Since Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of the great cloud of witnesses I included in Acts Of Faith, and since I didn’t read a full biography of him in preparation for writing that half-chapter but rather relied on snippets of information gleaned from a couple of places, I decided I should read a biography of Bonhoeffer. I figured, if what I had already written was somehow off the mark or lacked vital information, I could add it and re-publish the book. So I looked in my library and, sure enough, found a suitable book.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Opponent of the Nazi Regime was written by Michael Van Dyke, published in 2001. It is part of Balfour Publishing’s Heroes of the Faith series, comprised of [then] 44 volumes. A short biography at 205 pages. In fact, it really isn’t biography per se. Rather, it is more creative non-fiction, for it contains much dialog between Bonhoeffer and others, dialog that could not possibly have been preserved to be able to reproduce in a book such as this.
That didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book. It was simple, meant to be understood by almost anyone. It didn’t go much into his early years. Starting at World War 1, the book describes an aristocratic lifestyle for the Bonhoeffer family. In the opening chapter, Walter, the oldest of the Bonhoeffer siblings, was killed fighting in France. This set the tone for the book.
The Bonhoeffer home was strict, Christian, and loving. Dietrich was studious from the beginning. He went to university and excelled there. Always a Christian based on his childhood memories, he still found a need to have an encounter with God, and for God to become personal for him. As the book says:
The one thing missing from Dietrich’s life during these pears of intense theological and philosophical study, though, was a warm heart of true faith. He was learning everything that had ever been said about God, and yet he never spoke to God himself. He never prayed or read the Bible in order to hear what God was saying to him personally. Growing up in a highly intellectual atmosphere, he had absorbed the assumption that expressions of religious fervor were something of the ignorant masses did. It was the province of those who lived according to their hearts, not according to their minds.
Bonhoeffer eventually found that experience with God. It was, perhaps, less emotional than some people experience. He came to believe that:
Christianity was the daily experience of God, both individually and corporately, to the furtherance of God’s glory alone.
Most of the book deals with Bonhoeffer’s relationship to the Nazis after they came to power. He tried to get the church to see that Hitler and his accomplices were evil and that the church should oppose them. He lamented that instead the church either embraced Hitler or acquiesced to the Nazis’ impositions on the church. He spent much time in theological studies and reflections trying to figure out what the correct response of the church and Christians should be to someone like Hitler. Bonhoeffer was a believer in non-violent resistance in the mode of Gandhi. How would that work against the Nazis?
Then World War 2 came. Bonhoeffer was of age where he could be called into the service. His brother-in-law was a member of an organization, the Abwer, that allegedly conducted counterintelligence but essentially was working to overthrow the government, either by a putsch or by assassination. Bonhoeffer joined. The violent intentions of the organization troubled him, but he went ahead with it. This is what eventually caused him to be sent to prison and, ultimately, executed.
The part of the book dealing with Bonhoeffer’s time in prison was very good. Interrogations, dealings with other prisoners, prison letters, relocation to different prisons. It’s all there.
At some point I will want to read a more comprehensive biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, but for now this will do. I’m not sure if I’ll keep this in my library or not. My wife may want to read it, so I suppose I will keep it for now.
