Welcome to the Beyers Naudé Archive

At the Beyers Naudé Archive we host and interpret documents with regard to Beyers Naudé, the Christian Institute and other dissidents. The following collections have been archived and made available for research purposes:


Completed Collections

The Ilse Naudé Collection


Most of the sermons and speeches delivered by Beyers Naudé from the 1930's to the 1990's (approximately 1 400), which are handwritten by him, has been donated to the BN archive by his wife.  These documents have categorised and are being duplicated, where after they are to be bound and made available for research. The original documents are housed in the DRC Archive for safe keeping. This collection has been incorporated in the BN Archive database and all the material will soon be available digitally.

The Pro-Veritate Collection


With the help of various donors, the BN Archive is thankful to report that a complete collection of Pro Veritate (a Christian monthly journal published by the Christian Institute of Southern Africa from 1962 to 1977) is housed at the Archive. Articles in Pro Veritate reflected a theological and Christian point of view on a wide range of topics during the Apartheid era of South Africa). These publications have been duplicated, bound and are available for research purposes. The original copies are housed in the DRC Archive for safe keeping. This collection has been incorporated in the BN Archive database.

The Christian Institute (CI) Collection 


This is a comprehensive collection which consists of the following:  the history, planning and constitution; monthly newsletters; director's reports; bible studies; general administration of the head office as well as that of the regional offices consisting of agendas, minutes, reports, financial statements of all the structures of the CI namely the Board of Directors, Executive Committee, Management Committee as well as the Annual General Meetings; correspondence by and to BN and the CI; criticism on BN and CI;  documents pertaining to the commission chaired by Jimmy Kruger, Schlebusch and L le Grange into the CI and other organisations; a duplicate copy of the file which was kept by the apartheid government on BN; the banning of BN and others as well as the discontinuation of the CI.  Furthermore, this collection also has documents with regard to related matters i.e. Sharpeville; Cottesloe; SA Council of Churches; Soweto uprising. This collection is available for research purposes and incorporated in the BN archive database.

Russel Botman

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It is certainly fitting and meaningful that the archive of the Beyers Naudé Centre for Public Theology houses a Russel Botman Collection, since he was the founder and first director of the Centre. 

Russel Botman received many honours throughout his life.  In March 2014, for instance, he received an honorary doctorate from Hope College in Michigan for leadership in higher education and the Reformed Church.  The fact that an institution with such a name awarded Russel Botman an honorary doctorate for these achievements is significant, since the concept of “hope" was central to his faith and the role he played in public life.  He promoted and embodied a theology and pedagogy of hope, and as Rector and Vice-Chancellor of Stellenbosch University he launched the “Hope Project". The name of Russel Botman is furthermore associated with the way he played a leading role in Reformed and ecumenical circles as well as in higher education, enacting in the process a visionary commitment to a future marked by human dignity, reconciliation, justice and hope. ​


Bernard Lategan

Ben Marais

​Jaap Durand

​​​John de Gruchy​


Collection of files (two) held by the security police on Beyers Naudé  and the South African Council of Churches

Etienne de Villiers Collection


General information as well as publications of the World Council of Churches (international and National).

In process and future collections


Denise Ackerman


Data bases:

Karl Barth