Rachael Kohn: That would have appealed to someone as busy as yourself, for sure.

John Wood: Yes, at that time I was running the Totalisator at the Jockey Club in Hong Kong and I had about 4,000 staff under me.

Rachael Kohn: Goodness. Well what happened then?

John Wood: I decided to get an education, studied the HSC by correspondence and went to Monash University, my first drop back in after 20 years of school, and I got an Economics degree.

Rachael Kohn: Well now you're in Queen's College, you actually live upstairs and tutor some of the lucky students. So how did your interest in Meister Eckhart grow?

John Wood: Well I was doing a normal Bachelor of Theology degree and during a course on church history, the Professor, Katherine Massan gave us a choice of four outstanding church writers, one of them was Meister Eckhart. And I hadn't heard of him for about 40 years, so I started to study Eckhart and I came across this very interesting passage about how the Eckhart Society in London was formed, and it was formed because a particular lady called Ursula Fleming had been speaking to a Buddhist monk and asked the question 'Can an intelligent person be a Christian?'

The Buddhist monk referred her to Meister Eckhart. After reading Eckhart, initially not comprehending him at all, she became a lay Dominican, and then she set up hospices throughout London, pain relief hospices, based on Eckhart's theory of detachment.

Rachael Kohn: Well that theory of detachment, that notion is certainly similar, it certainly rings bells from a Buddhist perspective.

John Wood: You'll find that Zen Buddhists have actually adopted Eckhart almost as a Zen exponent, particularly you'll find in the writings of Thomas Merton how he expounds on the relationship between Eckhart and Zen Buddhism.

Rachael Kohn: That's interesting, so Thomas Merton was probably one of the ways people came to know about Meister Eckhart's thought?

John Wood: Precisely, Rachael. Merton is credited with popularising Eckhart throughout America for sure, and he did say several times that he was a great man and many of Merton's best sermons are based on Eckhart's teachings.

Rachael Kohn: Well what is it about Meister Eckhart's teachings or his approach to being a Christian that attracts you personally?

John Wood: As Ursula Fleming found, he seems to be able to give you clues of what may be the answers to the fundamental questions. He has an overwhelming view of creation and of God's - he has this beautiful word - ebullitio, that God was so full of love that he boiled over into creation, and that's how we came into being, that he has this fascinating concept of the godhead, the God above all Gods.

Now you can't talk about God according to Eckhart, he's ineffable, but you can talk about the Trinity. You can talk about God as the Father, God as the Son, God as the Holy Ghost, these can be discussed. So the fascination for me, and I intend to be studying, as Maryanne said, she's going to learn, I'm going to continue learning for the rest of my life the deep thought behind some of Eckhart's statements.

Rachael Kohn: Well what you've just said there about God being ineffable, and having these emanations into the created world, but not being complete in those, that there is this godhead beyond that is the source of it all, it sounds very Kabbalistic, it sounds very Jewish actually.

John Wood: Absolutely, and you have to really read Eckhart in context, balance one set of sayings against another. Any superficial reading of Eckhart will really leave you mystified.

Rachael Kohn: You're telling me don't jump to conclusions, aren't you?

John Wood: Well for example, he says 'Stop trying to look for a way to God. There's no way to God, God's already here, and you can't find a way to here.' He'll say that in one context, and then he'll talk about the actual reincarnation to such a degree that he says things like, 'The body of Christ takes you so close to God that even the angels can't tell the difference.' So the fascination for me, Rachael, is that here you have a devout Christian who can be all-inclusive, and include the mysticism of the Sufis, of Zen, Martin Luther, a tremendous advocate, and so it's all this magic of the diversity of the man, that fascinates me.

Rachael Kohn: Well is that what you wanted, this Meister Eckhart Society in Australia to explore?

John Wood: You could say that. It almost happened without my instigation.

I was in London three years ago attending the Eckhart Society annual convention. I met Richard Woods, who's going to be our keynote speaker, and they asked me then would I like to set up a branch in Australia. I said yes. If you asked me what is my purpose, it would be as an example to help people who are searching as Ursula was, to be able to hold your intellect and your belief at the same time.

John Wood: The Franciscans and the Dominicans were at loggerheads. Dominicans believed in intellect, the Franciscans believed in love. Dominicans thought knowledge was tremendous. Eckhart conveys that love of knowledge is the way.

Rachael Kohn: Now you're a mature-age student, and you've got a lot of things you want to achieve. What is your goal in the next five years, say?

John Wood: Well because of the world we live in, I want the Meister Eckhart website that I'm creating, have already created, to be a tremendous source of access to the best of his teachings, and to get contributions from all of the great Eckhart scholars and devotees, you can call them devotees into that website. It's purely to be an instrument towards bringing Eckhart both to the very - the right word would be academic levels, and also to those we term lay people nowadays. But he has something for everybody.

Rachael Kohn: Well I think in this upcoming conference, you've managed to bring some very fine experts on Eckhart to Australia.

John Wood: Yes. Richard Woods has written a very, very good book on Eckhart, and I'm only hoping that because of the graciousness of you providing this interview, some of your listeners will come along and learn more about what we have to offer.

Rachael Kohn: John, didn't the Archbishop of Canterbury also send his good wishes?

John Wood: Rowan Williams has given many sermons on the teachings of Meister Eckhart, and he is the patron of the Eckhart Society in London. He has sent a letter to our patron, Father Tom Cassidy, saying that now more than ever, the necessity of reading Meister Eckhart is apparent. Very strong words, that it's necessary to read Eckhart, coming from the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Rachael Kohn: Well you must feel great, being able to bring this about, at least through your initial efforts with the Eckhart Society conference.

John Wood: There seems to be a flow, Rachael, things seems to be happening, and that is the marvellous part of just being part of that flow, people like Maryanne, and Tom around me and now you, this is marvellous, and there's more to it than meets the eye, as you and I both well know, these things aren't just happened without some reason behind them.

Rachael Kohn: Well I wish you well, both for the society and the conference. Thank you very much, John Wood.

John Wood: Thank you, Rachael, for your courtesy, your intellect and your friendliness.