History of Zionism part 2

(Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion part 1)

Now as we get into the 20th century, a lot of pieces of political puzzle begin to take shape. This next segment on Zionism will discuss the first in a series of documents and political movements that are connected to, or believed to be connected to Zionism. These documents and political movements are also the source of most modern conspiracy theories about a Jewish power elite global agenda.


The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion:

(Bear with me here, this one is complicated and has a lot of "separate moving parts".)

For those who are not familiar with this particular work; "The Protocols" is a document of hotly debated origin. In one camp are those who believe it originated with the Jewish elite power structure as a manual of how to take over the world. In the other camp are those who claim it's a forgery, who's real origins are simply propaganda of an anti-Semitic counter-revolutionary Russian author named Matvie Golvinski. (I'll get into his story in a minute / more later.)

"The Protocols" is a political piece that has been translated into multiple languages and is probably one of the most (if not the most) influential and (probably most) widely read political pieces of the 20th century. Some literary scholars equate it to "political satire literature" with a message of warning, along the lines of George Orwell's book 1984. 1984 has a lot of similarities to "The Protocols", of which I'm sure Orwell was at least familiar with this piece.

"The Protocols" are alleged by some to be a forgery, plagiarized by Matvie Golvinski and sold to an editor (Pavel Kruschevan) of the newspaper "Znamya"; which parts thereof were subsequently published in Russia in 1903. The forgery was said to be from Maurice Joly's Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu which was published in 1864. Joly's work was alleged to be a satirical allegory, with Machiavelli substituting for Napoleon.

Interestingly though, Joly was later identified to be Joseph Levy, a Jew who was a life long member of the Mazraim Masonic Lodge in Paris. He was the protege of Adolf Cremieus (AKA Isaac Mouse Cremieus) who was the head of the lodge, as well as a minister in the Leon Gambetta (Jewish backed) government.

Joly was known to have plagiarized other works: Les Mysteries du Paris authored by Eugene Sue (1845) as well as Machiavelli, Montesquieu, Rousseau authored by another Mazraim Lodge member (Jacob Venedy) and fellow protege of Cremieux.(1850)

So, today (for various reasons) there are a minority of scholars who are suggesting Joly's "Dialogue in Hell" was actually plagiarized from "Protocols", not the other way around. These scholars do make some valid points about their position. ("Protocols" themselves claim to be centuries old.) One of these articles I read, postulating that Joly plagiarized "Protocols", was written by a Jewish professor. So, with that being said; interestingly, as we will see with other early publishers of "Protocols", Joly met an untimely death as he's said to have committed suicide in 1879.

The Masons:

Now to understand some of the rest of this story, we have to talk a little bit about Masonry. The Masons are a social / "para" religious group that spans many countries. Masonic legend goes back to Solomon's temple where "mason" meant "artist" of any sort of working craft, not just stone work. Masonic lodges have all sorts of "flavors". Some of the older "rites" are named for ethnic groups like "Scotch". Some are geographical areas like "York".

When the Renaissance came along, a new order of Masons began to emerge called the "Free Masons". These were the ones who began to get the reputation of "secret society" because they met in secret. The stated reason (from a Mason), being these men were coming out of the "secrets of the dark ages" into the "age of enlightenment"; so thus they were now "free" to engage all sorts of fellow brother human beings. This is where Masonic lodges began to mix peoples of different cultural and religious backgrounds who had the same social goals in common.

From the other perspective; comes those who believe Free Masons really are a secret society who's been involved in occult practices for centuries. They have valid questions too, as much of Masonic symbolism and (what little is known of) ceremonies do hearken back to ancient near eastern pagan religions; which have been intertwined into what has become portions of today's occult practices. "Occult practices" though, much like any other organized religion, are divided up into sects. Some practices and symbols cross sects. Anything I would discuss in this study though, would be things related to where ever Masons, Rabbinic Judaism, ancient pagan religions and the occult cross each other.

So, from my less the perfect understanding of the Masons, membership in Masonic lodges comes in certain degrees. Once you get past the "entered apprentice", "fellow craft", "master mason"; there are 4th degree, 5th, 6th, etc (all the way up to 32. All of which may have common names in all the rites, yet may mean different things in different rites). The higher you get up in the Masonic organization, the higher your "degree" status is. Some rites will only accept Masons of a particular degree or higher. Within those upper-echelon lodges, (historically speaking at least) they seem to have degrees of their own.

Masonry first came to France with Napoleon Bonaparte; the first lodge "officially" established in 1799. It's never been confirmed that Napoleon was a Mason, but it's not doubted either and seems highly probable given his status as a political leader. Napoleon was first exposed to Masonry in Egypt where they had an order at the time called "the rite of the Mazraim". This particular rite was closely associated with Talmudic, Kabbalahic and Gnostic teachings, which had come to be imported with it's Jewish lodge members into France. About 100 years later this lodge was combined with another American "rite of Memphis" and became the "right of Mazraim-Memphis" wherewith this particular lodge says it began to exclude teachings from the Kabbalah and the occult.

Now if I'm correctly understanding what I'd read about Masonic degrees, in order to get into the Mazraim (or now Mazraim-Memphis) rite, you have to be a ninth or tenth degree Mason. This may be of significance when looking at a particular Jewish magazine that talks about "The Protocols"; for this article specifically calls out "the newly unearthed secret documents throwing light upon the sinister world wide conspiracy of the learned elders of Zion of the third degree".

American Hebrew Magazine:

This article was entitled "Our Own Protocols" and appeared in a Jewish magazine "The American Hebrew" dated September 10, 1920. The publication can be found on the Internet. The magazine was published in New York City, to it's own Jewish audience beginning in 1879 and is still in publication today under the name "Washington Jewish Week". This publication has gone through several revisions and mergers over the course of the past nearly 150 years before it became "Washington Jewish Week" (1984). There are several interesting things about the article "Our Own Protocols", as well as the magazine which published it.

First off, this article freely confesses that "The Protocols" are a Jewish writing, yet does not convey any fondness for them, nor does it condone any sort of conspiracy to take over the world. The article states that the magazine received their copy of "The Protocols" from a friend (who was reported in the article to now be deceased); who'd received them from a woman who'd risked her life to steal a copy at the close of a gathering which had initiated new members into the group of elders / leaders of Zionism. (The predeceasing World Zionist Congress had met in 1913, yet I have no idea which meeting or organization the magazine article was making reference to.) The article goes on to authenticate "The Protocols" (of two "articles from Protocols" they published) via its use of certain language and events alleged to be known only in Jewish circles.

The second "article of The Protocols" published in this magazine article, credits the "learned elders of Zion" with creating the Mormon church. The point of which this is illustrated, appears to be on account of the fact that the founding of the Mormons far predates the alleged forgery of "The Protocols". (Mormon church 1830) I had not realized this at the point in this study that I'd written my segment on the Masons; but much of Mormon rites, rituals and symbolism are the same as those of the Masons. Joseph Smith was a Mason, as were many of the founders of the Mormon church. The Masons in Ohio had accused Joseph Smith of "borrowing" from their organization in the "revelation" of this new religion.

The Book of Mormon is also alleged to be a forgery and has many similarities to an unpublished story Manuscript Found written by the minister of a Congregationalist church living in Connecticut named Solomon Spaulding. Spaulding had been in the Continental army during the American Revolution and died in 1816; so he and Joseph Smith had never met. Ironically though, both introductions to Manuscript Found and The Book of Mormon have uncanny commonalities to another story "The Legend of Enoch", which is part of the folklore of the Masons. Well guess where "The Legend of Enoch" comes from? If you guessed the Kabbalah, you are correct. Yes, it is another tale of Jewish folklore.

The reason for "the elders of Zion" to (allegedly) form the Mormon church is unclear to me, other than attempts to give validity to the notion that Divine revelation didn't just come to the Hebrew people. Jews are often accused of being pathologically ethnocentric and exclusionary racist; (Just take a look at Israel's immigration policy for an example.) and the notion of another / new group of Jews in the new world, "brings in" certain non-European ethnic groups as also being "Jews". Any anthropologist or geneticist though can (and would) tell us that the natives on the north and south American continents are not Semitic either; (as in being genetically related to Abraham).

So while we are on "alternative Christian interpretations / writings / Bibles" and the Freemasons; I think it's fair to bring up again our aforementioned Cyrus I Schofield, the famous "author" of the Schofield Reference Bible. If you are wondering whether or not he was a Mason? To my knowledge, he wasn't: but the main financier behind his Bible was. George Bannerman Dealey was a member of Schofield's church, but was also a 33rd degree Mason.

On top of this, the two men who "mentored" Schofield in the penning of the reference Bible (Westcott and Hort) were active in the occult. B.F. Westcott and F.J.A Host were (respectively) an Anglican bishop and Oxford professor of divinity. They had started two different fraternal type groups; one called "Hermes" (Greek name for god of the underworld - i.e. Satan) which was well known in it's day for the intensity of homosexual relations between its members and the other listed as "the ghost society". Ghost Society had many British political figures among it's ranks; one of which was Britain's future prime minister Arthur James Balfour, who will be discussed later concerning the importance of a particular document that bears his name - The Balfour Declaration.

Lastly, of much importance, is another article printed in American Hebrew magazine on October 31, 1919 entitled "The Crucifixion of Jews must Stop". (Also can be found in the Internet.) This article speaks of a "holocaust" and "6 million dead." I'll discuss that later too.


Stay tuned - the history of "The Protocols" coming next: