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I And Thou Paperback – February 1, 1971
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Considered to be one of the most influential books of Western thought since its original publication in 1923, Martin Buber’s slender volume I and Thou influenced the way we think about our relationships with one another and with God. Buber unites currents of modern German philosophy with the Judeo-Christian tradition, powerfully updating faith for modern times.
I and Thou is Martin Buber’s pioneering work and the centerpiece of his groundbreaking philosophy. In it, Buber—one of the greatest Jewish minds of the 20th century—lays out a view of the world in which human beings can enter into relationships that enhance their mutual existential dignity (I–Thou relations). These “dialogical” relations contrast with those that tend to prevail in modern society, namely the treatment of others as objects to advance personal and collective interests (I–It relations). Buber demonstrates how I-Thou interhuman meetings reflect and embody the human meeting with God. For Buber, the essence of biblical religion affirms the possibility of a dialogue between man and God.
- Print length192 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherTouchstone
- Publication dateFebruary 1, 1971
- Dimensions5.5 x 0.6 x 8.38 inches
- ISBN-100684717255
- ISBN-13978-0684717258
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what’s missing in our contemporary lives and in our politics at every level." —JERRY BROWN, former 34th and 39th governor of California
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Man's world is manifold, and his attitudes are manifold. What is manifold is often frightening because it is not neat and simple. Men prefer to forget how many possibilities are open to them.
They like to be told that there are two worlds and two ways. This is comforting because it is so tidy. Almost always one way turns out to be common and the other one is celebrated as superior.
Those who tell of two ways and praise one are recognized as prophets or great teachers. They save men from confusion and hard choices. They offer a single choice that is easy to make because those who do not take the path that is commended to them live a wretched life.
To walk far on this path may be difficult, but the choice is easy, and to hear the celebration of this path is pleasant. Wisdom offers simple schemes, but truth is not so simple.
Not all simplicity is wise. But a wealth of possibilities breeds dread. Hence those who speak of many possibilities speak to the few and are of help to even fewer. The wise offer only two ways, of which one is good, and thus help many.
Mundus vult decipi: the world wants to be deceived. The truth is too complex and frightening; the taste for the truth is an acquired taste that few acquire.
Not all deceptions are palatable. Untruths are too easy to come by, too quickly exploded, too cheap and ephemeral to give lasting comfort. Mundus vult decipi; but there is a hierarchy of deceptions.
Near the bottom of the ladder is journalism: a steady stream of irresponsible distortions that most people find refreshing although on the morning after, or at least within a week, it will be stale and flat.
On a higher level we find fictions that men eagerly believe, regardless of the evidence, because they gratify some wish.
Near the top of the ladder we encounter curious mixtures of untruth and truth that exert a lasting fascination on the intellectual community.
What cannot, on the face of it, be wholly true, although it is plain that there is some truth in it, evokes more discussion and dispute, divergent exegeses and attempts at emendations than what has been stated very carefully, without exaggeration or onesidedness. The Book of Proverbs is boring compared to the Sermon on the Mount.
The good way must be clearly good but not wholly clear. If it is quite clear, it is too easy to reject.
What is wanted is an oversimplification, a reduction of a multitude of possibilities to only two. But if the recommended path were utterly devoid of mystery, it would cease to fascinate men. Since it clearly should be chosen, nothing would remain but to proceed on it. There would be nothing left to discuss and interpret, to lecture and write about, to admire and merely think about.
The world exacts a price for calling teachers wise: it keeps discussing the paths they recommend, but few men follow them. The wise give men endless opportunities to discuss what is good.
Men's attitudes are manifold. Some live in a strange world bounded by a path from which countless ways lead inside. If there were road signs, all of them might bear the same inscription: I-I.
Those who dwell inside have no consuming interest. They are not devoted to possessions, even if they prize some; not to people, even if they like some; not to any project, even if they have some.
Things are something that they speak of; persons have the great advantage that one cannot only talk of them but also to, or rather at them; but the lord of every sentence is no man but I. Projects can be entertained without complete devotion, spoken of, and put on like a suit or dress before a mirror. When you speak to men of this type, they quite often do not hear you, and they never hear you as another I.
You are not an object for men like this, not a thing to be used or experienced, nor an object of interest or fascination. The point is not at all that you are found interesting or fascinating instead of being seen as a fellow I. The shock is rather that you are not found interesting or fascinating at all: you are not recognized as an object any more than as a subject. You are accepted, if at all, as one to be spoken at and spoken of; but when you are spoken of, the lord of every story will be I.
Men's attitudes are manifold. Some men take a keen interest in certain objects and in other men and actually think more about them than they think of themselves. They do not so much say I or think I as they do I.
They "take" an interest, they do not give of themselves. They may manipulate or merely study, and unlike men of the I-I type they may be good scholars; but they lack devotion.
This I-It tendency is so familiar that little need be said about it, except that it is a tendency that rarely consumes a man's whole life. Those who see a large part of humanity -- their enemies; of course -- as men of this type, have succumbed to demonology.
This is merely one of the varieties of man's experience and much more widespread in all ages as a tendency and much rarer as a pure type in our own time than the Manichaeans fancy.
There are men who hardly have an I at all. Nor are all of them of one kind.
Some inhabit worlds in which objects loom large. They are not merely interested in some thing or subject, but the object of their interest dominates their lives. They are apt to be great scholars of extraordinary erudition, with no time for themselves, with no time to have a self.
They study without experiencing: they have no time for experience, which would smack of subjectivity if not frivolity. They are objective and immensely serious. They have no time for humor.
They study without any thought of use. What they study is an end in itself for them. They are devoted to their subject, and the notion of using it is a blasphemy and sacrilege that is not likely to occur to them.
For all that, their "subject" is no subject in its own right, like a person. It has no subjectivity. It does not speak to them. It is a subject one has chosen to study -- one of the subjects that one may legitimately choose, and there may be others working on the same subject, possibly on a slightly different aspect of it, and one respects them insofar as they, too, have no selves and are objective.
Here we have a community of solid scholars -- so solid that there is no room at the center for any core. Theirs is the world of It-It.
There are other ways of having no I. There are men who never speak a sentence of which I is lord, but nobody could call them objective. At the center of their world is We.
The contents of this We can vary greatly. But this is an orientation in which I does not exist, and You and It and He and She are only shadows.
One type of this sort could be called We-We. Theirs is a sheltered, childish world in which no individuality has yet emerged.
Another perennial attitude is summed up in the words Us-Them. Here the world is divided in two: the children of light and the children of darkness, the sheep and the goats, the elect and the damned.
Every social problem can be analyzed without much study: all one has to look for are the sheep and goats.
There is room for anger and contempt and boundless hope; for the sheep are bound to triumph.
Should a goat have the presumption to address a sheep, the sheep often do not hear it, and they never hear it as another I. For the goat is one of Them, not one of Us.
Righteousness, intelligence, integrity, humanity, and victory are the prerogatives of Us, while wickedness, stupidity, hypocrisy, brutality, and ultimate defeat belong to Them.
Those who have managed to cut through the terrible complexities of life and offer such a scheme as this have been hailed as prophets in all ages.
In these five attitudes there is no You: I-I, I-It, It-It, We-We, and Us-Them. There are many ways of living in a world without You.
There are also many worlds with the two poles I-You.
l-You sounds unfamiliar. What we are accustomed to is I-Thou. But man's attitudes are manifold, and Thou and You are not the same. Nor is Thou very similar to the German Du.
German lovers say Du to one another, and so do friends. Du is spontaneous and unpretentious, remote from formality, pomp, and dignity.
What lovers or friends say Thou to one another? Thou is scarcely ever said spontaneously.
Thou immediately brings to mind God; Du does not. And the God of whom it makes us think is not the God to whom one might cry out in gratitude, despair, or agony, not the God to whom one complains or prays spontaneously: it is the God of the pulpits, the God of the holy tone.
When men pray spontaneously or speak directly to God, without any mediator, without any intervention of formulas, when they speak as their heart tells them to speak instead of repeating what is printed, do they say Thou? How many know the verb forms Thou commands?
The world of Thou has many mansions. Thou is a preachers' word but also dear to anticlerical romantic poets. Thou is found in Shakespeare and at home in the English Bible, although recent versions of the Scriptures have tended to dispense with it. Thou can mean many things, but it has no place whatever in the language of direct, nonliterary, spontaneous human relationships.
If one could liberate I-Thou from affectation, the price for that would still involve reducing it to a mere formula, to jargon. But suppose a man wrote a book about direct relationships and tried to get away from the formulas of theologians and philosophers: a theologian would translate it and turn Icb und Du into I and Thou.
Copyright © 1998 by Charlotte Allen
Product details
- Publisher : Touchstone
- Publication date : February 1, 1971
- Language : English
- Print length : 192 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0684717255
- ISBN-13 : 978-0684717258
- Item Weight : 7.2 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.6 x 8.38 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #105,616 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #113 in Religious Philosophy (Books)
- #114 in Religion & Philosophy (Books)
- #308 in Philosophy of Ethics & Morality
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Customers find the book thought-provoking, with one describing it as a great masterpiece of philosophical/poetic/spiritual inspiration. Moreover, they consider it well worth the time and appreciate its inspired art style. However, the readability receives mixed feedback - while some find it well written, others say it can be quite obtuse and difficult to understand. Additionally, customers find the book not easy to follow.
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Customers find the book thought-provoking and insightful, describing it as a beautiful path to spiritual truth and an important philosophical work.
"...As to the text itself, it is timeless and profound." Read more
"This is a great book. Very deep and well worth pondering...." Read more
"Great writing great subject" Read more
"...Deservedly so, I and Thou is a classic in western theological and social thought. A warning, however: the book is not easily accessible...." Read more
Customers find the book well worth their time, describing it as brilliant and a tremendous read.
"...as bonded to "it" and not to "thou." It's worth reading, but probably for over 25-year olds!" Read more
"good book and thank you!" Read more
"This is a great book. Very deep and well worth pondering...." Read more
"...It's a decent read and I suspect many will like it" Read more
Customers appreciate the art style of the book, describing it as an inspired work of art and very sublime.
"...gives English-speaking readers the opportunity to follow a beautiful and psychologically-sound path to spiritual truth...." Read more
"...Buber, this book is written in his usual highly intellectual and abstract style...." Read more
"...Short and yet absolutely beautiful. I also really appreciate the work of the editor of the 100th anniversary edition...." Read more
"...intellectual approach to fully appreciate it, because it is a work of art and emotion as much as a work of intellect." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the book's readability, with some finding it well written and praising it as the best translation into English, while others find it challenging and difficult to understand.
"...] My opinion is that this is by far the best translation into English, the job was given to Kauffmann by Martin Buber's son." Read more
"...I.e., the writing can be quite obtuse and requires a willingness to read and re-read portions as one works through it..." Read more
"...of Buber's I and Thou except to say that there isn't a deeper, more poetic, more trenchant -profound- analysis / treatment of human relationship and..." Read more
"...My general complaint is that the writing is not necessarily systematic and it does not clearly define its terms very well...." Read more
Customers find the book difficult to follow.
"...A warning, however: the book is not easily accessible...." Read more
"...Buber is not easy, and the thread of his thinking is sometime difficult to follow, but translator Ronald Gregor Smith adds unnecessary difficulty...." Read more
"...it is complicated to follow and 2) it is translated from German...." Read more
"A fascinating book, but dense and difficult to grapple with in many ways. I shall probably have to read it again many times." Read more
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- Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2013I am reviewing Kaufman's translation of Buber's I and Thou (or, as the translator has it, I and You). Deservedly so, I and Thou is a classic in western theological and social thought. A warning, however: the book is not easily accessible. I.e., the writing can be quite obtuse and requires a willingness to read and re-read portions as one works through it (a consequence of its German origins and the writing style of the author). Kaufman at one point footnotes a very long sentence with the observation that (paraphrase)"this is one of the most baffling sentences in the book." Buber himself in the postscript notes that he was constantly asked to explain and clarify various points in the original text, thus choosing to update the book in his postscript (which is minimally better). Nevertheless, one is encouraged to take the plunge and enter into a relationship (his key theme in I/Thou relations)with the author by forging ahead even if one does not always understand some things at the moment; it will become more clear as one reads on. Buber distinguishes between I-It and I-Thou relations. I-It is normal and to be expected; it is a natural component of human reality. However, the fundamental problem of I-It relations, especially between human beings,is that the other is reduced to just another object in a world of objects and treated as a means to one's ends. I-It is a symbol of the "sickness of our age." I-Thou/I-You, however, results from relationships/associations whereby the "other" becomes essential to the development of and realization of the self (I). I-It functions within the terms of monologue; the attempt by the self to manipulate and control the other. I-Thou is founded upon dialogue: the sharing of self with another self with the goal of maximizing the humanity of those party to the conversation. I-Thou relations are reciprocal and spirit (both human and otherworldly) comes to exist and mediates the "between" (rather than located only in the I, described as "ghostly solitude"). Thus, the book is a contribution to examining and critiquing what became known in the 20th century as mass society theory and has links to that genre in numerous ways (Marcuse, One Dimensional Man et al). Implicit throughout is his deep spirituality/religiosity; in Section 3 he is explicit about this as he explores I-Thou in terms of I-and-the-Eternal Thou" (God; every You/Thou is a glimpse of the Eternal You/Thou. Non-religious readers (or potential readers) should not avoid the book for this reason; indeed, this portion of the discussion helps to clarify the "regular" I-Thou relations. I and Thou was published the same year as Freud's Ego and the Id. Buber's take is an interesting subtle critique of Freud's formulation: according to Buber, the ego is not equivalent to the I; egos are created by setting one ego apart from other egos. The I, on the other hand,is rooted in the person and his/her reciprocal relations with other persons (e.g., Jacques Maritain's thesis). Ich und Id is about controlling and suppressing; Ich und Du is about liberation.
- Reviewed in the United States on October 18, 2011"I and Thou" by Martin Buber is one of the most important books ever written.
First published in 1923, in my opinion, it is certainly the most important book of the 20th century. Over the course of decades, it affected religious and philosophical thinking throughout the Western world, and even in some Asian places.
Buber shows how the relationships between people, between people and the world and between people and God are pivotal in how we see the world.
"To man the world is twofold, in accordance with his twofold attitude ...in accord with the twofold nature of the primary words he speaks ...
"The one primary word is the combination I-Thou.
"The other primary word is the combination I-It ...," says Buber at the beginning of this work.
This is much more complex than can be explained here, which is why you need to read this book of only 137 pages, including the postscript.
In short, when we approach someone with the attitude of I-It, we see him or her as an object. This is the attitude we often take at work, and the attitude which allows us to exploit the world.
When we approach someone with the attitude of I-Thou, we see him or her as the unique and existentially real person he or she really is at heart. We see that person's soul and can never treat him or her as an object in any way.
This attitude is also the way we address the world when it seems magical, such as in moments when nature calls to us and we see it as part of ourselves and ourselves as a part of it.
I-Thou is how we address God when our hearts and souls open to let the Infinite in, when the spirit of God touches us.
In other words, I-Thou is when we are in true relation with anything, when the boundaries we set up between ourselves and the world come down.
Unfortunately, since we live in a material world, there are times when we must address the world as I-It, which is where troubles begin.
Buber was an Austrian-born Jewish philosopher who was a part of the Zionist movement as the editor of its central newspaper, but later became an advocate of a joint Palestinian-Jewish homeland to share what is Israel today.
Since Buber wrote "I and Thou" in idiosyncratic German, with a highly poetic and metaphorical structure, there are differences in how some think it should be translated. Personally, I prefer the translation Buber worked on with Ronald Gregor Smith, because it retains its poetic and reverent tone, but the most available translation is a later translation by Walter Kaufmann. Readers may have to find used copies to find the Smith translation, as I did, get the Kindle edition or try the interlibrary loan system.
Even if you've read this gem, it bears reading again. Different chapters of our lives can give it added meaning, which is why I read it every few years.
Don't miss this one.
Top reviews from other countries
ciaranhurley@hotmail.comReviewed in the United Kingdom on May 19, 20175.0 out of 5 stars Buber explains why empathy is so fundamentally important to human relations
I can't comment on the translation. In a radical departure from the obscurantism of other existential philosophers, Buber states his ideas simply and clearly. For people embarking on a career in care-work, clinical psychology or therapy, I would recommend this text to inform some of the basic reasons why empathy is such an important characteristic to develop and grow.
Len RamsayReviewed in Canada on December 10, 20165.0 out of 5 stars and it's one of my favourite and foundational books
Some find this a difficult read - it's poetry, really, and it's one of my favourite and foundational books.
Amazon カスタマーReviewed in Japan on May 28, 20255.0 out of 5 stars yes
book
Drake MabryReviewed in France on March 21, 20205.0 out of 5 stars Unique voyage
Buber writes about our habit of treating people like objects and explains why we can change this to treating them as living beings. Way ahead of his time. An original writing style, almost stream of consciousness at times. A must read.
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aforji njunjima mgbereReviewed in Spain on September 22, 20144.0 out of 5 stars regalo
era para mi primo,me dice que ha gustado mucho el libro,porque era lo que buscaba el,un saludos a todo. espero









