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Analysis Of The Book ' Silence, Sh Ū Saku End Ā ' By ' The Hell Of Boiling Water '

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Within the first few pages of the novel, Silence, Shūsaku Endō’s throws his readers head on to the cruelty and darkness that the Christians had faced in 17th century feudal Japan. Father Rodrigues, a Jesuit priest sent to covert the Japanese to the Christian faith, he described the “immersion in the hell of boiling water at Unzen.” the five of priests and two women went through to give up their faith. However, with all the tortures methods used and being immersed in the boil water and being in prison, they still didn’t give up. It leaves the reader, such as my shudder and hard to contemplate what I have just read. Although disturbing, the onslaught of Christian persecution has been ongoing for thousands of years. This historical fiction novel follows the journey of three Jesuit priests from Portugal to investigate the actions that led one of their own superiors to abandon his faith and defaced the image of the church while also carrying out the covert Christian missions in the country. However, when they land in Maco, Father Valignano informs them that Inoue, the governor of Chikugo, are persecuting Christians by using various torture methods to apostatizing and killing them when they don’t. According to Endo, the act of apostatizing was to step on the fumi-e, “a bronze portrait of Jesus or Mary mounted on a wooden frame. The Japanese Christians would have to step on every New Year’s in order to be freedom from the persecution.” This didn’t dissuade the three priests who

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