84 • cHAPTeR 2
eternally despise them, al- Khalidi explains. In this passage, al- Khalidi
does not clearly denounce this religious hatred, but his use of the term
taʿaṣṣub— fanaticism, bigotry, or chauvinism— in this context suggests
his negative judgment of christian religious antisemitism.
The second cause al- Khalidi cites for these discriminatory laws is
Russians’ “animosity based in economics,” their hatred of “people who
are satisfied with small profit and insignificant prices compared to the
christian Russians.” When a Jew opens a store next to that of a chris-
tian, al- Khalidi explains,
it does not take long before the christian has no market for his
merchandise and declares bankruptcy due to his inability to keep
up with the Jews in the field of commerce. This is especially so
because the Jew does not work in hard labor, agriculture, farm-
ing, or mining, which are the basis of the acquisition of wealth.
Rather, the Jews acquire preexisting wealth and the children
of the foreigner are his plowmen and his vine- trimmers as was
mentioned earlier in the Book of Isaiah: and they shall enjoy the
wealth of the nations and glory in their riches.^156Jews are described as aggressive businesspeople willing to accept low
standards of living as they force their gentile competitors out of the
market.^157 In this second, economic explanation for Russian antisem-
itism, al- Khalidi does not quite blame Russian Jewry for the bigotry
they face, but his analysis of their economic situation, and particularly
his assessment of their resistance to those “productive” fields that are
the actual “basis of the acquisition of wealth,” suggest that al- Khalidi
perceived their plight to be at least partially self- inflicted. Importantly,
even in his discussion of the economic motivation for anti- Jewish big-
otry, al- Khalidi again cites Isaiah’s prophecy of Jewish exploitation
of gentiles; the Bible remains central for al- Khalidi’s understanding
of the Jews, even in his explanation of their economic activities and
inclinations.
(^156) al- Khālidī, “as- Sayūnīzm, ay al- masʾala aṣ- ṣahyūniyya” [copyist version], 68. This
is another reference to the previously cited passage from Isaiah 61.
(^157) This accusation has a lengthy history in christian europe. Writing of a particular
form of european christian economic antisemitism, derek Penslar explains that “Jewish
competition was particularly distressing because of the alleged Jewish practices of cut-
ting margins to the bone, selling a wide variety of wares and engaging in many differ-
ent enterprises simultaneously, and aggressively seeking customers.” Penslar, Shylock’s
Children, 16. cf. Theodor Herzl’s explanation of the causes of antisemitism: “For we
had, curiously enough, developed while in the Ghetto into a bourgeois people, and we
stepped out of it only to enter into fierce competition with the middle classes.” Herzl,
TheJewishState, 22.