The Karaite Response to the Russian Scholarly Articles and Reconstruction of Karaite

Empire in Publications from the Middle of the 19

^th

Century to the Beginning of the 20

^th

Century

This chapter, after providing a brief historical overview, will analyse the Karaite response to research on their ethnic origin by non-Karaites, which I discussed in the previous chapter. Their response reflects the gradual development of a Karaite identity. For this chapter, I collected the Karaite responses from several newspapers and books on Karaite history by Karaite authors from the end of the 19^th century to the beginning of the 20^th century. For the beginning of the 20^th century, my sources mainly come from two Karaite periodicals of that period: Karaimskaya Zhizn [Karaite Life] (published in Moscow, 1911–1912) and Karaimskoe Slovo [Karaite Word] (published in Vilnius, 1913–1914). These are the most important sources that could be found on the reconstruction of a Karaite identity for this period. As my analysis is based on printed material only, it reflects the opinion of some of the Karaite intelligentsia, but it does not necessarily reflect the opinion of most Karaites at that time.

Historical Overview: National Policy in the Late Russian Imperial Period

In order to better understand the development of a Karaite national identity, we need to look at it within the context of the political and historical circumstances of late Imperial Russia.

The first version of Russia as an ‘imagined community’, to use the terminology of Benedict Anderson, was based on a religious mission (Hosking 1998: 286). Peter the Great and his successors tried to create a secular myth to supplant it, one nourished by Russia’s size and diversity, its armed forces and its high culture and learning. This new myth entailed fostering a secular and Europeanised culture, together with creating an education system to sustain it among the empire’s elites (Hosking 1998: 286).

Russia before Peter the Great was only a people (narod): she became a nation (natsiia) thanks to the impetus supplied by the reformer. (PSS vol 5: 124 as cited in Hosking 1998: 286)

In the 19^th century, the industrialisation process in Europe gave rise to modern nation-states, which gradually became the norm throughout Europe. Those places that did not immediately fit the pattern, the Habsburg, Ottoman and Russian Empires, became relatively weaker and were threatened with disruption and possible dissolution (Hosking 1998: 316). Russia’s disgraceful defeat in the Crimean War (1853–1856) testified to the backwardness of the country’s industry and

communications and the precarious condition of its finances; the authorities confronted mounting peasant discontent and an urgent need for radical reforms (Hosking 1998: 315). Hence, the regime under Alexander II (who reigned from 2 March 1855 until his assassination on 13 March 1881) initiated reforms to bridge the gap between the elite and the rest of the people and to move Russia closer to becoming a nation-state (Hosking 1998: 319). His first civic strategy was to create institutions that would enable the various social and ethnic groups to articulate and defend their interests and participate in the political process. Thus, the creation of zemstvos in 1864 and municipal councils in 1870 gave Russia for the first time a proper network of elective local government assemblies (Hosking 1998: 319). The second strategy for change was an ethnic strategy: to try and bring the people and the empire closer together by making Russians more conscious of their national identity and non-Russians more like Russians. That was the policy pursued intermittently by Alexander II and more consciously by his two successors, Alexander III and Nicholas II (Hosking 1998: 319).

In the later decades of the 19^th century, Russia’s first mass-circulation newspapers were published. This was an important development because obshchestvennost’ became an autonomous factor in public life, as information and ideas about issues of domestic concern and international politics began to spread beyond a relatively narrow circle of officials and oppositional intellectuals and reach a broader segment of the public: at first professional people, then increasingly literate shopkeepers, employees and workers (Hosking 1998: 332). In Hroch’s terminology, this was ‘Phase B’ of the development of a new national awareness: ‘the period of patriotic agitation’ (Hroch 1985:

23). Only, because of the restricted nature of politics in Russia, it was not politicians but a relatively small group of writers, editors and journalists who projected a picture of what it meant to be Russian (Hosking 1998: 332).

Alexander II’s policy of trying to bind the regime and elites closer together through the creation of a civil society had failed — or, at the very most, it had been only partly successful — and in the process it had created new dangers to internal order. The obvious alternative was to replace a civic policy with an ethnic policy to bolster political cohesion by promoting identification with the nationality whose name the empire bore, i.e. the Russian nationality (Hosking 1998: 367).

The alternative policy of Russification was introduced at the first sign of crisis, during the Polish rebellion of 1863–64 (Hosking 1998: 367).

Russification was in part a continuation of the policies that Nicholas I (r. 1825–1855) had pursued: administrative centralisation and the elimination of local privileges and other anomalies (Hosking 1998: 367). Now, however, there was a major new element: the attempt to inspire among all peoples of the empire a subjective sense of belonging to Russia, whether by the habit of using the Russian language, through reverence for Russia’s past, its culture and traditions, or through conversion to the Orthodox faith. This kind of Russian-ness did not necessarily imply abandoning altogether a localised non-Russian identity. Most practitioners of Russification saw Russian identity

as overarching, not destroying other ethnic (or ‘tribal’, as they called them) loyalties (Hosking 1998: 367).

The strict policy of Russification at the end of the 19^thcentury and beginning of the 20^th century, accompanied by the acceleration of industrialisation and secularisation of Russian society, in fact provoked strong opposition — the nationalisation of the liberation movements along the national borders of the empire (Bezarov 2015: 10). In this context, it is understandable why Lithuanian Karaites, living in an environment where many were advocating a national liberation movement for Lithuania or Poland, had a stronger national identity than did Karaites in the central parts of Russia, e.g. Crimean Karaites in Moscow (see more in the chapter ‘National Romanticism’).

What Karaites Had to Say about Their Identity and Ethnic Origin Reformatory and De-Judification Tendencies among Karaites in the 1870s

Two anonymous Karaite reformatory articles were published in the Russian newspaper Novorossiyskie vedomosti in 1870. One of the articles, ‘Neskol'ko slov o karaimakh’ [Few Words About the Karaites], suggested abolishing the celebration of Purim, because it was a Jewish tradition. The author of another reformatory article, ‘Koe-chto o karaimakh’ [Something About the Karaites], stated that the Karaite religion, Judaism, and the Karaite clergy who support it were the main reasons for the backwardness of the Karaites. The Karaite people, in his view, were inseparably connected with Russia and, therefore, they should have live in unity with Russian people, rather than standing apart from them. However, according to the author, this was only possible by getting rid of the influence of Judaism and of its clergy. The author was also quite sceptical of the holy language of the Karaites and of the system of its teaching as well as outdated notions, in his view, found in the Bible. Referring to Zhurnal Ministerstva Narodnogo Prosveshcheniya (1846),⁵⁸ the author stated that the Karaites were not Jews. That was why they did not have to adhere religiously to Judaism, which belonged to the Jewish people. He proposed several reforms: to substitute the teaching of religious law in Hebrew for Russian, to close Karaite midrashim and allow Karaite children to study in schools providing a general education, to abolish all religious festive traditions, which constrained freedom of action of the Karaites, to discard religious restrictions on food, to pray in Russian in order to understand one’s prayers and to cease remaining apart from other peoples and thereby seeming backward (‘Koe-chto o Karaimakh’ 1870:

66).

58 In fact, the article was published in Zhurnal Ministerstva Vnutrennih Del in 1846, not in Narodnogo Prosveshcheniya. Moreover, it was a copy of the article ‘Evreyskiya religioznyya sekty’ from 1846, apparently written

To the best of my knowledge, these two newspaper articles from 1870 are the earliest evidence of the beginnings of a process of de-Judification of the Karaites. The fact that they were published in a Russian newspaper, and not in a Karaite newspaper, also reflects the character and aim of the message to reform or even abolish old-fashioned Jewish traditions and to become more integrated with Russian society. The authors felt the Karaite conservative religion to be a burden not appropriate (in their opinion) to life in a ‘progressive’ society. They associated the Karaite religion and traditions either with backwardness or with ‘Jewishness’, which they wanted to get rid of. The most interesting fact for this study is that one of the articles stated that the Karaites were not Jews.

The authors were probably young secularised Karaites. We do not know the extent to which the authors' views were supported or opposed in Karaite society (I have not found any feedback on these articles). From the articles, we know that there was opposition to such a reformatory and de-Judification stream of thought among the Karaite religious clergy. However, the articles show that anti-Jewish and de-Judification tendencies started in Karaite society no later than the 1870s.

First Seraya Szapszał Publication on the Khazar Theory (1896)

One of the first Karaites who strongly supported the Khazar theories at the end of the 19^th century was then a young Karaite named Seraya Szapszał (1873–1961),⁵⁹ a person who later played a key role in the formation of the Karaite Turkic identity in the 20^th century. His conception of the Khazar origin of Karaites became firmly established in Karaite literature after Szapszał was elected to the office of hakham in Taurida and Odessa in 1915–1917 and then assumed the post of Polish-Lithuanian hakham in 1927 (Kizilov 2011:143; Kizilov 2009) (See next chapter). But at that time, Szapszał published his ideas in the brochure ‘Karaimy i Chufut Kale’ [Karaites and Chufut Kale] in 1896 when he was a student of Oriental Languages at St. Petersburg University (Szapszał 1896).

First of all, he regretted that people still continued to judge the Karaites on the basis of their religion, in other words, considering them to be Jews and ignoring their way of life, language and [anthropological] type.⁶⁰

In his article, he pointed out the main arguments for why the Karaites were ethnically distinct from the Jews. He would develop such arguments later in the 20^th century as well.

His first argument had to do with the Karaite physical type. He referred to Grigoriev's anonymous article ‘Evreyskiya religioznyya sekty’ (1846: 30–31), claiming that the Karaites lacked a ‘particular Jewish kind of face, which always had allowed recognising [sic] any Israelite from a person of any other nation’ (Szapszał 1993: 13).

59 On the biography and activities of Seraya Szapszał, see Kizilov 2009a; Kizilov 2002: 255–273; Shapira 2002;

Petrov-Dubinkiy 2007: 64–78; Prokhorov, Kizilov 2008: 396–400; Shapira 2008. See the appendix ‘Biographies’.

60 Szapszał 1896, reprinted in Szapszał 1993.

His second argument had to do with the Karaites’ Turkic language, which, according to him, the Karaites had not adopted from Tatars, but had spoken before any contacts with the Crimean Tatars (Szapszał 1993: 13). Szapszał referred to Smirnov (Smirnov 1887; Smirnov 1890) and his discussion of archaisms in the Karaite language. He also referred to Avne Zikkaron by Firkovich (1872: 211), with Firkovich allegedly having found copies of Karaite inscriptions in the Turkic language on graves in Mangup dated from the 9^th century. Smirnov had also mentioned the existence of such inscriptions in Turkic. However, they remained unknown to other scholars (see the previous chapter). Referring to Firkovich’s (1872) and Chwolson’s (1884: 467) works, Szapszał listed the Karaite Turkic names of the pre-Tatar period, such as Bakhshi or Bakshi, Tokhtamysh, Bikeche, Mamuk and others on graves dating back to 413–821 CE (Szapszał 1993: 14).⁶¹ Chwolson wrote that the Karaites had used Turkic names at least starting from the 8^th century (Chwolson 1865:

46–47).⁶²

Szapszał’s final argument was that Karaites had not married other peoples during those centuries. However, referring to the Russian writer Smirnov (1890), Kondaraki (1873 and 1875), Livanov (1874) and a Karaite named Sinani (1888), he noted that there had ‘occurred a complete [ethnic – D.M.] assimilation’ between Karaites and Khazars (Szapszał 1993).

Szapszał was most likely the first Karaite who implicitly and completely supported ideas about the Khazar role in the Karaite ‘ethnogenesis’ and the complete assimilation of both peoples.

He based his opinion on Firkovich's materials and on earlier conclusions found in works by Russian scholars. It is not known if there were other Karaites at that time who supported theories on the ethnic merger of the Khazars with the Karaites. Sinani, for instance, wrote that the Karaites married foreigners. However, he did not specify who they were (see next section of this chapter). Szapszał ideas became very influential later.

Karaite Supporters of their Semitic Origin, as the Russian Scholar Shugurov Testifies Despite the fact that all Karaite authors totally supported the authenticity of Firkovich's sources, in contrast to the above-mentioned Russian scholars, not all Karaites accepted the Russian scholars' theories on their ethnic origin at the end of the 19^th century. Not all Karaite writers started rethinking their ethnic origin or were ready to give up their Semitic identity and claim a Turkic origin for their people at the time.

We find evidence on the Semitic identity of the Karaites in an article by a Russian writer Shugurov ‘History of Jews in Russia’ (1894), mentioned in the previous chapter. The author stated

61 Chwolson indeed mentioned these names found on monuments in Chufut-Kale. See Chwolson 1865: 116, 309, 488–

507.62 However, Samoylovich and other scholars disputed the notion that the names on the monuments were no older than

that a Turkic origin for the Karaites was first proposed by scholars, but most Karaite intellectuals did not accept such a notion at first:

Some scholars, Neumann (1847) for instance, consider the Karaites to be descendants of the ancient Khazars; but the Karaites themselves by all possible means, oral traditions, documents and antiquities, tried to defend their Jewish origin... According to Rabbi Solomon Beim, his people had settled in Crimea already before the destruction of Jerusalem... Few descendants of Annan ... consider themselves to be true Jews. (Shugurov 1894: 178) (my italics and translation)

The earliest evidence of Karaite insights into their ethnicity and identity can be found in the works of four Karaite authors from the second half of the 19^th century and beginning of the 20^th century: Solomon Beim (1862), Isaak O. Sinani (1888), Yu.D. Kokizov (1900) and S. Prik (1902).

As Phillip Miller wrote, they ‘reflect the outlook and values of their author’s generation and provide the literary basis upon which subsequent generations of Eastern European Karaites based their identity’. (Miller 1993: 51, ref. 2).

A Karaite hakham named Solomon Beim (1819–1867)⁶³ supported Firkovich’s sources, interpreting them in his book Memory about Chufut-Kale (1862) in a similar way as the above-mentioned Russian researchers. But he made an important stipulation that he did not consider the Karaites to be descendants of the Khazars. He stated that the Crimean Karaites had always had an oral tradition about their early settlement on the peninsula, but they could not disclose it to the general public because it lacked a clear argument and supporting evidence. That is why, according to him, when the Karaites talked about their origin, they were usually criticised by non-Karaite scholars, who had another view on the matter and linked them to the Khazars, Sadducees, Sofets and others (Beim 1862: 22). However, in Beim’s opinion, the situation had changed when Firkovich found the old Jewish manuscripts (meaning the Madjalis Scroll in particular),⁶⁴ which supported the oral tradition.

Like the first articles by the Russian authors, the Karaite Solomon Beim also believed that those ancient Crimean Jewish communities that had settled in Crimea before the destruction of the Second Temple had not heard about the Talmudists until Rabbanites sent their missionaries to the peninsula.

Just like the above-mentioned Russian scholars, Beim concluded from Firkovich's findings that Yitzhak ha-Sangari had converted the Khazars to ‘pure Judaism’ in approximately 200 BC;⁶⁵ and that the Khazars had established synagogues in Crimea with the help of the ancient Jewish community living there. Beim also pointed out that those Judeans, i.e. Karaites, borrowed the language and many female names from the Khazars because they lived a long time in the same neighbourhood (Beim 1862: 25).

63 See the appendix ‘Biographies’.

64 The Madjalis document, the manuscript from Karasubazar and the manuscript from Chufut-Kale were all discovered by Firkovich in 1840 (Beim 1862: 28).

65 Beim referred to the translation of the manuscripts found by Firkovich into Russian at the end of his book (Beim 1862: 28).

Thus, having based his opinion on Firkovich’s findings and referred to the close relationship between the Karaites and Khazars and their non-Talmudic Judaism, Beim strongly opposed the idea of a Khazarian ethnic origin for the Karaites. He only mentioned that the Karaites had borrowed Khazar female names.

More than two decades later, another Karaite, Isaak Sinani (1888), was sure that in spite of the doubts voiced by the Karaites' enemies, ‘the stones’ found by Firkovich showed clearly that Karaite settlement of the Crimean Peninsula was very ancient. Sinani was convinced that a new-born science, palaeography, would have confirmed the matter (Sinani 1888: 94). In contrast to the other mentioned authors, Sinani was silent about the Khazars, but he noted an interesting detail that after the Tatar invasion of Crimea, the Karaite community experienced intellectual stagnation during the ensuing period of hardships, and hence they married foreigners, being unaware of the Karaite religious law, which prohibited that (Sinani 1888).

The Karaite Solomon Prik (1902) also supported Firkovich's findings and the theory of the ancient settlement of the Karaites of the peninsula (Sinani 1888: 94). But he did not discuss the Khazars.

The Karaite scholar Yu.D. Kokizov analysed Firkovich’s sources more carefully and wrote on the history of the Karaite settlement of the Crimean Peninsula (Kokizov 1900). But Kokizov denied that the Karaites were direct descendants of the Khazars. He considered this assumption to be absolutely groundless:

Karaites have never been Khazars and they do not descend from them, but they have always existed independently as a particular people. (Kokizov 1900: 13) (my translation)

He only emphasised the friendship between the Khazars and Karaites:

The truth is only that both peoples existed in solidarity and mutual sympathy, which is supported by the old manuscripts from the Imperial Public Library. (Kokizov 1900: 13) (my translation)

His view is close to Firkovich’s view. However, despite his argument that the ‘Karaites were never Khazars’, Kokizov was also tempted to state that the remnants of the Judeo-Khazars were included in the Karaite community and had merged with them completely and assumed the name Karaites (Kokizov 1900: 13, ref. 14 to Lerner 1867). Therefore, Kokizov took a controversial stand.

On the one hand, he believed that Karaites were Jews and had never been Khazars and had always existed as a distinct people. On the other hand, he repeated the statements of the Russian scholars that the Judeo-Khazars had genetically merged with the Karaites.

Kokizov drew his conclusions about the arrival of the Karaites on the Crimean Peninsula also based on the Madjalis Scroll. He supposed that they had come from Asia through Persia and the Caucasus, where they had borrowed a Turkic language and Turkic and Persian names (he referred to the Karaite grave monuments of the first centuries CE). He maintained that it was not a one-time-only arrival, but that they had come to Crimea earlier than had the Khazars and Tatars, before more

In document A Case of Cultural Nationalism in Eastern Europe : Karaite Studies and Their Role in the Development of a Karaite Identity in the 19th–21st Centuries (sivua 79-109)