Explain Rasputin's contribution to the collapse of Tsarism

GCSE Coursework – Russian Revolution

By James Windsor 10L

Explain Rasputin’s contribution to the collapse of Tsarism

Nowadays Rasputin is quite often considered evil, but did he actually contribute to the collapse of Tsarism? Most people in our modern day society believe Rasputin was an evil person without knowing too many of the facts, or the story behind him and his background they see him as a drunken evil man, and he’s often described as the mad monk when he was neither mad nor a monk however he built up a bad reputation to the modern day world

Rasputin started life off as a peasant in the lowest cast, an untouchable and he used to take things from people to sell for drink. He was the lowest of the low and therefore it would have been hard to influence the tsar’s decisions as he was of no importance he was just a peasant wasn’t he?. But he was a spiritual man and spent hours a day in prayer he once said “The peasant is great in god’s eyes”, he left his family in search of enlightenment. He often walked up to 30 miles a day from town to town. He became involved with the Khlysts which was a cult in Russia. Rasputin believed that sinning then repenting was the way to god and he sinned through sex. Rasputin was an instant hit with the upper class ladies as they believed that he could give them the true path to god. There were a few other “holy peasants” but Rasputin was the most popular, In being popular amongst them it could have given him some influence politically, doubtful but still suspect. anyway his influence with the upper class ladies lead to his reputation spreading and the belief that he had spiritual healing powers, this interested one family in particular when their son was diagnosed as a haemophiliac at 18 months old this meant he couldn’t play a lot of games like hide and seek he could only play non-active games like card games. The doctors confirmed that the child would eventually die. This family was of course the tsar and his wife. The tsarina had heard about Rasputin and asked him if he could help, Rasputin prayed beside the boy and comforted the boy even Rasputin’s enemies admitted he was doing more than any doctor could. Although today we know that it is probably not due to the fact he had healing powers but it was more psychological, in comforting the child it relieved his pain as the calmer you are the easier it is to get better. However to the people of the time it seemed like he was working miracles the importance of Rasputin to the tsar and tsarina was very large for this reason and would have given him some influence on them. Which could mean the tsar paid some attention to his opinions as his sons life practically depended on him this is evidence he did contribute to the collapse of tsarism.

Another reason people will argue that Rasputin did play a role in the collapse of the tsar and Tsarism is that there is evidence to suggest that he did have influence over the decisions made by the tsar. As the tsarina did write letters to the tsar when she was close to Rasputin there was even rumours of them having an affair which would certainly mean he would have some influence (over the tsarina anyway) and she did mention his views and opinions in them. Which the tsar would have read and this could have influenced his decisions. In the ...

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However although she was sending letters to the tsar about what to do it is highly doubtful that although his views were in there the tsar paid any attention to the letters whatsoever especially when it came to making crucial decisions. The letters were generally full of complaints too because the tsar wasn’t using any of Rasputin’s suggestions, showing that Rasputin wasn’t really influencing anything.

Rasputin was a bit of a wild character and often went to parties he also wrote notes to many important characters most of which were ignored. Showing he had very little influence. He earned himself a very bad reputation especially by his behaviour at the bath houses.

Soon enough Rasputin had angered his enemies too much and they decided to kill him, he was invited to a party and poisoned, shot, then thrown in a river and shot a few more times. This is one of the main factors that makes it look like Rasputin had very little to do with the collapse of tsarism the fact that after he died nothing changed, things continued the way they were just as when he was alive, once he had died which is strong evidence to suggest that he did not (or his contribution was very small) contribute to the collapse of tsarism.

Rasputin basically acted as a scapegoat he was easy to lay the blame on; in actual truth he probably postponed the revolution more than anything. He was not so much a cause of the collapse of tsarism but a product of it.

James Windsor 10L