A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #108

[May 2000 journal entry]

The ‘wilderness’, ‘prison’, ‘isolation’ experienced by Bonhoeffer and the ‘scrapheap’ Job contributed directly to their seminal ideas. I have long pondered

1. whether Bonhoeffer would have remained/continued on the ‘non-religious’ path he was beginning to see/describe in his smuggled prison letters to Eberhard Bethge and
2. whether the ‘scrapheap’ Job should be interpreted as sustaining the radical insights/perspective he expresses in the exchanges with his three close friends.

A ‘yes’ answer to these questions would imply that they would have intentionally (had) to retain a ‘wilderness’, ‘prison’, ‘isolation’ experience (for Bonhoeffer, after prison; for the ‘scrapheap’ Job, after relief from his physical afflictions). I have attempted to retain a ‘wilderness’, ‘prison’, ‘isolation’ experience since my first wife’s death (e.g., taking advantage of isolation times, staying near individuals in desperate situations, taking actions that are consistent with being ‘with the world face to face’, . . .).