| Author Quoted | Martin Buber |
| Title Quoted | I and Thou |
| Date (Year/Month/Day) | 1958/04/28 |
| Imprint | |
| Quotation | Fine climax to Buber's I and Thou. "Meeting with God does not come to man in order that he may concern himself with God, but in order that he may confirm that there is meaning in the world. "All revelation is summons and sending. But again and again man brings about instead of realization, a reflection to Him who reveals. He wished to concern himself with God instead of with the world. Only in such a reflection he is no longer confronted by a Thou, he can do nothing but establish an It - God in the realm of things, believes that he knows of God as of an It and so speak about him"¦ "God remains present to you when you have been sent forth; he who goes on a mission has always God before him: the truer the fulfillment the stronger and more constant his nearness. He cannot concern himself directly with God but Its apparent turning towards the primal source belongs in truth to the universal movement away from it"¦" These are among the wisest religious truths written in our century. |
| Quotation Source | A Search for Solitude: Pursuing the Monk's True Life. The Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume 3, 1952-1960.; Edited by Lawrence S. Cunningham. / San Francisco : Harper Collins. 1996, p. 195-96 |
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| Link to Merton's Copy |
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