Derek: 00:23

Welcome back to the Fourth Wave Podcast. In this episode, I had the privilege of interviewing Doctor. Stephen Haines on his book, The Battle for Bonhoeffer. Now, Doctor. Haines actually has quite a number of other books related to Bonhoeffer, some of which he is going to talk a little bit about in this episode.

Derek: 00:44

And he's also got some other interesting ones related to segregation in the church and such. So I definitely recommend you check out all of his other books because he touches on a lot of subjects that I find interesting and which will relate to some of the issues that we have discussed this season. But in this episode, we are particularly focusing on the way that evangelicals are wielding Dietrich Bonhoeffer or particularly the conservative wing, the Trump wing of evangelicals. And we are going to talk about the issue of truth and why truth matters and kind of going back to our first episode of the season, why narratives are so important. This is a really short episode and we don't do justice to how broad and deep the topic is, so I highly recommend that you check out some of Doctor.

Derek: 01:41

Haynes' other work. Alright, Doctor. Haynes, thank you so much for being willing to chat today. Before we get started, I'd love for you to introduce yourself and talk a little bit about your book, The Battle for Bonhoeffer, and what led you to write that.

Dr. Haynes: 01:59

Hey, Derek. Thanks for the invitation to do this. So my name is Steve Haynes. I teach at Rhodes College in Memphis. I've been here for about thirty five years.

Dr. Haynes: 02:09

I've been interested in Bonhoeffer probably since college, but took a more academic interest in in him in the probably in the mid nineties as I was teaching a a course on the Holocaust at Rhodes, and I was interested in the German church struggle and how people like Bonhoeffer had responded to the Nazis. So I wrote three books in the February about Bonhoeffer and his reception. And then in 02/2018, actually, in 02/2016, I I wrote a an op ed piece in the Huffington Post shortly after the election where I tried to sort of sound the alarm about about Trump and about the way that people like Eric Metaxas had used Bonhoeffer to sort of rally support for him. And based on that article, I had a couple of authors to or please to write a book based on that. And so I did so it took a couple years to come out.

Dr. Haynes: 03:19

So it came out in 02/2018. It was called The Battle for Born Off Earth. And it was a an expansion of the essay. But also looking back at, how Bonhoeffer had been used and in, attempts to understand American culture, American history, American politics, really since 09/11. And so the first two chapters deal with that, sort of preparatory material, and, a lot of the book is about Eric Metaxas and his 02/2010 book on Bonhoeffer and the and the way that he had sort of launched this misinformation campaign about about the German theologian and trying to track that in the book.

Derek: 04:07

Yeah. You definitely spend a lot of time focusing on on more of the right wing politics, I think, because of those are the that's the group that's, I think, largely wielding it at this point. But before we kind of zoom in on that, what I really appreciated about your book is that you give a pretty broad view of Bonhoeffer and how he's been used. So I think that would be helpful before we zoom in to kind of talk about that. You said that back in the '60s when some were identifying that Bonhoeffer was kind of an important figure and starting to put him forward, that he was a Rorschach test, I think is the way that you put it.

Derek: 04:47

Could you briefly summarize the kind of bird's eye view of how Bonhoeffer has been used by various groups throughout history?

Dr. Haynes: 04:55

Yeah. So that was the subject of my 02/2004 book called the Bonhoeffer phenomenon, and I divided it up into several different Bonhoeffers, images, portraits of Bonhoeffers that people had developed. One was the radical Bonhoeffer, which sort of saw him as a radical theologian, who advocated the death of God or secularizing theology as it was being conceived in the nineteen sixties. That played out pretty quickly. There's also, sort of liberal Bonhoeffer that sees him sees his his legacy as particularly related to, the view from below and the, Christ in the neighbor and and seeing Bonhoeffer as a grandfather of liberation theology.

Dr. Haynes: 05:44

There's an evangelical Bonhoeffer, which, I can say more about as we go on. There is a sort of spiritual Bonhoeffer or universal Bonhoeffer, which is Bonhoeffer shorn of all his specific theological commitments. People in this category wanna wanna sort of capture his bravery and his humanism without all the religious trappings. And then at the end of the book, I talk about, sort of right wing Bonhoeffer as it existed at that time in 02/2004. It was Bonhoeffer being sort of held up as a as an anti abort abortion warrior, somebody who was inspiring those who murdered or sought to murder abortion abortion providers.

Dr. Haynes: 06:35

There was a whole sort of sort of cult of of bonafer in this area. So those are the main those are the main pictures that I that I focused on in that book.

Derek: 06:48

Yeah. Okay. So zooming a little bit into the evangelical circles, which is I know that I appreciated your kind of testimony of sorts at the end talking about where you had come from and and your association with evangelicalism. And I currently run-in those circles as well. And so it's something that my experience resonated very much with your prologue.

Derek: 07:15

Know, being taught in Christian school, this this idea of integrity and all of this stuff my whole life, and then coming to to, you know, the 20 and and kind of being shocked at at what was happening. So go ahead. Yeah.

Dr. Haynes: 07:31

Well, I was just thinking of my introduction to Bonhoeffer, which was in the seventies. I was in a parachurch, Christian group called Young Life. I was in a sort of training cadre, and they they asked us to read some books, including the cost of discipleship. Of course, they didn't offer any context for understanding it, but it was very provocative, very inspiring. So that was my initial introduction to Bonhoeffer.

Dr. Haynes: 07:57

And so yeah. To see him sort of co opted by the political right, and not just the political right, but the Trump the Trumpist right, you know, which is about as bad as, in my view, about as far away from Bonhoeffer as as possible to get and yet, you know, sort of fashion Bonhoeffer as a as a guide for for to follow this sort of path. It was really shocking, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Derek: 08:29

Yeah. And what was fascinating to me is that so you talk about how Bonhoeffer was a Rorschach test back in the sixties. Yeah. But evangelicals, by and large or that group was not too keen on Bonhoeffer initially. Mean, some of the theological aspects of questioning the virgin birth and that kind of thing, that's one of the core fundamentals, you know, from the early 1900s.

Derek: 09:01

How and I mean denominationalism is a huge thing in evangelicalism where you will separate denominations for very small things that aren't even a part of the fundamentals. So how did somebody like Bonhoeffer get incorporated to being this this huge hero and figurehead for evangelicals if they have to put aside, you know, or or at least bring into question some of these core fundamentals?

Dr. Haynes: 09:27

Yeah. It's a really good question. The the evangelical reception of Bonhoeffer is very interesting. If you go back to the sixties and seventies, there was a a strong push against this idea that Bonhoeffer was a suitable Christian hero. And some of the leading Bonhoeffer, some of the leading evangelical scholars at the time, you know, sounded this note of caution that he's not you may be impressed by his life, and some of his writings may seem very inspiring, but be careful because he was not he was not a real Christian.

Dr. Haynes: 09:59

We know that because he denied the virgin birth or was sort of mushy on the resurrection or because he read and endorsed Boltman Boltman or because he talks about Hegel or whatever it is. People were very, very reluctant to sort of endorse Bonhoeffer. And this this begins to change gradually, I think, because in evangelical culture, there's this real premium on bravery and standing against the world. And I think as this is my this is my own theory. I think as Christianity becomes saddled with responsibility for a lot of the world's ills, like slavery, the Holocaust, oppression, people are looking for heroes that sort of disprove that narrative.

Dr. Haynes: 10:55

And so Bonhoeffer becomes important because he was a somebody who stood up to Hitler, and he was a devout Christian. And he somebody you can point to. If somebody says, well, Christians stood by while Hitler, you know, sort of did his thing, said, well, what about Bonhoeffer? If people say that about slavery, you can say, what about Wilburforce? And by the way, I think this is the formula that Eric Metaxas has used to to gain so many book sales and so much success.

Dr. Haynes: 11:28

His his two most important books are about Wilbur Force and Bonhoeffer. And I think that's not coincidental. He really wants to demonstrate that there are Christians among the good guys, and you don't need to be ashamed if you wanna, you know, if if you wanna use the name of Christ of twenty first century. We have our heroes too.

Derek: 11:51

Yeah. And, yeah, I noticed that about Wilberforce as well, and it's I don't know. It seems like it goes very hand in hand with with, you know, a lot of people in my group not wanting to bear responsibility, wanting to take good things from our history

Dr. Haynes: 12:07

Right.

Derek: 12:08

Prop up the good without taking responsibility for the bad.

Dr. Haynes: 12:12

Sure. So

Derek: 12:17

as a Bonhoeffer scholar, it seems like, okay, you don't like the way that maybe Bonhoeffer is being wielded by certain groups of people. But it seems like it probably would be it's in your interest that Bonhoeffer's name is doing really well right now. And people are talking about him, you know, no press is bad press type of thing. So why are you so concerned with writing a book that undermines some of the myths about Bonhoeffer, some of the narratives that people have? Why do you think truth is is so important, and what can we learn from from the importance of truth in in the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer?

Dr. Haynes: 13:00

Yeah. So it's a really interesting question. I mean, the first thing you said was as a scholar. So that and that's partly an answer to your question. Right?

Dr. Haynes: 13:09

As a scholar, it's my job to care about truth. And I think it's important to remember that scholarship is is a is an evolutionary process. Right? So there's a view upon offer that's sort of reigns, and then somebody questions that, and then people critique that, and the sort of thing moves forward. This is this is natural.

Dr. Haynes: 13:33

And so the Bonhoeffer Society and the Bonhoeffer Guild is a is a pretty big tent with lots of different views within it. And as long as that tent, you know, is respected and as long as there's reasonable dialogue going on there, then I have no problem with that. The problem came when Metaxas came along and said, you know, the tenet of Bonhoeffer studies is is a lie. It's a lie, perpetrated by Bonhoeffer scholars for the last fifty years, and I alone am capable of telling the truth, and the truth is that everything you know about Bonifour is wrong. And, subsequently, when those of us within the Bonifour Guild have tried to point out to Metaxas, you know, his errors or engaging him, he's been he's been completely impervious to criticism.

Dr. Haynes: 14:25

And I I heard him say just a week or so ago that, you know, the only thing that people had pointed out about his his Bonhoeffer book was typos. And he knows better. This is fundamentally dishonest on his part. There are egregious errors of fact in his book, but there's also just this this misleading interpretation of of Bonhoeffer as as essentially an evangelical Christian. So I'm I'm interested in sort of searching for truth in the sort of on the scholarly path that's very slow and evolutionary.

Dr. Haynes: 15:02

But sometimes an intervention needs to be made when somebody has so egregiously, you know, misapplied Bonhoeffer and refused to submit to any criticism or feedback. So I felt like I needed to really address directly the things that had, gone wrong in in Bonifourter interpretation or the things that have gone, you know, far beyond, what reasonable people would would disagree about, and this seemed like the way to do it.

Derek: 15:34

Yeah. I'm I'm sure that question can kinda sound like a a sort of, you know, trivial question because it's like, well, course, we value truth. But I think the reason that I wanted to to ask that and have you expound on truth is because it seems like in our society and evangelical circles, the ends are justifying the means. And so doing what we need to do in order to accomplish God's will or the greater good is something that we're willing to do. And I remember I was having a conversation, having read your book before watching the Bonhoeffer film, I noticed a couple things that stood out that you had talked about in your book.

Derek: 16:15

One of them was that famous quote by Bonhoeffer, which made it into the film, something to the extent of like, to do nothing is or to not act is to act. Yeah. And also his direct involvement with taking Jews into Switzerland was something that was portrayed. And so I'm thinking, as I'm watching the film, I'm like, you know, those are beautiful things. Okay, it's the spirit of Bonhoeffer.

Derek: 16:42

It's, you know, I understand what they're trying to say. They're trying to paint this wonderful protagonist that we empathize with and but at the same time, having those falsehoods in films like that or portrayed by people like Metaxas produce a convenient sort of image that can then be wielded, I think. So I liked your story and maybe you could, as you're weaving in an answer, of weave in some of the stories that you had in your book. But you talk about your experience with one of

Dr. Haynes: 17:19

your

Derek: 17:19

pastors, you know, trying to justify having his means justify the ends with certain political candidates and such. And I think your your testimony here is is really helpful in understanding the importance of of integrity and truth.

Dr. Haynes: 17:36

Yeah. Before I get to that, let me just comment on the quote. Right? Not to act is to act. Not not to speak is to speak.

Dr. Haynes: 17:43

So you mentioned is it a Bonhoeffer quote. It's not a Bonhoeffer quote, and Metaxas is the one who popularized it. Metaxas knows it's not a Bonhoeffer quote. It's been proven demonstrably over and again that it's not a Bonhoeffer quote. And Warren Throckmorton, who's a a blogger that I follow, has has identified where it came from.

Dr. Haynes: 18:03

So the idea that you know, again, what scholars do is they they present something, and somebody comes along and says, I don't think that's a Bonifour person. Okay. My bad. We'll revise it, and we'll take it out. This is not this is not what does.

Dr. Haynes: 18:17

He just doubles down, and so the the movie continues this this sort of. Oh, yeah. So so I grew up in a in an evangelical church, in Key Biscayne, Florida, a suburb of Miami. As it turned out, Richard Nixon had a house on the island. He started coming to church occasionally at our church.

Dr. Haynes: 18:42

He really befriended our pastor, and our pastor got close to him and was invited to the White House to preach and so forth. We were all very proud of that. But in I guess, when Watergate unfolded in '73, our pastor John Huffman felt very felt very betrayed and, you know, asked Nixon sort of face to face, is any of this true? He was assured that it was not. And when it turned out that that he had been lied to, I mean, he publicly reputed Nixon.

Dr. Haynes: 19:16

And by publicly, I mean, like, in articles in Time Magazine and places like that. And this is something that I respected at the time as a young evangelical, but but began to respect more and more as I grew older, you know, the importance of speaking truth to power and not being seduced by power. This is the part that I think, you know, evangelicals today have really failed to to understand that they're shifting sort of moral values with regard to political candidates. It's really a reflection of something deeper, which is their their the ease with which they've been seduced to to give seduced to give their support to someone in exchange for a seat at the table and and cultural relevance. I think they feel like their relevance has been eroding, and it suddenly, it's it's come back, and they wanna make sure they take advantage of that.

Dr. Haynes: 20:12

And that's the exact opposite of what we should be doing as Christians, and it's it's the exact opposite of what I saw as a as a kid, as a teenager. And it and so going to this Trump thing, it really reminded me of this, and I got I got in touch with John Helfman and his his family. I read his biography, make sure I had all the details right. And so I retold that story as a way of sort of reminding evangelicals and Christians generally what it is that we could be doing, what it is we should be doing.

Derek: 20:54

Yeah. Like I said, that was the part I think that that resonated the most with me was your testimony at the end because, you know, honestly, when I first saw your book, I didn't read your book when it first came across as a recommended reading for me because, you know, when I see political sounding sorts of books, a lot of times I think, Okay, this is just going to be a polarization of, you know, somebody bashing, you know, the other side. And while I might agree with one bashing more than another, you know, I didn't want that. But a friend recommended it to me, a friend who I trust, and as I read it, I was just I was really pleasantly surprised with how balanced you were and especially your humility at the end with tying in your own story and not lambasting people but, you know, calling to repentance and reflection. I thought it was it was very helpful for me, for my heart.

Dr. Haynes: 21:50

Thanks for thanks for saying that. I appreciate that feedback.

Derek: 21:54

Yeah. So final question here for you. So a lot has happened since the book was first released, and I was kind of surprised when I saw when it was released. It was, you know, years ago. And Trump has had two more years of presidency since you released that book.

Derek: 22:14

COVID happened. We had a Democrat president in between, and now Trump has been reelected. And now there's a Bonhoeffer film out. A ton has happened in the Bonhoeffer world, in the evangelical world, in the political world. If you were just releasing this book now in 2024, almost 2025, what do you think that you would add, remove, or emphasize to fit with where we are today?

Dr. Haynes: 22:44

Yeah. It's an interesting question because I'm in contact with Erdmann's about revising the book and updating it. I don't know exactly what that'll look like, but I have been, keeping up. You know, I've been doing papers, since 02/2018 at Bonhoeffer meetings about, you know, what's happened in the previous year or two years and so forth. And so, I hope I can I can expand the book and and update it?

Dr. Haynes: 23:12

I mean, the basic story is the same. It's right, the co opting of of Christians to support a fundamental anti Christian movement, in my view. The this stuff around January 6 is really the the thing that's so interesting. We have somebody like Metaxas who, up till then, I think, had convinced people that he was this winsome evangelical in the mold of Chuck Colson. He just goes full Trump and just into lunacy and and has been there ever since.

Dr. Haynes: 23:49

And, you'd think that that would give people pause, right, about his interpretation of Bonhoeffer and his claim that Bonhoeffer would would be in his camp. Maybe it has for some, and maybe he's finally his his star is is descending. I don't know. But it's just such a cautionary tale of of how somebody can can relinquish whatever credibility they might have had to that point by, you know, just buying into this to this lie and to this halt and losing any sort of credibility he had. And now being you know, there's threat of him being sued by the Bonhoeffer family.

Dr. Haynes: 24:37

He was involved. I think it's an ongoing, litigation by Dominion Voting Systems where he was called out for his claims about the way that the the, you know, election had been hacked and so forth. So I hope I can sort of update it. It's not fun material to to talk about, but it's really important, I think, to see the trajectory that he's been on.

Derek: 25:05

Well, I'm really encouraged by books like yours that I I think there are there are a lot of people like me who are really dissatisfied with where our evangelical group is at the moment. And it's really hard when you feel like you're the only one who kind of sees those sorts of things. So to have truth being told and to have it be told in such a humble way and a loving way is is really helpful. So thank you so much for your work.

Dr. Haynes: 25:39

Yeah. Thanks so much, Derek, for inviting me to be on your podcast. Appreciate it.

Derek: 25:45

That's all for now. So peace, and because I'm a pacifist, when I say it, I mean it. This podcast is a part of the Kingdom Outpost Network. Please check out the links below to find other great podcasts and content related to non violence and Kingdom Living.