Revolution: A New Power, A New Persecution
The Bolshevik revolution initially seemed like a promise: abolition of the Pale of Settlement, a decree on the equality of peoples. But it quickly became clear that tsarist antisemitism had been replaced by Soviet antisemitism — dressed in ideological clothes.
- 1918 — Nationalisation of businesses ruined Jewish traders and craftsmen
- 1919 — Hebrew banned as "the language of bourgeois nationalists"
- 1921 — Closures of cheders (Jewish elementary schools) across the country
- 1922–1930 — Systematic closure of synagogues; Chabad institutions targeted first
The Communists offered Jewish workers something: a secular Jewish culture in Yiddish, a role in the new order. But observant, traditional Jews — above all Chabad — got something else: active persecution by a Jewish section of the Communist Party itself.
The Yevsektsiya: Jewish Communists Persecuting Jewish Communities
The Yevsektsiya (Jewish Sections of the Communist Party, 1918–1930) was one of the most painful episodes in the history of Soviet Jewry. Jewish communists were tasked with destroying traditional Jewish life from within.
The Yevsektsiya organised show trials in which synagogues were "condemned" by the local Jewish community itself. Buildings were confiscated and turned into clubs, warehouses, or Party offices.
Lists of religious leaders were compiled. Rabbis, teachers, and community organisers were arrested on charges of "anti-Soviet activity," "counterrevolution," and "bourgeois nationalism."
Teaching Torah, Talmud, or Hebrew to children was made a criminal offence. Underground cheders and yeshivot became the only option for religious education.
Chabad was a particular target: its organisational strength, underground networks, and ideological resistance to communism made it the main enemy in the eyes of the Yevsektsiya.
The Yevsektsiya was dissolved in 1930 — by then, it had done most of its destructive work. Its leaders were themselves executed in the Stalinist purges of the 1930s.
Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson: Condemned to Death, Exiled from the USSR
Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson (1880–1950) led Chabad from 1920 and built an underground network of schools, yeshivot, and religious communities across the Soviet Union. The GPU (secret police) had been watching him for years.
On 15 Sivan 5687 (June 1927) GPU agents arrested the Frierdiker Rebbe in Leningrad. The charges: "counter-revolutionary activity," "incitement against Soviet power," organising underground religious education.
The sentence: death by firing squad. The charge carried a mandatory death penalty under Soviet law.
News of the arrest spread rapidly beyond the Soviet Union. Jewish communities worldwide, foreign governments, and diplomats sent petitions demanding the Rebbe's release. The Soviet government — sensitive to international opinion — commuted the sentence to three years' exile in Kostroma.
Shortly afterwards the sentence was commuted again to expulsion from the USSR. On 12–13 Tammuz 5687, the Frierdiker Rebbe was freed and allowed to leave the country.
He settled first in Riga, then Warsaw, and from 1940 in New York, where he continued to lead Chabad from exile until his death in 1950. His rescue became known as the miracle of 12–13 Tammuz, a date still celebrated in Chabad communities worldwide.
"They can take my body and put it in prison. But my soul — my soul is free and no prison can hold it."— Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson, upon his arrest in 1927
After the Frierdiker Rebbe's departure, those who remained — rabbis, teachers, activists — were left without leadership, in a country that was closing in on them. The 1930s would bring the most brutal chapter yet.