Sean Pidgeon
TRS 650A
Reflection Paper #2
October 27, 2004
Meister Eckhart
Blessedness opened its mouth to wisdom and said: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs" (Mt 5:3).
All angels and saints and all who were ever born must keep silent when the Wisdom of the Father speaks, for all the Wisdom of the angels and of all created beings is mere folly before the unfathomable Wisdom of God. It has said that the poor are blessed.1
Meister Eckhart was a 13th and 14th century mystic in the Dominican Order whose writings, while fascinating, at times have been seen as troubling or differentiating from what is commonly understood as orthodox Christian spirituality. The challenging nature of his thought can be seen clearly in Sermon Fifty-Two, where he comments on Jesus’ call in the Beatitudes to be poor in spirit., and what exactly being poor in spirit consists of.
Most readers of the Gospel are able to grasp that when Jesus speaks of being poor in spirit, he is not speaking of physical poverty. While a life of living the gospel and preaching the gospel through physical poverty can be a laudable way of life for a Christian, with St. Francis of Assisi as a prime example, poverty of spirit is something different. As Eckhart says, "there are two kinds of poverty. There is an external poverty, which is good and is greatly esteemed in a man who voluntarily practices it for the love of our Lord Jesus Christ...But there is a different poverty, an inward poverty, and it is of this that we must understand that our Lord is speaking: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit.’"2
This ‘poverty of spirit’ that Jesus speaks of is often interpreted to be humility. Yet, for Eckhart, it goes much deeper than that. One who is poor in spirit "wants nothing, and knows nothing, and has nothing."3 One who "wants to fulfill God’s dearest will, he has not the poverty of which we want to talk."4 That is, Eckhart is saying that even if we get rid of all of our own desires, and only wish to do God’s will, yet still, we desire to do God’s will, we have not yet reached poverty of spirit. It is not enough to get rid of one’s own will. A person must not even seek God’s will, because to seek God’s will is to seek something and want something. One must want nothing in order to be poor in spirit. Eckhart’s call is so radical, that he calls us to "pray to God that we may be free of ‘God’" so that we may "desire as little as little as [we] wanted and desired when [we] did not exist."5 We should desire as if we did not exist, for before we came into existence we did not have any desires, even the desire to do God’s will.
Beyond not even wanting God’s will, one must, for Eckhart, one must not want to know nothing, such that he is "so free of all knowing that he does not know or experience or grasp that God lives in him."6 We must not only eliminate all desires, even the desire to serve God, but also eliminate the knowledge inside us of God’s will, for knowing God’s will may encourage us to seek God’s will. Yet, even not desiring God’s will and not knowing God’s will is still not enough. For one to truly have poverty of spirit, Eckhart says, he must "keep so free of God and of all his works that if God wishes to work in the soul, he himself is the place in which he wants to work."7 Poverty of spirit means not even leaving room for God to work in your soul.
This teaching of Eckhart appears very troubling. The traditional Christian understanding of poverty of spirit is transforming our desires so that they mirror God’s will. But, Eckhart is asking us to go beyond that, and eliminate all desire, all will. This is very similar Buddhist teaching. For Buddhists, desire is the cause of suffering, and the way to end suffering is to end desire. Is Eckhart really calling us to embrace a philosophy that–while rightly seeing our own desires devoid from God as inadequate–tells us all desire, even desiring God’s will, is an impediment to poverty of spirit?
We could easily dismiss Eckhart as an ‘Eastern or Buddhist mystic’ wolf hiding in ‘Catholic Dominican Order’ sheep’s clothing. We could call him a covert "heretic" teaching under the guise of authentic faith, with the intention of subliminally poisoning and corrupting the faithful into believing what is not church teaching to be true. That would be a bit haste, though. For, I do not believe that Eckhart need be seen as a subversive, or as one who stretched the limits. We just need to look deeper to recognize what Eckhart is truly telling us.
Christianity does teach that poverty of spirit is achieved through a transformation of our desires to fit God’s will. Yet, Eckhart is right to criticize an unexamined acceptance of this. For, none of us have a "God’s-eye-view." No one sees things as God sees things, as they truly are. Each person sees from his own perspective. I am not promoting subjectivism or relativism or the idea that each person creates his own truth. There is objective truth. I am just saying that only God sees truth entirely as it is; we all see things from a personal perspective and not from God’s objective perspective. When we shed our personal desires and "put on Christ", or will what God wills, there is a danger that in trying to will God’s will, we will only be willing our skewed interpretation of God’s will. Eckhart wisely sees this danger. He calls us to let go of all of this, even of desiring God’s will. This is important, I believe, because each of us, in our lives, go through spiritual ‘highs’ and spiritual ‘lows’. We have times when we strongly feel God’s presence and it is easy to do God’s will. There is a danger here, though, for people to "become obsessed with their own goodness and pursuit of perfection" and to ask God "‘Why cannot others be holy like me?’"8 During these times, we can be like the Pharisees and, when we seek to impose God’s will, we are only imposing our own will on others. Conversely, we have times when no matter how hard we pray or seek God, God does not seem to be there and we do not feel his presence. From "the darkness of [our] soul [we] cry out god. But he still seems not to listen."9 It is during this ‘dark night of the soul’ that we see if we truly have faith; that is if we have faith even when it is not easy or does not feel good. By living "as if [we do] not even know or experience or grasp that God lives within [us]"10 during the ‘high’ spiritual times when we easily feel God’s presence, we prepare ourselves to be able to experience God’s grace even during our ‘dark night of the soul.’
Eckhart shows us a unique way to look at Jesus’ call to live in spiritual poverty. By letting go of our desires, even our desire to seek, know, and have God’s will–a desire that is skewed by our flawed understanding of God’s will–we are thus able to ‘let go, and let God.’
TRS 650A
Reflection Paper #2
October 27, 2004
Meister Eckhart
Blessedness opened its mouth to wisdom and said: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs" (Mt 5:3).
All angels and saints and all who were ever born must keep silent when the Wisdom of the Father speaks, for all the Wisdom of the angels and of all created beings is mere folly before the unfathomable Wisdom of God. It has said that the poor are blessed.1
Meister Eckhart was a 13th and 14th century mystic in the Dominican Order whose writings, while fascinating, at times have been seen as troubling or differentiating from what is commonly understood as orthodox Christian spirituality. The challenging nature of his thought can be seen clearly in Sermon Fifty-Two, where he comments on Jesus’ call in the Beatitudes to be poor in spirit., and what exactly being poor in spirit consists of.
Most readers of the Gospel are able to grasp that when Jesus speaks of being poor in spirit, he is not speaking of physical poverty. While a life of living the gospel and preaching the gospel through physical poverty can be a laudable way of life for a Christian, with St. Francis of Assisi as a prime example, poverty of spirit is something different. As Eckhart says, "there are two kinds of poverty. There is an external poverty, which is good and is greatly esteemed in a man who voluntarily practices it for the love of our Lord Jesus Christ...But there is a different poverty, an inward poverty, and it is of this that we must understand that our Lord is speaking: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit.’"2
This ‘poverty of spirit’ that Jesus speaks of is often interpreted to be humility. Yet, for Eckhart, it goes much deeper than that. One who is poor in spirit "wants nothing, and knows nothing, and has nothing."3 One who "wants to fulfill God’s dearest will, he has not the poverty of which we want to talk."4 That is, Eckhart is saying that even if we get rid of all of our own desires, and only wish to do God’s will, yet still, we desire to do God’s will, we have not yet reached poverty of spirit. It is not enough to get rid of one’s own will. A person must not even seek God’s will, because to seek God’s will is to seek something and want something. One must want nothing in order to be poor in spirit. Eckhart’s call is so radical, that he calls us to "pray to God that we may be free of ‘God’" so that we may "desire as little as little as [we] wanted and desired when [we] did not exist."5 We should desire as if we did not exist, for before we came into existence we did not have any desires, even the desire to do God’s will.
Beyond not even wanting God’s will, one must, for Eckhart, one must not want to know nothing, such that he is "so free of all knowing that he does not know or experience or grasp that God lives in him."6 We must not only eliminate all desires, even the desire to serve God, but also eliminate the knowledge inside us of God’s will, for knowing God’s will may encourage us to seek God’s will. Yet, even not desiring God’s will and not knowing God’s will is still not enough. For one to truly have poverty of spirit, Eckhart says, he must "keep so free of God and of all his works that if God wishes to work in the soul, he himself is the place in which he wants to work."7 Poverty of spirit means not even leaving room for God to work in your soul.
This teaching of Eckhart appears very troubling. The traditional Christian understanding of poverty of spirit is transforming our desires so that they mirror God’s will. But, Eckhart is asking us to go beyond that, and eliminate all desire, all will. This is very similar Buddhist teaching. For Buddhists, desire is the cause of suffering, and the way to end suffering is to end desire. Is Eckhart really calling us to embrace a philosophy that–while rightly seeing our own desires devoid from God as inadequate–tells us all desire, even desiring God’s will, is an impediment to poverty of spirit?
We could easily dismiss Eckhart as an ‘Eastern or Buddhist mystic’ wolf hiding in ‘Catholic Dominican Order’ sheep’s clothing. We could call him a covert "heretic" teaching under the guise of authentic faith, with the intention of subliminally poisoning and corrupting the faithful into believing what is not church teaching to be true. That would be a bit haste, though. For, I do not believe that Eckhart need be seen as a subversive, or as one who stretched the limits. We just need to look deeper to recognize what Eckhart is truly telling us.
Christianity does teach that poverty of spirit is achieved through a transformation of our desires to fit God’s will. Yet, Eckhart is right to criticize an unexamined acceptance of this. For, none of us have a "God’s-eye-view." No one sees things as God sees things, as they truly are. Each person sees from his own perspective. I am not promoting subjectivism or relativism or the idea that each person creates his own truth. There is objective truth. I am just saying that only God sees truth entirely as it is; we all see things from a personal perspective and not from God’s objective perspective. When we shed our personal desires and "put on Christ", or will what God wills, there is a danger that in trying to will God’s will, we will only be willing our skewed interpretation of God’s will. Eckhart wisely sees this danger. He calls us to let go of all of this, even of desiring God’s will. This is important, I believe, because each of us, in our lives, go through spiritual ‘highs’ and spiritual ‘lows’. We have times when we strongly feel God’s presence and it is easy to do God’s will. There is a danger here, though, for people to "become obsessed with their own goodness and pursuit of perfection" and to ask God "‘Why cannot others be holy like me?’"8 During these times, we can be like the Pharisees and, when we seek to impose God’s will, we are only imposing our own will on others. Conversely, we have times when no matter how hard we pray or seek God, God does not seem to be there and we do not feel his presence. From "the darkness of [our] soul [we] cry out god. But he still seems not to listen."9 It is during this ‘dark night of the soul’ that we see if we truly have faith; that is if we have faith even when it is not easy or does not feel good. By living "as if [we do] not even know or experience or grasp that God lives within [us]"10 during the ‘high’ spiritual times when we easily feel God’s presence, we prepare ourselves to be able to experience God’s grace even during our ‘dark night of the soul.’
Eckhart shows us a unique way to look at Jesus’ call to live in spiritual poverty. By letting go of our desires, even our desire to seek, know, and have God’s will–a desire that is skewed by our flawed understanding of God’s will–we are thus able to ‘let go, and let God.’
posted by SeanPatrick | 9:24 PM
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