Hippolytus Lutostansky

Hippolytus Lutostansky (1835–1915), also transliterated as Lutostanski, Liutostanskii, J. J. Ljutostanski, Ippolit Iosifovich Lutostanskiĭ; Polish: Hipolit Lutostański, was a former Catholic priest of Polish extraction in the Russian Empire, a convert to the Russian Orthodox Church, and a noted antisemite.

Biography

He studied and was ordained a Catholic priest in Russia. He was defrocked for alleged offenses, including sexual misconduct, theft and embezzlement, which were later not proven. Thereafter he converted to Russian Orthodoxy and joined a religious academy as a student.

He was famous for writing The Talmud and the Jews (Талмуд и евреи), for which the tzar and his officials awarded him.

Political claims

Blood libel

His books and his public statements claimed blood libel.

Jewish plot He maintained that Jews wanted to divide Russia among themselves, once they left the Pale of Settlement, furthering the claims laid in the antisemitic works of Osman Bey (pen name of Frederick van Millingen) The Conquest of the World by the Jews, and contributing to the creation of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. In 1904 he directly quoted Pavel Krushevan's version; without revision, in an updated edition of his The Talmud and the Jews book. (See main article Cesare G. De Michelis about the versions.)

Zionism He declared himself to be a Zionist and proposed that "Russia should make any sacrifice to help the Jews settle in Palestine and form an autonomous state of their own".

Recantation At the turn of the century, Lutostansky recanted his previous antisemitic views.