The I-Thou relationship comes easily and often, over breakfast or at work, in the classroom or at the gym as well as in turning points of life. In the eighty years since Jewish thinker Martin Buber proposed the idea of I-Thou, no one has taken ordinary language to describe this simple spirituality in words, gestures and glances. God in Our Relationships: The Spirituality between People from the Teachings of Martin Buber makes clear the ephemeral and often overlooked encounter of I and Thou. Many people turn into the soul for insights of belief and for faith. God in Our Relationships looks outward, to holy possibilities between people, to the spiritual opportunities in words, gestures and glances. Drawing from the writings and biography of Martin Buber, from his loving edition of Hasidic tales as well as from the Bible and events in my typical day, God in Our Relationships speaks to all faiths about an interpersonal spirituality, that special feeling "in the air" in simple exchanges of words and in heart-to-heart conversation.
As a rabbi, I talk about God. As a social worker, I focus on interpersonal communication. In God in Our Relationships, I weave together two decades of religious and social life to describe the holiness of the I-Thou relationship -- what it is, when it arrives, why it must end, what of it endures and why it is so important.
Reviews of God in Our RelationshipsGod in Our Relationships, Spirituality between People from the Teachings of Martin Buber," is another worthy choice for holiday reading. Rabbi Dennis S. Ross draws on multiple sources to illuminate the sacredness of relationships and apply Buber's ideas to our lives. Buber theorized more than 80 years ago in his work, "I and Thou," that there are holy possibilities present whenever people interact. Ross takes Buber's classic and infuses it with contemporary sensibility, weaving together his own life experience with quotations and insights gleaned from Buber's often difficult obscure writing.
Vicki Cabot
Jewish News of Greater Phoenix
The philosophy of Martin Buber, particularly that known by the two words I-Thou, may not be everyone's idea of easy and readily comprehensible material. Yet this is exactly what Dennis Ross sets out to make it in another original publication by Jewish Lights Publishing. His starting point is a chance encounter a quarter century ago with Buber's Tales of the Hasidim: The Later Masters, which served as his introduction to the philosopher's other writings, especially that entitled
I-Thou. In this deeply spiritual and sustaining short book, drawing on his own personal and professional experience as well as some Hasidic tales, Ross applies the major themes of the I-Thou philosophy to every day life and describes with passion and enthusiasm they ways in which it can enrich our everyday lives
Liberal Judaism, ULPS News
What is happening when we lose ourselves in conversation with a friend, or even a chance acquaintance? What is different about these occasions from our run-of-the mill transactions with others? Such questions are the starting point for Rabbi Dennis Ross in his deft and appealing introduction to the thought of Martin Buber, "God in Our Relationships."
Abandoned by his mother at age three, Martin Buber (1878-1965) early experienced the anguish of lost relationship. His grandparents nurtured the intellectual and spiritual interests decisive in his future work: secular and Jewish scholarship, Hebraic studies, and the life of the Jewish community. It was through them, also, that Buber became acquainted with Hasidim, whose master-disciple teaching tradition and emphasis on the sanctification of everyday life became important themes in his work. Buber's best-known work, "I and Thou" (1923), explores human relationships, from those in which we see another as the fulfiller of our own needs (I-It relationships), to those in which we are truly present to another person and grant the other full reality (I-Thou). Each I-Thou encounter is gathered into the life of God, becoming part of the everlasting record of human good in the Eternal Thou.
Ross, who is the rabbi at Temple Anshe Amunim in Pittsfield, makes these ideas accessible to the general reader through the structure of his book as well as his clear and engaging writing. The very brief chapters (few of which exceed three pages) loosely follow his course through a single day, from a stop at the bank at its beginning to reviewing its events with his wife at its close. Each of his encounters, whether routine or of life-and-death significance, illuminates some aspect of the I-It, I-Thou and Eternal Thou relationships. Together, they provide a developing narrative framework into which Ross weaves both Buber's illustrative Hasidic stories as well as his own knowledge and experience as a counselor. Each chapter invites one to linger on a new idea, relish the wit of a Hasidic master, or re-examine one's own memories, yet flows naturally to the next with increasing impact.
The result is a book that is thoughtful, moving and timely. Buber's critique of a purely utilitarian approach to social relationships is newly relevant to a world of spiritual seekers. His recovery of Hasidic teaching and his expression of the role of God in human relationships -- which from the start Influenced Christian as well as Jewish theologians -- have taken their place In an increasingly rich and serious dialogue between these faiths, at its best a true I-Thou encounter.
Ross opens this dialogue to a wide audience. "God in Our Relationships" will prove inviting and refreshing to anyone seeking deeper relationships with others and a greater awareness of the presence of God in everyday life.
Linda Schwab, Ph.D.
Berkshire Eagle
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