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Is this antisemitism [1]
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Date: 2025-05-17
I came across this Xitter thread documenting anti-semitism in the Soviet Union.
x Alright, let's give some examples of Soviet state antisemitism. It went a lot further than these ignorant dweebs think. Incoming thread.
https://t.co/OLpHbZVNfc — Alex גדעון בן װעלװל (@JewishWonk) May 16, 2025
The writer is a relatively well known Zionist writer who was born in the Soviet Union. Presumably an expert in the topic of antisemitism; AND also relatively well versed with Soviet history. But I was very surprised by this list.
Let us take item #1 as an example.
1) The Bolsheviks shut down synagogues. Our rabbis were arrested. Many were executed.
This is factually correct, in that the Bolsheviks did shut down synagogues, and many rabbis were arrested, and some were executed.
But, on the other hand, this treatment was also extended to other religions. The Bolsheviks were atheists, and were very vehement (i.e. violent) in promoting atheism.
As a side note, these actions by the Bolsheviks should give some pause to atheists about the relative moral superiority of atheists. The atheist response to this can well be that atheism was not central to Stalin’s persecution of religion (see this quote by Dawkins: ”What matters is not whether Hitler and Stalin were atheists, but whether atheism systematically influences people to do bad things. There is not the smallest evidence that it does”). The counter-point is in this same linked article: (where you can get the quote from Dawkins):
Victoria Smolkin demonstrates painstakingly that atheism was central to the Bolshevik project. Statements by Bolshevik leaders, Soviet instructions for youth, and the testimony of memoirs all affirm that atheism is essential to Communism. The Bolsheviks intended to create a whole new type of human being, and the first criterion for “the new Soviet person” was that he or she would be an atheist and a materialist. Communism could not be achieved otherwise, any more than one could create a prosperous capitalist society populated by dedicated Franciscan friars.
I am an atheist myself, so this side note is mostly just a warning to myself (and to other atheists): atheism may not be as morally superior to the religious practices we sometimes criticize.
Anyhow, coming back to the Bolsheviks, and how they treated Jews… there is ample evidence that they persecuted Jews. But there is (to my knowledge) no evidence that they singled out Jews. The “resistance” to the Bolshevik purge of religion was actually organized by the Russian Orthodox Church.
In February 1918, Patriarch Tikhon, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, issued a pastoral letter anathematizing the Bolsheviks. This letter condemned the Soviet authorities for their violent actions against the Church and called upon the faithful to resist these measures. Tikhon's declaration was a significant act of spiritual defiance, asserting the Church's moral opposition to the Bolshevik regime.
In response to increasing persecution, many Orthodox Christians formed the "Catacomb Church." This underground movement comprised clergy and laity who continued to practice their faith secretly, rejecting the authority of the state-sanctioned Church leadership, especially after Metropolitan Sergius's 1927 declaration of loyalty to the Soviet government. The Catacomb Church maintained traditional Orthodox practices and became a symbol of spiritual resistance. The writer of the Xitter post above may appreciate this, given that Jews have also done this at several points in their history.
I have seen no-one make the claim that the Bolsheviks unduly targeted Jews (and synagogues) over other faiths. In fact, all available reporting/documentation suggests that they targeted the Russian Orthodox Church as their primary target. As an example, from about 50,000 Orthodox churches in 1917, there were fewer than 500 by 1940 (or about 49,500 were shuttered,,,for about 99%. Tens of thousands of Orthodox priests/monks/bishops arrested, imprisoned, or executed. And Anti-Orthodox rhetoric was central to Soviet propaganda.
To be sure, the Bolsheviks also shuttered synagogues. Exact estimates vary, but most reports suggest that about 90% of all synagogues were shuttered. To me, within reporting and counting errors (and the fact that this happened 100 years back), this 90% could well be the same as the 99% of orthodox churches that were shuttered.
So, coming back to my central question: Is the Bolshevik treatment of Jews antisemitism ?
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