Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-11-23
WORK OF THE BREAD.
The Curious Doctrine Laid Down by
Tolstoi and BOndareff.
TOLL THE REDEEMER OF TIE RACE
All the World Should be q Farm and All
the People Farmers.
WOMEN ARE SPIRITUALLY SUPERIOR

Such is the translation piyan the Hebrew
text, placed on the title page of the remark
able WORK, Toll, joint product OF Count
Leo ToIstoi and Timothy Bondareff. Toll,
they declare, is not only the direct conse-
quent of sin, but the means of REDEMPTION
therefrom. The. earth was cursed indeed.
but cursed for Adams sake, and not. as ia
generally supposed, in Adams despite.
Adam had fallen into sin, and for this an
all-wise and benefcent Providence imposed
the law of enforced labor as a means of 70
demption therefrom.
And Dy toll, both Tolstoi and his inspirer,
Bondareff. mean especially, the work Of
the bread;" that is to say, the literal sowing,
reaping, threshing and garnering of wheat,
together with the final grinding and making
OF it into bread. No other work will do;
this alone has in it virtue to save and
cleanse. So Adam redeemed himself, his
work of tine bread'' being counted to him
as righteousness. $50 now, it is by such
toll alone, and not by any other means Of
salvation-no, not even by the merits Of
Jesus Christ-that man may be saved"
LAW OF LOVE AND TOLL.
The law of bread labor is the primitive
law of salvation, the first commandment
given by God, the keeping of which is the
sum of redemption. Jesus Christ, writes
Bondaref, says little of toll, because from
his very childhood he had seen no virtue in
it and had been brought up to think it the
greatest misfortune. For instance, does He
not say, "Look at the lilies of the field;
they toll not, neither do they spin-and the
birds of the air, they lay not up in gar
ners?" etc., all OF which, in the opinion of
our author, shows that He rejected the law
of toll, substituting therefor the law of love
alone, a law which has value only when
subordinated to that of toll. God, he con-
stantly reiterates, laid the command to
labor on man from the beginning and pro-
vided no other means, then or since, by
which he might be saved.
The second primitive commandment is in
cluded in the first, namely, that every man
ought to clothe, provide for andshelter him
self and family without need of others. To
do this, says Tolstol, is the sum of his cor
poreal duties, and to feed and clothe the
helpless that of his spiritual. II he does
these two things he has thereby fulfilled the
whole duty of man. The forbidden fruit
and the eating thereof in the Garden of
Eden means, according to Bondaref, the
employing and living on the labor and
bread of others. This was and is the crime
of crimes. For this Eden was lost and Tor
this heaven forfeited.
THE AToNEMENr OF WOMEN.
"And to Eve God said, you will not
work to earn your food, but your children
| will come to you with pain" This. declare
our authors. is woman's personal atonement
| for her share of the sin that entered and
= . + 80, H.,
truly has it come to pass. But MANI From
the beginning almost has he shirked or
hidden the law regarding himself, or made
I it OF little account as fguratiYe expression
! only of the necessity OF toll in general. But,
argues Bondareff, what right has he to do
| this last? The law given to woman was
literal in that it was and still is literally
fulfilled to its utmost. Why then should
not that concerning man be also literally
construed? Why not say at once that
| which is the explanatory truth of the mat
| ter, viz: That man hates to toll with his
| hands, and especially to do the work of the
| bread, and he therefore evades it whenever
he can. Such being the case, man is still
under the curse-the law broken and unlul-
| flled-and is, as a consequent, still unre-
! deemed. In a word, until he individually
returns and repents kneading his own bread
| in the sweat of his face, he is, all else to the
/
to hell.
| And because women have, as a rule, al
| ways worked out their part of the law by
suffering in childbirth, they are now spirit.
ually stronger than man, and are to beeoms
the means by which man is eventually re-
| deemed.
| THE EARTH ONE VAST FIELD.
As auxiliary to the universal return to
manual labor, he recommends the desertion
of cities, the discarding of all but the most
| necessary mechanical aids and the reversion
| OF the earth into vast agricultural region,
| principally devoted to the work of the
bread" all crimes, all social evils, and
among them, that greatest-the compelling
of woman to toll for her food-spring from
the universal breaking of the primitive
| command, SIN the sweat of thy face thou
| shalt knead thy bread" Men, according to
ToIstoi and Bondaref, use violence and de-
ceit, because, not doing bread work them
selves, they lack bread. and see no other
| way to get it. "Supposing, however, all did
] the bread work, there would then be plenty
all round, and no more temptation to crime
| as a means OF livelihood"
Bread, itself, they claim, should neither
| be bought nor sold. Money and bread are
not interchangeable, because money is a
dead thing, and bread is living thing-a
1
| 1t should therefore be given only in ex-
change for the work of the bread itself, or else
p1yen freely and for nothing As a class, tillers
of the soil should rank superior to all, because
| the upholder of all. They. too, are almost the
| only ones who approximate the keeping OF the
primitive lay of bread work. The general per-
version of things is nowhere shown so clearly
as in the low esteem almost universally held
for the peasant farmer and his toll.
THE DOCTRINE UNFoLDED.
would speedily unite all the world in the ties of
q common brotherhood and religion. Properly
divided, there would be land enough for all,
and with plenty for all. discord and violence
would be done away with. They do not
hold that it IS necessary to confine
oneself exclusively to the work of the bread
for the entire year. DO what manual and
selfsupporting labor you will Tor 800 days of
the time" they say, but devote the remainder
to the work of the bread, and to kneading your
own bread to the sweat of your face. Then,
| and then only, shall all be well with you, and
your feet turned in the direction of life
| eternal"
Such, in brief, is the gist Of this, to say the
| least most extraordinary book, the Joint essay
| of Tolstoi and Timothy Bondaref Who IS
| Bondareff? A Russian peasant. belonging to
| the district ManOussinsk, illiterate man Of
| the sect of Sabbatlsts, diigent student of the
| Old Testament to the dIsfayoring of the New.
Hardly able to spell, he made bis way pain.
| fully, verse by verse, until he formulated what
he believed to be the true solution of all social
| questions, based on the oft-Quoted verse in
| Genesis. With great labor he put his ideas in
| the form of book, the printing of which was,
/ however. denied by the Gar and censor. Il
/ was about this time-the year 1SS5-that he first
| met Tolstoi, OF whom he speedily made a con-
| vert to his views.
| Here, therefore, we have the curious CO
| laboratlon OF an uneducated peasant and