Martin Buber's Dialogical History: Theopolitics as a Critique of the History of Human Power

Abstract:This essay explores the relationship between Buber's philosophy of history and his political theory, known also as theopolitics. Buber's first book on theopolitics, Kingship of God (1932), implemented the principle of dialogue as a critique of leadership. Dialogue reconciles the paradox of authoritarian theocracy and absolute freedom of anarchy: it unites the interhuman relationship (religious anarchy) and the divine-human relationship (direct theocracy). Without dialogue, anarchy would become chaotic and theocracy would actually mean the tyranny of the priests (hierocracy). But Buber's theopolitics also revealed a particular understanding of history. As this essay demonstrates, Buber held a notion of dialogical history (contrary to Hegelian dialectic history), which ultimately functioned as a critique of the history of victory and power. Dialogical history criticizes not only secular but also any kind of religious or sacred history claiming to authorize human power by divine justification. Dialogical history, therefore, should be seen as "counter-history," not only because it is based on a rehabilitation of myth (Hasidic tales and biblical myths) but also because it is engaged in an alternate philosophy of history, whose fulfillment is vouchsafed neither by the necessary unfolding of a spirit, nor by "great" historical deeds, but by everyday human agency and responsibility alone.