Meister Eckhart Quotes & Sayings

This is not only a commandment but also a promise or reward. — Meister Eckhart

To be full of things is to be empty of God. To be empty of things is to be full of God. — Meister Eckhart

Whoever possesses God in their being has Him in a divine manner, and He shines out to them in all things; for them all things taste of God and in all things it is God's image that they see. — Meister Eckhart

The seed of God is in us. If the seed had a good, wise and industrious cultivator, it would thrive all the more and grow up to God whose seed it is, and the fruit would be equal to the nature of God. Now the seed of a pear tree grows into a pear tree, a hazel seed into a hazel tree, and the seed of God into God. — Meister Eckhart

In Islam, and especially among the Sufi Orders, siyahat or 'errance' - the action or rhythm of walking - was used as a technique for dissolving the attachments of the world and allowing men to lose themselves in God. The aim of a dervish was to become a 'dead man walking': one whose body stays alive on the earth yet whose soul is already in Heaven. A Sufi manual, the Kashf-al-Mahjub, says that, toward the end of his tourney, the dervish becomes the Way not the wayfarer, i.e. a place over which something is passing, not a traveller following his own free will...it was quite similar to an Aboriginal concept, 'Many men afterwards become country, in that place, Ancestors.' By spending his whole life walking and singing his Ancestor's Songline, a man eventually became the track, the Ancestor and the song. The Wayless Way, where the Sons of God lose themselves and, at the same time, find themselves. — Meister Eckhart

God is at his greatest when I am at my least. — Meister Eckhart

The soul does not grow by addition but by subtraction. — Meister Eckhart

If the seal is pressed completely through the wax so that no wax remains without being impressed by the seal, then it becomes indistinguishably one with the seal. Similarly the soul becomes completely united with God. — Meister Eckhart

A man may go into the field and say his prayer and be aware of God, or he may be in Church and be aware of God; but if he is more aware of Him because he is in a quiet place, that is his own deficiency and not due to God, Who is alike present in all things and places, and is willing to give Himself everywhere so far as lies in Him ... He knows God rightly who knows Him everywhere. — Meister Eckhart

A question arises regarding the angels who dwell with us, serve us and protect us, whether their joys are equal to those of the angels in heaven, or whether they are diminished by the fact that they protect and serve us. No, they are certainly not; for the work of the angels is the will of God, and the will of God is the work of the angels; their service to us does not hinder their joy nor their working. If God told an angel to go to a tree and pluck caterpillars off it, the angel would be quite ready to do so, and it would be his happiness, if it were the will of God. — Meister Eckhart

Every creature is a word of God. — Meister Eckhart

Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language. — Meister Eckhart

There is no need to look for God here or there. He is no farther away than the door of your own heart. — Meister Eckhart

Truth is something so noble that if God could turn aside from it, I could keep the truth and let God go. — Meister Eckhart

That which a man acquires by contemplation he should spend in love. — Meister Eckhart

The beast that bears you fastest to perfection is suffering. — Meister Eckhart

We rarely find people who achieve great things without first going astray. — Meister Eckhart

Eckhart tells us that God 'must' give birth to himself in us fully and at all times. He has no choice in the matter; this is simply his nature. If we do not receive the spiritual benefits of this birth, then that is because we are not content to allow God to act in us. Rather, we obstruct him with our false notions of self and the determination to cling to the nothingness which is the true reality of our own creaturely being. — Meister Eckhart

Be ready at all times for the gifts of God, and always for new ones. — Meister Eckhart

The more deeply we are our true selves,
the less self is in us. — Meister Eckhart

God is nearer to me than I am to myself; He is just as near to wood and stone, but they do not know it. — Meister Eckhart

The only thing that burns in hell is the part of you that won't let go of your life: your memories, your attachments.
They burn them all away, but they're not punishing you, they're freeing your soul.
If you're frightened of dying and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away.
If you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels freeing you from the earth. — Meister Eckhart

God does not work in all hearts alike, but according to the preparation and sensitivity He finds in each. — Meister Eckhart

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

The very best and highest attainment in this life is to
remain still and let God act and speak in you. — Meister Eckhart

We ought not to have or let ourselves be satisfied with any thought of God. When the thought goes, our God goes with it. No, what we want is a real (subsistent) God who far transcends the thoughts of men and creatures. This God does not disappear unless we turn our back on him of our own accord. He who has God thus, in reality, has gotten God divinely; to him God is apparent in all things. Everything smacks to him of God; everywhere God's image stares him in the face. God is gleaming in him all the time. In him there is riddance and return; the vision of his God is ever present to his mind. — Meister Eckhart

God is at home. We are in the far country. — Meister Eckhart

The soul is created in a place between Time and Eternity: with its highest powers it touches Eternity, with its lower Time. — Meister Eckhart

God holds each of us by a string. When we sin, we cut the string. But God ties it up again, making a knot. Each time our wrongdoing cuts the string, God ties another knot drawing us up closer to Him. — Meister Eckhart

Spirituality is not to be learned by flight from the world, or by running away from things, or by turning solitary and going apart from the world. Rather, we must learn an inner solitude wherever or with whomsoever we may be. We must learn to penetrate things and find God there. — Meister Eckhart

Your own efforts "did not bring it to pass," only God-but rejoice if God found a use for your efforts in His work. — Meister Eckhart

Do exactly what you would do if you felt most secure. — Meister Eckhart

The most powerful form of prayer, and the one which can virtually gain all things and which is the worthiest work of all, is that which flows from a free mind. The freer the mind is, the more powerful and worthy, the more useful, praiseworthy and perfect the prayer and the work become. A free mind can achieve all things. — Meister Eckhart

To be properly expressed a thing must proceed from within, moved by its form: it must come, not in from without but out from within. — Meister Eckhart

Between God and Me there is no 'Between'. — Meister Eckhart

The moral task of man is a process of spiritualization. All creatures are go-betweens, and we are placed in time that by diligence in spiritual business we may grow liker and nearer to God. The aim of man is beyond the temporal in the serene region of the everlasting Present. — Meister Eckhart

God is equally near to everything and every place and is equally ready to give himself, so far as in him lies, and therefore a person shall know him aright who knows how to see him the same, under all circumstances. — Meister Eckhart

The greatest power available to man is not to use it. — Meister Eckhart

If God gave the soul his whole creation she would not be filled thereby but only with himself. — Meister Eckhart

My children, mark me. I pray you. Know! God loves my soul so much that his very life and being depend upon his loving me, whether he would or no. To stop God loving me would be to rob him of his Godhood; for God is love no less than he is truth; as he is good, so is he love as well. It is the absolute truth, as God lives ... If anyone would ask me what God is, I should answer: God is love, and so altogether lovely that creatures all with one accord essay to love his loveliness, whether they do so knowingly or unbeknownst, in joy or sorrow. — Meister Eckhart

No man was ever lost except for one reason: having once left his ground he has let himself become too permanently settled abroad. — Meister Eckhart

For a heart to be perfectly ready it has to be perfectly empty. In this condition it has attained its maximum capacity. — Meister Eckhart

Think more about who you are and less about what you do, for if you are just, your ways will be just. — Meister Eckhart

All that the Eternal Father teaches and reveals is His being, His nature, and His Godhead , which He manifests to us in His Son, and teaches us that we are also His Son. — Meister Eckhart

There is a huge silence inside each of us that beckons us into itself, and the recovery of our own silence can begin to teach us the language of heaven. — Meister Eckhart

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

Above all else, know this: Be prepared at all times for the gifts of God and be ready always for new ones. For God is a thousand times more ready to give than we are to receive — Meister Eckhart

Only those who have dared to let go can dare to re-enter. — Meister Eckhart

Everything is full and pure at its source and precisely there, not outside. — Meister Eckhart

Behold how all those people are merchants who shun great sins and would like to be good and do good deeds in God's honour, such as fasts, vigils, prayers, and similar good deeds of all kinds. They do all these things so that our Lord may give them something, or so that God may do something dear to them. All these people are merchants. — Meister Eckhart

When you are thwarted, it is your own attitude that is out of order. — Meister Eckhart

In silence man can most readily preserve his integrity. — Meister Eckhart

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

There's a place in the soul where you've never been wounded. — Meister Eckhart

God is like a person who clears his throat while hiding and so gives himself away. God lies in wait for us with nothing so much as love. — Meister Eckhart

Stillness is where creativity and solutions are found. — Meister Eckhart

Relation is the essence of everything that exists. — Meister Eckhart

We should not content ourselves with a God of thoughts for, when the thoughts come to an end, so too shall God. Rather, we should have a living God who is beyond the thoughts of all people and all creatures. That kind of God will not leave us, unless we ourselves choose to turn away from him. — Meister Eckhart

God is the word that speaks itself. — Meister Eckhart

I am as sure as I live that nothing is so near to me as God. God is nearer to me than I am to myself; my existence depends on the nearness and the presence of God. — Meister Eckhart

There is no better advice on how to find God than to seek him where we left him: do now, when you cannot find God, what you did when last you had him, and then you will find him again. — Meister Eckhart

If the only prayer you said was thank you, that would be enough. — Meister Eckhart

As long as I am this or that, or have this or that, I am not all things and I have not all things. Become pure till you neither are nor have either this or that; then you are omnipresent and, being neither this nor that, are all things. — Meister Eckhart

Existence itself stands in need of nothing, for it lacks nothing, whereas everything else needs it, because outside of it there is nothing. Nothingness stands in need of existence, as a sick man lacks health and is in need. Health has no need of a sick man. To want nothing, therefore, characterizes the highest perfection, is fullest and purest existence. — Meister Eckhart

In true obedience there should be no 'I want this or that to happen' or 'I want this or that thing' but only a pure going out of what is our own. And therefore in the very best kind of prayer that we can pray there should be no 'give me this particular virtue or way of devotion'2 or 'yes, Lord, give me yourself or eternal life', but rather 'Lord, give me only what you will and do, Lord, only what you will and in the way that you will'. This kind of prayer is as far above the former as heaven is above earth. And when we have prayed in this way, then we have prayed well, having gone out of ourselves and entered God in true obedience. — Meister Eckhart

Now some people are of the opinion that they are altogether holy and perfect, and go around the place with big deeds and big words, and yet they strive for and desire so many things, they wish to possess so much and are so concerned both with themselves and with this thing and that. They assert that they are seeking great piety and devotion, and yet they cannot accept a single word of reproval without answering back. Be certain of this: they are far from God and are not in union with him. — Meister Eckhart

To the quiet mind all things are possible. — Meister Eckhart

Do not think that saintliness comes from occupation; it depends rather on what one is. The kind of work we do does not make us holy, but we may make it holy. — Meister Eckhart

And so in my view the most important thing of all is that we should give ourselves up entirely to God whenever he allows anything to befall us, whether insult, tribulation or any other kind of suffering, accepting it with joy and gratitude and allowing God to guide us all the more rather than seeking these things out ourselves. — Meister Eckhart

A just person is one who is conformed and transformed into justice. — Meister Eckhart

Truly, it is in the darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow, then this light is nearest of all to us. — Meister Eckhart

One must learn an inner solitude, wherever one may be. — Meister Eckhart

Whatever God does, the first outburst is always compassion. — Meister Eckhart

Love is the root of all joy and sorrow. — Meister Eckhart

I will be silent and will hear what God will say in me ... If God wishes to speak to me, let him enter. I will not go out. — Meister Eckhart

I mean those who cling to their own egos in their penances and external devotions, which such people regard as being of great importance. God have mercy on them, for they know little of the divine truth! Please people are called holy because of what they are seen to do, but inside they are asses, for they do not know the real meaning of divine truth . . . They are greatly esteemed by people who know no better . . . May they attain heaven because of their good intent, but that poverty, of which we now wish to speak, they know nothing. — Meister Eckhart

No-one knows what the soul is. But what we do know is, the soul is where God works compassion — Meister Eckhart

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, "thank you," that would suffice. — Meister Eckhart

He is conscious only of God ... To be conscious of knowing God is to know about God and self. — Meister Eckhart

Compassion is where peace and justice kiss — Meister Eckhart

By humility, out of an enemy He has made a friend, which is more than to have created a new earth. — Meister Eckhart

The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake. — Meister Eckhart

To the extent that you eliminate ego from your activities, God comes into them - but no more and no less. Begin with that, and let it cost you your uttermost. In this way, and no other, is true peace to be found. — Meister Eckhart

Only the hand that erases can write the true thing. — Meister Eckhart

God is not found in the soul by adding anything but by a process of subtraction. — Meister Eckhart

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough. — Meister Eckhart

But of God you can never have a sufficiency. The more you have of God, the more you desire. If you could ever have enough of God, so that you were content with him, then God would not be God. — Meister Eckhart

This then is salvation - when we marvel at the beauty of created things and praise their beautiful Creator. — Meister Eckhart

Our bodily food is changed into us, but our spiritual food changes us into it. — Meister Eckhart

For with God we can miss nothing. We can no more miss anything with God than God can. Accept the one way from God then, and draw all that is good into it. — Meister Eckhart

The more we have the less we own. — Meister Eckhart

God is at home, it's we who have gone out for a walk. — Meister Eckhart

When God sends his angel to the soul it becomes the one who knows for sure. — Meister Eckhart

Remember this: all suffering comes to an end. And whatever you suffer authentically, God has suffered from it first. — Meister Eckhart

There is in the soul a something in which God dwells, and there is in the soul a something in which the soul dwells in God. — Meister Eckhart

I am what I wanted and I want what I am. — Meister Eckhart

We shall find God in everything alike, and find God always alike in everything. — Meister Eckhart

Let God operate in thee; Hand the work over to Him and do not disquiet thyself as to whether or no He is working with nature or above nature, for His are both nature and grace. — Meister Eckhart

The shell must be cracked apart if what is in it is to come out, for if you want the kernel you must break the shell. — Meister Eckhart

Pay heed to this, how you are turned toward your God, when you are in church or in your cell. Maintain this same state of mind and bear it among the crowd and into unrest and dissimilarity. — Meister Eckhart