"An illiterate itinerant peasant, Rasputin was monk able to wield considerable influence over Russia’s autocratic rulers. He rose to prominence as an enigmatic mystic, finding a ready audience for his peculiar brand of religious devotion at a time when many Russian aristocrats were fixated by mysticism and the occult. He appears to have embraced a distorted version of the ‘Khlysty’ creed, reworking its emphasis on flagellation to advocate sexual exhaustion as the surest path to God."