Martin Buber is a great Jewish humanist and philosopher, as well as a well-known public and religious figure. This person is ambiguous, very complex. Some researchers consider him a theorist, the founder of Zionism. Others are called the existential philosopher of the first magnitude. Who was Martin (Mordechai) Buber actually? His biography and main works will be devoted to our article.
The philosopher lived a long, but poor life by external events. But, nevertheless, a lot of biographical works and studies are devoted to him. The name of Buber is world famous. He worked in various fields of culture. He touched not only the philosophy of human existence, but also education, art, sociology, politics, religion (in particular, biblical studies). His works on Hasidism have been translated into many languages of the world. But there are not many works of this philosopher available to the Russian reader. Only Jewish art, Renewal of Jewishness, and a number of articles were translated. In the seventies, and they were redirected to special funds. Buber's works were reprinted and circulated among progressive Soviet citizens in samizdat.
Biography of Martin Buber. Childhood and adolescence
Mordechai (Martin) Buber was born in Vienna on February 8, 1878 in a rather prosperous Jewish family. The boy was not even three years old when his parents divorced. The father took his son to Lemberg (modern Lviv, Ukraine), which was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In this city, Martin's grandfather and grandmother lived on the paternal side - Solomon and Adele. Shlomo Buber (he died in 1906) was a wealthy banker. But he was famous in Lviv not by this, but by the fact that he was a brilliant specialist in the textology of Midrash. Therefore, it was considered a great authority in the Hasidic community of Lviv. Grandfather instilled in the boy a love of the Hebrew language. He literally opened the door to his heart for the fascinating and mystical world of Hasidism - a religious movement that arose in the mid-eighteenth century in the Jewish environment of Eastern Europe. Grandmother read boy excerpts from Kabbalah, and his grandfather taught him Hebrew, instilled a love of literature and religion.
Hasidism and the philosophy of dialogue by Martin Buber
It was in Lviv that the future philosopher learned about the "pious" Judaism. The founder of Hasidism, Isroel Baal-Shem-Tov, believed that true faith does not consist in the teachings of the Talmud, but in attachment to God with all one’s heart, the mystical exit of an enthusiastic soul from the bodily shell in hot and sincere prayer. In this religious ecstasy, the dialogue of man with the Creator of the Universe takes place. Therefore, the Hasidim depart from the external restrictive prohibitions of Judaism. Those who constantly communicate with God, the Tzaddiks, have the ability of prophecy and clairvoyance. These pious people also help other Hasidim to gain ear salvation and cleansing from sins. This whole mysterious and mystical world greatly influenced the young Martin Buber. In his book, “My Way to Hasidism, ” he says that in one instant he realized the essence of all human religions. This is communication, dialogue with God, the relationship of I and You.
Education. Adolescence
Grandfather-banker made sure that his grandson had a brilliant education. At eighteen, Martin Buber enrolled at the University of Vienna. After graduating, he continued his education at the higher schools of Zurich and Leipzig. At the University of Berlin, his teachers were W. Dilthey and G. Simmel. At twenty, the young man became interested in Zionism. He was even a delegate to the third Congress of this Jewish movement. In the nineteen hundred and first year, he served as editor of the Zionist weekly De Welt. When the party split, Buber, who lived in Berlin at that time, founded his own publishing house called The Judicher Ferlag. It produced Jewish books in German. The youth did not weaken interest in issues of Hasidism. He translated into German a series of short stories and parables by Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav. Later he devoted Hasidism to the works Gog and Magog (1941), The Secret Light (1943) and Pardes Hashidut. Buber pays a lot of attention and social activities.
Zionism and Socialism
In 1916, Martin Buber became the chief editor of the monthly Der Yude. This publication has become the mouthpiece of the spiritual rebirth of the Jews. He founded the National Jewish Committee, which at the beginning of World War I represented the interests of Eastern European Yishuv. And finally, in 1920, the philosopher formulated his social positions. He proclaimed them in Prague at the Zionist congress. This position is close in its class sound to socialism. Regarding the national question, Buber proclaimed "peace and brotherhood with the Arab people, " urging both nationalities to coexist together "in a new common homeland." The position I - You, a dialogue where each side can hear and understand the "truth" of the other, formed the basis of the thinker's philosophy.
WWII and later years
Between the two wars, Buber worked at the University of Frankfurt. He served as professor at the Department of Ethics and Philosophy of Judaism. When the National Socialists came to power in the thirty-third, the philosopher lost his job. Soon he was forced to flee from Germany to Switzerland. But later he emigrated from this country, which maintained neutrality in World War II. Martin Buber, whose quotes on the peaceful coexistence between Jews and Palestinians, alas, was “the voice of one crying in the wilderness, ” moved to Jerusalem. In this holy city, the philosopher lived from 1938 to 1965. He died on June 13 at the age of eighty-seven. In Israel, Buber worked as a professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Jerusalem. In the early sixties received the honorary title of the first president of the Israeli Academy of Sciences.
Anthropological approach in the philosophy of Martin Buber
While still a student, the philosopher vividly participated in the Nietzschean discussions of youth. The doctrine of the leader and the crowd, "little men" was unacceptable to him. At the same time, he understood that Nietzsche was trying to put at the forefront the problem of the unique human existence in a world where "God denies people His presence." However, it must be decided on the basis of the value of each individual, Martin Buber believed. “The problem of man” is primarily a polemic work in which the scientist criticizes Nietzsche’s postulates. "The will to power" cannot, in his opinion, serve as a guiding light for strong personalities and free minds. Such an approach will only lead to an even greater dictatorship. In the Nietzschean discussions, as well as under the influence of Dilthey and Zimer, his teachers, Buber's own concept of anthropology matures.
Martin Buber, Me and You: Summary
This work, of course, can be called the main one in the philosophical work of the thinker. In it, Buber puts on different scales the ratio of "I - It" and "I - You." Only in the latter case is Dialogue possible, interpersonal live communication. When a person refers to something or someone as “it, ” only utilitarian use is obtained. But personality is not a means, but a goal. Relation to another as in “You” gives the participant of the dialogue a spiritual, valuable nature. Bronislaw Malinowski coined the term "mana" in philosophical circulation. This Polynesian word very accurately reflects the sensation of pre-religious insight, the sensation of the invisible power carried by a person, animal, tree, phenomenon, and even an object. According to Buber, these two types of relationships give rise to opposing concepts of the world. Of course, it’s difficult for a person to constantly be in the “I - You” state. But one that always refers to the outside world as “It, ” is losing its soul.
Religious Studies
Another fundamental work that Martin Buber wrote was Two Images of Faith. In this book, the philosopher recalls his childhood impressions of entering the world of a mystical, slightly sensual Hasidism. He contrasts it with Talmudic Judaism. You can also distinguish two fundamental approaches to faith. The first, pistis, is a rational “Greek” approach. In this sense, faith is information taken into account. It can be called knowledge or even a “scientific hypothesis”. Such a pistis faith is opposed to an emuna. It is based on trust, living love, attitude towards God as “You”. Buber traces how early Christianity was gradually moving away from the biblical spirit associated with the cordial, sensory perception of the Heavenly Father, to church dogma with its dead set of patterns.
Mysticism
At the universities of Zurich and Vienna, Martin Buber, whose philosophy is increasingly leaning towards existentialism, attended psychoanalysis courses. He is interested in the human person in all its aspects. The scientist perceives the ideas of mysticism not at all as a mental pathology. The theme of his doctoral dissertation was a comprehensive study of the philosophy of Meister Eckhart and Jacob Boehme. These German mystics of the late Middle Ages had a great influence on Buber. As a student of Dilthey, the philosopher tried to get used to the religious experience of the disgraced Dominican Eckhart. For this, all pilgrimages, repentance and fasting, everything that is imposed by orthodoxy, has no value if a person does not seek communion with God. Boehme also argues that the commandments must be inside, written on the tablets of the heart, and not be outside, like dogmas.
