Nicholas II and Anti-Semitism.

[Eddie_uk]

Can we please leave the whole Israel/Palestine conflict out of this? It will simply create explosive debates and has no bearing on the time surrounding this discussion.

what wit eddieboy. if you want to get political on PM, feel free, i will tell you about injustice. but you're right ortino, everytime someone tells me about the jewish conspiracy, they always bring the middle east up just to back up their pathetic conversation. sorry for offending any person around here
selina                  xxxxxxxxxxxx

Oh, no offence dear!! That's your opinion!!!

[ferngully]

very convenient for you that this topic isn't going to get nasty over the situation in the present 

[Forum Admin]

I have been asked by several to review the recent "goings on" in here. Having been sidelined with a nasty summer cold, I've spent most of my time in here approving new members and keeping the spammers at bay (you have NO idea how many try so often! something like 10-15, some trying twenty times a day!!) and answering PMs, so I haven't been reviewing alot of threads.

OK: Here's how I see things. This thread has pretty well drifted WAY off course of the stated purpose of Nicholas' attitude toward the Jews. You have tried making analogies, which is fine, but now you are all caught up in dissecting the politics of the ANALOGIES rather than the topic.  With that, discussion has now gone into the weeds. I must castigate the moderators for participating in this diversion and taking things afield rather than their jobs of keeping discussin On Topic.

Lisa, I think you came down too hard on JamesH. I did not see "derision" in his comments, frankly others in here have come equally as close to the line but were addressing other users and not GDElla.  I think EVERYONE needs to stop addressing other users and go back to the topic.

Thanks
FA

[Maria_Pavlovna]

I don't know if anyone posted that during that time, -Tsarist rule and Russian Orthodox religion were one. That why there’s a double eagle flag (tsar and Christian Orthodoxy)
I am also guessing that in Russia, during Nicholas’ reign- “not Christian, not Russian” ....sad.

[James1941]

There has been some discussion of the fact that one of the books Nicholas read while at Tobolsk was one which contained the Protocols. This has been suggested that it supports the view he was anti-Jewish.
Is there any evidence that Nicholas personally went around chosing the books that would go with the family when they left the Alexander Palace for Tobolsk?
I know that they took a great deal of stuff with them such as wine, napkins, linens, sheets, etc. as well as their personal clothing and possessions. However, did Nicholas choose which books would go, or did he simply instruct some of the servants to pack a number of books. Could it be that this book was included for no sinister reason except that it was among a bunch of other books?

NEVER MIND. I went back and read the posts and see that the book was supposedly sent to Alexandra and she gave it to Nicholas. I stand corrected. I don't know how to delete my post.

[Elisabeth]

James, since according to Alexandra's very own diary in Tobolsk (it's been published, by Yale University Press), Nicholas was reading the Protocols aloud to his entire family every night, I think we have to take seriously the charge that he was anti-Semitic and that he chose, of his own free will, to be anti-Semitic. Frankly, it's not surprising, given his nationality, class, cultural background and upbringing. In fact, it would be more surprising if he had turned out not to be anti-Semitic. If that had been true, he would have been an exceptional human being indeed... and as we all know, Nicholas II was the very reverse of being exceptional. In fact, he was totally ordinary in every way, the essence of the average. Maybe that's why his ultimate fate strikes such a chord with so many of us ordinary, average human beings?

But sorry, I see from your P.S. that you've already revised your opinion. At any rate, it's an interesting subject for discussion. 

[lexi4]

Elisabeth,
You mention that Alexandra's diaries have been published by Harvard. Can you tell me where I can get a copy?
Thanks,
Lexi

[Nadezhda_Edvardova]

The Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra, Edited by Vladimir M. Khrustalëv and Vladimir A. Kozlov; Introduction by Robert K. Massie. ISBN-10: 0300072120 Cloth: $45.00 tx.  Well worth the price.  Check the usual online booksellers and the publisher at http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/home.asp.  Pax, N.

[Nadezhda_Edvardova]

This is always a fascinating topic.  As we proceed, let me caution against presentism, the error of judging the past by present-day standards.  As students of history, we must evaluate Nicholas in the context of his own times.  As for reconciling his attitudes toward Jewish people and his professed Christianity, well, that's up to God.  Remember also that God makes saints, the church only recognizes what God has already done, and that no one is without sin except Christ. Therefore, all saints were once sinners. Pax, N.

[Forum Admin]

James, since according to Alexandra's very own diary in Tobolsk (it's been published, by Yale University Press), Nicholas was reading the Protocols aloud to his entire family every night, I think we have to take seriously the charge that he was anti-Semitic and that he chose, of his own free will, to be anti-Semitic....

Let us NOT exaggerate the genuine facts, please. There is one, and only one diary entry by Alexandra on the subject:

Tobolsk 26 March/8 April
4th week of GreatLent
 ...

8 PM Nicholas read to us.  (Protocols of the freemasons)--

Nicholas wrote in his diary the next day:
Yesterday I started to read aloud Nilus's book on the Antichrist, to which have been added the 'protocols' of the Jews and Masons - very timely reading matter."

Now, according to the author of the Yale translations, Khrustalėv, on pg 91:
"Nicholas evidently read Sergei Nilus's Velikoe v malom i Antikhrist, kak blizkaia politicheskaia vozmozhmost: Zapiski pravoslavnogo (The great in the small and the Antichrist as an imminent political possibility: Notes of an Orthodox believer) 2nd ed. Tsarskoe Selo, 1905. which included the so called Protocols of the Elders of Zion.  The White Army investigators found this book in the Ipatiev House after the family was killed.  Nilus claimed that these were the protocols of a Zionist organization bent on destroying civilization and creating a worldwide Jewish state.  In fact, the Protocols had been fabricated by the tsarist secret police."

This is hardly "every day" in Tobolsk that the "Protocols" were being read. Alexandra herself obviously thought it was the MASONS and not the Jews...and Nicholas himself believed them to be as much Masonic as Jewish....and Nilus himself appears to have attributed them to a Zionist "organization" and not to the Jews as a whole.

[tandtb]

Hello everyone.  Newbe here and so glad that I found this site.  For many years I have had an interest in Russian history, and have recently begun doing a geneological search on my family.  After finding out that my great grandparents were from Russia I began to look up various subjects on google.  WOW I found this site  how fabulous.  As i said I have had interest in particular in the Nicholas/Alexandria reign, but have stopped reading about the last czar due to anti semetic feelings that I have read about him.  However now since joining this forum I have read where in fact HE was more for Jewish rights in Russia than first believed.  I have started purchasing books on ebay regarding the Romanovs and speciafically Nicholas II and am looking forward to enjoying this forum with all of you.

[anna11]

Well most of Russia's aristocrocy was anti-sematic and rather racist. Alexandra was  less anti-sematic than Nicholas, but even with him I think it was a much more 'they're not like us' attitude than a malicious hatred. They were products of their times, it doesn't reveal any particular nastiness in Nicholas's character imo.

And welcome to the forum!

[tandtb]

Thank you so much Anna.  I am aware that during that time period in history there was quite a lack of understanding of others.  I am glad that I found this forum.

[tsarsrule]

i heard that Nicholas was anti-semite but was fond of his Musilm subjects, and when he took the trip to england he was suprised by the jews he saw and people who were married to jews.

[helenazar]

.... when he took the trip to england he was suprised by the jews he saw and people who were married to jews.

What do you mean by this?