The Maccabaean

A Prophecy Fulfilled

“The Fall of Tsardom,” by Carl Joubert. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company.

No, this is not a new book, hastily manufactured by an enterprising publisher since the great upheaval took place in Russia. This department has to deal with books, new and old, and here is a volume that is more or less old, but of most timely interest. Looking through my library for a subject for discussion, I came upon “The Fall of Tsardom,” a remarkable book written by a most remarkable man. Beside it is a companion volume called “Russia As It Really Is”; but it is the former title that at once brings to mind a prophecy fulfilled, that immediately attracts one’s attention. I turn to the preface and note the date of April, 1905. In the course of a series of affective chapters which discuss every phase of Russian life, the author, who displays a most intimate knowledge of affairs in that country, mercilessly analyses the corruption and incompetence of the Russian bureaucracy and confidently predicts its hasty doom.

We read at the outset of the first chapter:

“I offer no apology for this, the third book on the subject of Russia and her government and people, which it has fallen to my pen to write within the space of a year and a half. History is making itself in that unhappy country with a rapidity that defies competition. Statements which were regarded a year ago as prejudiced to the verge of fanaticism, have been cerified in the pages of recent Russian history. The leaves are turned with anxiety, and, in anticipation of the grim story which awaits the world in the coming pages, the events of the past are relegated to the category of accepted facts, and have become part of the common knowledge. The incredible of twelve months ago is the truism of today. A mighty empire, stretching in unbroken continuity from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific Ocean, which vaunted its firm foundation on the bed-rock of autocracy, is tottering to its fall. The gradual decay which has marked the downfall of great nations in the past has given place in Russia to a sudden collapse, and to the whole world is exposed the canker which, for centuries, has eaten into the heart of the nation, and the ghastly spectacle of a hundred and fifty millions of people who are forced to pay with their substance and with their blood for the follies of Tsardom.”

Chapters on “Semitism and Anti-Semitism” at once recall the rare friendly and sympathetic attitude of the author to the Jewish people, which began with his interest as a student of Jewish life and history, and which -ended with his conversion to Judaism. Living in Russia for many years, the writer was so strongly attracted by the simplicity and spirituality of Jewish life that he cast his lot with the Jews, lived in the house of a Jewish laborer, acquired the Yiddish language, studied Hebrew and the Talmud, until the late Rabbi Isaac Elchanan of Kovno pronounced him to be worthy of “Semicha.” It was not until after his death that the strange and picturesque career of “Carl Joubert” became known. An account of his life appears in the initial number of The Chronicle, in which, by the way, on March 14, 1906, brother de Haas and the writer of these lines began a short-lived fight or skirmish for the democratic organization of American Jewry. The article in question was called “A Daniel Deronda In Real Life,” and was based

on information which Mr. Albert M. Hyamson, of London, for many years a friend of “Carl Joubert,” at that time supplied to the Jewish press.

I quote from that article:

“It is a tale of a new Daniel Deronda that is now told as the career of ‘Carl Joubert,’ whose real name, as it was entered in the books of the Hammersmith Synagogue, was A. W. C. Grottey.

oro”,) vyoew + ae Fyre Se + 9-2 * “The name of ‘Carl Joubert’ has long loomed large before the eyes of all who have been following events in Russia, and the revolution are movement of that country, within the last few years. For some time it was generally known that the author of ‘Russia As It Really Is,’ wrote under a non de plume, and that behind ‘Carl Joubert,’ another personality was hidden; but the true identity of the writer was never revealed, and secretly guarded during his life time. Various guesses and suggestions were made from time to time, but all went wide from the mark. Now we were told that ‘Carl Joubert’ was pseudonym of a Russian Grand Duke, and then that he was one of the ministers with liberal inclinations, and again, that he was a Russian revolutionare, and finally, that he was a Russian Jew. Contemporary with the writings of ‘Carl Joubert’ appear the articles of a Quarterly Reviewer, whose bold article on the ‘Czar, displaying a thorough acquaintance with that distinguished nonentity, was also attributed to a variety of eminent personages, ranging from a close relative of the Czar to M. de Witte, who was then in disfavor.”

““T studied for three years in Jerusalem,’ he had told Mr. Hyamson, ‘and for four years in Kovno. Rabbi Elchonon of Kovno himself gave me a diploma to the effect that I am worthy to be a rabbi in Israel.’ Feeling the force of the Jewish faith, he applied formally for admission into the Jewish community, and was received by a rabbi in Warsaw some years ago; from that date he remained a professing Jew. When two years ago he finally returned to England, he immediately became a member of the Hammersmith Synagogue, and there he was frequently seen among the worshippers. ‘I am a Jew in the fullest sense,’ he said, ‘if I ever marry, none but a Jewess could be my wife.’

This is what we are told concerning Joubert’s sources of information on Russian affairs:

“He assured me more than once that, after all, he was, to a considerable extent, but the mouthpiece of personages of the greatest influence in the Russian Empire, whose surroundings render the bald declaration of Liberal views hazardous to the continuance of their welfare. They used him as the vehicle through which to disclose the true state of affairs to the outside world. Certain it is that his sources of information were often exceptionally reliable.”

“‘I have given my life,’ ‘Carl Joubert’ once said, ‘I have sworn to fight for the Jews, not because I wish to pose as their champion, but because I know the truth about them. No Jew knows his fellow-Jews better than I know them. In French, German and Russian Jewries I am equally at home. But in Russian Jewry the problem is to be found. I speak Yiddish as well as the Jews themselves.’ ”

What a pity that this modern Ger Zedek did not live to see the realization of the freedom for which he fought so bravely, and which he so boldly prophesied?