Crosses (crosses) - those who converted to Christianity from another religion

This term is most often used in relation to baptized Jews and carries negative connotations (despite the fact that the first baptized were the apostles and disciples of Christ). Most modern dictionaries give the word “cross” with the mark “obsolete.”

Jews especially often began to convert to Christianity in the 19th - early years. XX centuries, when religious affiliation with Judaism was no longer strictly identified with national identity, the transition to Christianity removed from the Jew educational and other restrictions that existed in a number of states (in Russian Empire until 1917). However, gradually some of them spread to crosses. Thus, they did not accept baptisms:
- to the gendarmes,
- With late XIX centuries they have not ordained priests,
- were not accepted for service in the navy,
- since 1910 they have not been promoted to officers in the army;
- in 1912, the ban on promotion to officers was also extended to children and grandchildren of crosses.
In Russia, Jews often accepted the Lutheran faith, since Lutherans could marry Jewish women.
Crosses often received surnames derived from the names of animals and birds, since a surname is formed by general rule, they didn’t want a father who had a Jewish name, and for a long time it was impossible to freely choose any surname for yourself in Russia.

The crosses were:

The first apostles - disciples of Christ - all were Jews who accepted the new teaching and became the first associates of Christian thought. They left everything and followed Christ. They went and taught the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Arseniy Grek - hieromonk, translator of Greek and Latin books and teacher of the Greek-Latin school.
Arseny also compiled a Slavic-Latin lexicon. He also invented a special handwriting or alphabet, which is still kept in the Moscow Typographic Library and is called the “Arseniev alphabet”.

Ivan Stanislavovich Bliokh - Russian banker, railway concessionaire in the Russian Empire, philanthropist, scientist, activist in the international peace movement.
Born in Warsaw in the family of a Polish Jew. He worked at the Teplica bank in Warsaw, then moved to St. Petersburg. Here he converted to Christianity, namely to Calvinism. At the end of the 1860s, he became involved in railway concessions and was the organizer of a number of railway enterprises, credit and insurance institutions, and took a close part in the affairs of the “Main Society of Russian Railways”. He was appointed a member of the Scientific Committee of the Ministry of Finance. On November 22, 1883, he was elevated to the dignity of nobility. Bliokh's coat of arms is included in Part 14 of the General Arms of Arms of the Noble Families of the All-Russian Empire. Under the name of Blokh, several multi-volume works about railways, finance and economic issues. The most famous book published in 1898 is “The Future War and Its Economic Consequences.”

Mordecai Vanunu, 1954 - Israeli nuclear technician who gained fame after disclosing information about Israel's nuclear program in the British press.
Vanunu was born into a Jewish family from Morocco who immigrated to Israel in 1963.
After finishing his service, he entered Tel Aviv University at the preparatory department of exact sciences, but soon, having failed the exams, he was forced to interrupt his studies. He completes the technician course at the nuclear research center and takes up the duties of a dispatcher in workshop No. 2. In 1979, he enters the evening department of Ben-Gurion University in Beersheba at the Faculty of Philosophy and Geography. I saw my name on the list for dismissal, but managed to shoot 57 frames of the secret compartments of the nuclear center in Dimona. Having received severance pay, flies abroad. In Nepal, Vanunu converts to Buddhism, and in Australia he is baptized. In 1986, he announces to the world community that Israel is pursuing a nuclear program and has nuclear weapons. He was sent to Israel, where he was found guilty of treason in a closed trial.

For six weeks, the Israeli government denied knowledge of Vanunu's whereabouts until then, but he managed to secretly reveal his whereabouts to journalists. Mordechai Vanunu was sentenced to 18 years in prison, of which he spent 11 years in strict isolation.
During his time in prison he was nominated several times as a laureate Nobel Prize world, some universities awarded him the title of honorary doctor. In Israel, Vanunu is considered a traitor by the majority of the population. He is not allowed to leave Israel or approach foreign embassies and is required to report any planned movements. In addition, he is prohibited from using the Internet and mobile communications, as well as communicate with foreign journalists. Currently, Mordechai Vanunu lives on the grounds of the Anglican Church of St. George Jerusalem

Stefan Geller , 1813-1888 - Austrian pianist and composer.
studied in Vienna with Anton Halm, and began actively giving concerts from the age of 14. In 1848 he settled in Paris, where he was closely acquainted with Chopin, Liszt and Berlioz, and was part of Richard Wagner's circle during his stay in Paris. Over the next decade and a half, he toured England several times.
Geller's compositional heritage includes more than 150 numbered opuses, which are almost exclusively piano pieces

Henrietta Julia Hertz (1764 - 1847) - writer of the early romanticism era, owner of the famous Berlin literary salon. Wife of doctor and writer Markus Hertz.
Henrietta was born into a Jewish family and received a good education. When she was 12 years old, she became engaged to the doctor Markus Hertz, and the wedding took place two years later. Markus Hertz gave lectures in his home on Kant's philosophy and led a circle on scientific and philosophical topics. Henrietta, who was fond of literature, soon gathered around her people interested in literature. At a time when her husband received high-ranking politicians and cultural figures, Henrietta led a women’s circle in the next room, focusing mainly on the literature of Sturm und Drang and the work of Goethe. From these two circles emerged the famous Berlin salon, where politicians, scientists, artists, writers and philosophers moved.
Markus Hertz died in 1803. Since 1813, she only gave lessons to poor children, but fame did not leave her. In 1817, Henrietta was baptized and converted to the Protestant religion.

Herman Mayer Solomon Goldschmidt (1802 - 1866) - German astronomer and artist who lived most of his life in France.
Born in Frankfurt, in the family of a Jewish merchant. He moved to Paris to study painting, where he painted a number of paintings, after which he became interested in astronomy. He is credited with the first observations (in 1820) of shadow waves that appear a few minutes before a total solar eclipse. In 1861 he received Gold medal Royal Astronomical Society. The Goldschmidt crater on the Moon is named after him, as is the asteroid 1614 Goldschmidt. Goldschmidt was a cross.

Benjamin Disraeli (1804 - 1881, ibid.) - English statesman Conservative Party of Great Britain, 40th and 42nd Prime Minister of Great Britain in 1868, member of the House of Lords since 1876, writer, one of the representatives of the “social novel”.
Benjamin was the eldest child in a family of five children. His parents were Jews emigrating to England. Literary success opened the doors of high society salons for Disraeli, where he studied political intrigue and found material for novels. A clear practical mind, resourcefulness, wit, irresistible personal attractiveness, ambition and iron perseverance helped Disraeli make connections in the highest spheres; travel to the East enriches his imagination, broadens his horizons, and a profitable marriage forever frees him from financial difficulties. In their literary works, marked by Byronism, he developed the theory of a “hero” to whom “everything is allowed.” Disraeli's novels were often portraiture: he depicted himself and other political figures in them, which caused a sensation.
After four unsuccessful attempts to enter parliament, Disraeli changed his program and in 1837 was finally elected from the Tory party. In parliament he makes sensational speeches for the Chartists in his time, groups the landed aristocracy around himself, being the soul of the Young England party; then - leader of the opposition, in 1852 - minister, in 1868 - prime minister. It is known that when he was prime minister, having read in the newspaper that the Sultan of Egypt was selling shares in the Suez Canal, Disraeli, without finishing his morning coffee, ran to the bank and took out a loan from state budget by 4 million pounds sterling and bought 100% of the shares, which brought the kingdom significant profits from fees for using the canal.

Nikolay Donin - lived in the 13th century, a Jew who converted to Christianity. Because of his report to the Pope about the contents of the Talmud, persecution of this book began in Europe.
Donin was born and studied under Rabbi Yechiel of Paris. He expressed doubts about the truth of the Oral Torah (Talmud) and for this he was excommunicated from the Jewish community. Over the next 10 years, Donin remained excommunicated, but continued to adhere to Judaism. Gradually his situation begins to oppress him. Donin converts to Christianity (possibly under the influence of Christian missionaries) and joins the Franciscan order.

Zolli, Israel (1881 - 1956) - religious leader of Judaism, then Catholicism.
He was born in the Galician town of Brody into the Zoller family, whose representatives had become rabbis for four centuries. He spent most of his life in Italy. From 1927 to 1938 he was professor of Hebrew at the University of Padua. Since 1939 - Chief Rabbi of Rome. In 1943, Rome was occupied by German troops. In 1943, Colonel Kappler, the chief of the German police in Rome, under threat of deportation, ordered the Jewish community to hand over 50 kg of gold to him within 24 hours. In the evening of that day, only 35 kg were collected, which forced Zolli to turn to Pope Pius XII for help. With the help of the Pope, the gold was collected, but this did not stop the Nazi program of deportations to death camps. Rabbi Zolli received asylum in the Vatican, where he also met with the Pope. In July 1944, a solemn ceremony took place in a Roman synagogue, during which Zolli expressed his gratitude to the Pope for the help provided to Jews during persecution.
On August 15, 1944, addressing the rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University, Jesuit Fr. Paolo Dezza, he expressed his decision to convert to Catholicism. On February 13, 1945, Zolli was baptized in the chapel of Santa Maria degli Angeli and took the name Eugenio Maria in honor of Pope Pius XII. The family who converted with him were subjected to fierce attacks. Zolli himself and his heirs emphasized that conversion to Christianity does not break with the Jewish people. In 1949, Israel Eugenio Zolli was a professor of Semitic writing and Hebrew at the University of Rome. He was also the author of a number of books and numerous works on biblical exegesis, liturgics, Talmudic literature and the history of the Jewish people, as well as the autobiographical reflections Before the Dawn (1954).
Judas Cyriacus (Quiriac) - a resident of Jerusalem mentioned in apocryphal literature who assisted Empress Helena in her search for the Life-Giving Cross.
According to the Golden Legend, Judas was one of the Jewish sages, among whose ancestors (his father's brothers) were the first martyr Stephen and Nicodemus, the secret disciple of Christ. He, having learned from his father about the location of the Cross, after Elena’s arrival in Jerusalem at the council of elders, declares that the discovery of the Cross will destroy their religion and deprive the Jews of their superiority over Christians. Then the Jews forbade him to inform the empress about the location of the relic, but after Helen threatened to burn them alive, Judas was handed over to her. Helen threw him into a dry well and kept him there for seven days, after which “he came to one place, raised his voice and prayed that a sign would be sent down to him. Immediately the earth began to move in that place, and smoke came out of such amazing sweetness that, feeling it, Judas clapped his hands with joy and exclaimed: “Truly, Jesus Christ, You are the Savior of the world!”
Also in the “Golden Legend” it is reported that Judas, after finding the Cross, was baptized under the name Quiriaca (“belonging to the Lord”) and then becoming the bishop of Jerusalem, accepted martyrdom during the time of Emperor Julian the Apostate.
Marranos or Maranos - the term by which the Christian population of Spain and Portugal called Jews who converted to Christianity and their descendants, regardless of the degree of voluntary conversion (late XIV-XV centuries). The Marranos, who secretly continued to practice Judaism, were the main object of persecution of the Spanish Inquisition, as were the Moriscos (Muslims) - Mudejars who converted to Christianity in a similar situation)
Edgardo Mortara (1851 - 1940) - Catholic priest of Jewish origin. He gained fame due to the fact that at the age of six he was taken away from his parents by the police and raised as a Christian. The Mortara case caused widespread public outcry.

On the evening of June 23, 1858, police arrived at the house of Marianna and Salomon (Momolo) Mortara in the city of Bologna to take away their six-year-old son Edgardo. They acted on the orders of Pope Pius IX. Church authorities learned that a maid in the Mortara house had secretly baptized Edgardo while he was ill. According to her, she was afraid that the boy would die and his soul would go to hell. Bologna was part of a theocratic state - the Papal States. According to the laws, Jews were forbidden to raise a Christian child, even if it was their own child.
Edgardo Mortara was transported to Rome, where he was raised in a home for Catholic Jews. The family was initially banned from having contact with him. Subsequently, visits were allowed, but not in private. Protests were made by various Jewish organizations, as well as famous figures (in particular, Napoleon III and Emperor Franz Joseph). However, Pope Pius IX rejected all demands for the child's return.
After the annexation of the Papal States to Italy in 1870, the pope lost power, and the Mortara family again attempted to return their son. However, by this time Edgardo Mortara, who had reached the age of 19 and became an adult, declared that he was committed to the Catholic faith. That same year he moved to France, where he joined the Augustinian Order. At the age of 23, Mortara became a priest, taking the new name Pius. He was engaged in missionary work in German cities, converting Jews to Catholicism.
Mortara was a supporter of the beatification of Pius IX. In 1912, speaking in support of the pope's beatification, he wrote that nine days later his parents arrived in Rome and visited him daily for a month, persuading him to return. According to him, he had no desire to return home, explaining this by the “power of prayers.” Mortara later restored relations with his family and attended his mother’s funeral. He owned nine foreign languages. Mortara died in Belgium, spending the last years of his life in a monastery.
Apostle Paul (Saul, Saul) - “apostle of the Gentiles” (Rom. 11:13), who was not one of the Twelve Apostles and participated in the persecution of Christians in his youth.
Paul's experience with the risen Jesus Christ led to his conversion and became the basis for his apostolic mission. Paul created numerous Christian communities in Asia Minor and the Balkan Peninsula. Paul's letters to communities and individuals form a significant part of the New Testament and are among the major texts of Christian theology. For the spread of the faith of Christ, the Apostle Paul endured much suffering and, as a citizen, was not crucified, but beheaded in Rome under Nero in 64.
Roman Sladkopevets - Christian saint of the 5th-6th centuries, known as the author of hymns called kontakia (in the early meaning of the term), some of which are still used in the worship of the Orthodox Church (for example, “The Virgin today gives birth to the Most Essential”; “My soul, my soul, rise up"). The Orthodox Church canonized Roman the Sweet Singer.
Roman the Sweet Singer was born in the middle of the 5th century into a Jewish family in the city of Emessa, in Syria, was baptized in his youth, served as a deacon in Beirut, under Emperor Anastasia I (491-518) he arrived in Constantinople, here he entered the clergy of the Church of Our Lady and at first, nothing without standing out, he even provoked ridicule. One day, after fervent prayer, he saw in a dream the Mother of God, who, according to legend, handed him a scroll and ordered him to swallow it; waking up and feeling inspired, he sang “Virgin this day,” followed by other songs. In the Greek original, Roman’s hymns had a special poetic meter, called tonic, of which it is considered a distributor. The German Byzantinist Krumbacher, who published the complete collection of Roman's hymns, admits that in terms of poetic talent, animation, depth of feeling and sublimity of language, he surpasses all other Greek hymns.

Oswald Rufeisen (1922-1998) - Catholic monk of Jewish origin, Carmelite, missionary, translator, polyglot.
Born into a Jewish family living in Poland near Auschwitz. He was raised Jewish and was active in the Zionist youth movement. During the war he took part in actions to save Jews. With his help, hundreds of Jews in the Belarusian city of Mir were saved from being sent to concentration camps. Hiding from the Nazis, in 1942 he ended up in a monastery, where he was voluntarily baptized. After the war, in 1945, Rufeisen returned to Poland, studied to become a priest and became a Carmelite monk.
In 1962, Brother Daniel sought Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return. When he was refused on the basis of the “procedural orders” of 01/01/1960, Rufeisen appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court (Case 72/62 Oswald Rufeisen v. Minister of the Interior).
In his appeal, Brother Daniel sought recognition of his right to repatriate to Israel on the basis that he is a Jew - if not by religious affiliation, then by birthright from a Jewish mother. He did not hide the fact that he converted to Christianity out of sincere and deep conviction, but he insisted on his belonging to the Jewish people in the “national plan.” Halacha also sees him as a Jew. Ber-Yehuda's directive, amended in July 1958, and Shapira's "procedural orders" do not correspond to the exact wording of the Law of Return and, therefore, are not legal.
The Supreme Court recognized that Halacha considers converts to be Jews, but did not recognize Halacha as part of Israeli law. The court found that Shapira's "procedural orders" were a low-level departmental instruction that did not comply with Israeli law. The court also recognized that no Israeli law defines the concept of “Jew.”
The Supreme Court ruled that due to the lack of written legislation and based on the secular nature of the Law of Return, the concept of “Jew” should not be interpreted in a strictly halachic sense, but based on the subjective opinion of the majority of the people: according to “how the word sounds in the mouths of the people these days” (Judge Berenzon’s formulation), “as we Jews understand it” (Judge Zilber’s formulation), or simply in accordance with the opinion of a simple Jew “from the street.” Thus, according to the Supreme Court,
a Jew is someone whom other Jews consider to be a Jew.
The judges also added that since neither the fathers of Zionism nor any Jew would ever consider a Christian believer to be a Jew, the Law of Return does not apply to persons born Jewish who voluntarily changed their religion. Such a person can certainly apply for the right of residence in Israel like other non-Jews, but he cannot be considered a Jew under the Law of Return and is not entitled to automatic Israeli citizenship or the rights of new immigrants. On this basis, Brother Daniel's claim was rejected.
Judge Chaim Cohen did not agree with the majority opinion, objecting to the subjective-collective criterion (the opinion of the majority of the people) in favor of the subjective-individual one ( own wish plaintiff), but remained in the minority.
However, Rufeisen was able to immigrate to Israel and obtain Israeli citizenship through naturalization. Until the end of his days he lived in the Carmelite monastery of Stella Maris in Haifa and was the pastor of the Jewish Christian community of the Catholic Church of St. Joseph. His merit is also the creation of a nursing home for the “Righteous Among the Nations” in the city of Nahariya.
Ignaz Trebitsch-Lincoln (1879-1943) - one of the most famous adventurers of the 20th century.
Born into a family of Orthodox Jews. While studying at the Budapest Academy acting skills I was caught several times for petty thefts. At the age of 18 he went to London, where at Christmas 1899 he converted to Lutheran confession. After graduating from the seminary in Brecklum (Germany), he sailed for missionary work to Canada, where his task was to convert Montreal Jews to Presbyterianism.
Having quarreled with Canadian Presbyterians over the amount of their salary, Trebitsch showed up in London in 1903, where he made acquaintance with the Archbishop of Canterbury. He managed to gain his trust and was appointed canon to the county of Kent. Here his patron was the confectionery magnate Seebohm Rowntree, who convinced him to leave the Anglican Church for a political career.
As a private secretary and confidant of Rowntree (one of the sponsors of the Liberal Party), Trebitsch took part in the elections to the British Parliament, which he won in 1909. However, a brilliant political future did not seduce the 30-year-old adventurer, for whom personal enrichment remained the first issue on the agenda. Instead of attending meetings of the House of Commons, he went to Bucharest, where he hoped to hit the jackpot with clever investments in the Romanian oil industry.
With the outbreak of World War I, the failed oil baron declared bankruptcy and returned to London, where he offered his services to British intelligence. Having been refused, he crossed the English Channel and was recruited as a German spy in the Netherlands. In 1915, he tried to establish cooperation with Franz von Papen, the German military attaché in the United States, but the latter did not want to have anything to do with the rogue. Finding himself penniless, Trebitsch published a scandalous material in a New York newspaper under the heading “Revelations of a Member of the British Parliament Recruited as a Spy.”
The British government hired Pinkerton detectives to hush up the scandal and demanded Trebitsch's extradition from the United States on fraud charges. After various legal delays, he was finally handed over to the British and spent the next three years in prison on the Isle of Wight. Upon his release, Trebitsch decided to no longer deal with the Anglo-Saxons and moved to the Weimar Republic, where he took an active part in the preparation and implementation of the Kapp Putsch, receiving an appointment as a censor for this.
After the suppression of the putsch, Trebitsch fled first to Munich and then to Vienna, where he trumped his acquaintance with such far-right politicians as Erich Ludendorff and Adolf Hitler. He eventually managed to gain a place in the White International, an international political organization of red-brown color. As soon as the secret archive of the reactionaries came into his possession, Trebitsch was quick to sell it to the secret services of several countries at once. Accused of treason, the swindler was deported from Austria and went to seek his fortune in the East.
In the mid-1920s, Trebitsch's trace was discovered in China, where he alternately served in the service of various political groups until he finally declared astral insight and took monastic vows. In 1931, he established his own monastery in Shanghai and spent last decades his life, extorting property from novices and seducing young Shanghainese women. During the Japanese invasion of China (1937), they found a loyal ally in the Buddhist elder Zhao Kong (Chinese: 照空, pinyin Zhào Kōng) (as Trebitsch now called himself). He asked to convey to Himmler and Hess about his readiness to raise millions of Buddhists to fight the British and even planned to take a trip to Tibet for this, but died before this mission began.
Rachel Farnhagen von Enze (German Rahel Varnhagen von Ense, nee Levin, also Rahel Robert or Robert-Tornow, Friederike Antonia (baptismal name), 1771 - 1833 - German writer of Jewish origin. Rahel Farnhagen belongs to the era of romanticism and the European Enlightenment. She advocated rights of Jews and women.
Daniil Avraamovich (Ab Ramovich) Khvolson (1819, Vilna - 1911, St. Petersburg) - Russian orientalist, historian, linguist, Semitologist, Hebraist, corresponding member of the Imperial RAS in the category of oriental languages. Works on the history of the East and the peoples of Eastern Europe, on the history of Christianity, on the history of writing (Arabic, Hebrew, etc.), the Hebrew language, Assyriology, etc. One of the editors of the scientific translation of the Bible into Russian.
The son of a poor Jew from Lithuania, he received a religious Jewish education, studied the Tanakh, Talmud and commentators on the Talmud. He later taught himself German, French and Russian by himself. Took a course at the University of Breslau. He received his PhD from the University of Leipzig for his dissertation: “Die Ssabier und der Ssabismus”. Returned to Russia. The result of his research was an extensive work published in St. Petersburg in 1856 under the same title. He converted to Orthodoxy and from 1855 occupied the department of Jewish, Syriac and Chaldean literature at the Eastern Faculty of St. Petersburg. University.
The phrase is attributed to Khvolson
It is better to be a professor in St. Petersburg than a melamed in Vilna.
From 1858 to 1883 - professor in St. Petersburg. Orthodox Theological Academy. He taught Hebrew language and biblical archeology from 1858 to 1884 at the St. Petersburg Roman Catholic Academy.
Khvolson's son, Orestes, became a famous physicist. Khvolson never refused to help Jews, sheltering in his home Jews whom the law prohibited from living outside the Pale of Settlement.

Israel Shamir (b. 1947, Novosibirsk) - Russian-Israeli writer, translator and anti-Zionist publicist. Orthodox Christian. He also published under the names Israel Adam Shamir and Robert David.
Shamir's critics accuse him of anti-Semitism and call him a "self-hater."
Shamir graduated from a physics and mathematics school, then studied at the Faculty of Mathematics at Novosibirsk University, as well as at the Faculty of Law of the Novosibirsk branch of the Sverdlovsk Law Institute. In his youth he joined the dissident movement. In 1969 he repatriated to Israel and participated in the Yom Kippur War (1973). He served in an elite parachute unit and fought on the Egyptian front. Later, as a correspondent for the Voice of Israel radio station, he worked in countries South-East Asia(Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos). Since 1975 he has lived outside of Israel (Great Britain, Japan). Shamir himself claims that he worked in the Russian service of the BBC.
In 1980, Shamir returned to Israel. Shamir is a Swedish citizen, some sources claim that his family lives there. In 2003, journalists working for Monitor magazine, as well as the Swedish anti-racist non-profit organization Expo, citing data they had collected, reported that Shamir was living in Sweden under the name Göran Ermas and presented a corresponding photo Swedish passport with the last name Ermas with a photo of Shamir.
Other critics of Shamir believe that he lives alternately in Israel and Sweden.
According to Shamir himself, he currently lives in Israel in Jaffa. This version is confirmed by some reports.
Pavel Vasilievich Shein (often erroneously Shein) (1826, Mogilev - 1900, Riga) - self-taught ethnographer and linguist, collector of Russian and Belarusian songs, expert in the life and dialects of the North-Western region, successor to the works of Afanasyev, Bessonov, Hilferding, Dahl, Kireevsky, Rybnikov, Yakushkina.
Born in 1826 in the family of Mogilev Jewish merchant Mofit Shein. Weak from birth, as a result of which he remained crippled for life, the boy could not even graduate from Jewish school and studied almost independently, using the advice of melamed. The future ethnographer became interested in the Hebrew language and literature. Shane's father admitted his son to one of the city hospitals in Moscow; and stayed with his son to prepare kosher food for him. Shane spent three years here. One Jew taught the boy to speak and read Russian, the German residents taught him the German language, and soon he met the best German poets. In imitation of German poets, he composed poems in Yiddish, pursuing views that reconciled Jewry with Christianity. The consequence of this acquaintance was Shane’s quite conscious transition to Lutheranism, tearing him away forever from his family and environment. Having entered the orphanage department of the Lutheran Church of St. Mikhail, he was so successful that after graduating from school he could teach Russian in the preparatory department.
He became close to his teacher F.B. Miller, and this gave impetus to Shane's cultural aspirations; he joined a circle of writers and artists who lived in Moscow (F. Glinka, M. Dmitriev, Raich, Ramazanov, Avdeev, etc.). He gave lessons to the families of landowners, met Russian peasants and, succumbing to the general passion for folk literature, he himself began to collect songs, first in the Simbirsk province. Bodyansky invited him to publish this material, and Shane’s first printed work dates back to 1859: “Russians folk epics and songs.” Shane’s subsequent life is full of wanderings, material hardships and family failures; he taught at a Sunday school in Moscow, then at L. Tolstoy’s Yasnaya Polyana school, at district schools (1861-1881) in Tula and Epifani, finally got a place at the Vitebsk gymnasium, then in Shuya, Zaraysk, Kaluga, etc.
At the same time, the collection of ethnographic materials was underway. Shane typed his notes and articles.
In 1881 he retired and settled in St. Petersburg. On behalf of J. Grot, from 1886 he participated in the compilation of an academic dictionary of Russian literary language. He introduced folk phraseology into it. With a lack of philological education, thanks to his energy and love of work, Shane was able to publish seven large books during his lifetime. The collector himself called himself only a "laborer" in science, and his works - "minor", which is explained rather by his modesty.
Dorothea Schlegel (Brendel Mendelssohn; 1764 - 1839) - eldest daughter Moses Mendelssohn. She gained fame as a literary critic, writer, life partner and wife of Friedrich Schlegel. One of the most famous women of Jewish origin who converted to Christianity. In 1778, at the age of 14, Brendel became engaged to businessman Simon Feith, who was 10 years older than her, and married him. They had four sons, of whom only two survived. Soon she met the young Friedrich Schlegel. On January 11, 1799, Brendel divorced her husband in a Jewish religious court, while undertaking not to remarry, not to be baptized, or to encourage her children to convert to Christianity. Brendel and Friedrich Schlegel began to live together openly. Friedrich Schlegel's novel Lucinda, scandalous at the time, reflects this life together.
In 1804, Brendel converted to Protestantism and married Friedrich Schlegel. In 1808, she changed her religion again, this time, together with Friedrich Schlegel, converting to Catholicism. Schlegel's Protestant family placed all the blame for this step on Dorothea. Dorothea baptized her two sons according to the Catholic rite.
Edith Stein (1891 - 1942, Auschwitz concentration camp), also known by the monastic name Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, was a German philosopher, Catholic saint, and Carmelite nun who died in the Auschwitz concentration camp because of her Jewish origin. Beatified by the Catholic Church on May 1, 1987, canonized on October 11, 1998 by Pope John Paul II. Edith Stein received an excellent education, she studied German, philosophy, psychology and history at the universities of Breslau, Göttingen and Freiburg. After defending her PhD thesis, she became research fellow with his scientific supervisor, the outstanding philosopher Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology. She served as a sister of mercy for two years, and later returned to philosophical studies, and it was then that she began to be interested in the phenomenon of religion.
Gradually Edith realized that her interest in religion went beyond ordinary curiosity. In 1922, Edith decided to be baptized in the Catholic Church. In 1932, she received the right to freely teach in Münster, at the Higher German Scientific and Pedagogical Institute, but in 1933 Hitler banned Jews from holding any public positions.
That same year, Edith Stein took monastic vows and became a Carmelite. In 1938, due to the outbreak of persecution of Jews in Germany, Sister Teresa was transferred to Holland, to a monastery in the city of Echte. In 1939, Edith completed a book about St. John of the Cross entitled "Scientia Crucis" (Science of the Cross). This was her last book. In August 1942, Sister Teresa was sent to Auschwitz along with other Dutch Christians of Jewish origin and died in the gas chamber.
In 1998 she was canonized by Pope John Paul II. The saint's memory is celebrated in the Roman Catholic Church on August 8.

As a Jew, I can tell you that the word “baptism” conjures up terrible images for my people. From the early years of Catholicism, Jews were forced to be baptized as Christians. Sometimes under the threat of death. In other times, the consequence for those who were not baptized was eviction from their home and country. For example, the Spanish Inquisition at one time ruled that Jews who did not convert to Catholicism (and, of course, were not baptized) must leave Spain.

In other cases, Jews were kidnapped and forcibly baptized, as was the case with the son of a rabbi in 1762. This happened in Russia just two centuries ago. The Russian Empire took Jewish boys from the age of 12 to serve in the army. “Involuntary, almost always forced, baptisms probably outnumbered any similar cases in other countries throughout history.”

What-what was he doing?

Because of such openly gangster stories, Jews shudder at the mere word “baptism.” When they hear the news about a Jew who came to faith in Yeshua and was voluntarily baptized, they are simply disgusted. And this is understandable; this disgust is based on historical facts. But, you know, it wasn't always like this.

who can forbid them to be baptized with water...? (Acts of the Holy Apostles 10:47)

Who are “they” and who is saying this? These are the words of the Jewish apostle Shimon Peter, and he is talking about the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius. There was a serious controversy about the baptism of Gentiles as believers in Yeshua. After all, this has never happened before. For the first nine years, the Gospel was preached exclusively to Jews.

Shimon Peter, after a vision and a word from the Lord (chapter 10 of Acts), slightly embarrassed, goes to the house of the Roman military man and shares the news about Yeshua with the people in this house. The Holy Spirit comes upon people in the midst of fellowship. The Jewish believers who witnessed this are stunned - the Gentiles are receiving the Holy Spirit!!!

Shimon Peter said: “Who can forbid those who, like us, have received the Holy Spirit to be baptized with water?” This became a major point of contention that was not resolved for the next ten years (Acts 15).

Reverse dispute

But since when did Gentile baptism become controversial? Can you imagine the accusations against... The First Baptist Church for baptizing non-Jews? It would be funny. However, if they baptize a large number of Jews, it will still make waves.

What most people—Jews and non-Jews alike—don’t know is that baptism (or immersion) is originally Jewish. Long before Queen Isabella forced the Jews of Spain to convert and be baptized, the Jews of Israel were familiar with the waters of immersion.

When John the Baptist, the Jewish prophet, came to preach repentance through baptism, we find no record of outrage: “What is this strange new tradition you are introducing?”. Water diving has already happened significant part Judaism. The Torah taught that priests were to be immersed in water as part of their sanctification (Exodus 29:2-5). Before any Jew could offer a sacrifice in the Temple in Jerusalem, he had to immerse himself in the mikveh, a water tank for ablution, thereby symbolizing the ritual of purification.

How to immerse three thousand people in water without a river?

Have you ever wondered how Shimon Peter and the apostles managed to immerse three thousand Jewish men in one day in Jerusalem? Jerusalem is not Tel Aviv or a city in Galilee where you can use the Mediterranean Sea or the Jordan River. Jerusalem is on a mountain. And there are no lakes, rivers or seas nearby. However, archaeologists have excavated about 50 mikvahs—water immersion tanks—that were used in Temple services. 50 tanks, each holding 60 people - three thousand people could take a water dive in a few hours. Without these Jewish mikvahs this would not have been possible.

Subscribe:

Today, the combination of Judaism with the act of immersion - what we see among the New Testament Jews - is like an attempt to combine oil and water. But this was not the case in the first century. The problem of those days was the question of what to do with the baptism not of Jews, but of Gentiles! And Shimon Peter immediately heard what other Jews thought about him, as soon as he did the “unthinkable” - he baptized and immersed the pagans into the Body of Yeshua.

1. The Apostles and brothers who were in Judea heard that the pagans had also received the word of God.
2. And when Peter came to Jerusalem, the circumcision rebuked him,
3. saying, “You went to the uncircumcised people and ate with them.”
(Acts of the Holy Apostles 11:1-3)

Strange, isn't it?

I'm a Christian and you may not like this, but I have one question that you might be able to clear up. The question concerns baptism. For example, in John. 1:25 The Pharisees asked John the Baptist why he baptized if he was not a prophet, and not Elijah, and not the Messiah. And this is far from the only place that confuses me. It turns out that John’s baptism was not something new, but was understandable to the Jewish Torah teachers of that time. I'm starting to think that baptism is not a Christian ritual at all, but a Jewish one. Could you please explain this to me and what it meant in the Jewish tradition, because I don't find anything about baptism in Old Testament(except for ritual ablutions, of course, but this is doubtful). Best regards, Anatoly. Thank you.

Answer:

Dear Anatoly!

Like many other rites that Christianity borrowed from Judaism (in a distorted form), the rite of baptism was also borrowed from Judaism. It is taken from the ritual of accepting Judaism: among other things, a person converting to Judaism must immerse himself in mikveh.

Best regards, Reuven Kuklin

Question.

Thank you very much for your answer. Could you explain more about what this rite of immersion in the Mikvah consisted of, where it came from (I don’t see anything similar in the Tanakh, except for ritual cleansing ablutions) and how it evolved into a rite of passage into Judaism, and also how it was changed by Christianity. I would also appreciate links to more information on this subject. I really want to figure out what I believe in, because it seems to me that the “sacraments” became sacraments after Christianity was separated from its Jewish roots, which can explain these sacraments. I have already heard about the origin of baptism from Mikvah from a Christian film, but I can find almost nothing about the rite itself or its connection with baptism. Please help me figure it out. Thanks a lot.

Anatoly

Answered by Rabbi Reuven Kuklin

Dear Anatoly!

The sages in Tractate Kritot (9a) teach from what is said in the Torah that all Jews initially entered into a union with G-d (and this happened when leaving Egypt) through three things: 1) sacrifice, 2) immersion in mikveh, 3) circumcision.

From what is said in the Torah (Bamidbar 15:15): “there is one decree for you and for the stranger ( accepting Judaism - R.K.), who lives among you," the sages teach (Kritot, ibid.) that everyone who accepts Judaism must go through a process consisting of the three above-mentioned stages. However, from what is said in the Torah (Bamidbar 15:14), the sages teach (tractate Gerim 2:5) that if a sacrifice is not made, this does not prevent the acceptance of Judaism (sacrifice is necessary only to achieve ritual purity). Therefore, in our days, when there is no Temple and there is no opportunity to make a sacrifice, a person accepting Judaism goes through only two stages (circumcision and dipping in mikveh). Each of these stages has its own framework and its own strict laws, failure to comply with which is an obstacle to the adoption of Judaism. All these laws are based on the Oral Torah, which the entire Jewish people accepted at Mount Sinai along with the Written Torah. All these laws were obtained “at one time”; there is no “evolution” here.

The first attempts to baptize Jews in the Russian Empire date back to the era that followed Patriotic War 1812 In 1817, the Society of Israeli Christians was created, providing baptized Jews with financial assistance, various benefits and advantages. However, attempts to convert Jews to Christianity ended in complete failure. At the same time, the authorities were faced with the opposite trend: the emergence of various Judaizing sects - and above all, Subbotniks. This fact led to a tightening of policies on the Jewish question: by the end of the first quarter of the nineteenth century, the authorities sought to “correct” the Jews by changing their lifestyle and organizing mass baptism.

One of the most important legislative acts regarding Jews during the entire period of the reign of Nicholas I (1825-1855) was the “Charter of Conscription and Military Service of the Jews” (1827). According to the same Stanislavsky, according to this Charter from 1827 to 1854. on military service About 70 thousand Jews were conscripted, about 50 thousand of whom were minors, the so-called. "cantonists". According to his calculations, during the Nicholas era, approx. 30 thousand Jews, of which only approx. 5 thousand converted to Orthodoxy voluntarily. Recruitment was not associated with military circumstances, but was seen as the most effective way of “enlightenment” and “correction” through baptism. Children of Polish nobles (after the uprising of 1831) and children of declassed elements were also recruited as cantonists. Formally, the recruiting regulations allowed a Jew to practice his faith in the army. But in reality it was often different. This is why they recruited minors, so that it would be easier to break them. Jewish boys found themselves in an environment alien and hostile to them - special battalions and units for minors (cantonist schools). They had a hard time for not knowing the Russian language, for their faith and customs. They were not allowed to speak or pray in their native language, their Jewish prayer books were taken away from them, and they were often forbidden to correspond with their parents.

Recruits, drafted into the army from the age of eighteen and older, could still stand up for themselves and their faith. It was much more difficult for children. They were forced to convert to Orthodoxy, and those who persisted were mercilessly tortured. Many memories of former cantonists about those cruel and inhumane times have reached our time, and the opinion of J. Petrovsky-Stern, who tried to re-evaluate tragic story child martyrs can hardly be accepted. One of the popular Jewish legends tells how once on the Volga, near Kazan, several hundred Jewish cantonist boys gathered on one day to baptize. The local authorities and clergy, in full regalia, settled down on the river bank. Children stood in orderly rows. Finally, Tsar Nicholas I himself arrived and ordered the children to enter the water. “We listen, Supreme Imperial Majesty!” they all exclaimed together and jumped into the river together. But none of them surfaced. All the children drowned themselves voluntarily. Instead of baptism, they agreed in advance to end their lives, to die for the sake of their faith. They performed “al Kiddush Hashem - they sanctified the Name of the Most High,” as was done in ancient times and in the Middle Ages, during the era of persecution, their co-religionists from different countries. They accepted suffering and martyrdom in the name of faith in God and loyalty to the precepts of Judaism.

At baptism, the names of the godfathers were usually given, and often their surnames. As a result, Yesel Levikov became Vasily Fedorov, Movsha Peysakhovich became Grigory Pavlov, Israel Petrovitsky became Nikolai Ivanov, etc. When you look through these endless lists, as Saul Ginzburg wrote, the thought involuntarily comes to mind: how much Jewish blood was poured into the Russian people, and how many among the current Ivanovs. Petrovs, Stepanovs, there are descendants of Jewish children who were once forcibly baptized.

Young recruits were recruited primarily from the poor and uninfluential sections of the Jewish community. To carry out recruitment, the Kahal leaders formed the institute of “happers” (“catchers”) - specially selected people who, for money, were engaged in kidnapping children and handing them over to the army. The recruitment policy of the autocracy led to tragic chaos in Jewish communities, a sharp loss of influence and authority of the kahal leadership.

The Jews tried to resist the recruitment drives. Suicides were committed, self-mutilation and escapes were widespread. In addition to traditional methods of behavior - fasting and prayers - bribes to officials were also practiced.

During the years of liberal reforms of Alexander II, policy towards Jews changed. The authorities are moving to incentive measures, the main of which was the abolition of the Pale of Settlement for the “productive”, from the point of view of the authorities, layers of Jews: in 1859 - for merchants of the 1st guild, in 1861 - for Jews from higher education, in 1865 - for certain categories of artisans. Thus, as Benjamin Nathans notes, a policy of “selective integration” was pursued. Nicholas soldiers, who proved through the court the violent nature of their baptism, were given the opportunity to return to Judaism. However, even if there was an opportunity for individual Jews to integrate into Russian society, only baptism opened the way in most cases for acquiring full rights: for Jews to occupy government positions and positions in the highest educational institutions, promotions, etc. Only church marriage was recognized, and one of the parties (Jew or Jewess) was required to be baptized: Jews could freely marry only pagans.

The Jewish community and family usually cut off all relations with converts. Main character In the novel “Tevye the Milkman,” the classic of Jewish literature Sholom Aleichem is forced to break off relations with one of his daughters, Chava, who was baptized in order to marry a Christian, the clerk Fedor:

“Get up... my wife, take off your shoes and sit on the floor - to celebrate mourning according to the commandment of God. The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away”... Let it seem to us that Chava never existed... I ordered in the house that no one dare mention Chava’s name, – no Chava!”

This, for example, happened to the famous Jewish historian Sh. Dubnov, who completely broke off relations with his daughter Olga, who married the Social Democrat M. Ivanov, and in connection with this was forced to perform the inevitable formality in these cases - to be baptized. A similar drama was experienced somewhat earlier by the family of the famous thinker Ahad Gaam, whose daughter Rachel (Rosa) married the Russian writer, member of the Socialist Revolutionary Party M. Osorgin.

Moses Krol (1862-1942) – famous Jewish public figure, a Narodnaya Volya member, political exile and ethnographer, reproduces a symptomatic dialogue in his memoirs. On behalf of the manager of the Committee of Ministers, A.N. Kulomzin, one of the minister’s wards, N. Peterson, offered Krol a job on the staff of the office - provided that Krol was baptized:

- Not otherwise? – I asked him ironically.
“You know,” Peterson continued in a tone of sympathy, “that at the present time accepting a Jew for public service absolutely impossible.
“But as soon as I get baptized, I’ll become a completely different person, won’t I?”
“Of course not,” Peterson admitted, “what to do when the authorities require this formality to be completed.” Are you that religious?
- Of course not!
– What can keep you from baptism? This ritual should not present any inconvenience for you. It's like trading a jacket for a tailcoat.
His naive cynicism and complete lack of understanding of the baseness of the deal with conscience offered to me directly disarmed me. I laughed and told him: “No, Nikolai Petrovich, I love my jacket very much and would not exchange it for the best tailcoat in the world... My work at the office of the Committee of Ministers was finished.”

Semyon Dubnov openly came out with a sharp condemnation of that part of the Jewish youth who accepted baptism. The overwhelming majority of converts were young people, who thus sought to bypass the percentage norm and freely enter higher educational institutions and make a career. It should be noted that many of the converts were atheists, and this step, essentially, did not have any moral significance for pragmatic young people. Some of them converted not to Orthodoxy, but to Protestantism - which was much simpler in procedural terms. At the same time, the conversion of hundreds of young Jews to another faith undoubtedly testified to the crisis of traditional Jewish values ​​in the 1900s. In the summer of 1913, S. Dubnov published a letter in the magazine “New Sunrise”, calling it “About those leaving” (“Declaration of Conversions”). He called for a decisive position against renegades: “Whoever renounces his nation deserves to be renounced by the nation.” First of all, he addressed those who were still hesitant:

“You are on the verge of treason. Stop, come to your senses! You acquire civil rights and personal benefits, but you will forever lose the great historical privilege of belonging to a nation of spiritual heroes and martyrs.”

However, this appeal prevented few people from fulfilling their plans. It is no coincidence that even earlier, in 1911, the famous publicist and one of the leaders of the Zionist movement in Russia, Vladimir Jabotinsky, published an article on the same topic, under the characteristic title “Our “everyday phenomenon”.” Indeed, since 1907, according to the reports of the Chief Prosecutor of the Synod, only the following people converted from Judaism to Orthodoxy: in 1908 - 862 people; in 1909 – 1128 people; in 1910 – 1299 people; in 1911 – 1651 people; in 1912 – 1362 people; in 1913 – 1198 people.

Not for everyone this act was a mere formality. A student of the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University, Solomon Lurie, a future famous historian of antiquity, decided to be baptized under strong pressure from his father, who raised his son as an atheist, alien to any religious faith. Baptism allowed Lurie to remain at the university as a “professorial fellow.” However, he still felt guilty. In one of his letters, student Lurie frankly remarked to his addressee: “Baptism, in any case, is, if not meanness, then the most vile of compromises.”

Anatoly Ivanov, who studied this phenomenon, of course, exaggerates when he claims that during this period Judaism, as the foundation of the Jewish community, was rapidly losing its adherents among Jewish intelligent youth. However, he is undoubtedly right when he notes that for Jewish students in Russian higher educational institutions, Judaism has ceased to be the main factor of national consolidation. However, one should not simplify the processes that took place in Jewish society in the period following the first Russian revolution and up to the First World War. Along with the “leaving” there was also a “return” to one’s people. The Jewish community, especially in Eastern Europe, became increasingly aware of themselves not only and not so much as a religious community, but as a people. Concerning Western Europe, Theodor Herzl also stated this in his book “The Jewish State” (1897): “We are a people, one people.” For Western Europe, such a statement had the character of a revolutionary challenge.

In the context of strengthening secularist tendencies in Russian society(and in Jewish, in particular), the return sometimes took place not only through the tradition of “baal teshuvah” (return to Judaism), but in the secular field: through the emergence of interest in the spiritual values ​​of one’s people, through empathy and compassion for their difficult spiritual and physical suffering. One of the leaders of the Jewish Social Democratic Labor Party (Bund), later known as the “legend of the Jewish labor movement,” Vladimir Medem, born into the family of a high-ranking military doctor, recalled his childhood and youth and his return to his people. These memories are so sincere and spontaneous that we have taken the liberty of citing an extensive fragment from them:

Although I was the youngest, it was I who happened to become the first Christian in our family. When I was born (July 1879) my parents decided: “We have suffered enough because of our Jewishness. Let our youngest not know this suffering.” I was baptized in the Orthodox Church... although my parents themselves remained Jews for quite a long time... But in fact, my father became a Christian before he accepted the rite of baptism. Everything was respected in our house church holidays… When I was five years old, I went to church for the first time. It left strong impression: sacred paintings, flickering candlelight, shrouded in mystery rituals, the vibrating bass of the archdeacon, the singing choir... As I grew older, my religious feelings...began to dissipate. When I was in the second grade of high school, I began to develop critical views. Last years During my time at the gymnasium, my social circle imperceptibly became more and more Jewish... In 1897, I was admitted to Kiev University... I began to study political economy... and learned about the Bund. In addition to studying Marx, I decided to study Hebrew. But my interest in Hebrew was more literary than Jewish... I wanted to read the Bible in the original... At home during summer holidays, it was not difficult for me to find myself as a teacher. Mitche, the boy who lived in our yard, agreed to teach me in exchange for Russian language lessons... He taught me the alphabet and pronunciation... But I suspected that Mitche himself did not understand very well what he was teaching me... I never learned Hebrew, but I got something different: I learned the alphabet - having received the key to the Yiddish language... In different ways and for various reasons I began to turn towards Jewry. Here I must mention my friendship with Isaac Theumin, a man much older than me...he was involved in the Jewish labor movement...He...came from a traditional Jewish family, knew and loved Jewish life. This love was passed on to me. It was in Minsk...On Yom Kippur, Teumin took me to the synagogue. I remember this evening well. I wandered the streets...the shops were closed, the streets were empty and deserted...There was an unusual silence in the city. It was felt that this particular day was different from all others. Later, Theumin and I went to the synagogue. I had been to a synagogue before...But for the first time I found myself in an ancient synagogue...I felt the presence of a new, hitherto unknown atmosphere in all its uniqueness and charm. This was all different from what was in the Russian church. There the great mass of people were in silence, calm and sadness, and only the priest and the choir spoke and sang on behalf of the community, speaking and singing in beautiful, harmonious and restrained tones. But here I found myself in the middle of a seething, boiling sea. Hundreds and hundreds of worshipers were absorbed in prayer and each one prayed to God at the top of his voice, with passionate insistence. Hundreds of voices ascended to heaven, each for himself, without any coordination or harmony. And they all flowed together into one amazing sound. There is no need to say how strange all this was to the Western ear, but it made a deep impression and had the unusual beauty of passionate mass feeling. Then we went to another, even smaller prayer house... And here, too, I found myself surrounded by hundreds of voices. But one voice - the voice of the old gray-haired cantor - rose and rushed upward above the noisy murmur of the masses. It was not singing, not prayer, but rather crying, which evoked burning tears of an anguished heart. And there was nothing of solemnity or measured harmony here. Christian prayer. It was truly the oriental passion of a tormented soul, a voice from hoary antiquity that cries and prays to God. And there was great beauty in this... Undoubtedly, the Jewish work environment greatly influenced me... the constant connection with Jews and Jewish life Judaized me... My memories are still fresh when I walked along Jewish streets, poor little alleys, with their tiny houses. It was Friday night...the Shabbat candles were burning in every house...I still remember the unique charm of that night...and I felt a romantic connection with the Jewish past; that warmth and that intimate closeness that you feel only to your past... And when did the moment come when I fully and irrevocably realized that I was a Jew? Hard to say. But I know that when I was arrested at the beginning of 1901, the gendarme gave me a questionnaire to fill out; under nationality, I wrote down “Jew.”

Literature:

Gessen Yu. History of the Jewish people in Russia. M., Jerusalem, 1993.

Ginzburg S. Child Martyrs (From the history of Jewish cantonists) // Jewish antiquity. T.XII.1930. pp. 59-79.

Ivanov A. Jewish students in the Russian Empire at the beginning of the 20th century. What was it like? M., 2007

Nathans B. Beyond the Line. Jews meet late imperial Russia. Translation and scientific edition. A. Lokshina. M., 2007.

Petrovsky-Stern J. Jews in the Russian army. 1827-1914. M, 2003.

Klier J. Imperial Russia's Jewish Question.1855-1881. Cambridge Univ.Press, 1995.

Stanislawski M. Tsar Nicholas I and the Jews. The Transformation of Jewish Society in Russia. 1825-1855. Philadelphia, 1983.

David Eidelman

Orthodox Orthodox - would rather trust a Jewish Orthodox than a baptized Jew. And vice versa. However, the phenomenon of Jewish Christians has its roots in the very beginning of Christianity, the founder of which, if you believe the statutory documents, did not oppose himself to Judaism at all, but promised not to violate the Mosaic Law, but to fulfill it.

Immediately after the end of the Jewish Passover and with the beginning Orthodox Easter I wanted to write about the phenomenon "Jewish Christians". I know that for a large number of people for whom Judaism is, first of all, Judaism - a religion, such a phrase itself looks like an unacceptable oxymoron.

If they are Jews, then they are not Christians. If they accepted Christianity, then they were converted - they were discharged from the Jewish tribe. Maybe not forever, but as long as they adhere to Christianity, they do not belong to Judaism.

After all, Jewishness for such people is not blood. Or at least not just blood. This is an ethno-confessional essence, and maybe a sacred unity.

However, the phenomenon of Jewish Christians has its roots in the very beginning of Christianity, the founder of which, if you believe the statutory documents, did not oppose himself to Judaism at all, but promised not to violate the Mosaic Law, but to fulfill it.

Moreover, he saw himself as a shepherd who was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

Pietro Perugino. "Christ and the Samaritan Woman"

Chapter 15 of the Gospel of Matthew

“And behold, a Canaanite woman, coming out of those places, shouted to Him: have mercy on me, O Lord, son of David, my daughter is cruelly raging.
But He did not answer her a word.
And His disciples came up and asked Him: let her go, because she is screaming after us. He answered and said: I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
And she, coming up, bowed to Him and said: Lord! help me.
He answered and said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs...”

The first Christians were Jews

And the apostles. And the disciples of the apostles.
It was only then that the roads forked and went apart, first parallel, then further and further, moving away from each other.

Only after the First Council of Nicea, convened by Emperor Constantine in 325, at which the Christian “Creed” was developed, was the separation of Christianity from Judaism finally proclaimed.

But even after this there were “Jewish Christians” of different kinds. They were exposed, denounced, exposed.

Caravaggio, "Saint Jerome"

17 years after the Council of Nicaea, Jerome was born, who in 360 (already in mature age) will be baptized, and then become one of the most revered and influential Fathers of the Church.

In 386 he settled in Bethlehem (Beit Lehem) and began translating the Bible into Latin. This translation, called the Vulgate, received official status in the Catholic Church.

And so Jerome writes from Bethlehem to another (even more revered!) Church Father Augustine about Jewish Christians: “Today there is a sect among the Jews in all the synagogues of the East, which is called the sect of Menaion, and it was condemned by the Pharisees. The adherents of this sect are also known as Nazarenes; they believe in Christ, the Son of God, born of the Virgin Mary; and they say that he is the one who suffered under Pontius Pilate and rose again, just as we all believe. But while they want to be both Jews and Christians, they are neither one nor the other.”

"Saint Jerome" by Leonardo da Vinci.

"Let there be no hope for the apostate"

Please note: describing groups of people who accepted the Nicene Creed (Christ is the Son of God, born of a virgin, was crucified and suffered, and was resurrected), but thought that they could remain Jews too (prayed in synagogues, kept the Sabbath , adhered to kashrut), that is, they did not separate “Christians” and “Jews”, Jerome rejects not only their attempts to be both at the same time. He ruthlessly rejects both of their identifications. Starting with Jerome, these are mutually exclusive possibilities.

Jerome calls them "Mineans" or "Nazarenes." Menaia is from the word “min” - species, class, variety, sex. This is from a Jewish prayer that calls not to trust either “minim and notzrim.” It's funny that the position of the Jewish blessing against apostates is closer to Jerome than the position of the Jews who profess the Nicene Creed.

Not much has changed since then. An Orthodox Christian is more likely to trust a Jewish Orthodox person than a converted Jew who is trying to sit on two chairs. And vice versa. For an Orthodox Jew, almost the main problem in the Christian world is the Jews who “either take off your cross or put on your panties.”

"The worst anti-Semites"

In Jewish families, they sat on the crosses “shiva” as if they were dead. Jews often believed that converts were anti-Semitic Jews, the most ardent distributors of anti-Semitic slander.

Sometimes this was justified. Trying to curry favor with their new coreligionists, the neophytes, relying on their authentic knowledge of former Jews, told all sorts of abominations about the tribe they had just left.

And those who viewed baptism as an accession - joining a people, joining a culture - also left a well-reasoned justification for such a step.

One of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century, Karl Popper (son of a cross), believed that Jews bear their share of the blame for anti-Semitism, since they stood apart from the majority.

Karl Raymund Popper

Popper wrote: “After much thought, my father decided that life in a Christian society obliges him to cause as little offense as possible to that society—that is, to assimilate.”

Converted Zionists

Even for many early Zionists, the first solution to the Jewish question was baptism: Jews must leave the cultural and social ghetto into which they had driven themselves - this would bring them liberation.

Then many converts went into Zionism, having previously participated in the revolutionary movement. One of the most famous examples- Pinchas (Peter) Rutenberg, who was first baptized, took Russian name, married a non-Jew, then became a revolutionary terrorist, and then turned to Zionism.

Peter (Pinkhas) Moiseevich Rutenberg

Many interpreters of Sholom Aleichem's book Tevye the Milkman believe that the return of Tevye's baptized daughter Havva at the end of the book symbolizes her departure to Palestine.

Herzl and mass baptism

Even Theodor Herzl suggested that a possible solution to the Jewish problem was a mass "voluntary and honorable conversion" to Christianity. In 1895, he wrote in his diary: “Two years ago I wanted to decide Jewish question, at least in Austria, with the help of the Catholic Church. I tried to get guarantees from the Austrian bishops and through them to get an audience with the Pope in order to tell him: help us in the fight against anti-Semitism, and I will create a strong movement among the Jews so that they freely and worthily accept Christianity. Free and worthy in the sense that the leaders of this movement, and above all myself, will remain Jews and, as Jews, will promote the adoption of the majority religion. In the light of day, at noon, the conversion to another faith will open with the ringing of bells with a solemn procession to St. Stephen's Cathedral (in Vienna). Not bashfully, as only a few did before, but with their heads held high. The fact that the leaders of this movement themselves, remaining within the framework of Judaism, lead the people only to the threshold of the church, while they themselves remain outside, will elevate this whole matter and give it deep sincerity...”

Theodor Herzl

Only the trial of Captain Dreyfus turned Herzl into a Zionist and made him the author of the “State of the Jews.” Herzl’s historical foresight was that he saw in the Dreyfus affair a dress rehearsal for a future genocide, which would destroy for “innate properties,” regardless of religion.

Judeo-Christianity of the Soviet intelligentsia

But I am not interested in people who consciously converted to Christianity and ceased to be Jews (at least in their own sense of self). The question is about people who at the same time, like those ancient “Mineans,” consider themselves both Jews and Christians, who try to be both.

David Eidelman