Introduction

Abstract

In May 1965, in the middle of the Cold War, the Committee of the Judiciary United States Senate held an unusual hearing. Senators listened to the testimony of a Romanian reverend who had managed to escape from behind the Iron Curtain. His name was Richard Wurmbrand. Born in a Jewish family he converted to Christianity in 1936 and was twice convicted for his religious belief; he spent nine years in Romanian prisons, three of which were in solitary confinement in an underground cell. A few years before his escape from Romania, a group of Norwegian Christians raised $10,000 and, bribing communist officials, obtained a passport for the reverend and his wife. Wurmbrand spent a few years in Europe, but fearing the long arm of the Romanian Security Intelligence, the Securitate,¹ went to the US where he was now giving evidence of what he had experienced.² He shocked the audience when, as proof of his words, he unbuttoned his shirt and showed 18 deep wound marks inscribed on his body.³ His testimony was a personal account of his inhumane experiences in prisons and of the general attitude of the atheist regime against religion.