44 S p i r i t ua l i t y S t u d i e s 7 - 1 S p r i n g 2 0 2 1 the unifying One present in the ground of the soul, it makes no sense to compare and hierarchize humans. Detached love is not guided by concepts like precedence, degree, more or less (Kern 1992, 750). The image of God in the ground of the soul guarantees that the relation between the one who loves and the loved one is that of equality and inclusiveness. Detachment from the preferences of one’s own will facilitates a radical expansion of the capacity of love. Detachment overcomes one’s natural bond to corporeality, multiplicity and temporality, which inhibit the spread of inclusive love for every human. Since detached love is one, even the difference between self-love and neighbor-love disappears (Langer 1986, 22). Thus, detachment represents the basis of a universal love that includes all people, nobody is excluded due to his characteristics. This love is divine by nature and man’s role is to contribute to its dissemination in the world. It has been entrusted to him and proceeds from his innermost depth. It is radically different from the love that is a creation of his own will and seeks in the neighbor a reflection of his own desires. Detached love transforms interpersonal relationships according to God’s very nature: it unifies them in absolute inclusivity. The presented doctrine of detachment has a substantial effect on lived spirituality. It leads man toward a unifiedspiritual life guided by a single spiritual principle. instead of focusing simultaneously on a number of different principles – that would raise the issue of their hierarchy and compatibility – the practitioner of detachment pursues a straightforward spiritual formation. as we have explained above, perfect detachment is the ultimate goal of the individual’s ascetic self-formation. Gradual detachment is the way of achieving this goal. In this context we can conceive of detachment as the supreme virtue guiding other virtues. Eckhart describes it as “the best and highest virtue whereby a man may chiefly and most firmly join himself to God, and whereby a man may become by grace what God is by nature” (Eckhart 2009, 566). Eckhart adds that this is so, because “all virtues have some regard to creatures, but detachment is free of all creatures” (Eckhart 2009, 566). Thus, Eckhart’s doctrine of detachment is a special take on virtue ethics. Instead of focusing one’s spiritual life on the practice of four cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance) and three theological virtues (faith, hope, love), Eckhart proposes a focus on the practice of a single virtue: detachment. as we have demonstrated above in the case of love, detachment is not an isolated virtue, rather it opens the way to the practice of other virtues. in this practice it fosters a strong reliance on God’s activity. The development of good habits and the realization of good works would be impossible without the activity of the divine one within man’s soul. The conscious collaboration with this activity is a presupposition of fruitful spiritual life. as for the traditional distinction in the field of practical spirituality between via purgativa, via illuminativa and via unitiva, detachment clearly relates to the first way: it is a separation, a letting go, a negation. It relates, however, also to the third way, as it emphasizes from the outset the unity of the ground of the soul with God, whom it reflects. This has been clearly tracked by robert J. kozljanič in Eckhart’s sermon In hoc apparuit caritas dei in nobis that discusses the individual stages of the mystical way (kozljanič 2001, 166–167). It could be argued in this connection that Eckhart’s doctrine of detachment contains motifs that resem-ble the concepts of nothingness and emptying out in John of the Cross [6]. This is indeed true, but there is no scholarly consensus on the extent of the Spanish mystic’s reception of German medieval mysticism. Eckhart’s mystical spirituality – and his doctrine of detachment – lived on in the works of his Dominican pupils Johannes Tauler and Heinrich Seuse, and more broadly in the tradition of Rheno-Flemish mysticism. The works of the representatives of this tradition – including Tauler and Seuse – were in the 16th century translated into Latin and later into Spanish (Clark 2013, 50–51). Through these translations this spiritual tradition was known to John of the Cross (Mazzocco 2013, 620–621), but a more precise determination of the trajectory of reception and of theoretical intersections is beyond the scope of this paper. It is evident, however, that both Eckhart and John of the Cross developed a spirituality in which negative notions are dominant. Eckhart’s spirituality of detachment found an echo also in a number of apocryphal writings ascribed to his pupils. Among these the most important is the Pseudo-Taulerian The Imitation of the Poor Life of Christ (1548) – a handbook of detachment spirituality – that included numerous paraphrases of Eckhart’s statements on detachment (Šajda 2008, 250). Thus, for Eckhart the union with God is not some distant goal, it is a present actuality that needs to be uncovered through spiritual exercise. Detachment is both a given and a task. The consciousness of this union infuses man’s spiritual life with positivity and makes him aware of his noble character. Overall, we can say that from the perspective of practical spirituality detachment both highlights the limits of human activity and emphasizes the noble character of the human soul. Man’s ascetic practice is meaningful only inasmuch as it is a conscious collaboration with God’s initiative proceeding from the ground of the soul. The ultimate goal of one’s spiritual journey is already present in one’s soul, it just needs to be fully uncovered and developed properly.
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