I-Thou: How You Make Me Real

Ich-Du, German for "I-Thou" ("Thou" being archaic English for "you," when it is both singular and the subject of a sentence), is a concept created by the philosopher Martin Buber. It is also the title of his book written on the subject.

"I-Thou" is what it's called when man enters into a certain kind of relationship. In it, man encounters another being. This encounter is a meeting, between two persons, two subjects. Both sides are equals, in the sense that neither side is acting nor receiving, dominant nor submissive. It's a sharing of a mutual experience, a mutual awareness, a mutual realness. Reciprocity is the key word, meaning that both sides equally share everything about themselves. One cannot enter into the I-Thou relationship without the fullness of your being; you must be yourself, entirely and sincerely. In the I-Thou relationship, you are confronted with the reality of another conscious person who's experiencing life just like you are, and you're doing it together.

I-Thou doesn't just exist between people. It can exist between man and nature, man and art (in any form), man and the universe, and man and G-d. But still, in some sense, these relationships exist between two beings; when in the I-Thou relationship, nature is not a thing, art is not a thing. They are as alive as you and I, and they both receive from us and take away. But throughout our lives, the Thou's that we encounter are more often than not people, who are much more easy to relate to and communicate with.

Buber believed that this relationship is what makes us "real." He says, "Through the Thou, man becomes an I." Before I come into contact with another person, I haven't truly become myself. People are by nature social; relationships are almost deeper than instinct, for even before someone is born his entire existence exists only as a relationship to his mother, and once he's brought into the world every necessity of is provided for him only through a fellow person. 

If man were to hypothetically live in solitude, never to meet a fellow person, could he be whole? Our thoughts and feelings spring from the heart like seeds, which have no purpose but to be planted in the soil of the "other." Left to remain in our own minds unfulfilled, they seem incomplete, indeed, even as if they're crowding our minds, as if we can't move on until they're released to be heard by another. People who are forced, either by punishment or misfortune, to live cut off from the world are frequently found later on to have somehow recorded their own thoughts. Not only do our minds need release, but our bodies as well. It's instinctive to desire affection, both friendly touch and sexual pleasure. They contribute to our overall comfort, health, and emotional well-being. As G-d is recorded as saying after creating the first human, "It is not good for man to be alone." It goes against everything about ourselves to remain by ourselves.

Let's look at The Inferno. In Hell, Dante is confronted with suffering to an unimaginable degree. Humans naturally share in the pain they see others suffering from, whether physical or psychological. In fact, that's where the word "compassion" comes from; "com" means "with", "passion" means "suffering" (literally; think "Passion of the Christ"). Twice throughout his adventure, Dante's senses fail from the sheer amount of torment that he confronts, and he loses consciousness. To Buber, this is indicative of the natural state of the I-Thou relationship. Dante is confronted with other beings, and because he relates to them fully and sincerely, he is affected almost as much by their suffering as they are through the give and take of the relationship, collapsing under the weight of an entire world's sorrow.

Another example is n the third circle of Hell, where Dante meets Ciacco, the Hogg, a man he knew from Florence. Ciacco is among the gluttons, living covered in an eternal shower of refuse and waste. Bloated and occasionally torn to pieces by the hell-hound Cerberus, Ciacco desperately calls out to Dante. He's ecstatic to meet another person, especially one not yet dehumanized by Hell, and questions Dante liberally about the state of Florence. Before returning to his bed of filth, Ciacco pleads with Dante, "But when you move again among the living, oh speak my name to the memory of men!" The tone in his voice is heartbreaking. The last image we have of him is his lying back down in the waste, forever indistinguishable from it. Ciacco, in some primal sense, knows what Buber knows. He will forever cease to exist if men forget his name. Everything he was, he thought, he did will have been in vain if he is forgotten. Indeed, having one's name cease to be mentioned means to no longer exist, because only that is real which exists in between men. Ciacco can take the endless torment. He's accepted it. It means that he's been returned something for what he brought into and took out of the world. It's proof that he existed, that he exists, and that whether for good or bad, his life had an impact and a purpose. To deprive him of remembrance is to make him nothing.

No fate could be more bleak.

And so, in the I-Thou, man glimpses eternity. Not only is man not real until he has this relation with another person, the entire external world cannot be real to him until he comes to this point. As we learned in class, Descartes teaches us that the only thing we can ever be sure of is our own existence. His proof? Our consciousness. Our thoughts and experiences that make up the wonder that is our "selves," show that we must exist. Buber diverges slightly; while this may prove that we exist, we do not fully become ourselves until we encounter another "self," just as real as our own, and yet separate. Once encountered, the world has gained our trust. Descartes believes we can't know anyone else exists, whereas Buber does. The proof is in the experience, and in that experience alone, eternity is captured and truth exists.