-Caveat Lector- > The poisonous Protocols > > Umberto Eco on the distinction between intellectual anti-semitism and > its > popular counterpart > > http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,775668,00.html > > The poisonous Protocols > > Umberto Eco on the distinction between intellectual anti-semitism > and its popular counterpart > > Saturday August 17, 2002 > > The Guardian > > Amid the controversy following the desecration of Jewish graves > in Rome last month, some words of Pier Ferdinando Casini, > speaker of Italy's chamber of deputies, have been remembered. > He claimed that anti-semitism is less rooted in Italy than in > other countries. It is my belief that a distinction must be > made between intellectual anti-semitism and popular anti-semitism. > Popular anti-semitism is as old as the Jewish diaspora. It > arose from an instinctive reaction of the common people to > different people, who spoke an unknown language evocative of > magic rites. A people steeped in the culture of the book, > the Jews learned to read and write. They practised medicine, > engaged in trade, and lent money - hence the resentment towards > them as "intellectuals". Such were the roots of peasant > anti-semitism in Russia. > > Certainly the Christian condemnation of the "people who killed > God" carried weight, but ultimately there was a (private) > relationship of shared interest and mutual respect between > Christian and Jewish intellectuals throughout the middle ages, > not to mention the renaissance. The desperate hordes who > followed the crusades and laid waste the ghettoes by fire > and the sword were not inspired by doctrine, but controlled > by the urge to pillage. > > Intellectual anti-semitism as we now know it originates from > the modern world. In 1797, Abbé Barruel wrote his Mémoires > pour servir à l'histoire du jacobinisme to show that the > French revolution was a plot of the Knights Templar and the > freemasons. Later it was an Italian, Captain Simonini, who > suggested to him that it was above all the perfidious Jews > who were acting behind the scenes. > > It was only after this point that the argument surrounding > international Jewry began, and the Jesuits seized on it as > an argument against the sects of the Carbonari. The > controversy raged throughout Europe, but found its most > fertile soil in France, where Jewish finance was now > identified as an enemy to defeat. The controversy was > certainly fuelled by Catholic legitimism, but it was in > secular, political circles that the ill-famed Protocols > of the Learned Elders of Zion slowly took shape. These > were then published in Russian Tsarist circles and were > finally used by Hitler. > > The Protocols were a rehash of serialised fictional material, > and prove their own unreliability, since it is hardly credible > that "the baddies" would reveal their fell purposes so blatantly. > The Elders even declare that they intend to encourage sport > and visual communication to dupe the working class (a passage > more reminiscent of Berlusconism than Judaism). Nevertheless, > though rough and ready, this was intellectual anti-semitism. > Conceding to Deputy Casini, it can be said that Italian popular > anti-semitism has been less strong than in other European > countries (for various social, historical and even demographic > reasons). Indeed, ordinary folk ended up opposing racial > persecutions by helping the Jews. But in Italy, Jesuitical > anti-semitic doctrine flourished (the novels of Father > Bresciani are but one example). This merged with the > bourgeois anti-semitism which ultimately produced the > notorious academics and writers who contributed to the > infamous journal La difesa della razza [The Defence of the > Race] and the version of the Protocols published by Julius > Evola in 1937. > > Evola wrote that the Protocols had "the value of a spiritual > tonic". He added: "Above all, in these decisive hours of > western history, they cannot be ignored or dismissed without > seriously undermining the front of those fighting in the name > of the spirit, of tradition, of true civilisation." > > International Jewry, he claimed, lay behind the main sources > of the perversion of western civilisation: > > "Liberalism, individualism, egalitarianism, free thinking, > anti-religious enlightenment and their various appendages > which lead to the revolt of the masses and to communism > itself." For the Jew it was a duty "to destroy every > surviving trace of true order and superior civilisation... > One Jew is Freud, whose theory is understood to reduce the > interior life to instincts and unconscious forces. Another > is Einstein, who has brought 'relativism' into vogue... > Schoenberg and Mahler, leading exponents of the music of > decadence. Tzara is a Jew, the creator of dadaism, the > extreme limit of degradation of so-called avant garde art... > It is the race, it is an instinct at work here... Now is > the time when the forces are rising up everywhere, because > now the face of the destiny to which Europe was about to > succumb is revealed... May the hour of 'conflict' find > those forces gathered in a single, cast-iron bloc, > unbreakable and irresistible." > > Italy made a leading contribution to intellectual > anti-semitism. But it is only today that a number of > phenomena hint at a new popular anti-semitism, as if the > ancient sources of anti-semitism have found fertile soil > in other, crude forms of racism of the neo-Celtic kind. > If proof were needed, it is that the doctrinal sources are > always the same: it is enough to visit certain racist > websites, or to follow anti-Zionist propaganda in the > Arab countries, to see that anti-semites have still > found nothing better to do than to recycle, yet again, > those ludicrous Protocols. > > © Umberto Eco > > http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,775668,00.html
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