K.H. Miskotte and the Dutch Reformed Churches during the Occupation of The Netherlands

Abstract

This article is about the Dutch theologian K.H. Miskotte and his theologically based resistance against the Nazi occupation regime (1940–1945). The leadership in Dutch churches chose a cautious and often unprincipled approach to dealing with the occupier. Miskotte, along with some others, pointed to a different way. He wanted a better resistance, founded in the Bible. He read the Bible as the testimony of the Liberator-God who frees his people from slavery to the gods and powers of this world that blind and enslave people. Miskotte’s book Biblical ABC s, though created under the challenging circumstances of occupation by a Nazi regime, also points the way for today to a way of reading the Bible that is current and surprising.