I would like to make two emendations to my recent
letter about Bonfoeffer and the Beast.
I wrote:

    I believe it is important for us to consider
    the possibility that some, if not many of
    the views that have been expressed in this
    context have little, if anything to do with
    Bonhoeffer's experience or with his thoughts
    as these are reflected in his writing;

I also quoted Bonhoeffer's criticism of the Anglo-Saxon
churches' campaigns and crusades for Prohibition and the
League of Nations and against slavery. In the limitation of
its historical perspective, Bonhoeffer's criticism is analogous
to the judgments about German politics in the twentieth century
that are so prominent on this list.
Such judgments, on Bonhoeffers part and on ours, are
eclectic simplifications of complex historical happenings,
simplifications that serve not to deepen our understanding
of history but to promote our own rhetorical agenda.

================

My second emendation relates to Martin Luther's political
philosophy, reflected in his interpretation of Revelations 13
as referring to imperial Rome and the Papacy that succeeded it.
One of his hymns brought it to my mind:

         "Erhalt uns Herr bei deinem Wort
          Und steuer des Papst und Tuerken Mord"

("Lord keep us steadfast in thy word, and guide (us to) the murder
of the Pope and the Turks.") Don't those lines, which in my 
contemporary German hymnal have been camouflaged:

         "Erhalt uns Herr bei deinem Wort
          Und steuer deiner Feinde Mord"

("Lord keep us steadfast in thy word, and guide (us to) the murder
of your enemies.") incite to genocide of the Turks in a manner 
identical with that in which Nazi propaganda incited to the genocide
of the Jews? If we point fingers of shame at Wilhelm Furtwaengler
Martin Heidegger and Emanuel Hirsch for having endorsed National
Socialism, how can we be comfortable in identifying our own religion
with Luther's name? I don't advocate that we change our name; I do
suggest that we be more cautious about pointing fingers, lest we
discover that we are pointing them at ourselves.

                                        Ernst Meyer