Jehovah’s Witnesses’ religious beliefs led them to defy several of the Nazi regime’s demands and expectations. Nazi authorities targeted Jehovah’s Witnesses as a threat to German national unity because they refused to give the Hitler salute, fly the Nazi swastika flag, or serve in the military.1 German authorities arrested around 10,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses and sent them to prisons or concentration camps. Many Witnesses were imprisoned for distributing banned religious literature—materials that often included criticism of the regime. Many Jehovah’s Witnesses saw their responses to Nazi persecution as acts of resistance.
A German man named Erich Hugo Frost composed the featured song, “Forward, You Witnesses!” after his arrest by Nazi authorities in 1941. A pianist and conductor, Frost lived in Leipzig and became a Jehovah’s Witness in 1923. Nazi authorities arrested Frost several times for distributing Jehovah’s Witness leaflets critical of the regime’s policies. In February 1941, he was arrested again for smuggling anti-Nazi literature and imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp.
Frost composed the song “Fest Steht” (German: “Stand Fast”) while marching with other prisoners each day to a worksite in the camp.2 With no access to paper to record the lyrics, Frost enlisted other prisoners to commit the verses to memory. The men would sing the song together, citing it as a source of hope and courage, while taking care not to let the guards hear them. The lyrics reflect the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ belief in the approach of a world-ending battle between the forces of good and evil, and the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth. They also remind Witnesses that their struggle is in service of God’s work on earth.
A copy of Frost’s song was smuggled out of Sachsenhausen and sent to the Watch Tower Society (the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ official organization), though Frost never learned how that happened.3 In 1950 the song was translated into English as “Forward, You Witnesses!” and became an important song in the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ songbook.4
In this audio recording, a Jehovah’s Witness named Simone Arnold Liebster5 sings the song, “Forward, You Witnesses!” in English.6 Although these recordings were made decades after World War II, Liebster had firsthand experience of Nazi persecution as a young Jehovah’s Witness—a key theme of this composition.
The lyrics of “Forward, You Witnesses!” urge Witnesses to face persecution without fear. Likewise, the Bible study materials smuggled to Simone Liebster’s father while he was imprisoned in Dachau remind Witnesses to act with faith and bravery. How else might songs and religious texts have helped prisoners to endure brutality and suffering under Nazi rule?