"The knower and the known are one. Simple people imagine that they should see God as if he stood there and they here. This is not so. God and I, we are one in knowledge."
— Meister Eckhart
"Therefore a master says: When a person wishes to work an inward work, he must draw all his powers into himself, as into a corner of his soul, and must hide himself from all images and forms, and then he can work. He must come into a forgetting and into an unknowing. It must be in a stillness and in a silence where this Word is to be heard. One can approach this Word by nothing better than by stillness and by silence: then one can hear it and thereafter understand it completely in unknowing. When one knows nothing, then it shows and reveals itself. Now you might say: “Lord, you place all our salvation in an unknowing. That sounds like a deficiency. God created man so that he should know; where there is unknowing, there is negation and emptiness. Man is, this must be true, an animal, an ape, a fool, as long as he remains in unknowing. But knowledge is to form itself into an over-form, and this unknowing is not to come from not-knowing; rather, from knowing one is to come into an unknowing.” Then we are to become knowing of the divine unknowing, and then our unknowing will be ennobled and adorned with supernatural knowledge. And here, where we conduct ourselves receptively, we are more perfect than when we are working. Therefore a master said that the power of hearing stands on a much higher level than the power of seeing, for one learns more wisdom through hearing than through seeing, and here one lives more in wisdom. It is told of a pagan master that, when he was lying dying, his disciples, in his presence, spoke of much art and great knowledge. Then he raised his head, still as he was dying, and listened and said: “Indeed, I would still like to learn this art, so that I might apply it in eternity.” Hearing brings more in, but seeing shows more outward. And therefore in eternal life we shall be much more blessed in the power of hearing than in the power of seeing. For the work of hearing the eternal Word is in me, and the work of seeing goes forth from me, and in hearing I am receiving, and in seeing I am working. But our blessedness does not lie in our works, rather in this, that we receive God. For by as much as God stands higher than the creature, by so much higher is the work of God than mine. Indeed, out of boundless love, God has placed our blessedness in a receiving, in that we receive more than we work, and by far take more than we give, and every gift prepares the receptivity for a new, indeed for a greater gift; every divine gift enlarges the receptivity and the desire for a greater reception. And therefore some masters say that in this the soul is like God. For as boundless as God is in giving, so boundless is the soul also in apprehending or receiving. And as God is almighty in working, so the soul is an abyss of taking, and therefore it is over-formed with God and in God. God shall work and the soul shall receive; He shall know Himself and love Himself in it; it shall know with His knowledge and shall love with His love. And therefore it is much more blessed from what is His than from what is its own, and its blessedness rests more in His working than in its own. The disciples asked Saint Dionysius why they were all surpassed by Timothy in perfection. Then Dionysius said: “Timothy is a God-receiving man.” Whoever truly understood this would surpass all people. And so your unknowing is not a deficiency, but your highest perfection, and your not-doing is thus your highest work. And in this way you must put away all your works and bring all your powers into silence, if you truly wish to experience this birth within yourself. If you wish to find the born King, then you must surpass and cast down everything that you might otherwise find. May He who for this reason became a human child, so that we might become children of God, help us to surpass and lose all that does not please this born King. Amen." - Mystische Schriften (Mystical Writings) by Meister Eckhart