Eckhart: doing vs. being

Friday, August 26, 2016
Meditation:
    For if the sprinkling of defiled persons with the blood of goats and bulls and with the ashes of a heifer sanctifies for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
    —Hebrews 9:13-14 (ESV)
Quotation:
    People should think less about what they ought to do and more about what they ought to be. If only their being were good, their works would shine forth brightly. Do not imagine that you can ground your salvation upon actions; it must rest on what you are. The ground upon which good character rests is the very same ground from which man’s work derives its value, namely, a mind wholly turned to God. Verily, if you were so minded, you might tread on a stone and it would be a more pious work than if you, simply for your own profit, were to receive the Body of the Lord and were wanting in spiritual detachment.
    ... Meister Eckhart (1260?-1327?), quoted in The Perennial Philosophy [1945], Aldous Huxley, New York: HarperCollins, 2004, p. 178 (see the book)
    See also Heb. 9:13-14; Ps. 51:7,10; 1 Cor. 2:16; 2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 2:10; 1 John 1:7
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, purge me from pursuit of dead works. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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