“If we are to know God it must be without means…if we do see God in this light, it must be quite private and indrawn, without the intrusion of anything created. Then we have immediate knowledge of eternal life”.1 This is one of many striking statements written by Meister Eckhart, a German theologian, philosopher, mystic, and Roman Catholic priest in the 13th and 14th centuries. He wrote his “Sermon Nineteen” on a particular passage in the Bible. It read, “Paul rose from the ground and with open eyes saw nothing”.2 Meister Eckhart proceeds to state four meanings for this: 1. Nothing was God; 2. Paul saw Nothing but God; 3. In all things Paul saw Nothing but God; 4. When Paul saw God, he saw all things as Nothing”.3 Meister Eckhart concludes his sermon by saying, “Let us pray to our Lord that we may come to that understanding that is wholly without mode and without measure”.4 This fourfold sense can sound contradictory and borderline heretical to say considering what we affirm and believe about God as Christians. If God is Creator and Creation, how could God be “nothing”?
In order to understand Meister Eckhart’s argument, it is important to distinguish “Nothingness” from “nothing”. Meister Eckhart is not making any sort of argument against the existence of God. Instead, I believe he has a twofold meaning in mind for the Nothingness which Paul experiences. First, God’s Nothingness refers to that which existed before time and space. Genesis 1 tells us that it is God who willed all things into existence. This means that God “existed” before existence, setting all time and space into motion. Put another way, God was not created but caused creation. In this way, Meister Eckhart’s “Nothing” refers to the God which was outside of space and time in order that space and time may be. It may seem contradictory, but there is only all existence, all being, within the scope of nothingness. “…all things are the divine nothing, because there is nothing but God”.5
Second, God’s “Nothingness” should be understood in relation to Christian mysticism, which is a difficult thing to describe. Denys Turner writes, “for the medieval mystical traditions, the Christian soul meets God in a ‘cloud of unknowing’, a divine darkness of ignorance. This meeting with God is beyond all knowing and beyond all experiencing”.6 These two notions of Nothingness go hand in hand in dealing with the complex notions of the unknown. Yet this raises a problem: how and what could we possibly know that is beyond knowing? Well, the answer, of course, is nothing — the great Nothing. For Meister Eckhart, in order to know God at all, we must submit ourselves to the unknowable.
These kinds of statements — ones that seem contradictory, yet actually reveal truths — are called paradoxes, and Christianity is full of them. A God which is wholly One Being, yet also three distinguishable and inseparable persons is a paradox. A being which is 100% divine, yet 100% human (Jesus) is a paradox. God being outside of time and space yet also present in all time and space is a paradox. Likewise, in Meister Eckhart’s argument, God is Creator, Creation, and Nothingness all at the same time.
Understanding paradoxes, then, brings us back to this story of Paul. Upon encountering Jesus on the road, Paul is blinded — an experience which many would assume to be horrifyingly bad. Yet, this is not so. Though his vision is restored several days later, Paul has had an undeniably life-changing experience which causes him to go from a persecutor of Christians to a preacher of the Gospel. However, in order to get there, Paul had to endure a period of darkness. Like Abraham — believing it was the will of God to sacrifice his son, Isaac — who travelled for three days in fear and trembling, Paul too traveled for three days in darkness and uncertainty. In other words, Paul was blinded in order that he may see.
What I believe Meister Eckhart is getting at provides us with an excellent entry point into Christian mysticism. Recognizing the supreme unknowability of God and, in humility and reverence, submitting wholeheartedly to God’s wonderous and divine mystery. While Paul’s blindness was literal, it was also an allegory from which we can all learn. At the cost of a temporary sacrifice, Paul briefly caught sight of the Nothingness which is the unknowability of God. With great fervor and sincere faith, perhaps we will be lucky enough to glimpse this unknowable yet paradoxically palpable aspect of God. “For God to be perceived by the soul, she must be blind”.7
The Nothingness of God is difficult to wrestle with and even attempt to understand. Thus, it is even more difficult to describe. But God is ever-present to us in our hearts and minds, in the mundane and the mystical. The beauty of mysticism comes from a loving relationship with God founded upon faith, trust, and an openness to be taken wherever the Spirit leads you — even if that’s somewhere beyond comprehension. God invites every one of us to have this loving relationship with Him. Thankfully, we have received the wisdom of many mystics who have sought to know and love God above all else. Meister Eckhart is just one of many who invites us to submit to the will of God, to deepen our bond with Christ, and to fall into the unfailing wisdom of the Holy Spirit. By doing so, he challenges all of us to “go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God”.8
- Von Hochheim, Eckhart. “Sermon Nineteen,” in Teachings of the Christian Mystics, edited by Andrew Harvey. Shambhala Publishers: Boston & London, 1998, pp. 95.
- Acts 9:8.
- Eckhart, pp. 94.
- Ibid, pp. 96.
- Milone, L.J. Nothing but God: The Everyday Mysticism of Meister Eckhart. Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2019, pp. 71.
- Turner, Denys. The Darkness of God. Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. i.
- Eckhart, pp. 95.
- Haskins, Minnie Louise. “The Gate of the Year.” White Balloon.
