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This Electronic Thesis Or Dissertation Has Been Downloaded from the King’S Research Portal At This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ Relating to Eckhart the coherence of Meister Eckhart’s teaching on relations with special reference to the newly re-discovered Parisian Questions on relatio O'Connor, Maria Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 27. Sep. 2021 Relating to Eckhart: The coherence of Meister Eckhart’s teaching on relations with special reference to the newly re-discovered Parisian Questions on relatio Maria O’Connor 0907771 Submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 1st April 2020 Department of Theology and Religious Studies King’s College London 1 Abstract This work was originally born out of the student’s placement on the project ‘Meister Eckhart and the Parisian University’, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in 2013- 2016. This group was formed to study the newly re-discovered Eckhartian texts as re-found by the project primary investigator, Prof. Markus Vinzent, in Prosper of Reggio Emilia’s text, preserved in the Codex Vaticanus latinus 1086. The second part of this codex includes quodlibetal questions (‘quaestiones’), short-form versions of debates that were held at the University of Paris in the early 14th century. Until this research, only five of such Latin quaestiones in this collection were attributed to Eckhart. Our more recent research has now added four ‘new’ questions to Eckhart’s authorship. Of these, this thesis will present questions Q8 and Q9, which are concerned with the medieval relatio debate. With these ‘new’ questions considered at the heart of the study, this thesis will explore the medieval theological debate on the metaphysical category of relation (relatio), with the more specific aim to understand better, and properly situate, Meister Eckhart’s position within it. The purpose of the current work is to try to paint a more holistic picture of Eckhart by means of a study of a particular aspect of his thought, namely, on ‘relations’ as it appears in examples taken from diverse genres and styles in his works. Although initial study of the quaestios can reveal how differently Eckhart thinks about the same topic in the different contexts—philosophical, theological, or mystical— I will demonstrate that Eckhart can also be seen as a truly joined-up thinker. This thesis sits within the discipline of History of Ideas but also dialogues with medieval theology and philosophy. The introductory chapters also consider medieval intellectual culture. 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgements - 2 A brief history of relatio Abbreviations - 3 Part One: Early sources - 43 Introduction Introduction - 4 Aristotle The Argument of the thesis Augustine Boethius Literature review - 6 Simplicius The newly rediscovered questions Averroes Medieval relations debate Eckhart as mystic Part Two: Medieval interlocutors - 94 Eckhart as scholastic Albert the Great Eckhart the man Thomas Aquinas John Duns Scotus Methodology - 20 William of Ockham Approach to Setting the scene Approach to A brief history of Relating to Eckhart - 131 relatio Eckhart's philosophy Approach to Relating to Eckhart Eckhart's theology Eckhart's mysticism Setting the scene - 29 Summary Eckhart's life and works Skilled administrator Conclusion - 212 Paris calls again Friends with the enemy Bibliography - 219 The Meister's demise A timeline of Eckhart's life and Appendix - 229 career A: A timeline of Eckhart’s life and The University of Paris career - 229 B: Q8 and Q9 English and Latin apparatus - 230 3 Acknowledgements Firstly, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor Dr. Lydia Schumacher for the continuous support of my PhD study, for her sound advice, patience, motivation, and kindness. Thank you for sticking with me and putting up with the occasional meltdown! This PhD has been an almost 7- year struggle. Lydia is my second supervisor on this long and bumpy road, and so due thanks also to Prof. Markus Vinzent for the initial scholarship and earlier support. This thesis is a second submission, the realisation of which was very hard to accept after already so much hardship. I seriously considered giving up. Besides my supervisor, I would therefore like to thank Prof. Kate Crosby, who encouraged me not to give up, and showed me some light in what felt like my darkest hour. I would also like to thank Dr Jonathan Stökl, as his understanding and proactivity helped me to get the support I needed to carry on. Since my initial viva in 2018, the thesis feels largely new, and I certainly feel much prouder of my work now than 18-months ago. So, whilst it has been very hard to pick myself up and start again, alongside a full-time job, two house moves, wisdom teeth extractions, and the rapid unfolding of a global pandemic, I remain grateful to my examiners. Thank you to Prof. Marie- Anne Vannier and Dr Louise Nelstrop who have afforded me the opportunity to improve my work. Additional thanks to Louise for her firm steers and thoughtful suggestions in Oxford, following the viva. I would be remiss to not mention my loving parents and my first teachers, Angela and Roger O’Connor and the support of my partner Dan who kept me going even when I didn’t think I could. As I sit here putting the final touches on my PhD thesis, I hope to soon come to a successful end to the hardest challenge of my 29-years of life. However, I sit at my dining room table (my office for some weeks now since the U.K. gradually worked towards national lock-down in response to Coronavirus) and I find myself at a time when the whole world is also facing a challenge harder than it has seen for decades. It puts my academic feat into a humbling perspective. As I submit this thesis, and indeed should it be successful after so much time and effort, I realise there will not be a party with friends or family to mark this moment, and with that I feel a little disheartened. I turn to my old friend Meister Eckhart for some inspiration, and I am reminded of one of his most famous quotes that seems highly appropriate whilst in enforced self-isolation: “God is at home, it is we who have gone out for a walk”. In fact, this is a popular paraphrasing of a sentiment and teaching we see in various parts of Eckhart’s teaching. One example is: If the soul does not go out into external things, she has come home, and dwells in her simple, pure light. There she does not love, nor does she know anxiety or fear. Understanding is a foundation and support of all being. Love has no anchor except in understanding. When the soul is blind and sees nothing else, she sees God, and this must be so. 1 Perhaps then, the relief of my PhD submission beckons not a celebration, but instead some meaningful contemplation at home. Indeed, with this work aside, I shall take some time to return to myself, and indeed, to return to God, who is always at home here in my soul. Thus finally, thank you to Meister Eckhart, it has been a pleasure getting to know your wisdom yet more deeply. Maria O’Connor Wednesday 25th March 2020 Finsbury Park, London 1 Eckhart, “Sermon Nineteen” (Pf 19, Q 71, QT 37) trans. Maurice O'Connell Walshe, The Complete Mystical Works of Meister Eckhart (New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 2009), 141 2 Abbreviations Abbreviation Meaning Q8 Refers to Question 8 of the Eckhartian questions or quaestios which were re-discovered in 2013 by the project’s primary investigator, Prof. Markus Vinzent, in Prosper of Reggio Emilia’s text, preserved in the Codex Vaticanus latinus 1086, which begins: Whether diversity is a real or rational relation? (‘Utrum diversitas esset relatio realis vel rationis’) Q9 Refers to Question 9 of the Eckhartian questions or quaestios as re-found in 2013 by the project’s primary investigator, Prof. Markus Vinzent, in Prosper of Reggio Emilia’s text, preserved in the Codex Vaticanus latinus 1086, which begins: Whether difference according to reason is prior to difference according to a thing? (‘Utrum differentia secundum rationem sit prior quam differentia secundum rem’) 3 Introduction This work was originally born out of this student’s placement on the project ‘Meister Eckhart and the Parisian University’, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in 2013-2016. This group was formed to study the Eckhartian texts as re-found by the projects’ primary investigator, Prof.
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