ZIONIST Protocols (Latest issues)

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (Latest issues)

A reproduction of the 1905 Russian edition by Serge Nilus, appearing in Praemonitus Praemunitus (1920).

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a series of articles

The Protocols of the (Learned) Elders of Zion (Russian: "Протоколы сионских мудрецов" or "Сионские протоколы") is one of many titles given to a text purporting to describe a plan to achieve global domination by the Jewish people. Following its first public publication in 1903 in the Russian Empire, numerous independent investigations have repeatedly proved the writing to be a hoax; notably, a series of articles printed in The Times in 1921 revealed that much of the material was directly plagiarized from earlier works of political satire unrelated to Jews. Nevertheless, some people continue to view it as factual, especially in parts of the world where antisemitism, anti-Judaism, or anti-Zionism are widespread.^[1] It is frequently quoted and reprinted by anti-Semites, and is sometimes used as evidence of Jewish conspiracy, especially in the Middle East.^[2]

The Protocols are considered one of the most important examples of contemporary conspiracy theory literature, and take the form of an instruction manual to a new member of the "Elders", describing how they will run the world through control of the media and finance, replacing the traditional social order with one based on mass manipulation. The work was popularized by those opposed to the Russian communist revolutionary movement, and was disseminated further after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but achieved worldwide popularity after the 1917 Bolshevik October Revolution, when the idea that Bolshevism was a Jewish conspiracy for world domination sparked far-ranging interest in the Protocols. It was widely circulated in the West in the 1920s and 1930s, and while continued usage of the Protocols as a propaganda tool substantially diminished with the defeat of the Nazis in World War II, it still has currency in the arsenal of contemporary anti-Semitism.

Contents [hide] 1 Publication history 1.1 The Protocols in the West 2 Images of early editions of the Protocols 2.1 Title variations 3 The twenty-four protocols 4 Plagiarism Sources and Origin of the Plot 5 Literary forgery 6 Origin of content 6.1 Maurice Joly 6.2 Hermann Goedsche 7 First Russian language editions 7.1 Pavel Krushevan 7.2 Comparison between The Protocols and Maurice Joly's Dialogue in Hell 7.3 Conspiracy references 8 Historical publications, usage, and investigations 8.1 Emergence in Russia 8.1.1 Krushevan and Nilus editions 8.1.2 Stolypin's fraud investigation, 1905 8.2 The Russian Revolution and the spread of the Protocols, 1920s 8.3 English language imprints 8.4 The Times exposes a forgery, 1921 8.5 German language publications 8.6 Middle East 9 The Berne Trial, 1934–1935 9.1 South Africa 9.2 Germany 9.2.1 Fascist 10 Contemporary imprints 11 See also 12 References 13 Further reading 14 External links 14.1 Notable web resources

Publication history

The Protocols appeared in print in the Russian Empire as early as 1903. The anti-Semitic tract was published in Znamya, a Black Hundreds newspaper owned by Pavel Krushevan, as a serialized set of articles. It appeared again in 1905 as a final chapter (Chapter XII) of a second edition of Velikoe v malom i antikhrist (The Great in the Small & Antichrist), a book by Serge Nilus. In 1906 it appeared in pamphlet form edited by G. Butmi.^[1]

These first three (and subsequently more) Russian language imprints were published and circulated in the Russian Empire during 1903–1906 period as a tool for scapegoating Jews, blamed by the monarchists for the defeat in the Russo-Japanese War and the 1905 Russian Revolution. Common to all three texts is the idea that Jews aim for world domination. Since The Protocols are presented as merely a document, the front matter and back matter are needed to explain its alleged origin. The diverse imprints, however, are mutually inconsistent. The general claim is that the document was stolen from a secret Jewish organization. Since the alleged original stolen manuscript does not exist, one is forced to restore a purported original edition. This has been done by the Italian scholar, Cesare G. De Michelis in 1998, in a work which was translated into English and published in 2004, where he treats his subject as Apocrypha.^[2][3] As fiction in the genre of literature the tract was further analyzed by Umberto Eco by his word, Foucault's Pendulum in 1988, and in English translation in 1989, and in 1994 in chapter 6, "Fictional Protocols", of his Six Walks in the Fictional Woods.

As the 1917 Russian Revolution unfolded, causing white Russians to flee to the West, this text was carried along and assumed a new purpose. Until then The Protocols remained obscure;^[4] it was now an instrument for blaming Jews for the Russian Revolution. It was now a tool, a political weapon used against the Bolshevikis who were depicted as overwhelmingly Jews, allegedly executing the "plan" embodied in The Protocols. The purpose was to discredit the October Revolution, prevent the West from recognizing the Soviet Union, and bring the downfall of Vladimir Lenin's regime. In that regard, The Protocols failed to achieve their aim.^[2][3]

It was first published in the United States in the English language in 1919 as two newspaper articles in the Philadelphia Public Ledger by journalist Carl W. Ackerman, but all references to Jews were replaced by references to Bolsheviks and Bolshevism.^[5]

The book has two titles in Russian: Сионские протоколы (Sionskiye protokoly, lit. "Protocols of Zion") and Протоколы сионских мудрецов (Protokoly sionskih mudretsov, lit. "Protocols of the Sages of Zion"). In other languages it has been published with many titles. For example, the first American English language edition, published in Boston in 1920 by Small, Maynard & Company, has the full title: The Protocols and World Revolution Including a Translation and Analysis of the "Protocols of the Meetings of the Zionist Men of Wisdom". Only pages 11 through 73 contain the so-called Protocols. The word "Zion" in this edition is not used and the word "Zionist" is employed. This contrasts to a similar practice of the prior Russian editions. For example, in 1905, Sergei Nilus' book The Big within the Small, on the imminent arrival of the anti-Christ, the Protocols constituted the final twelfth chapter.

A serialized commentary was subsequently published in the United States in 1920, under the title, The International Jew, in The Dearborn Independent, a newspaper owned and controlled by Henry Ford. And these series were subsequently collected and published as four pamphlets, under the same general title as in the newspaper.

The Protocols in the West

In the United States The Protocols are to be understood in the context of the Red scare, the First Red Scare (1917–1920). The text circulated in 1919 in American government circles, specifically diplomatic and military, in typescript form, a copy of which is archived by the Hoover Institute.^[6] It also appeared in 1919 in the Public Ledger as a pair of serialized newspaper articles. But all references to "Jews" were replaced with references to Bolsheviki as an expose by the journalist and subsequently highly respected Columbia University School of Journalism dean.^[7]

By 1920 several diverse editions and imprints appeared in the Russian language, but it appeared that year in English translation under different titles; in London, published by Eyre & Spottiswoode, under the title The Jewish Peril; in Boston, published by Small, Maynard & Company, under the title The Protocols and World Revolution; and in New York City, published by The Beckwith Company, under the slogan or lead title Praemonitus Praemunitus. Each was originally edited anonymously, but the editors are now known to have been George Shanks, Boris Brasol, and Harris A. Houghton, respectively, working on three independent imprints. The last two American editions are translations from Serge Nilus' 1917 fourth edition, titled It Is Near, At the Door (title translation by Boris Brasol).

Also in 1920 two commentaries or secondary sources were published in Great Britain and the United States, titled The Cause of World Unrest, associated with the name of H. A. Gwynne (editor of The Morning Post), and The International Jew, associated with the name of Henry Ford.

In 1923 there appeared an anonymously edited pamphlet by the Britons Publishing Society, a successor to The Britons, an entity created and headed by Henry Hamilton Beamish. This imprint was allegedly a translation by Victor E. Marsden, who died in October 1920.^[6]

The text is difficult to pin down in any language because it is published by different antisemitic entities, with diverse front matter and back matter, edited anonymously, alleging that the manuscript was stolen from a secret Jewish organization in Paris, France. But the original manuscript has never been found. There is no "authorized" or "standard" edition. The plot, summarized and derived from these different editions, involves a conspiracy theory alleging that Jews, and/or Masons, are aiming to "take over the world", or achieve "world domination". Most versions, however, substantially involve "protocols", or minutes of a speech given in secret involving Jews who are organized as Elders, or Sages, of Zion,^[8] and underlies 24 protocols that are supposedly followed by the Jewish people. The Protocols has been proven to be a literary forgery and hoax as well as a clear case of plagiarism.^{[9][10][11][12][13]}

Images of early editions of the Protocols

The front piece of a 1912 edition utilizing occult symbols.	It is Near, At the Door, An edition from 1917 by Serge Nilus.	Texts drawn The Protocols appeared in the Public Ledger as anti-Bolshevik propaganda in 1919.	1920 edition from New York.
A 1934 edition by the Patriotic Publishing Company of Chicago.

Title variations

Main article: Protocols of the Elders of Zion (versions)

Diverse editions or imprints have been published under a variety of titles. Alphabetically, the list of titles used includes:

• The Illuminati Protocols
• It Is Near, At The Door
• The Jewish Peril
• The Non-Extent Manuscript
• Praemonitus Praemunitus
• The Protocols and World Revolution
• Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion
• Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion
• Protocols of the Meetings of the Zionist Men of Wisdom
• Protocols of the Sages of Zion
• Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion
• Protocols of Zion
• The War Against the Kingship of Christ
• Warrant for Genocide
• Waters Flowing Eastward

The twenty-four protocols

Houghton's 1920 imprint enumerated the twenty-four protocols in that table of contents as follows:

1. The Basic Doctrine—"Right Lies in Might"
2. Economic War and Disorganization Lead to International Government
3. Methods of Conquest
4. The Destruction of Religion by Materialism
5. Despotism and Modern Progress
6. The Acquisition of Land and the Encouragement of Speculation
7. A Prophecy of a World-wide War
8. The Transitional Government
9. The All-embracing Propaganda
10. Abolition of the Constitution; Rise of the Autocracy
11. The Constitution of Autocracy and Universal Rul
12. The Kingdom of the Press and its Control
13. Turning Public Thought from Essentials to Non-Essentials
14. The Destruction of Religion as a Prelude to the Rise of the Jewish God
15. Utilization of Masonry; Heartless Suppression of Enemies
16. The Nullification of Education
17. The Fate of Lawyers and the Clergy
18. The Organization of Disorder
19. Mutual Understanding Between Rulers and People
20. The Financial Program of Destruction and Construction
21. Domestic Loans and Government Credit
22. The Beneficence of Jewish Rule
23. The Inculcation of Obedience
24. The Jewish Ruler

Plagiarism Sources and Origin of the Plot

Based on evidence repeatedly corroborated by British, German, Ukrainian, Polish and Russian sources over a 75 year period, The Protocols, far from being a document "stolen" from Jews as it was claimed to be, was in fact a forgery fabricated sometime between 1895 and 1902 (exact date unknown) by Matvei Golovinski, a Russian journalist and member of the antisemitic Святое Братство ("Holy Brotherhood")^{[citation needed]}. Also implicated in creation of the forgery was Pyotr Ivanovich Rachkovsky, head of the Paris office of the Russian Secret Police during the same time period.^{[14] [15]}

The source material for the forgery was the synthesis of an 1864 book of fiction by French political satirist Maurice Joly entitled Dialogue aux enfers entre Machiavel et Montesquieu (Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu) and a chapter from a 1868 book of fiction entitled "Biarritz" by antisemitic German novelist Hermann Goedsche, which had been translated into Russian in 1872.^[16]

Joly's book was written as a veiled attack on the political ambitions of Napoleon III. In the book, Napoleon III was represented by Machaivelli^[17] and was depicted as secretly plotting to rule the world. Joly's book was based on a popular novel of the time entitled Les Mystères Du Peuple (The Mysteries of the People) by Eugène Sue, which also described a secret conspiracy to rule the world although, in Sue's version, the plotters were the Jesuits. Neither the Joly version of the story nor the original Sue version of the story contained any reference to the Jews.

In creating The Protocols forgery, Golovinski and Rachkovsky took Joly's novel and changed the plotters a third time. The original fictitious story by Eugene Sue of secret world domination by the Jesuits, which was then changed by Maurice Joly to the story of a secret plot for world domination by Napoleon III, was now changed by Golovinski and Rachkovsky to the story of a secret plot for world domination by the Jews. The forgery was named The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and published as a recently "discovered" document. The current belief is that the forgery was initiated and authorized by factions of the Russian aristocracy opposed to the political and social reforms initiated by the previous Tsar (Alexander II). The document was fabricated with the goal of convincing the antisemitic Tsar Nicholas II to oppose any additional reforms, since all reforms would play into the hands of this just uncovered "secret Jewish plot". Once the Russian Revolution began in 1905, however, the use of the forgery changed. The same group, now part of the White Movement, disseminated the document during their 18 year fight against the Bolsheviks in an attempt to link the Bolsheviks and the Red Army to the fictitious conspiracy.

Literary forgery

The forgery contains numerous elements typical of what is known in literature as a "False Document": a document that is deliberately written to fool the reader into believing that what is written is truthful and accurate even though, in actuality, it is not.^[2] It is also one of the best-known and most-discussed examples of literary forgery, with analysis and proof of its fraudulent origin going as far back as 1921.^[18] The forgery is also an early example of "Conspiracy Theory" literature.^[19] Written mainly in the first person plural,^[20] the text embodies generalizations, truisms and platitudes on how to take over the world: take control of the media and the financial institutions, change the traditional social order, etc. It does not contain specifics.

Origin of content

The text borrows or plagiarizes multiple sources.

Maurice Joly

Elements of the text in the Protocols were plagiarized from the 1864 book, Dialogue aux enfers entre Machiavel et Montesquieu (Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu), written by the French satirist Maurice Joly. Joly's work attacks the political ambitions of Napoleon III using Machiavelli as a diabolical plotter in Hell as a stand-in for Napoleon's views^[21]. In the book, Machiavelli describes a series of steps that he intends to take to become ruler of the world.

Since it was illegal to criticize the monarchy, Joly had the pamphlet printed in Belgium, then tried to smuggle it back into France. The police confiscated as many copies as they could, and it was banned. After it was traced to Joly, he was tried on April 25, 1865, and sentenced to 15 months in prison at Sainte-Pelagie. Joly committed suicide in 1878.

The Joly book was in turn based on material borrowed from a popular novel of the time by Eugène Sue titled The Mysteries of the People, in which those plotting to rule the world were the Jesuits instead of Napoleon III. Neither the Joly book nor the Sue book mentioned either Jews or Masons.

Hermann Goedsche

Hermann Goedsche's 1868 novel, Biarritz (in English as To Sedan) contributed another idea that may have inspired the scribe behind the Protocols. In the chapter, "The Jewish Cemetery in Prague and the Council of Representatives of the Twelve Tribes of Israel", Goedsche wrote about a nocturnal meeting between members of a mysterious rabbinical cabal, describing how at midnight, the Devil appears before those who have gathered on behalf of the Twelve Tribes of Israel to plan a "Jewish conspiracy". His depiction is also similar to the scene in Alexandre Dumas, père's Joseph Balsamo, where Cagliostro and company plot the affair of the diamond necklace. With Biarritz appearing at about the same time as The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu, it is possible that Goedsche was inspired by the ideas in Joly's pamphlet, especially in detailing the outcome of the cabal's secret meeting.^[22]

"Goedsche was a postal clerk and a spy for the Prussian secret police. He had been forced to leave the postal work due to his part in forging evidence in the prosecution against the Democratic leader Benedict Waldeck in 1849."^[23] Following his dismissal, Goedsche began a career as a conservative columnist, while also producing literary work under the pen name Sir John Retcliffe.^[24] In 1871, the story was being presented in France as serious history. In 1872, "The Jewish Cemetery in Prague", translated into Russian, appeared in St. Petersburg as a separate pamphlet of purported non-fiction. François Bournand, in his Les Juifs et nos contemporains (1896), reproduced a speech from the chapter as that of a Chief Rabbi "John Readcliff".

First Russian language editions

Pavel Krushevan

Pavel Krushevan published The Protocols in Russia in 1903

Serge Nilus, Published The Protocols in 1905

The book typically consists of 24 to 27 paragraphs or sections titled "Protocols". It has been published and distributed in many forms: manuscript, periodical, booklet, book and via the internet. It was first edited and disseminated to the public in 1903 by Pavel Krushevan, the instigator of the Kishinev pogrom. It was re-published in 1906-1907 by the Union of the Russian People, a part of the pro-Tsarist antisemitic group The Black Hundreds, as a pamphlet titled Enemies of the Human Race. The pamphlet was published specifically to blame the Jews for Russia's defeat in the Russo-Japanese War. It was similarly used in opposition to the Russian Revolution of 1905, the October Revolution (1917), and the peace negotiations at the end of World War I, becoming known worldwide during the 1919-1920 period when it was widely circulated in the West.

Comparison between The Protocols and Maurice Joly's Dialogue in Hell

The Protocols 1–19 closely follow the order of Maurice Joly's The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu 1–17. In some places, the plagiarism is incontrovertible to any observer, trained or not. For example:

Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu	The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
How are loans made? By the issue of bonds entailing on the Government the obligation to pay interest proportionate to the capital it has been paid. Thus, if a loan is at 5%, the State, after 20 years, has paid out a sum equal to the borrowed capital. When 40 years have expired it has paid double, after 60 years triple: yet it remains debtor for the entire capital sum. — Montesquieu, Dialogues, p. 209	A loan is an issue of Government paper which entails an obligation to pay interest amounting to a percentage of the total sum of the borrowed money. If a loan is at 5%, then in 20 years the Government would have unnecessarily paid out a sum equal to that of the loan in order to cover the percentage. In 40 years it will have paid twice; and in 60 thrice that amount, but the loan will still remain as an unpaid debt. — Protocols, p. 77
Like the god Vishnu, my press will have a hundred arms, and these arms will give their hands to all the different shades of opinion throughout the country. — Machiavelli, Dialogues, p. 141	These newspapers, like the Indian god Vishnu, will be possessed of hundreds of hands, each of which will be feeling the pulse of varying public opinion. — Protocols, p. 43
Now I understand the figure of the god Vishnu; you have a hundred arms like the Indian idol, and each of your fingers touches a spring. — Montesquieu, Dialogues, p. 207	Our Government will resemble the Hindu god Vishnu. Each of our hundred hands will hold one spring of the social machinery of State. — Protocols, p. 65

In addition to mentioning Vishnu, improbable in the Jewish religious literature, and the lack of Talmudic citations that would be expected in it, textual references to the "King of the Jews", the semi-messianic idea that carries strong connotations of Jesus, further suggest the author was not well-versed in Jewish culture, as this term has been avoided in the Judaic tradition since the schism between Judaism and Christianity.^[25]

In 1921, when Philip Graves published articles in The Times which showed the writers of the Protocols had plagiarized from the Dialogue, it became clear that the Protocols was not an authentic document.^[26]

Conspiracy references

The idea that the Freemasons formed part of an anti-Christian conspiracy, either separate from or in association with Jews, long predated the spreading of The Protocols. In the late 18th-early 19th centuries, Freemasonry was popular (as were many fraternal organizations), and its most significant opponent, the Roman Catholic Church, opposed its open support for freedom of religion and enlightenment ideals.

After some interaction with Masons, a Scottish natural philosopher John Robison became an enthusiastic conspiracy theorist and expanded on his impressions in his 1797 pamphlet Proofs of a Conspiracy against all the Religions and Governments of Europe, carried on in the secret meetings of Freemasons, Illuminati and Reading Societies. He did not take into account that French masons were members of several mutually hostile factions and that many of them were executed by their rivals. Robison's work does not mention Jews. Jesuit priest Augustin Barruél had some contact with Robison, but extended the notion to include Jews.^{[citation needed]} He had accused the Jews of founding the Bavarian Illuminati.^{[citation needed]}

According to Daniel Pipes,

The great importance of The Protocols lies in its permitting antisemites to reach beyond their traditional circles and find a large international audience, a process that continues to this day. The forgery poisoned public life wherever it appeared; it was "self-generating; a blueprint that migrated from one conspiracy to another."^[27] The book's vagueness — almost no names, dates, or issues are specified — has been one key to this wide-ranging success. The purportedly Jewish authorship also helps to make the book more convincing. Its embrace of contradiction — that to advance, Jews use all tools available, including capitalism and communism, philo-Semitism and antisemitism, democracy and tyranny — made it possible for The Protocols to reach out to all: rich and poor, Right and Left, Christian and Muslim, American and Japanese.^[28]

Pipes notes that the Protocols emphasizes recurring themes of conspiratorial antisemitism: "Jews always scheme", "Jews are everywhere", "Jews are behind every institution", "Jews obey a central authority, the shadowy 'Elders'", and "Jews are close to success."^[29]

The Protocols is widely considered influential in the development of other conspiracy theories, and reappears repeatedly in contemporary conspiracy literature, such as Jim Marrs' Rule by Secrecy. Some recent editions proclaim that the "Jews" depicted in the Protocols are a cover identity for other conspirators such as the Illuminati,^[30] Freemasons, the Priory of Sion, or even, in the opinion of David Icke, "extra-dimensional entities." Other groups that believe in the authenticity of the Protocols have claimed that the book does not depict the way that Jews think and act, but only those belonging to an alleged secret elite group of Zionists, and that the "Elders" were not Rabbis, but secular Zionist leaders.

Historical publications, usage, and investigations

Emergence in Russia

The chapter "In the Jewish Cemetery in Prague" from Goedsche's Biarritz, with its strong antisemitic theme containing the alleged rabbinical plot against the European civilization, was translated into Russian as a separate pamphlet in 1872.^[16] In 1921 Princess Catherine Radziwill gave a private lecture in New York. She claimed that the Protocols were a forgery compiled in 1904-1905 by Russian journalists Matvei Golovinski and Manasevich-Manuilov at the direction of Pyotr Rachkovsky, Chief of the Russian secret service in Paris.^[15] Golovinski worked together with Charles Joly (son of Maurice Joly) at Le Figaro in Paris. This account, however, contradicts basic chronology of Protocols publication, as they were already published in 1903 in the newspaper Znamya. Catherine Radziwill was previously convicted of forging Cecil Rhodes' signature on a promissory note. She also authored numerous gossip and propaganda books. In 1935 Radziwill repeated her statement as a witness at the Berne Trial.

In 1944 German writer Konrad Heiden identified Golovinski as an author of the Protocols.^[30] Radziwill's account was supported by Russian historian Mikhail Lepekhine, who published his findings in November 1999 in the French newsweekly L'Express.^[31] Lepekhine considers the Protocols a part of a scheme to persuade Tsar Nicholas II that the modernization of Russia was really a Jewish plot to control the world. Ukrainian scholar Vadim Skuratovsky offers extensive literary, historical and linguistic analysis of the original text of the Protocols and traces the influences of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's prose (in particular, The Grand Inquisitor and The Possessed) on Golovinski's writings, including the Protocols.^[32]

In his book The Non-Existent Manuscript, Italian scholar Cesare G. De Michelis studies early Russian publications of the Protocols. The Protocols were first mentioned in the Russian press in April 1902, by the Saint Petersburg newspaper, Novoye Vremya (Новое Время - The New Times). The article was written by a famous conservative publicist Mikhail Menshikov as a part of his regular series "Letters to Neighbors" ("Письма к ближним") and was titled "Plots against Humanity". The author described his meeting with a lady (Yuliana Glinka, as it is known now) who, after telling him about her mystical revelations, implored him to get familiar with the documents later known as the Protocols; but after reading some excerpts Menshikov became quite skeptical about their origin and did not publish them.^[33]

Krushevan and Nilus editions

The Protocols were published at the earliest, in serialized form, from August 28 to September 7 (O.S.) 1903, in Znamya, a Saint Petersburg daily newspaper, under Pavel Krushevan. Krushevan had initiated the Kishinev pogrom four months earlier.^[34]

The Protocols enjoyed another wave of popularity in Russia after 1905, when progressive political elements in Russia succeeded in creating a constitution and a parliament, the Duma. The reactionary Union of the Russian People, known as the Black Hundreds, together with the Okhrana, the Tsarist secret police, blamed this liberalization on the "International Jewish conspiracy," and began a program of disseminating the Protocols^{[citation needed]} as propaganda to support the wave of pogroms that swept Russia in 1903–1906 and as a tool to deflect attention from social activism. It also was of interest to Tsar Nicholas II, who was fearful of modernization and protective of his monarchy, and he presented the growing revolutionary movement as part of a powerful world conspiracy and blamed the Jews for Russia's problems^{[citation needed]}.

In 1905, Sergei Nilus published the full text of the Protocols in Chapter XII, the final chapter (pages 305–417), of the second edition (or third, according to some sources) of his book, Velikoe v malom i antikhrist, which translates as "The Great within the Small: The Coming of the Anti-Christ and the Rule of Satan on Earth". He claimed it was the work of the First Zionist Congress, held in 1897 in Basel, Switzerland.^[35] When it was pointed out that the First Zionist Congress had been open to the public and was attended by many non-Jews, Nilus changed his story, saying the Protocols were the work of the 1902–1903 meetings of the Elders, but contradicting his own prior statement that he had received his copy in 1901:

In 1901, I succeeded through an acquaintance of mine (the late Court Marshal Alexei Nikolayevich Sukotin of Chernigov) in getting a manuscript that exposed with unusual perfection and clarity the course and development of the secret Jewish Freemasonic conspiracy, which would bring this wicked world to its inevitable end. The person who gave me this manuscript guaranteed it to be a faithful translation of the original documents that were stolen by a woman from one of the highest and most influential leaders of the Freemasons at a secret meeting somewhere in France — the beloved nest of Freemasonic conspiracy.^[36]

Nilus also may have had personal motivations for publishing them. Some have alleged that at this time he was trying to gain influence with the Royal Family. This was, it is claimed, part of a faction fight against Papus and Nizier Anthelme Philippe at the Tsarist court (Indeed, Papus was accused in 1920 of having forged the Protocols to discredit Philippe).

Stolypin's fraud investigation, 1905

A subsequent secret investigation ordered by Pyotr Stolypin, the newly appointed chairman of the Council of Ministers, came to the conclusion that the Protocols first appeared in Paris in antisemitic circles around 1897–1898.^[37] When Nicholas II learned of the results of this investigation, he requested: "The Protocols should be confiscated, a good cause cannot be defended by dirty means."^[38] Despite the order, or because of the "good cause", numerous reprints proliferated.^[34]

The Russian Revolution and the spread of the Protocols, 1920s

After the Russian Revolution, factions connected to the White movement used the Protocols to perpetrate hatred and violence against the Jews. The idea that the Bolshevik movement was a Jewish conspiracy for world domination, plus the fact that some top Bolsheviks, particularly Leon Trotsky and most of the top ranking revolutionaries were Jews, sparked worldwide interest in the Protocols.

English language imprints

On October 27 and 28, 1919, the Philadelphia Public Ledger published excerpts of an English language translation as the "Red Bible," deleting all references to the purported Jewish authorship and re-casting the document as a Bolshevik manifesto.^[39] The author of the articles was the paper's correspondent at the time, Carl W. Ackerman, who later became the head of the journalism department at Columbia University. On May 8, 1920, an article^[40] in The Times followed German translation and appealed for an inquiry into what it called "uncanny note of prophecy".

Great Britain

The first British English language edition of the Protocols was published in 1920 in London. The full title was The Jewish Peril. Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion; the translator has been subsequently discovered to be George Shanks. The most widespread English translation of the Protocols is credited (by its anonymous editor(s)) to a British correspondent for The Morning Post in Russia, Victor E. Marsden. That anonymous source further claims that Marsden was imprisoned by the Bolsheviks in the Peter and Paul Fortress, subsequently released, and returned to England. Marsden, prior to his death on October 28, 1920, had allegedly translated Chapter XII of Nilus' 1905 book on the coming of the Anti-Christ, a copy of which was at hand in the British Museum. His name does not appear in the first British imprint, issued by Eyre & Spottiswoode Ltd., nor in the second, issued by The Britons. It only first pops up in the edition issued one or two years later, in the imprint issued by the Britons Publishing Society.

In the single year of 1920, five editions sold out in England.

United States

Title page of 1920 edition from Boston.

In the United States, Henry Ford sponsored the printing of 500,000 copies, and, from 1920 to 1922, published a series of antisemitic articles titled "The International Jew: The World's Foremost Problem", in The Dearborn Independent, a newspaper he owned. In 1921, Ford cited evidence of a Jewish threat: "The only statement I care to make about the Protocols is that they fit in with what is going on. They are 16 years old, and they have fitted the world situation up to this time."^[41] In 1927, however, the courts ordered Ford to retract his publication and apologize; he complied, claiming his assistants had duped him. He remained an admirer of Nazi Germany, however.^[42]

In 1934, an anonymous editor expanded the compilation with "Text and Commentary" (pages 136–141). The production of this uncredited compilation was a 300-page book, an inauthentic expanded edition of the twelfth chapter of Nilus's 1905 on the coming of the anti-Christ. It consists of substantial liftings of excerpts of articles from Ford's antisemitic periodical The Dearborn Independent. This 1934 text circulates most widely in the English-speaking world, as well as on the internet. The "Text and Commentary" concludes with a comment on Haim Weizman's October 6, 1920 remark at a banquet: "A beneficent protection which God has instituted in the life of the Jew is that He has dispersed him all over the world". Marsden, who was dead by then, is credited with the following assertion:

It proves that the Learned Elders exist. It proves that Dr. Weizmann knows all about them. It proves that the desire for a "National Home" in Palestine is only camouflage and an infinitesimal part of the Jew's real object. It proves that the Jews of the world have no intention of settling in Palestine or any separate country, and that their annual prayer that they may all meet "Next Year in Jerusalem" is merely a piece of their characteristic make-believe. It also demonstrates that the Jews are now a world menace, and that the Aryan races will have to domicile them permanently out of Europe.^[43]

This quote occurs on page 138. On the previous page, the nameless commentator has the following: "There has been recently published a volume of Theodor Herzl's Diaries, a translation of some passages of which appeared in the Jewish Chronicle of July 14, 1922". Accordingly, the commentary must have been written at least two years after Marsden's death.

The Times exposes a forgery, 1921

The Times exposed the Protocols as a forgery on August 16–18, 1921

In 1920-1921, the history of the concepts found in the Protocols was traced back to the works of Goedsche and Jacques Crétineau-Joly by Lucien Wolf (an English Jewish journalist), and published in London in August 1921. But a dramatic expose occurred in the series of articles in The Times by its Constantinople reporter, Philip Graves, who discovered the plagiarism from the work of Maurice Joly.

According to writer Peter Grose, Allen Dulles, who was in Constantinople developing relationships in post-Ottoman political structures, discovered 'the source' of the documentation ultimately provided to The Times. Grose writes that The Times extended a loan to the source, a Russian émigré who refused to be identified, with the understanding the loan would not be repaid.^[44] Colin Holmes, a lecturer in economic history of Sheffield University, identified the émigré as Michael Raslovleff, a self-identified antisemite, who gave the information to Graves so as not to "give a weapon of any kind to the Jews, whose friend I have never been."^[45]

In the first article of Graves' series, titled "A Literary Forgery", the editors of The Times wrote, "our Constantinople Correspondent presents for the first time conclusive proof that the document is in the main a clumsy plagiarism. He has forwarded us a copy of the French book from which the plagiarism is made."^[46] The New York Times reprinted the articles on September 4, 1921.^[47] In the same year, an entire book^[48] documenting the hoax was published in the United States by Herman Bernstein. Despite this widespread and extensive debunking, the Protocols continued to be regarded as important factual evidence by antisemites.

German language publications

The first and "by far the most important"^[49] German translation was by Gottfried Zur Beek (pseudonym of Ludwig Müller von Hausen). It appeared in January 1920 as a part of a larger antisemitic tract^[50] dated 1919. After The Times discussed the book respectfully in May 1920 it became a bestseller. "The Hohenzollern family helped defray the publication costs, and Kaiser Wilhelm II had portions of the book read out aloud to dinner guests".^[51]

Alfred Rosenberg's 1923 edition^[52] "gave a forgery a huge boost".^[51]

Middle East

In the 1920s, the Protocols occasionally appeared in the Arab polemics linking Zionism and Bolshevism.^{[citation needed]} The first Arabic translations were made from the French by Arab Christians.^{[citation needed]} The first translation was published in Raqib Sahyun, a periodical of the Roman Catholic community of Jerusalem, in 1926.^{[citation needed]} Another translation made by an Arab Christian appeared in Cairo in 1927 or 1928, this time as a book. The first translation by an Arab Muslim was also published in Cairo, but only in 1951.^[53]

The Berne Trial, 1934–1935

Main article: Berne Trial

In 1934, Dr. Alfred Zander, a Swiss Nazi, published a series of articles accepting the Protocols as fact. This led to a civil lawsuit (what has come to be known as the Berne Trial) in the Amtsgericht (district court) of Berne on October 29, 1934. The plaintiffs (the Swiss Jewish Association and the Jewish Community of Berne) were represented by Georges Brunschvig and Emil Raas. Working on behalf of the defense was German anti-Semitic propagandist Ulrich Fleischhauer. On May 19, 1935, the defendants (Theodore Fischer and Silvio Schnell) were convicted of violating a Bernese statute prohibiting the distribution of "immoral, obscene or brutalizing" texts.^[54] The court declared the Protocols to be forgeries, plagiarisms, and obscene literature. Judge Walter Meyer, a Christian who had not heard of the Protocols earlier, said in conclusion:

I hope, the time will come when nobody will be able to understand how in 1935 nearly a dozen sane and responsible men were able for two weeks to mock the intellect of the Bern court discussing the authenticity of the so-called Protocols, the very Protocols that, harmful as they have been and will be, are nothing but laughable nonsense.^[34]

Vladimir Burtsev, a Russian émigré, anti-Bolshevik and anti-Fascist who exposed numerous Okhrana agents provocateurs in the early 1900s, served as a witness at the Berne Trial. In 1938 in Paris he published a book, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion: A Proved Forgery, based on his testimony.

On November 1, 1937 the defendants appealed the verdict to the Obergericht (Cantonal Supreme Court) of Berne. A panel of three judges acquitted them, holding that the Protocols, while false, did not violate the statute at issue because they were used as a means of political propaganda.^[54] The presiding judge's opinion stated, though, that the forgery of the Protocols was not questionable and expressed regret that the law did not provide adequate protection for Jews from this sort of literature. The court imposed the fees for both trials on the defendants.^[55] This decision gave grounds for later allegations that the appeal court "confirmed authenticity of the Protocols" which is contrary to the facts. A view favorable to the pro-Nazi defendants is reported in an appendix to Leslie Fry's Waters Flowing Eastward.^[56] A more scholarly work on the trial is in a 139 page monograph by Urs Lüthi.

South Africa

In an August 1934 case in Grahamstown, South Africa, a court case took place in which Rev. A. Levy sued three Greyshirts leaders (Johannes von Strauss, von Moltke, David Hermanus Olivier) and Harry Victor Inch for defamation because they published a document said to have been stolen from the Western Road Synagogue in Port Elizabeth where Rev. Levy was Minister. The document, proven at the trial to be a forgery, alleged to set out the plans of the Jews to obtain world domination on the lines of the notorious Protocols. The court awarded Rev. Levy damages totalling £1,775 (about $8,875 at the time or about $130,000 in 2005 dollars) - £1000 against Inch, £750 against Moltke and £25 against Olivier. Inch was also sentenced to six years in prison for perjury. Nahum Sokolow appeared as a witness at the trial. In what is believed to be a legal first, the Protocols was also declared to be a forgery during the trial.

Germany

The Protocols also became a part of the Nazi propaganda effort to justify persecution of the Jews. It was made required reading for German students. In The Holocaust: The Destruction of European Jewry 1933–1945, Nora Levin states that "Hitler used the Protocols as a manual in his war to exterminate the Jews":

Despite conclusive proof that the Protocols were a gross forgery, they had sensational popularity and large sales in the 1920s and 1930s. They were translated into every language of Europe and sold widely in Arab lands, the United States, and England. But it was in Germany after World War I that they had their greatest success. There they were used to explain all of the disasters that had befallen the country: the defeat in the war, the hunger, the destructive inflation.^[57]

Hitler refers to the Protocols in Mein Kampf:

... To what extent the whole existence of this people is based on a continuous lie is shown incomparably by the Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion, so infinitely hated by the Jews. They are based on a forgery, the Frankfurter Zeitung moans and screams once every week: the best proof that they are authentic. [...] the important thing is that with positively terrifying certainty they reveal the nature and activity of the Jewish people and expose their inner contexts as well as their ultimate final aims.^[58]

Hitler endorsed it in his speeches from August 1921 on, and it was studied in German classrooms after the Nazis came to power. At the height of World War II, the Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels proclaimed: "The Zionist Protocols are as up-to-date today as they were the day they were first published."^[51] In Norman Cohn's words, it served as the Nazis' "warrant for genocide".

Fascist

While the first edition of the Protocols (1921) did not have much success, in the wake of the growing alliance between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, the Protocols were re-published in Italy in 1937 by Giovanni Preziosi with an introduction by Julius Evola.

Contemporary imprints

Main article: Contemporary imprints of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion

While there is continued popularity of The Protocols in nations from South America to Asia, since the defeat of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy in WWII, governments or political leaders in most parts of the world have generally avoided claims that The Protocols represent factual evidence of a real Jewish conspiracy. The exception to this is the Middle East, where a large number of Arab and Muslim regimes and leaders have endorsed them as authentic. Past endorsements of The Protocols from Presidents Gamal Abdel Nasser and Anwar Sadat of Egypt, one of the President Arifs of Iraq, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia, and Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi of Libya, among other political and intellectual leaders of the Arab world, are echoed by 21st century endorsements from the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Ekrima Sa'id Sabri, and Hamas, to the education ministry of Saudi Arabia.^[59]

See also

Wikisource has original text related to this article: The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion

Pertinent concepts

• Black propaganda
• List of conspiracy theories
• Psychological projection
• World government
• New World Order (conspiracy theory)

Individuals

• Heidegger and Nazism

Related or similar texts

• A Racial Program for the Twentieth Century
• The permanent instruction of the Alta Vendita
• Tanaka Memorial
• The Report from Iron Mountain
• Protocols of Zion (film)

• Further reading

• Stephen Eric Bronner: A Rumor About the Jews: Reflections on Antisemitism and the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion (Oxford University Press, 2003) ISBN 0-19-516956-5
• Eisner, Will: The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. ISBN 0393060454
• Hagemeister, Michael: "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion: Between History and Fiction - Hagemeister 35 (1103)". http://ngc.dukejournals.org/cgi/reprint/35/1_103/83. Retrieved 2009-09-15.
• Hagemeister, Michael. The 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion' and the Myth of a Jewish Conspiracy in Post Soviet Russia, in: Brinks, Jan Herman; Rock, Stella; Timms, Edward (ed.): Nationalist Myths and Modern Media. Contested Identities in the Age of Globalization, London / New York 2006, pp. 243–255.
• Jacobs, Steven Leonard and Weitzman, Mark: Dismantling the Big Lie: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. (2003) ISBN 0-88125-785-0
• Luthi, Urs: Der Mythos von der Weltverschwörung: die Hetze der Schweizer Frontisten gegen Juden und Freimaurer, am Beispiel des Berner Prozesses um die "Protokolle der Weisen von Zion" (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1992), ISBN 3719011976 9783719011970, OCLC: 30002662
• Katz, Steven; Landes, Richard (eds.): Reconsidering 'The Protocols of the Elders of Zion': 100 Years After the Forgery, New York 2008 (in print)
• Kis, Danilo: The Book Of Kings And Fools in The Encyclopedia of the Dead, 1989 (Faber and Faber)
• Goldberg, Isaac: The so-called "Protocols of the Elders of Zion": a Definitive Exposure of One of the Most Malicious Lies in History (Girard, Kansas, Haldeman-Julius Publications, 1936).
• Stauber, Roni; Webman, Esther (eds.): The Protocols of the Elders of Zion - The One-Hundred Year Myth and Its Impact, Tel Aviv 2008 (in print)
• Timmerman, Kenneth R.: Preachers of Hate: Islam and the War on America (2003), Crown Forum. ISBN 1-4000-4901-6
• Wolf, Lucien: The Myth of the Jewish Menace in World Affairs or, The Truth About the Forged Protocols of the Elders of Zion (New York, The Macmillan company, 1921).
• The truth about "The Protocols" : a literary forgery (1921) The original Times articles exposing the book collected in a contemporary pamphlet.
• Bernstein, Herman (1921): The History of a Lie at Project Gutenberg As page images at archive.org Internet Archive: Details: The history of a lie, "The protocols of the wise men of Zion"; a study Archive.org. Retrieved on 2009-02-01

Bohemian Grove (New World Order)

Bohemian Grove is a 2,700-acre (1,100 ha) campground located at 20601 Bohemian Avenue, in Monte Rio, California, belonging to a private San Francisco-based men's art club known as the Bohemian Club. In mid-July each year, Bohemian Grove hosts a three-week encampment of some of the most powerful men in the world.

Introduction

The Bohemian Club's all-male membership includes artists, particularly musicians, as well as many prominent business leaders, government officials (including many former U.S. presidents), senior media executives, and people of power.^[4][5] Members may invite guests to the Grove although those guests are subject to a screening procedure. A guest's first glimpse of the Grove is typically during the "Spring Jinks", in June, preceding the main July encampment. Bohemian club members can schedule private day-use events at the Grove any time it is not being used for Club-wide purposes, and are allowed at these times to bring spouses, family and friends, though female and minor guests must be off the property by 9 or 10 p.m.^[6]

After 40 years of membership the men earn "Old Guard" status, giving them reserved seating at the Grove's daily talks, as well as other perquisites.

The Club motto is "Weaving Spiders Come Not Here", which implies that outside concerns and business deals are to be left outside. When gathered in groups, Bohemians usually adhere to the injunction, though discussion of business often occurs between pairs of members.^[2] Important political and business deals have been developed at the Grove.^[6] The Grove is particularly famous for a Manhattan Project planning meeting that took place there in September 1942, which subsequently led to the atomic bomb. Those attending this meeting, apart from Ernest Lawrence and military officials, included the president of Harvard and representatives of Standard Oil and General Electric. Grove members take particular pride in this event and often relate the story to new attendees.^[2]

History

In the 1870s, Henry "Harry" Edwards was an actor with the California Theatre Stock Company, a founding Bohemian and the head entomologist at the California Academy of Sciences.

The tradition of a summer encampment was established six years after the Bohemian Club was formed in 1872.^[2] Henry "Harry" Edwards, a well-loved founding member, announced that he was relocating to New York City to further his career. On June 29, 1878, somewhat less than 100 Bohemians gathered in the Redwoods in Marin County near Taylorville (present-day Samuel P. Taylor State Park) for an evening sendoff party in Edwards' honor.^[7] Freely flowing liquor and some Japanese lanterns put a glow on the festivities, and club members retired at a late hour to the modest comfort of blankets laid on the dense mat of Redwood needles. This festive gathering was repeated the next year, without Edwards, and became the club's annual encampment.^[8] By 1882, the members of the Club camped together at various locations in both Marin and Sonoma County, including the present-day Muir Woods and a redwood grove that once stood near Duncans Mills, several miles down the Russian River from the current location. From 1893, Bohemians rented the current location and, in 1899, purchased it from Melvin Cyrus Meeker who had developed a successful logging operation in the area.^[2] Gradually over the next decades, members of the Club purchased land surrounding the original location to the perimeter of the basin in which it resides.^[2]

Writer and journalist William Henry Irwin said of the Grove,

You come upon it suddenly. One step and its glory is over you. There is no perspective; you cannot get far enough away from one of the trees to see it as a whole. There they stand, a world of height above you, their pinnacles hidden by their topmost fringes of branches or lost in the sky.^[9]

Not long after the Club's establishment by newspaper journalists, it was commandeered by prominent San Francisco-based businessmen, who provided the financial resources necessary to acquire further land and facilities at the Grove. However, they still retained the "bohemians"—the artists and musicians—who continued to entertain international members and guests.^[2]

Membership and past attendees

The Bohemian Club is a private club; only active members of the Club (known as "Bohos" or "Grovers"^[10]) and their guests may visit the Grove. These guests have been known to include politicians and notable figures from countries outside the U.S.^[2] Particularly during the midsummer encampment, the number of guests is strictly limited due to the small size of the facilities. Nevertheless, up to 2,900 members and guests have been reported as attending some of the annual encampments.

The membership list has included every Republican U.S. president since 1923 (as well as some Democrats), many cabinet officials, directors and CEOs of large corporations including major financial institutions. Major military contractors, oil companies, banks (including the Federal Reserve), utilities (including nuclear power) and national media (broadcast and print) have high-ranking officials as club members or guests.^[11]

Facilities

The main encampment area consists of 160 acres (0.65 km²) of old-growth redwood trees over 1,000 years old, with some trees exceeding 300 feet (90 m) in height.^[12]

The primary activities taking place at the Grove are varied and expansive entertainment, such as a grand main stage and a smaller, more intimate stage. Thus, the majority of common facilities are entertainment venues, interspersed among the giant redwoods.

Camps

A Bohemian tent in the 1900s, sheltering Porter Garnett, George Sterling and Jack London

There are also sleeping quarters, or "camps" scattered throughout the grove, of which it is reported there were a total of 118 as of 2007. These camps, which are frequently patrilineal, are the principal means through which high-level business and political contacts and friendships are formed.^[2]

The pre-eminent camps are:^[2][13]

• Hill Billies (Big Business/Banking/Politics/Universities/Media);
• Mandalay (Big Business/Defense Contractors/Politics/U.S. Presidents);
• Cave Man (Think Tanks/Oil Companies/Banking/Defense Contractors/Universities/Media);
• Stowaway (Rockefeller Family Members/Oil Companies/Banking/Think Tanks);
• Uplifters (Corporate Executives/Big Business);
• Owls Nest (U.S. Presidents/Military/Defense Contractors);
• Hideaway (Foundations/Military/Defense Contractors);
• Isle of Aves (Military/Defense Contractors);
• Lost Angels (Banking/Defense Contractors/Media);
• Silverado squatters (Big Business/Defense Contractors);
• Sempervirens (California-based Corporations);
• Hillside (Military—Joint Chiefs of Staff);
• Idlewild (California-based Corporations)

Entertainment venues and gathering spots

• Grove Stage—an amphitheater with seating for 2,000 used primarily for the Grove Play production, on the last weekend of the midsummer encampment. The stage extends up the hillside, and is also home to the second largest outdoor pipe organ in the world.
• Field Circle—a bowl-shaped amphitheater used for the mid-encampment "Low Jinks" musical comedy, for "Spring Jinks" in early June and for a variety of other performances.
• Campfire Circle—has a campfire pit in the middle of the circle, surrounded by carved redwood log benches. Used for smaller performances in a more intimate setting.
• Museum Stage—a semi-outdoor venue with a covered stage. Lectures and small ensemble performances.
• Dining Circle—seating approximately 1,500 diners simultaneously.
• Clubhouse—designed by Bernard Maybeck in 1903, completed in 1904 on a bluff overlooking the Russian River;^[14] a multi-purpose dining, drinking and entertainment building; the site of the Manhattan Project planning meeting held in 1942.
• The Owl Shrine and the Lake—an artificial lake in the middle of the grove, used for the noon-time concerts and also the venue of the Cremation of Care, that takes place on the first Saturday of the encampment. It is also the location of the 12:30 p.m. daily "Lakeside Talks." These significant informal talks (many on public policy issues) have been given over the years by entertainers, professors, astronauts, business leaders, cabinet officers, CIA directors, future presidents and former presidents;^[15] these have been the subject of ongoing controversy, as the transcripts of these talks are rarely released to the public (though have been known to be used for such mundane purposes as reading for the lecturer's graduate students).

Camp Valets

Camp valets are responsible for the operation of the individual camps. The "head" valets are akin to a general manager's position at a resort, club, restaurant, or hotel. Service staff include female workers whose presence at the Grove is limited to daylight hours and to central areas close to the main gate. Male workers may be housed at the Grove within the boundaries of the camp to which they are assigned or in peripheral service areas. High-status workers stay in small private quarters but most workers are housed in rustic bunkhouses.^[2]

Symbolism and rituals

Since the founding of the club, the Bohemian Grove's mascot has been an owl, symbolizing knowledge. A 40-foot (12 m) hollow owl statue made of concrete over steel supports stands at the head of the lake in the Grove; this Owl Shrine was designed by sculptor and two-time club president Haig Patigian, and built in the 1920s.^[16] Since 1929, the Owl Shrine has served as the backdrop of the yearly Cremation of Care ceremony.^[2]

The Club's patron saint is John of Nepomuk, who legend says suffered death at the hands of a Bohemian monarch rather than disclose the confessional secrets of the queen. A large wood carving of St. John in cleric robes with his index finger over his lips stands at the shore of the lake in the Grove, symbolizing the secrecy kept by the Grove's attendees throughout its long history.^[2]

Cremation of Care

Main article: Cremation of Care

The Cremation of Care ceremony was first conducted in the Bohemian Grove at the Midsummer encampment in 1881, devised by James F. Bowman with George T. Bromley playing the High Priest.^[17] It was originally set up within the plot of the serious "High Jinks" dramatic performance on the first weekend of the summer encampment, after which the spirit of "Care", slain by the Jinks hero, was solemnly cremated. The ceremony served as a catharsis for pent-up high spirits, and "to present symbolically the salvation of the trees by the club..."^[18] The Cremation of Care was separated from the Grove Play in 1913 and moved to the first night to become "an exorcising of the Demon to ensure the success of the ensuing two weeks". The Grove Play was moved to the last weekend of the encampment.^[19]

Grove Play

Main article: List of Grove Plays

Each year, a Grove Play is performed for one night during the final weekend of the summer encampment. The play is a large-scale musical theatrical production, written and composed by club members, involving some 300 people, including chorus, cast, stage crew and orchestra.^[20] The first Grove Play was performed in 1902; during the war years 1943–1945 the stage was dark. In 1975, an observer estimated that the Grove Play cost between $20,000–30,000, an amount that would be as high as $121,000 in today's dollars.^[20]

[edit] Protests and controversies

With its combination of wealth and power, Bohemian Grove's secrecy has been a target for protest for many years. The Bohemian Grove Action Network of Occidental, California organizes protests and has aided journalists who wish to penetrate the secrecy surrounding the encampment. Over the years, individuals have infiltrated the Grove then later published video and claimed accounts of the activities at Bohemian Grove.

Infiltrations

In the summer of 1989, Spy magazine writer Philip Weiss spent some seven days in the camp posing as a guest, which led to his November 1989 article "Inside Bohemian Grove".^[1]

On July 15, 2000, Austin, Texas-based filmmaker Alex Jones and his cameraman, Mike Hanson, walked into the Grove. With a hidden camera, Jones and Hanson were able to film the Cremation of Care ceremony. The footage was the centerpiece of Jones' documentary Dark Secrets: Inside Bohemian Grove.^[21] Jones claimed that the Cremation of Care was an "ancient Canaanite, Luciferian, Babylon mystery religion ceremony," and that the owl statue was Moloch. The Grove and Jones' investigation were covered by Jon Ronson in Channel 4's four-part documentary, Secret Rulers of the World. Ronson documented his view of the ritual in his book, Them: Adventures With Extremists, writing that it was a startling, immature, and bizarre way for world leaders to spend their summer vacations, but that he did not see evidence of covert Satanism. According to his description of the account it was nothing more than a fraternity-esque ritual, and the only reason one could see it as Satanic was if one were looking for Satanism in it to begin with.

Also filmed for The Order of Death^[22] was Jones' return to the entrance of the Bohemian Grove in 2005 where he filmed a protest organized by the Bohemian Grove Action Network that took place at the Grove's entrance on Bohemian Highway, only to discover a majority of the protesters engaging in an "occult counter-ritual" known as the Resurrection of Care, supposedly a counter-ritual against the Cremation of Care. Jones' narration for the film lambasted the protesters' actions and motivations from a religious standpoint. In 2005, Chris Jones (no relation) walked into the Grove when hired as an employee, and videotaped the Owl Shrine in daylight, even venturing inside the hollow statue.^[23] Chris Jones said he was regularly propositioned for sex by the Grovers. Chris Jones was subsequently sentenced to three years in state prison for sexual assault of minors.^[24] Alex Jones included Chris Jones' video in "The Order of Death".^[25]

Actor/writer Harry Shearer (This is Spinal Tap, Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons), who has attended at least one Bohemian Club event, wrote and directed The Teddy Bears' Picnic, a parody of Bohemian Grove mock pagan pageantry and drunken revelry.^[26]

Females

Though no woman has ever been given full membership in the Bohemian Club, the small number of female honorary members includes Ina Coolbrith (who served as librarian for the Club), Elizabeth Crocker Bowers and Sara Jane Lippincott.^[19] Such honorary members and other women guests have been allowed into the Bohemian "City Club" building and as daytime guests of the Grove, but not to the upper floors of the City Club nor as guests to the main summer encampment at the Grove.^[19] Annual "Ladies' Jinks" were held at the Club especially for spouses and invited guests.^[19]

In 1978 the Bohemian Club was charged with a discrimination lawsuit by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing over its refusal to hire women employees. In January 1981 Judge Robert Kendall issued a decision supporting the practices of the Club, noting that club members at the Grove "urinate in the open without even the use of rudimentary toilet facilities" and that the presence of females would alter club members' behavior.^[27] On October 17, 1981 the Department of Fair Employment and Housing countered the Kendall ruling by ordering the Club to begin recruiting and hiring women as employees.^[28] In 1986 the Bohemian Club went to the California Supreme Court over the issue, arguing that their freedom of association was being harmed; the Court found against the Club and denied a review in 1987, forcing the Club to begin hiring female workers during the summer encampment at the Grove in Monte Rio.^[29] This ruling became quoted as a legal precedent and was discussed during the 1995-1996 floor debate surrounding California Senate Bill SB 2110 (Maddy), a proposed bill concerning whether tax-exempt organizations (including fraternal clubs) should be exempt from the Unruh Civil Rights Act.^[30]

Logging

Outside of the central camp area which is the site of the old-growth grove, but within the 2,712 acres (10.98 km²) owned by the Bohemian Club, logging activities have been underway since 1984. Approximately 11 million board-feet of lumber equivalents were removed from the surrounding redwood and Douglas fir forest from 1984 to 2007. In 2007, the Bohemian Club board filed application for a nonindustrial logging permit available to landowners with less than 2500 acres of timberland, which would allow them to steadily increase their logging in the second-growth stands from 800 thousand board-feet per year to 1.7 million board-feet over the course of the 50-year permit.^[31] The board had been advised by Tom Bonnicksen, a retired forestry professor with more than 35 years of experience in the field, that they should conduct group selection logging to reduce the risk of fire burning through the dense second-growth stands, damaging the old-growth forest the Club wants to protect. The Bohemian Club stated that an expansion of logging activities was needed to prevent fires, and that money made from the sale of the lumber would be used to stabilize access roads and to clear fire-promoting species like tanoaks and underbrush.^[32] Opponents such as Stacy Martinelli, an associate biologist working with the California Department of Fish and Game, have instead recommended single-tree logging to preserve the habitats of murrelets and spotted owls in senescent trees. Philip Rundel, University of California, Berkeley professor of biology said that redwoods aren't very flammable and "This is clearly a logging project, not a project to reduce fire hazard".^[31] Reed F. Noss, professor at the University of California, Davis, has written that fires within redwood forests do not need to be prevented, that young redwoods are adapted to regenerate well in the destruction left behind by the fires typical of the climate.^[33]

After controversy raised by opponents of the harvesting plan, the club moved to clearly establish their qualification for the permit by offering 163 acres to the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation in Missoula, Montana for a conservation easement. A further 56.75 acres were written off as not being available for commercial logging, bringing the total to 2,316 acres and thereby qualifying for the permit. Opponents and their lawyers interpret the relevant law as counting all timberland and not just that actually subject to the logging permit. They state that if the total of timberland is counted, 2,535.75 acres are owned by the club, so the permit should not be granted.^[31]

Quotations

• "The Bohemian club! Did you say Bohemian club? That's where all those rich Republicans go up and stand naked against redwood trees right? I've never been to the Bohemian club but you oughta go. It'd be good for you. You'd get some fresh air."—Former President Bill Clinton to a heckler^[34]

• "The Bohemian Grove, that I attend from time to time—the Easterners and the others come there—but it is the most faggy goddamn thing you could ever imagine, that San Francisco crowd that goes in there; it's just terrible! I mean I won't shake hands with anybody from San Francisco."—President Richard M. Nixon on the Watergate tapes, Bohemian Club member starting in 1953.^[15][35]

• "If I were to choose the speech that gave me the most pleasure and satisfaction in my political career, it would be my Lakeside Speech at the Bohemian Grove in July 1967. Because this speech traditionally was off the record it received no publicity at the time. But in many important ways it marked the first milestone on my road to the presidency."—President Richard Nixon, Memoirs (1978).^[15]

See also

• Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference—Annual meetings held over five days in early July in Idaho between top media, communications and IT business leaders.
• Belizean Grove—Women's-only club in New York City modeled after the Bohemian Grove
• Bilderberg Group—Annual meetings, rotated through the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Asia
• List of Bohemian Club members
• Pacific-Union Club—An elite San Francisco-based club whose membership interlinks with the Bohemian Club and Grove.
• Rancheros visitadores—Annual meetings held in Santa Barbara in May.
• S-1 Uranium Committee
• The Family (club)—offshoot formed by ejected members of the Bohemian Club
• Trilateral Commission—Annual meetings, rotated through the U.S., Europe, and Asia
• World Economic Forum—Annual meetings, mostly held in Davos, Switzerland

References

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b} Philip Weiss, Masters of the Universe Go to Camp: Inside the Bohemian Grove. Spy Magazine, November 1989
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m} Peter Martin Phillips, A Relative Advantage: Sociology of the San Francisco Bohemian Club, 1994.
3. ^ Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Image Collection. Breakfast at Owls Nest Camp, Bohemian Grove, July 23, 1967 . Around the table, left to right: Preston Hotchkis, Ronald Reagan, Harvey Hancock (standing), Richard M. Nixon, Glenn Seaborg, Jack Sparks, (unidentified individual), (unidentified individual), and Edwin W. Pauley. Retrieved July 15, 2009.
4. ^ Wallace Turner. "At the Bohemian Club, men join, women serve", The New York Times, 12 January 1981
5. ^ Inside Bohemian Grove from Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting Nov-Dec 1991
6. ^ ^{a b} OC Weekly. August 31, 2006. Nick Schou. Bohemian Grove Exposes Itself!
7. ^ Garnett, 1908, p. 6.
8. ^ Garnett, 1908, p. 7.
9. ^ Garnett, 1908, p. 8.
10. ^ Sonoma County Free Press. CounterPunch. Alexander Cockburn. June 19, 2001. The Truth About The Bohemian Grove. Retrieved December 7, 2008
11. ^ Sonoma County Free Press. Bohemian Grove Fact Sheet. Retrieved December 7, 2008
12. ^ SF Gate. Bohemian Club's logging plan raises plenty of sawdust. Jane Kay, Chronicle Environment Writer. Thursday, July 12, 2007. Retrieved September 16, 2008
13. ^ Louis E. Gelwicks. The Camps: Facts, Artifacts and Fantasies 1979
14. ^ Vernacular Language North. Bernard Maybeck. Bohemian Clubhouse. Retrieved March 4, 2009.
15. ^ ^{a b c} Domhoff, G. William, The Bohemian Grove and Other Retreats: A study in ruling class cohesiveness, Harper and Row, 1974.
16. ^ Starr, Kevin (2002). The Dream Endures: California Enters the 1940s. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195157974. http://books.google.com/books?id=9HnIh_auw9MC.
17. ^ Garnett, 1908, p. 19.
18. ^ Garnett, 1908, p. 25.
19. ^ ^{a b c d} Ogden, 1990, p. 36.
20. ^ ^{a b} Domhoff, 1975, p. 10
21. ^ Alex Jones. "Dark Secrets: Inside Bohemian Grove"
22. ^ Alex Jones. "The Order of Death"
23. ^ PrisonPlanet.com. Alex Jones and Paul Joseph Watson. "The Re-Infiltration of Bohemian Grove". January 17, 2006
24. ^ Jack McLamb. Alex Jones Radio Show, May 23, 2008.
25. ^ Infowars.net. Steve Watson & Paul Watson. "2008 Bohemian Grove Guest List Obtained By 9/11 Truth Activists." July 21, 2008
26. ^ New York Times. Movie Review. Dave Kehr. March 29, 2002. Teddy Bear's Picnic (2002)
27. ^ New York Times. January 23, 1981. AP. AROUND THE NATION; Bohemian Club Is Upheld On Refusal to Hire Women.
28. ^ New York Times. October 17, 1981. AP. AROUND THE NATION; Bohemian Club Ordered To Begin Hiring Women.
29. ^ New York Times. July 8, 1987. Katherine Bishop. RETREAT MAY BE CLUB'S LAST WITHOUT WOMEN.
30. ^ California State Senate. 1995-1996 Senate Bills. SB 2110
31. ^ ^{a b c} "No retreat from uproar over Bohemian Club woods". San Francisco Chronicle. July 6, 2009. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/07/06/MNUU18ICIV.DTL. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
32. ^ Henley, Patricia Lynn. Metroactive, July 4–10, 2007. "Timber! Bohemian Club's long-term logging plan draws fire." Retrieved on October 1, 2009.
33. ^ Noss, Reed F.; Save-the-Redwoods League. The redwood forest: history, ecology, and conservation of the coast redwoods, p. 231. Island Press, 2000. ISBN 1559637269
34. ^ Clinton Bohemian Club Heckler "Clinton makes 'naked' attack", CNN video, October 26, 2007
35. ^ youtube.com Nixon Tape Discusses Homosexuals at Bohemian Grove

Bibliography

• For a definitive look at the history of the Grove and the composition of Bohemian Club members and their social, business and political affiliations, updating Domhoff's book (below), see A Relative Advantage: Sociology of the San Francisco Bohemian Club by Peter Martin Phillips, current Professor of Sociology at Sonoma State University in California. Phillips attended events at the Grove and conducted scores of interviews with attendees in his research.
• Domhoff, G. William, The Bohemian Grove and Other Retreats: A study in ruling class cohesiveness, Harper and Row, 1974.
• Field, Charles K., The Cremation of Care, 1946, 1953
• Fletcher, Robert H., The Annals of the Bohemian Club, Hicks-Judd, 1900
• Garnett, Porter, The Bohemian Jinks: A Treatise, 1908
• Hanson, Mike, Bohemian Grove: Cult Of Conspiracy, iUniverse Inc, 2004
• Hoover, Herbert, Memoirs, Vol 2: The Cabinet and the Presidency, Macmillan, 1952. Hoover was a prominent figure in the Grove's history and coined the phrase: "The Greatest Men's Party on Earth".
• Hotaling, Richard M.; Wallace Arthur Sabin, George Sterling, Bohemian Club. The Twilight of Kings: A Masque of Democracy, the 16th Grove play (1918)
• Ickes, Harold L., The Secret Diary of Harold L. Ickes, Vol 1. The First Thousand Days, 1933–36. Simon and Schuster, 1953. Ickes was Secretary of the Interior during the New Deal.
• Isaacson, Walter, Kissinger: A Biography, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992, (updated) 2005. Contains a brief reference to his attendance at the Grove and fame for his performances in various skits.
• Maupin, Armistead, Significant Others, Chatto and Windus, 1988. A fictionalized account of the grove, as described from the point of view of one of the major characters in this the fourth of the 'Tales from the city' series. Sympathetic and well informed, it includes an accurate description of the Cremation of Care ceremony.
• McCartney, Laton, Friends in High Places: The Bechtel Story: The Most Secret Corporation and how It Engineered the World, Ballantine Books, Updated edition,1989. For the network of links between the Californian-based and privately-owned Bechtel Corporation and members of Reagan's Cabinet, along with their camp membership in the Grove.
• Nader, Ralph, The Big Boys, Pantheon, 1987. Contains a chapter on high-level businessmen and the tightly-held secrecy of their Club membership.
• Nixon, Richard, RN : The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, Grosset & Dunlap, 1978.
• Ogden, Dunbar H.; Douglas McDermott, Robert Károly Sarlós (1990). Theatre West: Image and Impact. Rodopi. pp. 36. ISBN 9051831250. http://books.google.com/books?id=96lCI145-38C.
• Quigley, Carroll, Tragedy And Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, G. S. G. & Associates, Incorporated, 1975. This book serves as the basis for many current conspiracy theories and studies of socio-economic elites.
• Santilli, Armand, The Boys at Bohemian Grove, Xlibris Corporation, 2004
• Schmidt, Helmut, Men and Powers : A Political Retrospective, Random House, 1990. He states in his memoirs that Germany had similar institutions, some of which included such rituals as Cremation of Care, but that his favorite was the Bohemian Grove.
• Shultz, George P., Turmoil and Triumph: Diplomacy, Power and the Victory of the American Ideal, Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993.
• Stephens, Henry Morse; Wallace Arthur Sabin, Charles Caldwell Dobie, Bohemian Club. St. Patrick at Tara, 1909 Grove play
• van der Zee, John, Power at Ease: Inside the Greatest Men's Party on Earth, Harcourt Brace Javonovich, 1974. The author waited tables at the Grove in the summer of 1972. The book has a comprehensive history of the Grove and an extensive bibliography.
• Warren, Earl, The Memoirs of Chief Justice Earl Warren , Madison Books, 2001. A frequent attendee, Warren mentions the Grove in his reminiscences.
• Watson, Thomas J. Jr., & Peter Petre, Father, Son & Co. : My Life at IBM and Beyond, Bantam, 2000. An IBM CEO gives an insider's business perspective on the Grove.