Martin Buber: Power

Martin Buber was German Jewish Existentialist philosopher and theologian. Explore interesting quotes on power.
Martin Buber: 116   quotes 21   likes

“Every morning
I shall concern myself anew about the boundary
Between the love-deed-Yes and the power-deed-No
And pressing forward honor reality.”

Martin Buber

"Power and Love" (1926)
Context: p> Every morning
I shall concern myself anew about the boundary
Between the love-deed-Yes and the power-deed-No
And pressing forward honor reality.We cannot avoid
Using power,
Cannot escape the compulsion
To afflict the world,
So let us, cautious in diction
And mighty in contradiction,
Love powerfully.</p

Love , Reality

“We cannot avoid
Using power,
Cannot escape the compulsion
To afflict the world,
So let us, cautious in diction
And mighty in contradiction,
Love powerfully.”

Martin Buber

"Power and Love" (1926)
Context: p> Every morning
I shall concern myself anew about the boundary
Between the love-deed-Yes and the power-deed-No
And pressing forward honor reality.We cannot avoid
Using power,
Cannot escape the compulsion
To afflict the world,
So let us, cautious in diction
And mighty in contradiction,
Love powerfully.</p

Love , World , Affliction

“So long as a man’s power, that is, his capacity to realize what he has in mind, is bound to the goal, to the work, to the calling, it is, considered in itself, neither good nor evil, it is only a suitable or unsuitable instrument. But as soon as this bond with the goal is broken off or loosened, and the man ceases to think of power as the capacity to do something, but thinks of it as a possession, that is, thinks of power in itself, then his power, being cut off and self-satisfied, is evil; it is power withdrawn from responsibility, power which betrays the spirit, power in itself.”

Martin Buber

Source: Between Man and Man (1965), p. 152

Thinking , Evil

“When we see a great man desiring power instead of his real goal we soon recognize that he is sick, or more precisely that his attitude to his work is sick.”

Martin Buber

Source: What is Man? (1938), p. 180
Context: When we see a great man desiring power instead of his real goal we soon recognize that he is sick, or more precisely that his attitude to his work is sick. He overreaches himself, the work denies itself to him, the incarnation of the spirit no longer takes place, and to avoid the threat of senselessness he snatches after empty power. This sickness casts the genius on to the same level as those hysterical figures who, being by nature without power, slave for power, in order that they may enjoy the illusion that they are inwardly powerful, and who in this striving for power cannot let a pause intervene, since a pause would bring with it the possibility of self-reflection and self-reflection would bring collapse.

“The great man, whether we comprehend him in the most intense activity of his work or in the restful equipoise of his forces, is powerful, involuntarily and composedly powerful, but he is not avid for power. What he is avid for is the realization of what he has in mind, the incarnation of the spirit.”

Martin Buber

Source: Between Man and Man (1965), p. 151

“Greatness by nature includes a power, but not a will to power.”

Martin Buber

Source: Between Man and Man (1965), p. 150

Nature

“It is the highest service to submit the evil impulse to God through the power of love.”

Martin Buber

Source: For The Sake of Heaven (1945), p. 45

Love , Making love , God , Evil

“God … desires His creature to be able to oppose Him. He has given that creature freedom. … When man turns away from evil with that whole measure of power with which he is able to rebel against God, then he has truly turned to God.”

Martin Buber

Source: For The Sake of Heaven (1945), p. 44

God , Evil , Freedom