Bonhoeffer's Ethics of Discipleship

This is the first book to focus on the ethic that Dietrich Bonhoeffer constructed during the 1930s—an ethic he crafted while playing a key role in Christian resistance to Nazism and an ethic still inspiring politically active Christians. The ethic of discipleship, this study argues, represents a reworking of the Christian faith so that it becomes actively opposed to totalitarianism. This book therefore adds a significant dimension to the published record concerning the German theologian and pastor executed in 1945 for conspiring to assassinate Hitler and overthrow the Third Reich.

Since an ethic reflects more than a cognitive assent and has emotional and experiential dimensions, the author's approach is socio-psychological, drawing on the large documentary record of Bonhoeffer's family relations. Reductionism, however, is rejected in this book, which gives social psychology parity but not superiority—in understanding Bonhoeffer's religious quest and political dialogue.