This is what a Martyr Looks Like

No, not the corrupted Jihadist notion of one, the kind that chooses to actively murder others because of who they represent to him, even if the use of the word has infected the rest of the Arab world and now most of the perceptual boundaries of the European left.

Piotr Stanczak did not exhibit the slightest hint of hesitation when the Pakistani Taliban asked him to choose between execution and conversion to Islam.

Whether the Polish geologist acted out of pride or religious conviction, he decided to pay through his blood to save his faith, a choice that bewildered his killers and keep them talking about him with respect after his murder.

Stanczak, 42, was kidnapped September 28 on his way to survey for oil exploration in Attock district, of Pakistan's eastern province of Punjab. The kidnappers also killed his driver and two guards.

Late Polish engineer Piotr Stanczak is a martyr, a man who died holding on to his convictions, even though dispensing of them would be easy.

The description of a martyr given by the pagan historian Ammianus Marcellinus (XXII, xvii), shows that by the middle of the fourth century the title was everywhere reserved to those who had actually suffered death for their faith.