Who inspires me? BEDiM Day 23

(This was the prompt for day 19 or 20...)

Less than a week from now I have the May meeting of our theological book club, for which we are reading George Metaxas' biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. It's something of a tome... In fact it's a brick. I don't know that I'll get it finished in time for book club this time next week.  This morning I posted to Facebook that I would have loved to sit at my favourite cafe with something light and airy like Mary Robinette Kowal's "Glamour in Glass", the second in her Regency-magic series that I'm really enjoying.  But Metaxas must be read.

I haven't heard much good about the Metaxas bio: I'm pretty sure I first heard about it on Fred Clark's Slacktivist website.  A quick Google has revealed the following, which are a good example

• Bad Scholarship, Bad Theology, from Left Cheek
• Bonhoeffer Bends a Lot of Ways, from Theoblogy by Tony Jones
• Eric Metaxas and the Egregious Misuse of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, by Scott Paeth

I really love the Paeth post, among which is the following fabulous point:

The unfortunate truth is that, because he was murdered, we have no way of knowing what direction Bonhoeffer's thought might have taken after the war. It's therefore worth displaying a bit of humility in attempting to assert with confidence what Bohoeffer "really" thought near the end of his life.
 

The Metaxas is living up (down?) to its reputation.  I found the first blatant error on pg 19, and even before that had been finding the glamourisation of homeschooling and wifely submission rather... anachronistic.  Now around pg 200, the best description I can come up with is "shallow" - which is saying something for a book of 500+ pages.

It is, however, making me think, which is always good.  It's had me frantically search through as-yet-still-packed boxes for my copies of Letters and Papers from Prison, the Christmas Sermons, and Eberhard Bethge's collected Essays. 

It should be clear from this that the one who inspires me is NOT Metaxas.

Obviously, it's Bonhoeffer.  I think Bonhoeffer inspires most people who know about him.  If he didn't, people like Metaxas in the US and others here in Australia wouldn't be so intent on making sure that Bonhoeffer "agrees" with them and not whoever they're arguing against.

To which Paeth responds perfectly. 

It's therefore worth displaying a bit of humility in attempting to assert... what Bonhoeffer ... thought.
 

(Will be cross-posted to my book blog and my discernment blog.)