Ioan Isac, martyr for Christ during the communist regime
Ioan Isac was a wealthy farmer from Zlaști, a suburb of Hunedoara. He completed 6 years of primary school. He married in his native town and had a son, Nicolae Isac, who would become a priest in the same settlement. Starting in 1950, he suffered several administrative condemnations because of his hostile attitude towards the communist regime. In October 1958, he was arrested and accused of belonging to the White Guard, a clandestine organisation preparing an armed insurrection to overthrow the communist regime. He is accused of having been given the task of recruiting new members for the organisation and of carrying out religious and anti-communist propaganda.
Ioan Isac’s life was similar to that of many farmers from Banat and Ardeal. He was a hardworking and faithful man who raised his son in the spirit of the Orthodox Christian faith and guided him towards a career as a priest. He was a sober and respected farmer in the village of Zlaști, skilfully managing a household that owned 13 hectares of land[1]. He enjoyed the respect and esteem of his fellow villagers, thanks to his personal example of household organisation and his attachment to the Orthodox Church, to which he belonged, and to the duties of a good Christian.
His moral conduct, his open hostility to the communist regime and its anti-religious propaganda, and the respect he enjoyed among the villagers brought him to the attention of the Security Service organs and the communist authorities. In 1950, he was sentenced by the Deva Civil Court to two months’ imprisonment “for disobedience to compulsory quotas”2. For the same act, considered hostile to the policies of the communist government, he was punished in the following years with several administrative fines[3]. The repeated persecution culminated in his arrest on 26 October 1958 on the charge of being an important member of the secret organisation “White Guard”. He was accused of receiving a stamped coin as a token of recognition and of recruiting others to join the organisation by distributing similar coins. Statements taken by the Securitate from residents of Zlaști contain details that refute the accusations concocted by the criminal investigator, Captain Nistor Vasile of the Securitate in Deva. The villagers in question stated that they had “no knowledge whether he (Ioan Isac – n.n.) had demonstrated against the current regime or not”.[4] Ioan Isac behaved in a dignified manner during the investigation, denying most of the accusations but admitting that he did not agree with the policies of the communist regime. He was charged on 2 December 1958 with “membership of the subversive organisation ‘White Guard’, whose aim was to overthrow the popular democratic regime in our country by provoking an armed uprising”.[5] The trial took place in Cluj in January 1959. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. He was first imprisoned in Deva Prison, then in Gherla Prison, where he died. His son, the priest Nicolae Isac, was also involved in the same trial and was sentenced to life imprisonment, which was commuted to 25 years’ hard labour in 1963. We do not know exactly what role Ioan Isac played in the organisation because of the exaggerated accusations made by the Security Service officers. Certainly, he was punished for his anti-communist stance, for his courageous stand against the atheistic and anti-national propaganda of the totalitarian communist regime and, above all, for being convinced of the truth of the Christian-Orthodox faith and guiding his son towards the priesthood.
The peasant Ioan Isac was a man with less knowledge of books and a lower level of theological culture. However, he lived in the spirit of Christian morality, with full respect for its fundamental dogmas. Until his arrest in 1958, he was the cantor in the parish of Zlaști, where his son Nicolae was the priest[6]. This is one of the reasons why he was so popular among the villagers of the locality. The clearest proof of his Christian behaviour and the faith he professed was his attitude during the Security Service investigations. Although he was subjected to inhuman torture, he stubbornly refused to admit his involvement in recruiting other people into the secret organisation. He always firmly denied the investigator’s accusations: “I never spoke to anyone about the existence of the organisation.”[7] Through this courageous Christian behaviour, he sought to limit the Securitate’s repressive actions against other people, sparing them suffering and imprisonment. He willingly sacrificed his own freedom to save others from torment and injustice. He admits that he agreed to join the secret organisation and fight against the atheist communist regime, but categorically denies the accusation that he lured others into this activity.
There is no doubt that the aim of the White Guard secret organisation was to overthrow the communist regime. Even if this was an unattainable goal in Romania in the 1950s and 1960s, its existence and importance cannot be ignored. The aim was also Christian and religious, since the symbol of the Holy Trinity was used as a badge of recognition for the members of the organisation, and membership of the organisation was done by professing faith in the Holy Trinity, with the will to preserve and defend the values of Christian spirituality.
From 1950 onwards, Ioan Isac was subjected to systematic psychological pressure by the communist authorities. Considered hostile to the economic and religious policies of the Communist Party, he was kept under constant police surveillance, physically assaulted, arrested, sentenced to prison, fined and threatened. For the hard-working farmer from Zlaști and his family, life was an ordeal. Although he firmly denied most of the accusations made during the Security Service investigation, the criminal investigator included in the indictment the most serious accusations, all of which were false[8].
The trial took place before the Military Court of the III Military Region of Cluj. It took place in the familiar form of political trials invented and directed by the communist authorities. During the trial, he denounced the torture and ill-treatment he had suffered at the hands of the Securitate and mentioned that his statements had been taken from him by force. He was sentenced to “life imprisonment” by decision no. 19/15 January 1959. The appeal was heard by the Supreme Court, Military College, which confirmed the original sentence by decision no. 176/14 April 19599. The charge was “incitement to armed rebellion”. He then suffered in Gherla prison, where he was detained. He became seriously ill as a result of the torture and inhuman conditions. Although he was on the verge of dying, he was not admitted to the Gherla prison hospital until 23 March 1960, four days before his death on 27 March at 4 a.m. His mortal remains rest in the cemetery of the Gherla prison, next to other anonymous graves of those who sacrificed themselves for faith and freedom. His martyrdom was caused not only by his hostile attitude towards the communist-atheist regime, but also by the fact that he was a member of the non-clerical staff of the Church and his son became a minister of the Church.
(Ioan Munteanu – Martyrs for Christ in Romania during the Communist regime, Publishing House of the Biblical and Mission Institute of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Bucharest, 2007, pp. 375-377)
1. ATMTT, Criminal fonds, file 1880/58/Hunedoara, vol. 8, unpag.
2. Ibidem, vol. 1, 297
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid, f. 308, 309
5. Ibid, vol. 8, f. nepag.
6. Ibid, vol. 1, f. 297 sqq
7.Ibid, f. 301
8. Ibid, vol. 8, f. nepag
9. Ibid.