What is the relation between Communism and Judaism?

It is often said that communism has a Jewish origin and that communist movements and governments are run by Jews. So let’s look at any possible relations between communism and Judaism:

The basic idea of communism is as old as man itself, and it resembles the way in which men lived in communal or tribal groups during prehistoric times (before written history); common ownership of the land, sharing all the goods between the community, public participation in decision-making, sharing duties and obligations, social equality, no oppression, no monetary system, working for common purposes and goals, taking care of any member of the community in an altruistic way, and so on. So we could say that the basic principles of communism are not in any way a recent invention; therefore, the idea of communism surely predates Judaism.

However, on the other hand, the first example of communist ideals in writing come from the teachings of Jesus Christ; and in this case, Jesus was Jewish.

Seriously now, let’s analyse “communism” as such; popularised by the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels; through a book titled “The Communist Manifesto” from 1848. On one hand we have that Engels was not Jewish, and neither had any relation with Judaism; not even the person who most influenced his ideals (Hegel) was Jewish. And on the other hand, Karl Marx was also not Jewish; he was baptised at the age of six. It is true that his origins were Jewish, but both his parents abandoned the Jewish faith and converted.

For some people, Marx’s origins might be enough to associate communism with Judaism. However, we have to take into account that Marx did not come up with communism. Apart from the fact that Engels also co-authored the book, it expressed the ideas of –and was commissioned by- an organisation called the “Communist League” (previously known as the “League of the Just”), which was actually a Christian group devoted to the ideas of Gracchus Babeuf (a French political agitator and journalist).

In regards to the claim that communist countries are/have been run by Jews, well, I found no evidences that suggest that China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Albania, Angola, Benin, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Congo, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Ethiopia, Mongolia, Mozambique, Poland, Romania, Somalia, South Yemen or Yugoslavia ever had a Jewish leader or that their governments were predominantly Jewish.

The only one left is the USSR, which seems to be the target of these type of claims; so let's have a look. Here is a list of its leaders and their origin:

• Vladimir Lenin (Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov): was baptized into the Russian Orthodox Church, and came from a mixed ethnical origin, which include: Mordovian, Kalmyk, Jewish, Volgan German, Swedish, and possibly others.


• Joseph Stalin (Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili): was the son of Vissarion Ivanovich Dzhugashvili and Ekaterina Georgievna -a family of peasants from Georgian origin- and of which contemporary witnesses and documented historical sources confirm instances of antisemitism.


• Georgy Malenkov: of Macedonian origin from his father’s side, and his mother was the granddaughter of an Orthodox priest.


• Nikolai Bulganin: son of an office worker, also not Jewish.


• Nikita Khrushchev: was the son of Sergei Khrushchev and Ksenia Khrushcheva; also peasants of Russian origin.


• Leonid Brezhnev: of Ukrainian or Russian origins.


• Yuri Andropov: was a descendent from the Don Cossacks, a noble orthodox Christian family.


• Konstantin Chernenko: son of Ustin Demidovich, who was of Ukrainian origin.


• And Mikhail Gorbachev: also from a peasant family of Russian origin.