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Breakthrough: Meister Eckhart's Creation Spirituality in New Transition

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Matthew Fox finds a Meister Eckhart that other scholars have difficulty obtaining. There seem to be three reasons for this: (1) Fox translates some sermons of Eckhart that are not generally accepted as being authentic, (2) Fox uses modern terms for some of Eckhart's Middle High German that distort what Eckhart is saying, and (3) Fox draws the wrong conclusions from some of Eckhart's teachings. The result is that Fox assembles a notion that Eckhart is a champion of creation spirituality, where compassion and justice challenge the economic and social structures of the day. All of this is nonsense. Eckhart does not emphasize creation but God, or more precisely, the godhead. He talks about mercy, but specifically rules out that this means mercy of one person towards another. Mercy, for Eckhart, is a deep activity of the godhead. By justice, Eckhart does not mean social or economic relations, but righteous or virtuous living. Justice, for Eckhart, is also an activity of the godhead. It is work that is conducted with why. Eckhart is not concerned with social structures, in and of themselves. And Eckhart, who lived in the fourteenth century, does not use the inclusive language that Fox bestows on him. A student with a serious interest in Meister Eckhart, would be better to read, Meister Eckhart: Sermons and Treatises, Volumes I to III, translated and edited by M.O'C. Walshe.

Whether this is the 'authentic' voice of Eckhart or not, it is an excellent book about spirituality and the approach to God. it makes God accessible. Rather than treat God as only worthy of being worshipped from afar, it brings the creation in intimate contact with the creator. One with Him. And the new way of looking at the Bible and Religion from an intimate perspective, branded Eckhart as a heretic. Of course, often in Religion you were burned or considered a heretic if you got too close to God. I loved this book and thought Matthew Fox did a wonderful job of bringing these ideas to modern english language.

Steven B. Herrmann, PhD, MFT
Author of "William Everson: The Shaman's Call."

As a Jungian psychotherapist and a poet, I love this book because I wrote my senior thesis on Meister Eckhart at U. C. Santa Cruz and Eckhart was a favorite spiritual writer of C. G. Jung's, whose essay I read as a young man while I was under the tutelage of the poet in residence, William Everson. Along with Jung, Matthew Fox is helping to bring Meister Eckhart rising out of the mists of obscurity. Fox does a great job bringing out the earthiness of Eckhart's spirituality in his translations and commentaries. He enables the depth-psychologist to better understand what Jung meant by the term "psychoid" later in life, which connects us not only with the depths of the psyche, but with Nature. I don't think Fox could have achieved what he did without his deep feeling for the shamanic influences in indigenous America. There is something about panentheism in the beginning of his book that speaks to this correlation. When one reads of the panentheism inherent in Eckhart's writings, one gets a sense of the presence of Thoreau, Whitman, Jeffers, or Muir, in this kind of mysticism; something of the shaman's presence shines through. In Eckhart's works the involution to the Godhead, as Matthew Fox says, becomes the vehicle for the "new birth." This happens through a shamanic movement, away from convention, from traditional ideas or images of God. "Indeed," writes Fox, "there are hints in Eckhart as when he talks of God as a 'great underground river' of the chthonic and more matriarchal period of consciousness when spiritual experiences were bound to the soil and were localized there with 'deities dwelling in the interior of the earth." I think there is a strong correlation between these two notions: Eckhart's Godhead and Jung's psychoid. As Fox points out, in the first of the four sections of his book, Creation Spirituality is steeped in panentheism. The whole concept of the "Ground," the "soil," the "riverbed" of the Godhead: all of these are metaphors that point to panentheism, as a way to describe what the psychoid is. A brilliant Introduction, brilliant commentaries, and a truly great translation, which is sure to make this book a classic of its kind.

Few books have moved me like this one. All the elements of the spiritual life are laid out in 37 wonderful sermons by an inspiring mystic of the 13th century, Meister Echkhart, complete with commentary by Matthew Fox. Detachment, Letting Go, the Transcendant and Immanent Diety, the divine inheritance of humanity, and more. Now, if they could only put it back in print!

Mathew Fox, who himself used to be a Dominican preacher (like Eckhart himself was) provides an interesting examination of Eckhart's mystical thought.

Fox uses his fourfold template of the way of light, way of darkness, way of creativity, and way of inner transformation, to interpret the Meister's ideas. While some of the claims Fox makes at the start of the book are over the top (for example Eckhart was deeply influenced by Celtic Christian spirituality) overall his representations and analysis are correct. I believe it is correct to see Eckhart as having a deeply panentheistic view of God's being (all things that are, are in God, and God is in all things, but God is not all things) and Fox rightly argues that Eckhart has a very positive view of the world.

This volume should be studied with the one Fox wrote about Thomas Aquinas, which provides valuable insights into Dominican spirituality, and also with the Classics of Western Spirituality volumes of Eckhart edited by McGinn.

Matthew Fox provides a light for those interested in understanding the mystical experience of Meister Eckhart. I am not a religous scholar and can not interpret the accuracy of Fox's translations but for me this is secondary, what matter most is: Matthew Fox provides the words and breathes new life into the writings of Eckhart. The words ring true [for me] because I detect there seems more 'stress' and 'struggle' in everyday life, where competing interests vie for one's time, energy and inner resources. It seems more true *now* than in the past 10 years. Maneuvering in everyday reality means playing systems which deplete one's very life force ('spirit'). The purpose of 'being' seems to be "creative" and as stated in Genesis after G-d created the world he pronounced his creation "good". Humans being created in the image of G-d, if at the end of our day we can not do this then there is a real problem. The essence of life seems 'to create' and find 'meaning', i.e. contentment, satisfaction, "repose" is what Matthew Fox translated Meister Eckhart had written. The next step is determining how this is done. One answer is 'read this book'. Simply stated ... find a quiet place everyday and read this book. After that, let the ideas float, rise, diffuse into your being. Apply the principles and ask yourself whether or not you are a better person for this experience, recognizing of course, that besides 'being' ... there is the 'doing'. So one must first connect with one's 'spirit' and after that begin 'creation' ...

There are many topics/sermons which Matthew Fox interprets for the reader. The ones most meaningful for me are: "Where the soul is, there is G-d", "Letting G-d be G-d in You", "How the Creator Seeks Repose and the Trinity Seeks Repose", "Waking Up to the Nearness of G-d's Kingdom", "How All Creatures Share an Equality of Being", "Bread is Given for us for Others, on Account of Others - Especially the Indigent" and "Everyone an Aristocrat, Everyone a Royal Person". Indeed, there is much food for thought and action in the 545 pages of text. Some of my favorite quotes from the book are "People do all their deeds for these two things: repose and pleasure. I have also said people can never feel joy in any creature if G-d's likeness is not within it" (Sermon 27). Another is from Sermon 15: "Everything that ever came out of G-d once stood in pure activity. But the activity proper to people is to love and to know." And one more from Sermon 15, "When people still stood in G-d's eternal being, nothing else lived in them. What lived there was themselves. Hence we say people should be as free of their own knowledge as when they were not yet, letting G-d accomplish whatever G-d wills. People should stand empty." Let these ideas and thoughts permeate your being and renew your spirit and inspire meaning in your life. This is what most people long for but are too busy struggling in life to find or build it. Erika Borsos (erikab93)

Some books seem to sum up an era. If you wanted a book to sum up the tentatively broadening state of Catholic spirituality in the seventies and eighties, you could not do better than this. The book was originally sent to me in highschool by a Dominican nun. Dominicans in this country were famously divided. Some, like the very liberal Adrian Dominicans favored rather advanced spiritualities. Others were scarcely more open than those who founded the Holy Office. Still, this book was a telling period piece, written by a Dominican priest. Fox's treatment of the important figure of Meister Eckhart is surprisingly rough-hewn and solid, even for all the flouncy "Creation Spirituality" vibe. Remember, this was in the orbit of Thomas Merton's embrace of Zen. And Eckhart's "Durchbruch zur Gottheit" seemed ripe for Catholic interpretations close to the yearning for a Zen satori. Even so, where Fox actually excels is not in Zen blandishments but in creating a context for understanding Eckhart's trial before the Inquisition which culminated in In Agro Dominico which condemned him , at the instigation of the Holy Office. Whatever the fusion of horizons here, it somehow still creates the lucidness to make one serious deduction historically: Deep spiritual insight is only variably rewarded by the Roman Church. Please note the strong attempt at sobriety in this statement of historical fact. It is not that spiritual insight is never heralded in Catholic climes, for instance in the great converso mystics Teresa de Avila and Juan de la Cruz. But on the whole the ability to embrace such profundity is surprisingly limited and fear-based. I am in the unique position of being able to reference a relative of mine, a cousin of my grandfather's, one Anselm Stolz, who actually wrote a famous study of Catholic mysticism called, in English, the Doctrine of Spiritual Perfection. The gist of that work was that, in very Benedictine fashion, that holiness and mystic insight should be sought in daily observances and activities. But that begs the question whether in general the Roman Catholic Church has helped or hindered such daily insights. Since it has limited spiritual meaning so strongly and ambitiously, it would seem Stolz's idea is evocative, but quaint, almost anachronistic for most people. There is not, lamentably, much difference between the incomprehension that met Eckhart before the writers of In Agro Dominico and the average curate of today tsk-tsking about some fallen away Catholic seeking authentiicity in a way that does not support the local parish. It is a surprisingly petty level for such profound human affairs, but, with the Church's omnivorous history in mind, not at all shocking.