April 5. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pastor and theologian, who became the lead spokesperson for German Protestant resistance to the Nazis.
Much of his resistance work was done undercover inside the Germany’s Military Intelligence organization, but he also demanded that the Nazi’s change the way they defined Jewish people.
He insisted Christians with Jewish ancestry were entitled to all the rights as other Christians. In this point, he was at odds with the Nazis and with some of the Christian leaders. The Nazis took away his right to lecture or publish. Too soon, they took away his life. Here’s how it happened.
One man of peace can wage war on evil.
When the Nazis came into power, they envisioned a new Germany. And they built Dachau first to house political prisoners, but it soon turned into a concentration camp for anyone the Nazis deemed unfit for the new Germany, including anyone with Jewish grandparents, artists, intellectuals, Gypsies, the physically and mentally handicapped, and homosexuals.
The government bullied Jewish people. The government destroyed Jewish-owned businesses. The government assassinated handicapped and mentally challenged people to get them out of the way. Evil swept through Germany, and it grew. The government was evil.
A week after Hitler declared himself Fuhrer, which means “supreme leader,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer went on the radio and proclaimed that Hitler was not the supreme leader. Only God was supreme.
Someone at the radio station cut off the speech—as Bonhoeffer was speaking. Silence filled the radio air. It was not the last time Germany would seek to silence Bonhoeffer. But he’d just begun to speak.
He tried to rally fellow ministers to join him, to stand up against Hitler. But they refused. Instead, they joined Hitler and literally took down crosses and put up swastikas.
One minister told Bonhoeffer, “Hitler is a gift sent by Christ.”
Seeing the cowardice of the church, Bonhoeffer was more determined than ever to end the evil.
He discovered that his brother-in-law Hans Dohnanyi headed part of the Resistance, and he also worked for the Abwehr, a German-government-intelligence office.
So Dohnanyi got Bonhoeffer hired to be a counterintelligence officer. He was a courier and diplomat to Great Britain. In his job, Bonhoeffer traveled to various countries and acquired information that would be valuable to the German government—and he smuggled out documents and proof of the atrocities Germany was committing against the Jews.
Dohnanyi asked Bonhoeffer to explain how God would not punish them if they killed Hitler. Bonhoeffer prayed extensively and explained it to Dohnanyi and the other members of the Resistance, some of whom were high-ranking officers in the German army.
“Sometimes a Christian must sin boldly for the cause of Christ,” Bonhoeffer said. “If I see a madman driving into a group of innocent bystanders, I can’t, as a Christian, simply wait for the catastrophe, comfort the survivors, and bury the dead. I must try and wrestle the steering wheel out of the driver’s hands.”
Bonhoeffer told his brother-in-law, “Hitler must be killed. I will kill him myself, if needed.”
Dohnanyi was grateful for Bonhoeffer’s willingness, but believed he’d be more valuable to the Resistance as a spiritual leader and courier.
In 1943, Dohnanyi delivered a special fuse and detonator to a high-ranking military man. He attached the detonator and the bomb to a bottle of Cognac and put it on Hitler’s plane. But somehow it didn’t go off.
A few days later, the Resistance gave two bombs to a partner Major Gerrsdorff, who hid the bombs in his pockets. Hitler would be visiting the area to inspect some weaponry, and Gersdorff was the guide. He planned to detonate the bombs and wrap his arms around Hitler. And they’d both die, ending the reign of evil.
But after the bombs were already detonated, Hitler unexpectedly hurried through the exhibition. He’d escaped again.
That time, Gerrsdorff was able to defuse the bombs.
Another attempt to kill Hitler resulted in the deaths of four Nazi officials, but not Hitler.
Dohnanyi assigned Bonhoeffer to get fifteen Jews out to Switzerland with new documents for each. And the mission was a success. The fifteen were safe.
But the Gestapo found out; they also found papers that linked Bonhoeffer to the assassination attempt, and they arrested Dohnanyi and Bonhoeffer.
He spent the next two years in prison, but he used his time to minister to others and to write books that inspired readers to live for Christ and to spurn evil. Three weeks before Hitler killed himself, the Nazis hanged Dohnanyi and Bonhoeffer.
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us,” (Romans 8: 18, NASB.)
What about you? Do you have the courage to stand up to bullies in our society? One man of peace can wage war on evil.
Bethge, Eberhard. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, A Biography (Minneapolis, MN, Fortress Press, 2000).
McCormick, Patricia. The Plot to Kill Hitler: Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Spy, Unlikely Hero (New York City, NY, Balzer + Bray, 2016)
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Ethics. P. 267.
Story read by Daniel Carpenter
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“… It is not only what is said that matters, but also the man who says it.”
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer