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Vladimir Solovyov, one of nineteenth-century Russia's greatest Christian philosophers, was renowned as the leading defender of Jewish civil rights in tsarist Russia in the 1880s. The Burning Bush: Writings on Jews and Judaism presents an annotated translation of Solovyov's complete oeuvre on the Jewish question, elucidating his terminology and identifying his references to persons, places, and texts, especially from biblical and rabbinic writings. Many texts are provided in English translation by Gregory Yuri Glazov for the first time, including Solovyov's obituary for Joseph Rabinovitch, a pioneer of modern Messianic Judaism, and his letter in the London Times of 1890 advocating for greater Jewish civil rights in Russia, printed alongside a similar petition by Cardinal Manning. Glazov's introduction presents a summary of Solovyov's life, explains how the texts in this collection were chosen, and provides a survey of Russian Jewish history to help the reader understand the context and evaluate the significance of Solovyov's work. In his extensive commentary in Part II, which draws on key memoirs from family and friends, Glazov paints a rich portrait of Solovyov's encounters with Jews and Judaism and of the religious-philosophical ideas that he both brought to and derived from those encounters. The Burning Bush explains why Jews posthumously accorded Solovyov the accolade of a "righteous gentile," and why his ecumenical hopes and struggles to reconcile Judaism and Christianity and persuade secular authorities to respect conscience and religious freedom still bear prophetic vitality.
"Gregory Glazov's study . . . is simply without comparison. There is no other publication that so comprehensively gathers and presents Solovyov's lifelong commitment to understanding Judaism and the Jewish people." —The Russian Review
Vladimir Solovyov, one of nineteenth-century Russia's greatest Christian philosophers, was renowned as the leading defender of Jewish civil rights in tsarist Russia in the 1880s.
Gregory Yuri Glazov is professor of biblical studies at Immaculate Conception Seminary School of Theology. He is the author of The Bridling of the Tongue and the Opening of the Mouth in Biblical Prophecy.
Selected Abbreviations
Acknowledgments
PART I
INTRODUCTION
1. Solovyov and the Origins of This Work
2. Texts, Annotations, Key Terms, and Translation
3. “The Life and Thought of Vladimir Sergeevich Solovyov” (1989) by Fr. Alexander Men’
4. Jewish History in Russia up to the End of the Nineteenth Century
Notes to Part I
PART II
COMMENTARY AND PORTRAIT OF SOLOVYOV’S ENCOUNTERS WITH JEWS AND JUDAISM
1. Solovyov’s Writings on Judaism in Light of His Notes, Letters, and Other Testimonies
2. Solovyov’s Unique Respect for Judaism and His Philosophy of History
3. Judaism and Christ: The Testimony of Family and Friends 124
4. Judaism, Christ, and Conscience: The Testimony of Colleagues
5. 1875–1877: Judaism and Sophia in Solovyov’s “Journey with the Magi”
6. 1878–1881: Lectures on Godmanhood and A Critique of Abstract Principles
7. 1878–1881: Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Getz 165
8. 1881–1883: The Break with the Slavophiles and Critique of Dostoevsky 9. 1884: “Jewry and the Christian Question”
10. 1885–1886: Joseph Rabinovich and “The Talmud”
11. 1887–1890: Getz’s Journal and the Gestation of the Protest
12. 1890: Tolstoy, Ezekiel 3:18 and 33:8, and the Launch of the Protest
13. 1891: The Foreword to Getz’s The Floor to the Accused
14. 1891: The Central Committee for the Organization of Jewish Emigration, Diminsky, Bakst, and the Encyclopedic Dictionary
15. October 1891: The Lecture “The Fall of the Medieval Worldview”
16. 1892–1894: Final Correspondence with Tolstoy
17. 1894–1896: Gintsburg, Arseniev, Leskov, and the Articles on the Kabbalah
18. 1898–1899: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and “The Tale of the Antichrist”
19. 1899–1900: The Obituary of Joseph Rabinovich and “The Tale”
20. July 1900: Last Days and Burial
Notes to Part II
PART III
PRIMARY TEXTS
1. “Jewry and the Christian Question” (1884)
2. “The Israel of the New Covenant” (1885)
3. “The Talmud and Recent Polemical Literature about It in Austria and Germany” (1886)
4. “The Jews(,) Their Religious and Moral Teachings(.) The Study of S. Y. Diminsky” (1891)
5. “When Lived the Hebrew Prophets?” Review of Ernest Havet’s La modernité des prophètes (1896)
6. “The Kabbalah,” from the Encyclopedic Dictionary (1896)
7. Foreword to “Kabbalah: The Mystical Philosophy of the Jews,” by David Gintsburg (1896)
8. Obituary of Joseph Davidovich Rabinovich ✝ 5 May 1899
9. Letters to Faivel Meir Bentsilovich Getz
10. “The Sins of Russia” (1887)
11. Correspondence with Tolstoy
12. The Protest Letter, London Times (December 10, 1890)
13. Solovyov’s Protest Letter in the Memoirs of Korolenko (1909)
14. Letter to Konstantin Konstantinovich Arseniev
15. Letters to Baron David Goratsievich Gintsburg
16. Letters to Nikolai Yakovlevich Grot
17. Letters to Moskovskie vedomosti (October 1891)
18. Six Poems
19. Appendix: The Protest Letter of Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, London Times (December 10, 1890)
Notes to Part III
Bibliography
General Index
Biblical, Christian Magisterial, and Rabbinic Index