The I Of The Basic Word I-thou

Here Is The Infallible Test. Imagine Yourself In A Situation Where You Are Alone, Wholly Alone On Earth, And You Are Offered One Of The Two, Books Or Men. I Often Hear Men Prizing Their Solitude But That Is Only Because There Are Still Men Somewhere On Earth Even Though In The Far Distance. I Knew Nothing Of Books When I Came Forth From The Womb Of My Mother, And I Shall Die Without Books, With Another Human Hand In My Own. 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 Being Looking At Me.

I Think No Human Being Can Give More Than This. Making Life Possible For The Other, If Only For A Moment.

I Do Not Accept Any Absolute Formulas For Living. No Preconceived Code Can See Ahead To Everything That Can Happen In A Man's Life. As We Live, We Grow And Our Beliefs Change. They Must Change. So I Think We Should Live With This Constant Discovery. We Should Be Open To This Adventure In Heightened Awareness Of Living. We Should Stake Our Whole Existence On Our Willingness To Explore And Experience.

I Have To Tell It Again And Again: I Have No Doctrine. I Only Point Out Something. I Point Out Reality, I Point Out Something In Reality Which Has Not Or Too Little Been Seen. I Take Him Who Listens To Me At His Hand And Lead Him To The Window. I Push Open The Window And Point Outside. I Have No Doctrine, I Carry On A Dialogue.

For Sin Is Just This, What Man Cannot By Its Very Nature Do With His Whole Being; It Is Possible To Silence The Conflict In The Soul, But It Is Not Possible To Uproot It