“HISTORY does not lie.” That is a well-known
saying in Estonia, and there are similar sayings in other lands. Yes, we
cannot change the past, but we can certainly learn from it. Wise King
Solomon of ancient Israel said: “I saw all this when I thought about the
things that are done in this world, a world where some men have power
and others have to suffer under them.”—Ecclesiastes 8:9, Today’s English Version.
A powerful testimony to the truth of this Biblical
statement was seen some decades ago in Estonia, as well as in many
other parts of Eastern Europe. Human rule brought suffering to countless
innocent people who were forcibly deported to faraway places to be
resettled or imprisoned in labor camps.
According to local historians, more than 46,000
civilians were deported from this small country between 1941 and 1951.
Most were targeted for their political affiliation, others for their
nationality or social status. Jehovah’s Witnesses, however, were singled
out for their religious beliefs.
Attack on God-Fearing People
In a study published by Tartu University Press in
2004, historian Aigi Rahi-Tamm stated: “From 1948 to 1951, 72 of
Jehovah’s Witnesses were arrested, including people associated with
them. However, a deportation on a far wider scale was planned and
carried out on the night of April 1, 1951, not just in the Baltic States
but also in Moldova, western Ukraine, and Belorussia.”
Before 1951, Jehovah’s Witnesses in Estonia were
subjected to arrest, psychological pressure, interrogation, and
imprisonment. This new campaign of deportation was apparently an all-out
effort to wipe Jehovah’s Witnesses out of Estonia altogether.
The date April 1, 1951, appears on the stamp
mentioned above. The number 382 on the stamp refers to the number of
Witnesses and their children who were deported on that day. This number
includes some relatives and neighbors who were not Witnesses. During the
day, arrests were made throughout the country. That night, those arrested—young and old—were herded into animal boxcars on trains headed for Siberia.
Ella Toom, *
25 years old at the time, was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Recalling a
typical interrogation, she says: “An officer tried to frighten me and
demanded that I stop preaching. Once he asked: ‘Do you want to live? Or
do you want to die with your God on the fields of Siberia?’” Ella,
however, fearlessly continued to preach the good news. She was sent to
Siberia and was transferred from one labor camp to another over a period
of almost six years.
Among the hundreds of individuals who were
deported without a court hearing was another young Witness woman, Hiisi
Lember. Recalling the events of April 1, 1951, she related: “They came
totally unexpectedly at night, ordering us: ‘You have half an hour. Pack
your things!’” Under the cover of darkness, Hiisi and her six-year-old
daughter were then taken to the train station. The creaky train traveled
from station to station and picked up more Witnesses. “We were thrown
into an animal boxcar. Thankfully, the animal dung was frozen;
otherwise, it would have been difficult to stand in it. We were like
animals stuffed into a container.”
The grueling two-week train trip was traumatic.
The boxcars were overcrowded and unsanitary. Young and old were
humiliated and disgraced in every possible way. Some of them wept and
refused to eat. However, the Witnesses encouraged and helped one another
by singing songs of worship, and they shared what food they had. They
were sent to a “permanent settlement” and were told that this was a
“one-way trip.”
Hiisi recalled the heartwarming support that she
received from fellow believers during this ordeal: “At one station, our
train stopped next to a train from Moldova. Through the wall of the
boxcar, we heard a man ask who we were and where we were going. We
explained that we didn’t know where we were going and that we were
Jehovah’s Witnesses from Estonia. Fellow Witnesses in the train from
Moldova overheard the conversation. Through an opening in the boxcar,
they threw us a big loaf of bread and some prunes.” She added: “Then we
began to understand the extent of the roundup of Jehovah’s
Witnesses—that it was from all the republics of the Soviet Union!”
Two teenage Witness girls—Corinna and her
sister, Ene—were separated from their mother for more than six years.
Their mother, also one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, had been arrested earlier
and sent to a labor camp. Then, on that infamous April night, the two
young girls were snatched from their home and herded into a boxcar.
Corinna reflects with thankfulness, “On the train, a Witness with two
children offered to care for us and assured us that we could live
together as a family with her and her children.”
What happened at the final destination? The day
after reaching the cold Siberian wilderness, a humiliating “slave
market” began. Men from nearby collective farms came to choose workers
for their farms. Corinna recalls: “We
overheard them bickering among themselves, saying: ‘You already have a
driver for your tractor. This one is mine,’ or, ‘I already took two old
ones. You have to take some old ones too.’”
Corinna and Ene were brave girls. They said
later: “We missed our mother very much, and oh, how we yearned just to
be in her warm embrace again!” Even so, they maintained their spiritual
strength and sense of humor. Corinna added: “In a way, it was good that
mother did not see us because sometimes we had to work outside in the
bitter cold without proper clothing.”
To be sure, innocent people in Estonia and
elsewhere have suffered gross injustice, and Jehovah’s Witnesses as a
group have been among them. (See the box “Unimaginable ‘Scale of
Terror.’”) Despite such mistreatment and suffering in the past,
Jehovah’s Witnesses in Estonia are still an active and happy group of
people.
A Bright Future Ahead
The Bible assures us that Jehovah God hates
injustice. It says: “Everyone doing these things, every doer of
injustice, is something detestable to Jehovah your God.” (Deuteronomy 25:16)
Though God has tolerated wickedness in the past, the time will soon
come when he will bring injustice and wickedness to an end. “Just a
little while longer,” says the psalmist, “and the wicked one will be no
more; and you will certainly give attention to his place, and he will
not be. But the meek ones themselves will possess the earth, and they
will indeed find their exquisite delight in the abundance of peace.”—Psalm 37:10, 11.
Yes, a bright future awaits us! Though we cannot
change the past, we can take steps to assure our future. Draw close to
God and see how you can be part of the wonderful future when true
righteousness will prevail.—Isaiah 11:9.
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