The folly of the Moldovian ‘Righteous’ Speaking
A little over a week ago I had a post up with the video of a Moldovan Priest and his parishioners going postal over a Menorah put up by the local Jewish community in the public square for Chanukah.
It is not often we – the North American descendents of Eastern Europeans – get to see first hand the classic and apparently enduring face of Christian ‘Old European’ styled anti-Semitism in action. The Moldovan Orthodox Church has come in for some heavy criticism internationally and the Moldovan government has been embarrassed publicly among the community of nations for this form of Christian fascism and has promised a clampdown of sorts. Although, I suspect the government won’t easily be re-making the Moldovian Church hierarchy into a silk purse any time soon.
The Moldovan Orthodox Church on Wednesday blamed the local Jewish community for the recent rally in which a public menorah was torn down and a cross was put in its place. During the December 13th incident, dozens of people led by an Orthodox priest smashed a menorah in Moldova’s capital Chisinau, using hammers and iron bars to remove the candelabra during Hanukkah.
The 1.5 meter (5-foot)-tall ceremonial candelabrum was retrieved and reinstalled. The national government said in a statement that “hatred, intolerance and xenophobia” are unacceptable. According to a report, published Monday by the Russian Interfax news agency, the church said in a statement, “We believe that this unpleasant incident in the center of the capital could have been avoided if the menorah had been placed near a memorial for victims of the Holocaust.”
The church said it opposed the form of the protest, and that it respects “the feelings and belief of other cults that are legally registered on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, and expects a similar attitude from their side,” according to the report.
“At the same time,” the statement continued, “we think it inappropriate to put a symbol of the Jewish cult in a public place connected to the history and faith of our people, especially because Chanukah is classified by the cult books of Judaism as a ‘holiday of blessing’ that symbolizes the victory of Jews over non-Jews.”
‘Jewish cult, ‘cult books of Judaism’. Oy vey.
This story has a political background. As I understand it they had recent elections in which Russian Orthodox Church sided with the Communists. Communists lost to the “liberals” (not the same meaning as in Canada). The newly formed government authorized Menorah to be placed in the centre of Kishenev and then the whole fuss broke out.
Should be noted that the government has nothing to be embarassed about – they behaved admirably throughout. Both the communists and the church are using this incident to attack the government; quite likely that was the whole purpose of the incident.
The irony here is that
1. Church claims that it was upset by having Menorah next to St Stephan memorial.
2. St Stephan was a medieval patron of Jews; he even had Jewish ministers.
Anyway, it’s a nice way to mark the ~century since the Kishenev pogroms, the bloodiest of them all. Byalik wrote his poem about one of Kishenev pogroms; it was later translated into Russian by Zhabotinski and inspired the revisionst zionist movement.
And btw, this gentleman who supported the Kishenev problem was made a Saint by the Russian Orthodox Church about 10 years ago:
http://shlemazl.blogspot.com/2009/07/saint-john-of-kronstadt.html
I heard hints of a political backdrop to this story but I do not have any kind of grasp on Moldovian politics to really comment so thanks for fleshing out the political. Although, regardless of the Church’s political angst, the fact it manifests its protest as an attack on a ‘Jewish cult symbol’ reveals a distinctly warped pathology.