Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Meditations on Psalms

by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Edwin H. Robertson (Editor)

“The only way to understand the Psalms is on your knees, the whole congregation praying the words of the Psalms with all its strength.” —Dietrich Bonhoeffer At the time of his execution by the Nazis in 1945, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was not quite forty years old. Yet already, his influence as a theologian was felt not only in Germany, but throughout the world. His interactions with the Psalms reveal a passionate heart and brilliant mind grappling with the Bible’s eternal truths and their application to human nature and temporal realities. Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Meditations on Psalms is vintage eloquent, incisive, encouraging, challenging, inviting us to find in the Psalms both a path toward repose in God and a call to Christlike living and practical action as followers of the Lord Jesus. Also available Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Prison Poems Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Christmas Sermons

Genres: Theology, Christian, Devotional, Religion, Christianity, Nonfiction, Christian Living

160 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2005

About the author

Works of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Protestant theologian of Germany, concern Christianity in the modern world; for his role in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, people executed him.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer served as a Lutheran pastor. He, also a participant in the movement of Resistance against Nazism and a member, founded the confessing church. Members of the Abwehr, the military intelligence office planned his involvement, which resulted in his arrest in April 1943 and his subsequent hanging in April 1945 shortly before the end of the war. His secular view influenced very many people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietric...

Reviews

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once I settled into the unfamiliar cadence of Bonhoeffer's language, I gleaned so many hard-hitting insights from his sermons. Even though I was generations beyond the audience he addressed, I felt his passion for God and challenge to Christlikeness as though he had spoken it directly to me.

The collection of sermons included key points in Bonhoeffer's life; it helped me get to know him and appreciate all the more his stand for Christ at such a crucial time in history.

I'm so thankful to God for men like Bonhoeffer whose ideas and writings help the rest of us Christians get a firmer grasp on our own faith.

This is an ideal book for non-theologians like me: it's in-depth enough to stretch my mind, but short enough not to overwhelm. Plus, everyone can relate to the Psalms, and here Bonhoeffer enriches them and encourages us not just to read them as poetry but to pray them as prayers.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome book. I'll admit Bonhoeffer's normally pretty intimidating for me to read, but this book was perfect. Deep in small doses. I was challenged and encouraged in so many ways by reading this book

[Justin Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good intro to Bonhoeffer as one who has never read his material or has known much about his life. His meditations and poems are thought-provoking. My wife and I enjoyed reading them as our morning devotions.

[Keith · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first half of this book features four sermons by Dietrich Bonhoeffer with Psalms as his scripture. I quiet appreciated and enjoyed those. The second half was much more fragmentary, pulled from letters and quotations of stanzas and lines of poetry Bonhoeffer wrote. It bugs me that his poetry was handled in such an excerpted manner since a poem cannot be fully appreciated unless it is whole. Since the same translator / editor has also done a book of Bonhoeffer's poetry, it struck me as a stingy approach due to a fuller treatment elsewhere. Aside from my subjective disappointments, this is a worthwhile look at how the Psalms specifically influenced the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer--and an admirable life it is!

[Eric · Rating 3 out of 5]

I set out listening to this with no knowledge of its context. I does seem a bit fragmentary, but this then seems about right as it had not been previously translated into English, plus the work is woven into Bonhoeffer's time in prison under the Nazis. I was expecting it to be a devotional work, which it certainly could be, just not in anything like a traditional work. Certainly knowing the capability of his captors/executioners, Bonhoeffer shares his vast insight into the Psalms to give comfort in dark times.

[Adam Shields · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short Review: Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Meditations on Psalms edited by Edwin Robertson--A collection of sermons, letters, devotional writing, etc on the psalms with helpful biographical introductions to Bonhoeffer and context on the sermon, letter, etc. I semi-devotionally read this over a couple weeks and we glad to read Bonhoeffer more directly.

My full review is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/dietrich-bonhoeffers...

[Eric Lynch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much like previous Bonhoeffer books, he has an excellent way of articulating his experiences through what he reads in the Bible. I did enjoy the journey through the Psalms along with his events in his life.

[Becca Rudy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do quite enjoy Bonhoeffer's writings, and this is edited well albeit briefly. Each chapter is quite short and gives a summary of the situation each reflection was written. A solid book, though not the best of Bonhoeffer

[Jeremie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very very good book. In all simplicity, he unfolds how the psalms touched him. Touching.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful look at the Psalms, definitely one that I will benefit from re-reading every couple of months.

[Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

This little book is an excellent entry into one of my favorite theological subgenres: “How To Read The Psalms Against Themselves.” How do Christians not only read but pray songs that contain much that seems to sit poorly alongside Jesus’ proclamation of God’s love?

Bonhoeffer starts with by contextualizing the Psalms within a New Testament horizon. First he looks to Jesus’ most famous prayer. The Our Father is the response to the disciples’ question about how to pray. If that is the most fundamental instruction on prayer, the Psalter must be seen in and prayed from that perspective.

Second, he notes that Christ, the Davidic heir, speaks the songs of his ancestor as their ultimate pray-er. Thus, we must learn to hear these words as Jesus would have prayed them. This move is very common in the subgenre, but Bonhoeffer’s version feels needlessly entangled with questions of Davidic authorship. The fact that Jesus prayed them should be enough regardless of whether we are reading a Pslam of David or a
Psalm of the Korahites.

This misstep highlights by contrast the great reserve the book everywhere exercises in staying away from exegetical rabbit trails. It is not intended to be a rigorous argument about the meaning of the Psalms but helpful advice on how to USE them. One might wish for more guidance on the nitty gritty, but it is clear and direct and largely accessible to a broad audience.

One of the most interesting theological moves he DOES make is the very Lutheran interpretation of the imprecations Psalms as fulfilled in the wrath poured out on Christ in the Cross. Whether you can buy into that take on wrath is its own question, but it provides a powerful lever for reading the Psalms against themselves.

Perhaps Bonhoeffer is a little too successful in his task. As with many authors of this subgenre, Bonhoeffer may leave his readers wondering what the point of reading the Psalms is at all. Why not just exclusively read the Gospels? Bonhoeffer’s small chapters on singing and community indicate some experienced level of personal fruit praying the Psalms, but the treatment of the question falls short of the cleverness of some of the theological moves being made.


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There is also at the end of the book a short biography of Bonhoeffer which is terribly written. Its minefield of clauses and ambiguously anteceded phrases testifies to perhaps a rushed translation from German.

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The Foreward by Bruggeman is fine but it doesn’t really add much to a work so short as to need very little commentary.

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If you like this subgenre, this is worth a quick read but skip the Foreward and short biography.

[Tony Ferguson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Totally loved this short book. DB had a love for the Psalms that rings loud from his days as a student to the moments before he was hung. This book has an editor that walks you through in short easy to read chapters at different stages of DB's life - off including one of his sermons on a Psalm. It is DB's struggle with Nazi journey and the Jewish atrocities that eventually land him in prison as he is implicated in a Hitler assassination attempt. This is what he says about the Psalms on page 147 right before the book ends: "There is not a single detail of the piety and the impiety of the Christian church that is not found in the Psalms and to study them is to make a strange journey of ups and downs, falling and rising, despair and exaltation, the experience of those who pray their way through the Psalms, on after the other."

[Chad · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are other books available by Bonhoeffer about the Psalms, but this short volume demonstrates how his love and study of the Psalms permeated through all of his work. The editor’s background about each text was very helpful.

The greatest weakness with the collection, which seems to be a drawback of any introductory anthology, is that many of the passages aren’t really long enough to gain momentum. As a result, I found that many of my “take aways” are brief statements rather than deeper understanding of particular Psalms. This was especially the case with many of the “Losungens.”

Again, this is a good introductory text, but look elsewhere if you’re looking for something to really dig intoi

[Christina Sinisi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew very little about Bonhoeffer before this book--and am somewhat ashamed. What a hero he was, and how much knowing that influenced my awe of his writings.

Also, I truly didn't know that much about the background of the Psalms. I've read the book several times, but how different is reading something when you know little compared to when you know much.

I highly recommend reading this with a pen and pad at hand rather than listening via Audible as I did.

Prayers for all who read this.

[Christy Whitsell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book compiles letters, pamphlets, sermons and poetry that Bonhoeffer wrote about Psalms. Interwoven are background pieces of info about what was happening in his life when he wrote each piece. The background info was fascinating. I especially want to remember his identification with Moses at the end of his life as he realized he wouldn’t live to realize the end of the war. He dying words were poignant.

[Sharon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dietric Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran Minister. He was also a member of the Abwehr. He was opposed to Hitler was involved in the plots to kill Hitler. He did not arrive easily at the decision to join the assassination plot. He was hanged just days before the Americans reached the location where he and others had been held. His writings on the psalms illustrate his feelings, hopes and fears during the rise of Naziism in Germany.

[Nick Affolter · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

Good, but lacking depth. Seems to be a short work and is a good intro into Bonhoeffer, yet there is better biographical and spiritual material on him (or from him) available. Worth a read.

[Benjamin Chandler · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reads as both meditations and mini-biography. Each chapter features a psalm (sometimes more than one), a biographical sketch of where Bonhoeffer was in his life when he wrote the homily/meditation about the aforementioned psalm. Knowing the life events surrounding Bonhoeffer's writing was actually quite helpful in the reading of both the psalms and his thoughts.

Bonhoeffer (a progressive Lutheran minister who got involved in the plot to assassinate Hitler) does not shy away from being realistic about human suffering. His sadness over Germany's transformation under the Nazi's, his own conflicted feelings about being involved with the plans to murder another human being (even if it was Hitler), and his feelings of hopelessness while in a Nazi prison all come through clear in his readings of the psalms (a book of the Bible which is no stranger to cries of suffering, sadness, isolation, hopelessness, and injustice). Having read some of Bonhoeffer's famous "The Cost of Discipleship", I know how difficult the man's style can be. This book gave me bite-sized homilies and poems which were much easier to digest than "Discipleship."

Over the past 2 months, I have struggled greatly with hope and purpose. (I think this is reflected some in my review of Robinson's tremendous novel, "Home".) It was of some comfort to me to be able to read the words of a man who struggled to find meaning in desperate and hopeless situations. In truth, both the psalmist and Bonhoeffer write about deep sadness and feeling abandoned by God. And although the sources of the psalmist's and Bonhoeffer's sadness and my own are very different things, deep sadness is deep sadness. And in that deep sadness there are promises of hope. I can only pray that I find it and hold to it as well as Bonhoeffer did, even up to his execution.

[Melody Franco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for my class on the psalms at Butner men’s prison. I will always love reading the work of Bonhoeffer, and this compilation of excerpts of his sermons, letters, and poems was no different. Each one is short, but thought provoking. I also enjoyed the context provided before each piece.

[BJ Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

A glimpse into Bonhoeffer's heart, with insights to the Psalms from someone facing death with and for their faithfulness.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

A difficult read for me. I hope to read more on this man.