Catechism of a Revolutionary

__NOTOC__"The Revolutionary Catechism" or "Catechism of a Revolutionary" is a manifesto written by Russian anarchists Mikhail Bakunin and Sergey Nechayev between April and August 1869. It is debated how much input Bakunin had or if it is mainly the work of Nechayev. The work called for total devotion to a revolutionary lifestyle. [cite book |last=Wesson |first=Robert |title=Lenin's Legacy |publisher=Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University |location=Stanford |year=1978 |isbn=0817969225 |pages=p.9] Its publication in the "Government Herald" in July 1871 as the manifesto of the Narodnaya Rasprava secret society was one of the most dramatic events of Nechayev's revolutionary life, [cite book |last=Heller |first=Mikhail |title=Cogs in the Wheel |publisher=Knopf |location=New York |year=1988 |isbn=0394569261 |pages=p.12 |quote=The "Catechism of a Revolutionary", a chilling blueprint for the ideal "New Man," was the manifesto of a secret society called The People's Revenge (Narodnaya Rasprava)...] [cite book |last=Crenshaw |first=Martha |title=Terrorism in Context |publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press |location=University Park |year=1995 |isbn=0271010150 |pages=p.72 ] through its words and the actions it inspired establishing Nechayev's importance for the Nihilist movement. The "Catechism" is divided into two sections; General Rules of the Organisation and Rules of Conduct of Revolutionaries, 22 and 26 paragraphs long respectively; abridged versions were published as excerpts in the anarchist periodicals "Die Freiheit" and "The Alarm".cite book |last=Avrich |first=Paul |title=The Haymarket Tragedy |publisher=Princeton University Press |location=Princeton |year=1986 |isbn=0691006008 |pages=p.171]

The most radical document of its age, [cite book |last=Moser |first=Charles |title=The Cambridge History of Russian Literature |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |year=1992 |isbn=0521425670 |pages=p.265] the "Catechism" outlined the authors' revolutionary Jacobin program of organisation and discipline, a program that became the backbone of the radical movement in Russia. The revolutionary is portrayed in the "Catechism" as an amoral avenging angel, an expendable resource in the service of the revolution,cite book |last=Gillespie |first=Michael |title=Nihilism before Nietzsche |publisher=University of Chicago Press |location=Chicago |year=1995 |isbn=0226293475 |pages=p.162–163] committed to any crime or treachery necessary to effect the downfall of the prevailing order.Avrich p.38]

Critics of anarchism cite the "Catechism" as the most notorious document in what they take to be the anarchist tradition, arguing that it reflects the innately violent and nihilistic nature of the philosophy. [cite book |last=Mclaughlin |first=Paul |title=Anarchism and Authority |publisher=Ashgate |location=Aldershot |year=2007 |isbn=0754661962 |pages=p.7] Scholar Michael Allen Gillespie has hailed the "Catechism" as "a pre-eminent expression of the doctrine of freedom and negation" that arose in the Fichtean notion of the "Absolute I" that had been concealed in Left Hegelianism. Prominent Black Panther of the 20th century Eldridge Cleaver adopted the "Catechism" as a "revolutionary bible", incorporating it into his daily life to the extent that he employed, in his words, "tactics of ruthlessness in my dealings with everyone with whom I came into contact". [Avrich p.13] The ideas and sentiments in the work had been in part previously aired by Zaichnevsky and Ishutin in Russia, and by Carbonari and Young Italy in the West. [Avrich, p.37]

ee also

* Anarchism and violence
* Professional revolutionaries
* "The Possessed", an 1872 novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky influenced by the events surrounding the publication of the "Catechism".

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