A Man Called Lenin (Reading) — Richard Wurmbrand

Marx and Engels’ Revolutionary Doctrine

During the lifetime of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels they gathered about themselves a large number of followers or disciples. They also projected into the minds of these disciples a particular teaching that came to be known as communism.

With the death of Marx in March 1883 and Friedrich Engels in 1895, the teachings of communism seemed to be doomed according to historians. However, this is everything but so. The particular doctrine that Marx and Engels left their disciples went something like this.

Marx had taught his followers that a revolution was coming. Because of the conditions of the working class in his days, he said these conditions would produce in time a revolution. This revolution would be violent and would destroy the ownership class called the capitalist.

And the workers then could take everything for themselves. This coming revolution, Marx taught, was to be a natural thing. It would naturally produce itself. It would occur when conditions amongst the workers, called the proletariat, had reached a certain peak.

For example, like water, under heat, when it reaches a certain point, it begins to boil. So Marx taught his disciples that at a certain point in the history of the working class, the revolution would automatically come.

He told them it was an inescapable fact of history. The revolution was coming. There was nothing they could do to speed it up or nothing they could do to slow it down. It was coming naturally, spontaneously, and automatically.

And this, in essence, was the basis of Marx's teaching left to his disciples. As a result of this and the death of Marx and Engels, the followers of these two said, well, the revolution is coming. Let's just wait for it.

There's nothing we can do to hurry it up, nothing we can do to slow it down. And they waited patiently as time ticked by for this Marxist-styled revolution to naturally occur. But friends, something happened.

The Failed Revolution and Lenin’s Emergence

History played a very dirty trick on the philosophy, the doctrine that Marx and Engels left their forlorn disciples. The revolution did not come. They waited for it from about 1848, when Marx wrote the Manifesto, right on up to his death in 1883, and they waited for it at the turn of the century, in the 1900s.

But the long-sought-for, looked-for, spontaneous revolution, the destruction of the ownership class, with the worker taking everything, did not occur. Poor Marx. History played a dirty trick on the philosophy that he left his disciples.

It is at this point that another patriarch of the Communist Party steps into the scene, a man called Lenin. V. I. Ulyanov was born April 22nd, 1870, in the Volga river town of Simbersky in Russia. Ulyanov being his true name, Lenin was a name he selected.

Every genuine communist has many names. V. I. Ulyanov, later on, was to become famous under his revolutionary name, V. I. Lenin. He chose this name when smuggling banned literature into Russia. He wrote books, pamphlets, and tracts under this name, V. I. Lenin, and many of them passed the eyes of the Tsar's censors without knowing it was the revolutionary name and the revolutionary literature of V. I. Ulyanov.

Lenin's father was a school inspector. His mother a Lutheran, a music teacher, and the daughter of a German doctor. There were six in Lenin's family. In examining the background and lives of the outstanding persons in history, which persons have been used in areas of deceit and heartache and devastation and mass genocide, if one will examine their lives, they will always find some special boyhood experiences that had effect on these lives until they were finished.

V. I. Ulyanov or Lenin, the man called Lenin, is no exception to this rule. At the age of 16, young Lenin overheard a conversation taking place between a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church and his father.

Lenin was in a back room listening at the door. The priest had visited the Ulyanov home, querying as to why the Ulyanov family, and especially young Ulyanov or Lenin, had not been attending the services in the local Russian Orthodox Church.

Lenin heard his father discuss with the priest the difficulty he was having getting young Ulyanov, that is Lenin, to attend the services. Finally, Mr. Ulyanov spoke to the priest these words. What can I do, priest, to get my son Zelitymyr back into the church?

The priest answered these fatal words. Beat him, beat him and beat him. Soon we will beat him back into the church. Young Lenin heard these words. And I will read to you his own statement as to his reaction.

He says, quote, I ripped the cross from my neck. I spat upon it. I threw it to the floor and ground it under my feet. I freed myself from the curse and the notion of religion and God forever. End of quote.

Listeners, one wonders what the reaction would have been if a true man of God had visited the cabin of Lenin's father. Would there have been a man called Lenin if there had been a true man of God who, speaking to Lenin's father, could have said something like this.

We must pray for young Zelitymyr. We must show him the love of God. We must present to him the way of Christ in patience, love and understanding. But alas, this Russian Orthodox priest, typical of so many, was not so.

In bitterness, young Lenin heard and received these words. And with this experience, he ripped the cross from his neck. And the world had a man called Lenin upon its hands. At the age of 17, his older brother Alexander was hanged on May 8, 1887 for taking part with a student's revolutionary movement who attempted to assassinate the czar or the ruler of Russia.

Upon reading the news of his brother Alexander's death, Lenin slammed the newspaper to the floor and swore this oath. I will get them. I will get them. Beyond any doubt, these two deep experiences in young Lenin as a lad 16 and 17 years of age helped to mold him into becoming the gangster and the mass murderer, the father of the establishment of communism in Russia and the world that he was to become.

Lenin’s Conversion to Marxism

Later on in life, Lenin received the degree of law. Historians tell us that he practiced ten cases and lost all but one. He soon gave up his would-be talent as a lawyer. At the age of 18, however, the poisonous books left by Marx and Engels began to find their way into the hands of young, determined Lenin.

He began to hold Marxist classes in his mother's home. His own brothers and sisters were his first students. In his latter teenage years, Lenin became a convinced Marxist. He believed what Marxists had left his disciples, the verbal legacy that a revolution was coming.

It was coming. And you must join in and take your slice of the revolutionary cake when the revolution comes. Years later, while in banishment from Moscow in May 1889, in the Siberian town of Shushinskoye, he met and married a young woman named Nadezhda Kropeskaya.

She became Mrs. V. I. Ulyanov Lenin. Lenin and his young wife were released from banishment and found their way soon to the city of London, England. In the year 1903, while in London with his wife, Lenin received news that a certain political organization were holding a meeting in the Trade Union Hall in London.

Lenin was very excited upon hearing this news. This group meeting were called the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. This long and sophisticated sounding title, by interpretation, simply means that the Marxist disciples, those who had been given the doctrine that the revolution was coming, it was this very organization, the old comrades and pals and disciples of Marx and Engels themselves, under the title the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, were holding an annual meeting in London, England.

And who should be in the city the same time but Lenin himself. Lenin had longed to meet the disciples of the late Marx and Engels. He had read the books of Marx and Engels as a lad, 18 years old, just mentioned in this lecture.

He became a convinced Marxist and now he had the life's privilege of meeting the very disciples of Marx themselves at this meeting in London. To be sure, he was there. It is at this point that the waning, waxing, discouraged followers of Marx and Lenin were introduced to a man named Lenin.

It is at this point that Lenin met his long admired and beloved Marxist heroes. In this meeting, in London, August 1903, young Lenin longed for an opportunity to speak to the over 400 delegates present.

Finally, his opportunity, his golden hour, arrived. Lenin had observed how discouraged and even disillusioned many of these followers of Marxism were. And they had reason to be so. Marx had drilled them with the philosophy that, just wait, the revolution is coming.

It will be a natural thing. There's nothing you can do to speed it up or slow it down. It will come naturally. Most of these men had lived many years and their lives were almost finished. And for sure, many of them were thinking, if the revolution doesn't hurry, we'll be dead.

Is it coming or is it not? Was the Marxist philosophy right or wrong? What should we do? And it was before this group of waning, waxing followers of the philosophy of Marxism, that the revolution was coming naturally, that young Lenin wanted to stand and speak.

Lenin himself, being a dedicated Marxist, had some new ideas that he would like to add to Marxist philosophy. Finally, on about the 23rd session of this meeting of political gangsters, Lenin was given the floor to speak.

And it was at this point that Lenin projected into the waning, dying Marxist thought, new life. He injected into it a life that has caused it to become the international conspiracy that it is at this present moment.

Something that's keeping the entire world in unrest. A few years before being released from banishment in Shishunsky, Lenin spent much of his time feverishly and dedicatedly writing with pen, paper, and ink.

During these final years of banishment from Moscow, he was preparing a booklet named, What Is To Be Done? It is almost the Bible of the Communist Party today. It was from this booklet that Lenin stood and read to the delegates present at this Russian Social Democratic Labor Party.

Lenin’s Revision of Marxist Revolution

Lenin's words went something like this, Comrades, we are Marxist. Comrade Marx left us a legacy. He revealed to us the class struggle. He has left us the truth that eventually there is coming a showdown between the worker and the ownership class.

Between the proletariat and the bourgeois. This struggle must be turned into a revolution. The revolution, the struggle both will come naturally. And Lenin said this is what Marx has left us. And it was at this point that he very cunningly and carefully put into Marxist philosophy something new.

Lenin said Comrades, though everything Marx said was true, there was one point that he did not consider. And that is since his days things have changed. The conditions have changed in America. They've changed in England.

They've changed in Europe. Today we must face the fact that Comrade Marx did not see this. This is not an alteration to his doctrine but rather an addition. Comrade Marx did not see that these nations would have a secure grip upon the worker.

And the revolution would not come naturally. It was at this point that Lenin said there are several things that we must add to the philosophy of Marxism. And upon the addition of these new points then we will have our revolution.

It will come as we have so long desired. The first contribution and addition that Lenin added to Marxism was what he called the need for a party or an organization. Prior to Lenin's contribution to Marxist philosophy there was a loosely knit organization drifting about Europe and England accomplishing much of nothing.

But now Lenin began to speak and he said I have a plan for an organization. We must reorganize ourselves into a mass of solidarity. And Lenin began to read his proposals for organization from his booklet drawn up previously during Siberian banishment the booklet called What Is To Be Done.

The Communist Vanguard and Democratic Centralism

Lenin's proposals for new firm organization went something like this. He said comrades we want a tiny handful of trained, dedicated, disciplined, informed, equipped followers. Each member of this new organization of Marxism each member must be willing to start at the bottom.

And they must struggle and wrestle and fight and plan their way to the top. Only by years of testing, of harassment, of arrest, even imprisonment and even death will we prove these individuals. Lenin's motto was we want fewer but better.

Lenin refused and disdained the idea of a huge, large, mass organization of millions everywhere who no one could control. With typical satanic, communist planning and genius Lenin shouted the call for fewer but better.

Perhaps we Christians could take a lesson from this. In the average church in the western free world the pastor gets more and worse. The more memberships there are, the more additions, the more the church is growing.

And usually, many times, these things considered blessings turn in to be cursings. Not so with Red Thinking. Lenin said we want a tiny handful. Starting at the bottom, struggling to the top. Fewer but better.

This tiny handful must be willing to take orders from one or two at the top without ever knowing who these one or two are. And in case these individuals are arrested they cannot betray the one or two at the top.

And these two top men can continue giving directives and can keep the organization moving and in living operation. Lenin said this party was to have an internal and unbreakable unity that would forever bind it together.

This party would speak with one voice and would obey and march to the orders of one command. This was Lenin's proposal to these discouraged Marxists who had waited so long for their cherished revolution to come naturally.

But it did not come. And believe me, my listeners, that these Marxists were quick to take up the proposals of young Lenin. They reflected over the past and they agreed that things had changed since the death of comrade Marx.

They agreed that the revolution would not come naturally. That we must have a militantly, carefully organized party that would work to bring about the revolution at their own selected time. But there was another suggestion that Lenin projected, not only the need for an organization, but he told them a special plan whereby this newly organized Communist Party would be unbreakable.

That though they would suffer arrest, the firing squad, the hangman's noose, they would not be shattered. They could continue on. And if they were willing to follow his suggestion, the Communist Party would be cemented together with an unbreakable unity.

The secret of Communist unity has puzzled thousands of Christians and of people all over the world. In my own work, in our question times, I've had some of the biggest intellectuals in the country stand and say, but what is it that keeps Communism together?

What is the secret of its unbreakable unity? It can be smashed and scattered by the security. Its agents can be sentenced and shot and hanged and vanished in exile. And yet it dogs on faithfully. What is the secret of the unity of the Communist Party?

This secret was projected into the Marxist group by Lenin back in 1903. His name for it is, quote, Democratic Centralism. This is a choice title, a beloved term in the vocabulary of any genuine Communist.

Democratic Centralism. This Democratic Centralism is the very secret, the very thing, that has wielded and bound the Communist conspiracy together through unbelievable problems, losses, difficulties. It stays together and it marches on.

Democratic Centralism is the chain that binds the devilish Communist conspiracy together. But what is it? How does it work? The Communist Party is set up like a huge pyramid. We're familiar with the pyramids of Egypt.

Starting from the bottom layer and going upwards, each world Communist Party is allowed to elect a representative in the bottom layers to represent it at a higher meeting at the higher levels. Finally, it all moves up and in to the top and smaller levels of the pyramid.

And as we get to the top, of course, there is the Politburo, which consists of several hundred men. Naturally, these men cannot meet every weekend for a discussion. Finally, we get to the top stone on the pyramid of the Communist Party.

And this top stone, as far as Russian Communism is concerned, is none other than Leonid Brezhnev, the present chairman of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. And he makes the final decisions. The Democratic part often deceives gullible, uninformed people into thinking there is something of democracy left in this devilish and fiendish system.

The Democratic part is simply this, that the Communist Party on the bottom deck of the huge pyramid has the Democratic right to elect a representative to find out what's going on in the higher strata or levels.

Every decision that is reached from the top levels is in turn passed back down through every division of the Communist apparatus worldwide. And the decisions that are reached are binding upon every party member.

In short, Democratic centralism simply means this. Every Communist Party member is fully committed to believe and obey every order he or she receives from the higher echelon, the higher levels, to obey without question or hesitation, to obey with a wholehearted sense of dedication and loyalty.

The order has been decided on from the top. It is imperative and binding upon every member from the top to the bottom. Hence, this system, viciously carried out, has given the Communist Party the unity that so amazes the millions who wonder of it today.

Communist Purges, China, and Russia

Some few years ago, in the country of Australia, a fierce battle raged in the annual meeting of the Australian Communist Party. This occurs often in various Communist Parties of the free world. During this fierce battle and struggle, one of the top members who had served the Australian Communist Party for many years was kicked out.

Many individuals, upon reading and hearing this, said, See? The thing is collapsing. It's beginning to decay. They're fighting and having faction and division from within. However, my friends, here is an erroneous notion we must correct.

Each time a National Communist Organization or a World Communist Organization meets together and some top, lifelong member is suddenly expelled in shame and humility from the Party, this is not a sign of weakness.

It is a sign of unity. He has only been removed from higher echelon, higher position, because those above him feel he can no longer be trusted. It would be good to add at this point that the battle and the argument going on between China and Russia at the present moment is not a war and an argument concerning Communism.

It is an argument as to how it should be implemented. Both China and Russia are still dedicated, lifelong Marxist-Leninist, pursuing themselves to the final aim of world conquest. China says, Destroy everybody now.

And Russia says, Deceive step by step. And they will fall into our hand as an overripe fruit. At this meeting of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in London, young Lenin suggested an organization, an organization built along the principles of democratic centralism, the thing that keeps them together with an unbreakable unity.

Lenin’s Influence on Fascism and Nazism

Other world dictators have studied and have seen the genius of Lenin's organizational plans, and they have naturally borrowed from them to create their own national parties under their full control. A man by the name of Benito Mussolini.

He took Lenin's principle of democratic centralism and came up with his Fascist Party of Italy. Another man in Germany by the name of Schickelgruber, or better, Adolf Hitler. He saw the cunning in Lenin's operational and organizational plans, and he borrowed Lenin's principles and organized his famous National Socialist Workers' Party of Germany.

He also took the fake document, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and palmed it off on the German people and received from this their cooperation in bringing about the slaughter of approximately six million Jews.

So through history, not only did Lenin's democratic centralism and not only has it worked with the Communist Party up to this moment, but it worked with a madman named Mussolini and another by the name of Hitler.

Both Mussolini and Hitler used Lenin's fiendish, cruel method to organize their dangerous powers. Both were simply a subdivision of Lenin's Bolshevikic democratic centralism. Hence we see at this meeting of the discouraged Marxist disciples in London in 1903, young Vladimir Ilyich Lenin projected into the feigning discouraged body an idea, the idea of a militantly lined organization being held together on the cherished principles of democratic centralism.

Had there not been a Lenin, had there not been a man named Lenin, there would not be in all probability international communism today. It's all because there was a man named Lenin who was turned away from the faith as a teenage boy.

Jesus Christ as Refuge and Savior

Friends, what lesson do we receive from this today? I'm glad to say that history has produced other men. There was a man who came to earth almost 2 ,000 years ago, a man named Jesus, born of a virgin in a manger in Bethlehem.

The prophet Isaiah said a man shall be a cover from the storm, a refuge from the heat in the days of trouble. This man is the man Jesus. We of Christian mission to the communist world, we are not only interested in presenting documented factual lectures of this nature in order that you might know the enemy, that you might not move in the pale of ignorance, but from the bliss of accurate information.

We're not only interested in that, but above everything else we're interested in presenting to you the man called Jesus. Do you know this Jesus as your own? I know that many of you listen to this type of lecturing because you are strictly anti-communist.

Many people tell me I'm with you in the battle against communism, but I have no time for religion. Well, I'm always happy to say to these people, my friend, we're not peddling religion. We're presenting to you the resurrected living Son of God, Jesus Christ, trusting that you will repent of your sins and by faith receive this man called Jesus into your own life as your personal Savior.

This is where life begins. What will you do with this Christ, this Jesus? In the closing moments of this recording, would you consider the possibility of being a great anti-communist all your life and then dying without Christ at life's end?

What a foolish choice. The benediction could be set over you as Jesus set over the traitor Judas. Better had this person never been born. Friend, would you trust this Christ as your own personal Savior?

As we've studied the devastation and the heartache brought by a man called Lenin, so there is the forgiveness of sins, the peace, and the everlasting life contrasted, brought to earth by a man called Jesus.