Bonhoeffer's notion of maturity and the possibility of redemption

Abstract

This article discusses implications of Bonhoeffer's notion of maturity (being of age), particularly for the notion of redemption and the ethical self. This is done through a reading of the relation between maturity and redemption in Kant, Nietzsche, and Levinas, which again is compared with Bonhoeffer's late thought as we find it in his Prison letters and his Ethics. All three philosophers share with Bonhoeffer the important premise that otherworldly redemption is downplayed to the benefit of a strong demand put on the self. At the same time, their notions of maturity show important differences, with subsequent consequences for their notions of redemption; Kant's notion is based on ethical autonomy, Nietzsche's on aesthetical autonomy, whereas Levinas presupposes ethical heteronomy. The reading of Bonhoeffer shows that he shares premises with all three thinkers, but particularly with Levinas. This is shown in the analyses of religionless Christianity as a turn to the practical dimension of faith, in the messianic structure of the ethical self, and in the turn to the Old-Testamently and the arcane discipline. Bonhoeffer's high estimation of the worldly and the aesthetic, however, also illustrates his affinities to Nietzsche.

Notes

1. Osthövener (Erlösung) has shown how there is a transformation of the notion of redemption throughout the Protestant theological tradition; in comparing accounts of Luther, Schleiermacher, and beyond, he shows how the notion of redemption to a high degree has left the theological perspective to the benefit of an anthropological or psychological one.

2. For recent discussions of the relation of Bonhoeffer to continental philosophical thought, see particularly Gregor and Zimmermann, Bonhoeffer and Continental thought and Frick, Bonhoeffer's Intellectual Formation.

3. An overview of the wide reception of Bonhoeffer's theology is given by de Gruchy, The reception.

4. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 533. Bonhoeffer has this sentence from Grotius, and uses it to illustrate how the world has become autonomous and no longer is in need of God as “Arbeitshypothese” – neither in moral, politics, science, philosophy, or religion (Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 532).

5. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 558.

6. He comes up with no simple answers, but an interesting question is whether the epoch-making experience of resistance made him pose this question radically anew. Of course, most of Bonhoeffer's thinking around these questions was developed already in the thirties, often as implicit answers to the crisis and the lacking resistance of German churches during Nazism. However, Larry Rasmussen has argued that the radicality of his questioning and the lack of confidence therewith connected happens in the prison letters themselves. At some point, Rasmussen claims, Bonhoeffer leaves the faith in the notion of “Christian civilization," which also implies a breakup of his Christological ontology as a system (Rasmussen, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 85–87). Others, like Eberhardt Bethge, have rather emphasized the continuity of Bonhoeffer's thought.

7. There have been several attempts to relate Bonhoeffer 's thinking to one or more of these philosophers (e.g. Floyd, “Encounter with an Other;“ Green, “Bonhoeffer;” Janz “Bonhoeffer;” de Lange, “Aristocratic Christendom;” and Ford, Self and Salvation). They have informed my reading in a general sense, but since my aim is primarily to elaborate on the quite specific problem of the relation between maturity and redemption, I have mainly chosen to base my discussion on close readings of primary sources rather than discussions in the secondary literature.

8. Kant, “Beantwortung der Frage,” 35.

9. Kant, Die Religion, 89.

10. Barth, Die protestantische Theologie, 241.

11. One may seek to reduce the distance between the commanding and the obeying self, but equating them would be to exceed the limits of critical reason and posit oneself as holy (Kant, Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, 83). The dialectics therefore has to remain critical in order to preserve the distance.

12. Kant, Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, 72–74.

13. This is demonstrated in Kant's descriptions of how conscience works in Metaphysik der Sitten: Conscience is important there in order to decide whether an act falls under the moral law or not, and is thought of as an inner courtroom, with an inner judge through which everyone finds oneself “beobachtet, bedroht und überhaupt im Respekt (mit Furcht verbundener Achtung) gehalten.“ (Kant, Metaphysik der Sitten, 438) However, since the same person is both judge and accused, the accused has a tendency to win, and this is why man must imagine an other as judge – and understand one's duties as divine commands.

14. The intelligible character is what Kant describes as the personality of the person, which is where the origin of duty belongs (Kant, Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, 87).

15. Kant, Die Religion, 62.

16. Nietzsche, Jenseits von Gut und Böse, 629.

17. Owen, Maturity and Modernity, 74–75.

18. Nietzsche, Also sprach Zarathustra, 175.

19. Nietzsche, Also sprach Zarathustra, 177.

20. Nietzsche, Also sprach Zarathustra, 176.

21. Nietzsche, Der Antichrist, 190. Although the content of religion is here in focus, Nietzsche also links this tendency quite explicitly to the Jewish race or to what he calls a “rassenverwandte Art von Grössenwahn” that the Christians had no other choice but to take over (Nietzsche, Der Antichrist, 218).

22. Nietzsche, Der Antichrist, 209.

23. Nietzsche, Der Antichrist, 215.

24. Levinas would claim that I am not only responsible for the other, but for the very responsibility the other has towards me (Levinas, Autrement qu'être, 186). This surplus of responsibility on my behalf implies that the other always holds an authority over me (Levinas De Dieu qui vient, 230), and that I am always more responsible to the other than the other is to me (Levinas, Ethique et infini, 99).

25. Levinas, Ethique et infini, 95.

26. Levinas, Otherwise than being, 195, n12 / Autrement qu'être, 172–173.

27. Levinas, Autrement qu'être, 232.

28. Levinas, Autrement qu'être, 227.

29. Levinas, Difficile Liberté, 25.

30. Levinas, Difficile Liberté, 129.

31. Levinas, Difficile Liberté, 130 (my translation).

32. Levinas, Autrement qu'être, 250.

33. See e.g. Green, “Bonhoeffer.”

34. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 402–403.

35. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 435.

36. In Ethics, Bonhoeffer writes about the role of the church in the world in other and more confident terms: “Das Wort der Kirche an die Welt ist das Wort vom Kommen Gottes ins Fleisch, von der Liebe Gottes zur Welt in der Sendung seines Sohnes, vom Gericht Gottes über den Unglaubigen; das Wort der Kirche ist der Ruf zur Umkehr, zum Glauben an Gottes Liebe in Christus, zum sich-bereiten auf die Wiederkunft Christi, auf das kommende Reich Gottes. Es ist also Wort der Erlösung für alle Menschen.” (359)

37. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 533–534.

38. In Ethics, Bonhoeffer claims that “das Evangelium sein Wesen nicht darin hat, weltliche Probleme zu lösen und dass darin auch nicht die wesentliche Aufgabe der Kirche bestehen kann.” (358)

39. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 535–536.

40. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 279.

41. “Wo Christus, wahrer Gott und wahrer Mensch, zum Einheitspunkt meiner Existenz geworden ist, dort bleibt zwar das Gewissen – formal – immer noch der Ruf aus meinem eigentlichen Sein zur Einheit mit mir selbst; diese Einheit kann aber nicht mehr verwirklicht werden in der Rückkehr zu meiner aus dem Gesetz lebenden Autonomie, sondern in der Gemeinschaft mit Jesus Christus. Das natürliche – und sei es das rigoroseste – Gewissen erweist sich nun als die gottloseste Selbstrechtfertigung, es wird überwunden durch das in Jesus Christus befreite Gewissen, das zur Einheit mit mir selbst in Jesus Christus ruft.“ (Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 278–279)

42. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 308. The meaning of shame is, according to Bonhoeffer, missed by Kant, who observes himself ashamed while praying and takes this as an argument against prayer. What Kant has overlooked, Bonhoeffer claims, is how prayer – like the erotic relation – essentially belongs in the secret chamber (Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 306–307). The feeling of shame is in other words not only felt in the relation to other human beings, but also in relation to God.

43. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 304.

44. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 308.

45. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 337.

46. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 311.

47. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 339.

48. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 276.

49. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 279.

50. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 316. Although the splitting of the self in conscience is a presupposition for judgment or knowledge about good and evil, judgment is according to Bonhoeffer not what Christian ethics is about. The reason for this seems to be that judgment creates a distance that may reduce responsibility. Bonhoeffer explores the difference between judgment and neighbourly love in Nachfolge: “Im Richten treten wir dem Anderen gegenüber in dem Abstand der Beobachtung, der Reflexion. Die Liebe aber lässt dazu keinen Raum und keine Zeit. Der Andere kann dem Liebenden niemals Gegenstand zuschauerischer Betrachtung sein, sondern er ist jederzeit der lebendige Anspruch auf meine Liebe und meinen Dienst.” (178) Love, in other words, suspends the judging distance between me and the other. Love is still not blind, but rather something that opens the eyes, because love sees the other under the cross! In judgment, on the other hand, I am blind both to the evil in myself and the grace that concerns the other (Bonhoeffer, Nachfolge, 179).

51. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 226.

52. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 415–416.

53. E.g. in Nietzsche, Der Antichrist, 183.

54. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 295.

55. Bonhoeffer, Ethik, 295–296.

56. Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung, 291.