Engaging Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus with Bonhoeffer Panel Discussion on Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance , by Reggie Williams

Abstract

Bonhoeffer’s self
interpretation in relation to Williams’ reading of the Harlem Renaissance.
Influences of Bonhoeffer’s Union Seminary theological discussion group of friends, and the
preaching of Adam Clayton Powell Sr. Question: the relative impacts on Bonhoeffer of the
Sermon on the Mount and the Harlem Renaissance. Bonhoeffer’s newly found 1934 letter to
Gandhi is a development of his 1931 thinking in New York. Reviewing Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus
poses questions regarding Bonhoeffer and the proletaria t in Germany, and also his theological
concept of Stellvertretung . Query: Why no reference to Josiah Young’s No Difference in the
Fare