Sermon on 12 January 2014
(1st Sunday after Epiphany)
The first song of the servant of God, one of the great texts from the Old Testament

Text Isaiah 42, verses 1-4

I warmly welcome you on this 2nd Sunday of the new year, the first Sunday after Epiphany. I am delighted to be able to celebrate this service with you and to open the series of "University Sermons" to mark the 40th anniversary of our Carl von Ossietzky University.

Today's sermon text, the so-called "Song of the Servant of God", takes us back to one of the darkest times of the Jewish people. In the year 540 before the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, the majority of the Israelites are in Babylonian captivity. They feel homeless, deprived of their basic rights. It seems only a matter of time before their spark of hope is extinguished. For many, the new rulers seem to have broken their backs; they feel abandoned by God and the world. Even if life in a foreign country has been more or less settled, the longing for what has been lost remains.

This painful feeling of having fallen out of the familiar world, of losing one's home and being uprooted was not only known to the Israelites half a century before Christ. It is a feeling that has struck individuals and communities throughout history and knocked them down. The fact that people have had to leave their homeland, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, is a phenomenon that we have encountered at all times in history and all over the world - right up to the present day. Just think of the 2.3 million Syrians who have been on the run since the outbreak of war. There is no end in sight to this tragedy.

As a historian of the 19th and 20th centuries, I know about the waves of emigration in the 19th century, which prompted millions of people from all European countries to seek their fortune in the New World for religious, political and economic reasons. In their letters to their families at home, we read that many did not find happiness, that they never lost the feeling of foreignness in their new life, that they rarely managed to truly arrive. Be it because it was not made easy for them, be it because they did not make it easy for themselves.

How much more difficult it must have been for those who were forced to flee and sought exile in order to survive. Let's look at one example: the philosopher Hannah Arendt, born in 1906, who was persecuted as a German Jew under National Socialism and found refuge in New York together with her husband and mother after an odyssey via France in 1941. With 50 dollars in their pockets, the family was allocated a furnished room in a shabby tenement building with a communal kitchen on 95th Street. Her husband Heinrich Blücher finds it particularly difficult to settle in. At first, he steadfastly refuses to learn English. Arendt's mother earns extra money doing needlework, while Hannah herself takes advantage of an offer from a refugee organisation to live with an American family in Winchester for a few weeks as a kind of au pair. She had expected to be exploited as a maid. But she was greeted as a welcome guest, people appreciated the conversations with the clever young woman from Germany and showed her affection. A first good experience in the new world. An experience that paved the way for her arrival.

And she did not stop writing, even though, as she was later to complain to her honoured teacher, Karl Jaspers, who was born and grew up in Oldenburg, writing in a foreign language was the real problem of emigration. However, she did not fall into a desperate speechlessness, but also spoke out in her new homeland, which she increasingly learnt to appreciate: thoroughly critical, but also liberated to finally be able to write openly about what she thought and felt.

Karl Jaspers is inspired by the fighting spirit of his former pupil. On 29 October 1945, his first letter to Hannah after years of enforced silence, he writes: "It was nice to hear from you, to read essays from you that you completely agreed with. We had often thought of your fate with concern over the years and had long since lost much hope that you were alive. And now not only this reappearance, but a living spiritual work from the wider world! You have, it seems to me, unswervingly preserved a substance, whether you are in Königsberg, Heidelberg, Paris or America. Anyone who is human must be able to do that. I have been spared this test." But Jaspers, who was married to a Jewish woman and lost his teaching licence at the University of Heidelberg and constantly had to fear for his life and that of his wife, also emigrated. An "inner emigration" that helped the couple survive the winter. And, like Hannah, he did not lose hope of a new beginning: "We want to see what can be rebuilt in the chaos. If the great history of the world doesn't simply destroy us, I have confidence. Young people are still here, burning with enthusiasm."

Confidence and hope are also Hannah's basic moods: Her conclusion is correspondingly positive: On 29 January 1946, she writes to Karl Jaspers: "I am quite well known here and have a little authority with some people on certain issues; in other words, they have confidence in me." The trust placed in her allows the homeless woman to look forward again. And the knowledge that she can make contact with her old friend and teacher again gives her new strength. On 18 November 1945, she writes: "Dear Karl Jaspers, since I know that you have both come through the whole spectacle of hell in one piece, I feel a little more at home in this world again. ... I am glad that you are confident."

Where do they both get their confidence from? Hannah Arendt's answer can be surmised. Her work "Vita activa or the active life" was published in 1958. It is a call for each individual to play an active role in shaping society and, as it were, a beacon of hope. Hope for the chance of a constant new beginning. She concludes chapter 5 with the words: "That one may have faith in the world and that one may hope for the world is perhaps nowhere more succinctly and beautifully expressed than in the words with which the Christmas oratorios proclaim 'the good news': 'Unto us a child is born'."

Hannah Arendt and Karl Jaspers are just two examples from our history who, despite their painful experiences, did not give up, did not give in, who continued to burn - for their ideas, for their society. But as strong as we perceive them in retrospect: They too will have been haunted time and again by the feeling of abandonment, of despair at what they had lost. We know that Jaspers always carried two cyanide capsules with him so that he and his wife Gertrud could end their lives together if necessary. Self-determined, before it could be taken from them by force. And Hannah Arendt was driven not least by her longing for her revered teacher Jaspers to continue writing in his spirit.

The chance of a new beginning in despair: that is also the message of today's sermon text. A hymn to hope. A hymn to the courage to take new paths. A beautiful text for the start of a new year. But it also harbours another, very decisive message: the bearer of hope, the one chosen by God, has his very own way of presenting himself. He will not shout or cry out, and his voice will not be heard in the streets.

He will not break the bruised reed, nor extinguish the smouldering wick. He will faithfully carry out justice. As great as the message is that is proclaimed here, its bearer is not so pompous. His justice comes quietly, he treads softly, he is aware of the highly sensitive sensitivities of those whom he hastens to help on God's behalf. The Lord's chosen one has a mission that makes him strong. But he also knows that those he comes to must first be strengthened in their will to live. And: He is fulfilled and convinced of his mission of justice.

"Justice" is a big word. A word that has lost none of its lustre despite all the abuse it has been subjected to in history. Around the world, justice appears to be the key to peace and the preservation of creation. The question of justice is also a high priority in domestic politics, especially in dealing with growing poverty, but also in education policy as the question of realising equal opportunities. The justice that Isaiah promises and acclaims is reflected in the behaviour of its messenger. As so often in history, it does not come across as imperialistic. It is not self-opinionated, it is not self-righteous. Rather, it is a justice that recognises the neediness of others and does what they need. This bearer of hope is one who does not come along like most of the self-proclaimed saviours of this world. And yet he offers guidance and ensures that those who are already suffering do not perish. He does not brute-force the rudder, he is not a charismatic leader with seductive rhetoric. The messenger doesn't shout, he is not a religious rabble-rouser, he doesn't need cheap slogans, no violence, no means of superficial victory. He knows how to raise people's spirits without a puffery attitude; his aim is to win them over to the truth with patience. And he knows how to empathise with those he comes to. He sees, he understands their despondency. But he does not submit to this despondency. He goes about his work cautiously. The world he comes into is not perfect, no one is perfect. His message, as wonderful as it is, is not meant to be overwhelming, not to be imposed, but rather to benefit people, to make them look up and move on. It is the message of reliable justice, also and especially for the weak.

Being just in the sense of today's text therefore means doing justice to others. Doing justice to others, to our counterparts, to our fellow human beings, is a learning process that requires patience. It begins with perceptions and experiences, with finding a common language. According to the message, we can only succeed in uplifting our fellow human beings if we approach them with genuine sympathy. When we empathise.

A song of praise for sympathy, for gentle co-operation: this is the second central message of the Isaiah text. It is not superficial pity that drives him. He makes the suffering of others his own, he allows his fellow human beings to come very close, he comes very close to them and this gives strength that is contagious. This sympathy, this shared suffering, this shared life allows him to find the right path, the appropriate words, and makes him credible, even for those who were already in danger of losing their faith. They need a master of soft tones who can also listen, who doesn't just talk but seeks dialogue.

Even at the time of the Babylonian captivity, and even more so at the time of Hannah Arendt's exile, these were still rather unfamiliar tones today. We know from history: The louder the proclamation, the more precarious the message often is. But even today, in our communicative world with its many messages that the world does not need, the quiet voices are often overlooked in the noise of everyday life. Those who do not boast are overlooked. The text of Isaiah tells us that God's righteousness does not need this spectacle. On the contrary: if it were loud, it would miss its goal of truly winning people over. This servant of God is considerate, he still respects those who are rejected and discarded by the standards of the world, who have marginalised themselves or who have been pushed out of society. His empathetic actions reflect the goodness and mercy of his message. He gives backbone to the bruised and lets the smouldering wick catch fire again.

There has often been speculation in theology as to who was meant by this servant of God: the Son of God or the people of Israel themselves? Regardless of this, I think the text proclaims a message that we should all accept, especially in this day and age: The message not to give up hope even in desperate situations, to reach out to one another and to do justice to our fellow human beings in order to pave the way for justice. Our text today is an appeal for shared hope and empathetic cooperation. An appeal for recognition and respect for others. It is an appeal not to let up in our endeavours to live together as human beings. Especially with people we do not yet know, who are perhaps strangers to us, who are "different". Oldenburg has gained a lot of experience here, especially since 1945. And today we can say that our city and region would not be in such a great position without the many, many refugees who found a new home here after the Second World War. A few months ago, I was very impressed to be able to read some of the student work from Oldenburg and the surrounding area that had been produced as part of the Federal President's history competition. This competition, which is aimed at school pupils, has been taking place every two years since 1975 and always has a special theme. This time it was "Neighbours". How strangers became friends. And many pupils from our region chose the topic of the coexistence of long-established Oldenburg residents and refugees. They were able to show very well that although it was a slow and not without tension, it was ultimately a very good process of approaching each other, listening to each other and coming together.

Today more than ever, living together is also a global challenge. "The isles wait for his instruction", says Isaiah. This means that the message of justice, of doing justice to one another, applies to the furthest corners of our earth and that we all bear responsibility for its success. Martin Luther King once spoke of the "great house of the world" that we have inherited and in which we live together. The walls of this house are becoming ever more permeable, the distances between us ever shorter. We are experiencing this everywhere. Even on the campus of our university. Not only having a home, but often having to reorientate oneself in the course of one's life, voluntarily or involuntarily, is a life challenge that is increasingly becoming the norm. Preparing our students for a world without borders and conveying this to them as an enrichment is the educational task of today's university. The ancient wisdom of Isaiah about giving hope and empathetic co-operation is a current and helpful guide.

Amen!