Quest of the Spirit: From Suffering to Acceptance

6.3 Man's Duality:Tillich,Buber,Barth, Bultmann,Hume, Kirkegaard!

                                                      Martin Buber: An Appeal for Mutual Relations

          "God's speech to men penetrates what happens in the life of each one of us, and all that happens in the world around us, biographical and historical, and makes it for you and me into instruction, message, and demand. Happening upon happening, situation upon situation are enabled and empowered by the personal speech of God to demand of the human person that he take his stand and make his decision"—Martin Buber

             "No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon" (Matthew 6:24). This passage from Christ's Sermon on the Mount echoes theologian Martin Buber's sentiment concerning the tragedy of twentieth century man. In essence, Buber laments man's abandonment of his relationship with God for the material values of the world. In the opening pages of Buber's I AND THOU, the author describes what he terms the "twofold nature of man and differentiates between the spiritual and the secular man by referring to them as I-Thou and I-It, respectively. The key to spiritual growth lies in what he calls relations, as I-Thou and I-It imply. Relations, according to the author, exist in three spheres: nature, man, and spirit. The relation is vital, Buber notes, because relationships necessitate a choice, be it God, or the world. Relations also require a mutual affirmation, which is equally essential (8). To sustain a relationship, a choice is imperative. James the Just emphasizes hat "friendship of the world is enmity with God," and "whosoever would be a friend of the world is the enemy of God" (James 4:4). Buber suggests that spiritual man must perceive a sacred purpose on each level, even in nature, which the author describes as existing on the "threshold of speech." Thus, the primary focus rests in his perception of the external world solely as a part of God's overall plan, not as a structure consisting of roots, trunk, branches, and leaves. The moment the subject ceases to maintain this spiritual identification is the moment that I-Thou shifts into an I-It relation because man now concentrates upon the physical details rather than the divine intent. According to Buber, "As soon as the relation has been worked out or has been permeated with a means, the Thou becomes an object among objects, perhaps the chief, but still one of them, fixed in its size and its limits" (17). This irrelevant content now enters the corpus of worldly knowledge, and forms a part of one's objective past, far removed from the spiritual message it was intended to inspire. As result, the subject ceases to hear the quiet encouragement of the Eternal, and consequently fails to fulfill his spiritual obligation to both his neighbor and his Creator. This tragic estrangement between God and His creation induces a sense of loss and alienation characteristic in modern man. The subject must strive to maintain an I-Thou relation, whatever the cost; otherwise, the human temptation for self-aggrandizement becomes so overwhelming that his ego falls prey to the illusions of the I-It relationship. Like Christ's Parable of the Sower, the newborn spirit in man is overcome by the cares and delusions of the world. The sphere of man is more significant because here communication occurs. As long as the person envisions his fellow man as a spiritual entity whose purpose, like his own, lies solely in his service to God, the individual can establish a relation on the I-Thou level; however, once the subject is distracted by the details of personality, habits, or appearance, here too the possibility of spiritual dialogue ceases. The author uses the metaphor of the clock to illustrate man's unfortunate condition: "I am the clock, which exists, and does not know itself" (68). The Book of James uses a similar comparison to describe the man who "beheld his face in a glass" but immediately forgot "what manner of man he was" (James 1:23).

            The third sphere consists of man's relation with Thou, or the Spirit of God. Buber compares the unity of the I-Thou relation to the beauty of a melody which consists of a combination of notes, verses, and lines but together creates a wondrous harmony (8). Buber describes this miraculous relation as "the cradle of Real Life" (9). When God communicates with man in this fashion, although His voice is unheard and unperceived, man nonetheless fells the call and responds by "forming, thinking, and acting" (6). Even when the spiritual man speaks to the worldly man through the Thou, the divine message can penetrate through the experiences of the unbeliever and establish a relation. This transcendence of God over all aspects of the material world forms one of the most unique features of Christianity in that a perfect God can communicate and transform an imperfect man. In no other religion does God care for his subjects or sacrifice His Son to atone for their sins. The author repeatedly uses the metaphor of the chrysalis and the butterfly to show how God can transform the undeveloped soul of man into a magnificent eternal creation (17). According to Buber, man can only achieve spiritual fulfillment by obeying the call of the eternal Thou. It is God's grace that enables man to communicate with his Creator (11), and God's love that enables him to experience the relation with others and see beyond details into divine purpose (15). Buber writes that "God enters into a direct relation with us . . . in creative, revealing, and redeeming acts, and thus makes it possible for us to enter into direct relation with Him. This ground and meaning of our existence constitutes a mutuality, arising again and again" (135). In another passage, the author says, "In every sphere in its own way, through each process of becoming that is present to us we look out toward the fringe of the eternal Thou; in each we are aware of as breath from the eternal Thou; in each Thou we address the eternal Thou" (6). Thus, it is man's innate propensity to seek God first. This inherent proclivity to be with God manifests itself in subjects who recognize this estrangement as the source of their problems and live their lives searching for a form of fulfillment they do not understand. Psycho-analysts often observe this behavior. Buber refers to this connection as the Inborn Thou (27), and describes its treatment thus: "This [solving one's spiritual estrangement] can only be done by one who grasps the buried latent unity of the suffering soul" and works closely with the patient (133). Underlying this premise is the presupposition that all men possess a buried latent unity of the soul which longs for God. Psychiatrist Carl Jung echoes this sentiment in Modern Man in Search for a Soul: "Among all my patients in the second half of life, that is to say, over thirty-five, there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life. It is safe to say that every one of them feels ill because he had lost that in which the living religions of every age have given to their followers, and none of them have been really healed who did not regain this religious outlook."Buber even relates a Jewish story that suggests an unborn child's affinity to God (25). It is also the newborn that reaches out for the tenderness of a relation with its mother, just as each man reaches out for God before being disillusioned by the temptations of a material world (28). It is Christ who compares the innocence of a child to the kingdom of God (Luke 18:16). In essence, entering relationships enables man to "gradually . . . develop out of this primal world" (28). The relation is crucial, and man stands at the focal point. Buber emphasizes that man exists between the I and the Thou of the I-Thou relation. Man must essentially die to this world to be reborn spiritually. Only from the despair of separation from God can he re-establish a rapport with his Creator that was lost at birth. In this respect, he must be reborn, or return to a state of harmony with God, from which he begins anew, ever growing and becoming." This phase constitutes the final stage of man's quest for spiritual fulfillment. At this point, the subject has been initiated into the world of It, overcome the trials and despair of spiritual separation, and returned to a state of peace with God, as in the beginning. The cycle is similar with loss-and-redemption or death-and-rebirth. In both of these cases, the initiate loses his spiritual innocence or dies symbolically from spiritual estrangement. He then must reach an inner awareness or realization of his need to change, or be reunited with his Creator. Intense suffering and anguish often characterize this phase. It is at this juncture that the individual calls upon God to re-establish his lost relation and commence the transformation process. From here on, the rebirth process begins. In religious terms, the subject repents and undergoes a conversion experience. As Buber suggests, the transformed spiritual man now serves his community and world because he realizes that his life and the lives of others play a part in God's providence. He cannot withdraw from (92) or dispense with (48) the material world because God's spirit works with him and through him to transform it (100). He feels that just as he needs God, so does God need him. It is only logical that God would need those whom He loves, just as man longs for rapport with those he loves. Moral man, on the other hand, serves others through a sense of duty and obligation. The materialistic person envisions his world as a place to experience and use for his personal benefit (108). This approach, he suggests, ultimately leads to emptiness and despair. Like Kierkegaard, Buber emphasizes that man must make the choice to serve God, not the material demons of society. Man must choose to live in the spirit of Thou, and unthinkingly obey the divine call for action. If he hesitates, he relinquished his role as God's agent, and immediately relegates himself to the world of I-It. There, because of his desire for personal gratification, he suffers tragic separation from his God, the futility of a lost soul, and its associated guilt, remorse, and repression (38-40). Buber says that the world of It, when "not brought into contact with and melted down by the Thou, as it comes into being takes on the alien form of an incubus," a demon, or nightmare (61). Tragically, this sinister force persuades man to succumb to the temptation. Ironically, it is man's adept ability to experience and use this environment for his own benefit that contributes to the "decrease of man's power to enter into relation" (39). In this respect, the growth of either relation is inversely proportionate. In other words, as materialism becomes more popular, spiritual relations dwindle. Buber uses the image of a world spinning out of control to emphasize the extent of this tragic paradox: "The tiny earth plunges from the whirling stars, tiny man from the teeming earth, and now history bears him further from the ages, to rebuild persistently the anthill of the cultures which history crushes underfoot" (71). For Buber, history forms a part of that vast body of knowledge which directs man toward his past rather than guiding him into a future of active service for God. The Almighty speaks to man in the present, and consequently, relations only exist in the present. Thus, man can only serve God during the present. Unfortunately, if man ignores the eternal voice, the message becomes lost as an inconsequential event of the past and shifts into the accumulated knowledge in the world of It (12-13). Frequently, when man fails to pursue relations with others through God, the power of the I-It supplants his previous desire and leads him into the deception of fulfillment. He may even delude himself into believing that his own religious experience, though void of what Buber terms the inborn Thou can resolve his problem. In the following passage, the author uses the image of a man lost in a maze to illustrate his hopeless condition: "The man may seek to explain it as a relation, perhaps, as a religious relation, in order to wrench himself from the horror of the inner double-ganger; but he is bound to discover again and again the deception in the explanation. Here is the verge of life, flight of an unfulfilled life to the senseless semblance of fulfillment, and its groping in a maze and losing itself ever more profoundly" (70). This utter hopelessness closely parallels a spiritual condition that Kierkegaard calls despair.