Table of Contents
Key Names and Terms xv
Prologue 1
Part I Letting Go of the World: The Friar
1 The Noble Heart: Young Eckhart absorbs the chivalric ideal of higher love 15
2 Heroic Christianity: Young Eckhart seeks a pure spirituality within the world of late medieval religion 39
3 The Dominican Way: Eckhart enters the Order of Preachers at Erfurt 63
4 The Right State: The prior Eckhart teaches young friars the interior nature of true religion 89
Part II Letting Go of God: The Scholastic
5 The Science of God: Eckhart begins graduate study of theology at the University of Paris 109
6 Master of Learning: Eckhart becomes adept as a scholastic theologian 135
7 Knowing the Unknowable God: Eckhart embraces negative theology and intuitive knowledge 157
Part III Letting Go of the Self: The Preacher
8 Pernicious Females: Eckhart encounters the nuns and beguines of Strasbourg 181
9 Master of Living: Eckhart adapts his scholastic teachings for a popular audience 209
10 The Wayless Way: Eckhart preaches on achieving divine union 229
11 Living Without A Why: Eckhart preaches on life and ethics after divine union 247
Part IV Holding On to Religion: The Spiritual Icon
12 Devil's Seed: Eckhart struggles with inquisitors in Strasbourg and Avignon 269
13 The Man from Whom God HID Nothing: Eckhart's reputation and legacy up to the present day 293
Epilogue 315
Acknowledgments 323
Recommended Reading 327
Notes 331
Index 351
Illustration Credits 363