Love is responsibility of an I for a You: in this consists what cannot consist in any feeling - the equality of all lovers.
Interpretation
Love transcends mere feelings; it is an active commitment to care for another person as an equal.
Martin Buber's quote emphasizes that love involves a profound responsibility between individuals, where one person (the 'I') actively engages and commits to the well-being of another (the 'You'). This perspective highlights that true love is not just a feeling but a conscious choice to uphold equality and mutual care between lovers, suggesting that love is rooted in shared responsibility rather than emotional dependency.
In practice
In a wedding ceremony, one might quote this to emphasize the responsibility that partners take for one another.
When I confront a human being as my Thou and speak the basic word I-Thou to him, then he is no thing among things nor does he consist of things. He is no longer He or She, a dot in the world grid of space and time, nor a condition to be experienced and described, a loose bundle of named qualities. Neighborless and seamless, he is Thou and fills the firmament. Not as if there were nothing but he; but everything else lives in his light.
Play is the exultation of the possible.
There is no room for God in him who is full of himself.
Every person born in this world represents something new, something that never existed before, something original and unique.
It is usual to think of good and evil as two poles, two opposite directions, the antithesis of one another...We must begin by doing away with this convention.
God dwells wherever man lets Him in.
There is an efficiency inspired by love which goes far beyond and is much greater than the efficiency of ambition; and without love, which brings an integrated understanding of life, efficiency breeds ruthlessness.
But one kiss levitates above all the others. The intersection of function and desire. The I do kiss. The Iβll love you through a brick wall kiss. Even when Iβm dead, Iβll swim through the Earth, like a mermaid of the soil, just to be next to your bones.
True love stories never have endings.
We fall in love because we long to escape from ourselves with someone as beautiful, intelligent, and witty as we are ugly, stupid, and dull. But what if such a perfect being should one day turn around and decide they will love us back? We can only be somewhat shocked-how can they be as wonderful as we had hoped when they have the bad taste to approve of someone like us?
Endeavoring to purchase something we think beautiful may in fact be the most unimaginative way of dealing with the longing it excites in us, just as trying to sleep with someone may be the bluntest response to a feeling of love.
You can't touch love, but you can feel the sweetness that it pours into everything.
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