Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Theologian in Nazi Germany Issue 32 | 1991

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Dr. Karl Bonhoeffer was a prominent neurologist and a professor of psychiatry at the University of Berlin. In addition, he served as director of the psychiatric and neurological clinic at the Charite Hospital Complex in Berlin. Trained in the disciplines of science, he encouraged in his children self-reliance, control, independence, and objectivity. He was not at all enthused when Dietrich decided as a boy to become a minister and theologian.
Paula Bonhoeffer was daughter of Karl-Alfred von Hase, a chaplain in the court of Kaiser William II. Her grandfather was renowned church historian Karl-August von Hase. Paula exercised profound influence on all her children. She was concerned that they develop familiarity with the Bible, hymns, and traditions of the Christian faith.
The Bonhoeffers had eight children: Walter, Karl-Friedrich, Klaus, Ursula, Christine, Sabine, Dietrich, and Susanne.
The Bonhoeffer home nourished a climate of anti-Nazism from the 1920s. Karl wrote in his memoirs: “From the outset we considered the victory of National Socialism in the year 1933 and Hitler’s being named Reich Chancellor as a misfortune.”
In addition, the parents fought anti-Semitism from the beginning of their family life. In a recent interview Eberhard Bethge stated with potency: “I am absolutely convinced that for Dietrich Bonhoeffer as for his family, the Jews were the main reason for sharing in the conspiracy.” It was little wonder that the Bonhoeffers’ home became a meeting place for resisters to the Nazis.

Were it not for Eberhard and Renate Bethge, it is unlikely this issue of Christian ...