Responsible Action and the Lesser Evil:
Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, Barth, and the Christian Duty to Resist Fascism
Timothy P. Cotton
www.truthandway.org
Introduction
In moments of historical crisis, Christians find themselves facing questions that resist easy answers. The rise of fascism in the twentieth century revealed the inadequacy of a purely private faith and the danger of a church that mistook silence for peace. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jürgen Moltmann, and Karl Barth all confronted in their own ways the central theological problem of evil: when political powers sanctify violence, persecute the vulnerable, and sacralize the state, what is the duty of the Christian?
The question is not academic. Across the globe, fascist movements are once again surging with alarming speed. In the United States, rhetoric that dehumanizes immigrants, minorities, and political opponents has been joined to nationalist Christianity and enforced by militarized policing. Peaceful protestors face arrest, and public space is increasingly colonized by political violence. Christians are left to ask: is nonviolence enough? What is demanded of discipleship when pacifism is silenced or rendered ineffective by systemic power?
This paper will argue, following the lead of Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth, that Christian responsibility cannot be reduced to moral purity. In a fallen world, sinless options are often unavailable. Responsible action may mean bearing guilt for the sake of others — even to the point of participating in violence against tyrannical powers. Assassination, though never “good,” may in extreme situations represent the lesser evil, the tragic but necessary choice to preserve life.
To develop this argument, the paper will proceed in five movements. First, Bonhoeffer’s ethics of responsibility will be examined, especially his move from pacifism to participation in the plot to kill Hitler. Second, Moltmann’s theology of hope and systemic evil will be brought into conversation with Bonhoeffer. Third, Barth’s prophetic “No” to idolatrous powers will provide a Reformed counterpoint. Fourth, the dilemma of “lesser evil” will be evaluated theologically. Finally, the paper will turn to contemporary reflections on the responsibility of Christians in an age of resurgent fascism.
I. Bonhoeffer’s Ethics of Responsibility
1. From Pacifism to Responsibility
Dietrich Bonhoeffer began his career as a committed pacifist, deeply shaped by the Sermon on the Mount and the radical call to discipleship it demanded. In his 1937 work Discipleship, he famously wrote, “Whenever Jesus Christ calls us, his call leads us to death” (Discipleship, DBWE 4:87). For Bonhoeffer, obedience to Christ meant suffering violence rather than inflicting it, and pacifism followed as the natural outworking of Christ’s command to love one’s enemies.
Yet as the 1930s gave way to the 1940s, Bonhoeffer increasingly realized that strict pacifism risked complicity with evil. The Nazi regime was not merely an immoral government; it was a death-dealing machine that legitimized mass murder, racial hatred, and war. To remain pacifist in the face of Hitler’s policies, Bonhoeffer concluded, was to become indirectly responsible for the atrocities.
This realization led him to a crucial shift: the Christian life is not about preserving moral innocence but about bearing responsibility. In Letters and Papers from Prison, he insisted: “The ultimate question for a responsible man to ask is not how he is to extricate himself heroically from the affair, but how the coming generation is to live” (Letters and Papers from Prison, DBWE 8:42). Responsibility meant facing the tragic reality that all available choices were touched by sin. The Christian must not seek to remain pure but must choose, in faith, the path that serves life.
2. Stellvertretung: Bearing Guilt for the Sake of Others
Bonhoeffer captured this new orientation with the theological concept of 'Stellvertretung', or vicarious representative action. Just as Christ bore the guilt of humanity on the cross, so too Christians are called to bear guilt for the sake of their neighbors. To act responsibly is to accept that one’s deeds may not be morally “clean” — indeed, they may be sinful — yet undertaken in solidarity with others and in obedience to God’s call to protect life.
This insight freed Bonhoeffer from the illusion that ethical life is about avoiding sin at all costs. Instead, it is about accepting guilt, confessing it, and nevertheless acting decisively for the sake of those under threat. As he is famously quoted as saying, “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty". This paradoxical claim expresses the depth of Bonhoeffer’s conviction: innocence is not an option in a world already marked by evil.
3. Tyrannicide and the Plot Against Hitler
Nowhere was this more evident than in Bonhoeffer’s involvement with the Abwehr conspiracy to assassinate Hitler. Though a pastor and theologian, Bonhoeffer became entangled in the plot to remove the dictator by force. He did not romanticize this step. He considered assassination to be murder, a violation of God’s commandment. Yet he judged it the lesser evil when compared with the greater evil of allowing Hitler to continue his reign of terror.
Bonhoeffer’s decision was not grounded in political calculation alone but in theological conviction. Hitler had become a false god, demanding absolute allegiance and legitimizing mass murder. To fail to resist was to betray Christ himself. Bonhoeffer thus chose to bear guilt — to act as Christ’s representative in solidarity with those who suffered — even though it meant implicating himself in violence.
His participation in the plot ultimately cost him his life. Arrested in 1943 and executed at Flossenbürg in April 1945, Bonhoeffer was martyred not as a passive victim but as a man who acted responsibly in the face of overwhelming evil. His letters from prison underscore this conviction: “It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith… not by trying to escape from the world” (Letters and Papers from Prison, DBWE 8:486). Bonhoeffer did not escape into private piety; he stepped into guilt for the sake of his neighbor.
4. The Theological Significance
Bonhoeffer’s legacy challenges comfortable moralism. The question is not whether Christians should prefer pacifism — he clearly did. The question is what Christians should do when pacifism no longer protects the neighbor, when peaceful resistance is silenced, and when evil advances unchecked. His answer was sobering: responsible action may require choosing the lesser sin, even assassination, for the sake of life.
In this way, Bonhoeffer reframed the ethical landscape. To act is to step into guilt. But to refuse to act is to bear greater guilt. His theology of responsibility provides the foundation for considering whether the assassination of fascist leaders today, though tragic and sinful, may in fact be the duty of discipleship in a world where the innocent are otherwise abandoned to death.
II. Moltmann: Hope, Systemic Sin, and Resistance
1. Sin as Systemic, Not Only Personal
Where Bonhoeffer framed responsibility in terms of personal guilt, Jürgen Moltmann widened the horizon by showing how sin is embedded in structures, institutions, and systems of power. Fascism, for Moltmann, is not merely the product of wicked individuals but of entire socio-political arrangements that sanctify violence and normalize death.
In The Crucified God, Moltmann argues that the cross is not only about the forgiveness of individual sins but about God’s solidarity with all who suffer under oppressive powers. Moltmann tells us that the cross is not and cannot be loved. Yet only the crucified Christ can bring the freedom which changes the world because it is no longer afraid of death. This insight reframes resistance: Christians are not called simply to maintain personal purity but to confront systemic evil, even at the cost of their lives.
For Moltmann, the evil of fascism is precisely that it makes death into a public principle. The Spirit of God is the power of life, of resistance to death, of the future of the resurrection. To remain passive in the face of death-dealing systems is, theologically, to resist the Spirit of life.
2. Hope as Active Resistance
Moltmann is perhaps best known for his theology of hope. His early work Theology of Hope declared that Christian hope is not resignation but active anticipation of God’s coming kingdom. Hope, in this sense, demands resistance. “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God means conflict with the world” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21).
This active dimension of hope has profound implications for resistance to fascism. Hope does not allow Christians to hide behind pacifism if pacifism allows evil to spread unchecked. Instead, hope compels action that interrupts cycles of violence, even when such action involves tragic compromise.
In this light, the assassination of a fascist leader may be understood not as an act of despair but as an act of hope: hope that the future is not foreclosed, that the grip of death can be broken, and that life might yet have space to flourish.
3. The Lesser Evil Through the Lens of Eschatology
Moltmann’s eschatology provides a unique angle on the problem of lesser evil. For him, history is not closed — it is open toward the coming of God. This means that the evaluation of human action is not exhausted by present categories of law and morality. What matters is whether an act opens space for the future of God or closes it off.
God’s righteousness is not the eternal law of the world order; it is the power which creates life, sets the unjust world to rights, and renews the earth. What justifies action, then, is not its conformity to an abstract moral code but its alignment with God’s renewing purpose.
This does not make assassination “good.” It remains tragic, sinful, and lamentable. But within an eschatological horizon, the Christian can see that it may nevertheless be the responsible choice if it disrupts systemic death and opens a space for life.
4. Bearing Hope Amid Guilt
Moltmann never romanticizes violence. He insists that hope looks forward to a peace in which swords are beaten into plowshares (Isaiah 2:4). But until that peace comes, Christians live in the tension of acting responsibly in history. Theologians must not offer a “cheap pacifism” any more than Bonhoeffer could tolerate “cheap grace.”
The Christian who takes part in the assassination of a fascist leader bears guilt, but also bears hope. For Moltmann, such an act can only be undertaken with confession and with eyes fixed on God’s promised future. Those who believe in the resurrection can no longer reconcile themselves with death. They must resist it and its reign.
In this way, Moltmann sharpens Bonhoeffer’s insight: responsible action is not only about individual guilt but about systemic solidarity. It is about resisting death in all its forms, trusting that God’s Spirit is present wherever life is defended and death is confronted.
III. Barth: The Word of God Against Tyranny
1. Barth’s “Nein!” to Idolatrous Powers
Karl Barth’s resistance to Nazism was not covert, like Bonhoeffer’s, but theological and public. From the beginning of Hitler’s rule, Barth denounced any attempt to merge the Word of God with the word of the Führer. The 1934 Barmen Declaration, of which he was the primary author, declared with clarity: “Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the one Word of God which we have to hear, and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death” (The Barmen Theological Declaration, Thesis I, 1934).
This affirmation was immediately followed by a rejection: “We reject the false doctrine, as though the church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen, Thesis I). Barth’s “Nein!” to fascism was grounded not in abstract ethics but in the recognition that any power demanding allegiance alongside Christ is idolatrous.
Thus, Barth set the stage for understanding fascism theologically: it is not merely bad politics but a false religion. Fascism claims divine authority for the nation, the race, or the leader. By doing so, it competes with Christ himself — and must be opposed as blasphemy.
2. Obedience to God vs. Obedience to the State
Barth’s theology of obedience sharpened the point. To believe in God means to believe in Him as the Lord over all lords, as the One who is sovereign over all worldly authorities and powers. The sovereignty of Christ relativizes every earthly authority.
This conviction made it clear: when the state demands obedience that contradicts Christ, the Christian must disobey the state. Barth’s call was not to anarchism but to theological resistance. The Christian does not resist the state for personal liberty or political advantage, but because obedience to Christ requires it.
Barth emphasizes that the state has a God-given role — to serve life and protect the weak. But when the state usurps God’s place, it ceases to be legitimate authority. At that point, disobedience to the state becomes obedience to God. As Barth put it, “The state becomes demonic...by a renunciation of its true substance, dignity, function, and purpose." (Community, State, and Church, 1960).
3. Prophetic Resistance and the Question of Tyrannicide
Unlike Bonhoeffer, Barth never participated in plots against Hitler. His form of resistance was theological: to expose the false religion of Nazism and call the church back to obedience to Christ alone. Yet his principles point beyond his personal choices. If fascism is a false religion, if the Führer is a false god, then Christians are not only permitted but obligated to resist.
Barth was cautious about endorsing violence, but he left the door open to the possibility. We must not seek a law which can tell us in advance what we are to do. We must seek the will of God in the concrete situation. This situational discernment aligns closely with Bonhoeffer’s ethic of responsibility: Christians must decide not on the basis of a timeless code but on obedience to God’s living command in history.
In this sense, Barth’s theology provides cover for Bonhoeffer’s choice. If obedience to God can demand disobedience to the state, and if the state has become an agent of death, then in extreme cases the assassination of a fascist leader could be seen as the concrete form of obedience.
4. The Word of God as Judgment
Barth’s greatest contribution here is not in offering a direct ethic of violence but in re-centering the discussion on the Word of God. Fascism is not simply evil because it kills; it is evil because it claims divine authority. Against this, Barth insists that only Jesus Christ is Lord. All ideologies, nations, and leaders stand under his judgment.
This theological orientation guards Christians from two dangers: first, from sanctifying violence as if it could build the kingdom; second, from retreating into moral quietism. Barth shows that Christian resistance is not self-justified violence but obedience to the living Christ. The assassination of a fascist leader, if it occurs, must not be seen as the triumph of human justice but as a tragic act under the judgment of God, taken in obedience to the one true Word.
Conclusion of Section
Barth’s theology complements Bonhoeffer and Moltmann by grounding Christian resistance in the sovereignty of Christ. If Christ alone is Lord, then no earthly power may demand ultimate allegiance. The rise of fascism, therefore, is not only a political threat but a theological heresy. Christians are called to resist, whether through proclamation, disobedience, or — in the most extreme cases — even tyrannicide. But such acts can only ever be undertaken in humility, under confession, and with faith that the Word of God alone judges both tyrants and those who resist them.
IV. The Lesser Evil: Theological and Ethical Evaluation
1. The Dilemma of Tragic Choices
Christian ethics often proceeds as though the world offers clear choices between good and evil. But in the face of systemic evil, the Christian finds that all options are tainted by sin. This is the tragic situation that Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth all confronted in different ways. Murder remains a violation of the commandment, yet allowing mass violence and systemic death is itself a deeper form of betrayal.
Bonhoeffer expressed this most directly: “The ultimate question for a responsible man to ask is not how he is to extricate himself heroically from the affair, but how the coming generation is to live” (Ethics, DBWE 8:42). Here, he rejected moral purity as the standard of faithfulness. The Christian is called not to maintain innocence but to act responsibly for the neighbor’s sake.
2. Analogy: Saving a Child
The dilemma is illustrated in the analogy of a would-be murderer poised to kill a child. If one kills the aggressor, one commits a sin — yet to refrain is to allow the child’s life to be taken. Bonhoeffer would insist that the Christian cannot choose inaction without bearing guilt for the child’s death. Action, even if sinful, is the responsible choice.
This analogy scales upward in the case of fascist leaders. A tyrant who legitimizes school shootings, foments hatred, and corrupts the youth functions as the aggressor. To allow his influence to spread unchecked is to abandon countless lives to death. The assassination of such a leader is not “good” but may be the lesser evil — a tragic deed undertaken for the sake of protecting the innocent.
3. Moltmann: Hope and the Struggle Against Death
Moltmann reframes the question by locating it in the eschatological struggle between life and death. Fascism is not merely the wrong policy; it is the enthronement of death. “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21).
In this light, the lesser evil of assassination is not justified as a positive good but as an act of contradiction — a refusal to accept death’s dominion. Moltmann emphasizes that the Spirit of God is the power of life, of resistance to death, of the future of the resurrection. Resistance, even when tragic, is Spirit-led insofar as it opens space for life against the machinery of death.
4. Barth: Obedience to Christ in the Concrete Situation
Barth guards this discussion from degenerating into sheer pragmatism. He insists that Christian action cannot be grounded in abstract principles but must be discerned in the living command of God. We must not seek a law which can tell us in advance what we are to do. We must seek the will of God in the concrete situation.
This means that assassination, if undertaken, must be judged not by utilitarian calculation alone but by obedience to Christ. It is never the kingdom of God itself, but at best a tragic act of faithfulness within a fallen world. Barth’s theology prevents Christians from idolizing violent resistance while still acknowledging its necessity in extreme situations.
5. Confession, Humility, and Responsibility
All three theologians converge on a final point: such acts, even if necessary, must be undertaken with humility, confession, and readiness to bear guilt. Bonhoeffer stressed, “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty” (Ethics, DBWE 8:42). Barth insisted that every human act, even the most faithful, remains under the judgment of God. Moltmann reminded the church that hope is never secured by human violence but by God’s promise of resurrection.
Therefore, the assassination of a fascist leader cannot be celebrated as righteous. It must be lamented as a tragic choice — but also recognized as potentially the only responsible option in a moment when inaction perpetuates greater evil. The Christian who takes this path does so not to justify violence but to protect life, bearing guilt in solidarity with the crucified Christ who bore the guilt of all.
Conclusion of Section
The theology of the lesser evil unsettles any easy conscience. It refuses to grant Christians moral innocence in history. Instead, it calls them into the hard responsibility of choosing between sins in order to serve life. Bonhoeffer teaches that responsibility may demand guilt. Moltmann shows that resistance to death is the mark of hope. Barth insists that such action must be obedience to Christ in the concrete situation. Together, they articulate a sobering ethic: Christians may sometimes be called to resist fascism not only with words but with deeds that bear guilt — assassination among them — trusting that even in guilt, God’s grace is sufficient.
V. Contemporary Reflections: Christian Duty in an Age of Resurgent Fascism
1. The Return of Fascism
The rise of fascist movements is not confined to the past. In the United States, authoritarian rhetoric, nationalist religion, and armed intimidation have converged in troubling ways. Public figures openly dismiss the deaths of schoolchildren as an acceptable cost of preserving gun rights. Youth are groomed into cultures of violence and hatred. Peaceful demonstrators face arrest while the state increasingly protects the powerful and suppresses dissent. These developments echo the very dynamics that Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth confronted in the 1930s.
Christians cannot afford to treat these patterns as “politics as usual.” For Barth, fascism was not just a political error but a false theology, a counterfeit gospel. For Bonhoeffer, it was a system that demanded action even when action implicated the Christian in guilt. For Moltmann, it was the enthronement of death itself. Their insights converge on a single conclusion: silence or neutrality in such a moment is complicity.
2. The Limits of Pacifism
Pacifism remains the first calling of the Christian, rooted in the Sermon on the Mount and in the hope of Christ’s peaceable kingdom. Yet Bonhoeffer’s life shows that pacifism, when weaponized by oppressive regimes, can become a shield for evil. To refuse resistance while fascism advances is to abandon the vulnerable to suffering.
This does not mean abandoning nonviolent struggle. Nonviolent resistance, protest, and civil disobedience remain essential. But when the state criminalizes peaceful demonstration and fills the streets with troops, Christians must ask with Bonhoeffer whether responsibility now demands a different form of action. The tragedy is that in such situations, the line between pacifism and complicity becomes perilously thin.
3. Choosing the Lesser Sin Today
The dilemma of the “lesser evil” remains painfully relevant. When leaders normalize violence, protect systemic death, and sanctify hatred, Christians face the same choice Bonhoeffer confronted: to act, even at the cost of guilt, or to remain innocent and thereby complicit.
Moltmann reminds us that hope requires contradiction: “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21). The contradiction of fascist violence may, in extremis, demand the elimination of its propagators. Barth underscores that such action can only be obedience if it is discerned as the living command of Christ in the concrete situation. And Bonhoeffer insists that the responsible Christian must be ready to bear guilt for the sake of others
4. The Role of the Church
The question is not only individual but corporate. The church must decide whether it will align with the powers of death or stand as a confessing community under Christ’s lordship. The 1934 Barmen Declaration still speaks: “We reject the false doctrine, as though the Church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen Declaration, Thesis I).
In today’s context, the church must reject the idolatry of guns, nationalism, and political strongmen. It must call out fascist rhetoric as heresy. And it must prepare its members for the costly discipleship that may include nonviolent resistance, imprisonment, and — in extreme cases — even the bearing of guilt in acts of tyrannicide.
5. Bearing Guilt with Hope
The crucial safeguard is humility. Christians who act against fascist leaders must do so not triumphantly but penitently, aware that they bear guilt before God. Bonhoeffer accepted this responsibility: he did not pretend that killing Hitler was righteous; he acknowledged it as sin, and entrusted himself to God’s mercy.
Here lies the paradox. Christians may be called to act in ways that violate the commandment in order to protect life, but such action is never beyond confession. It is always accompanied by the recognition that grace alone can redeem human guilt. Moltmann’s theology assures us that the Spirit of life is present wherever death is resisted. Barth reminds us that even our best acts stand under judgment. Bonhoeffer teaches us that faithfulness is not purity but responsibility.
Conclusion of Section
In the twenty-first century, as in the twentieth, the Christian duty is not to preserve innocence but to protect the neighbor. Pacifism remains the calling, but when pacifism is suppressed and fascism thrives, responsibility may require bearing guilt in action. The assassination of a fascist leader is never good — but in an age when silence sanctifies death, it may be the tragic duty of discipleship. The church must prepare its people to live in this tension, resisting evil in hope, confessing guilt with humility, and trusting that God’s grace will redeem even our most compromised acts of responsibility.
Conclusion: Responsible Guilt and the Hope of God
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jürgen Moltmann, and Karl Barth each faced the reality of fascism and offered insights that remain painfully relevant today. For Bonhoeffer, discipleship meant costly responsibility, even to the point of bearing guilt for violent action when pacifism became complicity. “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty” His life and death bear witness that Christian faith is not the preservation of innocence but solidarity with the neighbor, even if it requires stepping into guilt.
Moltmann extended this responsibility to the systemic level. Fascism is not only the wickedness of individuals but the enthronement of death in public life. Hope in Christ, he insisted, cannot accept such reality but must contradict it: “Peace with God means conflict with the world” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21). Resistance, even in tragic form, becomes an act of hope — not hope in human violence, but hope that the Spirit of life is present wherever death is resisted and the future of God is defended.
Barth, meanwhile, provided the theological anchor. His “Nein!” to Nazism in the Barmen Declaration declared that Jesus Christ alone is Lord, and no nation, ideology, or leader can claim divine authority. “We reject the false doctrine… as though the church could and would have to acknowledge… other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen Declaration, Thesis I). For Barth, fascism was not just political tyranny but theological heresy. Christian disobedience to the state, even in its most radical form, is obedience to Christ when the state makes itself an idol.
Together, these three theologians point toward a sobering but necessary ethic for our own moment. Christians may be called not only to witness with words but to act in ways that bear guilt in order to protect life. The assassination of a fascist leader is never “good” in itself. It is tragic, sinful, and lamentable. Yet in extreme situations, it may be the lesser evil, the responsible choice to safeguard the innocent against systemic death.
But the final word must not be left with human violence. The church lives by the hope of God’s kingdom, not by its own acts of resistance. Moltmann reminds us that “God’s righteousness is his creative justice...It brings justice for the victims, sets right what has been made wrong, and creates new life for the forsaken. God's righteousness is the power of the resurrection which renews the earth” (The Coming of God, 1996). Christian resistance, then, is always provisional, always penultimate, always under God’s judgment and grace. It is a sign of hope, not its fulfillment.
Thus, the Christian who resists fascism, even through the lesser evil of violence, does so with humility, confession, and trust in the God who redeems. Responsibility does not rest in human hands alone but in the crucified and risen Christ, who bears our guilt and opens the future. In the end, Christians resist not because they trust in the power of their deeds, but because they hope in the coming of God, in whose kingdom death will be no more, and whose peace will finally reign without the need for lesser evils.
Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, Barth, and the Christian Duty to Resist Fascism
Timothy P. Cotton
www.truthandway.org
Introduction
In moments of historical crisis, Christians find themselves facing questions that resist easy answers. The rise of fascism in the twentieth century revealed the inadequacy of a purely private faith and the danger of a church that mistook silence for peace. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jürgen Moltmann, and Karl Barth all confronted in their own ways the central theological problem of evil: when political powers sanctify violence, persecute the vulnerable, and sacralize the state, what is the duty of the Christian?
The question is not academic. Across the globe, fascist movements are once again surging with alarming speed. In the United States, rhetoric that dehumanizes immigrants, minorities, and political opponents has been joined to nationalist Christianity and enforced by militarized policing. Peaceful protestors face arrest, and public space is increasingly colonized by political violence. Christians are left to ask: is nonviolence enough? What is demanded of discipleship when pacifism is silenced or rendered ineffective by systemic power?
This paper will argue, following the lead of Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth, that Christian responsibility cannot be reduced to moral purity. In a fallen world, sinless options are often unavailable. Responsible action may mean bearing guilt for the sake of others — even to the point of participating in violence against tyrannical powers. Assassination, though never “good,” may in extreme situations represent the lesser evil, the tragic but necessary choice to preserve life.
To develop this argument, the paper will proceed in five movements. First, Bonhoeffer’s ethics of responsibility will be examined, especially his move from pacifism to participation in the plot to kill Hitler. Second, Moltmann’s theology of hope and systemic evil will be brought into conversation with Bonhoeffer. Third, Barth’s prophetic “No” to idolatrous powers will provide a Reformed counterpoint. Fourth, the dilemma of “lesser evil” will be evaluated theologically. Finally, the paper will turn to contemporary reflections on the responsibility of Christians in an age of resurgent fascism.
I. Bonhoeffer’s Ethics of Responsibility
1. From Pacifism to Responsibility
Dietrich Bonhoeffer began his career as a committed pacifist, deeply shaped by the Sermon on the Mount and the radical call to discipleship it demanded. In his 1937 work Discipleship, he famously wrote, “Whenever Jesus Christ calls us, his call leads us to death” (Discipleship, DBWE 4:87). For Bonhoeffer, obedience to Christ meant suffering violence rather than inflicting it, and pacifism followed as the natural outworking of Christ’s command to love one’s enemies.
Yet as the 1930s gave way to the 1940s, Bonhoeffer increasingly realized that strict pacifism risked complicity with evil. The Nazi regime was not merely an immoral government; it was a death-dealing machine that legitimized mass murder, racial hatred, and war. To remain pacifist in the face of Hitler’s policies, Bonhoeffer concluded, was to become indirectly responsible for the atrocities.
This realization led him to a crucial shift: the Christian life is not about preserving moral innocence but about bearing responsibility. In Letters and Papers from Prison, he insisted: “The ultimate question for a responsible man to ask is not how he is to extricate himself heroically from the affair, but how the coming generation is to live” (Letters and Papers from Prison, DBWE 8:42). Responsibility meant facing the tragic reality that all available choices were touched by sin. The Christian must not seek to remain pure but must choose, in faith, the path that serves life.
2. Stellvertretung: Bearing Guilt for the Sake of Others
Bonhoeffer captured this new orientation with the theological concept of 'Stellvertretung', or vicarious representative action. Just as Christ bore the guilt of humanity on the cross, so too Christians are called to bear guilt for the sake of their neighbors. To act responsibly is to accept that one’s deeds may not be morally “clean” — indeed, they may be sinful — yet undertaken in solidarity with others and in obedience to God’s call to protect life.
This insight freed Bonhoeffer from the illusion that ethical life is about avoiding sin at all costs. Instead, it is about accepting guilt, confessing it, and nevertheless acting decisively for the sake of those under threat. As he is famously quoted as saying, “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty". This paradoxical claim expresses the depth of Bonhoeffer’s conviction: innocence is not an option in a world already marked by evil.
3. Tyrannicide and the Plot Against Hitler
Nowhere was this more evident than in Bonhoeffer’s involvement with the Abwehr conspiracy to assassinate Hitler. Though a pastor and theologian, Bonhoeffer became entangled in the plot to remove the dictator by force. He did not romanticize this step. He considered assassination to be murder, a violation of God’s commandment. Yet he judged it the lesser evil when compared with the greater evil of allowing Hitler to continue his reign of terror.
Bonhoeffer’s decision was not grounded in political calculation alone but in theological conviction. Hitler had become a false god, demanding absolute allegiance and legitimizing mass murder. To fail to resist was to betray Christ himself. Bonhoeffer thus chose to bear guilt — to act as Christ’s representative in solidarity with those who suffered — even though it meant implicating himself in violence.
His participation in the plot ultimately cost him his life. Arrested in 1943 and executed at Flossenbürg in April 1945, Bonhoeffer was martyred not as a passive victim but as a man who acted responsibly in the face of overwhelming evil. His letters from prison underscore this conviction: “It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith… not by trying to escape from the world” (Letters and Papers from Prison, DBWE 8:486). Bonhoeffer did not escape into private piety; he stepped into guilt for the sake of his neighbor.
4. The Theological Significance
Bonhoeffer’s legacy challenges comfortable moralism. The question is not whether Christians should prefer pacifism — he clearly did. The question is what Christians should do when pacifism no longer protects the neighbor, when peaceful resistance is silenced, and when evil advances unchecked. His answer was sobering: responsible action may require choosing the lesser sin, even assassination, for the sake of life.
In this way, Bonhoeffer reframed the ethical landscape. To act is to step into guilt. But to refuse to act is to bear greater guilt. His theology of responsibility provides the foundation for considering whether the assassination of fascist leaders today, though tragic and sinful, may in fact be the duty of discipleship in a world where the innocent are otherwise abandoned to death.
II. Moltmann: Hope, Systemic Sin, and Resistance
1. Sin as Systemic, Not Only Personal
Where Bonhoeffer framed responsibility in terms of personal guilt, Jürgen Moltmann widened the horizon by showing how sin is embedded in structures, institutions, and systems of power. Fascism, for Moltmann, is not merely the product of wicked individuals but of entire socio-political arrangements that sanctify violence and normalize death.
In The Crucified God, Moltmann argues that the cross is not only about the forgiveness of individual sins but about God’s solidarity with all who suffer under oppressive powers. Moltmann tells us that the cross is not and cannot be loved. Yet only the crucified Christ can bring the freedom which changes the world because it is no longer afraid of death. This insight reframes resistance: Christians are not called simply to maintain personal purity but to confront systemic evil, even at the cost of their lives.
For Moltmann, the evil of fascism is precisely that it makes death into a public principle. The Spirit of God is the power of life, of resistance to death, of the future of the resurrection. To remain passive in the face of death-dealing systems is, theologically, to resist the Spirit of life.
2. Hope as Active Resistance
Moltmann is perhaps best known for his theology of hope. His early work Theology of Hope declared that Christian hope is not resignation but active anticipation of God’s coming kingdom. Hope, in this sense, demands resistance. “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God means conflict with the world” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21).
This active dimension of hope has profound implications for resistance to fascism. Hope does not allow Christians to hide behind pacifism if pacifism allows evil to spread unchecked. Instead, hope compels action that interrupts cycles of violence, even when such action involves tragic compromise.
In this light, the assassination of a fascist leader may be understood not as an act of despair but as an act of hope: hope that the future is not foreclosed, that the grip of death can be broken, and that life might yet have space to flourish.
3. The Lesser Evil Through the Lens of Eschatology
Moltmann’s eschatology provides a unique angle on the problem of lesser evil. For him, history is not closed — it is open toward the coming of God. This means that the evaluation of human action is not exhausted by present categories of law and morality. What matters is whether an act opens space for the future of God or closes it off.
God’s righteousness is not the eternal law of the world order; it is the power which creates life, sets the unjust world to rights, and renews the earth. What justifies action, then, is not its conformity to an abstract moral code but its alignment with God’s renewing purpose.
This does not make assassination “good.” It remains tragic, sinful, and lamentable. But within an eschatological horizon, the Christian can see that it may nevertheless be the responsible choice if it disrupts systemic death and opens a space for life.
4. Bearing Hope Amid Guilt
Moltmann never romanticizes violence. He insists that hope looks forward to a peace in which swords are beaten into plowshares (Isaiah 2:4). But until that peace comes, Christians live in the tension of acting responsibly in history. Theologians must not offer a “cheap pacifism” any more than Bonhoeffer could tolerate “cheap grace.”
The Christian who takes part in the assassination of a fascist leader bears guilt, but also bears hope. For Moltmann, such an act can only be undertaken with confession and with eyes fixed on God’s promised future. Those who believe in the resurrection can no longer reconcile themselves with death. They must resist it and its reign.
In this way, Moltmann sharpens Bonhoeffer’s insight: responsible action is not only about individual guilt but about systemic solidarity. It is about resisting death in all its forms, trusting that God’s Spirit is present wherever life is defended and death is confronted.
III. Barth: The Word of God Against Tyranny
1. Barth’s “Nein!” to Idolatrous Powers
Karl Barth’s resistance to Nazism was not covert, like Bonhoeffer’s, but theological and public. From the beginning of Hitler’s rule, Barth denounced any attempt to merge the Word of God with the word of the Führer. The 1934 Barmen Declaration, of which he was the primary author, declared with clarity: “Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the one Word of God which we have to hear, and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death” (The Barmen Theological Declaration, Thesis I, 1934).
This affirmation was immediately followed by a rejection: “We reject the false doctrine, as though the church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen, Thesis I). Barth’s “Nein!” to fascism was grounded not in abstract ethics but in the recognition that any power demanding allegiance alongside Christ is idolatrous.
Thus, Barth set the stage for understanding fascism theologically: it is not merely bad politics but a false religion. Fascism claims divine authority for the nation, the race, or the leader. By doing so, it competes with Christ himself — and must be opposed as blasphemy.
2. Obedience to God vs. Obedience to the State
Barth’s theology of obedience sharpened the point. To believe in God means to believe in Him as the Lord over all lords, as the One who is sovereign over all worldly authorities and powers. The sovereignty of Christ relativizes every earthly authority.
This conviction made it clear: when the state demands obedience that contradicts Christ, the Christian must disobey the state. Barth’s call was not to anarchism but to theological resistance. The Christian does not resist the state for personal liberty or political advantage, but because obedience to Christ requires it.
Barth emphasizes that the state has a God-given role — to serve life and protect the weak. But when the state usurps God’s place, it ceases to be legitimate authority. At that point, disobedience to the state becomes obedience to God. As Barth put it, “The state becomes demonic...by a renunciation of its true substance, dignity, function, and purpose." (Community, State, and Church, 1960).
3. Prophetic Resistance and the Question of Tyrannicide
Unlike Bonhoeffer, Barth never participated in plots against Hitler. His form of resistance was theological: to expose the false religion of Nazism and call the church back to obedience to Christ alone. Yet his principles point beyond his personal choices. If fascism is a false religion, if the Führer is a false god, then Christians are not only permitted but obligated to resist.
Barth was cautious about endorsing violence, but he left the door open to the possibility. We must not seek a law which can tell us in advance what we are to do. We must seek the will of God in the concrete situation. This situational discernment aligns closely with Bonhoeffer’s ethic of responsibility: Christians must decide not on the basis of a timeless code but on obedience to God’s living command in history.
In this sense, Barth’s theology provides cover for Bonhoeffer’s choice. If obedience to God can demand disobedience to the state, and if the state has become an agent of death, then in extreme cases the assassination of a fascist leader could be seen as the concrete form of obedience.
4. The Word of God as Judgment
Barth’s greatest contribution here is not in offering a direct ethic of violence but in re-centering the discussion on the Word of God. Fascism is not simply evil because it kills; it is evil because it claims divine authority. Against this, Barth insists that only Jesus Christ is Lord. All ideologies, nations, and leaders stand under his judgment.
This theological orientation guards Christians from two dangers: first, from sanctifying violence as if it could build the kingdom; second, from retreating into moral quietism. Barth shows that Christian resistance is not self-justified violence but obedience to the living Christ. The assassination of a fascist leader, if it occurs, must not be seen as the triumph of human justice but as a tragic act under the judgment of God, taken in obedience to the one true Word.
Conclusion of Section
Barth’s theology complements Bonhoeffer and Moltmann by grounding Christian resistance in the sovereignty of Christ. If Christ alone is Lord, then no earthly power may demand ultimate allegiance. The rise of fascism, therefore, is not only a political threat but a theological heresy. Christians are called to resist, whether through proclamation, disobedience, or — in the most extreme cases — even tyrannicide. But such acts can only ever be undertaken in humility, under confession, and with faith that the Word of God alone judges both tyrants and those who resist them.
IV. The Lesser Evil: Theological and Ethical Evaluation
1. The Dilemma of Tragic Choices
Christian ethics often proceeds as though the world offers clear choices between good and evil. But in the face of systemic evil, the Christian finds that all options are tainted by sin. This is the tragic situation that Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth all confronted in different ways. Murder remains a violation of the commandment, yet allowing mass violence and systemic death is itself a deeper form of betrayal.
Bonhoeffer expressed this most directly: “The ultimate question for a responsible man to ask is not how he is to extricate himself heroically from the affair, but how the coming generation is to live” (Ethics, DBWE 8:42). Here, he rejected moral purity as the standard of faithfulness. The Christian is called not to maintain innocence but to act responsibly for the neighbor’s sake.
2. Analogy: Saving a Child
The dilemma is illustrated in the analogy of a would-be murderer poised to kill a child. If one kills the aggressor, one commits a sin — yet to refrain is to allow the child’s life to be taken. Bonhoeffer would insist that the Christian cannot choose inaction without bearing guilt for the child’s death. Action, even if sinful, is the responsible choice.
This analogy scales upward in the case of fascist leaders. A tyrant who legitimizes school shootings, foments hatred, and corrupts the youth functions as the aggressor. To allow his influence to spread unchecked is to abandon countless lives to death. The assassination of such a leader is not “good” but may be the lesser evil — a tragic deed undertaken for the sake of protecting the innocent.
3. Moltmann: Hope and the Struggle Against Death
Moltmann reframes the question by locating it in the eschatological struggle between life and death. Fascism is not merely the wrong policy; it is the enthronement of death. “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21).
In this light, the lesser evil of assassination is not justified as a positive good but as an act of contradiction — a refusal to accept death’s dominion. Moltmann emphasizes that the Spirit of God is the power of life, of resistance to death, of the future of the resurrection. Resistance, even when tragic, is Spirit-led insofar as it opens space for life against the machinery of death.
4. Barth: Obedience to Christ in the Concrete Situation
Barth guards this discussion from degenerating into sheer pragmatism. He insists that Christian action cannot be grounded in abstract principles but must be discerned in the living command of God. We must not seek a law which can tell us in advance what we are to do. We must seek the will of God in the concrete situation.
This means that assassination, if undertaken, must be judged not by utilitarian calculation alone but by obedience to Christ. It is never the kingdom of God itself, but at best a tragic act of faithfulness within a fallen world. Barth’s theology prevents Christians from idolizing violent resistance while still acknowledging its necessity in extreme situations.
5. Confession, Humility, and Responsibility
All three theologians converge on a final point: such acts, even if necessary, must be undertaken with humility, confession, and readiness to bear guilt. Bonhoeffer stressed, “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty” (Ethics, DBWE 8:42). Barth insisted that every human act, even the most faithful, remains under the judgment of God. Moltmann reminded the church that hope is never secured by human violence but by God’s promise of resurrection.
Therefore, the assassination of a fascist leader cannot be celebrated as righteous. It must be lamented as a tragic choice — but also recognized as potentially the only responsible option in a moment when inaction perpetuates greater evil. The Christian who takes this path does so not to justify violence but to protect life, bearing guilt in solidarity with the crucified Christ who bore the guilt of all.
Conclusion of Section
The theology of the lesser evil unsettles any easy conscience. It refuses to grant Christians moral innocence in history. Instead, it calls them into the hard responsibility of choosing between sins in order to serve life. Bonhoeffer teaches that responsibility may demand guilt. Moltmann shows that resistance to death is the mark of hope. Barth insists that such action must be obedience to Christ in the concrete situation. Together, they articulate a sobering ethic: Christians may sometimes be called to resist fascism not only with words but with deeds that bear guilt — assassination among them — trusting that even in guilt, God’s grace is sufficient.
V. Contemporary Reflections: Christian Duty in an Age of Resurgent Fascism
1. The Return of Fascism
The rise of fascist movements is not confined to the past. In the United States, authoritarian rhetoric, nationalist religion, and armed intimidation have converged in troubling ways. Public figures openly dismiss the deaths of schoolchildren as an acceptable cost of preserving gun rights. Youth are groomed into cultures of violence and hatred. Peaceful demonstrators face arrest while the state increasingly protects the powerful and suppresses dissent. These developments echo the very dynamics that Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Barth confronted in the 1930s.
Christians cannot afford to treat these patterns as “politics as usual.” For Barth, fascism was not just a political error but a false theology, a counterfeit gospel. For Bonhoeffer, it was a system that demanded action even when action implicated the Christian in guilt. For Moltmann, it was the enthronement of death itself. Their insights converge on a single conclusion: silence or neutrality in such a moment is complicity.
2. The Limits of Pacifism
Pacifism remains the first calling of the Christian, rooted in the Sermon on the Mount and in the hope of Christ’s peaceable kingdom. Yet Bonhoeffer’s life shows that pacifism, when weaponized by oppressive regimes, can become a shield for evil. To refuse resistance while fascism advances is to abandon the vulnerable to suffering.
This does not mean abandoning nonviolent struggle. Nonviolent resistance, protest, and civil disobedience remain essential. But when the state criminalizes peaceful demonstration and fills the streets with troops, Christians must ask with Bonhoeffer whether responsibility now demands a different form of action. The tragedy is that in such situations, the line between pacifism and complicity becomes perilously thin.
3. Choosing the Lesser Sin Today
The dilemma of the “lesser evil” remains painfully relevant. When leaders normalize violence, protect systemic death, and sanctify hatred, Christians face the same choice Bonhoeffer confronted: to act, even at the cost of guilt, or to remain innocent and thereby complicit.
Moltmann reminds us that hope requires contradiction: “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21). The contradiction of fascist violence may, in extremis, demand the elimination of its propagators. Barth underscores that such action can only be obedience if it is discerned as the living command of Christ in the concrete situation. And Bonhoeffer insists that the responsible Christian must be ready to bear guilt for the sake of others
4. The Role of the Church
The question is not only individual but corporate. The church must decide whether it will align with the powers of death or stand as a confessing community under Christ’s lordship. The 1934 Barmen Declaration still speaks: “We reject the false doctrine, as though the Church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen Declaration, Thesis I).
In today’s context, the church must reject the idolatry of guns, nationalism, and political strongmen. It must call out fascist rhetoric as heresy. And it must prepare its members for the costly discipleship that may include nonviolent resistance, imprisonment, and — in extreme cases — even the bearing of guilt in acts of tyrannicide.
5. Bearing Guilt with Hope
The crucial safeguard is humility. Christians who act against fascist leaders must do so not triumphantly but penitently, aware that they bear guilt before God. Bonhoeffer accepted this responsibility: he did not pretend that killing Hitler was righteous; he acknowledged it as sin, and entrusted himself to God’s mercy.
Here lies the paradox. Christians may be called to act in ways that violate the commandment in order to protect life, but such action is never beyond confession. It is always accompanied by the recognition that grace alone can redeem human guilt. Moltmann’s theology assures us that the Spirit of life is present wherever death is resisted. Barth reminds us that even our best acts stand under judgment. Bonhoeffer teaches us that faithfulness is not purity but responsibility.
Conclusion of Section
In the twenty-first century, as in the twentieth, the Christian duty is not to preserve innocence but to protect the neighbor. Pacifism remains the calling, but when pacifism is suppressed and fascism thrives, responsibility may require bearing guilt in action. The assassination of a fascist leader is never good — but in an age when silence sanctifies death, it may be the tragic duty of discipleship. The church must prepare its people to live in this tension, resisting evil in hope, confessing guilt with humility, and trusting that God’s grace will redeem even our most compromised acts of responsibility.
Conclusion: Responsible Guilt and the Hope of God
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jürgen Moltmann, and Karl Barth each faced the reality of fascism and offered insights that remain painfully relevant today. For Bonhoeffer, discipleship meant costly responsibility, even to the point of bearing guilt for violent action when pacifism became complicity. “It is not the sinless who act responsibly, but the guilty” His life and death bear witness that Christian faith is not the preservation of innocence but solidarity with the neighbor, even if it requires stepping into guilt.
Moltmann extended this responsibility to the systemic level. Fascism is not only the wickedness of individuals but the enthronement of death in public life. Hope in Christ, he insisted, cannot accept such reality but must contradict it: “Peace with God means conflict with the world” (Theology of Hope, 1967, p. 21). Resistance, even in tragic form, becomes an act of hope — not hope in human violence, but hope that the Spirit of life is present wherever death is resisted and the future of God is defended.
Barth, meanwhile, provided the theological anchor. His “Nein!” to Nazism in the Barmen Declaration declared that Jesus Christ alone is Lord, and no nation, ideology, or leader can claim divine authority. “We reject the false doctrine… as though the church could and would have to acknowledge… other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation” (Barmen Declaration, Thesis I). For Barth, fascism was not just political tyranny but theological heresy. Christian disobedience to the state, even in its most radical form, is obedience to Christ when the state makes itself an idol.
Together, these three theologians point toward a sobering but necessary ethic for our own moment. Christians may be called not only to witness with words but to act in ways that bear guilt in order to protect life. The assassination of a fascist leader is never “good” in itself. It is tragic, sinful, and lamentable. Yet in extreme situations, it may be the lesser evil, the responsible choice to safeguard the innocent against systemic death.
But the final word must not be left with human violence. The church lives by the hope of God’s kingdom, not by its own acts of resistance. Moltmann reminds us that “God’s righteousness is his creative justice...It brings justice for the victims, sets right what has been made wrong, and creates new life for the forsaken. God's righteousness is the power of the resurrection which renews the earth” (The Coming of God, 1996). Christian resistance, then, is always provisional, always penultimate, always under God’s judgment and grace. It is a sign of hope, not its fulfillment.
Thus, the Christian who resists fascism, even through the lesser evil of violence, does so with humility, confession, and trust in the God who redeems. Responsibility does not rest in human hands alone but in the crucified and risen Christ, who bears our guilt and opens the future. In the end, Christians resist not because they trust in the power of their deeds, but because they hope in the coming of God, in whose kingdom death will be no more, and whose peace will finally reign without the need for lesser evils.
