“In all that he tried to say, whether in familiar or startling terms, Eckhart was trying to point to something that cannot be structured and cannot be contained within the limits of any system. He was not trying to construct a new dogmatic theology, but was trying to give expression to the great creative renewal of the mystical consciousness which was sweeping through the Rhineland and the Low Countries in his time. If Eckhart is studied in the framework of a religious and cultural structure, he is undoubtedly intriguing; yet we may entirely miss the point of what he was saying and become involved in side issues. Seen in relation to those Zen Masters on the other side of the earth who, like him, deliberately used extremely paradoxical expressions, we can detect in him the same kind of consciousness as theirs. Whatever Zen may be, however you define it, it is somehow there in Eckhart.”

“...let us remind ourselves that another, metaphysical, consciousness is still available to modern man. It starts not from the thinking and self-aware subject but from Being, ontologically seen to be beyond and prior to the subject-object division. Underlying the subjective experience of the individual self there is an immediate experience of Being… It has in it none of the split and alienation that occurs when the subject becomes aware of itself as quasi-object. The consciousness of Being is an immediate experience that goes beyond reflexive awareness. It is not ‘consciousness of’ but pure consciousness, in which the subject as such disappears. Posterior to this immediate experience of a ground which transcends experience emerges the subject with its self-awareness.”