Abstract
The focus of this essay is on human relationships, specifically, the empowering potential of those relationships, and, most particularly, on the empowering potential those relationships have for enabling us to discover our respective possibilities. It is argued that we often discover who we are and what we can become as our possibilities are discovered by another and reflected back to us. This empowering potential of human relationships can be helpfully understood as a manifestation of the redemptive role of God in human life.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Keen, S.,To a Dancing God. New York, Harper and Row, 1970, pp. 100–101.
Jaspers, K., “On My Philosophy.” In Kaufmann, W., ed.,Existentialism From Dostoevsky to Sartre. New York, New American Library, 1975, p. 174.
Ibid..
Hegel, G.W.F.,The Phenomenology of Mind, J.B. Baillie, trans. London, George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1931; see especially pp. 226–227. In commenting on Hegel, Robert Solomon observes that Hegel is “the one philosopher in the modern tradition who saw rather clearly that selfhood and self-consciousness presuppose interaction with other people. ...“Solomon, R., “Reflections on the Meaning of (Fetal) Life.” In Bondeson, W.,et al., eds.,Abortion and the Status of the Fetus. Dordrecht, Holland, 1983, p. 209.
de Mello, A.,Wellsprings. New York, Doubleday and Co., 1986, p. 61.
Ibid., p. 89.
Ibid., p. 117.
Ibid., p. 156.
Claypool, J.,Opening Blind Eyes. Oak Park, Ill., Meyer Stone Books, 1987, p. 52.
Ibid., p. 57.
Ibid., p. 58.
Ibid., pp. 58–59.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Baird, R.M. “Reflections on a peach-seed monkey”: Empowering relationships. J Relig Health 29, 21–27 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00987091
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00987091