KoertVerhagen, <i>Being and Action Coram Deo: Bonhoeffer and the Retrieval of Justification’s Social Import</i>. London: T&amp;T Clark, 2021, x + 171pp. £28.99/$39.95

Koert Verhagen's contribution to T&T Clark's New Studies in Bonhoeffer's Theology and Ethics shows why the series promises to be a welcome addition to the work of systematic theology. With brisk but careful attention to primary and secondary sources, Verhagen puts Bonhoeffer's ethically calibrated account of justification in conversation with Martin Luther, in opposition to German idealism, in concord with Pauline theology, and in support of James Cone. The result is helpful not only for Bonhoeffer scholarship but also for ‘turning afresh to the social implications of justification’ in a way that neither denies nor collapses into the individual (p. 140). The book proceeds in seven chapters. First it provides background in Martin Luther's doctrine of justification that shows how Christ's gift of righteousness can be definitive not only for the salvific exchange, but also for the whole dynamic of what it means to live as a human being in the presence of God. This is followed by a chapter which locates the roots of Bonhoeffer's later Discipleship and Ethics in the earlier anthropology of such publications as Sanctorum Communio and Creation and Fall. Verhagen explains Bonhoeffer's view that humanity is relationally constituted by its extrinsic dependence upon the Creator, which is revealed to it in justification. That humanity's fallen state of affairs is simultaneously judged and forgiven by Jesus Christ is determinative not only for final salvation but also for life lived in the meantime. Reality cannot be negotiated in the abstract but can only be lived in the ‘historical dialectic’ of Christ's encounter with creation, judging human sin and re-establishing it in reconciliation (p. 48). In chapter three, Verhagen unpacks the problem of abstraction in terms of Bonhoeffer's opposition to the Weltanschauung of German idealism, wherein ‘anthropology gets indexed to a certain ideal or value, which then, in turn, yields a teleology that is achievable on the basis of humanity's rational prowess’ (p. 52). This indexing privileges and absolutizes human powers in a manner that is directly confronted by the incarnation and, more specifically, by justification. According to Verhagen, Bonhoeffer poses the basic human dilemma in terms of sicut deus and coram Deo: If the ultimate reality is life before God in simple obedience, and the drive to live as God is a falsification that wreaks havoc in the penultimate history, then humans need to be saved from that falsifying incurvature not only in their lives before God but also before one another. This is a sound, contextual account of Bonhoeffer, and it leads to the second half of the book, which shows how this dynamic account of justification plays out in anthropology and ethics. Chapter four shifts from reading Bonhoeffer in his context to considering the viability of his ‘justification-based anthropology’ in light of Pauline theology (p. 78). Verhagen's concern is to put Bonhoeffer in mutually instructive conversation with Pauline scholarship on ‘relational ontology and participation’, on the one hand, and ‘historical dialectic and embodiment’ on the other (pp. 79, 84). At this point, centre stage is given to scholars such as Susan Eastman, John Barclay, James Dunn and Ernst Käsemann. Those who are interested to locate the precise correlations in Bonhoeffer's work might wish the chapter slowed down a bit, but the breadcrumbs are there, the resonances are intriguing, and the finer distinctions are insightful. For example, Verhagen aligns Käsemann with Bonhoeffer to argue that justification ‘provides the framework within which the constitutive implication of humanity's standing coram Deo and coram hominibus can be held and thought together’. The footnote then argues that, whereas Eastman says ‘relationality is prior to individuality’, Bonhoeffer has them held in tension and mediated by Christ alone (p. 80). The overall upshot is that Bonhoeffer seems consistent with Pauline conceptions of humanity as ‘relationally grounded, Christologically focussed, and extrinsically sourced’ (p. 83). In other words, human beings are ‘created, embodied, and embedded’ in a ‘historical dialectic’ that is ‘extended into the ethical sphere’ in participation with the living Christ (p. 90). Returning to a primary focus on Bonhoeffer's work, chapters five and six explore how justification informs discipleship and witness. Bonhoeffer scholars may want to test the way Verhagen sees Discipleship developed in Ethics, but tracing their coherence is illuminating. Because life before God is mediated moment-to-moment by Jesus Christ (whether people recognize it or not), to reckon with this is to be a disciple, and to bear witness to this is not simply to proselytize (to the projection of one's worldview), but is to seek Jesus' just mediation of all relationships (even in confrontation with oneself). As in justification, so in life: Jesus graciously intervenes to rescue human beings from their fraudulent and dehumanizing attempts at unmediated existence, and relocates them in a church that exists for the world (p. 130). When humans strike out for immediacy, they collapse the qualitative and temporal ultimacy of God on themselves, but justification is the gracious confrontation of sicut deus wherein Jesus restores humanity coram Deo, enlivening it for life in the penultimate that participates in reconciliation. To demonstrate the ethical relevance of this, the final chapter sets its sights on whiteness and white supremacy. In conversation with James Cone, Willie Jennings and others, Verhagen further develops the argument for justification's social import and places it in service of a chastened and recalibrated theology. Here one might wonder whether the mere identification of ‘social import’ is enough, since white supremacy has a social vision of salvation, but Verhagen does very well to expose the distortions of its Christ-avoidant ‘valourization of hierarchies’ (pp. 148, 154). Without pretending that theological correctives alone will effect social change, Verhagen's argument for a more just account of justification offers to ‘locate tools within one of the white Western church's most cherished doctrines for challenging its disturbing complicity in the rise and perpetuation of white supremacy’ (p. 140). As such it is a carefully qualified and compelling conclusion which could be extended to other ethical questions (like the Christ-mediated relationship of humans and other creatures) as well. It makes for a very helpful book.

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