All real living is meeting. - Martin Buber

To look away from the world, or to stare at it, does not help a man to reach God; but he who sees the world in Him stands in His presence.

It was from Buber’s other writings that I learned what could also be found in I and Thou: the central commandment to make the secular sacred.

The Two Caps Rabbi David Moshe, the son of the rabbi of Rizhyn, once said to a hasid: “You knew my father when he lived in Sadagora and was already wearing the black cap and going his way in dejection; but you did not see him when he lived in Rizhyn and was still wearing his golden cap.” The hasid was astonished. “How is it possible that the holy man from Rizhyn ever went his way in dejection! Did not I myself hear him say that dejection is the lowest condition!” “And after he had reached the summit,” Rabbi David replied, “he had to descend to that condition time and again in order to redeem the souls which had sunk down to it.