Dietrich Bonhoeffer: The Pastor-Spy and Community

How wonderful and pleasant it is when brothers and sisters live together in harmony! Ps. 133.1

The challenge of living together in “harmony” is one of the ongoing realities of most of our lives. An absence of harmony is discord or conflict. Some go through life with little conflict and for others life is conflict.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer is one of the most famous Christians of the 20th century because he is somewhat of an enigma. A theologian who was a spy. An assassination plotter who was an avowed pacifist. Much of his writing took place in Germany during the rise of Adolf Hitler and WW2. Unfortunately Bonhoeffer did not survive the war, and was executed in the war’s waning days.

Bonhoeffer wrote a book, Life Together, full of rich insights on living in community. Life Together grew out of Bonhoeffer’s years living under the slow but steady Nazification of Germany. Life and politics in this time was drenched in half-truths and propaganda. Families, friends and churches were unsure how to respond to increasing interference (or help, depending on one’s point of view) in social and ecclesial (church) life.

The slow but steady reforms of life during this time resulted in a political opposition in Germany that was weak and confused. So too the church. By the time Bonhoeffer wrote Life Together, converted Jews were no longer allowed to serve as pastors in German churches. The weak and cowardly life of the wider church at this time was the primary context for Bonhoeffer’s writing.

Yet there were those within the church who resisted. Most famous amongst these was Karl Barth (a famous theologian). There was also the German pastor Martin Niemoller, who wrote these famous words:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

I’ve peered into the cell where Niemoller spent WW2 as a personal prisoner of Adolf Hitler in Sachsenhausen Prison Camp outside of Berlin. It was unnerving. Yet even this brave man evidenced the confusion and poor judgment of many within Germany, and particularly those within the church, when long after the war he admitted:

I find myself wondering about that too. I wonder about it as much as I regret it. Still, it is true that Hitler betrayed me. I had an audience with him, as a representative of the Protestant Church, shortly before he became Chancellor, in 1932. Hitler promised me on his word of honor, to protect the Church, and not to issue any anti-Church laws. He also agreed not to allow pogroms against the Jews, assuring me as follows: “There will be restrictions against the Jews, but there will be no ghettos, no pogroms, in Germany.”

I really believed, given the widespread anti-Semitism in Germany, at that time—that Jews should avoid aspiring to Government positions or seats in the Reichstag. There were many Jews, especially among the Zionists, who took a similar stand. Hitler’s assurance satisfied me at the time. On the other hand, I hated the growing atheistic movement, which was fostered and promoted by the Social Democrats and the Communists. Their hostility toward the Church made me pin my hopes on Hitler for a while.

I am paying for that mistake now; and not me alone, but thousands of other persons like me.Link

It is this context of deceit, confusion and cowardice that Bonhoeffer forged his thoughts about community with a small group of other men.

Sartre said, “Hell—is other people.”

Bonhoeffer says, “Life together is a great gift.”

This is the introductory post for a closer examination of the book Life Together, which has proven to be so helpful in my own life.

For further reading I recommend Ferdinand Schlingensiepen’s Dietrich Bonhoeffer 1906-1945, or Eric Metaxas’ Bonhoeffer.