The Inner Word and Outer Word: Eckhart, Jüngel, and Lonergan on Trinitarian Knowing and Naming of God

Mark Miller

The Inner Word and Outer Word

Eckhart, Jüngel, and Lonergan on Trinitarian Knowing and Naming of God

Authors

Mark Miller University of San Francisco

Keywords:

Pneumatology, Christology, Epistemology, Eckhart, Jüngel, Lonergan

Abstract

Can we know God? If so, how? This essay considers Bernard Lonergan’s thoughts on God’s inner and outer Words (the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ) and how they are received in human consciousness. It applies these two ways of knowing God to two theologians who each emphasized one of these Words: Meister Eckhart, a medieval, Neoplatonic monk, who focused on union with the inner Word, and Eberhard Jüngel, a recently-deceased Protestant theologian, who focused on the outer Word. It offers the view that by keeping in mind God’s revelation through both divine Words, Christians and the Church in general might come to a more comprehensive knowledge of God that will help us face future challenges.

Author Biography

Mark Miller, University of San Francisco

Since 2008, Mark T. Miller has taught systematic theology and Philippine Studies at the University of San Francisco. He is an associate professor and past chair of the Theology and Religious Studies Department. He has also taught at the Ateneo de Zamboanga, the University of Asia and the Pacific, Boston College, Georgetown University, Santa Clara, and Seton Hall (as the inaugural Toth/Lonergan Endowed Visiting Chair). He is the author of The Quest for God and the Good Life: Lonergan’s Theological Anthropology and he is working on a book on conversion that will put Lonergan in dialogue with Malcolm X, Sartre, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and others. He is half Filipino and enjoys visiting the Philippines as much as he can.

The Inner Word and Outer Word: Eckhart, Jüngel, and Lonergan on Trinitarian Knowing and Naming of God