His name meant "Goose" in Czech, and he joked about it. "Today you roast a goose," he said as the flames rose around him, "but a hundred years from now a swan will arise whose singing you will not silence." A century later, Martin Luther fulfilled the prophecy.
Jan Hus was rector of Prague University, preacher at the Bethlehem Chapel, beloved by the common people and hated by the corrupt clergy. He preached that the Church had strayed from Christ, that popes could err, that scripture was the final authority, that indulgences were fraud.
"The truth I have preached and written,
Drawn from the law of God and the teachings of holy doctors,
I am prepared to defend unto death.
For truth is mighty and will prevail,
Though it be condemned by councils
And burned at the stake."
They summoned him to the Council of Constance with a safe-conduct pass. He went, believing the guarantee. It was a trap. The Emperor's word, they explained, need not be honored to a heretic. They imprisoned him in a dungeon so foul that he nearly died before trial.
At the trial, they would not let him speak. Every time he tried to explain his position, they shouted him down. They read charges based on distortions of his writings. They demanded he recant things he had never said.
"You ask me to recant," he said.
"To recant means to say what I taught was false.
I cannot say that truth is false.
If you show me from Scripture that I have erred,
I will gladly recant. But you show me only
The decrees of men, not the word of God."
On July 6, 1415, they led him to the stake. They placed a paper crown on his head with devils painted on it. They chained him to the post. They piled wood and straw to his chin. A final time they offered him life if he would recant. He began to pray aloud.
The fire was lit. Through the flames, witnesses heard him singing hymns until the smoke choked his voice. He died praying for his enemies.
His death sparked the Hussite Wars, a revolution that held off crusading armies for fifteen years. His followers kept his teaching alive. The Reformation he foreshadowed would reshape Europe.
Teaching 32
Truth cannot be silenced by burning its speakers. A safe-conduct from the powerful is worthless if they decide you are a heretic. The goose they roast becomes the swan who cannot be silenced. Speak truth; it will outlast the flames.