No Ordinary Men: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnanyi, Resisters Against Hitler in Church and State (New York Review Books Collections)

During the twelve years of Hitler’s Third Reich, very few Germans took the risk of actively opposing his tyranny and terror, and fewer still did so to protect the sanctity of law and faith. In __No Ordinary Men__, Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern focus on two remarkable, courageous men who did—the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi—and offer new insights into the fearsome difficulties that resistance entailed. (Not forgotten is Christine Bonhoeffer Dohnanyi, Hans’s wife and Dietrich’s sister, who was indispensable to them both.) From the start Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazi efforts to bend Germany’s Protestant churches to Hitler’s will, while Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Justice Ministry and then in the Wehrmacht’s counterintelligence section, helped victims, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, and was an important figure in the various conspiracies to assassinate Hitler. The strength of their shared commitment to these undertakings—and to the people they were helping—endured even after their arrest in April 1943 and until, after great suffering, they were executed on Hitler’s express orders in April 1945, just weeks before the Third Reich collapsed. Bonhoeffer’s posthumously published __Letters and Papers from Prison__ and other writings found a wide international audience, but Dohnanyi’s work is scarcely known, though it was crucial to the resistance and he was the one who drew Bonhoeffer into the anti-Hitler plots. Sifton and Stern offer dramatic new details and interpretations in their account of the extraordinary efforts in which the two jointly engaged. __No Ordinary Men__ honors both Bonhoeffer’s human decency and his theological legacy, as well as Dohnanyi’s preservation of the highest standard of civic virtue in an utterly corrupted state.

The Third Reich was the twentieth century’s most popular tyranny. After Adolf Hitler took power in 1933, most of Germany’s civil servants and professional elite collaborated with the Nazis or else tried to remain “unpolitical,” to retreat into “inner emigration.” Those who resisted were intimidated and silenced, often through terror and murder. To oppose the regime was rare and dangerous; to do so to protect the sanctity of law and faith was rarer still.
 
But nonetheless some did. Claus von Stauffenberg, who was at the center of the conspiracy that attempted to kill Hitler on July 20, 1944, is only the best-known member of the German resistance. No Ordinary Men is the story of two of the Nazi regime’s most courageous and admirable opponents: the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi. Bonhoeffer opposed Nazi racial thought and fought the Nazis’ efforts to control the German Protestant churches. Dohnanyi, a lawyer working in the Wehrmacht’s counterintelligence section, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, helped victims, tried to sabotage Nazi policies, and conspired to assassinate Hitler. Both were arrested in April 1943 and interrogated about their resistance activities, and both were executed, after terrible suffering, in April 1945 as the Third Reich was collapsing.
 
Bonhoeffer’s writings were collected after the war; his Letters and Papers from Prison found a wide audience, and both his theological ideas and his resistance activities attracted much interest. Dohnanyi was less well known but his work in opposing the Nazis—and that of other members of their family—was intimately bound up with Bonhoeffer’s.
 
In No Ordinary Men, Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern demonstrate that the resistance to the Nazi regime was a larger and more complicated drama than is usually depicted. Among those opposed to Hitler’s rule, their growing outrage about the treatment of the Jews was what motivated their decision to resist and to try to remove him, for they knew it was a barbarism that would be a burden of guilt for their nation ever after.
 
Bonhoeffer and Dohnanyi embodied qualities all too rare among their countrymen at the time: integrity and hard work, selflessness, and remarkable bravery. Sifton and Stern honor both Bonhoeffer’s human decency and his theological legacy, as well as Dohnanyi’s preservation of the highest standard of civic virtue in an utterly corrupted state. Dohnanyi remarked that they had simply taken “the path that a decent person inevitably takes.” Their story expands our understanding of the responses to the Nazi regime and exemplifies how morality can endure in the face of depravity and horror.

The fascinating story of two courageous opponents in Hitler’s Germany who both bravely resisted the Nazis—for World War II history buffs and fans of little-known histories. “A story that needs to be heard.” — Library Journal During the twelve years of Hitler’s Third Reich, very few Germans took the risk of actively opposing his tyranny and terror, and fewer still did so to protect the sanctity of law and faith. In No Ordinary Men , Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern focus on two remarkable, courageous men who did—the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi—and offer new insights into the fearsome difficulties that resistance entailed. (Not forgotten is Christine Bonhoeffer Dohnanyi, Hans’s wife and Dietrich’s sister, who was indispensable to them both.) From the start Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazi efforts to bend Germany’s Protestant churches to Hitler’s will, while Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Justice Ministry and then in the Wehrmacht’s counterintelligence section, helped victims, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, and was an important figure in the various conspiracies to assassinate Hitler. The strength of their shared commitment to these undertakings—and to the people they were helping—endured even after their arrest in April 1943 and until, after great suffering, they were executed on Hitler’s express orders in April 1945, just weeks before the Third Reich collapsed. Bonhoeffer’s posthumously published Letters and Papers from Prison and other writings found a wide international audience, but Dohnanyi’s work is scarcely known, though it was crucial to the resistance and he was the one who drew Bonhoeffer into the anti-Hitler plots. Sifton and Stern offer dramatic new details and interpretations in their account of the extraordinary efforts in which the two jointly engaged. No Ordinary Men honors both Bonhoeffer’s human decency and his theological legacy, as well as Dohnanyi’s preservation of the highest standard of civic virtue in an utterly corrupted state. The story of two courageous opponents within Hitler’s Germany—Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the celebrated theologian, and his brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Wehrmacht—who both bravely resisted the Nazis During the twelve years of Hitler’s Third Reich, very few Germans took the risk of actively opposing his tyranny and terror, and fewer still did so to protect the sanctity of law and faith. In No Ordinary Men, Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern focus on two remarkable, courageous men who did—the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi—and offer new insights into the fearsome difficulties that resistance entailed. (Not forgotten is Christine Bonhoeffer Dohnanyi, Hans’s wife and Dietrich’s sister, who was indispensable to them both.) From the start Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazi efforts to bend Germany’s Protestant churches to Hitler’s will, while Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Justice Ministry and then in the Wehrmacht’s counterintelligence section, helped victims, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, and was an important figure in the various conspiracies to assassinate Hitler. The strength of their shared commitment to these undertakings—and to the people they were helping—endured even after their arrest in April 1943 and until, after great suffering, they were executed on Hitler’s express orders in April 1945, just weeks before the Third Reich collapsed. Bonhoeffer’s posthumously published Letters and Papers from Prison and other writings found a wide international audience, but Dohnanyi’s work is scarcely known, though it was crucial to the resistance and he was the one who drew Bonhoeffer into the anti-Hitler plots. Sifton and Stern offer dramatic new details and interpretations in their account of the extraordinary efforts in which the two jointly engaged. No Ordinary Men honors both Bonhoeffer’s human decency and his theological legacy, as well as Dohnanyi’s preservation of the highest standard of civic virtue in an utterly corrupted state. During the twelve years of Hitler's Third Reich, very few Germans took the risk of actively opposing his tyranny and terror, and fewer still did so to protect the sanctity of law and faith. In No Ordinary Men, Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern focus on two remarkable, courageous men who did - the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi - and offer new insights into the fearsome difficulties that resistance entailed. (Not forgotten is Christine Bonhoeffer Dohnanyi, Hans's wife and Dietrich's sister, who was indispensable to them both.) From the start Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazi efforts to bend Germany's Protestant churches to Hitler's will, while Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Justice Ministry and then in the Wehrmacht's counterintelligence section, helped victims, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, and was an important figure in the various conspiracies to assassinate Hitler. The strength of their shared commitment to these undertakings - and to the people they were helping - endured even after their arrest in April 1943 and until, after great suffering, they were executed on Hitler's express orders in April 1945, just weeks before the Third Reich collapsed. Bonhoeffer's posthumously published Letters and Papers from Prison and other writings found a wide international audience, but Dohnanyi's work is scarcely known, though it was crucial to the resistance and he was the one who drew Bonhoeffer into the anti-Hitler plots. Sifton and Stern offer dramatic new details and interpretations in their account of the extraordinary efforts in which the two jointly engaged. No Ordinary Men honors both Bonhoeffer's human decency and his theological legacy, as well as Dohnanyi's preservation of the highest standard of civic virtue in an utterly corrupted state During the twelve years of Hitler's Third Reich, very few Germans took the risk of actively opposing his tyranny and terror, and fewer still did so to protect the sanctity of law and faith. In No Ordinary Men, Elisabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern focus on two remarkable, courageous men who did-the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi-and offer new insights into the fearsome difficulties that resistance entailed. (Not forgotten is Christine Bonhoeffer Dohnanyi, Hans's wife and Dietrich's sister, who was indispensable to them both.) From the start Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazi efforts to bend Germany's Protestant churches to Hitler's will, while Dohnanyi, a lawyer in the Justice Ministry and then in the Wehrmacht's counterintelligence section, helped victims, kept records of Nazi crimes to be used as evidence once the regime fell, and was an important figure in the various conspiracies to assassinate Hitler. The strength of their shared commitment to these undertakings-and to the people they were helping-endured even after their arrest in April 1943 and until, after great suffering, they were executed on Hitler's express orders in April 1945, just weeks before the Third Reich collapsed. Bonhoeffer's posthumously published Letters and Papers from Prison and other writings found a wide international audience, but Dohnanyi's work is scarcely known, though it was crucial to the resistance and he was the one who drew Bonhoeffer into the anti-Hitler plots. [from the publisher] The Third Reich was the twentieth century's most popular tyranny. After Adolf Hitler took power in 1933, most of Germany's civil servants and professional elite collaborated with the Nazis or else tried to remain "unpolitical," to retreat into "inner emigration." Those who resisted were intimidated and silenced, often through terror and murder. To oppose the regime was rare and dangerous; to do so to protect the sanctity of law and faith was rarer still. But nonetheless some did. Claus von Stauffenberg, who was at the center of the conspiracy that attempted to kill Hitler on July 20, 1944, is only the best-known member of the German resistance. No Ordinary Men is the story of two of the Nazi regime's most courageous and admirable opponents: the pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his close friend and brother-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi. Bonhoeffer opposed Nazi racial thought and fought the Nazis' efforts to control the German Protestant churches.... ϡ쯦랠