In Two Types of Faith, Martin Buber suggests that the disparity between the doctrines of Judaism and Christianity is creating a chasm between the two religions. To ensure the survival of both faiths, as well as their followers, a greater understanding of the interrelation of the beliefs is imperative. Buber's solution calls for a heightened degree of tolerance and flexibility for both faiths. In essence, one must recognize their respective similarities and differences in order to develop an approach which works toward a mutual understanding of the two beliefs, their points of origin, conjuncture, and departure. The author emphasizes that the traditional idea of the believer in a holy nation was essential for the perpetuation of God's will, but today, neither unity nor prophets exist. Buber says, "The conception of the holy nation in its strict sense has faded altogether; it does not enter into the consciousness of Christendom, and soon that of the Church takes its place" (173). In other words, a similar comparison can be made of Ezekiel's prophecy to a wayward people, only worse because no prophets now exist. America and other Christian nations face a similar dilemma. Buber quotes Kierkegaard who expresses a similar sentiment: "The blessing of Christian salvation, the true consistency of the redeemed soul, is imperiled. A hundred years ago Kierkegaard recognized this severely and clearly, but without estimating adequately the causes or showing the seat of the malady. It is a question of the disparity between the sanctification of the individual and the accepted unholiness of this community as such, and the disparity is necessarily transferred to the inner dialectic of the human soul" (173). Thus, the spiritual conflict between the subject and society poses the most serious dilemma. The greatest difference in the two faiths lies in their respective concepts of redemption. Here, Buber challenges the reader to transcend his traditional religious perspective. The author emphasizes that the Jewish mind has difficulty imagining the concept of a Savior-God redeeming individuals because Hebrew tradition calls for the redeeming of Israel as a nation; and Christians have similar difficulty accepting the idea of a nation rather than individuals being redeemed. This challenge to the Christian world constitutes Buber's hope for the beginning of a dialogue between the two faiths.
Buber initially examines several fundamental Christian precepts from the Jewish perspective to make the western reader aware of the difference in seemingly similar theological concepts. Implicit in his presentation is his compelling desire to explain the religious plight of his people. He first describes the Hebrew concept of faith which consists in the total surrender of the personality to God, a relinquishing of all personal interests to those of the Father. This condition of commitment is one which all Jewish people are taught from birth; there was not an option or moment of decision, as in Christianity. In this respect, it is God who has selected them, not vice-versa; and it is the role of the Jewish believer to maintain his fidelity to this covenant. Once man is "taken into the realm of God, he does not possess the power of God; rather, the power of God possesses him, if and when he has given himself to it, and is given to it" (21). It is at this point that man must make the choice to be faithful to God, and begin to establish a mutual relation with his Creator. Fidelity and trust must also accompany this act of humility or submission because "only in the full actuality of such a relationship can one be both loyal and trusting" (29). The author describes the concept of surrender in the following manner: "The hour that has been predetermined for aeons has arrived, the kingly rule of God which existed from the beginning, but which was hidden until now, draws near to the world, in order to realize itself when apprehended by it: that ye may be able to apprehend it, turn, ye who hear, from your erring ways to the way of God, come into fellowship with Him, with whom all things are possible, and surrender to His power" (25). The idea of giving of oneself completely corresponds to the teaching of Isaiah and Jesus in that they both "demand the realization of their faith in the totality of life, and especially when the promise arises from amidst catastrophe, and so points to the drawing near of God's kingdom." Buber strongly emphasizes that this type of faith provides hope and perseverance in times of loss, and most definitely is not a faith which man takes for granted as an innate predisposition or matter of course (29). The Hebrew term for this surrender or turning of the whole person is Teshuvah. Buber says that "the man who achieves turning into the way of God penetrates in the dynamis, but he would remain an intruder, charged with power but unfit for the world of God, unless he completes the surrender." Another Hebrew word closely associated with Teshuvah is Emunah or trust, a verb implying an action that results from the changing of one's mind to follow the Creator, the first phase that established an original relationship to the Godhead (26). This choice denotes the initial stage of the subject's spiritual transformation. The difference in the Jewish and Christian interpretation of this term rests in the character of the subject making the decision. In the Old Testament, the prophet makes this appeal to God for the salvation of his nation; whereas, in the New Testament, the individual makes the choice for himself. As Buber suggests, "The call to turn back to God or up to God is the primary word of the prophets of Israel; from it proceed, even when not expressed, promise and curse. The full meaning of this summons is only made known to him who realizes how the demanded turning back of the people corresponds to a turning away from God from the sphere of His anger or of His returning to Israel. Turning and returning are sometimes emphasized together (27). In this sense, the nation's collective spiritual quest undergoes the similar archetypal stages of separation, transformation, and return. This phenomenon of turning and returning parallels the cycle of loss-and-redemption on a national scale. It is a reciprocal relation in which man and God interact (28-29). Buber says, "The true permanence of the foundations of a person's being derive from true permanence in the fundamental relationship of this person to the Power in which his being originates" (28). As men turn to God, God turns to them, and vice –versa. This act of turning or transformation requires all of the strength of the Will because the spirit is warring against the flesh. In Reich Gottes und Menschensohn, R. Otto suggests that "only by summoning all one's power, and with the strenuous determination, does one penetrate it" (Otto, quoted in Buber 95). Albert Schweitzer even suggests that the subject experiences an internal "pressure which compels the work of God to become apparent" (Schweitzer quoted in Buber 94). This stage of unconditional surrender Buber calls the perihelium of grace. It is at this point that the person chooses "to hold on to nothing, to allow nothing else to prevent him from meeting it, but to become free for storming the rule of God as he does who goes before and whom one ought to follow." Here, the author uses the apostles as examples, when they leave everything behind to obey their Master's command, "Follow me" (95). The Hebrew word for individual faith, in this case, is Pistis, a concept that does not figure into Jewish thinking but finds meaning in Christian theology (170-171). Buber explains that Teshuvah (turning) and Emunah (trust) work with individual awareness of truth, or Pistis, to from a relationship with God. Thus, trust in God plus individual recognition, or belief, "demand and condition one another" (26).
The idea of total surrender is closely related to the Hebrew concept of serving God solely because of one's love for Him, known as Lishmah. According to Buber, Lishmah means "for the sake of the thing itself." By this word there is expressed first of all the fact that man "should learn the Torah for its own sake and not because of what it yields; he is to fulfill the commandment for its own sake and not for its advantageous consequences; constantly the note is clearly sounded; for the sake of the teaching, for the sake of what is commanded: and thus it is as mentioned comprehensively expressed: 'All thy works should be for the sake of God.' The only thing which matters is that everything should be done truly for God's sake, from love of Him and in love to Him" (92-93). This principle equally applies to Christianity. Love should be the motivation for every believer, not the goal of eternal life or an existence free from pain, sorrow, or the fires of hell. The ultimate benefits of serving God are its indirect rewards. In the same respect, God's love for man should constitute the only motivation for the nonbeliever to adopt a life of faith. As Buber suggests, man cannot love God unless he first realizes that God loves him. This statement is profound because it is man's realization of God's love for him that compels him to love his Creator. For the Jew, proof of God's love manifests itself in God's promise and protection throughout the generations, and for the Christian, it is God's ultimate sacrifice of His Son for man's sins. This interrelationship in both cases begins with love from the Father which enables man to love Him, and others. Paul writes in Romans 5:5, "Hope does not make one ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us." Here is one of the mysteries of God, that we cannot love Him unless His love is first in us. The same principle applies to faith. Buber also suggests that serving God for the wrong reason can ironically induce the subject to turn to God. Only God, here again, can use man's imperfections for His purpose. The paradox of good proceeding from evil, though inexplicable, fortunately explains the working of God's Spirit in the human heart. In Buber's words, "The dynamic character of the Lishmah doctrine is . . . not concerned with two types of men who are opposed to each other, but with two human attitudes to the divine manifestation, which are to be sure fundamentally different and yet so related to each other that a way can lead from the negative attitude to the positive' (94). This miracle of God's transforming power expresses Buber's hope for both Jew and Christian. Buber cites the Babylonian Berachot in saying, "If he seriously does what he can, he will advance from the not for its sake to the for its sake" (94). Only God can do this! Ironically, the same effect is true for symbols and archetypes. Although philosophers and theologians alike are reluctant to admit that God could have used the influences from the ruling kingdoms that conquered the Jewish nation, Buber acknowledges that the Greek concept of a binitarian God-image in human form is totally foreign to the Jewish mentality. As Buber notes, "If we may presuppose such a change of view, then the biographical fact is given, around which after the death of Jesus and the visions of the disciples, the crystallizing of the mythical element lying ready in the hearts of those influenced by Hellenism took place, until the new binitarian God-image was present. Not merely new symbols but actually new images of God grow up from human biography, and precisely from its most unpremeditated moments" (109). Although Buber uses this observation to show how pagan elements have corrupted the true faith, one could also argue that Greek influence thus made it possible for the spread Christianity. In this way, just as Buber suggests earlier that God can change negative into positive results, so could one argue that God uses the philosophies of other nations when His time to use them has come. As the Apostle Paul says in his Epistle to the Galatians, "But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons" (Galatians 4:4-5). Furthermore, in his History of Western Philosophy, Bertrand Russell suggests that the popularity of Platonism enabled man, for the first time, to envision an ideal world. In essence, the rise of Persian and Greek thought made it possible for people to conceptualize a sphere of perfection, and thus understand the teachings of Jesus concerning ideal behavior, a perfect world, and a perfect God. Just as the modern world is a composite of the influences of previous civilizations, so can Christianity be the product of earlier philosophies, depending upon God's will and the fullness of time. Just as John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus, so could God use the thoughts, symbols, and images of earlier cultures to pave the way for the birth of Christianity. Similarly, Jesus' life as Suffering Servant corresponds with the earlier Jewish tradition of the Deutero-Isaiah concept which Buber describes as a "powerful motif . . . of the way from the hidden office of suffering to the public office of fulfillment" (107). In this respect, Jesus undergoes a spiritual quest through the stages of separation from God, transformation as he becomes aware of His divine destiny, and return to the Father, following the culmination of His mission through His death, burial, and resurrection. Jewish tradition also refers to the life of Jesus the prophet's coming of age. For instance, Schweitzer and Buber speculate over the particular time in which Jesus first realized His divine purpose. Buber points out that the hidden nature of this revelation also falls under a traditional Jewish Masoretic Text which compares the prophet to "the unused arrow in God's quiver." According to Buber, "In the concealment, when he lay hid like an unused arrow in God's quiver, he did not even understand himself in his sufferings, until it was made know to him what the office was which God kept for him; but even now he does not yet know when, at which stage of his way the fulfillment will come" (106). In this case, the parallel with Jesus' life is obvious. Also, the idea of a prophet's suffering for the sins of others is a common theme in early Jewish literature. Buber explains that the Hebrew people long awaited an appointed servant of God who would fulfill his divine commission "to realize justice in Israel." To many, this role suggested a military leader in an earthly kingdom. Another portion of the promise concerns the Chosen One's suffering for the sins of his people. Describing what he calls the Messianic Commission, Buber explains, "The first function, which is preparatory, is a suffering: the servant of the period of suffering takes upon himself in his own present condition of prophetic concealment the burden of the sins of the many from the nations of the world, he who is guiltless exculpates them and thereby makes possible the speedy break-through of salvation" (Buber 110-111). This role again parallels Jesus' vicarious suffering for mankind. The Scapegoat theme also is a tradition well known to the Hebrew people. As Sir James Frazer writes in The Golden Bough, "On the Day of Atonement, which was the tenth day of the seventh month, the Jewish high-priest laid both hands on the head of a live goat, confessed over it all the iniquities of the Children of Israel, and having thereby transferred the sins of the people to the beast, sent it away into the wilderness" (Frazer 659). In essence, the sacrificial scapegoat is a common archetypal motif in which "the hero, with whom the welfare of the tribe or nation is identified, must die in order to atone for the people's sins and restore the land to fruitfulness" (Guerin 121). Herein is another miracle of God: that within the mind of every person is a propensity to understand the concept of atonement or propitiation. The final phase of the Messianic Commission is the stage of spiritual fulfillment through the reappearance of the savior whom all will recognize and acknowledge (113).
Buber also warns his reader of a hollow intellectual faith which lacks personal commitment. In this case, the author suggests that although a Christian makes a choice that the Jew does not, the choice alone is not enough for a true relationship. One must surrender himself totally, his whole personality, to God (40). "By the action of inflated self-assurance, which has nothing in common with genuine trust and is nothing other than self-deception, genuine trust in the faithful God has become completely lost," he suggests (49). In essence, man's loyalty to his Creator constitutes his faith or trust, or Emunah, in God (28-29). Emunah manifests itself most during periods of persecution by providing hope for the suffering Israelites, an assurance promised to them as God's chosen people. Buber suggests that the faith of the Hebrew people derives from tradition and commitment through suffering and oppression their entire lives; that makes the difference. He illustrates this through the history of his people (40). Referring to Christianity, the author says, in contrast, "The pathos of faith is missing here, as it is missing in the relationship of a child to its father, whom it knows from the very beginning as its father. In this case, too, a trusting-in which has faltered must sometimes be renewed." As Buber says, Hebrew faith is founded from this unique relationship between the Jewish nation and God, a bond that Jehovah had promised would endure throughout eternity, and in this sense, requires both commitment and action. In other words, faith without works is dead. In essence, the author differs in his interpretation of Pauline doctrine, or justification through faith. Citing Abraham as an example, Buber holds that the difference in believing God and believing in God is the difference in a life of faith and a life of mere intellectual assent. Faith demands a life of action and commitment, not merely a change in one's attitude. Abraham did more than this when he unconditionally followed God's command to sacrifice his son (47). For Buber, faith comes from an inner relationship with God which expresses itself through love and obedience to Jehovah. According to the author, "With God there is no difference between love and the action of love. And to love Him with the complete feeling of love can be commanded, for it means nothing more than to actualize the existing relationship of faith to Him, as in trust so in love, for both are one" (71-72). He then expresses how one's love for God leads to man's desire to serve Him: "But if a person really loves Him, he is led on by his own feeling to love the one whom he loves; naturally not the sojourner only; it merely becomes quite clear in his case what is meant, but every man whom God loves, according as a person becomes aware that He does love him. Man's love toward his fellow man is thus awakened by the love of God" (72). The beauty of this relationship surpasses the physical life itself. The author describes the purity of this spiritual relation in the following passage: "This caring of God manifests itself most sensibly in two acts, one in the past, yet which directly influences the present condition of the man who trusts: the revelation to Israel, through which he learns how he can fulfill God's will; and one of the future, which however acts similarly, the resurrecting of the dead, the promise of which warrants to the man who trusts that even death, apparently the end of his existence, is not able to put an end to God's concern with him and accordingly to his concern with God's" (41). Buber furthermore emphasizes that Paul's eschatological teachings only stress the moment of conversion and the ultimate redemption, namely what he calls the doctrine of justification through faith, but for the Jew, the works portion is just as important because the active life of faith for Jews often involves suffering, plus obedience to the Law, not merely faith, as Paul maintains (49). To the Jew, God is never far away; His presence surrounds the believer at all times, and the only eschatology is in the present, the time which demands action. The faithful Jew knows this and devotes his every moment in surrender to the Law.
Buber next stresses that the true relation with God begins in the human heart. The author suggests that Jesus' admonition of the Pharisees agrees with the teaching of the Torah. In essence, when Jesus says that no one can enter the Kingdom of God except his righteousness shall exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, He was not condemning the Law but fulfilling it, as He prophesied, by exposing their "current, erroneous and misleading usage" (63). Despite others' perversion of it, the Judaic Law remains true, as God's source of guidance for His chosen people. God's words are true and unchanging, just as His promise to redeem the faithful of the Hebrew nation. Buber expresses this concept more aptly when he says, "The doctrine can best be described as that of granting direction to nature without direction, its impulses whirl it around in all directions, and no direction which the individual gathers from his world stands firm, each one finally is only able to intensify the whirl of his heart; only Emunah is persistence: there is no true direction except to God. But the heart cannot receive this direction from the human spirit . . . only from a life lived in the will of God" (63-64). The promise of divine deliverance is the paradox that transcends human understanding and demands a tolerance between Jews and Christians. God's promises are eternally true, for Jew and Gentile alike. Despite Buber's criticism of what he calls Pauline doctrine, Paul's epistles strongly encourage the Christian not to condemn the Jew because God selected the Jewish people as His chosen race. Although the author calls for tolerance, he strongly disagrees with Paul's explanation of Jewish Law as a schoolmaster supplanted by the teaching of Christ, which he feels dehumanizes the followers of Judaism. Here Christians must recognize and appreciate the role that the Jewish people have played in suffering for generations for their faith. Christians must not take Jewish persecution lightly. They have suffered vicariously for Christians so that all may see God. If one accepts the premise that God knows the human heart, one must also accept by faith that God will act justly, despite man's inability to rectify the paradox of His saving both Jew and Christian. This step of faith closely corresponds with what psychiatrist Viktor Frankl calls super-meaning. According to Frankl, "What is demanded of man is not, as some existential philosophers teach, to endure the meaninglessness of life, but rather to bear his incapacity to grasp its unconditional meaninglessness in rational terms. Logos is deeper than logic" (Frankl 141).This initial step of faith, in essence, must be the most vital consideration for both Jew and Christian, if any degree of mutual consensus is to be reached. This concept I would term Super-Faith. In this respect, one might ask, "Where will this end?" The answer requires even greater faith or Emunah. For both Jew and Christian, the same God awaits their redemption, for He rewards the faithful. There is no inconsistency. If this level cannot be attained, mutual respect and flexibility must be ensured at all cost. Buber calls for mutuality in his hope for both faiths, if not today, hopefully in the future (174).
Buber also suggests that Jesus' teachings are largely in accord with Jewish Law (63), but he interprets Paul's theology differently because it seemingly 1) excludes Jews from the possibility of salvation; 2) reduces the Israelites to mere instruments which God uses to convert the Gentiles (90); 3) discredits the Torah as a source of Jewish faith and promise (53); makes Jesus more important than God; and suggests that God's inner nature is so inherently wrathful that only through the death of His Son can His anger be appeased (139-141). This, he affirms, clearly differs with the Jewish perception of the Creator. Buber suggests that Paul is confusing the Greek concept of fate with the grace and power of God because fate is characterized as the inexorable force that destroys the lives of men (140). Buber maintains that these Hellenistic influences in Paul's epistles have altered the interpretation of the Law (44-47), as well as the teachings of Jesus (59). Buber also attributes Paul's divergence from the principles of the Law to the apostle's personal interpretation of God's Word. Buber's final claim suggests that God is capable of saving His people without Jesus, and any attempt to ascribe human qualities to Him through the Son demeans both God and those ignorant of His inscrutable nature (164). For the Jew, the hidden God exists in man's heart and in His manifestation in the external world. To the Hebrew people, their nation as a whole will be redeemed in God's time, not through individual salvation, as in Christianity. Buber points out that the concept of individual salvation is nonexistent for the Jew because his survival through generations of persecution is, and has been, sustained because of Emunah, in this hidden God, not an individual's trust in Him. The moment of spiritual transformation, in essence, does not occur within individual subjects but in the actions of the Jewish nation as a whole. The history of his people is one of turning from and returning to God. The children of Israel must choose to become a faithful nation once again if hope is to exist. When Israel has abandoned it goal as a holy nation, its spiritual purpose is denied. According to Buber, "Then only a great renewal of national faith would be able to provide the remedy. In this the ever-existent inner dialectic of Israel between those giving up themselves to guidance and those letting themselves go must come to a decision in the souls themselves, so that the task of becoming a holy nation may set itself in a new situation and a new form suitable to it. The individuals, regenerated in the crisis, who maintain themselves in Emunah, would have fulfilled the function, when it comes about, of sustaining the living substance of faith through the darkness" (171-172). Thus, the collective coming-of-age, spiritual loss-and-redemption, symbolic death-and-rebirth, or Teshuvah occurs numerous times throughout the Old Testament; and Buber senses its necessity once again. For the Christian, these issues must not create walls of misunderstanding, but rather, a starting point from which to build a meaningful dialogue. Fanaticism in the name of religion, as Buber suggests, will never resolve these differences (173).
In his criticism of Paul's teaching, Buber suggests that the apostle overemphasizes the wrath of God more than His mercy. To support his claim, Buber alludes to the Pharisaic concept of middot, the relationship of God's justice and mercy as they apply in the lives of men. According to Buber, this relationship between the rigor and the grace of God "leads to the conception of a dramaticism within the Godhead." In essence, the two modes or attitudes collectively form what is "understood as the middot of God." God, in a sense, responds along a spectrum from justice to mercy; however, the two modes are always united; one may prevail over the other at different times, but never is one mode excluded from the other. Just as freedom and responsibility function within the same individual or social framework, so does God "embrace the whole polarity of that which happens to the world, good and evil." According to Buber, "The creation of the world too took place not through grace alone, but through its working together with rigor; but also no act of chastising justice is accomplished without the participation of mercy. When God made man, He created him by the middah of judgment and the middah of compassion, and when He expelled him, He did so by the middah of judgment and the middah of compassion." According to the Midrash Genesis, the walk means the direction which God moves from one to the other and vice-versa, but always according to His divine plan. The most important feature of the middot, or middah, is that mercy far outweighs justice in God's eyes. For Christians, the same principle should hold true. James 2:13 says, "For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath showed no mercy, and mercy rejoices against judgment." Buber expresses this concept in the following passage: "Yet, and this is the most important: they are not equal to one another in power: the middah of grace is stronger. It, and not rigor, is the right hand, the strong hand (Sifre 50). Because this is so, the world is preserved; otherwise, it could not continue. And what applies to the existence of the world applies to that of man. It is the right hand which God, Who judges with the left, stretches out towards the sinner who turns back to Him and with which He raises him to Himself. In the whole course of human history, and not only in salvation, grace prevails; the measure of the good is greater than the measure of reprisal' (153-154). This again is another of God's inscrutable miracles, that His grace and mercy far outweigh His justice. Christians typically think of God's grace and justice on equal terms, but not according to Jewish tradition. For they perceive God governs with justice in His left hand and grace in His right, the side that rules all creation. In other words, God's love and mercy reaches out to man in a way that far transcends man's ability to reach out to Him. What a wondrous picture of God's love for all men! This overwhelming desire to love and understand exemplifies the type of tolerance and compassion that Christians and Jews should strive to show one another.
From Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus, Buber describes some of the most beautiful imagery found within the Bible, namely, that of creation by the Spirit of God. When Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night, Jesus tells him that "except a man is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." At this, Nicodemus asks, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?" To this, Jesus responds, "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" (John 3:1-5). Here water and spirit, in Jewish tradition, allude to the creation of the world, that is, "the breath of power from above, which blows down on the awakened potentiality of all living creatures and which brings them to life" (Buber 119).Thus, as Buber suggests, in one of Jesus' earliest speeches, He refers to the idea of rebirth by water and spirit. For Buber, the concept of being born anew does not begin with Jesus' words, but rather, in earlier Hebrew tradition, dating back to Abraham who was spiritually transformed or "regenerated in the midst of life" (119-120). Buber also refers to a passage in Isaiah 61:1 which Jesus quotes at the beginning of His ministry: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." Citing this passage to begin His ministry, Jesus alludes to the concept of rebirth for those who follow Him. Jesus' subsequent colloquy with Nicodemus suggests that the Spirit of God which created the world will also dwell in man to create a new spirit in him. At this point, Buber points out that western translators have agreed upon the Greek pneuma as the word meaning wind and spirit; however, he suggests that of the three options, namely, ruach, pneuma, and spiritus, the most precise interpretation should be ruach, which translates as "the divine breath, which from the beginning in religious sensuality, blows toward the cosmos the stirring and enlivening wind and inspires the mind of man with the stirring and enlivening Spirit." From the Christian perspective, God's creation of the world parallels His creation of man as a new spirit through Christ. Thus, Jesus becomes the instrument of a spiritual rebirth. In the original Hebrew creation account, the ruach of God hovers over the earth like "a bird which, with outspread wings, hovers above its nestlings, the tips of its wings vibrating powerfully" (Buber 122). Similarly, when John baptizes Jesus in the Jordan River, this same Spirit of God descends like a dove and hovers over Jesus! What a beautiful image! Buber cites the Babylonian Talmud which refers to a hovering dove in both instances. He also points out that the ruach carries away the prophet Elijah (2 Kings 2:11) with the same intensity that Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness (Matthew 4:1)). And finally, he cites Jesus' words to Nicodemus: "The wind (ruach) blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes, or whither it goes; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit (ruach) (Buber 123). In these two instances, the Spirit of God in the form of a dove hovers over all creation, descends upon the Son of Man and enters into the soul of every believer. This image of peace and assurance is one of the most beautiful pictures found in the Scripture. For both Jew and Christian, the image of the same Spirit of God guiding a nation as well as individual believers provides a sense of hope and security that will remain unchanged.
Buber also emphasizes the importance that suffering has played in Israel's spiritual growth. According to the author, "The experience of suffering as innocently borne works at times in the history of faith both as a destructive factor and as an element of renewal (143). Psychologically, suffering forces the subject to turn inward for greater self-awareness. From this point, he can assess his spiritual condition and commence the process of rebirth or transformation. He furthermore suggests that the image of God in the person of Christ has detracted from the majesty of God because the Jew did not understand the concept of man as God. This idea, he contends, is Hellenistic in origin. The idea of a savior coming from heaven to earth and the resurrection of an individual are also notions completely foreign to the Jewish mind because they have long expected a Deliverer in the tradition of Moses (101). In fact, Jesus' appearance and expression of His role as redeemer-king is totally the opposite from what Jewish tradition predicted. In essence, the Hebrew people anticipated a deliverer rising to power in society and ushering in kingdom of Israeli domination, when in reality, Jesus comes from heaven to preach a life of spiritual fulfillment through humility to the Father. Here, the roles are completely reversed. Buber emphasizes the distinction more aptly in the following passage: "As the second presupposition [the concept of the Suffering Servant] there was joined to it pre-existence, and differently from Jewish Apocalypses as a distinct essence and person, so that the fundamental and persistent character of the Messiah, as of one rising from humanity and clothed in power, was displaced by one substantially different: a heavenly being, who came down to the world, sojourned in it, left it, ascended to heaven and now enters upon the dominion of the world which originally belonged to him" (113). Ironically, it is in John's Apocalypse, or Revelation, that Jesus appears clothed in such power and glory: "Then I turned to see whose voice it was that spoke to me, and when I turned, I saw seven gold lamp stands, and in the midst of the lamp stands one like a son of man, wearing an ankle-length robe, with a gold sash around his chest. The hair of his head was as white as white wool or as snow, and his eyes were like a fiery flame. His feet were like polished brass refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing water. In his right hand he held seven stars. A sharp two-edged sword came out of his mouth, and his face shone like the sun at its brightest" (Revelation 1:12-126). For the Jew this reversal appears both contradictory and incredible. Buber also suggests that the dual role of Christ and God leads the Jewish community to believe that the Christian God cannot consummate His kingdom alone, but needs a savior to intervene for man, to appease His wrath. For the Christian, the very opposite is true, namely, that God did not despise the world so much that he needed His son, but rather, He loved the world so much that He sent His Son. It is not God's wrath which is terrible but man's sinful condition which makes it necessary for the coming of the Messiah. For Jews, Jesus is a great prophet, but "his theology no longer applies." (134). For the Christian, Christ's message is eternal. Again, these questions baffle the Jew and should be a source of utmost concern for the Christian who is truly interested in establishing a viable rapport with them. As Buber suggests, inflexibility is certainly not the answer.
Works Cited for Buber's Two Types of Faith
Buber, Martin. Two Kinds of Faith : A Study of the Interpenetration of Judaism and Christianity. Trans. Norman P. Goldhawk. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961.
Frankl, Viktor. Man's Search for Meaning. Revised and updated. New York: Pocket Books, 1985.
Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion. Volume I Abridged. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1974.
Guerin, Wilfred L. Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature. New York: Harper & Row, 1966.