Captivity & suffering in Etty Hillesum and Iulia De Beausobre: A closer look of autobiographical texts

With this paper I intend to outline, with a comparative approach, the spiritual experience of suffering in two 20th-century female authors who admirably described the impact that World War II and the Russian Revolution had on their lives respectively. On the one hand, Etty Hillesum (1914-1943), a Dutch Jewish writer who was a victim of the Holocaust, and Iulia de Beausobre (1893-1977), an author of Russian origin who was a refugee in England. Different lives in similar contexts, one Dutch and the other Russian, one tied to a complex network of family and emotional relationships seasoned by personal contradictions and the looming threat of war, the other, after her release from a seven-year imprisonment in the ‘Gulag’ concentration camps of the Soviet Union, treasured the experience and summarised it in her autobiography “The Woman Who Could Not Die” (1938) in the pamphlet “Creative Suffering” (1940). They suffered abuse and violence very close together. Their existences were punctuated by suffering, but they were able to rework, according to their respective faiths, their suffering and draw great lessons from it, which have been bequeathed to us.

Suffering runs through all human life. Iulia de Beausobre, speaking in London in the dark days of 1940 from her experience of isolation and exile, describes how the Russian people learned to respond to suffering. She starts from the basic premise that suffering can be used creatively, in the power of Christ’s victory.

In Etty Hillesum, there is an evolution of the meaning of suffering according to the progress of her own spiritual growth; in her life she was able to gather and integrate experiences, maturing an understanding of suffering by linking it to that of others; for her, recognizing her own and others’ pain meant strengthening her trust in God. Suffering was seen as a source from which to draw the strength to overcome obstacles.

For Etty, suffering is a “potential for humanisation”; for Iulia, suffering is “participation”. In this talk, we will examine the respective views of the authors, trying to draw parallels and points of contact.

1. Preliminaries

With this intervention, which falls within the topic of Christian Approaches (Orthodox and non-Orthodox) to Violence, War, and Conflict, I intend to outline, through a comparative approach, the “suffering” as a spiritual experience, and the spiritual resources to meet them, in the lives of two 20th-century female authors who admirably recorded their own impressions in diaries, letters, and autobiographies.

Etty Hillesum (1914–1943) and Iulia de Beausobre (1893–1977) had different life experiences but were intertwined within similar historical contexts. One was Dutch, while the other was a Russian refugee in Great Britain. One was Jewish, the other Eastern Orthodox Christian. One was connected to a complex web of family and emotional relationships that intertwined with personal contradictions and the threat of war. The other, after seven years of imprisonment in Soviet Union camps, captured her experience of evil in “Creative Suffering” written in 1940.^[1] They both endured similar abuses and violence, and their lives were marked by pain. However, this allowed for the on-going reworking of their sufferings, drawing profound lessons for themselves and those who follow their teachings.

Iulia de Beausobre, writing from London about her experiences of isolation and exile in the dark post-release days her release, described how the Russian people, whom she considered herself a part of, and had learned to respond positively to suffering. The fundamental premise is that suffering can be used creatively, leveraging the strength of Christ’s victory over death. Cruelty is symptomatic of a deeply rooted evil that surpasses human understanding. Thus, her time in prison allowed her to delve into the very roots of evil, which, for every Christian, were defeated on the Cross.

In Etty Hillesum, we can observe an inner evolution of the meaning of suffering, following the progress of her spiritual growth. In her life, she was able to gather and integrate multiple nuances of pain, maturing an understanding of suffering in relation to the suffering of others. For her, recognizing her own pain and that of others meant strengthening her trust in God. Suffering was seen as a source from which to draw strength to overcome life’s obstacles.

For Etty, suffering was a great potential for humanization. Similarly, for Iulia, the hermeneutic key of suffering is essentially “participation.” In this intervention, we will have the opportunity to observe their respective reflections, seeking to analyse their parallels and potential points of contact.

2. Status quaestionis

Physical pain, illness, and death relate to the broader issue concerning human finitude. Man constantly faces the horizon of death; he is a “Sein zum Tode” (Heidegger). On such a profound problem, suffering humanity has sought answers not only in philosophical speculation but also in religious beliefs. The problem of the meaning of suffering, being inherently personal and concrete, yet involving all of humanity, requires a reflection that encompasses every level of reality. It calls for a refraction of the most human dimension of this problem, emphasizing each individual’s ability to consciously integrate it into their existential worldview. This endeavour was magnificently undertaken in the past century by authors belonging to various religions and denominations, such as Wiesel, Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and others.

The question often arises: “What does the Bible say about God and the mystery of human suffering”? The most famous biblical reference to the reality of innocent suffering is found in the book of Job. This text has been the subject of commentary by great thinkers of the Church, from Augustine and Gregory the Great to Elie Wiesel, who survived the Holocaust. This book allows us to glimpse, on one hand, the silence of God, and on the other, His merciful care for the suffering poor, who undergo a process of inner transformation due to their pain. This entails moving from resistance to supplication, acceptance, making choices, and ultimately sharing and experiencing this journey together.

Both authors urge us to perceive in catastrophic events the positive resonances of the suffering endured by others, proposing a transformative solution to being that embodies the incessant pursuit of holiness akin to that of Christ on the Cross and the great patriarchs and prophets of the Old Testament.

In this presentation, we will first explore the contributions of Iulia de Beausobre and then delve into those of Etty Hillesum, as Iulia’s figure remains relatively unknown to most.

3. The Creative suffering of Iulia de Beausobre

In nineteen hundred and thirty-two, Iulia de Beausobre, a highly inconvenient and politically exposed Russian woman, was imprisoned as a result. She was a young aristocratic lady from a noble family in Tsarist Russia and spent her early years in St. Petersburg. In nineteen hundred and fourteen, at the onset of the Great War, she returned from her European trip to serve as a voluntary nurse. In nineteen hundred and twenty, she married Nikolay de Beausobre, a Russian diplomat.^[2]

Her marriage to a diplomat drew the attention of the political police, resulting in their imprisonment. Her personal sufferings were first recorded on paper in nineteen hundred and thirty-eight in her autobiography, The Woman Who Could Not Die. Having sought refuge in England since nineteen hundred and thirty-four, she provided a powerful account of her captivity in Soviet Union camps, along with a careful analysis of the various psychological and spiritual states she experienced during her painful ordeal. In this text, Iulia recounted the illnesses she contracted and her fear for her life, from her exile in nineteen hundred and twenty-nine to Nikolay’s arrest in February nineteen hundred and thirty-two, followed by her own arrest six days later. After being released from the concentration camp, she decided to seek refuge in Great Britain.

It was during this phase of her life, alone and without assistance or shelter, with the confirmation of Nikolay’s execution, that she began her original elaboration of the concept of “creative suffering.” This led her to write “Creative Suffering” in nineteen hundred and forty, a theological interpretation of her personal experience in the light of Eastern mystical churches. She was guided by the idea that, like the Foolishness for Christ (διά Χριστόν σαλότητα, in Greek; yurodstvo, in Russian),^[3] she had been called to participate in the miseries of life.

3.1 Peace in suffering

In her autobiography, Iulia placed emphasis on the aid she received from meditating on the Gospel. It was the words of John, “Peace be with you” (John 20:19), that resurfaced forcefully in her prison cell, offering her an avenue of escape from despair. Iulia mustered the courage to address her five armed jailers, saying to them: “Let peace stream to the left of you. Let peace stream to the right of you. Let peace remain awhile wherever you may tread. May it spread even to the furthest boundaries of the universe.”^[4]

What did this serene gaze of perfect understanding reveal to her? In “Creative Suffering,” being a sharp-eyed and observant observer, Iulia described how a victim could survive the cruelty of their tormentors through an extraordinarily clear effort of perception of both reality and oneself.

This effort, incidentally and inevitably, is capable of granting the victim of abuse a kind of inner serenity. Iulia was certain that even this inner peace could be shattered, particularly when the pressure from the captors is of a psychological nature. What Iulia did was to analyse the very idea of suffering, not so much from the perspective of the isolated victim, but from that of the martyr embedded in the mystical tradition of the Church. She wondered if the belongingness of the tortured ones to the Church could alter the perception of suffering itself, that is, if recognizing oneself as part of the mystical body of Christ could change the balance between the torturer and the tortured. Supporting this hypothesis, Iulia found illustrious examples from the Orthodox mystical tradition, such as that of Mother Theodosia and the other nuns encountered by Seraphim of Sarov in the lumber camp in the forest.^[5] Although the nuns were prohibited from singing hymns and litanies out loud, they constantly prayed to Christ, and Mother Theodosia herself continued to watch over the dying even on her deathbed.^[6] Iulia learned a great deal from those nuns about self-discipline. She knew she was part of the mystical body of Christ, as Mother Theodosia had suggested^[7]. Iulia realized that this view of suffering, as an essential part of communion with Christ, was typically Orthodox, but at the same time, it should not be limited to Russian Christians alone. On the contrary, she believed that spreading this constructive perspective on pain could help every Christian bear the burden of personal suffering. Her reference to the “fools for Christ” finds resonance in the Western mystical tradition as well, in the writings of Julian of Norwich and not just in the Gospels. Julian’s positive view of suffering – which, through her contemplation of her own bewilderment in the face of the hell that separated humanity from God, led her to believe that if everything was brought into being and accomplished by Him, then even sin could be seen as something “benign” – aligns not only with Iulia’s thinking but with the entire Orthodox mysticism. This universality of value is explicitly expressed in “Creative Suffering,” where Iulia explains how accepting the perception of her communion with the Saints allowed her to overcome the sufferings of imprisonment and experience a state of peace. However, the merit of this outcome does not solely lie in a mental state but directly stems from the Passion of Christ on the cross, which, in turn, depends on God’s merciful love. Realizing that she stood beneath the Cross implied belonging to the community of all those to whom God has granted knowledge of His peace, even in the midst of pain. However, Iulia focused specifically on Redemption because it assisted her in “redeeming the act” of sadism and cruelty that she herself, as a victim, had endured. This attention to Redemption also had deep roots in Orthodox mystical thought; the life of Serafim of Sarov is once again an emblematic example. In one of the episodes from his biography, the Saint had encountered in the forest a redeemed creature, a ransomed tree, a towering black spruce illuminated from within, an echo – so to speak – of his transfiguration, a sign of the new creation that was gloriously breaking into his path.^[8]

Iulia realized that the peace she had attained was of transcendental origin and not psychological. She knew that it is “more potent to counteract sadistic lusts than any barren impassivity could be,”^[9] and therefore, “The serenity that has been attained is a sure safeguard against all self-deception and any petty distractions.”^[10] Iulia firmly believed that the path towards transcendence leads directly to the limits of human existence, as it is through active participation that one can overcome difficulties, not through resistance or evasion. The effort to transcend evil through sheer force inevitably led to further evils, which is why the hermeneutical essence of “Creative Suffering” is undoubtedly found in “participation.” While this author illustrated her concept of “participation” through imagery drawn from Russian and English literature, the broader significance of this notion can be discerned. The concept of “active participation” in suffering or in the evil of others involved integrating both the evil and the wrongdoer into a wider context — the context of God’s plan and one’s own state of sanctification. Participation entailed a “loving sympathy” towards one’s jailor based on the belief that “Where evil is at its most intense, there too must be the greatest good. To us this is not even a hypothesis. It is axiomatic.”^[11]

De Beausobre assures us that such sympathy is “an act of redemption” for the one who suffers and for all others. Through loving participation, suffering can be creative in the sense of an impersonal enrichment, a universal good, a part of the redemptive work of Christ in his mystical body. The author is sensitive to the corporate or social aspect of suffering. A Christian does not suffer, or overcome suffering, alone but as a member of Christ’s mystical body, the Church.^[12]

4. Etty Hillesum and the Spirituality of Suffering

It feels as if great changes are taking place in me, and I believe it is more than a passing mood. Last night was a great breakthrough: a new insight, at least if one can call something like that insight, and this morning I was filled with peace again and with an assurance I have not felt for a long time. And all this because of one little blister on my left foot.^[13]

In nineteen hundred and forty-two, Etty Hillesum was aware of the intensification of persecutions against the Jewish people, and her response manifested in three ways: through accepting the responsibility to document such persecution, through the maturation of her own conception of God and prayer life, and the development of a “spirituality of suffering.”^[14] In this examination, we will focus specifically on this last aspect, as within her, a spontaneous introspective movement had arisen, driven by the urgent need to understand human essence, which she explicitly identified with the search for God. For her, when the Lord is recognized within the depths of the individual, love then emerges as the only possible attitude to comprehend and respond to the pain of suffering. The love that Etty Hillesum speaks of is inherently a tension, a vital force, a desire that propels humans towards God and towards others.

Etty, in her analysis of others’ actions, also included those that were evil and cruel, and she believed that it was necessary to start from the awareness of a common psychological background among human beings, which exists regardless of religion or other factors, defining the essence of humanity itself. One comes to feel a sense of strength that permeates the relationship with the executioner because – for Etty – even the enemy is a human being, and within this humanity, something to be understood is hidden, as was the case with the German soldier who attended the daughter of a rabbi at the peak of her agony, upon which Etty reflected with extreme sensitivity and compassion, noting: “Out of all those uniforms one has been given a face now. There will be other faces, too, in which we shall be able to read something we understand: that German soldiers suffer as well. There are no frontiers between suffering people, and we must pray for them all.”^[15]

The German soldier, above all, cannot be regarded as the adversary, but rather as a human being whose exploration should emerge from personal experience and lived circumstances. It is essential to consider all the challenges that shape their existence. This lies at the heart of Etty Hillesum’s proposition against indiscriminate animosity, combating the ailment of the soul that oversimplifies reality, dichotomizing it into opposing factions of malevolent and virtuous, oppressors and victims. In contrast, Hillesum advocates for the potency of love, capable of delving even into the countenance of the foe, seeking a glimmer of humanity.

The perspective adopted by Hillesum allows us to understand that the other is a human being, and their soul represents an expansive and deep battleground where opposing forces collide and all contradictions find space. It is humanity, irrespective of race, that is capable of both evil and love.^[16] The world is not a battlefield between two opposing principles, but rather a place where the love of God is made manifest. This unwavering conviction enabled Hillesum to confront one of the darkest chapters in human history with an attitude that may appear as resignation and passive acceptance. In response to this underlying accusation, she wrote: “I shall always be able to stand on my own two feet even when they are planted on the hardest soil of the harshest reality. And my acceptance is not indifference or helplessness. I feel deep moral indignation at a regime that treats human beings in such a way. But events have become too overwhelming and too demonic to be stemmed with personal resentment and bitterness. These responses strike me as being utterly childish and unequal to the fateful course of events.”^[17]

In the face of a subjective viewpoint, a broader perspective emerged that left no room for resentment, bitterness, and hatred, as such feelings are devoid of strength, barren, and blind, incapable of generating anything positive. Hence, Etty’s Diary and Letters reflect her growing conviction that when suffering cannot be avoided, it can still be transformed by incorporating it into a wider vision of existence. This forms the foundation of her “spirituality of suffering,” wherein one must neither flee from suffering nor allow oneself to be overwhelmed by it, but rather incorporate it into broader horizons where grace and blessing can always be found.^[18]

5. Epilogue

In the face of the extermination of Jews in Europe, in her writings, Hillesum reveals a kind of emotional depth that testifies to an outpouring of love as a means of responding to experiences of life and death, much like the great mystics and poets of all times. Etty reached a point where she had learned to love people through the love for God that was within them.^[19] Her perspective alludes to an approach to suffering that involves nurturing and transforming it into love and compassion, rather than rationalizing or intellectualizing it. This view emphasizes the importance of embracing suffering and, at the same time, allows for the shaping of one’s empathetic capacity and understanding of others.^[20]

This approach converges with the one adopted by Iulia De Beausobre, as she assures us that this sympathy/empathy is “an act of redemption” not only for the one who suffers but also for everyone else. “Participation” is perhaps the only way to survive the sadism and cruelty of one’s oppressors. To achieve this, it is necessary, to the extent possible, to enter the minds and motivations of those who inflict pain.

The author of “Creative Suffering,” speaking of her experience of isolation and exile from London, described how the Russian people had learned from the Christian Tradition to treasure this experience. Iulia’s core idea centers on the backdrop that underpins this book the idea that suffering can be harnessed creatively, drawing strength from Christ’s ultimate triumph over death. Consequently, any endured cruelty is indicative of a profound malevolence beyond human comprehension. Nevertheless, it is at its core that Christ conquers this malevolence, and it’s for this very reason that such suffering is embraced out of love for the Father. Ultimately, we can agree with Peranton in affirming that Hillesum followed a similar path to the Orthodox one, recognizing God in her life and gaining a deeper understanding of herself. This led her to see other human beings as images of God. Therefore, in June nineteen hundred and forty-two, when events took a swift and definitive turn, Hillesum tried not to emphasize in her Diary the separation between “them” – the Nazis, the perpetrators, and the evil – and “us” – the Jews, the victims, and the good.^[21] Furthermore, like Iulia, Hillesum turned to prayer to confront this terrifying situation. In prayer, she perceived her own suffering and that of all humanity, leading to new levels of understanding the significance of terms such as “with,” “the other,” and “you.” She began to experience the importance of unity, of sharing in common, to strengthen their shared hope.^[22]

 

^[1]  De Beausobre, Iulia. Creative Suffering. Fairacres Oxford: SLG Press, 1994. (First printing: De Beausobre, Iulia. Creative Suffering. Westminster: Dacre Press, 1940.)

 

^[2]  Babington Smith, Constance. Iulia de Beausobre. A russian christian in the West. London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1983, 5-22.

 

^[3]  The “foolishness in Christ” (in Greek διά Χριστόν σαλότητα, in Church Slavonic оуродъ, юродъ) represents a particular expression of holiness in the tradition of Eastern Christianity. Its sources in the New Testament can be mainly found in the Pauline Epistles (1 Corinthians 1:25; 3:19; 4:10; 2 Corinthians 6:8). The fool in Christ bears witness to Christ by going decidedly against the common way of life. They exhibit bizarre behaviour: living in extreme poverty, uttering seemingly meaningless words, and performing actions and gestures that defy common logic. This is motivated by a desire to despise oneself and to highlight the glory of God. The fool aims to demonstrate the vanity of appearances, the falsehood of self-love, pride, and arrogance, while calling for authenticity in the Christian life. Unique expressions of this kind of holiness include freedom of conscience and speech, indifference to adversity, simplicity, rejection of education, the gift of prophecy, which makes them interpreters of the will of the Lord, and inner solitude. The Russian term (derived from the ancient word “urod” meaning “abortion, monstrosity,” see 1 Corinthians 4:10) designates those individuals who adopt an extremely ascetic way of life, disregarding social conventions. In the Byzantine world, the fool in Christ was referred to by the Syriac term “salós,” as mentioned in dictionaries (Ferro, Maria Chiara. ‘Tradurre i lemmi russi appartenenti al lessico agiografico slavo ecclesiastico. Difficoltà e proposte’, Studi Slavistici IX (2012): 139-140.)

 

^[4]  De Beausobre, Iulia. The woman who could not die. New York: Viking Press, 1938, 10-11.

 

^[5]  In the life of Serafim of Sarov, it is narrated the special spiritual bond he shared with the sisters of the Diveyevo convent. Donald, Nicholl. ‘The starets: saint Seraphim.’ Triumphs of the spirit in Russia. London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1997, 11-66; Evdokïmov, Pavel Nikolaevič. ‘Saint Seraphim of Sarov. An icon of Orthodox spirituality,’ Ecumenical Review 15 (1963): 264-278.

 

^[6]  Felton Pidgin, Charles. Theodosia, the first gentlewoman of her time. The story of her life, and a history of persons and events connected therewith. Boston: C.M. Clark Publishing Company, 1907.

 

^[7]  Kontzevitch, Helen. Saint Seraphim. Wonderworker of Sarov and his spiritual inheritance. Wildwood (CA): St. Xenia Skete, 2004, 17.

 

^[8]  Cavarnos, Constantine, and Zeldin, Mary-Barbara (ed.). St. Seraphim of Sarov. Belmont: Institute for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, 2001, 116.

 

^[9]  De Beausobre, Iulia. Creative Suffering, 17.

 

^[10]  De Beausobre, Iulia. Creative Suffering, 45.

 

^[11]  De Beausobre, Iulia. Creative Suffering, 14.

 

^[12]  Murphy, Anne. ‘Contemporary theologies of the Cross, II,’ The Way 28, no. 3 (1988): 263.

 

^[13]  Hillesum, Hetty. An Interrupted Life the Diaries, 1941–1943 and Letters from Westerbork. New York: Owl Books-Henry Holt and Company, 2012, 157.

 

^[14]  Gaillardetz, Richard R.. ‘Sexual Vulnerability and a Spirituality of Suffering: Explorations in the Writing of Etty Hillesum,’ Pacifica 22 (2009): 78-79.

 

^[15]  Hillesum, Hetty. An Interrupted Life the Diaries, 1941–1943 and Letters from Westerbork, 142.

 

^[16]  Etty Hillesum endeavours to look at the individuality of each man and woman, something that war prevents us from seeing, and she perceives in the behaviour of the oppressor and the person in charge a characteristic that can also appear on the face of the victim. Fear for oneself and hatred must be replaced by the experience of pain, which, like love, is a part of life. Thus, pain becomes pietas, a clear acknowledgment of evil, and a refusal to judge the wrongdoers, because the afflictions of the soul affect everyone. (Boella, Laura. Le imperdonabili Milena Jesenská, Etty Hillesum, Marina Cvetaeva, Ingeborg Bachmann, Cristina Campo. Sesto San Giovanni (Mi): Mimesis, 2013, 80).

 

^[17]  Hillesum, Hetty. An Interrupted Life the Diaries, 1941–1943 and Letters from Westerbork, 165.

 

^[18]  Gaillardetz, Richard R.. ‘Sexual Vulnerability and a Spirituality of Suffering: Explorations in the Writing of Etty Hillesum,’ 81.

Gradually, as her understanding grew, she saw suffering as an inescapable reality, and her challenge became accepting the inevitable; she turned to face vulnerabilities and sorrows instead of evading them. Her perspective began to reveal an interesting lucidity. If suffering is a part of life, there is no point in not facing it; still, one should not seek it out either. Moreover, authentic suffering leads the human being to what she called – echoing Spier’s annotations – an “active passiveness” that “consists in accepting and enduring something irrevocable, and that is how new forces are released.” […] In that progressive existential lucidity, Etty Hillesum discovered that suffering could give her a humanizing potential. Suffering could be lived in dignity, and human beings could even face death with no loss of self. For this, all that was necessary was to live beyond the stigmas that humans place on things because of their fear. And again, for Hillesum, suffering was viewed as a source of strength and life, for both oneself and for others (Navarro Sánchez, Rosana Elena. Suffering, Silence, and Wisdom in the Life of Etty Hillesum. In The Lasting Significance of Etty Hillesum’s Writings. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2019, 296-297).

^[19]  Morrison, Glenn. ‘I love people so terribly: approaching affectivity with Levinas, Hillesum, and Christian Theology,’ Journal of Ecumenical Studies 54, no. 4 (2019): 541.

 

^[20]  Murphy, Anne. ‘Contemporary theologies of the Cross, II,’ 263.

 

^[21]  Arriero Peranton, Fernando. A “staretz” in Camp Westerbok. The Connections Between Slavic Orthodoxy and the Spirituality of Etty Hillesum. In The Lasting Significance of Etty Hillesum’s Writings. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2019, 38.

 

^[22]  Navarro Sánchez, Rosana Elena. Suffering, Silence, and Wisdom in the Life of Etty Hillesum, 295.