// Press Release //
Release date: Friday, April 16, 5pm

Meister Eckhart rehabilitated by the Pope

Paradoxically - Meister Eckhart's rehabilitation after 750 years culminates in the verdict that he never needed a rehabilitation. Such is the summary of the response which the then Master of the Dominicans, Timothy Ratcliffe, received from the Vatican in 1992, and which he had summarised in a letter to Peter Talbot Wilcox, the then President of the British Eckhart Society, dated 15 August 1992:
'We tried to have the censure lifted on Eckhart', writes Timothy Ratcliffe, 'and were told that there was really no need since he had never been condemned by name, just some propositions which he was supposed to have held, and so we are perfectly free to say that he is a good and orthodox theologian.'
 What reads like a harmless statement is, however, the concise answer to the outcome of a a very detailed report which a commission of theologians had worked out on behalf of the General Chapter of the Dominicans of 1980 and which together with a petition was passed on in a letter by the then Master of the Dominicans to Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger on 30 March, 1992.
The letter to Cardinal Ratzinger spelled out that 'the Order of Saint Dominic has obviously a very direct interest in Meister Eckhart's life, works and reputation. This is why the General Chapter of 1980 welcomed one petition concerning the great theologian and mystic. It originated in Great Britain from a group of Dominican laity and friends of the Order in that country, headed by the late Ms. Ursula Fleming, who founded the association "Friends of Meister Eckhart" (= The Eckhart Society).
The commission pf experts comprised the following members and was created in 1983 by Master Fr. Vincent de Couesnongle: Alois M. Haas, Professor of German Medieval Literature at the University of Zurich; Ruedi Imbach, Professor of Medieval Philosophy at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland; Loris Sturlese, Professor of the Scuola Normale di- Pisa; Fr. fidouard Weber, OP, of the Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques; Fr. Willehad Eckert, OP, who teaches History at the University of Cologne and Fr. Heinrich Stirnimann, OP, Emeritus Professor of the Faculty of Theology in Fribourg in Switzerland and Chairman of the Commission.
After almost ten years of scholarly research, the Commission had published its conclusions in "Eckardus Theutonicus, homo doctus et sanctus". In addition, the Commission requested Prof. Winfried Trusen, of Wurzburg, to make a study on the precise nature of the process against Meister Eckhart, which led to his "Der Prozess gegen Meister Eckhart, Vorgeschichte, Verlauf, Folgen", Paderborn 1988.
 Both documents were included in the letter to Cardinal Ratzinger.

The Dominican Master pointed out in his letter that according to Professor Trusen's opinion 'Eckhart does not need a "rehabilitation" in the canonical sense of the word, since his person, his doctrine, his apostolate or his spirituality were not really condemned. Only 28 propositions were censured, but they were taken out of their context and impossible to verify, since there were no manuscripts in Avignon.'
He added Fr. Weber's finding that 'Eckhart's doctrine is perfectly coherent with the orthodox tradition of great theologians like the Cappadocians, Augustine, Thomas and others' and that of T. Suarez-Nani 'that each of the censured propositions, when studied attentively, may be interpreted in a perfectly orthodox way.'
Finally he addressed Cardinal Ratzinger's personal 'interest in mystic doctrine, particularly that of Eckhart himself',  'considering also the help and light that so many people, not alone christians, find in his writings and especially in his Sermons', and then formally asked the Cardinal 'to take into consideration the request of our General Chapter: whether it would be possible to lift any condemnation.'

Timothy Ratcliffe's answer which was kept in the archive of the British Eckhart Society, re-emerged a few days ago when the German Eckehart Gesellschaft invited the British Eckhart Society to their annual congress in Munich and in their opening address, the representative of the Society quoted the relevant documents which clearly prove that the Vatican, if not Cardinal Ratzinger himself, responded positively to the Dominicans position and supported all three main suggestions: Indeed, Meister Eckhart does not need any rehabilitation, he is in line with Catholic orthodoxy, and he is a theologian who is worth recommending!
Professor Georg Steer, the eminent German Eckhart scholar and editor, has today published the content of these documents in the Theologische Literaturzeitung.


Professor Markus Vinzent
University of Birmingham (from 09/10 King's College London)