Views Of Detrich Bonhoeffer And Socrates

"The great masquerade of evil has played havoc with all our ethical concepts. For evil to appear disguised as light, charity, historical necessity, or social justice is quite bewildering to anyone brought up on our traditional ethical concepts". Evil should not have a place in the name or eyes of the law other than for the law to bring justice onto the evil which as been committed. The law is there to protect and provide equality and justice to all. People are equal. Each and every person has the ability to make their own decisions which ever way they choose to. Some people make grand decisions and some make poor ones. The majority of the time people are good and they strive to help each other. They generally realize that what they do will have an affect on others. Sometimes however, people's judgment, morals, and how they judge others can become warped. This is when crazy things can start to take place.

Socrates believes that in order to have a fair and just trial everyone involved must be considered equal. He states that he is very unpopular with many people because of the slanders that had been brought against him. The fact that he had become "unpopular" with many people hints that his trial would have been an unjust one considering the jury may have already based their opinion of him. In the same way that Socrates was slandered the Jewish people were also slandered against, making them unpopular and disliked. Both Socrates and the Jewish people because of the slander done to them had started out on the lesser side of equal in the eyes of the law. When evil judgment corrupts the ones doing the judging it begins to weave a troublesome web.

Some people make the decision to be good people, and some people make the decision to be bad people. There are different levels of each of course, but the principle of each is the same- good and evil. The law is good (supposedly) and the people of the law are supposed to be good. They are the ones who bring peace and justice to the countries and communities. If the leaders of the law are corrupt the communities and countries will become corrupt, the barrier between right and wrong will become smaller and smaller, until chaos breaks loose. This is what took place during Bonhoeffers time. The rulers of Germany had evil, distorted, and delusional beliefs. They then passed these beliefs onto the citizens. The citizens had been taught to follow the norms and laws passed on to them by it s leaders. These citizens had most likely realized the things that were taking place in their country were horrifying and inhumane but when they had been taught to obey the law how would they make the decision? It would be wrong to break the law and also wrong to follow it. Bonhoeffer states "It is a moral rather than an intellectual defect." The citizen's morals became tainted. They began to believe what they know to be unjust to be in fact justifiable. They began to think of ways to justify their actions and their leaders' actions, leaving what they know deep down to be unjustifiable. "The power of some needs the folly of others." The corrupt leaders relied on the citizens to be cowardly and to not stand up for themselves, each other, and their beliefs. The leaders make it look as if their actions are for good purposes and are trying to help the country and the people. The citizens are too afraid to be thought of as out of the norm and will go on doing what they are told even if it is against their beliefs. There were some people like Bonhoeffer whose morals were much too strong to sit back silently and watch what taking place was, they knew it was wrong, their conscience and morals would not let them rest.

"Mere waiting and looking on is not Christian behavior." Those citizens who did not agree with the leaders but did not stand up for what they knew to be right may as well have just agreed with the leaders anyway. What good was it for them to know there were so many people being treated with such an unjust and for them to do nothing about it? This is why it is so dangerous when countries' leaders have anything but the best good intentions for their people.

It can be hard to consider ones self equal to another if one does not know the way of life of the other person. Often people of higher classes think themselves "better" than the people of lower classes. The old saying "don't judge another until you have walked a mile in their shoes" holds very true. If these higher class citizens had to spend time seeing what it was like for the lower classes and even the poverty struck, maybe they would change their minds about what equality was. Bonhoeffer says