Meister Eckhart (c.1260–1327,) originally Johann Eckhart, also Eckhart von Hochheim, was a German Dominican mystic and writer. A theologian and preacher, he represented God as dwelling in man’s soul and charted a course of union between the individual soul and God.
Born near Gotha in Thuringia, Germany, Eckhart joined the Dominican convent of Erfurt and studied in Strasbourg and Cologne. In Paris, he received a master’s degree in theology in 1302. He became provincial in 1303, later vicar, in Bohemia. In 1311–13, he was again in Paris as a teacher and then was a professor of theology in Strasbourg until 1323. Finally, he taught and preached as a regent in Cologne.
Eckhart conceived an ambitious speculative and exegetical theology called the Opus Tripartitum. When Eckhart was accused of heretical teaching in 1326 and tried before the court of the Archbishop of Cologne, he appealed to the Pope but died during the proceedings. In 1329, Pope John XXII condemned Eckhart’s 28 propositions as heretical or misleading but declared that Eckhart had recanted before his death.
The translator and mysticism scholar Jeanne Ancelet-Hustache wrote the acclaimed biography Master Eckhart and the Rhineland Mystics (1957.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Meister Eckhart
Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language.
—Meister Eckhart
If the only prayer you ever say in your whole life is “thank you,” that would suffice.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Life, Blessings, Love, Appreciation, Prayer, Gratitude
Be willing to be a beginner every single morning.
—Meister Eckhart
It is a fair trade and an equal exchange: to the extent that you depart from things, thus far, no more and no less, God enters into you with all that is his, as far as you have stripped yourself of yourself in all things. It is here that you should begin, whatever the cost, for it is here that you will find true peace, and nowhere else.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Simplicity
The more we have the less we own.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Possessions
There exists only the present instant… a Now which always and without end is itself new. There is no yesterday nor any tomorrow, but only Now, as it was a thousand years ago and as it will be a thousand years hence.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: The Present, Present
To be full of things is to be empty of God. To be empty of things is to be full of God.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: God
The Wayless Way, where the Sons of God lose themselves and, at the same time, find themselves.
—Meister Eckhart
You may call God love, you may call God goodness. But the best name for God is compassion.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Compassion, Kindness
If God gave the soul his whole creation she would not be filled thereby but only with himself.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Soul
The outward man is the swinging door; the inner man is the still hinge.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Self-Discovery
The very best and utmost of attainment in this life is to remain still and let God act and speak in thee.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Prayer
To be right, a person must do one of two things: either he must learn to have God in his work and hold fast to him there, or he must give up his work altogether. Since, however, we cannot live without activities that are both human and various, we must learn to keep God I everything we do, and whatever the job or place, keep on with him, letting nothing stand in our way.
—Meister Eckhart
God does not work in all hearts alike, but according to the preparation and sensitivity He finds in each.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Preparation
Time is what keeps the light from reaching us. There is no greater obstacle to God than time: and not only time but temporalities, not only temporal things but temporal affections, not only temporal affections but the very taint and smell of time.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Time Management, Time
What a man takes in by contemplation, that he pours out in love.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Childhood, Youth
No-one knows what the soul is. But what we do know is, the soul is where God works compassion
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Compassion
The seed of God is in us. Given an intelligent and hard-working farmer, it will thrive and grow up to God, whose seed it is; and accordingly its fruits will be God-nature. Pear seeds grow into pear trees, nut seeds into nut trees, and God-seed into God.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: God
Man goes far away or near but God never goes far-off; he is always standing close at hand, and even if he cannot stay within he goes no further than the door.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: God
The soul is created in a place between Time and Eternity: with its highest powers it touches Eternity, with its lower Time.
—Meister Eckhart
If “thank you” is the only prayer you say, that will be enough.
—Meister Eckhart
There is no greater valor nor no sterner fight. He who would be what he ought to be must stop being what he is.
—Meister Eckhart
In silence man can most readily preserve his integrity.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Silence
To be sure, our mental processes often go wrong, so that we imagine God to have gone away. What should be done then? Do exactly what you would do if you felt most secure. Learn to behave thus even in deepest distress and keep yourself that way in any and every estate of life. I can give you no better advice than to find God where you lost him.
—Meister Eckhart
Topics: Faith
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
Dante Alighieri Italian Poet, Philosopher
William of Ockham English Philosopher, Polemicist
Petrarch Italian Scholar
Giovanni Boccaccio Italian Writer, Poet
Thomas Aquinas Italian Catholic Priest
Roger Bacon English Philosopher
Bonaventure Italian Christian Scholar
Albert Einstein German-born Theoretical Physicist
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe German Poet
Arthur Schopenhauer German Philosopher