye is so weak and delicate that it does not ap p reh en d things in their true simplicity as they are in themselves. T hey m ust first be sifted and refined in the air and in the light. This is because the eye has the intellect todirect it” (DW I, 151; v. Pf 132 and RS I, 4).

17. DW V, 419; DW I, 231, also note 4; DW III , 445; LW IV, 65.18. See Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q l6 , a2.19. LW IV, 407.20. DW I, 151.21. T h e ‘h igher intellect’ being direct insight o r im m ediate intellectual

knowledge in the g round o f the soul. See DW I, 182, 32; LW III , n. 318; v. note 7. Also v. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q85, a l .

22. DW V, 202; see DW I, 144-45; LW II, 97-98; In Johannem n. 609.23. LW IV, 280. Eckhart quoting from A ugustine, De Trinitate XIV,

12.24. LW IV, 431.25. See also Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q85, a l .26. Rom. 11:36.27. DW I, 182-84.28. DW I, 163; v. Aquinas, Summa Theologica I, q77, a8; I—II, q67, a l ,

ad 3.29. LW IV, 202; Aquinas, De Veritate, q 13, a2.30. DW I, 150; v. LW V, 40, 42, 43.31. T h a t is, by the act [isness] o f God, as Eckhart has previously ex

plained, “inasm uch as potentiality as such can never by itself attain to actuality” (LW IV, 382).

NOTES TO PAGES 19 7 -2 0 3 271

32. LW III , 24.33. LW IV, 368; DW I, 377: “T h e m ost suitable good tha t God ever

com m unicated to m an was to become m an himself.” DW I, 86-87: “God not only becam e m an, he assum ed hum an nature. . . . [Christ] was a m essenger from God to us, bringing us o u r blessedness.” Obviously God simply is, never becomes anything, “the re being no becom ing in G od,” but according to o u r hum an intellection “the divine became hum an while rem aining divine.” See LW III, 381.

34. LW IV, 365. Eckhart warns against false understandings re: the Body o f Christ—v. LW IV, 43.

35. DW I, 66, 62; LW III , 52; DW II, 96; LW III, 10; v. Aristotle, Metaphysics I, 980b.

36. DW I, 364-65.37. D W V, 4 1 9 .38. DW I, 105-6.39. DW I, 80.40. LW III, 474.41. DW I, 288-90.42. Q 272— Pf 180—Strauch, No. 26.43. DW I, 292, 249.44. LW IV, 419.45. LW IV, 115.46. DW I, 364-65; LW II, 62; cf. I n Genesis II, n. 113.47. LW III , 52; v. Aquinas, De Trinitate, q5, a3; Commentarium I Senten

tiarum xix, q l , a7.48. T his is particularly true in the abstract sciences, such as m athem at

ics, as Eckhart frequently notes.49. LW IV, 341.50. LW III, 125.51. This term ‘ideal w orld’ (LW III , 331) is not to be confused with

A ugustine’s “intelligible realm ” o r “w orld o f eternal ideas,” since his ‘ideas’ are possibilities in the divine essence that pertain to structureless m anifestation, in spite o f the individualized and overim aginative expressions in which he, like many neo-Platonists and Plato himself, frequently clothed his thought.

52. LW IV, 382-83.53. DW I, 155-56.54. I Cor. 11: 6 -7 .55. DW I, 184; v. LW III , 72. This analogy o f intellectual function is

no t to be understood as an antiwom an tendency in Eckhart, fo r elsewhere he says: “W hen God created m an, he created woman from the side o f man in o rd e r that she should be equal to him in na tu re .” M oreover, “In the G odhead [though not here in manifestation] m an and woman, fathe r and m other are the same” (DW I, 106-7; LW III, 165).

56. LW IV, 197.57. LW III, 17.

272 NOTES TO PAGES 203-208

58. LW III , 11.59. DW V, 430.60. DW II, 264.61. LW II, 429.62. LW IV, 278.63. DW III , 196.64. Jostes, XXXIV.65. In pure contem plation “the soul enters the union o f the Holy T rin

ity. It is fu rth e r blessed by becom ing one with the naked [unm anifested] G odhead w here the T rinity o f God is the Self-determ ination. In the u n m anifested G odhead there is no activity. T h e soul is not perfectly beautified until it casts itself into the desolate G odhead w here neither structure nor activity exists and there in undifferen tiation loses itse lf: as self the soul vanishes and has no m ore to do with things than it had w hen it was no t” (P f 241—42).66. LW IV, 198; v. LW IV, 93; LW I, 232; LW III , 117-19.

67. LW IV, 199.68. By ‘m odern psychology’ we m ean to include the as yet quasi

science o f ESP, ‘psychic research’ and even all form s o f ‘spiritism ’ and ‘psychic-metaphysics’ (!) which likewise pertain exclusively to the o rd e r o f n a tu re and the realm o f individual and structural m anifestation. T hey in no sense w hatsoever pertain to the truly supernatu ra l, to p u re m etaphysics o r detached intellection, o r to what Eckhart understands as Divine Knowledge. It should, however, be acknowledged tha t the psychological insights o f Carl Ju n g and some o f his followers at least keep certain doors open tha t affo rd a possibility o f transcendence o f the purely naturalo rd e r o f m anifest individuality and an em inent appreciation o f the contemplative state.

69. This includes the phenom ena o f all “spiritual visions o r hearings o r feelings clothed in form ” (LW IV, 327) and all mystical experiences as such, and explains why Eckhart, in the nam e o f detached intellection, is not essentially interested in them , even though some o f these ‘occurences’ may, u n der certain strict conditions, have validity in the ir own defined and restricted state. See DW V, 226.

70. DW I, 196-97.71. DW I, 152; v. In Genesis II , n. 80; In Johannem. n. 568.72. DW I, 155; v. RS IX, 5.73. DW I, 122, 56; v. also LW V, 60; LW II, 213-14.74. LW IV, 114-15.75. DW V, 116. And he adds tha t “all m en naturally desire knowl

edge.” Cf. Aristotle, Metaphysics 1. 1.76. Eckhart uses the term mensch which here, as in several o th e r instan

ces, m eans ‘se lf o r ‘individuality’. See Q 272.77. LW IV, 138.78. DW V, 116.79. DW I, 132 ff. Cf. DW V, 112, where Eckhart considers the highest

stage o f spirituality.

NOTES TO PAGES 2 0 g - 2 l 6 2 7 3

80. LW III, 357.81. DW V, 289.82. See Pf 183; LW III, 426. T here is here no contradiction o f the for

mal explanation o f this revealed ‘m ystery’ given by Aquinas when he states that since “the soul lasts forever, so it m ust be conjoined again with the body,” for “it is contrary to the nature o f the soul to be w ithout the body.” It is not that the same particles o f m atter that were possessed at the m om ent o f death will be reassum ed spiritually in the resurrection, but it can be said formally tha t the glorified body will have the qualities o f “impassibility, clarity, and subtlety” and “w hatever belongs to the integrity o f the hum an nature o f those who have part in the resurrection will rise again.” (Summa Theologica III , q80; III Contra Gentes, 79). See Spa- m er, Eckhart Texte, B. 2: “Now it is the Christian faith tha t this actual body will rise at the last day. T h en things shall also rise, not as themselves as such bu t in him who has inverted them into him self.”

83. DW V, 400-1; v. V, 114.84. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 484 ff; DWV, 118.85. Ibid. Note that Eckhart does not say “were I wholly what I am ,”

etc., but pointedly “were I wholly that I am ”; thus, the tru th that whatness is preceded by isness which is in function o f knowledge. T hus also indicating: “were I wholly that / am [i.e. God who identified him self as ‘I am who I am .’],” etc.

86. DW V, 434-35. It is quite possible tha t this quotation, which is at the very end o f the T ractate Von Abgescheidenheit (v. also Pfeiffer’s text), actually comes from Eckhart’s student Suso.

87. See LW IV, 85-86.88. Pf 249.89. LW III , 231; Pf 241-42: “ In the unm anifested G odhead there is

no action.”90. Von dem Schauen Gottes. See LW III, 415.91. See Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I—II, q3.92. DW V, 116-17.93. Q 430-31— Pf 15.94. Q 434— Pf 26.95. LW III, 477.96. DW I, 18.97. Q 434— Pf 26.98. DW V, 42.99. LW III , 34 ff. See DW V, 201, 204-05, 228.100. Q 273— Pf 181—Strauch, No. 26.

Chapter 6: The Detachment1. DW III , 230-31.2. LW IV, 26; cf. IV, 24.3. LW III, 76; 179.4. LW II, 65; v. LW III, 186.

274 NOTES TO PAGES 2 1 6 -2 2 25. DW I, 136.6. LW III, 421.7. LW III, 130-31. St. Paul’s dictum is an o th er exam ple o f the neces

sary ‘inversion’ to which Eckhart has repeatedly re fe rred , for the ‘m ountains’ signify the en tire o rd e r o f ‘o therness’ which, when rem oved by knowledge in principio and charity, o r divine Love (the Holy Spirit), leaves noth ing but the “silent undifferen tiated desert.”

8. LW IV, 374. “T h a t which one knows to be tru e” is, o f course, the W ord, identified as it is in every respect with unm anifested G odhead; and this knowledge is o f grace. See LW IV, 378 ff.

9. LW IV, 237.10. LW III, 396.11. Eckhart is in full agreem ent with Aquinas on this point, both m ain

taining that true m oral and intellectual developm ent only occurs when man form s the habit o f m aking dem ands upon himself, dem ands instituted by natural law which is a d irect reflection o f divine authority (Summa Theologica I—II, q49, a2).

12. Jo h n 16:7 and 28. See DW V, 430-31.13. LW III , 376. “In the moral sphere the beginning [or principle] o f

all o u r intentions and actions m ust be God [this ‘beginning’ being the ethical im perative o f ‘n o t-se lf}.” “V irtue and everything good depend on good will.” “T he will is un im paired and good when it is entirely free from self-seeking, and when it has abandoned itself and is form ed and transform ed into the will o f G od.” (LW III, 41; DW V, 216, 221).

14. DW I, 305; v. LW IV, 316; DW II, 321-22.15. LW IV, 170 and 96.16. LW IV, 186.17. DW I, 276; LW I, 247.18. DW I, 168-70.19. DW I, 193; v. 178.20. As previously noted, the participation in being is a participation in

God, for “the g round o f being is isness and isness is God” (see LW I, 38).21. DW I, 193.22. Luke 14:26.23. DW I, 193-94.24. DW I, 167.25. DW I, 130: “Being is G od’s circle, the circle o f the Knowledge that

he is.”26. DW I, 193-94.27. DW V, 403, 412; 413-14.28. See especially Von Abgescheidenheit (DW V, 400 ff); Predigt 12 (DW

I, 192 ff); Predigt 52 (DW II, 486 ff).29. DW II, 523.30. DW V, 404-10.31. DW V, 413-22.32. DW II, 486 ff.

NOTES TO PAGES 2 2 3 - 2 3 2 27533. DW II, 492-94. Cf. V, 195 and 297.34. DW II, 494-98.35. LW III, 285.36. DW II, 488-91.37. See Suso’s defence and clarification o f this purely metaphysical

tru th against would-be ‘subjectivists’ o r so-called ‘Free-Spirits’, in Bihl- meyer, p. 354.

38. LW IV, 171, 129.39. Summa Theologica I, q27, a3, ad2.40. LW IV, 360.41. LW II, 496.42. DW V, 423-24.43. LW IV, 78.44. DW V, 432.45. LW IV, 242; v. DW I, Predigt nos. 6 and 8. Even the desire fo r the

‘great mystical experience’ contains an elem ent o f self-will. See DW V,226-27.

46. DW V, 35, 432.47. Summa Theologica I—II, q l2 , a3; LW IV, 377.48. DW V, 412-13.49. DW V, 429; v. LW III, 461.50. Confessions V II, 10, 16; DW I, 110-11 and note 1.51. LW III, 298.52. LW III, 304.53. LW IV, 208.54. LW I, 163.55. LW I, 181; LW II, 20.56. It is im portan t to note here the subtle distinction between ‘unity’

and ‘unicity’; the la tter em braces multiplicity and hence can be referred to as the opposite o f complexity, whereas ‘unity’, which is ‘identity’ (LW IV, 269), is the principle o f multiplicity and , as previously explained, no th ing can stand in opposition to the Principle.

57. DW I, 69-70. See RS IV, 15 and IX, 43.58. LW V, 50.59. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 488.60. LW IV, 100; cf. DW II, 67-69.61. DW III, 447; DW II, 265-66.62. DW I, 106 and 115.63. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 486-87.64. LW III, 75 ff.65. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 488; v. LW IV, 371.66. Pf 106.67. Aquinas, De Trinitate, q4,al.68. LW IV, 24.69. P f 106-7.70. Pf 242.

276 NOTES TO PAGES 232-242

71. DW I, 55.72. DW I, 56; v. LW IV, 28, 110.73. I l l Contra Gentes, 53.74. Pf 182; DW I, 13-14 and 298; LW IV, 143 and 315.75. Summa Theologica I, q l2 , a5.76. Q 343; DW II, 309; v. DW I, 164 and LW III, 244.77. DW V, 428.78. LW IV, 226, 452; LW III, 244; v. LW III, 45 and DW I, 164-65.

Also “Das Verspuren is not in your power, bu t only in his, i.e. God’s act” (Q 436—Pf 28).

79. DW II, 326.80. LW IV, 94-95; LW III , 274.81. DW I, 26 ff; Q 434— Pf 26.82. LW IV, 97; 235-37, 243, 449.83. LW IV, 167.84. Von dem Schauen Gottes, 485.85. DW III , 215-16. See Aquinas, Commentarium II I Sententiarum xxvii,

q l , a l .86. Cf. Q 436— P f 27-28.87. DW III , 216.88. DW I, 253; 185.89. Canticle o f Canticles 3:2^1.90. DW III, 219-25.91. DW V, 306-8.92. LW IV, 387.93. Summa Theologica I, q3, a3.94. mac unde kan got.95. DW III , 339-44.96. DW I, 90-92.97. DW III , 266-67.98. LW III , 295-98.99. Pf 239.100. DW II, 107.101. LW IV, 207.102. Pf 241; v. LW III, 118-19.103. LW IV, 45; LW V, 118r104. Pf 239 f f ; DW V, 263-64.105. LW V, 342; LW IV, 278.106. DW I, 52.107. Pf 239.108. DW II, 416. “Preparation ,” i.e. “way to the Father.”109. Eckhart does not outline o r counsel any particular ‘m ethod’ o r

‘exercise’ fo r attaining contem plation. As to particular m eans o f attaining detachm ent, such as prayer, fasting, m editation, alms-giving, devotions, penance, etc: “Do not restrict yourself to any particular means, fo r God is

NOTES TO PAGES 242-245 2 7 7

not in any one k ind o f devotion” (DW I, 82). “Not all m en can follow one way” (DW V, 252).

110. T h a t is, those who m isunderstand o r abuse, for instance, St. A ugustine’s fam ous dictum : Ama Deum, etfac quod vis (“Love God, and do what you will”).

111. DW II, 78-79; v. DW II, 11-12.112. LW III , 242. See RS IX, 16.113. LW IV, 60 ff.114. DW I, 80; V, 30.115. DW I, 194-95; cf. RS IX, 42.116. DW I, 274; v. DW III, 193-94 and RS IV, 11.117. LW III, 425; DW V, 40-42.118. DW III, 298-301.119. Q 272—Pf 180—Strauch, No. 26. In o ther words, and as indi

cated throughou t, the deneget semetispum o f M ark 8:34 designates farm ore than an ethical injunction. W hat these words m ean is understood by Eckhart when he says tha t “the self m ust completely go” and “the negation o f self is, in the same stroke, the negation o f all o therness.”A fter all, “the kingdom o f God is fo r none but the totally dead to self (Cf.DW III, 628, 630; LW IV, 179; Pf. 600).

Index

Abstraction, 200, 203 Accidie, 255n39. See also Awareness, con

traction o f Action, 82, 239, 244, 256n69, 260n20 Activists, 82, 256n69 A lanus de Insules, 28, 260n75 Albert the G reat, Saint, 27, 29 All-inclusive, the, 52, 109, 1 1 7 ;o rd e ro f,

78, 93, 96 -97 , 101-02, 106, 166; and individuality, 88; is God, 91, 179

All-possibility, 31, 52, 142; con ten t o f p u re knowledge, 47, 110; designated o f God, 90, 91, 140, 183, 238; content o f unlim ited will to know, 100 ; convertible with th e Infinite, 109; beyond distinction, 153, 164; not indeterm ination, 187

Ambrose, Saint, 29Analogy, 11, 127, 169; knowledge o f

God by, 46-47 , 51, 92; p roportionate , 98, 169; o f attribution, 169, 170; its term is unity, 172, 267n22

—inverse, 117, 118, 127. See also In version

Angels, 170, 172, 262n57, 265n57 Anselm, St., 29Aquinas. See T hom as Aquinas, Saint Aristotle, 57, 248n6, 265n33; E. in

debted to, 28; on intellect, 79, 172; on categories, 106; on First Cause, 130; on infinite, 178

A ugustine, Saint, 38, 48, 53, 78; influence on E., 28, 29; on knowledge o f God, 31; on tim e and eternity, 32-33, 161; teachings of, 39; on essence, 152; on the Eucharist, 227; rejects necessity o f creation, 254n?5; on divine ideas, 262n66, 271n51; on m em ory, 270n /0 ; on love o f God, 277n770

A vencebrop, 29 Averroes, 29 Avicenna, 29, 254n33 Awakening, 45, 81

Awareness, 197, 204; contraction of, 72, 89, 119, 131, 163, 220

Beatitude, 210, 212, 214, 230, 272n65; o f God, 47, 188; and beatific vision, 196; perfects grace, 209

Beghards, 40Being, 57, 58, 106, 274n25; object o f

intellect, 56-57; participation in, 58, 274n20; God transcends, 106, 117, 173, 174-75, 203; in function o f knowledge, 173. See also Isness

Belief, 10, 59. See also Faith B ernard o f Clairvaux, Saint, 29 Body, 194, 221; and soul, 137, 140, 199;

glorified, 209, 273n82. See also C orporeality

Boethius, 28 B utler, B. C., 248n6Cajetan (Thom as de Vio), 49, 117 Categories, 106Causality, 51, 255nJ6 an d a?<¥, 265n75.

See also Efficacious cause Christ, 7, 9, 50, 130, 227; G od’s com

m unication in, 10, 76, 198, 249n7; the God-m an, 45, 198, 262n57; G od’s Self-revelation, 54; faith in, 76; reveals him self in the soul, 114-15; pu tting on, 120; indispensable, 128; the Rem inder, 131, 132; doctrine of, 165; is T ru th , 165; the T ru e Man, 204; following, 224; and tru th , 229; death in, 230, 232; and the C hurch , 240-41, 249n7. See also W ord, the, incarnate

Christianity, 23, 50, 54 Chrysostom , Saint, 29 C hurch , the, 9, 11, 44, 50, 239-42 pas

sim, 248n7 Cicero, 28 Clark, Jam es M., 29 Clem ent V, Pope, 40 Conception, general o rd e r of, 97, 100;

particular o rd e r of, 97, 100; defined, 1002 7 9

280 INDEXConsolation, 53C ontem plation, an d action, 82, 256n69;

m eaning of, 121, 204-10 passim, 216; pure , 196-97, 214, 272n65

Contingency, 71, 104, 133, 179 Contradiction, 91, 153, 176, 183, 187 Corporeality, 102, 128, 194, 202, 220.

See also Body Corruptibility, 75, 157-58 C reation, 90 -92 , 139, 161, 184 C rea turehood , 52. See also Individuality

Damascus, St. Jo h n , 29 Denifle, H. S., 250n2 Descartes, Rene (Cartesian), 93, 147,

166, 263nSS Detached intellection, 18, 24, 63, 140,

190, 210; defined, 4, 65, 79, 81, 97, 105, 166; an d direct knowledge, 34, 167; no t mysticism, 107. See also Pure metaphysics

D etachm ent, 17, 81, 228, 237, 239 D eterm ination, 31, 177; a restriction,

109; o f isness, 111, 112, 144; o f God, 173, 267n34

Devotio modema, 249n 10 Dionysius the pseudo-A reopagite, 33,

36, 39, 108; mystical theology of, 4, 30-31; influence on E., 28, 29, 74, 116

Discrim ination, 31, 42, 51, 68 ; and distinction, 41; and delusiveness, 215

Distinction, 41, 99, 112; real, 58, 81, 99, 145,235; an d separation, 95, 149, 183; intellectual, 142, 147; o f isness, 144, 147, 153-54; not in God, 144, 147, 153, 178

Duns Scotus, 29

Efficacious cause, 72, 151, 265n?7 Egalitarianism , 74, 146 Em anation, 90, 91 Epistemology, 4 Erigena, Jo h n Scotus, 28, 156 E rro r, 79, 163 Esse. See IsnessEssence, 58, 72, 200; an d isness, 69-70,

93, 1 4 3 ^ 6 passim, 147, 151-59 passim. See also W hatness

E ternal law. See Law, eternal

Eternity, 32-33, 160, 196, 225. See also Fullness o f time

Ethics, 218 Evil, 14, 72-73 , 74 Existence, 33, 52, 58, 200, 240, 241 Existentialism , 49E xperience, 44, 46, 58, 127, 175, 193,

196, 227

Faith, 37, 44, 48, 217; act of, 45; united with intellect, 52, 165, 240; blind, 55; in Jesus Christ, 76; in the W ord, 119-20, 121

Feeling, 53, 77, 80 Feuerbach, Ludwig, 147 Fideism, 39, 50Finite, 11, 32; and infinite, 112, 149,

229Form (structure), 94, 102, 145, 155, 199 Franciscan Spirituals, 40 Frangois de Sales, Saint, 248n4 Free Spirits, 40, 275n?7 Fullness o f tim e, 18, 121, 261nJ0,

262n65

Gerson, Jo h n , 49 Gleichwie, 125, 2 6 In48 Gnosticism, 9, 13 God;—com m unication of, 59, 119, 120, 239,

256n57, 263n77, 271rt?5; as revealing Divine Knowledge, 9, 46; in Jesus Christ, 76, 198, 249n7; as T riu n e , 116

—knowledge of, 3, 60, 110, 183, 196, 202; by negation, 30, 31, 69, 108-09; by analogy, 47, 51, 92, 168-69; th rough God, 115, 196, 214. See also K nowledge, th rough identity

— n atu re of, unconditioned, 7, 32, 69; cannot be dem onstrated , 31; w ithout form and duality, 33; not this, not that, 47, 92, 98, 101, 126, 184, 237, 258n42; an d infinite Personality, 51, 93; not a whatness, 69; unrestricted, 70; beyond determ ination , 109, 267nlO, 268n?4; indistinct, 118; withou t otherness, 147; detached, 2 2 0 - 21, 224. See also All-inclusive, the; Allpossibility; Intellect, unm anifest pu re

— principial identity with, 26, 96, 98,

INDEX 2 8 l

104, 118, 132-33, 181; in my tru e s t/ , 68, 69, 96; in the W ord, 77, 139; in the Son, 120, 129-30, 136-37, 155,- 172, 220; in the divine spark, 136, 139-40

—the Principle. See Principle, the infinite

—reality of, 54, 55, 60; dem onstrated , 60-61 , 62 -64

—th e Subject, 119, 143, 166, 168, 211 —will in (divine), 71, 76, 90, 145, 146,

182, 184G odhead, 30, 47, 118, 188, 256o57; is

Divine Knowledge, 2, 6, 154, 24 7 n /; is pu re Intellect, 27; and G od, 90, 239; is the All-inclusive, 109; and action, 273n89

G oodness, 167, 207; in G od’s com m unication, 76; designated o f God, 76, 120 ; a transcendental, 1 0 1 ; convertible with being, 106

Grace, 64, 167, 227, 244, 2 6 In29; sustains unlim ited will to know, 35; and principial knowledge, 81; constitutes soul in God, 120,239; perfects nature, 165, 209; necessity of, 234-35; and m ethod, 237; form al doctrine of, 237-38

— uncreated , 50, 81, 121, 168, 204; is the Holy Spirit, 50, 234; is the spark in the soul, 136, 138; is the act o f God, 234

G regory o f Naziensus, Saint, 29 G regory o f Nyssa, Saint, 29, 78 G regory the G reat, Saint, 29

Hegel, Friedrich, 49, 147, 252n67 Hell, 270n/5H ierarchy, universal, 31, 74, 145-46,

157, 202 Hilary, Saint, 29 Hof, H ans, 252n67Holy Scripture, 7, 9, 27, 39, 50; divinely

inspired, 10 ; com m entaries on, 1 1 ; source o f knowledge, 44; w hat is prim ary in, 45-47 , 248n6, 252n57. See also New T estam ent

Holy Spirit, 50, 118, 119, 125, 182, 216, 223. See also Grace, uncreated

H ugh o f St. Victor, 29 H um an being, 87, 92, 102, 144; n atu re

of, 56, 95, 103-04, 128, 194-95; com

posite, 103, 158, 259n46; an d natural law, 145-46; decom position of, 158; a person, 158. See also Man

H um or, xiv, 188

Idea(s), 139, 197; divine, 33, 262n66, 271n51; defined, 100; and concrete reality, 152; luminosity of, 201, 203

Identity. See God, principial identity with; Knowledge th ro ug h identity

Ignorance, 13, 15, 43, 49, 163 Im age, 67, 99, 103, 127, 163. See also

Reflection Im m ortality, 158, 225 Incorruptibility , 157-58 Indeterm inancy, 187 Individuality, 60, 73,99; m eaning of, 52,

88; and the All-inclusive, 52, 88, 102; universe of, 75; an d infinite Personality, 88 ; extension of, 100- 0 1 ; and God, 101; o rd e r of, 102; negation of, 136

Infinite, 11, 32, 109; and finite, 112, 149, 178, 229

Innerm ost m eans transcendence, 124 Innerm ost Self, 68 , 77, 208, 226, 245.

See also Self, divine In n e r self, 120, 208, 223, 226, 245 Intellect:—m anifest hum an, 55, 127, 215, 241,

2 5 In26, 260n2; prim ary over reason and will, 27, 31; and unitive knowledge, 35; possible, 36, 38, 80, 130, 250n4, 256n66; and faith, 52, 165; object of, 56, 253n4; is spiritual, 65; and p u re Intellect, 66, 78, 114, 235, 2 5 In 26; h igher, 78, 79, 192, 196, 270n2 /; signifies God, 185, 254n22; an d will, 207

—unm anifest pure , 34, 36, 64, 96, 251n26; as the Principle, 26, 38; as G odhead, 27 ,68; is superessential, 30, 78; and intellection, 66 , 67; is knowledge o f all that is, 78; not definable, 78; dom ain of, 81; does not seek, 98, 125, 236; and isness, 114, 142

Intellection, 35, 43-44 , 46, 66-67 , 196.See also D etached intellection

Intu ition , 79

2 8 2 INDEXInversion, 38, 82, 141, 171, 173, 181; in

p u re m etaphysics, 99, 113; and transposition, 133, 242; o f extasis into instasis, 153. See also Analogy, inverse

Isadore, Saint, 29, 161 Isness, 36, 57, 117, 160, 253n4; esse as

noun , xiv, 2 5 In25, 264n27; p u re , 33, 80, 98, 111, 156, 251n44, 265n47; and knowledge, 42, 142, 254n22; m anifest, 47, 71, 123, 158, 252n67,- not a whatness, 60, 151; unrestricted , is God, 61, 67, 71, 89, 144, 175; and essence, 69, 93, 143-46, 147, 149, 151; in function o f p u re Intellect, 143, 154, 177; the first distinction, 144, 153; double, in creatures, 161

Jesus Christ. See Christ; W ord, T he Jo h n o f the Cross, Saint, 248n4 Jo h n X X II, Pope, 14, 41, 249n/0 Ju n g , Carl, 272n68 Justice, 179-81

Kant, Im m anuel, 49Kenosis, 187K ierkegaard, Soren, 166 K ingdom o f G od, 189, 269n&2,

2 7 7 n //9Knowability, 36, 58; and being, 56, 177;

unrestricted, 91, 143, 173 Knowledge:—contem plative, 196. See also C ontem

plation —degrees of, 190-91, 201 — in divinis, 2, 31, 51, 78, 192, 247n /;

unrestricted , 5; when neglected, 111; beyond distinction, 234

—intellectual, 35-37, 40, 44, 62, 66, 77 — participatory, 26, 64, 67, 89, 191; not

pu re , 15; in being, 58, 60, 74 —prim acy of, 27, 172 —principial, 26, 31, 47, 70, 80, 208,

243; explained, 26, 96, 114-15, 118, 250n4; conform s to Divine Knowledge, 45, 114, 142; actuated by God, 50, 80-81; an d isness, 73; void o f intellectual p ride, 98; w ithout direction, 113; transcends object, 118; pre-em inent, 130; effected by grace, 140, 141; and nunc aetemitatis, 161;

and divine Subjectivity, 166; is u n knowing knowledge, 176. See also U nknow ing knowledge

— rational, 35, 167, 171, 193, 196, 197.See also Reason

—sensory, 58, 127-28, 193, 197; and sense-perception, 43, 62; and practical experience, 196

—through identity, 32, 47, 51, 78, 178, 226, 231; knower and known are one, 26; actuated by God, 36, 53, 77; notion of, 87; is principial, 118, 142, 185; and detachm ent, 239

— unitive, 23, 35, 77, 82, 121, 202, 204 Koch, Josef, 248n6, 250n2Law: eternal, 74, 145; natural, 74

145-46, 2 7 4 n //L iberation, 43, 110, 218, 221, 223, 225,

243Logos, 68 , 192, 261n35. See also W ord,

theLom bard, Peter, 29 Lossky, V ladim ir, 248n4 Love, 119, 217, 230; and knowledge,

173, 237; in God, 184-85; m eaning of, 207, 243-44

Ludwig, E m peror, 41

Macrobius, 28M aimonides, Rabbi Moses, 29 M an, 48, 80, 99, 172, 194, 198. See also

H um an being M anifestation, 31, 71, 73, 102; o rd e r of,

48-49 , 73, 75, 171; m eaning of, 89-90, 182-83; and creation, 90; structureless, 101-02, 144, 191; structural, 102, 191, 194. See also Possibility, o f m anifestation

M artha and Mary, 256n69 M ateriality (m atter), 65, 194; and p o ten

tiality, 74; and spirit, 94; and form , 94, 145, 158; an d intellectuality, 102, 123; and corporeality, 102, 194; and q u an tity, 155

M athematics, 128, 271n48 M eans, 45M emory, 125, 192, 270n 10 Metaphysics, philosophical, 5, 52, 106,

166. See also Pure metaphysics

INDEX 283

Monism, 48, 149 M onotheism , 150, 265n37 Morality, 218-19, 2 7 4 n /i Multiplicity, 183, 220 , 275n56 Mystical theology, 2, 30-31 , 49, 1 1 2.

See also Negative theology Mysticism (mystical experience), 2, 112,

225, 234, 247n2, 272n69; limitation of, 2 -3 , 107, 248n4, 275n45. See also Mystical theology

N atural law. See Law, natural Necessity, 186-87, 227; o f thought, 177 Negatio negalionis, 118, 148, 170, 187,

259n70Negative theology, 2, 30-31, 47, 108,

110,265n5/. See also Mystical theology New T estam ent, 9, 44. See also Holy

Scripture Nicholas o f Cusa, C ardinal, 49 N othingness, strict, 75, 91, 153, 176;

prior, 90-91 Notion (prim ary intention), 58, 100 Now, the eternal, 33, 63, 89, 96, 138,

196; production in, 160-61; contem plation in, 209; dispossession in, 226

O ne, the (God), 164, 169, 171, 179; as non-dual, 147-48, 150

Ontology, 4, 15, 106, 112, 130, 152, 159 O pposites, 208, 212 O rigen, 29O u ter self, 193, 198, 208, 245 Ovid, 28

Pantheism , 48, 150Personality, 67, 96; in God, 7, 51, 88, 93,

158; signified by intellect, 63, 258n27 Phillip the Fair, King o f France, 40 Philology, 3, 9, 50Philosophy, 1-5 passim, 37, 48, 55, 131 Plato, 28Plotinus, 28, 90, 148 Possibility, 91, 133-34, 140, 186, 226; o f

m anifestation, 91-92, 153, 159, 178, 183, 191. See also All-possibility

Potentiality,' 36, 74, 75, 133-34, 233, 270n?/

Poverty o f spirit, 221, 286; in ac th e

willing, 222-23, in active knowing, 223; in having, 223-24

Principle, the infinite, 26, 70, 143, 239, 257n7, 260n9; supradeterm inate, 6; inconceivable, 26; is God, 26, 30, 37, 56, 87—89 passim, 95, 160, 175; is p u re Intellect, 26, 38, 70; knowledge in, 47; reality of, 59, 224; m anifestation of, 71, 91, 92, 98; an d Divine Knowledge, 106, 111; and the W ord, 115, 138. See also G odhead; Knowledge, principial

Proclus, 28 Profane, 72, 75 Protestant Reform ers, 49 Psychology, 3, 9, 205-06, 272n68 Pure metaphysics, 48, 95, 106, 112, 178,

248n6; defined, 4 -5 , 52, 118, 139; au th o red by the W ord, 5 -6 ; context of, 81; and doctrine o f Christ, 165-66. See also Detached intellection

Pure Spirit, 64, 93-94 , 96, 158Quality, 93, 94 Q uantity, 94Q uint, Josef, 250n2, 257n3

Reason, 43, 77, 125, 192, 198, limitation of, 35, 82, 100, 118, 128, 139; and intellect, 35-36, 77, 79; and faith, 45, 48; and e rro r, 79; an d feeling, 80; respected, 164, 167, 172, 203; receives from the senses, 200. See also Knowledge, rational

Reflection, 65, 88, 99, 130, 162-63, 201 Relation, principial, 104-05, 143, 162,

166, 235Resurrection o f the dead, 209, 273r>82 Revelation, 76, 114, 116, 119, 121, 239 Richard o f St. Victor, 29 Rites, 241Ruysbroeck, Jan , 49, 259n5#

Sacram ents, 240, 241Salvation, 123. See also LiberationSelf:—divine (God), 59, 67, 69, 75, 134, 216,

229; the Principle, 64, 96, 108. See also Innerm ost Self

— hum an, 56, 62, 66, 71, 226-27; as a

284 INDEX

Self: (continued) knower, 56-57 , 123; as nothing, 105,119, 232, 238; negation of, 119, 126, 136, 188, 224, 230, 2 7 7 n //9 . See also Individuality; In n e r se lf ; O u te r self

Seneca, 28Sense perception (sensation), 43, 62,

155, 193. See also Knowledge, sensory Sin, 14, 73, 214, 218, 255n59 Soul, 125, 139, 176, 196; is intellectual,

36, 64; draw n into God, 118; g round o f the, 123, 126, 127, 139, 158, 207; faculties o f the, 125, 27On/0; ineffable, 127; spark in the, 135-39 passim; principle o f the body, 137, 198-99; beatified, 272n65

Spirit. See Holy Spirit; Pure Spirit Structure. See Form Subject and object, 57, 58, 108, 221-22,

213Subjectivism, 166, 228 Suso, H enry, 14, 49, 249n/0 , 259n58 Synderesis, 137 System, 5, 16

T au ler, Jo h n , 4, 14, 49, 259n5# Testim ony, 43; o f Holy Scripture, 44,

45 -46Theology, 1-7 passim, 15, 108, 112, 116.

See also Mystical theology; Negative theology

Thom as Aquinas, Saint, 8 , 29, 48, 78, 264n23; influence on E., 12 ,27 ,28,33 , 152; condem nation of, 15; and way of rem otion, 31, 167; on time and e te rnity, 32, 33, 41; on intellect and reason, 35-37; principial language of,37, 48, 260n9,' on exposition o f divine doctrine, 37-38; teachings of, 39, 74; on individuality, 52; on God, 53, 168, 224, 259n76; on reason and will, 77; on tru th , 78, 263n69; on the principle o f plurality, 100, 186; E’s u n d erstan d ing of, 102, 108, 149, 150, 172, 247n 11; on transcendentals, 106; on esse, 117; on nonduality , 150-51; students of, 153; on analogy, 167, 169; on infinite esse, 171, 238, 258rt?9, 265n47; on infallible necessity, 227; on transcendence, 233; on accidie,

255n39; on resurrection o f the body, 273n82

T im e (tem porality), 32-33, 62, 65, 219, 220, 232

T rad ition , sacred, 8, 9 T ranscendence, 51, 124; o f God, 67,

117, 154; m eaning of, 185, 229; only by way o f act, 233-34

T ranscendentals, 101, 106, 157 T rinity , the Holy, 30, 144, 184, 188,

272n65; o f Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, 47, 116, 118, 124, 129-30, 136

T ru th , 115, 165, 229, 240; and intellect, 57; Aquinas on, 78, 263n69; designated o f God, 91, 120, 238; a transcendental, 101, 157; convertible with being, 106; C hrist is, 165

Unity (union), 30, 147, 275n56; a transcendental, 1 0 1 ; convertible with being, 106, 150; is identity, 121, 172, 179; in principial knowledge, 128; as principle o f num ber, 150; pu re metaphysical, 165; and multiplicity, 183; and unicity, 275n56

Unknowing knowledge, 110, 188, 216, 231, 242; characterizes Divine Knowledge, 2 , 6 , 170, 2 1 1 ; transcends m ental activity, 13, is transform ed knowledge, 176; as perfect awareness, 225; and detachm ent, 234; and identity, 244. See also Knowledge, principial

U nlim ited will to know. See Will, to know, unlim ited

Unreality, 42, 91, 104, 163

Virgil, 28V irtue, 218, 221, 274n 13

W hatness, 57, 58, 70. See also Essence Will:

— hum an, 146, 192, 222, 243, 274n 13; and reason, 77; faculty o f the soul, 125, 192; and intellect, 207; m ust deny itself, 242

—o f God, 145, 222, 242. See also God, will in

—to know, unlim ited , 40, 5 5 ,5 9 , 202; as intellectual desire, 26, 37, 56; its objective, 35, 57; its term , 43, 58, 97, 178;

INDEX 285

innate in the soul, 56, 140, 253n7; aborting of, 58, 72, 201, 219; content of, 100; sustained by transcendent act, 105; and the W ord, 119

W isdom, 23, 40, 115 W omen, 271 n55W ord, the (Logos), 8, 1*5, 27, 122, 161;

com m unication o f God, 7, 26, 119; identically God, 9, 114, 121, 124, 129, 144; reveals Divine Knowledge, 10; is

p u re Intellect, 12, 26 lnJ5 ; testim ony of, 47; makes intellect operative, 80; in the g ro u n d o f the soul, 123, 124; not a m ediator, 124

—birth of, 52, 76, 129, 132; realization of, 53; p reparation for, 54

—incarnate, 7, 38, 50, 128, 248n6; is Christ, 13, 166; the G od-m an, 44, 45, 76, 198, 243, 262n51. See also Christ

W ords, 12, 14, 25, 131, 187

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C. F. Kelley • Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge

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