Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy

by Eric Metaxas

Suddenly a trumpet fanfare on the radio loudspeakers announced a special news flash: France had surrendered! Twenty-two years after Germany’s humiliation, Hitler had turned the tables. People went wild3. Some of them leaped up and stood on chairs; others stood on tables. Everyone threw out his arm in the Nazi salute and burst into “Deutschland über Alles” and then the “Horst Wessel Song.” It was a pandemonium of patriotism, and Bonhoeffer and Bethge were pinned like beetles. At least Bethge was. Bonhoeffer, on the other hand, seemed to be a part of it. Bethge was flabbergasted: along with everyone else, his friend stood up and threw out his arm in the “Heil, Hitler!” salute. As Bethge stood there gawking, Bonhoeffer whispered to him: “Are you crazy? Raise your arm! We’ll have to run risks for many different things, but this silly salute is not one of them!” Bethge’s extraordinary friend and mentor had schooled him in many things over the previous five years, but this was something new.