Our trek into saintly Quirks and Quotes continues with Meister Eckhart taking on Columba. To make it to the Saintly Sixteen Eckhart somehow managed to defeat Drogo, the patron saint of coffee, while Columba snuck past Kateri Tekakwitha in the closest encounter (of the saintly kind) of Lent Madness 2016.
Don't forget, especially if you're just getting started in Lent Madness, that links to all the previous battles are available on the Bracket page (scroll down). In other words, what you read in this round isn't all that has been written about our saints. You can read the initial bios in additional to these write-ups and make a fully informed decision. To make this as user friendly as possible, you can even click the links in the first paragraph above to revisit the first round matchups of both Meister Eckhart and Columba. Yes, throughout Lent, the Supreme Executive Committee continues to lose sleep on your behalf.
Yesterday, Albert Schweitzer made it past Methodius 56% to 44% to claim his spot in the Elate Eight. He'll face the winner of Roch vs. Julian of Norwich.
And in case you missed yesterday's edition of Monday Madness, you can watch it here. Learn how to submit your Mug Shot (and view several examples) to have a crack at winning St. Francis of Assisi!
Meister Eckhart
“The eye, with which I see God, is the same eye with which God sees me; my eye and God’s eye are only one eye and one seeing and one knowing and one love.”
So taught Meister Eckhart, Dominican friar, professor, preacher, teacher, and mystic.
Eckhart received his formal schooling from the University of Paris, the greatest institution of higher education in late 13th century Europe. However, Eckhart’s work of preaching and providing spiritual counsel to the Dominican nuns of Saxony was not a one-way street; his informal education came from the women whom he conversed with on spiritual matters, and his writings show a familiarity with the mystical mothers of the Rhineland including Hadewijch and Mechtild of Magdeburg.
In summing up his own preaching, Eckhart said that everything he taught was a variation on four intertwined themes:
“When I preach, I am careful to speak about detachment and that a person should become free of self and of all things. Secondly, that one should be reformed in the simple good that is God. Thirdly, that one should think of the great nobility which God has placed in the soul, so that a person can thereby come to God in a wonderful way. Fourthly, concerning the purity of divine nature—there is such brilliance in it that it is inexpressible!”
Basically, Eckhart is saying that through humility, love, and discernment, believers are able to break through their own distracting notions and ideas about both God and the self (that’s what he means by being “free of self and all things”) to discover that God and the soul are—by nature—at one.
As one aspect of this teaching, Eckhart insists that creation and incarnation should be understood as two sides of the same coin, and uses the image of a dance of sorts: “The Father speaks the Son always, in unity, and pours out in him all created things. They are all called to return into whence they have flowed out. All their life and being is a calling and a hastening back to God from whom they have issued.”
While his Dominican superiors approved of his teaching, the Archbishop of Cologne and later the pope condemned Eckhart’s writings after his death based on excerpts taken out of context. The charges focused around technical statements suggesting some aspects of the soul were uncreated, that Eckhart failed to draw a sharp enough distinction between Creator and creature. His defenders argue that the context of his works provide assurances of his orthodoxy, and Eckhart himself declared that he had no intention of teaching anything contrary to the faith.
With that, Eckhart himself receives the last word: “He who lives in the goodness of his nature lives in God’s love; and love has no why.”
Columba
Columba was
the founder of the abbey at Iona--the center of Celtic Christian activity through the Middle Ages and beyond. According to several sources, Columba was initially baptized Crimthan, which means "The Fox." However, as he grew up, his patient and loving demeanor didn’t fit his name, so he was renamed Columba, which means "The Dove." Despite his name change, Columba cut an arresting figure: “He was a striking figure of great stature and powerful build, with a loud, melodious voice which could be heard from one hilltop to another.”
The two battles that he was involved in really did pain him. It was Columba himself who suggested his exile to Scotland to the council of monks--vowing that he would go forth and convert all the world in order to make penance for those he had hurt, and never again see Ireland. He chose Iona as a settling place because it had no view of the Irish coast, as opposed to the first island where he landed.
From Iona, he traveled all over Scotland, and his missionary efforts included people and monsters. Apparently, in August of 565, Columba was wandering around the Highlands and came up to the River Ness. He noticed some Pict men dragging the body of a man out of the lake. The man had fallen out of his boat and been chomped by Nessie. The people on the shore had cast out fishing lines to bring back the body. Columba, unperturbed, asked someone to swim across the lake and retrieve the boat so he could cross the river. Lugne Moncumin (one of the men) quickly stripped and dove in the water.
As he was swimming across, he woke up Nessie again, and she charged at him, ready to chow down a second time. Columba raised his arm and rebuked the sea monster in the name of the crucified Christ, while making the sign of the cross. He said, "You will come no further. Go back! Do not touch this man!" At once, the monster receded. "Quicker than if pulled down by ropes" writes Columba’s biographer. The Picts were amazed and impressed.
Lugne retrieved the boat unharmed. And everyone, including Nessie, became Christian. Apparently, this story in Columba’s biography has been used extensively by crypto-zoologists in the search for the Loch Ness monster.)
He did return to Ireland once, in 575 CE, in order to settle a dispute between the king and the league of poets. In order to hold to the terms of his exile, he traveled blindfolded the entire time. The poets had sent for him because of his well-known love of books; however, he was so reasonable and calm, he succeeded in getting the king to compromise and see the dispute in the poets’ way.
Columba’s dedication to evangelism and the wonders of the written word have left a lasting impact on the world
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166 comments on “Meister Eckhart vs. Columba”
This is a really difficult one for me today. I really love and admire each of these giants in the spiritual life. But, I have got to go with one of my patrons, Columba!
Meister Eckhart for me. I feel an affinity for heretics who turn out to be completely orthodox after all.
I vote for Columba because one of my classmates used to live at Iona with her husband.
Love has no why is wonderful. But Columba gets my vote. He settled a problem by being reasonable and calm! Fancy that! A strange concept currently. Also, I'm Irish.
Ay Columba! 'Nuff about Nessie. This is serious LM going on here. Meister Eckhardt really won me over with his communication with women mystics and support of women, as well as with the vital words of freedom from self and all things. Words that really spoke to me. Even if he loses, he's made an impact on my life. Thank you, SEC and Celebrity Blogger, for opening my eyes to the life of this exemplary man.
It's Meister Eckhart for me, for his mysticism and appreciation of the intellect and value of women.
Nessie!Really?
Mr. E had me with one seeing, one knowing, and one love. This so reminded me of our dept. pledge taken from Wendell Berry---One Lord, one baptism, and one cornbread. Then Columba told the best fish story of the Nessie. Now that was "halt and release" fishing. He also went to battle for the Poets, and I am an English Major and a minor league poet. Columba gets my vote.
Although I have not yet read the works of Meister Eckhart, I find in him an echo of many of my beliefs about the nature of God and the relationship to Creation, including humanity. I have to vote for him. My heart leaped as I read the summary.
I love the legends about the Loch Ness monster but I'm not inspired up by Colomba's encounter with Nessie. And in addition I have a granddaughter who attends a college run by Dominicans: Go, Providence! So Meister Eckart it is!
Ah, I was leaning toward Eckhart already, and then the dance imagery totally won this dancer's heart!
"...love has no why." Meister Eckhardt it is.
The sheer purity of Eckhart's thought and soul win me over. Columba has a great story, but Eckhart has no need of one.
That said, I hope someone makes "Columba -- the Movie" soon.
"Eckhart has no need of one." Like!
If you ever travel to Iona, you will understand. I do hope you get the opportunity.
It is a stunningly beautiful, mystical place.
While reading the monster story Gandalf came to mind, "Thou shalt not pass! Might Tolkein of based Gandalf on this story, and perhaps other aspects (ability yet reluctance to fight, traveling through the countryside to share beliefs and provide protection)of St. Columba's life? If so, he has a movie or 3 to his credit.
Once again my vote is cast based upon the vote of my students in Chapel--today the Middle School. I think it was the Lock Ness monster that garnered near universal support, although sympathy for one persecuted by the Inquisition gained Meister Ekhart a few votes.
I have been flirting with mysticism. And I love the quote GOD is at home. It is we who have gone on a walk.
So I'm voting for Meister Eckhart. (I must remember to not take this vote so seriously!)
I think it was the additional information on Columba that interrupted my tendency to side with the Rhenish mystics. The poets are for me one of the surest paths to God. The conversion of Nessie doesn't hurt either. A Franciscan before his time, that Columba!
My first time reading all the comments. My vote is for Meister Eckhart. A man who learned from women! That's awesome. " Free of self in all things." I am trying to learn humility. Ha, even that sounds prideful... So, I am working on it. He has something to teach me.
Today I am voting for Meister Eckart, praising the Creator and in thanksgiving for ALL of creation. For those voting for Columba because of the legendary conversion of Nessie, maybe you are missing part of the point. EVERYONE became Christians.
"...love (and God's grace) has no why" but "there is such brilliance in it that it is inexpressible!”
for which I am surely thankful. Thank you Meister Eckart for reminding me and (re-) opening my eyes!
I'm not missing the point, I'm looking at a different pointthan you are.
St. Columba. His gentle demeanor while championing Nessie wins me over. Go Dove!
Columba! Bookish nerd, life long learner/transformer, keeper of his word, and possessor of a streak of bad-a** that (while occasionally problematic) includes the conversion of the Loch Ness Monster.
Ah! I know what it is to commit errors ( really sins?) and know, without being required to do so, that penance must be paid. Columba was faithful in making amends for his failings. About converting the Loch Ness monster I don't know but it sure adds some spice to this entry...I liken it to the monsters in our lifetime.....say, the political upheavals we now face? We need a Columba to work a healing miracle!.
Blog on !
I have an Irish passport, I've visited Iona, and Columba's great heart has always been an inspiration to me. His work on Iona planted the seeds of Christianity throughout Scotland and parts of the British Isles, with long lasting results. Though Meister Eckhart's life is truly commendable, it's got to be Columba.
That bit about Meister Eckhart learning from women would sway me on any day, so today being International Women's Day, well, Columba had no chance. (There's not much I like about Columba's story to begin with, Columba was a bit of a warmonger. And the Nessie conversion is fanciful at best.)
People continue to write "I don't like Columba because he was warlike".
But he repented of that. Why is that part of the story forgotten?
I went round and round thinking about Eckhart, but the latent Celt in my just had to go for Columba.
The founder of Iona has my vote today. Anyone who could impress the Picts had to be very special. Meister Eckhart was a great teacher but he was preaching "to the choir". Whereas, Columba was blazing new trails into a part of the British Isles that even the Romans were not going invade.
Columba may have left Ireland for cause and returned only blindfolded, but his native land held him dear: upon his death, his body was interred alongside Brigid and Patrick. Three saints all interred at Downpatrick--or so the Irish tell us.
Columba's story is far fetched for me; I appreciate Meister Eckhart's writing' he got my vote & I do not think he was preaching to the choir especially in today's world. Learning about these saints is the best part of Lent Madness.
Columba got my vote with his rebuke of Nessie: "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!!"
My professor [Larry Hatab of Old Dominion University, in Norfolk, Virginia] taught a class in 1980 titled "Mysticism East and West". When he was discussing Eckhart, he explained that we needed to understand that Eckhart had an advanced audience for much of his preaching, or as he put it, innocently [unconsciously!] using a turn of phrase, "He was preaching to a hot bed of nuns". The class laughed greatly at this Freudian slip and he blushed at his words !!
A theological game ensues. "First half" : ... Is this too risque for the arguably [???] pious SEC to allow to be posted?
... OR ... Is this very allowing what makes the SEC greatly human !?
"Second half": ... Consider only one trinitarian question: 1 Would God laugh? 2 Jesus? 3 The Holy Spirit? Only one Holy Yeah is needed for this post to make the SEC cut!! Such a split result would affirm complex humor amid the trinity - don't humans too both laugh and not laugh at a thought sometimes. ... And further, if we are made in God's image, and we find it humanly humorous, would not God also? Even if with a bit of a holy groan! And is this site not one of occasional holy groans? And is that not indeed the very reason why God is "well pleased" with it !!
"Final two minutes": If no one person of the trinity laugh [enough], do not at least [some of] the saints laugh? And if so, do we really need a vote from the trinity at all??
"Over time": This is, sort of, like the reasoning of Lot of course, but did not God let Lot win the argument? So now I have thus also sited settled "case law", Genesis 18: 23-33. ... So ... "God said it, I believe it, that settles it!"
The case is thus closed!! The game is won!! ... Post it!!!
to moderator: I emailed this post re my professor’s words to some friends, some rabbis too, with the subject heading:
Lent Madness: my post re Eckhart AKA my rabbis taught me to argue like this
Also I added in my intro to them before my post: [btw, I wish they had non-christian saints !!!]
Had to vote for Columba because Nessie.
I have been to the holy island of Iona twice...in fact, I just happen to be wearing a cross with iona marble in it today. For Iona's and this man's influence on my life it must be Columba!