Letters and Papers From Prison (25 page)

from the Augustinian O
bone Jesu
by Schütz. Doesn’t this passage, in its ecstatic longing combined with pure devotion, suggest the ‘bringing again’ of all earthly desire? ‘Bringing again’ mustn’t, of course, be confused with ‘sublimation’; ‘sublimation’ is
σάρξ
‘flesh’ (and pietistic?), and ‘restoration’ is spirit, not in the sense of ‘spiritualization’ (which is also
σ
ά
ρξ),
but of
καινί κτίσιζ
through the
πνϵνμαἀγων,
a new creation through the Holy Spirit. I think this point is also very important when we have to talk to people
who ask us about their relation to their dead. ‘I will bring again’ - that is, we cannot and should not take it back ourselves, but allow Christ to give it back to us. (By the way, I should like the choir to sing at my funeral One thing I desire of the Lord’, ‘Hasten, God, to deliver me’, and O
bone Jesu.)

At midday on Christmas Eve a dear old man is coming here at his own suggestion to play some Christmas carols on a cornet. But some people with good judgment think it only gives the prisoners the screaming miseries, and so makes the day even harder for them; one said that the effect is ‘demoralizing’, and I can well imagine it. In former years the prisoners are said to have whistled and kicked up a row, no doubt to stop themselves from becoming sentimental. I think, too, that in view of all the misery that prevails here, anything like a pretty-pretty, sentimental reminder of Christmas is out of place. A good personal message, a sermon, would be better; without something of the kind, music by itself may be positively dangerous. Please don’t think that I’m in any way frightened of that for myself; I’m not, but I’m sorry for all those helpless young soldiers in their cells. One will probably never quite get rid of the accumulated weight of all the oppressive experiences that come day after day, and I suppose it’s right that this should be so. I’m thinking a great deal about a radical reform of the penal system, and I hope my ideas may be turned to account some day.

If this letter reaches you in time, please try to get me something good to read over Christmas. I asked for a few books some time ago, but they may not have been available. Something exciting would do quite well. And if you can get without difficulty Barth’s
Doctrine of Predestination
(in sheets), or his
Doctrine of
God,
⁹⁶
please have them sent to me.
Please
don’t come yourself unless you have permission to visit. Your time now is short, and belongs to Renate.

Today I read the account of the travels in Palestine which old Soden did with Knopf; nothing special, but I conceived a plan to travel there with you after the war. It seems that one only gets something out of it as a theologian; for the laity too much of it is a disappointment. We’ll take our wives to Italy and leave them there to wait for us. What do you think?

The propagandist with whom I walk every day is really getting more and more difficult to put up with. Whereas most people here do try to keep control of themselves, even in the most difficult cases, he has completely gone to pieces, and cuts a really sorry figure. I try to be as nice as I can to him, and talk to him as if he were a child. Sometimes he’s almost comical. What is pleasanter is to hear that when I’m in the sick-bay in the afternoon the word goes round the kitchen or the garden, and the prisoners come up on some pretext or other because, they say, it’s so nice to have a chat with me. Of course, that isn’t really allowed, but I was pleased to hear about it, and I’m sure you will be too. But mind you don’t let it get around.

This is probably the last chance we shall have for some time of writing each other uncensored letters. When I’m released I shall miss you very much; it isn’t easy to imagine my first time outside. There will be many great decisions to be made, and I would need you for them. Of course I would very much like a short answer to some of the questions in my letters. Even if you haven’t anything to add that might be important for me, then please let me know. I’m afraid that the time of our separation could become too long and then we wouldn’t have exchanged any substantial thoughts. On the other hand, I don’t want to make too many demands on your days in Berlin. Enjoy these days as much as you can, and above all come back soon and safely. It’s at least a small consolation that you’re going into such a beautiful and interesting neighbourhood. It will also remind you of August 1936.
⁹⁷
And if you can in any way, see if you can’t get me into your neighbourhood. There is a ‘World Alliance’ man in Florence; I was at many conferences with him. I think he’s a professor;
⁹⁸
a Protestant, but I’ve forgotten his name. You’ll find him in the Annual Book of the World Alliance under ‘Italy’. It’s among my books. You can write to him without further ado, mentioning my name. He knows me well. Perhaps he can be of some use to you. It’s always good to have someone like that at hand. If you can’t find the Annual, Renate need only ring up Diestel
⁹⁹
and ask him; he will know straightaway, and perhaps has other addresses. I wouldn’t neglect doing it if I were you; take all these addresses in case of
any eventuality. You can make some very useful contacts that way.

That’s all. Read Proverbs 18.24 and don’t forget it.
¹⁰⁰
A good Christmas, a good New Year, tolerable service and above all a speedy return home. With all my heart.

Your faithful Dietrich

22 December 1943

They seem to have made up their minds that I’m not to be with you for Christmas, though no one ventures to tell me so. I wonder why; do they think I’m so easily upset? Or do they think it kinder to lull me from day to day with empty hopes?…
¹⁰¹
The English have a very suitable word for this sort of thing – ‘tantalizing’. Out of pure sympathy they’ve been ‘tantalizing’ Maria and me for a couple of weeks. If you had been there, Eberhard, you would have…done the duty of a friend by telling me the truth. Tomorrow or the day after I should be able to talk to you…That’s an event. I must spare my parents and also Maria, but you I will not deceive in any way, nor must you deceive me. We haven’t done that before, and mustn’t do it ever. I won’t be able to write to you again after our meeting. But I want to thank you now, today, for coming and for being there for me. If you write to Renate from Italy and can occasionally include a note for me, even if it’s only a few words, you will make me very happy. Aren’t there things like purification plants in lakes? You know my technical naïvete - but there is something like that, and that’s what you are to me. I do want to convey to you somehow tomorrow that my attitude towards my case is unquestionably one of faith, and I feel that it has become too much a matter of calculation and foresight. I’m not so much concerned about the rather artless question whether I shall be home for Christmas or not; I think I could willingly renounce that, if I could do so ‘in faith’, knowing that it was inevitable. I can (I hope) bear all things ‘in faith’, even my condemnation, and even the other consequences that I fear (Ps. 18.29);
¹⁰²
but to be anxiously looking ahead wears one down. Don’t worry about me if something worse happens. Others of the brethren have already been through that. But faithless vacillation,
endless deliberation without action, refusal to take any risks – that’s a real danger. I must be able to know for certain that I am in God’s hands, not in men’s. Then everything becomes easy, even the severest privation. Now it’s not a matter (I think I can say this truthfully) of my being ‘understandably impatient’, as people are probably saying, but of my facing everything in faith. In this regard, enemies are often much less dangerous than good friends. And I feel that you’re the only one who understands that. I think that Maria, too, already feels rather the same thing. If you think of me, in the next days and weeks, please do so in this way (Ps. 60.12).
¹⁰³
And if you’ve something to say to me about it, be so good as to write it to me. I don’t want to go through this affair without faith.

My own view is that I shall be released, or called up into the army, in January or February. If you can do anything – and want to – where you are about my joining you, don’t let yourself be dissuaded by the suggestions of others. The only question is whether you have anyone there to whom you can speak in confidence. However, it would have to happen soon. We must learn to act differently from those who always hesitate, whose failure we know in a wider context. We must be clear about what we want, we must ask whether we’re up to it, and then we must do it with unshakable confidence. Then and only then can we also bear the consequences.

Now I want to assure you that I haven’t for a moment regretted coming back in 1939
¹⁰⁴
– nor any of the consequences, either. I knew quite well what I was doing, and I acted with a clear conscience. I’ve no wish to cross out of my life anything that has happened since, either to me personally (would I have got engaged otherwise? would you have married? Sigurdshof, East Prussia, Ettal, my illness and all the help you gave me then, and the time in Berlin), or as regards events in general. And I regard my being kept here (do you remember that I prophesied to you last March about what the year would bring?) as being involved in Germany’s fate, as I was resolved to be. I don’t look back on the past and accept the present reproachfully, but I don’t want the machinations of men to make me waver. All we can do is to live
in assurance and faith – you out there with the soldiers, and I in my cell. – I’ve just come across this in the
Imitation of Christ: Custodi diligenter cellam tuam, et custodiet te
(‘Take good care of your cell, and it will take care of you’). – May God keep us in faith.

From his father

[Sakrow] 25 December 1943

Dear Dietrich,

We hoped that perhaps we would have you at home for Christmas, and that had a bad effect on our correspondence. However, the visits made by Maria and Eberhard have kept us in the picture about your doings to some degree. Unfortunately we’re still without news about our application to visit you over Christmas. The post is very variable, as one sees in other respects. Perhaps we shall already have talked to you by the time this letter arrives. The morning attack by the English that ushered in Christmas Eve was hateful; this time it has apparently brought a good deal of misfortune upon the south-eastern suburbs. Nothing has happened here. After the Dohnanyi children and Christel had been with Hans
¹⁰⁵
in the afternoon, we had a celebration in the evening with the Schleichers and the Bethges. The Dohnanyi children had brought another splendid tree which Eberhard and Renate decorated. The children were gay and Eberhard read the Christmas epistle. It’s the first time that we haven’t had a tree in our house and haven’t been able to have the children and grandchildren with us. You can imagine that our thoughts were very much with you and Sabine. But we were grateful to be able to be together with the children here in an undamaged house.
¹⁰⁶
The absence of Hans and Christel cast a deep shadow and reduced little Christoph to tears by the tree, but confidence that his release had to come soon was so great that gradually cheerfulness set in again among the children. We then ate our fill together, with herring salad, goose – the gift of a patient – and poppy-seed tarts, as satisfactorily as we old ones could expect after all that we’ve been through in the past year…

Affectionately, your Father

To Renate and Eberhard Bethge

Christmas Eve 1943

Dear Renate and Eberhard,

It’s half past nine in the evening; I’ve been spending a few lovely peaceful hours, and thinking very thankfully about your being able to spend the day together…

One of my greatest joys this Christmas is that we have again been able to exchange the
Losungen
¹⁰⁷
for the coming year. I had already thought of it and hoped for it, though I hardly expected that it would be possible. And now this book, which has meant so much to me in the past months, will be with us throughout next year too, and when we read it in the morning we shall think especially of each other. Many, many thanks. It was a particularly nice idea of yours to look for the beautiful book of poetry; I keep reading it and find much joy and gain in it. I was at first rather sad that I can’t give you anything nice this time; but my thoughts and wishes have been closer than ever to you, if that is possible.

I should like to say something to help you in the time of separation that lies ahead. There is no need to say how hard any such separation is for us; but as I’ve now been separated for nine months from all the people that I’m devoted to, I should like to pass on to you something of what I have learnt. So far, Eberhard and I have exchanged all the experiences that have been important to us, and this has been a great help to us; now you, Renate, will have some part in this. You must try to forget your ‘uncle’ and think more of your husband’s friend.

First: nothing can make up for the absence of someone whom we love, and it would be wrong to try to find a substitute; we must simply hold out and see it through. That sounds very hard at first, but at the same time it is a great consolation, for the gap, as long as it remains unfilled, preserves the bonds between us. It is nonsense to say that God fills the gap; he doesn’t fill it, but on the contrary, he keeps it empty and so helps us to keep alive our former communion with each other, even at the cost of pain.

Secondly: the dearer and richer our memories, the more difficult the separation. But gratitude changes the pangs of memory into a tranquil joy. The beauties of the past are borne,
not as a thorn in the flesh, but as a precious gift in themselves. We must take care not to wallow in our memories or hand ourselves over to them, just as we do not gaze all the time at a valuable present, but only at special times, and apart from these keep it simply as a hidden treasure that is ours for certain. In this way the past gives us lasting joy and strength.