Ethics

Translated from the German: Ethik.

It is hard to review Bonhoeffer's Ethics since it is not completed. Many of its portions seem a bit disjointed, especially the somewhat arcane discussion of Lutheran primus usis legis and the like.

Nevertheless, the general theory of the book has merit-- the world is not dualist, but singular, under the authority of Jesus Christ who reconciled the world to God through His blood. Nothing can be properly understood as apart from Christ, since Christ is the source of creation and all things exist because of Him. On account of these things, and in an attempt to make sense of reality, Bonhoeffer identifies four mandates that God imposes upon the world-- labor, marriage (he adds family to this on occasion), government, and the church. Bonhoeffer sees each of these functioning in complementary ways and operating under their distinct mandates.

It would have been great to see how all the different pieces could contribute to this whole, but alas, such will not be the case. ( )

CONTENTS:
PART ONE
I. Ethics as Formation & Inheritance and Decay: Guilt, Justification and Renewal
II. Christ, Reality and Good (Christ, the Church and the World)
III. The Last Things and the Things Before the Last
IV. The Love of God and the Decay of the World
V. The Church and the World
VI. History and Good & The Place of Responsibility
VII. The 'Ethical' and the 'Christian' as a Theme & The Concrete Commandment and the Divine Mandates

PART TWO
I. The Doctrine of the Primus Usus Legis According to the Lutheran Symbolic Writings
II. Personal and 'Real' Ethos
III. State and Church
IV. On the Possibility of the Word of the Church to the World
V. What is Meant by 'Telling the Truth'?

This work is unfinished due to the death of Bonhoeffer by Nazi Germany. Bonhoeffer argues that the church should challenge the government to rule justly. In this way, he moves away from his more passive (less politically radical) message in his Cost of Discipleship. ( )

This is his last writing, and it is unfinished because he was executed in prison for living the ethics he preached. In this book, Bonhoeffer states, "Ethics as formation, then, means the bold endeavor to speak about the way in which the form of Jesus Christ takes form in our world, in a manner which is neither abstract nor casuistic, neither programmatic nor purely speculative." ( )