Everyone Who Acts Responsibly Becomes Guilty: Bonhoeffer's Concept of Accepting Guilt

by Christine Schliesser

Overview

"Everyone who acts responsibly becomes guilty" was a basic premise that Dietrich Bonhoeffer expressed in various ways in his theology and ethics. Even Bonhoeffer's own actions—in praying for the defeat of his country in World War II and in participating in a plot to assassinate Hitler—demonstrate the tension between the reality of guilt and Bonhoeffer's ethical decisions.

In this study, Christine Schliesser examines the problem of guilt in Bonhoeffer's writings, arguing that the concept of accepting guilt emerges from Bonhoeffer's understanding of Christology. Since Jesus Christ has accepted the guilt of humankind, so the disciple must also be willing to accept guilt for the sake of the other. In addition, Schliesser reveals the unresolved tensions that emerge in the concept of accepting guilt and discusses the extent to which Bonhoeffer's concept is still relevant to Christian ethics today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780664232160
Publisher:	Westminster John Knox Press
Publication date:	10/03/2008
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Christine Schliesser received her Ph.D. from Fuller Theological Seminary. She is the author of Schuld durch rechtes Tun? Verantwortliches Handeln nach Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Table of Contents

Foreword XI Acknowledgments XIII Introduction 1
1 History of Scholarship 3 I Preliminary Remarks 3 II History of Scholarship-An Overview of the Reception of Bonhoeffer's Concept of Accepting Guilt in Bonhoeffer Scholarship 4 III Results and Specification of Our Task 37
2 Sanctorum Communio: Acceptance of Guilt in the Church-Community 38 I Being-For-Each-Other and Being-With-Each-Other 40 II Stellvertretung in Sanctorum Communio 44 III Results 46
3 Act and Being: Guilt and Sin as Act and Being? 48 I The Concept of the Person 50 II Sin as Act and Being 50 III Two Understandings of Guilt as Act and Being 52 IV Results 54
4 Creation and Fall: The Beginning of Guilt 55 I Guilty of the Other's Guilt 57 II Good and Evil 61 III Freedom as Freedom for 64 IV Results 66
5 Temptation: The Temptation of Suffering 68 I Results 70
6 Discipleship: The Christological Necessity of Accepting Guilt 71 I Christ and Bearing: Two Dimensions 72
1 Bearing as Part of Discipleship 72
2 Bearing in Community with Christ 74
3 Excursus to Gal 6:2:'O [characters not reproducible] 75 II The Imago Christi 80 III Consequences of the Imago Christi: Accepting and Bearing Guilt 82
1 The Renunciation of One's Righteousness and Free, Responsible Action 83
2 The Renunciation of One's Dignity and Sharing Other's Guilt 85
3 The Renunciation of One's Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Freed Conscience 88
4 Accepting Guilt in Stellvertretung 90 IV Results 91
7 Life Together: Accepting Each Other within a Christian Community 93 I Results 95
8 The Prayerbook of the Bible: Praying and Suffering with Christ 97 I Results 98
9 Ethics:Accepting Guilt as Responsible Stellvertretung 100 I The Context: Bonhoeffer's Christology 101
1 The Early Works: Sanctorum Communio and Act and Being 103
2 The Berlin Lectures: Creation and Fall and Christology 105
3 The Illegal Seminary in Finkenwalde: Discipleship 109
4 Against the Background of the Conspiracy: Ethics 113
5 The Prison Years: Letters and Papers from Prison 116 II Responsible Life as Obligation/Bond and Freedom 117
1 Obligation as Stellvertretung 124
2 Obligation as Accordance with Reality 130
3 Freedom as Accountability for One's Life and Action: The Acceptance of Guilt and the Role of the Conscience 137
4 Freedom as the Venture of a Concrete Decision 142 III Results 144
10 Letters and Papers from Prison: Accepting Guilt and "The Need for Free and Responsible Action" 145 I After Ten Years 146 II Existential Perspectives on Accepting Guilt 148
1 "Night Voices in Tegel" 149
2 "Jonah" 153 III Results 156
11 The Concept of Accepting Guilt in Dietrich Bonhoeffer: A Reconstruction 158 I Sanctorum Communio 159 II Act and Being 161 III Creation and Fall 162 IV Temptation 163 V Discipleship 164 VI Life Together 167 VII The Prayerbook of the Bible 167 VIII Ethics 168 IX Letters and Papers from Prison 172 X Results 174
12 Unresolved Tensions within Bonhoeffer's Concept of Accepting Guilt and Further Deliberations 175 I The Moral Dilemma 176 II Guilt as Innocence? 178 III Guilt Actively Incurred vs. Guilt Non-Actively Incurred 180
1 A Christological Confusion? 181 IV A Contradiction within the Will of God Itself? 186 V Bonhoeffer's Understanding of Guilt: A Lack of Definition? 189 VI Summary of Tensions in Bonhoeffer's Concept of Accepting Guilt 190 VII Was Bonhoeffer Guilty? 191 VIII Bonhoeffer as Christian or as Political Martyr? 195 IX Biography and Theology in Bonhoeffer 198 X Bonhoeffer's Ethics and his Concept of Accepting Guilt: Still of Any Use? 200 XI Summary of Further Deliberations 204 Bibliography 207