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Silence

Shūsaku Endō,

William Johnston (Translator)

4.08 · Rating details · 21,368 ratings · 2,848 reviews

Beneath the light of the candle I am sitting with my hands on my knees, staring in front of me. And I keep turning over in my mind the thought that I am at the end of the earth, in a place which you do not know and which your whole lives through you will never visit.

It is 1640 and Father Sebastian Rodrigues, an idealistic Jesuit priest, sets sail for Japan determined to he ...more

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Paperback, 201 pages

Published January 1st 1999 by Taplinger Publishing (first published 1966)

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Average rating 4.08 ·

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· 21,368 ratings · 2,848 reviews

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Jan 08, 2017 Jeffrey Keeten rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, religion, the-japanese

“Sin, he reflected, is not what it is usually thought to be; it is not to steal and tell lies. Sin is for one man to walk brutally over the life of another and to be quite oblivious of the wounds he has left behind.”

photo ChristianMartyrsOfNagasaki_zpssyl4fq5l.jpg

Japanese Painting by an unknown artist of the Christian Martyrs of Nagasaki.

The Jesuit priest Francis Xavier born in SPAIN, but representing PORTUGAL arrived in Japan in 1543 to save souls. The Japanese were Buddhist, not “heathens” without a proper religion. The Spanish Francisca ...more

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Sep 23, 2017 Jim Fonseca rated it really liked it

Shelves: religious-theme, history, japanese-authors

This is a historical novel about the early years of Christianity in Japan. It is a fictionalized account based on real historical characters.

It’s set in the late 17th century. Two Portuguese priests get into Japan by ship from Macao at a time when Japanese officials had banned Christianity and were killing priests and torturing suspected Christians to apostatize (give up their faith). They are forced to verbally renounce their faith and to stomp and spit on religious figures.

description

The main character ...more

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Jan 22, 2017 AMEERA rated it really liked it

Painful and deep book about the religions
I think this book change me and makes me more respectful to other religions even if you religion different than what I believe I should respect you because this what you believe too

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Jun 19, 2015 Laura Leaney rated it it was amazing

This is an intense - rather grim - epistolary novel written mostly from the vantage point of a Roman Catholic priest, a missionary to Japan, early in the 17th century. The events are based on historical facts and the characters on actual people. The succinct introduction by translator William Johnston reveals that the novel begins after the period when daiymo Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who had once allowed the Christian missionaries much privilege, had twenty-six Japanese and European Christians crucif This is an intense - rather grim - epistolary novel written mostly from the vantage point of a Roman Catholic priest, a missionary to Japan, early in the 17th century. The events are based on historical facts and the characters on actual people. The succinct introduction by translator William Johnston reveals that the novel begins after the period when daiymo Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who had once allowed the Christian missionaries much privilege, had twenty-six Japanese and European Christians crucified. Apparently there "stands a monument to commemorate the spot where they died" to this day. Although missionary work continued, there began a savage effort to exterminate Christianity from Japan. The first executions created too many martyrs, so the Japanese officials attempted to force the Christians to apostatize by stamping or pressing their foot on a depiction of Christ or the Virgin, a fumie. If not, they were wrapped tightly and hung upside down in a pit filled with excrement until they signaled their apostasy (with their one free hand) or died.

The novel opens with two priests willing to risk capture and death to keep Christ's flame burning. They are Sebastian Rodrigues and Francisco Garrpe, both Portuguese. Crossing the "leaden sea," they entrust themselves to Kichijiro, a Japanese Christian who wears a "servile grin." Pax Christi. What happens to these men in Japan is beautiful and terrible. The letters of Rodrigues are testament to the powerful writing of Endō and show the priest's anguish as God remains silent in the face of so much suffering. He writes: "I knew well, of course, that the greatest sin against God was despair; but the silence of God was something I could not fathom." Rodrigues is plagued by his inability to understand. His journey to Japan parallels the suffering of Christ, his dealings with Judas, as well as his interviews with Roman officials. It is not a good outcome, but the ending blew me away.

Here's an important question to the faithful: If you could save men and women from slow torture by stepping on the fumie and apostatizing, would you do it? Or would you hold your ground while listening to their agonizing moans? Does God want you to help the suffering of human beings or does God want you to keep your foot off His image? What a terrible situation for a Christian priest. At one point Rodrigues is forced to watch the death of Japanese Christian martyrs as they are wrapped alive in matting and dropped into the sea. He cannot shake the vision of it, and he sees the "sea stretched out endlessly, sadly; and all this time, over the sea, God simply maintained his unrelenting silence.[. . .] 'Eloi, Eloi, lama sabacthani!' The priest had always thought that these words were that man's prayer, not that they issued from terror at the silence of God."

If you grew up Roman Catholic, as I did, this book will strike a strong chord in you. The questions that Rodrigues asks are the questions we all wanted to ask. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Like Dostoyevsky, Endō shows the existential condition of man as alien in the world, lonely, and horribly in need of comfort. More than anything else, Silence is food for thought.
...more

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Dec 31, 2016 Darwin8u rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016, aere-perennius

"Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent."
-- Wittgenstein, Tractus Logico-Philosophicus 7

description

The novel started off a bit slow, but once it hit its pace it was almost Dostoevskian in its depths. Endō, a Japanese Catholic, uses the story of two Jesuit priests in search of an apostate Jesuit to explore issues of faith, circumstance, religous colonialism, belief, sin, courage, suffering, martyrdom, etc., especially during periods when God is silent. He examines Christ and Christianity and ...more

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Mar 30, 2011 Mariel rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: my day depends on the setting sun

Recommended to Mariel by: george michael's faith

This book ruined my life. Sorta true. It's the catchiest review intro I'm going to come up with. I'm afraid to review this book and remember why it set me off to feeling hopeless and stupid. Band aid scenario. Pull it off!

I don't have the religion or spiritual kinds of faith. I'm dyslexic when it comes to religion, maybe. My mind jumbles the meanings and I just don't speak that language of KNOWING what you can't see and this is good and this is always bad. I don't look at someone who does have i ...more

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Mar 24, 2011 William2 rated it liked it

Shelves: japan, 20-ce, translation

A worthwhile read even for a non-Christian like me who, nonetheless, has a deep and abiding intellectual interest in religion and spirituality. But VERY Christian. You have to have some empathy for that side of the story in order for it to be a satisfying read. If you're an atheist, not for you. No no no...

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Jun 12, 2017 Sr3yas rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2016-books-movie-tv

It is easy enough to die for the good and beautiful; the hard thing is to die for the miserable and corrupt.

The context of the above line is based on the sacrifice Jesus made for sins of humanity. Now I am going to revise this line to explain the story of Silence.

For priests of Japan, it was easy enough to die as good and beautiful; the hard thing was to die as miserable and corrupt.

Hailed as one of the best novels of the twentieth century, Endo's Silence creates a fascinating as well as tho ...more

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Nov 21, 2016 Blake Crouch rated it it was amazing

What a devastatingly brilliant novel about faith, fanaticism, love, suffering, and ultimately, the silence of God. Why does God allow pain to flourish in the world? Why does God stand silent while the world burns? This novel, about Jesuit Portuguese missionaries in Japan in the 17th Century is gorgeously rendered, asks the hardest of hard questions, and is simply one of the greatest novels I've ever read. Very excited to see the upcoming film adaptation by Martin Scorsese.

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Jul 20, 2017 Hugh rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: translations, modern-lit, modern-classics, read-2017

This is a very impressive historical novel set in 17th century Japan. I have not seen the Scorsese film but my edition does contain an introduction by Scorsese so there is a link to it.

The book is primarily about the difficulties in maintaining faith in a hostile environment, and specifically the trials undergone by Portuguese Catholic missionaries, whose work in Japan flourished in the 16th century but was brutally suppressed. This is a little difficult to understand for those of us who never h ...more

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Oct 08, 2016 BrokenTune rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: reviewed

2.5*

The premise of a story of Catholic missionaries trying to spread Christianity in Japan really caught my interest because I have fond memories of reading Shogun, which featured a similar premise as a side-story. Although, if any of you have read Shogun "fond" may not be the best way to describe the reading experience as there lots - and I do mean LOTS - of gory descriptions of cruelty and violence.

Obviously, I must have forgotten about that when I gleefully signed up to the group read of Sile 2.5*

The premise of a story of Catholic missionaries trying to spread Christianity in Japan really caught my interest because I have fond memories of reading Shogun, which featured a similar premise as a side-story. Although, if any of you have read Shogun "fond" may not be the best way to describe the reading experience as there lots - and I do mean LOTS - of gory descriptions of cruelty and violence.

Obviously, I must have forgotten about that when I gleefully signed up to the group read of Silence.

Endo also goes into a lot of detail when describing the obstacles and hardship - read "torture and violence" - that the priests and Christians endured under the samurai rule, at a time when Christianity was banned from Japan - because the rulers decided it was of "no value" (according to one of Endo's characters) to the Japanese society.

The second aspect that intrigued me to the book was, of course, that some reviews compare Endo to Graham Greene. How could I not be intrigued by that?

Silence really was an intriguing read. Endo really tried to capture the mind and spirit of the priest that is sent to Japan and discovers that he may not be able to fulfill his mission and the doubt he feels when he witnesses the events around him.

Unfortunately, this really didn't work for me.

Endo's narrative limits the reader to experience the book only from the priest's point of view. There is not a lot of dialogue or consideration that deals with the point of view of the Japanese characters. I'm sure Endo created this limitation on purpose, maybe to focus on the priestly condition and to emphasize the isolation of the foreigner from the other people around him, but without the other perspectives the book is really limited and reads more like a list of Japanese torture methods than an investigation into the human or priestly condition.

In turn, this distances Endo's work from that of Greene's. I may not have enjoyed Greene's religious musings but at least he made his protagonists doubt their mission, doubt their conviction, and consider other points of view. This was missing from Silence. ...more

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Apr 13, 2009 booklady rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2009, theology, classic, crime, fiction, spiritual, historical-fiction, worth-reading-over-and-over, hagiography, biography

Silence is a modern classic by Shusaku Endo. On the cover a crucified Jesus hangs from Japanese writing characters. My friend, Carol, recommended this book to me awhile back and I've had it sitting on my bookshelf. Then during Holy Week while I was finishing Fr. Neuhaus’ Death on a Friday Afternoon, he mentions the heroic struggles of the European missionaries who gave their all to travel around the world to share the Gospel message. Sometimes it just seems appropriate to leave off one book and Silence is a modern classic by Shusaku Endo. On the cover a crucified Jesus hangs from Japanese writing characters. My friend, Carol, recommended this book to me awhile back and I've had it sitting on my bookshelf. Then during Holy Week while I was finishing Fr. Neuhaus’ Death on a Friday Afternoon, he mentions the heroic struggles of the European missionaries who gave their all to travel around the world to share the Gospel message. Sometimes it just seems appropriate to leave off one book and seek out another, as if you are being led to it.

Silence tells a fictionalized story of what may have happened to two Portuguese priests who ventured onto mainland Japan during the persecution of the Christians around 1643. The story is told – brilliantly and poignantly – through the eyes of one Sebastian Rodrigues. The all important thing was to suffer and die a glorious martyr’s death. It was unthinkable that those who did not know Christ could devise any suffering, whether it be physical, mental, emotional or even spiritual which would lead the true believer to recant—but then this was before the days of Vietnam and the Japanese POW camps. Then it was believed no pain, deprivation, imprisonment, torture of oneself or one’s fellows—however prolonged, could ever be so bad it couldn’t be endured for love of God. It was simply a matter of one’s faith and will.

Silence is about the silence of God. I was 96 pages into the book before it occurred to me to keep track of all the times Shusaku Endo used the word, ‘silence’, ‘silent’ or ‘silently’, as well as words about sound. I had a feeling it was central to the story. From then until the end of the book (page 191) I counted fifty-one more times; I may have missed a few. It might have been a silly exercise—like something a high school English teacher would have you do—but I didn’t mind. And it focused my reading just when plot action came almost to a halt and most everything which was ‘happening’ was in the main character’s mind, or as experienced through his senses.

Silence is a powerful book. It seems to have as much to say about East meets West as it does about evangelization, martyrdom and the true voice of God. It is one Christian man’s search for the meaning of ‘the mud swamp Japanese in me’. ‘Japan is a mud swamp because it sucks up all sorts of ideologies, transforming them into itself and distorting them in the process.’ (p. xv) Sound like another country we all know and love?

Silence will leave you different than it found you. 'Be still (silent?) and know that I am God.' (Psalm 46:10) ...more

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Mar 31, 2012 K.D. Absolutely rated it really liked it

Recommended to K.D. by: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die (2006-2012)

Shelves: 1001-core, religion, historical-fiction, japanese

Mind-blowing. It tells about the 17th century Japan when the Tokugawa shogunate was in power. During this time, practicing Catholics were called Kakure Kirishitan ("Hidden Christians") because they had to do their religious rituals underground. This was also the time of "fumie" a metal plate bearing the images of Jesus and Mary. The religious police asked the families suspected to be Catholics to trample this fumie to prove that they had not converted from Buddism.

It was also during this time w Mind-blowing. It tells about the 17th century Japan when the Tokugawa shogunate was in power. During this time, practicing Catholics were called Kakure Kirishitan ("Hidden Christians") because they had to do their religious rituals underground. This was also the time of "fumie" a metal plate bearing the images of Jesus and Mary. The religious police asked the families suspected to be Catholics to trample this fumie to prove that they had not converted from Buddism.

It was also during this time when Portuguese missionaries arrived in Japan to further propagate the Catholic faith. This book, Silence tells the story of the Jesuit priest, Sebastian Rodriguez who has to come to Japan via Macao to find the truth about his mentor Cristobal Ferreira who is reported to have apostatized, i.e., have defected from the Catholic faith.

The first few chapters of the book are told in a chronicle-like narration. Fr. Rodriguez records his day-to-day experience during his journey to Japan. Once in the country, the narration shifts to third party narrator. The shift is like journeying together with the narrator and then later looking at the whole scene as a third person. The effect is fresh and invigorating despite the too sad and serious theme of sacrificing life and bearing all the tortures just to keep one's faith in God. Its impact to me was that I should not take my belief in God for granted because missionaries (now saints and blessed ones) gave up their lives to spread the Catholic faith all over the world. Although I am living in the Philippines and Catholicism spread in the country almost with no resistance, still what some missionaries in other parts of the world played the roles of martyrs and their examples should always be remembered.

The title of the book came from their question of why during this era in Japan, God had remained silent. That during the torture of the missionaries when they were asked to stay inside a small well until they were dead, God did not do anything. The question was answered at the end of the novel and it was I think an appropriate ending.

I recommend this book to all religious scholars who want to know more about that era in Japan. I also recommend this to all fans of Japanese novels in English. It is just mind-blowing and bewildering in this beauty: prose, theme and content.

My second Endo and he is still to disappoint. Whew! ...more

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Jan 13, 2012 Owlseyes inside Notre Dame, it's so strange a 15-hour blaze and...30-minutes wait to call the firemen...and rated it it was amazing

Shelves: book-made-movie, jap-lit

Preamble

Jesuit priest Francisco Xavier called Japan “the light of my heart…the country in the Orient most suited for Christianity”.

Fact: Kakure or Japanese crypto-Christians, meeting in secret for 240 years…reciting a Japanese version of the “Hail Mary” and yet nobody knew what it meant for many years.

Estimate: 30,000 Kakure live today in Japan.

Chronology

1587- Hydeyoshi started the persecution of Christians.
1614-26 priests punished in Nagasaki.
1614-expulsion from Japan of all missionarie ...more

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Sep 07, 2019 Loretta rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: catholic, historical-fiction, five-star-reads, religion, my-2019-reading-challenge

This was a very disturbing book for me. One that I probably won't forget for awhile.

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Jan 05, 2018 Sam Quixote rated it it was ok

Set in the 17th century, a pair of Portuguese Catholic priests, Rodrigues and Garrpe, set off to the remote and mysterious island kingdom of Japan to spread Christianity and track down their mentor, Father Ferreira, who is rumoured to have committed apostasy (renounced his faith). But the Japanese government are not friendly to foreigners (this xenophobic attitude actually continues to this day!) and are particularly hostile to this new religion - is Ferreira simply dead and does a similar fate Set in the 17th century, a pair of Portuguese Catholic priests, Rodrigues and Garrpe, set off to the remote and mysterious island kingdom of Japan to spread Christianity and track down their mentor, Father Ferreira, who is rumoured to have committed apostasy (renounced his faith). But the Japanese government are not friendly to foreigners (this xenophobic attitude actually continues to this day!) and are particularly hostile to this new religion - is Ferreira simply dead and does a similar fate await Rodrigues and Garrpe?

Naaah. I wasn’t impressed with this one. You know what this book needs? A story! Barely anything happens in this 300-page novel. The priests get to Japan and have to evade the authorities, they’re inevitably caught, and then it ends unmemorably. Way too much of the book is all about the Japanese authorities trying to get Rodrigues to apostatize himself by trampling on an image of Christ which gets dull fast.

All it reminded me was how stupid religion is as a whole, whether it’s Christianity or Buddhism, the extraordinary cruelty it brings out in people and the total lack of critical thinking its followers exhibit. We’re right! No, we’re right! I’ll kill you for not believing in my imaginary friend! Etc. Endo lightly touches on the doubt Rodrigues feels from God’s silence (Eh? Eh? “Silence” - like the title? Eh? LITERARY...) despite his desperate prayers for help but doesn’t go any further with it. For a book ostensibly about spirituality, it’s not very deep!

The book’s well-written and Endo convincingly brings this era to life, even providing a thoughtful perspective on the Japanese mentality when it came to their interpretation of Christianity - that they’re incapable of viewing Jesus as anything but a literal man, like the Buddha, rather than on a larger, more metaphorical level.

But honestly, the real reason I finished this book? I just liked the edition itself as an object. It was well-designed, I liked the texture and smell of the pages, and, because it was easy to read and inoffensively dull, I just liked holding it while I read. Yeah - pretty damn superficial of me but that’s the truth!

As it is, Shusaku Endo didn’t do enough to make me care about his characters or their plight and, as a result, Silence was a largely uninteresting and unexciting narrative about nothing worthwhile - a very poor and forgettable historical novel. ...more

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Dec 08, 2016 Χαρά Ζ. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

_Silence_

I feel confused, i feel conflicted and i am struggling. My inner world is seperated in half and i cannot decide. I haven't had so much thought over an action in a long time and i know that it has to do with God and stuff, but i just, i cannot make peace with myself. What would i do in this situation? What would i do? I just... I don't know what i would do, i was angry and i wanted to cry for the sin and didn't know which one was a greater sin. Rage was pumping in my blood for all the se ...more

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Mar 04, 2015 Alex rated it it was amazing

Shelves: japan, 2015

This slim book by a famous Japanese author, currently being adapted into a movie by Scorsese starring the dude from Girls, is about a missionary sent to Japan in the 1600s. Christians were terribly persecuted back then; it was called the time of "Kakure Kirishitan", or Hidden Christians. Christians were forced to trample on the image of Jesus (called a fumie) or they were horribly tortured to death.

And the thread of torture and death hangs over every page, so this is a tough book to read. It bri ...more

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Aug 01, 2018 Mary ~Ravager of Tomes~ rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 3-star, year-2018, audiobook

Actual Rating: 2.5 Stars

Hm. Truly, I flickered between being super interested in this & falling asleep while reading it. I enjoy religious themes, especially when presented in conflict, but somehow this small book manages to feel long winded with dry patches throughout.

Read for BookTube-a-Thon 2018!

Challenge: Read a book & then watch the film adaption!

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Oct 13, 2016 Edward rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: own, 4-star, translated, japan, fiction

Introduction, by Martin Scorsese
Historical Note

--Silence

Appendix: Diary of an officer at the Christian residence

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Apr 21, 2018 Fr Stabin John Capuchin rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2018-read, catholic, favorites

We are on our way.
We are on our way.
We are on our way to the temple of Paradise.
A wonderfully written historical fiction by Shusaku Endo and translated by William Johnson. This story was a great thread which sticks us on the text. Still, now I carry the characters of the story.
description

This story is about two missionaries (Frs. Sebastian Rodrigues and Garrpe) going to Japan for their mission. Their journey and the lives in the land of Japan makes the story vibrant and our hearts will be burning when we We are on our way.
We are on our way.
We are on our way to the temple of Paradise.
A wonderfully written historical fiction by Shusaku Endo and translated by William Johnson. This story was a great thread which sticks us on the text. Still, now I carry the characters of the story.
description

This story is about two missionaries (Frs. Sebastian Rodrigues and Garrpe) going to Japan for their mission. Their journey and the lives in the land of Japan makes the story vibrant and our hearts will be burning when we read this book. I was really immersed those three days I read this novel. They have another mission to fulfil that to find the truth behind Fr. Ferreria, who was their mentor in the seminary.
They reached in Japan with a help of an apostate by the name Kichijero, who escaped from his native place after the trial of his family. But this man's lives whom we found throughout the story is really interesting. His words are sometimes hurt our minds, he is a crypto Christian and always denying the Jesus.
Two Fathers, missionaries (Frs. Sebastian Rodrigues and Garrpe) were so much zealous about their call among the peasants of Japan. The way they were administering the sacraments and doing the priestly duties was very much impressed. In our modern world, we are free to move around and go for all the liturgical functions but very often for small reasons we just avoid such programmes. But when these priests arrived at this land those Christians were so happy to receive them when they offered a crucifix to those Christians they were pressing the crucifixes to their foreheads spent a long time in adoration. They were not allowed to see such things because of the ban on Christianity.
Christianity was banned in Japan for many years because of the misunderstanding the rulers were having against Christianity. They were thinking that Christianity is not good for Japan. In this story, we see a governor by the name Inoue who were persecuting the Christians for their faith. Earlier I have a strange feeling about the martyrdom, the martyrs I knew from my studies were heroes but by seeing another type of martyrdom which is so cruel made my eyes watered. Like Fr. Rodrigues I too thought it as wretched, miserable like huts they lived in, like the rags in which they were clothed. But the way they receive the martyrdom is really speechless when one receives the death other faithful together will sing a song We are on our way.
We are on our way.
We are on our way to the temple of Paradise. this is to encourage the other to receive his prize with courage.
Many things we learn from our seminary about the life of missionary but the real life is entirely different sometimes the world is so powerful to take us away from the love which we have towards Jesus and his kingdom.
Another wonderful thing Endo did was how he was narrating this story parallel to the passion narrative of Jesus. The sufferings priest was undergoing he compared with that of Jesus. He says as Jesus said to the priest, When you suffer, I suffer with you. To the end, I am close to you.
I never expect from Fr. Rodrigues such a reply but I am not able to judge him.
I encourage everyone to read this story really it will strengthen your faith. ...more

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Mar 15, 2017 Anand rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. [What follows is a rambling writing on the book, interspersed with a few major spoilers)

Shusaku Endo's Silence is one of the strangest yet most engrossing novels I've read, alongside other religious novels like Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, and Wise Blood. It's a short book, about two hundred or so pages, yet there's some of the most intense, sustained religious storytelling I've ever read in any novel.

The resonant, repeated echoes of the cross, of silence, and of the face of Chr [What follows is a rambling writing on the book, interspersed with a few major spoilers)

Shusaku Endo's Silence is one of the strangest yet most engrossing novels I've read, alongside other religious novels like Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, and Wise Blood. It's a short book, about two hundred or so pages, yet there's some of the most intense, sustained religious storytelling I've ever read in any novel.

The resonant, repeated echoes of the cross, of silence, and of the face of Christ are compelling in a book who's title is Silence and a story whose major turning point centers around the face of Christ. The swamp/root/plant verbal echoes are important, considering how the story has the East-West subtext informing its treatment of the Catholic missionary enterprise.

The novel certainly deserves the praise of such writers as Garry Wills, John Updike, David Mitchell, and Irving Howell. It's one of the most compelling retellings of the Passion narrative/mythos transmitted into a Japanese cultural context centering around a Portugese missionary effort in a story written by a twentieth-century Japanese Catholic author, later turned into a film in the 21st century by Italian-American director Martin Scorsese. Needless to say, Silence is itself a story of strong intertextuality, cultural and otherwise.

I'm interested in how Silence intercuts between the first-person perspective of Rodrigues, which lasts until about chapter 5, where the narrative voice shifts to a third-person. The prose style is very lucid, simple to read, yet deep enough to sustain the verbal echoes of silence ('silent' 'silence' and other similar plays on this idea) and the face of Christ, as well as the narrative echoes of the Passion story. It's clear that Endo wants us to think of the Passion story, and of the story of Christ, in order to better respond to Rodrigues' individual story.

What's interesting about the story is that, however controversial its climax is, when Rodrigues tramples on the fumie, it incorporates and welcomes various responses to persecution and suffering. Mokichi and Ichizo, as well as Garrpe, suffer the persecutions head-on; they die the glorious martyrdoms. Kichijiro remains a Judas figure, and Endo sustains the Judas-Kichijiro echoes (and the Rodrigues-Christ echoes too), yet the fact that he wants to remain a Christian and receive forgiveness elevates him, if only a little, above the betrayer of our Lord.

In addition, I can't help but wonder if Rodrigues' trampling intends to resemble not so much Judas' betrayal but Peter's triple denial of Christ:

The priest placed his foot on the fumie. Dawn broke. And in the distance the cock crew.

If we understand the Bible, it's clear that Peter was restored and became the great leader of the Christians in the Book of Acts and later on, and, according to Catholicism, became the first Holy Father. Of course, Endo doesn't make the direct comparisons between Rodrigues and Peter as much as he does between Rodrigues and Christ, but for those who are well-read in the Bible, the details of the dawn and the cock are clearly meant to echo Peter's denial. Yet Rodrigues' public denial is not a wholesale apostasy, and neither was Peter's denial. I believe that's what we are intended to read in the novel, and that's how I read it.

The prose style is composed of simple sentences and vocabulary, with bits of descriptive prose that capture the natural beauty of the Japanese environment in simple sentences and in simple impressions. The style is equipped to carry on the verbal echoes of the New Testament, of Catholic texts, while remaining stripped-down and bare (though not bare-bones). The resonant echoes of silence and Christ's face work and make the book's drama that much more powerful.

Highly recommended. ...more

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Nov 27, 2015 Fiona rated it it was amazing

Shelves: historical-fiction

Endo addresses the question that so many ask - why does God stay silent in the face of human suffering? I was brought up in the church (of Scotland) and had a deep faith as a child but I started to question my faith in my late teens, eg the irrationality of believing in a supernatural being who watches and judges us throughout our lives; the irrationality of praying to or believing in a concept; that other world faiths have gods so there cannot be just one God, and to believe that there is and t Endo addresses the question that so many ask - why does God stay silent in the face of human suffering? I was brought up in the church (of Scotland) and had a deep faith as a child but I started to question my faith in my late teens, eg the irrationality of believing in a supernatural being who watches and judges us throughout our lives; the irrationality of praying to or believing in a concept; that other world faiths have gods so there cannot be just one God, and to believe that there is and that s/he is the Christians' God is to dismiss the beliefs of millions worldwide. Despite losing my faith, I've maintained an interest in religious ideas and have retained a sense of spirituality - not a belief in anything but an emotional response perhaps. Or just a curiosity.

This is a deeply profound story in which we walk hand in hand with Rodrigues, a Portuguese priest who has asked to go to Japan to work, his hidden agenda being to search for his old mentor, Ferreira who, it is rumoured, has apostatized. Rarely has a book given me so much food for thought. Why was Christianity seen as such a threat to the Japanese (and to others in the course of history)? They slaughtered and tortured unknown thousands during this period. Why did Western Christians, particularly Roman Catholics, see themselves as so superior to those they converted? Why were they so patronising when Jesus had taught that all men are equal in the eyes of God?

Once imprisoned by the Japanese who want him to apostatize, Rodrigues starts to identify his journey with that of Christ's last few days. He sees that martyrdom can be perceived as sheer vanity, that it is an act performed for the self rather than for others, in the belief that the church will reward them with sainthood in due course. Rodrigues embarks on a spiritual journey from the blindness of faith over reason to the stubbornness of faith in the face of blinding reality. When he reaches the point where he must apostatize or die, I was with him every step of the tortured way towards his final decision.

This is an exhausting book but not one that I will easily forget. The inventiveness of Japanese methods of torture is stomach churning but has parallels with the Inquisition - which raises more questions? Why were men of God guilty of such despicable cruelty towards their fellow men? How did they reconcile this with their faith and the teachings of the Bible? Why did God remain silent then too?

This is probably the longest review I've ever written to date. Perhaps this book is best read by a book group so that all of these questions can be discussed properly. Meanwhile, I'll be thinking about this book and discussing it with anyone who will listen for a long time. ...more

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Jun 16, 2011 Manny rated it it was amazing

Excellent, possibly the best Catholic novel I've ever read. Everyone should read this though. It's not just a Catholic novel.

Going through a reread.

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Oct 14, 2016 Amanda rated it really liked it · review of another edition

4.5 stars

This is an extremely powerful and deep exploration of faith. It takes place in 17th century Japan where Portuguese priests (missionaries) travel to minister to the Christian peasants. This was a time when Christians were hunted down and tortured and forced to renounce their beliefs. When one of the priests is given the choice to renounce to save Christians from being tortured he has to face his own beliefs and fears. This wasn't a fun book to read but I'm really glad I read it. I learne ...more

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Jan 12, 2017 Cindy Rollins rated it really liked it

Shelves: audiobooks, 2017, 2017-audio

I did not enjoy reading this. From page one I recognized (rather uncomfortably) Father Rodriques, the passionate, naive priest. I knew where this was heading. But I cannot deny that Endo drew the picture as craftily and subtly as any portrait I have ever read. In the end, we see a God much bigger than Rodriques, or I, imagined.

As to the torture and suffering, it is unbearable to read and made me feel ashamed at every turn.

I was quite surprised and pleased by the appropriately sudden ending. I ...more

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Nov 16, 2016 Sam rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016-reads

I read this as part of a November group read for All About Books, and was initially interested in it because it is set in Japan, one of my favorite countries I've visited, and because I had read about the forthcoming Scorsese movie/passion project, and wanted to read the book first. I didn't know quite what to expect from it, other than that Silence is thought of as a modern classic and it's a slim little volume (my PB is just over 200 pages).

About half of the novel is told in an epistolary form I read this as part of a November group read for All About Books, and was initially interested in it because it is set in Japan, one of my favorite countries I've visited, and because I had read about the forthcoming Scorsese movie/passion project, and wanted to read the book first. I didn't know quite what to expect from it, other than that Silence is thought of as a modern classic and it's a slim little volume (my PB is just over 200 pages).

About half of the novel is told in an epistolary format through the letters of Sebastian Rodrigues, a Jesuit missionary to Japan in the 17th century and based on a historical figure named Giuseppe Chiara. We see through Rodrigues' eyes his arrival with his fellow priest Garrpe, their early efforts to minister to the Christians in hiding in the peasant villages, and wrestling with that fear of discovery. It is interesting to see in these early pages how Rodrigues is fighting with various notions of fear: as an educated Jesuit priest, he has heard tell of glorious martyrdom and in some ways openly embraces that fate for himself, but he is also caught off guard a bit by the fear that the samurai will uncover their missionary work and he and the Christian peasants will lose their lives. Rodrigues is also some ways put into a position of Christ with his own Japanese version of Judas, a fact which at first humbles him and gives him strength, but also later causes doubt, confusion and anger for his own feelings that differ from Christ's forgiveness and love for his betrayer. His faith begins to wobble a bit in the early parts, a prelude for the massive test before him in the end, and this wavering faith is visible many times but most notably as he watches three Christians bravely go to their deaths:

They were martyred. But what a martyrdom! I had long read about martyrdom in the lives of saints - how the souls of the martyrs had gone home to Heaven, how they had been filled with glory in Paradise, how the angels had blown trumpets. This was the splendid martyrdom I had often seen in my dreams. But the martyrdom of the Japanese Christians I now describe to you was no such glorious thing. What a miserable and painful business it was! The rain falls unceasingly on the sea. And the sea which killed them surges on uncannily - in silence.

The latter half pulls out of the perspective of Rodrigues and into third person as he is captured, interrogated, and tempted. Though we see much of the cruelty of the Japanese with their methods of torture and death against the peasants, a more insidious, effective punishment is devised for Rodrigues. He is put into conversation with the intelligent Inoue and an apostate former colleague, and together the words Rodrigues hears are the ones that truly brings his faith into question: should he apostatize to save the tortured Christian peasants, or maintain faith, communion, salvation and the love of God for himself. As put in a conversation with his former mentor:

"Laudate Etum! I engraved those letters on the wall," Ferreira repeated. "Can't you find them? Look again!"
"I know" The priest, carried away by his anger, shouted louder than ever before. "Keep quiet!" he said. "You have no right to speak like this."
"I have no right? That is certain. I have no right. Listening to those groans all night I was no longer able to give praise to the Lord. I did not apostatize because I was suspended in the pit. For three days, I who stand before you was hung in a pit of foul excrement, but I did not say a single word that might betray my God." Ferreira raised a voice that was like a growl as he shouted: "The reason I apostatized... are you ready? Listen! I was put in here and heard the voices of those people for whom God did nothing. God did not do a single thing. I prayed with all my strength; but God did nothing."
"Be quiet!"
"Alright. Pray! But those Christians are partaking of a terrible suffering such as you cannot understand. From yesterday - in the future - now at this very moment. Why must they suffer like this? And while this goes on, you do nothing for them. And God - he does nothing either."

Silence as the title is fitting because the climax and Rodrigues' decision is all about the perceived silence of God in the face of Christians suffering, apostatizing, dying, and the silence Rodrigues longs for when he hears the words that serve to shake his position and force him to choose. Rodrigues has been trained and has believed in the power of God, but here in Japan, circumstance and machination in some ways force God out of the equation, and a single man (fluid between who has the power to choose, to act between Rodrigues and Inoue) is given all the power over life and death of others. Indeed throughout the novel we are treated to more and more references of silence, of quiet, of being alone and abandoned, as Rodrigues is increasingly under threat physically and spiritually and feels removed from God. Although in the end, I might argue, Ferreira's reasoning proves true and it is only because of Rodrigues' love of Christ and use of Christ as an exemplar that the priest is able to make the choice that he makes.

Endo's prose (and its English translation) is quiet but powerful, sparse yet beautiful. There's little dialogue in the first half as we're immersed in Rodrigues' thoughts, though the exchanges in the second half help balance the work. I will say that writing is somewhat simple, not overly sophisticated, which works within the overall effects of the novel but can also sometimes be tedious with the repetition of description and metaphor. The whole of the work functions as a work of historical fiction bringing to life a tumultuous, bloody time in the history of Japan and history of Christianity in Japan. It also functions as a sort of long, fleshed out parable, of a man of God in the wilderness, confronted and tempted. I found Silence overall a thought provoking and meditative read, though its quiet style and unique subject matter means that while I would on the one hand recommend it to all readers for its universality, I probably wouldn't go out of my way to put it in the hand of anyone I know since matters of faith and how to wrestle with one's faith and the ideas of the mission and conversion and apostasy are deeply personal. ...more

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Dec 26, 2016 Clif Hostetler rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: novel

Silence tells the story of a Jesuit missionary sent to 17th century Japan, who endures persecution in the time of Kakure Kirishitan ("Hidden Christians") that followed the defeat of the Shimabara Rebellion.

A persistent theme of this book is the silence of God for a believer facing adversity.

Questions raised by Silence include:

• Where is God’s voice?

• Why is God silent in the midst of suffering?

• How may an individual’s actions (or silence) contribute to suffering?

• How can human beings inflict ...more

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Nov 08, 2015 Ray rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Sebastian Rodruiges, a Portuguese priest, enters Japan secretly to administer to persecuted Christians. His mission is an abject failure and he is captured. Can he retain his faith in the most difficult circumstances, facing the torture of himself and other innocents?

There is also the shadowy figure of Father Ferreira, a former mentor who has been in Japan for twenty years, and who has renounced Christianity. The two men are brought together and Ferreira explains how and why he has lost his fait ...more

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Apr 24, 2007 David rated it it was amazing

Quite possibly among the most profound and stirring books I have read that address the issues of faith. While this is based on the true events in japan, jesuit/christian missionaries going over to convert the japanese people and the subsequent fallout and harsh persecution of the people who practiced christianity. Part of my interest lies in my background with Jesuits and my Catholic/Christian faith. But I think that this book goes well beyond this scope and quite honestly my offend or disturb m ...more

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About Shūsaku Endō

Shūsaku Endō

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Shusaku Endo (遠藤周作), born in Tokyo in 1923, was raised by his mother and an aunt in Kobe where he converted to Roman Catholicism at the age of eleven. At Tokyo's Keio University he majored in French literature, graduating BA in 1949, before furthering his studies in French Catholic literature at the University of Lyon in France between 1950 and 1953. A major theme running through his books, which ...more