Meister Eckhart Mirrored: Sermon 23 in the Critical Edition and in Two Late Medieval Manuscripts Once Belonging to the Dominican Convent of St. Catherine in Nuremberg

Abstract

ABSTRACT The present paper refers to the metaphor of the mirror to explore how Meister Eckhart’s image is created in the critical edition of his vernacular sermons. The result is contrasted with the late medieval manuscript tradition which ‘mirrors’ Eckhart in its own manifold ways. As a concrete example the paper compares Eckhart’s Sermon 23 in the modern edition and in manuscripts N1 (Cent. IV, 40) and N5 (Cent. VI, 56) by asking four questions: 1. Is Eckhart recognizable as the author of the sermon? 2. How is the sermon presented? 3. Why can the sermon claim authority? 4. How is the sermon contextualized?