• Sebastião Rodrigues - Portuguse Jesuit priest
• Kichijirō - Judas
• Inoue - Japanese inquisitor

To ferret out hidden Christians, security officials force suspected Christians to trample on a fumi-e, a carved image of Christ. Those who refuse are imprisoned and killed by ana-tsurushi, which is by being hung upside down over a pit and slowly bled.

contemplation of Jesus condemnation/exclamation of Judas "what thou dost, do quickly" -

was he no more than a puppet in the drama of salvation wrought by the passion?

The priest who senses that he will be betrayed by the apostate and wants to send him away as Jesus did. Kichijirō’s sin is his conviction that he is not strong enough to be a martyr, or even to not betray Sebastião

“it seems as though when I speak to you [God] I only blaspheme”

for he prays for the redemption of others and sees only their torture and suffering because of their refusal to renounce their faith whether symbolically (stepping on the fumi-e), or actually, like Kichijirō)

Even if he had been silent, my life would have spoken of him to this day.

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