THREAD ON MYSTICISM

1/ always wondered why the medieval church persecuted mystics like Meister Eckhardt who believed in the annihilation of the soul in God (unio mystica) which is a commonplace of mystical thinking, earliest expressed in Vedantic/Upanishadic texts

2/ similar to the orthodox Sunni persecution of a Sufi mystic like al-Hallaj (who visited India and studied Vedanta); his assertion ana al-Haqq (I am the Real) got him killed, since al-Haqq was one of the 99 most beautiful names of Allah

3/ Today whilst audiobooking Johan Huizinga's Waning of the Middle Ages I heard Huizinga posit that the animosity toward such mystics stemmed *not* from the perception of overweeningly prideful equation of the self (Skt, atman) with the ineffable Ground of Being / God/ Brahman

4/ but from the implicit assumption that the soul when annihilated in God (Arabic, fana'a) was incapable of sin, or exited the state of sin; and was thereby taken outside the system of guilt, confession, charity, works, absolution, etc. which is the source of orthodox power

5/ That is: the mystic at the moment of mystical union exited the rewards-seeking piety-competition; the mystic required no assistance from any priesthood and accessed the divine *without intercession*; no need for absolution when you are one with the Absolute