Author ERIC METAXAS
Publisher THOMAS NELSON
ISBN 1-5955-5138-2
This book has been received enthusiastically by American evangelicalism in the eighteen months since it was published. Some regard it as the definitive biography of Bonhoeffer. However, there are those who have certain reserves with which I would concur. The author writes both interestingly and excitingly, almost as though he is turning everything into a story the way certain movies do when dealing with real life events, they subtly adapt them to put over a point of view or to spice the whole thing up. I wonder how much this book has been produced to boost the American evangelical mindset. This element of the life of Bonhoeffer being turned into an exciting story left me feeling, especially at points as though the author had been pressed into writing something too soon, more serious research into his subject and his times may have been of use. For a book dealing with such massive subject matter the Bibliography is not as substantial as maybe it should be and the absence of German sources is noticeable. Was Bonhoeffer something like a right wing American Evangelical, he certainly seems to have been according to this biographer although reading through some of his theology would not indicate that this was so. In the course of this book we obviously read about Martin Luther and his anti-Semitic views, especially those of his later life and yet this does not explain the strong racial bias in favor of the Germanic people and against the Jew. This indicates that, to a degree this biography tends toward a limited portrayal of the Germany in which Bonhoeffer grew up and the battle with the Nazis in which he took part. I note the use of these four words describing Bonhoeffer, pastor, martyr, prophet and spy, however there is one word missing namely, theologian. Although Metaxas does frequently visit the writings of his subject the ones he uses do not do justice to the complicated nature of this theologian’s thought, Bonhoeffer was a complex man with a brilliant mind. “Cometh the hour, cometh the man” is a proverb that we could employ about him and many others in the days of Nazism, its enemies both within Germany and among the allies that fought in the Second World War. Having pointed out these caveats there is much value and instruction as to God and His ways to be found here. The way He prepares His men, shaping them even from family background, upbringing, education and a multitude of other elements. It becomes clear that Bonhoeffer grew into a man determined to do the will of God faithfully, and, if necessary to swim against the tide, even if that tide was sweeping with it many of his fellow pastors and church leaders. Actually, there is a second sub-title not found on the cover of the book but on the title page and this better explains Bonhoeffer in “a righteous Gentile versus the Third Reich.” Yet, even that is not a complete description. He was a Christian and a lover of God, a man of his times and one from whose life we can learn much. He was one of God’s twentieth century men and martyrs.
