Customer Reviews

Meditations with Meister Eckhart

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This book is small only in size. It is one of the best and most inspiring of guides to meditation. Meister Eckhart lived in the 14th century, yet his writings, especially those chosen in this book, are amazingly up to date. The beauty of the poetic expression leads the reader to that quiet place of beauty and joy and peace, helping the heart to open and expand, and transcending all to be: 'one with one, one from one, one in one, and externally one in one'. I recommend this book to all spiritual seekers, no matter what the level. To all Lovers of Truth and Beauty and Joy.

As the previous reviewer points out, this book is small only in size. I stumbled into Meister Eckhart upon recommendations at my Zen center from both Buddhist and Christian practitioners (in my lineage many religions come together to practice zazen). I was amazed by what I found. I bought this book for 50 cents, and a 50 cents well spent! My idea, if I had to be said to hold one (of God), is that of a void or nothingness. Some call this point God, some call this point emptiness or void, or even nothing. Nearly anywhere I read "God" in here, if I am to replace it with void, or Tao, it reads just like a work from a Buddhist text. Meister Eckhart was truly an "enlightened man", for he did not allow himself to dizzy in spells of notion sickness. Not surprisingly, as with all the great mystics and prophets throughout history in Christianity, Eckhart was declared a heretic; simply because there was no understanding of his very metaphysical and transcendent views of "God." Ironically, Matthew Fox, the editor and compiler the book, had been excommunicated from the church by the Vatican, and consequently "booted" from the Dominican order. That's a shame, why must it always be in hindsight, that we acknowledge the wisdom of open minds?

Enjoy this VERY deep book

This is an excellent translation, or version, of Meister Eckhart's "Wayless Way". The way of the passive mind and the active heart, the contemplative way of being silent and listening. "In the midst of the silence the secret word was spoken unto me". (Sermons and Treatises, Sermon One.) Matthew Fox is true to the spirit of Meister Eckhart's thoughts concerning the spiritual life. Meister Eckhart was, and Matthew Fox is, an optimist where human potential is concerned. Life is such that there are basically two ways of looking at the same reality. The glass is half full, or the glass is half empty. Our Creator has given us free will. We choose our reality, or at least co-create it with our attitude toward it. Religiously minded pessimists view Man as essentially flawed, sinful, the Original Sin tradition. This type tends to be judgmental dividing Heaven from Earth. Those more optimistically inclined choose to focus on Man's potential to change and represent the Creation-Centered spiritual tradition. That there is a spark of Divinity within each of us gives this type reason for hope where man is concerned. The Kingdom of God is found within, Heaven is as much below our feet as above our head. Man is a bridge between the material and the spiritual realms. Same reality, two different ways of looking at it. In my opinion those that say man cannot change only have the right to speak for themselves. I have always been a bit of a rebel where the status quo is concerned. We are not static, we can change, grow, mature. God does not require perfection, God is perfection, God's mercy is whole. God sets the example for the rest of us to follow. The way to follow God is the way of love. The underlying unity of life's dualities is compassion, love. Love is the Wayless Way that brings us into unity with God, selfless love.

Let me be clear on this point. I feel it is pivotal. God has given us but one way to spiritual maturity, that way is love, agape love. Neither self-discipline, nor hope, nor faith, nor religion, nor science, is capable of changing our heart. Only true love changes the heart. Jesus reduced all of the law down to the triune commandment of love. Matthew 22:36-40. The Apostle John said, "God is Love". 1 John 4:16. The great Sufi mystic and poet Rumi once said, "The Love/Religion has no code or doctrine. Only God".

"Every human person is an aristocrat,
every human person is noble and of royal blood.
Who is more noble than someone who is born,
on the one hand,
from the highest and best that a creature possesses
and who on the other hand,
is born
from the intimate depths of the divine nature
and the divine wilderness?"

M.E.

There is much food for prayerful thought here. As Meister Eckhart noted, "God is like a great underground river". Meditation is the art of digging one's own sacred well into the river of living water that flows beneath, through, and beyond our everyday lives. Our spade is humility, our pick is compassion, our cup is our heart.

This is a rather small book, but it packs a whallop...not in a brutal way, but in a way that cuts through the layers of dirt and debris that we have allowed to collect upon our hearts and souls and get straight to the center of the situation where we find God.

When we empty ourselves of pre-conceived ideas, judgments, worries, and doubts we find that God has always been at the center of our lives; we find that it's not our busy-ness that matters, but it's those times where we're able to get still and quiet that make the most difference. People say they just don't seem to find the time without even realizing we are always in the midst of Eternity.

I carry this book in my car and sometimes I am rushed and frantic and filled with the things of the world, but I'll glance over and see this book and at a red light, I'll just flip to a page and read a small passage,

"We are celebrating the feast of the Eternal Birth which God the Father has borne and never ceases to bear in all eternity... But if it takes not place in me, what avails it? Everything lies in this, that it should take place in me..."

I breathe this statement in...I breathe it out...I let myself remember that I am always One with God. That all fear, all worry, all doubt is not because God really isn't there, but because I have somehow cut myself off from the Divine Flow.

This is a great book of reminders from a thoughtful and generous Christian mystic who knew God in himself...maybe this is why we are all here, to make that great discovery for ourselves that we are in God and God is in us and all is One.

Great book!

This is a very interpretative take on the thought of Meister Eckhart, and one person's new-age seventies-style musings. I was hoping for for additional insight into the writings and teachings of Meister Eckhart and so was disappointed and will probably rarely open the volume.