The collection / 35 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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01c. 1969 AD

I had no real communication with anyone at the time, so I was totally dependent on God. And he never failed me.

Diet Eman / quote

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02c. 1969 AD

Again, a conversation with the doctor. We always come back to the same point: "The church may not mix in politics." he says. And I tell him that when you are a Christian and profess that God is almighty, there is no single area of life from which you can eliminate God. -From the diary of Diet Eman

Diet Eman / quote

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03c. 1969 AD

(Thinking while being interrogated by the Germans) You big shots think you can decide on my life, but I have news for you: you can't touch a hair on my head without the will of God my Father, because He is on my side.

Diet Eman / quote

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04c. 1969 AD

I would stand there at times and remember how beautiful God created this world, and then I would be reassured that he would certainly take care of me and all of my loved ones.

Diet Eman / quote

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05c. 1969 AD

By the end of the war, I could pick out Jewish people almost as if I had a sixth sense about it, even if they had blue eyes and blond hair. I would have been a very valuable Gestapo person.

Diet Eman / quote

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06c. 1969 AD

Yesterday the paper had a "short" summary of the places where Jews are not allowed! I can better mention where they are still aloud: "in their houses and in the streets!" God, punish those who are persecuting the people you chose and to whom Jesus also belonged. -From the diary of Diet Eman

Diet Eman / quote

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07c. 1969 AD

After the prayer they executed an armed robbery. That sounds very strange this many years later: prayer and then armed robbery.

Diet Eman / quote

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08c. 1969 AD

Because your character is always full of ambition, the news of my being locked up must have been much harder on you than it was on me. When I was arrested, it was almost a relief to know that I could now experience what you were experiencing yourself. I am so afraid that they are breaking your spirit.

Diet Eman / quote

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09c. 1969 AD

Her face expressed suffering so deep that I will never forget it; her eyes radiated a deep sadness...Mrs. Folmer was oppressed by that special sadness, perhaps the most horrible torture, of those who had no idea what happened to their loved ones.

Diet Eman / quote

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10c. 1969 AD

The worst fear in the hearings was that you would get some evil interrogator: you could never know what might happen then. No one who lives in a free country will ever understand that kind of fear. What is most horrifying is the realization that you have no idea what can happen, that your life is totally in the hands of someone in the chair in front of you, someone might well be a demon.

Diet Eman / quote

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11c. 1969 AD

All during that prison time I really lived by prayer. Be in prayer always, we're told, and back then I was.

Diet Eman / quote

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12c. 1969 AD

Heavy laden -- that's what I am. Laden with pride, often thinking myself better than others while we have to think the other one better than ourselves. Laden with my own egotism. Laden with all my sins. And when I went to bed last night and thought about everything and wanted to bring all those difficulties to God, I couldn't even find the words!

Diet Eman / quote

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13c. 1969 AD

But miracles still happen, even if we don't think they do.

Diet Eman / quote

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14c. 1969 AD

I felt peace, even though I was still scared to death. I thought that, whatever would happen to me - I could still be killed. I didn't know - and in what I'd already been through, God was in control.

Diet Eman / quote

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15c. 1969 AD

To me it was real war and my life was at stake, and I believe that all those clandestine spy games we played as children helped when the Occupation came.

Diet Eman / quote

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16c. 1969 AD

They thought we were stupid to do it, (hide Jews) of course; in fact, it was beyond their comprehension that we would risk so much for Jews.

Diet Eman / quote

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17c. 1969 AD

O Father, console them and please spare our country from that terrible disaster, not because we are any better but only out of grace. And if it has to be different, then teach me to pray: "Your will be done." O please protect him whom my soul lives! -From the journal of Diet Eman

Diet Eman / quote

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18c. 1969 AD

And now, when Mother called to wake me up for the New Year, I first wanted to pray, but it turned into thanks, darling, for all that God had given us this year. For his wonderful ways with us, even if we don't understand it all now. For his love, that in all our disappointments and sorrow he himself helps us to bear it all, so that all this turns into a blessing because we feel his nearness and can take up our cross joyfully. And so we may know, and we do experience, that his power is made perfect in our weakness.

Diet Eman / quote

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19c. 1969 AD

I had great pity on Ansje, because she always acted very happy, but I believed that it was really a front. I could see through it. Inside she was crying because she was really very sad. You pity people like that -- the ones who try to lie to themselves -- because they suffer so much and don't face reality.

Diet Eman / quote

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20c. 1969 AD

I lay there for three whole days, totally paralyzed. My friends helped me to the bathroom and anywhere else I needed to move; but I have very vague impressions of those days because it was a time of complete darkness for me. Somebody told me later that what I had was a form of hysteria: my body and my mid fled into paralysis. There was nothing wrong with me organically, but somewhere inside I suffered a complete breakdown.

Diet Eman / quote

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21c. 1969 AD

I'm sorry to say it, but it was hard on me to see life continue all around.

Diet Eman / quote

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22c. 1969 AD

You should not try to live without thinking and feeling, for then you are only a piece of machinery, not a human being. Even if it hurts. Even if the thing you have to think of are sad, think them through; live them through and write or tell me. Only when we completely work through our thinking and feeling do we live a full life. ~From a letter to Diet Eman from Hein Sietsma

Diet Eman / quote

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23c. 1969 AD

If you dont speak, they will know you know more than you're telling them. And if they know that, they'll find a way to get what you know out of you. Believe me, they'll get everything out, Willie. Don't have any qualms about it -- make your story good and make it believable. Silence won't work!" This was an expert giving me the best advice she could. From that point on, I worked hard not to remember the people I loved, to try instead to create another life, a false life...I tried to become a person concerned only with very simple things -- and scared. I tried to become the woman I needed to be in order to live.

Diet Eman / quote

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24c. 1969 AD

Those women who had gone out with Germans were grabbed and treated very badly, often shaved totally bald so that everyone could see who they were. Some were taken prisoners. There had been so much suffering during the war because of the betrayal of those collaborators, so many killed and hurt because of what they had done to families, that the mood for revenge against the traitors was very high. It was not right, but it was understandable.

Diet Eman / quote

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