Dmitry Kolotilenko
Dmitry Kolotilenko completed his graduate studies in History. He is a content developer and educator at the E-Learning Department at Yad Vashem's International School for Holocaust Studies
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Thank you for your response. Each step in the course is accompanied by a short relevant bibliography which serves as a further suggested reading and as a kind of reference to the video. Prof. Volkov's short lecture in this step is based on her publications, and especially on her book: Volkov, Shulamit, Germans, Jews, and Antisemites: Trials in Emancipation...
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@JeanNisbet Yes, she is referring to the Roman Catholic Church.
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Within the framework of this course, we couldn't of course cover the entire range of existing attitudes towards Jews in all the areas in the past and in the present. In the first four weeks we mainly cover Europe and the Western world while week 5 deals with the Arab and Muslim world. We hope that week 5 will help shed further light on this matter.
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@AnnaB Thank you for the question. The term itself is taken from Isaiah 56:5: "And to them will I give in my house and within my walls a 'memorial and a name' (Yad Vashem) ... that shall not be cut off." See step 1.2 (about Yad Vashem) and all the information can be found on the Yad Vashem site https://www.yadvashem.org/about/yad-vashem.html. I hope this...
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Prof. Nirenberg (Anti-Judaism… pp. 226-227) argues that Luther was afraid "that the world was converting to Judaism" – not because there was any real phenomenon of Jews converting Christians to Judaism but because Luther identified his Christian opponents' positions as "Judaizing" and saw them and the Jews as part of the same "dangerous" in his view...
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Thomas Kaufmann, in his new book listed below, argues that Luther's gruesome piece 'On the Jews and their Lies' was directed against the Jews as well as against Christian Hebrew scholars. He argues that this essay was written by Luther in response to Sebastian Münster's piece of writing 'Messiahs of the Christians and the Jews' (1539) in which Luther thought...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
With regards to the radicalization of Luther's position towards the Jews, there are different answers to this question. Dr. Kalik mentions that "the Protestants that were attacked and had to protect themselves from the accusations that they are Judaizers, that they are very much like the Jews, they are similar to the Jews, created a very sharp anti-Jewish new...
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Thomas Kaufmann, in his new book listed below, argues that Luther's gruesome piece 'On the Jews and their Lies' was directed against the Jews as well as against Christian Hebrew scholars. He argues that this essay was written by Luther in response to Sebastian Münster's piece of writing 'Messiahs of the Christians and the Jews' (1539) in which Luther thought...
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Prof. Nirenberg (Anti-Judaism… pp. 226-227) argues that Luther was afraid "that the world was converting to Judaism" – not because there was any real phenomenon of Jews converting Christians to Judaism but because Luther identified his Christian opponents' positions as "Judaizing" and saw them and the Jews as part of the same "dangerous" in his view...
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With regards to the radicalization of Luther's position towards the Jews, there are different answers to this question. Dr. Kalik mentions that "the Protestants that were attacked and had to protect themselves from the accusations that they are Judaizers, that they are very much like the Jews, they are similar to the Jews, created a very sharp anti-Jewish new...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Tamara Adler
Thank you for your participation and feedback. We'll take your comments into consideration for the future.
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Thank you for your participation. Due to the space limitations we couldn't go into all the details of Prof. Schwarz-Friesel's research. We recommend her book cited below.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Kristy H.
Thank you for your participation. Please see step 2.13. "France was the first state to grant its Jews emancipation in 1791. During the 19th century, the Jews of France became an integral factor in all parts of French society."
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@KarinGuinchard Thank you - corrected.
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@VivienneC Thank you, Vivienne. As you see none of the participants' comments in this thread have been removed by FutureLearn moderators as unacceptable. However, some uneasiness has been expressed by learners. We just wanted to reiterate that we are in an inclusive learning environment shared with people who may be of different nationalities, religions,...
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Thank you for your participation. We just wanted to clarify that prof. Tibi draws a distinction between Islam and Islamism. Antisemitism is shared by both violent and nonviolent forms of Islamism not Islam.
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@AsimahHussain Thank you for your comment and for bringing this up. We are going over the learners' comments and considering their implications. We do indeed need to be very careful with the statements that may exceed the limits of legitimate criticism and be offensive to a specific community.
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Thank you for your participation in the course and for your comments. We ask learners to refrain from statements that may be offensive to others as required by FutureLearn's code of conduct.
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Thank you Josephine for your comment and participation. The question regarding the origins of antisemitism has been greatly debated in scholarly research. As it is a multilayered and complex matter, we attempt to break it down and address it in a structured manner in steps 1.10-1.14.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Simon Ward
Thank you for the question. Zionism is explained by Prof. Anita Shapira in week 2, step 2.18.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Karin Guinchard
@KarinGuinchard Thank you - corrected.
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The status of the Jews under Christianity and under Islam is discussed in the next step - 5.5. Prof. Cohen touches on the economic aspect in step 5.5 as well. He mentions that Jews were prominent as merchants under Islam which occupation was viewed rather positively. Money lending was a very prominent role filled by the Jews in Christian Europe and was viewed...
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As indicated in the video at first the Soviet Union viewed Israel as a potential ideological and political ally in the power struggle against the West, hoping that Israel would emerge as a socialist state. As Israel was manifestly gravitating towards the West, not matching the expectations of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union changed its policy. The change...
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@HarryNichol Antisemitism was a factor both within the White and the Red movements to varying degrees in different places and stages of the Revolution, WWI and the Civil War. For specific situations, pogroms initiated by some of the Bolshevik supporters and numbers of Jewish victims, one can consult for example Budnitskii's book listed in the references...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Peter Privett
May be interesting to see some statistics of Jewish occupations from the census of the Russian Empire in 1897
https://www.google.co.il/amp/s/yannayspitzer.net/2012/09/30/jewish-occupations-in-the-pale-of-settlement/amp/ -
Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Peter Privett
Historically the Jews were occupied in urban professions while over 90% of the general population was rural. That gave them a bit of an edge over others sometimes - in the period of dramatic urbanization for example. Of course the Jews dealt in all urban professions (trade, arts, transportation, various white-collar occupations etc) and not just in economic...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Peter Privett
@PeterPrivett Thank you for your participation.
There were some individual Jews who became wealthy just as there were some non-Jews who were wealthy and in economic power positions. At the same time there were of course many Jews as well as non-Jews who lived in utter poverty and deprivations.
The problem is that individual wealthy Jews are stereotyped... -
This is an interesting question. As we have seen antisemitism is indeed a real factor in history that may lead and has led to violence against Jews. Thus we saw in the previous week how antisemitism led to violent pogroms starting in 1881. We also saw how the Protocols of the Elders of Zion a document allegedly exposing the "Jewish conspiracy to dominate the...
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Thomas Kaufmann, in his new book listed below, argues that Luther's gruesome piece 'On the Jews and their Lies' was directed against the Jews as well as against Christian Hebrew scholars. He argues that this essay was written by Luther in response to Sebastian Münster's piece of writing 'Messiahs of the Christians and the Jews' (1539) in which Luther thought...
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Prof. Nirenberg (Anti-Judaism… pp. 226-227) argues that Luther was afraid "that the world was converting to Judaism" – not because there was any real phenomenon of Jews converting Christians to Judaism but because Luther identified his Christian opponents' positions as "Judaizing" and saw them and the Jews as part of the same "dangerous" in his view...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
With regards to the radicalization of Luther's position towards the Jews, there are different answers to this question. Dr. Kalik mentions that "the Protestants that were attacked and had to protect themselves from the accusations that they are Judaizers, that they are very much like the Jews, they are similar to the Jews, created a very sharp anti-Jewish new...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to James Kelleher
Thank you for many interesting and relevant comments. We would like to ask you to stay focused because we believe this will allow more people to actively participate and help us learn in a more progressive and constructive way. Antisemitism in the contemporary Far Right and Far Left are discussed and presented in week 4.
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Just wanted to draw your attention to the PDF with the so-called "May Laws" (in "downloads" below) that are relevant to the allegation that the Jews exploited the rural population.
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@SimonWard Thank you for this comment. There is indeed room for bewilderment here. One of the aspects of antisemitism is that it is activated and instrumentalized in a way that has little to do with actual reality. Alexander II was assassinated by a revolutionary organization Narodnaya Volya ("The Will of the People") that was hoping to precipitate the...
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@HarryNichol Thank you for your comment. We are not allowed by copyright restrictions to upload whole sections or chapters from books. However, Prof. Nirenberg does of course speak based on what he wrote in his book – so this is a kind of a taster if you like. The book is of course available in various libraries if the learners decide to pursue this subject...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Paul Grivell
Thank you for your comment. To get into all the details it would be indeed best to read Birnbaum's book (Birnbaum, Pierre, Léon Blum: Prime Minister, Socialist, Zionist [New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015]). Birnbaum mentions antisemitic attacks coming not only from the nationalist right but also from the extreme left. Thus, Maurice Thorez, the head of the...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Susana Bykov
@EleanorCohn-Eichner I believe step 1.10 will be helpful.
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Thank you for your participation. Just to clarify in this video Dr. Vago is giving examples of the antisemitic claims voiced during this time. One such claim was: "the Jew takes our place in this new urban civilization and tries to destabilize our national values..." This statement is not a description of the historical reality but an example of some false...
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Thank you for the very interesting comments. Jews, as several other minorities, were granted privileges of admittance and settlement in the early modern Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth on the basis of them filling specific economic urban roles for the ruling classes. This means that individual choice with regard to occupation and settlement was very limited....
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@ReinaDayan This is indeed an important point to remember when dealing with the early modern period and in some regions even in the later modern period.
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@MiraVogel We have a discussion of some anti-Jewish attitudes in the Greco-Roman world in steps 1.10 and 1.11 ( as you may have seen by now). Prof. Gager and Prof. Fredriksen discuss whether these attitudes can be considered antisemitic or not. There are also PDFs with some relevant quotes and a very helpful bibliography.
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Thank you for your comment. We've supplied a bibliography because the course naturally has a limited time frame. Kaufmann, Thomas, Luther’s Jews: A Journey Into Anti-Semitism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017) goes into all the details of Luther's writings.
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Some of them had the skills to be administrators of the large estates of the Polish nobility which indeed made them very prominent. The majority of the so-called leaseholders were not administrators but petty leaseholders (such as tavern keepers).
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@StuartGoldstone Thank you for your participation and question. To better understand the social and economical role of the Jews in Eastern Europe - in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth - it is really necessary to get into the books by the leading researchers in the field listed in the references (Hundert, Rosman, Teller, Kalik). What Margaret mentioned in...
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Thank you for your interesting comment and questions. In order to gain further insight into Prof. Nirenberg's analysis of anti-Judaism during this time period, we recommend his book listed in the references, particularly chapters 5-10 in his book.
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Thank you for your participation and comments. We just wanted to reiterate that there is a debate among historians as to whether anti-Jewish sentiments in the Greco-Roman period can be viewed as antisemitic. Step 1.11 addresses this issue. You are welcome to review step 1.12 where the impact of the advent of Christianity is discussed.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to nigel pyart
I believe that step 1.9 will be helpful.
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@AnnClark I believe the section on the "The historical roots of antisemitism" will be very helpful.
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Thank you for these points. I believe steps 1.10 - 1.14 will answer your questions.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Elisabeth Watkins
The link seems to be working fine... In any case, here it is https://www.yadvashem.org/about/yad-vashem.html.
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Welcome to the course. Thank you for your participation. You are only asked to briefly explain one of the two points mentioned in this step - just to help you review and digest the main points of this week. A short paragraph should be enough.
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Thank you Jennifer. FYI, there will be a second run of the course.
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As Prof. Gager explains, exceptionally intense anti-Jewish attitudes emanate from the Hellenistic Egypt in a specific context. Prof. Fredriksen cautiously notes that there is a particular attitude towards the Jews as being anti-social that one could classify as a form of ancient antisemitism. Certainly prominent antisemitic tropes such as blood libel, Jews as...
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Thank you for your participation and for bringing up these two major events in Jewish history. Historians use with much caution the terms antisemitism and racism in application to the Greco-Roman antiquity, usually with qualifiers such as "proto-racism" or "ancient antisemitism" (used by Prof. Fredriksen). The historians' evaluations of the destruction of the...
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@RichardKnight We do need to be careful with labels and use properly defined terms. Loose use of the term anti-Zionism may actually constitute a serious problem. Some people may refer only to "a position opposing the Israel government's policies" while others may actually refer to opposing the very legitimacy of the Jewish state. To help clarify sensitive...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Yoav Yaron
Denmark does indeed stand out with the vast majority of the Jewish community being rescued; 482 Jews, mostly elderly and sick, were caught and deported to the camp of Theresienstadt - no Danish Jews were sent to
Auschwitz. (for short account http://www.yadvashem.org/righteous/stories/the-rescue-of-denmark-jews.html ; for more details... -
Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Yoav Yaron
@YoavYaron Thank you for your participation and for your questions. We just wanted to clarify in terms of history that the story of the Bulgarian Jews during the Holocaust is complicated. Indeed the Bulgarian Jews were not sent to extermination camps although anti-Jewish measures had been passed against them. Quite a different fate met 11,000 Jews of...
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Just wanted to mention Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern's research of the Jewish draft into the tsarist army - Jews in the Russian Army, 1827-1917: Drafted Into Modernity. - One to one and a half million Jews were conscripted during the period under discussion. In terms of military career opportunities, the situation in the Russian army was very different - as you...
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Thank you Richard for your question. This goes beyond the subject of the course but we can still respond briefly.
Dr. Kalik does not say that the Jews mainly lived in the villages. For a long period the Jews in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as well as under the Russian Empire (after the partitions of Poland in the 18th century) were mainly an urban...
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Thank you for your participation in the course. This step is included in the section The historical roots of antisemitism and Augustine's doctrine, as Prof. Jeremy Cohen explains, is indeed an important foundation of the negative perceptions of the Jews in the Christian sphere as they developed in the late antiquity and in the Middle Ages. However, also note...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Tracey Kinney
Thank you for the point. A list of credits is attached at the end of each week. So please see downloads in step 3.21 for this week.
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Thank you for your participation. Prof. Dina Porat touches upon this point in 4.19.
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@AnnePalmer In Russian - Черта́ осе́длости. The word черта́ means 'line' - referring to the borderline of the area within which the Jews were allowed to reside or to settle permanently.
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There are Jewish sources expressing Jewish attitudes towards others. Each source has its specific context. The Hellenistic Jews (Greek-speaking Jews) often admired the Greek culture. There is always a tension, however, regarding divine worship as Prof. Fredriksen mentions. For example, The Letter of Aristeas is an interesting source (written by a Jew but...
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Antiochus in question is indeed Antiochus IV (Epiphanes) during whose rule the Maccabean revolt took place. The negative attitudes expressed in Josephus's quotations, however, according to Peter Schäfer, among others, predate the Maccabean revolt and originated not in Judea but in Hellenistic Egypt. As Prof. Gager explains the intense attitudes towards Jews on...
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@IainPreston @IainPreston Thank you for your participation and your questions. Questioning spirits are most welcome.
The origins of Josephus (a Jew from Judea writing much of his work in Rome in 1st c. CE) and Apion (an Alexandrian Greek writer and scholar of Egyptian origin, end of 1 c. BCE – first half of 1st c. CE) certainly play a role in the written... -
Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Benjamin Ackland
Thank you for your participation in the course. Zionism is first defined and discussed in step 2.21 in week 2. Please see step 2.21.
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@ShaneHopkison Thank you for your participation. As we've already stated above:
"It is indeed incorrect to define the Labour Party as a "far left" party. The voices being discussed here, as Dr. Rich points out, emanate from segments within the party that can be defined as stemming from a more radical Left tradition. As Dr. David Hirsh (a Labour Party...
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@YoavYaron Yes, it does.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Lois R.
Interesting.
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Interesting. Thanks for the comment.
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Thank you for your question. We've selected bibliography for each step that answers this and other relevant questions. All the quotes are found in Menahem Stern. Eric Gruen's books deal in detail with perceptions of Jews by ancients. Prof. Gager's book would be a good point to start with since he is the speaker in the video.
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Thank you for your comment and participation. You can indeed access the annual analysis reports through the Kantor Center's website: http://kantorcenter.tau.ac.il (the link to the 2017 report is provided in the video description). These reports provide information on both increases and decreases in antisemitic acts, contextualizing and analyzing them. The...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Anne Palmer
Thank you for the suggestion.
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Thank you for your participation and suggestions.
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Thank you Caroline. Your understanding is correct. And it is fair to see the 3D test as a useful tool.
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Thank you for your participation in the course. We would like to point out that the accepted view among historians is that in the "deliberations of the United Nations and its bodies in 1947-
1948, it is difficult to find evidence that the Holocaust played a decisive or even significant role." (see Evyatar Friesel below). The various parties involved were in... -
@NoreenO'DonovanHage Thank you Noreen. These are of course important points. The terms antisemitism and antisemitic are indeed problematic as the scholars explain in steps 1.7 and 1.8. However as they also point out, these terms have become common usage in public, political and scholarly discourse and they carry with them specific important historical and...
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What we see in this week is that Jews and Judaism played a pivotal role in the Christian world. They were a particular kind of "other". They were the kind of other by means of whom early and medieval Christian doctrine defined what it means to be a Christian. In this sense they are quite different from any other "others."
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Nigel Bowles
@NigelBowles It would be helpful to consult Stowe, Kenneth R., Alienated Minority: The Jews of Medieval Latin Europe, listed in the references.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Doreen Levy
Thank you Doreen. The term "Judaize" is indeed the anglicized original Greek word ἰουδαΐζειν (infinitive) used by Paul in Gal. 2:14. It is derived from Ἰουδαῖος meaning 'Jew.' It is worthwhile noting that the term Judaism or Ἰουδαϊσμός in Greek is also related to the verb ἰουδαΐζειν. This verb is not found too often in the ancient sources. Here it designates...
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Could you try again? I was able to download the correct video.
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Just to clarify that when Prof. Nirenberg says that "thinking about a central monarchical power, came to be associated in the Middle Ages with Judaism and that many civil wars, many revolutions many rebellions against monarchical power, came to be thought of as rebellions against Judaism" he does not mean that the wars were actually directed against Judaism...
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Thank you for your comment. In 1.18 Prof. Cohen explains "a few highlights and ... a few factors that helped precipitate, that contributed towards that downfall of the Jews in Western medieval Europe and their virtual disappearance from Western medieval Europe by the end of the Middle Ages." For a detailed discussion and for other academic analyses, we...
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Thank you for raising these important points – demography and conversion. There have been attempts to estimate the share of the Jewish population in various regions in antiquity although reliable data is hard to come by (for estimates one can consult Botticini, Maristella, and Zvi Eckstein. The Chosen few: How education shaped Jewish history, 70-1492....
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@NigelBowles These passages are meant to exemplify negative attitudes towards the Jews and also towards other groups found in the Greco-Roman sources. Positive attitudes towards the other can be found as well. E. Gruen's books listed in the references in step 1.10 bring out the whole complexity of the situation.
However, the passages from Josephus are...
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Thank you for your question. Context really matters. In the ancient sources there is a wide range of attitudes - both more positive and more negative ones. Since the course deals with antisemitism starting from an inquiry into its origins, we focus mainly on the negative attitudes towards the Jews, asking whether such attitudes can be considered antisemitic or...
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Dmitry Kolotilenko replied to Silvia Hidal
Thank you for your participation and for your feedback. You are of course welcome to share the course and its contents with others.
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@SarahPerris
Thank you for the comment. You are absolutely right in saying that "the left has a proud history in combating racism, fascism and antisemitism."It is important to emphasize that confronting antisemitism of course is part of the struggle against any form of hate, xenophobia and prejudice. In this regard, we can recall what Prof. Porat has...
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@HenrikBlunck Steps 1.7 and 1.8. in week 1 should be helpful.
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Thank you for calling our attention to a possible misunderstanding in this passage in the way it's formulated. It is important to clarify that Dr. Webman is presenting the view of Qutb and his followers according to which the Jews were "the driving force" behind the "Jewish-Christian tradition or civilization" which in their view is contrary and detrimental to...
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Antisemitism is indeed a complex phenomenon and thank you for taking the time to study this complex phenomenon with us.
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Thank you for these reflections, Naomi.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
Thank you all for your participation in the course and for your responses to week 5. We appreciate your comments and will give them due attention for the future.
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Dmitry Kolotilenko made a comment
In response to some of the comments, we just wanted to remind for everyone's convenience that the history and utility of the term antisemitism is discussed in week 1, steps 1.7 and 1.8.
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@PaulBaird Thank you for your comments and questions. As there can be different spellings and transliterations, it is important to clarify that Sherif Hamed Salem is a faculty member at the Menoufia University (http://www.menofia.edu.eg/art/StaffPage/en ).
The following link shows two of his books:...
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@DanielM The discussion in step 4.8 may be helpful, Daniel.
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@DanielaNémetová Thank you for your participation and comment. We've adjusted the map of the post-WWI Eastern Europe according to the borders of 1923 when the borders became more stabilized to avoid possible confusion and to still illustrate how empires disintegrate and nation-states emerge.
