When I first heard of this book I decided I would read it. A few months later I did. I wasn’t sure what to expect especially since forward notes that the book has “no literary value.” Before starting this book I only knew that Richard Wurmbrand had been in prison because of his religious beliefs.
Wurmbrand describes his early life by saying “I was an atheist but atheism did not give peace to my heart.” He tells the story of how a Romanian carpenter converted him to Christ. After his conversion the Nazis arrested him several times. “The Nazi terror was great but only a taste of what was to come under the communists… these Nazi times had one great advantage. They taught us that physical beatings could be endured.”
Once Romania became a communist country it became illegal to preach the gospel and Wurmbrand spent 14 years in prison. He notes “What the communists have done to Christians surpasses any possibility of human understanding. I have seen communists whose faces while torturing believers shown with rapturous joy. They cried out while torturing the Christians we are the devil. We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the principalities and powers of evil. We saw that communism is not from men but from the devil. It is a spiritual force, a force of evil, and it can only be countered by a greater spiritual force the spirit of God.”
Even while in prison Wurmbrand would continue to preach the gospel. He noted that the Christians and the guards had an understanding. He notes “It was a deal we preached and they beat us. We were happy preaching they were happy beating us so everyone was happy.”
After his release from he has been asked if he hates the communists. He replies “Tortures endured in communist prisons have not made me hate communists. They are God’s creatures how can I hate them? But neither can I be their friend…they hate the notion of god. I love God.”
Overall this is a book that shows what humanity is capable of both in terms of brutality and in resilience and love. Overall I give it 4 out of 5 stars.
On July 9, 1722 the New England Courant published a letter from Silence Dogood. The letter stated in part:
“Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as publick Liberty, without Freedom of Speech; which is the Right of every Man, as far as by it, he does not hurt or controul the Right of another: And this is the only Check it ought to suffer, and the only Bounds it ought to know.
“This sacred Privilege is so essential to free Governments, that the Security of Property, and the Freedom of Speech always go together; and in those wretched Countries where a Man cannot call his Tongue his own, he can scarce call any Thing else his own.”
Silence Dogood was the pen name Benjamin Franklin used for a series of letters that he wrote. Franklin outlines the importance of freedom of speech above. If freedom of speech is curtailed it is only a matter of time before every other right will be taken as well. In the letter Franklin continued by saying:
“The best ...
