The Bonhoeffer Reader

17. The Right to Self-Assertion

330 1. [DB-ER, 223. For more on the chaplaincy, see DBWE 11:480–482 and DB-ER, 222–226.] 2. [DBWE 11:246, n. 2. For his later reflections, see DBWE 6:239–245.] 3. [DBWE 11:247, n. 4.] 17. The Right to Self-Assertion DBWE 11:246–257 After returning from the ecumenical conference in Cambridge, Bonhoeffer undertook a new assignment as a chaplain at Berlin’s Technical College. Of this role, which Bonhoeffer filled in 1931–1932, his close friend and biographer, Eberhard Bethge, offers this blunt assessment: “Bonhoeffer’s work as student chaplain was unfruitful.”1 The College lacked a strong tradition of chaplaincy, and Bonhoeffer had difficulty attracting students to his devotions and talks. The following talk delivered at the College shows that in his chaplaincy as much as in his ecumenical work Bonhoeffer was forced to deal with National Socialist ideology. The Nazi rhetoric of expansionism, which traded on the purported right of the nation to assert itself, provides Bonhoeffer with the opportunity to expound on a foundational issue in his ethics: the question of self-assertion and self-denial.2 He argues that true freedom comes through the denial of the self for others, a denial open to us through the self-sacrifice of Christ. Characteristically, Bonhoeffer discusses self-denial as applying not only to individuals but to communities as well. Thus the critique of National Socialism: as the individual lays down his life for his brother, so the nation might deny itself that others might live. This talk is noteworthy for more than Bonhoeffer’s resistance to Nazi ideology, however . Its opening passage demonstrates how heavily the economic depression weighed on Germans; at the time of this address in February 1932, more than 30 percent of the German workforce was unemployed.3 It also provides a glimpse into Bonhoeffer’s fascination with—and romanticizing of—India. He had at several points made serious plans to visit India, even securing a personal invitation from Mahatma Gandhi, only to have his plans fall through. 331 The Right to Self-Assertion 246 247 248 4. [“In February 1932, unemployment reached its highest point, with 6,128,000 persons unemployed, over 30 percent of the German workforce. This was a recurring issue for Bonhoeffer in 1932. See the German editor’s afterword DBWE 11:477, and the editors’ introduction, DBWE 11:2,” DBWE 11:247, n. 4.] No working person today can escape the observation that he is replaceable, that, indeed, behind him stand many who are only waiting, either to convince him of his dispensability during his very lifetime, or are just as eagerly ready to assure him of an immediate honor in his memory in the newspaper when things get serious. We are infinitely unimportant not only in terms of the overall picture of working humanity, but even from the particular place where we happen to find ourselves: It is extremely unimportant, whether I am studying or not; names are trivial and boring. Numbers say more and are more appropriate. And what city dweller does not know this impression of empty, futile importance at 7:30 in the morning, in the streets, on the trains, as thousands hurry to their work, to their livelihood, a condemned, patient, replaceable mass. It conveys something endlessly desolate and boring , yet exciting and outrageous at the same time. And we belong in the midst of the superfluous ones, and even our own situation has at the same time something very boring and very shocking for us. Partly out of boredom , partly out of indignation, we then decide in some way to put an end to the feeling of our being superfluous, be it through fired-up work performance , be it by getting married and bringing new beings into superfluous human existence and making them dependent on us, be it by forgetting our own pointlessness and now simply allowing ourselves to take it easy and enjoy ourselves in a vegetative existence. These are, indeed, three very different behavior patterns, but no one likes to be superfluous and one becomes inventive in making excuses. Every day you read new statistics in the newspapers that have only one purpose , namely, to show that there are too many people out there. Between 35 and 50 percent of all the pupils at the secondary schools, around 50 percent of university students, and 60 percent of the students at the technical colleges will not find a position. In the job market4 basically everything...