Political Enemies Research Articles

„Munkatábor, tehát nem büntetőtábor”– Törvényen kívüli állapot a mohácsi láger példáján (1945)

„Labor camp, so no prison camp“ – Extraordinary conditions in Mohács in 1945
 In 1945, in the city of Mohács in southwest Hungary, existed a labor and internment camp for a few months, which has been completely excluded from research of the history of the region until now. At the End of the Second World War, the camp served as a manpower reservoir, but also to punish former political enemies and the ethnic German minority for alleged and actual war crimes.
 This paper presents the circumstances of the formation of the camp and the debates about it between the members of the Mohács National Committee in January 1945. It also analyzes the activity, organization and difficulties that characterized the months of the camp's existence. Another focus of the study is the investigation of the chaotic circumstances and the (lack of) legal framework and regulations that should provide an explanation for why a camp could be established at this early point in time after the war in Mohács. Local archive documents from Mohács and the neighboring villages are used as sources, which offer a deep insight into local history and the chaotic conditions at the immediate end of the war.

The Last Voyage of the Gloucester (1682): The Politics of a Royal Shipwreck

Abstract The significance of the wreck of the Gloucester on 6 May 1682 en route to Scotland, with James Stuart, duke of York, later James II and VII, on board, is poorly understood. Based on new archival research, this article places the event in its political, cultural and naval contexts in order to re-evaluate its importance to British history and to correct a number of inaccuracies in recent historiography. The wreck occurred at a sensitive political moment when, within the maelstrom of the Exclusion Crisis (1679–81), the Duke was hopeful of securing his place in the succession. However, thanks in part to the cultural vigour of the ‘ship of state’ trope, the disaster risked James being regarded as a pilot and commander unable to steer the nation. Because his political enemies could use the shipwreck as propaganda to undermine his position as heir to the throne, the event in general, and especially the Duke’s behaviour, became popular topics which were debated and contested from Whig and Tory viewpoints. Since the tragedy occurred at sea, one arm of early modern state apparatus that was especially responsive to these debates was the English navy, which was itself in the midst of a power struggle between Crown and admiralty for control over its future direction. The article sheds new light on the far-reaching implications for James’s reign of the sinking of the Gloucester, and argues afresh for the centrality of maritime history to Restoration political history.

“Mujeres ricas y libres”: Mujer y poder; Inés Muñoz y las encomenderas en el Perú (s. XVI)

This study addresses the role of women in shaping Spanish rule and society in Peru during the first decades of colonial dominance. Liliana Pérez Miguel, while focusing on the specific historical character Inés Muñoz, examines the extensive and diverse groups of women who benefited from the encomienda. This institution, transplanted from the Iberian Peninsula to the New World, entrusted to its beneficiaries, known as encomenderos, the Catholic evangelization and protection of specific Indigenous communities. These encomendados in return paid a tribute, in metals and goods, to their encomenderos. This access to tribute and labor force made encomiendas one of the royal rewards most desired by those who participated in the discovery, conquest, and colonization of the New World. This book shows that several women were active participants in early Spanish colonization, an enterprise that according to the traditional historiography was dominated by male actors.Pérez Miguel specifies that her book fits with an increasing production of gender studies on Latin America and colonial Peru specifically. Her work highlights the diverse social and ethnic backgrounds of those women who obtained an encomienda and their challenges and actions in the face of changing legislation and political interests that shaped their tenures. While the book focuses mainly on Inés Muñoz's life and contribution to Peru's colonization and early society, Pérez Miguel constantly draws comparisons with other contemporaneous encomenderas in colonial Peru, which allows her to reveal the wide range of these women's experiences during the convulsive decades of Spain's colonization of Peru. Through various waves of political unrest, many of these encomenderas had to overcome the loss of partners, children, and even the benefits granted them by the crown. Contradicting the passive role that traditional scholarship has asserted for female actors in early modern societies, many of these encomenderas actively assumed the leadership of their households and estates, and they even initiated legal battles to defend their benefits or seek alternative ones. Thus, beyond a clear focus on gender and biography, this work significantly contributes to social and legal history scholarship.The book provides a lively illustration of the early decades of Spanish rule in Peru, exploring the personal and intimate experiences of famous historical characters such as Francisco Pizarro and Hernando Pizarro, along with many other Spanish conquerors. However, Pérez Miguel highlights as protagonists their female companions and offspring, who on various occasions became the beneficiaries of encomiendas. Their access to economic resources, political influence, and local support networks permitted these women to make profound and lasting contributions to early colonial Peru's politics, economy, society, and culture. Muñoz was related to Francisco Pizarro through her marriage to Francisco Martín de Alcántara, half brother of the famous conqueror. Her close relationship with the first governor of Peru led Muñoz to become the caretaker of his mestizo children and brought her political and economic benefits, including multiple encomiendas. However, she was also affected negatively by the political instability of the early colonial period. After the governor and her husband died at the hands of political enemies, Muñoz became vulnerable, facing the loss of some of her political and economic benefits. By recounting the various setbacks suffered by Muñoz and many other women, some of whom had received encomiendas, the book re-creates the changing political environment faced by these women.Pérez Miguel approaches the experiences of encomenderas with a sharp analysis that employs diverse historical methodologies. She offers an extensive historiographical discussion on her use of gender as a category of analysis that brings together scholarship produced in Latin America, Europe, and North America, a historical dialogue that nurtures this book's outstanding contributions. The author's analysis is also grounded on copious archival research, including probanzas, personal correspondence, notarial records, legal proceedings, and many other records. In approaching these materials, she reminds the readers about their potential biases in relation to women's actions. She also recognizes the danger of generalizing from encomenderas' particular experiences, some of which escaped the written registers. Aware of these limitations, Pérez Miguel critically examines these resources, providing elaborate tables and charts to complement her argument. This book is enjoyable reading for both expert and general audiences, with lively stories and exciting data. Overall, Pérez Miguel's work provides a significant contribution to the scholarship on early colonial Peru.

Religious Hatred and Byzantine Ideology before the Crusades

Religious hatred has a long and painful history. It was conceptualized, defined and employed in various ways and for various ends throughout history. The present article focuses on the religious hatred and the roles that it played in Byzantium. It proposes a comparative approach to analyze expressions of religious hatred in Byzantine texts. The article does not analyze religious hatred as the actual hatred that a Christian might feel for his Jewish neighbor because he is Jewish, or vice-versa, but the way it appears in texts as a literary and rhetorical construction. What could be termed “Byzantine typology of religious hatred” as it presented and constructed in different types of texts by different authors will reveal the construction of a Byzantine perspective to mark political enemies as religious adversaries and vice versa. The question is to what end. This article proposes to look more closely into the way religious hatred served as a tool in the construction of Byzantine public opinion, a means for the Byzantines to perceive their polity and themselves as righteous.

Mediating a regime in crisis: corruption and succession in Zimbabwe’s state media

Political scandals are rarely the focus of major academic research in Zimbabwe where tight control of the dominant state media by the ruling party ensures that scandals involving senior government officials are suppressed. Informed by Altheide and Snow’s media logic and Thompson’s concept of mediated political scandals, this article uses framing analysis to examine The Herald’s logic behind exposing the ZIMDEF scandal involving former Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education, Jonathan Moyo. We therefore view the scandal as a political power scandal within ZANU-PF as two main factions, the Lacoste faction led by then Vice-President and now President Emmerson Mnangagwa and the G40 faction fronted by the then Minister of Higher Education Jonathan Moyo, who fought a nail-biting contest over the succession of long-time ruler Mugabe as his reign entered the twilight. The article argues that the scandal evolved like a choreographed sting operation, in which the objective was not to expose public corruption, but to neutralise a formidable political foe as the race to succeed former president Robert Mugabe intensified.

Adolf Hitler’s Attitudes About Religion in the Book “My Struggle” („Mein Kampf“)

The aim of this work is, through the analysis of the book „My struggle”, especially its parts connected with religion and devotion and the most important facts about this complex topic, present to the modern readers Adolf Hitler’s main ideas in the process of decreasement, and even often destroying of a religious factor in the everyday life of average Germans in the period between his entering into politics and the start of WWII and his project of solving the Jewish problem in the areas conquered by the German army. The complexity of this topic is also visible in the fact that there was a conflict in whole social life in Germany after losing WWI. The society in Germany after WWI had been searching for comfort and escape from poverty that happened after 1919, political instability and other destabilizing factors in religion, no matter is it Roman Catholicism, Protestantism or Judaism. For National socialists who were constantly getting more and more power, thanks to mistakes of other political movements, excellent organisation and endurance of its leaders, before all, Adolf Hitler, every kind of devotion that was not agreeing with the ideas of national socialism was declared as a political enemy. From today’s perspective, we can say that Germany between the two World Wars was a very interesting area for researching the relationship between religion and politics, especially if we keep in mind that Hitler in his book defined the relationship between religion and its destroying, in the case when religion does not use to the political goals.

Centrist and Radical Right Populists in Central and Eastern Europe: Divergent Visions of History and the EU

ABSTRACT This article compares the politics of history and positions in the EU of six ruling populist leaders and their parties (Fidesz, PiS, SDS, GERB, ANO and OĽaNO) from Central and Eastern European (CEE) EU member states. Through the comparison of leaders’ biographies and longitudinal analysis of party electoral manifestos an overlap between two types of CEE populism and two types of mnemonic actors in the region is found. Radical right-wing populist parties (Fidesz, PiS and SDS) are more oriented towards national histories, memory wars against ex-communists and critical events for losing or gaining their national sovereignty (mnemonic warriors). Centrist populist parties (GERB, ANO and OĽaNO) largely ignore that kind of narrative and focus on anti-corruption or promises of managing the state more effectively (mnemonic abnegators). Radical right-wing populist parties are also more likely to challenge the Brussels elites by using examples from their national histories. Emphasis on national traumas, anti-communism and their leaders’ vision of politics labelled here as combat tasks politics seems to be contributing to their Euroscepticism. Combat tasks politics, i.e. seeing politics as a constant battle against political enemies, underpins the Eurosceptic narratives of Kaczyński, Orbán and Janša-former dissidents who were politically socialised while challenging militarised communist regimes.

Ulysses S. Grant: Chronic Malaria and the myth of his alcoholism.

Ulysses S. Grant, Civil War general and twice-elected President of the United States, was highly respected in late-19th century America. Gradually however, it became the conventional wisdom that he was an alcoholic who had only succeeded as a general by using overwhelming force. This change began with his political enemies and those who resented his suppression of the Ku Klux Klan, his regard for the welfare of Native Americans and his support of Reconstruction. Jealous subordinates and those with an axe to grind added their voices to this and then the views of certain influential academic historians and romantic adherents of 'The Lost Cause' were unchallenged until the mid-1950s. Grant was undoubtedly an occasional binge drinker but this is not the same as being an alcoholic. Charles A. Dana is the most authoritative source for the claim that Grant was a frank alcoholic. In 1887 he wrote that Grant was drunk on a trip to Satartia, Mississippi in 1863 during the siege of Vicksburg. In this paper, the author shows that Grant was actually ill on that trip from the disease of malaria, alcohol was not involved at all, and that Grant suffered episodically from this disease both before and during the Civil War.

Front and Back Covers, Volume 38, Number 1. February 2022

Front and back cover caption, volume 38 issue 1QANONThis QAnon supporter was part of the crowd of demonstrators at the Washington DC ‘Million MAGA March’ shortly after Trump's 2020 electoral defeat. This woman's sign alludes to ‘The Storm’, a millenarian denouement that, in the QAnon imagination, will see Trump and his supporters rounding up and arresting top Democrats so as to retake power.In this issue, McIntosh describes the verbal art with which the mysterious and oracular figure of ‘Q’ managed to enlist millions of enthusiasts through the Internet. Q specialized in cryptic messages and urged online followers to decode and interpret them. These exercises fostered the notion that supporters themselves were engaging in high‐stakes interpretive work, and that a digital army of Q followers could see through fraudulent politicians and experts, ultimately garnering their own knowledge and expertise. At the same time, Q used the power of secrecy to impart the conviction that Q was connected to a new alt‐right state waiting in the wings.McIntosh also argues that the alt‐right — including but not limited to Q — have increasingly encouraged the idea that reality or truth may lie somewhere behind or beneath the unreliable sign vehicle. Communications from political enemies should be read with suspicion, while communications from Q and Trump alike should be decrypted for their underlying encoded meanings, particularly dark portents. This oracular semiotic ideology now thrives alongside conventional liberal understandings of rational political processes.MAGICAL CONSCIOUSNESSPagan shaman Gordon MacLellan, also known as Creeping Toad, is an environmental educator who helps people find their own stories in nature. Here, he is storytelling in Plas Power Woods, Wales, UK. Gordon's stories are inclusive to anyone who wants to listen without discrimination.In this issue, Susan Greenwood characterizes magical consciousness as a pan‐human participatory and analogical mode of thought that underpins mythopoetic expressions ranging from the ancient narratives of the Australian Aboriginal Rainbow Snake and the life‐enhancing ecological stories of Gordon MacLellan to the alt‐right conspiracy theories fostering racial hatred embraced by ‘shaman’ and QAnon supporter Jake Angeli, a central figure in the storming of the US Capitol in 2021.Stories and storytelling are the modus operandi of magical consciousness. Essentially amoral, magical consciousness engages the emotions and helps create meaningful patterns that encompass varieties of human expression cross‐culturally.Magical consciousness manifests itself along a spectrum. It can sometimes lead to divisive actions fuelled by conspiracy theories such as QAnon. Analysis of magical consciousness may add a further dimension to the investigation of Western post‐truth societies whereby the Enlightenment notion of reason and scientific facts — as the only locus of ‘truth’ — contrasts with ways of engaging with reality primarily through emotions and beliefs.A better understanding of magical consciousness may help build bridges between Western cultures and the world views of indigenous peoples. In replacing machine metaphors with metaphors drawn from nature, such understandings may help shape our future responses to our planet's ecological, economic and social crises.

The new historical politics and criticism of Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi in contemporary Indian press

To successfully modernize the country and mobilize Indian society and to eventually implement ambitious plans for economic development, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sets itself the task of achieving national unity. The BJP in the face of its leader Narendra Modi is forced to conduct constant polemics with their main political opponent - the Indian National Congress. Having come to power in 2014, the BJP representatives use a number of management methods aimed at changing the historical memory of the peoples of India, which can be characterized as "historical politics". The authorities are trying to back up their actions to mobilize Indian society with a new historical rationale, using Hindutwa as a "new ideology". A new official version of the past is being formed, history and historical mythology are actively used to solve political problems of the present. The historical memory of society undergoes transformation and becomes an arena for the struggle against a political enemy. In the Indian press, every memorable date, every historical event becomes the basis for broad discussion and polemics with its historical predecessors and political competitors. After coming to power, Bharatiya Janata Party constantly refers to recent historical events, considering them from a certain ideological angle. This controversy, which has spilled over into the pages of the Indian press, allows us to talk about the BJP pursuing a new historical policy aimed at creating comfortable interpretations of controversial historical events for itself.

A Tribute to Miriam Fuchs: With Love from Her Student

A Tribute to Miriam FuchsWith Love from Her Student Amy Carlson (bio) First and foremost, Miriam Fuchs Z”L taught me about life narratives. She sat down at our seminar table with confidence, curiosity, and a sharp wit, listening to each of us and encouraging our explorations. I write this as one of many students spurred on by her intent gaze as she asked us to expand on our thoughts. Like a repeat customer, I took as many lifewriting seminars as I could from her in graduate school, and she patiently guided me through my coursework and exam preparation. She pressed me to reach just a bit further in my arguments, to develop my ideas, to flex, to attain a potential I could not see for myself. But I also read a fondness in her carefully crafted comprehensive exam question: the one she dreamed up thinking of me and the one response I wrote that made her proud. Good teachers mentor their students to become their future peers. Others experienced this too. I am not alone. Many of my classmates returned to her seminar table for my same reasons. By their very nature, life narratives prompt intimate classroom conversations. As we analyzed the complexity of identity and referentiality encoded into the texts, the play of public and private itself could elicit experiential disclosure. But I never expected Miriam to offer her own lesson in scholarly humility and vulnerability. She detailed a potential professional mishap in her 1995 article “The Diary of Liliʻuokalani,” which she assigned as a companion reading to Queen Liliʻuokalani’s Hawaii’s Story by Hawaii’s Queen. Relying on the photocopied transcript of the diaries, she lost an important connection to the physicality of the diaries—their small size and the way Queen Liliʻuokalani’s handwriting fills each small page— which led her to reconsider old rumors from the Queen’s political enemies who questioned the Queen’s capability to author the diaries. Once Miriam viewed the original diaries, however, she recognized the disconnection, and her research resumed on its original trajectory. Her “cautionary tale” encouraged us to use primary sources, or at minimum, warned us to question mediated versions (39). As a librarian who works with mediated and accessible versions of texts, I found that her scholarly admission intersected with my own professional and research pursuits and impacted my approach to my job and to my studies from that moment on. In 2012, Miriam offered a lifewriting seminar on Holocaust literature. The seminar considered issues in representing the Holocaust in a range of genres, from [End Page 160] life writing to imaginative literature, in relation to Theodore Adorno’s proclamation that “to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric” (34). According to Philippe Lejeune, life narrative already has inherent impossibility, which Miriam focalized in her book The Text is Myself, but by reading inscribed life narratives and representations of the Holocaust, the class continuously contended with two impossibilities (6). I don’t believe my classmates and I—nor Miriam—were prepared to bear witness to the traumatic testimony of each text. With life narratives, the stakes are often high, but the extermination of six million Jewish people from all over Europe resulted in both genealogical and memory “holes” of indiscernible and unbearable size (Raczymow and Astro 104). With Miriam as our leader, we bore witness together. Job stress, fights with spouses, the burden of school work, a concerning diagnosis: any problem we brought with us to that seminar table seemed relationally small and distant compared to the immense pain and loss of lives. We also had moments of levity and release, and other times the relative smallness of our problems, as we sat at the table, refocused to life-size once we left the seminar room. Each of our lives had weight too. She gave so much of herself and her life energy to our class. We listened and watched and witnessed, and that experience is stitched into my memory of Miriam. “My goal is that students leave the first class session questioning the expectations they came in with,” she wrote on her pedagogical approach to the teaching of life narratives (“Graduate Seminar...

“The Moralizing Catechism of True Freemasons” by I. V. Lopukhin as a Way of Forming the Masonic Ideal of Man

The article analyzes the problems of I. V. Lopukhin’s “Moralizing Catechism of True Freemasons” as part of the treatise “The Spiritual Knight, or the Seeker of Wisdom” (1791). “The Moralizing Catechism” is considered to be a text that reflects the way of formation of the Masonic ideal of a person with a focus on the philosophy of Rosicrucianism. The purpose of the article: to prove that the answers to 40 questions of the “Moralizing Catechism” are the ethical basis of I. V. Lopukhin’s work. Based on the methods of ideological-thematic and subcultural analyses, the author of the article highlights the following topics raised by I. V. Lopukhin: proof of the Christian origin of Masonic teaching, description of the “scientific” knowledge of the Christian mysteries by Freemasons, the process of removing the “Old Adam” from a person and the triumph of the “Reborn man” living in the kingdom of Astrea. The “Moralizing Catechism” contains a refutation of government rumors about Masons as political enemies of Russia, describes in detail the ethical component of the private life of a true Freemason, including his attitude to family, servants, property. At the end of the article, the development of the tradition of “spiritual chivalry” in the works of Russian thinkers and writers of the 19th–20th centuries is outlined: from the Slavophiles to the culture of the Silver Age.

The Politics of Nostalgia and the Marcos Golden Age in the Philippines

The increasing incidence of disinformation in the Philippines promotes romanticized recollections of Ferdinand Marcos’ martial law (1972-1981). While the general scholarship remembers the era for its horrors and atrocities, narratives circulated online claim that Marcos’ rule made the nation great and that several groups and institutions conspired to distort people’s memory, serving the purpose of Marcos’ political enemies. These narratives, shared by Marcos and Duterte supporters, echo a desire to return to a fantastical “golden age.” This study investigates the nostalgia for the Marcos golden age, magnifying the salient features of whitewashed memories of Marcos’ martial law in online communities, as well as techniques that turn the Marcos propaganda into a basic grammar that frames people’s articulation of their frustrations and aspirations. The study found that the described propaganda embeds the light-darkness-light perspective in its us-versus-them narrative. Within such a framework, nostalgia can set the stage for the expression of polarizing phrases, hate speech, conspiracy theories, discontent, and hope, which complete the grammar of the Marcos propaganda.

Revenge Is a Genre Best Served Old: Apocalypse in Christian Right Literature and Politics

Apocalypse is a phenomenology of disorder that entails a range of religious affects and experiences largely outside normative expectations of benevolent religion. Vindication, judgment, revenge, resentment, righteous hatred of one’s enemies, the wish for their imminent destruction, theological certainty, the triumphant display of right authority, right judgement, and just punishment—these are the primary affects. As a literary genre and a worldview, apocalypse characterizes both the most famous example of evangelical fiction—the Left Behind series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins—and the U.S. Christian Right’s politics. This article’s methodological contribution is to return us to the beginnings of apocalypse in Biblical and parabiblical literature to better understand the questions of theodicy that Left Behind renews in unexpected ways. Conservative white Christians use apocalypse to articulate their experience as God’s chosen but persecuted people in a diversely populated cosmos, wherein their political foes are the enemies of God. However strange the supersessionist appropriation, apocalypse shapes their understanding of why God lets them suffer so—and may also signal an underlying fear about the power and attention of their deity.

Istota totalitaryzmu. Wokół teorii Zbigniewa Brzezińskiego i Carla Friedricha

The aim of this text is a contemporary estimation of the thesis formed in a famous book by Zbigniew Brzeziński and Carl Friedrich, Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (1956). This is a classic text of Western political science about totalitarianism, simultaneously scientific and political. Scientific, because it presents the idea of three types of political regimes in the 20th century: totalitarian, authoritarian, and liberal-democratic. Political, because the term “totalitarianism” was very useful in the time of the Cold War. This term presents the old (Nazi Germany) and new (Stalinist Russia) totalitarian states as equal political enemies of the USA, equal in their hostility to political and individual freedom, i.e. America’s creed. By using this term, the Americans can create a horrible picture of Russian communism as totalitarian, the same as Hitler’s regime, while presenting old enemies (West Germany, Italy, and Japan) as good friends of both the USA and freedom, because in this moment these states are democratic and liberal. The new term ended the old line of the delimitation between fascist or pro fascist and antifascist states and legitimates the new alliance between the USA and Franco’s Spain. The author analyses the definition of totalitarianism by Brzeziński and Friedrich as well as the political and ideological accusations made against this book by leftist critics.

Cezarov javni lik prema spisima iz njegova korpusa / Caesar’s public image according to Corpus Caesarianum

Ceasar’s propaganda consisted of two parts. First part included his staff officers and magistrates who were, on his behalf, in conflict with the optimates opposition in Rome. Caesar’s Commentaries on Gallic and Civil wars, where he personally exposed his actions during eleven years of active campaigning, were the second part of propaganda. Through his Commentaries, Caesar managed to establish certain narrative strategies towards his army, Roman people and his political enemies (i.e. thus creating his public image). The objective of this paper is to present narrative strategies (which contained certain patterns) by which Caesar tried to impose personal virtues on different categories, so he could earn proclamation as a man of virtus.

Augustus’ presentation of “empire” in his Res Gestae

Having defeated all his political enemies and expanded the rule of Rome enormously, Octavian, from 27 BC known as Augustus, ended the civil wars which had plagued the Late Republic and founded the system known as the Roman Principate. The Res Gestae purports to be a retrospective survey by Augustus of his own public achievements in restoring the res publica and conquering the world. It was published in Rome but the only surviving copies were found in the new and distant province of Galatia. In this paper I will try to explain how Augustus, as the founder of the new era known today as ‘the Roman Empire’, envisages and presents Roman rule under his leadership by analysing the content of the Res Gestae. From it we can see that there indeed emerges a concept similar to our ‘empire’. The narrative structure of the Res Gestae shows that Roman imperial rule is conceived of by Augustus in a scheme of core-periphery, in which the core is composed of the provinces under direct Roman control, while the periphery is an area of more vaguely subject people or places maintained by threats and intervention, or more weakly by ‘friendship’ (amicitia), which vary according to the historical specifics of contact between these areas or peoples and Rome. In both cases, whether subjection is in the name of the ‘rule’ or the ‘friendship’ of Roman people, it is Augustus’ personal authority that appears to matter the most, which indicates that Augustus’ institution of a monarchic system was a decisive element in the development of this new holistic concept of Roman imperial rule.

Russian Empire’s Religious Institutions in the 18th - Early 20th Century: The Evolution of “Friend - Alien - Foe” Relations

The Russian governments three principal institutions to regulate the empires diverse religions from the 18th to the early 20th century are examined. Its author describes the evolution of these bodies, their features and purpose, as well as defining the concept of religious security by analyzing its specific historical content. The author also discusses the relationship between the institutions of the official Russian Church, religious tolerance for foreign confessions, and discrimination against the Old Believers through the prism of friend - alien - foe relations. This approach helps us understand the hierarchical nature of the relations and contradictions that existed between the institutions, whose activities regulated the religious life of the Russian Empires subjects until 1905. The article goes on to analyze the relationship between the official legal status of the Russian Church, imperial tolerance, and religious discrimination. It concludes that the formation of the three state-religious institutions that began in the 18th century ended during the reign of Emperor Nicholas I. That time saw the beginning of the gradual evolution of friend - alien - foe inter-institutional relations, which peaked under Emperor Nicholas in 1904-1906. The author also considers the changes in the governments policy towards the Russian schism of the 17th century, which ultimately removed the friend-or-foe opposition in the relations between the Russian state, the Russian Church and the schismatic Old Believers. In accordance with the modernized legislation on religious tolerance, lawful Old Believers and sectarians moved from the category of religious and political foes to that of aliens, to which foreign confessions traditionally belonged. Under the new legal and political conditions, intolerance and religious discrimination against the schism ceased to be an instrument of state policy.

The Habsburg and Transylvanian Aims Related to the Campaign of the Ottomans against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1634)

In 1634 the Ottoman Emperor, Murad IV (r. 1623–1640), decided to lead a campaign against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. He wanted to request military support from the Prince of Transylvania, György Rákóczi I (r. 1630–1648), but the prince tried to avoid it, because at that time he had been struggling with his political enemies, who endangered his rule in Transylvania. In the same year, the Habsburgs sent an ambassador (Johann Rudolf von Puchheim) to Constantinople, who tried to dissuade the Sublime Porte from leading a military campaign against the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The idea of that mediation came from the former Vizier of Buda and at that time, the commander of the Ottoman army, Pasha Murteza, because he did not want this war either. Prince Rákóczi, Puchheim, Trzebiński (Aleksander, the Polish envoy) and Murteza all wanted to stall for time in relation to that campaign. In this article, the author investigates the aims and the problem-solving strategies of the Habsburg, the Transylvanian, the Polish and also the Ottoman elite in that situation. The war against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth did not take place in the end, because Murad IV began a campaign against the Safavid Empire.

The world-view foundations of hetero-images in Mullā Muṣṭafā Basheskī’s Chronicle

Written in the second half of the 18th century in the Ottoman Turkish language the Chronicle of Mullā Muṣṭafā Basheskī discusses ideological references about hetero-images in regard to post-structuralist imagology. Considering the hypothesis that the image of the other is always culturally conditioned, the members of other religions are researched through the analysis (Bosnian Catholics, Orthodox and Jews), military and political enemies of the Ottoman Empire (Austrians, Russians, Montenegrins) and non-Bosnians (Turks and Arabs). To be more precise, the way in which the chronicler creates the image of the members of other religions always depends on the fact whether they are neighbors i.e. people who live nearby and share living space or the members of other religions living across the Empire’s border. Basheskī’s descriptions, characterizations, as well as his comments of the ‘’inner others’’, are never primarily directed at the religious identity of the mentioned ones; those characterizations, however, either affirmative or negative, are always ad hominem oriented and related to real people. Nevertheless, as regards to the imagery point of view, those characterizations go beyond the notion of religion, being general and universal. Accordingly, such perception is related to chronicler’s cosmopolitan interpretation of the original rules of Islam, as well as to his affinity towards Sufi mysticism. As a result, imagery point of view of Sarajevo in the Chronicle does not function on the profane-descriptive, but on the ethical grounds, thus connecting empirical, concrete and metaphysical. However, as regards to the ‘’external others’’, the lack of information and affective relation towards the real danger, resulted in predominance of mythological conceptions and stereotypes even in Basheskī’s Chronicle.