An animal's eyes have the power to speak a great language. Martin Buber More Quotes by Martin Buber More Quotes From Martin Buber But it can also happen, if will and grace are joined, that as I contemplate the tree I am drawn into a relation, and the tree ceases to be an It. . . . Does the tree then have consciousness, similar to our own? I have no experience of that. But thinking that you have brought this off in your own case, must you again divide the indivisible? What I encounter is neither the soul of a tree nor a dryad, but the tree itself. Martin Buber gracetreethinking The perfection of any matter, the highest or the lowest, touches on the divine. Martin Buber divineperfectionmatter I'm not sure I can take your advice. You are dealing with English Gentlemen. We are dealing with monsters. Martin Buber advicewarpeace The ones who count are those persons who - though they may be of little renown - respond to and are responsible for the continuation of the living spirit. Martin Buber maylittleslife It is usual to think of good and evil as two poles, two opposite directions, the antithesis of one another...We must begin by doing away with this convention. Martin Buber oppositestwothinking The salvation of man does not lie in his holding himself far removed from the worldly, but in consecrating it to holy, to divine meaning. Martin Buber doemenlying Greatness by nature includes a power, but not a will to power. ... The great man, whether we comprehend him in the most intense activity of his work or in the restful equipoise of his forces , is powerful, involuntarily and composedly powerful, but he is not avid for power. What he is avid for is the realization of what he has in mind , the incarnation of the spirit . Martin Buber greatnesspowerfulmen All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveller is unaware. Martin Buber destinationjourneysecret Read the Bible as though it were something entirely unfamiliar, as though it had not been set before you ready-made. Face the book with a new attitude as something new. Martin Buber christianbibleattitude I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human face looking at me. Martin Buber facesdoorsbook In philosophical anthropology, ... where the subject is man in his wholeness, the investigator cannot content himself, as in anthropology as an individual science, with considering man as another part of nature and with ignoring the fact that he, the investigator, is himself a man and experiences this humanity in his inner experience in a way that he simply cannot experience any part of nature. Martin Buber philosophicalhumanitymen The philosophical anthropologist ... can know the wholeness of the person and through it the wholeness of man only when he does not leave his subjectivity out and does not remain an untouched observer. Martin Buber philosophicaldoemen The tradition of the camp fire faces that of the pyramid. Martin Buber pyramidsfirefaces God said to Abraham: "Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee." God says to man: "First, get you out of your country, that means the dimness you have inflicted on yourself. Then out of your birthplace, that means out of the dimness your mother inflicted on you. After that, out of the house of your father, that means out of the dimness your father inflicted on you. Only then will you be able to go to the land that I will show you" Martin Buber mothercountryfather The world is a spinning die, and everything turns and changes: man is turned into angel, and angel into man, and the head into the foot, and the foot into the head. Thus all things turn and spin and change, this into that, and that into this, the topmost to the undermost, and the undermost to the topmost. For at the root all is one, and salvation inheres in the change and return of things. Martin Buber angelfeetmen Creation is not a hurdle on the road to God, it is the road itself. Martin Buber hurdlecreation In the ice of solitude man becomes most inexorably a question to himself, and just because the question pitilessly summons and draws into play his most secret life he becomes an experience to himself. Martin Buber iceplaymen But when a man draws a lifeless thing into his passionate longing for dialogue, lending it independence and as it were a soul, then there may dawn in him the presentiment of a world-wide dialogue with the world-happening that steps up to him even in his environment, which consists partially of things. Or do you seriously think that the giving and taking of signs halts on the threshold of that business where an honest and open spirit is found? Martin Buber givingmenthinking Eclipse of the light of heaven, eclipse of God - such indeed is the character of the historic hour through which the world is now passing Martin Buber lightcharacterheaven When we rise out of [the night] into the new life and there begin to receive the signs, what can we know of that which - of him who gives them to us? Only what we experience from time to time from the signs themselves. If we name the speaker of this speech God, then it is always the God of a moment, a moment God. Martin Buber namesgivingnight
