Meister Eckhart Mystic and Philosopher

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Meister Eckhart: Mystic and Philosopher. Translations with Commentary by R. SchrmannReview by: J. D. C.The Review of Metaphysics, Vol. 32, No. 4 (Jun., 1979), pp. 769-770Published by: Philosophy Education Society Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20127294.

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SUMMARIESAND COMMENTS 769sistence that one's thought is grounded in one's particular existenceand by the fact that he is among the most autobiographically inclinedof all philosophers.In his exposition proper of Nietzsche's thought, Ries begins withNietzsche's tradition-breaking critique of reason and morality. Hepresents Nietzsche as one who dissects morality with ruthless integrity, discovers the seamy side of allegedly lofty actions and senti

ments, and finally comes to the realization that there are no moralphenomena, only moral interpretations of phenomena. Nature, according to Nietzsche, grants no basis for morality. Nietzsche's destructive analysis of reason runs parallel to this view, for he also thinksthat there is no reason in nature. Reason is an impotent tool forunderstanding reality because reality is not rational. Since there isno inherent meaning in either nature or history, but reason is doomedto discover meaning everywhere, Nietzsche feels compelled to exposeits hallucinatory insistence on teleology. He attempts to show thefutility of all metaphysics by pointing to the absurdity of distinguishingbetween seeming and being, the foolishness of thinking that there mustbe a true world behind the apparent one that meets the eye.Nietzsche's formula for a world stripped of all transcendent meaningis God is dead. With God's alleged death man must confront theabyss. Nihilism becomes a problem, for everything seems permittedif nothing ultimately matters. Nietzsche fights nihilism with a newand non-teleological doctrine of reality, the will to power, the revaluation of all values, and the doctrine of the eternal return of the same,that core of his new metaphysics which asserts the innocence of meaningless becoming. However, Ries's final judgment is that Nietzschefailed to surmount the nihilism he diagnosed so incisively.Ries's analysis can be criticized on various grounds. His comparisons of Nietzsche with Marx, Freud, and Kafka are not always illuminating; he neglects to get into such central problems as the difficultrelationship between the doctrine of the will to power and the doctrine of the eternal return; and he too readily dismisses the positiveaspects of Nietzsche's thought. Nevertheless he has facilitated theaccess to a difficult but rewarding thinker.?W.J.D.

Sch?rmann, R. Meister Eckhart: Mystic and Philosopher. Translationswith Commentary. Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1978. 265 pp.

$17.50?Eckhartian studies in English have recently taken a largestep forward. In addition to the present volume, two other booksand a special issue of The Thomist have since 1977 been devoted tothe Rhineland mystic who for so long lay in oblivion. Sch?rmann'sstudy first appeared in French in 1972. It is here translated by theauthor himself, who now teaches at the New School. Sch?rmann'sformat in each of the three chapters is to offer a translation of a keysermon of the Meister, and then to weave the main themes of his

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770 DEREKCROSS AND STAFFteachings in a detailed analysis and commentary upon each sermon.

At the end of each chapter, and sometimes within it, five other sermonswhich treat of a cognate theme are also translated. The translationsalone are quite welcome in view of the scarcity of good English renderings of Meister Eckhart. And Sch?rmann's commentary is extremely valuable as well. The American edition follows the Frenchedition quite closely. Sch?rmann has added a short conclusion to thethird chapter, excerpted from a previous article. And he has addedan additional sermon, Blessed are the Poor, at the end of the book.This is a happy choice, for the sermon in question is to my mind Eckhart's greatest, and it serves as an excellent transition to the appendix,which is also new in the American edition, and treats of the Eckhartinterpretation proposed by Suzuki inMysticism: Christian and Buddhist. The subtitle of the book has also been changed; the Frenchread la joie errante, the wandering joy.In general Sch?rmann holds that Eckhart taught a peregrinal ontology or an ontology of one who is underway, in which the soulis thought of as making its way towards God. This peregrinal ontologyneeds to be articulated not in a metaphysics of things and substancesbut of event and happening, which Sch?rmann argues is found in thelater Heidegger. The second chapter traces the four steps which thesoul takes in following its way. These are described as dissimilarity,similarity, identity, and dehiscence. Sch?rmann is attentive to Eckhart's sources and frequently interprets the Meister's teachings in thelight of what he has drawn from thinkers such as Augustine and Aristotle. He also takes issue with the traditional interpretation of thedoctrine of analogy in Meister Eckhart as an analogy of attribution.Subscribers to the Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy will be interested in pp. 192-213, which are devoted to aconfrontation of Heidegger and Meister Eckhart. The volume has aselected, annotated bibliography, along with an index of technicalterms.?J.D.C.

Spaemann, R. Zur Kritik der politischen Utopie. Stuttgart: Ernst KlettVerlag, 1977. 211 pp. n.p. ?This work contains ten essays publishedby Spaemann between 1965 and 1975, as well as an exchange (entitledDie Utopie des guten Herrschers ) between Spaemann and J. Habermasconcerning one of the essays ( Die Utopie der Herrschaftsfreiheit ).Another of the essays, Remarks on the Problem of Equality,is accessible in translation (Ethics 87 [July 1977]; the Publikationsnachweise mistakenly lists the month as April ); this essay embodies

many of the themes discussed by Spaemann in the other pieces reprinted in the book. In the introduction written for the book, Spaemann summarizes the theme common to the essays: It is always aquestion of rational objections against the abstract utopia of radicalemancipatory rule of reason. . . . The thesis of this book is that thisutopia is irrational (pp. vii, viii). The irrationality consists both in

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Meister Eckhart Mystic and Philosopher

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