“Platonic Pragmatism”

In his dialog with Slavoj Zizek (published as The Monstrosity of Christ: Paradox or Dialectic? (Short Circuits) ), Milbank cites Meister Eckhart’s suggestion that there is an analogy between the Father/Son relation and the relation of justice to a just man: “if the Father and the Son, justice and the just man, are one and the same in nature, it follows . . . that the just man is equal to, not less than, justice, and similarly with the Son in relation to the Father.”  According to Eckhart, without a just man “there would be no justice at all, since justice must be done.  All justice must be expressed justice, performed justice, since justice as a mere idea would not be existing justice at all.”

In short, “a Platonism concerning justice is not denied, as with Hegel, but rather redoubled within the Trinitarian notion by a kind of ‘Platonic pragmatism.’”