Konrad Temple

Konrad Tempel (2012)

Konrad Tempel (born May 31, 1932 in Hamburg ) is a teacher, Quaker and pacifist .

Job and life

Hans-Konrad Tempel, from 1983 just Konrad Tempel, completed a commercial apprenticeship in a Hamburg magazine publisher after graduating from high school in 1951 and studied pedagogy and German at the University of Hamburg .

From 1957 to 1967 he worked as a primary and secondary school teacher in Hamburg with a focus on social studies / politics. In 1967 he became a deputy teacher (assistant) at the Pedagogical Institute of the University of Hamburg and from 1968 worked as a seminar leader for the subject of politics and later as a senior seminar leader at the State Study Seminar in Hamburg. Until his retirement in 1995 he was head of department for elementary, secondary, secondary and special schools and managing director. 1969–1983 he had a teaching position for political didactics at the University of Hamburg.

He has been married to Helga Tempel since 1962 and has three children (* 1963, * 1965, * 1968). Together they are involved in the peace movement for nonviolence and social participation. Konrad Tempel is about encouraging others in their respective paths and encouraging them to change. He gained his standards through the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount, Henry David Thoreau's understanding of democracy , the Hasidic narratives ( Martin Buber ) and the practice of the Quakers. After the First World War, the Quaker diet saved many children in Germany from the harmful effects of malnutrition. The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) has become a spiritual home for Konrad Tempel. From 1971 to 1974 he was their “co-writer” (federal chairman) and from 1976 to 2005 chairman of the supporting association of the social youth welfare facility “The Quaker Houses” in Buchholz / Lüneburg Heath. He is involved in the sense of the Quaker "peace certificates" ("Pray-In" in Brunssum / NL in front of the NATO High Command, stimulated and co-organized by him, publications on Quaker peacekeeping).

Conscientious objection and protest against conventional and nuclear armaments

At the beginning of 1952 Konrad Tempel joined the International of Military Service Opponents (IdK) , held courses there for the first German conscientious objectors, represented them in front of the examination committees in two instances and was a member of the federal executive committee. He was involved in the merger with the group of conscientious objectors, co-founder of the Association of Conscientious Objectors (VK) and was active in its federal board.

He got in touch with the British peace and anti-nuclear weapons movement ( April Carter , Pat Arrowsmith ), became a correspondent for the pacifist weekly Peace News , (London) and met the then Peace News editor Gene Sharp .

Tempel co-founded the Hamburg Action Group for Nonviolence and, from 1956, led courses on “practicing sensible conflict behavior”. Two students took part in one of his training courses for nonviolent action in 1961, the later political scientist Theodor Ebert , who was inspired by this for his further scientific work, and the American David Hartsough , who became the initiator of the Nonviolent Peaceforce in 2002 . Tempel initiated the first German (14-day) vigil following the last big fight against atomic death rally in Hamburg, was involved in a daily protest against French atomic tests in the Sahara at the end of 1959 and was involved in the construction at the end of 1960 of the first North German nuclear shelter in Hamburg-Altona ( Mole campaign ).

In 1960 he was the initiator of the first German Easter March against nuclear weapons in East and West, a star march from four northern German cities, which he and u. a. organized with his wife and Andreas Buro and for which he won the futurologist Robert Jungk . Until 1964 he acted as a spokesman for the Easter March movement and campaign for disarmament.

In 1961 he took part in the American-European March San Francisco-Moscow for unilateral disarmament in the German Democratic Republic for several days, for which he had prepared German participants such as Reiner Steinweg . When the World Peace Brigade was founded in Beirut in 1962 (including by AJ Muste, Bayard Rustin, Danilo Dolci, Andreas Buro, Helga Tempel), he designed a training plan for the volunteers.

Conflict Transformation Efforts

After the announcement of the development of the neutron bomb in the late 1970s, the second phase of his political commitment began:

in the peace initiative Ahrensburg u. a. through a fortnightly campaign “Fasting for Peace”, through public events for “de-feuding”, through advertising for a city partnership with an Eastern European city and through participation in blockades,
by participating in the founding phase of the educational and meeting center for nonviolent action / KURVE Wustrow, of which he was later chairman for 8 years,
by participating in the founding of the Federation for Social Defense / FSIO, of which he was co-chair from 1995-2003,
by working on the concept for a civil peace service / ZFD of the BSV (educational part 1994) and by drafting a teaching and learning concept for peace workers "outline of a curriculum",
by co-founding the forumZFD in 1996, by being in charge of the training plan for the qualification courses and by providing pedagogical support for the trainer teams until 2004,
by the "appeal to all soldiers of the Bundeswehr who are involved in the Yugoslavian war: refuse your further participation in this war!" in the taz of April 21, 1999 as a co-signatory. For temples, the appeal to refuse is an appeal to examine one's conscience (Basic Law Art. 4/3 and Section 22 Soldiers Act). The Berlin public prosecutor's office assessed the appeal according to the Criminal Code (§111, StGB) as a call for criminal offenses, namely desertion (§16 Paragraph 1 Wehrstrafgesetz [WStG]) and refusal to obey (§20 WStG). In contrast to most of the other signatories, Helga and Konrad Tempel were acquitted in two instances. In 2001 the Humanist Union (HU) honored the first signatories of the appeal with the Fritz Bauer Prize . (see below).
by participating in the conception and founding of the Nonviolent Peaceforce / NP for Unarmed Civilian Peacekeeping 2002 in India and involvement in the German NP-AG and leading the “Interlink Group” of the European member organizations.

In 1977 he signed the voluntary commitment of Living Without Armor , Stuttgart: “I am ready to live without the protection of military armament. I want to advocate in our state that peace without weapons is politically developed ”. In addition to the BSV and forumZFD, Konrad Tempel is a member of the Social Democratic Party, SPD (previously in the neutralist All-German People's Party of Gustav Heinemann), the Arbeiter-Samariter-Bund , the Education and Science Union (GEW) and the International Union of Reconciliation (IFOR) .

Awards

1988: Olof Palme Peace Prize of the SPD Stormarn, together with Helga Tempel
2001: Fritz Bauer Prize of the Humanist Union, together with other first signatories who on April 21, 1999 in the taz the “Appeal to all soldiers of the Bundeswehr who are involved in the war in Yugoslavia: Refuse your further participation in this war ! ”Had signed. (see above)

Works

Co-editor of texts on nonviolence : Gene Sharp on other ways (Which Way to Freedom? A Study in Nonviolence, 1957) Hamburg 1958, and Henry David Thoreau Resistance against the Government (Civil Disobedience, 1849, first German single print), Hamburg 1959.
Associate Editor of the Handbook for Nonviolent Actions by Charles Walker, Offenbach 1963.
Easter marches against atomic death , NDR 3 school radio history / 2nd semester, Hamburg, 1982.
Living Peace in Radical Hope - Voices to Keep German Quakers at Peace Today , Pyrmont 1993.
Beginning of nonviolent action in the first 20 years after the war. Who knows what it really was like in the journal Nonviolent Action - Quarterly Issues for Peace and Justice Special Volume, Berlin 1997.
It's about "correct" behavior in conflict situations - comments on educational aspects in publications by Theodor Ebert in non-violent action , special volume, 1997.
Ability and willingness - guiding principles of training to become peace workers , in Tilman Evers, ed. Civil Peace Service - Specialists for Peace - Idea. Experience. Goals , Opladen 2000.
On the spiritual dimension of political action in the history of the friends , Quäker magazine , Pyrmont, 4/2002.
Civil conflict management in the area of tension between society and the state , in Astrid Sahm u. a., Ed. The future of peace, a balance sheet of peace and conflict research , Wiesbaden 2002.
Several articles in Andreas Buro, ed. Stories from the Peace Movement / Personal and Political Affairs , Committee for Fundamental Rights and Democracy, Cologne 2005.
Editor of the ZFD impuls series , Bonn 2005–2007: “Setting Signs / On Civic Commitment to the Civil Peace Service / Göttingen Peace Prize”, “Nonviolent Intervention by a Third Party - Instruments for the Civil Peace Service - Comments from a German point of view / experiences from American training practice : Curriculum and trainer manual (on CD-Rom) ”/“ Encounter and transform - on the psychology of peace work ”/“ Faces and stories - from the project practice of the civil peace service ”.
“Spirituality and global responsibility - what does being connected to the world mean for me? What does this mean for my dealings with the world? ” Quäker magazine , Pyrmont, issue 4/2007.
“Incitement to nonviolence / Via ways of mindful practice and spirituality”, Berlin 2008.
"Nourishing the seeds of joy and peace / What was important to me" in "Peace research and peace practice / encouragement to work on utopia", Frankfurt 2009.
Associate Editor “1660-2010 - Let Your Lives Speak / Quaker Peace Testimonies in Our Time”, Pyrmont 2010.
Relevant effects of the Easter marches 1960/68 in the magazine FriedensForum 3/2010.
“Learning the 'craft of nonviolence': obstacles and approaches to overcoming them” in Reiner Steinweg, Ulrike Laubenthal (ed.), “Nonviolent Action / Experiences and Analyzes”, Frankfurt 2011.

Web links

Commons : Konrad Tempel - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Literature by and about Konrad Tempel in the catalog of the German National Library
Homepage of Helga and Konrad Tempel http://tempel.quakers.net/

Individual evidence

^ Religious Society of Friends, “That one may live there”, Pyrmont 1986, p. 76; “The Future of Peace - A Balance Sheet of Peace and Conflict Research”, Wiesbaden 2002, p. 372
^ Wolfgang U. Eckart : Medicine and War. Germany 1914-1924 , Ferdinand Schöningh Verlag Paderborn 2014, p. 280 + 281, illustrated Quaker feeding for children. ISBN 978-3-506-75677-0 .
^ Religious Society of Friends, "That one may live there", Pyrmont 1986, p. 76
^ Karl A. Otto , "From Easter March to APO - History of the Extra-Parliamentary Opposition 1960-70", Frankfurt 1977, a. a. P. 70; Lübecker Nachrichten / Stormarner Nachrichten, “Marching for Peace”, March 21, 2008, p. 11
^ Theodor Ebert: In search of a non-violent alternative to the Bundeswehr. Experience report of a peace researcher, November 2, 2005
↑ Politics from below - On the past and present of non-violent action , journal Non-violent action , special volume 1997, p. 66ff
^ Andreas Buro: The emergence of the Easter march movement as an example for the development of mass learning processes , in peace analyzes , focus on peace movement , Frankfurt 1977, p. 60ff; Westermanns Pedagogical Contributions, "Peace Education", Braunschweig, 3/1982, p. 120ff; Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Easter marches against atomic death , NDR 3 school radio history / 2nd half of the year, Hamburg, 1982, p. 23ff; Hermes Handlexikon, The Peace Movement , 1983, p. 296; Der Spiegel, Children of Light, Children of Darkness , No. 42, October 17, 1983; Lübecker Nachrichten / Stormarner Nachrichten Marching for Peace , March 21, 2008, p. 11; Welt am Sonntag 50 Years of Easter March , April 4, 2010, p. 8; Hamburger Abendblatt, magazine, left, left, two three four , April 3, 2010, p. VII