Eckhart von Hochheim OP commonly known as Meister Eckhart or Eckehart was a German theologian, philosopher, and mystic, born near Gotha in the Landgraviate of Thuringia (now central Germany) in the Holy Roman Empire. These Meister Eckhart quotes will motivate you.
Best Meister Eckhart Quotes
- “If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The most important hour is always the present.
The most significant person is precisely the one sitting across from you right now.
The most necessary work is always love.” ~ Meister Eckhart - “What good is it to me that Mary gave birth to the son of God fourteen hundred years ago, and I do not also give birth to the Son of God in my time and in my culture? We are all meant to be mothers of God. God is always needing to be born.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“And suddenly you know: It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The only thing that burns in hell is the part of you that won’t let go of your life: your memories, your attachments.
They burn them all away, but they’re not punishing you, they’re freeing your soul.
If you’re frightened of dying and you’re holding on, you’ll see devils tearing your life away.
If you’ve made your peace, then the devils are really angels freeing you from the earth.” ~ Meister Eckhart - “Above all else, know this: Be prepared at all times for the gifts of God and be ready always for new ones. For God is a thousand times more ready to give than we are to receive” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “There is a huge silence inside each of us that beckons us into itself, and the recovery of our own silence can begin to teach us the language of heaven.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“For the person who has learned to let go and let be, nothing can ever get in the way again.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Become aware of what is in you. Announce it, pronounce it, produce it, and give birth to it.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Be willing to be a beginner every single morning.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Love will never be anywhere except where equality and unity are….. And there can be no love where love does not find equality or is not busy creating equality. Nor is there any pleasure without equality. Practice equality in human society. Learn to love, esteem, consider all people like yourself. What happens to another, be it bad or good, pain or joy, ought to be as if it happened to you.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The most powerful prayer, one well-nigh omnipotent, and the worthiest work of all is the outcome of a quiet mind. The quieter it is the more powerful, the worthier, the deeper, the more telling and more perfect the prayer is. To the quiet mind all things are possible. What is a quiet mind? A quiet mind is one which nothing weighs on, nothing worries, which, free from ties and from all self-seeking, is wholly merged into the will of God and dead to its own.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “It is in the darkness that one finds the light.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Stillness is where creativity and solutions are found.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Apprehend God in all things, for God is in all things. Every single creature is full of God and is a book about God. Every creature is a word of God.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“When the soul wants to experience something she throws out an image in front of her and then steps into it.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me; my eye and God’s eye are one eye, one seeing, one knowing, one love.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Between God and Me there is no ‘Between’.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “There is nothing so much like God in all the universe as silence.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“Love is the root of all joy and sorrow.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Spirituality is not to be learned by flight from the world, or by running away from things, or by turning solitary and going apart from the world. Rather, we must learn an inner solitude wherever or with whomsoever we may be. We must learn to penetrate things and find God there.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Wisdom consists in doing the next think you have to do, doing it with your whole heart, and finding delight in doing it.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Theologians may quarrel, but the mystics of the world speak the same language.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “To be full of things is to be empty of God; to be empty of things is to be full of God.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“To the quiet mind all things are possible.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “God is not found in the soul by adding anything but by a process of subtraction.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Treat all things as if they were loaned to you without any ownership – whether body or soul, sense or strength, external goods or honors, house or hall . . . everything.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Do exactly what you would do if you felt most secure.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “As God can only be seen by His own light, so He can only be loved by His own love.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The more deeply we are our true selves, the less self is in us.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“Truly, it is in darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow, then this light is nearest of all to us.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Compassion is where peace and justice kiss” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The very best and noblest attainment in this life is to be silent and let God work and speak within. Therefore it is said: ‘In the midst of silence the secret word was spoken to me’.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “To the extent that you eliminate ego from your activities, God comes into them – but no more and no less. Begin with that, and let it cost you your uttermost. In this way, and no other is true peace to be found.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “God expects but one thing of you, and that is that you should come out of yourself in so far as you are a created being made and let God be God in you.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“The soul does not grow by addition but by subtraction.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Nobody at any time is cut off from God.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The very best and highest attainment in this life is to remain still and let God act and speak in you.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“That which a man acquires by contemplation he should spend in love.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The seed of God is in us: Pear seeds grow into pear trees; Hazel seeds into hazel trees; And God seeds into God.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “If you love yourself, you love everybody else as you do yourself. As long as you love another person less than you love yourself, you will not really succeed in loving yourself but if you love all alike, including yourself, you will love them as one person and that person is both God and man.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “People should not worry as much about what they do but rather about what they are. If they and their ways are good, then their deeds are radiant. If you are righteous, then what you do will also be righteous. We should not think that holiness is based on what we do but rather on what we are, for it is not our works which sanctify us but we who sanctify our works.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“The soul is created in a place between Time and Eternity: with its highest powers it touches Eternity, with its lower Time.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “You need seek God neither below or above. He is no farther away than the door of the heart.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “If we seek God for our own good and profit, we are not seeking God.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Jesus went into the temple and boldly drove out those that bought and sold. And when all was cleared, there was nobody left but Jesus. Observe this, for it is the same with us: when he is alone he is able to speak in the temple of the soul.
If anyone else is speaking in the temple of your soul, Jesus will keep still, as if he were not at home. And he is not at home wherever there are strange guests-guests with whom the soul holds conversation, guests who are seeking to bargain. If Jesus is to speak and be heard, the soul must be alone and quiet.” ~ Meister Eckhart -
“He who would be serene and pure needs but one thing, detachment.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Our bodily food is changed into us, but our spiritual food changes us into it.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The eye with which I see God is the same eye with which God sees me.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “People who dwell in God dwell in the eternal now.” ~ Meister Eckhart Quotes
- “You will have peace to the extent that you have God, and the further you are away from God the less you will be at peace… Thus you may measure your progress with God by measuring your peace or the lack of it.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“God is at home, it’s we who have gone out for a walk.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The outward man is the swinging door; the inner man is the still hinge.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “What does God do all day long? He gives birth. From the beginning of eternity, God lies on a maternity bed giving birth to all. God is creating this whole universe full and entire in this present moment.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Whether you like it or not, whether you know it or not, secretly all nature seeks God and works toward [God].” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“The beast that bears you fastest to perfection is suffering.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “There exists only the present instant… a Now which always and without end is itself new. There is no yesterday nor any tomorrow, but only Now, as it was a thousand years ago and as it will be a thousand years hence.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “Existence itself stands in need of nothing, for it lacks nothing, whereas everything else needs it because outside of it there is nothing. Nothingness stands in need of existence, as a sick man lacks health and is in need. Health has no need of a sick man. To want nothing, therefore, characterizes the highest perfection, is fullest and purest existence.” ~ Meister Eckhart
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“God cannot know himself without me.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “People should not worry so much about what they do but rather about what they are.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “The shell must be cracked apart if what is in it is to come out, for if you want the kernel you must break the shell. And therefore if you want to discover nature’s nakedness you must destroy its symbols, and the farther you get in the nearer you come to its essence. When you come to the One that gathers all things up into itself, there you must stay.” ~ Meister Eckhart
- “God is like a person who clears his throat while hiding and so gives himself away. God lies in wait for us with nothing so much as love.” ~ Meister Eckhart
