In memory of Vladimir Avdeyev (1962-2020) by Pavel Tulaev.
On December 5, 2020, Vladimir Borisovich Avdeyev died in a Moscow hospital after a long illness with complications from COVID-19. He is a personality of a global importance. His creative contribution to science and culture deserves a serious consideration.
A conscientious Russian patriot, a talented writer, a researcher of religions, Avdeyev devoted the most mature years of his life to the study and popularization of raciology (from Rassenlehre — racial doctrine, Rassenkunde — racial science), an extremely important, but underestimated science of race and human qualitative characteristics. In addition to his own works, being summarized and published in Russian and English in the fundamental monograph “Raciology», Avdeyev has also prepared for publication many works of classical and modern authors who were specializing in this field and commented on them.
Before sharing my personal memories of him, I will give some biographical information. Vladimir Borisovich was born on March 24, 1962 in the family of a military man in the large industrial city of Nizhniy Taghil in the Urals. In 1985 he graduated from the Moscow Power Engineering Institute with a degree in systems engineering, and then he was called up for an urgent military service with the rank of an officer of The Air Force. In the Trans-Baikal district, he worked with an aircraft of the «Su» class (aircraft designer Pavel Osipovich Sukhoi). After the army, he was an employee of one of the closed enterprises of the defense complex. Avdeyev was always proud of his belonging to the techies and the military class. Regarding the oath of allegiance to the Motherland, he said that it must be given once and for life.
During his stay in the Far East, the future raciologist became interested in literature and philosophy, spent a lot of time in libraries, where he was reading rare, pre-revolutionary books. In Moscow, he became an employee of the Ministry of Culture and the All-Russian Cultural Foundation, and then decided to pursue a literary career and joined the USSR Writers’ Union in 1989. At the beginning of the post-Soviet period, Avdeyev became a member of the Coordination Council of the Moscow Slavic pagan community, created by Alexander Konstantinovich Belov, the founder of the fighting style and the Slavic-Goritsky wrestling club.
As far as I know, Vladimir Borisovich did not have the family of his own, although I heard something about his love affairs. At least, I can say that he was a man of the traditional sexual orientation. In addition to the book business, Avdeyev had some kind of private business, but I had never delved into the details of the topic which was of little interest to me.
When I met Vladimir Borisovich at the end of 1995 at one of the creative meetings at Moscow State University, he was engaged in fiction and religious studies, proudly positioning himself as a member of the Writers’ Union of Russia. I looked through his novels «The Passion for Gabriel» (1990) and «Prothesist” (1992) but did not read them carefully because I did not really like fiction. I liked his short and ironic aphorisms much more. He wrote them down in a thick notebook and quoted them on occasion, shocking his interlocutors with his cuteness. They were often impromptu. For example, when Alexander Gelevich Dugin was mentioned in one of the conversations, my interlocutor joked: «He is a guenonist, and I am a hedonist.»
Vladimir Borisovich understood hedonism not primitively, not as a physiological indulgence of passions and lower instincts but as an aesthetic enjoyment of life, admiration for its beauty, harmony and inner energy. I was impressed by his interest in ancient culture because I myself devoted several years to studying the heritage of ancient Greece and Rome, being inspired by the works of Alexei Fyodorovich Losev. Criticizing the integral traditionalism of the mystic Rene Guenon where in the Gospel spirit dissimilar elements of the Hellenistic and Semitic traditions were mixed, Avdeyev persistently repeated: «There are Greeks, and there are Jews.»
Avdeyev loved the elegance of expression and epitage. In his younger years, he wore long hair, and when he got matured he began wearing strict suits with a bow tie and a bowler hat and was outwardly resembling Churchill. Once the magazine «Heritage of the ancestors» where Vladimir Borisovich was one of the members of the editorial board published his portrait in a jacket. Some readers had noticed that in that suit Avdeyev looked like Goering. “Yes, I know that,” the writer said calmly, and defiantly turned in profile.
At the beginning of the same 1995, I was attracted to the project “The Heritage of the Ancestors” by its founder Vladimir Yuryevich Popov, a young nationalist who published the newspaper “The Era of Russia”. He needed a reputable editor with experience in other publications. Being the chairman of the Creative Association «Sobor», which existed since 1990, by that time I had already got several books published: collections of articles «The People and the Intelligentsia» (1990), «Russia and Europe: the Experience of Cathedral Analysis» (1990), «Around Losev «(1990), as well as the monographs «The Cross over Crimea» (1992), “Seven rays” (1993), and “Understanding the Russian Mindset” (1994). Together with Popov, we released the first eight issues of the Right perspective magazine, as it was stated on the cover of “The Heritage of the Ancestors”. First, we did the layout together, with the participation of Fyodor Razoryonov, and then the founder completely entrusted me with the entire editorial and publishing process.
From the second issue, Avdeyev joined us, full of energy, humor, ideas and intentions. His stormy character was perfectly expressed in the epigram by the contemporary poet Eduard Ericsson:
Rosy and big, cheerful,
Ironic, elegant Avdeyev.
He bursts in as a noisy crowd. He’s boiling!
And his gaze is terrible (for the enemies of Russia, not for the friends).
There is so much of Him that He alone can
Fill in the entire Aryan Space!
He has crushed Islam and Jewish Christianity with a pen.
Without False modesty, He’s not a Human,
But a Lump Nordic Ice,
He has shattered evil spirits —
She-Sergeants, pseudo-sex whores,
Cosmopolitans, liberal flies — with deadly criticism.
He is an Aristocrat, an Esthete, a Thinker —
He, an Antique Genius, a Friend of Paradoxes,
He hasn’t come from nowhere!
Avdeyev is a Magus Engineer, a Thunderstorm for Chaldeans,
A Pagan Hedonist!
When I decided to understand the history and essence of paganism, I devoted a lot of time to the study of ancient gods, ethnic religions and cults, Vladimir Borisovich and I could continuously discuss various aspects of faith. I was close to my native, Slavic heritage, which I studied according to the classical works by A.N. Afanasyev, B.A. Rybakov, according to the reconstruction of our contemporaries. Avdeyev delved into Aryan Zoroastrianism, the worldwide interest in which had been awakened by Friedrich Nietzsche with his famous philosophical essay «Thus Spoke Zarathushtra». My colleague argued that Christianity which had grew on the Jewish soil, from an esoteric point of view, borrowed a lot from Mithraism, and in general was an eclectic religion. For me, the Russian Orthodoxy was a confession, a personal choice, but for Avdeyev it was a subject of stinging criticism and ridicule. His book «Overcoming Christianity» (Kupj, 1994) aroused my disagreement but due to diplomatic considerations, I had to endure the anti-Christian lances of my interlocutor who called himself a «magus-blasphemer.» During our heated debates, I repeatedly asked the writer to be more delicate.
By the way, almost simultaneously with this book in 1994, the “Vityaz” publishing house issued a similar in spirit essay “Christianity as It Is” by Anatoly Mikhailovich Ivanov, an experienced historian and publicist, another member of the editorial board of “The Heritage of the Ancestors”. The book «Zarathushtra Spoke Wrong» which had been written back in the Soviet times also belonged to his critical pen. So ideological bombardment in the spirit of Nietzsche came from two sides. The moderator in controversial issues of editing was Vladimir Yuryevich Popov who respected the Russian Orthodox Church.
During another polemic with Avdeyev, in order to distract him from obsessions about the Jewish origin of Christianity and other features of the Semitic tradition, I showed him several books on racial topics. I brought them from the USA where I had been working as a teacher of the Russian language and the history of the Russian culture for a year. Those were reprints of rare brochures on the history of the Ku Klux Klan and the American edition of the monograph «The Racial Elements of the European History» by Hans Gunther, a classic of the German anthropology and eugenics, a propagandist of the theory of the superiority of the Nordic race. Avdeyev was carried away by that topic, because theoretically and mentally he was ready for it.
His articles soon appeared in “The Legacy of the Ancestors”: «The Personal freedom and racial hygiene» (1997, No. 3), «The Genetic socialism» (1997, No. 4), «Anthropology, geophysics and a religious consciousness» (1998, No. 5), «The Racial thinking of the ancient Greeks» (1999, No. 6), «A new paradigm in raciology» (1999, No. 7), «The Biological foundations of the Nordic worldview» (No. 8, 2000).
The same magazine (No. 8, 2000) published a small, but very capacious and important article «The Postmodern Era» by Irina Avdeyeva, the sister of our regular author. In it, she systematized the main directions of the modern Russian thought and listed its leading ideologists. Irina witnessed «the emergence of a new lifestyle: the Russians – the Right — nationalists». At the same time, she rather accurately characterized the essence of her brother’s ideas as «neo-paganism» and mine as «desimitized Orthodoxy.»
Through the Moscow club of right-wing intellectuals «European Synergies» which was headed by A.M. Ivanov, an active member of the editorial board Avdeyev organized interviews with like-minded people abroad: Gaston-Armand Amodruz, Edoardo Longo, Jurgen Rieger. For the first time in many decades, we reprinted an article by the famous geneticist N.K. Koltsov «Development of Eugenics in Russia and the USSR». Finally, in one of the libraries, Vladimir Borisovich found unique materials for publication about the secret archives of the Ahnenerbe. It was a sensation!
I write in detail about those early Avdeyev’s publications because in modern literature and on various sites on the Internet, the false information is spread, but science loves accuracy.
At the beginning of the new millennium, for technical and personal reasons, I temporarily stopped working with Vladimir Yuryevich Popov and in 2000, at the beginning of the 3rd millennium, I founded a periodical of my own, called “The Athenaeum” (registration number of the preliminary information — PI No. 77-5491). My task as an editor-in-chief was to unite the most talented, in my opinion, contemporaries around the new international magazine, dedicated to the Goddess of Wisdom and Just War. Vladimir Avdeyev did not hesitate to declare: «I will work with Tulaev.» Virtually the entire team, including A.M. Ivanov, S.A. Yashin and O.V. Nikankin, moved to “The “Athenaeum”. Soon G.S. Lozko, V.I. Milovanov, A.B. Rudakov, A. Dorozhkin (Orey), E. Yarova and others joined them.
The foreign relations, established by Anatoly Mikhailovich Ivanov, were preserved, and I was offered to become his deputy for «European Synergies», coordinated by Robert Steuckers (Belgium). I had my international contacts in Spain, USA, Slavic countries, in particular, through the World Congress of Ethnic Religions (WCER) which was headed by Jonas Trinkunas, but one thing complemented the other. It was not about positions, but about living connections of modern keepers of primordial traditions.
Avdeyev was a good friend and a reliable colleague. Being my age, he always politely addressed me «Pavel Vladimirovich», took advice and carefully prepared his publications for «The Athenaeum» which gained more and more authority and fame year by year. Wolfgang Strauss, a well-known publicist and Russophile from Germany, called our magazine «the theoretical organ of the New Rights in Russia”. And that was true.
We had published articles on the most relevant topics of our time: the theory and practice of new generation wars, geopolitics, biopolitics. technological breakthrough, classical, traditional and right-wing radical culture, native faith and neo-paganism. Simultaneously with the magazine, we were publishing a news feed under the abbreviation R.A.C.A. (Russian Agency for Communications and Analytics), which many patriotic newspapers reprinted.
Raciology had become one of the main headings of “The Athenaeum”. There Vladimir Borisovich continued publishing his own articles: «The Racial Theory of Time» (No. 1), «The Discourse on Racial Prejudices» (No. 2), «The Comparative Psychology in the Third Reich (No. 3-4), «The Biopolitical Inquisition «( No. 5), “The founder of the Russian racial theory S.V. Eshevsky «(No. 7), «The National Socialism with a Human Face «(No. 8). Не also discovered the forgotten names of the classics of the Western European and Russian anthropological school: Paul Pierre Broca, Fritz Lenz, Otto Rehe, Walter Gross, Hermann Schwarz, Max Wundt, Joseph Deniker, Viktor Bunak, Yuri Filipchenko and others, publishing their articles with biographical sketches and their own comments. We accompanied those unique publications with photographs of the authors and artistic images that illustrated various human types.
Having earned the recognition of readers, Avdeyev became the only member of the editorial board of «The Atheneaum», whose artistic photograph (done by Orey) was placed on the cover of the double issue 3-4.
In general, we made sure that our periodical had its own face, in the figurative sense of the word. We gave original publications, the first translations, tried not to copy someone else’s but to create our own new ones, to set the tone for the general movement for the revival of right-wing ideals. Vladimir Borisovich understood this perfectly well. In his interview with «The Athenaeum» (No. 9-10), he called our magazine a «school of style» that stood out vividly against the general background of patriotic periodicals of that time. At the same time he stressed that «we were the first to show how to work.»
Nevertheless, the titan of thought, sparkling with energy, felt cramped within the framework of our almanac which was published only once a year. At the same time, he was a regular columnist of the «Archive of Racial Politics» in the patriotic newspaper “Za Russkoe Delo” (For the Russian Cause) which was published in St. Petersburg. In Moscow two collections of «The racial meaning of the Russian idea» (v.1, 2000, v.2, 2002) with articles by contemporary authors were also published. Vladimir Borisovich made those books in collaboration with the prominent political scientist Andrei Nikolaevich Savelyev but it was Avdeyev himself who was the main engine of the project. He began turning into a popular «brand».
A real breakthrough occurred when the publishing house of Igor Viktorovich Dyakov “Feri-V” published a thick two-volume book “The Russian racial theory before 1917” which was edited by Avdeyev (vol. 1, 2002, vol. 2, 2004). The collection with a detailed preface of a compiler included the works of the founders of the Russian anthropology, psychophysiology and neurology — by S.V. Eshevsky, A.P. Bogdanov, V.A. Moshkov, I.A. Sikorsky, D.N. Anuchin, I.I. Mechnikov, S.S. Korsakov, G.E. Grumm-Grzhimailo, A.A. Ivanovsky and others. Each of those names deserved attention, but in the Soviet time, they had been pushed to the periphery of science because of the struggle of the Marxist political economy school against classical biology and genetics.
“Few people know that the racial theory in Russia was by no means a marginal phenomenon, it was promoted from the departments of the most prestigious educational institutions. Scientific activity in that area was patronized by the royal dynasty and the best part of the state-minded nobility, and was also repeatedly blessed by the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church”, the compiler wrote in the annotation, clearly feeling proud that he returned part of their national heritage to the compatriots.
For clarity, Avdeyev published illustrations with skulls, skeletons and measuring instruments which were shocking for ordinary people. To prevent the reader from thinking it was “for show-off”, he also included an article by S.M. Khomyakov «How to Measure People» there, which was taken from a pre-revolutionary reference book. There was also a catalog of anthropological instruments of the firm “Shvabe”. Finally, he added a list of members of the Russian Anthropological Society.
Foreseeing possible accusations of opponents of “racism”, Vladimir Borisovich joked in his characteristic ironic manner: “Modern sexologists are quite seriously discussing the problem of the size of the genitals. Why can the penis be measured, but cannot the skull? After all, it is the container for the brain! »
Friends rejoiced, while ideological opponents resented. Wasn’t the race doctrine invented by the German National Socialists? Did the Russians have their own tradition of anthropology? Not only had, but in many ways the Russian tradition was ahead of Western studies.
Our genetics is still at a high level today (see the works by V.P. Alekseyev, A.F. Nazarova, A.A. Klyosov, I.V. Ravich-Shcherbo, E.V. and O.P. Balanovskikh and others ).. As for the defensive significance of biological and racial research, it was Yuri Alexandrovich Bobilyov, a specialist in secret programs of state and military importance, the author of the sensational book «Biological Bomb» who wrote about it in “The Athenaeum”. Today, his articles are openly printed by many publishers, and they can be found even on the Internet, along with publications on related topics by Major General of Police Vladimir Semyonovich Ovchinsky, a famous Russian criminologist who for some time headed the Russian Bureau of Interpolo, and his co-author Elena Sergeyevna Larina who writes about wars of a new generation.
Military biological research is now in demand, but it has received a tangible state support only recently, after the disaster with COVID-19. Our long-standing idea of a national genetic database has received the green light from V.V. Putin! And no one laughs at the problems of genetic weapons, does not call this topical topic «fascist» or «nazi».
But then, in the early 2000s, the public reaction was completely different. In order to drown the «inconvenient» author and too bold publisher, of whom it was no longer possible to keep silent, opponents began to slander Avdeyev, to seek out flaws and mistakes from him. A critical article appeared in the journal «The Diagnosis», where Vladimir Borisovich was presented as an alcoholic writer, unreasonably claiming for scientific discoveries. On the Internet, they began to discuss malicious publications by Doctor of Historical Sciences. V.A. Shnirelman, chief researcher at the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Complaints to the prosecutor’s office were poured in order to «confiscate extremist literature with propaganda of racism and anti-Semitism”.
The engaged critics are not interested in the fact that raciology is an exact science, and has no direct relation to racism — one of the radical ideologies. The racial theory is based on the classical anthropology, which, like anatomy, describes the structure of the human body. For example, using data from modern neuropsychology, it studies the role of the brain in the formation of human intelligence. Anthropology supplements biological data with historical information about the human origin and research in the field of ethnology. And raciology goes even further, it generalizes the facts accumulated by science, systematizes them and builds a hierarchy of racial types.
Comparative anthropology gave rise to the polygenic school. Previously, it was believed that all people descended from common ancestors, relatively speaking, from Adam and Eve. However, this misconception was taken from the Old Testament. Polygenists, since the days of Todor Arldt and Hermann Klaatch, who had lived before the Third Reich, proved that there was not a single cradle of human civilization, but there were several regional centers of ancient culture. Paraphrasing the famous thesis of Charles Darwin that “man descended from a monkey”, Avdeyev ironically clarified: “Each race — white, yellow and black — descended from its monkeys”.
Races initially differ from each other in dozens of characteristics, not only in skin, hair, and eye color. For example, there are qualitative differences in skeletal structure, skull shape, skin tissue structure, fingerprints, brain size, genitals, nervous system functioning, psychomotor performance, sweat production, and even odors. These and many other racial characteristics are carefully analyzed by the author of the book «Raciology», written not for the representatives of the Nordic type, but for a wide range of people of any origin.
As far as I remember, Avdeyev never allowed himself a single offensive statement against the Jews, but he also did not consider them «sacred cows» that should be avoided. Judaica (the science of Jewry) and Semitology (studies of the Semitic tradition) are sections of academic science. Anthropology recognizes the qualitative differences between the Semitic and Aryan types. That was known back in biblical times, when, after the Flood, the sons of Shem and Ham began developing some lands and the descendants of Japhet (Iapet) began developing others. Criticism of Semitic religions is part of «The Scientific Atheism», which was taught in the Soviet universities as a compulsory subject. It is not an expression of «anti-Semitism.» On the other hand, it is known that Zionism, a radical form of Jewish nationalism, was qualified as a form of racism and racial discrimination by the UN General Assembly in 1975.
As for the vicious criticism by V.A. Shnirelman, a specialist in the origin of cattle breeding, industrial farming, ethnogenesis and social conflicts in the ancient world, who in recent years was carried away by the defeat of racology, neo-paganism, Aryan ideology and Russian native faith, then more than one anecdotal incident happened to him. For example, when Avdeyev found out that his longtime opponent had written a whole treatise about him, in the title of which he called him “the chain dog of the race,” protecting the “white man,” Vladimir Borisovich took that gem as a compliment. In response, he expressed another aphorism: “A dog is a Nordic animal, therefore a white man must love dogs. But the Chinese, even those who live in Moscow, eat dogs! »
The participants in that intellectual duel were initially in an unequal position. Avdeyev acted as a private person, as a free thinker and an independent intellectual. And Shnirelman was a representative of the said Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, supported by the Biblical and Theological Institute, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israeli publishing house «Gesharim» («Bridges of Culture»). He wrote another devastating work which was commissioned by the well-funded Information and Analysis Center “SOVA” (owl), which specializes in racism and xenophobia, the relationship between religion and society, political radicalism, liberal values and human rights in Russia. The center is supported by the European Instrument for Democracy & Human Rights (EIDHR), the International Partnership for Human Rights, the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, the Russian Jewish Congress and other influential organizations. Later Shnirelman was awarded the Yegor Gaidar Prize, an ideologist of neoliberal capitalism in Russia, for his work.
It is also important to note that the talented writer did not confine himself to the study of raciological problems. He loved the journalistic genre of essay, and in addition to biographies of selected authors, sometimes he published articles on philosophical and ideological topics: integral nationalism, national hedonism, caste ethnocracy, the myth of a single humanity, how to destroy the «new world order», etc. Vladimir Borisovich formulated the headlines of his articles provocatively, for example: «First Eurasia, and then Asiopa», «The esoteric patrol», «Turn the steering wheel to the right!» or «In order to win in politics, you have to leave it.»
Where to go? Into the solitary contemplation of the mortal world? The ivory tower? Family life? Everyone chooses what is close to his own type and experience. Avdeyev, being a creative, active person, devoted his mature years to scientific research and author publications. This is not a complete self-isolation, but a certain distance from momentary politics, allowing the wise man to look at it from the outside and not to get bogged down in the swamp of current events.
The zenith of Avdeyev’s fame can be considered in the book series «The Library of the Racial Thought» founded by him. At “White Alves” Publishing House from 2000 to 2019, he published and commented on the writings of many racial thinkers and authors. Some of them have been awarded separate volumes, such as: Ludwig Woltmann (“The Political Anthropology”, 2000); Hans F.K. Gunther (“The Selected Works on Raciology”, 2002); Ernst Crick (“Overcoming Idealism. Foundations of Racial Pedagogy”, 2004); Karl Straz (“The Racial Female Beauty”, 2004); Ludwig Ferdinand Klaus (“Race and Soul. Practical Psychoanthropology”, 2014); Walter Scheidt (“The General Raciology”, 2014); Felix von Luschan (“Peoples, Races and Languages”, 2014); Ludwig Krzhivitsky (“Anthropology and Psychic Races”, 2015). The works of other authors were included in the anthology on the topics: «The Philosophy of Leadership» (2006), «Race and Worldview» (2009) and «The Russian Eugenics» (2012). Each of the collections of articles contains from twenty to forty texts! It is the tireless Anatoly Mikhailovich Ivanov whom the publishing house owes the translation of numerous German studies to.
In the same unique series a collection of articles by V.B. Avdeyev «The Metaphysical Anthropology» (2002), which included previous publications in the journals “The Heritage of the Ancestors”, “The Athenaeum”, “The Russian Geopolitical Collection”; his author’s monograph «Raciology», which was discussed above (in two editions in 2005 and 2007); as well as the works of the Russian contemporaries — the aforementioned A.M. Ivanov («The Dawn and Twilight of the Aryan Gods», 2007), A.N. Saveliev («The Image of the Enemy. Raciology and Political Anthropology», 2007) and a separate publication in collaboration with A.N. Sevastyanov (“Race and Ethnos”, 2007). They worked in collaboration with Vladimir Borisovich and felt the influence of his research.
The director of the publishing house «White Alvy» Svetlana Nikolaevna Udalova did a lot to print the mentioned works in a high-quality manner and bring them to the interested reader. She even had to suffer during the «raids» of the prosecutor’s office and justify herself with the help of lawyers, because the responses about the books in the series were very different: from laudatory to devastating.
According to the magazine «The Book Business» (2006, No. 4), the monograph by V.B. Avdeyev «Raciology» became the best-seller. In the nomination «philosophy, political science, esoterics» it had no equal. Experts explained the increased demand for that research by the topics that “opened up a new direction in science which was related to the field of interdisciplinary knowledge”.
Another assessment was given by forensic experts, who received a request from the prosecutor’s office: «The book praises the ‘white race’, while other races are subjected to derogatory criticism … The content of the book under study was aimed at inciting racial hatred against certain ethnic and social groups”.
Having withstood the blow of opponents, Avdeyev began to look for the «alternative airfields.» He printed the works by such authors as Georges Vacher de Lapouge, Isaac Taylor, Paolo Montegazza, Fritz Lange, Carlton Stevens Kuhn at other printing facilities. Hans Gunther’s third book, “The Raciology of the Jewish People”, was published separately, because any careless mention of the Jews caused a scandal in well-known circles. By the way, I will note that Isaac Taylor is an author of the Jewish origin, which has not prevented the publication of his interesting work «The Slavs and the Aryan World.» Taylor continues the line of research of the Polish anthropologist Ilse Schwidecki which has been confirmed by the latest discoveries of the Russian geneticist Anatoly Klyosov.
I received many of the above books personally from Vladimir Borisovich with his written dedications and wishes for cooperation. The rest of the books were purchased from publishers or stores. I cannot boast that I have carefully studied all the listed publications, but I have looked through most, selectively read, and even reviewed some of them.
I should point out that the works of F. Lange and P. Mantegazza are devoted to physiognomy, which Ivan Alekseyevich Sikorsky had promoted in Russia before them. The works of the classic of the Russian anthropology and psychiatry, presented in the anthology «The Russian Racial Thought before 1917», were later published by Avdeyev in a separate collection under the title «The Physiology of Mental Suffering» (2007). It came out with the assistance of O.M. Gusev and R.L. Perin in the series «The Lost Keys». It reveals the problems of ethnopsychology on the example of the Russians, Ukrainians and other Slavs, as well as the psychological characteristics of geniuses, such as the great poet A.S. Pushkin.
The nature of genius occupied the minds of many scientists of the 19th and 20th centuries, especially geneticists and psychologists. Developing the main theses about the inequality of human races and anthropological types, substantiated by J.A. Gobineau, as well as F. Galton’s doctrine of the heredity of talents, such experts as C. Lombroso and M. Nordau believed that genetically determined qualities of geniuses, under certain conditions, can lead to psychological deviations and diseases. The question arose about the so-called mental «normality», its characteristics and limits. Great talent, as you know, stands out from the general number of average people. It is significantly higher than normal. In this sense, one can say about Gogol, Dostoevsky or Tchaikovsky that they are not normal, but brilliant. And this genius is accompanied not only by laurels, but also by thorns, psychological suffering, intensified by the conflict with a society that is conservative and philistine.
At the same time, Avdeyev was interested in general problems of degeneration. They are associated not only with the innate qualities of people, but also with acquired habits, conditioned by upbringing and social environment.
Under socialism, which our generation found itself in its heyday, the ideology of economic determinism prevailed. It attributed human vices to the predatory nature of capitalism, which mercilessly exploited the labor of hired workers. Under Stalin, genetics was declared a «bourgeois science». Outstanding biologists were repressed at the whim of the authorities and contrary to common sense. Now we have returned to the «broken washtub» and are again trying to understand the internal causes of human degeneration.
Any living creature is born with a genetically defined program, which the ancient Aryans called the «golden seed of Shiva.» These can be species and typical qualities, personal properties and talents, a general predisposition to certain actions or diseases. The racial identity of people is programmed by nature, but the individual qualities of the subject can change which depends on the circumstances, even after reaching maturity, including: height, body weight, character, habits. Only within certain limits! For example, a dwarf cannot become a giant, and an imbecile born of genetically defective parents cannot grow up to be a genius. Under favorable conditions, a gifted person reaches the level of development of direct ancestors and surpasses them. However, being on the wave of success or at the zenith of fame, a talented person under the influence of numerous temptations can degrade.
Indeed, didn’t the genius revolutionary, destroyer of the Russian Empire and the founder of the world’s first socialist state, Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (maternal — Blank), to whom Avdeyev’s revelatory essay «Lenin’s Mummy» was dedicated, end his life in complete madness? From a political point of view, originally his madness manifested itself in a rabid hatred for the Church, tsarism, capitalism and the bourgeoisie, in the merciless «Red Terror», from which, in general, millions of people died, and from a psychological and medical point of view, those were attacks of indignation, painful neuroses and, finally, total atherosclerosis of cerebral vessels (Abnutzungssclerose).
The brutal inclinations, being inherited by people from the animal world which are more primitive in terms of the level of development, can manifest themselves at a critical moment in any person, if they are not deliberately controlled and kept in check, like wild horses. And when violence becomes the norm and is encouraged, it takes on predatory, bloodthirsty and painful forms.
This brings forth a historical example of the massacres of the Nazis during the Second World War against an ideological background. However, I will remind you of the non-politicized maniac of the 1980s, serial killer A.V. Chikatilo, a necrosadist and cannibal, inventive in his own way during the preparation and commission of monstrous crimes. The main reason for his abnormal behavior was in the pathology which was not related to the peculiarities of the social environment and the era.
Uncontrollable passions, called sins in Christianity, are studied by psychology, psychiatry and sexopathology, as long as the violation of the norm occurs in personal life. And when the demonic passion (from the word «demons») develops into demonic possession, into aggression, when it becomes socially dangerous, seeks psychological or ideological justifications for itself, and even strives for power in order to dictate forcefully to other people their insane, painful will, such a passion becomes a subject for study by criminologists and specialists in criminal law.
The problems of degeneration attract the attention of many modern authors. Boris Andreyevich Didenko from St. Petersburg, who is familiar with Avdeyev, developed an original theory of «vidism» which is set forth in a series of books of popular science and literary genres: «The Ethical Anthropology», «The Power of Predators», «The Civilization of Cannibals», «The Tsar City». Another friend of our raciologist, Roman Lyudvigovich Perin, the aforementioned co-editor of the patriotic newspaper “Za Russkoe Delo”, investigated the ethical and psychological aspects of personnel policy in the USSR, including the People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs. In his book «The Guillotine for Demons» (2001), he reveals such delicate and closed topics that it is better not to touch on in this essay.
Who is to blame for the genocide of the Russian people and other fraternal ethnic groups? What are its reasons? What can be done to save new generations, whose gene pool is already significantly damaged?
During the period of the so-called «perestroika», M.S. Gorbachev and the liberal capitalist reforms of B.N. Yeltsin, the process of depopulation of Russia, or, simply speaking, the extinction of the people began. There are more dying people than births. This is a glaring quantitative indicator of demographics. And who examines the quality of people? After all, here not only the parameters of the general level of health should be considered, but also the usefulness of genetics, mental and other abilities.
In this regard, I want to say a few words separately about the eugenics reader, the science of improving the human race. When we reprinted Y. Filippchenko’s Soviet article «Eugenics in School» (first publications in 1910 and 1924) in “The Athenaeum” #6 (2004), it attracted everyone’s attention. After all, this topic at the beginning of the last century was fashionable all over the world! I created a special page «Eugene» on our website https://ateney.ru/old/evgeniya/index.htm, where I began to post relevant articles about choosing a couple, about the role of the family, about genetic inheritance, about prenatal education, and even published photo sessions of female models from a circle of friends. However, that was not enough, and I persistently reminded Vladimir Borisovich of his mission: “We must raise the banner of Russian eugenics!”. I offered him my anthology plan. “We’ll do it, we’ll do it. Not all at once, — he answered with a smile, but the publication of the planned book was always postponed. In 2005, a collection of articles «Eugenics in the discourse of global problems of our time» got published under the general editorship of Yu.V. Hen, it was approved for publication by the Academic Council of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. And only seven years later, the publishing house «White Alves» finally printed the long-awaited anthology «Russian Eugenics», which included the works by the aforementioned classics: N.K. Koltsov, V.V. Bunak, Yu.A. Filipchenko, as well as N.F. Florinsky, M.V. Volotsky, A.S. Serebrovsky, P.I. Lublinsky and other specialists. What is remarkable about this story is that the universal eugenic idea, denigrated and slandered by the political opponents of biological science, has breached the wall of ignorance, regardless of our activity.
As you can see, we were working with Avdeyev in one team, where each participant had his own ideological preferences, priorities and areas of responsibility. I have always had my own point of view on the theoretical and practical issues of anthropology. Even when I and Vladimir Borisovich had different views on racial issues, and our magazine began to be called racial, it never crossed my mind to abandon my own worldview, which developed according to internal laws.
For example, in 2006, with the help of the Athenaeum and European Synergies staff, I organized a landmark international conference “The White World’s Future” in Moscow, where I made a report on the topic “Russia in the context of the Fourth World War”. The forum was attended by some authoritative authors, such as Guillaume Fay (France), Pierre Krebs (Germany), Pierre Vial (France), David Duke (USA), Enrique Ravello (Spain), Galina Lozko (Ukraine), Gerhoch Reisegger (Austria), Jan-Ber Tillenon (France), Konstantin von Hoffmeister (Germany), Eleftherios Ballas (Greece), and others in absentia. The press release, final declaration and reports were published in full in the paper Athenaea, and then posted on our website, where they can be read even today in the original under the heading “Translations”: https://www.ateney.ru/
White Forum 2006, unusual for our country, heuristic in concept and bold in generalizations, was a great success and got lively responses in the press, so the next year we held a similar conference on the topic “Russia and Europe: New Prospects”. The already established core of Athenaeum authors were joined by: Manfred Roeder (Germany), Chris Roman (Belgium), Stefanos Gekas (Greece), Alexander Thiel (USA), Kai Murros (Finland), Alexander Rudakov (Russia), not counting external students, including such outstanding ones as Robert Steuckers (General Secretary of «European Synergies» from Belgium, Stefano Lorenzoni (Italy), Stashko Potrebovsky (Poland), Anton Rachev (Bulgaria) and others.
At the first conference Avdeyev spoke on the topic «Hygiene of the European worldview.» He proceeded from the thesis about the racial core of the White race, which is in conflict with its periphery. According to this logic, the struggle between the center and the outskirts is inevitable and necessary, because it strengthens the core, protecting it from decay. The radical conclusions of Vladimir Borisovich were perceived by the audience, and then by the readers with great interest.
The second international conference was unofficially titled «White Forum 2007», but Vladimir Borisovich did not insist on his speech. My introductory lecture was devoted to the meaning of the White Idea, in its spiritual, philosophical and historical dimensions. In some aspects, he polemicized with the racial-anthropological approach.
In the following years, it often happened that many questions of «The Athenaeum» readers on biopolitical topics ricocheted to me, as the host of the mentioned conference and other international meetings, as the editor-in-chief of the publication, who published the texts of reports and articles.
Once, at the Heavenpolitics Club, where my author’s meeting was held, even before my speech, the famous sinologist Andrey Petrovich Devyatov asked: «What do you think about the works of Vladimir Avdeyev?» To that, I answered briefly: “I think that Avdeyev and Tulaev are different people,” and then I began to state my own convictions.
For many years, I have been developing the lineage of generic consciousness and the logic of generosity. From this point of view, there are not only individuals who make up one family (from the word «seed» in Russian) with their relatives, but also related tribes, peoples, races, languages, cultures and even gods. Yes, there are native gods! They are also genetically related to each other and with us. And there is also a generic, folk, or national, heritage. This is a great treasure! The Orthodox faith belongs to the national heritage. The doctrine of the Holy Trinity, of the incarnation of the God-man as Savior, has deep Aryan roots. Jesus Christ is not the messiah the Jews were waiting for, otherwise he would not have become the founder of the Church and would not have been condemned by the Talmud as a «heretic» and «sorcerer.» An ontological abyss lies between the Old and New Testaments. The Christian anthropology, which differs from materialistic, is close to the spiritual teachings of the East, such as Buddhism and Krishnaism, and the experience of miraculous healing through fasting, prayer, laying on of hands («mantica») and God’s will is comparable to the tradition of the legendary therapist Charaka, which was developed in Indian Ayurveda and the Tibetan Sorig school.
As for the concept of race, which in Sanskrit literally means fruit juice, and in a figurative sense — the best and strongest, in recent years I have been thinking about rasayana as an Ayurvedic term, dedicated to the healing of the body and high-quality longevity.
Our readers, “The Athenaeum” researchers and prosecutors, who forced me to close the printed version of the popular international magazine in 2010, need to understand a simple thing: people not only have the right to knowledge and their own opinion, they have a legal right to different worldviews.
Vladimir Avdeyev became a legend during his lifetime. The political persecution only increased his popularity. The group of the most zealous followers of the ideologue of the new anthropology, with many talented minds and outstanding figures in it, began to be called «Avdeyevtsy» as a kind of sect. Raciology, despite persecution, has become popular, and racial thinking has become fashionable. Indeed, why can only animals have a breed? Are people worse than dogs or horses? And did not the wise men say: «From a bad seed there can be no good tribe». Or is it also racism?
Avdeyev’s critics often emphasized his fascination with the National Socialist school of thought in Germany, which he considered part of the Soviet trophies which were won during the Great Patriotic War. In reality, Vladimir Borisovich’s outlook was much broader. In addition to German, French and Russian authors, he was seriously interested in the Anglo-Saxon ones. He wrote a comprehensive History of the English Raciology (2010), in an appendix to which he placed selected texts and excerpts by such authors of the 19th and 20th centuries as Robert Knox, James Brees, Arthur Keith, John Walter Gregory, A.J. Russell and some others. In the last decade, the ascetic got the individual monographs published: the modern British Richard Lynn (“Racial Differences in Intelligence”, 2010), the Canadian John Philip Rushton (“Race: Evolution and Behavior”, 2019), and the Americans Jared Taylor (“White Identity. Racial Identity in the 21st Century”, 2014), Lothrop Stoddard (“The Revolt Against Civilization”, 2016) and Roger Pearson (“Race Problems in Modern Science”, 2019). In that direction, Vladimir Borisovich was helped by the following translators: D.O. Rumyantsev, K.N. Smetannikov, M. Yu. Diunov and others.
I also learned that Avdeyev, with the help of his colleague Dmitry Tkachenko, had prepared the works by Thomas Cowley Allen, Glade Whitney, Frank Mille for publication. He had collected materials for a review of the history of the American School of Anthropology, had studied the works of Frank Spencer and Anne Fabian. I wanted to publish another book by Richard Lynn on eugenics and dysgenics. I discussed the possibility of translating the works of Edward Dutton and Nathaniel Weil’s research on Karl Marx and planned to publish the collection «The essence of racial differences: yesterday, today, tomorrow.» However, because of his illness, these projects were not completed.
It is important to pay attention to the fact that Vladimir Borisovich maintained personal contacts with some contemporary authors and publishers abroad, and they helped to publish his main monograph «Raciology» in English. I have posted a review of this book in the Internet version of “The Atheneaum”: https://ateney.ru/old/eng/eng030.htm
Our foreign relations were predominantly creative, intellectual in nature, and were partly an expression of people’s diplomacy, that is, people’s goodwill to communicate, exchange knowledge and life experience. Avdeyev, who was fluent in English, often corresponded or called intellectuals from the UK and the USA. Ivanov, being a polyglot, preferred to communicate with the Germans and French. And I had a correspondence with the Spaniards, the leaders of the Slavic movement and the Russian emigrants, which did not prevent me as a professional linguist to improve my skills in Western European languages. Our website www.ateney.ru published articles and materials in ten languages, and the paper version of “The Atheneaum” was distributed in more than 20 countries, not to mention dozens of Russian cities. Some readers even thought that the Russian international magazine, which became the newspaper of the New Rights, that it was a «special project of the KGB» (State Security Committee), although in reality it was done by 3-4 volunteers.
Once, with the participation of our leading raciologist, one unforgettable meeting took place. Koos Fermullen, one of the leaders of the modern movement for apartheid, that is, the separation of aborigines and colonists from Europe, came to Moscow from the Republic of South Africa. Vladimir Borisovich brought him to my house, and together we began to discuss the difficullt situation of the white population of Africa, who fell under the repression of the Negro authorities. Once upon a time, the European colonialists oppressed the aboriginals who were at the level of development of a primitive society. They drove them into the“ bantustans ”(reservations). And when several generations of blacks, educated in European culture, grew up, the balance of power radically changed. Thanks to the principles of constitutional equality, the black majority during the voting in democratic elections defeated the «pale-faced», who found themselves in the minority. Mr. Fermullen, sitting at my kitchen table, told us about the cases of brutal violence against white people in South Africa, and at the end of a frank conversation he asked: «Can Russia help the affected Christians?» It was about the formation of small security detachments to protect the civilian population. For such work, the supporters of apartheid, in its moderate, reasonable forms were willing to pay good wages, at the level of European standards.
Avdeyev found this task quite relevant and solvable. After all, he himself was the son of an officer and had experience in urgent military service near the People’ Republic of China which Mongoloid population is 10 times as large as the Caucasoid one in the Russian Federation. And we have thousands of well-trained military specialists with experience in combat operations in border regions in our country. Many of them would love to work under contract in South Africa which has a wonderful climate and an abundance of cheap products..
After we discussed the technical details of the bold project, Vladimir Borisovich took out a bottle of vodka he had brought and offered to drink on that occasion, proclaiming a toast «to the racial cooperation of Russians and white Afrikaners.» Koos Fermullen happily agreed, but asked to pour ordinary milk into his glass instead of vodka. As a supporter of a healthy lifestyle, I supported the Afrikaner’s sober gesture, and the three of us raised our glasses with laughter.
To some people, this story may seem insignificant, secondary, but this is a delusion. On a global scale there is a degeneration of the white race, which now makes up not more than 8% of the total population of the planet. Our Motherland is in third place in the world in the absolute number of deaths from alcohol, second only to China and India, but their population is an order of magnitude higher than in Russia. So, the personal problem of the choice of drinks is of the national importance. Only a sober Russia will become great!
Some skeptical analysts believe that the degradation of the White race cannot be stopped. In addition, the Europeans are losing competition to Asians, to Mongol race, not only in terms of population. In recent years, China has been ahead of Western countries in terms of economic growth and the introduction of high technologies into production. Whether there is still any chance for Russia to be among the world leaders is a big question!
Immediately I will note that the outstanding Russian geopolitician and military intelligence officer Vandam (Alexei Efimovich Edrikhin), who took part in the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902 on the side of the Afrikaners and wrote the famous “Letters from the Transvaal”, translated from French at the beginning of the 20th century book by Edmond Demolen «The Aristocratic Race». It was published twice in St. Petersburg, in 1906 and 1907. I think it would be nice to reprint this pre-revolutionary monograph with comments on the role of the aristocracy as the best power and its modern tasks. Avdeyev was not against the new publication of the aforementioned book by Demolen, but he had his own list of applicants, overcrowded with the names and titles of works.
When the next books came out, my longtime colleague called me on my home phone to share the joy, and we discussed the news. Then the calls became less frequent, and I learned about his recent publications from Svetlana Nikolaevna Udalova at the book fair in the section of the publishing house «White Alves».
Each book, published by Avdeyev, awakens the interest of the Russian public, provokes public controversy, and sometimes provokes harsh criticism from specialists, which sometimes reaches the point of caricature. Of course, having done such a titanic job of publishing and commenting on the listed works, comparable to the activities of some research institutes, our Hercules may have made a mistake somewhere, some inaccuracies, or drunkenly allowed himself a literary liberty. After all, he was an esthete, a writer who loved elegant style and irony. However, on the whole, the creative legacy of the “racial encyclopedist”, as he called himself, is a huge achievement. It is impossible to deny that Avdeyev has awakened the keen interest of a whole generation of compatriots in the current problems of anthropology, race, eugenics, physiognomy, biopolitics and other related topics. And dozens of outstanding world-class specialists in the above-mentioned fields of knowledge, confirmed by experimental experience, cannot be mistaken in everything.
The last time I saw Vladimir Borisovich was three years ago at the “Conservator” Club. Its presenter Valentina Bobrova made a presentation of the Russian edition of the book «The Left Psychopaths» by Kerry Bolton, a famous political scientist from New Zealand. Avdeyev wrote a preface on the political degeneration and an appendix on the biopolitical inquisition. During the club presentation, he spoke brightly, intelligently, ironically, almost without hesitation, which testified to his good intellectual form. Outwardly, the speaker did not look very fresh, but no one then could have thought that in a couple of years the legendary raciologist would be taken to hospital, and with difficulty overcoming the accumulated diseases, would die in the prime of life.
Avdeyev had a severe form of diabetes with a complication of the kidneys and other organs of the body called «diabetic polyneuropathy.» His long-standing craving for alcohol and the consequences of a difficult operation, as a result of which a large part of his intestines was cut out, had a detrimental effect. Sitting on a strict diet, the former hero, who was pulling 120 kg, became as thin as a fasting person. And that was not it. During a regular hospital stay Vladimir caught the coronavirus. His lungs were 75% affected! An exhausted body with a weakened immune system could not resist infection for a long time and the agony followed.
For about a year, Vladimir Borisovich was in a serious condition, observing bed rest either in hospitals or at home under the supervision of sick-nurses. The person who has paid the most attention to him is his sister Irina, who deserves a deep gratitude.
It is difficult to realize and to accept the idea that such a talented, energetic, courageous person left us when he was only 58 years old. I would like to say, according to the Orthodox tradition: «The Kingdom of Heaven, for you, dear Vladimir, and eternal memory!» However, Avdeyev had his own idea of Eternity. He called it a «good racial memory.» I think that with his positive works, Vladimir Borisovich has earned a worthy place in the galaxy of talented contemporaries whose good memory will live for a long time.
Pavel Tulaev, Moscow,
December the 6th , 2020 – January the 6th 2021.
