Mystics speak the same language - Eckhart

[Dingbat]

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

Can mystics even communicate with other mystics?

Consider a Hindu mystic who holds forth on self-realization. A mystic with a
different background might not understand the Hindu concept of 'self'.

Similarly, a Hindu mystic might not understand the vocabulary of a Chabad-
Lubavitcher even if there is one natural language known to both of them.

[David Kleinecke]

OK - just how authentic is that statement as a statement of
Meister Eckhart. I have seen the equivalent statement attributed
Aldous Huxley and the thought seems characteristic of Evelyn
Underhill.

[Dingbat]

On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 8:24:16 AM UTC+5:30, David Kleinecke wrote:
> On Wednesday, June 7, 2017 at 7:34:35 PM UTC-7, Dingbat wrote:
> > Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language.
> > ----Meister Eckhart
> >
> > Can mystics even communicate with other mystics?
> >
> > Consider a Hindu mystic who holds forth on self-realization. A mystic with a
> > different background might not understand the Hindu concept of 'self'.
> >
> > Similarly, a Hindu mystic might not understand the vocabulary of a Chabad-
> > Lubavitcher even if there is one natural language known to both of them.
>
> OK - just how authentic is that statement as a statement of
> Meister Eckhart.

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/582851-theologians-may-quarrel-but-the-mystics-of-the-world-speak

> I have seen the equivalent statement attributed
> Aldous Huxley and the thought seems characteristic of Evelyn
> Underhill.

If multiple philosophers say the same thing, did they think of it independently
or did all but one borrow? I don't know how you can tell.

[David Kleinecke]

That is not an adequate reference for the alleged Meister Eckhart
quotation. I still suspect Underhill.

[Dr. HotSalt]

I can't find a source with a cite. This looks suspiciously like the source, but it's only half of it:

https://books.google.com/books?id=h1tszkAj43QC&pg=PT9&lpg=PT9&dq=Meister+Eckhart+same+language&source=bl&ots=kawULAlDZX&sig=qF90qZA0bh7U2msDtXM-1XzRnSs&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj835al1a3UAhVFx2MKHYIADY8Q6AEISjAH#v=onepage&q=Meister%20Eckhart%20same%20language&f=false

It does sound like something that would get him investigated for heresy, which he was.


Dr. HotSalt

[Don Phillipson]

"Dingbat" <ranjit_...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:ae43efe8-f11e-46c1...@googlegroups.com...

> Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same
> language.
> ----Meister Eckhart
>
> Can mystics even communicate with other mystics?
>
> Consider a Hindu mystic who holds forth on self-realization. A mystic with
> a
> different background might not understand the Hindu concept of 'self'.

True -- but various authors and reporters assert that nonverbal
communication is really felt (or claimed by its participants): e.g.
that mere proximity to a holy person with whom you share no
language is felt to be significant. (I have no opinion whether
such feelings are real or imagined.)
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

Perhaps it is a version of the placebo effect.

--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[Peter T. Daniels]

I went to J2P2's Mass in Grant Park, Chicago, and there was definitely a
feeling in the air -- perhaps akin to that surrounding Obama in nearly
the same place on the night of his 2008 election victory.

I had to get on the "L" to O'Hare for a trip to New York that afternoon,
and somewhere I still have the Pope Pass the CTA issued for the occasion.
(It was a standard One-Day Unlimited fare card, with special graphics.)

[Jerry Friedman]

It certainly looks like what Huxley was saying in his essay
"The Perennial Philosophy".

--
Jerry Friedman

[Tex]

On Wednesday, June 7, 2017 at 9:54:16 PM UTC-5, David Kleinecke wrote:
>
> OK - just how authentic is that statement as a statement of
> Meister Eckhart. I have seen the equivalent statement attributed
> Aldous Huxley and the thought seems characteristic of Evelyn
> Underhill.

I have been poking around on the net. The only attributions that I have found are to Meister Eckhart. Huxley in his book The Perennial Philosophy quotes from Eckhart extensively, but seems not to have mentioned this aphorism in the book. A typewritten copy of the book is available at https://archive.org/stream/perennialphilosp035505mbp/perennialphilosp035505mbp_djvu.txt .

I have found no attribution to any of Echart's sermons or books, but at http://www.imere.org/content/mystical-experience-meister-eckhart I found this:

"Meister Eckhart (1260 - 1328) was a Catholic German theologian, philosopher, and mystic. Eckhart came into prominence during the Avignon Papacy, at a time of increased tensions between the Franciscan Order and Eckhart's Dominican Order of Preachers. He once stated that, “Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language.” In later life, Eckhart was accused of heresy, brought up before the local Franciscan-led Inquisition, and tried as a heretic by Pope John XXII."

I suspect that if the quotation is authentic, it would be found in a letter of Eckharts, written, of course, in Latin or German.

Tex

[teh....@yahoo.com]

In 1989, a book by Eknath Easwaran was published, called Original Goodness. There he states in the first chapter (which is about Eckhart; see https://education-human-services.wright.edu/sites/education-human-services.wright.edu/files/page/attachments/original-goodness.pdf): "Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language, and the practices they follow lead to the same goal." This may be the origin of the quote, which then would be from Easwaran rather than from Eckhart.

I also found a website that attributed the quote to the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. But that seems to be another misattribution. In another book by Eknath Easwaran, Words to Live by, first published in 1990, the Upanishad is quoted and then there is a text by Easwaran where he again states what I mentioned above.

[Madhu]

* teh....@yahoo.com <4ef897e2-3ecb-456b...@googlegroups.com> :
Wrote on Sat, 26 May 2018 18:46:04 -0700 (PDT):

> In 1989, a book by Eknath Easwaran was published, called Original
> Goodness. There he states in the first chapter (which is about
> Eckhart; see
> https://education-human-services.wright.edu/sites/education-human-services.wright.edu/files/page/attachments/original-goodness.pdf):
> "Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same
> language, and the practices they follow lead to the same goal." This
> may be the origin of the quote, which then would be from Easwaran
> rather than from Eckhart.

[Bringing up the "Biblical plague"...]

I've seen the phrase "The prophets speak with one voice" or the
"prophets spoke with one voice" in both Biblical and Islamic contexts.

[This is important in that it determines or establishes canonicity - if
the message is too different, it is to be rejected even as per the
instructions in Deuteronomy]

> I also found a website that attributed the quote to the Brihadaranyaka
> Upanishad. But that seems to be another misattribution.

It occurs in S. Radhakrishnans's Introduction to his translation "The
Principal Upanishads":

"Naturally the Upanishads do not adopt an attitude of
dogmatism[1]. This attitude of acceptance of all forms of worship
has been a persistent character of India's religious life.[2]
The word of God is not bound by languages in which it is
spoken.[3] It is the one voice that is heard in all religions."

The first footnote makes a reference to Eckhart:

"[1] St Paul's remarkable words that all nations 'seek the Lord
if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he be
not far from everyone of us' (Acts of the Apostles XVII 27)
indicate the right attitude.

"Eckhart 'He who seeks God under settled forms lays hold of the
form, while missing the good concealed in it.'

"[2] 'The Supreme is pleased with him who listens to all
discourses on dharmas, who worships all gods, who is free from
jealousy and has subdued anger.' ...

> In another book by Eknath Easwaran, Words to Live by, first published
> in 1990, the Upanishad is quoted and then there is a text by Easwaran
> where he again states what I mentioned above.

I'm sure Radhakrishnan was required reading for Eknath and
Radhakrishnan's reinterpretation of Indian Philosophy was the framework
for Eknath (and for most of the new Hindu religious liberalism)

[Jerry Friedman]

It's a metaphor for some such claim as that mystics all talk about the
same thing and use the same methods, broadly speaking. You can probably
get the idea the book by Easwaran that teh.kitty cited, or maybe from
Aldous Huxley's essay "The Perennial Philosophy".

--
Jerry Friedman

[David Kleinecke]

Whatever the old-timers said, the modern version of the idea
seems to have started with Evelyn Underhill's "Mysticism" in
1911.

[Arindam Banerjee]

On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 12:34:35 PM UTC+10, Dingbat wrote:
> Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language.
> ----Meister Eckhart

Mystics are generally peaceful.

> Can mystics even communicate with other mystics?

No. Mysticism is fundamentally a personal affair, some would say it is too self-centred and lazy. Certainly it is introspective.

> Consider a Hindu mystic who holds forth on self-realization. A mystic with a
> different background might not understand the Hindu concept of 'self'.

True, but the other mystic would interpret Hindu mysticism in his own particular way and vice-versa.

> Similarly, a Hindu mystic might not understand the vocabulary of a Chabad-
> Lubavitcher even if there is one natural language known to both of them.

Understanding in the reflective sense, so much of reason and logic, play little part in mysticism. According to the philosophy of the dancing dervishes I saw in Turkey, their goals are far more lofty - at the height of their rotation they become one with God.

[CDB]

It's the moment of "AND", as Hopkins called it. that is the same.

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Sunday, May 27, 2018 at 5:33:25 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
> On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 12:34:35 PM UTC+10, Dingbat wrote:

> Mystics are generally peaceful.

Such as Rasputin.

[Jerry Friedman]

Which I hadn't heard of till you mentioned it.

On the subject of old-timers,

"The Perennial Philosophy has its historical roots in the syncretism
of Renaissance humanists like Marsilio Ficino and Pico della Mirandola,
who suggested that Plato, Jesus, Hermes Trismegistus and the Kabbalah
were all pointing to the same God (they were almost excommunicated as
a result). Leibniz also championed the /philosophia perennis/. You can
see it flourishing in the transcendentalism of Emerson, Coleridge and
Thoreau.

"The idea then reached a mass-market through Aldous Huxley’s 1945 book,
/The Perennial Philosophy/, and then in the 1960s it became almost the
foundational idea of the New Age, spread through centres like Esalen,
the California spiritual community that developed the 'religion of no
religion'."

http://www.philosophyforlife.org/exploring-the-multiverse-of-spiritual-pluralism/

Not having read any of that but the Huxley book and some bits of
Coleridge, Emerson, and Thoreau, I can't dispute your statement that
Underhill's version is more modern than the earlier ones.

--
Jerry Friedman

[Sam Plusnet]

He's been no trouble for the last century or so.

--
Sam Plusnet

[Arindam Banerjee]

He was peaceful, but was finished off very violently. There is a school of thought which holds that had he lived, the Russian aristocracy - some members of which killed him out of pique - would have survived; and there would have been no world war.

Not that Rasputin was a mystic - he was a peasant with some strange powers and a magnetic personality. A spiritual medium, unusual; a stark contrast to the materialist world. Introducing sexual relations into spiritualism ruined it for him, and Russia.

"There's no disputin
we love Rasputin" - sentiment of the young ladies of McRobertson Girls' High School in Melbourne, in the 90s.

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

On 2018-05-27 22:59:04 +0000, Arindam Banerjee said:

> On Sunday, May 27, 2018 at 11:44:24 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
>> On Sunday, May 27, 2018 at 5:33:25 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
>>> On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 12:34:35 PM UTC+10, Dingbat wrote:
>>
>>> Mystics are generally peaceful.
>>
>> Such as Rasputin.
>
> He was peaceful, but was finished off very violently. There is a school
> of thought which holds that had he lived, the Russian aristocracy -
> some members of which killed him out of pique - would have survived;
> and there would have been no world war.

I suppose this makes as much sense as most of your statements. Do you
think that the Germans decided to invade Belgium only when they guessed
that Rasputin was going to get murdered two years later? Or that
Gavrilo Princip would have spared the Archduke Ferdinand if he had
expected Rasputin to survive to a prosperous old age?

>
> Not that Rasputin was a mystic - he was a peasant with some strange
> powers and a magnetic personality. A spiritual medium, unusual; a stark
> contrast to the materialist world. Introducing sexual relations into
> spiritualism ruined it for him, and Russia.
>
> "There's no disputin
> we love Rasputin" - sentiment of the young ladies of McRobertson
> Girls' High School in Melbourne, in the 90s.

--
athel

[Arindam Banerjee]

On Monday, May 28, 2018 at 5:08:12 PM UTC+10, Athel Cornish-Bowden wrote:
> On 2018-05-27 22:59:04 +0000, Arindam Banerjee said:
>
> > On Sunday, May 27, 2018 at 11:44:24 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> >> On Sunday, May 27, 2018 at 5:33:25 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
> >>> On Thursday, June 8, 2017 at 12:34:35 PM UTC+10, Dingbat wrote:
> >>
> >>> Mystics are generally peaceful.
> >>
> >> Such as Rasputin.
> >
> > He was peaceful, but was finished off very violently. There is a school
> > of thought which holds that had he lived, the Russian aristocracy -
> > some members of which killed him out of pique - would have survived;
> > and there would have been no world war.
>
> I suppose this makes as much sense as most of your statements.

Thank you. I read a few books on Rasputin some years ago. My statements are always based upon my research and other experiences.

Rasputin was away in the Holy Land when the Tsar ordered general mobilisation, and that led to WW1.

His reaction as given in that book was, "It must stop! The Serbs aren't worth it."

As he had influence as court - for he represented the common man so far as the royals were concerned - he could have told the Tsar to let things be.

[occam]

On 27/05/2018 03:46, teh....@yahoo.com wrote:
<snip>

...and that language is 'Bollocks'.

(Disclaimer: 'Bollocks' may vary according to geography, language,
culture, and local customs.)

[Arindam Banerjee]

As for mysticism, it is often expressed through poetry. A popular song by Tagore (aakash bhora surjo tara) shows the elements of mysticism. One essential element is wonderment.

[Arindam Banerjee]

Mysticism imparts consciousness to all objects. Rumi thus writes beautifully of the flute - its mournful playing laments its separation from the reeds.

[Madrigal Gurneyhalt]

There are no reeds in a flute. Just saying.

[Peter T. Daniels]

A flute IS (or can be) a hollow reed, in particular the kind Rumi would
have known. (Sorry to be defending AB, but a stopped annual-chronometer is right once a year.)

[Arindam Banerjee]

Surly churl this Daniels.

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

On 2018-05-29 22:30:46 +0000, Arindam Banerjee said:

> Surly churl this Daniels.

Living embodiment of Dunning-Kruger, this Banerjee.


--
athel

[Arindam Banerjee]

I embody da Vinci, Shakeespeare and Newton on one hand; and Drona, Chanakya and Kalidas on the other hand.

Cheers,
Arindam (bin Einstein ban Gandi) Banerjee, greatest genius of all time, sole god among lotsa devils.

[Arindam Banerjee]

Shelley followed in Rumi's footsteps, as we find in his poem "The Cloud". A great poem, worthy of translation to Bengali, and that I did many moons ago.

Romanticism incorporates mysticism.

Many of Tagore's love songs can as easily be directed to the Divine, as to the beloved.

A people scorning mysticism must be very dull, at the very least. Such dullness leads them to doing many mischiefs.

[Janet]

In article <f7080652-cfb8-4666...@googlegroups.com>,
banerjee...@gmail.com says...

>
> I embody da Vinci, Shakeespeare and Newton on one hand; and Drona, Chanakya and Kalidas on the other hand.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandiose_delusions

Janet

[Arindam Banerjee]

Sour puss.

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 4:11:37 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:

> Shelley followed in Rumi's footsteps, as we find in his poem "The Cloud". A great poem, worthy of translation to Bengali, and that I did many moons ago.

I wonder how badly AB distorted Shelley's meaning (given his example of
destroying Shakespeare).

> Romanticism incorporates mysticism.
>
> Many of Tagore's love songs can as easily be directed to the Divine, as to the beloved.

So he was imitating the Bible.

[Dr. Jai Maharaj]

In article
<MPG.35788d9f3...@news.individual.net>,
Janet <nob...@home.com> posted:
>
> In article <f7080652-cfb8-4666...@googlegroups.com>,
> Arindam Banerjee <banerjee...@gmail.com> says...

> >
> > I embody da Vinci, Shakeespeare and Newton on one hand;
> > and Drona, Chanakya and Kalidas on the other hand.
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandiose_delusions
>
> Janet

Arindam Banerjee may have used "embody" in one or more
of several ways:

embody

verb

1.
be an expression of or give a tangible or visible form to
(an idea, quality, or feeling).
"a team that embodies competitive spirit and skill"

2.
include or contain (something) as a constituent part.
"the changes in law embodied in the Freedom of Information
Act"

Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan.jai-maharaj

[Arindam Banerjee]

Indeed. 1 is correct in this case.
Cheers,
Arindam Banerjee

[Arindam Banerjee]

On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 10:13:35 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 4:11:37 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
>
> > Shelley followed in Rumi's footsteps, as we find in his poem "The Cloud". A great poem, worthy of translation to Bengali, and that I did many moons ago.
>
> I wonder how badly AB distorted Shelley's meaning (given his example of
> destroying Shakespeare).

Surly churl Daniels, I have made Shakespeare up to date, polished him in Bengali, and thus made all his true meanings crystal clear, as he intended me to do, . He wrote his sonnets for me, so that was the least I could do for the old boy. Just as I wrote my book "The Son of Hiranyaksh" for some Arindam of his time, who will be born a few centuries later from now.

> > Romanticism incorporates mysticism.
> >
> > Many of Tagore's love songs can as easily be directed to the Divine, as to the beloved.
>
> So he was imitating the Bible.

I don't think so. Tagore had many influences upon his work, but the Bible as such did not influence him any more than it did other Brahmos (a half-Christian, half Hindu sect).
Apart from the local influences, he was influenced by Scot lyrics such as

"Drink to me only with thine eyes and I shall pledge with mine"

the tune of which he used in his song

"kotobaro bhebechinu aapona bhuliya"

some lines of which from translation are:

"How many times I longed to cast all heed of sense and shame
At your feet I will lay my heart open full and bare
Them I would hold fast and thus make it clear
How in silence I have loved you beyond measure."

This isn't mysticism as such, of the Rumi class, but mysticism is what is beyond Tagore's description of the influence of the bonzer shiela upon the universe, as in the song

"nupur beje jaye rini-rini" which I also translated many moons ago.

Very effective all this - girls love it. Bengali girls, I mean.

Cheers,
Arindam Banerjee

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 9:26:19 PM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 10:13:35 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 4:11:37 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:

> > > Shelley followed in Rumi's footsteps, as we find in his poem "The Cloud". A great poem, worthy of translation to Bengali, and that I did many moons ago.
> > I wonder how badly AB distorted Shelley's meaning (given his example of
> > destroying Shakespeare).
>
> Surly churl Daniels, I have made Shakespeare up to date, polished him in Bengali, and thus made all his true meanings crystal clear, as he intended me to do, . He wrote his sonnets for me,

You're saying that you were his boyfriend -- more than 400 years ago?

It seems like someone who inspired exalted poetry deserves a better
reincarnation than you.

> so that was the least I could do for the old boy. Just as I wrote my book "The Son of Hiranyaksh" for some Arindam of his time, who will be born a few centuries later from now.

> > > Romanticism incorporates mysticism.
> > > Many of Tagore's love songs can as easily be directed to the Divine, as to the beloved.
> > So he was imitating the Bible.
>
> I don't think so. Tagore had many influences upon his work, but the Bible as such did not influence him any more than it did other Brahmos (a half-Christian, half Hindu sect).

Clearly irony-impervious. The point was that Tagore hardly innovated
the phenomenon of "love songs ... as easily directed to the Divine,
as to the beloved."

[Arindam Banerjee]

On Thursday, May 31, 2018 at 1:53:59 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 9:26:19 PM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
> > On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 10:13:35 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 4:11:37 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
>
> > > > Shelley followed in Rumi's footsteps, as we find in his poem "The Cloud". A great poem, worthy of translation to Bengali, and that I did many moons ago.
> > > I wonder how badly AB distorted Shelley's meaning (given his example of
> > > destroying Shakespeare).
> >
> > Surly churl Daniels, I have made Shakespeare up to date, polished him in Bengali, and thus made all his true meanings crystal clear, as he intended me to do, . He wrote his sonnets for me,
>
> You're saying that you were his boyfriend -- more than 400 years ago?

That's what a stupid pervert would think.

Shakespeare was a pagan fascist who loved ideas and ideals, beauty and virtue, talent and love. He was dead against the vile tastes of the public; the domination of the worthless over the worthy; the substitution of love with lust. As his duty for the good of the world, he wrote his sonnets for the most brilliant idealists of the highest moral character, that would be born over the coming centuries; in order to give them encouragement, with his verbal support, so clearly and powerfully expressed, in our evil world stuffed with lying scum in high places.

That is why I say that he wrote his sonnets for me, for I understand what his intentions were. They are all very clear in the sonnets. Most useful to me, in my struggles to create the HTN and IFE, and put rubbish notions like e=mcc=hv into the garbage bin of history.

> It seems like someone who inspired exalted poetry deserves a better
> reincarnation than you.

Shakespeare wrote to promote ideas and ideals that would last over time. There may have been someone who he thought was worthy to represent such ideals, in his time, with his own imagination. But that is not important. He wrote his sonnets for the excellent WHs of the future who would understand his meanings. His plays were for the public he despised; his sonnets were a reparation.

[CDB]

On 5/30/2018 9:26 PM, Arindam Banerjee wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 10:13:35 PM UTC+10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
>> On Wednesday, May 30, 2018 at 4:11:37 AM UTC-4, Arindam Banerjee wrote:

[...]

> Apart from the local influences, he was influenced by Scot lyrics such as

> "Drink to me only with thine eyes and I shall pledge with mine"

"I will pledge". Ben Jonson was so much not a Scot that he almost had
his nose slit by James's censor for making some unkind remarks about them.

[...]

[Arindam Banerjee]

Thanks for the correction. Somehow I have the notion that all the good old UK lyrics are from Scotland or Ireland. This particular tune was so good, that Tagore pinched it. Whether or not Ben Jonson got it from the Scots, is the question. Nazrul got some of his best tunes from the Middle East such as for "shukno patar...".