After reading several Carl Rogers books and papers I was led to Martin Buber's works. Martin Buber was one of the most profound thinkers of our times. Not an easy read but a one well worth the time and effort. Illuminating and insight on the subject of good and evil.

There is a sense that this is one of the most important book in my life. I have re-read it for the last 3 summers and i have found different things that i needed. Buber has a distinct method of communication that pulls from you who you are... i hear his subtlety in my ear even now. Buber is brilliant.

I read this book as part of a high school class, and the conversations within our class as a result of it were just amazing. a very deep and spiritual book. buber believes that there are three relationships people can have: relationships between man and things, between man and god, and between man and man. to put it simply, to have a relationship with things, you must go to them. to have a relationship with god, god has to come to you. but in relationships between man and man, we can come to each other...

read "Dialogue"

I Thou is truly one of the books that changed the way people think. I Thou is a book that has changed the world, and that is not an exaggeration. Buber's influence on counseling and psycho therapy is undenieable. Carl Rogers revised his thinking after his encounter with Buber and I Thou. I Thou teaches fundamental truths about interaction, interpersonal relationships, and true dialog. Martin Buber will long stand as the seminal work for dialog and interpersonal interactions. But, don't take my word for it, read the book.

This small book is obscure at times and difficult to grasp, yet it completely changed my life. I honestly think Buber wrote it poetically to encourage the reader to slow down and potentially I have a true encounter with the ideas. Most of Buber's later books seem to be developing the ideas expounded in I and Thou, so it might be helpful to read another Buber text, like Between Man and Man, alongside I and Thou. He becomes his own commentary. If you have the patience, I think you'll find this book opens a whole new perspective on relationships, our perspective on the world, and the potential for truly divine encounters.

In 1988 my life was completely transformed by this tiny book, and those effects continue today. Buber's powerful stance on human (and divine) relations is even more relevant and poignant today as we spend more and more time in enclosed rooms trying to communicate with strangers through machines. Buber understood human isolation so well and so eloquently mourned its harmful effects, proposing a far better way to live and relate to others.

I hope that readers will take the time to digest what Buber has to say. As for which transation to read, I began with the Kaufmann, but soon found the older one by Ronald Gregor Smith to be more direct, less wordy, and much more beautifullly written. However, regardless of which translation you read, this book is truly a gem.

I read this book because my friend recommended it to me. Well I recommend to everyone reading this review to stay away from this book which bores you with facts. Run, dont walk, away from this book.

R. G. Smith did a translation of Martin Buber's work, "I and Thou" that changed my life.

I have not read this book, but upon seeing the previous review I was concerned because the quality of other works by Smith such as Smith's translation of "I and Thou", which is a book of greatness. His words are so joyously chosen, not as words, but as part of a larger whole that moves beyond the world of objects into the world of unconditional relationship that touch the heart.

I have talked to and read Buber scholars who disagree. Those disagreements are based on politics and agenda, not inspiration or communications of the heart.

I would highly recommend any book by R. G. Smith.