Changes

Although Marx was "more than a little tainted with that most ignoble of pastimes, Jew-baiting," observes British writer Alexander Baron, apologists for Marx "are extremely coy about it nowadays, for obvious reasons."<ref>Alexander Baron, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Khe9AAAACAAJ Anti-capitalism from anti-semitism to 'anti-racism']'' (Anglo-Hebrew Publishing, 1995) ISBN 1898318239, p. 1</ref> Henderson and Manchester University historian W.H. Chaloner comment:

Although Marx was "more than a little tainted with that most ignoble of pastimes, Jew-baiting," observes British writer Alexander Baron, apologists for Marx "are extremely coy about it nowadays, for obvious reasons."<ref>Alexander Baron, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Khe9AAAACAAJ Anti-capitalism from anti-semitism to 'anti-racism']'' (Anglo-Hebrew Publishing, 1995) ISBN 1898318239, p. 1</ref> Henderson and Manchester University historian W.H. Chaloner comment:

{{cquote|...Marx's anti-Semitism has been played down, or even ignored, in some popular socialist accounts of Marx's career and doctrines published in the West and intended for radical and socialist consumption.... There may not be exactly a conspiracy of silence but attention may be drawn to the fact that there is a difference between telling the truth and telling the whole truth. Deception by omission is still deception. Western commentators, too, with a few honourable exceptions, have tended to dodge the issue or to gloss over unwelcome facts. Scholars unfamiliar with the German language, who rely only upon English translations of the writings of Marx and Engels, may be led astray if they use selections compiled by Marxists who are prepared to suppress evidence which might display their hero in a somewhat unfavourable light.<ref>W.H. Chaloner & W.O. Henderson, "[http://www.paulbogdanor.com/antisemitism/marxracism.pdf Marx/Engels and Racism]," ''Encounter'', July 1975, pp. 18-23</ref>}}

{{cquote|...Marx's anti-Semitism has been played down, or even ignored, in some popular socialist accounts of Marx's career and doctrines published in the West and intended for radical and socialist consumption.... There may not be exactly a conspiracy of silence but attention may be drawn to the fact that there is a difference between telling the truth and telling the whole truth. Deception by omission is still deception. Western commentators, too, with a few honourable exceptions, have tended to dodge the issue or to gloss over unwelcome facts. Scholars unfamiliar with the German language, who rely only upon English translations of the writings of Marx and Engels, may be led astray if they use selections compiled by Marxists who are prepared to suppress evidence which might display their hero in a somewhat unfavourable light.<ref>W.H. Chaloner & W.O. Henderson, "[http://www.paulbogdanor.com/antisemitism/marxracism.pdf Marx/Engels and Racism]," ''Encounter'', July 1975, pp. 18-23</ref>}}

A case in point is the Marxists Internet Archive, which bowdlerizes some of Marx's writings (including ''On the Jewish Question'')<ref>The Marxists Internet Archive softens "secular cult" (''weltliche Kultus'') to "worldly religion" and "Haggling" (''schacher'') to "[http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/jewish-question/ Huckstering]." Cf. Allan Megill, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=yLF7hxDPWNoC Karl Marx: the burden of reason (why Marx rejected politics and the market)]'' (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002) ISBN 0742511669, p. 164. “When Marx used this particular term he borrowed from the vocabulary of anti-Semitism,” writes Werner Cohn, professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia. “Ultimately derived from the Hebrew ''sakhar'', commerce, ''schacher'' became in the nineteenth century a very specific term of abuse.” Cohn cites the famous German dictionary written by the brothers Grimm: “''[http://urts55.uni-trier.de:8080/Projekte/WBB2009/DWB//call_wbgui_py_from_form?textpattern=schacher&lemmapattern= Schacher] .... Kleinhandel, besonders gewinnsüchtiger Hausirhandel, gewöhnlich von den Juden, in verächtichem Sinne gebraucht''” [“Haggling, particularly greedy haggling, usually by Jews, with the connotation despised”], Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm, ''Deutsches Wörterbuch'' (Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1893), vol. 8, p. 1959, as cited in Werner Cohn, “[http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a784656037~frm=abslink From Victim to Shylock and Oppressor: The New Image of the Jew in the Trotskyist Movement],” ''Journal of Communist Studies'', vol. 7, no. 1 (March 1991), pp. 46-68</ref> and deletes others, such as “The Russian Loan” (See below)<ref>So embarrassing is this article to apologists for Marx that the Marxists Internet Archive has dropped it down the [http://www.newspeakdictionary.com/ns-dict.html memory hole]. The Web site's collection of [http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/subject/newspapers/new-york-tribune.htm Marx's articles from the ''New York Daily Tribune'', August 21, 1852-February 1861], skips from November 16, 1855 to January 12, 1856&mdash;erasing this article (of January 4, 1856) as effectively as [http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/research/digitaltampering/stalin1+2.jpg Stalin erased Nikolai Yezhov]. (Without mentioning this article by name, the archive does mention that the 1897 publication of the book in which this article was reprinted [http://marxists.org/archive/hyndman/1910/07/marx-and-engels.htm “was not 'helpful'.”]) The site claims that "In the past, some writers who have contributed to Marxism have expressed racist... views. The MIA generally [http://www.marxists.org/admin/intro/index.htm does not “filter out” such views]; if we are archiving the work of a writer, any and all of that writer’s work may be included...." The site's censorship of Marx himself is an exception.</ref> altogether. Others argue the point directly: “To designate Marx as an anti-Semite is nothing but cold war propaganda,” wrote the Marxist<ref>Lawrence Jacob Friedman, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=tFJvyOpFJtUC Identity's architect: a biography of Erik H. Erikson]'' (Harvard University Press, 2000) ISBN 067400437X, p. 422</ref> Erich Fromm.<ref>Karl Marx, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=ZprWAAAAMAAJ Early writings]'', T. B. Bottomore, tr. (McGraw-Hill, 1964), p. v</ref> The idea that Marx was an anti-Semite, agrees David Hirsh of the University of London, is "a standard misreading" of ''On the Jewish Question''.<ref>David Hirsh, Book Review: "[http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2009/05/07/book/ Perry and Schweitzer, ''Antisemitic myths: a historical and contemporary anthology'']," ''[http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/01419870.asp Ethnic and Racial Studies]'', Vol. 32, No. 4 (May 2009), pp. 749-750</ref> The idea that Marx was in any sense anti-Semitic is a “myth,” concurs Warwick University Sociology Professor Robert Fine (a [http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/staff/emeritus/robertfine/home/mycv/ member] of the [http://www.cseweb.org.uk/ Conference of Socialist Economists]), arising in part out of what he calls a “deafness” to Marx's “ironic style.” Marx's claim that “Money is the jealous god of Israel,” contends Fine, is actually a “witty and deeply ironic” critique of that claim.<ref>Robert Fine, "[http://www.engageonline.org.uk/journal/index.php?journal_id=10&article_id=33 Karl Marx and the Radical Critique of Anti-Semitism], ''Engage'', Issue 2 (May 2006)</ref>

A case in point is the Marxists Internet Archive, which bowdlerizes some of Marx's writings (including ''On the Jewish Question'')<ref>The Marxists Internet Archive softens "secular cult" (''weltliche Kultus'') to "worldly religion" and "Haggling" (''schacher'') to "[http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/jewish-question/ Huckstering]." Cf. Allan Megill, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=yLF7hxDPWNoC Karl Marx: the burden of reason (why Marx rejected politics and the market)]'' (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002) ISBN 0742511669, p. 164. “When Marx used this particular term he borrowed from the vocabulary of anti-Semitism,” writes Werner Cohn, professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia. “Ultimately derived from the Hebrew ''sakhar'', commerce, ''schacher'' became in the nineteenth century a very specific term of abuse.” Cohn cites the famous German dictionary written by the brothers Grimm: “''[http://urts55.uni-trier.de:8080/Projekte/WBB2009/DWB//call_wbgui_py_from_form?textpattern=schacher&lemmapattern= Schacher] .... Kleinhandel, besonders gewinnsüchtiger Hausirhandel, gewöhnlich von den Juden, in verächtichem Sinne gebraucht''” [“Haggling, particularly greedy haggling, usually by Jews, with the connotation despised”], Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm, ''Deutsches Wörterbuch'' (Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1893), vol. 8, p. 1959, as cited in Werner Cohn, “[http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a784656037~frm=abslink From Victim to Shylock and Oppressor: The New Image of the Jew in the Trotskyist Movement],” ''Journal of Communist Studies'', vol. 7, no. 1 (March 1991), pp. 46-68</ref> and deletes others, such as “The Russian Loan” (See below)<ref>So embarrassing is this article to apologists for Marx that the Marxists Internet Archive has dropped it down the [http://www.newspeakdictionary.com/ns-dict.html memory hole]. The Web site's collection of [http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/subject/newspapers/new-york-tribune.htm Marx's articles from the ''New York Daily Tribune'', August 21, 1852-February 1861], skips from November 16, 1855 to January 12, 1856&mdash;erasing this article (of January 4, 1856) as effectively as [http://www.newseum.org/berlinwall/commissar_vanishes/vanishes.htm Stalin erased Nikolai Yezhov]. (Without mentioning this article by name, the archive does mention that the 1897 publication of the book in which this article was reprinted [http://marxists.org/archive/hyndman/1910/07/marx-and-engels.htm “was not 'helpful'.”]) The site claims that "In the past, some writers who have contributed to Marxism have expressed racist... views. The MIA generally [http://www.marxists.org/admin/intro/index.htm does not “filter out” such views]; if we are archiving the work of a writer, any and all of that writer’s work may be included...." The site's censorship of Marx himself is an exception.</ref> altogether. Others argue the point directly: “To designate Marx as an anti-Semite is nothing but cold war propaganda,” wrote the Marxist<ref>Lawrence Jacob Friedman, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=tFJvyOpFJtUC Identity's architect: a biography of Erik H. Erikson]'' (Harvard University Press, 2000) ISBN 067400437X, p. 422</ref> Erich Fromm.<ref>Karl Marx, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=ZprWAAAAMAAJ Early writings]'', T. B. Bottomore, tr. (McGraw-Hill, 1964), p. v</ref> The idea that Marx was an anti-Semite, agrees David Hirsh of the University of London, is "a standard misreading" of ''On the Jewish Question''.<ref>David Hirsh, Book Review: "[http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2009/05/07/book/ Perry and Schweitzer, ''Antisemitic myths: a historical and contemporary anthology'']," ''[http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/01419870.asp Ethnic and Racial Studies]'', Vol. 32, No. 4 (May 2009), pp. 749-750</ref> The idea that Marx was in any sense anti-Semitic is a “myth,” concurs Warwick University Sociology Professor Robert Fine (a [http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/staff/emeritus/robertfine/home/mycv/ member] of the [http://www.cseweb.org.uk/ Conference of Socialist Economists]), arising in part out of what he calls a “deafness” to Marx's “ironic style.” Marx's claim that “Money is the jealous god of Israel,” contends Fine, is actually a “witty and deeply ironic” critique of that claim.<ref>Robert Fine, "[http://www.engageonline.org.uk/journal/index.php?journal_id=10&article_id=33 Karl Marx and the Radical Critique of Anti-Semitism], ''Engage'', Issue 2 (May 2006)</ref>

"[http://www.joelkovel.com/newreadings.html#ecosocialism1 Eco-socialist]" Joel Kovel disagrees: "No attempt to read these pages as a play on words can conceal the hostility which infuses them, and is precisely directed against the identity of the Jew."<ref>Joel Kovel, “[http://www.springerlink.com/content/p2q3w7416w7h1516/ Marx on the Jewish Question],” ''Dialectical Anthropology'', Vol. 8, No. 1-2, (1983) pp.31-46</ref> Moreover, Marx expressed his contempt for Jews, not only in ''On the Jewish Question'', but in other writings as well. In ''The German Ideology'', Marx likens the bourgeoisie to Jews, whom he describes as criminals and hypocrites: “The attitude of the bourgeois to the institutions of his regime is like that of the Jew to the law; he evades them whenever it is possible to do so in each individual case, but he wants everyone else to observe them.”<ref>Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=DdMLAAAAYAAJ The German Ideology: including Theses on Feuerbach and introduction to The critique of political economy]'' (Prometheus Books, 1998) ISBN 1573922587), p. 194</ref> In ''The Holy Family'' Marx expands on the theme of "the material, mass-type Jews," arguing that "real ''secular'' Jewry, and hence ''religious'' Jewry ''too''... finds its final development in the ''money system''," concluding that "the task of abolishing the essence of Jewry is actually the task of abolishing the ''Jewish character of civil society''... the most extreme expression of which is the ''money system''."<ref>Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=KKPaAAAAMAAJ Collected Works'', Vol. 4] (Lawrence & Wishart, 1975) ISBN 0853152942, pp. 94, 109-110</ref>  

"[http://www.joelkovel.com/newreadings.html#ecosocialism1 Eco-socialist]" Joel Kovel disagrees: "No attempt to read these pages as a play on words can conceal the hostility which infuses them, and is precisely directed against the identity of the Jew."<ref>Joel Kovel, “[http://www.springerlink.com/content/p2q3w7416w7h1516/ Marx on the Jewish Question],” ''Dialectical Anthropology'', Vol. 8, No. 1-2, (1983) pp.31-46</ref> Moreover, Marx expressed his contempt for Jews, not only in ''On the Jewish Question'', but in other writings as well. In ''The German Ideology'', Marx likens the bourgeoisie to Jews, whom he describes as criminals and hypocrites: “The attitude of the bourgeois to the institutions of his regime is like that of the Jew to the law; he evades them whenever it is possible to do so in each individual case, but he wants everyone else to observe them.”<ref>Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=DdMLAAAAYAAJ The German Ideology: including Theses on Feuerbach and introduction to The critique of political economy]'' (Prometheus Books, 1998) ISBN 1573922587), p. 194</ref> In ''The Holy Family'' Marx expands on the theme of "the material, mass-type Jews," arguing that "real ''secular'' Jewry, and hence ''religious'' Jewry ''too''... finds its final development in the ''money system''," concluding that "the task of abolishing the essence of Jewry is actually the task of abolishing the ''Jewish character of civil society''... the most extreme expression of which is the ''money system''."<ref>Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=KKPaAAAAMAAJ Collected Works'', Vol. 4] (Lawrence & Wishart, 1975) ISBN 0853152942, pp. 94, 109-110</ref>