Jan Bosch, of Bergh, or Jan Durps, in the Year 1559

This Jan Bosch, commonly called Jan Durps, was a pious, honorable man, and a linen weaver by trade. He lived at Maestricht, and though the divine knowledge of the truth was greatly estranged and obscured, the light of divine grace appeared to him, and the true evangelical truth was presented to him, and so he joined the church of the Lord, fulfilling the obedience instituted and commanded by Christ, the Son of God (Mark 16, verse 16); and since for a time he gave good heed to his calling, it was entrusted to him by the church, and he was ordained, that he should take some oversight of the church, and minister to her with the Word of the Lord, by reading as well as exhorting; to which, when he had consented, though with much reluctance, he faithfully attended, putting his talent to usury, to the best of his ability.

As this tended to the glory of God, and to the edification of the church, Satan, who is always the enemy of everything that is good and pleasing to God, sought to destroy this good work, and to this end moved his ministers to report this good man to the authorities as a heretic and Anabaptist. The authorities, deceived by this spirit, thought they were doing God a service, and proceeded rashly. One of the burgomasters, in broad daylight, went with the constables to the place where Jan Durps, under his master, was working at the loom. He arrested him, and, leading him through the city, brought him to the Landtskroom (the city hall), and imprisoned him there. He was immediately examined by priests and monks, who approached him in many ways. He plainly confessed his faith to them, and that he was baptized upon faith in Christ Jesus; also, what he thought of the sacrament. He confessed all this according to the Scriptures, rebuking the idolatry which they committed with it.

When this petty council and the priests had examined him, and he had confessed his faith, and held to it immovably, they judged the case so grave as to be criminal in its nature; therefore they delivered him to the lords through the bailiff. These took him, and put him in prison, where Jan remained in confinement for a time. In the meantime his wife sent him a letter, in which she exhorted him to be of good cheer in his sufferings, and to hold faithfully to the truth until death; which he received very thankfully, comforting his wife in return, and exhorting her, and the friends together, that they should hold to the truth, and continue in it to the end; he also earnestly requested the prayers of the faithful. He suffered many tortures, because they sought to force from him who, in the city, were his brothers and fellow believers. But the Lord kept his lips, so that not a single name could be gotten from him, however greatly he was tortured for it.

When the time had come, sentence was pronounced upon him, namely, that he should, according to the imperial decree, be burned alive to ashes; to which he listened with good cheer, and submitted to it, letting himself be bound, and led between many sergeants armed with sticks and halberds, which now and then came down on the head of someone who came too close to Jan in order to hear his words; for on his way from the prison to the Vrijthof, Jan spoke much to the people, telling them to remember that a man had been among them who had told them the truth. He urged them hard to repent, to amend their life, and to seek God's grace. When he arrived in the Vrijthof, where the scaffold had been erected, that place was found to be filled with arquebusiers fully armed, all four companies of arquebusiers of the city having been commanded to appear there with their arms. Jan artlessly ascended the scaffold, too, and was led into a hut by the executioner, who then set fire to it in several places. As Jan stood in the flames, he cried aloud several times: "O Lord, into Your hands I commend my spirit"; and he was thus burned to ashes as a faithful witness of Jesus Christ. This took place on the 23rd of September, in the year 1559.