tles :ud ted :ant ho? was :ted and ion, :red any the :nts. and nan, JOLIE at it f?ce :xual ck? apart This bout hour and pens such they or tred? very a the thing aeself elieve one?1'lOt icly in p. 98) Should Soviet Jews Leave? Samuel D. Kessow rue or false: the recent mass exodus of Soviet Jewry is a reaction to exaggerated fears of anti- Semitism and pogroms. True, say both Alan Snitow Soviet Prospects, Jewish Fears,? Tz'lelzzm, Jul./ Aug. 1990) and Vitaly Korotich, editor of Ogozzele, the most important ?liberal? weekly in the Soviet Union. Korotich has urged Soviet Jews to join the battle for political reform at home. But the tepid response of Soviet Jewish leaders leaves him highly dissatis?ed. Korotich registered his complaints in a July interview with Walter Ruby of the Jerusalem Post: I have met with many Jewish leaders and offered to work with them in order to convince Jews to stay here, but then I never hear frOm them again. The trend in the Jewish community is to support the idea that it is safest for Jews to emigrate. This impulse is certainly understandable, but it gives credence to spokesmen for Pamyat and other anti- Semitic groups who say, ?Now the country is facing dif?cult times, and all the Jews are running away.? Indeed, the pace of the exodus is picking up. Perhaps 200,000 Jews will leave the Soviet Union in 1990. This is certainly no emigration of committed Zionists or long-time ?refusenilts.? These are ordinary Jews edu- cated in Russian culture, Jews who doubtless have felt some discrimination but who made their peace with the Soviet system. From the death of Stalin until the late 19605, the Soviet government had a kind of un- written social contract with its Jewish population. Jews would forfeit all hopes of cultural freedom, and of certain careers?the party elite, the diplomatic.corps? but they could gain social mobility and professional satisfaction through the educational system. This con- tract eroded, then broke down in the 19705. Lately things have improved, at least outwardly. A major re- vival of Soviet Jewry is leading to the formation of hundreds of cultural organizations, theater groups, Circles for the study of Hebrew and Yiddish, and major Samuel D. Kessow is a professor of history at Trinity College Harb'ora?, Connecticut. His latest [700k 2's Students, Pro- fessors and the State in Tsarist Russia (University of Calf- fomz?a Press, 1989). efforts to establish Jewish culture in the Russian lan- guage. In December 1989, representatives from about two hundred Jewish organizations met in Moscow to found the Congress of Jewish Organizations and Com- munities (the Va?ad) in the USSR. In addition to this body, the of?cial Yiddishists grouped around the journal Sovetz'sb have organized the All-Union Society of Soviet Jewish Culture. In keeping with the spirit of glasnost, even Sooetz?s/J has undergone remarkable changes. Fine young Yiddish writers such as Gennadi Estraikh have joined the journal, and Aron Vergelis, the editor, has loaded the magazine with real Jewish content?a serial- ization, for example, of Simon Dubnov?s History of the Jewish People. serve to reassure jittery Soviet Jews. The dreaded May 5 pogrom failed to materialize. To be sure, hundreds of Soviet citizens have died in ethnic violence ?Armenians, Azeris, Abkazians, Georgians, Kirghiz? but very few Jews. In the 1990 elections to local soviets, anti-Semitic candidates suffered crushing defeats, espe? cially in Moscow and Leningrad. More to the point, winning groups such as the Democratic Union in Lenin- grad have pulled no punches in ?ghting the anti-Semitic Right. The ?April Group,? which includes some of the most respected writers in the Soviet Union, has also weighed in to defend Jewish rights. Then on July 22, Pravda published its strongest condemnation of anti- Semitisrn yet (even while admitting that the fear of the ghost of pogroms is starting to acquire a dimension of panic?). And according to recent public-opinion polls published in the June 10 issue of Moscow News, anti- Semitism among Russians?while a cause for concern?? hardly enjoys mass support: 85 percent of those inter- viewed supported Jews? right to equal treatment in education and employment, and agreed that the govern- ment had to protect these rights. At the same time the poll, in the ?half empty, half full? tradition, shows a substantial minority that might be mobilized for anti-Semitic politics. On the question of whether the respondent ?would be happy if a Jew were to become a member of my family,? 32 percent 0 why the stampede? Recent developments should 27 agreed, 26.6 percent disagreed, and 41.4 percent held an intermediate position. Some 28 percent believed that a Jew would choose money over people. Another 8.8 percent believed that ?Jews deserved punishment because they cruci?ed Christ.? In other indexes of anti- Semitic feeling, 7.6 percent blamed Jews for the prob- lems of postrevolutionary Russia and 7.7 percent con- demned Jews wishing to emigrate. Other arguments could buttress Korotich?s case. Per- estroika, which has certainly opened up a new era for Soviet Jewry, is beleaguered but far from moribund. While no one can deny the enormity of the economic and- political problems facing Gorbachev, the fact re- mains that he has held onto power. His triumph over party hardliners at the July Party Congress only con- ?rmed the real source of his?strength?the inability of his opponents to offer a credible alternative. As Eduard Shevardnadze and . Alexander Yakovlev asked at the recent Party congress, were the heckling delegates really prepared to send tanks into Berlin to defend commu- nism? Could the resurrection of the Gulag bridge the widening technological gap between the Soviet Union and the rest of the world? The delegates may have cheered Igor Ligachev, but when it came to a test of strength, Gorbachev humiliated his rival. In a memorable debate at the 1988 Party Conference with the noted economist Leonid Abalkin, Gorbachev stressed that his only chance was to put political re- forms in place before overhauling the economy. Other- wise the apparat would strike at will. These political reforms stressed that perestroika had to go beyond the sporadic Russian of ?change from above.? Gorbachev and key advisers such as YakOvlev stressed the importance of galvanizing the Soviet people, break- ing down the paralysis induced by gen- erations of repression, and creating the beginnings of a ?civil society.? In the process, the ideology of class struggle would give way to the primacy of ?universal, humanistic? values. That in turn would serve to legiti- mize a new approach to Soviet foreign policy and open the way for a more pluralistic political system at home. The pitfalls have been enormous, but Gorbachev can point to some breathtaking achievements. On both the local and national levels he has created new struc- tures of power to counter the party apparatus. He has gutted the Politburo, and his decision to continue on as General Secretary?a decision many liberals oppose? provides some added measure of insurance against bureaucratic obstructionism. Equally signi?cant is the enormous transformation of Soviet political life in the last few years. Two years ago, after Nina Andreeva published her celebrated neo-Stalinist manifesto in March 1988, only one newspaper?Moscow News? bucked the tide of fear and counterattacked. Gorbachev 28 TIKKUN VOL. 5, No. 5 supporters cowered for three weeks until a Pravda ar- ticle written by Yakovlev signaled that perestroika was still on track. Today, 1988 seems like a thousand years ago. Election campaigns, new voluntary associations, and a vocal press have transformed all levels of Soviet society. To be sure, glasnost is a double-edged sword. The future of the Soviet Union is in real question, as is Gorbachev?s ability to wheedle enough support for his dauntineg unpopular economic reforms. In the middle of 1990, the economy does seem to be spinning out of control. Premier Nikolai has warned that for- eign currency shortages may soon curtail vital imports of grain. Key production rates continue to fall, and in many areas, food shopping has come to resemble ?nding an available beach on the Connecticut shore: Local residents only! Wages have escalated faster than available goods and market equilibrium has all but collapsed. ere too, however, an ?optimistic? reading at least deserves a hearing. Couldn?t one argue that ?controlled chaos? (with the emphasis on ?controlled?) is, on balance, a source of strength for Gorbachev? The worse things get, so this reasoning would go, the more indispensable Gorbachev seems. All this leads to the ?optimistic? assumption that a civil society of responsible citizens will read, argue, discuss issues, and then elect delegates who will share responsibility for solving national problems. In short, a new political order will acquire the legitimacy to take unpopular but necessary stands. No matter that Boris Yeltsin has quit the Party and become a powerful ?gure in his own right. He might well become the partner Gorbachev needs. Skillful coalition politics, this view argues, could be the next step in the building and institutionalizing of Soviet democracy. In the meantime, the end of the cold war may provide the critical margin to buy some time. Shevardnadze mentioned a ?peace dividend? of 250 billion rubles, and Gorbachev ob- viously hopes that Kohl?s three-billion-dollar loan is only the beginning. And the new instability in the Per- sian Gulf increases the value of Soviet energy reserves. That political and economic bargaining chip bolsters the case for massive Western investment in the Soviet economy. It also ensures that the Russian Republic will maintain its economic leverage within the USSR, and may even induce other republics to stop short of out- right secession. In light of these seemingly reassuring signs, why isn?t Korotich having better luck with Soviet Jewish leaders, or with the people they are supposed to be leading? To begin with, many fear economic calamity, and most doubt Gorbachev will succeed. Pamyat, of course, will . Lap: ?Ami-?1 ?n-tp?mr?wunr -- a" we? ?a ar- vas tars '115: Jiet [he is his Idle of for- and 1ble ore: .han but at tgue rasis 1 for ning is. rat a 'gue, hare nort, take Boris igure rtner view and time, argin )eace .7 ob- an is :Per- erves. ulsters Soviet will ., and out- isn?t aders, 1g? To most 3, will 2.. hardly start loving Soviet Jews if they change their minds and decide to stay. But behind these doubts lies the perception that the position of the Jews in Soviet society is undergoing a basic changedfor the worse. Consider, for example, the case of Gregory Kanovich, a well-known Russian writer on Jewish themes. No refusenik or dissident, Kanovich has enjoyed a success- ful literary career in the Soviet Union and recently won election from Vilnius to the Congress of People?s Deputies. His position has given him some access to the highest levels of the Soviet leadership. If anyone can make the case for staying to build a self-respecting Jewish existence in a new Soviet Union, it is a writer such as Kanovich. Furthermore, his writing represents one aspect of the Russian-language Jewish creativity that many observers see as crucial to the future of Jewish identity in the country. In a poignant article published in the October 5, 1989, issue of the Vilnius Komromolrkaia Pravda, Kano- vich suggested that instead of asking, ?Must I leave?? one should ask, ?Is it possible to stay?? For Kanovich the answer was clear: no. He admitted that some read- ers might ?nd such gloom misplaced in the hepeful era of perestroika. There were indeed hopeful changes, but they paled beside the storm clouds gathering above Soviet Jewry. ?You can?t empty the ocean with a thimble,? Kanovich noted. Kanovich?s worries centered on three counts: real fear that the government would lack the strength to protect Jews if trouble came, concern over growing anti-Semitism in the Russian intelligentsia, and profound ?kepticism about chances for building a new Jewish community in the Soviet Union. His stint in the Con- gress of People?s Deputies has only strengthened his fears. In May 1989, at the First Congress of People?s Deputies, Kanovich presented Gorbachev with an appeal against anti-Semitism signed by two hundred deputies; all but ?ve were non~Jews and signers included Boris Afanasayev, and Tatiana Tolstaia. Gorbachev did not respond. Nor did the recently concluded September 1989 Party Plenum men- tion anti-Semitism, even though it adopted a platform on nationality problems. Since Kanovich?s article appeared, Gorbachev has maintained his lukewarm attitude. On April 10, 1990, at the Congress of the Young Communist League, he was asked a direct question about how he proposed to ?ght rising anti-Semitism. He went out of his way to bury the issue in the general problem of ethnic strife. believe,? Gorbachev replied, ?that we must prevent outbursts of nationalism, chauvinism, anti?Semitism, and all other ?isms.?? But in March he appointed to the newly created Presidential Council Valentin Rasputin, the noted Russophile writer, and Veniamin Yarin, the leader of the right-wing National Workers Front. This may all be good politics, as Gorbachev reaches out to disparate elements in Russian society. There appears to be a division of labor, since other members of the Presidential Council such as Alexander Yakovlev and Stanislav Shatalin have been far tougher in attacking. anti-Semitism. Little of this reassures Soviet Jews. Jewish fear; or even the desire for economic security. will lead many to emigrate. We should respect that choice. \Vhy, Kanovich asks, is the government so afraid to take a tougher stand against anti-Semitism? He hardly accuses Gorbachev of collusion, and no one doubts that Gorbachev is personally opposed to anti-Semitism. But Kanovich artiCulates what many Soviet Jews suspect ?that the regime is too embattled to risk an overt embrace of Soviet Jewry. In other words, the regime is weak (and getting weaker). Polls show that a growing number of Soviet citizens fear general collapse. During the recent debates in the People?s Congress on the question of whether the Congress or the people should elect the President, Dimitri Likhachev, one of the most respected cultural leaders in the country, stated ?atly that a mass election would ?result in civil war.? If the regime collapses and chaos ensues, will the comforting opinion polls and the encouraging election results protect Soviet Jewry from mob violence? Is the glass half empty or half full? In a civil society with functioning institutions and accepted laws, anti- Semitic sentiments of 5, 20, or 25 percent have a much different signi?cance than they do in a society gripped by uncertainty and apprehension. Even electoral vic- tories by ?progressive? forces lose their meaning if the voters are volatile, angry, and afraid. A populist, anti- establishment v0te for a democrat like Leningrad?s new mayor, A. A. Sobchak, could soon turn into a vote for a populist with far less appetizing credentials. Alan Snitow?s optimistic assessment of the chances for democratic reform in the USSR and his call to support the Jewish self?renewal movement are well taken. I have made the same arguments myself. The problem is that Snitow may be misreading the latest political developments in the Soviet Union. In a recent article on the situation in Eastern Europe (New York Review of Books, July 19, 1990), Adam Michnik worried that xenophobic chauvinism rather than liberal democracy could well fill the vacuum created by the collapse of communism. That may be true in the Soviet Union as well. SOVIET JEws 29 uncertainty grows, Soviet citizens are ?heading home? to the shelter of ethnic identity and local politics. Power is drifting downward, to- ward new structures and personalities closer to the people. At the same time, the Russians are now joining other ethnic groups in asserting their sense of ethnic identity and pride. As the game of political and psy- chological musical chairs goes on, Soviet Jews ask them- selves whether there will be room for them at the end. For all its faults, the old Soviet system developed a concept of nationhood that transcended ethnicity, at least in theory. In the emerging political culture, many Jews fear that they will be outsiders again?forced to choose between Russians and non-Russians in the other republics, unable to ?nd a secure place in a Russia grimly looking for its own soul. Jews have traditionally preferred political cultures that are broadly inclusive to those that use ?ethnic? and ?organic? criteria to restrict membership. Is such inclusiveness likely in Russia and in the non-Russian republics? Snitow is right that nationalist movements such as the Ukrainian Ruch and the Lithuanian Saiudis have condemned anti-Semitism and have supported Jewish aspirations. But he may be underestimating the pitfalls ahead. Naturally, the Ukrainians and Lithuanians will reexamine their history and try to construct a ?usable past.? But Jews may come up with different versions of Lithuanian or Ukrainian history. Even with the best intentions in the world, problems will arise. Recently, for example, a Sajudis activist proposed a ?deal.? The Lithuanians would apologize for their role in the 1941 massacre of Lithuanian Jewry, if the Jews would apologize for their collaboration with the Com- munists! One should not doubt the sincerity of many of these national leaders. But as these peoples confront their history, the Jewish question will loom large. In many respects the Russians face more dif?culties than other nationalities in de?ning their nationhood. Dominant in the Soviet empire, Russians increasingly see themselves as its most pathetic victims. The price of military and political glory has been polluted rivers, im- poverished villages, ravaged forests, depleted resources, growing infant mortality and poverty, and an alarmingly high incidence of alcoholism. There is pain and shame and anger. One sees it all across the political spectrum?from the speeches of Yakovlev, Gorbachev?s super-liberal left-hand man, all the way to Igor Shafarevich and Pamyat on the Right. It is precisely in this painful search for a new sense of Russianness that anti-Semitism achieves central signi?- cance. For proponents of perestroika, anti-Semitism looms as a powerful danger. The July 22 Pravda article stressed how powerful a weapon anti-Semitism.could be in the hands of antireform forces. A speci?c cause 30 TIKKUN VOL. 5, No. 5 for concern, Pravda warned, was that the anti-Semitic campaign had spread beyond Pamyat and had found support in important literary journals: Perhaps for the ?rst time in our history, Judeo- phobia has become popular in certain circles of our intelligentsia. And this unprecedented ?respectabil- ity? [emphasis added] of anti-Semitism arouses the worst fears. Because here we see an attempt to derail the consolidation process of our society on the platform of perestroika. One important reason for anti-Semitism?s potential political force is that it serves as the ?glue? (to borrow Yitzhak Brudny?s phrase) which binds disparate anti- Gorbachev forces??village writers,? SIavoPhile intellec- tuals, neo-Stalinists, angry bureaucrats, and disgruntled workers. For the Left, as for Westernizers during the reign of Czar Nicholas I, Russia?s only choice is to ?join the West.? That means a new ideology that will stress uni- versal values rather than class- (or nation-) based values, and the virtues of cooperation rather than rivalry and competition. To do this means overcoming a perceived negative legacy in Russian history: the ?strong hand? of Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, and Stalin; moral and social passivity; a paranoid tradition that based nationhood on the constant struggle against the ?other? ?spies, Jews, intellectuals, bourgeois, kulaks, and so on. Gorbachev has put perestroika ?rmly in this camp and has constantly referred to Russia as a part of Europe. Along with ?democrats? such as Yeltsin and People?s Deputy Nikolai Travkin, he has shown more ambiva- lence with regard to embracing the principles of the market economy. . Among the political elite, Yakovlev has been one the most prominent articulators of this ?Western? ori- entation. In ?The Enemy The Anatomy of a Social Pathology," a remarkable interview published in the February 14, 1990, issue of Literatumaz'a Gazeta, Yakovlev took dead aim at the new Right and anti- according toYakovlev, posed an extraordinary danger to perestroika and united an unsavory coalition of ?losers,? ideologues, and ordinary people desperately seeking simple explanations for eco- nomic hardship, cultural change, and social displacement. The ?losers? included bureaucrats, managers, and work- ers who feared the consequences of economic reform. And without naming names, Yakovlev drew a sharp line between the anti-Semitic Right and the nineteenth- century Slavophile thinkers. The latter, he stressed, were cultured, decent people whose sincere examination of the roots of Russian culture still merited serious study and respect. They had nothing in common with Continued on p. 99) .95? H. -?j,lihl?? 1.4 twin. nu' .a 2-. l-umiw- Jen: r? area-r.? ?in: Ad?s r" ?x - "t?nlL-?IA or?; 1 'dear '?xl?ulh?n' M-rmuxl- ?11 .rr?u: .v?w [810115 red tely 1ths my It hed . ?Is 'eud ated reud a ites: :atly- a rhat acess res The import of this letter is clear: Freud still believed, at the end of 1897, that the women had been telling him the truth all along. They bad been abused. ?Why,? I asked Anna Freud, ?did you omit this letter?? Her answer astonished me: ?Because it was wrong. My father later came to believe that the women had been fantasiz- ing, and this letter would only confuse the general public.? When she saw my look of astonishment she added: ?Just as it has confused you.? I have to admit that Anna Freud was far more astute, in many ways, than I was. There was a clarity to her intellect that I could admire without reservationdevious person. She was honest, and straight- forward, but there were also things she could not absorb. I wanted to absent myself, in some personal way, from the signi?cance of what we were ?nding. I wanted Anna Freud to look at the evidence entirely on its own merits, with no reference to me, to her, or even to the fact that Freud was her father. This was impossible. From her response to me, I began to get the ?rst inkling of what was later to become much more explicit and personally virulent. ?Why, Dr. Masson, are you so fascinated by this episode?? Anna Freud asked me. I did not know, but whatever the answer, it was irrelevant to the importance of this momentous historical event. I didn?t want to plead with Anna Freud to be empathic with victims of child abuse, it seemed so crude. I wanted her to see that this whole ?episode,? as she insisted on calling it (as if it were an unfortunate episode, one best forgotten, which is probably what she thought), was central to her father?s development of However one judged it, its importance could not be denied. One could not pay too much attention to it. Here was one of the central moments in the birth of modern therapy. Freud was confronted with a deep challenge: either he believed the women and turned his considerable intellectual powers onto the issues these hidden truths raised, thereby becoming an ally to women, or he did not believe them, and instead spent his time trying to discover the reasons for their ?hysterical mendacity,? as he later came to call it, becoming their prose- cutor. It. was important to decide who was ?denying?? society, or the women. We were at one of our frequent intellectual impasses. ?Dr. Masson, my father based his rejection of these women?s memories on clinical material. He recanted because he was wrong the ?rst time.? (Whenever she used that phrase ?my father? I would shudder a bit at its historic magic?knowing, too, that in just a few years, nobody else would ever be able to say that again, but I also learned that it usually prefaced a ?nal opinion and one with which I would not agree.) I had no choice but to be direct- ?How do yOu know that, Miss Freud? After all, we have no clinical records demonstrating this to be true. Did he tell you that? Did he ever give you any informa- tion on this point? We saw that his reliance on Ellis was unfounded.? Silence. Too prolonged for my comfort. ?He told me that he changed his mind based on his clinical work with patients.? ?But there is no proof that that is true. There are no case histories. There is no evidence for it in his own clinical notes. In fact, Miss Freud, you must recognize that the very passages from his letters to Fliess that you omitted contain clinical material of the opposite nature to the one you suggest: proof that he was seeing the reality of sexual abuse in his own private practice, after he supposedly abandoned the theory. And you omitted those very case histories from the published record yourself. So, in fact, the history of the whole episode has been more obscure than necessary.? I took a breath. ?Please, believe me,? I continued, am not trying to be rude to you, or to impugn the character of your father. How can we know that anybody else would have behaved any differently? But I am trying to remove this whole question from the personal, from you, from me, from your father. I want to ?nd out what happened then. Please don't analyze my motivations, because I really don?t count in this at all; just focus your attention on the material. It is so important. Please.? I saw her look at me with a mixture of admiration and distaste. She was not accustomed to being spoken to in this manner. I knew that. She was looking at me and possibly wondering who I was, what I really wanted, what I intended to do with his new information. She was wondering, even though I begged her not to, about my motivation. She was making a clinical judgment about me. It was her profession to do so. I didn?t want that. Iwanted to get away from the world of analysis for the time being. I knew that I was taking a risk. She could revoke her permission to publish the letters at any time. But I was not interested in getting into a power struggle with her. I wanted?to say something to her that was more direct, more human, less theoretical. It had to do with something essential to the way people grew up in the world, and how they became unbearably sad. SOVIET JEWRY (Contz'nuedfrom p. 30) the self-styled Russophiles who fostered national hatred, ?exposed? Jewish surnames, and fed on ?paranoid? anti-Semitism. The Right is in fact a coalition, divided by its inter- pretation of 1917 and the Stalinist state, but united by the common bond of anti-Semitism. There are the neo- Slavophiles, Russophiles, and ?village writers? who see TIKKUN VOL. 5, No. 5 99 the source of Russia?s troubles in the assault of ?foreign? ideologies and their destruction of a morally superior and unique Russian civilization?agrarian, organic, and communal. The neo-Slavophiles and the village writers cannot forgive Stalin for the collectivization campaign. The neo-Stalinists, on the other hand, accept 1917, hanker for their dead hero, and ascribe any crimes to the schemes of his Jewish advisers. And ?nally, in addi- tion to the Slavophiles and the neo-Stalinists, one ?nds, at the margins, Pamyat and similar organizations. Vocal as they are, these latter- groups are only the tip of the iceberg of Russian anti-Semitism. To be sure, Soviet Jews worry about black-Shirred thugs yelling anti-Semitic slogans and barging in with seeming impunity at meet- ings of liberal writers (as happened in Moscow in Janu- ary). But ultimately they are far more worried when world-class mathematicians such as Shafarevich and influential writers such as Rasputin and Vasily Belov make an ?intellectual? case for the harmful role of Jews in Russian culture. ?Intellectual? anti-Semitism has found some power- ful forums: the journal Nos/3 Sovremenml?, Lz'remturizaz'a Rossz'z?a, and the Writers Union of the Russian Republic. Anyone doubting the importance of anti-Semitism in the Writers Union of the Russian Republic should look at the transcript of its November 13- 14 board meeting, published in part by Ogozzek (1989, No. 48). On the agenda was the discomfort felt by ?truly Russian writers? in the Leningrad branch of the Union. These ?true Russians? wanted their own newspaper and got the sympathetic support of Iurii Bondarev, who chaired the meeting, and Valentin Rasputin. At one point Bon- darev even referred to the ?viruses and microbes? that were undermining the Writers? Union. The operative word at the meeting was ?Russophobia.? Writers complained that Jews were slandering Russian culture and were grossly overrepresented in Russian literature. Sergei Voronin drew ?continuous applause? when he shouted There is nothing worse than the destruction of one people by another.What have in mind is the extraor- dinarily serious situation which has arisen in our Leningrad writers? organization. The only way to ex- plain the fact that we Russian writers are only 20 per- cent of the members is by looking at the elementary lack of respect accorded us, Russian writers, by a group of Ramon-language [emphasis added] writers, the majority of whom are of Jewish nationality. Anatoly Builov, who also raised the question of ?vi- ruses,? complained that the ?Jews were the only group interested in sowing discord in our ranks.? No, he admitted, he was not a member of Pamyat, but ?there?s a lot in its literature that I like.? 100 TIKKUN VOL. 5, N0. 5 The journal Nos/9 Sovremenmlle has become a major mouthpiece of the neo-Slavophiles. In 1989 it printed an abridged version of Shafarevich?s notorious Russo- poobz'a. Shafarevich is a famous mathematician and a founding member of the Committee to Defend Human Rights in the USSR. Many of the arguments of the book bear striking resemblances to the turn-of?the-century Action Frangaz'se. maintains that Jews have played a major role in slandering Russia, have destroyed her self-confidence, and imposed mechanical foreign values in place of healthy native ones. Soviet Jewry has reacted to such attacks in several ways. One, obviously, is emigration. But even at the present rate of emigration a sizable number of Soviet Jews will remain. What will happen to Soviet Jews who stay? What future is there for Jewish existence in the Soviet Union? It?s crucial to grasp that both emigration and renewed Jewish cultural activity in the Soviet Union will change the nature of the Jewish community and the choices available to Soviet Jews in the future. or many Jews, fear or the desire for economic security will be enough reason to emigrate: We should respect that choice. It may be morally sublime to tell Soviet Jews to ?ght for nascent democ- racy at home, but that is up to those who may have to live with the physical consequences of that decision. And sometimes simple truths should be restated. The safety and security of Israel should still be the number- one Jewish concern- In this regard, heavy Soviet Jewish immigration will not only bolster the Jewish population but may also increase the chances for peace. These Jews want peace, quiet, jobs, and homes. Few are rabid nationalists. They may well come to support more prag- matic policies, ready to trade territories for peace. Furthermore, the daunting ?nancial challenge posed by the immigration, along with the strain on housing and social services, may finally force the Likud to aban- don heavy investments in West Bank settlements. The noted ethnographer Mikhail Chlenov, in his key- note address at the December meeting of the Va?ad, recognized the strength of the emigration movement. ?It is possible,? he told the delegates, that Soviet Jewry has really entered the final phase of its existence, but this phase is a long process and we must be concerned to do something for those who stay as well as those who leave.? The lesson Jews really had to learn from the wave of anti-Semitism was the futility of assimilation: How do Jews usually defend themselves against anti-Semitism? First of all by a strong and full national life, by national organization. The assimilated Jew who lacks ties with his fellows, is detached from his culture, his heritage, his peOple, is absolutely in! Liar?3H! iy helpless in the face of anti-Semitism. The only thing left for him to do is to repeat after the famous French philosopher [Sartre] that he is a Jew only when confronted by an anti-Semite. Therefore panic ?rst of all seizes assimilated Jews. The most trustworthy, although not the quickest form of defense is via the development of national self- awareness, self-organization, reunion with the Jewish people. To my mind, it is precisely this last point?reunion with the Jewish people?that is the most signi?cant result of the burgeoning movement for Jewish self- renewal in the USSR. From the presence of foreign Jewish observers and teachers in Moscow, to the serial- ization of Dubnov in Swan's/7 Hez'?zlanal, to Adin Stein- saltz?s yeshiva' in Moscow, Soviet Jewry can now show that it once again feels itself to be a part of the Jewish people, not only in Israel but also in the Diaspora. Jews are organizing, they are seeking each other out, and the old arguments are returning: Yiddish vs. Hebrew, the role of Russian in Jewish culture, and so on. As one participant in the December meeting remarked, it was like 1917 all over again, with the whole cast of characters back, except for the Bund. ut rigid ideological approaches have never really suf?ced to explain the situation of Russian Jews. In the years before World War 1, Russian Jewry produced key ideologies such as Bundism and Zionism. Its greatest mass movement, however?one that was to have enormous consequences for Jewish history~?was the spontaneous mass emigration of two million Jews. (Then too, there were Bundists who called on the Jews to stay behind and ?ght for Russian democracy.) Another trend cut short by the Revolution was the rise of a rich Russian-language Jewish culture, represented by such journals as Kansas! and Vos?bod. Well-intentioned out- siders can urge their own solutions on Soviet Jews, but Soviet Jewry will also have to provide new, indigenous models of Jewishness. Indeed, thede 22 Pravda article signaled of?cial willingness to tolerate a variety of ap- proaches to Jewish culture: it advocated equal freedom for Zionists and for those preaching Jewish renewal in the USSR be it in Yiddish, Hebrew, or Russian. Just like other nationalities in the country, Soviet Jews have to come to terms with all the unique features of their identity?as Jews, as products of Russian cul- ture, as members of the Soviet middle and professional classes to which they might belong. In this respect, American Jewry may provide a useful model. The February 1990 issue of Soaetz'r/J Hez'mlazzd con- tains a fascinating debate between Boris Viner and eth- nographer Igor Krupnik. Using census, emigration, and intermarriage ?gures,Viner predicts the demise of Soviet Jewry within two generations. But Krupnik?s answer reads like a throwback to the debate on Charles Silber- man?s debunking of pessimistic readings of American Jewry?s future. Soviet Jews, Krupnik emphasizes, are on the threshold of a new era. Gone are the circumstances which once impelled children of mixed marriages to opt for non-Jewish nationality. Constant contact with Jews abroad, both former emigrants and others, will leave its stamp on Soviet Jewry. New Options allow Soviet Jews to emulate their cousins in the United States and find ways of combining various forms of ?Jewish? and ?general? allegiance. Furthermore, Krupnik hopes, in the future many emigrants may return, or at least go back and forth. Krupnik?s p?osition makes a lot of sense?if the Soviet Union can avoid imminent chaos. In theJuly 18 issue of Lz'terammar'a Gazeta, the noted economist and writer Nikolai Shmelev wrote that everybody agrees on the long-term goals. We have to become a civilized country, a normal society. But achieving that goal will take decades. . .. So the question is, will we be able to take that path without a prior period of catastrophes, bloodshed, chaos, and millions of victims. That?s the main thing. And I?m worried that might all come about in the next few Years. Shmelev hopes he is wrong. So do we. But meanwhile, we must help Soviet Jews with money, empathy, and respect for the different choices they make?whether to leave or stay. Alan Snitow's optimism is still premature. A CONVERSATION WITH A. B. YEHOSHUA Continued from p. 34) repetition of the materialism, anti-intellectualism, anti- spirituality, and anti-democratic realities that they could just as easily find in_the larger society. And in the larger society they didn?t have to learn Hebrew or study esoteric texts. So, many reasoned, why go through all the struggle to be Jewish if at bottom Jewish values merely repeat those of the larger American society? The ?she-err! yz's- reel,? the saving remnant of Israel, may be those who reject the organized Jewish community for these kinds of reasons. Unfortunately, in the process some of these people end up rejecting Judaism itself, not understanding that the very values that lead them to reject what parades as Judaism in the public arena are in fact the major values of the prophetic tradition of Judaism! Yehoshua: But why hold on to Judaism? The French don?t need to hold on to French feudalism to be authentically French?they can take their own values TIKKUN VOL. 5, o. 5 101