Justinas Pranaitis

Justinas Pranaitis photographed during the Beilis trial.

Justinas Pranaitis (Russian: Иустин Бонавенту́ра Пранайтис; 27 July 1861 – 28 January 1917) was a Lithuanian Catholic priest and Professor of Hebrew at the St. Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy. He is best known as the author of the antisemitic book The Talmud Unmasked, which contains factual inaccuracies. He is also known for his involvement in the Beilis trial.

Quotes

• Questioner: What is the meaning of the word Hullin [animals permissible as food]?

  Pranaitis: I don't know.

  Questioner: What is the meaning of the word Erubin [Sabbath walking limits]?

  Pranaitis: I don't know.

  Questioner: What is the meaning of the word Yebamot [family relationships]?

  Pranaitis: I don't know.

  Questioner: When did Baba Batra [a tractate of the Talmud] live and what was her activity?

  Pranaitis: I don't know.

  • Exchange with Menahem Mendel Beilis' lawyer during the Beilis trial. As reported by Rebekah Marks Costin in Jews on Trial by Robert Garber.

The Talmud Unmasked (1892)

The Talmud Unmasked: The Secret Rabbinical Teachings Concerning Christians (Latin: Christianus in Talmud Iudaeorum: sive, Rabbinicae doctrinae Christiani secreta) is an antisemitic book by Pranaitis, noted to contain factual inaccuracies.

Book cover of The Talmud Unmasked.

• In the 13th century "Popes Gregory IX and Innocent IV condemned the books of the Talmud as containing every kind of vileness and blasphemy against Christian truth, and ordered them to be burned because they spread many horrible heresies."
  • "The Talmud", p. 21

• Many passages in the Talmudic books treat of the birth, life, death and teachings of Jesus Christ. He is not always referred to by the same name, however, but is diversely called "That Man," "A Certain One," "The Carpenter's Son," "The One Who Was Hanged," etc. […] Since the word Jeschua means "Savior," the name Jesus rarely occurs in Jewish books. It is almost always abbreviated to Jeschu, which is maliciously taken as if it were composed of the initial letters of the three words Immach SCHemo Vezikro—"May his name and memory be blotted out."
  • "Jesus Christ in the Talmud", p. 28

• In the infamous book Toldoth Jeschu […] it is related that in the house of the Sanctuary there was a stone which the Patriarch Jacob anointed with oil. On this stone were carved the tetragrammatic letters of the Name (IHVH), and if anyone could learn them he could destroy the world. They therefore decreed that no one must learn them, and they placed two dogs upon two iron columns before the Sanctuary so that if anyone should learn them the dogs would bark at him coming out and he would forget the letters through fear. Then it is related: "Jesus came and entered, learned the letters and wrote them down on parchment. Then he cut into the flesh of his thigh and inserted them there, and having pronounced the name, the wound healed."
  • "Jesus Christ in the Talmud", pp. 34–35

• As in our languages Christians take their name from Christ, so in the language of the Talmud Christians are called Notsrim, from Jesus the Nazarene. But Christians are also called by the names used in the Talmud to designate all non-Jews: Abhodah Zarah, Akum, Obhde Elilim, Minim, Nokhrim, Edom, Amme Haarets, Goim, Apikorosim, Kuthrim.
  • "The Christians", p. 42

• In numerous places ignominious names are given by the Jews to Christian things. It will not be out of place to list a few of these names which they give to things and persons which are held holy and dear by Christians, as follows:

  Jesus is ignominiously called Jeschu—which means, May his name and memory be blotted out. His proper name in Hebrew is Jeschua, which means Salvation.

  Mary, the mother of Jesus, is called Charia—dung, excrement (German Dreck). In Hebrew her proper name is Miriam.

  Christian saints, the word for which in Hebrew is Kedoschim, are called Kededchim (cinaedos)—feminine men (Fairies). Women saints are called Kedeschoth, Whores. […]

  The gospel books are called Aavon Gilaion, Books of Iniquity.

  • "Christians Must Be Exterminated", p. 70

• In Abhodah Zarah (26b, Tosephoth) it says:

  "Even the best of the Goim should be killed"

  • "Christians Must Be Exterminated", p. 82
  • Comment. This is incorrect. The phrase occurs, not in the Avodah Zarah, but in Soferim 15:10, in the following context: "Yoḥai taught: Kill the best of the heathens in time of war; crush the brain of the best of serpents. The most worthy of women indulges in witchcraft. Happy is he who does the will of the Omnipresent."

Quotes about Justinas Pranaitis

• Cross-examination of Pranaitis has weakened the evidential value of his expert opinion, exposing lack of knowledge of texts and insufficient knowledge of Jewish literature. Because of his amateurish knowledge and lack of resourcefulness, Pranaitis' expert opinion is of very low value.
  • A Tsarist secret police agent reporting on Pranaitis' testimony in the Beilis trial. In Царская Россия и дело Бейлиса, Tager, A., Moscow, 1934.

• Father Pranaitis was one of those "liquidated" by the Cheka during the Bolshevist revolution in Russia.
  • Eugene Nelson Sanctuary, in "Editor's Note" to the E. N. S. edition of The Talmud Unmasked, p. 4

• Justinas Pranaitis was a Roman Catholic priest, Hebraist, and author of antisemitic tracts. […] In 1892, he published The Christian in the Talmud of the Jews, or The Secrets of the Rabbinical Teachings Concerning Christians, a work based on his dissertation. By means of numerous citations in Hebrew and in Latin translations, he sought to demonstrate that the Talmud obliged Jews to injure Christians in multifarious ways and to work for their elimination. Pranaitis drew on the works of the German anti-Talmudists Jakob Ecker and August Rohling. The book received the imprimatur of the church and was published by the press of the Academy of Sciences. […] Pranaitis's work was translated into Lithuanian, Polish, Russian, Italian, Spanish, and English (as The Talmud Unmasked). Today, it is still being distributed by extreme right-wing and clerical circles and can be accessed from a number of antisemitic websites.
  • Michael Hagemeister and Richard Levy (transl.): "Pranaitis, Justinas (1861–1917)". In Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, Volume 1, pp. 564–565. ABC-CLIO Ltd. (2005). ISBN: 978-1851094394.

See also

• Antisemitism

External links

• The Talmud Unmasked on Internet Archive (PDF)