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.
In Call to Discipleship (Fortress 2003), Karl Barth discusses the concept of complete total surrender to God as the solution man's existential dilemma. Barth says that Jesus' call to follow him means faith and obedience, as well as trust, in Christ. This call in no manner suggests a free offer to all men to live as they please through grace but rather a call to suffering, self-denial, and persecution, as did Christ (Barth 27). This divine call requires a complete break with man's former nature, and the beginning of a new direction in Christ. As Barth suggests, "To follow Jesus means to go beyond oneself in a specific action and attitude, and therefore to turn one's back upon oneself, to leave oneself behind" (19). It is a command from God to identify those chosen by His grace (1), and a means through which Christ can identify Himself and purify his followers through grace. In essence, to receive God's grace, one must obey this divine call, which assumes the form of a command. It is thus impossible to neglect the call, that is, if one is to obey God. Grace is only available through obedience to Him; obedience and trust occur in a moment of time, as one automatic response; there can be no reluctance or equivocation; obedience requires immediacy (32). According to Barth, "Those who offer themselves to be disciples are obviously bound to be of the opinion that they can lay down the conditions on which they will do this. But a limited readiness is no readiness at all in our dealings with Jesus" (Barth 6-11). To believe Christ is to follow Him, and belief constitutes trust (13-14). In this way, Christ's call takes the form of a command from God, what Barth terms "the commanding grace of God," which identifies those chosen by God, those whom Christ chooses to reveal His divine nature and those who attest "to the kingdom of God as the end of the fixed idea of the necessity and beneficial value of force" (55). In other words, obeying the Spirit's call attests to the kingdom of God as the reward of human compliance. Those ordained for God's service were chosen from the beginning. There can be no lackadaisical response; it must result in total surrender of one's human nature. According to Barth, "His summons is, however, that they should give him and therefore to God a true and serious and total faith, not a mere acceptance of the fact that He is their Lord nor an idle confidence that they are by him; but this acceptance and confidence as a faith that is lived out and practiced by them; a faith that is proved to be a true and serious faith by the fact that it includes at once their obedience" (17).Barth goes on to say, "There is nothing in the accounts of the call of the disciples to suggest a kind of interval, i.e., that they first believed in him , and then decided to obey him, and actually did so" (17). In his Dynamics of Faith, Paul Tillich expresses a similar perspective in what he calls a faith of action, through which love serves as the medium between faith and works. In essence, for the believer, it is love that motivates man to love and to act out of love (Tillich 114-115).
In essence, several similarities exist in the authors' concepts of choice, despair, and rebirth. In Either/Or, Kierkegaard advocates what he terms ethical choice as the solution to man's existential dilemma (Kierkegaard 167). Action is implicit in the term, for the choice serves as an essential feature in the transformation of the personality. In contrast, denying the choice, by omission or commission, leads to the deterioration of the inner self (Kierkegaard 167-168). The concept of ethical choice, like repentance, requires the subject to alter his current selfish course of action in favor of a life of eternal service to God (220). This act of devotion, or spiritual obedience, denotes a significant phase in the subject's coming of age, religious conversion, or Jungian individuation. Before one decides to commit himself to this new approach to life, he must experience what Kierkegaard terms despair. Ironically, from the throes of despair, the subject chooses the desire to transform; and from this realization, he begins actively to participate in the external environment. Undergoing the anguish and suffering of despair, in successful cases, compels the person to choose to transcend the cares of the world (212-213). This stage of maturation corresponds with the moment of repentance, for in both cases the subject must make a conscious effort to alter his previous behavior. To Kierkegaard, those who spend their lives in pursuit of materialistic values fail to realize that they too live in a state of despair that robs them of spiritual fulfillment (197). Only when the person becomes aware of the emptiness and futility induced by this condition can he commence the rebirth process. Buber's archetypal hero also chooses to "meet life courageously in the spirit, not worrying about events or circumstances to come. He does not allow any form of determinism (56), teleology (57), or the constraints of time (12) and space ((33) to weaken his optimism. Confident, he proceeds, realizing that Providence needs him as much as he needs God. As Buber expresses it, "You know always in your heart that you need God more than everything; but do you not know too that God needs you, in the fullness of His eternity needs you? How would man be, how would you be, if God did not need him, did not need you? You need God, in order to be, and God needs you, for the very meaning of your life." Buber goes on to say, "The world is not divine sport, it is divine destiny. There is divine meaning in the life of the world, of man, of human persons, of you and of me" (82). Thus, determined despite the trials and suffering in life, Buber's hero anticipates his destiny with God, whereas the self-willed man makes use of his destiny entirely for person gain (60).Wandering and lost in a "world cluttered with purposes," materialistic man can only perceive himself as a victim of fate, finding himself "inextricably entangled in the unreal." Refusing to humble himself before God, the person "directs the best part of his spirituality to averting or at least to veiling his thoughts," for it is these memories that sink him farther into despair, into the "soil out of which arise self-destruction and rebirth." This stage, Buber suggests would be the beginning of turning (61). In both of these instances, Kierkegaard and Buber allude to spiritual disintegration leading to despair, the importance of the subject's making an ethical or spiritual choice to serve God instead of materialism, and the possibility of rebirth as the result of one's transformation or turning. This rebirth occurs not once but every time the Thou calls upon man. As the author suggests, "Man can do justice to the relation with God in which he has come to share only if he realizes God anew in the world according to his strength and to the measure of each day" (114). In this respect, both theologians suggest a theme of loss-and-redemption or death-and-rebirth.
Another corresponding theme in the works of Kierkegaard and Buber is the concept of being before God. The religious man, because of his relation with Thou, is always aware of God's presence. Every choice he makes filters through his spiritual consciousness because he realizes that God is present at all times. This divine omnipresence constitutes another unique feature of Jewish and Christian theology which serves to contribute to the cohesiveness of the I-Thou relationship. The spiritual man serves his community and world just as the moral man, but for a different reason, not for the betterment of mankind but for the service of his God. Buber expresses this motivation more aptly when he says, "He who approaches the Face has indeed surpassed duty and obligation, but not because he is now remote from the world; rather because he has truly drawn closer to it" (107-108). The spiritual man now serves his brother not out of obligation. In essence, the duty of secular man is replaced by his duty to God through love (108). In The Sickness Unto Death, Kierkegaard discusses the concept of being before God much in the same was as Buber explains the idea of relations. According to Jewish and Christian theology, God miraculously stands before all men, rich or poor, ready to listen and communicate with them at any time. This same God suffers and dies for them so that they can be saved! This is the true miracle, the greatest miracle of all! Kierkegaard aptly expresses this concept when he says, "And now Christianity! Christianity teaches that this single human being, and so every single human being, whether husband, wife, servant girl, cabinet minister, merchant, barber, student, etc., this single human being is before God, this single human being, who might be proud to have spoken once in his life with the king, this human being who hasn't the least illusion of being on an intimate footing with this or that person, this human being is before God, can talk with God any time he wants, certain of being heard; in short this human being has an invitation to live on the most intimate footing with God! Furthermore, for this person's sake, for the sake of this very person, too, God comes to the world, lets himself be born, suffers, dies; and this suffering God , he well-nigh begs and implores this human being to accept the help offered to him! Truly. If there is anything one should lose one's mind over, this is it!" (Kierkegaard 117-118). Here, as with Buber, the miracle of a loving, sacrificial God talking with each of us transcends human understanding.
Writing in Kerygma and Myth (Harper & Row 1961), theologian Rudolf Bultmann also addresses the role of choice in determining man's spiritual fulfillment. For Bultmann, it is the Will that maintains the individual's relationship with the divine, even more so than the heart. With the heart man decides to alter the course of his personal life, but with the Will he detaches himself from the physical allurements of the world, daily takes up his cross, and submits to that inner voice of the Spirit. According to Bultmann, "The Spirit does not work like a supernatural force, nor is it the permanent possession of the believer. It is the possibility of a new life which must be appropriated by a deliberate resolve (Bultmann 22). For Bultmann, the grace that is available at the moment of man's decision can only be potentially realized through the subject's daily walk that subsequently grows as a result of the choice. It is from the suffering and persecution associated with his continual submission to God that He enables man to grow in grace and become a new creature. In essence, the continual conscious surrender of self must be a disciplined effort of the Will, a determined resolve to live and walk in the Spirit. Seventeenth-century mathematician-theologian Blaise Pascal expresses a similar sentiment when he writes in Thoughts: "God prefers rather to incline the will than the intellect. Perfect clearness would be of use to the intellect, and would harm the will. To humble pride" (Pascal 581). Just as Tolstoy envisions man as a vessel of God's love perpetuated like drops of rain passing through the water cycle, so does Bultmann perceive man as a vessel of God's availability. Although man may not serve God's purpose at all times, he must be continually available for divine use, in the same miraculous way that God is always available to man. This idea of reciprocal availability enhances one's admiration for a creator who cares to establish a relationship both in and though Him (Bultmann 19-33). In an even broader respect, Bultmann emphasizes that the "decision of faith is never final; it needs constant renewal in every fresh situation. Our freedom does not excuse us from the demand under which we all stand as men, for it is freedom for obedience (Rom. 6.11ff). To believe means not to have apprehended but to have been apprehended. It means always to be traveling along the road between the already and the not yet, always to be pursuing a goal" (21). What a miracle it is that faith and growth form a continual process, never to be physically achieved; otherwise, the option of repentance and forgiveness would not be available. It is God who realizes man's frailty and provides a dispensation for it as well!
Kierkegaard and Buber also explore the conflict between faith and reason. In discussing the paradox of opposing ideas united under a single religious philosophy, Buber admits his inability to reconcile necessity and freedom; however, he also acknowledges limitations to human understanding, and that some apparent contradictions can only be justified through the eyes of God. Hence, man must accept their validity as one of the mysteries of divine creation. In other words, one must accept the inscrutable if it means preserving one's relation with the Almighty. Buber says "But if I consider necessity and freedom not in the world of thought, but in the reality of my standing before God, if I know that I am given over for disposal and know at the same time that it depends upon myself, then I cannot try to escape the paradox that has to believed by assigning the irreconcilable propositions to two separate realms of validity; nor can I be helped to an ideal reconciliation by any theological device; but I am compelled to take both to myself, to be lived together, and in being lived they are one" (96). Kierkegaard discusses this particular form of faith in Fear and Trembling and when he alludes to God's command for Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. Abraham, confronted with a mystery that confounds him, must choose between his love for Jehovah and his son Isaac. Kierkegaard suggests that the patriarch's decision to sacrifice his son would, in the eyes of rational man, constitute murder, if not insanity. Kierkegaard expresses this paradox in the following passage: "The ethical expression for what Abraham did is that he was willing to murder Isaac; the religious expression is that he was willing to sacrifice Isaac; but in this contradiction lies the very anguish that can indeed make one sleepless; yet without that anguish Abraham is not the one he is" (60). In essence, Abraham acknowledges the supremacy of divine wisdom and acts in accordance with it by defying human understanding. This is the type of faith which Buber and Kierkegaard emulate, although both concede that this form of spiritual affirmation most frequently is accompanied by intense anguish and grief. Buber acknowledges that man's relation with God in no way alleviates the suffering he is called upon to endure. Having a relation with God requires courage and strength; furthermore, it is not painless. Buber admits, "The Thou confronts me. But I step into direct relation with it. Hence the relation means being chosen and choosing, suffering and action in one; just as any of the whole being which means the suspension of all partial actions, and consequently of all sensations of actions grounded only in their particular limitation, is bound to resemble suffering" (76-77).
Buber also explores the concept of fate and free will. He largely attributes the overwhelming acceptance of fate to the different theories of determination current at the time. It is these dialectics that "have worked together to establish a more tenacious and oppressive belief in fate than has ever before existed" (56). The author uses the archetypal image of paradise to reflect the misplaced values of the material world. This inverted heaven is not a healthy place filled with living streams of water from the Almighty, but rather a sickened environment separated from God, stagnant, and overpowering, like a giant ghost of the fens (54). In this setting, man serves also as a lost archetypal Adam sadly compelled to succumb to what he perceives as an oppressive stifling fate. Buber suggests that this stoic acceptance of one's fate poses the most tragic aspect of human life because man begins to believe in its inerrant immutability. The author emphasizes that fate only exists in the minds of those who believe in it. Nevertheless, such a belief suppresses the movement of turning and eliminates the possibility of an I-Thou relation (57). Like Kierkegaard, Buber strongly suggests that man make the choice to live in close communion with God. The I-Thou man "believes in destiny, and believes that it can stand in need of him." To grow in the spirit he must sacrifice his puny, unfree will, that is controlled by things and instincts, to his grand will, which quits defined for destined being" (59). The opportunity for I-Thou remains open for all who put aside the delusions of the world and rise from the anguish of despair. For those who realize their need for a spiritual relation, and courageously act to establish it, the Providence of God shall abide with them.
Buber also discusses the inscrutable nature of God. The Almighty meets the individual in a manner that draws the person closer to Him. The experiences change the inner man in indescribable ways. In Buber's words, "The man who emerges from the act of pure relation that so involves his being has now in his being something more that has grown in him, of which he did not know before and whose origin he is not rightly able to indicate" (109). The change affects his inner nature, attitudes, and responses in ways which prove mentally inexplicable. They may foster actions which appear contrary to the subject's known patterns of behavior or self-concept, itself. They may even cause him to doubt the consistency of his character because he might be called upon to alter his values or disposition in a fashion unspeakable or unthinkable to himself. This is the inscrutable nature of God that can recreate spiritual man for His purpose. As a person calls upon God and ultimately rests in His Presence, he realizes that he must follow God's direction. There is no alternative because God's Spirit permeates his to the extent that he no longer values his own desires. Only God's desire remains because it fills him with incomprehensible joy, peace, and love. This again is an inscrutable mystery of God, that He can transform us into beings of intense happiness and fulfillment. As Buber explains, "We cannot approach others with what we have received, and say 'You must know this; you must do this.' We can only go and confirm its truth. And this, too, is no ought, but we can, we must (Buber 111). Another feature of God's Providence involves the manner in which He answers men's prayers. Man receives from God in such a way that he does "not know it has been given." Months and years may pass, and all at once one realizes that his request has been answered. Just as man cannot predict the day nor the hour when the Son of Man shall come in His glory, neither can we foretell the time or the manner in which God will respond. Buber here quotes Nietzsche regarding this mystery: "We take and do not ask who it is there that gives" (110). Another mystery lies in the inexplicable attributes of God. Buber describes how materialistic man strives to create God in his own image by making demands upon Him in the same manner that he uses and experiences the external world for his own benefit (112-113)."I do not believe in the self-naming of God, a self-definition of God before men," says Buber. "The Word of revelation is I am that I am. That which reveals is that which reveals. That which is is, and nothing more. The eternal source of strength streams, the eternal contact persists, the eternal voices sound forth, and nothing more" (Buber 112). Man has on numerous occasions used religion to justify his vested interest. Secular man makes demands of God which he hopes to use for his own benefit. This practice insults the power and glory of God (Buber 113). Like Buber, philosopher David Hume expresses a similar sentiment in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. During the eighteenth century, Hume voices a religious view contrary to the Deism of his day when he suggested the inability of man to ascribe characteristics to God, unlike his contemporaries who used the Deistic tenets of reason and order to justify their progress and superiority in the world. Hume says, "The whole is a riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery, suspense of judgment appears the only result of our most accurate scrutiny concerning the subject. But such is the frailty of human reason, and such the irresistible contagion of opinion that even this deliberate doubt could scarcely be upheld" (Hume 74). Hume concludes that God is unknowable to man in that 1) man's sentiments differ from God's (530); 2) man's ides are derived from the senses, and thus, differ from the Deity's (530); 3) none of man's materials of thought or understanding parallel the Supreme Being's (531) ; 4) man's manner of thought differs from the Divine since human thoughts are fleeting and God's are constant; and 5) man can never know the Deity because human morality is not a just criterion for one's judgment of God (568). In essence, preoccupation with the characteristics of God should never overshadow the divine purpose of man's service to Him. God meets with man so that He may summon and send him. This is the primary purpose of revelation; learning about God merely redirects man's focus toward himself (Buber 114).
In essence, Martin Buber's I AND THOU affirms the author's faith that man can re-establish a spiritual relationship with God. To achieve this goal, the person must choose to serve God instead of the material values of the world. As Buber suggests, "Life cannot be divided between a real relation with God and an unreal relation of I and It with the world. You cannot both truly pray to God and profit by the world" (107). The key to the relation is free-will or choice. The next phase begins with a close association with the Creator that Buber calls the I-Thou relation. From this point, one commences a life of active faith through which God enables him to perceive the Divine in relations with the eternal Thou, man and nature. As God's Spirit works through these relations, man re-connects with his cosmic origin, and from here spiritual fulfillment begins, Buber expresses his optimism concerning this process in the closing passage: "Meeting with God does not come to man in order that he may concern himself with God, but in order that he may confirm that there is meaning in the world" (Buber 115).
Works Cited for I AND THOU
Barth, Karl. The Call to Discipleship. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1958.
Buber, Martin. I AND THOU. Trans. Ronald Gregor Smith. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1958. 2nd edition (with a Postscript by the Author added).
Bultmann, Rudolf. Kerygma and Myth. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961.
Hume, David. Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. Norman Kemp Smith, Editor. 2nd edition. New York: Social Sciences Publishers, 1948.
Jung, Carl. Modern Man in Search of a Soul as quoted in God and the Unconscious. Victor White. Introduction by William Everson. Dallas:Spring Publications, Inc., 1982.
Kierkegaard, Soren. Either/Or. Volume II. Walter Lowrie, Trans. With Revisions and Foreword by Howard A. Johnson. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1974.
Kierkegaard, Soren. Fear and Trembling. Translated, with Introduction by Alastair Hannay. New York: Penguin Books, 1985.
Kierkegaard, Soren. The Sickness Unto Death. Translated,with Introduction and Notes by Alastair Hannay. New York: Penguin Books, 1989.
Pascal, Blaise. Thoughts. New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1910.
Tillich, Paul. Dynamics of Faith. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1958.