RASPUTIN! (1872-1916)--A Defence of the Gurus!--From SABC DFO1118 2/8/81
1. (INTERVIEWER:) LISTEN TO THIS CHARGE: "We all know what a dark drama is being enacted. In the middle stands an enigmatic tragic comical figure, a sort of ghost from another World or a survivor, from the gloom of centuries, & he's not alone. Is there not standing at his back a mass of people, a motley group worshipping both him & his sorcery? It's our duty to cry a warning! The Church is in danger & the State too is in danger!" Now, these accusations...
2. (RASPUTIN:) THIS SOUNDS LIKE THE ACCUSATIONS AGAINST CHRIST! (Interviewer:) But they're serious, they were made by serious people in the Russian parliament, the Duma, they were well founded. (Rasputin:) But Ushka, the little mother. (I:) Oh, the Tsarina? (R:) Tsaritza! (I:) Tsarina, well, anyway, OK. (R:) Tzaritza said that I was the true Christ! (I:) You, Rasputin, with your dirt & your drunkenness & you sexual orgies!?
3. (R:) BUT IT WAS NOT TRUE.--I WASN'T CHRIST! They got things into their heads. (I:) Yes, & how much did you do to help them get those things into their heads? (R:) Ha, ha, ha! Sometimes when God needs a messenger it would be somebody like me! Ha, ha, ha!
4. (I:) YOU WERE ACCUSED BY SOME HISTORIANS OF CONTRIBUTING DIRECTLY TO THE CAUSE OF THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION because of your carrying on with the Tsarina, I mean the Tsaritza, I'm sorry. You were accused by many in the church of belonging to a sect that practised flagellation & incest, promiscuity! (R:) Khlysty! (I:) What was that? (R:) Khlysty! (I:) The name of the sect.
5. (I:) YOU WERE ACCUSED SEVERAL TIMES OF RAPING CHILDREN, YOUNG GIRLS, you were even accused of raping a nun! You were accused, let me see, yes, time & time again of interferring with the government of Russia before & during the First World War & before the Revolution. You were accused of being a drunk, of being a charlatan, of being a seducer of the Tsaritza, of being a German spy. You're not as tall as I would have thought.
6. (R:) I AM ACCUSED OF BEING SHORT! I confess to not being as tall as you thought! (I:) It's just that we have this image of Rasputin the Mad Monk... (R:) Never never never I was monk! I was Staretz, Holy man. (I:) You weren't a monk? (R:) No. (I:) Oh, so that part's not true. (R:) Maybe the rest is not true! (I:) Well, I think if there's as much smoke as there was around you, there's got to be a fire there somewhere! What I'm trying to get at is we've got all these accusations against you on the one side, & what you say on the other, & there must be some kind of truth in the middle.
7. (R:) WHY MUST THE TRUTH BE IN THE MIDDLE? Why can't what I said be the truth? (I:) Because there were so many serious careful people who wrote down all these charges against you, that you were a drunk. (R:) Ha, ha! Everybody said I was a drunk! (Sings:) Li, li! You don't sing songs, you play guitar? Ha, ha! Everybody said I was a drunk, but I never drank vodka!--Only Madeira. (I:) You're not exactly sober right now.
8. (R:) BUT IT WAS NOT THE DRINKING THAT STARTED THE ACCUSATIONS, it was the accusations that started the drinking! (I:) And I suppose it was the accusations of sexual excess that started your sexual excesses? (R:) Let me tell you about when I was a boy... (I:) No, no, no, I can't let you off the hook on this issue so easily, we really have to deal with all these charges against you.
9. (R:) BUT IN ORDER TO DEAL WITH THEM YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHY THESE CHARGES WERE MADE & BY WHO! I was born in Siberia. (I:) 1872. (R:) The village of Pokrovskoe, Province of Tobolsk. We had a farm, we were moujiks, peasants. I was different from other children. I could wee the truth when others couldn't see it. you're a little boy & you're lying sick in the house, some men are talking to your father about a horse that was stolen in the village.
10. ALL OF A SUDDEN IT COMES TO YOU THAT THE HORSE THIEF IS ONE OF THE MEN TALKING TO YOUR FATHER; YOU SAY SO. The man gets angry, he says lots of things, but it turns out that he was the horse thief. How did little Gregory who was sitting in bed for days know he was the horse thief? The story of a little boy does not interest you much.
11. YEARS LATER A MAN CAME TO ME TO HIRE ME TO TAKE HIM TO THE MONASTERY in Rekuchua. I went with him & I spent lots of time in the monastery. In the forest near the monastery lived an old man, people think he's crazy. He wore chains all the time & talked to chickens in the hut. People from all over Siberia came to see Father Makari. He advised me.
12. (I:) I JUST WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT ALL OF THIS IS GETTING US SOMEWHERE. (R:) How will you know until I'm finished? How do you know a joke is funny until you hear the end? How do you know a parable means something till the end? (I:) Is this a parable? (R:) If it teaches you anything! Ha! Ha! Ha!
13. (R:) ANYWAY, I WENT BACK TO THE VILLAGE, & THE PEOPLE FROM THE VILLAGE USED TO COME TO MY CELLAR FOR EVENING PRAYER. Now in this village there was a priest who did not like this. He said I was taking away his congregation from him they were listening more to me than to him. He was jealous. They were all jealous!
14. (I:) JEALOUS! YOU'RE TELLING ME THAT ALL OF THESE ACCUSATIONS WERE MADE BECAUSE PEOPLE WERE JEALOUS OF YOU? (R:) Yes. (I:) Well I have to say I find that very difficult to believe. (R:) I don't care. You have no ladies here, only men. you should have some nice ladies here, makes it more fun! (I:) You say you don't care. You mean to say you don't care whether people believe you're innocent or not?
15. (R:) EVEN IF I WERE GUILTY, GOD WOULD FORGIVE ME! (I:) Ah now look, that's far too tidy & neat & easy for you to get off the hook. On the one hand you say, "The accusations had no foundation because they were made by people who were jealous of me," on the other hand you say, "Even if I were guilty, God would get me off the hook!" It's just too neat, it's too easy.
16. (R:) GIVE ME AN ACCUSATION! (I:) I've given you all kinds of accusations! (R:) Give me one! (I:) All right, I've got some of the records right here. Here we are. September 2, 1900. Lisa Vietta Nicolievnabull visited the police station at Tobolsk--this is right from the police records & accused you of trying to murder her. Her story was that she saw you in a field having sex with two girls. She yelled at you to leave the children alone, you attacked her & tried to murder her but she ran away & hid until nightfall.
17. (R:) WHEN DID SHE SAY I WAS IN THIS FIELD TRYING TO RAPE THESE GIRLS? (I:) The 31st of August, last day of August. (R:) In that day I was in Kazan. Kazan is 600 miles from Tobolsk. (I:) She said she saw you do the deed near Kazan. (R:) She testified on September the 2nd? (I:) Yes. (R:) How did she go 600 miles in two days? (I:) I don't know. (R:) Neither do I! (I:) If all of these accusations were so easy to disprove, why did people keep on making them?
18. (R:) IF YOU CANNOT PROVE THE BAD, YOU WILL TRY TO DISPROVE THE GOOD. (I:) No, no, that's not what I'm trying to do at all. I'm just trying to figure out some way to get at the core of your story. You know, I can read all these books & reports that talk about your sexual excesses & your meddling in politics, exerting too much influence over the Tsaritza who already influenced far too much, but then I can read in the same book that you claimed to have healed many people by spiritual methods & to have prophesied a great many events.
19. (R:) I DID NOT DO THIS. (I:) AH, YOU DIDN'T DO THIS? (R:) GOD DID THIS THROUGH ME! The Tsar & the Tsaritza wanted a male heir to the throne. There was a doctor from France who guaranteed the Tsaritza that he would produce for them a son. Well, in time, Matushka seemed to be pregnant. She grew bigger & her breasts swelled, but she gave birth to (spits) nothing, air! Some time later I made a prophecy, I prophesied that in a year's time the Tsaritza would have a son!--In a year's time she had a son. God did this through me. (I:) Well, it could have been a good guess.
20. (R:) TSAREVITCH, HE WAS A BLEEDER. (I:) A HAEMOPHILIAC. (R:) Yes. He was a boy, he had to play with soft toys. He always had a guard for him, Nagoni the sailor, because if he was cut it was likely he would bleed to death. When he was eight years old he had a bad fall & bruised himself very badly. Three doctors looked at him & considered the case impossible. The Tsaritza thought he would die.
21. SHE HAD THEM SEND ME A TELEGRAM & I PRAYED FOR THE BOY. I sent them a telegram back saying that God had seen their tears & had heard their prayers & that their little boy would not die. The next day he was better. He improve markedly. I also said that when the boy would become twelve years old he would be all right. God did this through me.
22. (I:) I THINK I FINALLY FIGURED OUT WHAT'S BOTHERING ME ABOUT ALL OF THIS. I can accept the Biblical prophets & healers because that was 2,000 years ago, but you were doing these things in my father's lifetime, 60, 65 years ago. (R:) (Laughs & chokes.) (I:) Are you going to be all right?
23. (R:) I WAS A BOY & I SAW STRANGE THINGS! I grew up, I was married & I went to the monastery. Father Makari tells me to walk to Mount Athos. I went from Siberia to Greece all those thousands of miles in my bare feet with the chains of penance hung around me. I came back & I preached love. I prayed for the recovery of others. I had prophecies made through me by God, & I know these things were true. And I became close to the Tsar & the Tsaritza.
24. ALL THE OTHER PEOPLE IN THE CHURCH WERE JEALOUS & SLANDERED ME & the nobles & the politicians slandered me because they knew that I had the faith of the moujiks, the peasants, & I had the faith of the Tsar & the Tsaritza. I could understand their jealousy. But sometimes I saw in their faces disbelief.
25. I SAW THAT THEY THOUGHT I WAS USING MY GOD AS A TOOL FOR PERSONAL POWER. They thought that, even though I turned down huge sums of money & gave away all the riches that were given to me & refused to take official position. They still thought that. They didn't believe the prophecies & the cures. What you say might be the reason why. (I:) What's that? (R:) Because they were too near.
26. (I:) COULDN'T IT ALSO HAVE BEEN THAT YOU MADE GOOD GUESSES, that there were a lot of coincidences? You analysed the situation pretty intelligently & did what any intelligent man could have done. (R:) What is to prevent a good guess from being a prophecy? What is to prevent a coincidence from being the will of God?
27. (I:) OK, LET'S MOVE ON TO SOMETHING ELSE. When you died, when you were murdered, they announced that fact in the theaters & the people cheered. (R:) I can believe that! (I:) But after all these wonderful things that you're supposed to have done, the healing, the prophecies?
28. (R:) MOST PEOPLE DIDN'T KNOW OR THEY DIDN'T BELIEVE. They believed what the powerful bishop said about me. They believed it because I would not support them in their political views, the bishops. They believed what the politicians & the nobles said about me because I would not intercede for them with the Tsaritza & the Czar. They believed what these politicians & nobles said that, ah, my God, that I slept with the Tsaritza, that I was a spy for the Germans! (I:) And of course you hadn't done anything wrong at all?
29. (R:) OF COURSE I SIN, NO MAN IS WITHOUT SIN! I was a man! Sure sometimes I slept in the bed of a woman who was not my wife! Salvation is impossible unless one has been redeemed from sin, & true redemption cannot be achieved unless sin has been committed. Are you without sin? (I:) No, of course not.
30. (R:) ARE YOU REPENTANT? IF YOU ARE REPENTANT, GOD WILL FORGIVE YOU! God gave you a body, He meant for you to use it. (I:) I understand. (R:) No, you don't. (I:) Perhaps not in the way that you... (R:) You would like to talk about something else. (I:) Yes I would as a matter of fact.
31. (I:) WHEN WE BEGAN TO TALK SOME TIME AGO YOU WERE WEAVING DRUNKENLY AROUND THESE CHAIRS and you've been drinking steadily ever since & getting more & more sober. How do you explain that? (R:) I have no explanation. Happens all the time. When I talk of spiritual things I become sober. Maybe the Lord means it this way. I don't know.
32. (I:) MAY I ASK YOU SOMETHING ABOUT THE MANNER OF YOUR DEATH? You were lured to an apartment by some nobles & politicians & given some poisoned wine & poisoned cakes. (R:) Yes. (I:) And then when the poison apparently didn't work, your would-be assassins began to get a bit panicky & someone ran & got a pistol & shot you in the back.
33. (R:) YES FELIX YASAFA, HE INVITED ME TO HIS PLACE TO MEET HIS WIFE. She was sick & he asked me to cure her. So they gave me some cakes & some wine, I drank the wine but then he shot me in the back. (I:) And then there was a doctor there who came & pronounced you dead on the floor of the apartment. (R:) The doctor drove the car.
34. (I:) THEN ONE OF THE WITNESSES WHO SAW THE WHOLE EPISODE, reported that after you'd been pronounced dead you leapt up & tried to strangle this man. Then I think they shot you again, they threw you down, somebody came & kicked you in the temple with a heavy boot & still you were struggling! And finally they tied you up & put you in a car, they beat you with clubs, they drove you to a bridge over the River Maeva & threw you into the river, & this was in the middle of December so it was probably partially covered with ice. (R:) Yes.
35. (I:) YOU SAY YES AS IF YOU REMEMBER ALL THAT! (R:) I was not dead yet. (I:) Yes, there's a witness who reported seeing you still after all of that, struggling to get out of the river. (R:) You don't believe this? (I:) Well... (R:) Along with all the rest you don't believe this? (I:) As a matter of fact I do believe this. (R:) You believe that a man can be shot, poisoned, shot again, hit with a club, kicked with boots, thrown in the river & still struggle for life? (I:) I've read the coroner's report, I've read the actual report on that.
36. (R:) THERE ARE DOCTOR'S REPORTS ON THE CURES GOD GIVES TO ME. They tried nine times to assassinate me before they succeeded. They tried to shoot me. Illiadore had one of his disciples, the whore, the prostitute, Griselda, stab me. I was in the hospital for three weeks. People did not know if I would live or die. They tried everything to kill me! They tired to run me down with the sledge in the snow like a dog. Through the years they tried nine times.
37. (R;) ON THE DAY BEFORE THE TENTH TIME ... what day was I murdered? (I:) It's in here, I think it was the early hours of the morning of December 17, 1916, that was the Russian calendar at the time, so that makes the 30th of December by our calendar. (R:) On the day before, I wrote a letter to the Tsar. (I:) I have that letter here.
38. (I:) YOU SAID, "I FEEL THAT I SHALL LEAVE LIFE BEFORE THE FIRST OF JANUARY. I wish to make clear to the Russian people, to Papa, the mother of Russia, to the children of Russia, that they should understand." You said, "If I am killed by common assassins, by Russian peasants, the Tsar of Russia has nothing to fear, he will remain on his throne & govern & his children will rule Russia for hundreds of years.
39. "BUT," YOU SAID, "IF I AM MURDERED BY NOBLES, THE NOBILITY WILL HAVE MY BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS & will not be able to cleanse their hands for 25 years. The nobility will leave Russia, brother will be set against brother. They will kill & hate for years & for 25 years there will be no nobility in the country.
40. "IF YOU, THE TSAR, HEAR THE BELL WHICH TOLLS MY DEATH & if you find it was your relations who murdered me, not one of your family will remain alive after two years." And it's interesting that that prophecy came true, you were murdered by the nobles & within two years the Tsar & his family were shot in the revolution. I guess I don't know whether I'd classify that as a miracle or another shrewd guess.
41. (R:) IT BEING A SHREWD GUESS DOES NOT PREVENT IT FROM BEING PROPHECY, it does not prevent it from being the work of God. There are explanations for the plagues that beset the Pharaoh's Egypt, the explanations do not prevent it from being the work of God.
42. WE LIVE TODAY SO FAR FROM THE DAYS OF CHRIST & MARY, & ALL WE SEE ARE THE DIFFERENCES. We see an automobile, & that is different. We send messages by telegram, & that is different. But walk as a I have walked through the streets of the Holy Land & you will see that it is all the same, nothing there was changed.
43. I WAS NOT EDUCATED, BUT IT WAS MEEK IN SPIRIT. I sinned with wine in the bed of a woman, but i repented. I made myself weak before God, He forgave me. If a bishop does not have meekness he will weep if he doesn't have a silver cross. But if he has meekness, a tattered cassock would please him. And it is the tattered cassock that the crowd will fall on. Jealousy is as insidious as a serpent. We have sunk into slumber & fallen to evil ways, the Lord awaken us!
44. (AMEN! PTL FOR SUCH A TESTIMONY & FAITHFUL WITNESS!--And thank God for the boldness of SABC-TV to telecast it!--It was a really thrilling drama!--So true to life & the sceptical attitude of the unbelievers!--And such a ringing honest defense of the Gurus!--With the implication that they're not all bad, some might even be partly good!
45. --LIKE RASPUTIN--THE HERO & THE HEEL! (See our "Rasputin, Hero or Heel?", No.12.) Most of us are both!--Aren't we?--Aren't you? But still God loves us, forgives us & uses us to help others! May God help each of us to be more hero than heel!--amen?--Which are you? Receive Jesus today & He can help you to be more Heroic than Hellenic! Ha! It's true!--And next time don't scoff at us Gurus!--We may have something!--And you may need it someday!--Are you ready? If not, receive Jesus now & He'll save you from the Hell to come!)
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