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[KULISHER] Mif o ritual’nom ubiystve u yevreyev. Vozniknoveniye i razvitiye yego [i.e. The myth of ritual murder among Jews. Its origin and development]

Kulisher, M.

Item #2683

[Moscow: Kushnerev, 1901]. 37—53 p. 23,5 × 15 cm. Contemporary binding. Slightly soiled pages. pre- Revolutionary stamps on the opening page.

Inscribed by the author on the opening page: ‘To deeply admired Samuil Iakovslevich Ianovsky from author’. Samuil Ianovsky was a Kyiv-based journalist.
Extract from ‘Russkaia Mysl’’ of the first publication of the article by Mikhail Kulisher (1847—1919), a Jewish Russian publicist, ethnographer, researcher of the history of primitive law. Kulisher was an important figure in end of the century Jewish life in Ukraine. He has studied at the rabbinical school in Zhitomir, later at the law faculty of the Kyiv, Odessa and St. Petersburg universities (graduated from the latter). In the late 1860s he began his journalistic career in the Odessa newspaper “Day” and “St. Petersburg Vedomosti’’. He continued to practice law and kept an office in St. Petersburg. In 1879, together with others, he founded the magazine of Russian Jews “Rassvet” in St. Petersburg, for some time he was its editor. In 1880 he was also involved with Odessa newspaper “Pravda”. In 1880—1886 he published one of the best provincial newspapers in Kyiv, “Zarya”, which ceased to be published due to his clash with the nominal editor. In 1908, at the founding meeting of the Jewish Historical and Ethnographic Society, he was elected deputy chairman of this organization.
Despite his rich bibliography, this short text by Kulisher became arguably his most well-known work, as it has been reprinted on numerous occasions. The reasons for that are convolute. First of all, the article came out in one of the mainstream St-Petersburg periodicals: liberal ‘Russkaia Mysl’’ had the circulation of 40 000 at the time. The majority of other publications by Kulisher were printed in Jewish Russian periodicals. The timing of the publication was crucial: at the time of pogroms and the active blood libel from the conservatism and monarchic editions and figures, it was important for the Russian society of the time to read this balanced, scholarly text on the origin and development of this premise from a respected St. Petersburg lawyer with Jewish roots.
According to A. Solzhenitzyn in his ’Two Hundred Years Together’, the study of the history of Jews in Russia, Mikhail Kulisher personified a representative of the Jewish intelligentsia, ready for full integration into Russian society at the beginning of the 20th century, actively speaking out against Zionist and socialist sentiments in the diaspora. Solzhenitzyn also quotes from Kulischer: «The intelligentsia of Russian Jews does not distinguish itself from Russian citizens» in the chapter on the late-XIX cent. Russian-Jewish relations.

No copies found in Worldcat.

Price: $750.00