Documentos de Académico
Documentos de Profesional
Documentos de Cultura
JUDAICA
ENCYCLOPAEDIA
JUDAICA
S E C O N D
E D I T I O N
VOLUME 14
MelNas
IN ASSOCIATION WITH
KETER PUBLISHING HOUSE LtD., JERUSALEM
ISBN-13:
978-0-02-865928-2
978-0-02-865929-9
978-0-02-865930-5
978-0-02-865931-2
978-0-02-865932-9
(set)
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
1)
2)
3)
4)
978-0-02-865933-6
978-0-02-865934-3
978-0-02-865935-0
978-0-02-865936-7
978-0-02-865937-4
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
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5)
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9)
978-0-02-865938-1
978-0-02-865939-8
978-0-02-865940-4
978-0-02-865941-1
978-0-02-865942-8
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
(vol.
10)
11)
12)
13)
14)
978-0-02-865943-5
978-0-02-865944-2
978-0-02-865945-9
978-0-02-865946-6
978-0-02-865947-3
(vol.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Entries MelNas
5
Abbreviations
General Abbreviations
793
Abbreviations used in Rabbinical Literature
794
Bibliographical Abbreviations
800
Transliteration Rules
813
Glossary
816
Mel-Mz
melamed, meir
well as articles in scientific journals. Of special significance
is his edition of Eusebius geographical work Onomastikon,
which he translated from the original (1938). Because of his
involvement with the Persian and other Oriental communities
(whom he served as honorary rabbi) and his familiarity with
their traditions of custom and language, Melamed served as
an important source on such community traditions.
[Menahem Zevi Kaddari / Stephen G. Wald (2nd ed.)]
melbourne
bath day as long as possible. They used the occasion to chant
special *zemirot and to relate h asidic tales. The melavveh malkah is also known as seudat David (King Davids banquet).
As such, it serves as a reminder of the legend that King David,
having been told by God that he would die on the Sabbath
(Shab. 30a), celebrated his survival each new week with special joy (Taamei Minhagim).
One of the favorite melavveh malkah hymns is Eliyahu
ha-Navi (Elijah the Prophet), attributed by some authorities
to *Meir of Rothenburg. It welcomes the prophet as the herald
of the Messiah. According to legend, Elijah is expected to announce the salvation of Israel at the first opportunity after the
termination of the Sabbath. Medieval paytanim devoted several other zemirot to the melavveh malkah festivities. Among
the most notable are Be-Moz aei Yom Menuh ah by Jacob Menea (14t century); Addir Ayom ve-Nora, Ish H asid by Jesse b.
Mordecai (13t century); and Amar Adonai le-Yaakov.
melbourne
exported to Palestine, prepared under the supervision of the
United Shechita Board and its chief shoh et Rabbi I.J. Super
(who served the community as shoh et, mohel, and teacher for
more than half a century), which was challenged by Rabbi J.L.
Gurewicz, disciple of Chaim Ozer *Grodzinsky of Vilna and
the respected leader of the Orthodox Carlton Synagogue in
its heyday. The main issues however were the battle against
anti-Zionist elements in the mid-1940s, the struggle for the
establishment of a Jewish day school, the continuing cleavage
between the Orthodox and the Liberals, a stubborn but losing
battle for the greater use of Yiddish, the attitude to antisemitism, and the problem of public relations.
The Transformation of the Community
Between the late 1930s and the mid-1950s the Melbourne
Jewish community was transformed, as were the other centers of Australian Jewish life, by a number of important interrelated events. Some of this change occurred before, when
the traditional synagogues, mainly Anglo-Jewish in orientation, such as the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation and the
St. Kilda Hebrew Congregation, which had provided communal leadership, were challenged by new synagogues representing either a stricter European Orthodoxy or the Reform
congregation founded in 1930. A Yiddish-speaking component already existed, centered in Carlton, just north of central
Melbourne, rather than in the traditional middle-class Jewish
area of St. Kilda, south of the inner city. Institutions like the
Jewish National LibraryKadimah, founded in 1912, and the
Judean League, a center of cultural life and pro-Zionist activity, founded in 1921, emerged in Yiddish Carlton, whose inhabitants demonstrated the range of Jewish orientations and
ideologies of troubled Europe.
There was no secular communal representative body until the foundation of the Victorian Jewish Advisory Board in
1938, an organization which changed its name in May 1947 to
the Victorian Jewish Board of Deputies (VJBD), and, in October 1988, to the Jewish Community Council of Victoria.
Although all local synagogues which wished to affiliate to the
Board could do so, it also included a plethora of secular bodies, including Zionist and Yiddish groups. These representative bodies took a much more visible and direct role in lobbying on behalf of Jewish interests to the government and the
media than was previously the case.
While (with many exceptions) the old Anglo-Jewishdominated Melbourne community had been notably lukewarm on Zionism, the new community was, by and large,
enthusiastically pro-Zionist, and, in the decade before the establishment of Israel, defended the creation of a Jewish state
against influential local Jewish non-Zionists such as Rabbi
Jacob *Danglow and Sir Isaac *Isaacs. Perhaps the most important manifestation of the new Jewish assertiveness in Melbourne was the foundation of Mt. Scopus College, the first
Jewish day school, in 1949. Mt. Scopus was coeducational,
and moderately Orthodox and Zionist in its orientation. By
the 1980s eight full-time Jewish day schools, representing
melbourne
obviously Jewish areas of concentration are the CaulfieldSt.
Kilda EastElsternwick districts, about five miles south of central Melbourne, where 18,216 Jews were identified in the 2001
census. This area contains many Jewish synagogues, institutions, and shops, and a large and visible Strictly Orthodox
community. The other significant areas of Jewish concentration
were adjacent to this core area: Bentleigh (2,667 Jews in 2001),
to the east; the wealthy neighborhood of Toorak (1,611 Jews)
to its north; and East Brighton (1,316 Jews) to its south. These
neighborhoods became heavily Jewish just after World War II
and have remained very stable ever since. There is little or no
sign of Jewish suburbanization, as in many other Diaspora
societies, nor any equivalent of white flight, as in the United
States, away from decaying neighborhoods. The only major
change in Melbournes Jewish demographic pattern since 1945
has been the decline to the vanishing point of the former area of
East European Jewish settlement in Carlton, immediately north
of central Melbourne, which, until the 1960s, contained many
Yiddish-based institutions such as the Kadimah, the leading
Yiddish cultural and social center. The Melbourne Jewish community has grown chiefly by immigration, welcoming successive waves of German Holocaust refugees and a very large flow
of postwar Holocaust survivors, especially from Poland, and
then more recent groups of South African and ex-Soviet immigrants, as well as a continuing settlement of Jews from the
English-speaking world and elsewhere for normal professional
purposes. Nevertheless, the stability of Melbourne Jewry, and
other social characteristics, have given it some very favorable
features. A 1991 random sample survey of the community, for
example, found that the Melbourne Jewish fertility rate was
apparently above the replacement level, a notable accomplishment for a middle-class Diaspora Jewish community.
CONGREGATIONS. In terms of congregational affiliation,
Melbourne had about 50 synagogues in the early 21st century,
of which four were Liberal (Reform) and one Masorti (Conservative), one Independent, and all the others Orthodox of
various strands ranging from moderate Anglo-Orthodoxy to
Strict Orthodoxy. The postwar era has seen a vast expansion
in the range of congregational affiliation beyond the AngloOrthodoxy predominant before 1939, especially at the religious extremes. Relations between the Orthodox and Reform components of the community have been notably bad,
as have, to a lesser extent, relations between different strands
in Orthodoxy. In part for this reason, no postwar Melbourne
rabbi has been able to act as recognized spokesman for the
whole community, in the manner of Rabbi Jacob Danglow
before the war. A number of rabbis, such as the Orthodox
*Gutnicks, Yitzhak *Groner, and John S. *Levi from the Liberals, have been viewed by many as notable leaders, but none
has been regarded as a consensual leader.
melchior
media are also good, although the community has protested
many times when Israel is unfairly criticized, as has become
common, especially in the liberal media and on talk-back
radio. Relations with other groups in the wider community
are normally also harmonious, despite the existence of antisemitic and anti-Zionist activists and the threat of terrorism,
especially from extremist sections of Melbournes growing
Muslim community.
Bibliography: P.Y. Medding, From Assimilation to Group
Survival (1958), incl. bibl.; L.M. Goldman, Jews in Victoria in the 19t
Century (1954), incl. bibl.; I. Solomon, in: Journal of the Australian
Jewish Historical Society, 2 (1946), 33248; N. Spielvogel, ibid., 2 (1946),
3568; R. Apple, ibid., 4 (1955), 61. Add. Bibliography: W.D. Rubinstein, Jews in the 1966 Australian Census, in: Australian Jewish
Historical Society Journal, 14, Part 3 (1998), 495508; idem, Jews in
the 2001 Australian Census, ibid., 17, Part 1 (2003), 7483; P. Maclean
and M. Turnbull, The Jews [of Carlton], in: P. Yule (ed.), Carlton: A
History (2004). See also *Australia.
Israel Porush and Yitzhak Rischin / William D. Rubinstein (2nd ed.)]
MELCHIOR, family prominent in Denmark since the mid18t century. Originally from Hamburg, where the family had
lived since the 18t century, MOSES MELCHIOR (17361817) arrived in Copenhagen in 1750. He became a successful dealer
in leather and tobacco and in 1795 founded the import-export firm of Moses and Son G. Melchior, which is still in existence. His son GERSON (17711845) took over the business
on his fathers death, and enlarged it by importing sugar, rum,
and tea. He was one of the leaders of the Copenhagen Jewish
community. One of his sons, NATHAN GERSON (18111872),
was a prominent ophthalmologist. He lectured at Copenhagen
University and in 1857 became a director of the Ophthalmological Institute in Copenhagen. Another son, MORITZ GERSON (18161884), succeeded his father as head of the firm in
1845, establishing branches in the Danish West Indies and in
Melbourne, Australia. Melchior was a member of the landsting (upper house of the Danish parliament) from 1866 to
1874 and was the first Jew to belong to the Danish Chamber
of Commerce, becoming its president in 1873. Active also in
the Jewish community, he served as a trustee and was made
president in 1852. The writer Hans Christian Andersen was
a friend and frequent guest in his house. His brother MOSES
(18251912) succeeded him in 1884, opening a New York office
in 1898. He was well known for his philanthropy, contributing to many Jewish and general causes. CARL HENRIQUES
(18551931) took over the business after his brothers death
and expanded it. He organized many athletic associations and
sports clubs in Denmark and became their patron. Like his
brother, he was the president of the Copenhagen community
(191129). His son HARALD RAPHAEL (18961973) succeeded
him in the firm, which dealt in the import of coffee, tea, rice,
cocoa, and vanilla.
Bibliography: Moses og sn G. Melchior, Et dansk handelshus gennem 6 generationer (1961), Eng. summary 5356; Dansk
Biografisk Haandleksikon, S.V.; Dansk Biografisk Leksikon, S.V.
10
melchizedek
gentile community, Melchior was considered one of the prominent orators in Denmark. He supported the establishment of
relations and furthering of understanding with West Germany.
Among his books are Jdedommen i vor tid (19662); En jdedommens historie (1962); Levet og oplevet (1965; A Rabbi Remembers,
1968; also Ger. tr.); and Tnkt og Talt (1967). He translated into
Danish (1961) Shalom Aleichems Tevye de Milkhiger. He was
succeeded in the chief rabbinate by his son Bent.
MELCHIOR, MICHAEL (1954 ), rabbi and Israeli politician. Born in Copenhagen, the son of Chief Rabbi Bent Melchior, Melchior studied in Israel at Yeshivat ha-Kotel after high
school. He was ordained in 1980 and in the same year became
the first chief rabbi of Oslo and was largely responsible for the
communitys renaissance (see *Norway; *Oslo). After six years
he returned to Israel but continued to serve Norwegian Jewry.
In Israel he entered politics and was elected to the Knesset in
1999 as a representative of Meimad, a moderate religious party
aligned with the Labor Party. In the government he served as
minister without portfolio, minister for Diaspora affairs, and
deputy minister for foreign affairs.
MELCHIZEDEK (Heb.: ; legitimate/righteous
king; the English spelling follows LXX Melxisedek as opposed to MT Malkizedek), king of Salem (or Jerusalem; cf.
Ps. 76:3) according to Genesis 14:1820. He welcomed *Abraham after he had defeated the four kings who had captured
his nephew, Lot. Melchizedek brought out bread and wine
and blessed Abraham. Finally, it is related that he gave him
a tithe of everything although who gave the tithe to whom
became a subject of considerable dispute (see below). The biblical account states that he (Melchizedek) was priest of God
Most High () . Melchizedeks priesthood was
a source of numerous post-biblical speculations, which were
intensified by the difficult verse Psalms 110:4: The Lord has
sworn/and will not repent/Thou art priest for ever/after the
manner of Melchizedek () .
It is generally believed that the Melchizedek mentioned here
and the one in Genesis are the same. Some interpreters, however, maintain that the Melchizedek of Psalms is not a person
but a title, my righteous king, presumably because the name
is written as two separate words () .
The first post-biblical documents mentioning Melchizedek in various contexts appear from around the beginning of
the Christian era. The earliest is probably the fragmentary
scroll discovered in cave 11 at Qumran (11Q Melch or 11Q 13)
and published by A.S. Van der Woude (in OTS, 14, 1965) and
again with certain corrections by M. de Jonge and A.S. Van
der Woude (in NTS, 12, 1966) and much studied since (bibliography in Brooke). Although this text is a midrashic development which is independent of the classic Old Testament loci
(J.A. Fitzmyer, JBL, 86, 1967), it is clear that the eschatological and soteriological functions it attributes to Melchizedek
draw on the perplexing figure of the biblical Melchizedek. In
the Qumran text, Melchizedek is described as passing judgENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
In Christian Tradition
The two brief and somewhat enigmatic references to Melchizedek in the Bible provided the New Testament with a subject
for typological interpretation. In the Epistle to the Hebrews
(7:17), Melchizedek (king of justice Zedek; of peace Salem) is described as unique, being both a priest and a king,
and because he is without father, without mother, without
genealogy; he is eternal, having neither beginning of days
nor end of life. In this respect Melchizedek resembles Jesus,
the son of God, and thus is a type of the savior.
Abraham, and therefore Levi in the loins of his father
(ibid. 910), paid the tithe in submission to Melchizedek.
Since in Christian tradition Jesus is high priest after the order of Melchizedek and not after the order of Aaron (ibid.
7:11, 1721), Jesus priesthood is excellent, superior to that of
11
meldola
Abrahams descent, and transcends all human, imperfect orders (Heb. 7:2328; 8:16). To Christians the objection that
Jesus, like Aaron, was in the loins of the patriarch, and consequently paid the tithe was met by the Church Fathers with
the argument that Jesus, though descended from Abraham,
had no human father.
[Ilana Shapira]
MELDOLA, Sephardi family of rabbis and scholars. The family originated in the 15t century in Meldola, northern Italy;
the legend that they descended from Spanish exiles cannot be
substantiated. The first of the family to attain prominence was
JACOB MELDOLA, rabbi in Mantua in the 16t century. His son
SAMUEL MELDOLA or MENDOLA was both a rabbinic scholar
and physician to the Mantuan court. In the next generation
members of the family settled in Leghorn, entering thus into
the tradition of Sephardi life. For the next 200 years they provided rabbis, printers, and leaders to the Sephardi communities in Holland, Italy, France, and England.
Bibliography: E. Castelli, I banchi feneratizi ebraici nel
Mantovano (1959), index; Mortara, Indice, 38; Ghirondi-Neppi,
79, 311, 3557.
[Cecil Roth]
12
melokhim-bukh
the time of Jesus. Together with other bishops of Asia Minor,
Melito continued to celebrate Easter on the 14t of Nisan, the
eve of Passover. He visited Palestine in an effort to establish an
accurate canon (Greek ) of the Old Testament (from
which he excerpted passages pertaining in some way to Jesus).
His list of books (Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. IV, 26:13 f.) corresponds to the Hebrew canon (excluding Esther). Only brief
quotations from Melitos works were known until the mid-20t
century, when two papyrus copies of his homily on the Passion
(On Pascha) were published. As a result of this discovery, Latin,
Coptic, Georgian, and two Syriac translations of this treatise
could be identified. The bishop delivered the treatise as a sermon after the biblical account of the Exodus was read on Easter, precisely the time when the Jews observed the Passover
feast. The coincidence of observances and Melitos animosity
toward Judaism caused his sermon, which was written between
160 and 170 C.E., to become one of the most important documents of early Christian anti-Judaism. After a theological introduction, Melito gives a dramatic description of Egypts sufferings at the time of the Exodus. Influenced by the Midrash
on Exodus 10:21, the darkness that engulfed Egypt is described
as tangible. However, the events surrounding the Exodus were
only a prefiguration of the Passion of Christ, the true Passover
lamb. The earlier model no longer had validity and usefulness,
because the prefigurations of the Old Testament had become a
reality in the New Testament. The second part of the sermon
is the oldest and one of the strongest accusations of deicide
made against the Jews in early Christian literature. Jews are,
among other things, described as having themselves crucified
Jesus; and the murder is clearly defined as deicide: God has
been murdered, the King of Israel has been slain by an Israelite
hand (96). In view of the tragic events suffered by the Jews
of this period the destruction of the Temple and the defeat
of Bar Kokhba Melito could say that, in consequence of the
deicide, Israel lay dead, while Christianity, the broad grace,
was conquering the whole earth. The sermon, nevertheless, attests the antiquity of the Passover Haggadah. Paragraph 68 of
the sermon contains a Greek version of part of the introduction to Hallel in the Haggadah; and paragraphs 8485 and 88
derive from the famous Passover litany Dayyeinu.
Bibliography: Eusebius Pamphili, Ecclesiastical History,
2 vols. (192632), index; T. Otto, Corpus Apologetarum Christianorum, 9 (1872), 374478, 497512; E.J. Goodspeed, Aelteste Apologeten
(1914), 30613; C. Bonner, Homily on the Passion (1914); M. Testuz
(ed. and tr.), Papyrus Bodmer XIII, Mliton de Sardes, Homlie sur
la Pque (1960); O. Perler, Mliton de Sardes sur la Pque, sources
Chrtiennes (1966); J. Blank, Meliton von Sardes vom Passa (1963); E.
Werner, in: HUCA, 37 (1966), 191210. Add. Bibliography: S.G.
Hall (ed.), On Pascha (1979); E.D. Hunt, Holy Land Pilgrimage in the
Later Roman Empire AD 312460 (1984), 3; J.E. Taylor, Christians and
the Holy Places (1993), 116ff.
MELOKHIMBUKH (Sefer Melokhim), anonymous 16t-century Yiddish epic. The epics narrative material derives from
the biblical book of Kings and its midrashic traditions (especially those concerning Solomon), while its poetic form and
conception derive from the medieval German epic. It focuses
less on battle scenes and more on ethical and didactic matters than the related *Shmuel-Bukh (1544). Both authors were
well versed in both the broad sacred text tradition of Judaism
13
melon
and non-Jewish secular epic literature. Composed in four-line
stanzas of two rhyming couplets (AABB), each line divided
rhythmically into two half-lines of three primary accents each,
the form derives from the stanza characteristic of the Middle
High German Nibelungenlied. With its 2,262 stanzas, it is the
longest poem in Old Yiddish literature. The basis of the entire
extant text tradition is the edition of Augsburg, 1543.
Bibliography: L. Fuks (ed.), Das altjiddische Epos MelokmBk, 2 vols. (1965; facsimile of Augsburg, 1543); Ch. Shmeruk, Prokim
fun der Yidisher Literatur-Geshikhte (1988), 11416, 19299; M. Wolf,
in: Tarbiz, 51 (1992), 13134; J.C. Frakes (ed.), Early Yiddish Texts:
11001750 (2005), 193213; J. Baumgarten, Introduction to Old Yiddish Literature (2005), 14042, 15155.
[Jerold C. Frakes (2nd ed.)]
identified with the kishut, kishuim (see *Cucumber), that belongs to the same botanical genus (and apparently even to the
same species) as the muskmelon, is especially polymorphic. It
could be that pollination between these two species gives rise
to hybrids and is the reason for the halakhah that the kishut
(Chate melon or cucumber) and the melafefon do not constitute kilayim (Kil. 1:2). Despite the ruling of the Academy for
the Hebrew Language, modern Hebrew has adopted the name
melafefon for cucumber.
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 52854; B. Chizik,
Z imh ei ha-Deluim be-Erez Yisrael, 1 (1937); H.N. and A.L. Moldenke,
Plants of the Bible (1952), 315 (index), S.V.; J. Feliks, Kilei Zeraim veHarkavah (1967), 4453; idem, Olam ha-Z omeah ha-Mikrai (19682),
164f. Add. Bibliography: Feliks, Ha-Z omeah , 101, 144.
[Jehuda Feliks]
14
meltzer, shimshon
School became a model for adult education throughout the
Jewish community.
In recognition of her communal leadership Melton received a number of awards, including honorary doctorates
from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Jewish
Theological Seminary of America, the Scopus Award from
the American Friends of the Hebrew University, and the
Ohio State University Distinguished Service Award. She was
inducted into the Ohio Womens Hall of Fame in October
1994.
[Barry W. Holtz (2nd ed.)]
MELTON, SAMUEL MENDEL (19001993), U.S. industrialist and philanthropist. Melton was born in Saros, AustroHungary. His family immigrated in 1904 to Toledo, Ohio. He
established the Capitol Manufacturing and Supply Company
in Columbus, as well as several pipe and nipple companies,
which later merged with the Harsco Corporation (1968) and
became a leader in the metals industry. Melton extended the
Capitol Company to Israel in 1949 and deeded it to various
Israeli institutions in 1955. Active in numerous communal and
national Jewish organizations, he was a member of the UJA
cabinet and the board of the Jewish Theological Seminary
(JTS), where he founded the Melton Research Center in New
York (1959) to develop Jewish educational materials. He established the Samuel Mendel Melton Foundation (1951); professorships in Judaica at Ohio State University and the Hebrew
University in Jerusalem (1965); a vocational school in Bat
Yam, Israel (1968); the Melton Center for Jewish Education
in the Diaspora at the Hebrew University (1968); the Melton
Building at the Hebrew University; the Melton Journal of the
JTS; the Melton Fellowship; the Jewish History and Studies
Center at Ohio State University (1976); and the Melton Coalition for Creative Interaction at the JTS, devoted to Jewish
arts education (1993).
[Edward L. Greenstein / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
Kletsk in Poland. Meltzer, however, refused to leave his community in Slutsk, despite his suffering at the hands of the Bolsheviks, including imprisonment for teaching Torah. In 1923
he left Russia for Kletsk and in the same year participated
in the founding conference of the *Agudat Israel in Vienna,
at which he was elected to the Moez et Gedolei ha-Torah. In
1925 he became head of the Ez H ayyim Yeshivah in Jerusalem.
In Erez Israel, he devoted himself almost entirely to the dissemination of Torah and the strengthening of yeshivot. As a
fervent Zionist, he exercised a moderating influence in the
councils of the Agudah. In 1935 his first work appeared, Even
ha-Ezel on the Mishneh Torah of *Maimonides which is regarded as a fundamental work of its kind. Seven volumes appeared during his lifetime, the other posthumously. He also
edited and wrote commentary to the novellae of Nah manides
(1928/29).
Bibliography: S. Zevin, Ishim ve-Shitot (19663), 33760;
D. Katz, Tenuat ha-Musar, 3 (1957), 3742 and passim; Yahadut Lita
(1960), index; A. Rothkoff, in: Jewish Life (March 1971), 5157.
[Mordechai Hacohen]
15
melun
MELUN, capital of the department of Seine-et-Marne, 26 mi.
(42 km.) S. of Paris. The first explicit reference to Jews in Melun dates from the middle of the 12t century: in his will, Simon of Beaugency mentions a Jew of Melun among his creditors. From the beginning of the 13t century, there is evidence
of a Rue des Juifs and an escole des Juis (the synagogue).
There is no record of a medieval Jewish community after the
expulsion of the Jews from the Kingdom of France in 1306.
Scholars of Melun took part in the *synod convened by *Samuel b. Meir (Rashbam) and Jacob b. Meir *Tam. Meshullam b.
Nathan of Melun, previously from Narbonne, lived in Melun
from 1150. During the second half of the 12t century, Jedidiah
of Melun also lived in the town. Judah b. David of Melun was
one of the four rabbis who confronted Nicholas *Donin at
the famous *disputation organized by *Louis IX (St. Louis) in
1240. Preserved in the municipal library of Melun is a mah zor
of the 14t century for the New Year and Day of Atonement according to the French rite (Ms. No. 14): it had previously been
in the possession of the Carmelite monastery of Melun and is
possibly of local origin. On the eve of World War II there was
a very small community in Melun. It increased in the postwar
period, mainly as a result of the arrival of Jews from North
Africa, and numbered over 500 in 1969.
Bibliography: S. Rouillard, Histoire de Melun (1628), 352f.;
M. Schwab in: REJ, 13 (1886), 296300; G. Leroy, Histoire de la ville
de Melun (1887), 126, 167: Gross, Gal Jud, 3515; J. Thillier and E. Jarr,
Cartulaire de Ste-Croix dOrlans (1906), 13.
[Bernhard Blumenkranz]
16
memorbuch
He specialized in the social effects of colonization, finding a
similarity between the situation of the Jew and that of colonized peoples. Though an advocate of independence for the
countries of the Maghreb, he was well aware that one of its
consequences would be the mass exodus of North African
Jewry. Memmis first two books were novels, both largely autobiographical. La statue de sel (1953; Pillar of Salt, 1955), is the
story of a North African Jews emergence from a narrow Jewish society through the discovery of French culture, and his
eventual disillusionment with an idealized Western humanism. Agar (1955; Strangers, 1958) describes the isolation of a
Tunisian Jew, rejected by both Frenchmen and Arabs. Memmi
was still dealing with the same problem a decade later in essays
such as Portrait dun Juif (1962; Portrait of a Jew, 1963) and its
sequel, La libration du Juif (1966; The Liberation of the Jew,
1966). He portrays the Jew as a shadow figure, neither wholly
assimilated nor anxious to lose his distinctiveness, concluding that Israel is our only solution, our one trump card, our
last historical opportunity. Memmis sociological studies appeared in various journals and in Le Franais et le racisme
(1965). He published an Anthologie des crivains nord-africains (1964) and a Bibliographie de la littrature nord-africaine
dexpression franaise 19451962 (1965). He also wrote essays on
Jewish subjects for LArche, Evidences, and Commentary. His
later works include Dictionnaire critique lusage des incrdules (2002) and a conversation volume with Catherine PontHumbert, Lindividu face ses dpendances (2005).
161 in 1933, and 104 on Jan. 1, 1939. The Jews, who were mainly
textile manufacturers and livestock merchants, were severely
hit by the Nazi boycott of Jewish business establishments, and
considerable numbers emigrated despite the many obstacles
they encountered. In 1938 the synagogue and Jewish homes
were looted and destroyed, and in the spring of 1942 the community was liquidated. In 1947 some 125 Jews lived in Memmingen, but they later emigrated. In 1968 there were two Jews
in the city. There are memorials to commemorate the former
synagogue, the former Jewish community, and the Jewish citizens of Memmingen who were killed by the Nazis. In 2000
the museum of Memmingen set up a permanent exhibition
on Jewish life in Memmingen.
Bibliography: J. Miedel, Die Juden in Memmingen (1909);
FJW (193233), 304; W. Rapp, Geschichte des Dorfes Fellheim (1960);
D. Linn, Das Schicksal der juedischen Bevoelkerung in Memmingen,
19331945 (1962); Germ Jud, 2 (1968), 5346; PK. Add. bibliography: A. Maimon, M. Breuer, Y. Guggenheim (eds.), Germania Judaica, vol. 3, 13501514 (1987), 85860; C. Engelhard, Erinnerung stiftet
Erloesung. Gedenkheft fuer die juedischen Frauen, Maenner und Kinder
aus Memmingen, die zwischen 1941 und 1945 verfolgt, verschleppt
und ermordet wurden (Materialien zur Memminger Stadtgeschichte,
Reihe B, Materialien, vol. 3 (1999)); P. Hoser, Die Geschichte der
Stadt Memmingen, vol. 2: Vom Neubeginn im Koenigreich Bayern
bis 1945 (2001), 20340, 33946. Website: www.alemannia-judaica.de.
[Larissa Daemmig (2nd ed.)]
17
18
where Jewish life had been suppressed for seven decades under Communist rule. The list of individuals and institutions
who received the Foundations support since its inception can
be found on its Website, www.mfjc.org.
In addition to its support of communities and institutions, the Foundation has developed innovative programs to
address needs not adequately met by the Jewish community
globally. These include the International Nahum Goldmann
Fellowship, which prepares communal, cultural, and professional leadership for Jewish communities around the world;
reaching the Jewish unaffiliated; Jewish family education; and
utilization of new technologies for Jewish culture and education. Currently the Foundations programs extend to Jewish
communities on six continents, reaching both individuals and
institutions at the core of the Jewish community as well as Jews
affiliated only marginally with Jewish life.
The Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture is committed to the creation, intensification, and dissemination of
Jewish culture worldwide, the development of creative programs to meet the emerging needs of the Jewish communities
as they enter the 21st century, and service as a central forum
for identifying and supporting innovative programs to ensure
the continuation of creative Jewish life wherever Jewish communities exist. Its headquarters are in New York.
[Jerome Hochbaum (2nd ed.)]
memphis
meaning established and beautiful), ancient city in Lower
Egypt, on the west bank of the Nile, approximately 12 mi.
(c. 19 km.) south of Cairo, lying partly under the site of the
modern village Mit Riheina. According to tradition, Memphis was founded by the legendary Egyptian king Menes
(probably the same as King Aha) in about 3100 B.C.E. The
Egyptian name Mn-nfr originally designated the pyramid
of King Pepi I (c. 2300 B.C.E.) at Saqqara, and was eventually extended to include also the town that grew up around
it. By the end of the second millennium the name was probably vocalized Menufi, although a papyrus from the late 20t
Dynasty (c. 11841087 B.C.E.), gives the variant reading Mnf,
from which the Coptic Menfi, Arabic Menf, and Hebrew Mof
were derived.
Until the founding of Alexandria, Memphis played a
paramount role in Egypt. As the administrative capital of the
Old Kingdom, it had many palaces and temples, particularly
that of Ptah, the citys creator god (with the Apis bull sacred to
Ptah being venerated at Memphis); the remains of these structures can still be seen on the site. Literary texts, lavish in their
praise and descriptions of the city, indicate that it was a cosmopolitan metropolis with a large, resident foreign population
which included Jews (cf. Jer. 44:1); this has been confirmed
by archaeological excavation. Foreign divinities worshiped
at Memphis include Resheph, Baal, Astarte, and Qudshu.
The eventual destruction of Memphis is predicted in Isaiah
19:13; Jeremiah 2:16; 46:14, 19; and Ezekiel 30:13. The city was
not in fact destroyed, although it was besieged and taken by
the Persians. Memphis was also the place where it was said
Antiochus IV Epiphanes received the crown of Egypt. Archaeological excavations have brought to light the large Ptah
temple, the palace of Apries, another large ceremonial palace,
shrines of Seti I and Rameses II, an embalming house of the
Apis bulls, tombs of the high priests, and various settlement
remains. A project to record the scattered remains of Memphis through excavation and survey has been undertaken by
D. Jeffreys and H.S. Smith for the Egypt Exploration Society
since 1982.
Jewish Federation. In 1853, Bnai Israel Congregation (Children of Israel), with 36 members, was granted a charter by
the state legislature. The congregation worshiped in rented
halls until 1857, and in 1858 converted a bank building into a
place of worship. The building was dedicated by Rabbi Isaac
Mayer *Wise, the founder of American Reform Judaism, and
would later be known as Temple Israel. Rev. Jacob J. Peres, a
native of Holland, was the first spiritual leader. In 1860 the relationship between the congregation and Rev. Peres was severed and a new congregation, Beth El Emeth, was organized.
From 1860 to 1870 R. Simon Tuska was rabbi of Congregation
Children of Israel.
At this time, the citys Jews, some 400 people, worked
in banking, barbering, and auctioneering (including slaves);
they even operated a racetrack. A good number ran several businesses simultaneously. A few entered the professions; most were small storekeepers who dealt in clothing and
dry-goods, groceries and hardware. Memphis suffered little or
no damage during the Civil War. Some Memphis Jews served
in the army of the Confederacy. From 1863 to 1866 Congregation Children of Israel sponsored a nonsectarian school
Hebrew Educational Institute. The school was to provide
educational opportunities during the disruption caused by
the war. Following the death of Rabbi Tuska in 1870, Rabbi
Max Samfield was elected rabbi of the congregation in 1871
and served until 1915. In addition to serving the congregation, Samfield published The Jewish Spectator from 1885 until his death. This paper served the Jews of Memphis and the
mid-South.
In 1884 the Orthodox Baron Hirsch Congregation was
organized and in 1891 converted a church as a place of worship.
The first rabbi was Benjamin Mayerowitz. It became the largest
synagogue in the United States. In recent years it moved to a
new, smaller sanctuary to be within the area with the highest
concentration of Jews in East Memphis. Congregation Anshei
Sphard was organized in 1898. Beth Sholom, a Conservative
congregation, was established in 1950 and in 1967 dedicated
its new synagogue. Like many Jews in the Memphis community, Beth Sholoms rabbi at that time, Rabbi Arie Becker, was
well known for his involvement in the civil rights movement.
Long-time Rabbi Zalman Posner was a h asid of the rebbe, but
he served in a congregational role. Official Chabad Lubavitch
of Tennessee was founded in Memphis in 1994. Under the
leadership of Rabbi Levi Klein, Chabad quickly became an
active part of Memphis Jewish life.
A Bnai Brith Lodge was organized in 1856 and in 1927
the Bnai Brith Home was established to serve the Jews of
Memphis and the mid-South. It was completely rebuilt in
the 1960s and dedicated in 1968 as the Bnai Brith Home and
Hospital. The Jewish Community Center was organized in
1949 and in 1968 dedicated a $2,000,000 edifice, and the Jewish Historical Society of Memphis and the Mid-South was established in 1986.
Jews have been active in the economic, political, and
civic life of the community. The Goldsmith family, leading
19
Bibliography: W.F. Petrie, Memphis, 1 (1909); idem, The Palace of Apries (1909); idem, Meydum and Memphis (1910), 3846; W.F.
Petrie et al., Tarkhan I and Memphis V (1913); A.H. Gardiner, Ancient
Egyptian Onomastica, 2 (1947), 1226. Add. Bibliography: J. Kamil, Ancient Memphis: Archaeologists Revive Interest in a Famous
Egyptian Site, in: Archaeology, 38:4 (1985), 2532.
[Alan Richard Schulman / Shimon Gibson (2nd ed.)]
menahem
merchants, were known as benefactors of the community for
three generations. The Jewish community was so well accepted
in Memphis that in the 1920s, it chose not to build a Jewish
hospital, fearing that it might alienate the non-Jewish medical
community and lead to a restriction of their hospital privileges. Abe Plough, a native of Tupelo, Mississippi, was generally regarded as one of the foremost citizens of the community
by virtue of his philanthropy. His company was bought out
by Schering to form Schering-Plough, a pharmaceutical giant.
He played an important role in settling the famous sanitation
strike of 1968 that brought Martin Luther King, Jr., to town,
the site of his assassination in April 1968, contributing money
anonymously to offset the costs to the city of pay raises. Other
families who generously supported the entire Memphis community include the Fogelman, Lipman, Lowenstein, Lemsky,
and Belz families. The Jews have also served as presidents of
the bar association and the medical society.
The Jewish population has remained relatively stable for
more than 80 years. It has received 200 Holocaust survivors
and 300 Russians. The communitys hub shifted to East Memphis, the heart of Jewish life today.
The community boasts the Bornblum Judaic Studies
Program, established in 1985 at the University of Memphis
through the generosity of David Bornblum and Bert Bornblum. The program brings numerous scholars and lecturers
to the community. As in many college towns, the town-gown
gap is bridged by the Judaic Studies Program. There are two
Jewish days schools: the Bornblum Solomon Schechter Conservative day school, and the Orthodox Margolin Hebrew
Academy Feinstone Yeshiva of the South, which honors Harry
Feinstone.
The Orthodox community of Memphis was described by
Tova Mirvis in her highly acclaimed novel The Ladies Auxiliary (1999).
Bibliography: R. Musleah, The Jewish Traveler: Memphis,
in: Hadassah (Dec. 2000).
[James A. Wax / Michael Berenbaum (2nd ed.)]
20
life was saved by a Christian friend of the family. When he recovered, he went to Toledo and studied in the yeshivot there.
Among his teachers were Joseph b. Shuayb and Judah the son
of *Asher b. Jehiel (the Rosh). From Toledo he went to Alcal
and studied under Joseph b. al-Aysh, succeeding him on his
death in 1361. In Alcal also, there were troubles and suffering. Fratricidal war had broken out in Spain between the two
aspirants to the throne, Henry of Trastamara and Pedro the
Cruel, and many Jewish communities suffered as a result. Menahem escaped to safety through the help of the royal courtier Don Samuel *Abrabanel, and Menahem praises him in the
introduction to his Z eidah la-Derekh.
In Toledo Menahem compiled his Z eidah la-Derekh, a
code of laws dealing in the main with the laws concerning the
daily way of life. The work has an added importance on account of the introduction, which contains valuable historical
material, including important details of the method of study
in the yeshivot of France and Germany, as well as contemporary incidents in the history of the Jews in Spain. The book
was designed as an abridged code for the upper classes who,
because of their preoccupation with material concerns, had
no time to refer to the sources. He writes reprovingly of those
Jews who, because of the demands of the times, began to disregard the observance of the precepts. Although he shows great
erudition in his knowledge of the Talmud and codes and was
acquainted with the teachings of the earlier Spanish, French,
and German scholars, he relies mainly for his halakhic rulings on those of Asher b. Jehiel.
Menahem gives much information about the different
customs of the Jews of Spain, France, and Germany, as well as
of various communities (see pp. 71, 82, 88, 104, 110, 116 in the
Warsaw edition of 1880). He had some knowledge of medicine, and in the code he includes the need to preserve ones
bodily health (see pp. 2833; et al.). He also knew astronomy
and believed in astrology (pp. 98120). Although he criticized
philosophy, he appears to have engaged in its study to some
extent (10448). In these sciences, however, Menahem merely
gleaned from the works of others. His work reflects contemporary conditions. He complains that many of the youth, particularly children of the wealthy, were careless in the observance
of the precepts and scoffed at the words of the sages, and some
were even licentious in matters of sex (pp. 6881). The book is
divided into five maamarim (articles), which are divided into
kelalim (principles), which are subdivided into chapters. The
first maamar discusses prayer and the blessings; the second,
the halakhot of *issur ve-hetter; the third, laws of marriage; the
fourth, the festivals; and the fifth, fasting and mourning, the
Messiah, and the resurrection. It was first published in Ferrara
in the printing press of Abraham Usque in 1554. In addition
to his major work, three small works by Menahem are extant
in manuscript an abridgment of Bah ya ibn Paqudas H ovot
ha-Levavot, Hilkhot Sheh itah u-Vedikah, and Menah em Avelim it is possible however, that they are simply abridgments
from his Z eidah la-Derekh (see A. Freimann, in: Annuario di
Studi Ebraici (1934), 166ff.).
21
[Shlomo Eidelberg]
MENAHEM BEN JACOB IBN SARUQ (Saruk; tenth century), Spanish author and lexicographer. Born in Tortosa, he
moved at an early age to Cordova, where Isaac, the father of
*H isdai ibn Shaprut, became his patron. After Isaacs death,
Menahem went back to his native town for a short interlude,
and then returned to Cordova, where he lived under the patronage of H isdai and worked as his secretary. Besides eulogies on H isdais parents, Menahem composed H isdais famous
letter to the king of the *Khazars. H isdai encouraged him to
compile his Mah beret, a biblical dictionary in Hebrew. However, Menahem endured poverty because H isdai was not a
very generous patron. Later, when Menahem fell into disgrace,
H isdai even persecuted his former protg and forced him to
return to Tortosa. Here Menahem wrote a touching letter of
complaint to H isdai, a gem of epistolary style and an important historical document concerning its authors life.
Menahems most important work, intrinsically and historically, is the Mah beret, whose original name was probably
The Book of Solutions. Because Menahems dictionary was
originally written in Hebrew, its style surpasses that of biblical dictionaries of greater quality translated into Hebrew
from Arabic, such as Judah ibn *Tibbons translation of *Ibn
Janah s Book of Roots. More importantly, because the dictionary was in Hebrew, it was also understood by Jews in Christian countries where it exerted great influence. For example,
in France, the Mah beret was used extensively by *Rashi. Menahem carefully refrained from linguistic comparisons between
Hebrew and Arabic, presumably as Hebrew was considered
a holy language. Menahems theological concern is further
reflected in his attempt to show that ehyeh which is referred
to as a name for God in Exodus 3:14 is not derived from the
verb hayah (to be).
Often original in terminology, the dictionary attempts,
without reference to its predecessors, a systematic summation
of the lexicographical and grammatical knowledge of the time.
Menahem shows awareness of ellipses and pleonasms occurring in the Bible, and brings into relief poetic parallelism, or
constructions in which, as he put it, one half instructs us in
the meaning of the other. However, he did not have a systematic knowledge of grammar, and his approach tended to the
empirical. Although Menahem carried out the investigation
of the Hebrew roots systematically and built his dictionary
accordingly, he thought that letters of the root that disappear
22
MENAHEM BEN SOLOMON (first half of 12t century), author of the midrashic work Sekhel Tov. Menahems country of
origin is unknown. The foreign words in his book are Italian,
but it is difficult to establish on this basis that he lived in Italy
since he does not mention the Arukh of *Nathan b. Jehiel of
Rome though it was written about 50 years earlier. Similarly,
all that is known of Menahem is that two halakhic responsa
were addressed to him apparently by Solomon b. Abraham,
the nephew of Nathan of Rome (included in the Shibbolei haLeket, pt. 2, still in manuscript). Menahems fame rests on his
Sekhel Tov, an aggadic-halakhic midrashic anthology arranged
according to the weekly scriptural readings. Only the first two
parts of the book, to Genesis and Exodus, have been preserved
and published by S. Buber (Sekhel Tov, 1900), who added a detailed introduction. However, many early scholars possessed
complete manuscripts from which they frequently quote, particularly the author of the Asufot (in manuscript) who lived in
Germany at the beginning of the 13t century. The Sekhel Tov
was written, according to its author, in 1139, with the aim of
explaining the verses in accordance with the Midrashim and
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
MENAHEM THE ESSENE (first century B.C.E.), a contemporary of *Herod, to whom prophetic powers were attributed.
Josephus relates how Menahem had once observed Herod,
then still a boy, going to his teacher, and greeted him as king
of the Jews. The pious Essene added, however, that Herod
would abandon justice and piety and thus bring upon himself the wrath of God. When Herod had reached the height
of his power, he sent for Menahem and questioned him about
the length of his reign. Menahem succeeded in satisfying the
king, albeit with an ambiguous answer, and hence (according
to Josephus) Herod continued to hold all Essenes in honor. L.
Ginzberg suggests that Menahem is to be identified with the
Menahem mentioned in the Mishnah (H ag. 2:2). This Menahem was, together with *Hillel, one of the heads of the Sanhedrin, who left his post (presumably to join the Essenes) and
was succeeded by *Shammai. There is little evidence, however,
to support his view. Talmudic discussions of the Mishnah tend
to describe the mishnaic Menahem in terms far more fitting
to *Menahem son of Judah the Galilean, a patriot leader during the uprising of 6670 C.E.
Bibliography: Jos., Ant., 15:3738; Klausner, Bayit Sheni, 3
(19502), 115; 4 (19502), 148; A. Schalit, Koenig Herodes (1969), 459; L.
Ginzberg, On Jewish Law and Lore (1955), 101.
[Isaiah Gafni]
23
menah emiyyah
MENAH EMIYYAH (Heb. ) , moshav in northern
Israel with municipal council status, southwest of Lake Kinneret, affiliated with Ha-Ih ud ha-H aklai. Menah emiyyah was
founded as a moshavah by the Jewish Colonization Association (ICA) in 1902, as part of the *ICA enterprise to establish
villages in Galilee based on grain production. Its name is based
both on the previous Arabic name of the site Milh amiyya
and the first name of Herbert *Samuels father.
Menah emiyyahs progress was slow, and it suffered from
the frequent attacks by Bedouins in the vicinity. In the 1920s,
a gypsum quarry was opened nearby to supply the Haifa
Nesher cement works. Later, World War II veterans (Yael)
joined the first settlers. Following the Israel *War of Independence (1948), new immigrants, mainly from North Africa and
Romania, settled in Menah emiyyah. In 1969 the moshav had
585 inhabitants; in the mid-1990s 1,240; and in 2002 1,100
on an area of 2.3 sq. mi. (6 sq. km.).
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
MENAHEM MENDEL BEN ISAAC (second half of 16t century), tax collector, architect, and builder in Kazimierz, near
*Cracow. Menahem Mendel was born in Brest-Litovsk, and
from 1560 to 1568 was the kings tax farmer in the Zhmud (Zemaitkiemis) region of Lithuania. In 1572 he moved to Kazimierz, and by 1581 he had become one of the elders of the kahal.
From the early 1570s, he constructed flour mills and city walls,
and was noted as a designer and builder of bridges. During
the Polish campaign against Russia (157982), King Stephen
Bthory was accompanied by Menahem Mendel, who built
bridges over the Dvina and military installations for the sieges
of Polotsk, Velizh, and Pskov. In 1587, since he had supported
the defeated Austrian archduke Maximilian, he was compelled
to leave Poland. Upon his arrival in Vienna, he was given a
modest allowance by the court. On July 4, 1589, he proposed
that Emperor Rudolph II finance the building of a bridge over
the Danube, between Vienna and Nussdorf, at an estimated
outlay of 30,000 Rheingulden. Menahem Mendel was to levy
tolls to repay the investment. After two years of deliberations
the project was deferred indefinitely and Menahem Mendel
returned to Kazimierz. In 1592 King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland deputed him to arrange a match between the kings aunt,
Ann Jagellon, and an Austrian archduke. All trace of Menahem Mendel vanishes after this point.
Bibliography: M. Balaban, in: Nowy Dziennik (Nov. 15,
1919); idem, Dzieje ydw w Krakowie i na Kazimierzu, 1 (1931), 139,
159, 162; M. Bersohn, Dyplomataryusz dotycrcy ydw w dawnej
Polsce (1910), 108 no. 171; Schwarz, in: Jahrbuch fuer Landeskunde
von Niederoesterreich (1913), suppl. 1.
to Erez Israel together with R. *Nah man of Horodenko (Gorodenka) and settled in Tiberias. Before his emigration, he visited Cekinowka and Soroki, townlets on both banks of the
Dniester, where he occupied himself in the redemption of
captives (pidyon shevuyyim). He is identical with R. Mendel
of Cekinowka mentioned in Shivh ei ha-Besht (Kapust, 1815),
19. As for the reason for his emigration, one of his intimates
has written: He emigrated to the Holy Land because emissaries started traveling to him urging that he occupy himself with community affairs (A. Rubinstein, in: Tarbiz, 35
(1965/66), 177), which probably signifies that they came to him
as a z addik and miracle-worker (*Baal Shem) and he refused
to assume such a role.
R. Mendel represents the extreme enthusiast among
the first generations of the h asidic movement. His teachings
abound in radical expressions which aroused violent opposition, such as: One should not be exceedingly meticulous in
every act performed, because this is the intent of the evil inclination; even if, Heaven forbid, one has sinned one should
not be overtaken by melancholy (Darkhei Yesharim (Zhitomir, 1805), 4b, 5a). Like other disciples of the Baal Shem Tov,
he considered devotion to God the pivot of h asidic doctrine
and conduct. In contrast to others, however, he thought that
Torah study and the practice of devotion were not compatible; study was therefore to be restricted so as not to restrain
the process of approximation to the Creator. If we divert our
thoughts from devotion to God, and study excessively, we
will forget the fear of Heaven study should therefore be
reduced and one should always meditate on the greatness of
the Creator. R. Mendel considered prayer the most suitable
manner in which to achieve devotion, and that prayer must
be restrained and not, as was the opinion of H asidim of other
schools, vociferous. In general, it was his view that devotional
conduct should be based on contemplative concentration attainable by seclusion from society and cessation of all occupation. His principal teachings were published in his booklet
Darkhei Yesharim ve-hu Hanhagot Yesharot (Zhitomir, 1805);
in Likkutei Yekarim (Lvov, 1792); and in Yosher Divrei Emet
(1905), of R. Meshullam Feivush of Zbarazh.
Bibliography: Dubnow, H asidut, index; A. Rubinstein, in:
Tarbiz, 35 (1965/66); J. Weiss, in: Tiferet Yisrael I. Brodie Jubilee Volume (1967), 15862.
[Avraham Rubinstein]
24
[Arthur Cygielman]
Teachings
In his teachings, Menahem Mendel remained faithful to those
of the Maggid. Following him, he regarded the z imz um (contraction) of divine emanation and its restriction as a condition for revelation, because that which is not limited cannot
be conceived, just as thought is conceived by restriction and
contraction into letters. The worlds were created by divine will
as an act of mercy, by the contraction of the divine emanation, because of the deficiency of the recipients. When one
teaches a small child, he must be instructed in accordance
with his young intelligence in accordance with the ability
of reception of his mind (Likkutei Amarim (1911), 17a). Divinity is restricted in every place (the world is not His abode,
but He is the abode of the world). It is the duty of man to adhere to the Divinity in the material creation and to redeem
the Divine Presence from its exile in the material world. This
can be achieved by various methods:
(1) By widening the conception of man as the wisest and
most capable of understanding, when he has attained wisdom and studies the Torah, he then creates new heavens and
a new earth (ibid.).
(2) By devekut (devotion) to God. Man is a part of the
Celestial Divinity. The root of his soul is to be found in the
world of *Az ilut (emanation) and he is therefore able to commune with God without the obstruction of any interruption
or barrier. Menahem Mendel emphasizes prayer with devotion
and kavvanah (intention). With his prayer, he is a groomsman who brings the Divine Presence before God (ibid., 31b).
In order to attain the virtue of devekut: (a) He must consecrate his person and his meditation to wisdom to the extent
25
Bibliography: Frumkin-Rivlin, 3 (1929), 138ff.; Yerushalayim, ed. by A.M. Luncz, 13 (1919), 223ff.
[Joshua Kaniel (Mershine)]
menahem of merseburg
that he, so to say, has no further existence, i.e., spiritual selfdenial. (b) By self-abnegation in the moral aspect and by the
cultivation of other ethical values, such as humility, compassion, etc. With the consciousness of his own worthlessness, he
is to regard himself as naught so that he become enwrapped
with awe (as a result of which he will rise to speculative contemplation), which is the gateway to love. This degree of love
will attach him to all men and his spiritual elevation will be
followed by the uplifting of all of them in perfect contact and
devekut. His occupation in secular affairs is to resemble the
coming and goings of a man who immediately returns to his
home (i.e., to his condition of devekut).
(3) By the observation of the precepts it is within the
power of man to knit together the whole of the world, to
control it and exert his influence in the heavenly spheres; he
should therefore accustom all his limbs to the precepts. When
observing a precept, he must realize that the reward of the precept is the actual observance of the precept itself (the observance of the precept for its own sake). Similarly, he emphasizes
that there must be fear of sin and not fear of punishment. The
perfect fear is a sublime degree which surpasses z imz um; it is
the fear of Gods majesty, a constant fear before which all the
other fears are contracted and happy is the man that feareth
always (Prov. 28:14). He stresses the importance of faith even
beyond logic and rational reason.
On worship through corporeality, he argues that one
must not follow the heretics who say that a man must be at a
lower degree so that he may ascend from there, a drop which
must needs precede a rise; may there not be such a thought
in Israel (Likkutei Amarim, 25b26a).
His main works were Peri ha-Arez (Kopys, 1814); Peri
ha-Ez (Zhitomir, 1874); Ez Peri (Lvov, 1880); Likkutei Amarim (Lvov, 1911). His letters appeared in Nefesh Menah em
(Lvov, 1930).
Bibliography: A.S. Heilman, Beit Rabbi, 1 (1903), 1122; A.
Yaari, Iggerot Erez Yisrael (1943), 30824; W. Rabinowitsch, Lithuanian H asidism (1970), index; R. Mahler, Divrei Yemei Yisrael, vol. 1,
book 3 (1955), 2468; Dubnow, H asidut, index; Horodezky, H asidut,
vol. 2, 1335; H. Liberman, in: KS, 36 (1960), 1278; L.I. Newman,
The Hasidic Anthology (1934), index; M. Buber, Tales of the Hasidim,
1 (19684), 17581; B.D. Kahana, H ibbat ha-Arez (1968); M. Wilensky,
H asidim u-Mitnaggedim (1970), index.
ish family life, particularly as a result of the widespread custom of child marriage. Some 150 years later his takkanah gave
rise to violent controversy when some wanted to explain it as
having been instituted only in cases where the child had been
influenced to exercise it (see Jacob *Falk). Solomon *Luria
writes in the Yam shel Shelomo to Yevamot (13: 17): It has
become customary during recent years not to permit meun,
this having originated with Menahem, author of Meil Z edek,
who carefully weighed up and enacted many restrictive and
preventive measures and was a great expert and scholar, and
his takkanot and restrictions spread throughout the whole of
Germany. Here the name of Menahems book is mentioned;
only fragments of it have been preserved. Quotations from it
are found in talmudic works of the 15t and 16t centuries, particularly in those of Jacob *Weil and Solomon *Luria, as well
as in the glosses of Moses H azzan to the Minhagim le-Kol haShanah of *Isaac of Tyrnau, and in the Shitah Mekubbez et of
Bezalel *Ashkenazi. Jacob Weil describes Menahem of Merseburg as an eminent scholar in his generation living in Saxony.
He laid down many laws and decisions which he collected,
and from them compiled an extensive work. That book is to
be found in Saxony and the minhag of Saxony completely follows it. Many of these rulings have been extracted from his
book and are in my possession (Resp. Maharyu 133). These
words were written in reply to questioners who were unaware
of Menahems identity and turned to Weil for information. In
fact, at the end of the printed editions of the responsa of Jacob
Weil there is a small collection, extracted from the Meil Z edek,
entitled Nimmukei Menah em Merseburg. It is entirely devoted
to the judicial relations between individuals and communities.
Among Menahems pupils was Yom Tov Lipmann *Muelhausen, author of Seder Tikkun ha-Get which was based on his
tradition (Yam shel Shelomo, Git. 2:5).
Bibliography: Joseph b. Moses, Leket Yosher, ed. by J. Freimann, 2 (1904), xiiv.
[Israel Moses Ta-Shma]
MENAHEM OF MERSEBURG (first half of the 14t century), one of the leading scholars of Saxony, Germany. Menahem was a pupil of Isaac b. H ayyim of Oppenheim (apparently
to be identified with the son of *H ayyim b. Isaac Or Zarua,
who was a pupil of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg). Menahem
was renowned in his time as a talmudic scholar, and was particularly well known for his takkanot which determined relations between the individual and the community in all matters affecting the communal life of the Jew especially in the
subjects of taxation, personal injuries, and fines. Especially
important was the takkanah in which he abolished the right
of meun (see *child marriage; responsa Judah Mintz (Venice,
1553) no. 13), which had been a cause of great tragedies in Jew-
26
menaH ot
27
MENAHEM Z IYYONI (late 14tearly 15t century), kabbalist and exegete who lived in Cologne, where he signed a document in 1382, probably as rabbi of the community. His father
was R. Meir Z iyyoni. Nothing else definite is known about his
life, his career, or his teachers. He is known only through his
major work, Z iyyoni, a homiletical commentary on the Torah
(first printed in Cremona in 1559 and again there in the following year after the first impression had been destroyed by
fire), and by the treatise Z efunei Z iyyoni (partly preserved in
Ms.), one of the major early kabbalistic books dealing in detail
with the powers of evil and demonology. Menahem Z iyyoni
was one of the few kabbalists in 14t-century Germany, and his
work demonstrates that he was heir to two different esoteric
traditions: the Spanish Kabbalah, including the Zohar, the
Sefer ha-Bahir, and the exegetical works of Nah manides; and
the esoteric theology of the 12t13t-century movement of the
H asidei Ashkenaz. He quotes frequently from Eleazar b. Judah
of Worms Sodei Razayya, referring to him as ish sodi (my
esoteric authority). These two traditions are also reflected in
his subject matter: the customary kabbalistic questions on the
emanation of the Sefirot alongside the Ashkenazi-h asidic conception of the Kavod (divine glory) and its relationship to
the prophets. He composed a kinah for the Ninth of Av which
was incorporated in the Ashkenazi liturgy.
Bibliography: Davidson, Oz ar, 4 (1933), 435; A. Kober,
Cologne (1940), 358; Y. Dan, Torat ha-Sod shel H asidut Ashkenaz
(1968), 259f.
[Joseph Dan]
menander of ephesus
that prevailed. But at the Second Temple we know that they
toiled in the study of Torah and were heedful of the tithes: why
then were they exiled? Because they loved money and hated
one another. This teaches that hatred of man for his fellow is
heinous before the Omnipresent and is regarded as being as
grave as idolatry, incest, and murder (13:22). The Babylonian
Gemara has some interesting aggadic passages. There is a remarkable story to demonstrate the merits of wearing z iz it as a
safeguard against immorality (44a); a most interesting homily
of R. Ezra (53a); and passages on the Jewish attitude toward
Greek culture (64b, 99b) and on the origin of the Temple of
Onias (109b). Several of the aggadot in Menah ot emphasize the
spiritual implications of sacrificing. A poignant aggadah by R.
Isaac states that when the poor offer God a meal-offering, in
spite of its negligible value, God honors the giver as though
he had offered up his soul (104b). Regarding its halakhot, large
portions of the text are taken up by extraneous material; e.g.,
28a44b deal mainly with the menorah, mezuzah, tefillin, and
z iz it. In the printed editions the sequence of the chapters in the
Babylonian Talmud differs from that of the separate Mishnah
edition; the 10t Mishnah chapter is 6t, and consequently the
mishnaic 6t, 7t, 8t, and 9t chapters become the 7t, 8t, 9t,
and 10t respectively. Menah ot was translated into English and
published by the Soncino Press, London (1948).
Bibliography: H . Albeck, Shishah Sidrei Mishnah-Kodashim
(1959), 5962; Epstein, Amoraim.
[Arnost Zvi Ehrman]
MENDA, ELIEZER (18871978), journalist. Born in *Edirne, he studied between 190510 in the Ecole Normale Orientale, Paris. He was a teacher at the *Alliance Isralite Universelle schools in Edirne, Tetouan, and Tatarpazarcik. Between
19101925 he taught French and German in various lyces in
Mersin, Adana, Konya, and zmit. He contributed to different
Ladino newspapers such as El Judio, El Jugeton, El Telegrafo,
28
mendelsohn, eric
La Boz de Oriente, and to French newspapers such LAurore
and Le Journal DOrient. In December 1950 he started publishing the Ladino newspaper La Luz with a partner, Robert
Balli. Later on Balli left and started to publish his own newspaper, La Luz de Trkiye, while Menda continued with La
Luz until 1972.
Bibliography: N. Benbanaste, rneklerle Trk Musevi Basnnn Tarihesi (1988); A. Elmaleh, Trkiyede Yahudice-Ispanyolca Basnnn Emektar: Eliezer Menda, in: La Vera Luz (Dec. 17,
1964Jan. 21, 1965); Homenaje a los Dekanos de la Prensa Judia
Turka don Eliezer Menda i don Eliya Gayus, in: La Vera Luz (Feb.
9, 1967).
[Rifat Bali (2nd ed.)]
29
MENDELSOHN, FRANKFURT MOSES (Moses ben Mendel Frankfurt; 17821861), Hebrew scholar and writer. Born
in Hamburg, he received a traditional education but, under
the influence of N.H. *Wessely, became attracted to Haskalah. He engaged mainly in literary work, writing in both German and in Hebrew. His main work is Penei Tevel (published
posthumously in Amsterdam in 1872), a collection of poetry
and prose in the style of the maqmt of Al-*H arizi. The book
contains satire, polemics, epic poems on biblical themes, and
a history of the Hebrew Haskalah movement at the turn of the
18t century. He was an uncle of S.R. *Hirsch.
Bibliography: E. Duckesz, H akhmei Ahav (1908), 1201; G.
Kressel, Ivrit ba-Maarav (1941), 3641; H .N. Shapira, Toledot ha-Sifrut
ha-Ivrit ha-H adashah (19672), 50310.
[Getzel Kressel]
MENDELSON, JOS (Yoysef; 18911969), Argentine Yiddish editor and writer. Born in Cherkassy (Ukraine), Mendelson had a traditional education from his father and was
early recognized as a talmudic genius. His first publication
was an article on Peretz *Smolenskin in 1912 in the RussianZionist monthly, Di Yidishe Hofenung. In the same year, he
immigrated to Argentina, where he taught Hebrew. With Z.
Brokhes he co-edited the fortnightly, Der Kolonist, in which
he also published articles on Yiddish and Spanish writers. He
began writing for Di Yidishe Tsaytung in 1917 and later edited
the publication (192329); with Y. Helfman he edited the Yiddish monthly Argentine (1921). He also edited the anthologies
Oyf di Bregn fun La-Plata (On the Banks of La Plata, 1919),
50 Yor Yidishe Kolonizatsye in Argentine (50 Years of Colonization in Argentina, 1939), and Rashi-Bukh (Rashi-Book,
1940). A collection of his writings, Amol in a Halbn Yoyvl
(Once in Half a Lifetime), was published in 1943. He translated many Russian, Spanish, French, and English novels into
Yiddish. Among his other works were plays and writings about
artists, sculptors, etc. From 1943, he directed the Hebrew-Yiddish Teachers Seminary in Buenos Aires.
Bibliography: LNYL, 6 (1965), 3941.
[Israel Ch. Biletzky / Jerold C. Frakes (2nd ed.)]
30
mendelssohn
world. He was a member of the administration of the Cantorial School of the Jewish Theological Seminary and a teacher
of the traditional style of the prayer services. He served in the
U.S. Army with the rank of captain. Mendelson initiated and
organized concerts of cantorial music. He assisted in the writing of new compositions in the areas of Jewish and cantorial
music and was president of the Cantors Assembly (198789).
In 1994 the Jewish Theological Seminary awarded him the
degree of Doctor of Music honoris causa. His brother is the
cantor Jacob Ben-Zion *Mendelson.
MENDELSSOHN
FAMILY
DOROTHEA
1765 1839
JOHANN VEIT
17901854
SIMON VEIT
PHILIPP VEIT
17931877
FRIEDRICH
SCHLEGEL
RECHA
1766 1831
MENDEL
MEYER
[Akiva Zimmerman]
HENRIETTA
1768 1831
MENDELSSOHN, family of scholars, bankers and artists. The founder of the family was MOSES *MENDELSSOHN
(17291786). His wife, FROMET (17371812), was a great-granddaughter of the Viennese Court Jew, Samuel *Oppenheimer.
(See Chart: Mendelssohn Family).
Moses eldest son, JOSEPH (17701848), had a banking
business, at times in partnership with his brother ABRAHAM
(17761835). The bank helped transfer the French indemnity
after Napoleons defeat, and was later active mainly in German and foreign railway issues and state loans, particularly
Russian. Mendelssohn and Co. were bankers and correspondents for many foreign commercial banks, central banks, and
governments, but did not launch any industrial ventures of
their own. After World War I the bank opened an issuing
house in Amsterdam. The Berlin house was absorbed by the
Deutsche Bank in 1939. Joseph was the friend and patron of
Alexander von *Humboldt, the naturalist, and for many years
chairman of the corporation of Berlin merchants. He and
his brother Abraham were co-sponsors of the enlightened circle of Jewish notables, Gesellschaft der Freunde. His nephew,
Abrahams son, the composer FELIX MENDELSSOHN BARTHOLDY (for the Bartholdy see Felix *Mendelssohn) urged
him to go through with his old project of an edition of his
fathers collected works, on the suggestion of F.A. Brockhaus,
the noted publisher; in this he was aided by his son, GEORG
BENJAMIN (17941874), professor of geography at Bonn University. Joseph himself contributed to this project, for which
he wrote his fathers biography. Of Josephs sons, Georg Benjamin was baptized; ALEXANDER (17981871), head of the
bank, remained a Jew. Through social contacts with the *Hohenzollerns, Josephs grandson FRANZ (18291889) and Abrahams grandson ERNST (18461909) were elevated to the hereditary nobility.
In 1804, Abraham married Leah Salomon, granddaughter
of Daniel *Itzig, and thereby became a naturalized Prussian
citizen, ahead of the bulk of his coreligionists. He served for
many years as municipal councilor without pay. A deist and
rationalist by conviction he brought up his children as Protestants in order to improve their social opportunities. He and his
wife embraced Christianity in 1822 because it is the religious
form acceptable to the majority of civilized human beings (in
a letter to his daughter Fanny). This decision to convert was
influenced by the current *Hep! Hep! riots (1819).
JOSEPH
17701848
GEORG BENJAMIN
1794 1874
HENRIETTA
MEYER
ALEXANDER
1798 1871
REBEKAH
SALOMON
MARIANNE
SEELIGMANN
1799 1888
Later Mendelssohn-Bartholdy descendants include ALBRECHT MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY, editor of the Europaische Gesprache in Hamburg, who died in exile in England. Felix *Gilbert, a historian, at the Institute of Advanced
Study, Princeton, New Jersey; the philosopher Leonhard *Nelson (18821927); KURT HENSEL, a West German diplomat
posted to Tel Aviv in 1968. CARL MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY
(18381897), assisted by his uncle PAUL (18131874), wrote the
first biography of his father Felix. Felixs nephew SEBASTIAN
HENSEL (18301898) was the first family chronicler.
Moses eldest daughter, Dorothea *Mendelssohn-VeitSchlegel (Brendel, 17651839), was married twice: to the
banker Simon Veit (see *Veit family) and to Friedrich Schlegel, man of letters. Her sons, Johannes *Veit (17901854)
and Philipp Veit (17931877), were painters of the Romantic
Nazarene school. HENRIETTE (Sorel; 17681831), Moses
31
FANNY
1805 1847
WILHELM HENSEL
1794 1861
MENDEL
DESSAU
d. 1766
MOSES
MENDELSSOHN
1729 1786
ABRAHAM
BARTHOLDY
1776 1835
FROMET
17371812
LEAH
SALOMON
17721842
ABRAHAM
GUGGENHEIM
d. 1766
FELIX BARTHOLDY
18091847
CECILE JEANRENAUD
1819 1853
REBEKAH
18111858
LEJEUNE DIRICHLET
18051859
DANIEL ITZIG
1723 1799
PAUL
18131874
ALBERTINE HEINE
d. 1879
NATHAN
17821852
Left Judaism
ARNOLD
18171850
HENRIETTA
mendelssohn, arnold
youngest daughter, resembled her father in character. She never
married, having his deformity. She served as governess and
teacher in Vienna and Paris, where she was head of a boarding school. The intellectual luminaries of the age, Madame de
Stal, Spontini, Benjamin Constant, and the Schlegels formed
part of her salon. In 1812 she became tutor to the French general Sebastianis daughter. In that year, following her mothers
death, she was baptized into the Catholic Church, taking the
name Marie (a few years earlier she had rebuked her sister
Dorothea for doing the same). Moses youngest son, NATHAN,
had a son, the physician Arnold Mendelssohn (18171850), a
supporter and confidant of Ferdinand *Lassalle.
32
mendelssohn, moses
Fanny Caecile (Zipporah) *Mendelssohn (18051847)
was unusually close to her brother Felix, and her marriage to
the painter Wilhelm Hensel in 1829 did not weaken this bond.
Felix relied upon her musical taste and advice, and six of her
songs which were published along with his (without identification) are stylistically indistinguishable from his work. Under her own name, she published four books of piano pieces,
two books of solo songs, and one book of part-songs. After
her death, a few more piano pieces, some songs, and a piano
trio in D major were published.
MENDELSSOHN, MOSES (Moses ben Menahem, acronym RaMbeMaN, or Moses of Dessau; 17291786), philosopher of the German Enlightenment in the pre-Kantian period,
early Maskil, and a renowned Jewish figure in the 18t century.
Born in Dessau, son of a Torah scribe, Mendelssohn received
a traditional Jewish education under the influence of David
*Fraenkel, who was then rabbi of Dessau. When the latter was
appointed rabbi of Berlin in 1743, Mendelssohn followed him
there in order to pursue his religious studies and to acquire
a general education. He earned his livelihood with difficulty
while simultaneously studying Talmud diligently and acquiring a broad education in literature and philosophy. In addition
to his fluent knowledge of German and Hebrew, he acquired
knowledge of Latin, Greek, English, French, and Italian. His
teachers were young, broadly educated Jews, such as the Galician immigrant Israel M. Zamosc, who taught him medieval Jewish philosophy, the medical student Abraham Kisch,
who taught him Latin, and the well-born Berlin Jew, A.S.
Gumpertz, who taught him French and English and in general served as a model of a pious Jew immersed in the larger
intellectual world. During this period he met the writer and
dramatist G.E. *Lessing (1754) and a deep and lifelong friendship developed between them. In 1750 he became a teacher in
the house of Isaac Bernhard, owner of a silk factory; in 1754, he
was entrusted with the bookkeeping of the factory and eventually he became a partner in the enterprise. Throughout his life
he worked as a merchant, while carrying out his literary activities and widespread correspondence in his free time. Only in
1763 was he granted the right of residence in Berlin by the
king. In 1762, he married Fromet Guggenheim of Hamburg,
and they had six children (see *Mendelssohn family). In 1754
Mendelssohn began to publish at first with the assistance of
Lessing philosophical writings and later also literary reviews.
He also started a few literary projects (for example, the shortlived periodical Kohelet Musar) in order to enrich and change
Jewish culture and took part in the early Haskalah. In 1763, he
was awarded the first prize of the Prussian Royal Academy of
Sciences for his work Abhandlung ber die Evidenz in metaphysischen Wissenschaften (Treatise on Evidence in Metaphysical Knowledge). However, when the academy elected
him as a member in 1771, King Frederick II refused to ratify
its decision. In 1769, he became embroiled in a dispute on the
Jewish religion, and from then on, he confined most of his
literary activity to the sphere of Judaism. His most notable
and enduring works in this area included the translation into
33
MENDELSSOHN, HEINRICH (19102002), Israeli zoologist. Mendelssohn was born in Berlin and studied zoology
there at the Humboldt University. He immigrated to Erez
Israel in 1933, continuing his studies at the Hebrew University. From 1947 to 1956 he served as director of the Biological
and Pedagogical Institute of Tel Aviv, which became the department of zoology of Tel Aviv University. In 1961 he was appointed professor. Mendelssohn devoted most of his activity
to nature conservation. He served as a member of the Nature
Conservation Authority and chairman of the Israel Committee for Nature Preservation in Israel of the International Biological Program. He represented Israel on the International
Conference of Ecology. He was awarded the Israel Prize in
science in 1973.
mendelssohn, moses
German and commentary on the Pentateuch, Sefer Netivot haShalom (Book of the Paths of Peace, 178083) and his Jerusalem: oder, Ueber religise Macht und Judenthum (Jerusalem,
or On Religious Power and Judaism, 1783), the first polemical
defense of Judaism in the German language and one of the
pioneering works of modern Jewish philosophy. An active intermediary on behalf of his own people in difficult times and
a participant in their struggle for equal rights, he was at the
same time a forceful defender of the Enlightenment against the
opposition to it which gained strength toward the end of his
life. In the midst of a literary battle against one of the leading
figures of the counter-Enlightenment, he died in 1786.
Philosophy
Mendelssohn made virtually no claim to be an original thinker
in the realm of philosophy. He considered himself to be little
more than an exponent of the teachings of the Leibniz/Wolffian school, perhaps contributing a more felicitous and contemporary expression to the demonstrations of Gods existence and providence and human immortality that had been
propounded by Leibniz and Wolff and their other disciples.
Here and there, however, he modestly acknowledged that he
was providing a new version of an old argument or even saying something that had not been said before. Mendelssohn
first acquired a wide reputation for philosophical acumen
with the publication of his prize essay in 1763. The Berlin
Academys question was whether the truths of metaphysics,
in general, and the first principles of natural theology and
morality, in particular, can be shown to be as securely established as those of mathematics. Mendelssohn answered that
such principles are capable of the same certainty but are by
no means as easily grasped. After discussing the obstacles to
such comprehension, he went on to offer cosmological and
ontological proofs for the existence of God. He sought to give
the ontological argument an easier turn by reversing its usual
course and arguing first for the impossibility of Gods nonexistence and then against the notion that the most perfect being
would enjoy a merely possible existence. In his later works,
Mendelssohn continued to reformulate and refine these very
same arguments. Following Leibniz, Mendelssohn argued in
a number of writings that the combination of divine goodness
and greatness known as providence brings into being the best
of all possible worlds. Like his mentor, he could maintain this
position only by adducing the evidence of the afterlife. He first
examined this question in his most celebrated philosophical
work, Phdon, oder ueber die Unsterblichkeit der Seele (Phaedo,
or on the Immortality of the Soul, 1767; Eng tr., 1784), which
borrows its form but not its substance from Platos dialogue of
the same name. Mendelssohn was encouraged in this project
by his correspondence with Thomas Abbt (17381760), a professor at the University of Frankfurt, about the destiny of man
and the fate of the soul after death. He placed in the mouth of
his Socrates arguments that he had admittedly derived from
his own recent predecessors, including such thinkers as the
natural theologian Hermann Samuel Reimarus and the liberal
34
mendelssohn, moses
irrefutable truth. Yet, whatever speculative reason might seem
to teach, he now argued, common sense still sufficed to orient people and guide them along the path to the most important truths. Just what Mendelssohn meant by common sense
has been a subject of much dispute, both among his contemporaries such as Thomas Wizenmann and Kant himself and
among modern scholars. But, however he conceived of this
faculty, it is clear that he did not believe that it would necessarily remain humanitys last resort. For, in the cyclical course
of things, providence would no doubt cause new thinkers to
arise who would restore metaphysics to its former glory.
35
mendelssohn, moses
he suffered from a disease that prevented him from pursuing
his philosophic studies.
Activities in the Realm of Jewish Culture
In the middle 1750s, at around the same time that his first
German-language publications were seeing the light of day,
Mendelssohn produced his earliest writings in Hebrew. They
consisted of anonymous contributions to Kohelet Musar
(Preacher of Morals), a periodical he co-edited with Tobias Bock. Although the two men managed to publish only
two eight-page issues, their effort nevertheless constituted a
revolutionary turning point in the development of Jewish culture. It marked the first occasion on which Jewish intellectuals attempted to introduce into their own culture an innovative form of publication then quite popular and influential in
Germany, England, and elsewhere, the moral weekly. Here
some of the ideas of the moderate Enlightenment were first
presented to Jewish readers in the Hebrew language known to
the communitys educated elite and couched in terms familiar
to them. Above all, the publication by two laymen of a periodical aimed at the moral improvement of the Jewish population amounted to an unprecedented subversive measure in
a world in which the rabbinical elite was acknowledged to be
the absolute authority in such matters. The weekly called on
the Jews to fill their lungs with the air of natural life, to observe
freely the beauty of nature, to nurture their sense of aesthetics
and harmony. It proclaimed their right to delight in a world
that is, as Leibniz taught, the best of all possible worlds created by God. Man, Gods finest creature, is at the center of
nature, and it is unthinkable that the Jew, of all people, should
repress his humanistic traits. Man can discover the majesty
of the Almighty and His powers by observing the creation of
the great architect of the world. Kohelet Musars transmission
of such messages appear to have made no significant impression on the Jewish society of the 1750s but it did pave the way
for the publication, decades later, of a much more influential
successor, the maskilic journal Ha-*Meassef.
In the decades following this abortive effort Mendelssohns writings in the Hebrew language were limited in number. In 1761 he published a commentary on Maimonides Millot
ha-Higgayon (Logical Terms) and in 1769 or 1770 he published a commentary on the biblical book of Ecclesiastes. The
former volume consisted of a republication of Maimonides
introduction to logic and philosophical primer together with
an introduction and commentary designed not only to clarify
Maimonides work but to bridge the distance between medieval Jewish philosophy and the regnant philosophy of Mendelssohns own day. The latter utilized the text of Ecclesiastes
to expound in a popular form an essentially Wolffian teaching
with regard to two principal tenets of natural religion, providence and immortality of the soul. At the end of the introduction to this commentary, Mendelssohn announced that if
it were well received he would attempt to write similar works
on Job, Proverbs, and Psalms but he never carried this plan
to completion.
36
mendelssohn, moses
Children), in which he published a translation of Maimonides 13 Articles of Faith. The last of Mendelssohns biblical translations to appear in print was his translation of the
Song of Songs with commentary, which was published posthumously (1788).
Activities for the Improvement of the Civic Status of the
Jews
Prior to the controversy with Lavater, Mendelssohn had not
campaigned for the improvement of the civic status of the
Jews, but from the 1770s onward he became something of an
activist on their behalf. He willingly replied to anyone who
came to him for counsel or guidance, endeavoring to assist
within the limits of his means any Jew who had been overtaken
by misfortune or who had become embroiled in difficulties
with the authorities. He also came to the aid of beleaguered
Jewish communities, taking advantage of his reputation in order to request help from various renowned personages whom
he had befriended. After receiving an appeal for help from the
tiny Jewish community of Switzerland in 1775, he enlisted none
other than Lavater in a successful effort to forestall imminent
anti-Jewish measures. When the community of Dresden was
threatened by an expulsion order in 1777, he prevailed upon
one of the leading officials of Saxony, who ranked among his
admirers, to prevent any action against it. In the same year his
brief on behalf of the community of Knigsberg enabled it to
refute the accusation that the Aleinu prayer was anti-Christian and led to the abrogation of the royal edict requiring the
presence of a government-appointed supervisor in the citys
synagogue during the recitation of prayers. Yet Mendelssohn
did not always see eye to eye with the people who requested his
assistance. In 1772, when the duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin
issued an order to his Jewish subjects prohibiting the religious
custom of immediate burial and requiring a three-day waiting period before interment, the local community called upon
Mendelssohn to intercede on its behalf. He dutifully composed
a memorandum to the duke in which he recommended that
the Jews be permitted to maintain their existing custom as long
as they obtained medical certification of death prior to burial.
At the same time, he maintained in his correspondence with
the Jews of Mecklenburg-Schwerin that their resistance to the
duke was unwarranted, since the three-day waiting period was
reasonable, prudent, and not without ancient precedent and
talmudic justification. While his memorandum inspired the
duke to replace his earlier edict with a regulation along the
lines of his suggestion, his letter to the community met with
the disapproval of the local rabbi. More importantly, it also
aroused the ire of Jacob *Emden, who accused Mendelssohn
of being too ready to relinquish the requirements of Jewish
law and to adopt the ways of the Gentiles. Even in the face of
Emdens dire warnings that he was increasingly being regarded
as someone who was edging toward heresy, however, Mendelssohn did not retreat from his position on this matter.
Mendelssohns involvement in the public debate on the
civic status of the Jews commenced with a request emanating
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
37
mendelssohn, moses
wrote, ecclesiastical law armed with coercive power has always been one of the cornerstones of the Jewish religion of
your fathers How then can you, good Mr. Mendelssohn,
profess attachment to the religion of your forefathers, while
you are shaking its fabric, by impugning the ecclesiastical code
established by Moses in consequence of divine revelation?
On this occasion, Mendelssohn felt that it was his duty to answer his critic and wrote his Jerusalem primarily in order to
do so. But the book ranged far beyond an answer to Cranz to
articulate a full-blown philosophy of Judaism, the first to be
developed in modern times.
vrit de fait, an established historical fact, because it was indubitably witnessed by the entire people of Israel. The best statement of the quintessence of the legislation He then revealed,
according to Mendelssohn, was the one uttered by Hillel the
Elder: Love thy neighbor as thyself. This is the text of the law;
all the rest is commentary. But in Jerusalem Mendelssohn devoted his energies much less to an elucidation of the humanitarian dimension of biblical law than to a somewhat tentative
explanation of the purpose for the rituals it prescribed.
Although humankind possessed from the outset the
capacity to grasp on its own the fundamental truths of natural religion, Mendelssohn wrote, it eventually descended
into idolatry. To account for this corruption of religion he
resorted to what was, in Alexander Altmanns opinion, the
least substantiated of all theories he ever advanced. The primary cause of the religious deterioration of humankind was,
according to this theory, hieroglyphic script. Men initially
employed hieroglyphic signs derived from images of animals
to symbolize the deity. In the course of time, however, they
fell victim to their own misunderstanding and the manipulations of unscrupulous priestly hypocrites and came to regard these signs themselves as deities, to worship them and
even to offer human sacrifices to them. In response to this
debasement of humankind, Mendelssohn maintained, God
ordained the ceremonial law of the Pentateuch. Through its
eschewal of all imagery and its concentration on actions this
law avoided the hazards of hieroglyphic script. Its main purpose, however, was not prophylactic but positive to connect vital knowledge with required practices. The ceremonial
laws guide the inquiring intelligence to divine truths, partly
to eternal and partly to historical truths upon which Judaism is founded. God gave the commandments only to Israel,
but He did not do so, according to Mendelssohn, for its sake
alone. Israel was to be a priestly nation, a nation that through
its laws, actions, vicissitudes, and changes was continually to
call attention to sound and unadulterated ideas of God and
His attributes. It was incessantly to teach, to proclaim, and to
endeavor to preserve these ideas among the nations, by means
of its mere existence, as it were.
At the conclusion of Jerusalem Mendelssohn indicated
how his account of Judaism was meant to dispel the objections
raised by the Searcher after Light and Right. Composed of
religious doctrines acquired by purely rational means and a
revealed legislation designed to remind its practitioners of
these truths as well as their own peoples historical record,
Judaism cannot be conceived as a religion authorizing temporal punishments for unbelievers or those who adhere to
false doctrines. While it is true that the original constitution
of Israel provided for a polity in which religion and state were
identical and in which a religious villain was a criminal, this
Mosaic constitution existed only once and has disappeared
from the face of the earth. Since the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, religious offenses have ceased to be offenses
against the state and the Jewish religion knows of no punishment, no other penalty than the one the remorseful sin-
38
STATE AND RELIGION. In the first part of Jerusalem Mendelssohn expounded a political theory clarifying the grounds for
his opposition to religious coercion. His account of the origin of the rights of coercion belonging to the state restricted
such rights to the sphere of transferable goods. This does
not encompass convictions, inalienable by their very nature.
Hence the state can never acquire the right to make any religious demands upon its citizens, and its grant of even the
smallest privilege or exclusive right to members of any particular religion is entirely devoid of legitimacy. Mendelssohn
nevertheless advised the state not to intervene directly but to
see to it from afar that such subversive doctrines as atheism and Epicureanism are not propagated in its midst. And
he declared churches no more entitled than states to resort to
coercion in matters of faith, since a religious action is religious only to the degree to which it is performed voluntarily
and with proper intent. Only after having thus reiterated and
amplified his opposition to religious coercion of any kind did
Mendelssohn refer to the claim of The Search for Light and
Right that his own adherence to Judaism was incompatible
with his liberal principles. Once he had restated Cranzs argument, he acknowledged that it cut him to the heart but did
not hasten to refute it. He first explained more systematically
and in greater detail than ever before why he remained convinced of the veracity of Judaism and what he considered to
be its nature and purpose.
mendelssohn, moses
ner voluntarily imposes on himself. Contemporary Judaism
could thus be seen to be fully in accord with Mendelssohns
own liberal principles, even if the original Mosaic constitution was not.
Jerusalem evoked little response in the Jewish community. Rabbis and maskilim alike paid only very limited attention to it. In the years following its publication Mendelssohn
learned to his dismay that he would find few supporters for
the positions he took in Jerusalem. Enlightened thinkers who
shared his appreciation of natural religion were alienated by
his reaffirmation of revelation and his insistence on the obligatory character of the ceremonial law. The orthodox rejected his
absolute denial of the right of religious institutions to wield coercive authority, and the earliest representatives of what Isaiah
Berlin called the Counter-Enlightenment assailed the very
rationalism in which his arguments were rooted.
39
Bibliography: H.M.Z. Meyer, Moses Mendelssohn Bibliographie (1965); Shunami, Bibl., no. 5, 395357; A. Altmann, Moses
Mendelssohn: A Biographical Study (1973); A. Arkush, Moses Mendelssohn and the Enlightenment (1994); E. Breuer, The Limits of the Enlightenment: Jews, Germans and the Enlightenment Study of Scripture
(1996); S. Feiner, The Jewish Enlightenment (2004); S. Feiner, Moses
Mendelssohn (Heb., 2005); J. Hess, Germans Jews and the Claims of
40
mendes
posthumously but most of Mendelssohns over 500 compositions remain unpublished. Those that were encountered skepticism, as it was then considered impossible for a woman to
have the creative power to compose music with any depth.
Fanny Mendelssohn died suddenly of a stroke while rehearsing for a concert. She had completed her last composition,
Bergeslust (Mountain Pleasure), just the day before.
[Judith S. Pinnolis (2nd ed.)]
MENDELSSOHNVEITSCHLEGEL, DOROTHEA
(17641839), woman of letters and convert to Christianity.
Born in Berlin, as Brendel, Dorothea was the eldest daughter
of Fromet and Moses *Mendelssohn. She was taught German,
French, music, and drawing, but seems not to have received
a thorough Jewish education. Her friendship circle of Jewish
girls included the future *salon hosts Rahel Levin *Varnhagen
and Henriette de Lemos *Herz. Dorotheas parents arranged
her engagement with Simon Veit, son of a prominent Berlin
family, when she was 14 and the couple married in 1783. Two
of their four children, Jonas and Philipp, survived to adulthood. Moses Mendelssohn died in 1786 believing his daughter was happily married.
During the 1790s, Brendel began to call herself Dorothea;
she socialized with Christian intellectuals, hosting a reading
club and joining a secret society. In 1797, Dorothea fell in love
with Friedrich Schlegel (17721829), an up-and-coming literary critic, and after much introspection, she left her husband.
When they were officially divorced in 1799, she received custody of Philipp. With her divorce Dorothea forfeited her right
to live in Berlin; she became estranged from her Mendelssohn
siblings, and lost many of her Christian friends. For years she
led a peripatetic life with Schlegel, roaming from Jena to Paris
to Vienna to Rome and back again to Vienna, where their
home became a social and intellectual center.
In 1804, Dorothea became a Protestant and the couple
married; four years later both she and Friedrich became Catholics. Although Dorotheas exit from Judaism was particularly stormy, ultimately four of the six Mendelssohn siblings
became Christians, two of them Catholics and two of them
Protestants. Neither of the siblings who remained Jewish was
involved in Jewish institutions or causes.
Dorothea and Friedrich were often impoverished, and
she did her part to support them by editing his work, publishing a novel, Florentin (1801), and editing and translating medieval texts. All of her work was published under her husbands
name. Her novel has been edited by L. Weissberg (Florentin.
Roman, Fragmente, Varianten (1987)). The Schlegels letters
have been edited by E. Behler (Briefe von und an Friedrich
und Dorothea Schlegel [1980]). Schlegels two sons with Veit
also became committed Catholics and flourished in Rome as
painters in the Nazarene style. After Friedrich died in 1829,
Dorothea made peace with her Mendelssohn siblings and they
provided financial support during her decade as a widow.
Scholars continue to ponder the significance of Dorothea
Mendelssohn-Veit-Schlegels life, trying to understand her atENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
titude to Judaism and the motives for her two conversions. Her
dramatic life journey demonstrates that Moses Mendelssohns
important Enlightenment legacy did not pass easily to his own
children in a time and a place when baptism offered many attractions for bright and ambitious young Jews.
Bibliography: H. Frank, Disharmonie, die mit mir geboren ward, und mich nie verlassen wird Das Leben der Brendel/Dorothea Mendelssohn-Veit-Schlegel (1988); C. Stern, Ich mchte mir Flgel
wnschen. Das leben der Dorothea Schlegel. (1990).
[Deborah Hertz (2nd ed.)]
MENDES (Mendiz), family of rabbis and merchants in *Morocco and *Algeria of Spanish-Portuguese origin. JOSEPH
MENDES (mid-16t century) was rabbi of the community of
Spanish exiles (Heb., megorashim) in *Fez and a signatory of
its takkanot. GIDEON (late 17early 18t century), a merchant
of *Amsterdam, served as consul of the Netherlands in Sal
from 1703 and was active in promoting commerce and negotiating treaties with Morocco. His son JOSHUA was a merchant
in Sal and in Amsterdam. A contemporary R. ISAAC was a
rabbi and an international merchant in *Agadir and spent
time in London trading with European countries. His son
JACOB remained in Agadir and one of his daughters married
the rabbi and thinker Khalifa b. *Malca.
Bibliography: Hirschberg, Afrikah, 2 (1965), 26872; J. BenNaim, Malkhei Rabbanan (1931), 107; SIHM, index.
41
mendes
Bibliography: L. Wolf, in: JHSET, 5 (190205), 533; A. Rubens, ibid., 14 (193539), 9597; A.M. Hyamson, Sephardim of England
(1951), index; J. Picciotto, Sketches of Anglo-Jewish History (19562),
index; Roth, England, index; Roth, Mag Bibl., 137, 409ff.; idem, Anglo-Jewish Letters (11581917) (1938), 99114, 1216, 13340, 1447;
Gentlemans Magazine (Jan. 1812), 2124. Add. Bibliography:
ODNB online; A. Ruben, Early Anglo-Jewish Artists, in: JHSET, 14
(193539), 91129; Katz, England, index.
MENDES, ARISTIDES DE SOUSA (18951964), Portuguese diplomat and Righteous Among the Nations. Born into
42
mends-france, pierre
in Cabanas de Viriato. When he died in 1954, he had been
reduced to poverty. Two of his children were helped by the
Jewish welfare organization HIAS to relocate to the United
States. In 1966, Mendes was posthumously awarded the title
of Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. After much
pressure from private individuals and organizations, in March
1988 Aristides de Sousa Mendes was officially restored to the
diplomatic corps by the unanimous vote of the Portuguese
National Assembly, and the government thereafter ordered
damages to be paid to his family.
Bibliography: J. Fralon, A Good Man in Evil Times (2001);
Yad Vashem Archives M31264; M. Paldiel, The Path of the Righteous
(1993), 5962.
[Mordecai Paldiel (2nd ed.)]
MENDES, DIOGO (b. before 1492D.C. 1542), Marrano merchant, born in Spain, and descended from the *Benveniste
family. With his brother Francisco (d. 1536), he established
a business in spices and precious stones. He settled in *Antwerp, and on his brothers death was joined there by the latters
widow, later Gracia *Nasi. Mendes became a magnate in the
spice trade and made large-scale loans to the governments of
the Low Countries, Portugal, and England. Taking advantage
of a network of factors and agents throughout Europe, he organized an underground railway to facilitate the flight of
Marranos from Portugal, via the Low Countries (and sometimes England) to Italy and Turkey. In 1535, he and his sisterENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
MENDES, SAM (1965 ), U.S. stage and film director. Samuel Alexander Mendes was born in Reading, Berkshire, England, the son of Sephardic Jewish parents born on the Caribbean island nation of Trinidad. His father was the son of the
writer Alfred Mendes, author of the novel Black Fauns, and
part of the group around C.L.R. James and Albert Gomes
which produced the literary magazine Beacon in the early
1930s. Mendes secondary education was at Magdalen College School, Oxford, and he later earned a degree from the
University of Cambridge.
As a stage director, Mendes became known for his 1998
production of Cabaret starring Alan Cumming, in which he
boldly reinvented the noirish musical, achieving a long-running hit in London and on Broadway. The Broadway production garnered four Tony awards, three Drama Desk awards,
and other honors. As a film director he is best known for his
debut film, American Beauty, for which he won an Academy
Award for best director in 2000 and awards as best director
from virtually every professional film organization.
Mendes got his start in the theater following his graduation from Cambridge in 1987 when he joined the Chichester
Festival Theater. Soon after he directed Dame Judi Dench in
The Cherry Orchard, which brought him a Critics Circle award
for best newcomer. He joined the Royal Shakespeare Company
in 1990, where he directed such productions as Troilus and
Cressida with Ralph Fiennes, Richard III, and The Tempest. In
1992 Mendes became artistic director of the reopened Donmar
Warehouse in London, where he directed many award-winning productions. During his tenure he won Olivier awards for
best director for Cabaret, The Glass Menagerie, and Company.
He also directed The Sea and The Plough and the Stars, both
with Judi Dench, The Birthday Party, and Othello, for which
he received another Olivier award. In 1998 he directed Nicole
Kidman on Broadway in The Blue Room.
Among his other films are The Road to Perdition (2002),
Jarhead (2005), and The Kite Runner (2006).
In 2000 Mendes was named a Commander of the British Empire.
[Stewart Kampel (2nd ed.)]
MENDSFRANCE, PIERRE (19071982), French statesman. Born and educated in Paris, his university thesis Le Redressement Financier Francais en 1926 et 1927 (1928) attracted
43
The Province
According to data of Vaad Hakehilot as of 2005 there were
some 550 families in the capital city of Mendoza and some
3040 families in San Rafael, out of a total population in the
province of about 1,579,651 (2001). Jews had settled in the
province as agriculturists and plantation owners by the end
of the 1880s. In 190405 Jews from Yekaterinoslav attempted
to settle in Palmira, but after a short time found they could
not meet the difficult terms of their settlement contract and
were compelled to leave. A similar attempt to settle there in
1913 likewise failed. In 1943 there were Jews in 24 out of the
123 towns and villages in the province. In 1964 only San Mar-
44
[Moshe Rosetti]
April 15, 1795. He wrote The Art of Boxing (London, 1789) and
The Memoirs of the Life of Daniel Mendoza (London, 1816). In
1954 Mendoza was one of the inaugural group chosen for the
Boxing Hall of Fame in the United States.
Bibliography: H.D. Miles, Pugilistica, 1 (1880); H.U. Ribalow, Fighter from Whitechapel (1962).
[Jesse Harold Silver]
MENDOZA, DANIEL (17641836), English boxing champion. Born in Aldgate, London, Mendoza learned at a young
age to defend himself with his fists. In 1780 he won his first
professional fight. A natural middleweight, Mendoza became
the father of scientific boxing by devising defensive moves
that enabled him to fight against much heavier opponents.
His ring success brought him to the attention of the Prince of
Wales and he became the first boxer to receive royal patronage.
Mendozas ascendancy to boxing heights, and his acceptance
by royalty, helped ease the position of the Jew in the English
community. He proudly billed himself as Mendoza the Jew.
He opened his own boxing academy and became a teacher.
He went on tour and gave boxing exhibitions in England,
Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. Mendoza lost the title of English Champion to John Jackson on a ninth-round knockout on
45
menelaus
written in reverse order or in accordance with the Atbash
(see *Gematria) sequence (Sanh. 22a). A. Alt proposes that
only the initials and not the whole words were written, and
he bases his view on the premise that it can be corroborated
from archaeological evidence that names of weights were often
designated by initials only; Aramaic contracts from the fifth
century B.C.E. attest to this practice. Alt, therefore, assumes
that what was written were the initials MMTPP (). H.L.
Ginsberg points out that in the Aramaic contracts the word
tekel is generally written shkl and abbreviated as sh, and it is
possible that even after the more modern spelling tkl was adopted, the abbreviation sh was retained. Therefore the legend
on the wall may have been not MMTPP but MM Sh. PP, which
made it harder for the kings regular sages to recognize it as a
series of abbreviations. Daniel, however, realized that the letter shin was the initial of the obsolete spelling shkl, for tekel,
and so he read for the two mems mene mene, for the shin
tekel, and for the two pes parsin.
A third problem is the variance between the written version on the wall (5:25): mene, mene, tekel, and parsin and the
words in Daniels version: mene, mene, tekel and peras (5:26ff.).
Most ancient versions (Vulg., Theod., and Jos., Ant., 10:239ff.)
give the written version (verse 25) also as mene, tekel, peras.
Since, however, Daniel interprets the last expression as meaning both perisat and paras, the Masoretic Texts version of verse
25 can be upheld, and the reading in verses 26 and 28 could be
the result of haplography. The doubling of the word mene at the
beginning, Ginsberg believes, was suggested by the doubling of
nafelah, fallen, in Isaiah 21:9, Fallen, fallen is Babylon.
The fourth and last problem is concerned with what the
words actually refer to. These words were probably used not
only to indicate monetary values but also to express estimates
of character. Thus, these words presumably referred to a situation of degeneration. God has weighed the kings of Babylon and has found them to be steadily decreasing in weight.
P. Haupt and J.D. Prince hold that the phrase refers to Nebuchadnezzar (mene), Belshazzar (tekel), the Medes (peres,
a half-mene, i.e., half the greatness of Nebuchadnezzar) and
the Persians (peres, a half-mene, i.e.; half the greatness of Nebuchadnezzar). E.G. Kraeling believes that the phrase was
applied to the occupants of the neo-Babylonian throne after
Nebuchadnezzar: Awl-Marduk (Evil-Merodach), LabshiMarduk, Nabonidus, and Belshazzar.
and Lysimachus, both mentioned in II Maccabees. According to II Maccabees 3:4, Simeon and Menelaus belonged to
the tribe of Benjamin, and Simeon did not therefore belong
to a priestly family. This raises a difficulty and attempts have
been made to amend the text, or to suggest that he belonged
to a priestly family named Benjamin or Miamin (cf. I Chron.
4:24). It seems preferable to accept the reading found in some
Latin manuscripts which reads Bilgah instead of Benjamin.
Bilgah was the name of one of the priestly divisions (I Chron.
24:14) and probably Menelaus and his brothers belonged to
it. The statement of Josephus (Ant., 12:2389) that Menelaus
was a brother of *Jason and a son of *Onias III, is certainly
erroneous. Merelaus was one of the leaders of the Hellenists
and one of the extremists among them. When sent by the high
priest Jason to Antiochus Epiphanes, he intrigued against his
principal, bribed Antiochus and received from him appointment as high priest (II Macc. 4:2324). At the beginning of
his tenure of office he plundered the Temple of its gold vessels (ibid., 4:32). He also instigated the murder of Onias III
(ibid., 4:34). His appointment and policy aroused the opposition of the people and caused uprisings and disturbances.
Jason attempted to seize the high priesthood back from him,
but Menelaus succeeded in retaining power, chiefly with the
assistance of the Syrians. He remained loyal to Antiochus
and sent him large amounts of money. As leader of the Hellenists he must be considered responsible to a great extent
for the persecution of Antiochus (see Bickermann in bibl.; cf.
II Macc. 13:4). It seems, however, that later, when it became
clear that this policy brought no advantage to the Hellenists,
he was partly responsible for the more conciliatory policy of
Antiochus Epiphanes (164 B.C.E.; II Macc. 11:29). Later he lost
favor in the court of the Seleucids and on the advice of Lysias
was put to death (apparently in 162 B.C.E.).
Bibliography: F.M. Abel, in: Miscellanea Giovanni Mercati,
1 (1946), 5258; Rowley, in: Studia Orientalia loanni Pedersen Dicata (Eng. 1953), 30315; V. Tcherikover, Hellenistic Civilization and
the Jews (1959), 7074, 21620, and index; E. Bickermann, From Ezra
to the Last of the Maccabees (1962), 106f.
[Uriel Rappaport]
46
mengele, josef
MENGELE, JOSEF (19111978), doctor of the Auschwitz extermination camp. Born in Guenzburg, Germany, he studied
medicine and anthropology at the University of Munich, the
University of Vienna, and the University of Bonn. At Munich
he obtained a doctorate in anthropology (Ph.D.) with a dissertation in 1935 on racial differences in the structure of the
lower jaw, supervised by Prof. Theodor Mollison. After his exams he went to Frankfurt, working as an assistant to Otmar
von Verschuer at the Frankfurt University Institute of Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene. In 1938 he obtained a doctorate in medicine (M.D.) with a dissertation called Familial
Research on Cleft Lip, Palate and Jaw. (He was deprived of
both academic degrees in 1961 and 1964, respectively.) Declared medically unfit to serve at the front in World War II,
he was, at his own request, appointed doctor of the Auschwitz
camp where, from 1943 to 1945, he initiated a series of cruel
medical experiments which caused the death of many Jewish inmates. To perfect the master race he studied twins to
see if the breeding of the German people could be improved
and two members of the race could be obtained in a single
pregnancy. He studied dwarfs and other abnormalities, in his
mind to protect the German people and improve the species.
And while he was experimenting, he could be kind and generous to those who were specimens for his lab. He dreamed
of scholarly prominence. He participated in the selection of
tens of thousands of prisoners in the Birkenau camp (see *Auschwitz), whom he consigned to die in the gas chambers. The
figure of Mengele decreeing life or death by a flick of his finger has become one of the symbols of the Holocaust; he was
called by the camp inmates the Angel of Death. But not all
survivor recollections of Mengele are accurate. He could not
have done all that he was credited with doing. Mengele did
work with a scientific team recruited from among arriving
physicians who faced the choice of Selektion or working with
him. Several of these inmate physicians have written memoirs,
and they are among the most important recollections of life
inside Auschwitz. At one moment Mengele could be gracious,
but not for long. He was unpredictable and everyone around
him lived in constant fear. Thus, Dr. Olga Lengyel reveals
that Mengele supervised the birth of a child with meticulous
care. Within an hour mother and child were sent to the gas
chamber. Dr. Gisella Perl, a Hungarian Jewish gynecologist,
described the aftermath of one brutal killing by Mengele. He
took a piece of perfumed soap out of his bag and whistling
gaily with a smile of deep satisfaction on his face, he began
to wash his hands. Vera Alexander described brutal scientific experiments in which inmates were sewn back to back,
wrist to wrist. And Dr. Miklos Nyiszli depicts the murder of
14 twins killed during one night.
When Mengele fled Auschwitz, according to Raul *Hilberg, he brought with him the records of his medical experiments, still believing that they might hold the key to his postwar prominence. According to one source, he also took these
potentially incriminating records with him when he left for
Argentina.
Until 1951 Mengele lived under his own name in various
places in Bavaria, Germany. The name Mengele is proudly seen
on farm equipment. It is a symbol of quality in Germany and
elsewhere. Throughout the years the Mengele family funneled
enough money to Josef to permit his survival, enough to elude
capture but not quite enough to achieve comfort. Mengele was
forced to move from Argentina to Paraguay and later to Brazil,
where he lived his final years in seclusion, perhaps even in loneliness. He met his only biological son, Rolf Mengele, on two occasions after the war, once when he was introduced as Uncle
Fritz and the second time when his son sought to understand
his father, to comprehend his deeds, to come to terms with his
motivations. Rolf had rejected his father and his politics.
Mengele was divorced from his first wife, Irene. They
grew apart in the postwar separation. After his divorce he married his beautiful sister-in-law, Martha Mengele, the wife of
his late brother, Karl, in what seemed like a merger to protect
the family assets as well as a marriage. He raised his nephew
Karl Heinz, the son of his brother, as his stepson and a surrogate son.
The search for him started only in 1953, after he escaped
from Germany. It is known that in 1954 he was granted Ar-
47
Menes main area of interest in Jewish history was its economic and social aspects. Articles on these subjects, covering
the talmudic period as well as late 19t-century Russian Jewry,
appeared in YIVOs historical publications. Together with Raphael *Abramowitz, Menes wrote Leyenbukh tsu der Geshikhte
fun Yisroel (A Laymans History of Israel, 1923). Another favorite topic of his was the history of the Jewish Workers Movement and of socialism: Der Onhoyb fun der Yidisher ArbeterBavegung un ir Shoyresh in Yidishen Folks Lebn, published in
the Zukunft (40 (1935), 53944), is an investigation into the
problems of socialism, in general, and in particular among
the Jews. His essays on significant events in Jewish history, in
both the preexilic and postexilic periods, were published in
Oyfn Sheydveg, an independent publication of Jewish culture,
art and literature, and cultural philosophy, edited by E. Tcherikower and I. Efroikin. These essays mark a turning point in
Menes approach to Jewish history: The time has come to
amend Heines youthful error and to replace le credit with la
religion the belief in man with the belief in God. Mention
should also be made of his contribution, Jewish History, to
the volume Jews in the Yiddish Encyclopedia, in which he
wrote on the biblical and talmudic periods. His articles in the
Forward dealt to a large extent with Jewish holidays. His writings on the problems of methodology in Jewish history are of
significance to scholars in the field.
Menes writings on Jewish ethics, sociology, and philosophy continued to be based on the principle that there can be
no faith in man without a feeling of sanctity. Jacob Glatstein
described Menes as a historian who has introduced a new
evaluation of Jewish history.
Bibliography: LNYL, 6 (1965), 7278.
[Israel Ch. Biletzky]
meninsky, bernard
gentinean citizenship. In Argentina he represented the Karl
Mengele and Sons factory for agricultural machinery, a firm
managed by his brother in Guenzburg. Mengele was traced
by organizations of former Nazi victims, both Jewish and
non-Jewish. His extradition was demanded by the government of West Germany, but Mengele escaped from Argentina. His disappearance was also, apparently, connected with
the apprehension of *Eichmann. Various conflicting news
items subsequently appeared in the world press concerning
the whereabouts of Mengele. Mengeles name was often mentioned by witnesses at the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem and at
numerous trials in West Germany, in particular at the *Auschwitz trials held in Frankfurt on the Main in 196365. He figures in Rolf Hochhuts play The Deputy (1963). He died in an
apparent drowning in Brazil in 1978. Efforts were made to ascertain that indeed the corpse discovered was that of Mengele.
Some suspected that the drowning was staged. But forensic
evidence and dental records confirmed his death.
Bibliography: M. Nyiszli, Auschwitz: A Doctors Eyewitness
Account (1960); O. Kraus and E. Kulka, Death Factory (1966). Add.
Bibliography: G. Perl, I Was a Doctor in Auschwitz (1988).
[Emmanuel Brand / Michael Berenbaum (2nd ed.)]
MENINSKY, BERNARD (18911950), English artist. Meninsky was born in Liverpool, the son of immigrants from
the Ukraine. He studied at the Liverpool School of Art and
the Slade School. In 1913 he became a founder member of the
London Group. During World War I Meninsky served as an
official war artist. In 1920 he became teacher of life drawing
at the Westminster School of Art and the City of Oxford Art
School. Retrospective exhibitions of his work were held in
London in 1951 and 1958 and several of his paintings are held
by the Tate Gallery.
Add. Bibliography: J. Russell Taylor, Bernard Meninsky
(1990).
48
menorah
won they both have eight. Menken has produced some of his
best-known work since the late 1980s, composing the scores
for such Disney films as The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and
the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), and Pocahontas (1995).
[Casey Schwartz (2nd ed.)]
49
menorah
8:23), that is, the spouts of the lamps and the wicks faced
northward, so that their shadow was cast on to the wall. The
measurements of the menorah are not given in the Bible but
the Talmud stated that its height was 18 handbreadths, which
are three short cubits (Men. 28b; Rashi to Ex. 25:35). The use
to which the Tabernacle menorah was put is described in the
Priestly Code. The lamps (nerot) are said to have burned from
evening to morning (Lev. 24:3), were lit at dusk and trimmed
in the morning by the high priest (Ex. 30:78), and hence
are called ner tamid (a perpetual lamp; Ex. 27:20; Lev. 24:2),
that is, they were lit according to a fixed routine and for the
nighttime only. This is specifically mentioned in connection
with the lamp in the sanctuary at Shiloh (I Sam. 3:3). However, in the Second Temple (see below) three of the lamps
burned throughout the day, the rest being lit in the evening
(Jos., Ant., 3:199).
The First Temple
In the Temple built by Solomon there were ten menorot of
gold, five along the northern and five along the southern wall
of the Heikhal (the hall; I Kings 7:49; II Chron. 4:7). These were
ornamented with carvings of flowers and furnished with appliances of gold for tending the lamps (I Kings 7:4950), the
number of which on each menorah is not stated. Some scholars hold that the passage listing the golden vessels made by
Solomon for the house of the Lord (I Kings 7:4850) is a later
addition; but this view should be rejected. All the vessels of
gold in Solomons Temple, including the ten menorot, were cut
in pieces at the end of Jehoiachins reign by the Chaldeans who
entered the Heikhal during their siege of Jerusalem (II Kings
24:13). Hence neither vessels of the Heikhal nor menorot are
mentioned in the description of the Temple in Ezekiels vision
(Ezek. 41:14), for this description is apparently based largely
on the actual appearance of the Temple in Jerusalem after the
exile of Jehoiachin.
The menorot in Solomons Temple may have had branches,
and these may have numbered seven on each menorah. For
the Heikhal, which Solomon built and which measured 40 by
20 cubits (I Kings 6:2, 17), was too large for only ten lamps to
give it adequate illumination. Hence it is probable that each
of the ten menorot had not one but several lamps, arranged
on a central shaft and on branches, and that they numbered
seven. Further support for the similarity between the menorot
of Solomon and the one in the Tabernacle is to be found in
the fact that the former, too, were ornamented with carvings
of flowers (7:49), resembling the latter which had cups made
like almond-blossoms and flowers. Moreover, the menorot
in Solomons Temple were made of pure gold (ibid., loc.
cit. zahav sagur, apparently the equivalent expression for zahav tahor used in the Priestly Code; see Ex. 25:31, 39; et al.;
see *Metals). The vessels of the menorah in the Tabernacle
consisted of lamps, tongs, snuff-dishes, and oil vessels (Ex.
25:3739; Num. 4:9); the first three are among those mentioned in connection with the menorot in Solomons Temple
(I Kings 7:4950).
50
menorah
with the above-mentioned statement that the menorah made
by Moses was used during the entire existence of the First
Temple, where all the menorot were placed on the south side,
five on its right side and five on its left, and that of Moses in
the middle (Men. 98b).
The golden menorah which stood in the Second Temple
in the early stage of its history (it is referred to by Ben Sira
26:17) was removed in 169 B.C.E. by Antiochus Epiphanes IV
(I Macc. 1:21). Judah Maccabee made new Temple vessels, including the menorah, after the cleansing of the Temple (I Macc.
4:4950; II Macc. 10:3). According to the Talmud the first one
was made of iron overlaid with tin (or with wood): When
they grew richer they made it of silver; when they grew still
richer, they made it of gold (RH 24b, Av. Zar. 43b); according
to Josephus (Ant., 12:238), however, it was made of gold from
the outset. It was seen by Pompey and his men when they entered the Temple (ibid., 14:7) and remained in Herods Temple
until its destruction (Jos. Wars, 5:2167). After the destruction
of the Temple it was borne by the Romans in Titus triumphal
procession (ibid., 7:1489) and depicted with the other vessels
on the wall of the triumphal arch called after him (see below).
Elsewhere, however (ibid., 6:3878), Josephus relates that during the siege of Jerusalem by Titus one of the priests went out
and handed over to him two lamps of gold similar to the lamp
in the Temple. On the erroneous assumption that the reference
is to the menorah, some maintain that there were in the Second
Temple several copies of the menorah of the Heikhal, one of
which was carried in the triumphal procession (see below). In
the Second Temple three of the lamps of the menorah burned
throughout the day, the rest being lit in the evening (Jos., Ant.,
3:199). The Talmud states that the priest who entered used to
clean and trim the lamps except its two eastern ones which
he found burning, and that its western lamp burnt continuously, and from it the priest relit the menorah at dusk (Tam. 3,
9; 6, 1; Sifra, Emor, 13, 7; Sif. Num. 59; Yoma 33a; et al.). If the
western lamp was extinguished it was interpreted as boding
ill for the future (Yoma 39b). Josephus (Apion, 1:22) similarly
reports in the name of Hecataeus that on the Temple menorah
there was a light which was never extinguished by night or by
day. According to some, the western lamp mentioned by the
sages refers to the second of the two easterly lamps, according
to others, to the middle lamp, designated as western because
its spout faced westward, that is, toward the inner sanctum,
the Holy of Holies (see Rashi to Shab. 22b, and to Men. 98b;
Maim. Yad, Beit ha-Beh irah, 3, 8). According to the latter interpretation the tradition of the sages accords with Josephus
statement (Ant., 3:199) that three lamps burnt throughout the
day, that is, the two eastern and the western lamps.
Menorah on the Arch of Titus
The most important testimony for the form of the Temple menorah is the candelabrum on the Arch of Titus in Rome, which
ought to be considered in conjunction with Josephus description. Only three sides of each octagon of the arch are visible.
51
[Menahem Haran]
menorah
proposals, suggested that the original pedestal had been broken in the transport from Jerusalem to Rome and was replaced by the work of a Roman artist. Another hypothesis is
that of W. Wirgin (IEJ 11, 1961, no. 3) who suggests that in order to carry the menorah in the triumphal procession without mishap, a Roman artist built a box-shaped covering from
relief plates well known from Roman censers around the
base to give it greater stability. A third suggestion is that the
menorah on the Arch of Titus had as its model another menorah, perhaps one given as a gift to Rome by Herod. In fact
Josephus (Wars, 6:388) relates that after the capture of Jerusalem, a priest handed to Titus two lampstands similar to
those deposited in the Temple. The Talmud (H ag. 26b, 27a)
also mentions duplicates and triplicates of all Temple vessels
in case the original ones were defiled. The Jerusalem Talmud
(H ag. 3:8; 79d) and the Tosefta (H ag. 3:35) report the cleansing
of the menorah on the Sabbath which provoked the derision
of the Sadducees. This would not have been done had there
been a duplicate but in any case it does not solve the problem
of the Arch of Titus, since the duplicate would have been an
exact replica of the original.
In Kabbalah
From the early days of Kabbalah, the menorah appears as a
symbol of the structure of the Sefirot. As far as is known, it
was *Asher b. David, in his Perush Shem ha-Meforash (published in Ha-Segullah (1932) pamphlet 2ff.), who first explained
the menorah in kabbalistic symbolic terms as reflecting the
world of the Sefirot. He was followed by *Bah ya b. Asher and
especially by Menah em *Recanati and others. There is little
difference between the interpretations of Recanati and Asher
b. David. The basic idea is that the menorah, despite the fact
it is composed of branches, bowls, etc., is not a combination
of parts but is one solid whole made from one bar. Similarly,
the world of the Sefirot, despite its multiplicity, is a unity. The
seven branches symbolize the seven lower Sefirot. Asher b.
David and, following him, Recanati, placed special emphasis on the middle branch, which is equal to the Sefirah Tiferet
(glory), which is called the middle line. This Sefirah is directed toward the attraction of the body of man, in contrast
to the other lower Sefirot which are directed toward the arms
and legs. The middle branch, which stands on the menorah itself, toward which all the other branches face, therefore naturally stands for the middle line. This Sefirah is imbued with
abundance flowing from above which is transferred from it
to the others. The oil which is put in the branches and is the
force for the light of the menorah signifies the dynamic stream
influenced by the *Ein-Sof. This stream is the inner soul of all
the Sefirot which operate within every Sefirah. For the same
reason these kabbalists maintain the Torah calls the seven
lower Sefirot lights and days of the week according to Genesis. The oil as a symbol of the streaming of abundance from
above is a commonplace idea in kabbalistic literature. There
were kabbalists who explained that the oil and the light indicate the three higher Sefirot.
According to the view of several kabbalists that Divine
Providence is exercised through the Sefirot. Recanati interprets
52
menorah
the saying of Zechariah (4:10): These seven are the eyes of
God, to mean that God governs by means of the seven Sefirot
symbolized by the seven branches of the menorah.
The *Zohar itself gives no details of the symbolic significance of the parts of the menorah. In the Tikkunei Zohar
the symbolism differs from that of the kabbalists mentioned
above. In one place the menorah symbolizes an angelic power
outside that of the Sefirot. The wick stands for the last Sefirah,
Malkhut, equated with the Shekhinah; the oil is the Sefirah Yesod (foundation); and the light is the Sefirah Tiferet (Tikkunei
Zohar, Introd., 146, ed. R. Margulies).
In a 14t-century kabbalistic manuscript Psalm 67 is interpreted as signifying the menorah and the counting of the
Omer (Vatican Ms. no. 214). A reproduction of the text of
the psalm in the form of a menorah has since become widespread among Oriental Jews and appears both in prayer books
and in the form of amulets on walls in homes and, especially,
synagogues.
[Efraim Gottlieb]
On Tombs
sculptures. In Bet Shearim, a menorah on the head of a
warrior (56).
53
menorah
note 53); Plate 16: Farh i Bible (Spain-Provence, Introduction,
23); Plate 23: British Museum (11639, Franco-German, ibid., 28,
note 95); and Plate 24: Pentateuch (French, ibid., 26; note 96).
In the British Museum plate, Aaron is twice depicted lighting the menorah (ibid., 114a and 122b), the differences in style
suggesting two artists. The frequency of this representation
may be connected with the fact that it is based on Numbers
8:23 and with its ample treatment by the Midrash. All five
examples reflect faithfully and impressively their local background: the first three, the influence of the iconoclastic Islamic
art, including the playful one of the Reconquista in no. 2: the
burning lights turned toward the center and the variant of the
oil flowing in the same direction; while the last two show the
influence of the late Gothic French environment with their
wealth of figures and drolleries. Numerous seven-branched
candelabra may also be found in medieval French, German,
and Italian churches.
A hitherto unpublished menorah with its appurtenances
(Ex. 25, 38) painted in gold and color, is contained in a Spanish 14t-century Bible-manuscript on parchment, which was
shown in an exhibition of the Jewish National and University
Library (Jerusalem AprilMay 1970, Catalogue No. 6). This
menorah has three feet with rather rare knobs (as in the recently excavated piece of plaster from the Old City of Jerusalem, see above), and snuff dishes like goblets with coats of
arms: the tongs hang from the outer branches of the candelabrum and are shown in perspective before and behind the
branches. It is apparently the work of an artist of the late Middle Ages, already accustomed to perspective. It frequently appears as an emblem also on book plates showing *H anukkah
lamps, printers marks, and community seals.
Modern Times
In modern times the menorah has continued to be used as a
religious symbol, particularly in synagogue art: wall-paintings,
stained glass windows, mosaics, and in spite of the talmudic
prohibition (see below) as a seven-branched metal candelabrum. In imitation of the ancient mosaics, some synagogues
place a menorah to the right and the left of the Ark. The menorah representations in modern American synagogues reveal
the problem of expressing ancient symbols in terms of modern
art. In many cases little is left of the original tree-and-branches
motive, but in some this has been preserved, in spite of modern simplicity. Independently of the synagogue, Benno *Elkan created several tree-shaped bronze menorot, of which one
stands in Westminster Abbey, London, and another in the vicinity of the Knesset building in Jerusalem. Marc *Chagall incorporated a lighted menorah and olive leaves (Deut. 33:24) in
his Tribe of Asher window (Hadassah Synagogue, Jerusalem).
The Warsaw Ghetto memorial (1963) embodies two outsize
menorot flanked by lions. The U.S. Jewish artist Ben *Shahn,
who is responsible for the mosaic in the Ohev Shalom synagogue in Nashville, Tenn. (Kampf, ibid., 1346), has produced
as its sketch a menorah (with shofar) in tempera (Ben Shahn,
1966, no. 116) and another one as the colored frontispiece of
54
mental illness
ple Menorah, in: J. Guttman (ed.), No Graven Images. Studies in Art
and the Hebrew Bible. (1971), 3638; V.A. Klagsbald, The Menorah as
Symbol: Its Meaning and Origin in Early Jewish Art, in: Jewish Art,
1213 (198687), 12634; L.Y. Rahmani, Representations of the Menorah on Ossuaries, in: H. Geva (ed.), Ancient Jerusalem Revealed
(1994), 23943; A. Amar, The Menorah of Zechariahs Vision: Olive
Trees and Grapevines, in: B. Khnel (ed.), The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian and Islamic Art: Studies in Honor of Bezalel
Narkiss (1998), 7988; Y. Yisraeli (ed.), In the Light of the Menorah:
Story of a Symbol (1998); L.I. Levine, The History and Significance of
the Menorah in Antiquity, in: L.I. Levine and Z. Weiss (eds.), From
Dura to Sepphoris: Studies in Jewish Art and Society in Late Antiquity
(2000), 13153; R. Hachlili, The Menorah, the Ancient Seven-Armed
Candelabrum. Origin, Form and Significance (2001): L. Habas, An
Incised Depiction of the Temple Menorah and Other Cult Objects of
the Second Temple Period, in: H. Geva (ed.), Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem, vol. 2 (2003), 32942.
55
mental illness
erence to it among Jews, and describes recognizable types of
mental disturbances. The reference in Leviticus 20:27, A man
also or a woman that divineth by a ghost or a familiar spirit,
apparently included the mentally ill and, almost definitely,
people subject to hysterical conditions. In Sauls personality, a
brooding homicidal paranoia was overlaid by suicidal depression. Some of the prophets seem to have experienced states of
ecstasy, and there are indications of neuroses among them.
The legal tenets of the Talmud regarding mental illness
indicate the existence of conditions ranging from grave types
of psychoses to those which develop out of physical states. The
writings of the noted Jewish physicians of the medieval period,
which were generally based on their practice among Jewish patients, reveal that mental illnesses were frequently encountered.
They included melancholia, mania, and other serious psychotic
states, states of anxiety, and psychosomatic conditions. The
wonder cures of the 18t-century folk healers (baalei shem)
provide evidence of the hysterical nature of the emotional disturbances they treated. In dealing with possession by a dybbuk, which was of the same nature, they were carrying on the
practice of the Kabbalists in Safed, in Erez Israel.
Toward the end of the 19t century mental disturbances
were clearly classified into two major categories. The first is
psychosis, where there is profound disturbance of perception
(e.g., hallucination), thought (e.g., delusion), and mood (e.g.,
depression), and accompanying vagaries of behavior, but the
patient does not understand that he is disturbed. The second
category is neurosis (and deviations of personality), where
the disturbance is less profound and the individual retains
his perception of reality and knows that he is disturbed, but
suffers from worry and guilt, or anxiety, or medically unexplained physical symptoms. Psychotic, neurotic, and normal
personalities shade imperceptibly into each other and have
more in common than appears from these categories. Thus
agreement about diagnosis is not constant. Theories of the
causes of mental illness fall into three main groups: physical
(including genetic); psychological (which has to do with the
control of instinct and the personal development of the child
within the family); and social (which has to do with the effect
of general social influence or stresses and deprivations). Modern theory seeks an explanation for many cases in a varying
combination of all three factors.
In the study of mental illness, the analysis of large numbers by statistical methods (epidemiology), and comparison
between groups, may provide clues to understanding its nature and causation and the mental health situation and needs
of a particular group. The most important epidemiological
method is the comparison of the incidence (frequency) of
new cases. Incidence is measured as a rate: the number of
new cases occurring per year in a given number of the population. In this article, incidence and all other rates are noted
per 100,000 of the population concerned. A rough but fairly
reliable incidence may be determined by calculating the rate
of new cases hospitalized per year. More reliable information
is obtained by noting all the cases which appear at both men-
56
Psychoses
DEPRESSION. Depression (manic-depressive, affective psychosis including involutional melancholia in the aging) is
a relatively significant mental illness among Jews. The U.S.
statistics of the 1920s for manic-depressive and involutional
illnesses from hospitals in New York City, Illinois, and Massachusetts, showed Jews to have had slightly lower first-admission rates than non-Jews (including blacks). However,
the painstaking work of Benjamin *Malzberg reveals that in
194951, Jews in New York State had a notably higher rate of
first admission to private and public hospitals than white nonJews (27 v. 15). These rates are crude, i.e., per 100,000 of the
total population of all ages. The crude rate for Jews in Israel
in 1958 was about the same (24) as for New York Jews. However, Jews in Israel born in Central and Eastern Europe had in
1958 twice the rates (50, 46) as for New York Jews of the same
origin and descent. As usual, the rate is about twice as high in
women as in men. On the other hand, in Israel in 1958, AsianAfrican-born Jews showed only half the rate of European-born
Jews and Israel-born Jews even less. The Oriental-born rates
were somewhat lower than that for New York Jews and probably only of a slightly higher order than for white non-Jews in
New York. Israel-born Jews seem to have had the lowest rates
of all these groups, despite the higher proportion among them
of those of European rather than Oriental descent.
The Israel rates of first admission for psychotic depressive conditions in 1966 seem to bear out all these conclusions
and show that (1) European-born Jews in Israel have a notably higher rate (45) than their non-Jewish European counterparts (Sweden: 21); (2) Asian-African-born Jews in Israel
have a markedly lower hospital rate (23) than those born in
Europe, lower than the known rate for Jews in New York, and
resembling that for European non-Jews; (3) Israel-born Jews
of both European and Afro-Asian descent show an even lower
rate (16) than the Afro-Asian-born and, a fortiori, a lower
rate than European-born immigrants. Israel-born Jews have
a lower rate than those known for Jews and even non-Jews in
New York State. Israel-born Jews in 1966 had a clearly lower
crude rate than Swedes (1964) and New Zealanders (1967), the
ratio being 6:21:27. The rate for Israel-born over the age of 15
mental illness
was only 17. The age-specific rate for the population over 15 is
a finer measure than the crude rate, since mental illness usually manifests itself after that age. To these conclusions must
be added Malzbergs proof of the higher incidence of depressive psychosis in New York State among Jews of European
birth and descent than among non-Jews.
The hypothetical reasons for the higher incidence of
depressive psychoses in Jews of European birth in Israel and
those of European birth and descent in the U.S. may well include the family and social tensions accompanying their profound, achievement-oriented ethical system. This has been
incorporated in their personality as a sense of individual
conscience and responsibility, the control of aggression, and
sobriety. This psychosocial system does not allow for easy
solutions and the camouflage of problems by the use of alcohol and other reality-denying behaviors. Furthermore, it
is known that closed Orthodox societies in the West tend to
produce more depression. The very high incidence of depression among European-born Jews in Israel is undoubtedly the
result of persecution and concentration-camp experiences,
underlain by tendency to depression and exacerbated by migrational upheavals.
The hypothesis that there is a hereditary element in the
Jewish tendency to depression is probably not tenable in the
light of the moderate rate among Asian-African-born Jews.
The apparent generational change manifested as a lower incidence of this psychosis in Israel-born Jews also argues against
genetic causes. The speculation that the higher incidence is the
result of the known readiness of Jews to seek psychiatric help
cannot hold much water. The high rates for European-born
Jews as compared to Asian-African-born Jews in Israel, where
all psychotics have an almost equal chance of hospitalization,
rule out that factor. It is certain, therefore, that European Jews
have a higher rate of psychotic depression than non-Jews. Research in Israel has proved that Jewish women, like all women,
have a depression rate about 100 percent higher than men.
In 1966, the rate for Israel-born women (27), because of the
particularly low rate for Israel-born men (7), was four times
as high as for men.
57
mental illness
than Catholics. Jews generally had the lowest rate for serious
impairment of mental health. Because Jews were found less
frequently in the lower socioeconomic strata, their seriously
impaired rates were lower. This leads to the conclusion that
the rate of the more severe conditions for which treatment was
sought in the U.S. was not greater among Jews than among
non-Jews. In Israel, European-American-born Jews had a definitely higher rate for all psychoses (including organic conditions) than Jews of other origins.
Neuroses and Allied Conditions
The available hospital statistics in New York City (Bellevue
Hospital, 1938) and in New York State (Malzbergs study,
194951) indicate a higher rate of neuroses in Jews than in
non-Jews. A higher rate of neuroses for Jews was reported
among military selectees in Boston in 194142. The rate for
first admissions to Illinois State mental hospitals, however,
was lower for Jews.
Leo Srole notes that in the early 1950s the prevalence rate
of treated neuroses for Jews was twice that of Catholics and
Protestants. In the Manhattan study, Jews also yielded considerably higher patient rates for disorders usually treated in
an ambulatory facility. While in the community survey they
showed the lowest seriously impaired rate, their mental health
was generally not as satisfactory as that of Catholics and Protestants, from which it is to be concluded that neurosis rates in
New York are higher among Jews than among non-Jews.
In Israel in 1958 Jews had a hospital first admission rate
which was definitely higher for neuroses than Jews in New
York (194951, 21 v. 12). Furthermore, the Asian-Africanborn had generally twice the rate (15-plus) of the Europeanand Israel-born. The highest rate (65) was among those born
in Iran, who had particular adjustment problems and also
showed an apparently greater tendency to paranoid reactions.
In 1966 the general Israel rate for neuroses was even higher
than in 1958 (30), but the two groups of immigrants had approximately the same rate (40). This is accounted for by the
steep rise in the first admission rate for neurosis among European immigrants and some subsidence in the rate among Oriental immigrants.
Concentration-camp survivors, while generally known to
have made a good social adjustment in Israel, were in a large
proportion of cases deeply affected by the trauma they had
suffered. Their emotional reactions often included anxiety,
depression, and difficulty in reestablishing relations. Kibbutzborn Israelis appear to have the usual emotional disturbances,
and in average proportions. They do not, however, manifest
homosexuality or delinquency.
For personality (character, behavior disorders), Malzbergs study of hospitalization showed a crude rate slightly
less for Jews in New York (1.5) than for white non-Jews. Israel
Jews in 1958 showed a very much higher hospital incidence
rate. The Asian-African-born in Israel showed remarkably
high rates in the population over the age of 15 (3648), as did
the Israel-born (50), when compared to the European-born
58
mental illness
the cases were related to medical treatment. The New Haven
study of 1950 revealed no drug addicts among Jews. A comparison of half-year figures for 1966 with 1970 shows a rise of
first admissions related to drugs (from 20 to 39) with an especial increase of the number of younger Israel-born Jews. In
1970, despite the absence of statistical study, the abuse of drugs
was known to have spread to groups of Jewish youth in the
U.S. A few who visited Israel after the Six-Day War required
treatment. Some of the older immigrants to Israel from North
Africa and the Middle East had been in the habit of smoking
marijuana, but it became much less evident among them in
Israel and was not used by their children except among delinquents and small marginal groups. Following the Six-Day War,
with the occupation of the West Bank and the flood of volunteers and students from North America, the use of marijuana
increased in marginal groups. The occasional and apparently
temporary use of a small amount of marijuana even appeared
among groups of pupils at secondary schools.
Suicide
Emile *Durkheim demonstrated at the end of the 19th century
that Jews had a lower suicide rate than Protestants and Catholics. It was estimated that in 1925 the suicide rate for Jews in
New York was ten as compared to a similar general average
yearly rate for the period 195059 in the U.S., a rate of three
in Ireland, and one of 23 in Denmark. In Israel in 195258 the
general rate was ten (and 15 for the population above 15 years
of age in 194959). While the suicide rate in Israel represents
a mid-point between extremes in other nations, it has special characteristics. The female rate relative to the male rate
is unusually high. In European countries males usually have
a suicide rate three or four times that of females. In Israel in
the years 194959, female rates were never less than half that
of males and in two of those years equaled that of males. This
has been explained as a result of the social equality and shared
burdens of the sexes in Israel. A slackening of religious Orthodoxy may be a factor, but high female ratios are not found in
other egalitarian societies. It is more probably a result of the
high incidence of depression, especially among older Western women in Israel. Since 1949 at least 70 percent of female
suicides have occurred in women over the age of 31, which is
also the age associated with the onset of depression.
The high ratio of suicides in women as compared to men
among Jews in Europe can be seen from a report by Arthur
*Ruppin in 1940. Of the suicides of Jews in Warsaw between
1927 and 1932, 49.4 percent were women. Ruppin ascribes this
to the difficult psychological situation of Jewish girls who, in
the secular environment of the Polish capital, had lost touch
with their Orthodox parents. Another striking fact is the very
low suicide rate in Israel among the Asian-African- and Israelborn. However, attempted suicide is becoming more frequent
among young women from Oriental homes in Israel. This is
probably related to the psychological conflict described by
Ruppin, who ascribes rising rates of suicide among Jews generally to growing secularity. Where Durkheim quotes a rate of 18
Later Figures
At the end of 2002, 5,439 psychiatric patients were occupying
hospital beds in Israel and during the year around 58,000 outpatients had been treated in government clinics. Hospitalization resulting from drug and alcohol abuse reached 19,528. In
this regard the estimate of 400 addicts in the country in 1970
cited above, reflecting even then the gradual introduction of
drugs into the country after the Six-Day War, underscores the
extent to which Israel in the early 21st century had evolved a
drug and alcohol culture. Hundreds of thousands can be said
to be users of illegal drugs of one kind or another. Similarly
the sharp rise in criminality and delinquency (see *Crime) are
further indications of Israels new realities.
Bibliography: L. Miller, in: N. Petrilowitsch (ed.), Contributions to Comparative Psychiatry (1967), 96137; idem, in: A. Jarus
et al. (eds.), The Child and the Family in Israel (1970); B. Malzberg,
Mental Health of Jews in New York State, 19491957 (1963); L. Srole
and Th. Langner, in: Mental Health in the Metropolis, 1 (1962), 30024;
M. Mandel, J. Gampel, and L. Miller, Admission to Mental Hospital
in Israel 1966 (1971); L. Eitinger, Concentration Camp Survivors in
Norway and Israel (1964). Website: www.health.gov.il.
59
menuhin, hephzibah
MENUHIN, HEPHZIBAH (19201981), pianist. Born in
San Francisco, Menuhin began to study piano at an early age,
giving her first recital in 1928. She continued her studies in
Paris with Marcel Ciampi. There, in 1934 she made her debut
with her brother Yehudi *Menuhin, thus starting a long partnership in sonata recitals. She toured widely as a recitalist in
most of the major cities of Europe and America, visiting Israel
with her brother in 1950. Her playing had a clean, clear approach abjuring frills.
Among her recordings are works by Schubert, Mendelssohn, Bach, Beethoven, and Bartk. In 1938 she married and
settled in Australia. In 1954 she moved to Sydney, where she
gave concerts and opened her home to anyone in need. Three
years later she settled in London. With her second husband,
Richard Hauser, she set up the Center for Human Rights and
Responsibilities. After her death, a Hephzibah Menuhin Memorial Scholarship fund for young pianists was established in
conjunction with the NSW State Conservatorium of Music.
Bibliography: Grove online; Bakers Biographical Dictionary (1997); L.M. Rolfe, The Menuhins: A Family Odyssey (1978); T.
Palmer, Menuhin: A Family Portrait (1991).
[Naama Ramot (2nd ed.)]
MENUHIN, SIR YEHUDI (19161999), violinist and conductor. Menuhin was born in New York, the son of parents
who had left Palestine to settle in the U.S. He himself spoke
Hebrew in his early years. He started to learn the violin at the
age of five and appeared as soloist with the San Francisco Orchestra when he was seven. He was taken to Europe in 1927,
and continued his studies with Georges Enesco and with Adolf
Busch. By 1929, he captivated Paris, London, and New York,
and made his first gramophone records. He had played the
Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms violin concertos under Bruno
*Walter in Berlin, and performed 75-year old Elgars violin
concerto under the composers baton in London and Paris.
In 1935 he retired for almost two years to California. During
World War II Menuhin gave an estimated 500 performances
for U.S. and Allied Forces. In 1944 he was the first Allied soloist
to play in liberated Paris and in 1945 he was invited to play in
Moscow. He paid the first of several visits to Israel in 1950.
Menuhin had increased the scope of his musical involvement. His second career, as a conductor, was initiated with
the Dallas SO in 1947 and became a regular feature of his activities. He established and directed music festivals in Switzerland (1957) and later in England (Bath and Windsor). He
established a school for musically gifted children. Menuhins
admiration for Indian music prompted an important musical
friendship with Ravi Shankar. He became an active member of
UNESCOs International Musical Council of which he served
as president. In 1970 he was awarded the Jawaharlal Nehru
Prize for International Understanding. He received degrees,
doctorates, and fellowships from universities around the world
and state honors from 17 countries. After adopting British citizenship in 1985 he was knighted, and in 1987 he was awarded
the Order of Merit. Among the many composers who wrote
60
specially for him were Ernst *Bloch, Bla Bartk, Paul *BenHaim, and Sir William Walton. He published several books
including the autobiography Unfinished Journey (1977), Life
Class of an Itinerant Violinist (1986), and The Violin (1996).
Yehudi Menuhins sisters, Hephzibah *Menuhin (19201981)
and YALTA (19212001), both gifted pianists, appeared with
him in chamber music recitals and in concert tours.
Bibliography: H.O. Spingel, Yehudi Menuhin (Ger., 1964).
Add. Bibliography: Grove online; Bakers Biographical Dictionary (1997).
[Uri (Erich) Toeplitz / Naama Ramot (2nd ed.)]
MEOT H ITTIM (Heb. ; wheat money), collection made before *Passover to ensure a supply of flour for
unleavened bread (maz z ot) for the poor. Residence in a town
for 12 months obliged one to contribute to or entitled one to
receive communal funds known as Kimh a de-Fish a (flour for
Passover; TJ, BB 1:6, 12d). In medieval Europe it was customary for the communal rabbi and seven notables to draw up
a list of those eligible to donate and to receive the tax, at the
beginning of the month of Nisan. The custom was codified
by *Isserles (Oh 429:1). In modern times, the term has been
broadened to include all the holiday needs of the poor at Passover (e.g., wine, fish, meat).
Bibliography: E. Ki-Tov, Sefer ha-Todaah, 1 pt. 2 (1960),
22f.; Eisenstein, Dinim, 342.
merchant, larry
not take any action and apparently remained loyal to David
(II Sam. 19:2532). *Ziba failed in his attempt to impute to
Mephibosheth the ambition of receiving the monarchy from
the people (II Sam. 16:14; 19:2530).
[Samuel Abramsky]
In the Aggadah
Mephibosheth was an outstanding scholar. David called him
My teacher, and consulted him on all matters (Ber. 4a), and
in the Talmud his name, used metaphorically to denote a
noted scholar (Erub. 53b; out of my mouth, humiliation), indicated that he humiliated even David by his learning (ibid.).
Nevertheless, David saved his life (cf. II Sam. 21:7) by praying
that Mephibosheth should not be made to pass before the Ark
and thus risk being condemned to death as were the rest of
Sauls sons (Yev. 79a). Because David gave ear to Zibas slander against Mephibosheth, the Temple was destroyed TJ, Yev.
4a). The later division of the kingdom was a punishment for
Davids decision that Mephibosheth and Ziba were to divide
the land (II Sam. 19:29; Shab. 56b).
Bibliography: H.P. Smith, The Books of Samuel (ICC, 1912),
3103, 3746; W. Caspari, Die Samuelbuecher (1926), 57980; Noth,
Personennamen, 119, 143; M.Z. Segal, Sifrei Shemuel (1956), 255, 293,
332, 3523; J. Lewy, in: HUCA, 32 (1961), 3637; H.W. Hertzberg, Samuel (Ger., 19602), 298301. IN THE AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, 4
(1954), 76; I. H asida, Ishei ha-Tanakh (1964), 265.
61
mercier, jean
interview, Merchant said: Its not my job to be a cheerleader.
Im skeptical of hype. He covered many of the top boxing
events of the late 20t century, including Sugar Ray Leonard
vs. Thomas Hearns, and Mike Tyson vs. Michael Spinks. In
1985, Merchant received the Sam Taub Memorial Award for
Excellence in Boxing Broadcast Journalism. He was inducted
into the World Boxing Hall of Fame in 2002. He wrote the
award-winning HBO documentary series Legendary Nights,
which focused on famous boxing matches. Merchant played
himself in two movies that featured boxing scenes, the 2001
remake of Oceans 11 and I Spy in 2002. He is the author of
three books on sports: And Every Day You Take Another
Bite (1971), The National Football Lottery (1973), and Ringside
Seat at the Circus (1976).
[Alan D. Abbey (2nd ed.)]
MERCIER, JEAN (Joannes Mercerus; d. 1570), French Hebraist. Born in Uzs, near Nmes, Mercier was a pupil of Franois Vatable, whom he succeeded as professor of Hebrew at
the Collge Royal, Paris, in 1546. Unlike his master, Mercier
was a prolific writer, publishing works on Hebrew and Semitic
grammar, Latin translations and editions of the Targums, Bible
commentaries, and other books of Jewish interest. Owing to
his sympathy with the Reformers during the French religious
wars, Mercier was obliged to take refuge in Venice in 1567
and, after returning to France, he died of the plague. One of
his best-known works was the Libellus de abbreviaturis Hebraeorum, tam Talmudicorum quam Masoritarum et aliorum
rabbinorum (Paris, 1561), later exploited by Guy *Le Fvre de
la Boderie, which reveals Merciers interest in the Kabbalah
and cites scholars such as *Reuchlin and *Galatinus. However,
from remarks in his commentary on Genesis (Geneva, 1598),
published after his death by Thodore de Bze, his enthusiasm
for later kabbalistic literature clearly waned. Mercier translated almost the whole of Targum Jonathan b. Uzziel on the
Prophets; and he wrote annotations to Santes *Pagninis Thesaurus (Oz ar Leshon ha-Kodesh; Lyons, 1575, etc.). His other
works include Besorat Mattei (1955), a Hebrew version of the
gospel of Matthew; Luh ei Dikduka Kasdaah o Aramaah: Tabulae in grammaticen linguae Chaldaeae (Paris, 1560); Aseret
ha-Devarim: Decalogus, with the commentary of Abraham
Ibn Ezra, in Hebrew and Latin (Lyons, 156668); and the posthumous De notis Hebraeorum liber (1582), revised by another
French Hebraist, Jean Cinqarbres (Quinquarboreus; d. 1587).
Among those who studied under Mercier was the Huguenot
leader and author Philippe de Mornay (Du Plessis-Mornay,
15491623).
apparently considered him almost synonymous with idolatry. Thus, where one baraita states, He who sees Mercurius
should recite Blessed (be God) who has patience with those
who transgress His will (Ber. 57b), the parallel source reads
simply, He who sees idolatry (Tosef., ibid. 7[6]:2). Similarly, the Midrash interpreted the general prohibition against
erecting statues or pagan monuments (Lev. 26:1) as referring to
statues of Mercury on the roads (Sifra, Be-Har 9:5). The rabbis
were also aware of certain modes of worship connected with
Mercury, and thus the Mishnah proclaims: He that throws a
stone at a Mercurius is to be stoned, because this is how it is
worshiped (Sanh. 7:6). The trilithon, or three stones erected
as part of the Mercurius, was also known, and therefore R.
Ishmael says: Three stones beside a Mercurius, one beside the
other, are forbidden, but two are permitted (Av. Zar. 4:1). So
well known, in fact, was Mercurius worship in Palestine that
it is mentioned even in popular proverbs: As one who throws
a stone at Mercurius is guilty of idolatry, so one who teaches
a wicked pupil is guilty of idolatry (Tosef., Av. Zar. 6[7]:18).
Rabbis were constantly confronted with Mercury, and according to one talmudic account, a Mercurius was erected in
the field of R. Simeon, son of Judah the Patriarch, but he succeeded in having it dismantled by the local authorities (TJ,
Av. Zar. 4:1, 43d).
Bibliography: S. Lieberman, in: JIR, 36 (1945/46), 3668;
37 (1946/47), 4254.
[Isaiah Gafni]
62
Bibliography: F. Secret, Les Kabbalistes Chrtiens de la Renaissance (1964), 2089; Steinschneider, Cat. Bod., 1748.
[Godfrey Edmond Silverman]
meretz
as Abraham are dependent on Gods mercy. Recognizing human frailty, God forgives transgressors, especially those who
themselves are forgiving (Ecclus. 28:2; Shab. 151b; BM 85a; Ex.
R. 12:1). The firm belief that it is because of the Lords mercies
that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not
(Lam. 3:22) has sustained the Jewish people through many
periods of travail (Hos. 12:7). Gods mercifulness does not negate the principle of divine justice, but rather complements it
and reinforces its efficacy (see *God, Justice and Mercy of).
In analyzing the 13 attributes by which God manifests Himself, the rabbis point to the positive interaction of mercy and
justice in Gods relation to the world (RH 17a, b; Lev. R. 29:3).
This combination of justice and mercy in God is denoted in
the two names of God, Elohim, and YHWH, the first of which
designates justice, the second, mercy. God resolves the tension
between strict judgment and mercy in favor of the latter (Ps.
89:3; Prov. 20:28). Philo expresses this in his statement: Gods
pity is older than his justice (Deus, 16). Judaism can thus demand of its judges the seemingly contradictory qualities of
impartiality and compassion (Ex. 23:3; Ket. 9:2: Sanh. 6b).
The principle of mercy assumes an overriding significance in
the administration of Jewish law, where rules of equity qualify
strict legalism: execute the judgment and show mercy and
compassion every man to his brother (Zech. 7:9).
63
mergentheim
Yossi *Sarid, received nine seats, and remained in the opposition. In February 1997 it registered as a party, and its three
bodies ceased to exist as separate parties. In the elections to the
Fifteenth Knesset Meretz received ten seats, and entered the
government formed by Ehud *Barak, receiving three portfolios, but it left the government in June 2000, because Sarid was
displeased by Baraks efforts to pacify Shas, and went into opposition. In the elections to the Sixteenth Knesset Meretz received only six seats, despite the fact that Yossi *Beilin and Yael
*Dayan, who had failed to enter the *Israel Labor Party list
for the elections to the Sixteenth Knesset in a realistic place,
joined the Meretz list. This failure led to Sarids resigning the
party leadership. In the elections for the partys leadership held
in February 2004, Yossi *Beilin beat MK Ran Cohen, and the
party changed its name to Yah ad and the Democratic Choice.
In the summer of 2005 Meretz was brought back into the
partys name. In the 2006 elections it won five seats.
[Susan Hattis Rolef (2nd ed.)]
MERGENTHEIM (Bad Mergentheim), city in Wuerttemberg, Germany. Jews settled in Mergentheim in the first half
of the 13t century; 16 Jews were murdered during the *Rindfleisch massacres of 1298. Jews are mentioned again in 1312;
they suffered during persecutions in 1336 and again during
those of the *Black Death in 1349 when a number of Jews were
martyred. They reappeared in the city, however, in 1355, and
during the next century prospered, in large part through moneylending. The Jewish population remained small throughout
the 14t and 15t centuries. In 1516 there was only one Jew in the
city, but by the end of the century the population rose again.
In 1590 a cemetery plot was put to use in Unterbalbach for the
Jews of that town as well as those of surrounding communities, including Mergentheim. This cemetery was enlarged in
1702 and remained in continuous use throughout the modern period. During the early 17t century, only *Schutzjuden
were permitted in the city; all other Jews were restricted to
an eight-day stay. Throughout the century, every attempt
was made by the municipal authorities to restrict Jewish economic activities. Nonetheless, the Jewish families managed to
build a synagogue in 1658; this was enlarged in 1762. By 1700
there were 40 Jewish residents, among them the Court *Jews
Calman Model and Hirsch Manasses. At this time Jewish
commercial interests included trade in horses, livestock, corn,
and wine. By the end of the century these had expanded into
wholesale trade and banking. In 1728 Mergentheim became
the seat of the *Landrabbiner, an office filled with distinction
between 1742 and 1763 by Naphtali Hirsch Katzenellenbogen
(see *Katzenellenbogen Family). In 1799 there were 90 Jews;
110 in 1830; 176 in 1869; 250 in 1886; and 276 in 1900. In 1933
there were 196 Jews.
On November 9/10, 1938, Jewish stores and homes were
demolished; the rabbi, M. Kahn, was physically assaulted and
the interior of the synagogue destroyed. By 1939 there were
only 87 Jews left in the city. In 1941 and 1942, 41 Jews were
deported to concentration camps. The communitys Torah
64
MERH AVYAH (Heb. ; Gods Wide Space), (1) kibbutz in the Jezreel (H arod) Valley, Israel, E. of Afulah and at
the foot of Givat ha-Moreh, affiliated with Kibbutz Arz i HaShomer Ha-Z air. In 1909, the first holding in the Jezreel Valley was acquired at Merh avyah by Jews through the efforts of
Yehoshua *Hankin on behalf of the Palestine Land Development Company. Initially, a group of *Ha-Shomer established a
farm there (1911). They persevered in spite of the malaria and
the attempts of the Turkish authorities and their Arab neighbors to make them leave the place. Merh avyah soon became
a workers cooperative according to Franz *Oppenheimers
ideas. During World War I, German pilots set up a temporary camp there. The cooperative dispersed after the war and
another group founded a settlement, joined by veterans of
the *Jewish Legion, which, however, did not succeed. In 1929
a group of Ha-Shomer ha-Z air pioneers from Poland established its kibbutz on the site. It became the movements organizational center, including the Kibbutz Arz i secretariat, archives, printing press, and the Sifriat Poalim publishing house.
In 1969, the kibbutz, with 550 inhabitants, based its economy
on intensive farming, and also had a factory for plastic pipes
and a metal workshop. In the mid-1990s, the population of
the kibbutz was approximately 620, growing further to 675 in
2002. In the 2000s the kibbutz economy was based on two industries, plastics and wood, and a resort with an amusement
park and events garden. Farming included field crops, citrus groves, and dairy cattle. The Big Yard featured restored
houses built between 1912 and 1916, a visitors center, and a
museum in memory of Meir *Yaari, one of the Kibbutz Arz i
Ha-Shomer ha-Z airs leaders. (2) Moshav founded on part of
the Merh avyah lands in 1922 by a group of Third Aliyah pioneers from Eastern Europe. Merh avyah, affiliated with Tenuat
ha-Moshavim in 1969, engaged in intensive agriculture with
field and garden crops, dairy cattle, and poultry as prominent
branches. In 1968 its population was 42, jumping to 285 in the
mid-1990s and 630 in 2002 after expansion.
Website: www.merchavyard.org.il.
[Efram Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
meridor, dan
MRIDA, city in W. Spain, capital of the ancient Lusitania.
Located at an important road junction, it had one of the oldest communities in Spain. A folk legend relates that the Jewish settlement there dated from the arrival of captives brought
by Titus after the destruction of the Second Temple; the exiles were the nobles of Jerusalem among them there was a
maker of curtains [for synagogue arks] by the name of Baruch
who was also skilled in silk-work. These people remained in
Mrida where they raised families (Ibn Daud, Sefer ha-Qabbalah, ed. by G. Cohen (1967), 79). There was a Jewish settlement in Mrida in the late Roman and Visigothic periods. A
Jewish tombstone inscription in Latin, probably dating from
not later than the fourth century, embodies Latin translations
of Hebrew formulas commonly found on Jewish tombstones
of the period. After the Arab conquest, there was an important Jewish community in Mrida. Its prominent families included those of Ibn Avitur and Ibn al-Balia.
During Christian rule the Jewish quarter was situated
near the Church of Santa Catalina, formerly the synagogue.
From 1283 the tax paid by the community was 4,000 maravedis. The Jews in Mrida suffered during the 1391 persecutions,
and a *Converso group existed there during the 15t century.
However the amount of tax paid by the community in 1439
(2,250 maravedis) shows that it was relatively flourishing.
Because of its proximity to the Portuguese border, the exiles
from Mrida went to Portugal when the Jews were expelled
from Spain in 1492.
Bibliography: Ashtor, Korot, 1 (19662), 2302; Baer, Urkunden, 2 (1936), index; J.M. Mills, in: Sefarad, 5 (1945), 301ff. (cf. plate
between 3001); C. Roth, ibid., 8 (1948), 3916; J. Ma. Navascus, ibid.,
19 (1959), 7891; Cantera-Mllis, Inscripciones, 410ff.; H. Beinart,
in: Estudios, 3 (1962), 9f., 14, 2730; Surez Fernndez, Documentos,
69, 81, 2577; A. Marcos Pon, in: Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana, 32
(1956), 24952 (It.). Add. Bibliography: L. Garca Iglesias, in:
Revista de estudios extremeos, 32 (1976), 7998.
[Haim Beinart]
*Shamir after the elections to the Twelfth Knesset in 1988 Meridor was appointed minister of justice. In that position Meridor took a clear liberal line on issues of human rights and
the rule of law, actively promoting the passing of Basic Law:
Human Dignity and Freedom, and Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation, which were viewed as the first stage in the passing
of a complete bill of human rights. Meridor also insisted that
human rights and the rule of law be preserved with regards
to the Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the
difficult period of the first Intifada. As a result he gained many
political enemies in the extreme right. He continued to push
for the passing of additional basic laws in the field of human
rights, and promoted Basic Law: Legislation in the Thirteenth
Knesset, when the Likud was in opposition. In the primaries in
the Likud for a new leader after the 1992 electoral defeat, Meridor supported the candidature of his friend Zeev Binyamin
*Begin opposite Binyamin *Netanyahu, despite Begins more
right-wing positions. In the government formed by Netanyahu
after the elections to the Fourteenth Knesset in 1996, Meridor
was appointed minister of finance in which role he advocated
a further liberalization of the economy, and the privatization
of government-owned companies, the banks whose shares
were held by the government since the 1983 bank crisis, and
state lands. Meridor resigned from the government in June
1997 after expressing his dissatisfaction with the appointment of Ronnie Bar-On as attorney general, and Netanyahus
treatment of the issue, and owing to growing tension with the
governor of the Bank of Israel, Prof. Yaakov *Frankel, on his
interest rate and foreign exchange policies. In February 1999,
Meridor was one of several leading members of the Likud,
including Yitzhak Mordechai and Roni *Milo, who left the
party to form the new Center Party. The new party gained six
seats in the elections to the Fifteenth Knesset. Meridor was not
appointed as a minister in the government formed by Ehud
*Barak in 1999, which was joined by the Center Party, and
was appointed chairman of the Foreign Affairs and Defense
Committee, until he joined the government formed by Ariel
*Sharon in 2001 as minister without portfolio. The Center
Party began to disintegrate after the elections for prime minister of February 2001, and though Meridor had decided to
return to the Likud, he formally remained part of the Center
Party parliamentary group.
Throughout his political career Meridor was known for
his honesty, mild temper, and gentlemanly demeanor, which
while gaining for him a good deal of respect, also led to his
being presented by satirists as a weak figure, and made it very
difficult for him to contend with the new atmosphere that developed in the Likud Conference before and after the elections
to the Sixteenth Knesset. As a result he decided not to run for
a place on the Likud list to the Sixteenth Knesset, and to return to his private law practice.
Dan Meridors brother, Salai, was chairman of the Jewish Agency.
Bibliography: S. Ben-Porat, Sih ot Im Dan Meridor (1997).
[Susan Hattis Rolef (2nd ed.)]
65
Merinids
MERINIDS (Banu-Marin), Berber dynasty ruling over Morocco and parts of Algeria from the mid-13t century to 1472.
Their capital and center of operations was the city of *Fez.
From the 1390s, the Jewish population under the dynasty increased significantly as a result of the flow of Jewish refugees
from areas re-conquered by the Christians in Spain from the
Muslims. Important Jewish communities expanded in Fez and
Taza. The King Abd al-Haqq (murdered by Muslim fanatics
in 1465) appointed Harun, a Jewish physician, as vizier (minister). Members of the Jewish elite served as vital trade and
diplomatic intermediaries between the Merinid court and Portugal, then a key military and commercial power with strategic interests inside Morocco. Although several Merinid kings
manifested compassion and even generosity toward the Jews,
the same was not true of all of them, and it most certainly was
not the case with ordinary Muslims, who resented the growing Jewish political and economic influence. Jews were periodically harassed and beaten by Muslims and were prohibited
from residing anywhere near Muslim holy sites.
66
merneptah
ters. Chapters 2730 include a special tract, found in several
manuscripts under the title Sar Torah, which was composed
much later than the bulk of the work. In the Middle Ages the
book was widely known as Pirkei Heikhalot. The edition published by Wertheimer includes later additions, some of them
Shabbatean (see G. Scholem, in Zion, 7 (1942), 184f.). Jellineks
version (in Beit ha-Midrash, 3, 19382) is free of additions but
suffers from many corruptions.
(3) Merkavah Rabbah, part of which is found in Merkavah Shelemah, mostly attributed to Ishmael, and partly to
Akiva. Perhaps this work contained the most ancient formulation of Shiur Komah (the measurement of the body of God),
which later was copied in manuscripts as a separate work that
developed into Sefer ha-Komah, popular in the Middle Ages
(see G. Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism (1965), 3642).
(4) A version of Heikhalot which has no name and was
referred to in the Middle Ages as Maaseh Merkavah (G. Scholem, ibid., 10317). Here statements of Ishmael and Akiva alternate.
(5) Another elaborate treatise on the pattern of Heikhalot Rabbati, but with differing and partly unknown new details; fragments have been published from the Cairo Genizah
by I. Greenwald, Tarbiz, 38 (1969), 35472 (additions ibid., 39
(1970), 2167);
(6) Hekhalot, published by Jellinek (in Beit ha-Midrash
(vol. 1, 19382), and later as III Enoch or the Hebrew Book of
Enoch (ed. and trans. by H. Odeberg, 1928). Unfortunately
Odeberg chose a later and very corrupt text as a basis for his
book, which he intended as a critical edition. The speaker is R.
Ishmael and the work is largely made up of revelations about
Enoch, who became the angel Metatron, and the host of heavenly angels. This book represents a very different trend from
those in Heikhalot Rabbati and Heikhalot Zutrati.
(7) The tractate of Heikhalot or Maaseh Merkavah in
Battei Midrashot (1 (19502), 5162) is a relatively late elaboration, in seven chapters, of the descriptions of the throne and
the chariot. In the last three works a literary adaptation was
deliberately made in order to eradicate the magical elements,
common in the other sources listed above. Apparently they
were intended more to be read for edification rather than for
practical use by those who delved into the Merkabah.
(8) The Tosefta to the Targum of the first chapter of
Ezekiel (Battei Midrashot, 2 (19532), 13540) also belongs to
this literature.
A mixture of material on the chariot and creation is
found in several additional sources, mainly in Baraita deMaaseh Bereshit and in Otiyyot de-Rabbi Akiva, both of which
appear in several versions. The Seder Rabbah de-Bereshit was
published in Battei Midrashot (1 (19502), 348), and in another version by N. Sd, with a French translation (in REJ, 34
(1964), 23123, 259305). Here the doctrine of the Merkabah is
connected with cosmology and with the doctrine of the seven
heavens and the depths. This link is also noticeable in Otiyyot
de-Rabbi Akiva, but only the longer version contains the traditions on creation and the Merkavah mysticism. Both extant
versions, with an important supplement entitled Midrash AlfaBetot, were published in Battei Midrashot (2 (19532), 333465).
M. Margaliot discovered additional and lengthy sections of
Midrash Alfa-Betot in several unpublished manuscripts. Again,
these works were arranged more for the purposes of speculation and reading than for practical use by the mystics. The
doctrine of the seven heavens and their angelic hosts, as was
developed in Merkabah mysticism and in cosmology, has also
definite magical contexts, which are elaborated in the complete version of Sefer *ha-Razim (ed. by M. Margalioth, 1967),
whose date is still a matter of controversy.
In the second century Jewish converts to Christianity apparently conveyed different aspects of Merkabah mysticism to
Christian Gnostics. In the Gnostic literature there were many
corruptions of such elements, yet the Jewish character of this
material is still evident, especially among the Ophites, in the
school of Valentinus, and in several of the Gnostic and Coptic
texts discovered within the last 50 years. In the Middle Ages
the term Maaseh Merkabah was used by both philosophers
and kabbalists to designate the contents of their teachings but
with completely different meanings metaphysics for the former and mysticism for the latter.
Bibliography: Pritchard, Texts, 3768, 4759; A.H. Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs (1961), 271ff.; R.O. Faulkner, in: CAH2,
2 (1966), ch. 23.
[Alan Richard Schulman]
67
merodach
MERODACH (Heb. ) , a Babylonian god (Jer. 50:2),
whose name also enters into the composition of the personal
names *Merodach-Baladan (= Berodach-Baladan; II Kings
20:12; Isa. 39:1), *Evil-Merodach (II Kings 25:27; Jer. 52:31),
and *Mordecai.
See *Marduk.
ian campaign were favorable for Merodach-Baladan and Hezekiah to form an alliance.
In 703 B.C.E. Sennacherib conducted a campaign against
Merodach-Baladan, defeating the Elamite and Babylonian
armies surrounding Kish. Merodach-Baladan fled to the Sealands, and from there continued to rule over Bt-Iakin and
the southernmost part of Babylonia. After Sennacherib returned from his campaign in the west in 701, he waged war
against Merodach-Baladan (700). The Chaldeans were no
match for the Assyrians, and Merodach-Baladan fled further
along the Persian Gulf to the region bordering on Elam, dying there in 694.
MERODACHBALADAN (Heb. ; Akk. dMarduk-ap-la-iddin; Marduk has given a son), Babylonian king
(722710 B.C.E.). Assyrian inscriptions place the origin of
Merodach-Baladan in the land of Bt-Iakin, a Chaldean kingdom near the coast of the Persian Gulf (Sealands). This is
more probable than Merodach-Baladans claim that he was
the son and legal heir of the Babylonian king Erba-Marduk.
In 731 B.C.E., Ukin-zer of Bt Amukkani, a Chaldean, wrested
the kingship of Babylonia from the pro-Assyrian king Nabunadin-zer. Merodach-Baladan, who also had designs on the
kingship, supported the Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III,
against Ukin-zer. He was thus able to strengthen his position
among the Chaldean tribes, increase his influence in Babylonia, and forge an alliance with Elam, without interference from
Tiglath-Pileser III or Shalmaneser V, both of whom exercised
sovereignty over Babylonia (729722 B.C.E.).
With the death of Shalmaneser V, Merodach-Baladan
seized the Babylonian throne (722/721 B.C.E.). This marked the
beginning of violent struggles between Merodach-Baladan and
the Assyrians. By 720, Sargon II was preparing for war against
Merodach-Baladan, who had the support of the Elamites.
Conflicting reports have been preserved of this battle, which
took place in the plain of Dr, east of the Tigris. MerodachBaladan ruled Babylonia until 710, when, through neglect and
economic exploitation, he incurred the enmity of the native
Babylonian population in the large urban centers which had
been loyal to him, although he enjoyed the support of the
Chaldean and Babylonian tribes which were largely concentrated in the southern part of the country.
Therefore, it is not surprising that when Sargon II waged
war against Merodach-Baladan in 710, he was warmly received by the urban population. Sargon defeated MerodachBaladans armies and conquered his fortresses, causing Merodach-Baladan to flee south to Bt-Iakin, where he waited for
an opportunity to regain the throne. Seeing in the widespread
disturbances that arose after the death of Sargon (705) the
opportunity to resume his rule over Babylonia, MerodachBaladan, in 703, with the support of the Elamites and much
of the Babylonian population, reestablished his rule there. He
found an ally in *Hezekiah, who was at that time planning a
revolt against Assyria, exploiting the latters political goals for
his own benefit. Hezekiah could help Merodach-Baladan by
distracting the attention of the Assyrians to the west. This appears to be the background of the biblical narrative concerning
the goodwill delegation sent by Merodach-Baladan to Hezekiah of Judah in 701 B.C.E. after Sennacheribs campaign there
(II Kings 20:1219; Isa. 39:18; II Chron. 32:31). However, it is
doubtful that political conditions in Palestine after the Assyr-
68
[Bustanay Oded]
In the Aggadah
Merodach-Baladan is praised for honoring his father. He
added his fathers name Baladan to his own when acting as
regent during the incapacity of his father, and signed documents in the name of both his father and himself (Sanh. 96a).
When told that the sun had reversed its course on the day that
Hezekiah miraculously recovered from his illness, he acknowledged the superiority of God, though previously he had been
a sun worshiper. He thereupon addressed a letter to Hezekiah
the original introduction of which was Peace to Hezekiah,
Peace to the God of Hezekiah, and Peace to Jerusalem. Realizing, however, that he had been disrespectful in not placing
God first, he took steps and recalled his messengers in order
to change the wording. As a reward he was told: You took
three steps for the honor of My name I will therefore raise
up from thee three kings [Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-Merodach,
and Belshazzar], who shall rule from one end of the world to
the other (Est. R. 3:1).
Bibliography: H.W.F. Saggs, The Greatness that was Babylon
(1962), 10920; J.A. Brinkman, in: Studies Presented to A. Leo Oppenheim (1964), 653; idem, in: JNES, 24 (1965), 1616; P. Artzi, in: EM,
5 (1968), 4459; Ginzberg, Legends, 4 (1913), 275, 300; 6 (1928), 368,
430; I.Y. H asida, Ishei ha-Tanakh (1964), 269.
meron, hanna
was an important pilgrimage site associated with the festival of
*Lag ba-Omer and influenced by the mystical traditions that
emerged in nearby Safed, just 6 miles (9 km.) away. R. Moses
Basola mentions the festival as early as 1522. The name Meron
also appears in this connection in the various poems of Kalir
and other liturgical authors.
The synagogue site was first surveyed and documented in
the important work of Kohl and Watzinger published in 1916,
though 19t century explorers and travelers knew the ruin as
well. The site was excavated between 1971 and 1977 by Eric M.
Meyers and an American team and their finds were published
in 1981. A subsequent Israeli salvage excavation was carried out
by N. Feig and published in 2002. One of the most important
observations to be made is that there was a very modest settlement in the late Hellenistic period, ca. 20063 B.C.E., and the
Early Roman period represented even less in scant remains.
No evidence for Josephus fortification was uncovered in any
excavation, which has led the excavators to abandon the idea
that Meron and Meroth of Josephus were one and the same
place. The heyday of occupations was the rabbinic period, or
the Middle-Late Roman era, from ca. 135363 C.E., the latter
date the year of the great earthquake that contributed to the
abandonment of the site; and significant remains of domestic
buildings and structures survive from this period as do important agricultural installations. The main building identified
with this period is the great synagogue on the summit, which
is a long basilical structure with the familiar triple doorway
on the Jerusalem-facing wall. A shallow portico with six columns was attached to the southern faade wall. The interior
of the synagogue has two rows of eight columns, making it
the longest of the Galilean synagogues, and while no trace of
a Torah Shrine was found it is likely that one stood on the interior of the southern wall. Most of the remains of the building had been robbed in antiquity, and only a small attached
room along the southeastern corner has survived. In its rubble foundations were found materials from the third century,
allowing the excavators to posit a date for the construction of
the building in the third century C.E. It may be assumed that
its final period of use came in ca. 363, when the rest of the
town was abandoned.
Remains from the lower city show a vibrant town with
shops and living complexes that reflect the indigenous life
style of the Land of Israel in late antiquity, with many industrial and agricultural installations dotting the interior spaces of
the town in the rabbinic period. Olive oil production was very
common in the region and its importance is reflected in the
material culture of Meron. A room full of charred foodstuffs,
possibly intended as *hekdesh, was found in one of the more
upscale homes in the lower city, as was a mikveh in another,
pointing to a community that observed Jewish laws.
After the abandonment of the site in the second half of
the fourth century the site was reoccupied in the 13t14t century, while some evidence for the 15t century also exists along
with the evidence of pilgrim travelers such as Rabbi Obadiah
of *Bertinoro (1495). In the 16t century Meron was a Muslim
69
meroz
MEROZ (Heb. ) , an unidentified locality, which is cursed
in the Song of Deborah (Judg. 5:23) because the inhabitants
refused to help the prophetess and Barak in their war against
Siserah. Suggested identifications for Meroz are Mazar on Mt.
Gilboa or al-Ruz near al-Lajjn.
Bibliography: J.J. Garstang, Joshua-Judges (1931), 396; Abel,
Geog, 2 (1938), 385; A. Alt, in: ZAW, 58 (1941), 244ff.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
MERRICK, DAVID (19112000), Broadway producer. Merrick was born in St. Louis, Mo., as David Margulois, the youngest child of a salesman. His parents were divorced when he was
seven and he bounced among relatives through adolescence. A
good student, he won a scholarship to Washington University
in St. Louis, then went to St. Louis University, where he studied law, a trade that would help him in his tough theatrical
contract negotiations. His marriage to Leonore Beck, whom
he had met in school, and who had a modest inheritance, allowed the couple to leave St. Louis for New York in 1939. A
year later, he invested $5,000 in a forthcoming comedy, The
Male Animal. The play was a hit, and David Merrick, taking
a new name inspired by the 18t-century English actor David
Garrick, was born.
For a quarter of a century that ended with his last blockbuster, the musical 42nd Street in 1980, Merrick was the dominant showman in the Broadway theater. In a typical season
during the 1960s he produced a half-dozen or more plays and
musicals. His productivity and profitability were unmatched by
any single impresario in the history of New Yorks commercial
theater. Among his successes were some of the most popular
musicals of his era, including Gypsy, Hello, Dolly!, and Promises, Promises as well as 42nd Street, one of the longest-running
productions in Broadway history. He introduced Woody *Allen
to Broadway as a playwright (Dont Drink the Water) and actor
(Play It Again, Sam) and produced the 1962 musical I Can Get
It for You Wholesale, which catapulted the 19-year-old singer
Barbra *Streisand to stardom. His productions also gave signature roles to Ethel Merman (Mama Rose in Gypsy) and Carol
Channing (Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly!) and he worked with
nearly every major songwriter of the Broadway musicals heyday. Merrick presented Laurence Olivier in his most celebrated
postwar performance (as Archie Rice in The Entertainer), the
breakthrough dramas of John Osborne (Look Back in Anger),
Brian Friel (Philadelphia, Here I Come!), and Tom Stoppard
(Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead), as well as two pivotal
Royal Shakespeare Company productions directed by Peter
Brook, Marat/Sade and A Midsummers Night Dream.
Merrick became famous for baiting critics, his own stars,
and his fellow producers, all to promote his wares. He gloried in his image as the abominable showman. When Al
*Hirschfeld drew a particularly unflattering caricature of him
as a Grinch-like Santa Claus, Merrick reproduced the image
on his annual Christmas card.
Merrick was famous for masterstrokes of publicity. In
1967, when the audiences for Hello, Dolly! began to decline, he
70
merton
MERSEBURG, city in Germany. The Jewish community of
Merseburg was one of the oldest in Germany. As early as 973
Emperor Otto II granted Bishop Gisiler authority over the
Jews, the merchants, and the mint in the city. King Henry II
renewed this privilege in 1004. In 1234 three Jews lent 80 silver marks to the burgrave of Merseburg. In 1269 the convent
of Pegau sold properties to repay debts to Merseburg Jews. In
this period R. Ezekiel of Merseburg addressed a number of
halakhic queries to Meir b. Baruch of *Rothenburg. Another
scholar of the period was R. Samuel of Merseburg. The cemetery of the community dated at least from 1362. The assertion that there was a persecution in 134950 rests on a confusion between similar names of localities. In a Hebrew source
*Menahem of Merseburg, author of Nimmukim, was a leading German rabbi in the second half of the 14t century. In
1434 the Jews of the Merseburg bishopric paid 100 gilders
coronation tax to King Sigismund II; in 1438 a 3 income tax
to King Albert II; and in 1440 a coronation tax again. At an
unknown time thereafter the Jews left the city, which underwent economic decline and internal tension. In 1556 the Saxon
historian Ernst Brotuff wrote, Formerly many Jews lived in
Merseburg who had their own synagogue with a courtyard in
the small street west of the Cathedral chapter. In 1565 Merseburg came under the rule of Saxon, where no Jews were tolerated, and in 1815 under Prussia, which lifted the restrictions in
the new territories only in 1847. By 1849, some 34 Jews lived
in Merseburg; there were 23 in 1871; 16 in 1880; 20 in 1903; 29
in 1905; 20 in 1913 (five families); and 40 in 1925. They were
affiliated with the Jewish community in Weissenfels. Records
for the years 193345 are missing. No Jews settled in Merseburg after 1945.
Bibliography: Salfeld, Martyrol, 78, n. 4; FWJ (19289), 293;
Deutsche Reichstagsakten, publ. by Hist. Kommiss. Bayer, Ak. d. Wissenschaften (18671961), 11, 3057; 13, 465; 14, 671; G. Kisch, Forschungen zur Rechts-und Sozialgeschichte der Juden (1955), 54; Baron,
Social2, 4 (1957), 6566; T. Oelsner, in: YIVOA, 2 (19589), 193; idem,
in YLBI, 7 (1962), 189; S. Neumann, Zur Statistik der Juden in Preussen (1884), 47; H.L. Mursek, Merseburg (1963), passim; Germania Judaica, 1 (1963), 22628; 2 (1968), 53940. Add. bibliography: A.
Maimon, M. Breuer, Y. Guggenheim (eds.), Germania Judaica, vol.
3, 13501514 (1987), 86769.
[Toni Oelsner]
MERSIN, city in *Turkey, on the Mediterranean coast in Cilicia, capital of the province of Icel; population (2004), 587,800.
In ancient times there was a Jewish community in the town.
In 107 B.C.E., some of its Jewish inhabitants were transferred
to the Bosphorus region by Mithridates IV, king of Pontus.
No information is available on the existence of a Jewish community during the Middle Ages. From the 19t century, however, there were a number of Jews in the town who had come
from various Turkish towns (especially *Salonika) and were
engaged in commerce. In 1909, there was a *blood libel, in
which one of the heads of the local Gatenyo family was accused of using Greek blood for the baking of matzah. The accusation was withdrawn after the intervention of the Greek
71
merton, robert C.
MERTON, ROBERT C. (1944 ), U.S. economist and educator; co-recipient of the 1997 Nobel Memorial Prize for economics. A New York City native, raised in Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., Merton was the middle child of renowned sociologist
Robert K. *Merton and Suzanne Carhart. In 1966 Merton received his B.S. in engineering mathematics from Columbia
University and an M.S. in 1967 from Caltech for applied mathematics. He switched his focus to economics and transferred to
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on a full fellowship and completed his Ph.D. in 1970; subsequently, he began his teaching career at MITs Sloan School of Management
where he taught through 1988. Upon leaving MIT he moved to
the Harvard Business School where, in 1998, he was named its
first John and Natty McArthur University Professor.
As a youth, mathematics was his favorite school subject
and the love of both numbers and baseball led him to memorize all the big-leaguers statistics. While his mother provided
him with his practical life knowledge, his father served as his
enduring intellectual adviser despite his choice of a starkly
divergent academic path.
Searching for real-life applications of mathematics is what
lured Merton to the field of economics. His research while a
member of MITs faculty led to his 1973 paper The Theory
of Rational Option Pricing (appearing in the Bell Journal of
Economics) not long after Myron Scholes and Fischer Black
advanced their landmark option-pricing formula in the Journal of Political Economy. Together, the men successfully tested
the system in the live market with their mutual fund, Money
Market/Options Investment, Inc., activated in 1976. The ramification on Wall Street of their mutually supporting theories
on valuing stock options was considerable and served as the
backbone to the formation of enormous derivatives markets.
This watershed in economics was finally honored in 1997 when
Merton and Scholes were bestowed with the Nobel Memorial
Prize in economic sciences.
Mertons success was tempered by the 1998 collapse of
his and Scholes Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM), the
Greenwich, Conn.-based hedge fund of which they were two of
several founders in 1993. Undeterred, he co-founded Integrated
Finance Limited (IFL), an international investment firm based
in New York City in 2003, and also serves as its Chief Science
Officer; in that same year, Dimensional Fund Advisors, an investment management company, chose Merton as a member
of its board of directors/trustees. He served on numerous corporate boards, held the presidency of the American Finance
Association in 1986, and was awarded many honorary degrees
from various universities. Along with the scores of articles appearing in professional journals during his three decades in
academia, Merton wrote several books including ContinuousTime Finance (1990) and Finance (1998), co-authored with Zvi
Bodie. In 2004 Merton donated his MIT and Harvard lecture
notes on finance theory to the Professional Risk Managers International Association (PRMIA) for the purpose of training
financial risk managers.
[Dawn Des Jardins (2nd ed.)]
72
merzbacher, leo
temporary Social Problems (with R. Nisbet, 19662); On Theoretic Sociology (1967); and The Sociology of Science (1973). He
was one of the editors of Reader in Bureaucracy (1952) and
wrote numerous papers, chiefly dealing with topics of the sociology of knowledge.
Add. Bibliography: C. Mongardini and S. Tabboni (eds.),
Robert K. Merton and Contemporary Society (1997); J. Clark et al.
(eds.), Robert Merton: Consensus and Controversy (1990); P. Sztompka,
Robert K. Merton, an Intellectual Profile (1986); R. Hill, Mertons Role
Types and Paradigm of Deviance (1980); L. Coser (ed.), The Idea of
Social Structure: Papers in Honor of Robert K. Merton (1975).
[Werner J. Cahnman / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
MERZBACHER, family of numismatists. ABRAHAM MERZBACHER (18121885), rabbi, banker, numismatist, and bibliophile, was born in Baiersdorf (near Erlangen), Bavaria. His
education at the yeshivah in Fuerth and the universities of
Erlangen and Munich was followed by a short career as rabbi
of Ansbach. Although running a business in antique books
and prints in Baiersdorf, Merzbacher lived in Munich from
1833. In 1846 he became an associate of the banking firm J.N.
Oberndoerffer, owned by his father-in-law at Munich, which
was also the leading German coin dealer, and later the house of
Rollin et Feuardent in Paris Rollin was a foremost European
expert in numismatics. He exposed the Becker Counterfeits,
a famous case of counterfeiting of ancient coins. He became
an expert on Polish medals, and also took a special interest
in Jewish coins and medals, building up a valuable collection.
In 1873 he retired from business and turned to collecting rare
Jewish manuscripts and prints to assist R.N.N. *Rabbinovicz
in his monumental Dikdukei Soferim (Variae Lectiones in
Mischnam et in Talmud Babylonicum, 1876ff.), also financing its publication. His library grew to over 4,000 volumes,
including 156 manuscripts and 43 incunabula, and eventually
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
MERZBACHER, GOTTFRIED (18431926), German explorer. Born in Baiersdorf, Bavaria, Merzbacher grew up in
a family of highly respected businessmen and bankers. He
founded a successful fur business in Munich in 1868. He retired and sold his business in 1888 at the age of 45 which allowed him to concentrate on his true passion: the scientific
research of mountain areas. Merzbacher, an accomplished
mountaineer explored in Africa, North America, the Caucasus, and from 1892 climbed mountains in Arabia, Persia,
and India. He published the reports of these expeditions in
scientific journals. From 1902 to 1908 he climbed the Central
Tien Shan range of Asia and his findings were published by
the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. His book Aus den Hochregionen des Kaukasus (1901) became a classic. One of his last
trips led him to the Bogdo-Ola mountain range. There a ridge
was named after him in 1927. In 1901 Merzbacher received an
honorary doctorate from the University of Munich. In 1907
he was appointed Royal Professor.
Bibliography: Y. Gleibs, Juden im kulturellen und wissenschaftlichen Leben Mnchens in der zweiten Hlfte des 19. Jahrhunderts (1981), 196200).
[Andreas Heusler (2nd ed.)]
73
merzer, arieh
of the founders of the Independent Order of True Sisters. Sickness limited Merzbachers activities, and he seems to have had
little impact either on his own congregation or on the New
York Jewish community.
[Sefton D. Temkin]
74
[Mira Friedman]
mesha stele
In talmudic sources of the third century C.E. the Jews of
Babylonia refer to Mesenean Jews as imprudent (Kid. 49b),
unfit and of tainted descent (Kid. 71b), since whosoever did
not know his family and his tribe made his way there (Yev.
17a). Marriage between Babylonian Jews and the Jews of the
northern Mesenean city of *Apamea was forbidden (Kid. 71b).
The city of Mes h n (Charax) is described as being lower than
hell, and Harpania, a second city of Mesene (perhaps a variant spelling of Apamea), as being lower still than Mes h n
(Yev. 17a). This hostility shown by Babylonian Jews may have
been caused, in part, by the adoption of elements of Mandeanism by the Jews of Mesene. It has also been noted that the
practice of allowing the Jewish dead of Harpania to lie while
the shroud was woven (Sanh. 48b) would indicate an adaptation by the Jews of that city of the Zoroastrian practice of
exposing a corpse before burial (see Obermeyer, 197). A possible preference by Mesenean Jews for the Jerusalem Talmud
may have further contributed to their being disliked by the
Jews of Babylonia.
Bibliography: Neubauer, Gogr, 325, 329, 382; E. Peterson,
in: ZNW, 27 (1928), 5598; J. Obermeyer, Die Landschaft Babylonien
(1929), index; S. Nodelman, in: Berytus, 13 (1960); J. Hansman, in:
Iranica Antiqua, 8 (1967).
MESHA (Heb.
) , king of Moab in the ninth century
B.C.E. (see *Moab). The name is formed from the root y, to
deliver, save. In II Kings 3:4 it is stated that Mesha was a sheep
breeder. He was subjugated by *Ahab and paid him tribute.
After Ahabs death, the king of Moab, most likely Mesha, revolted and ceased paying tribute (II Kings 3:45; cf. II Kings
1:1). *Jehoram son of Ahab conducted a military campaign
against Moab to subjugate it (II Kings 3:6ff.).
Most of the information on Mesha is contained in the
stele which he erected at Dibon (see *Mesha Stele). The first
three lines of the inscription mention that Meshas father Chemoshyat, whose name is known from a stele found in Kerak
(Kir of Moab; W.L. Reed and F.V. Winnett, in: BASOR, 172
(1963), 6), ruled over Moab for 30 years, and that Mesha succeeded him. Mesha resided at Dibon, situated north of Arnon,
and called himself King of Moab, the Dibonite. The stele
then relates how *Omri, king of Israel, took possession of the
land of Medeba in the northern part of the plain, and subjugated Moab his days and a part of the days of his son, forty
years. The phrase his son obviously refers to Ahab. However, all the days of Omri and Ahab together are considerably
fewer than 40 years. Moreover, the Bible relates that the king
of Moab revolted after Ahabs death, rather than during his
lifetime. Among the many attempts to explain the discrepancy between what is recorded in the Bible and in the Mesha
Inscription, the most acceptable theory is that the number 40
is not to be taken literally, but is the conventional length of
a generation (cf. Num. 32:13; Ps. 95:10). Mesha apparently revolted twice, once during the reign of Omris son Ahab, as is
related in the stele, and once after Ahabs death, as is stated in
the Bible. If this theory is correct, the following sequence of
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
75
meshech
the aid of a squeeze made by Clermont-Ganneau of all but
the last few lines. The language of the inscription is Moabite,
which is closely related to Hebrew, though it diverges from it
in several grammatical features. The alphabetic Canaanite-Hebrew script is well shaped and clear; the words are separated
from each other by dots, and the sentences by vertical lines.
Mesha dedicated the stele to his deity Chemosh out of gratitude for the latters deliverance of the Moabites from Israelite
rule, and for his help in the conquest of the plain. The stele
(lines 49) relates, As for Omri, king of Israel, he humbled
Moab many years [lit. days], for Chemosh was angry with his
land. And his son followed him and he also said I will humble
Moab. In my time he spoke [thus], but I have triumphed over
him and over his house, while Israel hath perished forever
(cf. II Kings 1:1; 3:45). However, by describing the events in
the first person, Meshas real intention was probably to perpetuate his own victories over Israel.
76
MESHULLAM BEN JACOB OF LUNEL (12t century), Provenal scholar. A master of halakhah, Meshullam also occupied himself with secular studies. He was a wealthy man and
philanthropist, and together with his sons provided for the
support and maintenance of the disciples and scholars who
flocked to his bet ha-midrash. Benjamin of Tudela describes
him and his five sons as being great and wealthy scholars, Joseph, Isaac, Jacob, Aaron, and Asher the ascetic, who had no
concern with worldly matters, but devoted himself to study
day and night, fasting and refraining from eating meat, and
77
78
appear in it, updating it with the Provenal tradition of scholarship, and dealing with criticisms of the work, including
those of Zerahiah ha-Levi Gerondi in his Ha-Maor all this
in order to give it uncontested authority. Indeed, Menahem
*Meiri, who wrote more than 50 years later, refers to Alfasi
in the same breath as the Sefer ha-Hashlamah, thus showing
it to be the standard version of Alfasi in his locality (see introduction to Meiris commentary on Avot ed. by B.Z. Prag,
1964). Meshullam based his work chiefly upon the teachings
of the earlier scholars of Provence, and shows especially high
regard for Abraham b. David of Posquires, though he does
not hesitate to disagree with him on occasion.
Publication of Sefer ha-Hashlamah was begun during
the last century and the greater part of it, comprising the orders Moed and Nezikin, and the tractate H ullin, has already
appeared. Those chiefly responsible for its publication were
Judah *Lubetzky Nezikin (Paris, 188587; Warsaw, 1907),
with an extensive commentary, Torat ha-Hashlamah; Moses
Herschler in the series Ginzei Rishonim (1962 ); and Abraham H aputa, who also added an extensive commentary, Reshit
ha-Hashlamah (1961 ). The Sefer ha-Hashlamah Yevamot
was published in the Vilna (Romm) edition of the Talmud
under the title Tosafot H ad mi-Kamai. Some of Meshullams
hassagot on Maimonides to Shabbat, Eruvin, and Shevuot (in
J. Lubetzky, Bidkei Battim, 1896), show he was apparently unaware of Abraham b. Davids hassagot on Maimonides.
Bibliography: Meshullam b. Moses of Bziers, Sefer haHashlamah le-Seder Nezikin, ed. by J. Lubetsky, 1 (1885), introd.; idem,
Bidkei Battim (1896); Neubauer, in REJ, 20 (1890), 2448; I. Twersky,
Rabad of Posquires (1965), 252f.
[Israel Moses Ta-Shma]
79
80
offered at the Tabernacle on Saturdays, interpreting Numbers 28:10 to mean that the burnt-offering must be sacrificed
on Friday for Saturday. Many deviations from tradition were
ascribed to him by his opponents: in his commentary on Leviticus Saadiah Gaon refers to Meshwis permitting the fat of
animals which were not sacrificed at the altar to be eaten. The
11t-century Karaite scholar, Tobias b. Moses, attacked him as
a heretic for declaring many pentateuchal laws void. Meshwi
may have been influenced by his contemporary, the heretic
Hiwi al-Balkh. Remnants of the Mish awayhites survived until
the 12t century; *Benjamin of Tudela, who met them in Cyprus, relates their heretical manner of observing the Sabbath,
and Abraham *Ibn Ezra, in his commentary on Exodus 16:24
and in his epistle on the Sabbath, refers to their interpretation
of Genesis 1:5 and their observance of the Sabbath. It is striking that the interpretation of *Samuel ben Meir (Rashbam) of
Gen. 1:5 corresponds to that of Meshwi.
Bibliography: Ankori, Karaites in Byzantium (1959),
372417 and index; S.A. Poznaski, in: REJ, 34 (1897), 16191; L.
Nemoy, in: HUCA, 7 (1930), 330, 38990; Y. Rosenthal, in: YIVOBleter, 21 (1943), 79.
[Judah M. Rosenthal]
mesopotamia
the era of the *Amorites. Amurru (or Amaru) was, in its earliest cuneiform attestations, simply a geographic name for the
west, or for the deserts bordering the right bank of the Euphrates. This area, which stretched without apparent limit into
the Syrian and Arabian Deserts, was traditionally the home of
nomadic tribes of Semitic speech who were drawn to the civilized river valley as if by a magnet and invaded or infiltrated it
whenever opportunity beckoned. In the process they became
progressively acculturated first as semi-nomads who spent
part of the year as settled agriculturalists in an uneasy symbiosis with the urban society of the irrigation civilizations, and ultimately as fully integrated members of that society, retaining
at most the linguistic traces of their origins. It was thus that,
perhaps as early as about 2900 B.C.E., the first major wave of
westerners had entered the Mesopotamian amalgam, and under the kings of Kish and Akkad became full partners in the
Sumero-Akkadian civilization that resulted. When, however,
the Akkadian sources themselves spoke of Amorites, as they
did beginning with Shar-kali-sharri about 2150, they were alluding to a new wave of invaders from the desert, not yet acclimated to Mesopotamian ways. Such references multiply in
the neo-Sumerian texts of the 21st century, and correlate with
growing linguistic evidence based chiefly on the recorded personal names of persons identified as Amorites which shows
that the new group spoke a variety of Semitic, ancestral to
301.
[Mendel Kohansky]
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Map 1. The ancient East in the second millennium B.C.E. Borders of modern states are in gray.
81
mesopotamia
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Map 2. Expansions and decline of the Assyrian Empire. Based on M. A. Beek, Atlas of Mesopotamia, Nelson, London, 1962.
82
mesopotamia
The pattern established by the Amorites was to characterize Near Eastern history down to the present: it was only
when the natural arenas of centralized political power in Mesopotamia and Egypt were in eclipse that the intervening area,
destined by geography for division into petty states, enjoyed
an opportunity to make its influence felt in unison. The simultaneous collapse of the Sargonic empire of Akkad and the Old
Kingdom in Egypt provided such an opportunity, and already
Shulgi of Ur had to construct a defensive wall, presumably at
the point where the Tigris and Euphrates flow closest together,
to deflect unwanted barbarians from the cities that lay to the
south. Shulgi was succeeded by two of his many sons, AmarSin and Shu-Sin, each of whom reigned for nine years. Like
him, these conducted most of their military campaigns in the
east, across the Tigris, but Shu-Sin greatly strengthened the
wall, calling it The one which keeps Didanum at bay in a direct reference to the Amorite threat. He managed thereby to
postpone the final reckoning, and even enjoyed divine honors
in his lifetime beyond those of his predecessors. His son IbbiSin, however, was less fortunate, and in native Mesopotamian
traditions was remembered as the model of the ill-fated ruler.
Unable to withstand the simultaneous onslaughts of Elamites
and Subarians from the east and Amorites from the west,
IRE
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Thebes
Map 3. The Empire of Nebuchadnezzar II (604562 B.C.E.). Based on M.A. Beek, Atlas of Mesopotamia, Nelson, London, 1962.
83
mesopotamia
ried Amorite and Akkadian influence even further afield, into
Cappadocia.
Closer to home, the traditional central control was at
first maintained, but even here the loyalty of the provinces
was shortlived. For most of the 20t century, Ishbi-Irras descendants at Isin were unchallenged as the successors of the
kings of Ur, but before it was over, the Amorite governors of
the southeast, probably based at the ancient city of Lagash, asserted their independence in order to protect the dwindling
water resources of that region. Under Gungunum, they established a rival kingdom at Larsa which soon wrested Ur from
Isin. In short succession, other Amorite chieftains established
independent dynasties at Uruk, Babylon, Kish and nearly all
the former provinces of the united kingdom, until Isin effectively controlled little more than its own city and Nippur. With
the more distant marshes long since under Amorite rule, the
19t century was thus characterized by political fragmentation,
with a concomitant outburst of warfare and diplomacy that
embroiled all the separate petty states at one time or another.
The staging area for the Amorite expansion was probably the Jabel Bishri (Mt. Basar) which divides or, if one prefers, links the Euphrates River and the Syrian Desert. From
here it was a comparatively short and easy march down the
river to Babylonia or across the river to Assyria. The way to
Egypt was not only longer but led through more hilly and
intractable land. This may be one reason that the Amorite
wave was somewhat longer in reaching the Egyptian border.
When it did reach it, it confronted just such a wall as Shu-Sin
(c. 20362028) had built to keep Didanum at bay: in one of
those curious parallels that punctuate Ancient Near Eastern
history, they met the Wall-of-the-Ruler, made to oppose the
Asiatics and crush the Sand-Crossers, and attributed to the
founder of the 12t Dynasty. But the extraordinary revitalization of the Egyptian monarchy by this dynasty (c. 19901780)
was the real reason that the Amorite wave broke harmlessly at
the Egyptian border and the characteristic petty statism that it
brought in its train was deferred for two centuries.
With the beginning of the 18t century B.C.E., the political geography of the Asiatic Near East can for the first time be rendered with reasonable accuracy, and many previously blank
spots filled in. This was a period of intense commercial and
diplomatic activity, punctuated by military campaigns and
sieges conducted at considerable distances from home. The
fortuitous recovery of archives from many diverse sites reveals
a host of geographic names, and many of these can be approximately located, or even identified with archaeological sites,
with the help of occasional itineraries. Such itineraries were
guides to travelers or, more often, records of their journeys or
of campaigns, comparable to the War of the four kings against
the five in Genesis 14, by marauding armies, and come closest
to maps in the absence of any real cartography.
No small-scale map can, of course, show all the minor
vassal and petty states in all their complexity. Even the larger
84
mesopotamia
reigns and an unbroken succession passing smoothly from
father to son. In 1793, the succession of this first dynasty of
Babylon (also known simply as the Amorite Dynasty) passed
to *Hammurapi (17921750). Hammurapi was one of the great
rulers of history, a man of personal genius and vision who left
an indelible impress on all his heirs.
At first Hammurapis prospects seemed anything but favorable. A celebrated Mari letter phrased his situation in classic terms: There is no king who is all-powerful by himself:
ten or 15 kings follow in the train of Hammurapi of Babylon,
as many follow Rm-Sin of Larsa, as many follow Ibal-p-El
of Eshnunna, as many follow Amut-p-El of Qatna, and 20
kings follow in the train of Yarim-lim of Yamh ad (G. Dossin, Syria 19 [1938], 10526). A lesser personality would have
fallen victim to the struggles between these and other major
powers of the time, but by an adroit alternation of warfare and
diplomacy, Hammurapi succeeded where others had failed.
He maintained the friendship of Rm-Sin until his 30t year,
when, in defeating him, he fell heir as well to all that Larsa had
conquered. He avoided challenging Shamshi-Adad, another
older contemporary, but defeated his successor two years after
disposing of Rm-Sin. Three years later, he conquered Mari,
where Zimri-Lim had reestablished a native dynasty after the
Assyrian defeat. Eshnunna and the lesser states across the Tigris fell to Hammurapis armies before the end of his reign, and
only the powerful kingdoms beyond the Euphrates-notably
Yamh ad and Qatna escaped his clutches. He was a zealous
administrator, and his concern for every detail of domestic
policy is well documented in his surviving correspondence. He
is most famous for his collection of laws which, in the manner
initiated by Ur-Namma of Ur, and elaborated in the interval at
Isin (Code of Lipit-Ishtar) and Eshnunna, collected instructive legal precedents as a monument to The King of Justice.
That was the name he gave to the stelae inscribed with the laws
which were erected in Babylon and, no doubt, in other cities
of his kingdom. Fragments of several, including a well-preserved one, were carried off centuries later as booty to Susa,
where they were rediscovered in modern times; some of the
missing portions can be restored from later copies prepared in
the scribal schools, where the laws of Hammurapi, recognized
as classic, were copied and studied for over a thousand years
more. Framed in a hymnic prologue that catalogued his conquests, and an epilogue that stressed his concern for justice,
the laws do not constitute a real code. They are not noticeably
adhered to in the innumerable contracts and records of litigation from this and subsequent reigns. However, they remain
the starting point for the understanding of Babylonian and all
Near Eastern legal ideals. Many of their individual formulations, as well as their overall arrangement, are paralleled by
the casuistic legislation of Exodus and Deuteronomy.
It is important, in spite of all this, to see Hammurapis
achievement in its proper perspective. His reunification of
Mesopotamia, consummated at the end of his reign, survived him by only a few years. His son and successor had to
surrender much of the new empire before he had ruled more
85
mesopotamia
Hittite kingdom into several generations of turmoil and weakness. The immediate beneficiaries of the sack of Babylon were
rather the rulers of the Sealand, who moved north from their
independent stronghold in the old Sumerian south and, in the
wake of the withdrawing Hittites, seized Babylon for themselves and thus qualified for inclusion in the Babylonian King
List as the Second Dynasty of Babylon. However, their occupation, too, was destined to be transitory: within a couple of
years the city was occupied by the Kassites, who moved downstream from their foothold in the Kingdom of Hana on the
Middle Euphrates. With their arrival in Babylonia proper, a
curtain of silence descended over the documentation from
that area; for the first time since the invention of writing, there
is a nearly total eclipse of cuneiform textual evidence, and for
the rest of the 16t century, the Asiatic Near East was plunged
into a true dark age.
In the meantime the Amorite kingdoms of the Mediterranean littoral also reacted to the stirrings set in motion by the
Hittites. Cut off from their kinsmen in the east, they evolved
distinct variations of the common cultural traditions. In the
north, these crystallized around *Ugarit, a strategically located center of commerce and industry which was also a seat
of learning. It devised an alphabet with an order of letters ancestral to, and essentially identical with, the order of the letters of the Hebrew and Western alphabets. Using this script,
Ugarit produced a rich religious and mythological literature,
with many features that show up later in biblical poetry. Further south, the biblical corpus itself enshrined much of the
common heritage in the distinctive medium of the Hebrew
language and Israelite conceptions.
The map of the Near East presented a very different appearance in 1500 than it had 300 years earlier. In place of numerous small and medium-sized Amorite states, a few large nonSemitic royal houses now ruled the Fertile Crescent with the
help of a nobility based on the ability to maintain horses,
equipment, and retainers. The indigenous Semitic population
was, at least for the time being, reduced either to the status of a
semi-free peasantry or to that of roving mercenaries. A parallel
may nonetheless be drawn with the earlier situation, for just
as geography seemed to favor Shamshi-Adad I at the beginning of the 18t century, so now it served to favor a kingdom
similarly centered in the triangle formed by the tributaries of
the Khabur River in Upper Mesopotamia. Somewhere in this
Khabur Triangle, at a site still not rediscovered, lay the city
of Washukkanni, capital of an empire which stretched clear
across northern Mesopotamia from the Mediterranean in the
west to beyond the Tigris in the east. The empire, called Mitanni, was headed by a small aristocratic ruling class whose
names identify them as Indo-Aryans, i.e., as the western
branch of a migration that was at the same time overflowing
India. They invoked Indian deities and perfected the raising of horses and horse racing, employing in part an IndoAryan terminology. (For hesitations about the Indo-Euro-
86
mesopotamia
ably recovering the surviving remnants of Sumerian learning
(both scholars and texts) that had found refuge there at the
time of the sack of Babylon. Under Kurigalzu I they built a
great new administrative capital named Fortress of Kurigalzu
(Dur-Kurigalzu) in the strategic narrow waist of the valley,
dominated by a traditional stepped tower (ziggurat), the best
preserved example of its kind from within Mesopotamia. They
adjusted their northern frontiers with varying fortunes in occasional battles with the emerging Assyrians, and one of their
15t-century kings even met on friendly terms with Pharaoh
Thutmose III on the Euphrates. They evolved an essentially
feudal society, which secured, while at the same time diluting, the royal power through grants of land and remission of
taxes to favored retainers. But by and large they were content
to depend on their inherited Babylonian prestige in order to
seek a place for themselves in the shifting kaleidoscope of Late
Bronze international relations.
This prestige had, in some sense, never been higher.
Throughout the Near East, the cuneiform script was being
put to use in one form or another, and Akkadian was becoming the language of international diplomacy. In order to master the Akkadian script and language, scribal schools arose
as far away as Anatolia and Egypt, and their curriculum followed to some degree the Babylonian model. A fragment of
the Gilgamesh Epic, found at *Megiddo, indicates that this
was true also of Palestine. Many of the great scribal families
of later Babylonia traced their ancestry to Kassite times, and
it was probably at this time that the major works of cuneiform literature were put into their canonical form. Thus it was
through the patronage of Kassite overlords, and the mediating role of the Hurrians (see above), that traditional SumeroAkkadian literature and learning spread far and wide from
its ancestral home.
In the West, meantime, military and political hegemony
was also passing out of the hands of Semitic-speaking peoples.
A new dynasty of Theban rulers, the 18t, had succeeded by
the middle of the 16t century in driving the *Hyksos (largely
consisting of Amorite elements) from Egypt and reuniting the
country. Thutmose III (14901436) carried Egyptian arms as
far as the Euphrates and reduced all the intervening city-states
to vassalage. His greatest victory was won on the very first
campaign, when he defeated the armies of the Asiatics, combined, if not exactly united, under the prince of Kadesh (better; Kedesh), at the great battle of Megiddo, the first Armageddon (the graecized form of Har Megiddo, hill of Megiddo).
With Retenu, as the Egyptians called Palestine and Southern
Syria, firmly in his grasp, Thutmose III even challenged the
armies of Mitanni and eventually extracted a treaty that recognized a common frontier running between Hama and Qatna (c. 1448). His successors continued to maintain the Asiatic empire by repeated incursions into Palestine and Syria to
receive the submission of loyal vassal princes and secure that
of the recalcitrant ones. Sporadic finds of cuneiform tablets
from Palestine (Taanach, Gezer) seem to include royal exhortations to this effect.
Thus the subjection of the indigenous Amorites was completed before the end of the 15t century throughout the Near
East. There was, however, one exception to this rule. Since
the emergence of the Amorites, cuneiform texts from very diverse regions had begun to make mention of a group of people
called *H abiru with ever increasing frequency until, by the
15t century, they appear in texts from all over the Near East.
On philological grounds, these H abiru can be conclusively
equated with the Apiru of the Egyptian texts and less likely,
with the Hebrews of the Bible. Their name was explained, tellingly if not scientifically, as meaning robbers, dusty ones, or
migrants, respectively. These H abiru were thus not an ethnic but a social entity: though largely of Amorite stock, they
constituted that portion of the population unwilling to submit to Amorite rule or, subsequently and more particularly,
to that of their nonsemitic conquerors. Instead they chose
to serve as roving mercenaries under successive masters, or,
alternatively, to band together in order to impose their own
rule in areas beyond the reach of the various imperial armies.
The latter was particularly true of the wooded hill country of
Syria and Palestine.
There they maintained a tenacious and much maligned
independence even while the great powers were dividing up
the cleared lowlands.
87
mesopotamia
Ashur. Ashur was the name of the god held in special reverence
by the Assyrians, and of the ancient city built by his worshipers
on the Tigris. For a thousand years before Ashur-uballit s accession, the city had been ruled by a long succession of foreign
masters as a minor province, in succession, of the great empires
of Akkad, Ur, Eshnunna, Shubat-Enlil, and Washukkanni.
In all this millennium, Ashur had enjoyed the status of
an independent city-state only once, in the brief interlude following the fall of Ur (c. 20001850). At that time its citizens
displayed their vitality by their extensive and sophisticated
trading operations deep into Anatolia; many thousands of
Cappadocian tablets, inscribed in the Old Assyrian dialect,
have left an enduring record of this trade. However, even in
periods of political subservience, the Assyrians maintained
a clear sense of their own identity. Foreign rulers were given
native genealogies or, by an equally pious fiction, local governors were elevated to royal status by the later historiography.
The Assyrian historians should not, however, be accused of
willful distortion; rather, they were giving formal expression
to a very real sense of continuity which centered on the worship of Ashur, the deity from whom their city took its name.
They thus provide an instructive parallel to the Israelite experience as canonized in the Bible. In both instances, it was
the reality of an unbroken religious tradition which permitted
an ethnic group to lay claim to the memories or monuments
surviving from the Middle Bronze Age and to link them to
later political institutions.
In Assyria, these institutions got their chance when Mitannian power began to collapse in the middle of the 14t century, under the combined impact of Hittite pressure and the
progressive disengagement from Asiatic affairs by the Egyptian pharaohs of the Amarna period, since Egypt, as the principal ally of Mitanni, was the only effective counterweight to
Suppiluliumas ambitions. Ashur-uballit took advantage of the
situation to throw off the Hurrian overlordship of Mitanni.
Disdaining that of Kassite Babylonia which claimed to have
inherited it, he began to negotiate on a footing of equality with
all the great powers of his time, as well as to show the Assyrian
mettle in battle, chiefly with the Kassites. Indeed, the fortunes
of Assyria and Babylonia were henceforth closely linked; dynastic intermarriages and treaties alternated with breaches of
peace and adjustments of the common border in favor of the
victor. A synchronistic king list recorded these contacts in the
first systematic attempt to correlate the histories of two discrete states before the Book of Kings (which made the same
attempt for the Divided Monarchy). This synchronistic style
was cultivated by the Assyrian historians along with other historical genres, while the court poets created a whole cycle of
epics celebrating the triumphs over the Kassites. The Assyrian
kings, portrayed in heroic proportions, figured as peerless protagonists of the latter, and generally claimed the upper hand
in these encounters. However, a deep-seated respect for the
older culture and religion of Babylonia, which they regarded
as ancestral to their own, constrained them from following
up on their advantage at first.
88
mesopotamia
Further south, the Canaanite (or Amorite) population of Canaan displaced by the *Philistines meanwhile encountered the
Israelites, while further to the east, the waning dynasty of the
Kassites finally succumbed to Aramean and other pressures
by 1157 B.C.E. Thus in the short span of a century, the Near
East took on a wholly new aspect, and new protagonists were
to rule its destinies in the Iron Age.
the early iron age (c. 1200750 b.c.e.)
For several centuries, the political history of Babylonia and
Assyria after 1200 had little noticeable impact beyond the borders of Mesopotamia, and cannot, therefore, claim the attention of historians in the same measure as earlier periods, some
of which contribute in crucial ways to our understanding of
all history. The international power vacuum of the time enabled the rise and consolidation of the smaller Levantine polities including Israel and Judah. Occasional royal figures stand
out for specific achievements; their names, in consequence,
were copied by later kings and thus in some cases passed into
the Bible. *Merodach-Baladan I (11731161), for example, was
the last Kassite king who still exercised effective control over
Babylonia; a considerable number of boundary stones (kudurrus) attest to the vitality of the land which characterized this
dynastys relations to its feudal retainers. Nebuchadnezzar I
(112403) was the outstanding ruler of the Second Dynasty of
Isin which succeeded the Kassites in Babylonia. He is generally
thought to have retrieved the statue of Marduk from captivity
(see above), elevated Marduk to his role as undisputed head
of the Babylonian pantheon, and commissioned the so-called
Epic of Creation (Enuma eli), actually a hymnic exaltation of
Marduk, often cited for its parallels to the biblical versions of
creation, though in fact more nearly relevant to the exaltation
of the God of Israel in the Song of the Sea (Ex. 15).
His younger Assyrian contemporary, Tiglath-Pileser I
(c. 11151077), was a worthy adversary who reestablished Assyrias military reputation and, while respecting the common
frontier with Babylonia in the south, and holding off the warlike mountaineers on Assyrias eastern and northern borders,
laid the foundations for her manifest destiny expansion to
the west. An Assyrian campaign down the Tigris to the Babylonian frontier and then up the Euphrates and Khabur rivers to rejoin the Tigris north of Ashur had become an annual
event by the time of Tukulti-Ninurta II (890884); the petty
chieftains of the Arameo-Hittite lands west of Assyria learned
to expect swift retribution if they did not pay the tribute exacted on these expeditions. The calculated frightfulness of
Ashurnas irpal II (883859) was graphically impressed on his
visiting vassals by the reliefs he carved on the walls of his new
palace at Kalhu (biblical Calah).
Under Shalmaneser III (858824), the Assyrian policy
took on all the earmarks of a grand design. The repeated hammer blows of his armies were directed with an almost singleminded dedication and persistence against Assyrias western
neighbors and brought about the first direct contact between
Assyria and Israel. The battle of *Karkar in 853 pitted ShalmaENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
89
mesopotamia
native sources themselves as ushering in the Mesopotamian
revival. The scribes of Babylon inaugurated a reform of the
calendar which systematized the intercalation of a 13t month,
on the basis of astronomical calculation rather than observation, seven times in every 19 years, according to the so-called
Metonic cycle; taken over later by the Jews, it continues as the
basis of the Jewish lunisolar calendar to the present. Babylonia
was by now divided largely between urbanized Chaldeans and
still mainly rural Arameans, and since the Chaldeans soon became the principal experts of Babylonian astronomy, the very
word *Chaldean came to be equated with astronomer, sage
in Hebrew (Dan. 2:2), Aramaic (Dan. passim), and Greek.
These astronomers now began to keep monthly diaries listing celestial observations together with fluctuations in such
matters as commodity prices, river levels, and the weather,
as well as occasional political events. Perhaps on the basis of
the last, they also created a valuable new historiographic record, the Babylonian Chronicle, into which they entered the
outstanding events of each year. In the Ptolemaic Canon, the
Nabonassar Era was recognized as a turning point in the
history of science by Hellenistic astronomy. Nonetheless, Nabonassar himself was but a minor figure. When he enlisted the
help of his greater Assyrian contemporary Tiglath-Pileser III
(744727) in his struggles against both Chaldeans and Arameans, the step proved as fateful as did that of *Ahaz of Judah
(735716; sole ruler 731716) against the Syro-Ephraimite coalition. Tiglath-Pileser III was a usurper, the beneficiary of
still another palace revolt that had unseated his weak predecessor. He and his first two successors changed the whole
balance of power in the Near East, destroying Israel among
many other states, and reducing the rest, including Judah, to
vassalage. They found Assyria in a difficult, even desperate,
military and economic situation, but during the next 40 years
they recovered and consolidated its control of all its old territories and reestablished it firmly as the preeminent military
and economic power in the Near East. Only the outlines of
the process can be given here.
Tiglath-Pilesers first great campaign against the West
(743738) involved organizing the nearer Syrian provinces under Assyrian administration, regulating the succession to the
kings liking in a middle tier of states, and waging war against
the more distant ones. The semiautonomous Assyrian proconsulates were broken up into smaller administrative units,
and their governors thereby deprived of the virtually sovereign power which the interval of royal weakness had allowed
them to assume. The Urartians were conclusively driven out
of northern Syria, and the northern and eastern frontiers were
pacified (737735). The second great campaign to the west
(734732) was in response to Judahs call for help according to
II Kings 16:7 (cf. II Chron. 28:16) and reduced Israel to a mere
fraction of its former size as more and more of the coastal and
Transjordanian lands were incorporated in the growing empire or reduced to vassalage. If Israel was allowed to remain a
vassal for now, it was because the kings attention was briefly
diverted by the rebellion of Nabu-mukin-zeri (Mukin-zeri) in
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hand, by such marvels of civil engineering as Sennacheribs
aqueduct at Jerwan and, on the other, by the greatly increased
attention to administrative matters reflected in the growing
amount of royal correspondence. Literature and learning too
came into their own, and the vast library assembled by Ashurbanipal at Nineveh is only the most dramatic expression of
the new leisure.
The new Pax Assyriaca was, of course, not unbroken
by military campaigns. Sennacheribs unsuccessful siege of
Jerusalem in 701 is well known from both the Assyrian and
biblical accounts (II Kings 18:1319:37; Isa. 3637). His generals campaigned against Cilicia and Anatolia (696695), while
his successor Esarhaddon (680669) is perhaps most famous
for his conquest of Egypt. Esarhaddon had succeeded to the
throne in the troubled times following his fathers assassination (cf. II Kings 19:37; Isa. 37:38), and was determined to secure a smoother succession for his own sons. The vassals of
the empire were therefore forced to swear to abide by his arrangements, and the treaties to this effect, excavated at Calah,
have proved a new key to the understanding of Deuteronomy.
The kings planning at first bore fruit, and for 17 years his designated successors ruled the empire side by side, Ashurbanipal from Nineveh and Shamash-shum-uk-m from Babylon.
However, in 652, war broke out between the two brothers. After four years of bloody warfare, Ashurbanipal emerged victorious, but at a heavy price. The Pax Assyriaca had been irreparably broken, and the period of Assyrian greatness was
over. The last 40 years of Assyrian history were marked by
constant warfare in which Assyria, in spite of occasional successes, was on the defensive. At the same time the basis for
a Babylonian resurgence was being laid even before the final
Assyrian demise.
Ashurbanipal had installed a certain Kandalanu as loyal
ruler in Babylon after crushing his brothers rebellion. When
this regent died in 627, however, Babylonia was without any
recognized ruler for a year. Then the throne was seized by
Nabopolassar (625605), who established a new dynasty, generally known as the neo-Babylonian, or Chaldean dynasty.
Although the Assyrian military machine continued to be a
highly effective instrument for almost 20 years, Nabopolassar successfully defended Babylonias newly won independence and, with the help of the Medes and of *Josiah of Judah
(639609), finally eliminated Assyria itself. The complete annihilation of the Assyrian capitals Nineveh, Calah, Ashur,
Dur-Sharrukin between 615 and 612 is attested in part by the
Babylonian Chronicle and even more tellingly in the contemporaneous world can still be measured in the prophecies of
*Nahum, and possibly of *Zephaniah. Only Egypt remained
loyal to Assyria, and Pharaoh Necos efforts to aid the last
remnants of Assyrian power at Haran under Ashur-uballit II
(611609) were seriously impaired by Josiah at Megiddo in
609. The last Assyrian king fled Haran in the same year, and
Assyrian history came to a sudden end.
Four years later, the Battle of *Carchemish (605) consolidated the Babylonian success with a defeat of the Egyptians
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as a self-imposed exile of the king by later legend. The Book of
*Daniel associates this sojourn of seven years (or, in the cuneiform sources, ten years) in the desert with Nabonidus more
famous predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar, but new finds from
Qumran show that other Jewish traditions linked it with the
correct king. In any case, his sojourn in Arabia was resented
by the population of Babylon, and the veneration of Sin there
and at Haran and Ur was regarded as a veritable betrayal of
Marduk, the national deity. Led by the Marduk priesthood,
Babylon turned against Belshazzar, the son whom Nabonidus
had left behind at the capital, and delivered the city into the
waiting hands of Cyrus the Persian. In a bloodless conquest
(539), he assumed control of all of Babylonia and rang down
the curtain on the last native Akkadian state.
ASSYRIOLOGY
Assyriology in its widest sense is the scientific study of all
those civilizations which employed one or another of the cuneiform scripts; defined more narrowly, it is the study of the
languages, literature, and history of ancient Babylonia and
Assyria. Because the earliest documents were found in excavations in Assyria (northern Iraq), the discipline received the
name Assyriology. The native language of both Assyria and
Babylonia (southern Iraq) was Akkadian, with Assyrian and
Babylonian referring to the respective dialects.
early explorations of cuneiform sites
The collapse of the Assyrian and Babylonian civilization was
so complete that its cities and remains were either wiped off
the earth or buried under it, and its peoples, art, languages,
and writings were erased from the memory of history. The
very names of its cities, rulers, and gods were forgotten except
in sundry local traditions, in the neglected works of Arab geographers, and in scattered and garbled allusions in the Bible
and in Greek literature. Only the finds of modern archaeology have been able to reveal the character, achievements, and
enormous contribution of this civilization and its great contribution to the civilizations that came after it.
In 1842, the first English and French expeditions began a determined search for the lost cities and treasures of Mesopotamia that occupied the next four decades. Its most conspicuous
successes were scored in the northeastern part of the country, ancient Assyria, and the whole field of study thus newly
opened soon acquired the name of Assyriology. The first
spectacular discoveries were made at Khorsabad, where PaulEmile Botta excavated D-r-Sharrukin, the great capital city
built by *Sargon II of Assyria at the end of the eighth century
B.C.E. (184344) The paintings and drawings made in situ by
E. Flandin for Bottas five magnificent volumes (184950), and
the original sculptures with which the Louvre opened its Assyrian Gallery in 1847 opened Western eyes to the grandeurs
of Assyrian archaeology. From 1852 to 1855, Victor Place resumed the French efforts at Dur-Sharrukin. In the meantime
Until the 1870s, impressive results were not had from the archaeological investigation of the southern half of Mesopotamia. However, in 1877 Ernest de Sarzec began to unearth
Lagash (Tellh) The mound of the tablets, and by 1900 he
had laid bare a whole new civilization whose very existence,
adumbrated by the Assyrian tablets, had until then been a matter of dispute: the Sumerian civilization. These excavations and
those which succeeded them helped to bring to light a whole
new millennium in human history. American excavations at
Nippur, meanwhile (18891900), uncovered the religious capital and center of learning of the Sumerians, with a library rivaling that of Ashurbanipal in importance, and antedating it
by more than a thousand years. The origin of the Sumerians
is unknown, and their non-Semitic language seems to have no
affinities with other known languages. Other Babylonian expeditions before World War I identified numerous other ancient
sites apart from Babylon, such as Sippar, Borsippa, Shuruppak,
Adab, and Kish. Improvements in stratigraphic techniques
in the field and the cumulative evidence of the inscriptional
finds permitted the gradual construction of a chronological
sequence and the recognition of certain significant cultural
epochs. The extensive French excavations at Susa in Elam,
begun in 1897, also proved significant, for this ancient capital
of Elam was for millennia a faithful mirror of Mesopotamian
influences, and the repository of some of its most precious
booty, notably the Stele of *Hammurapi. inscribed with his
laws. The American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 led to wide-
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mesopotamia
spread looting, illegal sale of antiquities, and the destruction
of significant elements of the archaeological record.
trends and prospects
New centers and new names have contributed their share to
postwar Assyriology. American influence has been strongest
in the lexical field, with Benno *Landsberger and the Oriental Institute at Chicago leading the way (Materialien zum
sumerischen Lexicon, and The Assyrian Dictionary (almost
complete in 2005), and the recovery of Sumerian Literature
by S.N. Kramer and Thorkild Jacobsen. Vigorous studies
are also being pursued in the homelands of the cuneiform
sources, notably Turkey and Iraq. There are very active centers in Germany, France, and Italy, and also in Austria, Holland, Finland, and Israel.
Substantial syntheses of the materials already recovered
are likely to occupy the attention of most Assyriologists for
some time to come. In textual terms, such syntheses include
(1) critical editions of literary or canonical compositions;
(2) tabular compendia of the data contained in economic or
archival tablets, using computer technology where necessary
to cope with the large numbers of texts and entries; (3) new
editions of the historical, religious, and votive texts of all periods and areas, together with the monuments on which they
are found, to serve as a sound basis for the chronological outline on which all other historical judgments must rest. When
these three fundamental syntheses have been achieved, the
way will be open for the modern interpretation of the cuneiform evidence and its full integration into the record of human achievement.
[William W. Hallo]
LAW
cuneiform law
The term cuneiform law has usually been understood to denote the legal practice, and the records bearing on that practice, in those cultures or political entities in the Ancient Near
East that used Sumerian or Akkadian cuneiform as their
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written medium. Taken in this sense, the realm of cuneiform
law embraces not only the heartland of the cuneiform world,
that is, ancient Sumer, Babylonia, and Assyria, but also the
Elamite territory to the east of the Mesopotamian plain, the
Syrian coast, and its immediate hinterlands from northern
Syria down to Palestine, and especially the Hittite Empire
which included practically all of Asia Minor. It must not be
thought that these territories together constituted a homogeneous area in which a fairly uniform type of legal structure
was in force. The homogeneity consists rather of the uniformity, or near uniformity, of a literary tradition that began in
the scribal schools of southern Mesopotamia and spread with
time to all the territories which are included in the definition
of cuneiform culture. In all the areas thus named, cuneiform
was employed as the regular written medium, at least for some
period of time between 3000 and 300 B.C.E.
In the Ancient Near East the notion of law was inseparable and virtually indistinguishable from justice and the judicial process, and the idea of law suggested to the Mesopotamian mind- and, more or less, to the consciousness of all the
peoples of the Ancient Near East violations of existing obligations, including obligations to the state and society as well
as private (i.e., civil) ones, but not the obligations themselves,
insofar as the Mesopotamians did not think in terms of law
in the context of specific regulatory institutions. The documentary sources from which knowledge of cuneiform law
may be derived are to be divided into a number of categories.
Primary among them are the large number of private records
of judicial cases which were heard in, and adjudicated by, the
courts. These cover many kinds of incidents and situations,
most of which fall within the realm of property law. Litigations, as far as they are preserved, deal primarily with the disposition of family property and suits which may arise among
members of a family or between two families over rightful
ownership of certain real estate or other property. Contracts
between individuals concerning sale, rental, and marriage and
adoption agreements also constitute an important category
for knowledge of cuneiform law. Here, too, the topic for the
most part is property. A lesser number of documents fall into
the category of private legal records, such as litigations concerned with matters that may be designated as private torts
or crimes, which ought preferably to be subsumed under the
more generic name, wrongs. For the present purpose, wrongs
may be understood as invasions against persons or property
by someone who held no prior claim or right against the victim or the object of this action. Punishments for such acts are
not distinguished in terms of the category of the act itself, but
rather in terms of the degree of seriousness of the offense or
the amount of aggravating circumstances involved in it and
could vary all the way from the requirement of simple restitution or pecuniary fine to the capital penalty.
Cuneiform private and public correspondence includes
references to judicial or quasi-judicial acts that have a bearing on the practice of law in ancient Mesopotamia. The correspondence of private persons very often contains reports
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mesopotamia
penalty is most often meted out for sexual offenses (E. Good,
Stanford Law Review 19 (1967), 94777).
Wherever the law corpora treat homicide and bodily
injuries in any detail, it is evident that they distinguished between premeditated acts, non-intentional acts, accident, and
negligence, the penalties increasing in direct proportion to the
degree of guilt, with injuries or deaths which are the result of
negligence regarded as more serious than accidental or even
non-intentional acts. Homicide resulting from negligence
such as faulty house-building that caused the death of an occupant, was treated as a serious offense, and could bring the
death penalty to the builder or a member of his family. However, the owner of a dangerous animal such as a goring ox was
subject only to pecuniary damages. Talionic punishments (an
eye for an eye) appear to have been an innovation in the Laws
of Hammurapi, since the earlier corpora prescribe only pecuniary damages for injuries resulting from assault and battery.
Even in LH the talionic penalty was limited to assaults upon
the upper classes, which is an indication that such actions
were viewed more gravely than similar acts against the lower
classes. However, it should be stressed that talionic punishments and penalties of physical mutilation are rarely attested
in documents referring to actual cases, and very likely were
hardly ever resorted to. The victim of an eye gouging would
have in most cases preferred monetary compensation. The talionic rules in the biblical law collections are probably equally
to be viewed as an ideal principle of justice and equity. The
non-talionic laws of Ur-Namma 1822 (M. Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor (1995), 19) permit a
rich man to maim anyone so long as he pays the stipulated
fines. The talionic punishments subject the offender to physical punishment.
An offense may be termed criminal when it is viewed as
inimical to the well-being of the society as a whole and when
the sanction is imposed by the public authority and not necessarily in the interest of any private party who may have been
directly injured by the offending act. A religious offense, if
subject to regular and predictable sanction, was thus a criminal offense. According to these criteria, sorcery is a criminal
offense. It is already so treated in LH, which prescribes the penalty of death by drowning (i.e., through the river ordeal) and
can be traced through LH, AL, HL, and finally in biblical law.
Blasphemy and sedition, and insurrection appear to constitute
another group of offenses treated early as criminal, e.g., AL 2
(blasphemy and sedition by a woman), and HL 2:173 (opposing the decision of the crown and the elders). The character
of the offense in the example from HL is clearly indicated by
the inclusion in the same paragraph of the case of the slave
who rebels against his master. This, in turn, indicates that the
offense of the wife in LH 143, for which she was to be cast into
the water, involved some overt act of disloyalty to her husband
in addition to profligacy, and from this it may be assumed a
fortiori that similar acts of disloyalty or sedition against the
crown or the religious order were dealt with in Babylonia with
at least equal severity.
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which some aspect is to be invoked in the particular instance
where the s imdatum is alluded to. When a text refers to the
s imdatum of the king the phrase is to be understood in the
broad sense as, e.g., the laws of the crown, of the realm of
which the particular reigning monarch is only the guardian,
not the author.
Finally, there occurs frequently in legal contexts the term
marum or marum; it denotes the quality of equity or balance, equilibrium and, hence, justice. The achievement
and maintenance of this balance is viewed as the primary
function and duty of the king. The periodic royal decrees and
edicts which are sometimes referred to as marum acts are
specific measures directed towards this end. In different periods and different reigns the content of these measures would
vary in accordance with the immediate situation. Hence the
name marum edict does not describe a measure of a specific or fixed content, but is something of an epithet attached
to measures announced by the king, usually early in his reign,
which are designed to remedy particular economic imbalances, and which thereby seek to assure the populace that
the new ruler has truly dedicated himself to the advancement
and maintenance of justice. These measures entailed cancellation of certain types of debts, release from certain kinds of
tenant obligations, and freedom from servitude for debt. Not
all obligations were cancelled for all the people on such occasions, but the edict specified the classes of persons, cities,
and types of obligations which were to be affected by each act.
References to such acts are found in the year-dates of the rulers of the Old Babylonian period, but to date only two texts
are known which are devoted to the specific measures that
such royal pronouncements entailed. These are the edicts of
Samsu-iluna (c. 1750 B.C.E.), Hammurapis son and successor,
and of Ammi-s aduqa (c. 1650 B.C.E.), the fourth successor to
the throne in Babylon after Hammurapi, and next-to-the-last
of the line. It must be kept in mind that such edicts were directed by the promulgating authority to the immediate situation only, and were in no way intended to become the permanent law of the land. Nor was there any rule which dictated
the issue of such decrees at regular intervals, or for having the
provisions contained in them take effect automatically at such
times, as was the case of the biblical rules for the *Sabbatical
year and the Jubilee.
One might conclude by characterizing law in ancient
Mesopotamia as being essentially a congeries of local customary systems, which kings periodically attempted to make uniform or reform for administrative efficiency. These attempts,
however, were at best of limited effectiveness even at the time
of their promulgation. Doubt may even be raised concerning
the degree to which the so-called lawgiver intended to have his
precepts enforced and whether he disposed of a bureaucracy
that was really capable of assuring such enforcement. These
law codes, however, remain of prime historical value as an index to the morals, ethical notions, and institutions prevailing
at the time of their publication.
LITERATURE
[Jacob Finkelstein]
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reads, as does the writing on a printed English page, from left
to right on the line, the lines running from the top of the page
downwards. There are indications, however, that cuneiform
writing once read from top to bottom and then, column for
column, from right to left. The tablets when inscribed were
usually allowed to dry naturally, occasionally, if durability
was of the essence, they were baked at a high temperature to
hard ceramic.
Except for a few excerpts in ancient classical writers from
a book by the Babylonian priest Berossus, nothing at all was
known either about cuneiform or the literature written in it
until explorations and excavations beginning shortly before
1800 C.E. focused attention on the cultural treasures that lay
hidden in the ruined city mounds of Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia, which corresponds to present-day Iraq, was in antiquity
divided into a northern part, Assyria, and a southern part,
Babylonia, also called Karduniash or Chaldea. The border between them ran approximately east-west a little above modern Baghdad. In still earlier times, Babylonia too was divided
into a northern part, Akkad, and a southern part, Sumer, the
dividing line running east-west a little above Nippur. Reliable copies of cuneiform inscriptions had been brought back
by Carsten Niebuhr, only survivor of a Danish expedition in
1767 C.E. In 1802 C.E. a young German teacher, Grotefend,
made the first substantial advance in decipherment of the
difficult script. He was followed by the Englishman Rawlinson, who independently had reached conclusions similar to
Grotefends. With Rawlinson, the Irish scholar Hincks should
be mentioned. Around 1860 C.E. the decipherment was essentially achieved.
Of the greatest importance, both for the help it proved in
the decipherment and for the interest it created in wider circles, was the fortunate fact that English excavations at Nineveh
came upon the remnants of a great library collected around
600 C.E. by one of the last Assyrian kings, Ashurbanipal. Historical texts from this library, as well as inscriptions found in
other Assyrian palaces, threw new light upon personages and
events dealt with in the Bible: occasionally Assyrian words
would help the understanding of a difficult biblical idiom and,
most striking of all, a story about the Deluge, remarkably similar to the biblical account, was among the finds.
Unfortunately, the importance of the tablet find did not
immediately dawn on the excavators, so no efforts were made
to keep together fragments that were found together; rather
everything was simply dumped in baskets. As a result, scholars to this day are hard at work piecing fragments of Ashurbanipals library together, and the finding of a new join is a
source of great joy and satisfaction.
The content of the library was rich and varied, ranging from literary works in the strict sense of belles-lettres, to
handbook literature codifying the knowledge of the times in
various arts, sciences, and pseudo-sciences. Of particular importance for the decipherment were the lexical texts found.
They gave precious information about how the multi-value
cuneiform signs could be read. They also contained gram-
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Sumerian literature
General Character
The earliest evidence of writing from Mesopotamia or indeed from anywhere dates back to around the middle of the
fourth millennium B.C.E. to the period known variously as the
Protoliterate period or Uruk IV. Before this, however, literature doubtlessly existed in Mesopotamia in oral form, and as
such it probably continued alongside written literature for long
spans of time. The uses of writing were from the beginning
those of aiding memory and of organizing complex data, as
is well illustrated by the two genres that comprise the earliest
written materials: sign lists and accounts. In time, new genres
evolved from these genres: lexical texts, derived from sign lists;
contracts and boundary stones, derived from accounts of gifts
that accompanied a legal agreement to serve as a testimony to
it; and, as a new departure, monumental inscriptions: votive
and building inscriptions; and the letter, originally, as shown
by its form, an aide-mmoire for the messenger delivering it
as an oral message.
The use of writing as a means to organize and remember
data underlies such genres as date lists and king lists. However, it is quite late that this power to organize complex data is
fully utilized, with the creation of canonical series and handbooks, a development which begins in Old Babylonian Times
and culminates in the Kassite period around the middle of the
second millennium B.C.E.
mesopotamia
The oral literature, in the meantime, while continuing
in its own medium, must gradually have explored the possibilities of using writing as an aid in memorizing. While the
innately written genres were, as has been seen, in general oriented toward serving as reminders and organizing data, the
genres which originated as oral genres, and only secondarily
took written form, had as a whole a different aim. A magical
aspect may be distinguished in oral literature, retained in its
pure form in the genre of incantation, where the spoken word
is meant to call into actual existence that which it expresses;
the more vivid the incantation, the more effective it is, a fact
which accounts for its being cast in literary, or even poetic,
language and form. The incantation was the province of a
professional performer, the incantation priest (Sum. mama,
Akk. aipu). A very similar magical purpose also seems to
underlie other genres rooted in oral tradition. Myth, epic,
and hymns to gods, temples, and kings, all had the purpose
of praising somebody or something, and in so doing as in a
blessing of enhancing or calling into being in the object of
the praise, the virtues ascribed to it. This magical dimension
of praise can still be seen to be very much alive in the short
hymns of praise or blessings spoken by the incantation priest
to the various materials he uses in his magical ritual, the socalled Kultmittelgebete, blessings intended to call up in these
materials the powers and virtues attributed to them in the
blessing. The praise takes in myths and epics the form of narrative presentations of great deeds of gods and heroes, originally, seemingly, to achieve by presenting them a vitalizing of
the power to which they testify. In hymns, the praise usually
takes the more static form of description of great qualities.
The praise genres were the province of a professional
performer, the bard, Sumerian nar, Akkadian nru, who sang
to the accompaniment of a small lyre-like instrument held in
the hand. The basic character of the myths, epics, and hymns
he recited is indicated by the standard ending for them found
over and over again; zag-m NN, Praise be NN where NN is
the name of the god, hero, or temple sung about. On the basis of the praise it offered up, the lyre was also called zag-m,
praise. The bard (nar) was a cherished member of the court
of the Sumerian ruler and is depicted reciting at royal banquets, on monuments from around the middle of the Early
Dynastic Period.
A praise of a special kind was the lament, the praise of
values lost. The lament genre may plausibly be assumed to
have originated as lament for human dead and from there to
have been extended to use in the rituals marking the death of
the god of fertility in his various forms, and to rituals seeking
the rebuilding of a destroyed temple. Actually, however, only
very few elegies for human dead have come down to us, and
on the whole, examples of laments of any kind do not antedate
the Third Dynasty of Ur. The genre of laments was the province of a professional performer, the elegist (gala). He was, like
his colleague the bard, a fixture at the Sumerian rulers courts,
ready to soothe the dark moments for his master by his elegies.
He played, as the texts show, a major role at funerals.
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central figures in most of them. The myths about Enlil include the following:
(1) Enlil and Ninlil: The Birth of the Moon-god, which
tells how Enlil when he was young took Ninlil by force, was
banned from Nippur by the assembly of the gods and set
out for the Netherworld. Ninlil, who had become pregnant
with the moon-god, followed him and on the road, in various disguises, Enlil persuaded her to lie with him to conceive
another child to take the moon-gods place in the Netherworld. Thus three further divine children were engendered, all
chthonic in character.
(2) Enlils wooing of Ninlil, a second, more conventional version of Enlils wooing of Ninlil when she was yet a
young girl in her mothers house in Eresh. Even in this tale Enlil is depicted as impetuous, but here he commits no wrong.
(3) The Creation of the Pickax, a short tale relating
how in the beginning Enlil forced Heaven apart from Earth
to make room for things to grow, fashioned the pickax with
which he broke the crust of the earth in Uzumua, Where
Flesh was grown, a sacred spot in Nippur, to uncover the
heads of the first men growing out of the earth like plants, and
how he then let the other gods share in the use of the pickax
and the human workers.
The myths about Enlils son Ninurta, god of the plow,
of the thunderstorms in spring, and of the yearly floods, are
mainly two.
(1) Lugal-e, a myth telling how Ninurta went to war in
the mountains to the east against the Asakku, a demonic being
engendered on Earth by Heaven, whom the plants had elected
king. After a pitched battle Ninurta was victorious. He then
built the near ranges, the h ursag, as a dam, directed the waters from the mountains into the Tigris to provide irrigation
water for Sumer, presented the h ursag as a gift to his mother
Ninlil when she came to see him, and gave her the name
Ninhursaga(k), Queen of the h ursag. After that Ninurta sat
in judgment on the stones, some of which had opposed him
viciously in the war. His judgments on them determined the
character and qualities they now have. The section about the
dolerite, a stone imported by Gudea for his statues, suggests
that the myth was written, or perhaps added to, in his reign.
(2) A second myth about Ninurta known as An-gimdim4-ma tells how Ninurta, as he nears Nippur in full panoply
of war, is met by Enlils vizier Nusku, who bids him lessen his
clamor and not disturb Enlil. Ninurta answers huffily with a
long boastful speech, but is calmed down and is made to enter
Nippur peacefully by his barber, Ninkarnunna.
(3) A third myth Ninurtas Pride and Punishment seems
to tell that Ningirsu, at Enkis behest, captured the thunderbird Ansud who had stolen the tablets of fate from Enki. He
had obviously hoped thus to obtain the tablets for himself,
but when Ansud released them from its claw they returned to
Enki in Apsu. Ninurta then, by bringing on a flood, sought to
take over from Enki by force, but was outwitted and imprisoned in a pit dug by the tortoise, where Enki severely chided
him for his ambitions.
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and Enki, drinking deep, confers in his expansive mood one
important office after another upon her. When he wakes up
sober next morning he rues his prodigality, but Inanna is gone.
He still tries to stop her boat and get the offices back but in
vain, and Inanna triumphantly brings them into Uruk.
(2) The myth of Inanna and Ebeh tells of the victory of
Inanna over the mountain Ebeh (modern Jabel Hamrin) and
consists mainly of a series of speeches glorifying her prowess
in one form or another.
(3) Another myth, Inanna and Bilulu, tells how Inanna
hears about the killing of her young husband, Dumuzi, composes a paean in his honor, and then sets about avenging him
on his killers Bilulu and her son Girgire.
(4) The longest of the myths about Inanna is the one
called Inannas Descent. It tells how Inanna took it into her
heart to descend to the Netherworld to wrest control of it from
her elder sister Ereshkigal. The venture ended in disaster and
Inanna was killed and changed into a cut of meat gone bad.
Her loyal handmaid, Ninshubur, seeking help for her, finally
obtained it from Enki, who fashioned two beings who were
to win Ereshkigals favor by expressing compassion for her.
They did so, and when in return she granted them a wish, they
asked for the meat that was Inanna and brought her back to
life with food and water of life that Enki had given them. Still
Inanna was not permitted to leave the Netherworld unless she
could provide a substitute for herself, and so a posse of Netherworld deputies were sent along with her. As they met persons close to Inanna on their way all dressed in mourning
for her she balked at giving them over to the demons. Only
when in Uruk they found her young husband Dumuzi festively
dressed and enjoying himself, did hurt and jealousy make her
turn him over to the deputies. He, terrified, appealed to the
sun-god, Utu, Inannas brother and Dumuzis brother-in law,
to change him into a gazelle that he might escape his pursuers.
Utu did so, and Dumuzi escaped but was again captured. This
repeated itself three times, but in the end there was no way
out for Dumuzi, who was taken to the Netherword. His sister,
Geshtinanna, seeking him, found him there with the help of
the Fly, and the myth ends by Inanna rewarding or punishing the Fly it is not clear which and dividing the stay in
the Netherworld between Dumuzi and his sister so that they
alternate, each of them spending half a year only in the Netherworld, the other half they are up with the living.
The myth about Dumuzis repeated flights and captures,
which forms the second half of Inannas Descent exists also,
with only slight modification, as a separate tale,
(1) Dumuzis Dream, which relates how Dumuzi had an
ominous dream, and sent for his sister Geshtinanna, who interpreted it as foreboding his death. Attempting to hide from
the deputies who came to carry him off, Dumuzi was betrayed
by a colleague and caught. His subsequent appeal to Utu, his
escape, etc., runs parallel to the story in Inannas Descent. A
more cheerful myth is
(2) Dumuzis Wedding, which begins by relating how
Inanna sends messages to her bridal attendants, including the
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Epics. The epics, which deal with great and memorable deeds
of men rather than of gods, are more immediately accessible than the myths, which often presuppose a knowledge of
what the gods stand for, which is not easily come by. Most of
the epics that have come down to us center around rulers of
the First Dynasty of Uruk. This was the dynasty from which
the kings of the Third Dynasty of Ur thought themselves descended, and it seems likely that what has been transmitted is
in effect a choice aimed at the taste of that court, perhaps as it
changed with time from one king to the next.
Closest to the effect of primary epic with its emphasis on
martial valor and honor is perhaps the following:
(1) The epic tale Gilgamesh and Agga (Akka; COS I,
55052). It tells how Gilgamesh, vassal ruler of Uruk under
Agga of Kish, persuades him to resist performing its corve
duties with weapon in hand. Agga and his longboats soon appear before Uruks walls. Only Gilgamesh himself is valiant
enough to make a successful sortie. He cuts his way to Aggas
boat and takes Agga captive. Having thus proved himself, however, he grandly sets Agga free and even reaffirms his overlordship, all in gratitude for the fact that on an earlier occasion Agga had taken Gilgamesh in when the latter sought his
protection as a fugitive.
(2) Also in some degree warlike in spirit, but with distinct romantic overtones of the strange and the far away, is the
tale of Gilgamesh and Huwawa, which tells how Gilgamesh,
to win fame, undertakes an expedition against the terrible
Huwawa in the cedar mountains in the west. The adventure
nearly ends in disaster, but by deceit Gilgamesh gets Huwawa
in his power and, when he is nobly inclined to spare him, Huwawa rouses the anger of Enkidu, Gilgameshs servant, who
promptly kills him.
(3) A mythical element enters into the tale of Gilgamesh
and the Bull of Heaven. The city goddess of Uruk, Inanna, has
offered Gilgamesh marriage and has been rudely refused. To
avenge herself, she asks the loan of the fierce bull of heaven
from her father Anu. Anu reluctantly grants her wish. Contrary to expectations, however, the bull does not manage to
kill Gilgamesh, but is itself slain by him and Enkidu.
(4) Gilgamesh exhibits a quite different friendly, attitude
toward Inanna in another story, Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the
Netherworld. In this tale, Inanna finds a tree drifting on the
river, pulls it in, and plants it, in the hope of making a bed
and a chair from its wood when it is fully grown. By that time,
however, the tree has been taken over by the Ansud bird, the
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demoness Lilith, and a great serpent. In her disappointment
she turns to Gilgamesh, who scares off the unwelcome guests,
fells the tree, and gives her wood for her bed and chair. From
the tree stub and the branches he makes what seems to be a
puck and stick for some hockey-like game, and celebrates the
victory with a feast. At the feast, however, a waif, who has no
one to take care of her, utters a cry of protest to the god of
justice and fairness, Utu, and Gilgameshs puck and stick fall
into the Netherworld. Enkidu offers to go down and bring
them up and Gilgamesh instructs him in how to behave so as
not to be held back down there. Enkidu, however, disregards
the instructions and so must remain in the Netherworld. All
Gilgamesh can do is to obtain permission for Enkidus ghost
to come up to see him. Enkidus ghost then ascends through
a hole in the earth, the two embrace, and in answer to Gilgameshs questions Enkidu tells him in detail how people are
treated in the hereafter.
(5) A badly damaged tale called The Death of Gilgamesh will be dealt with later when the genre of elegiac
epic is discussed.
To the romantic epic with its penchant for the strange
and fantastic belongs also the Lugalbanda Epic, the hero of
which is listed in the Sumerian King List as the successor of
Enmerkar and predecessor of Gilgamesh, separated from the
latter by one Dumuzi, a fisherman from Kuar. According to
other traditions, Lugalbanda was the father of Gilgamesh.
In the epic called after him Lugalbanda is still a young
man. It relates how Enmerkar calls up his army for a campaign against the city of Aratta in the eastern highlands. On
the march, Lugalbanda falls seriously ill and is left to die in a
cave (h urrum) in the mountains by his fellows. He partly recovers, however, and begins fervently to pray to the gods for
help. The gods hear his prayers and as he roams the mountains he comes upon the nest of the thunderbird, Ansud, gains
its favor, and is granted, at his own wish, supreme powers of
speed and endurance. The bird also helps him find his way
back to the army, and there, among his comrades, Lugalbanda
completely recovers. The army reaches Aratta and begins a
long siege of it. However, after a while Enmerkars zest for the
task wanes and he wishes to send a message back to Uruk to
Inanna, upbraiding her for no longer caring enough for him;
she must choose between him and her city Aratta. There is,
however, no messenger who dares undertake the hazardous
journey. At last Lugalbanda volunteers, and successfully carries the message to Inanna. She receives him well, hears Enmerkars message, and advises Enmerkar to catch a certain
fish on which Arattas life depends. Thus he will put an end
to the city. Its craftsmen, handiwork, copper and moulds for
casting, he can then take as spoil.
There are two other epics of which Enmerkar is the hero:
Enmerkar and Suhkesdanna and Enmerkar and the Lord of
Aratta. The first of these is a romantic epic verging on fairy
tale. It tells how Ensuhkesdanna of Aratta sent messengers to
Enmerkar in Uruk, demanding that he submit to Aratta since
Ensuhkesdanna could provide a temple of lapis lazuli and a
richly adorned couch for the rite of the sacred marriage with
Inanna, while Enmerkar had but a temple of mud brick and
a bed of wood to offer. The demand is, as could be expected,
proudly refused, and Ensuhkesdanna then wishes to obtain
his demands by force of arms. The assembly in Aratta is not
willing to support him in this, however, and so he is temporarily at an impasse. Then an incantation priest (mama)
and magician at his court offers to use his powers to have a
canal dug to Uruk and to have the inhabitants load their possessions on boats and haul them to Aratta. Ensuhkesdanna is
delighted and rewards him richly. The magician then sets out
from Aratta, and arriving on his way at Nidabas city Eresh
near Uruk he persuades since he can speak the language of
animals the cows and goats there to stop giving milk, thus
interrupting the cult of Nidaba. At the complaint of the herders, a learned amazon goes up against him in a sorcerers contest in which both cast fish spawn into the river and pull out
animals: the magician, a fish, and the amazon, a bird, which
flies off with the fish; the magician, an ewe and its lamb, the
amazon, a wolf that runs off with them, and so forth. After
the fifth try the magician is exhausted, it becomes dark before
his eyes, and he is all confused. The amazon chides him, saying that while his wizardry is plentiful, his judgment is sadly
lacking in that he has tried his wizardry against the holy city of
Nidaba. So saying, the amazon seized his tongue in her hand
and, denying his plea for mercy on the grounds that his crime
was sacrilegious, killed. Word of his fate reached Aratta, and
Ensuhkesdanna, much sobered, acknowledged the preeminence of Enmerkar.
The other epic about Enmerkar makes of the rivalry between Enmerkar and the lord of Aratta a battle of wits, a test
of which of them is most competent as ruler. In its scale of values, peaceful compromise seems to win out over military solutions. It begins by telling how Enmerkar appealed to Inanna to
make her other city, Aratta, subject to Uruk, so that its people
would bring down stone and other precious building materials as tribute to Uruk for Enmerkars temple building. Inanna
grants his wish, tells him to send a messenger to Aratta to demand submission, and withholds rain from Aratta, in order
to put pressure on it to submit. The ruler of Aratta at first rejects the demand, but when he is told that Inanna sides with
Enmerkar he accedes pro forma: he will submit if Enmerkar
will send grain to relieve the famine caused by the drought, but
this grain must not be sent in sacks, it must be loaded into the
carrying nets of donkeys. Enmerkar complies with this seemingly impossible demand by sending sprouted grain and malt,
but is set a new similar, seemingly impossible condition. After
he had complied with that and still another, he loses patience,
however, and threatens to destroy Aratta. His angry message
is too long for the messenger to remember, and so to help him
Enmerkar invents the letter. When the messenger arrives in
Aratta with the written letter and the lord of Aratta is pondering it to think of a new subterfuge, the god of rainstorms,
Ishkur, apparently knowing nothing about what is going on,
drenches the region around Aratta, producing a bumper crop.
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At this point, unfortunately, the text is incompletely preserved.
From what we have, however, it is possible to gather that the
conflict was resolved by the invention of trade and a peaceful
exchange of goods follows. Thus Enmerkar is able to obtain his
coveted building materials through peaceful means.
The later Dynasty of Agade, with its heroic figures Sargon and Narm-Sin, formed a second, minor focus for the
epic tradition. Sargon, the founder of the dynasty, figures in
an unfortunately very fragmentary text in which he seems to
have made the wife of his Sumerian opponent Lugal-zagge-si
his concubine, but under what circumstances is not clear. Another, as yet unpublished, story tells how he was protected by
Inanna at the court of Ur-Zababa of Kish when he was serving there as cupbearer. The figure of Narm-Sin seems to have
become the type of the self-willed human ruler challenging
the gods in his hubris. The epic tale called The Fall of Agade
tells, after describing the might and prosperity of Agade, how
Narm-Sin, wishing to rebuild Enlils temple Ekur in Nippur,
failed to obtain favorable omens that would allow him to do
so. Yet, against Enlils will, Narm-Sin mustered his forces and
began demolishing Ekur. Enlil in his anger called in the wild
Gutian mountaineers, who disrupted all communication in
the country and produced dire famine. Lest the whole country be destroyed, the major deities of Sumer then appealed
to Enlil and succeeded in having the punishment focused on
Agade as the actual offender. It was thoroughly cursed by the
gods so that it would never again be inhabited.
Hymns to Gods. Praise, with its attendant effects of enhancement and expression of allegiance to persons and to values,
can take descriptive as well as narrative form and becomes
then hymnal rather than mythical or epic. Mesopotamian literature focused such hymnal praise particularly on three subjects: gods, temples, and kings. The resultant genres are not,
however, kept rigidly apart, and sections of a hymn to a god
may well be devoted to praise of his temple, just as hymning a
temple generally includes praise of its divine owner. The royal
hymns abound in addresses to the gods to assist and protect
the king hymned.
Among major hymns directed to gods, there is reason to
mention first the great hymn to Enlil of Nippur called Enlil
surae. It tells how Enlil chose Nippur as his abode, describes
its sacred character so fiercely intolerant of all evil, moves on
to Enlils temple in it, Ekur, describes the latters rituals and
sacred personnel, and then Enlil himself as the key figure in
the administration of the universe, planning for the maintenance and well-being of all creatures; it ends with a brief acknowledgement also of Enlils spouse, Ninlil, who shares his
powers with him.
Another remarkable hymn is a hymn to the sun-god Utu,
which praises him as maintainer of justice and equity in the
universe and the last recourse of those who have no-one else
to turn to. Utus sister, Inanna, is hymned as the evening star
in a hymn of ten sections. It describes her role in judging human conduct, and ends with a description of her rite of the
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is the much copied Hymn to the Temple of Kesh, which is
already represented in the Abu Salabikh materials. The finest
example of the genre is, however, a hymn which never entered the standard body of school literature: the great hymn
to the temple of Ningirsu in Girsu, E-ninnu, written on the
occasion of its rebuilding by Gudea. The hymn was originally
written on three large clay cylinders, of which the second and
third are preserved. It describes in detail the communication
of Ningirsus wishes to Gudea in a dream, the care taken to
check that the gods message was correctly understood and to
carry out the task correctly, the bringing of building materials
from afar, the actual building process step for step, and finally
the occupation of the new temple by Ningirsu, the appointment of its divine staff, and the concluding housewarming
party for the gods.
Hymns to Kings. A suitable subject for hymning was also
the king, and a great many royal hymns are extant. The oldest examples of the genre deal with Ur-Namma, the first king
of the Third Dynasty of Ur. A high point of productivity
was reached with his successor, Shulgi, who figures in more
than 20 hymnal compositions, and the genre continues to be
productive through the first half of the succeeding Isin Dynasty, at which point it begins to peter out. The last example is a hymn to Abi-eshuh of the First Dynasty of Babylon.
The content of the genre is varied in the extreme. Many of
the hymns deal with the election of the king by the assembly of the gods, or with divine favors showered upon him.
Some contain appeals to the gods on the kins behalf, and
some the royal hymns in the narrower sense contain a
sustained praise of the king, his abilities, e.g., as warrior or as
scholar, his virtues, e.g., his sense of justice and fairness, and
the prosperity he brought to the country. Frequently these
hymns take the form of self-praise and are put in the mouth
of the king himself.
Love Songs. Love songs, of which Sumerian literature has
quite a few, may perhaps also be considered hymns of praise,
albeit of a special distinctive character. Some of these are put
in the mouth of the divine lovers, Dumuzi and Inanna, or deal
with episodes of their courtship, in some the beloved is the
king, particularly Shu-Sin of the Third Dynasty of Ur. These
songs praise his physical attractions and express the longing
and love of the girl who sings of him. It seems not unlikely
that a considerable number of these songs were the work of
a poetess in the circle around Shu-Sin; one would guess the
lukur priestess Kubatum.
ELEGIACS. Whereas the praise in myths, epics, and hymns
is directed toward extant values, in the elegiac genres it is focused on values lost and longed for. In elegiacs corresponding to the myth are narrative accounts of the death of gods;
in those corresponding to the epic, accounts of the death of
kings and heroes; and in those corresponding to the hymn,
dirges for gods, temples, and kings, and in very rare cases for
ordinary human dead.
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(Instrument) of Dirges for Him in the Desert and many others. Most often there is an element of narrative, reflecting the
fact that these laments were part of the ritual of going to the
gods destroyed fold in the desert. The Damu laments likewise tend to alternate with narrative sections, but the lament
of Aruru for her lost son, and the lament of Lisin are examples of pure laments.
Laments for Temples. As the loss of gods and kings was
mourned, so were the great public disasters: destruction of
cities and their temples at the hand of enemies. The lament
was intended to soothe the emotions of the bereaved god and
channel them, and thus prepare the way for divine will to restoration. To the genre of lament for destroyed temples belongs
what is perhaps the highest achievement of Sumerian poetry,
the magnificent and deeply moving Lament for the Destruction of Ur, which deals with the capture and destruction of the
city by the Elamites and the Sua people that ended the Third
Dynasty of Ur. The vivid and very detailed, but much less
powerful, Lament for Ur and Sumer (COS I: 53539) deals
with the same event. Among later laments there is the long
Lament for Nippur and Ekur connected with the restoration of Ekur by Ishme-Dagan, which ends with a long section
in which Enlil promises to restore the temple. Other laments
for Ekur and for Inannas temple in Uruk, EAnna, popular in
later times, go back to the end of the Isin-Larsa period. As in
the Dumuzi laments, so in the laments for temples, narrative
and lyrical sections alternate, the dramatic events around the
day of destruction being told in all their stark detail.
Dirges. Laments for kings and heroes in non-narrative lyric
form have not so far been found, but two examples of dirges
for ordinary mortals succeeded in entering the standard body
of literature. They were written by a certain Ludingirra, one in
honor of his father, the other on occasion of his wifes death.
WISDOM LITERATURE. Wisdom literature is not committed
from the outset as are, each in its way, the encomiastic and elegiac works, but is rather discriminating and evaluative.
Disputes. One of the most popular forms of entertainment
and humorous examination of standard values was the dispute
or logomachy, which seems to have flourished particularly
under the rulers of the Third Dynasty of Ur, several of whom
are referred to by name in these works. The usual pattern is a
mythological introduction setting the action in the beginning
of time, which is then followed by a lengthy dispute about their
respective merits by the two contestants. Sometimes the end
of the tale is a judgment by a god or the king, but other settings occur, and the text may launch directly into the debate.
Examples of works in this genre are Summer and Winter,
Silver and Copper, Ewe and Grain, Plow and Hoe, Shepherd and Farmer, and others. As a rule, the more lowly contestant carries the day. A special group of such disputes have
the school or the life of a scribe as a setting. Among these are
A Scribe and His Disappointing Son, in which a father details
the many failings of his son one senses that he has spared
the rod too much as also The Overseer and the Scribe, in
which the scribe lists the numerous services a scribe performs
in a large household, Enkimansum and Girniisag, a dispute
between an obstreperous student and his tutor, and The Dispute between Enkita and Enkihegal, which, as the disputants
get more and more heated, deteriorates into a mere slanging
match. It would seem that the ancient listeners must have derived a good deal of vicarious enjoyment from hearing of quarreling and listening to the unrestrained flow of bad language,
for in this genre such things are frequent. Another example
of it, perhaps the worst, is a vitriolic slanging match known as
Debate Between Two Women. The most interesting evaluative work of Sumerian wisdom literature is, however, probably
the one called Man and His God, in which a man complains
about his gods neglecting him and the bad luck dogging him
as a consequence. It is a Sumerian precursor, in some sense, of
later treatments of the motif of the just sufferer and the earliest indication of awareness of the problem we have.
Apodictic and Didactic Wisdom Texts. Apodictic statements of
dos and donts characterize the extensive proverb genre, which
comprises actual proverbs, as well as all kinds of saws, turns of
phrase, etc. and also includes short fables with pointed morals.
A large collection of such saws was attributed to Shuruppak,
father of the Sumerian hero of the Flood, Ziudsudra, and appear in the composition The Instructions of Shuruppakas
this wise fathers counsels to his son. This composition was,
as mentioned, already in existence in the Abu Salabikh materials. The composition commonly called the Farmers Almanac, which is cast in the form of a fathers the plow-god
Ninurtas advice to his son, and describes in order all the
standard activities to be carried out by a good farmer during the year, is apodictic and didactic insofar as it presents
a norm for the activities of the farmer. Formally similar in
many ways is the composition called Schooldays, in which
a schoolboy takes time out on his way to school to tell a questioner where he is going so early in the morning, and what he
usually does in school.
INCANTATIONS. The genre of incantations continues, and
substantial collections of individual incantations begin to
be made. There are three major types of incantation: (1) The
first is the legitimation type, in which the incantation serves
to identify the incantation-priest as the messenger and agent
of a god-usually Enki and as under his protection. It ends
with a formula conjuring the demons in the name of heaven
and earth. A similar type of incantation is (2) the so-called
prophylactic type, which first describes the evil doings of the
demons, then orders them to depart. Lastly (3) the MardukEa type describes first the evil done by the demons, then how
Asalluhe/Marduk sees it and asks his father Enkis/Eas advice.
Enki then states what ritual acts will serve as cure.
VARIA. A variety of other types of writings, not easily classifiable, are found with works of the genres here listed. Mention
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may be made of such things as copies of royal inscriptions,
of royal diplomatic correspondence, of noteworthy letters of
various kinds among them appeals to deities for help in illness and misfortune riddles, copies of legal deliberations
and decisions in the assembly of Nippur, lists of medical prescriptions, of legal formulas, and copies of law codes, among
them those of Ur-Nammu and Lipit-Ishtar. In general these
various memorabilia are examples of specific utilization of the
organizing and mnemotechnical powers in writing. Not infrequently they stand at the beginning of new handbook genres
developing in the second and first millennia.
old-babylonian literature
Cuneiform writing seems to have been used to write Akkadian very early, perhaps already toward the end of the Protoliterate period. Apart from votive inscriptions and royal
monumental inscriptions, however, there is little evidence of
Akkadian literary activity. Economic texts, contracts, deeds,
letters, a few incantations with perhaps a fragment of a royal
hymn, seem to be all. It is not until Old-Babylonian times,
around 1700 B.C.E., that more substantial literary activity in
Akkadian is attested; quite possibly sparked by a tradition of,
and an appreciation for, oral literature among the West Semitic
Amorites, who by that time had entered Mesopotamia in large
numbers and had furnished such a key ruling dynasty as the
First Dynasty of Babylon.
Old-Babylonian literature is, however, clearly written in
the country and builds in large measure on Sumerian materials. However, it treats these materials freshly, with notable
originality and literary power.
The genres represented are first myths, with works such
as the Poem of Agushaya which tells how Ea created the
goddess Saltu, Strife, to challenge the warlike goddess Ishtar
(Agushaya) and the Myth of Anzu about the thunderbird
which stole the tablets of fate from Enlil, and with them his
powers of office. More impressive than these, though, is the
remarkable Myth of Atrahasis, which deals both with the creation of humans and their near destruction by flood (COS I,
45053). The gods in those early days had to toil themselves
as agricultural workers. After a while, in the first record in
history of a strike, they rebelled and rioted in front of Enlils
temple in Nippur. Eventually a compromise was worked out
by Enki: a god presumably the ringleader in the rebellion
was to be killed, and from his flesh and blood man was to be
created to take upon himself the toil of the gods. After a while,
however, mankind grew so numerous and made so much
noise that Enlil found it impossible to sleep. He tried various
means to diminish their number and noise, but without lasting effect. Eventually he persuaded the other gods to bring on
the Flood and thus to wipe out humanity entirely. Enki, however, as might have been expected, warned his protg Atrahasis and had him save himself and his family and all species
of animals in a big boat. Enlils anger when he found that a
human being had survived was appeased by Enki, who instituted a variety of measures orders of nuns who were not to
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framework appear to move toward what have been called the
handbook genres. In the belletristic genres proper the spirit
of the age leads toward the establishing of relatively large epic
cycles such as, e.g., the 12-tablet Gilgamesh epic, trend which
was already discernible in the standard body of Sumerian literature. The standard Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic, for instance,
will, with its 12 tablets have covered well over 3,000 lines when
complete. Similarly, the appreciation of repetition and ornate
description seems to grow. In the genre of laments, for instance, a composition can often be followed from its concise
form in the time of standard Sumerian literature to a vastly
enlarged, interminably repetitious form which almost makes
such narrative elements as it has impossible to follow, in standard Babylonian literature. In part, perhaps such treatment is
explicable from the use of the text for recitation in which the
music is the main concern. Improved organization, greater
length, and less terse language are noticeable also in the genres
which specifically grew out of the use of writing to make lasting records: royal memorial inscriptions, legal deeds and contracts, and so on, and which are thus essentially evidential in
character. A feature of considerable interest is the occurrence
of a tradition about individual authorship of literary works
at this time. The works of the standard Babylonian literature
may, then, conveniently be considered under the headings of
belletristic, handbook, and evidential genres.
Belles Lettres
MYTH. A certain number of Sumerian myths were translated
into Akkadian, seemingly already in Old-Babylonian times,
and continued to be copied. Among these were the two Ninurta compositions, Lugal-e, which as has been mentioned,
seem to date back to Gudea or earlier, and An-gim-dim4-ma;
a bilingual creation myth.
Among Akkadian works, such myths as the one about
Anzu and the Atrahasis myth continued to be copied. New
additions were the Dynasty of Dunnum, a tale about the
earliest generations of gods, who cheerfully murdered their
fathers to take over rule of the world, and then married their
mothers or sisters; the myth of Nergal and Ereshkigal (COS
I, 38490), which relates how Nergal became lord of the Netherworld and subdued and married its queen, Ereshkigal; and
the Erra Epic (COS I, 40416), which describes how Erra
tricked Marduk into letting him take over rule of the universe
and then embarked upon a veritable orgy of rioting and killing. He was finally pacified by his vizier Ishum, but still had
the gall to pride himself on having left a remnant and not
wiped out everybody. The Myth of Adapa ( COS I, 449) also
deserves mention. Adapa refused, at his master Eas clever advice, the food of life and water of life offered to him in heaven
when he was called to account there before Anu for having
broken the wing of the south wind with a spell. Ea, clearly, did
not want his clever servant to be other than mortal.
The most substantial and impressive literary work that
should be mentioned here is, however, the Babylonian epic
of creation Enuma eli (COS I, 390402). Scholars differ conENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
siderably in their dating of it and estimates range from OldBabylonian times down to shortly after 1000 B.C.E. It can be
assumed that in essentials it is a creation of late Old-Babylonian times, but that what has been preserved is a late redaction from approximately the beginning of the first millennium
B.C.E. It tells how in the beginning there was only Tiamat, the
Sea, and Apsu, the sweet waters under the earth. As their waters mingled the gods were born of them. The gods, as embodiments of activity, found themselves in basic conflict with
their first parents. Provoked beyond endurance by the gods,
Apsu, at the first, determined to destroy them, but was subdued by Ea with a spell and killed. Eas son Marduk, playing
with the winds which his grandfather Anu had given him,
further provoked Tiamat and her brood, and she was brought
to attack the gods. She raised an army and placed her second
husband, Kingu, in command. Marduk, chosen champion,
king, by the gods, met her in battle and defeated her. Out of
her carcass he then created the present universe. Kingu, after
he had been indicated as fomenter of the rebellion, was killed,
and Marduk had Ea create man from his blood to take over
the hard menial work and leave the gods free. Marduk then
pardoned those gods who had sided with Tiamat and distributed all the gods as administrators in heaven and on earth.
To show their gratitude, the gods then for the last time took
tools in hand and built Babylon, the city Marduk had asked
for. Here in his temple Esagil they all gathered for a feast and
assembly to appoint him permanent king and to celebrate his
powers and virtues in 50 names by which they named him,
one after the other. The postscript to Enuma eli suggests that
it be read to princes, and it is in fact a paean in praise of the
ideal absolute monarch as personified in Marduk. When later
in the first millennium the benevolent despot became a rarity
in Babylonia, the despot pure and simple seems, in the figure
of Erra, to have been a more believable symbol of the power
ruling existence. In fact, the Erra Epic looks almost like a deliberate attack on Enuma eli and its political optimism.
EPIC. Of older Sumerian epics that of Lugalbanda at least
its second half survived as a bilingual. An Akkadian translation of the end of Gilgamesh, Engidu and the Netherworld was appended mechanically to the late version of the
Gilgamesh Epic as its 12t tablet, probably by a copyist rather
than by the author of the version. Of Akkadian epics the
Etana Epic and the Nar m-Sin Epic survived. An epic about
Sargons campaign into Asia Minor, ar tamh ari, The King
of Battle, would seem to have been first composed in OldBabylonian times. The Gilgamesh Epic, which may have existed as an epic in Old-Babylonian times and which in part
builds on Sumerian materials, was reworked traditionally by
one Sin-liqi-unninni into the standard later version which
has been preserved from Ashurbanipals library. A completely
new epic of this time is a warlike epic about Tukulti-Ninurtas
wars with Babylonia.
WISDOM LITERATURE. New and notable contributions to
the genre of wisdom literature are two long poems, Ludlul bel
107
mesopotamia
nmeqi, Let me Praise the Expert (COS I, 492), which treats
the theme of the righteous sufferer, and the Theodicy (COS I,
49295), which deals with the problem of the worldly success
of the wicked. The proverb tradition continues, and new material is added, especially, it appears, fables. The genres of disputes also continued with new compositions such as a Dispute between the Horse and the Bull. A new creation based
on the omen form is a text warning rulers against mistreating Babylon and its citizens. It dates most likely from early in
Sennacheribs reign. Humor seems to be represented outside of the proverb literature by the so-called Dialogue of
Pessimism (COS I, 49596), an ironical dialogue between a
fickle master and his slave, and by the story of a poor man
getting his revenge on an abusive official called The Poor
Man of Nippur.
108
Handbook Literature
INCANTATIONS AND PRAYERS. Numerous large series of
incantations belong to the collections recording the lore that
a capable incantation-pries (aipu) ought to control. Of the
better known of those which have come down may be mentioned Utukke limnuti, The Evil Demons, against demons
of diseases; Bit rimki, The Bath House, containing ritual and
incantations for purifying the king by means of lustrations;
the series Mouthwashing; and the series Maqlu and urpu,
devoted to the burning of witches in effigy and other white
magic; and many more. Individual prayers were sorted under the incantation priest: various new types of prayer, with
hymns to gods as their introductory part, developments of the
penitential psalm, and prayers classed as incantations. To a
large extent treatment of illness that was considered to be
caused by evil demons was the task of the aipu, who thus
overlaps in function with the physician or asu, who worked
mainly with medicaments of various kinds. It is often difficult to distinguish between his handbooks and those of the
aipu.
LAMENT. The lament genre with its laments for great public
disasters continued to be in the hands of the kal- (Sumerian
gala) or elegist. As mentioned, the laments tended to grow
in length and to become more and more repetitious. They also
tended to be held in more general terms and lost the close connection with identifiable historical events which characterized
the older laments for destroyed cities
OMEN. A new Akkadian genre was in Old-Babylonian times
the omen. In the following centuries the collections of omens,
their systematization, and the systematic extension of possible
ominous data, grew. The handbooks for the use of the bar,
the seer, were numerous. There were series dealing with
omens from the shape of the liver of sacrificial animals, from
dreams, from monstrous births, from ominous happenings
of all kinds in city and country, astronomical omens, omens
from wind and weather, and so on.
mesopotamia
Simpson, The Ancient Near East: a History (1971); For further bibl. see
CAH2, 12 (1961ff.). GOVERNMENT: T. Jacobsen, in: Zeitschrift fr Assyriologie, 52 (1957), 91140; idem, in: W.L. Moran (ed.), Toward the Image of Tammuz (1970), 13256, 157243, 36696, 396430; N. Bailkey,
in: American Historical Review, 72/74 (1967), 121136. LAW: Pritchard,
Texts (19693), 159 (Lipit-Ishtar), 161 (Eshnunna), 163 (Hammurapi),
180 (Assyrian Laws), 188 (Hittite Laws), 523 (Ur-Nammu/a), 525 (Sumerian Laws), 526 (Ammisaduqa); G.R. Driver and J. Miles, The Assyrian Laws (1935); idem, The Babylonian Laws, 2 (195255); F.J. Steele,
in: American Journal of Archaeology, 52 (1948), 42550; A. Goetze, The
Laws of Eshnunna (1956); F.R. Kraus, Ein Edikt des Knigs Ammsaduqa
von Babylon (1958); J. Friedrich, Die hethitischen Gesetze (1959); J.J.
Finkelstein, in: JCS, 22 (1969), 6682. LITERATURE: SOURCES IN
TRANSLATION: Pritchard, Texts3; A. Heidel, The Babylonian Genesis
(1942); A. Schott and W. von Soden, Das Gilgamesch Epos (1970); W.G.
Lambert and A.R. Millard, Atra-Hasis The Babylonian Story of the
Flood (1969); A. Falkenstein and W. von Soden, Sumerische und akkadische Hymnen und Gebete (1953); T. Jacobsen and J. Wilson, Most
Ancient Verse (1960); W.G. Lambert, Babylonian Wisdom Literature
(1960); Luckenbill, Records. TREATMENTS: S.N. Kramer, Sumerian
Mythology (1944); idem, From the Tablets of Sumer (1956); idem, The
Sumerians (1963); B. Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien, 2 (1925); A.L.
Oppenheim, Ancient Mesopotamia (1964; rev. E. Reiner, 1977); T. Jacobsen, in: W.L. Moran (ed.), Toward the Image of Tammuz (1970).
RELIGION: GENERAL: J. Bottro, La religion Babylonienne (1952); E.
Dhorme, Les Religions de Babylonie et dAssyrie (19452); D. Edzard, in:
H.W. Haussig (ed.), Wrterbuch der Mythologie, 1 (1965); T. Jacobsen,
in: H. Frankfort et al. (eds.), The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man
(1946 = Before Philosophy, 1949); S.N. Kramer, The Sumerians (1963); B.
Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien, 2 vols. (192025). SPECIAL STUDIES: H. Frankfort, Kingship and the Gods (1948); C.J. Gadd, Ideas of Divine Rule in the Ancient Near East (1948); T. Jacobsen, in: W.L. Moran
(ed.), Toward the Image of Tammuz (1970); S.N. Kramer, Sumerian
Mythology (1944); idem, From the Tablets of Sumer (1956); idem. The
Sacred Marriage Rite (1969); R. Labat, Le caractre religieux de la royaut assyrobabylonienne (1939); S.A. Pallis, The Babylonian Akitu Festival (1926). SOURCES IN TRANSLATION: Pritchard, Texts3; Luckenbill,
Records. ASSYRIOLOGY: E.A.W. Budge, The Rise and Progress of Assyriology (1925); A. Deimel, Orientalia, Uebersicht ueber die Keilschrift-Literatur; Reallexikon der Assyriologie (1928ff.); A. Pohl et al., Orientalia,
Keilschriftbibliographie, 9 (1940); A. Parrot, Archologie Msopotamienne, 1 (1946); S. Lloyd, Foundations in the Dust (1955); S.A. Pallis, The
Antiquity of Iraq: A Handbook of Assyriology (1956); J. Friedrich, Extinct
Languages (1957); A.L. Oppenheim, in: Current Anthropology, 1 (1960),
40923; idem, Ancient Mesopotamia (1964); P. Garelli, LAssyriologie
(1964); B. Meissner, Die Keilschrift (1967); R. Borger, Handbuch der
Keilschrifliteratur (19671975). Add. Bibliography: GENERAL: M.
Chavalas and K. Younger (eds.), Mesopotamia and the Bible (1992); D.
Snell (ed.), A Companion to the Ancient Near East (2005). HISTORY:
P. Steinkeller, ABD, 4:72432; A.K. Grayson (ibid), 73277; R. Drews,
The End of the Bronze Age (1993); Cambridge Ancient History, I; II;
III:1; III/2; IV; VI (revised; 19721994); A. Kuhrt, The Ancient Near
East c. 3000330 B.C. (2 vols., extensive bibliography; 1995); CANE, 2,
807979; LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE: Translations in COS; Studies in CANE IV, part 9. LAW: S. Geengus, in: ABD, 4, 24252; M. Roth,
Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor (Akkadian and Sumerian in transliteration and translation. Hittite laws in translation by
H. Hoffner; 1995); RELIGION: T. Jacobsen, The Treasures of Darkness
(1976); J. Black, Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia
an Illustrated Dictionary (1992); S. Dalley, Myths from Mesopotamia
(2000); K. van der Toorn, Family Religion in Babylonia, Syria and Israel
(1996); idem, (ed.), The Image and the Book (1997).
109
RELIGION
It has sometimes been claimed that the religion of Mesopotamia
was based on premises totally different from those underlying
the religion of Israel. But we must distinguish between the religious ideals of the Bible and the practices of ancient Israel. The
biblical prophets portray themselves as a minority who tolerate
the worship of no god other than Yahweh, whereas their opponents worship other gods alongside Yahweh (e.g. Jer. 7:811).
Depending on who controlled the Yahweh temples it was possible for Yahweh to entertain visiting gods in his temple just as
Marduk might do in Babylon (II Kings. 21:45). In the area of
religious institutions it is likely that materials from Mesopotamia will be helpful. A case in point is the temple. In Mesopotamia the temple was conceived as a house of the god, comparable
to the house of a noble or king. The temple housed the statue of
the god, thought to contain the essence of the god. The temple
building itself, and its symbolism, was considered a reflection
of the cosmic abode of the god. The rites of worship consisted
mainly in ministering to the physical needs of the gods. The
Israelite temple is in many ways similar to the Mesopotamian
temple at least in its external aspects. The Hebrew language
employs vocabulary similar to that of its neighbors. Thus the
temple is a house or palace, while to worship is to serve
or to work. Like its Mesopotamian counterparts, the Israelite
temple made use of cosmic symbolism. Scholars in recent years
have begun to question the axiom that the cult of Yahweh was
aniconic. The fact that Deuteronomy 4:1219 fulminates against
making an image of Yahweh (see already Hazzekuni a.l.) suggests strongly that the practice was known. Judges 1718 indicates the presence of an image of Yahweh in the temple of Dan
(especially Judg. 17:16). As such, the role of the cult statue in
Mesopotamia may yet illuminate a similar phenomenon in
ancient Israel. Apostolic prophecy once considered unique to
ancient Israel is now known from *Mari as well as from NeoAssyrian sources (SAA IX) proximately closer to the days of the
Hebrew monarchy. The use of blood sacrifices in the Israelite
cults differentiates from the Mesopotamian cults in which the
gods were fed a diet that was vegetarian in the main.
The culture of Mesopotamia pervaded the ancient Near
East. Ancient Israel and Judah spent centuries in the shadow
of Mesopotamia. Biblical law, language, literature and religion
were all influenced by Mesopotamian civilization. Through the
intermediacy of Aramaic, the Akkadian language continued
to make an impact on the Jews of Babylonia. As such, Assyriology is significant, not just for its own sake, but for the study
of the Bible and Judaism.
[Aaron Skaist / S.David Sperling (2nd ed.)]
mesquita
MESQUITA, family name of prominent American and European Sephardim of Marrano descent. The merchant LUIS DE
MESQUITA (or Amesquita), of Segovia, Castile, took up residence in Mexico and was reconciled at an *auto-da-f there
in 1646. BENJAMIN BUENO DE MESQUITA, who went to Jamaica from Portugal in the 1660s, petitioned the English authorities for the right to trade with the crown, which foreign
merchants could not ordinarily do. Permission was granted
in 1664, but soon thereafter he and two sons were banished
from Jamaica on an extraneous charge. He then went to New
York where he died in 1683 (the earliest date on any tombstone
in New Yorks Jewish cemeteries). JOSEPH BUENO DE MESQUITA, one of these sons, became prominent in New York
and around 1700 had important financial dealings with Lord
Bellamont, the colonial governor. On behalf of Congregation
Shearith Israel he purchased a burial ground, the Chattam
Square cemetery, from William Merett. Josephs will gives the
name of the other brother, ABRAHAM BUENO DE MESQUITA
who was then living at Nevis in the British West Indies. The
name Mesquita appears also in Europe. MOSES GOMEZ DE
MESQUITA (16881751) was haham of Londons Spanish-Portuguese Jews from 1744.
Bibliography: A.M. Hyamson, Sephardim of England (1951),
index S.V. Bueno de Mesquita and Gomez de Mesquita; J. Picciotto,
Sketches of Anglo-Jewish History (1956), 465; M. Gaster, History of the
Ancient Synagogue (1901), passim; I.S. Emmanuel, Precious Stones
of the Jews of Curaao (1957), index; J.R. Rosenbloom, Biographical
Dictionary of Early American Jews (1960), 112.
MESSIAH, an anglicization of the Latin Messias, which is borrowed from the Greek , an adaptation of the Aramaic
meshih a (Aram.
) , a translation of the Hebrew (ha-melekh) ha-mashiah (Heb. )] [ , the Anointed [King];
a charismatically endowed descendant of David who the Jews
of the Roman period believed would be raised up by God to
break the yoke of the heathen and to reign over a restored
kingdom of Israel to which all the Jews of the Exile would return. This is a strictly postbiblical concept. Even *Haggai and
*Zechariah, who expected the Davidic kingdom to be renewed
with a specific individual, *Zerubbabel, at its head, thought of
him only as a feature of the new age, not as the author or even
agent of its establishment. One can, therefore, only speak of the
biblical pre-history of messianism. It may be summarized as
follows: Stage I. At the height of Davids power there appears
the doctrine that the Lord had chosen David and his descendants to reign over Israel to the end of time (II Sam. 7; 23:13,
5) and had also given him dominion over alien peoples (II Sam.
22:4451 = Ps. 18:4451; Ps. 2). To quote II Samuel 22:5051 (=
Psalm 18:5051; all the arguments against dating this composition later than the age of David seem forced):
(50) For this I sing Your praise, O Lord among the nations/and hymn Your name://
(51) He who grants wondrous victories to his king/and
deals graciously with his anointed (mashiah ), with David,
110
messiah
and with his offspring, evermore.//David is here, as Saul was
before him (I Sam. 24:6; 26:9; II Sam. 1:14, 16), and as he expects descendants of his to be after him, the Lords anointed
in the sense that he was anointed as a sign of consecration to
the Lord (see *Kingship, *Oil), not, of course, in the sense of
the Messiah described at the beginning of this article. Because anointing is an act of consecration, Deutero-*Isaiah
speaks of Cyrus as the Lords anointed in the purely derived
sense of a non-Israelite-king chosen by the Lord for a great
destiny and a great mission (Isa. 45:1). Thus Stage I of the
prehistory of messianism is the doctrine that Davids present
position of power will endure throughout his lifetime and be
inherited by an endless chain of succeeding links in his dynasty. Stage II began with the collapse of Davids empire after
the death of Solomon. There arose the doctrine, or hope, that
the House of David would again reign over Israel as well as
Judah and again exercise dominion over neighboring nations.
This hope was expressed
(a) probably by reinterpretation of compositions like
Psalm 18 in a prophetic sense and
(b) in so many words in prophecies like Amos 9:1112;
Isaiah 11:10; Hosea 3:5 (the phrase a Judahite interpolation and (the Israelites will seek) their king David); Ezekiel
37:15ff., especially verses 24ff. (and see *Isaiah A, Panel 3, Field
A, on Isa. 9:16 [27]). Stage III. Isaiahs shifting of the emphasis from the perpetuity of the dynasty to the qualities of
the future king: the foundation of his throne will be justice,
he will be distinguished by his zeal for justice, and, finally, he
will be charismatically endowed for sensing the rights and
wrongs of a case and for executing justice. (See not only the
passage in *Isaiah just cited on Isa. 9:16 [27], but also Isaiah B I, 4 on Isa. 16:45 and, in particular, *Isaiah A, Panel 3,
Field B on Isa. 11:1ff., where the origins of this idea are discussed). The *Immanuel prophecy in Isaiah is completely
irrelevant, so far as one can see and the echoes of ancient Canaanite-Ugaritic mythology that have been discovered there
are as dubious as those in the figure of the Ancient of *Days
in Daniel 7. Without stage III in its biblical prehistory, the
development of the postbiblical idea of the Messiah would
not have been possible.
Second Temple Period
The title Messiah (Heb. )as a designation of the eschatological personality does not exist in the Old Testament; it
occurs only from the time of the Second Temple after the Old
Testament period. However for ancient Judaism the idea of
eschatological salvation was more important than the concept
of Messiah. Hence there are books from the Second Temple
period where the Messiah does not occur, even if they refer to
eschatological salvation. Such a book, for instance, is the Book
of *Tobit, in which the salvation of Jerusalem, the return of the
Diaspora, and the conversion of nations to the God of Israel
is described but a personal Messiah is lacking. The same also
applies to the Book (Wisdom) of Ben *Sira and probably the
Book of Daniel. In the latter, the messianic figure of the son of
111
messiah
messianic pretenders. Such a list of messianic pretenders occurs in Acts 5:3637. One of the names there is Judas the Galilean, who was the founder of the *Zealots. Thus this movement was centered on a family with messianic pretensions.
Josephus (Wars 2:444448) states that Judas son, Menahem,
was murdered in the Temple, being arrayed in royal robes.
Apparently after Judas death his partisans transferred the status of pretender to the kingship to his son.
The most important historical messianic figure was surely
Bar *Kokhba, though he himself did not sign as king and
names himself only nasi. He was already seen by others as the
messiah, and it is important that on his coins his name also
occurs with that of a priest Eleazar. Both Josephus and the Talmud also mention other messianic pretenders from the first
and beginning of the second centuries C.E. The first messianic
interpretation of a biblical verse occurs in the Greek translation of the Pentateuch (Num. 24:17) where the word scepter
is translated in the Greek by man (see also the Greek translation of Num. 24:7). The Greek translation of the Pentateuch
dates back to the third century B.C.E. Possibly the designation of the Messiah as man is a proof that the special concept of son of man already existed in the early third century
B.C.E. Philo, who did not like to refer explicitly to the eschatological hopes of Israel, mentions the hope of the coming of
the Messiah in connection with this Greek interpretation of
the biblical verse. The above shows that messianic concepts
were manifold in the time of the Second Temple, and there
were even numerous aspects to the function of the Messiah.
All depended upon the spiritual and theological approach of
the various Jewish trends, but the Messiah or messiahs were
always human beings, even if sometimes supernatural qualities were connected with them. The political aspect, if it prevailed, did not always eliminate the supernatural. However, the
Messiah was always an agent of God and never a savior in the
Christian meaning. The Davidic origin of the kingly Messiah
was supposed; but, as it seems, the messianic pretender had to
prove his authenticity by his deeds in the period of the Second Temple Davidic descendants were not traceable.
Messiah in Rabbinic Thought
In rabbinic thought, the Messiah is the king who will redeem
and rule Israel at the climax of human history and the instrument by which the kingdom of God will be established. While
the Bible stresses the nature of the age called the end of days,
the rabbis focus as well on the person of their regent, who
gives the messianic age (yemot ha-mashiah ) its very name.
Messiah (Mashiah ) means anointed and in the Bible can
refer either to a king or a priest. The aggadah restricts the term
to the eschatological king, who is also called malka meshih a
(king messiah) in the Targums, ben David (son of David),
and mashiah ben David (Messiah, son of David). The Messiah was expected to attain for Israel the idyllic blessings of
the prophets; he was to defeat the enemies of Israel, restore the
people to the Land, reconcile them with God, and introduce
112
[David Flusser]
messiah
are those of constructive achievement. Third-century sources
speak of a suffering Messiah, or a leprous Messiah; still later,
his suffering atones for Israel (Sanh. 98b; PR 37:162b). The vicarious atonement of all righteous for the wicked is a general
aggadic theme, however.
The Messiah is generally assumed to be man, though writ
large. As such, he can come either riding a donkey, in subdued
fashion (cf. Zech. 9:9), or triumphantly riding the clouds (Dan.
7:13). That the Messiah is fully human is dramatically shown
by Akivas knowledgement of the rebel leader, Bar Kokhba, as
the Messiah. (Yet Akiva also declared that the Messiah would
occupy a throne alongside God). One talmudic source does
apparently attribute immortality to Messiah (Suk. 52a), and
the Midrash (mostly later) singles him out among the immortals of Paradise. The Messiah does not displace either God or
Torah in rabbinic thought. Thus, Hillel (fourth century) can
deny the coming of Messiah (for which he is rebuked), though
he doubtless expected Israels redemption. So too, the Midrash
can declare that the ultimate author of redemption is not Messiah but God, and His kingship is stressed in the liturgy as well
(Mid. Ps. to 31:1; 36:1; 107:1).
The Doctrine of the Messiah in the Middle Ages
Jewish ideology in the Middle Ages did not receive from the
ancient period a coherent, unified concept of the Messiah,
messianic times, and the signs of the messianic age. Apocalyptic literature of the Second Temple period (see above) differed
greatly from the biblical concept of the Messiah and his times,
and talmudic literature and the various Midrashim included
many contrasting views about this problem. In the Middle
Ages messianic ideas were a product of medieval thought and
experience, based on some ancient sources, but developed
within medieval Hebrew literature and thought. During the
last decades of Byzantine rule in Palestine, in the last years of
the sixth century and the beginning of the seventh century,
the political upheavals in the Middle East especially the continuous wars between the Byzantines and the Persians gave
rise to a body of messianic literature, which was destined to
play a major role in shaping the image of the messianic age in
the eyes of medieval Jewry. The most important work which
was written at that time was the Book of *Zerubbabel. In this
pseudepigraphical work Zerubbabel, the last ruler of Judea
from the House of David, tells his visions concerning the happenings at the end of days and the time of the Messiah. According to this work, the appearance of the Messiah will be
preceded by the appearance of a satanic king of Rome, who
will be the son of Satan and a stone sculpture of a woman; his
name will be *Armilus (= Romulus, the first king of Rome who
will also be the last). Armilus will conquer the whole world,
vanquish all the traditional enemies of Rome, especially Persia,
and will unify the whole world under his religion. He will be
a spiritual Satan as well as an emperor. According to the descriptions, the writer seems to see in him a new incarnation,
or a new appearance, of Jesus. The whole world will believe in
him and see him as god and emperor, except the Jews. The war
113
[Gerald J. Blidstein]
messiah
plete, coherent picture, in which it was as easy to believe as if
it sprang directly from the traditional sources.
This does not mean that other, non-apocalyptical concepts of the messianic age did not exist in the Middle Ages
among Jewish thinkers. Thus, for instance, whereas Eleazar
*Kallir, in describing the messianic age, used images similar to those in the apocalyptic literature, his predecessor and
probable teacher, the paytan *Yannai, used more quiet, nonapocalyptical images in referring to the redemption. Most of
the philosophers did not accept the apocalyptic picture, even
though Saadiah *Gaon, the first systematic Jewish philosopher,
included in his Book of Beliefs and Opinions a paraphrase of the
Book of Zerubbabel when describing the messianic age. *Maimonides and his followers regarded the coming of the Messiah as a political deliverance of the Jews from the rule of the
gentiles, without any upheaval in the order of the world and
without any apocalyptic elements. Maimonides also opposed
messianic speculation, and rejected rumors from Yemen and
other places that a Messiah had come (see Messianic *Movements). However, other philosophers held different opinions.
Abraham bar H iyya, a rationalist philosopher with neoplatonic tendencies, wrote a major work, Megillat ha-Megalleh,
attempting to establish, by astrological calculations, the date
of the coming of the Messiah.
Messianic speculation and attempts to find such dates
were a constant feature of Jewish culture in the Middle Ages
and early modern times. Dozens of dates were proposed as the
dates of the beginning of the redemption, which was divided
into many stages; sometimes different dates for different stages
were also given. Sometimes the dates set for redemption coincided with great upheavals in the world and terrible persecutions of the Jews like the beginning of the persecutions by
the crusaders (1096), the years of the Black Death in Europe,
the Expulsion from Spain (1492), or the persecutions in Poland
and the Ukraine (1648). But, even though one date after the
other was refuted, the explanation was that the Jews were not
sufficiently righteous to accept the Messiah, and a new date
was set. The generations preceding and following the Expulsion from Spain were especially rich in such speculations, but
in fact every age engaged in such speculations, with very little
differences in method and ideological concepts.
Among the theological movements in the Middle Ages
the ideas of apocalyptical eschatology clashed with the ideas of
personal eschatology, the personal reward that a devout person will receive upon his death in the next world. Evidently,
when emphasis was put upon personal redemption in the Garden of Eden the descriptions of national deliverance upon the
coming of the Messiah tended to be somewhat blunted. This
may have been one of the reasons why Maimonides and his
school de-emphasized the apocalyptic nature of the redemption. However, among the masses of the people, belief in the
apocalyptic redemption did not diminish.
A good example for this conflict can be found in the
movement of the H asidei *Ashkenaz in the late 12t and early
13t centuries. In their popular works the teachers of Ashkenazi
114
[Joseph Dan]
messianic movements
universalistic message ready to be heeded by all was rendered
hollow by the rise of Zionism with its stress on the Jews as
a nation and its emphasis on a physical return to Palestine,
culminating in the emergence of the State of Israel; the threat
of antisemitism and the Holocaust in which six million Jews
were murdered; and the disillusionment that set in after the
two world wars. Even as early as 1937 the Pittsburgh Platform
was considerably modified by a conference of Reform rabbis
in Columbus, Ohio. A statement by the conference dealing
with the messianic question reads: In all lands where our
people live, they assume and seek to share loyally the full duties and responsibilities of citizenship and to create seats of
Jewish knowledge and religion. In the rehabilitation of Palestine, the land hallowed by memories and hopes, we behold
the promise of renewed life for many of our brethren. We affirm the obligation of all Jewry to aid in its upbuilding as a
Jewish homeland by endeavoring to make it not only a haven
or refuge for the oppressed but also a center of Jewish culture
and spiritual life. Throughout the ages it has been Israels mission to witness to the Divine in the face of every paganism
and materialism. We regard it as our historic task to co-operate with all men in the establishment of the kingdom of God,
of universal brotherhood, justice, truth and peace on earth.
This is our messianic goal.
There is a tendency among some modern Jewish thinkers to invoke once again the traditional idea of messianism
as a direct, divine intervention, in which a new heart will
be created for men, rather than as automatic human progress
towards an ideal state. Even a determined non-supernaturalist like Mordecai Kaplan can write (Questions Jews Ask (1956),
183): We can no longer believe that any person or semi-divine
being, is divinely destined to rule as the Messiah and usher in
the millennium. Nevertheless, the idea of the Messiah can still
figure symbolically to express the valid belief in the coming
of a higher type of man than this world has yet known. Will
Herberg (Judaism and Modern Man (1951), 22735) is typical
of the new school of thought. History cannot redeem itself. It
proceeds and ends in catastrophe from which it must be redeemed by God. Even the most perfect world state could do
no more than enforce peace throughout the world, but the hatred and conflicts among men would remain. The peace in
the messianic age dreamed of by the prophets is, on the other
hand, an inner harmony that needs no external sanctions. To
attempt to reduce the prophetic vision of perfection to the
level of perfectionist utopianism is to throw confusion into
both practical politics and the ultimate insights of religion. It
is not surprising, therefore, to find voices raised, also outside
the Orthodox camp, in favor of retaining the doctrine of the
personal Messiah sent by God.
Orthodoxy retains unimpaired the traditional doctrine.
The Messiah is a scion of the House of David. He will reign
in Jerusalem, will rebuild the Temple, and will reinstitute the
sacrificial system. Many Orthodox rabbis were at first opposed to Zionism in that it seemed to substitute a purely human redemption for the redeemer sent by God. But with the
115
[Louis Jacobs]
MESSIANIC MOVEMENTS.
Basic Elements
The pattern on which Jewish messianic movements were
based crystallized in the late Second Temple period and furnished Jews in following generations with certain basic elements. These, when confronted by certain typical challenges,
culminated in messianic movements of varying scope. The
term messianic movement in Jewish history applies to a
movement centered around or expressing the yearning for
messianic movements
a king or leader of the house of David and for a new ideal
political existence for the Jewish people that would serve as
a reassertion of independence and cause their return to Erez
Israel, as well as acting as a model and focus for a united
and better mankind. Experiencing the miracle of Jewish redemption, mankind would attain an ideal world where true
faith and real harmony would prevail. Jewish prayers for redemption, while seeking the advent of the king and the kingdom, also ask may they all blend into one brotherhood to do
Thy will with a perfect heart, and express the hope that with
this change of heart, Thou shalt reign over all whom Thou
hast made, Thou alone (in evening service (Arvit) for Rosh
Ha-Shanah). This formulates the abiding hope of the Jew
while in the *galut. The basis of the movements is intense
longing for the messianic era. Up to the 18t century it was
both an article of faith and an emotional necessity among
Jews to hope constantly for the immediate advent of the Messiah. Yet this persistent element did not of itself necessarily
lead to the emergence of such movements. Jewish messianic
history includes periods and religious trends in which people experienced intense and wholehearted hopes for the Messiah while being lukewarm toward active messianic movements. Thus the *Karaites throughout the Middle Ages had a
deep-seated feeling of being in exile; Karaite settlers in Jerusalem in the tenth century called themselves *Avelei Zion
(Mourners for Zion), organizing their life and patterning their thought on the basis of this attachment to Zion.
Yet only one Karaite messianic movement is known for certain. The Rabbanite *H asidei Ashkenaz longed for the Messiah, yet only rarely is any active striving for a Messiah mentioned in their relatively extensive writings. Indeed, some of
the expressions they use appear to satirize computations of
the date of the coming of the Messiah (J. Wistinetzki (ed.),
Sefer H asidim (1924), 461, no. 1706). They even warned their
readers: If you see that a man has prophesied the advent of
the Messiah, know that he is engaged either in sorcery or in
dealings with devils; or that he uses the power of the Divine
Name. One has to say to such a man: Do not talk in this
manner, eventually he will be the laughingstock of the
whole world they teach him calculations and secrets to
bring shame on him and on those who believe him (ibid.,
7677, no. 212).
This attitude displayed by mystics and ascetics in opposing activist messianism finds even sharper expression in the
views of the 13t-century mystic, Nah manides. In his disputations with the representatives of Christianity, Nah manides
told the Spanish king at *Barcelona in 1263:
Our Law and Truth and Justice are not dependent upon a Messiah. Indeed, you yourself are more important to me than a Messiah. You are a king and he is a king. You are a gentile sovereign
and he is a king of Israel. The Messiah is but a king of flesh and
blood like yourself. When I serve my Creator under your jurisdiction, in exile, torment, and subjection, exposed constantly
to universal contempt, I merit great reward; for I offer of my
own flesh a sacrifice to God, and my reward in afterlife will be
116
so much the greater (Kitvei Rabbenu Moshe ben Nah man, ed.
by H.D. Chavel, 1 (1963), 310).
The basic consideration put forward here is that the greatness of the individual suffering under alien rule can be as
rewarding as redemption. In a work addressed to Jews Nah manides wrote:
Even if we thought that it is the will and purpose of God to afflict us with political enslavement on this earth [forever], this
would in no way weaken our adherence to the precepts of the
Torah, for the sole rewards which we anticipate are those of the
world to come the beatitude of the soul which, having escaped
hells torments, enjoys the bliss of paradise.
messianic movements
as the death throes of the fourth and last beast-kingdom and
the harbingers of the messianic eternal kingdom.
The person to lead the messianic movement the Messiah himself was viewed from two different angles. Jews in
particular since the parting of the ways with Christianity saw
the Messiah as a man and not God; in the first place, as a national king. But here the agreement ends. Some, like *Maimonides in the 12t century, stressed that the Messiah will himself die even though his life will be a long one. He will first be
tested as the successful warrior-king of Israel and proved its
lawful ruler by devotion to Torah. Mankind will follow this
new exemplary Jewish state. Nature will not change its laws,
though society will become perfect (Yad, Melakhim (1962),
417). Along with this rationalistic conception of the Messiah,
there is also a miraculous one, in which the person of the Messiah sometimes attains semi-divine heights. The 17t-century
pseudo-Messiah, *Shabbetai Z evi, concluded a letter:
I will have to give full reward to all those who believe truly, men,
women, and children from the Lord of Peace and from me,
Israel your Father, the bridegroom coming out from under the
marriage canopy, the husband of the dear and virtuous Torah,
this beautiful and virtuous matron, the man set on high, the
Messiah of God, the lion of the upper regions and the deer of
the high regions, Shabbetai Z evi (his letter to Venice, in: J. Sasportas, Z iz at Novel Z evi, ed. by I. Tishby (1954), 129).
The Movements
EARLY MANIFESTATIONS. Some consider the events surrounding *Zerubbabel of the house of David and his mysterious disappearance (c. 519/518 B.C.E.) as the first messianic
movement. The charismatic leadership of the first *Hasmoneans and the devotion they inspired is by rights part of the
messianic movement cycle, but for the open question of the
claims of this house as opposed to the claims of the house of
David. The political and moral ferment created with the rise
of *Herod and his house, and even more so with the advent
of undisguised Roman rule in Judea, led to the emergence of
many messianic leaders and influenced new concepts concerning their aims and leadership. *Jesus of Nazareth was one of
many Jews who in this turbulent period claimed to be bringing
redemption to the people and who were eventually crucified
for announcing their message. *Judah the Galilean told Jews
about ten years before the birth of Jesus that it was shameful
for them to be consenting to pay tribute to the Romans and
tolerating mortal masters after having God for their Lord
(Jos., Wars, 2:118). Judah and his comrade, the Pharisee Saddok, were regarded by the hostile *Josephus as the founders of
the Zealots. They had a passion for liberty that is almost unconquerable since they are convinced that God alone is their
leader and master (Jos., Ant., 18:23). With these men there
began a heroic and tragic line of short-lived kings, martyred
leaders, and brave fighters for freedom. Combating both the
Romans and the Herodians, they developed the concept of
117
messianic movements
inaugurating the reign of the Kingdom of Heaven for Gods
elected people here and now. There were many such leaders;
it is almost certain that not all of them are mentioned in the
extant sources. It is difficult to be certain about their ideas
and types of leadership, for the accounts of their activities are
subject to distortion either by uncritical admirers or by tendentious enemies. In the case of some of them, not only Jesus,
miraculous elements enter the conduct of their leadership. Of
*Theudas it is related that he influenced the majority of the
masses to take up their possessions and to follow him to the
Jordan River. He stated that he was a prophet and that at his
command the river would be parted and would provide them
an easy passage (Jos., Ant., 20:97ff.; see also Acts 5:3539). For
this, he and many of his followers paid with their lives, about
45 C.E. Also mentioned is a Jew from Egypt, who had gained
for himself the reputation of a prophet; followed by about
thirty thousand Jews, he went to the Mount of Olives. From
there he proposed to force an entrance into Jerusalem and to
free it from the Romans. Many of his followers were killed in
battle (Jos., Wars, 2:261ff.). How he was regarded by the Romans appears clearly from the fact that the Christian apostle
*Paul was mistaken for him (Acts 21:3738). It is almost certain that *Menahem b. Judah was considered a Messiah by the
Zealots, as possibly was *Simeon Bar Giora.
The unflinching heroism displayed by the warriors in the
great revolt against the Romans (6670/73 C.E.) is comprehensible only in the context of a messianic movement. Some
consider that the reason why the Jews did not despair when
their messianic leaders had fallen in battle was because of their
belief in the Messiah in the person of the son of Joseph (see
*Messiah), who is destined to fight and die before the coming
of the Messiah in the person of the son of David. Even Josephus who tried to conceal the messianic motives of the great
revolt once had to reveal that what more than all else incited
them to the war was an ambiguous oracle, likewise found in
the sacred Scriptures, to the effect that at that time one from
their country would become ruler of the world (Wars, 6:312;
cf. Tacitus, Historiae, 5:13, and Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars, Vespasian, 4). The *Qumran scrolls also point to messianic hopes and suffering as activating factors in the life and
thoughts of this sect, though lacking the Davidic element.
As the great revolt, the precedent of many types of messianic leadership and activity, lay crushed, many new concepts
of messianic challenge and response entered the Jewish mind
and imagination as the legacy of this period. One trend of Jewish messianism which left the national fold was destined to
conquer the conquerors by the gradual Christianization of
the masses throughout the Roman Empire. Through Christianity, Jewish messianism became an institution and an article
of faith of many nations. Within the Jewish fold, the memory
of glorious resistance, of the fight for freedom, of martyred
messiahs, prophets, and miracle workers remained to nourish
future messianic movements.
Jewish messianic revolt against the Roman Empire did
not cease with the severe defeat of 70 C.E. The Jewish revolt
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messianic movements
many signs and miracles. There was widespread excited anticipation. It was reported that, under the impression that the
redemption was at hand, the Jews were idly neglecting their
work. They sent letters to Constantinople to appraise them
of the good news. Other communities sent to inquire about it.
There was also a rumor that all the Byzantine congregations
were together in Salonika, and would leave from there for
Erez Israel (J. Starr, The Jews in the Byzantine Empire 6411204
(1939), 2036 no. 153). This was apparently a messianic movement without a Messiah. Jews were united by general feelings
of excitation, rumors, and indeterminate tidings.
Maimonides heard that a miracle-working Messiah had
appeared at Lyons in France or Leon in Spain about 1060.
He also heard a tradition that in approximately 1100 a man
had been influenced by a dream to proclaim himself Messiah.
The man, Ibn Aryeh, was flogged and excommunicated by the
community leaders, and with this the affair ended. In the first
half of the 12t century messianic ferment was strong in Jewish
communities everywhere. About 1121, *Obadiah, the Norman
proselyte, met a Karaite Kohen, Solomon, who prophesied that
within two-and-a half months all the Jews would be gathered
together in Jerusalem, for I am the man whom Israel is waiting for. The proselyte was amazed that a man of Aaronide descent should claim messiahship: It is 19 years since I entered
the Covenant and I never heard that Israel is looking for redemption at the hands of a son of the tribe of Levi only at the
hands of the prophet Elijah and the King Messiah of the seed
of King David (J. Mann, in: Ha-Tekufah, 24 (1928), 3367).
This encounter in the Near East reveals how deep-rooted, even
in the case of a proselyte, was the concept that the Messiah
should be of Davidic descent, whereas in sectarian circles the
ancient sectarian concept of an Aaronide Messiah (as shown
in the *Dead Sea Scrolls) still persisted.
More or less about the same time, in 1120/21, there was
messianic excitation in Baghdad centered around a young
prophetess (see S.D. Goitein, in: JQR, 43 (1952/53), 5776). In
1127 approximately the same occurred in Fez, Morocco, where
the man, Moses Al-Dari, a great scholar and admired by
Maimonides even after he proclaimed his messiahship announced the coming of the Messiah.
He told them that the Messiah was about to appear on the first
night of Passover. He advised them to sell all their property
and to become indebted as much as possible to the Muslims,
to buy from them a thing worth a dinar for ten dinars, and thus
to fulfill the words of the Torah [Ex. 12:36], for after Passover
they would never see them. As Passover came and went and
nothing happened, these people perished for they had sold all
their property and their debts overwhelmed them (Iggeret Teiman, 103).
The story is not only remarkable in demonstrating the influence wielded by the Messiah on large groups of Jews, and their
obedience to his instructions, but also instructive since this
movement occurred soon after the visit to Fez of Muhammad
ibn Tumar, the founder of the *Almohads, and the public discussions he held there with the leaders of the Muslim establishment. Maimonides attitude to Moses, his blessing him after his death, and his statement that his prophecies were true,
reveal that even such a consistent rationalist could be inconsistent with regard to messianic movements.
The first half of the 12t century also saw the remarkable
messianic movement led by David *Alroy. Though the dates
and personalities are very confused in the sources mentioning
this event, they all indicate that it occurred in the first half of
the 12t century, and in the remote eastern districts of the Muslim Empire. Most traditions indicate his great and widespread
influence and an extensive campaign of written and oral propaganda. All of them agree about the military character of the
movement. The apostate to Islam, *Samuel al-Maghribi, relates
that Alroy attempted to take the fortress of Amadiyah, in the
mountains of Azerbaijan, by the stratagem of having masses
of his believers enter the fortress with hidden weapons (tactics
resembling those used by the earlier Muslim founder of the
Assassins, Hasan ibn al-Sabbah, with regard to the fortress of
Alamut). The apostate adds that:
When the report about him reached Baghdad two Jewish tricksters, cunning elders, decided to forge letters by Menahem to the
Jews of Baghdad bringing them the good tidings which they had
been expecting since of yore; that he would appoint for them a
certain night in which all of them would fly to Jerusalem. The
Jews of Baghdad, their claim to sagacity and pride in craftiness
notwithstanding, were all led to believe it. Their women brought
their moneys and jewels in order that it all might be distributed on their behalf, as charity to those whom the two elders
considered deserving. In this manner the Jews spent the bulk
of their wealth. They donned green garments and on the night
gathered on the roofs expecting, he asserted, to fly to Jerusalem
on the wings of angels. Women began to weep over their nursing infants; what if the mothers should fly before their children
or the children before their mothers? The children might suffer
because of the delay in feeding (Ifh m al-Yahd: Silencing the
Jews, ed. and trans. by M. Perlmann (1964), 73).
He told them that each man shall distribute all his money and
give to the poor. All those who obey him are fools and he is a
sinner; for he acts against the Torah. For according to our Torah
a man should give as charity only part of his money and not all
of it. No doubt his heart and mind that have misled him to
say that he is a Messiah have also brought him to tell the peo-
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messianic movements
ple to leave all their property and give it to the poor. Thus they
will become poor and the poor rich, and according to his law
they [the former poor] will have to return to them [the now
impoverished rich] their money. In this fashion money will
go back and forth between rich and poor unceasingly (Iggeret
Teiman, 89).
Maimonides advised the communities to proclaim him a madman or put him to death (ibid., 93, 95). Later on, in a letter to
the scholar of Marseilles, Maimonides related further details
about the movement and its end. By this time he knew that
the man in the Yemen was only:
saying that he is a messenger to smooth the path for the King
Messiah. He told them that the Messiah [is] in the Yemen. Many
people gathered [around him] Jews and Arabs and he was wandering in the mountains. He gave them new prayers. After
a year he was caught and all who were with him fled. Asked by
his Arab captor for proof of the divine source of his message,
the Yemen Messiah answered him: Cut off my head and I will
come back to life immediately, and so he was killed. Maimonides heard that there were still many foolish people in the
Yemen who believed that he would arise and lead them yet (A.
Marx, in: HUCA, 3 (1926), 356).
120
As the position of the Jews in Christian Spain steadily deteriorated, messianic hopes were kept alive. The fall of Constantinople in 1453 awakened great messianic hopes and speculations both in the communities of Spain and among Ashkenazi
Jewry. Among the forced converts (*anusim) men and women
prophesied the coming of the Messiah. Letters from the Constantinople community related tales about the birth of the
Messiah, the place of his activity, and mode of living. A mother
and daughter told their Converso friends: The gentiles do not
see us [do not understand us], for they are blind and know not
that the Lord our God hath decreed that for a time we should
be subject to them, but that we shall now surpass them [have
the upper hand], for God hath promised us that after we go
to those lands [overseas], we shall ride on horses and pass
them by (ibid., 2925). Even on the eve of the expulsion of
the Jews from Spain, both Jews and anusim actively harbored
these hopes. About 1481 a Converso told a Jew, when at his
request the latter read the messianic prophecies to him: Have
no fear! Until the appearance of the Messiah, whom all of us
wait for, you must disperse in the mountains. And I I swear
it by my life when I hear that you are banished to separate
quarters or endure some other hardship, I rejoice; for as soon
as the measure of your torments and oppression is full, the
Messiah, whom we all await, will speedily appear. Happy the
man who will see him! One Marrano was certain that the
Messiah would possess the philosophers stone and be able to
turn iron into silver. He also hoped that in 1489 there will be
only one religion in the world. Even after the expulsion many
Marranos expressed these hopes and were punished for them
by the Inquisition (ibid., 350ff.).
Ferment in the 16t to 18t Centuries
In the 16t century there were numerous expressions of messianic expectation. In 150002 Asher *Lemlein (Lammlin)
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
messianic movements
preached repentance and the imminent coming of the Messiah. He had great influence. The grandfather of the chronicler David *Gans broke up the oven that he had for baking
maz z ot, being sure that next year he would be baking maz z ot
in the Holy Land (Z emah David). From the end of the 15t
century tales originating in and letters from Jerusalem show
messianic hopes centering around the *Ten Lost Tribes of
Israel. Joseph *H ayyun commenting on the verse In his
days Judah shall be redeemed and Israel will live secure (Jer.
23:6) wrote:
gathering to him. He said to us, Come with me and you shall see
the avenging of the destruction of the Temple. We went there;
he fought there and defeated all the Christians there. He entered
the Temple and slew also those who were in it. He commanded
all the Jews and told them, Brethren, cleanse yourselves and
our Temple of the defilement of the blood of the corpses of
these uncircumcised ones and of the defilement of the idolatry
that was in it. We cleansed the Temple and reconstructed it as
it was, the daily burnt offering was brought by the arch-priest
who looked exactly like my neighbor Rabbi Israel (his Sefer haH ezyonot (1954), pt. 2, no. 2, p. 41).
This blend of the Safed reality and messianic visions of war and
glory expresses the intensity of messianic hopes in kabbalistic
circles that found expression in Shabbetai Z evi in the 17t century. Most communities became involved with Shabbetai Z evi
and the messianic movement he led in the 1660s. In it many
aspects of the messianic movements reached their highest expression, to be faced by crisis: his followers fervently believed
that the Messiah would achieve a miraculous victory and were
cruelly disappointed when Shabbetai Z evi collapsed before the
terror of punishment; the masses of his followers repented, but
repentance proved of no avail. The movement stimulated Jews
to feelings of liberation, but they remained subjugated; orgiastic aspects developed which discredited the movement. The
movement led by Jacob Frank in the 18t century introduced
the elements of nihilism, licentiousness, and severance of the
connection between messianism and Erez Israel.
Scholars are divided as to whether in its origins H asidism
bore traits of a messianic movement or whether it was on the
contrary a kind of sublimation of messianism.
121
messina
risma, and the binding spell of Jewish statehood and kingship
to be realized immediately through Gods will, through the
passion and devotion of His people. Some have spoken of the
price that Jews and Judaism have had to pay for disappointment and disenchantment after every failure of the messianic
movements. Against this are to be set the benefits that these visionary movements gave to a suppressed people in inspiring
them to activity, revitalization, and a sense of sacrifice.
For a late 20t century manifestation of this phenomenon, see *Chabad and *Schneersohn, Menahem Mendel.
Bibliography: J. Klausner, The Messianic Idea in Israel
(1955); A.H. Silver, A History of Messianic Speculation in Israel (19592);
A.Z. Aescoly, Ha-Tenuot ha-Meshih iyyot be-Yisrael (1956); Y. Baer, Yisrael ba-Ammim (1955); M. Hengel, Die Zeloten (1961); Baron, Social2,
index; S. Yeivin, Milh emet Bar Kokhva (1946); Scholem, Shabbetai
Z evi; J. Liver, in: HTR, 52 (1959), 14985; H.H. Ben-Sasson (ed.), Toledot Am Yisrael, 3 (1969), S.V. Meshih im; idem, The Reformation in
Contemporary Jewish Eyes (1970).
[Haim Hillel Ben-Sasson]
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referred to in various contexts, including methods of mining, metallurgical processes of extracting the metal, and preparing finished products. The strategic and economic importance of metals and of metal craftsmen is stressed. The
prophets employ figures of speech based on the properties of
metals and the stages of their treatment. These metals have
been uncovered in excavations in Erez Israel in the form of
vessels and slag. At Tell Jemmeh, Tell Kasila, Timnah, and
other sites, furnaces for smelting iron and copper have been
found dating from different periods. The only explicit biblical reference to a foundry is to that of King Solomon in the
plain of Jordan in the clay ground where Temple vessels
were produced (I Kings 7:46). Utensils for smelting are mentioned mainly as metaphors But you the Lord took and
brought out of Egypt, that iron blast furnace (Deut. 4:20).
Isaiah speaks of refining silver in a furnace (Isa. 48:10); while
Proverbs (27:21) describes the refining of gold and silver in a
furnace. Ezekiel compares Israel with the process of refining
metals: The house of Israel has become dross unto Me; all of
them, silver and bronze and tin and iron and lead in the furnace, have become dross (Ezek. 22:18). The prophet was apparently well acquainted with the technical process of refining
and smelting silver, and describes how silver is extracted from
its ores by means of bellows, leaving slag behind. The working
of metals was executed by special smiths and craftsmen, the
first of whom was Tubal-Cain, who forged all implements
of copper and iron (Gen. 4:22). The Bible speaks of the high
qualifications necessary for the specialized metalwork of the
Tabernacle: I have endowed him with a divine spirit of skill,
ability, and knowledge to make designs for work, in gold,
silver, and copper (Ex. 31:35). Solomon was forced to bring
the craftsman Hiram from Tyre to work in copper (I Kings
7:1314). The Bible describes the Philistine monopoly of metalsmiths and their strategic importance: Now there was no
smith to be found throughout all the land of Israel; for the
Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make themselves swords
or spears (I Sam. 13:19). The great importance attributed by
Nebuchadnezzar to craftsmen and smiths is evident in his deporting them from Jerusalem together with Jehoiachins army
to prevent a possible revolt (II Kings 24:1516). The methods
of working metal after its extraction varied according to the
type of metal and the use to which it was put: casting, hammering, gilding, preparing metal, wires, etc.
In the Bible
Six metals are mentioned in the Bible and in many passages
they are listed in the same order: gold, silver, copper, iron,
tin, and lead. Antimony is also mentioned. The metals are
123
[Sol Liptzin]
SILVER (Heb. kesef ). The main minerals in which silver appears in nature are natural silver and silver sulfides. Silver is
commonly found in association with gold and copper, and
sometimes with lead. Silver was known to man in earliest antiquity; articles of silver have been found in Erez Israel from as
early as the Middle Bronze Age. Silver mines in ancient times
were located in Spain, Egypt, and Anatolia. According to the
Bible, silver, like other metals, was brought by Solomon from
*Tarshish (II Chron. 9:21) and Arabia (9:14). Silver was extracted from its ore by smelting, with the use of bellows, and
the slag containing lead was separated from the silver (Jer.
6:2930). Job was acquainted with the technical process of
extracting silver: Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place
for gold which they refine (Job 28:1). Ezekiel also describes
the method of extracting silver and mentions slag containing
bronze, iron, lead, and tin (Ezek. 22:2022).
Because of the high value of silver, it was used as a means
of payment from earliest times, in preference to gold which
was extremely soft. Payment in silver took the form of bullion
(400 shekels of silver, Gen. 23:15) or was weighed on scales.
The biblical verse Here, I have with me the fourth part of a
shekel of silver (I Sam. 9:8) clearly indicates the use of coins.
The Temple tax was also paid in silver coins (a half-shekel,
Ex. 30:13). In the Bible the shekel designates a unit of weight
(Heb. mishkal), from which the term *shekel is apparently derived. Weighing the silver was replaced by standard units of
weight, which became *coins; later the coins were counted,
as, for example, I herewith give your brother 1,000 pieces of
silver (Gen. 20:16).
Silver was also used for making vessels for the Tabernacle
and the Temple. It was a symbol of wealth and position as in
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126
In Rabbinic Literature
Rabbinic literature the Talmuds in particular contains a
wealth of information on metals and metallurgy (though not
on their primary production by mining), on the use of the
various metals in manufacture, on metal artifacts, and so on.
The growth of terminology as well as the use of terms borrowed from Greek, Latin, and even Persian is an indication
on the progress from biblical times in the refining process and
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
GOLD. Both Talmuds and some Midrashim have slightly differing lists of seven varieties of gold, most of which occur already in the Bible (TJ, Yoma 4:4, 41d; Yoma 44b; Num. R. 12:4;
Song R. 3:10, no. 3; for the talmudic discussion on the various names for gold see above, in the biblical section). Vari-
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[Jacob Kaplan]
metaphysics
From the above it is clear that the notion that Jews succeeded in forming part of the metal industry in the Diaspora
only in secondary branches, close to the consumer, ignores the
specific part they played in developing the primary branches.
Even if this part was not quantitatively significant, there is
no doubt that it was qualitatively important. It would appear
that in those times and countries in which Jews were able to
enter these branches of industry they engaged in them with
great success.
Jewish Craftsmen in the Metal Trades. Many successive generations of Jews were engaged in various crafts connected with
the metal industries. This continuity of occupation could be
preserved chiefly in Muslim countries, where the Jews were
enabled to conduct a more varied economic life than in Christian Europe. This was also true of such countries as Spain and
Sicily which, although conquered by the Christians, still preserved modes of life from the days of Muslim domination.
Jews were especially noted for arms manufacture. Jewish armorers are mentioned in the Mishnah (Av. Zar. 1:6), and Josephus describes the preparation of arms during the Jewish
War (see, e.g., Jos., Wars, 3:22). *Dio Cassius, the historian of
the second to third centuries C.E., relates that before the *Bar
Kokhba War Jewish smiths deliberately manufactured defective weapons so that they would be rejected by the Romans
and could later be used by Bar Kokhbas soldiers. From this
account it can also be deduced that the Romans conscripted
Jewish craftsmen to manufacture their arms. When *Muhammad gained control of *Medina, in southern Arabia, many of
the weapons he obtained for his army were manufactured by
local Jewish artisans. The coats of mail of David (probably
named after a Jewish smith) were then famous in Arabia. The
Jews of Portugal, too, excelled in this craft; their expulsion
in 1496 brought a considerable number of them to Turkey,
where they made a significant contribution to strengthening
the military might of the Ottoman Empire.
The agent of the king of France in Constantinople during the first half of the 16t century tells of the numerous
Marranos who revealed to the Turks the secrets of manufacturing cannons, guns, warships, and war machines. Obadiah
of *Bertinoro found many Jewish copper and ironsmiths
in *Palermo in 1487. When an expulsion decree was issued
against the Jews of Sicily, in the wake of the expulsion from
Spain, the local authorities complained that tremendous loss
would result because almost all the craftsmen in Sicily were
Jews; their expulsion would deprive the Christians of workers who manufacture metal utensils, arms, and ironware. A
similar complaint was heard in Portugal as a result of the expulsion order of 1496.
Many Jewish craftsmen and artisans were engaged in the
metal industry in Christian Spain. In 1365 three Jewish smithies are mentioned in Toledo, and there were also Jewish workshops in Avila, Valladolid, Valdeolivas near Cuenca, and Talavera de la Reina; a Jewish tinsmith, Solomon (uleman) b.
Abraham Toledano of Avila, is mentioned in a document of
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
1375; at the close of the 14t century Jewish smiths were called
upon to repair the copper fountain of Burgos. Before 1391
many Jewish smiths, engravers, and goldsmiths lived in Barcelona. From a Saragossa register of 1401 we learn that there
were many Jewish engravers and artisans in copper and iron.
The local engravers synagogue was used for the meetings of
the community administration.
Jewish metalworkers continued to pursue their crafts
along traditional medieval lines in various Muslim lands,
where manual occupations were often despised and therefore pursued by religious minorities, particularly Jews. The
report of the French consul on the condition of the Jews in
Morocco at the close of the 18t century speaks of Jewish armorers there. The traveler *Benjamin II relates that Jews were
employed in the iron industry in Libya in the middle of the
19t century. There are also reports on Jewish smiths who
manufactured horseshoes there at the beginning of the 20t
century. R. H ayyim *Habshush, who guided the researchers
Joseph *Halevy and Eduard *Glaser in their search for ancient manuscripts in Yemen during the second half of the 19t
century, was a coppersmith. Visiting that country in the late
1850s, R. Jacob *Saphir found many Jewish smiths. Yom Tov
Z emah reports that in 1910 the three remaining Jewish smiths
of Sana were compelled to move to the provincial towns because of unemployment.
[Jacob Kaplan]
131
metatron
Moreover, the Kalam only constitutes a metaphysics in the
broadest sense. While there was no one period in which any
one of these metaphysical systems was exclusively subscribed
to by the Jews, the periods of dominance for each were: Platonism, the first centuries before and after the Common Era;
Kalam, the tenth century; Neoplatonism, the 11t and 12t centuries; and Aristotelianism, the 12t century through the end
of medieval times. The foremost representatives respectively
among the Jews employing these systems were *Philo, *Saadiah, Solomon ibn *Gabirol, and *Maimonides. The Jewish
philosophers were primarily interested in meeting the challenges that various metaphysics presented to their Judaism
and their understanding of revelation. Metaphysics, pursued
scientifically through reason, produced ostensibly different
conclusions about God, the universe, and salvation from those
conveyed by the literal meaning of Scriptures. The religious
thinker who valued human reason and did not wish to repudiate what was considered its profoundest activity met the
challenge by reconciling and synthesizing metaphysics with
Scripture. This was usually accomplished by partially limiting the validity of metaphysics, and partially by interpreting
the literal meaning of Scriptures. Philo, in his great works of
metaphysical and scriptural synthesis, formulated the basic
methods for reconciling reason and revelation, which were
employed throughout medieval philosophy not only by the
Jews, but by the Muslims and Christians as well. It may be
noted that not all Jews acquainted with metaphysics found
its claims to truth convincing. Thinkers such as *Judah Halevi
and H asdai *Crescas met the challenge of metaphysics, not by
reconciliation, but with trenchant critiques of its conclusions.
As the validity of metaphysical knowledge in post-Cartesian
thought came increasingly under attack from within philosophy itself, which concentrated primarily on the problems of
epistemology, there existed little need for Jewish thinkers to
meet speculative claims in the grand medieval style. However,
in modern thought new challenges arose from rationalism and
idealism, the scientific and empirical philosophies, and from
existentialism which required the continued involvement of
Jewish thinkers in philosophic thought.
132
Bibliography: Guttmann, Philosophies; Husik, Philosophy; H.A. Wolfson, Philo, Foundations of Religious Philosophy, 2
vols. (1947).
[Alvin J. Reines]
metatron
before Jahoel was identified with Metatron, designations such
as the greater Jaho or the lesser Jaho passed into Gnostic
use and are mentioned in various contexts in Gnostic, Coptic, and also in Mandean literature, none of which mentions
Metatron. The name Yorba ( )in Mandean in fact means
the greater Jaho but he has there been given an inferior status as is characteristic of this literature in its treatment of Jewish traditional concepts.
Two different traditions have been combined in the figure
of Metatron. One relates to a heavenly angel who was created
with the creation of the world, or even before, and makes him
responsible for performing the most exalted tasks in the heavenly kingdom. This tradition continued to apply after Jahoel
was identified with Metatron. According to this tradition, the
new figure took over many of the specific duties of the angel
*Michael, an idea retained in certain sections of the Heikhalot
literature up to and including the Kabbalah. The primordial
Metatron is referred to as Metatron Rabba.
A different tradition associates Metatron with Enoch,
who walked with God (Gen. 5:22) and who ascended to
heaven and was changed from a human being into an angel
in addition he also became the great scribe who recorded
mens deeds. This role was also already delegated to Enoch in
the Book of Jubilees (4:23). His transmutation and ascent to
heaven were discussed by the circles who followed this tradition and elaborated it. The association with Enoch can be seen
particularly in the Book of Heikhalot, sometimes also called
the Book of Enoch, of R. Ishmael Kohen ha-Gadol, or the Hebrew Book of Enoch (H. Odebergs edition (see bibl.) includes
an English translation and a detailed introduction). The author
links the two traditions and attempts to reconcile them. But it
is clear that chapters 913 allude to the primordial Metatron,
as Odeberg points out.
The absence of the second tradition in the Talmud or
the most important Midrashim is evidently connected with
the reluctance of the talmudists to regard Enoch in a favorable light in general, and in particular the story of his ascent
to heaven, a reluctance still given prominence in the Midrash
Genesis Rabbah. The Palestinian Targum (Gen. 5:24) and other
Midrashim have retained allusions to Metatron in this tradition. Instead of his role of heavenly scribe, he sometimes appears as the heavenly advocate defending Israel in the celestial
court. This transposition of his functions is very characteristic
(Lam. R. 24; Tanh . Va-Eth annen; Num. R. 12, 15). A number of
sayings of the sages, in particular in Sifrei, Parashah Haazinu,
338, and Gen. R. 5:2, were explained by medieval commentators as referring to Metatron on the grounds of a corrupt reading of Metraton instead of metator (guide).
In certain places in Merkabah literature, Metatron completely disappears and is mentioned only in the addenda that
do not form part of the original exposition, such as in Heikhalot Rabbati. The descriptions of the heavenly hierarchy
in Massekhet Heikhalot and Sefer ha-*Razim also make no
mention of Metatron. On the other hand, Metatron is a conspicuous figure in the Book of the Visions of Ezekiel (fourth
133
metchnikoff, elie
behind the throne. However, the duty to serve the heavenly
throne was associated with Metatron only at a later stage and
does not agree with the earlier traditions. It is highly doubtful whether the angel of the Countenance entering to exalt and arrange the throne in a befitting manner mentioned
in Heikhalot Rabbati (ch. 12) can in fact be Metatron, who is
not mentioned at all in this context. The Greek word thronos
does not appear in talmudic literature. The origin of the word,
therefore, remains unknown.
In contrast to the lengthy description of Metatron found
in the Hebrew Book of Enoch, in later literature the material
relating to him is scattered, while there is hardly a duty in the
heavenly realm and within the dominion of one angel among
the other angels that is not associated with Metatron. This applies particularly to kabbalistic literature (Odeberg, 11125).
Extensive material from the Zohar and kabbalistic literature
has been collected by R. Margalioth in his work Malakhei
Elyon (1945, 73108). In books dealing with practical Kabbalah
there are no incantations of Metatron, although his name is
frequently mentioned in other incantations.
Bibliography: H. Odebeg, III Enoch or the Hebrew Book
of Enoch (1928); Scholem, Mysticism, 6770; idem, Jewish Gnosticism (1965), 4355; idem, Les Origines de la Kabbale (1966), 1325,
22531, 263.
[Gershom Scholem]
134
prevent these unhealthy fermentations, Metchnikoff advocated the inclusion of sour milk in the diet. In 1908 Metchnikoff shared the Nobel Prize for medicine with Ehrlich for
his work on immunity.
Bibliography: O. Metchnikoff, Life of Elie Metchnikoff,
18451916 (1921), incl. bibl.; H. Zeiss, Elias Metschnikow, Leben und
Werk (1932), incl. bibl.; A. Besredka, Histoire dune ide (1921); T. Levitan, Laureates, Jewish Winners of the Nobel Prize (1960), 1115.
[Mordecai L. Gabriel]
METMANCOHEN, YEHUDAH LEIB (18691939), educator in Erez Israel. Born in Ostiya, a village in Ukraine, Metman-Cohen was ordained as a rabbi. He joined *Benei Moshe,
and in 1904 settled in Erez Israel, where he became headmaster
of the school in *Rishon le-Zion. In 1906, he founded the first
Hebrew high school in Jaffa, the Herzlia Gymnasium with 17
pupils and four teachers, and directed it until 1912; he was its
headmaster again during World War I. Metman-Cohen was
one of the founders of Tel Aviv (1909) and one of the initiators
of Ir Gannim (1913), which eventually became *Ramat Gan.
His publications included textbooks on the teaching of technical subjects in Hebrew and works on Hebrew language.
His wife, FANIA (1874?), was one of the first teachers at
the Hebrew high school in Jaffa and was active in the Womens
Federation for Equal Rights.
[Abraham Aharoni]
metz
tria itself he did little for the Jews at the Congress of Vienna
he consistently supported the liberal policy of Karl August
von *Hardenberg and Wilhelm *Humboldt (see Congress of
*Vienna). He repeatedly warned the senate of *Frankfurt on
the Main not to infringe upon the rights of its Jewish community and sent letters of protest to *Hamburg, *Luebeck, and
*Bremen when they deprived their Jewish citizens of their
civil rights. During the 1819 *Hep! Hep! riots he cautioned
the Frankfurt authorities against letting matters get out of
control. Metternich ordered his diplomatic agents to reveal
Frances complicity in the 1840 Damascus *blood libel affair.
A frequenter of the sophisticated Jewish salons of Vienna, he
associated, for business and pleasure, with the patrician Jewish
banking families to such a degree that the *Rothschilds were
suspected of aiding his escape from revolutionary *Vienna in
1848. His right-hand man, Friedrich von Gentz, was also sympathetic to Jewish causes.
135
Bibliography: M.J. Kohler, Jewish Rights at the Vienna Congress (1918), index; S. Baron, Die Judenfrage auf dem Wiener Kongress
(1920), index; N.M. Gelber, Aktenstuecke zur Judenfrage am Wiener
Kongress (1920); idem, in: JJLG, 18 (1926), 21764; I. Kracauer, Geschichte der Juden in Frankfurt a. M., 2 (1927), 498521; M. Gruenwald, Vienna (1936), index. Add. Bibliography: E. Timms, in:
YLBI 46 (2001), 318; N. Ferguson, ibid., 1954.
metzger, arnold
ter organized the famous concourse of the academy of Metz
on this subject Jewish emancipation (1785). In 1792 Marquis de
Lafayette, who commanded the army at Metz, proclaimed the
religious freedom of the Jews. The proclamation was later suspended during the Reign of Terror (1794). The *consistory created in Metz in 1808, which included Moselle and Ardennes,
served 6,517 Jews. The yeshivah (Ecole Centrale Rabbinique),
which became the Rabbinical Seminary of France in 1829, was
transferred to Paris in 1859. The synagogue, which had been
destroyed earlier, was rebuilt in 1850, as was the almshouse in
1867. After the German annexation of Alsace-Lorraine (1871)
about 600 Jews immigrated to France. Immigrants soon arrived from other parts of Germany as well. After 1918, when
the region reverted to France, there was a massive influx of
immigrants from Eastern Europe and from the Saar region.
The Jewish population of the city numbered about 2,000 in
1866; 1,407 in 1875; 1,900 in 1910; and 4,150 in 1931.
[Gilbert Cahen / David Weinberg (2nd ed.)]
Hebrew Printing
In 1764 Moses May set up a Hebrew printing press in Metz. In
association with the royal printer Joseph Antoine, May published a Yiddish translation of Daniel Defoes Robinson Crusoe (1764) and the first edition of Bezalel *Ashkenazis Asefat
Zekenim (Shitah Mekubbez et, to tractate Bez ah, 1765). These
works were followed by a large number of rabbinic and liturgical works, including the outstanding rabbis of Metz, such as
Aryeh Leib b. Ashers novellae Turei Even (1781). Mays effort
to publish a small-scale edition of various talmudic tractates
from 1768 onward led to his financial ruin. His son-in-law and
successor Godechau-Spire printed several volumes of enlightened literature in Hebrew, such as a volume of riddles
by Moses Ensheim (1787). May and his successors were active until 1793. Other Hebrew printers in Metz were Ephraim
Hadamar and Seligmann Wiedersheim and successors. The
Wiedersheim press continued to publish until 1870, when the
German annexation of Alsace-Lorraine led to its closure.
Holocaust Period and After
Under German occupation in World War II, Metz, like the
rest of Moselle and Alsace, was made judenrein following the
flight of the population and the particularly brutal expulsions
carried out by German troops. About 1,500 Jews died after
being deported, among them rabbis Bloch and Kahlenberg.
German soldiers plundered and defiled the two synagogues
and destroyed the workhouse. The great synagogue was used
as a military warehouse. After the liberation, the reorganized
Jewish community began a slow process of reconstruction.
In 1970 Metz had about 3,500 Jews (including some 40 families recently arrived from North Africa) and a well-organized
communal body. Metz was the seat of the consistory of Moselle, which comprised 24 communities with a total of about
5,500 Jews; the largest communities were Thionville with 450;
Sarreguemines with 270; Sarrebourg with 180; and Forbach
with 300. In Metz itself, in addition to the great synagogue
(Ashkenazi rite) with a seating capacity of 700, there are four
136
smaller places of worship, including one Polish and one Sephardi. The community also ran a Talmud Torah, a kindergarten with a kosher canteen, a workhouse, a mikveh, and a
h evra kaddisha. In 1987, the Jewish population of Metz was
estimated to be about 4,000.
Bibliography: Gross, Gal Jud, 346ff.; R. Anchel, Juifs de
France (1946), 153212; N. Netter, Vingt sicles dhistoire (1938); J.
Schneider, La ville de Metz (1950), 288f.; R. Clement, Condition des
juifs de Metz (1903); A. Cahen, in: REJ, 7 (1883), 10315; 20426; 8
(1884), 25574; 12 (1886), 28397; 13 (1886), 10526; Germ Jud, 2 pt. 2
(1968), 228ff.; H. Contamine, Metz et la Moselle, 1 (1932), 4446;
2 (1932), 3529; A. Hertzberg, French Enlightenment and the Jews
(1968), index, Add. Bibliography: Guide du judasme franais
(1987), 39.
METZGER, ARNOLD (1892?), German scholar and author. Metzger was born in Landau in the Palatinate and began his career at the Hochshule fuer die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin, where he taught from 1934 to 1937. In the
face of rising Nazism he escaped to England, and then spent
time in the United States where he became associated with
Simmons College, Boston. After the war he returned to Germany, accepting a professorship in philosophy at the University of Munich. Much of his writing treats those areas of philosophy that touch on psychology; his contributions center
on the phenomenology of recollection, perception, and the
longing for death. His early books include Phaenomenologie
und Metaphysik (1933); better known are his works on free will
and determinism, Freiheit und Tod (1955), on transcendentalism, Daemonie und Transzendenz (1964), and on the ramifications of technology for the human personality, Automation
und Autonomie (1964). His later interests include existentialism, social philosophy, and the American pragmatic school
in juxtaposition to the German metaphysical schools. In this
connection he wrote William James and the Crisis of Philosophy (In Commemoration of William James, 1942).
add. Bibliography: K. Bloch, Wir arbeiten im gleichen Bergwerk Briefwechsel 19421972 Ernst Bloch und Arnold Metzger, 1987.
mexico
MEUNITES (Heb. ) , an Arab tribe which lived on the
border of the kingdom of Judah. Along with the Philistines
and the Arabians that dwelt in Gur-Baal (II Chron. 26:7), the
Meunites paid a tax to *Uzziah king of Judah. At about the
time of Hezekiah, the Meunites were attacked by the tribe of
Simeon, which reached to the entrance of Gedor, even unto
the east side of the valley (I Chron. 4:3941). An inscription
of the Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III indicates that at about
this time (eighth century B.C.E.) the Meunites lived near the
Egyptian border, which extended to the Brook of Egypt
(Wadi el-Arish). There is no basis for J.A. Montgomerys identification of the Meunites of Chronicles with the Mineans, one
of the south Arabian kingdoms whose economic activities and
settlements reached as far as the oases in northern Arabia, or
for A. Musils location of them in the region of Maan in southern Transjordan. These theories are based upon references to
the () in the Septuagint and in works of the classical
historiographers of the third century B.C.E. and later; the conditions reflected in these sources are later and do not conform
to those of the eighth century B.C.E.
[Israel Ephal]
self a distinguished scholar; therefore, he is referred to in letters as Sanhedra Rabba (member of the Sanhedrin). His fame
as a physician was such as to gain him an appointment at the
Egyptian royal court. He succeeded his brother Judah as nagid
in about 1080. At that time *David b. Daniel b. Azariah arrived
in Egypt to wrest the leadership from the heads of the Egyptian community. He instigated others to bring false accusations against Mevorakh and forced the latters banishment from
the Egyptian capital to Fayyum and later to Alexandria. After
some time Mevorakh succeeded in proving his innocence, and
was reinstated as court physician and nagid. His triumph over
David b. Daniel was complete by 1094. He wielded much influence with al-Malik al-Afd al, the *Fatimid regent, and remained
in his position until the beginning of the 12t century.
Bibliography: Mann, Egypt, 1 (1920), 169, 188ff.; 2 (1922),
249ff.
[Eliyahu Ashtor]
Colonial Period
The Jewish presence in Mexico began with the Spanish conquest led by Hernn Corts in 1521. Many secret Jews and
Conversos sought refuge in the newly conquered lands, and
in this way a significant movement toward La Nueva Espaa
(New Spain the name of Mexico in the colonial period)
was initiated. There were two kinds of Conversos arriving in
the New World, first, the Crypto-Jews (also called disrespectfully Marranos) who had been forced to convert and
continued their traditions in secret and were looking for a
better economic situation and a way to evade the persecution of the Inquisitions Tribunal. Many of those belonging to
this group were accused before the Tribunal and their records
137
mexico
were kept at the Archivo General de la Nacin (Mexican
National Archive), so that their history can be tracked. Also,
there were those who were truly converted and integrated who
hid their origin and their blood impurity. The latter were
the ones that most frequently gave away the Crypto-Jews and
were incorporated to the Church structure; remarkable examples, among many others, were Fray Bartolom de las Casas,
Fray Alonso de la Veracruz, and Fray Bernardino de Sahagn.
Following the arrival of the Conversos in the New World,
we can divide their history into three periods: from the discovery to the conquest (14921519); from 1519 until the establishment of the Inquisition Tribunal in New Spain in 1571; and
from 1571 to 1810 during which the Tribunal functioned. The
first stage was initially characterized by the abandonment of
Spain, owing to the expulsion decree. Many Crypto-Jews and
New Christians decided to sail with Columbus and other expeditions in order to discover new routes; they even financed
these trips. Some remained in the newly discovered islands,
while some returned and motivated others they knew into
joining this adventure. Until 1502 the migratory restrictions
were minimal. From then on, however, the Crown allowed access to the newly discovered lands only to the descendents of
Christians who counted no converts among their ancestors or,
in other terms, were pure blooded (limpios de sangre), meaning that the children of the Jews, the Moorish, the newly converted, and those processed by the Inquisition were not able
to sail in official missions such as that of Nicols de Ovando in
1502. Yet, beginning in 1511 restrictions became flexible owing
to the need to populate the new lands with craftsmen, leading to an increase of the number of Conversos with a professional license as well as of businessmen. The commerce in
false documents attesting to pure blood increased as well,
allowing the sailing of a large number of Crypto-Jews heading toward the Indias.
In the second period many Crypto-Jews participated
with Hernn Corts in the conquest of the mainland and in
the defeat of the Aztec Empire situated in Tenochtitlan. We
know about them because of the process against four of them
that took place in 1528: two of the Morales brothers, Hernando Alonzo and Diego de Ocaa, were burnt at the stake
and the other two received minor punishments. During this
stage a significant arrival of Conversos took place, mainly
from Madrid and Seville. They arrived as soldiers, conquerors, and colonizers. There is information that by 1536 there
were in New Spain Crypto-Jewish communities in Tlaxcala
and Mrida and there are files and records of the procedure
against Francisco Milln, a bartender who sold Sabbath wine
to the community and informed on a large amount of correligionists. Along with the development of the mining districts,
the Crypto-Jews settlements became diversified as well, such
as in Taxco, Zacualpan, Zumpango del Rio, Espritu Santo,
and Tlalpujahua (1532), Los Reales del Monte in Pachuca,
Atotonilco (1544), Zacatecas (1547), and Guanajuato (1554).
By the end of the 16t century some small communities were
138
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mexico
colonial society. Among their crafts particular notice may be
given to the shoemakers, tailors, silver craftsmen, engravers,
barbers, doctors, painters, wagon riders, musicians, lawyers,
and solicitors.
From 1625 to the end of the 17t century, the migration of
the Conversos and their descendants from Spain and Portugal
diminished, and the persecution of the wealthy Crypto-Jews
increased actions that benefited the wealth of the Inquisition, which confiscated their assets. The inquisitors prosecuted
over 200 people between 1620 and 1650 and from 1672 to 1676
a hundred more. Most of the accused came from Portugal, owing to the separation of the two kingdoms in 1640, which provoked increased persecution of Portuguese by Spain. Typical
cases were those of Domingo Mrquez, deputy major of Tepeaca in 1644, and Diego Muoz de Alvarado, who was chief
magistrate in Puebla de Los Angeles and accumulated a large
fortune to the extent of having his own commercial ships.
The Faith Prosecutions did not stop. In 1646, 46 Conversos were prosecuted and were obliged to make a public
reconciliation with the Church; in 1647 there were 21; 40 in
1648; and finally, on April 11, 1649, 35 were prosecuted out of
which eight were executed by burning. From that moment
the reconciliated were deported to the Iberian Peninsula to
prevent them from reinitiating their Jewish practices for lack
of surveillance. Among the deported were Captain Macas
Pereira Lobo, sent to trial in 1662; Teresa Aguilera y Roche,
wife of New Mexicos governor; Bernardo Lpez de Mendizbal, judged in 1662; Captain Agustn Muoz de Sandoval,
sentenced in 1695; and a Crypto-Jewish monk tried in 1706
called Fray Jos de San Ignacio.
From the beginning of the 18t century through to the
achievement of Independence (1821), migration disappeared
and religious persecution diminished. The Crown and authorities of New Spain took care to prohibit the reading of
books from European encyclopedia writers that had liberal
and democratic ideas. By then the assimilation of Crypto-Jews
into the society was much greater, causing the loss of Jewish
customs and traditions due to the lack of contacts with outside
political allies. Oral tradition survived in some cases, albeit
deformed, and some objects went from generation to generation without a link to their ritual meaning. Some families did
not forget their origins, and such was the case of a university
professor, Francisco Rivas, who, by the end of the 19t century,
published a journal called El Sbado Secreto (The Secret Saturday), in which he declared himself to be a descendant of
Conversos from the Colonial period.
Despite the fact that the Inquisition ended symbolically
as well as physically regarding Judaism, there are still some
groups in Mexico that define themselves as Jews descending
from the Crypto-Jews. The main congregations identified as
such are the ones at Venta Prieta in Pachuca, Hidalgo, and
Vallejo a northern neighborhood of Mexico City. The members of those communities at Venta Prieta and Vallejo, named
Kahal Kadosh Bnei Elohim (the leader of the latter in 2005 was
Dr. Benjamn Laureano Luna), who have mixed blood and
139
mexico
and the *Jewish Colonization Association (ICA) in London,
several plans for the establishment of extensive Jewish farming settlements in Mexico were proposed. However, this was
not accomplished due to the negative reports that were given
by the experts who were sent to evaluate this possibility. They
thought that the potential settlers would not be able to compete with the cheap local labor work. In 1899, when the first
immigrants from Syria reached Mexico, the above-mentioned
Francisco Rivas Puigcerver started with his weekly journal
El Sbado Secreto (later called La Luz del Sbado Shabbat
Light), dedicated to Sephardi history and language.
Immigration and Community Organization (190050)
The deterioration in the quality of life of the Jews in the Turkish-Ottoman Empire, caused by political instability and the
frequent wars with which they had to contend on their borders, forced the different Jewish communities to look for more
appropriate geographical and economic arenas. Sephardi Jews
from the Middle East, the Balkans, and Turkey (Ladino speakers), as well as Jews from Syria and Lebanon (Arab speakers),
were the first interested in recreating a Jewish life in Mexican grounds.
Jews coming from Damascus and Aleppo maintained
daily prayers and rituals inside private homes, owing to the
fact that families had known each other previously and kinship was the basis for their strong union. Parallel to the informal gathering among the Syrian Jews, scattered Ashkenazim living in Mexico tried to organize a community. In
1904 a group called El Comit (The Committee) organized
the Rosh Ha-Shanah services on the premises of a Masonic
Lodge. After this event, there were several attempts at community organization, but it was not until 1908 in which the
Union of American Hebrew Congregations, which was interested in establishing a Jewish community in Mexico to
avoid illegal immigration to the United States, sent Rabbi
Martin Zielonka to organize a congregation in Mexico. The
Committee was then summoned and with the 20 attendees
the Sociedad de Beneficencia Monte Sinai was established.
However, the activities of this group were not fruitful, because
many of them left the country with the outburst of the Mexican Revolution in 1910.
In 1912 the Alianza Monte Sinai AMS re-constituted
itself under Isaac Capons initiative. Born in Turkey, he was
aware of the need to have a Jewish cemetery, since upon the
death of his mother she had to be buried in a Catholic graveyard. All of the Jewish residents in Mexico, including the Syrians, participated in the initiative, and thanks to the good relationship between one of its members, Jacobo Granat, with
the president at that moment, Francisco I. Madero, the AMS
received permission from the authorities for the acquisition
of the first Jewish cemetery. In 1918 AMS bought a house on
Jesus Maria Street in the center of Mexico City where they
decided to build a synagogue. The day when President Venustiano Carranza gave his authorization signature became a
memorable one, because it was the first time the existence of
140
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was created in order to take care of the religious needs (such
as prayer, talmud torah, kashrut, h evrah kaddisha, and others). This institution became the Kehil nucleus that was established with official recognition in 1957. After some attempts
begun in 1923, the Zionist Federation was established in 1925,
with the different ideological trends of the Zionist Ashkenazi
Jews. In the 1920s and the 1930s there were also active Bundist
and Communist organizations. The Sephardim formed their
own Zionist organization, Bnei Kedem, in 1925, because they
did not feel comfortable in meetings where the predominant
language was mostly Yiddish. In 1924 the Yiddishe Shul Colegio Israelita de Mexico was founded, the first of a wide network of Jewish day schools still in operation.
In 1924 Jews from Turkey, Greece, and the Balkans Ladino speakers decided to separate from the AMS and establish their own community and welfare association La Fraternidad in order to help their fellow countrymen with economic,
medical, and social aspects. In 1940 the Union Sefarad was
founded, with the fusion of La Fraternidad, the womens mutual aid society Buena Voluntad, and the youth organization
Unin y Progreso. Since then, this community has had a day
school (founded in 1943), two synagogues, and a cemetery as
well as a formal administrative structure.
The AMS was left actually in the hands of the Syrian Jews.
Those who came from Aleppo (halebies), however, did not actively take part, because they had their own places of prayer
and their own talmud torah, so that their economic participation was very limited. They even built their own synagogue,
Rodfe Sedek, in 1931, and in fact were separated from the
AMS. Problems arose when they wanted to make use of the
cemetery and they were required to update the payment of
their membership fees. The halebies founded their own communal and administrative institutions and bought their own
grounds for a cemetery. In 1938 Sedak uMarp was founded, a
charity society that grouped together the diverse institutions of
men, women, and youth, as well as the observant groups that
were in charge of the religious services, assistance, and social
activities. On the other hand, the AMS, managed by the Damascenes since the second half of the 1920s, changed its statutes
in 1935 and became an exclusive organization for this sector.
By the end of the 1930s, the limits of the community structures were defined, so that community affairs administration
would be taken care of by institutions organized according to
their origin, and the original culture would be recreated within
them, preserving the identity of the first immigrants.
duced the credit system sales, which made it easier for their
customers to enhance their lifestyle and acquire goods which
otherwise would have been impossible to get. They sold shoes,
socks, ties, fabrics, thread, stockings, ribbons, and some other
consumer goods necessary for domestic use. In the second
half of the 1920s, the Bnai Brith contributed economically,
together with the Ashkenazi associations, to incorporate immigrants; it gave them credit to start as merchants, taught
them Spanish, and organized their social life.
In the 1930s, and as a result of the unemployment caused
by the economic effects of the Great Depression of 1929, antisemitic and xenophobic movements promoted attacks against
the vendors at La Lagunilla market. Antisemitism forced the
small Jewish merchants to install their own commercial spaces
as well as to establish small manufacturing workshops in order
to protect themselves from the attacks of ultra-right nationalist groups, in the long run resulting in their economical ascendance. During this process the Banco Mercantil, founded
by Jews in 1929 on the basis of a loan fund, financed the acquisition of machinery for the textile industry and industrial
input assets. In 1931 the Cmara Israelita de Industria y Comercio (Jewish Industry and Commerce Chamber) was created in order to coordinate the economic efforts of the Jews
and to serve as a representative organ of the Jews vis--vis the
Mexican authorities and the society at large.
ECONOMY AND SOCIAL STRATIFICATION. Since their arrival, Jewish immigrants dedicated themselves to commerce,
mainly as peddlers. Before 1940 the Mexican population was
basically rural, so that salesmen had to carry the goods to the
smaller towns and not only to the urban centers. For this reason there were Jews who preferred to stay in the provinces
and prospered as itinerant salesmen or with fixed or semifixed shops in the markets, even though most of them lived
in the capital. Along with other foreign merchants, they intro-
141
mexico
of Mexico) in 1938 as an umbrella institution of all the existing Jewish organizations, becoming the only representative
body recognized as the legitimate Jewish representative by
the government, as well as by international Jewish institutions
the world over, such as the *Joint Distribution Committee
and the *World Jewish Congress. In 1944, the Anti-Defamation League was created within the Comit Central, becoming better known by the name of its journal Tribuna Israelita,
with the objective of preventing antisemitism. The tumultuous
antisemitic attacks from the ultra-right were silenced in 1942
when Mexico declared war on the Axis powers.
The 1940s in Mexico were outstanding, because it was
the starting point for a sustained economic growth that lasted
for over 30 years. World War II promoted the export of food
and basic goods into the United States as well as the strengthening of the Mexican internal market. The imports substitution program, launched by the government, stimulated the
creation of industries in a protected economic environment.
The Jews saw in this project the opportunity for improvement, so they established manufacturing factories, especially
in the textile field. Their economic status improved and the
occupational areas that participated were also diversified. A
survey performed in 1950, among the Ashkenazi sector, found
52 occupations in different fields, especially commerce and
industry and also professions such as medicine, engineering,
and the sciences.
Jewish Education
In many cases the community institutions organized schools
of Jewish studies for the children of their members. They established talmudei torah and Kutabim (complementary traditional schools), and also day schools in which general studies
were imparted together with subjects of Jewish culture. At the
beginning the Jewish studies were learned in Yiddish, Arabic,
or Spanish, together with rudimentary knowledge of Hebrew.
The first day school was the Yiddishe Shul Colegio Israelita
de Mexico, established in 1924 by Meir Berger. During the first
decade Jewish studies were taught in Yiddish. In the 1930s a
few attempts were made to teach in Hebrew but they failed.
Since then the school has defended Yiddish as a fundamental
cultural current of Judaism. In the 1940s many new schools
were established, according to the ideology of the founders and the parents, and also according to the community of
origin of the families. Two schools were established in 1942:
the Hebraist school Tarbut by Avner Aliphaz and Yeshaiahu
Austridan, and the Ashkenazi religious school Yavneh. They
were followed by the Hebraist schools of the Sephardi community (1943) and that of the AMS (1944). All these schools
adhered to the Zionist movement or sympathized with it,
and after 1948 they were among the most important vehicles
for the linking of the communal identity with Israel. In 1946
a Teachers Seminary was established in the Yiddishe Shul by
its new principal, Avraham Golomb. In 1947 the day school
Sedak uMarp of the Aleppan community was founded and
functioned until 1951 without a curriculum in Jewish stud-
142
ies. In 1950 Avraham Golomb left his former school and established a new Ashkenazi school the Naye Yiddishe Shul
I.L. Peretz Nuevo Colegio Israelita with a Yiddishist trend
and inclination towards the Bund. The Sephardi School, the
Monte Sina School, and the Teachers Seminary adhered to
the Zionists and adopted the educational politics sent from
Israel to the Diaspora. The schools were connected to the
Vaad haHinuch (educational council), that was linked with
the Jewish Agency and the State of Israel. The Jewish Agency
assigned to the schools in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s Israeli
shelih im teachers and principals to teach Hebrew, Yiddish,
and Jewish culture, and to bring the schools closer to the Jewish state. Since then the schools have employed Israeli educators on their own.
ZIONISM. The events that marked world Jewish history in the
middle of the 20t century, the Holocaust and the creation of
the State of Israel, were present in the life of the Jewish Mexican community and its leaders. Zionism was the flag identifying Mexican Jews vis--vis the national society. The Jewish
efforts to achieve the legitimation of the national Jewish aspirations and the obtaining of a favorable vote from Mexico
on the partition of Palestine in the United Nations in November 1947, was the main challenge for the Zionist sector. The
coordination, unification, and efforts were manifested in the
creation of the Zionist Emergency Committee and the Emergency pro-Palestine Jewish Committee, representative organizations of the Jewish community before the Mexican society.
The legitimate demands that accompanied the Zionist ideals
as a national liberation movement, gave a positive image of
Judaism, compensating for the impact of previous anti-Jewish expressions and demonstrations, despite the abstention of
Mexico in the United Nations in 1947.
The creation of the State of Israel in 1948 had concrete
effects within the internal dynamic of the Ashkenazi sector;
the organized unification of the Zionist parties and groups
became a reality in 1950. The Zionist Federation of Mexico
became the framework in which the different sectors coordinated their efforts thanks to the links established with Israel.
The new state replaced the Zionist party organizations with
government institutions, a process that the Zionists in Mexico also followed as they developed community institutions.
Since then, Israel became the central issue for the secular Jewish solidarity and identification. Within the Sephardi community, the Zionist youth organizations were very active. In
the case of Sedak uMarp and AMS, Zionism introduced a
new element of identity and Jewish pride, and gave meaning
to their work on behalf of the State of Israel.
Consolidation of the Jewish Community in Mexico
19502000
During the first half of the 1950s the Club Deportivo Israelita
(CDI) was created, becoming the largest organization of Mexican Jewry, with the affiliation of Jews from all the communitys
sectors, becoming one of its most inclusive institutions. The
objective of the CDI was to stimulate physical and cultural acENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mexico
tivities allowing the association of children, youngsters, and
adults. Around 15,000 Jewish families are members of the CDI,
including some non-affiliated.
The two main communities that consolidated outside
Mexico City and its metropolitan area since the 1930s are
Monterrey and Guadalajara, consisting of approximately 150
families each. Having created institutions that include synagogues, schools, recreational facilities, and their own cemetery, both maintain religious institutions and organizations for
women and men, where Ashkenazim and Sephardim gather
in the same community space. In Tijuana there is also a community of 70 families that since 1943 had been closely linked
to the U.S. community of San Diego. Some Jewish families
also live in Veracruz, Puebla, and Cuernavaca, however, with
no representative institutions. In the 1990s, in Cancn, community life has been promoted among the 70 families that
moved to that city.
In the 1950s and the 1960s the Jewish institutions were
consolidated. The fast economic ascent of the Jewish families,
made possible the change of residential neighborhoods in
Mexico City: from the downtown area and Colonia Roma to
Condesa and Polanco; for this reason some new community facilities were built, such as large and elegant synagogues,
new school buildings, new community centers, and places for
the youth movements. These were the years in which the religious attachment diminished because the Jewish core identity
remained linked to Zionism, coinciding with the secularization process with which Mexican society was experimenting
along with its fast growing urban modernization. It is quite
significant that during this period there emerged the only
two Conservative synagogues that exist in Mexico City: Bet
Israel created in 1953 by American Jews, and Bet El founded
in 1963 by Ashkenazi Jews who were not able to find in the
religious legacy of their parents a meaningful Judaism, and
decided to be separated from the Kehil in order to practice
more modern religious forms that were closer to their reality.
However, in the Ashkenazi sector as well as among the Sephardim, there remained vigorous nuclei of religious Orthodox families who continued the rites and practices preserving
the different modalities according to the original tradition of
the immigrants.
SOCIAL INTEGRATION AND IDENTITY. The socioeconomic
improvement placed the Jews in the upper levels of the Mexican society and their cultural practices resembled those of the
elite. Many sent their children to American schools to learn
English, intermingled with Mexican entrepreneurs to do business, and made frequent trips to the United States. The Jews
learned how to adapt themselves into the Mexican political
system; they registered their institutions according to the national schemes, e.g., the welfare societies were registered in
the Secretara de Salubridad y Asistencia (Health and Welfare
Ministry). However, an asymmetric relationship with the government prevailed, since it recognized the Jews as citizens, but
did not consider them as a distinct group, although in fact it
143
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agogues and especially of midrashim and kolelim (religious
adults study centers for bachelors and married men respectively) rose, in particular in the most Orthodox sector, the
Magun David Community, formerly the Aleppan Sedak
uMarp. This trend is a new development in the religious life
in Mexico, since it is linked to the ultra-Orthodox movements
from Israel, in which there is a kind of synthesis of the religious tradition of the communities of Middle Eastern origin
with the Ashkenazi tradition.
A significant change in the relations between the Jewish
community and the Mexican State was felt after the creation
of the Ley de Asociaciones Religiosas y Culto Publico (Religious Associations and Public Cult Law) in 1992. Until the
1990s, the Jewish minority had adapted to the limited space
given by the State, registering itself as civil associations. Since
the 1940s, the relations between State and Church were based
on the agreement, according to which the government did not
interfere in the affairs of the Church in exchange for the recognition of the Church in the sociopolitical hegemony of the
State. This relation was also applied to the Jewish case. This
was illustrated in the increase in Jewish schools during the
1940s, which besides the official program taught Jewish history, Bible, and tradition which could be interpreted as religion. The State tolerated this kind of expression even though
it was forbidden by law.
The reforms of 1992 in the Constitution, related to the
legal recognition of the religious institutions and their public activities, attempted to normalize the common practices.
This kind of legality recognizes the legitimacy of group consolidation through the religious identification. The religious
associations became another channel of collective expression.
The religious and ideological diversity in the society increased
in correlation with a greater democratization of political and
cultural life. Gradually the participation of the Jews in these
areas is becoming wider and less questioned everyday, and
the presence of Jews in senior official posts is becoming more
frequent.
144
mexico
lower in the Magun David and Monte Sina communities (18
and 10 respectively). However these differences tend to diminish in the younger generations. In addition to education,
community life dynamics are expressed in a variety of social
and cultural activities. Besides the activities performed by each
of the community sectors, there are also inter-communal organizations, such as the womens associations WIZO, Naamat,
and the Mexican Federation of Jewish Women or the Mexican
Friend Associations of the Israeli universities.
There are around 16 youth movements with approximately 2,000 members, most of them identified with the
State of Israel. Each year several hundred Mexican Jewish
youngsters visit Israel in groups organized by the schools. The
Federacin Mexicana de Universitarios Judos (FEMUJ) and
the Federacin de Universitarios Sionistas de Latinoamrica
(FUSELA) have a significant presence in the community. Since
1948, nearly 4,000 Mexican Jews have made aliyah.
The Jewish press is diverse but mainly dedicated to inner
community matters. The news or ideological publications typical of the 1940s and the 1950s, mainly in Yiddish, no longer exist. Each community sector has its own bulletins and periodic
magazines. There are some independent organs such as Foro
magazine distributed through subscriptions or Kesher with free
distribution in all the communities and the Centro Deportivo
Israelita. The Jewish journalists and writers association meet
and express themselves through the community press.
The Jewish museum named Tuvia Maize is dedicated
to the history of the Jewish community in Mexico and to the
Holocaust. At the Ashkenazi Kehil there was established a
Centro de Documentacin e Investigacin (Center for Documentation and Research); it preserves historical documents
of the Jewish Community in Mexico, as well as books in several languages, that were part of private libraries of the first
immigrants, and promotes the publication of documentary
books and researches.
Another important cultural site is the Centro Deportivo
Israelita (CDI), which besides having excellent sports facilities,
has an art gallery, a theater, and a banquet hall. This is the location of the most important Annual Jewish Dance and Music Festival in Latin America.
RELIGIOUS LIFE. In Mexico City there are around 25 synagogues and an equal number of small places for prayer and
study that belong to the most Orthodox sectors in the community. Two of the synagogues are Conservative, and all the
others are Orthodox. The level of religious observance has
increased by 4 from 6.7 Orthodox Jews, according to the
results of the socio-demographic study of 1991, to 10.7 according to that of 2000. Most of the Mexican Jews consider
themselves as traditionalists (76.8) while the non-observant,
secular, and atheist Jews comprise 12.5, according to the data
of 2000. When analyzing figures per community, Magun
David presents the lower index of traditionalists (66) and an
equal number of Orthodox (17) and non-observants (17),
which shows a tendency toward polarization of the religious
add. Bibliography: P. Bibelnik, Olamam ha-Dati shel haMityah adim be-Mexico ba-Meah ha-Sheva-Esreh, in: Peamim, 76
(1998), 69102; idem, Mishpetei ha-Inkviziz yah neged ha-Mityah adim
be-Mexico (16421659), in: D. Gutwein and M. Mautner (ed.), Law
and History (1999), 12745 (Heb.); J. Bokser-Liwerant (ed.), Imgenes
de un Encuentro. La presencia juda en Mxico durante la primera mitad del siglo XX (1992); I. Dabbah, Esperanza y realidad. Races de la
Comunidad Juda de Alepo en Mxico (1982); S. DellaPergola and S.
Lerner, La poblacin juda en Mxico: perfil demogrfico, social y cultural (1995); D. Gleiser Salzman, Mxico frente a la inmigracin de refugiados judos, 19341940 (2000); A. Gojman Goldberg, Los Conversos en la Nueva Espaa (1984); A. Gojman de Backal, Los Conversos
145
MEYER, ANNIE NATHAN (18671951), U.S. educator, activist, and writer. Born in New York City to a family of early
colonial stock (see *Nathan family), Meyer was an autodidact.
Dissatisfied with the lack of serious educational opportunities
for women in New York, Meyer determined to found a college
for women within Columbia University, advocating her cause
on the speakers platform and in the press. When she had obtained substantial financial contributions, she negotiated with
the trustees of Columbia University, and, in just two years, her
efforts were realized. In 1889, two years after her marriage to
ALFRED MEYER, a prominent New York physician, Barnard
College opened, and Meyer became its lifelong trustee. The
Meyers had one daughter who died tragically in 1924.
Although Annie Meyer considered herself a feminist,
she opposed the womens suffrage movement. Decrying unintelligent use of the vote, she called for the inclusion of
an educational clause in the suffrage bill. Meyer was the prolific author of plays, novels, social studies, magazine articles,
and art reviews, including Barnards Beginnings (1935) and
Womens Work in America (1891; rep. 1972). Her first novel,
Helen Brent, M.D. (1892), celebrated a woman who chose
medicine over marriage. However, Meyer idealized motherhood and expressed her opposition to mothers who worked
for self-fulfillment in two plays dealing with that theme, The
Dominant Sex (1911) and The Advertising of Kate (produced
on Broadway in 1921). Another play, Black Souls (produced
and published in 1932), dealt with hypocrisy and race relations in the American South. Her autobiography, Its Been
Fun, appeared in 1951.
Meyer was an active lecturer and publicist who spoke
to both Jews and African Americans about the challenge of
prejudice and the need for pride in ones heritage. True to her
principles, she sponsored and supported several Jewish and
African-American students at Barnard, including writer Zora
Neale Hurston. Early in the 1930s, she recognized the dangers
of Nazism and clashed publicly with several prominent New
Yorkers whom she accused of antisemitism. Though she was
not acknowledged in her lifetime as Barnard Colleges founder,
146
she never lost her enthusiasm for the school, even as she devoted her energies to literature and social justice causes.
Bibliography: D. Askowith, Three Outstanding Women
(1941); M. Goldenberg, Annie Nathan Meyer, in: JWA, 2, 91821.
[Myrna Goldenberg (2nd ed.)]
meyer, leon
Hanns *Eisler. He immigrated to England in 1933 and returned
to Germany in 1948 to become professor of music sociology at
the Humboldt University in East Berlin. An authority on the
music of the 16t and 17t centuries, he wrote English Chamber
Music (1946), Musik im Zeitgeschehen (1952), and Aufsaetze ueber Musik (1957). He composed ballet and chamber music, and
a cantata, Das Tor von Buchenwald (1959). His teachings and
compositions followed the principles of socialist ideology.
MEYER, EUGENE (18751959), U.S. banker, government official, and newspaper editor and publisher. Born in California,
he formed the banking firm of Eugene Meyer, Jr., and Co. in
1901. For 16 years he played a leading role in developing oil,
copper, and automotive industries. During World War I he
entered government service as an adviser on nonferrous metals to the War Industries Board. In 1918 he was named managing director of the War Finance Corporation, and under
President Hoover he served as governor of the Federal Reserve Board and organized the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (1932). He was also the first chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. In 1933, he bought the then
moribund Washington Post at a public auction, pumped new
life into it, absorbed the Washington Times-Herald, and raised
the Washington Post daily circulation to 400,000. After World
War II, Meyer accepted an appointment by President Truman
to become first president of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and continued to serve on various
commissions under President Eisenhower. The Washington
Post Company, owner also of Newsweek magazine and a number of radio stations, was later headed by Meyers daughter,
Katherine *Graham.
Bibliography: Current Biography, 20 (Oct. 1959), 30.
[Irving Rosenthal]
MEYER, HANS JOHANNES LEOPOLD (18711944), Austrian organic chemist. Meyer was born in Vienna and worked
at German University of Prague (18971933) where from 1911
he was professor of chemistry. His books include Anleitung zur
quantitiven Bestimmung der organischen Atomgruppen (1897),
Analyse und Konstitution (1908, 19386), Boehmisches Porzellan
und Steingut (1927), and Lehrbuch der organischen chemischen
Methodik (4 vols., 193340). Meyer died in Theresienstadt.
MEYER, JONAS DANIEL (17801834), Dutch jurist and
public figure. Meyer was a grandson of Benjamin *Cohen, a
prominent Dutch Jew and friend of William V of Orange. A
child prodigy, Meyer was awarded the LL.D. at the age of 16
for a thesis on the American revolutionary Thomas Payne,
whom he attacked for the latters disapproval of religious ceremonies, particularly those of the Jews. Meyer was the first
Jew in Holland to be admitted as a lawyer. In 1808, Louis Napoleon then king of Holland appointed Meyer director of
the Royal Gazette, a member of the Institute of Sciences, and
a court magistrate in Amsterdam. Within the Jewish community Meyer was a member and from 1809 president of the High
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
147
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meyer, seligmann
taught at HUC-JIR, Los Angeles, 196467, and from 1968 at
HUC-JIR, Cincinnati, where he was named Adolf S. Ochs
Professor of Jewish History. He also taught regularly at HUCJIR in Jerusalem and was a visiting professor at UCLA, Antioch College, the University of Haifa, Ben-Gurion University, and the Hebrew University. Meyer served as chairman
of the International Association of Historical Societies for
the Study of Jewish History and was one of the founders of
the (American) Association for Jewish Studies and its president in 197880. He was also the international president of
the Leo Baeck Institute.
Meyer has been called the dean of German-Jewish historians, and he has said that my awareness of being one of
the niz z olei ha-Shoah those saved from the Holocaust has
deepened my commitment to things Jewish and to the study
of German-Jewish history. He was considered perhaps the
leading authority on Reform Judaism, about whose future he
expressed optimism. His major work is Response to Modernity
(1988), a history of the Reform movement through the 1970s,
which won the National Jewish Book Award; it has become
a standard work and has influenced all subsequent scholars
on the subject. He has also edited (with Michael Brenner) a
comprehensive four-volume history of modern German Jewry,
sponsored by the Leo Baeck Institute, which is also recognized
as a landmark work (its first volume won the National Jewish
Book Award in 1997). In 1996 Meyer was awarded the Zeltzer Scholarship Award in Historical Studies by the National
Foundation for Jewish Culture, in recognition of his stature
and influence.
Meyer published many scholarly articles and edited a volume of the papers of Leo Baeck. His books include The Origins of the Modern Jew: Jewish Identity and European Culture
in Germany, 17491824 (1967), Response to Modernity: A History of the Reform Movement in Judaism (1988), Jewish Identity in the Modern World (1990), Ideas of Jewish History (edited, 1974), German-Jewish History in Modern Times, 4 vols.
(edited with Michael Brenner, 199698), The Reform Judaism
Reader: North American Documents (edited, with W. Gunther
Plaut, 2001), and Judaism within Modernity: Essays on Jewish
History and Religion (2001).
Add. Bibliography: R. Berbig, Poesieprofessor und literarischer Ehrabschneider. Der Berliner Literaturhistoriker Richard
M. Meyer; mit Dokumenten, in: Berliner Hefte zur Geschichte des
literarischen Lebens, 1 (1996), 3799; H.H. Mueller, Ich habe nie
etwas anderes sein wollen, als ein deutscher Philolog aus Scherers
Schule. Hinweise auf Richard Moritz Meyer, in: W. Barner and C.
Knig (eds.), Juedische Intellektuelle und die Philologien in Deutschland 187 1933 (2001), 93102; idem, T. Kindt and H.H. Mueller,
in: C. Koenig (ed.), Internationales Germanistenlexikon, 2 (2003),
12181230.
[Rudolf Kayser]
149
MEYER, RICHARD JOSEPH (18651942), German inorganic chemist. Meyer was born in Berlin. In 1896 he joined
the Pharmacological Institute of University of Berlin and was
professor of chemistry there until 1933. He was a member
of international commissions on nomenclature and atomic
weights and wrote Bibliographie der seltenen Erden (1905),
Analyse der seltenen Erden und der Erdsaeuren (1912), and sections of Ullmanns Encyclopaedie der Chemie (1914). He edited
several editions of the standard Gmelin-Kraut Handbuch der
anorganischen Chemie.
MEYER, RICHARD MORITZ (18601914), German literary historian. Born and educated in Berlin, Meyer became
professor (without salary) of literature at Berlin University in
1901. His books enjoyed a remarkable popularity extending
far beyond his immediate scholarly circle. His prizewinning
biography of Goethe in three volumes was published in 1895.
He wrote a monograph on Nietzsche, Nietzsche. Sein Leben
und sein Werk (1913). Meyers outstanding achievements were
his Die deutsche Literatur des 19. Jahrhunderts (1900; popular
edition, 1912) and Die deutsche Literatur bis zum Beginn des
19. Jahrhunderts (ed. O. Pniower, 1916; enlarged edition ed. by
Hugo *Bieber, 1923).
MEYERHOF, MAX (18741945), ophthalmologist and medical historian. He was born in Hildesheim, Germany. In 1903
he went to Egypt and served as chief of the Khedivial Ophthalmic Clinic. He returned to Germany in 1914 to serve as a
medical officer in the German army and after the war settled
in Hanover as a practicing oculist. He returned to Cairo in 1923
and stayed there until his death. During his lifetime, Meyerhof published over 300 books, monographs, and treatises on
ophthalmology and medical history. He made special studies of the various eye diseases endemic in Egypt and North
Africa, especially of trachoma and its complications, of glaucoma, lepra of the eye, etc. His book Ueber die ansteckenden
Augenleiden Aegyptens appeared in 1909. He also wrote on the
history of ophthalmology and pharmacology among Spanish
Muslims and Jews and did research on medieval Arab medi-
150
meyerhoff, harvey
cine from unpublished documents in Cairo and other libraries. He edited and translated the Arabic text of the famous
medieval ophthalmologist H unain ibn Is h q, The Book of
the Ten Treatises on the Eye (1928), and was one of the first to
study Maimonides as a physician; he translated and published
for the first time Maimonides glossary of drugs LExplication
des noms de drogues (1940). In recognition of his many services as an oculist and medical historian, Meyerhof received
many honors and decorations from medical societies all over
the world. Meyerhof also contributed to the organization of
medical care for the poor in Egypt.
clude articles on philosophy, literature, psychology, and politics. He died in an automobile accident. A free speech plaza
at the Los Angeles campus of the University of California is
named after him.
[Myriam M. Malinovich]
MEYERHOFF, HARVEY (1927 ), U.S. businessman, communal leader, philanthropist. The middle child and only son of
Joseph and Rebecca Witten Meyerhoff, Harvey Bud Meyerhoff was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He attended Baltimore
public schools and the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
He settled in Baltimore and joined his father in the familyowned firm known as the Property Sales Company (later the
Joseph Meyerhoff Corporation). As a partner, Meyerhoff led
the firm to focus on developing shopping centers and apartment buildings, and oversaw the merger of the Meyerhoff Corporation with Monumental Life Insurance Company, which
became Monumental Properties, Inc. in 1969.
In 1987 Meyerhoff was appointed by President Ronald
Reagan to succeed Elie Wiesel as chairperson of the United
States Holocaust Memorial Council (USHMM). When he
assumed office, expectations were high but little had been
achieved with regard to constructing a building, developing
the permanent exhibition, and raising the requisite funds.
Meyerhoff strengthened the organizations fund-raising efforts
and met its fiscal goals, pushed for distinctive architectural
treatment of the museum building, and navigated complex
matters of exhibition content.
Meyerhoff s leadership of the USHMM came in the midst
of a long career of service to his native city of Baltimore and
its Jewish community as well as national causes. He served as
chairman of the Johns Hopkins Hospital (1987), the Central
Maryland United Way Campaign (1975), and the Associated
Jewish Charities Campaign. He was president of the board of
trustees of Baltimores Park School, a non-sectarian, private
elementary and high school, from 1972 to 1975. He played a
leadership role in such diverse organizations as the National
Conference of Christians and Jews, Maryland Region; the
United Jewish Appeal; the Baltimore County Advisory Committee on Mass Transportation; the Baltimore Convention Bureau; the Baltimore League for the Handicapped (president,
196164); the National Association of Homebuilders Research
Foundation (president, 196566); and the United States Rent
Advisory Board.
Meyerhoff s wife, Lyn (19271988), was also a prominent
community leader. Long active in Maryland and national Republican politics, she was appointed by President Reagan in
1983 as a United States public delegate to the United Nations
38t General Assembly. She was also very active in many philanthropic initiatives including the National Aquarium, the
Digestive Disease Center at Johns Hopkins Hospital, and the
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. Harvey and Lyn Meyerhoff
were following in Joseph Meyerhoff s footsteps when they
established a charitable foundation, The Harvey M. and Lyn
P. Meyerhoff Fund, in 1972. Seven years later, they broke new
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meyerhoff, joseph
philanthropic ground by setting up a separate fund to be administered jointly by their four children, who named their
fund The Children of Harvey M. and Lyn P. Meyerhoff Philanthropic Fund. It was joined in 1999 by an additional fund
known as The Grandchildren of Harvey M. and Lyn P. Meyerhoff Philanthropic Fund.
Bibliography: E.T. Linenthal, Preserving Memory: The
Struggle to Create Americas Holocaust Museum (1995); K.L. Falk, If I
Ran the World: A Biography of Lyn P. Meyerhoff (2006).
[Karen L. Falk (2nd ed.)]
152
MEYERSON, EMILE (18591933), French chemist, historian, and philosopher of science; son of Malvina Meyerson,
Polish novelist. Born in Lublin, Poland, Meyerson studied in
Germany, mainly in Heidelberg with the noted chemist R.W.
Bunsen. He later immigrated to Paris where he worked as an
industrial chemist, editor, and administrator of the Jewish
colonization association (ICA). Although never appointed to
a university post, Meyerson came to be recognized as an unusually erudite scholar of the interrelationships among the
natural sciences, the history of philosophy, and cultural developments, particularly since the rise of modern science in
the 16t century. His knowledge embraced the most recent
work on Einsteins theory of relativity and the early quantum theory of Max Planck and Niels Bohr. Meyerson wished
to understand the nature of explanation both in the natural
sciences and elsewhere. He believed that the philosopher of
science has to have a thorough knowledge of the history of
science, and of how scientists themselves conceived of their
own work. His own philosophy, though abstract, was based
on vast scholarly research which led him to conclude that rational understanding consisted of the discovery of those factors of permanence underlying processes of change, and the
search for those identities found within the evident flux of
experience or the incompletely rationalized world of most
scientific work. Reality nevertheless seemed to Meyerson to
be only partially open to rational understanding. Its sensual
factors, for instance, which are so important for epistemological theory, remain unexplained. A complete understanding
of nature thus seems to elude the grasp of a reasoned science.
Meyersons works include Identit et Ralit (1908; Identity and
Reality, 1930), De lexplication dans les Sciences (2 vols., 1921),
and various essays.
Bibliography: T.R. Kely, Explanation and Reality in the Philosophy of Emile Meyerson (1937), incl. bibl.; G. Boas, A Critical Analysis of the Philosophy of Emile Meyerson (1930); L. de Broglie et al.,
in: Bulletin de la Socit francaise de Philosophie, 55:2 (1961), 55105,
issue devoted to Meyerson and Milhaud.
[Robert S. Cohen]
153
154
mezhirech
Jerusalem. Meyuh as was also a leader of the H ibbat ha-Arez
Society, which founded *Moz a, near Jerusalem. One of the first
Erez Israel Sephardim to take an Ashkenazi wife, he married
Margalit, the daughter of Y.M. *Pines. His was among the first
families to follow Eliezer *Ben-Yehudas example of speaking
Hebrew. Meyuh as was among the founders of the Ginzei Yosef
u-Midrash Abrabanel Library, which formed the nucleus of
the *Jewish National and University Library. From 1920 to 1931
he was president of the city council of Jews in Jerusalem. From
his youth, he contributed to the Hebrew and Ladino press on
matters of culture, education, and literature and became a specialist on Sephardi folklore, Oriental communities, the Arabs
of Palestine, and the history of the Jews of the Orient and of
the yishuv. He published a number of works and some have
remained in manuscript.
[Abraham Aharoni]
MEZEY, FERENC (18601927), Hungarian lawyer and communal worker. Mezey studied law at the university of Budapest
and took an interest in Jewish affairs from his student days. In
the *Tiszaeszlar blood-libel case, he assisted the counsel for
the defense, K. Etvs. During the 1890s Mezey was one of
the founders of the movement seeking institutional equality
for the Jewish religion (granted in 1895). From 1902 he was
the secretary of the national bureau of the Hungarian Jews,
and its president in the last year of his life. Between 1889 and
1916 he was also secretary of the h evra kaddisha of Pest (see
*Budapest), and was instrumental in establishing social welfare institutions. Mezey was also president of the administrative council of the rabbinical seminary. He founded the Jewish
Museum of Budapest (1916), and was editor of the periodical
*Magyar Zsid Szemle. An extreme assimilationist and antiZionist, Mezey sought to foster religious life organized within
the religious institutions in order to repair the breach between
the two factions of Hungarian Jewry, and helped to promote
the influence of *Neologism.
Bibliography: L. Blau, in: Magyar Zsid Szemle, 45 (1928),
97100; idem, in: IMIT, 44 (1929), 1125; . Klmn, M.F. lete s
mkdse (1929).
[Jeno Zsoldos]
MEZHIRECH (Pol. Miedzyrzec Korecki; Ukrainian Mezhirichi), a town in Rovno district, Ukraine. In Jewish sources
Mezhirech is called Mezrits Gadol to distinguish it from
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mezfi, vilmos
Miedzyrzec Podlaski in the province of Lublin and Miedzyrzec
in the province of Poznan. An organized Jewish community
existed there from the 1570s. In 1700 the economic situation
of the Jews was satisfactory, and they were obliged to pay a
poll tax (together with Kilikiev) of 1,550 zloty, which was a
considerable sum on the Volhynian tax list. The community
struggled to free itself from the dependency on Ostrog. During the liquidation of the *Council of Four Lands, Mezhirech
is mentioned as an independent community. In 1707 there
were no Jews due to the total destruction of the city by Ataman Mazepa. In 1784 there were 295 Jews. Among the celebrated Jewish personalities who lived there were the kabbalist R. *Jacob Koppel b. Moses Lipschuetz and R. *Dov Baer
of Mezhirech; as a result of the latters presence the town became a center of the h asidic movement. In 1847 the Jewish
community numbered 1,808 persons. At the close of the 19t
century the Jews of Mezhirech established and developed a
factory producing brushes, which became known throughout Russia. During 191012 the annual turnover of this firm
amounted to over 50,000 rubles. There were 2,107 Jews (67
of the total population) living in the town in 1897 and 1,743
(73) in 1921. A Tarbut school and nursery operated in the
town, and from 1930 a religious school. In 1937 Beitar established a farm to train agricultural workers for Erez Israel, and
served also as a base for the *Irgun Z evai Leummi. The town
was occupied by the Soviet army in September 1939, and, on
July 6, 1941, by the Germans, who murdered, robbed, and conscripted the Jews into forced labor, with the assistance of the
local Ukrainians. Of the 160 young Jews sent to work in Kiev,
almost all were murdered there, with only two who had joined
Soviet partisans surviving. On the first day of Shavuot (May
22, 1942) most of the towns Jews were murdered at prepared
pits outside the settlement. The remaining 950 were confined
in a ghetto. On September 26, 1942, about 900 of them were
executed, and others fled, but only part of them managed to
survive by joining Soviet partisan units. On January 14, 1944,
the town was liberated, and 30 Jews came out of the forests and
from hiding, and another 50 from the interior of the U.S.S.R.
They soon left for Israel and the West.
Mezfi played a leading role in the Social Democrats attempt to organize agricultural workers. He was elected to the
Hungarian parliament in 1905 where he advocated universal
suffrage and pressed for immediate land reform. He left the
party in 1910 when he found that it was not applying itself
to this question. After World War I Mezfi joined the newly
formed small landowners party and edited its journal Szabad
Sz (Free Word). He continued to be active in Hungarian
politics after the counterrevolution of 1920. In 1938 legislation
was introduced to deprive Jews of their civic rights. Mezfi
vigorously fought the proposals and helped to organize the
defense of the Jewish community. He was elected president of
the 14t synagogue district of Pest in 1941.
Among Mezfis many writings are A szocildemokrcia
evangliuma (Gospel of Social Democracy) and A munkabrek Magyarorszgon az 18961898 vekben (Wages in Hungary During the Years 18961898, 1899). In 1937 he published
a pamphlet, Irs a sidkrl (Script on the Jews), directed
to the agricultural population to combat the antisemitic Nazi
propaganda which was being distributed among them.
Bibliography: Magyar Irodalmi Lexikon, 2 (1965), 226; Magyar letrajzi Lexikon, 2 (1969), S.V.
[Baruch Yaron]
156
mezzrow, milton
near the doorway. They carve on them the Ten Commandments or the ten categories by which the world was created.
Sometimes they use abbreviations and initial letters of the ten
or single verses in praise of God. Mezuzah stones of this sort
are found in Israel dating from the early Arab and perhaps
even Byzantine era. The Karaites do not make the mezuzah
obligatory. Nevertheless, the mezuzot that they do attach are
made of a tablet of blank plate in the form of the two tablets
of the law but without writing on them and they fix them to
the doorways of their public buildings and sometimes to their
dwelling places.
In the Middle Ages the custom obtained of making kabbalistic additions, usually the names of angels, as well as symbols (such as the *magen david) to the text. The custom was
vigorously opposed by Maimonides. He declared that those
who did so will have no share in the world to come. With
their foolish hearts they turn a commandment whose purpose is to emphasize the love of God into an amulet (Yad,
Tefillin 5:4). Despite this, there is one clear reference in the Talmud to the efficacy of the mezuzah as an amulet, though from
the context it need not be regarded as doctrine. In return for
a material gift sent by *Ardavan to *Rav, the latter sent him a
mezuzah, and in answer to his surprised query replied that it
would guard him (TJ, Peah 1:1, 15d; Gen. R. 35:3). To a similar
context belongs the story of the explanation of the mezuzah
given by *Onkelos the proselyte to the Roman soldiers who
came to arrest him: In the case of the Holy One, blessed be
He, His servants dwell within, while He keeps guard on them
from without (Av. Zar. 11a).
Maimonides decision prevailed, and the mezuzah today contains only the two biblical passages. However, at
the bottom of the obverse side there is written the formula
, a cryptogram formed by substituting the next
letter of the alphabet for the original, it thus being the equivalent of ( the Lord, God, the Lord). This is
already mentioned by *Asher b. Jehiel in the 13t century in
his commentary to the Hilkhot Mezuzah of Alfasi (RommVilna ed. p. 6b).
The mezuzah must be affixed to the entrance of every
home and to the door of every living room of a house, thus
excluding storerooms, stables, lavatories, and bathrooms, and
must be inspected periodically (twice in seven years) to ensure that the writing is still readable. The custom has become
widespread and almost universal at the present day to affix
the mezuzah to the entrance to public buildings (including
all government offices in Israel) and synagogues. There is no
authority for this, unless the building or room is also used
for residential purposes (Levi ibn H abib, Resp. no. 101), and
the Midrash (Deut. R. 7:2) actually asks the rhetorical question, Is then a mezuzah affixed to synagogues? As the scriptural verse states, it is also to be affixed to thy gates. It is thus
obligatory for the entrances to apartment houses. On the gates
of the suburb Yemin Moshe in Jerusalem, which stand since
their erection in 1860, the mezuzot are still to be seen. After
the Six-Day War mezuzot were affixed to the gates of the Old
City of Jerusalem. In the responsa Shaali Z iyyon of D. Eliezrov (1962, pt. 2, nos. 910), who served as rabbi to the Jewish
political prisoners at Latrun during the British Mandate, there
are two responsa from him and Rabbi Ouziel, Sephardi chief
rabbi of Israel, as to whether mezuzot were obligatory for the
rooms and cells of the camp.
In the Diaspora the mezuzot must be affixed after the
householder has resided in the home for 30 days; in Israel,
immediately on occupation. If the house is sold or let to a Jew
the previous occupier must leave the mezuzah. It is customary,
among the pious, on entering or leaving to kiss the mezuzah
or touch it and kiss the fingers (Maharil, based on the passage
from Av. Zar. 11a quoted above).
The Talmud enumerates the mezuzah as one of the seven
precepts with which God surrounded Israel because of His love
for them. Of the same seven (the z iz it being regarded as four)
R. *Eliezer b. Jacob stated, Whosoever has the *tefillin on his
head, the tefillin on his arm, the z iz it on his garment, and the
mezuzah on his doorpost is fortified against sinning (Men.
43b). The mezuzah is one of the most widely observed ceremonial commandments of Judaism. In modern times the practice
developed of wearing a mezuzah around the neck as a charm.
Some of the cases in which the mezuzah is enclosed are choice
examples of Jewish art, and the artistic mezuzah case has been
developed to a considerable extent in modern Israel.
157
miami-dade county
MIAMIDADE COUNTY, located on the southeast coast
of Florida. Miami-Dade County is comprised of 32 cities with
Miami as the county seat and largest and oldest city. Miami,
founded in 1896, was difficult to reach until the railroad was
extended southward. The stereotyped image as the destination
of Jews settling in Florida has been Miami. In reality, Miami
was among the states latest communities to develop a Jewish
population at all, with the Jews coming from other places in
the United States (either New York or Key West); they were
mostly immigrants from Russia and Romania. Romanian Jews
had come to Key West in the 1880s and 1890s and left either
as a result of a peddlers tax in 1891, the decline of the cigar
industry, or the general decline of that city as the railroad arrived in Miami. Russian Jews who had come to New York began to come south with the railroad, first to Ft. Pierce, West
Palm Beach, then Miami. This was true of the earliest Jews to
settle in Miami. The first Jew to arrive in Miami in 1895 was
either Sam Singer or Jake Schneidman. The earliest permanent Jewish settler was Isidor Cohen, who was a signatory of
the citys charter in 1896 and helped found many Jewish and
civic organizations. About 25 of these pioneer Jews had religious services beginning in 1896. There was no synagogue
at the time but a rabbi was brought from West Palm Beach
to conduct High Holy Day services. After the great fire that
destroyed most of the businesses and took the life of Jewish
merchant Julius Frank on December 26, 1896, and a yellow fever epidemic in 1899, the Jewish population declined by 1900
to three people: Isidor Cohen and Jake and Ida Schneidman;
then Jake soon died. Cohen said that Jews owned 12 of Miamis first 16 retail stores. Miami remained a hostile environment for would-be settlers. Nonetheless, aided by the railroad
and a fledgling tourist industry, Miami didnt give up. In 1905
Cohen married widow Ida Schneidman and the first brit was
celebrated in 1907 for their son, Eddie, the first Jewish birth
in the city. A girl, Nell Lehrman, was born in 1914. The death
of a Jewish tourist in 1913 forced the small Jewish community
to gather to discuss creating an organization and a cemetery.
Meeting at the home of Mendel Rippa, the group of 35 Jews
established the first congregation in Miami. They called it Bnai
Zion, in tribute to its first president, Morris Zion. Later, the
name was changed to Beth David. By 1915, there were 55 Jews
in Miami. In the 1920s there was a Zionist Society; the United
Jewish Aid Association (that eventually became Jewish Family
Service); a Bnai Brith lodge; chapters of the National Council of Jewish Women and Hadassah; Workmens Circle The
New Jewish Unity newspaper (192635); and then the Jewish
Floridian (192890). Tremendous advertising combined with
abundant land, new roads, and the availability of the automobile and commercial aviation, created a tourist and real estate
boom. A population of 30,000 (that included 100 Jewish families) exploded to more than 130,000 with 3,500 Jews by 1925.
Jews founded Temple Israel, the first Reform congregation,
in 1922, and were among those who chartered the University
of Miami in 1925. The hurricane that swept Miami just as Kol
Nidre services on Yom Kippur ended on September 18, 1926,
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miami-dade county
but by the 1960s, many were moving into medical and legal
professions. In 1963 the first two Jews from South Florida were
elected to the state legislature Murray Dubbin and Louis
Wolfson II. William Lehman was Floridas second Jew to
serve in the U.S. Congress (after David Levy Yulee in the 19t
century) when he began his 20 years of service in the House
of Representatives in 1973. Lehman was a powerful force on
transportation legislation, responsible for bringing mass transit to South Florida. In this period, Jews began to move north
to North Miami and North Miami Beach. Cuban Jews started
their own congregations.
From a shipping family, Israeli Ted *Arison, in 1972, acquired his own ship, the Mardi Gras, which was the start of
Carnival Cruise Lines, today the largest cruise company in
the world. Arison headed the campaign to bring professional
basketball to South Florida (Miami Heat) and was the chief
benefactor of the New World Symphony, founded by Michael
Tilson *Thomas. The 1973 Arab oil embargo plunged Miami
into the worst recession since the 1930s. Yet Jewish Miami
continued to grow. By 1980 the Greater Miami Jewish population reached its all time peak of 230,000, with a full array of
Jewish organizations, including Jewish Federation TV and the
Miami Jewish Tribune (198693). The Miami Herald published
an insert, the Jewish Star Times (200002).
In the 1980s, Miami became the new Ellis Island for people fleeing troubled countries like Haiti and the Dominican
Republic. The influx of Caribbean immigrants, as well as the
growing Spanish-speaking Cuban population, alienated some
people and many Jews moved north to Broward and Palm
Beach counties. By 1985 the Jewish population had declined
to 209,000. As well, many of the old Jews, who had lived on
Miami Beach, had died. But the greater Miami Jewish community was reinvigorated by the arrival of Jews from Latin
America, Russia, and Israel. In 2005 the Jewish population
of the county has decreased but stabilized at about 121,000
with a high percentage of retired and elderly persons (but less
than in Broward and Palm Beach counties). There are more
than 60 congregations, 34 Jewish educational institutions, and
three Jewish community centers. The highest percentage and
increase in Jewish population is in North Dade, especially in
Aventura. Miami-Dade County hosts Floridas third largest
Jewish population and the nations tenth largest.
Miami Beach and Antisemitism
From the early 20t century, people visited the southern
tip of Florida to picnic on its sandy beaches or bathe in the
warm waters of the Atlantic Ocean. In 1913 the Collins Bridge
opened, joining the beach to the mainland. That same year,
New York Jews Joe and Jenny Weiss, and their son Jesse, relocated to Miami Beach. Joe and Jennie operated a snack bar at
a popular bathing spot at the tip of the beach, the only place
Jews could settle. Several years later, the Weiss family opened
Joes Stone Crab Restaurant in a small, wooden frame house,
which they continued to expand and today remains the site of
this world famous restaurant. It is still run by descendants of
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miami-dade county
at least several thousand (out of an overall population for Miami Beach of 28,012) by decades end, as Miami-Dade County,
formerly called Greater Miami, replaced Jacksonville as the
center of Florida Jewry.
Many of the new arrivals to Miami Beach came initially
as tourists. Most came from the northeast United States. Most
hotels and apartments continued to exhibit Gentile Only
signs. Jewish builders erected many of the finest hotels on
South Beach during the 1930s. Many bore the Streamline or
Nautical Modern style of architecture designed by Henry Hohauser, who moved to Miami Beach in 1936. His initial project
was to design a new sanctuary for Miami Beachs first congregation the building that now houses the Jewish Museum of
Florida. For the next ten years, this brilliant architect was responsible for the design of more than 100 hotels, apartments,
and buildings on Miami Beach. The Art Deco buildings of
the 1930s and 1940s on Miami Beach are architectural treasures known throughout the world. The square-mile district is
bounded by Fifth Street to 23rd Street, Lenox Avenue to Ocean
Drive. In the 1980s, Barbara Baer Capitman, a Jew, launched
the campaign that established the Art Deco District, the largest collection of 1930s Art Deco and Art Moderne buildings in
the nation. Jews operated many of the hotels. The 1930s also
marked the dismantling of restrictive barriers to Jewish ownership of real estate throughout the Beach, as large numbers
of Jews purchased commercial properties from debt-ridden
owners only too happy to sell them. Jews also began buying
residential lots whose restrictive covenants proved impossible
to enforce after the property had changed owners a couple of
times. While discrimination had by no means vanished, conditions were improving. But it was not until 1949 that a law
was passed by Floridas legislature that ended discrimination
in real estate and hotels. The Jewish retail, institutional, and
residential presence was most strongly felt at the southern
portion of the island, especially along Washington Avenue
and Collins Avenue and Ocean Drive, stretching from the tip
more than one mile north to, and even beyond, Lincoln Road.
Small Jewish businesses dotted Miami Beach streets and Jewish tenants filled apartments. In 1925, Jews began meeting for
services in apartments. Several very observant Canadian Jewish visitors lobbied for a synagogue. As a result of their efforts,
Orthodox Beth Jacob Congregation was organized in 1927. In
the 1930s, as the Jewish population moved into areas north
of Fifth Street, many members of Beth Jacob broke away and
organized a Conservative congregation. Jacob Joseph of Miami Beach subsequently became the Miami Beach Community Center in the 1940s, and, finally, in 1954, Temple EmanuEl. Rabbi Irving *Lehrman served as the powerful spiritual
leader for 50 years. As the Jewish population continued to
move north, and many Jewish soldiers poured into the area
for wartime training, Jews founded the Beth Sholom Center
in a storefront on 41st Street in 1942 (it was renamed Temple
Beth Sholom in 1945), where Rabbi Leon *Kronish served for
nearly 50 years. Today there are more than 20 congregations
on the Beach. Jewish education is abundant: the Hebrew Acad-
emy since 1947, Lehrman Day School since 1960, and Talmudic Academy since 1974. There has been a mikveh since 1945
and an eruv since 1982. Commensurate with their increase in
numbers, Jews began to play increasingly more important civic
roles. Baron de Hirsch *Meyer, who came to the area during
the boom after earning a law degree from Harvard, served as
president of numerous Jewish organizations and was the first
Jew to sit on the Miami Beach City Council (1934). Mitchell
Wolfson, who migrated to Miami with his family around 1915
from Key West, became Miami Beachs second Jewish councilman. Like de Hirsch Meyer, Wolfson was a stellar businessman, civic leader, and visionary. In 1943 he was elected
mayor, the first of 15 Jews who have served as mayor of Miami Beach (as of 2005). Mitchell Wolfson was very important
to business in Miami. With his brother-in-law Sidney Meyer,
Wolfson formed WOMETCO (Wolfson Meyer Theater Company) in 1949. WOMETCO became the first television station
in Florida, WTVJ. Wolfson also built the Seaquarium and left
an endowment to create the Wolfson campus of Miami-Dade
College. By the mid-1940s, the Greater Miami Jewish Federation placed the number of Jews in Dade County at 29,325 in
a county nearing 400,000 in population. Nearly one-half of
these Jews lived on Miami Beach.
Less civic-minded Jews also embraced Miami Beach.
Most prominent of these was Meyer *Lansky, the reputed boss
of South Florida crime in the middle decades of the 20th century. Less prominent than Lansky nationally but quite active on the Beach was the S&G Syndicate, founded and operated by five Jews. From its office on Washington Avenue, the
S&G controlled bookmaking in a couple of hundred hotels on
Miami Beach and elsewhere in the area in the 1940s, grossing
millions of dollars annually. A U.S. Senate crime investigating
committee, chaired by Estes Kefauver, put the syndicate out
of business in the early 1950s.
The tragedy of the Holocaust caused many Jews to turn
to Zionism. In 1944, more than 8,000 persons gathered in Miamis Bayfront Park to hear Dr. Stephen S. Wise, a renowned
scholar and leader, present the case for the Jewish people and
for a homeland in Palestine. Some South Florida Jews, led by
Shepard Broad (Broad Causeway honors him), helped outfit
boats and planes to transport Jews from Displaced Persons
(DPs) camps in Europe to Palestine. Inspired by first-hand
experience in financing boatloads of Holocaust survivors and
DPs to arrive in Palestine, Max Orovitz formed the Miami
Group with fellow Jewish businessmen and created the Dan
Hotel chain in Israel following statehood. Following World
War II, Jewish doctors could not get staff privileges at any
area hospitals. In response, Jewish leaders in the community
formed Mount Sinai Hospital on Miami Beach; Max Orovitz
was the founding chairman for 30 years. Today, the 55-acre
hospital, the largest employer in that city, is renowned for its
leadership in medicine, especially cardiac care.
As the social and cultural fabric of Miami Beach changed
following the end of World War II, so did the Beachs physical
appearance. Hotels were built rapidly to satiate the desire of
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mica
tourists for fancy new hotels. The hotel industry was greatly
bolstered by Jews, including Ben Novack who, with Harry
Mufson, built the Fontainebleau Hotel (1954). Designed by
Morris *Lapidus, the elegant hotel quickly became a trademark property. A year later, Mufson commissioned Lapidus to
design the equally grandiose Eden Roc Hotel next door.
Larry *King began his live talk show on Miami Beach in
1956. Sophie *Tucker belted her songs in Yiddish during the
1950s and 1960s in Miami Beach hotels. In 1967 Judy Drucker
organized the first concert at Temple Beth Sholom and began
bringing world famous performers to Miami Beach. Fifteen
years later Drucker formed the Concert Association of Florida.
From Yiddish theater in the 1930s to Pavarotti on the beach in
the 1990s, from the Miss Universe Beauty Pageant at the Fontainebleau Hotel in 1960 to the opening of the Jewish Museum
of Florida in 1995, Jews have played an active role in developing the arts and entertainment scene of Miami Beach to what
it is today, and they continue to nurture it. Jews started the
other museums, Bass Museum of Art and Wolfsonian, as well
as the Miami City Ballet. In 1990 Kenneth Treister designed
the Holocaust Memorial, a 50-foot outstretched arm with 135
life-sized bronze sculptures.
In the 1970s, about 80 of the population was Jewish.
In 2004 it was 20 (about 20,000). There is a resurgence of
Orthodoxy (17 of the Beach population), especially among
younger families. The elderly Jews have passed away and Latin
American and Israeli Jews have arrived. The increasing popularity of Miami Beach, rising real estate values, and a declining
Jewish population have forced more synagogues to close their
doors and become nightclubs and retail stores. The skyline of
Miami Beach has changed from the day the first skyscraper
went up in 1940. It continues to change, as some buildings
come down and new higher ones go up. Jews have been involved in every aspect of these developments, as architects,
developers, and contractors. Through their contributions to
the physical appearance of Miami Beach, their roles in building the Beach are apparent and perpetual.
(Current demographics (2004) were provided by Ira M.
Sheskin, Ph.D., for the Greater Miami Jewish Federation.)
[Marcia Jo Zerivitz (2nd ed.)]
Add. Bibliography: M. Bejarano, From Havana to Miami, The Cuban Jewish Community, in: Judaica Latinoamericana,
3 (1997); I.M. Sheskin, Population Study of Greater Miami Jewish
Community (1982): B. Heisler-Samuels, Forced to Leave Homes,
Cuban Jews Thrive in Miami, in: the Miami Herald Internet Edition (Jan. 17, 2001).
161
micah
MICAH (Heb. ) , the sixth book in the collection known
as the Twelve Minor Prophets within the subdivision Later
Prophets of the second division of the Hebrew Bible (the
Prophets). In the Septuagint translation, where the order varies, Micah usually comes immediately after Hosea and Amos.
It is possible that the prophets name is a hypocoristic of a
name formulated as a rhetorical question. Mi-ka-yahu, who
is like YHW(H) or Mi-ka-El, Who is like God / El. An ostracon from Jerusalem from the late eighth or early seventh
century attests the name Mk[y]hw (Ahituv, 23).
The Content of the Book
The title (1:1) specifies the name, country, and date (in the days
of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah in the eighth
century) of Micahs prophecy concerning Jerusalem and Samaria. This is followed by a diatribe against Israel and Samaria
(1:27). Critics have suggested that verse 1:5b, dealing with the
cult places (bamot) of Judah which are hardly a concern
of Micah is a gloss inspired by 3:12. Others emend bamot to
h attot, sins. In the succeeding lamentation (1:816), over the
birthplace of the prophet and the neighboring towns, misfortune strikes at the gates of Jerusalem (12) but does not pass
beyond them. The prophetic I makes its first appearance in
verse 15. In verse 16, as the form of the Hebrew verb shows, a
female person is addressed; no doubt Daughter-Zion of verse
13, or, following the reading of some manuscripts of the Septuagint, Fair Israel. In fact the kings of Israel did suffer a
reverse at Achzib, as verse 14 indicates.
In 2:1 the threat is no longer directed against cities but
against those who, having dispossessed others and defrauded
them of their holdings, shall themselves be dispossessed. This
section of chapter 2 may be dealing with social injustices
(812) or, like Hosea 5:911, with a territorial dispute between
tribes. Note that it is a clan (mishpah ah, 2:3), which has angered the Lord and it is a stranger who reaps the benefit of
the vengeful spoliation, without right of repurchase. The key
phrase is in verse 7: the Lord does not abandon Israel. The
sense of the passage becomes clearer if the prophet is assumed
to be warning the ministers of Judah, who wish to expand at
the expense of Israel. From this the conclusion can be drawn
that the Lord, the sole King, steps into the breach and gathers
His people together despite Judahs policy. In a new soliloquy
(3:1) the prophet personally attacks the leaders and magistrates of Israel (without any mention of kings) who ignore
the law and devour each other in quarrels, which the prophet
depicts figuratively as cannibalism, through which the people
suffer. The prophets for their part mislead the people. In punishment, the Lord no longer provides them visions. Chapter
3 culminates in a prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem,
corresponding to that of Samaria in 1:6. According to Jeremiah
26:18, this text had great repercussions, reaching the ear of
Hezekiah and perhaps precipitating his reforms.
The allusion to Jerusalem and Zion is followed by the
insertion of the famous passage, from Zion shall come forth
Torah/ teaching/ law and the word of the Lord from Jeru-
salem, which appears also in Isaiah (2:24). The passage predicts the universal reign of peace, with the Lord issuing instructions on Mount Zion and settling disputes so that war will
be unnecessary. (On the relation between the Micah and Isaiah
oracles, Andersen and Freedman (41325) cite no fewer than
seven options.) After the profession of faith in 4:5 (We walk
in the name of the Lord, our God), a new oracle announces
the reign of the Lord, who assembles the crippled. DaughterZion regains her former sovereignty (vs. 8). Her present pangs
are pangs of birth that augur well for the future when YHWH
will redeem her. The section (5:15:5) on Beth-Lehem-Ephrathah appears to be a unity. Though the area is too small to be
a fighting unit, from there the leader (moshel, the term king
is avoided) of Israel will arise (cf. the Christian reading of this
passage in Matt. 2:56). The allusion to a Davidide is clear, inasmuch as his wellsprings, or origins, can be traced from ancient times (5:1). The schism between Israel and Judah is compared to the abandonment of the Israelites by this Davidide
until the day when she, presumably Daughter-Zion (4:10), who
is destined to give birth does so. The leader presides over the
ingathering, but here this is presented as a return of Judah to
Israel (cf. Deut. 33:7). This shepherd is capable of organizing
a coalition against Assyria of seven shepherds and eight nesikhim (princes) and of assuring peace. This passage is therefore linked with the preceding one, as B. Renaud pointed out.
It likewise is connected with the following verses: 68, where
the remnant of Israel is seen as present in the midst of the nations as a sign of the Lords blessing or curse.
In contrast, chapter 5:914 returns to the theme of the extermination of idols (as in 1:7 against Samaria; cf. Isa. 2:622)
with an allusion to the cities of the country (as in 1:1015). This
passage is linked associatively with chapter 6 by the repetition
of the verb shama, hear (cf. 5:14) in 6:1. Here the presentation is in the form of a complaint (riv). The Lord recalls his
acts of salvation, citing the exodus from Egypt led by Moses,
Aaron, and Miriam (the only non-genealogical reference to
Miriam outside the Pentateuch), and the plot of Balak and
Balaam, which YHWH foiled. No response of the people has
survived. The verses that follow are arguably among the most
famous in the Bible. In vss. 67 we have a question modeled
on the liturgy of entrance: With what shall I come before
YHWH, bow down to the god on high? Shall I come before
him with burnt offerings, with calves sons of a year? Will
YHWH be pleased with thousands of rams, with myriads of
streams of oil? Shall I give my first born for my transgression,
the fruit of my belly for my own sin? Verse 8 replies that
it has already been revealed to humans what is required of
them: justice, mercy, and humility before the Lord. Chapter
6:916 is a new soliloquy to an unnamed town, and probably
to a tribe. The resemblance to Amos 8:45 and the allusion in
verse 16 to Omri and the house of Ahab make it probable that
the passage alluded (at least originally) to Samaria. The tribe
may be Ephraim, since in the oracles of Hosea and Isaiah the
kingdom of the North dismembered by *Tiglath-Pileser III is
called Ephraim (Isa. 9:7 (8)).
162
micah
The prophetic I again appears in 7:1 in a lamentation on civil discord (cf. 3:3; Isa. 10:17ff.). This I reappears
from verse 7 onward where the prophet speaks in the name
of Israel, which reproaches its enemy for having rejoiced at
its downfall. It is probable that (as in 2:8) the enemy is in this
case Judah, since the question raised by the enemy: Where
is your God? is the reproach of the Judahites against the Israelites who did not recognize the choice of the sanctuary at
Zion. Verse 10b is reminiscent of 3:12 on the ruin of Jerusalem.
Chapter 7:1420 is a prayer imploring the Lord to become the
shepherd of His people once again (the geographical terms
are of the North, Carmel, Bashan, and Gilead, alienated in
733 B.C.E.) as He promised to Jacob and Abraham. This rare
reference probably aimed at encompassing both Judah and
Israel in the same gathering.
Composition
The book is composed of independent but more or less connected sections. Ordinarily, these sections are re-divided into
three: chapters 13 speak of condemnation, 45 of consolation,
and 67 of a mixture of condemnation and consolation. The
visions of consolation are generally attributed to the years following the Exile and are assumed to have been added to the
original oracles of Micah at the time when the book was put
together (Renaud). There are two objections to this view:
(1) It disregards the importance of the kingdom of the
North and its downfall in 722 in the religious thought of Israel.
This strain in Micah was given great emphasis by F.C. Burkitt,
O. Eissfeldt, and J.T. Willis;
(2) It neglects the influence of the cultural traditions in
the sanctuaries (including Jerusalem) on the prophetic oracles.
E. Hammershaimb and B. Reicke have stressed this fact. In the
ancient Orient, as at the beginning of the monarchy, prophecy
announced good tidings rather than misfortune.
But as Willis survey of the numerous theories about
Micah demonstrates, the history of the books composition
is far from settled. The unity, coherence, and attribution to
the prophet are all debated. Where some scholars see artful redactional unity, others (e.g., Hillers) find no meaningful structure. Willis himself enumerates areas that need to
be addressed. Among these are the text, which swarms with
philological difficulties, and the criteria for the dating of passages. It is impossible to speak meaningfully about the theology of the book, if indeed it has one or several, apart from
the questions of composition, arrangement, and redaction.
There is general agreement though that the present book has
a historical core in the eighth century, and that at least some
of the prophecies are those of the prophet Micah referred to
in Jeremiah 26:1619, and confused with Michaiah son of Imlah in I Kings. 2228.
The Prophet and His Time
R. Weil emphasized the importance of historical events known
from II Kings 2022 for an understanding of Micah. His birthplace, Moresheth-Gath, near Lachish, is known as far back as
the El-Amarna period (tablet 335:7). This region had suffered
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
In the Aggadah
According to one opinion, Micah was a contemporary of Isaiah (SOR 20; and Pes. 87b); according to another, he was one
of the post-Exilic prophets (P d RK 16, 128b). The verse: He
hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the
Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and
to walk humbly with thy God? (Micah 6:8) is a quintessence
of the 613 commandments of the Bible (Mak. 24a).
Bibliography: F.C. Burkitt, in: JBL, 45 (1926), 15961; K.
Elliger, in: ZDPV, 57 (1934), 81152; R. Weil, in: RHR (1940), 14661;
H.L. Ginsberg, in: Eretz Israel, 3 (1954), 84; idem, in: JAOS, 88 (1968),
4749; Pritchard, Texts, 2867; H. Tadmor, in: Journal of Cuneiform
163
micaiah
Studies, 12 (1958), 8083; O. Eissfeldt, in: ZDMG, 112 (1962), 25968;
idem, Einleitung in das Alte Testament (19643, rev. ed.); B. Renaud,
Structure et attaches littraires de Miche IVV (1964); E. Hammershaimb, Some Aspects of Old Testament Prophecy (1966); B. Reicke,
in: HTR, 60 (1967), 34967; C. Cazelles, in: Fourth World Congress of
Jewish Studies, 1 (1967), 8789; J.T. Willis, in: VT, 18 (1968), 52941;
Kaufmann Y., Religion, 3958. IN THE AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, index; I. H asida, Ishei ha-Tanakh (1964), 260. Add. Bibliography: H. Woolf, Micah: A Commentary (1981); R. Smith, MicahMalachi (Word; 1984), 160; D. Hillers, Micah (Hermeneia; 984);
idem, in: ADB, 4:81710; P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah An Archaeological Commentary (1988); S. Ahituv, Handbook of Ancient Hebrew
Inscriptions (1992); A. Fuchs, Die Inschriften Sargons II. aus Khorsabad (1993); J.Willis, in: DBI, 2:15052; F. Andersen and D. Freedman,
Micah (AB; 2000), 3399, extensive bibl.
164
michael, jakob
In the Aggadah
In the Aggadah, Micaiah is identified with the anonymous
prophet who came near unto Ahab and foretold the destruction of the Aramean army (I Kings 20:13; SOR 20, p. 52).
Later, when he predicted the death of Ahab in battle, the false
prophet Zedekiah b. Chenaanah challenged his prophecy,
claiming that Elijah had previously prophesied that the dogs
would lick Ahabs blood in the field of Naboth, and he would
not therefore be slain on a battlefield three days journey from
there. However, both prophecies were fulfilled. Ahab fell in
Ramoth-Gilead, but his blood was licked by the dogs in Samaria, when they washed the slain kings chariot there (I Kings
22:28; Jos., Ant. 8:15, 4).
Bibliography: J.A. Montgomery, The Book of Kings (ICC,
1951), 33541; B. Oppenheimer, in: Sefer Urbach (1955), 8993. IN
THE AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, index; for further bibliography
see *Prophecy.
MICHAEL, JAKOB (18941979), U.S. financier and philanthropist. Born in Frankfurt, he began his business career in
1910 with his father-in-laws metal-trading firm, Beer Sondheimer. Demobilized from the German army in 1917, he became active in trade and industry, but in 1933 left Germany
for Holland, and in 1939 moved to the United States where he
continued his activities in various industrial enterprises. He
was prominent in many Jewish philanthropic, educational,
and scientific institutions. He financed a high school and a
childrens home in Pardes Hannah, Israel; an institute of biomedical research at the Einstein College of Medicine, New
York; the institute of nuclear science at the Weizmann Institute
in Israel; and a college of Hebraic studies at Yeshiva University, New York. Much of his attention was devoted to religious
institutions, and his special interests included the collecting
of Jewish ceremonial objects and Jewish music. He donated
a collection of 25,000 items of Jewish music to the Hebrew
University and many valuable books and ceremonial objects
to the Israel Museum (including a complete synagogue taken
from Vittorio Veneto in Italy).
[Joachim O. Ronall]
165
michael, moses
MICHAEL (Michaes, Michall), MOSES (Moshe bar Jehiel;
16751740), ship owner and international trader, born in Harzfeld, Germany. Michael immigrated to New York, and from
1717 shipped large quantities of foodstuffs, sometimes lumber
and candles, to Curaao, and supplied its garrison with flour
and other foodstuffs. Michael usually traveled with his cargo
on board his schooner Abigail. From 1721 to 1722 he was in
partnership with Michael Asser of Boston; from 1731 to 1732,
with his son Michael Michaels (d. 1736). In 1729 he paid for
the privilege of placing the first cornerstone of New Yorks Mill
Street Synagogue. He died in Curaao.
166
Bibliography: H.A. Alexander, Notes on the Alexander Family of South Carolina and Georgia (1954), 98105; I.S. Emmanuel, Precious Stones of the Jews of Curaao (1957), 2605.
[Isaac Samuel Emmanuel]
Michael
Michael (Mikhael, Who is like God? in ten passages the name of as many men: Num. 13:13; I Chron. 5:13,
14; 6:25; 7:3; 8:16; 12:21; 27:18; II Chron. 21:2; Ezra 8:8). Daniel
10:211 states that Daniel practiced asceticism for three full
weeks in his endeavor to move Heaven to reveal to him what
he wanted to know. At the end of that period a frightening
figure appeared to him. He fell on his face in terror, but the
being helped him to his feet and told him that he had been
sent to deliver a message to him. In 10:1221 he then explains
that Daniels petition had been received favorably on the very
first day, but the speaker was unable to leave his post for 21
days because he was holding in check the prince [sar, ] of
the kingdom of Persia; at the end of that period, however, he
was relieved in this task by Michael, one of the chief princes
[sarim], whom he left there with the kings of Persia. He
himself will only stay with Daniel long enough to inform him
what will befall your people at the end of the days (verse 14),
for he will have to return to fight with the prince of Persia
and when he retires there comes the prince of Greece and
there is none who shares my efforts against all these but your
(pl., i.e., the Jews) prince, Michael. At the climax of history, it
is Michael, the great prince who stands guard over your fellow countrymen, who will arise and save them (12:1). It will
be seen that sar properly dignitary, official, or minister,
but here better prince in view of the designation of God in
8:25 as the sar of sarim means angel, that every nation
is conceived of as having an angelic representative, and that
the author conceives of these representatives as engaging in
clashes with each other which prefigure clashes between the
respective nations. Obviously, the germ of this idea is Deuteronomy 32:8, which reads, according to the text of the Septuagint and a fragment from Qumran: When the Most High
gave nations their countries,/ When he set the divisions of
167
168
In the Aggadah
Michael and Gabriel, along with Uriel and Raphael, are the
four angels who surround the throne of the Almighty (Num.
R. 2:10; cf. Enoch 9:1). Michael, as the constant defender of the
Jewish people (PR, 46), is considered greater than Gabriel (Ber.
4b). The aggadah consistently identifies Michael and Gabriel
with the anonymous divine messengers or angels mentioned
in the Bible. Thus, they were two of the three angels who visited Abraham after his circumcision (Gen. R. 48:9), Michaels
task being to announce the future birth of Isaac while Gabriels was to destroy Sodom (Gen. R. 50:2). It is Michael who
called to Abraham at the *Akedah, telling him not to offer
up Isaac (Midrash Va-Yosha in A. Jellinek, Beit ha-Midrash,
1:38). It was either Michael or Gabriel who wrestled with Jacob
(Gen. R. 78:1) and appeared to Moses at Horeb (Ex. R. 2:5).
It was Michael who rescued Abraham from the fiery furnace
(Gen. R. 44:13) and also informed him of the capture of Lot
(Pd RE, 27). He also accompanied the servant of Abraham in
his mission to find a wife for Isaac (Gen. R. 59:10). Michael
and Gabriel were called upon to record that the birthright was
sold to Jacob by Esau (Gen. R. 63:14). They were both among
the angels who accompanied God when He came down on
Mount Sinai (Deut. R. 2:34). Although they were considered
the kings of the angels, they were afraid of Moses (Eccles. R.
9:11, 2), and they refused to take his soul, so that God himself had to do so. Michael and Gabriel then stood at either
side of Moses bier (Deut. R. 11:10). On the day that Solomon
married the daughter of Pharaoh-Neco, Michael came down
from heaven and stuck a reed in the sea, round which matter
settled, and upon this Rome, the future destroyer of Israel,
was built (Song R. 1:6, 4). Michael smote Sennacherib and his
army, and Gabriel delivered Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah
(Ex. R. 18:5) from the fiery furnace. Michael acted as the defender of the Jews against every charge which Haman brought
against them (Esth. R. 7:12). It was Michael who pushed Haman against Esther to make it appear as if Haman intended to
violate her (Esth. R. 10:9). Both Michael and Gabriel will be
among those who will accompany the Messiah, and they will
then contend with the wicked (Otiyyot de-Rabbi Akiva Shin).
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
michaelis, leonor
Michael is made up entirely of snow and Gabriel of fire, and
though they stand near one another they do not injure one
another, thus indicating the power of God to make peace in
His high places (Job 25:2; Deut. R. 5:12). Michael also occupies an important place in the interpretation of biblical stories in later Midrashim, e.g., Exodus Rabbah, Midrash Avkir,
and Midrash Konen.
[Aaron Rothkoff]
In the Kabbalah
The motifs of Michael and Gabriel as found in the aggadah
are in general repeated in the Kabbalah, but Michael is given
an added importance.
In the Heikhalot and Merkabah literature of the late talmudic period and the period of the geonim, Michael plays a
central role in the realm of the Chariot. He is the guardian
of the south side, the figure of the lion in the Chariot, and so
on (the descriptions vary in the different versions of this literature). In any case he is one of the four archangels, despite
the interchange of names in the list. G. Scholem has deduced,
from a statement in Perek Reiyyot Yeh ezkel (Wertheimer, Battei Midrashot, 2 (1955), 1323) and from other sources, that at
first Michael and *Metatron were identical the guardian of
the interior and the highest figure in the domain of the angels
in the Merkabah literature and in the Kabbalah which succeeded it and that some of the descriptions of Michael in
talmudic and midrashic literature were later transferred to the
figure of Metatron. He is outstanding as guardian and protector of Israel in Merkabah literature and in the European mystical literature of the H asidei Ashkenaz and early kabbalistic
circles. A central role in bringing about the redemption was
attributed to him in midrashic and Merkabah literature. Such
descriptions of the role of Michael relied mainly on sayings in
the Book of Zerubbabel and other apocalyptic works dating
from the end of the ancient era and the beginning of the Middle Ages, in which Michael was assigned the role of revealer
and bringer of tidings. (As there is in the various versions an
interchange between Michael and Metatron, it does indeed
seem that the two figures are basically identical.)
In kabbalistic literature Michael is allotted the role of
grace in the Merkabah, angel of the right, representing the
Sefirah H esed (grace). In several places in the *Zohar Michael symbolizes the Sefirah H esed itself (Zohar 1:98b99a,
Sitrei Torah; 2:147, et al.). All the symbols of grace (the right
side, silver, water, etc.) are to be found in the descriptions of
the angel Michael. He is frequently described as a high priest,
and the Zohar and later kabbalists (e.g., Moses Cordovero)
portray him as bringing the souls of the righteous before the
Almighty, an act which led to their inclusion in the world of
emanation (az ilut).
MICHAELIS, SIR ARCHIE (18891975), Australian politician. Born in Melbourne, Archie Michaelis worked in his successful family firm of leather goods merchants before entering
state politics in Victoria, Australia. Michaelis became one of
the best-known politicians in Melbourne and the state of Victoria. Always a member of the right-of-center party (which
changed its name several times during his career), Michaelis
sat in the Victorian Legislative Assembly as member for St.
Kilda from 1932 to 1952. He served as minister without portfolio in 1945 and was speaker of the Victorian Legislative Assembly from 1950 to 1952. He was president of the St. Kilda
Hebrew Congregation, a leading Orthodox synagogue in Melbourne. Originally typical of Jews of his background in opposing political Zionism, by the end of his life he had become
a strong supporter of Israel.
Bibliography: W.D. Rubinstein, Australia II, 3046.
[William D. Rubinstein (2nd ed.)]
[Joseph Dan]
Bibliography: H.L. Ginsberg, Studies in Daniel (1948). IN
THE AGGADAH AND IN KABBALAH: J. Kaufman (Ibn Shemuel),
Midreshei Geullah (1954), 73ff.; R. Margulies, Malakhei Elyon (1945),
8789, 10835; I. Tishby, Mishnat ha-Zohar, 1 (1949), 4639; Ginzberg, Legends, 7 (19673), 3112 and index; G. Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism (1960), 4345.
MICHAELIS, LEONOR (18751949), German biochemist. Born in Berlin, he worked with Paul *Ehrlich at the City
Hospital where he directed the bacteriology department from
1906 to 1922. In 1908 he was appointed professor of medicine
at the University of Berlin, and from 1920, professor of physi-
169
170
michal
MICHAELS, LORNE (1944 ), Canadian writer-producer.
Born Lorne David Lipowitz to successful furrier Abraham
and Florence (ne Becker) Lipowitz in the affluent Forest Hill
area of Toronto, Ontario, Michaels got involved with a theater group and began working on sketch comedy and satires
while studying in the English program at the University of
Toronto. After graduating college, Michaels left for England,
where he worked briefly as a car salesman. Upon his return
to Canada in 1966, Michaels and Hart Pomerantz began performing as a popular comedy duo on the CBC. In November
1967, he married comedy writer Rosie Schuster. Michaels and
Pomerantz went to Hollywood to write for The Beautiful Phyllis Diller Show (1968), but the show only lasted six weeks. The
duo picked up work with Rowan and Martins Laugh-In, writing the opening monologues for the hosts from 1968 to 1969;
however, their material was often rewritten by senior writers
or dismissed altogether. Disillusioned with the experience
of writing for Laugh-In, Michaels and Pomerantz returned
to Canada to create their own television programs. In 1970,
the pair inked a deal with the CBC to create such specials as
The Hart and Lorne Terrific Hour and Today Makes Me Nervous. Over the next four years Michaels continued to pitch
ideas for TV shows in Hollywood, and in 1975 NBC agreed to
launch a live sketch comedy program called Saturday Night.
(The show was retitled Saturday Night Live in 1977 after Saturday Night Live With Howard Cosell was cancelled in 1976.)
The show launched the careers of such SNL players as Chevy
Chase, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda *Radner, Laraine
Newman, Eddie Murphy, Billy *Crystal, Mike Myers, Adam
*Sandler, and Will Ferrell in its more than 30-year history and
has won 18 Emmy Awards and nabbed 60 nominations. Over
the years Michaels also produced a film version of Gilda Radners Broadway show Gilda Live (1980), Simon and Garfunkel: The Concert in Central Park (1982), Nothing Lasts Forever
(1984), and the TV series Kids in the Hall (198894). By the
early 1990s, a reinvigorated Saturday Night Live served as the
springboard for a variety of successful comedy features, including Waynes World (1992), Coneheads (1993), and Tommy
Boy (1994). Michaels became executive producer of NBCs Late
Night with Conan OBrien in 1993 and The Colin Quinn Show
in 2002. He was inducted into the Order of Canada and the
Television Academys Hall of Fame, and received a star on the
Canadian Walk of Fame. In 2004, Michaels produced the hit
comedy Mean Girls and received an honorary award from the
Producers Guild of America.
harassed by enemies and was even arraigned in court as a result of a false accusation. In 1893 he became rabbi of Plonsk
and from then on was known as the rabbi of Plonsk. At the
outbreak of World War I he was on a visit to Carlsbad and was
unable to return home. In 1922 he was elected a member of
the rabbinical council of Warsaw, and engaged in many communal activities. When the German forces entered Warsaw he
was working in the community archives and in 1942 he was
taken to *Treblinka where he died.
An exceptionally prolific writer whose knowledge of
family lineages was unequaled, Michaelson published many
books in such diverse fields as halakhah, aggadah, history, biography, and bibliography.
His best-known works are Degan Shamayim on tractates
Berakhot and Rosh ha-Shanah (appended to Israel Jonah Landau, Ein ha-Bedolah , 1901); responsa Beit Yeh ezkel, (1924); Pinnot ha-Bayit, novellae (1925); Siddur Beit ha-Oz ar (1931 (1929));
responsa Tirosh ve-Yiz har (1936). His most famous biographies
are those of R. Israel Jonah of Kempen, R. Meshullam Zalman
Ashkenazi, R. Joseph *Teomim, R. Shabbetai *Bass, R. *Phinehas of Korets, the Margolioth family, R. Solomon *Ganzfried,
R. Z evi Hirsh Z emah, and R. Jacob Aryeh of Radzymin, all appended to his editions of their works. During the Holocaust,
three large chests containing his manuscripts were lost. They
included Imrei Yeh ezkel on the Pentateuch and Meat Z evi on
the other books of the Bible.
[Lucien Harris]
MICHAELSON, ISAAC CHESAR (19031982), Israeli ophthalmologist. Born in Scotland, he taught at Glasgow University and served with the Royal Army Medical Corps in World
War II. During Israels War of Independence in 1948, he was
specialist adviser to the Israel government and from 1953
served as professor of ophthalmology at the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School in Jerusalem. He set up eye clinics in Liberia, Malawi, Tanzania, and Rwanda and trained local
doctors and medical assistants to run them. The Ophthalmology Research Laboratories administered by Michaelson and
his colleagues from Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem served an
estimated patient-population of 20 million in Africa.
A specialist on the diseases of the inner eye, Michaelson is the author of Circulation of the Inner Eye in Man and
Animals (1952) and, with Ballantyne, of Textbook of Diseases
of the Eye (19702). Michaelson was awarded the 1960 Israel
Prize for medicine.
MICHAL (Heb. ) , the youngest daughter of King *Saul
(Sam. 14:49), who loved *David and was given to him in marriage after he had killed 200 Philistines (in the Septuagint
100). Michals father had insisted on this as the condition for
the marriage contract a hundred Philistines foreskins,
instead of a dowry (18:2729), hoping of course that David
171
172
[Samuel Abramsky]
In the Aggadah
Michals love for David is compared to that of Jonathan;
whereas the latter saved David from Saul outside the palace,
Michal did so inside the palace (Mid. Ps. 59:1). She is identical with Eglah (mentioned in II Sam. 3:5 as Davids wife), and
was so called because like a heifer (eglah) she refused to accept
the yoke of her father (Mid. Ps. 59:4). This love was returned.
Although David married Merab after Michals death he continued to refer to My wife, Michal (II Sam. 3:14; Sanh. 19b).
Michals marriage to Palti (I Sam. 25:44) was illegal, since she
was already bethrothed to David (Sanh. ibid.), and she had no
marital relations with him (ibid.). She is stated to have worn
tefillin (Er. 96a).
When rebuking David (II Sam. 6:20), Michal made a
forceful comparison between the modesty which Saul displayed when covering his feet (I Sam. 24:4), and Davids behavior (Num. R. 4:20); it was on account of this criticism that
she was punished with childlessness (Sanh. 21a).
Bibliography: Bright, Hist, 172, 1767, 186; de Vaux, Anc
Isr, index, S.V. Mikal; Morgenstern, in: ZAW, 49 (1931), 5455; Stoebe,
in: ZAWB, 77 (1958), 22443; EM, S.V. incl. bibl.
173
michelson, charles
He was born in Strelno, Prussia, and was taken by his family
to the United States at the age of two. Michelson graduated
from the naval academy at Annapolis in 1873. However, after
spending two years at sea he resigned to become an instructor in physics at the naval academy (187579). He spent a year
in Washington and then two years studying in Germany. He
returned to the U.S. in 1883 to become professor at the Case
School of Applied Science in Cleveland until 1889. From 1889
to 1892 he was at Clark University and finally he was professor at the University of Chicago (18921929). He was awarded
the Nobel Prize in physics in 1907. Michelson was a remarkable experimentalist able to secure astonishing accuracies with
the simplest apparatus. His lifelong interest was the velocity of
light, and this was the subject of his first experiment even in his
mid-20s when he was an instructor at the U.S. naval academy at
Annapolis. At that time physicists believed in the existence of
an ether that filled all space, was at absolute rest, and through
which light traveled in waves. There was then no way of measuring the motion of any body relative to the ether and leading
scientists doubted whether this could be done. If it could be
measured, two beams of light should show interference fringes
denoting the difference. By measuring the width of the fringes
it should be possible to show the earths exact velocity when
compared with the ether. Not only would the earths absolute
motion be determined, but also that of all bodies in the planetary system whose motions relative to the earth were known.
For his experiment Michelson developed the interferometer,
an instrument now used to measure wavelengths of light and
other wavelengths of the radiation spectrum. He carried out his
first experiments in Berlin in 1881 in Helmholtz laboratory. In
1887, together with Edward Williams Morley, he performed one
of the most important experiments in the history of science,
which provided a new starting point for the great theoretical
developments in 20t-century physics. The conclusion of the
experiment indicated that light travels with the same velocity
in any direction under any circumstances, and the implication
was that the ether did not exist. This became one of the basic
concepts which led *Einstein in 1905 to his special theory of relativity. The proving of this revolutionary theory of the absolute
speed of light under any conditions has become the underlying
principle of modern physics, astronomy, and cosmology and is
considered to be, perhaps, the one absolute natural law in the
universe. As a great experimentalist, Michelson established in
1892/93 the meter in terms of the wavelength of cadmium. He
also determined the diameter of Jupiters satellites and was the
first person to measure the dimension of a star, Alpha Orion.
Michelson wrote Velocity of Light (1902), Light Waves and Their
Uses (1903), and Studies in Optics (1927).
MICHELSON, CHARLES (18691948), U.S. editor, journalist, and political publicist. Michelson, who was born in Virginia City, Nevada, ran away from home at the age of 13. He
MICHELSTAEDTER, CARLO (18871910), Italian philosopher and poet. Michelstaedter was born at Gorizia, then part
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, into a well-known family.
His mother was a descendant of Abraham *Reggio, chief rabbi
of Gorizia in 1830, and Isacco Samuel *Reggio, who held the
same office some years later, and who, together with Samuel
David Luzzatto, co-founded the Rabbinical Institute of Padua.
His father, Alberto, who came from a family of German origin, was an important part of the intellectual and social life
of the city.
The young Michelstaedter strongly opposed his fathers
19t-century positivist views, but politically, he did not disagree with him on the Irredentist cause. Michelstaedter undertook classical studies at the University of Florence. There
he was greatly influenced by the writings of Schopenhauer,
Nietzsche, and Ibsen and based his philosophy on the assumption that all human endeavor, spiritual or physical, is
merely an illusion. Moreover Michelstaedters Jewish origins
gave his thought an original twist. Jewish Diaspora themes
of the loss of self, exclusion from the fullness of life, the inability to enter deeply into existence, reflect a strong drive toward completeness. His ideas, as well as his Jewish identity,
were reflected in his interest in the Kabbalah. On the other
hand, Michelstaedter dissociated himself from the Zionist
movement.
Michelstaedters fundamental pessimism is expressed in
his Dialogo della Salute (1912) and, in a more poetic fashion,
in his Poesie (1912). He spent the last years of his short life in
his native Gorizia preparing a thesis on The Concept of Persuasion and Rhetoric in the Writings of Plato and Aristotle.
After completing the second volume of this work (La persua-
174
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175
michigan
Jewish immigrant families followed the route of the railroad across southern Michigan to Chicago, establishing themselves in the mid-19t century not only in Ann Arbor, but also
in Ypsilanti, Jackson, and Kalamazoo. Maurice Heuman was
elected mayor of Jackson, Samuel Folz in Kalamazoo.
A Historical Marker in Kalamazoo honors arctic pioneer
Edward Israel, a University of Michigan graduate, who served
in 1881 as scientist on the nations first polar expedition led by
Lt. A.W. Greely. Along with 18 of the 25 expedition members,
Israel perished of starvation after severe storms in the third
winter of the expedition.
By 1845 the families of German immigrants Samuel Leopold and Julian Austrian, sailing their one-masted sloop to
Mackinac, established a pioneer fishing business which
soon shipped as much as 1,000 barrels of salted fish to cities
around the Great Lakes, including Cleveland. They became
owners of a large fleet of sailing vessels, and after the discovery of copper in the Upper Peninsula, opened shops in five
towns across the peninsula.
Jake Steinberg, Gustave Rosenthal, and Moses Winkleman operated successful stores in different U.P. towns,
supplying the many lumberjacks and miners and their families. Winklemans grew to a large chain of shops for womens apparel.
An observant Jew who closed his store on the High
Holidays, William Saulson operated the prosperous Peoples
Store in St. Ignace. In 1888, he was elected Mayor of St. Ignace.
In an ad published in 1884, Saulson proposed the building of
the Mackinac Bridge, which opened 75 years later, in 1958.
The five-mile-long suspension bridge linking the two peninsulas was designed by engineering genius David Steinman;
Lawrence Rubin was the executive secretary of the Mackinac
Bridge Authority.
Bavarian-born Dr. Frederick L. Hirschman, an 1873 graduate of one of the first classes of the Detroit College of Medicine, went to the Upper Peninsula to combat the smallpox
epidemic there, and remained a doctor to the Republic Mines
until his early death at the age of 38.
By 1903, at the far western end of the Upper Peninsula,
Russian Polish immigrants Harry and Sam Cohodas first
opened fruit markets in Houghton, Hancock, and Calumet.
These developed into the nations third largest wholesale produce business. The Cohodas family became nationally known
for its philanthropy and support of civic and Jewish causes.
Temple Jacob opened in Hancock in 1912, named for merchant
Jacob Gartner, and still serves the Jewish students and faculty
of Michigan Technological University.
Supplying five million board feet annually for the building of the nations homes and factories, white pine was king
in Michigan until about 1910, when the valuable forests had
been stripped. In the late 18t and early 19t centuries, Jews followed the centers of lumbering, from Bay City and Saginaw
on the states eastern side to Grand Rapids, Traverse City, and
Muskegon on the western shore, and, as mentioned, crossing
over to the Upper Peninsula. A successful work shirt manu-
176
michmash or michmas
est and most active, and both are recognized with Michigan
Historical Markers.
In the time before the Civil War, Beth Els Rabbi Leibman
Adler was preaching vigorous abolitionist sermons. Ernestine
Rose, a Jewish woman who belonged to the national coalition
of social reformers, had visited Detroit in 1846 to speak out
against slavery as well as child labor, and for womens rights.
Temple members Emil Heineman and Mark Sloman were active participants in the Underground Railroad. From the 151
Jewish families in Michigan, 181 men and boys served in the
Union Armies; 38 lost their lives in the conflict.
To meet the needs of the growing wave of immigrants,
in 1899 Detroit established the United Jewish Charities, under the leadership of Rabbi Leo M. Franklin. This included
the Hebrew Free Loan Association, which since 1895 had been
helping peddlers with loans of $5 to get them started.
By the early 1900s, an emerging automobile industry
was providing additional economic opportunities. Engineer
Max Grabowsky and his brother Morris, along with Bernard
Ginsburg, formed the Grabowsky Power Wagon Company to
manufacture the worlds first gasoline-powered truck. Their
successful four-story business in Detroit was bought by Will
Durant to make up the new General Motors Company. Durant also hired bookkeeper Meyer Prentis who became treasurer of General Motors in 1919. Robert Janeway headed an
engineering group for Chrysler for 30 years; A.E. Barit served
as president of the Hudson Motor Car Company from 1936
to 1954. Participating in the wave of American inventiveness,
in 1903 Rabbi Judah L. Levin received United States patents,
and later British and Japanese patents, for his adding and subtracting machine which now is in the collection of the Smithsonian Institute.
However, since Jews were substantially excluded from
the executive ranks of the automotive corporations, many
Jewish entrepreneurs became suppliers to the industry. Jewish shops, which eventually grew into thriving businesses,
supplied manufactured parts, glass, paint, chemicals, textiles, slag, and coveralls and operated laundries for factory
uniforms. Max Fishers Marathon Oil Company recycled and
refined used oil. The Industrial Removal Office in New York
City sent Jews to Detroit for industrial jobs and for work at
the Ford Motor Company for $5 a day.
Providing a needed voice for the rights of workers, Jews
were prominent in the labor movement. Samuel Goldwater was elected president of Detroits Cigarmakers Union in
the 1890s. Later Myra Wolfgang organized the waitresses
union. Many Jewish leaders worked with Walter Reuther in
the UAW, including Sam Fishman, Bernard Firestone, and Irving Bluestone, who later served as professor of labor studies
in the Economics Department chaired by Professor Samuel
Levin at Wayne University. Prominent labor lawyer Maurice
Sugars papers are collected at the Reuther Library at Wayne
University.
In 1912, Henry Ford, who was actively antisemitic a decade later, hired architect Albert Kahn to design the first fac-
tory to house a continuously moving assembly line to manufacture the Model T. Kahn continued to design Ford factories.
Henry Butzel served as chief justice of the Michigan Supreme
Court, while his attorney brother Fred became known as Detroits Most Valuable Citizen. Charles Simons was appointed
justice to the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals;
while his brother David was elected to Detroits first nineman city council in 1914.
In the 1990s, with a total Michigan population of
9,478,000, there were 107,000 Jews statewide, with a Jewish
population of 96,000 in metropolitan Detroit, the greater majority in the nearby Oakland County suburbs. It is anticipated
that more current studies will show a greater degree of spread
to additional nearby communities as well as a decline in the
Metro Detroit Jewish population.
An estimated 200,000 Muslims live in Metro Detroit,
many concentrated in Dearborn. The local American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, and the Jewish
Community Council are each involved in outreach activities
between local Muslims and Jews.
Carl *Levin served as United States Senator, elected four
times from 1978.
His brother, Sander, was re-elected to the House of Representatives from 1982. A leader of the statewide Democratic
ticket, Kathleen Straus was elected to the Michigan Board of
Education and served as president. Community activist David
Hermelin was appointed by President Bill Clinton as ambassador to Norway, where he served until his untimely death.
Florine Mark, founder of Weight Watchers in Michigan and
a philanthropic leader, is in the Michigan Womens Hall of
Fame. William *Davidson, a third generation Detroiter, is
the owner of the Detroit Pistons, the Detroit Shock, and the
Tampa Bay Lightning; chairman of glass manufacturer Guardian Industries, Inc; he is a major philanthropist taking a special interest in Jewish education. The patriarch of the Jewish
community, Max *Fisher, who passed away in 2004, was recognized as the dean of American Jewry and was acknowledged by United States presidents as a world citizen.
177
mickiewicz, adam
of the Philistine forces later encamped in the city prior to the
battle of Michmash, fleeing by way of Aijalon after their defeat (I Sam. 1314). It is mentioned in Isaiahs description of
the advance of the Assyrian army, where it is placed between
Aiath and Geba (Isa. 10:28), and in the lists of those returning from the Babylonian Exile (Ezra 2:27; Neh. 7:31). Jonathan
the Hasmonean resided there (until 152 B.C.E.) before assuming the high priesthood (I Macc. 9:73; cf. Jos., Ant., 13:34). In
the Mishnah, the wheat of the place is highly praised (Men.
8:1). Eusebius calls it a very big village, 9 mi. (c. 14 km.) from
Jerusalem and in its territory (Onom. 132:34). Michmash is
identified with Mukhms, close to Rama, approximately 6 mi.
(c. 10 km.) northeast of Jerusalem. A first-century C.E. ossuary
is known from a local tomb bearing the names Shimon and
Levi. A Byzantine church with an inscription was found in
the village. The Byzantine monastic laura of Firminus is situated in the vicinity of Mukhms.
Bibliography: Abel, Geog, 2 (1938), 386; Aharoni, Land,
index; EM, 4 (1962), 9612. Add. Bibliography: Y. Tsafrir, L.
Di Segni, and J. Green, Tabula Imperii Romani. Iudaea Palaestina. Maps and Gazetteer (1994), 173, S.V. Machmas; J. Patrich, The
Judean Desert Monasticism in the Byzantine Period: The Institutions
of Sabas and his Disciples (1995); B. Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages
of Samaria (2002), 22; G.S.P. Grenville, R.L. Chapman, and J.E. Taylor, Palestine in the Fourth Century. The Onomasticon by Eusebius of
Caesarea (2003), 143.
[Michael Avi-Yonah / Shimon Gibson (2nd ed.)]
178
as professor of Slavonic languages and literatures at the Collge de France in Paris (184044), Mickiewicz was at pains to
praise the Jews and defend them against their detractors. In a
sermon delivered in a Paris synagogue on the Fast of the Ninth
of Av, 1845, he expressed his sympathy for Jewish suffering
and yearning for Erez Israel. Although he dreamed for years
of the conversion of the Jews to Christianity, he was greatly
disappointed at the assimilationist tendencies of French Jews.
In one of the statutes of the Polish legion which he organized
in Italy in 1848 to fight against Russia Mickiewicz wrote: To
Israel, our elder brother: honor, fraternity, and help in striving towards his eternal and temporal goal. Equal rights in all
things. When the Crimean War broke out in 1853, Mickiewicz
went to Constantinople to help raise a Polish regiment to fight
against the Russians. He hoped to include Jewish units, and
was prepared to assure them the right to observe the Sabbath
and all other religious obligations. His chief assistant, a French
medical officer named Armand Lvy, was a Jewish nationalist,
and it is possible that the two men believed that the creation
of Jewish units would be a first step towards the revival of the
Jewish nation in its own land. Mickiewicz died suddenly before his mission in Constantinople was completed.
Bibliography: A.G. Duker, in: M. Kridl (ed.), Adam Mickiewicz, Poet of Poland (1951), 10825; S. Scheps, Adam Mickiewicz: ses
affinits juives (1964); R. Brandstaetter, Legjon ydoswki Adama Mickiewicza (1932=Miesicznik ydowski, 2 (1932), 2045, 11232, 22548);
W. Feldman, Stosunek Adama Mickiewicza do ydw (1890); P. Kon,
in: rdamocy, 1 (1924), bibl. of Heb. and Yid. trans.; R.A. Braudes
(Broydes), Adam Mickiewicz (Heb., 1890); F. Kupfer and S. Strelcyn,
Mickiewicz w przekadach hebrajskich (1955).
[Yehuda Arye Klausner]
miczyski, sebastian
Furthermore, the neoplatonic notion that the human mind is
potentially a (intelligible world) implies that
by knowing the intelligibles man becomes identical with all
being. Microcosmic speculation tended to combine with astrology (correspondence between heavenly bodies and parts
of the human body), medicine (universal and human nature,
parallel between the four elements and the four humors),
and magical practice (universal sympathy). Philo frequently
compares man as microcosm to the universe
(Conger, in bibl., 1618; H.A. Wolfson, Philo, 1 (1948), 424, n.),
stressing the parallel between the human and cosmic minds
(logoi; e.g., Op. 6971). He is said to have drawn his theory
of the microcosm from Greek and rabbinic sources (A. Altmann in bibl., 20). Among the latter is found a long list of
gross analogies between parts of the world and parts of man
in Avot de-Rabbi Nathan (ARN2 31, 92). (For other rabbinic
sources, see Altmann, 21, n.) In medieval Jewish philosophy
the motif is frequently cited, being part of the common stock
of popular philosophy found in such works as the Epistles of
the *Brethren of Sincerity. It is mentioned, for example, by
*Saadiah Gaon in his commentary on the Sefer Yez irah (ed. by
M. Lambert (1891), 67ff., 91), where he compares God to life
and intelligence and sets forth a series of analogues between
the universe, the sanctuary, and man (followed by Abraham
Ibn Ezra in his commentary on Ex. 25:40; see Altmann, in
bibl., 2526); by *Bah ya ibn Paquda (H ovot ha-Levavot, 2:4);
and by *Judah Halevi in his Kuzari (4:3), where he quotes the
philosophers who compared the world to a macranthropos
(large man) and man to a microcosm, implying that God is
the spirit, soul, mind, and life of the world. (For other citations
of the microcosm motif by medieval Jewish philosophers, see
Conger, in bibl., 37ff., and Altmann, in bibl., 2728.)
The microcosm theme was productive in *Israeli, Ibn
*Gabirol, and Joseph ibn *Z addik. Israeli links it to his definition of philosophy as self-knowledge: This being so, it is
clear that man, if he knows himself in both his spirituality
and corporeality, comprises knowledge of all, and knows both
the spiritual and the corporeal substance, and also knows the
first substance which is created from the power of the Creator without mediator (A. Altmann and S.M. Stern (eds.),
Isaac Israeli (1959), 27; see comments, ibid., 2830, 2038, and
Altmann, in bibl., 2223). The same combination of philosophy as self-knowledge and the consequent knowledge of all
is found in Ibn Z addiks Sefer ha-Olam ha-Katan (Introd.).
Ibn Z addik adds that this knowledge leads to knowledge of
the Creator. (See also Sefer ha-Olam ha-Katan, pt. 2, Introd.,
where Job 19:26 is cited as a proof verse And from my flesh
I shall behold God; cf. Altmann-Stern, 208; Altmann, in bibl.,
23, 25; and Vajda, in bibl., 97 and n. 3, who cites the similar
combination of the microcosm and (know
yourself ) themes by Abraham ibn Ezra.) In a more primitive vein, reminiscent of Avot de-Rabbi Nathan and the microcosm passage in the Iranian Greater Bundahihn (trans. by
B.T. Anklesaria (1956), 245), Ibn Z addik (pt. 2, ch. 1), referring
to the ancients, compares the members of the human organ-
179
middlesex county
denunciations accusing the Jews of all the misfortunes that
had befallen the kingdom of Poland and its people. Through
reports of *blood libels and accusations that they had desecrated icons and profaned Catholic festivals, the Jews are
presented as the implacable enemies of Christians. Miczyski
also presents the Jews as traitors and spies in the pay of Turkey, and lays special emphasis on the wealth of the Jewish
merchants and craftsmen who compete with their Christian
neighbors, driving the guilds and towns to ruin. The pamphlet
seriously disturbed the Jews of *Cracow. When riots broke
out in the town, the parnasim of the community appealed
to King Sigismund III Vasa. The king promptly prohibited
the circulation of the pamphlet, but in spite of his order it was
reprinted in a second and enlarged edition during the same
year; it was published for a third time in 1648. Miczyskis
work is an important link in the chain of Polish antisemitic
literature.
Bibliography: K. Bartoszewicz, Antysemityzm w literaturze
polskiej 1517 wiekw (1914); M. Baaban, Historja ydw w Krakowie
i na Kazimierzu, 1 (1931), 1717.
[Arthur Cygielman]
MIDDOT (Heb. ; measures), tenth tractate of the order Kodashim (in some codices and early editions it is ninth;
in current Talmud editions the 11t and last). It is found in the
Mishnah only. This tractate gives, in five chapters, exact details and measurements of the building of the Temple and of
its component parts, intended perhaps to serve as a guide for
the rebuilding of the Temple. The description is of the Temple
of Herod. It is not based on a plan drawn up in Temple times,
but depends on the memory of sages who saw the Temple and
who after its destruction gave an oral description of it to their
disciples. The main reporter seems to have been *Eliezer b.
Jacob I, who figures prominently in this tractate. He is thought
to have seen the Temple while it was still standing, but he may
also have learned much about its inner arrangements from his
uncle who actually served in it (1:2). That the descriptions are
based on memory is evident from the controversies on factual points (1:9; 2:6; 3:4, 6; et al.); moreover, Eliezer b. Jacob
is repeatedly reported to have forgotten certain details (2:5;
5:4). In fact this tractate was considered the original mishnah
(teaching) of Eliezer b. Jacob; the final redaction of Judah
ha-Nasi contains, of course, the variant traditions of the other
authorities as well (see Yoma 16a17a; TJ, Yoma 2:3, 39d).
180
midian, midianites
Bibliography: H . Albeck, Shishah Sidrei Mishnah, 5 (1959),
3135.
[Arnost Zvi Ehrman]
during the war in the wilderness (Num. 31:8) and Zebah and
Zalmunna in the war of Gideon (Judg. 8:1ff.). The Midianite
kings are called chieftains (nesiim) and princes (nesikhim;
Josh. 13:21; Ps. 83:12), very fitting titles for a tribal organization
united in groups; Zur, a prince of Midian, is explicitly called
the tribal head of an ancestral house in Midian (Num. 25:15).
Their typically (semi- and eventually complete) nomadic
character made them close to other similar tribes Amalekites and Kedemites. The Midianites in Transjordan followed
the cult of the Moabite Baal-Peor, while those who inhabited
the Negev and the Sinai became close to the Kenites or even
identified with them (cf. Num. 10:29; Judg. 1:16; 4:11) and the
Hebrews. The Midianites were known as shepherds (Ex. 2:17)
and traders (Gen. 37:28, 36). From time to time, they, together
with neighboring tribes, broke into the permanent settlements
around them. The Bible describes them as robbers (Judg. 6:5).
During the Monarchy the Midianites lived within the confines
of their place of origin, North Arabia, and they were known
as middlemen in the frankincense (levonah) and gold export
from Sheba in South Arabia (cf. Isa. 60:6). During the Hellenistic period the Nabateans mined much gold in the land of
Midian and exported it via the port of Macna (Strabo, Geographica, 17:784). There has been no systematic scientific research of Midian in North Arabia.
[Samuel Abramsky]
In the Aggadah
Midian and Moab had always been enemies but, fearing that
Israel would subdue them, they composed their differences
and entered into an alliance (Sanh. 105a). They succeeded in
inducing the Israelites to commit fornication with the daughters of Midian only by first making them drunk. For this reason, Phinehas forbade the drinking of gentile wine (Pd RE 47).
The hatred of the Midianites for Israel was solely on account
of the observance of the Torah by Israel (Num. R. 22:2). The
Midianites are sometimes identified with the Moabites, who
lost their claim to special consideration as descendants of
Lot (Deut. 2:9), the nephew of Abraham, because they tried
to induce Israel to sin (Yelammedenu in Yal. 1, 875). The command to Moses to make war upon the Midianites before his
death was because, having no reason for their hatred against
Israel, they nevertheless joined the Moabites and outdid them
in their enmity. Moses did not lead the war in person because
he had found refuge in Midian when he was a fugitive from
Egypt. He delegated the command to Phinehas as he had been
the first to take action against them by slaying the Midianite
princess, Cozbi (Num. R. 22:4).
Bibliography: R.F. Burton, The Gold Mines of Midian (1897);
idem, The Land of Midian (1898); E. Glaser, Skizze der Geschichte
und Geographie Arabiens, 2 (1890), 261ff.; E. Meyer, Die Israeliten
und ihre Nachbarstaemme (1906), 326ff., 3812; H. Grimme, in: OLZ,
13 (1910), 5459; H. Gressmann, Mose und seine Zeit (1913), 416ff.;
A. Musil, The Northern Hegz (1926), 109ff., 267ff., 27898, 321ff.;
W.J. Phythian-Adams, in: PEFQS (1930), 193ff.; L.E. Binns, in: JTS, 31
(1930), 33759; A. Reuveni, Shem, H am, ve-Yafet (1932), 1618, 6869;
Albright, Stone, 1956; idem, in: BASOR, 83 (1941), 36, n. 8; M. Noth,
in: ZAW, 60 (1944), 23ff.; B. Mazar, in: Eretz-Israel, 3 (1954), 20; S.
181
midler, bette
Abramsky, ibid., 1189; Y. Kutscher, Ha-Lashon ve-ha-Reka ha-Leshoni
shel Megillat Yeshayahu (1959), 82; G.W. van Beer, in: BA, 23 (1960),
3, 7095; A. Grohman, Arabien (1963), 21, 3892. IN THE AGGADAH:
Ginzberg, Legends, 7 (1938), 313; A. Rosmarin, Moses im Lichte der
Aggadah (1932), index.
*Midreshei Halakhah), usually forming a running commentary on specific books of the Bible.
The term Midrash itself derives from the root drsh ()
which in the Bible means mainly to search, to seek, to examine, and to investigate (cf. Lev. 10:16; Deut. 13:15; Isa. 55:6;
et al.). This meaning is also found in rabbinic Hebrew (cf. BM
2:7: until thou examine [tidrosh] thy brother if he be a cheat
or not). The noun Midrash occurs only twice in the Bible
(II Chron. 13:22 and 24:27); it is translated in the Septuagint by
s, i.e., book or writing, and it seems probable
that it means an account, the result of inquiry (examination,
study, or search) of the events of the times, i.e., what is today
called history (the word history is also derived from the
Greek root which has a similar meaning). In Jewish
literature of the Second Temple period the word Midrash was
first employed in the sense of education and learning generally
(Ecclus. 51:23), Turn unto me, ye unlearned, and lodge in my
house of Midrash, which the authors grandson translated into
Greek, house of instruction or of study; compare the similar development of the Latin studium which originated in the
verb studeo which means to become enthusiastic, to make
an effort, to be diligent, etc. and only in a secondary sense,
in the post-Augustan era, in the sense of learning (with diligence and the noun studium passed through the same stages
of meaning; cf. Ger. studium; Fr. tude, etc.).
Darosh both in its nominal and verbal forms is sometimes found in the literature of the *Dead Sea sect as the designation for a certain method, a special technique of learning
things in halakhah and in aggadah through rigorous study
and painstaking, searching inquiry into the verses of the Bible.
This method of Midrash was both ideologically and halakhically one of the fundamentals of the life of the sect: and that
his deeds appear in accordance with the Midrash of the Torah
as followed by the holy upright men (Damascus Covenant
8:2930; cf. the Manual of Discipline 8:2526: If his way is
perfect in company, in Midrash, and in counsel; cf. also ibid.
6:24 and 6:6). The nature of this Midrash is testified to by the
explicit words: When these become a community in Israel
with such characteristics they separate themselves from the
company of the wicked men to go thither to the wilderness to
make clear there the way of the Lord, as is written [Isa. 40:3],
and in the wilderness clear ye the way make plain in the desert a highway for our God, that being the Midrash of the Torah
[which] he commanded through Moses, to do in accordance
with all that is revealed in every era and as the prophets revealed through his holy spirit (Manual of Discipline 8:1216);
i.e., the Midrash of the Torah is the lesson derived from the
verse (4:215 5:11). A different method of interpretation is the
*pesher, although the Midrash could also contain pesharim
(see 4Q 174 Florilegium, 12, I 1419, in: J.M. Allegro, Discoveries in the Judean Desert, V: Qumran Cave 4, I (1968), p. 53f.).
This technique of biblical exegesis which is largely similar to
that customary among the Greek grammarians, the students
of the classical texts of Homer, and among the Roman rhetoricians, the exponents of Roman law, is found among the Jews
182
MIDLER, BETTE (1945 ), U.S. singer, entertainer, and actress. Born in Honolulu, Midler entered show business as a
member of the Fiddler on the Roof cast on Broadway in 1964.
She gained notoriety as a popular performer in the Continental Baths cabaret, a meeting place for homosexuals, and
then scored a hit single with the frequently recorded Do You
Wanna Dance? (1974). She followed this success with her topselling album The Divine Miss M. and a popular film of her
live act called Divine Madness (1979). Midler turned actress
in a movie loosely based on the life of Janis Joplin, The Rose
(1981), which earned her an Academy Award nomination for
Best Actress. Midler, who was named after legendary film
icon Bette Davis, starred in subsequent films such as Down
and Out in Beverly Hills (1986), Ruthless People (1986), For the
Boys (Oscar nomination for Best Actress, 1991), The First Wives
Club (1996), Drowning Mona (2000), Isnt She Great (2000),
and The Stepford Wives (2004).
Over the years, among other TV guest spots, Midler appeared on Johnny Carsons Tonight Show 24 times, starting in
1970 and including the final program in May 1992. She also
appeared in the TV movie Gypsy (1993) and produced and
starred in the sitcom Bette (20001).
On the Broadway stage, Midler appeared in Fiddler on
the Roof (196472), Bette Midler Special Concert (1973), Bette
Midlers Clams on the Half Shell Revue (1975), Bette! Divine
Madness (1979), and Short Talks on the Universe (2002).
For her multiple talents as an actress, writer, singer, and
performer, Midler won a host of awards. In 1974 she received
a special Tony Award for adding luster to the Broadway season. She won four Grammy awards, including the 1973 Best
New Artist and the prestigious Record of the Year in 1989 for
her rendition of her #1 hit Wind Beneath My Wings from the
movie Beaches. She won three Emmy awards and was nominated for another four. In 1987 she received the American
Comedy Awards Lifetime Achievement Award in Comedy, as
well as the American Comedy Award in 1988, 1989, 1993, 1996,
and 1998. Her writings include A View from a Broad (1980)
and the fable The Saga of Baby Divine (1983).
Bibliography: M. Bego, Bette Midler: Still Divine (2003);
A. Waldman, The Bette Midler Scrapbook (1997); G. Mair, Bette: An
Intimate Biography of Bette Midler (1995); A. Collins, Bette Midler
(1989); M. Bego, Bette Midler: Outrageously Divine (1987); J. Spada,
The Divine Bette Midler (1984).
[Jonathan Licht / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
midrash
for the first time in the Dead Sea sect (see particularly Book
of *Jubilees). Nevertheless these earlier forms of exegesis must
be distinguished from rabbinic midrash as a fully developed
literary form (cf. *Midreshei Halakhah: Literary Nature and
Relation to Early Midrash). Suggestions to the effect that the
Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum (pseudo-Philo) is a Midrash
are without foundation.
The Redaction of the Midrash). Moreover, even after one arrives by use of this method at a provisional determination regarding precedence, other additional factors must be taken
into account (literary forms, language, style, etc.).
Midrashic Literature
It is very possible that the earliest Midrash to come down
is the Passover *Haggadah, the earliest and chief element of
which is a Midrash to Deuteronomy 26:58 (cf. Sif. Deut. 301).
A great part of the midrashic aggadah of the tannaitic period
is included side by side with the midrashic halakhah in the
halakhic Midrashim (cf. *Midreshei Halakhah: The Aggadic
Material). On the other hand there are no independent works
devoted only to midrash aggadah from the tannaitic era (see
however *Seder Olam Rabbah and the *Baraita de-Melekhet haMishkan). All the extant literary works devoted primarily to
midrash aggadah were apparently compiled originally in Erez
Israel during the amoraic and post-amoraic periods. While the
Babylonian Talmud contains a vast amount of aggadic midrash
(cf. the Midrash on the Book of Esther in Meg. 10b17a, and on
Lamentations in Sanh. 104ab), its literary structure follows the
earlier tannaitic model, including both midrash halakhah and
aggadah (as in the midreshei halakhah), and integrating both
of them into an appropriate context following the order of the
tractates of the Mishnah, as was done in both the Mishnah and
the Tosefta (see *Mishnah: Aggadah in the Mishnah).
From the point of view of the period of their arrangement and collection the aggadic Midrashim can be divided
into three groups: early, middle, and late. The determination
of the time of the editing and arranging of the various Midrashim is by no means a simple matter. It is nearly impossible
to determine with even approximate certainty the period when
a Midrash or aggadic work was compiled (see *Pirkei de-R.
Eliezer). However, it is possible to arrive at a relative date, that
is, to determine the relation of a particular Midrash to others
(see Table: Midreshei Aggadah). To do this one cannot rely on
the historical allusions alone or merely on the names of the
sages mentioned in the Midrash, nor can one rely on the first
mentions of the Midrash and its first citations, since all the Midrashim contain much material from different and extended
eras. The lack of historical allusions after a definite period do
not suffice to testify to its compilation immediately after that
period, just as the lack of mention of a Midrash and of its citation until a certain period does not prove that it was edited
at the date nearest to the beginning of that period. In neither
case can one rely on the argumentum a silentio. A more reliable method for determining priority and lateness among Midrashim is the relationship between the various Midrashim
the use one makes of another as well as their relationship to
other sources. This procedure, however, involves a number of
very complex issues, and no consensus has yet been reached
on how it should be applied in practice (see *Genesis Rabbah:
183
midrash
whole book on each chapter, on every verse, and at times
even on every word in the verse. The homiletical Midrash is
either a Midrash to a book of the Pentateuch in which only
the first verse (or verses) of the weekly portion is expounded
(in accordance with the early *Triennial cycle that was current in Erez Israel, e.g., *Leviticus Rabbah), or a Midrash that
is based only on the biblical and prophetic reading of special
Sabbaths and festivals, in which, also, only the first verses are
expounded (eg., Pesikta de-Rav Kahana). In both cases, in contrast to the exegetical Midrashim, the homiletical Midrashim
contain almost no short homilies or dicta on variegated topics, but each chapter (or section) constitutes a collection of
homilies and sayings on one topic that seem to combine into
one long homily on the specific topic.
Megillat Antiochus
Midrash Petirat Moshe (Death of Moses)
Tanna de-Vei Eliyahu (Seder Eliyahu)
Pirkei de-R. Eliezer
Midrash Agur (Called Mishnat R. Eliezer)
Midrash Yonah
Midrash Petirat Aharon
Divrei ha-Yamim shel Moshe
Otiyyot de-R. Akiva
Midrash Sheloshah ve-Arbaah
Midrash Eser Galuyyot
Midrash va-Yissau
Midrashim
Date C.E.
The Era
Genesis Rabbah
Leviticus Rabbah
Lamentations Rabbah
Esther Rabbah I
Pesikta de-Rav Kahana
Songs Rabbah
Ruth Rabbah
Targum Sheni
Midrash Esfah
Midrash Proverbs
Midrash Samuel
Ecclesiastes Rabbah
Midrash H aserot vi-Yterot
Deuteronomy Rabbah
Tanh uma
Tanh uma (Buber)
Numbers Rabbah II
Pesikta Rabbati
Exodus Rabbah II
Va-Yeh i Rabbah
The Manuscripts of the Tanh uma
Yelammedenu Midrashim
Midrash Tehillim I
Exodus Rabbah I
Aggadat Bereshit
Aggadat Shir ha-Shirim (Zuta)
Ruth Zuta
Ecclesiastes Zuta
Lamentations Zuta
Midrash Shir Hashirim
Abba Guryon
Esther Rabbah II
Midrash Tehilim II
400500
Classical Amoraic
Midrashim of the
Early Period
(400600)
500640
640900
(775900)
9001000
10001100
11001200
12001300
13001400
14001500
1. Tanh uma Midrash (Yelammedenu). 2. All based on the work of Moshe ha-Darshan. 3. These are anthologies
Note: Names in Italics are homiletical Midrashim; the rest are exegetical.
184
Eliezer) or Byzantine (The Throne and Hippodrome of Solomon, etc.) eras can be seen.
The Late Period
To the period of the 11t and 12t centuries belong the very latest Midrashim. Of these special mention should be made of
Midrash Abba Guryon, Esther Rabbah II, Midrash Tehillim II,
and the series from the school of *Moses ha-Darshan that already border on the anthologies with regard to their period of
composition as well as to content. In these Midrashim there
is hardly a trace of even an imitation of the classical proem,
the Hebrew is completely medieval, and the pseudepigraphic
influence both in content and form is still more pronounced.
Among the aggadic works of this period particular mention
must be made of the Sefer ha-Yashar (see *Midrashim, Smaller
in supplementary entries, vol. 16) where the Muslim influence
is most recognizable.
The Yalkutim (Anthologies)
From the beginning of the 12t century, scholars in various
countries assembled anthologies from various Midrashim and
aggadic works. To these belong such works as the *Midrash
Lekah Tov (or the Pesikta Zutarta) to the Pentateuch and the
five *scrolls (of Tobiah b. Eliezer); the *Yalkut Shimoni to the
whole of the Bible (assembled in Germany at the beginning
of the 13t century); *Midrash ha-Gadol to the Pentateuch and
scrolls; and the *Yalkut Makhiri to various biblical books. Anthologies of the aggadot in the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds were also collected, especially close to the beginning of
the age of printing. Most of the anthologies quote their sources
with the original wording and indicate them (an exception being the Midrash ha-Gadol).
Bibliography: Zunz-Albeck, Derashot; H.L. Strack, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash (1945), pt. 2; A.G. Wright, The Literary Genre Midrash (1967); J. Bowker, The Targums and Rabbinic Literature, and introduction to Jewish interpretations of Scripture (1969);
G. Vermes, Scripture and Tradition in Judaism (1961); Ginzberg, Legends; S.M. Lehrman, The World of the Midrash (1961). Add. Bibliography: J. Fraenkel, Darkhei ha-Aggadah ve-ha-Midrash. (Heb.;
1996); idem, Midrash ve-Aggadah (1996); idem, Sippur ha-Aggadah
Ah dut shel Tokhen ve-Z urah (Heb.; 2001); Stemberger, Introduction
(1996), 23346, 276325; M. Bregman, The Tanh uma-Yelammedenu
Literature (Heb.; 2003).
[Moshe David Herr]
185
midrash ha-gadol
and have created confusion regarding both the number of stories included and the structure of the book as it appears in the
several printed versions and the 20 extant manuscripts.
The collection was called a Midrash although its contents do not justify the name. It is basically a narrative work,
one of the first medieval Hebrew works in the field of fiction.
Its treatment of the midrashic material can be described as
revolutionary: whereas traditional Midrashim place primary
importance on homiletic material with only occasional use of
stories, this work is primarily composed of stories, with the
homiletic passages relegated to secondary importance. This
stress on the fictional element is one of the characteristics
of the new attitude toward the story introduced in medieval
times (see *Fiction).
The work, which is based on the Ten Commandments,
is correspondingly divided into ten parts. However, there is
not always a close connection between the midrashic story
and the commandment on which it is supposed to be based.
This explains the material occasionally introduced into a story
to create the impression of such a connection. In some versions the work is called Midrash shel Shavuot or Haggadah leShavuot, leading one to believe that it was used on Shavuot,
the festival on which the receiving of the Ten Commandments
is celebrated. However, there is no proof that any Jewish community ever used this work during Shavuot. Noy (see bibl.)
concludes plausibly that the arbitrary connection between
the Midrash Aseret ha-Dibberot and the commandments and
Shavuot is merely an attempt to give a religious veneer to a
collection of essentially secular stories which had no other
purpose than to entertain.
Some of the stories in the collection are originally found
in the Talmud and represent a medieval retelling of the talmudic aggadah. Others are derived from more ancient sources,
like the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha: the story of Judith
is told in a different version (without mentioning her name),
and the story of the woman and her seven sons from the
Book of Maccabees is also retold. However, most of the stories are folktales, either Jewish in origin or Jewish versions of
international folktales found in a variety of versions in
many languages (Noy lists among them the international
types Aarne-Thompson 976, 670, 899, 2040, and others).
Some of these stories are still current today among oral storytellers.
The number of stories composing the collection differs
from version to version, some containing no more than 17 and
others nearly 30. One manuscript (Parma 473) has 44 stories.
As there are some which appear in only one version, the total
number of stories connected with this work is over 50. A large
number of stories (12) are concerned with the commandment
Thou shalt not commit adultery; an erotic element is also
found in stories related to other commandments. Women, frequently courageous and devout, are the heroines of many of
the stories. From the religious point of view, the stories seem
to imply an extreme devotion to the observance of the commandments, far beyond that required by the halakhah. The
collection can also be described, therefore, as one of the earliest ethical works written in the Middle Ages.
186
midrashim, smaller
only slight value, and the other (anon.), the Sefer ha-Margalit
(Book of the Pearl), containing explanations in Hebrew and
Arabic of difficult words. The Midrash ha-Gadol is still a standard work of rabbinic homily for the Yemenite community
and circulates widely in manuscript.
MIDRASHIM, SMALLER. This entry covers those aggadic and midrashic works which are not treated in separate
articles.
(1) MIDRASH AGUR, also known as Mishnat R. Eliezer,
or Midrash Sheloshim u-Shetayim Middot. Belonging to some
extent to the category of aggadic works, this Midrash is an exposition on Proverbs 30:13 (The words of Agur the son of
Jakeh ), and begins by quoting R. *Eliezer b. Yose haGelilis
Baraita of 32 Rules. It used the Babylonian Talmud. Though
written in a pure Hebrew, it contains Arabic words and refers to the kingdom of Ishmael. Therefore it was probably
composed in Erez Israel, more or less contemporaneously
with *Pirkei de-R. Eliezer about the middle of the eighth century C.E. It was apparently used by *Saadiah Gaon, and was
first printed by Menahem de Lonzano at Safed in 1626, but
not a single copy of this edition has been preserved. An excerpt from the Midrash was published from a manuscript
by L. Ginzberg in Tarbiz, 4 (1933), 297342 (and see J.N. Epstein, ibid., 34353; S. Lieberman, in: Ginzei Kedem, 5 (1934),
18690). A scholarly edition, with an introduction in English,
was published by H.G. Enelow (1933).
(2) AGGADAT SHIR HA-SHIRIM (Aggadah of Song of
Songs) or Shir ha-Shirim Zuta (Minor Song of Songs), a
collection of extracts from various Midrashim. The redactor
made extensive use of a Midrash, no longer extant, which was
also much used by the Yelammedenu-Tanh uma Midrashim,
especially *Pesikta Rabbati. It has no proems. This Midrash
in its present form was undoubtedly used by R. *Judah b.
Kalonymus, the 12t-century author of Yih usei Tannaim veAmoraim. The date of its redaction is apparently not earlier
than the tenth century. Alongside later material it also contains much of an earlier date, unknown from other sources.
It was published in scholarly editions (from Parma Ms. 541)
by S. Buber (1894) and S. Schechter (1896).
(3) MIDRASH SHIR HA-SHIRIM (Midrash Song of
Songs), also a collection of extracts from various Midrashim.
The redactor used tannaitic literature, the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds, and *Genesis Rabbah, as well as sources used
by the Yelammedenu-Tanh uma Midrashim. This Midrash,
187
midrashim, smaller
(10) MIDRASH ESFAH, named from its introductory
words: Gather [esfah] unto Me seventy men of the elders of
Israel (Num. 11:16). This is a midrashic work on the Book of
Numbers, most of which is no longer extant. Excerpts from it
are quoted in Yalkut Shimoni and some have been published
from manuscripts (*Abraham b. Elijah of Vilna, Rav Pealim,
ed. by S.M. Chones (1894), 14753; S.A. Wertheimer, Battei
Midrashot, 1 (1950), 2114). Unpublished fragments are also
in existence. Known to the Babylonian geonim in the ninth
century, apparently the work was edited not earlier than the
end of the seventh century.
(11) MIDRASH ESER GALUYYOT (Midrash on the Ten
Expulsions), found in different versions in several manuscripts, some of which have been published (Basle, 1578 [on
which is based L. Gruenhuts Sefer ha-Likkutim, 3 (1889)], 122
(second pagination); Carmoly, Brussels (1842); A. Jellinek, Beit
ha-Midrash, 4 (1938), 1336; 5 (1938), 1136; M. Ish-Shalom in
Sinai, 43 (1958), 195211). The date of the work, for which the
author used Midrashim of tannaitic and amoraic times, is not
earlier than the ninth century.
(12) MIDRASH SHELOSHAH VE-ARBAAH (Midrash
Three and Four; also called Pirkei Rabbenu ha-Kadosh,
Maaseh Torah, and H uppat Eliyahu), also extant in different
versions in many manuscripts, only some of which have been
published (S.A. Wertheimer, Battei Midrashot, 2 (1953), 4573;
S. Schoenblum, in the collection Sheloshah Sefarim Niftah im
(1877); L. Gruenhut, Sefer ha-Likkutim, 3 (1899), 3390 (second
pagination); Kol Bo, para. 118; A. Jellinek, Beit ha-Midrash, 2
(1938), 92101; H.M. Horowitz, in the collection Kevod H uppah
(1888), 4556). However, most of the manuscripts remain unpublished. Enumerating various themes grouped in numbers
from three onward, the work used various ancient sources and
was redacted not earlier than the ninth century.
(13) OTIYYOT DE-R. AKIVA (Letters of Rabbi Akiva),
or Alef Bet de-R. Akiva (Alphabet of Rabbi Akiva), an aggadic work likewise extant in different versions and in many
manuscripts, only some of which have been published (Constantinople (1516), version A; Cracow (1579), version B; Wertheimer, Battei Midrashot, 2 (1953), 333465, four versions), but
most of them (including Mss. of the 13t and 14t centuries)
have not yet appeared in print. This late Midrash on the alphabet contains many mystic and eschatological discussions.
As it was quoted in the tenth century, the work was apparently
compiled in the ninth century.
(14) MIDRASH H ASEROT VI-YTEROT, a homiletic exposition on the reasons for the defective and plene writing in the
Bible. It is also extant in many versions in numerous manuscripts, only some of which have been published (a critical edition including variant readings of the different versions was
issued by Wertheimer, Battei Midrashot, 2 (1953), 203332).
The work shows the influence of the masoretic period. Since
different versions are already cited in the responsa of *Hai
Gaon, the date of its redaction has therefore to be fixed in the
ninth century.
(15) MIDRASH AVKIR, so called after the initial letters of
188
midrashim, smaller
apparently at the end of the 11t century, perhaps in southern
Spain. First published in Venice in 1625, it has since been republished many times.
(19) MIDRASH KONEN, or Adonai be-H okhmah Yasad
Arez , dealing with the Creation, the heavens, paradise, and
hell. This Midrash was influenced by apocalyptic sources
of the Second Temple period, and by the mystic literature
of the beginning of the Middle Ages. Composed not earlier
than about the 11t century, it was first published in Venice
in 1601. Another version was published from manuscript by
A. Jellinek (Beit haMidrash, 5 (1938), 6369) and excerpts
from similar Midrashim, Seder Rabbah di-Vereshit, were published by S.A. Wertheimer (Battei Midrashot, 1 (1950), 148).
Yet another version, Zeh Maaseh Bereshit, appeared in Sefer
Raziel ha-Malakh, and still another version was published
from a manuscript by L. Ginzberg (Ginzei Schechter, 1 (1928),
1827).
(20) MIDRASH VA-YEKHULLU (RABBATI), called after its opening sentence (Gen. 2:1): And the heaven and the
earth were finished [va-yekhullu] This Midrash, which is
no longer extant, was quoted from the middle of the 12t century onward. The various quotations that have been preserved
(they have been collected by L. Gruenhut, Sefer ha-Likkutim,
2 (1898), 16b20a) show that the redactor used the Jerusalem
Talmud and Yelammedenu-Tanh uma. It is difficult to fix the
date of its redaction but it was apparently not before the end
of the tenth century.
(21) MIDRASH VA-YOSHA, a late aggadic work on the
song at the Red Sea, which used, among others, Pirkei deR. Eliezer and Pesikta Rabbati. The name is derived from the
opening sentence (Ex. 14:30): Thus the Lord saved [vayosha] The Midrash mentions *Armilus as a well-known figure. Apparently redacted at the end of the 11t century, it was
first published at Constantinople in 1519 and again in the collection Divrei H akhamim (1849).
(22) MIDRASH AGGADAH, an exegetical Midrash on the
Pentateuch consisting mainly of excerpts from the work of
Moses ha-Darshan. This is evident from the many parallel
passages between, on the one hand, Midrash Aggadah and, on
the other, *Genesis Rabbati, Numbers Rabbah I, and the quotations from Moses ha-Darshans work cited in Rashis commentary on the Pentateuch. It is further evident from the extensive use both of Midrash Tadshe (no. 16) and of apocryphal
and pseudepigraphical works of the Second Temple period (in
particular, the Book of Jubilees). Midrash Aggadah, compiled
apparently in the 12t century, was published from the Aleppo
manuscript by S. Buber (1894).
(23) MIDRESHEI H ANUKKAH. Some of these Midrashim
were published by A. Jellinek (Beit ha-Midrash, 1 (1938), 1326;
6 (1938), 13), the rest being extant in manuscript. They are
all late aggadic works, the oldest of them having been written
apparently not earlier than the tenth century, and comprise
various aggadot on the *Hasmonean revolt into which have
been woven the story of *Judith and Holofernes as well as the
theme of ius primae noctis.
189
MIDRASH LEKAH TOV (Heb. ) , a late 11tcentury Midrash on the Pentateuch and Five Scrolls by Tobias
b. Eliezer. The author called it Lekah Tov (good doctrine) on
the basis of its opening verse (Prov. 4:2): For I give you good
doctrine which he chose with allusion to his name (for the
same reason he begins his interpretations of the weekly portions of Scripture and of the Scrolls with a verse containing the
word tov, good). The book was called Pesikta by later scholars, and also, in error, Pesikta Zutarta. Tobias lived in the Balkans (Buber), and his Midrash contains allusions to contemporary historical events and specific reference to the martyrs
of the First Crusade of 1096 (in the portion Emor and in his
commentary on the verse Therefore do the maidens love thee,
Song 1:3). Zunz defined the Midrash as a composition which is
half exegesis and half aggadah, but even in the half aggadah
the exegetical commentary aspect is conspicuous. Tobias took
the ideas he needed from the Babylonian Talmud, the halakhic
Midrashim, and the early aggadic Midrashim (including some
no longer extant), as well as from the early mystical literature
and used them as the basis of his Midrash. He did not however quote them literally nor as a rule did he mention their
authors. He translated Aramaic passages as well as Greek and
Latin terms into Hebrew; abridged the language of the early authors; and even combined their sayings and refashioned them.
He tended to quote scriptural verses from memory, which explains the many variations from the standard text.
The work also contains hundreds of explanations by Tobias himself, some in the style of the midrashic literature and
some giving the literal meaning. He expounds the keri and
the ketiv, the *masorah, *gematriot, and *notarikon and also
gives many mnemotechnical devices in the manner of the rabbis. His literal explanations are based on the rules of grammar, vocalization, accentuation, etc. It is noteworthy that he
explains anthropomorphic verses and statements as parables
and frequently repeats: The Torah speaks in the language of
men. This tendency is without doubt an aspect of his violent
struggle with the Karaites which finds expression in the Midrash in many places. His practical aim is also conspicuous
when he deals with certain halakhot whose performance was
apparently neglected in his time. Tobias Midrash was frequently quoted soon after it was written, but until the end of
the last century only the Lekah Tov to Leviticus, Numbers,
and Deuteronomy had been published (first edition, Venice,
1746). It was published in full, Genesis and Exodus by S. Buber
(1884); Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy by Meir Katzenellenbogen of Padua (1884) from the Venice edition with
corrections; the Song of Songs was published by A.W. Greenup (1909); Ruth by I. Bamberger (1887); Lamentations by J.
Nacht (1895), and again by Greenup (1908); Ecclesiastes by G.
190
midrash tehillim
Prague, 1613. Subsequently the printers relied chiefly upon the
Prague edition, which relied upon the Venice edition (whose
reading is doubtful, as Buber has shown), and added to it the
glosses, Ot Emet, of Meir b. Samuel Benveniste. In 1893 S. Buber published a new edition of great value based upon three
manuscripts, as well as the Constantinople edition. Additional
manuscripts of the Midrash are now available.
Bibliography: Zunz-Albeck, Derashot, 133, 412f.; S. Buber
(ed.), Midrash Mishlei (1893), introd.
[Jacob Elbaum]
It was published a third time in Prague in 1613 with the commentary of Isaac b. Samson Katz, son-in-law of *Judah Loew
b. Bezalel of Prague, and has been frequently reprinted since.
The best edition is that of S. Buber (Cracow, 1893) based on the
printed editions of the Parma manuscript. For a commentary
to Avot of the same name see Samuel ben Isaac *Uceda.
Bibliography: Zunz-Albeck, Derashot, 133, 4134; S. Buber,
Midrash Shemuel (1893), 740.
[Jacob Elbaum]
191
midrash va-yissau
minology is inconsistent, the proems are mainly anonymous,
and their formulation is at times defective. Albeck claims, furthermore, on the basis of the many differences between the
manuscripts, the many additions in several of them, the errors in their arrangement, and the significant differences in
the repetition of the same homily, that the present Midrash
Tehillim consists of groups of Midrashim to the Psalms. This
too is the reason, in his view, for the lack of uniformity in the
methods of interpreting the Psalms: some are interpreted at
length, every single verse being discussed, while in others
homilies are found for only a few verses. It may be concluded,
therefore, that the period of composition of the Midrash extended over some centuries. Obviously it is not identical with
the Midrash Tehillim which Simeon b. Judah ha-Nasi taught
H iyya (Kid. 33a; and see also Av. Zar. 19a), even though it apparently contains material from as early as this period (third
century). Its concluding section is definitely from the 13t century, and not as Mann suggested, that parts of it derive from
an early short Midrash to Psalms.
Despite the lack of uniformity in this Midrash, its fragmentary nature on the one hand and the many additions to
it on the other, it has retained many fine qualities and is one
of the most beautiful in aggadic literature: it has exalted language and colorful themes, cites many stories and parables,
and makes extensive and tasteful use of the hermeneutics of
aggadic interpretation. L. Rabinowitz, adapting the main theory of Mann in his The Bible as Read and Preached in the Old
Synagogue, claims that one could assume a triennial reading
of the Psalms paralleling that of the Torah, and from this it is
possible to understand the contents of its homilies. This claim,
however, is still far from being proved.
The Midrash has been frequently published: Constantinople, 1512, Venice, 1546, Prague, 1613, etc. Of great value are
the Warsaw editions of 1873 and 1875, with the commentary of
Aaron Moses Padua; the 1891 Vilna edition of Buber, for which
he utilized eight manuscripts and the glosses of Abraham Provenal; and the English edition of Braude (1959). Important
fragments of the Midrash Tehillim were published by A. Jellinek, Beit ha-Midrash, 5 (1873), 7086 (glosses by A. Provenal); J. Mann, in: HUCA, 14 (1939), 30332; and M. Arzt, in: Alexander Marx Jubilee Volume (1950), Hebrew section, 4973.
Bibliography: S. Buber (ed.), Midrash Tehillim (1891), introd.; Zunz-Albeck, Derashot, 131f., 40712; L. Rabinowitz, in: JQR,
26 (193536), 34968; W.G. Braude (trans.), The Midrash on Psalms,
1 (1959), introd.
[Jacob Elbaum]
first describes a war of Jacob and his sons against the army of
Ninevites, who came to Palestine to subdue the whole world.
Characteristic of this chapter are exaggerations which are lacking in the two other chapters, a style possibly influenced by the
Book of Josippon. This chapter does not appear in some manuscripts, although two of them consist of it only, which indicates
that it was possibly a later addition to the Midrash. The second chapter describes the wars of the sons of Jacob against the
Amorite kings seven years after Jacob and his family withdrew
from Shechem (Gen. 35:5) because of the defilement of Dinah
and the events which followed. The story of the victory over
the Amorite kings is opposed to that of the biblical narrative,
where Jacob fears that he will be outnumbered and destroyed.
However, the story of the victory is hinted at in Genesis 48:22,
a verse which is quoted to this effect in the Midrash. The third
chapter describes the war between Jacob and his sons and Esau
and his sons, in which Esau is killed by Jacob and Esaus descendants become tributary to Jacobs family.
The medieval Hebrew book (with the exception of the
first chapter) is a free translation from Greek (or Latin) of an
old Jewish (Hebrew or Aramaic) text from the time of the Second Temple, a text which was also used by the authors of the
Book of Jubilees and the Testaments of the Patriarchs: the wars
against the Amorites are narrated in the Testament of Judah,
chapters 37, and in an abbreviated form in Jubilees 34:19; and
a parallel narrative to the war against Esau and his sons is preserved in Jubilees 37 and 38:114, and in an abbreviated form,
in the Testament of Judah, chapter 9. The medieval Midrash
Va-Yissau is of great importance for a reconstruction of the
original ancient Jewish text. The ancient text, which was used
by the Book of Jubilees and the extant Testament of Judah,
and is the basis of chapters 23 of Midrash Va-Yissau, could
have been a separate work. It seems more probable, however,
that the common source of all three works, in their description of the war of Jacob and his sons against the Amorite kings
and against Esau, was an older and more expanded form of
the Testament of Judah than its extant form in the Testament
of the Patriarchs, a situation similar to that of the Testament
of *Levi and the Testament of *Naphtali. Some scholars see
in the description of the wars against the Amorites and Esau
a tendentious projection into the biblical past of the wars of
John Hyrcanus against the Samaritans and Edomites, the descendants of Esau, and a historical justification of these wars.
Midrash Va-Yissau was used, expanded, and rewritten in the
medieval Sefer ha-Yashar (Book of Jashar). A critical edition was published with an introduction by J.Z. Lauterbach
in Abhandlungen zur Erinnerung an H.P. Chajes (1933, Heb.
pt. 20522).
MIDRASH VAYISSAU (Heb. ) , a medieval Midrash in Hebrew about the legendary wars of Jacob and his
sons. The name derives from the first word of Genesis 35:5,
with which the Midrash opens. The original name of the work
is probably The Book of Wars of the Sons of Jacob, a name
which is preserved in Nah manides commentary on the Book
of Genesis (to Gen. 34:13), the earliest reference to the existence
of the legend. The small book contains three chapters. The
Bibliography: S. Klein, in: ZDPV, 57 (1934), 727; A. Jellinek, Beit ha-Midrash, 3 (19382), ixxiv, 15; R.H. Charles (ed.), The
Greek Versions of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (1908), li,
2358; idem (ed.), The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (1908), lxv,
6979; idem (ed.), The Book of Jubilees (1902), 2004, 21421; Ginzberg, Legends, 5 (1925), 315f., 321f.; Y.M. Grintz, Perakim be-Toledot
Bayit Sheni (1969), 105f., n. 2.
[David Flusser]
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midreshei halakhah
MIDRESHEI HALAKHAH (Heb. ; Halakhic
Midrashim), the appellation given to a group of tannaitic
expositions on four books of the Pentateuch. This body of
tannaitic literature will be discussed below under the following headings: (1) Characteristics of Halakhic Midrash: (a) The
Collections; (b) The Term Halakhic Midrash; (c) Literary Nature and Relation to Early Midrash; (d) Authority of the Bible;
(e) Development of Exegetical Methods. (2) The Schools of
R. Ishmael and of R. Akiva: (a) Distinct Exegetical Methods;
(b) The Division into Schools; (c) Redaction of the Material
from the Schools. (3) The Aggadic Material. (4) Traces of Early
Halakhah. (5) Relation to Other Works: (a) Aramaic Targumim on the Torah; (b) Mishnah; (c) Tosefta; (d) Talmuds.
(6) Time and Place of Redaction. (7) History of Research and
Future Challenges.
1. Characteristics of Halakhic Midrash
(A) THE COLLECTIONS. Halakhic Midrashim (H m) contain
both halakhic and aggadic (i.e., nonlegal) material from the
tannaitic period, arranged according to the order of verses in
the Torah, in contrast with other major compositions of this
period Mishnah and Tosefta in which the material is arranged by subject. (See: *Mishnah: The Mishnah as a Literary
Work; Halakhah in the Mishnah; Aggadah in the Mishnah.)
H m were composed on four of the five books of the Torah:
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. There is only
a single whole extant H m on each of these four books: *Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael on Exodus (MY), *Sifra on Leviticus,
*Sifrei on Numbers (SN), and *Sifrei on Deuteronomy (SD).
Three other midrashim have been partially reconstructed from
Genizah fragments, and from citations by rishonim (medieval
authorities): *Mekhilta de-Rabbi Simeon ben Yoh ai on Exodus
(MS), *Sifrei Zuta on Numbers (SZN), and *Mekhilta on Deuteronomy (MD). Passages from an additional tannaitic midrash
on the book of Deuteronomy, known as *Sifrei Zuta on Deuteronomy (SZD), were recently discovered.
In his fundamental study of H m, Hoffmann drew a clear
and persuasive distinction between the midrashic schools of
R. *Akiva and R. *Ishmael, that differ from one other in their
homiletical methods, midrashic terminology, the names of the
major sages mentioned in them, and in the body of the exegeses. Hoffmann similarly demonstrated that the midrashim
Division of Midreshei Halakhah According to Types
Type A
(de-vei R. Ishmael)
Type B
(de-vei R. Akiva)
Exodus
Leviticus
Numbers
Deuteronomy
(fragments?)
Sifrei on Numbers
Deuteronomy = Midrash
Tannaim
Mekhilta of R. Simeon
ben Yoh ai
Sifra
Sifrei Zuta
Sifrei Deuteronomy
The Midrashim that were known in the middle of the 19th century are marked
with a .
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midreshei halakhah
midrashei ha-halakhah, is somewhat misleading, since these
midrashim also contain aggadic material, a fact that is especially striking in MY and in SD, half of whose exegeses are of
an aggadic nature. Nonetheless, the name midrashei ha-halakhah is defensible, since almost all the legal material mentioned in the Torah is included in H m, while only scant nonhalakhic material, such as narratives, genealogical lists, ethical
exhortations, and the like, are the subject of orderly midrashic
exegesis in H m. Criteria have not been formulated that would
explain why certain aggadic passages were included in H m,
while others are not subject to such exegetical treatment. The
clear linkage of the tannaitic midrashim to the halakhic material, specifically, can be learned from the fact that three out
of the eight extant H m (MY, SN, and SZN) start with the first
halakhic topic appearing in the appropriate biblical book, and
not with the beginning of the book itself. This also explains
the absence of any tannaitic midrash on the Book of Genesis, that is mostly concerned with nonlegal topics. It is worth
noting in this context that a majority of the aggadic material
incorporated in the H m seems to reflect an independent common source, and may not originally have derived from the two
schools of halakhic exegesis. This strongly suggests that the
midrashic material that was redacted by the sages from each of
the two schools primarily contained passages that were fundamentally halakhic (see 3. The Aggadic Material below).
(C) LITERARY NATURE AND RELATION TO EARLY MIDRASH.
H m literature draws a sharp distinction between the biblical
text, on the one hand, and its interpretation by the rabbis, on
the other. Every passage opens with a lemma consisting of the
quotation of one or more words from the biblical verse, followed by a presentation of the exegetic interpretation of the
words quoted. The quote and its interpretation comprise an
independent literary unit known as a midrash. Generally, the
order of the interpreted biblical passages precisely follows the
order of the verses in the Bible, and only on rare occasions do
the midrashim diverge from the biblical order.
The midrashim are written in Mishnahic Hebrew, and
are formulated concisely, in a reserved and focused style. These
works occasionally contain fairly simple and straightforward
interpretations of the language of the Bible, that are formulated in accordance with the vocabulary and terminology
of rabbinic language and paraphrases of the language of
Scripture. Generally speaking, however, the midrashim go
far beyond the simple interpretation of the biblical passage
to derive laws and ideas from Scripture, or find support in it
for them, employing exegetical methodology. Additionally,
at times the midrashim tend to append to the narrow interpretation of the verse expanded and extensive discussion of
halakhic matters and aggadic topics that only indirectly bear
on the verse.
Most of the midrashic interpretations are unattributed,
but the name of the rabbinic author of the midrash is often
mentioned at its beginning or end. Frequently, a number of
anonymous midrashic interpretations are offered for a single
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midreshei halakhah
ing the close link between the halakhot and the verses in independent compositions; (5) the internal debate between the
different exegetical schools of the tannaim themselves also
intensified the need for the redaction of midrashim by each
of these schools. Another possibility is that external governmental prohibitions against Torah study, and the fear that this
would result in the Torah being forgotten, spurred the process of a new summation of the halakhot, whether redacted
by subject, as in the Mishnah, or in the order of the verses in
the Torah, as in the H m. The general explanations cited above
are applicable to a relatively long period; better knowledge of
the time of the redaction of the H m might possibly enable us
to gain a more correct understanding of the circumstances
surrounding their redaction.
(D) AUTHORITY OF THE BIBLE. The Pentateuch, including all its verses, is perceived in H m as the authoritative and
obligatory word of God. The belief in the divine source of the
Pentateuch, and in the reliability of its transmitted and accepted version, constituted the necessary pre-conditions for
the composition of H m, that in many instances are based on
close readings of the minutest details of the words and even
letters of the biblical text. The sages of H m openly do battle
with the argument that Moses forged the Torah, or that he
wrote certain verses of his own volition, while the tannaim
concurrently reject the Samaritan version of the Torah on the
grounds that it is a corruption of the original.
In no instance in H m or in other talmudic sources do we
find the rabbis arguing among themselves as to the version of
the Bible that is the subject of their exegesis, with one rabbi
upholding a certain version, and another authority championing a different wording. Despite, however, the absence of
overt disagreements between the rabbis concerning the versions of the Bible, H m contain indirect echoes of the awareness by the tannaim of more than a single version for some
Scriptural passages, both in a number of explicit testimonies,
and in several expositions that instruct: Do not read x but y,
when the second version does in fact exist in another textual
tradition (and this is therefore not to be viewed as mere wordplay); and possibly also in midrashim that incorporate two
alternative versions.
The (apparently intentional) absence of open disagreements on this issue is all the more striking given the clear indications of rabbinic cognizance of the existence of biblical textual variants brought above. This should come as no surprise,
because controversies regarding the text of the Bible were liable to have undercut the very basis of the tannaitic exegetes. It
should be emphasized, as regards the biblical text underlying
H m, that it is not absolutely identical with Masoretic Text, the
details of which were finally formulated only in the medieval
period. Here and there H m cite verses in a version that differs
from Masoretic Text and that, at times, accords with other versions, such as LXX, the Samaritan Torah, or the Peshitta. We
also find interpretations based on the non-Masoretic Text version, that prove that this was the commonly accepted text of
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midreshei halakhah
the Bible possessed by the tannaim-exegetes. An awareness of
this phenomenon is of importance, both for an examination of
the textual versions of the Bible, and for a proper understanding of the midrashic interpretations themselves.
(E) DEVELOPMENT OF EXEGETICAL METHODS. The first
testimony in the tannaitic sources relating to the methods by
which the Torah is expounded (middot) describes the principles employed by Hillel (Sifra, chap. 1, p. 9). These rules comprise, in practice, seven simple exegetical principles for the
clarification of a given verse aided by an examination of other
verses that contain (1) a law either more of less severe than that
in the verse under discussion (kal va-h omer [a minori ad majus]); (2) a law equivalent to that in this verse (gezerah shavah
[comparison of similar expressions]); (3) a law that is specified in another place, but may be utilized elsewhere (binyan
av [prototype]); (4) two verses that contradict one another
(shenei ketuvim); (5) a verse that includes a general formulation along with one or more individual cases (kelal u-ferat
[general and particular]); (6) a rare word or phenomenon
that is explicated by other instances in other places (ka-yoz e
bo be-makom ah er [similarly, in another place]); (7) a verse
that is understood by its context (davar lamad me-inyano).
A later list of 13 exegetical methods by which the Torah
is expounded appears in the beginning of Sifra, in the name
of R. Ishmael. In addition to their greater number, the methods of R. Ishmael are characterized by their extended explanation, their detail, and their distance from the relatively simple
and straightforward principles of Hillel. For example: Hillels
shenei ketuvim is given an interpretation: Two texts that refute one another, until a third text comes and decides between
them; davar lamad me-inyano, the method of understanding from context, was supplemented: ve-davar ha-lamed misofo [and something that is learned from a later reference in
the same passage]. Additional methods were specified, such
as Hillels binyan av, that R. Ishmael developed into binyan
av mi-katuv eh ad, u-binyan av mi-shenei ketuvim [a prototypical inference from a single verse, and a prototypical inference from two verses]. The method of kelal u-ferat was
the subject of especially extensive development, as it was divided into subsections, with an accompanying explanation of
their meanings: kelal u-ferat; perat u-khelal [particular and
general]; kelal u-ferat u-khelal [general, particular, and general] [the law] is discussed only in accordance with the subject of the particular case; [] everything that was in the general statement that is specified, that does so to teach [a law],
is not specified only to teach of itself [i.e., the specific case],
but rather to teach of all that is encompassed by the general
statement, and many more.
Furthermore, at times we witness a development of the
meaning of exegetical methods that were formulated in the
same fashion in the lists of Hillel and R. Ishmael. An outstanding example of this phenomenon is the method of gezerah shavah [analogy], whose primary meaning, as proposed by Lieberman, is a comparison between two identical matters. It was
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midreshei halakhah
no longer represents a biblical word of general content, and
the perat does not denote a word that details the generalization. The main reason for this apparently can be traced to
the ongoing attempt to find biblical proof texts for increasing
numbers of laws, even though these halakhot had not initially
been derived from Scripture, specifically. This tendency, of
finding support in biblical verses for many diverse halakhot
that had developed over the course of long periods of time,
therefore gave rise to the need for a parallel development of
the methods by which the Torah is expounded, and of the
other exegetical methods.
(2)The Schools of R. Ishmael and of R. Akiva
(A) DISTINCT EXEGETICAL METHODS. One of the important achievements of H m research consists of the delineation
of the methodological disagreement between R. Ishmael and
R. Akiva concerning hermeneutical methods, and in its wake,
the drawing of a distinction between the two chief types of
H m: the midrashim that belong to the school of R. Ishmael,
on the one hand, and those from the school of R. Akiva, on
the other.
Some of the methodological differences between these
two rabbis are already mentioned in tannaitic sources, and
their consistent disagreement on a number of topics is also
mentioned in amoraic sources. Only modern scholars, however, methodically collected the disagreements between these
two rabbis concerning hermeneutical methods that are dispersed throughout the talmudic literature. The reconstruction
of the differences between R. Ishmael and R. Akiva and their
schools was made on the basis of four types of testimonies:
(1) testimonies concerning dicta transmitted in the name of
R. Ishmael or R. Akiva; (2) testimonies regarding views attributed by the talmudic sources to the schools of the two tannaim, such as tanna de-vei Ishmael or tanni R. Simeon bar
Yoh ai of the school of R. Akiva; (3) disagreements implicit
from an analysis of the differences between H m belonging to
each school: (4) reconstructions of disagreements between
R. Ishmael and R. Akiva proposed by the Talmuds. These different types of testimony generally complement one another.
Based on a careful analysis and comparison of these various
testimonies, scholars have reached well-founded conclusions.
At times, however, the evidence concerning the disagreements
between R. Ishmael and R. Akiva that emerge from the different types of testimony are inconsistent, and we should be cautious regarding generalizations and harmonizations, some of
which were voiced by the talmudic sources themselves.
R. Ishmaels exegetic method is generally more moderate
than that of R. Akiva, and the expositions by the former are
less distant from the simple meaning of the biblical text than
the far-reaching exegeses of R. Akiva. R. Ishmael also relies
upon more middot, interpretive rules, and comparisons between different verses, in contrast with R. Akiva, who tends
to focus upon the individual verse and draw conclusions regarding its exegetical meanings from its specific words and letters. These two tannaim frequently employ different exegeti-
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parison of different verses, as is demonstrated by his use of
the 13 middot by which the Torah is explained, as described
above. In addition to these rules, additional principles also
were prevalent in the school of R. Ishmael, one of which relates to topics that are repeated in the Torah: This is a rule
for expounding the Torah: Every passage that was stated in
one place but lacks one element, and was taught again in another place, was repeated only for the element that was omitted. R. Akiva says, Every place in which le-emor [saying] is
stated must be expounded (SN piska 2, p. 4). This apparently
indicates that the school of R. Ishmael maintained that expositions are not to be founded on the duplication caused by the
repetition of the other similar verses in the two passages. The
problem with this is that on occasion the H m of R. Ishmael,
as well, employ such repetitions as the basis for exegeses, and
it may reasonably be assumed that there was no unanimity
within the school of R. Ishmael regarding this hermeneutical rule. At any rate, the incompleteness of our information
regarding the opinions of both R. Ishmael and R. Akiva on
this cardinal issue graphically illustrates the extent to which
our knowledge regarding the conceptions of the tannaim are
partial and imprecise.
Another hermeneutical rule of R. Ishmael relates to the
tension between the simple meaning of the biblical text and
what seemed logical and correct to the rabbis. R. Akiva resolves the contradiction by means of an extreme exegesis that
removes the verses from their literal meaning and interprets
them in accord with an opinion that seemed fitting to the tannaim. R. Ishmael, in contrast, candidly presents the inconsistency between the interpretation of the verse in accordance
with his regular hermeneutical rules, on the one hand, and
logic, on the other, and presents a compromise that allows
both to coexist (See SN, piska 8, p. 1415).
The tension between the simple meaning of Scripture and
the halakhah is the subject of a similar disagreement between
R. Ishmael and R. Akiva. The latter, as is his wont, explains the
Torah in a manner that conforms with the halakhah. R. Ishmael, in contrast, pointedly indicates the instances in which
there is a disparity between the two and says: In three places
the halakhah supersedes the biblical text (Midrash Tannaim
on Deut. 24:1, p. 154, and parallels). It nonetheless should be
stressed that in many instances R. Ishmael, as well, uses his
hermeneutical method to expound the Torah and harmonize
it with the halakhah.
Another area in which we find a significant difference
between R. Ishmael and R. Akiva relates to the bounds of the
applicability of the middot, which R. Ishmael limits, while
R. Akiva expands. A few examples: R. Ishmael permits the
use of the gezerah shavah rule only if one of the two words
on which it is based is free, i.e., it has not been used in other
expositions. R. Akiva, in contrast, maintains that this hermeneutical method may also be used for two words that
have already been put to other exegetical use. According to
R. Ishmael, everything that is not specified in the Torah, but
rather is learned by exegesis, cannot serve as the basis for an
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midreshei halakhah
Heschel that R. Ishmael was a rationalist who vigorously opposed esoteric expositions of the Torah and matters that cannot be attained by the intellect. More generally, the drawing of
unnecessary connections between simple and literal interpretation and religious rationalism should be avoided.
(B) THE DIVISION INTO SCHOOLS. The discovery of the
differing exegetical methods of R. Ishmael and of R. Akiva
led scholars to divide H m into two schools: that of R. Ishmael and that of R. Akiva. This classification was based on
the differences between the midrashim in the following areas: (1) The use of the exegetical middot that are prevalent
in the midrashim from the school of R. Ishmael: Both midrashic schools make frequent use of several of the straightforward hermeneutical methods, such as kal va-h omer and
gezerah shavah (although the emphasis that the word of the
gezerah shavah is free, as we could expect, appears only in
the school of R. Ishmael). Other methods, such as kelal u-ferat, perat u-kelal, and kelal u-ferat u-kelal, appear only in midrashim from the school of R. Ishmael. (2) The terminology
of the midrash: Some of the terms and introductory formulas that appear in H m are shared by all the midrashim, while
additional midrashic terms are specific to each of the two
schools. Some of these special terms are essentially related
to the differing hermeneutical methods of the two schools,
while others are merely alternative terms in which the redactors of each of the schools apparently were accustomed to
use. (3) The names of the central rabbis: The midrashim from
the school of R. Ishmael cite many dicta by R. Ishmael himself and by students from his school, headed by R. Joshia, R.
Jonatan, R. Nathan, and R. Isaac, who receive scant mention
in H m of R. Akiva and in the Mishnah, that also belongs to
the sources of the school of R. Akiva. Conversely, H m of the
school of R. Akiva make particular mention of R. Akiva himself and his students, headed by R. Judah and R. Simeon. In
other instances, the midrashim are distinguished by the name
each gives to the same rabbi (The most outstanding example
of this practice is the use by H m of the school of R. Akiva of
the name R. Simeon, while the midrashim from the school
of R. Ishmael cite R. Simeon ben Yohai.). (4) Parallel expositions, appearing in a number of places in each school, whose
content is virtually identical, or whose exposition employs a
similar interpretive principle that is characteristic of each of
the two schools. (5) Anonymous dicta whose attribution to
the heads of the two schools is indicated by the parallels in
the talmudic literature (Although this criterion was considerably amplified by Hoffmann, and after him, by Epstein, we
should register a reservation, since H m also contain unattributed midrashim that the parallels ascribe to the rabbis of the
opposing school. Scholars have not compiled orderly lists of
this phenomenon, thus impeding an assessment of the relative weight of the unattributed dicta.). As was noted above, the
fundamental division by early scholars, based on these criteria,
between the schools of R. Akiva and R. Ishmael remains valid.
A comprehensive and more precise examination, however, of
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
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midreshei halakhah
Despite the high degree of similarity in the aggadic material in the midrashim of both schools, most scholars have
sought to apply to this material as well the accepted division
of midrashim into the schools of R. Ishmael and R. Akiva.
Although various signs supporting such a division appear at
times, clear-cut differences between the schools in hermeneutical methods, exegetical terms, and names of rabbis are usually
to be found only in the halakhic portions of the midrashim,
and are hardly discernible in the aggadic sections. Accordingly,
the common aggadic material of H m was quite probably not
produced in the schools of R. Ishmael or of R. Akiva, but it is
highly plausible that during the course of the appending of
this material to the various H m, the later redactors of the two
schools occasionally left their mark on this material, as well.
As regards the relation between the midrashim, concerning their shared aggadic material, the aggadic material
appended to MY and MD (from the school of R. Ishmael) is
notably lengthier than the parallel material that was added to
MS and SD (from the school of R. Akiva). Additionally, the
aggadic material incorporated in the former two midrashim,
from the school of R. Ishmael, is frequently superior in style
and content to the parallel material in H m from the school
of R. Akiva. On the other hand, the reader is struck by the
considered thought invested in the aggadic material by the
redactors of SD, and especially of MS, who sought to reformulate the deficient material that they apparently received.
The two H m on the Book of Numbers contain similar aggadic material, but there are no extant direct textual witnesses
from Genizah fragments of SZN, thus hindering the conducting of any reliable comparison between them. A preliminary
examination of the fragmentary aggadic citations from SZN in
Yalkut Shimoni and in Midrash ha-Gadol indicates a relatively
major distinction between them and the aggadot of SN, and
the characteristic features marking the relationship between
them differ from the common features exhibited by the dual
midrashim on Exodus and Deuteronomy. The aggadic material appended to SZN (from the school of R. Akiva) is often
more detailed than its parallels in SN (from the school of R.
Ishmael). These initial findings are therefore not surprising,
because SZN represents an independent midrashic branch of
the school of R. Akiva, and it is only natural that the aggadic
material appended to it possesses unique features, that do not
necessarily resemble the aggadic fragments added to MS and
SD, that represent the other branch of this school.
Finally, it should be noted that our characterization of
the aggadic material in H m relates solely to the large units of
entire Torah portions that are of an aggadic nature, and not
to aggadic expositions of a certain verse that are incorporated
within the halakhic sections, that are an integral part of the
classical midrashim from both schools.
from later tannaim than does the Mishnah. At the same time,
H m also preserve opinions from, or allusions to, halakhot that
differ from the prevalent rabbinic halakhot, as the latter were
transmitted in most of the talmudic sources. Some of these
opinions reflect the views of tannaim that, for whatever reason, have not come down to us in the other traditions, while
another portion is representative of early or rejected halakhot
that were observed in the Second Temple period.
The reasons for the preservation of these early halakhot
in H m are to be found mainly in the following elements: (1) the
highly developed dialectic deliberations in H m, including methodical discussions of several possible interpretations of the
Bible, including a reasoned acceptance of one interpretation
over another, with this alternative (rejected) interpretation
occasionally representing the early halakhah; (2) the diverse
sources used by the redactors of H m, some of which, such as
the Mishnah that was used by the school of R. Ishmael or that
used by the subschool of Sifrei Zuta, have not reached us in
an orderly form through other transmission channels; (3) the
incorporation of early interpretations and midrashim in H m,
at times as part of the attempt by the later redactors to adapt
them to the accepted halakhah of their time; (4) the inferior
standing of H m in comparison with the Mishnah, a fact that
paradoxically led to the more faithful preservation of their
original versions and traditions. On the other hand, the halakhic authority of the Mishnah and its orderly interpretation
by the amoraim and later authorities often resulted in the
emendation and adaptation of its versions and traditions, under the influence of the reigning halakhah in a later period.
The traditional commentators of H m generally sought to
obscure the remnants of non-normative halakhah in H m, in
order to adapt it to the more common and well-known halakhah brought in the Mishnah and the Talmuds. A. Geiger was
the first scholar to systematically reveal the early halakhah in
H m. L. Finkelstein devoted discussions in a number of studies
of this topic, in the attempt to prove that Sifra contains many
remnants of an early, Second Temple period, midrash on Leviticus, and that many early halakhot following Beit Shammai
are retained in SD, along with more ancient fragments from the
Second Temple period, and possibly even from the time of the
Prophets(!). While Geiger and Finkelstein have certainly made
significant contributions to the scholarly research in this field,
both by raising the proper questions and by providing many
fertile insights into these difficult issues, a not inconsiderable
portion of their brilliant and far-reaching conclusions are not
sufficiently based on a literal interpretation of the language of
the midrash, nor are they supported by the direct evidence of
the Dead Sea Scrolls that was published only recently.
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midreshei halakhah
the literal interpretation of the midrashim, and for an understanding of content of passages in which the exegesis alludes
to a subject that is explicated in the Targumim.
Each Targum must be examined separately in order to
answer the question of which came first, H m or the Aramaic
Targumim. Early material that influences the language of the
exegeses in H m is sometimes embedded in the Targum in MS.
Neofiti, the Fragmentary Targum, and Onkelos. On the other
hand, the Neofiti and the Fragmentary Targum occasionally
contain homiletical expansions that would clearly seem to
originate in H m. Although Pseudo-Jonathan is closely and
consistently linked to H m, it would appear that the author of
this Targum did not possess early midrashic material (as maintained by Geiger and other scholars), but rather made use of
several of the currently extant H m, in order to complete the
foundation of the Neofiti and the Fragmentary Targum, that,
as is known, were available to him. Proofs of this use of H m
by Pseudo-Jonathan can be brought from a number of corruptions in Pseudo-Jonathan that most likely were due to the
errors made by the redactor of the Targum during the course
of the rendition of H m. We would be hard-pressed to find a
strong connection to H m and the other ancient Bible translations, such as the Septuagint, the Peshitta, and the Vulgate, and
their primary contribution to the study of the midrashim lies
in the versions of the Bible that they present, that are equivalent here and there to the accepted Bible text of H m.
(D) TALMUDS. The amoraim drew upon collections of tannaitic H m on the Torah, as we learn from thousands of quotations from the latter in TB and TJ (see their listing, by their
order in the Pentateuch, in Melamed, HM in the Babylonian/
Palestian Talmud). Most of the citations in the Babylonian
Talmud are from the school of R. Akiva, but there are also a
large number of passages from the school of R. Ishmael, and
additional sources. About forty percent of the quotations in
the Talmud are of new material that does not appear in the
extant H m, some of which was unquestionably taken from
201
midreshei halakhah
other collections of the schools of R. Ishmael and R. Akiva
and additional nonextant sources. The remaining 60 percent
of the citations that are common to the Talmuds and H m apparently indicate that the amoraim possessed collections akin
to the extant H m. The parallels for this material are not completely congruent, with the dissimilarity between the H m and
TJ smaller than the difference between H m and TB Exceptional
in this respect are Sifra, which is frequently cited by TB in its
original language, and MS, with a not inconsiderable number
of its expositions cited by TB Some of the differences between
the otherwise similar parallels in H m and the Talmuds ensue
from differing traditions and transmissions of the same basic
or raw material, while in other instances various interpretive
glosses and additions, along with numerous abridgements and
adaptations, were attached to the baraitot in the Talmuds, notably in TB, but also in TJ We nonetheless may conclude with
certainty that the baraitot in H m generally reflect the teachings of the tannaim in a manner better and more faithful to
the original than their parallels in the Talmuds.
The amoraim often appended their explanations and
clarifications to the baraitot of H m; needless to say, these ancient interpretations are of incalculable value for a full understanding of the tannaitic dicta. The midrashim were not, however, always given a literal interpretation by the amoraim, and
several of the general perceptions in the Talmuds concerning
the methods of the schools of R. Ishmael, R. Akiva, and other
rabbis are inconsistent with the original views held by these
tannaim themselves. In addition to the various concrete interpretive and halakhic considerations, that frequently influenced the nonliteral interpretation of the midrashic baraitot in
the talmudic discussions, the amoraim also disagree with H m
regarding several general principles concerning hermeneutical methods. This is especially true concerning the common
tendency of redactors from both schools to base various halakhot on a single biblical expression, on the one hand, while, on
the other, they find support for a single halakhah in a number of verses. One of the central assumptions prevalent in the
Talmuds, in contrast, is that each biblical expression contains
the foundation for a single halakhic derivation, and that the
same halakhah is not to be derived from more than one biblical expression. The consistent application of this exegetical
assumption in both Talmuds (which the Talmuds also ascribed
to the tannaim themselves) led to the interpretation of many
tannaitic midrashim in the Talmud in a manner which is not
consistent with their literal or original sense. In addition to
the growing belief in the unique halakhic significance of each
and every biblical expression, the biblical exegesis of the amoraim themselves also represents a new direction in the development of midrashic methodology. Generally speaking, the
latter took another step forward in developing the exegetical
method of R. Akiva and his school, with increasing focus upon
the details of the verse, and by basing ever-growing numbers
of laws and their particulars on Scripture, while at the same
time further distancing them from the simple meaning of the
biblical text.
202
midreshei halakhah
provided by internal indicators, such as the phenomenon of
transferring literary units from one place to another, usually
unaccompanied by any attempt to adapt them to their new position, corresponding to the common strategy of the literary
redactors of the tannaitic and amoraic literature in the Land of
Israel. The redactors of the TB, in contrast, frequently sought
to have their displaced sugyot conform to their new position.
The division of the Pentateuch into portions following Land of
Israel practice is also noticeable in the redaction of H m.
All this also applies to the midrashim belonging to the
school of R. Ishmael, that some scholars thought were redacted in Babylonia, an opinion resting on the assumption
that most of the leading tannaim from this school, headed by
R. Josiah, R. Jonathan, R. Natan, and R. Isaac were Babylonians. A re-examination of the subject revealed that several
of these rabbis, such as R. Josiah, were not Babylonians at all,
and that some of them seemingly immigrated to the Land of
Israel. Especially impressive is the statement in MD by R. Jonathan who was (unjustifiably) considered in the past to be
a Babylonian tanna that is incorporated in a passage that
extols the importance of the obligation to reside in the Land
of Israel, and vehemently opposes leaving the Land, even for
the purpose of Torah study: I vow [noder] never to leave the
Land [of Israel] (MS Oxford Heb. c 18.5). All the above evidence therefore points in the direction of the Palestinian redaction of all H m.
At present we do not possess sufficient data for a more
precise determination of the location within the Land of Israel
of the batei midrash of R. Ishmael and R. Akiva, nor of settlements or regions in which the various H m were redacted. This
question is obviously related to the difficulties involved in the
identification of the last redactors of each of the midrashim, a
subject to which most scholars have devoted lengthy inquiries,
without reaching convincing or commonly accepted conclusions. It is to be hoped that new archaeological and future literary finds will aid in solving these knotty questions.
(7) History of Research and Future Challenges
The first steps in the systematic research of H m were taken in
the late eighteenth and early the nineteenth centuries by scholars of the Wissenschaft des Judentums: A. Geiger, L. Zunz, Z.
Frankel, J.H. Weiss, M. Friedmann, and others. They focused
on three main areas: (1) a historical description of the development of the talmudic and midrashic literature as a whole;
(2) the manner in which halakhah and midrash were learned
in antiquity and developed; and (3) a reinterpretation of the
various H m.
In the late 19t and early 20t centuries the study of H m
intensified, with works by I. Lewy, D. Hoffmann, S. Schechter,
H.S. Horovitz, and others, who focused on three other spheres:
(1) the schools of R. Ishmael and R. Akiva and the classification of H m by this criterion; (2) the publication of critical editions of the major H m based on mss.; (3) the reconstruction
of lost H m, based on *Yalkut Shimoni, *Midrash ha-Gadol,
*Genizah fragments, and other sources.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
203
midstream
1 (1989), 2171, 12091; vol. 5, (1992), 4960, 100144, 151*254*; S.D.
Fraade, From Tradition to Commentary: Torah and Its Interpretation
in the Midrash Sifre to Deuteronomy (1991), 123; idem, Interpreting Midrash 2: Midrash and Its Literary Contents, in: Prooftexts, 7
(1987), 28499; idem, Looking for Legal Midrash at Qumran, in:
M.E. Stone and E. G, Chazon, Biblical Perspective: Early Use and Interpretation of the Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Studies on
the Texts of the Desert of Judah, 28 (1998), 5979; I. Gafni, The Jews of
Babylonia in the Talmudic Era (Heb.; 1990), 8186; A. Geiger, Kevuz at Maamarim (Heb.; 1885); idem, Urschrift und Ubersetzungen der
Bibel (19282); A. Goldberg, The Early and the Late Midrash, in: Tarbiz, 50 (1981), 94106 (Heb.); idem, Chanokh Albek: Introduction to
the Talmuds, in; Kiryath Sepher, 47 (1972), 919 (Heb.); idem, The
Wordings of Davar Aher in the Midrashei ha-Halakhah, in: Gilat, et
al., Studies in Rabbinic Literature, 99107 (Heb.); idem, The School of
Rabbi Akiva and the School of Rabbi Ishmael in Sifre Deuteronomy,
Pericopes 154, in: Teuda, 3 (1983), 916 (Heb.); D Weiss Halivni,
Midrash, Mishnah and Gemara (1986), 165; D. Henshke, On the
Relationship between Targum Pseudo-Jonathan and the Halakhic
Midrashim, in: Tarbiz, 68 (1999), 187210 (Heb.); idem, The Rabbis Approach to Biblical Contradictions, in: Sidra, 10 (1994), 3955
(Heb.); A.J. Heschel, Theology of Ancient Judaism (Heb.), vols. 12
(19621965); D. Hoffmann, Zur Einleitung in die Halachischen Midraschim, in: Jahresbericht des Rabbiner-Seminars (1888), 192; M.
Kahana, The Biblical Text as Reflected in MS Vatican 32 of the Sifre,
in: Talmudic Studies (Heb.), 1, (1990), 110; idem, The Development
of the Hermeneutical Principle of Kelal u-Ferat in the Tannaitic Period, in: Studies in Talmudic and Midrash Literature in Memory of
Tirza Lifshitz (Heb.; (2005), 173216; idem, The Genizah Fragments of
the Halakhic Midrashim (Heb.), 1 (2005); idem, Halakhic Midrash
Collections, The Literature of the Sages, vol. 3b (2006); idem, The
Importance of Dwelling in the Land of Israel according to the Deuteronomy Mekhilta, in: Tarbiz, 62 (1993), 50113 (Heb.); idem, Manuscripts of the Halakhic Midrashim: An Annotated Catalogue (Heb.;
1995); idem, The Two Mekhiltot on the Amalek Portion (Heb.; 1999);
idem, Sifre Zuta on Deuteronomy (Heb.; 2002); idem, The Tannaitic
Midrashim, in: The Cambridge Genizah Collections: their Contents
and Significance (2002), 5973; S. Lieberman, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (1950); idem, Siphre Zutta: The Midrash of Lydda (Heb.; 1968);
E.Z. Melamed, Halachic Midrashim of the Tannaim in the Babylonian
Talmud (Heb.; 19882); idem, Halachic Midrashim of the Tannaim in the
Palestinian Talmud (Heb.; 2000); idem, An Introduction to Talmudic
Literature (Heb.; 1973), 165317; idem, The Relationship between the
Halakhic Midrashim and the Mishnah & Tosefta (Heb.; 1967); S. Naeh,
Did the Tannaim Interpret the Script of the Torah Differently from
the Authorized Reading?, in: Tarbiz, 61 (1992), 40148 (Heb.); E.S.
Rosenthal, Ha-Moreh, in: PAAJR, 31 (1963), 171 (Heb.); I.L. Seeligmann, The Beginnings of the Midrash in the Book of Chronicles,
in: Tarbiz, 49 (1980), 1432 (Heb.); M. Zucker, For the Resolution of
the Problem of the 32 Middot and Mishnat R. Eliezer, in: PAAJR, 23
(1954), 139 (Heb.); L. Zunz, Die gottesdientlichen Vortrge der Juden
historisch entwickelt (1892).
Holocaust Period
Before the outbreak of World War II, there were about 12,000
Jews in the town and they constituted 75 of the total population. During the first year of Nazi occupation, about 4,000
Jews from other places were forced to settle there. In December 1939, 2,300 Jews from Nasielsk, Pultusk, Rupi, and Serock were deported to Miedzyrzec Podlaski. In April 1940
204
[Arthur Cygielman]
mielziner, moses
over 1,000 Jews from Slovakia were deported there, followed
by 600 Jews from Cracow, Mlama, and Mielec. In June 1940
about 2,300 men were deported to six forced labor camps organized in the vicinity of the town. Almost all of them perished. On Aug. 2526, 1942, the first deportation to the *Treblinka death camp took place. Other deportations followed
on Oct. 69, 1942, and Oct. 27 of that year. Over 11,000 Jews
perished in these deportations, but hundreds succeeded in
fleeing into the surrounding forests. Some of them organized
small guerrilla units that operated in the vicinity.
In October 1942 the Germans issued a decree about the
establishment of a ghetto in Miedzyrzec Podlaski. Jews who
fled into the forests were encouraged to return and promised
that no more deportations would take place. The Germans
managed to concentrate over 4,000 Jews in the ghetto. In December 1942 about 500 of them were deported to the Trawniki
concentration camp, where all of them perished. On May 2,
1943, the ghetto was liquidated and all its inmates were deported to the Treblinka death camp and exterminated there.
Only about 200 Jews were left in a forced labor camp, but they
too were executed on July 18, 1943, when the town was declared judenrein. After the liberation of the town in July 1944,
129 Jewish survivors settled there, but after a short time they
left because of the inimical attitude of the local Polish population. Organizations of former residents of Miedzyrzec Podlaski are active in Israel, the United States, and Argentina.
[Stefan Krakowski]
Bibliography: Halpern, Pinkas, index; Cracow, Archiwum
PAN, 3795 (= CAHJP, H m 6739); B. Wasiutyski, Ludno ydowska w
Polsce w wiekach xix i xx (1930), 35; A. Eisenbach et al. (1963), index.
HOLOCAUST: J. Horn (ed.), Mezrich Zamlung: Isum (comps.), ydzi a
powstanie styczniowe, materiay i dokumenty 10 Yortsayt (1952). Add.
Bibliography: J. Horn, Mayn khoruve haym (1946).
MIELEC, town in Rzeszow province, S.E. Poland. The Jewish community of Mielec was first organized in the middle of
the 17t century. The *Council of Four Lands decided in 1757
that the Mielec community should pay an annual tax of 1,200
zlotys to the *Opatow kahal. In 1765 there were 585 Jewish
poll tax payers in Mielec and 326 in the surrounding villages;
among the former were 12 tailors, three hatters, three bakers,
two goldsmiths, five butchers, three shoh atim, four musicians
(klezmer), and three jesters (badh anim). In the 19t century
Mielec came under the influence of the H asidim of *Chortkov and *Ropczyce and descendents of the z addik of Ropczyce were rabbis there. The few wealthy Jews exported timber,
dealt in grain, livestock, feathers, and building materials, and
ran sawmills, but the majority engaged in petty trade, tailoring, shoemaking, smithery, and building. There were also
some Jewish farmers in the nearby villages. An elementary
school was established by the *Baron de Hirsch fund in 1900,
as well as a Beth Jacob school for girls. In 1907 the Zionist association, Benei Yehudah, was founded. During the elections
of 1907 and 1913 there were anti-Jewish riots in the town. In
1917 a Borochov circle was organized, as well as a Jewish liENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
brary and sports clubs. The Jewish population of the town remained relatively static, increasing from 2,766 (56 of the total
population) in 1880 to 2,819 (57) in 1900 and 3,280 (53) in
1910, then falling to 2,807 (50) in 1920. Zionist parties, *HeH alutz and *Agudat Israel, were active in Mielec between the
two world wars.
[Arthur Cygielman]
Holocaust Period
By September 1939 the population had reached 4,000. On
Sept. 13, 1939, the eve of Rosh Ha-Shanah, the Germans set
a synagogue aflame and pushed 20 persons into the burning
building. Those who tried to escape were shot. German soldiers sent some Jews into the slaughterhouse and set it aflame.
Then the soldiers entered the mikveh and murdered the Jews
present. On Sept. 15, 1939 (second day of Rosh Ha-Shanah), a
second synagogue was set aflame. Jews suffered from administrative and economic restrictions, from the local Germans
living at Czermin, and from forced labor at the camp near the
Berdechow airport.
Early in January 1942 the General Government decided
on the deportation of the Mielec Jews. Orders were given to
deport 2,000 persons, and on March 79, 1942, the order was
executed in greater dimensions. The sick and old were shot
on the spot; others were transferred to the Berdechow airport, where a Selektion was made. A group of youths was sent
to the labor camp at Pustkow; the remaining population was
sent to Parczew, Wlodawa, Hrubieszow, Miedzyrzec, Susiec,
and other towns in the Lublin district. The Jewish population
there eased the suffering of the Mielec refugees by providing
lodgings and public kitchens. Some months later, the Mielec
refugees and these Jewish communities were exterminated.
Mielec was among the first cities that the General Government made judenrein. Near the workshops of the Heinkel
airplane company, Mielec had a labor camp under the direct
auspices of the SS. At first the camp employed 250 forced laborers, 80 of whom were from Mielec and others from Wielopole Skrzynskie. The population at the camp increased with
the deportation of Mielec Jews in the winter of 1942. By the
summer the population reached 1,000, including Jews from
Tarnobrzeg and Huta Komarowska. The mortality rate at the
camp reached more than 15 per day, excluding the sick who
were shot. The camp was liquidated on Aug. 24, 1944. Some
of the prisoners were transferred to Wieliczka and the rest
to the camp at Flossenburg. Some 200 persons of the Mielec
community survived.
[Aharon Weiss]
MIELZINER, MOSES (18281903), rabbi, professor. Mielziner was born and educated in Germany, where he began
his rabbinic career. He headed a Jewish school in Copenha-
205
mieses, fabius
gen, Denmark, while earning his Ph.D. from the University
of Giessen (1859). Immigrating to the United States, Mielziner served as a congregational rabbi and educator in New
York City until 1879, when Isaac Mayer *Wise appointed him
professor of Talmud at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati.
Upon Wises death, Mielziner was chosen interim president
of the seminary, a position he held for three years, from 1900
until his death.
Mielziner was a charter member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), and his scholarly input on
relevant subjects had an important influence on early discussions of CCAR policy. He published several treatises on Jewish law including a volume on *halakhah and divorce and
marriage, as well as an overview of rabbinic civil and criminal
law but is best known for his classic work Introduction to the
Talmud, published originally in 1894 and reissued three times
since; the most recent edition, which appeared in 1968, contains an updated bibliography compiled by Alexander *Guttmann. Mielziners exposition of talmudic methodology featuring a skillful dissection of the Talmuds distinctive system
of technical terms and phrases adapted to its unique methods of investigation and demonstration has been an indispensable handbook for the serious student of the Talmud for
more than a century.
Bibliography: K.M. Olitzky, L.J. Sussman, M.H. Stern,
Reform Judaism in America: A Biographical Dictionary and Sourcebook (1993).
[Bezalel Gordon (2nd ed.)]
206
migrations
MIGDAL (Heb. ; Tower), moshavah in the Ginnosar
Valley, N.W. of Lake Kinneret, established in 1910 by Jews
from Moscow who hired laborers to work their land. In 1921
it became a camp for Third *Aliyah pioneers working on the
construction of the TiberiasRosh Pinnah road. These laborers founded *Gedud ha-Avodah, the Labor Battalion,
at Migdal. From 1924 Jews from England and America acquired parcels of land at Migdal and some of them went to
settle. Lord *Melchetts farm was among those established at
the time. After 1948 the moshavah was enlarged as new immigrants settled. In 1949 it received municipal council status.
Banana, date palm, and other fruit orchards, out-of-season
vegetable gardens, and dairy cattle constituted its principal
farming branches. It also had resort facilities. The population numbered 535 in 1970 and 1,390 in 2002, occupying an
area of 4.6 sq. mi. (12 sq. km.). The historical name of the site
is *Magdala.
Baalsephon in the demotic Cairo papyrus (31.169). It is present-day Tell al-Khayr near Pelusium.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
MIGDOL (Heb. ) .
(1) Canaanite city, mentioned in the list of cities conquered by Thutmosis III (no. 71) with Socoh (Ras al-Shuwayka) and Yaham (Khirbat Yamma). It is identified with Khirbat Majdal southeast of *H aderah. Sherds of the Late Bronze
Age were found on the site.
(2) Egyptian border fortress near Baal-Zephon (Ex. 14:2;
Num. 33:7), inhabited by Jews in Jeremiahs time (Jer. 44:1;
Ezek. 29:10). It is the Greek Magdolos and the Migdol of
MIGRATIONS. Jewish migrations have a history of thousands of years: the wanderings of the Patriarchs; the Exodus from Egypt; the Babylonian Exile; the existence of Jewish groups outside Erez Israel in the Second Temple period;
the dispersion of the Jewish people in the Roman and Near
Eastern empires after the destruction of the Second Temple;
the spread of the Jews to many countries of the Christian and
Islamic world; the attraction of Jews to places with favorable
conditions, and, on the other hand, departures from countries
as a consequence of persecutions and expulsions culminating in the scattering of the Jews of the Iberian Peninsula and
the settlement of some Jews (and Marranos) in the New World
since the early stages of the European colonization. In small
numbers, Jews made their way to the Holy Land throughout
the ages of the Diaspora. From the second third of the 19t
century, a noticeable stream of Jewish migration flowed from
Europe to the United States.
The modern period of intensive Jewish migration began in 1881. Since then, migrations have completely changed
the world map of the geographical distribution of the Jews.
In the demographic history of mankind, this period is generally characterized by the relative frequency of intercontinental migrations, especially from Europe; the Jews, however, exceeded by far other peoples of similar or superior size in the
relative volume of long-distance migration. The world Jewish
population at the beginning of the 1880s, which is estimated
to have been more than 7 million, is almost equaled by the
number of Jews who have taken part in international migrations since then (c. 6 million in intercontinental migrations).
Another feature characterizing Jewish migrations is the motivation behind them. Whereas individuals from other nations
migrated over great distances primarily for economic motives,
the great majority of Jews also tried to escape discrimination
and were in fact refugees, especially since the 1930s; on the
other hand, aliyah to Erez Israel was often based on idealistic
motives. Consequently, whereas a considerable portion of the
economically motivated migrants from other nations eventually returned to their countries of origin, remigration was
much rarer among Jews.
When a substantial number of Jewish migrants had
reached a country, further Jewish immigration was thereby
facilitated (except for instances of worsening of the political
or economic situation in the country or of the immigration
regulations). The established Jews tended to assist whether
individually or through organizations in the arrival and
establishment of their fellow Jews. The changes in environmental influences produced by migration have strongly contributed to profound alterations in the economic, social, and
demographic characteristics of the Jews in recent generations.
Moreover, migrations have removed, before it became too late,
large numbers of Jews from areas where they would otherwise
207
MIGDAL HAEMEK (Heb. ; Tower of the Valley), town with municipal council status in Lower Galilee,
4 mi. (7 km.) S.W. of Nazareth, founded in 1952 with the aim
of absorbing inhabitants of transitory immigrant camps in the
vicinity. Real progress started at the end of the 1950s, when
industrial enterprises opened there. The population increased
from 1,650 in 1955 to 8,200 in 1968 when 67 of the inhabitants were from Morocco and other North African countries,
19 from Romania, and 7.5 from Iraq, while 1 were veteran Israelis and the rest from different countries. Approximately half of the towns gainfully employed worked in local
factories, the largest of which were leather and cosmetic plants
and produce mainly for export. In 1969 it was said to have
the highest export-dollar income per capita in the country.
Its educational network comprised 2,700 pupils in 1968, and
maintained two comprehensive high schools. In 1988 Migdal
ha-Emek received city status and in 2002 its population was
24,500 a third new immigrants with an area of 2.8 sq. mi.
(7.3 sq. km.). The city expanded its industry to include a number of hi-tech firms but income remained well below the national average. The city overlooks a beautiful landscape, with
a wide view over the Jezreel Valley in the south, and is surrounded by extensive woodlands, among them the *Balfour
Forest.
Website: www.migdal-haemeq.muni.il.
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
migrations
have been faced with the danger of physical destruction. The
Nazi persecutions might have come much closer to their aim
of a genocidal final solution had it not been for the preceding
large-scale emigration from Europe. The period of intensive
Jewish migration since 1881 can be divided into three main
parts, with several subdivisions.
In most immigration countries, the statistics on Jewish arrivals were markedly higher during the second part of
the period (190114) than during its first part (18811900).
The outbreak of World War I put an abrupt stop to this vast
movement while it was still gathering momentum. The absolute and relative size of intercontinental migration, by countries of destination, is seen in Table 1: Intercontinental Migrations, 18811914.
In the U.S. (see Table 2: Jewish Immigration to the U.S.,
18991914), those registered as Hebrews accounted for nearly
11 of all migrants during 18991914 (the total share of the
Jews may have even been somewhat greater as it is not certain that every Jew was actually registered under Hebrews).
The number of Jews was second largest of all the immigrant
national groups that came to the U.S. during that period; if,
however, remigration is deducted and only net migration
is considered, the difference between the Jews and the top
group the Italians almost disappears. The Jews differed
from other immigrant groups in the U.S. by their low proportion of remigration seven remigrants per 100 immigrants
during 190814, as compared to an overall average of 31 per
hundred (among some national groups, remigration exceeded
half the volume of immigration). Because of the permanent
nature of their immigration, the Jews often brought their entire families with them and thus had higher proportions of
women and children than other immigrant groups (see Table
3: Immigrant Characteristics, U.S.).
The Jewish immigrants to the U.S. were also distinguished by the high proportion registered as industrial workers: 66 per 100 wage earners. In the U.S. immigration statistics of 18991914, Jews thus accounted for 31 of all industrial workers, and in some branches, especially clothing
manufacture, they were a clear majority. During 18991914,
the distribution by previous country of residence of the close
to 1,500,000 Jews who immigrated to the U.S. was as follows:
Russia, 71.7; Austria-Hungary, 16.2; Romania, 4.2; Great
Britain, 4.0; Canada, 1.2; Germany, 0.7; other countries,
18811914
This period is characterized by a large flow of Jewish migration from Eastern Europe overseas and by the virtual absence
of administrative restrictions on free entry into the main immigration recipient the United States of America. The total
volume of Jewish intercontinental migrations during 184080
has been estimated at little above 200,000, but for the years
18811914 at about 2,400,000. The overwhelming majority of
these Jewish migrants came from Eastern Europe: the czarist
empire, the eastern regions of Austria-Hungary (especially
Galicia), and Romania. They were escaping the hardships
inflicted by poverty, antisemitic discrimination, or political
oppression. Since East European Jewry experienced a strong
natural increase at the time, emigration also served as a regulator drawing away the Jewish population surplus for which
there were not enough opportunities for a livelihood in those
backward and inhospitable surroundings. About 85 of the
Jewish intercontinental migrants turned to the U.S. Conspicuous among the other destinations were (in descending order of
numbers) Canada, Argentina, Erez Israel, and South Africa.
The overseas movement of East European Jews started in
1881, after a series of pogroms in Russia. Its intensity increased
in the first half of the 1890s, subsequently ebbed somewhat,
but rose sharply after the great 1905 wave of pogroms in Russia, which came in the wake of the abortive revolution of that
year. From mid-1905 to mid-1906, a peak figure of 154,000
Jews arrived in the U.S., and the total volume of Jewish international migrations in the same year has been estimated at
200250,000. Similar figures were reached in the following
year and again directly before the outbreak of World War I.
Total
United States
Canada
Argentina
Other Latin American countries
South Africa
Erez Israel
Other
Yearly average of migrants, absolute numbers
(thousands)
Per 1,000 of Jewish population in whole world
208
18811914 Total
18811900
Percent
Absolute
Numbers
(thousands)
Percent
100.0
85.0
4.0
5.0
0.5
2.0
3.0
0.5
2,400
2,040
105
113
14
43
70
15
70.0
100.0
88.0
1.0
3.0
0.5
3.0
4.0
0.5
6.8
19011914
Absolute
Numbers
(thousands)
770
675
10
25
2
23
30
5
38.0
4.2
Percent
Absolute
Numbers
(thousands)
100.0
84.0
6.0
6.0
0.5
1.0
2.0
0.5
1,630
1,365
95
88
12
20
40
10
116.0
9.7
migrations
Table 2: Jewish Immigration to the United States, 18991914
1
2
Year2
Number1
Year2
Number1
1899
1900
1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
1906
37,415
60,764
58,098
57,688
76,203
106,236
129,910
153,748
1907
1908
1909
1910
1911
1912
1913
1914
149,182
103,387
57,551
84,260
91,223
80,595
101,330
138,051
The category Hebrew was rst introduced into ofcial migration statistics in
1899.
Fiscal year, i.e., the 12 months ending in June of the year indicated.
Table 3: Immigrant Characteristics, U.S. Differential Characteristics of Jewish and Total Immigrants to the United States,
18991914
Jewish
Immigrants
Females
Age distribution
013
1444
45 and over
Dependents
Occupational distribution of earners
Agriculture
Clothing manufacture
Other industry
Commerce and transport
Liberal professions
Unskilled labor
Total
Immigrants
Percent
44.0
31.7
24.4
69.8
5.8
43.3
12.4
82.4
5.2
26.3
2.6
39.6
26.0
9.2
1.3
21.3
28.1
} 17.8
4.7
1.5
47.9
2.0 (but among the Jews arriving in the U.S. from countries
outside Eastern Europe, particularly Great Britain and Canada, many were actually of East European origin).
Immigration to Erez Israel during the same period fell
immensely short of the mighty stream that turned to the U.S.
In the history of modern Erez Israel it is usual to distinguish
between the First Aliyah (18821903) and the Second Aliyah (190414). Altogether about 70,000 Jews migrated to the
country, but a considerable number of them left again, mainly
because of economic difficulties. Due to the overwhelming
attraction of the U.S. and of other economically promising
overseas countries, the arrivals in Erez Israel accounted for
only 3 of Jewish intercontinental migrants.
During 18811914 there was also considerable international migration of Jews within Europe generally from east
to west and, particularly, from Russia and Romania to Central and Western European countries. This movement has
been estimated to include 350,000 persons so that the total
of Jewish international migrants over that period amounted
to about 2,750,000. There were also large-scale streams of
Jewish migration within the extended empires of Europe of
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
209
migrations
Table 4: Jewish Intercontinental Migrations, 1915May 1948 (rough estimates)
Country of destination
Total
United States
Canada
Argentina
Other Latin American countries
South Africa
Erez Israel
Other
Yearly average of migrants
Absolute numbers (thousands)
Per 1,000 of Jewish population in whole world
Per 1,000 of Jewish population in main emigration
regions
1
2
1,600
650
60
115
140
25
485
125
19151931
19321939
1940May 1948
Percent
Absolute
Numbers
Percent
Absolute
Numbers
Percent
Absolute
Numbers
Percent
100
41
4
7
9
1
30
8
760
415
45
80
65
15
115
25
100
55
6
10
9
2
15
3
540
110
5
25
60
10
250
80
100
20
1
5
11
2
46
15
300
125
10
10
15
0
120
20
100
42
3
3
5
0
40
7
48.0
3.3
7.8
45.0
3.1
6.3
68.0
4.2
10.2
37.0
2.6
8.7
Includes migrants from Asian countries to Erez Israel; excludes internal migration between the European and Asian parts of the U.S.S.R. and remigration to region of
origin.
Up to 1931: Eastern Europe (inc. U.S.S.R.); 1932May 1948; total Europe (excl. U.S.S.R.).
POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS. After the political and economic dislocations in Europe in the wake of
World War I, which had also adversely affected many Jews, a
stabilization occurred there. In Palestine, on the other hand,
there were absorption difficulties and unemployment, leading
to relatively considerable emigration in the later part of the
1920s. In the second half of the 1920s a majority of the then
comparatively infrequent Jewish overseas migrants went to
countries other than either the U.S. or Palestine especially
to Latin America.
In the 1930s, the objective motivation for Jewish emigration from Central and Eastern Europe increased tragically,
but the would-be migrants encountered ever growing difficulties in gaining admission to other countries. The special
motivation for departure arose from the accession of Hitler to
power in Germany, the spread of authoritarian and more-orless overtly antisemitic regimes in other states of Europe, and
the great economic depression, which affected the livelihood
of many Jews and provided further incentive to antisemitic
agitation. However, with cruel irony, the very factors which
made Jews wish to leave rendered prospective immigration
countries unwilling to admit considerable numbers of Jews,
so as to avoid aggravating their own international and internal problems. The more desperate the need to escape became
for large numbers of Jews, the more tightly most prospective
immigration countries shut the gates of entrance.
Whereas prior to World War I Jewish long-distance migration was strongly determined by economic considerations,
from the 1930s until quite recently it has been predominantly a
movement of refugees trying to escape oppression and unable
to return to their former land for political, racial, or religious
reasons. As opportunity allowed, Jews escaped from Nazi horrors, from antisemitism and Communist regimes in Eastern
Europe and, especially after 1948, from the outbursts of intolerance and fanaticism in Arab lands. International efforts in
the Nazi period to mitigate the plight of the Jewish refugees
and find them new homes e.g., through appointment of a
special high commissioner for refugees by the League of Nations as early as in the autumn of 1933 and through the *Evian
Conference of 1938 led to few tangible results.
In the history of Jewish migration, the 1930s are characterized by the following traits: the prominence of emigrants
from Central Europe Germany and, toward the end of the
decade, Austria and Czechoslovakia (about 350,000 Jews are
estimated to have left Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia
before the outbreak of World War II); the continuation of departures from Eastern Europe (except for the U.S.S.R., where
exit was barred); and the growth in importance of Palestine
as a major destination for Jewish refugees (in addition to the
continuing idealistic motives for aliyah). During the period
193239, nearly one half of all intercontinental Jewish migrants
turned to Palestine (Fifth Aliyah). In the years 193436, Palestine attracted even a strong majority of the intercontinental Jewish migrants. Then the protracted Arab riots (193639)
led to a deterioration of the British authorities immigration
210
migrations
to the U.S. constituted a majority of both total Jewish intercontinental migration and of general immigration to the U.S.
The 1930s also witnessed a considerable amount of international migration of Jews within Europe, from the central and
eastern parts of the area (outside U.S.S.R.) to countries of
Western Europe.
As the German armies swept over most of continental
Europe, there were tragically few opportunities for the Jews
to leave Nazi dominated areas. The most notable exception
was in the east, where many Soviet Jews, together with Jews
from Poland and other neighboring countries, managed to
retreat before the invaders. Many joined the armed struggle
against the common enemy; a large proportion of the Jewish
civilians who were thus saved spent the remaining war years
in Soviet Siberia and Central Asia. Sweden gave refuge to the
Jews of occupied Denmark. On the whole, however, millions
of European Jews remained confined under Nazi sway, left to
their fate by an indifferent world engrossed in war. No more
than 45,000 Jews were allowed to reach Palestine during the
five years 194044. Among the illegal immigrants who were
turned back from the shores of Palestine by the British, hundreds of lives were lost in tragic events such as the explosion
on board the Patria in 1940 and the sinking of the Struma in
the Black Sea in 1942. On the other hand, among the seven
to eight million Jews caught in Nazi-dominated areas of Europe, the intensity of movement from one place to another
reached fantastic heights. Most of the Jews were driven from
their homes to be deported and crammed into ghettos, concentration camps, labor camps, and extermination camps or
transferred from one to another of those places of horror. Only
a small minority could join the partisans, go into hiding, escape into Soviet or neutral territory, etc. Except for those executed forthwith in their locality of residence, nearly all Jews
in Nazi-occupied Europe migrated before the eventual doom
overcame most of them.
After the war there was a reverse movement back to
previous places of residence, on a much smaller numerical
scale, due to the paucity of survivors. This return migration
took place within the areas previously occupied by the Nazis
and as a repatriation movement of Polish and other Eastern
European Jews from the Soviet Union. Jews also participated
in some of the new population transfers in Eastern Europe
from territories newly incorporated into the Soviet Union
(eastern Poland, Bessarabia, Carpatho-Ruthenia) to other territories, some of which had been vacated by former German
inhabitants (Silesia). The Jewish repatriates to places in Eastern Europe, however, found themselves haunted not only by
the memory of their families and fellow Jews who had been
maltreated and killed there, but also by fresh outbursts of antisemitism and active hostility toward the repatriates (e.g., the
pogrom in *Kielce, Poland, in 1946). Many therefore moved
to *Displaced Persons camps in Germany, Austria, and Italy,
which accommodated about a quarter of a million Jews at the
end of 1946. Most of them fervently wished to go to Erez Israel
and start a new life there. But the British authorities admitted
211
1915
1916
1917
1918
1919
1920
1921
1922
1923
1924
1925
1926
1927
1928
1929
1930
1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
JanMay 1948
1
2
3
United States2
26,497
15,108
17,342
3,672
3,055
14,292
119,036
53,524
49,719
49,989
10,292
10,267
11,483
11,639
12,479
11,526
5,692
2,755
2,372
4,134
4,837
6,252
11,352
19,736
43,450
36,945
23,737
10,608
4,705
..
Erez Israel3
1,806
8,223
8,294
8,685
8,175
13,892
34,386
13,855
3,034
2,178
5,249
4,944
4,075
12,553
37,337
45,267
66,472
29,595
10,629
14,675
31,195
10,643
4,592
4,206
10,063
15,552
15,259
18,760
22,098
17,165
Ofcial immigration statistics from Erez Israel are available as from 1919; in the
United States, the category Hebrew was included in ofcial migration statistics
only between 18991943.
In the United States, scal year, i.e., the 12 months ending in June of year
indicated.
Includes tourists settling.
migrations
little more than 70,000 Jews from 1945 to May 1948, turning
back many illegal immigrants (e.g., the passengers of the
Exodus in 1947) or interning them in Cyprus; the DP camps
were emptied only after the establishment of the State of Israel.
A smaller stream of DPs went to the U.S., where emergency
legislation granted admission above the usual quotas. The following international organizations and Jewish bodies played a
prominent part in the care, transportation, and resettlement
of the DPs: UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation
Administration), IRO (International Refugee Organization),
the American Jewish *Joint Distribution Committee, the *Jewish Agency for Palestine, HIAS (Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society), the *World Jewish Congress, etc.
There was a high proportion of young adults among
the migrants to Palestine throughout the Mandatory period
(1919May 1948) in keeping with the pioneering character of
many of the newcomers (h alutzim), part of whom had received agricultural training prior to leaving their countries of
origin. The proportion of young adults was particularly high
among the illegal immigrants. Although the adjustment of
Jewish overseas migrants to their new surroundings was universally necessary, a special situation existed in Palestine because of the emphasis of Zionist ideology on manual, and especially agricultural, work and the dynamic process of creating
a new nation consisting of all economic and social strata. On
the other hand, the age composition and occupational structure of the Jewish immigrants to the U.S. in the Nazi period
reflected the aging, as well as the considerable proportion
of liberal professions and commerce, characteristic of Central
European Jews at that time.
Throughout the period 191548 there was also a large
volume of Jewish migration within countries. The case of
the vast Soviet Union is of particular importance in discussing interregional migrations. After the abolition of the *Pale
of Settlement following the Revolution (1917), hundreds of
thousands of Jews moved into the central and southern parts
of the country. Subsequent transfers of Jews to Siberia not
only to *Birobidzhan with its ill-starred experiment of Jewish
territorial autonomy focusing on agriculture, but especially to
new industrial centers that were set up in Siberia became
increasingly important. In addition, in most countries of the
world, the urbanization of the Jews was accentuated by residential changes from smaller to larger localities, and especially to the biggest population centers of each country. In
most cases Jewish overseas migrants turned directly to the
main urban centers of their new country. Compared with
this predominant trend, the movement to Jewish agricultural
settlement in Palestine, Argentina, Crimea was of minor
numerical importance.
INTRODUCTION. The study of international migration concerning the State of Israel revolves around five main issues
212
migrations
state by the UN fled the area, leading to what has since become
the Palestinian refugee problem. According to Israeli sources,
the number of Arabs who left the territory under Israeli control was estimated at between 625,000 and 650,000. Higher estimates exist and reflect conflicting views of the same history,
namely competing evaluations of the size of the Arab population in the Jewish areas in 1948, and the permanent status as
residents of some of those who fled, or who were cut off from
their main sources of economic support there.
At the time of independence in 1948 the population of
Israel comprised 630,000 Jews. An estimated 156,000 Arabs
remained in Israel at the end of 1949. Between 1948 and the
end of 2003, Israels total net migration balance amounted
to 2,385,800 individuals (excluding the exodus of Palestinian refugees). This resulted from 2,990,800 new immigrants
and immigrant citizens and 605,000 emigrants, or a ratio of
about five immigrants per single emigrant. Of the total international migration net balance in 19482003, 2,153,200 were
Jewish, 158,000 were non-Jewish family members of the latter, 40,200 were Arabs (Muslims, Christians, and Druze),
and another 34,400 otherwise unaccounted for probably reflected reclassification of group identifications and other data
corrections.
In early 2005, Israels population totaled 6,864,000, excluding the Palestinian population of West Bank and Gaza
areas occupied and administered by Israel since the 1967 war,
and partly transferred to the Palestinian Authority following the 1993 Oslo agreements. Of the total Israeli population,
5,234,800 were Jewish and 290,300 were non-Jewish members
of Jewish households, making a total of 5,525,100. Of Israels
Total
May
19481964
May
19481951
19521954
19551957
19581960
19611964
Total
United States, Canada
Israel
Other
thereof: Europe
1,780
240
1,210
330
255
840
105
685
50
100
30
55
15
30
245
30
165
50
35
145
30
75
40
450
45
230
175
190
Percent
1
2
Total
United States, Canada
Israel
Other
100
14
68
18
100
12
82
6
100
30
55
15
100
12
68
20
100
21
52
27
100
10
51
39
106
8.6
82.5
233
19.9
92.8
33
81
6.6
72.8
48
3.8
47.8
112
8.6
144.9
Includes migrants from Asian countries to Erez Israel; excludes internal migration between the European and Asian parts of the U.S.S.R. and remigration to region of
origin.
May 19481951: total Europe (excluding U.S.S.R.), Asia (excluding Israel and U.S.S.R.), North Africa. 19521964: Eastern Europe (excluding U.S.S.R.), Asia (excluding
Israel and U.S.S.R.), North Africa.
213
migrations
Table 7: Jewish Population Estimates, by Major Regions, 19002005
Region
Total (thousands)
Total (%)
Palestine/Israela
East Europeb
West Europe
Other Asiab,d
North Africae
North Americaf
Latin America
Southern Africag, Oceaniah
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
1900
1939
1948
1970
2005
10,600
100.0
16,500
100.0
11,185
100.0
12,633
100.0
13,033
100.0
0.5
71.6
11.1
3.6
2.9
9.7
0.2
0.4
2.7
49.4
8.2
3.4
3.0
30.0
2.6
0.7
5.8
23.8
9.3
4.2
5.3
45.6
4.7
1.3
20.4
15.6
8.9
3.9
0.6
45.0
4.1
1.5
40.2
2.9c
8.8c
0.3
0.0
43.4
3.0
1.4
Table 8: Jewish International Migration, by Major Areas of Origin and Destination Absolute Numbers, Percent Distribution, Yearly Rates
per 1000 Jewish Population in Countries of Origin, 19692002
Areas of origin and destination
1969-1976
1977-1988
1989-1996
1997-2002
Total
Grand total
Yearly average
Percent
Grand total
From Eastern Europe
To Western countries
To Israel a
From Asia-Africa b
To Western countries
To Israela
From Israel to Western countries
From Western countries to Israel a
Regional subtotals
To Western countries
To Israela
Percent to Israel
Out of total Eastern Europe
Out of total Asia-Africa
451
56
589
49
1,240
155
535
89
2,815
83
100
39
8
32
14
5
9
20
27
100
41
29
12
14
7
8
24
20
100
64
23
41
19
1
18
11
5
100
62
25
36
10
1
9
17
12
100
55
22
33
16
3
13
16
13
33
67
60
40
35
65
43
57
41
59
80
64
71
53
64
95
59
90
60
81
4
10
2
8
44
14
30
4
2
4
12
8
3
73
32
40
3
1
12
110
38
72
146
42
94
4
1
7
97
40
57
134
13
121
3
1
6
51
20
31
97
27
70
4
1
Grand total
From Eastern Europe
To Western countries
To Israela
From Asia-Africa b
To Western countries
To Israel
From Israel to Western countries c
From Western countries to Israel a
Source: Adapted from DellaPergola, The Global Context of Migration to Israel (1998), 58. Based on data from Israel Central Bureau of Statistics; HIAS; and various other sources.
a Since 1970 includes immigrant citizens (from West).
b Since 1990, Asian regions of FSU included in Asia-Africa.
c All emigration from Israel included here.
214
migrations
grants, along with the larger contingents that moved to Israel,
virtually put an end to the bi-millenarian Jewish presence in
North Africa, and substantially strengthened the Jewish communities in Europe.
Of all Jewish international migrants, Palestine and
since 1948 Israel was the country of destination of 3 in
18801918, 30 in 191948, 69 in 194868, 52 in 196988,
and 61 in 19892004. Between 1948 and 2003, Israel attracted
73 of the total Jewish emigration from North Africa and the
Middle East, and 65 of the total from Eastern Europe. Since
1969, the percent of Jewish migrants choosing Israel from each
main region reached 81 and 60, respectively (Table 8).
Table 9: Jewish Immigrants to Israel by Origin, May 19481967
Year
Number
MayDec. 1948
1949
1950
1951
1952
1953
1964
1955
1956
1957
1958
1959
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
101,828
239,576
170,249
175,249
24,369
11,326
18,370
37,478
56,234
71,224
27,082
23,895
24,510
47,638
61,328
64,364
54,716
30,736
15,730
14,327
87.3
53.7
50.9
29.2
29.6
28.4
13.9
8.6
13.8
57.6
55.3
66.3
70.5
52.9
22.6
31.8
58.3
53.6
57.7
38.2
Total
19671969
19701974
19751979
19801984
19851989
19901994
19951999
20002003
Total
-356,000
-74,900
-27,100
-81,800
-68,700
-45,300
29,400
-52,900
-34,700
215
migrations
der Check Post provides basic information on the number and
characteristics of new immigrants and of departing and returning residents. The data are processed by Israels Central Bureau
of Statistics. In addition, periodic census data provide information about population characteristics of immigrant stocks.
Immigration to Israel reflected the changing balance of
circumstances in the Jewish Diaspora as well as in Israeli society. Between the various determinants, by far the most dominant were push (negative) and hold (positive) factors in the
countries of origin of migrants. The intensity of pull (positive)
and repel (negative) factors operating in Israel, while not negligible, played a complementary role. However, we cannot ignore the fact that the choice of Israel as a destination country
reflected not only socio-economic processes that usually govern international migration, but also the powerful historical
and cultural grounds for migration decisions. Indeed, Israels
economic ranking improved from being a poor country in
1948 to 24t worldwide in 1975 and to 22nd in 2002, but other
countries in North America and Western Europe continued
to offer a better standard of living.
Immigration occurred in waves, each dominated by
a particular sub-set of countries of origin (see Figure 1 and
250
225
200
175
Thousands
150
125
100
75
50
25
0
1947 1952
1957
1962
1967
1972
Total immigration
1977
1982
1987
1992
1997
2002
Total emigration
216
migrations
Table 11: Jewish Immigrantsa to Israel, by Continent of Last Residence and Period of Immigration, 1948b2004
%
Period of Immigration
1948b2004
1948b1951
19521954
19551957
19581960
19611964
19651968
19691971
19721974
19751979
19801984
19851989
19901991
19921999
20002004
a
b
c
Annual Average
2,971.8c
686.7
54.1
164.9
75.5
228.0
81.3
116.5
142.8
124.8
83.6
70.2
375.6
580.7
181.5
52.5
189.2
18.0
55.0
25.2
57.0
20.3
38.8
47.6
25.0
16.7
14.0
187.8
72.6
36.3
Total
Asia
Africa
Europe
America-Oceania
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
14.3
35.8
24.6
5.3
17.6
8.6
18.5
17.0
4.4
9.5
8.3
9.3
0.4
7.4
12.2
16.5
14.2
51.8
63.0
18.5
50.9
31.2
10.4
4.8
4.8
18.8
11.0
6.6
3.4
8.9
61.3
49.3
18.1
29.5
59.2
34.0
38.9
43.3
72.0
62.1
42.6
51.9
91.0
83.9
65.9
7.9
0.7
5.5
2.2
4.8
6.5
11.4
29.1
18.8
23.6
30.3
27.5
2.0
5.1
13.0
Economic, Legal, or Illegal Migrants, Refugees. The mechanisms of mass immigration to Israel also underlie the often
irreversible nature of such migration. Emigration to Israel
217
migrations
often means loss of citizenship and civil rights in the country
of origin, making it impossible to return there. Most Israeli
immigration from North Africa, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe thus corresponds to ex post facto refugee movements.
Since the 1990s, with Israels rapidly growing economy,
and following the halt on Palestinian labor in connection with
the first and second Intifadas, there has been a significant increase in the influx of foreign labor. Many of these (non-Jewish) workers from Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Balkans tend to remain after their working permits have expired.
The numbers of actual i.e., legal and illegal foreign workers are not accurately documented. Estimates for 2004 ranged
around 190,000, but the governments policy of forced expulsion attempts to significantly reduce this number.
ISRAELI EMIGRATION. Definitions and Data. While immigration and the absorption of immigrants lie at the core
of societal and research focus in Israel, emigration remains
both a sensitive and comparatively little researched subject.
The very definition of an emigrant is beset with difficulties.
In the past, data were collected on the reasons for leaving the
country, including emigration. However, the information
proved highly unreliable and data collection was discontinued in the early 1960s. Given the lack of precise data on numbers of emigrants, indirect estimates can be obtained on the
basis of different operational criteria. Long-term absentees,
i.e., people leaving and not returning for a period of several
years, provided the customary basis for emigration estimates.
Another measure compares the known number of new immigrants and returning residents with the annual international
migration balance which also reflects permanent residents
who traveled abroad and did not return within a period of 12
months. The latter is a measure of actual absence rather than
of permanent emigration.
Major Trends and Differentials. The absolute number of annual emigrants including return migration increased over
time, but reflecting more rapid population growth emigration rates per 1,000 resident population consistently declined
from the late Ottoman period, the British Mandate, and after
Israels independence. Over the period 19492004, based on
any of the mentioned measures, the annual number of emigrants never fell below 5,000 or exceeded 28,000. The number of emigrants from Israel regularly fell short of the number of new immigrants, with the exception of 1953, 1981, 1985,
1986, and 1988 in which the Israeli economy was especially
under stress.
Between 1948 and the end of 2003 over 700,000 Israeli
residents left the country and did not return. This figure includes over 100,000 Israeli residents who had been abroad for
less than a year in 2003 and, based on the experience of previous years, could be expected to return in the short term. The
total number of Israeli residents settled or planning to settle
abroad for a period of four years or more at the end of 2003
could thus be estimated at about 600,000, but the number of
218
mihaileni
levels of development. Rates of emigration per 1,000 population closely match the levels of immigration to Israel per 1,000
Jews in countries with a level of development similar to that
of Israel. Emigration from Israel differs markedly from largescale Jewish migrations driven by the objective of permanent
resettlement in new countries. The tendency towards further
return migration to Israel is quite high.
At the same time, further attention should be paid to the
longer-term picture of Israeli emigration. While Israeli immigration was long influenced by a commitment to building a
new society by enhancing Jewish cultural, religious, and national values, emigration indicates a diminishing salience of
these factors. Partial evidence indicates that the probability of
emigrating is likely to be higher among those whose feelings
of Jewishness and Israeli identity are weaker.
A little studied aspect of Israeli emigration concerns the
economic impact of emigrants on the Israeli economy. It is not
possible to provide a direct evaluation of the amounts of capital transferred by emigrants. However, total individual remittances (excluding personal payments from Germany) can be
compiled from data on the balance of payments. Clearly, such
transfers do not concern Israeli emigrants only, but rather the
whole Jewish Diaspora which while viewed by the Law of
Return as a virtual target for future immigration comprises a
vastly large population. During the late 1990s and early 2000s
the yearly amount transferred fluctuated around $ 1 billion
and represented roughly 1 percent of the total Gross National
Product (see Table 12: Net Personal Remittances, and Percent
of GNP, 19952004).
MIHAILENI (Rom. Mihtileni), town in Moldavia, N.E. Romania. When the town was founded in 1792 only Jews from
the other side of the border were permitted to settle in the locality. The prayer house of the Jews and their ritual bathhouse
were exempted from taxes, and during the first year Jewish
merchants did not have to pay taxes. In 1834 the town became
the property of the prince of Moldavia, Michael Sturdza. Eager to develop the town, he granted Jewish craftsmen special
privileges, exempting them from taxes for five years. He also
encouraged merchants to settle there by granting loans. From
a population of 516 in 1820 the number of Jews reached 2,472
(67.6 of the total population), in 1859. In 1903 there were 248
Jewish and 58 Christian merchants in the town. The majority of the Jews were engaged in commerce, especially the fur
trade. Jewish carriers plied their trade throughout the whole
area; they had their own prayer house. An organized community dates from 1897. A Jewish primary school was founded
in 1899. After World War I, with the Romanian annexation
of Bessarabia and Bukovina, Mihaileni lost its position as a
frontier town. In 1930 only 1,490 Jews (32) remained in the
town. In the same year, the Jewish Party obtained the majority
of votes in the local council elections. The peasants preferred
it to the other parties, asserting that the Jews were more capable administrators. The election, however, was canceled by
the authorities. On the eve of World War II there were nine
prayer houses, a ritual bath, a primary school, and a cemetery
in Mihaileni. The Hebrew author of the Haskalah period Mar-
219
Personal remittances
(net) $ millionsa
GNPb
$ millions
Personal remittances
(net) as % of GNP
1995
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
1,039
826
960
949
1,227
1,179
1,093
95,790
111,011
109,263
122,475
118,851
109,195
121,091
1.08
0.74
0.88
0.77
1.03
1.08
0.90
mihaly, eugene
cus *Strelisker lived and died in Mihaileni. The Yiddish poet
Jacob *Groper (18901966) was born there.
In World War II the Jews of Mihaileni were deported to
*Transnistria. Few returned to Mihaileni after the war; the
majority emigrated. The Jewish population numbered 680 in
1947, 400 in 1950, and about ten families in 1969.
Bibliography: PK Romaniya 1801; E. Schwarzfeld, Impopularea, rempopularea i ntemeierea trgurilor i trguoarelorm
Noldova (1914), 2633, 43, 8283, 1013; M. Schwarzfeld, in: Analele
Societa istorice Juliu Barasch, 2 (1888), 2829, 117; Fraternitatea, 4
(1882), 345.
[Theodor Lavi]
MIHALY, EUGENE (19182002), rabbi, professor, and college administrator. Mihaly was born in Hungary and immigrated to the United States in 1930. He received his B.A. from
*Yeshiva University in 1940 and dual ordination from Rabbi
Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (Orthodox, 1941) and
*Hebrew Union College (Reform, 1949), where he also earned
a Ph.D. in 1952. Invited to join the HUC faculty, Mihaly became
professor of rabbinic literature and homiletics and Deutsch
Professor of Jewish Jurisprudence and Social Justice (emeritus in 1989). He added high-level administration to his lecturing duties when he was named executive dean for academic
affairs of all four HUC-JIR schools in 1976, becoming academic
vice president in 1985. After his retirement in 1990, he continued to contribute to the Encyclopedia Britannica and the
Encyclopedia Judaica.
Mihaly, a radical reformer in the mold of classical Reform, wrote responsa sanctioning such controversial practices
as rabbinic officiation at mixed marriages and holding weddings on the Sabbath. In response to the Reform movements
perceived drift toward Orthodox and Conservative stances
on such issues as the importance of Zionism and Israel, the
vital role of Hebrew and the embracing of ritual and tradition,
Mihaly wrote the articles Reform Judaism and Halacha and
Halakhah Is Absolute and Pass, which articulated the need
for Reform Judaism to return to its original rejection of Jewish law. In 1974, he was unanimously elected president of the
newly formed (and ultimately short-lived) Association for a
Progressive Reform Judaism, established by a group of approximately 100 Reform rabbis who shared concerns about
what they claimed to be the subordination of the freedom of
individual rabbis to positions adopted by the *Central Conference of American Rabbis, the alienation of the institutions of
Reform Judaism from Reform laity, and undue emphasis on
the ethnic and national aspects of Judaism at the expense of
pure religion. In addition to numerous articles, responsa, and
monographs, Mihaly wrote the books Religious Experience in
Judaism (1957) and A Song to Creation (1975).
MIILYA, Christian-Arab village in northern Israel, in western Upper Galilee, west of *Maalot. Miilya constitutes an
important center in Israel for the Greek-Catholic faith, to
MIKES, GEORGE (19121987), Hungarian-born humorist. After working for the BBC during World War II, he wrote
many lighthearted books on politics, social customs, and national foibles. These works include How to Be an Alien: England (1946), Ueber Alles: Germany (1953), and How to Scrape
Skies: United States (1948). Mikes also poked fun at Japan (The
Land of the Rising Yen, 1970), the UN (How to Unite Nations,
1963), and Britain again (How To Be Inimitable, 1966; How To
Be a Brit, 1984; How To Be Decadent, 1986). Though converted
as a boy, Mikes retained a keen interest in Jewish affairs, writing two incisive books on Israel, Milk and Honey (1950) and
The Prophet Motive: Israel Today and Tomorrow (1969).
220
mikhalevich, beinish
MIKHAL, EPHRAM (18661890), French author. Georges
Michel (his real name) was born in Toulouse of an Alsatian
father and a Provenal mother. There were strong links and
intermarriage with families from Montpellier and Nmes, for
example with the Bernards from Nmes, whose eldest son
Lazare was and remained Georges Michels dearest brother
in every sense, personal and intellectual. When both became
budding writers in Paris, they changed their neutral-sounding French names for Jewish-sounding pen names a gesture of Jewish self-assertion. Around 1884 Georges Michel
became Ephram Mikhal and Lazare Bernard became Bernard *Lazare. E. Mikhals other Jewish brother was Camille Bloch, from an Alsatian rabbinical family, who became
a leading historian.
E. Mikhal moved to Paris as a schoolboy with his family.
He began his literary career at age 17, while a pupil at the prestigious lyce Fontanes, where, in a spirit of fraternal poetic
exaltation, small literary groups sprang up, fed by intellectual
pursuits and love of beauty.
E. Mikhals student years (188488) were spent at the
Sorbonne and exclusive cole des Chartes, specializing in
Latin and medieval studies, graduating as archivist-paleographer, which won him an appointment at the Bibliothque
Nationale, a post he held until his untimely death.
Mikhal was a fine scholar, ever broadening his knowledge in the realms of Greek and Oriental studies, philosophy, and comparative religion. His vast fund of knowledge
served both his theoretical speculations and his poetic inspiration and the thematic background for his literary creation.
He was a prolific and intensive writer in the six years of his
student and professional careers and regarded as the most
gifted of his generation by Victor Hugo and Mallarm among
others.
Although he is remembered primarily as a poet and
quoted in the leading anthologies, he also excelled in poetic prose (tales, prose poems, parables), composed fine dramatic works (see La Fiance de Corinthe, 1988), and important theoretical essays. Except for one small volume of poems,
LAutomne (1886), he published primarily in literary journals,
particularly La Pliade, launched by his own little group and
destined to become the famed and long-lived Mercure de
France. The bulk of his writings appeared in a fine volume of
verse and prose, published shortly after his death.
Though he remained famous for his melancholy poems
(Crpuscule pluvieux, Tristesse de septembre, et al.), he
had a dual personality: on the one hand he had a sad, pessimistic bent and on the other an innate love of life, whimsical
and ironic, as in his satirical poems and some tales. He progressed from an idle reverie on the theme of the fatal burden of
solitude and self-concern (exemplified in La dame en deuil
and La captive among others) towards an active meditation,
no longer severed from real life and commitment. In his last
major critical text, he stakes a claim for a new art, which
rejects both the formal luxuriousness of the Parnasse school
of poetry in favor of renewed freer expression and the flatly
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
221
mikhmoret
ber Bund and edited its organ Der Kemfer. In the following
years between repeated arrests, exile, and flight he was an
organizer, speaker, publicist, and propagandist of the Bund.
In the internal struggles he belonged to the soft group that
supported the Bunds return to the Russian Social Democratic
party (1906), and during the period of reaction, after the shortlived constitutional aftermath of the revolution, he belonged
to the anti-liquidators, who demanded to continue illegal
activities. Mikhalevich was the first to discuss the problem
of the relationship between the Bund and the Jewish kehillah
(the organized Jewish community) (1907). In 1912 he became
a member of the central committee of the Bund and edited
its weekly Tsayt in St. Petersburg. During World War I he was
active in welfare and educational institutions in Vilna until his
imprisonment by the German occupation forces for a leaflet
he wrote against forced labor.
The leftward turn of the Bund in independent Poland
decreased Mikhalevichs political standing and he devoted
himself mainly to writing and to social and cultural work. He
wrote in the Bund organ Folkstsaytung, and gave a historicalbiographical description of the Jewish workers movement in
three volumes: Zikhroynes fun a Yidishn Sotsialist (192123).
He took part in the founding of the Central Yiddish School
Organization (CYSHO) and until his death served as its chairman, visiting the U.S. in 192324 as its emissary and promoting
the establishment of the Society for Helping Childrens Institutions Overseas. He was also a member of the Jewish community council in Warsaw (192528). One of the outstanding
polemicists against Zionism, Mikhalevich was popular even
among his opponents because of his honesty and attachment
to Jewish values.
Bibliography: LNYL, 5 (1963), 60812; I. Cohen, Wars
Tribulations and Aftermath (1943), 361; idem, in: Beinush Mikhalevich Gedenk Bukh (1951), incl. bibl.; A. Litvak, Mah she-Hayah (1945),
23745; A.S. Stein, H aver Artur (1953), index; J.S. Hertz et al. (eds.),
Geshikhte fun Bund, 3 vols. (196066), indexes.
[Moshe Mishkinsky]
MIKHOELS, SOLOMON (stage and public name of Solomon Vovsi; 18901948), Yiddish actor; head of the Moscow
State Jewish Theater; chairman of the Jewish *Anti-Fascist
Committee. Born in Dvinsk (today Daugavpils, Latvia), Mik-
222
hoels studied law at St. Petersburg. In 1918 he joined Alexander *Granovskys Jewish drama studio, the next year following Granovsky to Moscow, where the group became the State
Jewish Theater (GOSET). He was Granovskys chief actor, and
succeeded him to the directorship in 1928 when he did not
returned from abroad. In 1931 he opened a studio affiliated
with the theater, which trained actors for all Jewish theaters in
the U.S.S.R. Mikhoels, whose distinction lay in his command
of both tragic and tragicomic roles, first attracted attention
in 1921 in a performance of *Shalom Aleichems Agents. He
was soon playing such famous Yiddish roles as Shimele Soroker in Two Hundred Thousand, Hotsmakh in Goldfadens
The Witch, Benjamin in The Travels of Benjamin the Third by
Mendele Mokher Seforim (S.Y. *Abramovitsh), and Shalom
Aleichems Tevye. One of his most notable performances was
King Lear in the production by Sergei Radlov in 1935. From
August 1941, Mikhoels, as chairman of the Jewish Anti-Fascist
Committee, launched fervent appeals to our Jewish brethren
in the West to help the Soviet war effort against Nazi Germany. In 1943 he and the poet Itzik *Fefer traveled on behalf
of the Anti-Fascist Committee to the U.S., Canada, Mexico,
and England, where they were enthusiastically received by the
Jewish public. At the end of World War II, when survivors of
the Holocaust and Jews returning from evacuation in Soviet
Asia tried to resettle in their old homes, Mikhoels gradually
became their spokesman and protector, interceding for them
with the Soviet authorities. He apparently was also connected
with the Crimean project which aimed at the settlement of
homeless Jews in the Crimea. On Jan. 13, 1948, while on an official mission in Minsk on behalf of the State Committee for
Theater Prizes, Mikhoels was brutally killed, ostensibly in an
alleged car accident, but in reality executed by the Soviet secret police, on the order of Stalin. (Svetlana Alliluyeva, Stalins
daughter, testified (in her book Only One Year) that her father
was personally involved in covering up Mikhoels assassination and presenting it as an accident.) On January 16, Mikhoels was eulogized at his state funeral in Moscow in which
many thousands of Jews participated. Mikhoels assassination
was the first step in the process of the liquidation of all Jewish
cultural institutions and of most outstanding Yiddish writers,
artists, and actors which took place during the last years of
Stalins rule. In 1952, four years after his death, Mikhoels was
claimed as a Jewish nationalist, a Joint agent, and a contact
man with the U.S. intelligence in the Doctors Trials. During
the de-Stalinization in the mid-1950s Mikhoels was de facto
rehabilitated. In Tel Aviv a square was named in his honor in
1962, on the tenth anniversary of the execution of Jewish writers in the U.S.S.R.
Bibliography: B.Z. Goldberg, The Jewish Problem in the
Soviet Union (1961), index; K.L. Rudnitskiy (ed.), Mikhoels (Rus.,
1965); Sutskever, in: Di Goldene Keyt, no. 43 (1962); I. Ionasovich, Mit
Yidishe Shrayber in Rusland (1959), passim. Add. Bibliography:
N. Vovsi-Mikhoels, My Father Solomon Mikhoels (Russian, 1984); G.
Kostyrchenko, In the Captivity of the Red Pharaon (Russian, 1994).
[Binyamin Eliav and Joseph Leftwich]
mikulov
MIKULOV (Ger. Nikolsburg), town in S. Moravia, Czech
Republic. The Mikulov community was the largest and most
important in Moravia, and was the seat of the Landesrabbiner
(chief rabbi) from apparently as early as 1574 until 1851. A Jew
from Mikulov, a moneylender, is mentioned in a document
of 1369, but there is no mention of Jews in the oldest known
city record of 1414. An inscription in the synagogue (burned
down in 1719) was dated 1450. The community was probably
founded by expellees from Austria (1420), reinforced in 1454
by those from *Brno (Bruenn) and *Znojmo (Znaim). The
charter granted the Jews in 1591 guaranteed a self-elected communal administration (the revised charter of 1612 (renewed
in 1708) removed the Jews from the jurisdiction of the town
to that of the lord). In 1593 the Jews were permitted to trade
in textiles. On the conquest of the town by the Swedes (1642),
the Jews raised a quarter of the towns contribution. Refugees
from the *Chmielnicki massacres came to Mikulov in 1648. In
1653 the *h evra kaddisha was founded. In 1657 there were 145
families in the town. Their number was augmented in 1670 by
expellees from Vienna, who at first kept apart from the local
community, maintaining their own institutions and endeavoring to return to Vienna. A hospital for infectious diseases
was built in 1680. Jews who were captured on the conquest of
*Belgrade were ransomed in 1688 and settled in Mikulov. Almost the entire Jewish quarter, including the old synagogue
and all records, was destroyed in a fire in 1719. The concomitant plunder led to a conflict between the central authorities
and the local lord over military intervention. Under the leadership of Samson *Wertheimer, communities throughout Europe offered assistance to the Jews of Mikulov. The municipality bought up building sites to avoid the enlargement of the
Jewish quarter, whose boundaries were fixed by an imperial
commission in 1720.
The prosperity of the community depended on its connection with the cultivation of wines and the wine trade and
on the towns position on the main road between Brno and
Vienna. Many of the Jews were carters. The Jewish wine merchants leased vineyards, vats, and cellars or bought up the
grape crops, paying in advance of the harvest. Jews also distilled spirits and produced the special Moravian plum jam
(povidl). In the 17t century, the Jews undertook to supply the
whole town with candles, and in the 18t century the purveyors of gold and silver to the imperial mint lived in Mikulov.
The community takkanot from the 18t century are preserved
in the National Library in Jerusalem. The Jewish tailors, shoemakers, and butchers were organized into guilds, with their
own synagogues. However, most members of the community earned their livelihood in peddling, mainly in the villages of Austria.
Mikulov, the center of all activities of Moravian Jewry,
was especially prominent when Samson Raphael *Hirsch held
office as chief rabbi (184651). A German-language school,
connected with a textile workshop, was opened in 1839. Joel
Deutsch founded the Jewish institute for the deaf and dumb
in 1844 (transferred to Vienna in 1852). Mikulov became a
223
mikva, abner J.
17081; A. Scheiber, in: Yeda-Am, 5 (1958/59), 7173; M. Freudenthal,
in: MGWJ, 46 (1902), 26870; W. Mueller, Urkundliche Beitraege (1903),
passim; Baron, Community, 3 (1942), index; S. Simonsohn, HaYehudim beDukkasut Mantovah, 2 (1965), index, S.V. Nikolsburg; M.H.
Friedlaender, Kore haDorot (Ger., 1876); G. Deutsch, in: Die Deborah, 2 (1902), 35462; Y. Heilperin, Takkanot Kehillot Mehrin (1952),
index; A. Freimann, in: ZHB, 20 (1917), 36f.; M. Steinschneider, in:
HB, 5 (1862), 128. Add. Bibliography: J. Fiedler, Jewish Sights of
Bohemia and Moravia (1991), 11416.
[Meir Lamed / Yeshayahu Jelinek (2nd ed.)]
224
mikveh
MIKVEH (Heb. ; pl. mikvaot; Hebrew for a collection
or gathering [of water]), a pool or bath of clear water, immersion in which renders ritually clean a person who has become ritually unclean through contact with the dead (Num.
19) or any other defiling object, or through an unclean flux
from the body (Lev. 15) and especially a menstruant or postpartum woman (see *Ablution; *Niddah; *Purity and Impurity, *Ritual; *Taharat ha-Mishpah ah). It is similarly used for
vessels (Num. 31:2223). Today the chief use of the mikveh is
for women, prior to marriage, following niddut, and following the birth of a child, since the laws of ritual impurity no
longer apply after the destruction of the Temple. Mikveh immersion is also obligatory for proselytes, as part of the ceremony of conversion. In addition immersion in the mikveh is
still practiced by various groups as an aid to spirituality, particularly on the eve of the Sabbath and festivals, especially the
Day of Atonement (see *Ablution) and the custom still obtains,
in accordance with Numbers 31: 2223 to immerse new vessels and utensils purchased from non-Jews. At the beginning
of the 21st century, mikveh immersion also frequently constituted a symbolic expression of a new spiritual beginning for
both women and men, in all branches of Jewish practice. In
addition to conversion to Judaism, rituals have developed incorporating mikveh immersion as part of bar mitzvah and bat
mitzvah (coming of age); prior to marriage for men as well
as women; in cases of miscarriage, infertility, and illness; and
following divorce, sexual assault, or other life-altering events.
An indication of the probable long-term impact of this trend
is the increased construction of mikvaot by non-Orthodox
Jewish communities in North America.
It is emphasized that the purpose of immersion is not
physical, but spiritual, cleanliness. Maimonides concludes
his codification of the laws of the mikveh with the following statement: It is plain that the laws about immersion as a
means of freeing oneself from uncleanness are decrees laid
down by Scripture and not matters about which human understanding is capable of forming a judgment; for behold, they
are included among the divine statutes. Now uncleanness is
not mud or filth which water can remove, but is a matter of
scriptural decree and dependent on the intention of the heart.
Therefore the Sages have said, If a man immerses himself,
but without special intention, it is as though he has not immersed himself at all.
Nevertheless we may find some indication [for the moral
basis] of this: Just as one who sets his heart on becoming clean
becomes clean as soon as he has immersed himself, although
nothing new has befallen his body, so, too, one who sets his
heart on cleansing himself from the uncleannesses that beset mens souls namely, wrongful thoughts and false convictions becomes clean as soon as he consents in his heart
to shun those counsels and brings his soul into the waters of
pure reason. Behold, Scriptures say, And I will sprinkle clean
water upon you and ye shall be clean; from all your uncleannesses and from all your idols will I cleanse you [Ezek. 36: 25]
(Yad, Mikvaot 11:12).
225
The Water
All natural spring water, providing it is clean and has not been
discolored by any admixtures is valid for a mikveh. With re-
mikveh
gard to rainwater, which is ideal for a mikveh, and melted snow
and ice (even if manufactured from drawn water) which are
also valid, care must be taken to ensure that the water flows
freely and is not rendered invalid by the flow into it being
stopped, thus turning it into drawn water. In addition the water must not reach the mikveh through vessels made of metal
or other materials which are susceptible to ritual uncleanness.
This is avoided by attaching the pipes and other accessories
to the ground, by virtue of which they cease to have the status of vessels. Similarly the mikveh is emptied from above
by hand, by vacuum, or by electric or automatic pumps. The
emptying through a hole in the bottom is forbidden since the
plug may be regarded as a vessel as well as giving rise to the
possibility of a leakage.
There is, however, one regulation with regard to the
mikveh which considerably eases the problems of assuring a
supply of valid water. Once it possesses the minimum quantity
of 40 seah of valid water even though someone draws water
in a jug and throws it into the mikveh all day long, all the water is valid. In addition if there is an upper mikveh containing 40 seah of valid water, and someone puts drawn water in
the upper mikveh, thus increasing its volume, and 40 seah of
it flows into the lower pool, that lower pool is a valid mikveh
(Yad, Mikvaot 4:6). It is thus possible to exploit limitless quantities of valid water.
Various Forms of Mikveh
The above regulations determine the various kinds of mikveh
which are in use. In rare cases where there is a plentiful supply
of valid water, spring or rain- (or sea-) water which can constantly replenish the mikveh, the only desiderata which have
to be complied with are to ensure that the water does not become invalidated by the construction of the mikveh, rendering it a vessel or by going through metal pipes which are not
sunk in the ground, as detailed above.
Since, however, mikvaot are usually constructed in urban and other settlements where such supplies are not freely
available, the technological and halakhic solution of the valid
mikveh depends essentially upon constructing a mikveh with
valid water and replenishing it with invalid water, taking advantage of the fact that the addition of this water to an originally valid one does not invalidate it.
The following are among the systems used:
1. The basic mikveh consists of the minimum valid amount
of 40 seah of rainwater. To this rainwater, ordinary water may
subsequently be added through a trough which is absorbent,
dug in the ground, or one made of lean concrete at least three
handbreadths (c. 30 cm.) long, and one wide. Through this device the added water is regarded as coming from the ground
and not through a vessel. The resultant mixture of both types
of water passes into the mikveh through a hole in the dividing
wall. Since the added water is regarded as seeding the original
valid water, it is called the oz ar zeriah (store for seeding).
2. In a second system the added drawn water is not previously mixed with the rainwater, as in the previous case, but
flows directly onto the basic rainwater mikveh through an aperture in the wall of the mikveh, the diameter of which must be
the size of the spout of a water bottle (c. 2 in.; 56 cm., Mik.
6:7). This method is called oz ar hasnakah (the store produced
by contact). Both the above methods, though they answer the
halakhic needs, have their disadvantages in operation and in
maintenance, particularly through the exhaustion of the rainwater and the stagnation of the standing water. The other systems are aimed at overcoming these drawbacks.
3. The dut is a cistern or tank built into the ground
to store rainwater. When changing the water in the mikveh,
it is filled each time with at least 21 seah of rainwater from
the cistern and water is then added from the store for seeding by conduction. The water in the mikveh is brought into
contact with the contact store by the method mentioned
above. Though indeed this method overcomes the many
shortcomings and halakhic problems, it nevertheless requires
an extensive area for the cistern, and large areas of roof and
pipes for filling with considerable amounts of rainwater in
the winter.
4. Both a store for seeding and a contact store are
built on each side of the mikveh. Each store has an aperture
connecting its water with that of the mikveh.
5. A single store consisting of both seeding and contacting.
6. A store upon a store. A contact store is built on
two stories joined by an aperture with the diameter of the
spout of a bottle. The water of the mikveh is validated by
means of the hole in the party wall between the mikveh and
the upper store.
7. A contact store under the floor of the mikveh, connected by means of a hole the size of the spout of a water
bottle.
The mikvaot of Jerusalem as well as the oldest mikvaot in
other towns of Erez Israel are built in general by the method
of the contact store as well as by the store of seeding. In
the new settlements and elsewhere the mikvaot are built in the
main only by the method of the store of seeding (a system
approved by Rabbi A.I. Karelitz, the H azon Ish). Latterly
mikvaot have been built by the method of two stores.
In recent years vast improvements have been made in the
hygienic and other aspects of the mikveh. An early enactment,
attributed to Ezra, that a woman must wash her hair before
immersing herself (BK 82a) may be provided for by the now
universal custom of having baths as an adjunct to mikvaot,
the use of which is an essential preliminary to entering the
mikveh, and especially in the United States they are provided
with hairdressing salons and even beauty parlors.
The regulations for constructing the mikveh are complicated and its construction requires a considerable knowledge
of technology combined with strict adherence to the halakhah,
and it should be built only after consultation with, and under
the supervision of, accepted rabbinic authorities. Nevertheless in order to increase the use of this essential requirement
of traditional Judaism, a book has been published which con-
226
mikveh
sists almost entirely of instructions for making a valid Do it
yourself mikveh (see D. Miller in bibl.).
History and Archaeology
During the Second Temple period (roughly from 100 B.C.E. to
70 C.E.), the Jewish population in Palestine had a very distinctive practice of purification within water installations known
as mikvaot. Large numbers of stepped-and-plastered mikvaot
have been found in excavations in Jerusalem, in outlying villages, as well as at various rural locations. Most of the installations in Jerusalem were in basements of private dwellings and
therefore must have served the specific domestic needs of the
city inhabitants. Numerous examples are known from the area
of the Upper City of Second Temple period Jerusalem (the
present-day Jewish Quarter and Mount Zion), with smaller
numbers in the City of David and the Bezetha Hill. A few
slightly larger mikvaot are known in the immediate area of the
Temple Mount, but these installations could not have met the
needs of tens of thousands of Jewish pilgrims from outside the
city attending the festivities at the Temple on an annual basis.
It would appear that the Bethesda and Siloam Pools to the
north and south of the Temple Mount were designed at the
time of Herod the Great to accommodate almost all of the
ritual purification needs of the large numbers of Jewish pilgrims who flocked to Jerusalem for the festivals. In addition
to this, those precluded from admission to the Temple, owing
to disabilities and bodily defects, would have sought miraculous healing at these pools and this is the background for the
healing accounts in the Gospel of John (5: 113; 9: 7, 11).
Although water purification is referred to in the Old
Testament, in regard to rituals and the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, with washing, sprinkling, and dipping in water, we do
not hear of specific places or installations that people would
constantly frequent for the purpose of ritually cleansing their
flesh. The term mikveh was used in a very general sense in the
Old Testament to refer to a body of water of indeterminate
extent (cf. Gen. 1:10; Ex. 7:19), or more specifically to waters
gathered from a spring or within a cistern (Lev. 11: 36) or waters designated for a large reservoir situated in Jerusalem (Isa.
22: 11). None of these places are mentioned as having been
used for ritual purification in any way. Hence, the concept of
the mikveh as a hewn cave or constructed purification pool attached to ones dwelling or place of work is undoubtedly a later
one. A distinction must be made therefore between the purification practices as they are represented in biblical sources,
with Jewish water immersion rituals of the Second Temple period, as well as with later customs of mikvaot prevailing from
medieval times and to the present day (see below).
The basis for our information about what was or was not
permitted in regard to mikvaot appears in rabbinic sources: the
tractate Mikvaot in the Mishnah and Tosefta. One must take
into consideration, however, that this information might very
well be idealized, at least in part, and that the reality of purification practices in Second Temple times may have been much
more flexible than one would suppose from these sources. Josephus Flavius is silent in his writings about the purification
installations of his time, and the few references in Dead Sea
Scroll manuscripts are definitely not to be relied upon to generalize about the common Jewish purification practices current in Second Temple period Palestine. The Mishnah (Mik.
1:18, ed. Danby) indicates that there were at least six grades of
mikvaot, listed from the worst to the best: (1) ponds; (2) ponds
during the rainy season; (3) immersion pools containing more
than 40 seah of water; (4) wells with natural groundwater;
(5) salty water from the sea and hot springs; and (6) natural
flowing living waters from springs and in rivers. Clearly
the ubiquitous stepped-and-plastered installation known to
scholars from archaeological excavations since the 1960s and
now commonly referred to as the mikveh (referred to under
No. 3, above) was not the best or the worst of the six grades of
mikvaot as set forth in the Mishnah. It is referred to as follows:
More excellent is a pool of water containing forty seah; for in
them men may immerse themselves and immerse other things
[e.g., vessels] (Mik. 1:7). The validity of mikvaot was apparently one of the subjects occasionally debated in the Chamber of Hewn Stone in Jerusalem (Ed. 7:4).
Stringent religious regulations (halakhot) are referred
to in regard to certain constructional details and how the installations were to be used. A mikveh had to be supplied with
pure water derived from natural sources (rivers, springs or
rain) throughout the year and even during the long dry season, and it had to contain a minimum of 40 seah of water
(the equivalent of less than one cubic meter of water) so that
a person might be properly immersed (if not standing, then
lying down). Once the natural flow of water into a mikveh
had been stopped, it became drawn water (mayim sheuvim).
Water could not be added mechanically, but there was a possibility of increasing the volume by allowing drawn water to
enter from an adjacent container, according to the sources, so
long as the original amount of water did not decrease to below the minimum requirement of water. Hence, an additional
body of water, known since medieval times as the oz ar (the
treasury), could be connected to the mikveh, and linked by
pipe or channel. There was, of course, the problem of the water becoming dirty or stagnant (though not impure), but the
mikveh was not used for daily ablutions for the purpose of
keeping clean. Indeed, people appear to have washed themselves (or parts of their bodies, notably the feet and hands)
before entering the ritual bath (Mik. 9:2). Basins for cleansing feet and legs have been found in front of the mikvaot of
Herodian dwellings in Jerusalem.
The mikveh was required, according to the rabbinical
sources, to be sunk into the ground, either through construction or by the process of hewing into the rock, and into it natural water would flow derived from a spring or from surface
rainwater in the winter seasons. There was, of course, the problem of silting (Mik. 2:6). The phenomenon of silts gathering
within a mikveh was referred to quite clearly in rabbinic texts.
For instance, in reference to the minimum quantity of water
227
mikveh
required in a mikveh for it to be ritually permissible, we hear
that: if the mud was scraped up [from the pool and heaped]
by the sides, and three logs [a measure] of water drained down
therein, it remains valid [for cleansing purposes]; but if the
mud was removed away [from the pool] and three logs rained
down therefrom [into the pool] it becomes invalid (Mik. 2:6).
Elsewhere, we are told about certain damming operations
made inside the mikveh: if the water of an immersion pool
was too shallow it may be dammed [to one side] even with
bundles of sticks or reeds, that the level of water may be raised,
and so he may go down and immerse himself (Mik. 7:7).
The walls and floors of the mikveh chambers were plastered (frequently made of slaked quicklime mixed with numerous charcoal inclusions); ceilings were either natural rock
or barrel-vaulted with masonry. These installations are distinguished by flights of steps leading down into them and extending across the entire breadth of the chamber; such ubiquitous steps, however, were not referred to in the sources. The
riser of the lowest step tended to be deeper than the rest of
the steps, presumably to facilitate the immersion procedures
when the level of water had dropped to a minimum. Some of
these steps had a low raised (and plastered) partition which
is thought to have separated the descending impure person
(on the right) from the pure person leaving the mikveh (on
the left). Similarly there were mikvaot with double entrances
and these may indicate that the activities carried out inside
them resembled those undertaken in installations with the
partitioned steps. This arrangement of steps and/or double
entrances is known mainly from Jerusalem, but also from
sites in the vicinity, as well in the Hebron Hills and at Qumran. The installations from Jerusalem and the Hebron Hills
with the single partitions fit well the double lane theory, that
it was constructed to facilitate the separation of the impure
from the pure, but at Qumran, installations were found with
three or more of these partitions, which is odd. According to
one suggestion (Regev) maintaining the utmost in purity inside the mikveh, reflected by the addition of features such as
the partitions, would have been a concern mainly for priests,
but little support for this hypothesis has been forthcoming
from the archaeological evidence itself. Indeed, Galor rightly
points out that the partitions are at best symbolic rather than
functional, and that in some of the installations at Qumran
they were not even practical, providing in one installation a
stepped lane which was only 6 in. (15 cm.) wide!
The mikveh was also used for the purifying of contaminated vessels (e.g. Mik. 2:910, 5:6, 6:1, 10:1; cf. Mark 7:4). It is
not surprising, therefore, that in the excavation of mikvaot at
Jericho and Jerusalem, some were found to contain quantities
of ceramic vessels. Alternatively, it is quite possible that such
mikvaot were intended specifically for the purpose of cleaning vessels and were never used for the immersion of people.
At Jericho, in one mikveh, located in the northern sector of
the main Hasmonean palace, hundreds of intact ceramic vessels (mainly bowls) of the first century B.C.E. were found in
a silt layer on the floor of one installation. It is quite possible
that these vessels were abandoned at one stage of the cleansing process because there was too much silt inside the installation, a phenomenon referred to in the Mishnah (see Mik.
2:10). A large concentration of pottery was also found trapped
beneath a collapse of ashlars in the lower part of a mikveh,
dating to the first century B.C.E., which was uncovered in the
Jewish Quarter excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem. The
concentration of pottery found there mainly consisted of an
unspecified number of small bowls, mostly intact.
The date of the first appearance of stepped-and-plastered
mikvaot is a matter still debated by scholars, but the general
consensus of opinion is that this occurred in the Late Hellenistic (Hasmonean) period, at some point during the end of the
second century B.C.E. or very early in the first century B.C.E.
One thing is certain: only a handful of mikvaot are known
from the time of the Hasmoneans, whereas by contrast large
numbers of mikvaot are known dating from the time of Herod
the Great (late first century B.C.E.) and up to the destruction
of Jerusalem (70 C.E.). This, therefore, led Berlin to conclude
that the appearance of mikvaot cannot predate the mid-first
century B.C.E., but there is sufficient evidence at Jerusalem,
Jericho, Gezer, and elsewhere to support an earlier date than
that. What there can be no doubt about is that the floruit in
the use of mikvaot was in the first century C.E.
To sum up what we know about the use of the household
mikveh in the first century based on the rabbinic texts and archaeological finds: the average size of the mikveh suggests that
ritual bathing was ordinarily practiced individually (no more
than one person would enter the installation at a time) and the
location of mikvaot within the basements of private dwellings
suggests this purification was done regularly and whenever
deemed necessary. The purpose of the immersion was to ritually cleanse the flesh of the contaminated person in pure water, but it may also have been undertaken within households
before eating or as an aid to spirituality, before reading the
Torah or praying. It was neither used for the cleansing of the
soul nor for the redemption of sins (as with the purification
procedures of John the Baptist), or any other rituals (except for
the conversion of proselytes following their acceptance of the
Torah and circumcision; Pes. 8:8). One assumes that disrobing
took place before the immersion and that new garments were
put on immediately afterwards. Ritual bathing could be conducted in the comfort of a persons dwelling, but there were
also more public mikvaot such as those used by peasants and
other workers (such as quarrymen, potters, and lime burners) who would cleanse themselves at various locations in the
landscape. A few mikvaot are known in the immediate vicinity
of tombs, but they are quite rare indicating that ritual purification following entrance into tombs was not common. The
mikveh was not used for general cleaning and ablution purposes: this was done in alternative installations located within
the house, or in public bathhouses instead.
The fact that so many mikvaot are known from greater
Jerusalem, from within the city itself as well as from the villages and farms in its hinterland, is a very clear reflection of
228
mikveh
with the sudden upsurge seen in the manufacturing of stone
vessels in the mid-first century C.E. (from c. 50 C.E. or perhaps 60) onwards. Such vessels were perceived of as being
able to maintain purity and as such were extremely popular in
the household Judaism assemblage of that time (see Berlin
2005), with small mugs and large (kalal) jars serving a particularly useful task during hand-washing purification procedures.
Perhaps we should regard mikvaot and stone vessels as two
sides of the same coin representing the overall explosion of
purity that took place within Judaism in the first century C.E.
(purity broke out among the Jews; Tosef. Shab. 1:14), stemming from changing religious sensibilities on the one hand
and perhaps serving on the other as a form of passive Jewish
resistance against encroaching features of Roman culture in
the critical decade or so preceding the Great Revolt.
229
mikveh israel
validation, floor tiles to prevent leaking of the water. In every generation the authorities of each generation have delved
deeply into the sources of the halakhah and its reasons, and
from them have come to clear decisions for the planner and
builder, leaving extensive scope for his imagination and his
ability to coordinate halakhah with technology.
[David Kotlar]
Bibliography: GENERAL: N. Telushkin, Tohorat Mayim
(1964); D. Muenzberg, Mivneh Mikvaot ve-Hekhsheram (1963);
Krauss, Tal Arch, 1 (1910), 209ff.; ET, 11 (1965), 189222; E. Roth
(ed.), Die alte Synagoge zu Worms (1961), 4651, 65, illus. nos. 2527;
R. Krautheimer, Mittelalterliche Synagogen (1927); D. Kotlar, in: Miscellanea di Studi in memoria di Dario Disegni (1969); C.M. Bassols,
in: Sefarad, 28 (1968); J. Mills-Vallicrosa, ibid., 25 (1965). Add. Bibliography: G. Heuberger (ed.), Mikwe: Geschichte und Architektur
juedischer Ritualbaeder in Deutschland (1992); R. Slonim (ed.), Total
Immersion: A Mikvah Anthology (1996); R. Wasserfall (ed.), Women
and Water: Menstruation in Jewish Life and Law (1999). HISTORY: R.
Reich, Miqwaot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple Period
and the Period of Mishnah and Talmud (unpublished Ph.D. Thesis,
Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1991 (Heb.)); D. Amit, Ritual Pools
from the Second Temple Period in the Hebron Hills (unpublished
M.A. Thesis, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1996 (Heb.)). See also R.
Reich, Domestic Installations in Jerusalem of the Second Temple (=
Early Roman) Period, in: G. Garbrecht (ed.), Vortraege der Tagung
Historische Wassernutzungsanlagen im oestlichen Mittelmeerraum,
Jerusalem, 21/22 (Maerz 1983), 1984, 19 (note alternate page numbers
in the same volume); R. Reich, A Miqweh at Isawiya near Jerusalem,
in: IEJ, 34, 1984, 22023; idem, The Hot Bath-House (balneum), the
Miqweh and the Jewish Community in the Second Temple Period,
in: Journal of Jewish Studies, 39, 1988, 1027; idem, Ritual Baths, in:
E.M. Meyers (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near
East, vol. 4 (1997), 4301; D. Amit, Jerusalem-Style Ritual Baths from
the Time of the Second Temple in the Mt. Hevron, in: Y. Friedman,
Z. Safrai, and J. Schwartz (eds.), Hikrei Eretz: Studies in the History of
the Land of Israel Dedicated to Prof. Yehuda Feliks (Heb., 1997), 3548;
A. Grossberg, Ritual Baths in Second Temple Period Jerusalem and
How They Were Ritually Prepared, in: Cathedra, 83 (1997), 15168
(Heb.); idem, How Were the Mikvaot of Masada Made Ritually Fit?,
in: Cathedra, 85 (1997), 3344 (Heb.); E. Regev, More on Ritual Baths
of Jewish Groups and Sects: On Research Methods and Archaeological Evidence A Reply to A. Grossberg, in: Cathedra, 83 (1987),
16976 (Heb.); D. Amit, A Miqveh Complex near Alon Shevut, in:
Atiqot, 38 (1999), 7584; R. Reich, Miqwaot at Qumran and the Jerusalem Connection, in: L.H. Schiffman, E. Tov, and J.C. VanderKam
(eds.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years After Their Discovery (2000),
72833; A. Grossberg, Ritual Pools for the Immersion of Hands at
Masada, Cathedra, 95 (2000), 16571 (Heb.); idem, A Mikveh in the
Bathhouse, Cathedra, 99 (2001), 17184 (Heb.); R. Reich, They Are
Ritual Pool, in: BAR, 28:2 (2002), 5055; K. Galor, Qumrans Plastered Pools: A New Perspective, in: J.-B. Humbert and J. Gunneweg
(eds.), Science and Archaeology at Khirbet Qumran and Ain Feshkha.
Studies in Archaeometry and Anthropology, vol. 2 (2003); S. Gibson,
The Pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem and Jewish Purification Practices
of the Second Temple Period, in: Proche-Orient Chrtien (2006);
A.M. Berlin, Jewish Life Before the Revolt: The Archaeological Evidence, in: Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic
and Roman Periods, 36 (2005), 452, note 92; L.H. Schiffman, Proselytism in the Writings of Josephus: Izates of Adiabene in Light of
the Halakhah, in: U. Rappaport (ed.), Josephus Flavius: Historian of
Eretz-Israel in the Hellenistic-Roman Period (Heb., 1982); M. Samet,
230
milan
MILAN, city in Lombardy, N. Italy. The presence of Jews in
Milan in the Late Roman period is attested by three Jewish inscriptions, two of which refer to the father of the community.
In 388, *Ambrose, bishop of Milan, expressed regret for failing to lead his congregation in burning down the synagogue
which instead had been destroyed by act of God. It was soon
rebuilt, but about 507 was sacked by the Christian mob, whose
action was condemned by the Ostrogothic ruler Theodoric.
The community presumably continued in existence, though
there is little evidence in succeeding centuries except for vague
references to Jewish merchants and farmers in the tenth century. With the spread of Jewish communities through northern Italy in the 13t century that of Milan was also revived, but
in 1320 the podest issued a decree expelling the Jews. In 1387
Duke Gian Galeazzo Visconti granted privileges to the Jews in
the whole of *Lombardy; these were confirmed by Francesco
Sforza and his successors. An important court Jew was Elia
di Sabato da Fermo, who in 1435 became the personal physician of the duke Filippo Maria Visconti. When in 1452 Pope
Nicholas V approved the Jewish right of residence in the duchy,
he specifically authorized the construction of a synagogue in
Milan. Pope Pius II demanded a levy of one-fifth on the possessions of the Jews to subsidize a Crusade (1459), but was
opposed by Duke Francesco Sforza. In 1489, under Ludovico
il Moro, the Jews were expelled from the entire Duchy. They
were soon readmitted, except to Milan itself where a Jew could
only stay for three days. Similar conditions continued under
the last Sforza dukes and after 1535, when the Duchy of Milan came under Spanish rule. In 1541 Emperor Charles V confirmed that Jews were allowed to live in various towns of the
territory, but not in Milan. Thus, when the Jews were finally
expelled in 1597, there were none in Milan itself.
Jews began to return to Milan at the beginning of the
19t century, when Milan was the capital of the Napoleonic
Kingdom of Italy. An area for a Jewish cemetery was bought
already before 1808. In 1820 around seven families lived in
Milan; in 1840, there were already 200 Jews there. Jews came
to Milan from the neighboring Kingdom of Sardinia to study
at the university, as the learning centers were open to Jews. In
1848 some Jews were active in the rebellion against Austrian
rule. In 1859 Milan became a part of the new Italian kingdom
and the Jews received full rights. In 1870 there were more than
700 Jews in the city.
The first synagogue was built in 1840 in Via Stampa. In
1892 the synagogue of Via Guastalla was erected, designed by
the architect Luca Beltrami.
Because of the great commercial and industrial development around Milan which now followed, the city became a
center of attraction for new immigrants. In 1920, 4,500 Jews
resided in Milano. In the same year the Jewish school was
founded.
[Attilio Milano / Samuel Rocca (2nd ed.)]
Holocaust Period
Already after World War I, Jews from Central and Eastern
Europe established themselves in Milan. However, only after
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
On January 27, 1993, the Contemporary Jewish Documentation Center (CDEC) inaugurated in Milan the largest
Jewish videotheque in Europe with 700 titles including *Holocaust documentaries found through research in East European archives. The CDEC archives and research facilities will
be totally renovated thanks to donations by Eliot Malki, an
Egyptian Jewish businessman who came to Milan in the 1970s.
It included a modern conference center. The synagogue on Via
Guastalla was restored and celebrated its 100t anniversary.
Jewish silver ceremonial objects stolen during World War II
were returned to the synagogue by the Milan Fine Arts and
History Department.
[Lisa Palmieri-Billig]
231
milano, attilio
At the outset of the 21st century the community numbered around 6,500 Jews. The main school, sponsored by the
community, is named after Sally Mayer. Besides the synagogue
in Via Guastalla, which follows the Italian rite, there are seven
other synagogues and houses of prayer of the Italian, Persian,
Lebanese, and Ashkenazi communities, as well as a rest home
for elderly people. The journal of the Jewish Community is Il
Bollettino della Comunita di Milano.
Bibliography: Milano, Bibliotheca, index; Kaufmann, in:
REJ, 20 (1890), 3472; Ferorelli, in: Vessillo Israelitico, 63 (1925), 22738,
33739; A. Sarano, Sette anni di vita e di opere della communita israelitica di Milano (194552) (1952). Add. Bibliography: O. Meron,
The Decline of Jewish Banking in Milan and the Establishment of
the S. Ambrogio Bank (1593) Were the Two Interrelated? in: Nuova
Rivista Storica, 74 (1990), 36985; idem, Demographic and Spacial
Aspects of Jewish Life in the Duchy of Milan during the Spanish Period, in: WCJS, 10 (1993), 3747; D. Noy, Jewish Inscriptions of Western Europe I (1993); J.N. Pavoncello, Le origini della comunit di
Milano, in: Israel (Feb. 22, 1968), 3; L. Picciotto-Fargion, Gli ebrei in
provincia di Milano 1943/45 Persecuzione e deportazione (1992); S.,
Simonsohn, History of the Jews in the Duchy of Milan IIV (198286);
A. Tedeschi Falco, Lombardia, Itinerari ebraici (1993), 5571. See also
bibliography to *Lombardy.
MILANO, ATTILIO (19071969), historian of Italian Judaism. Milano was born in Rome, where he studied law and
economics. He immigrated to Israel in 1939 with the inception of the racist laws in Italy, settling in Ramat ha-Sharon,
where he worked as a manufacturer. Milanos historical studies deal mostly with the economic and social conditions of
various Italian Jewish groups, particularly stressing the study
of the causes and consequences of usury and relations with
the Roman Catholic Church. His Bibliotheca Historica ItaloJudaica (1954, 1964, and RMI, 1966) is an indispensable bibliographical tool for the study of Italian Jewry; it includes articles
published in various periodicals by Milano himself. Among
his important works are Storia degli Ebrei Italiani nel Levante
(1949), Storia degli Ebrei in Italia (1963), and Il Ghetto di Roma
(1964). He was editor of the department for Italian Jewish history of the Encyclopaedia Judaica.
His Storia degli Ebrei in Italia, originally published in 1963
(reprinted in Torino, 1992), has become a classic for the history of the Jews in Italy, and it is quoted very frequently. His
fine collection of books, periodicals, articles and documents on
the history and traditions of the Jews in Italy was donated to
the Research Center for Italian Jewish Studies in Jerusalem.
Bibliography: E.S. Artom, in: RMI, 29 (1963), 22730; G.
Romano, ibid., 35 (1969), 36973; idem, in: Quaderni della labronica,
n. 3 (1969), 512; idem, et al., in Scritti in memoria di Attilio Milano,
RMI, 36 (1970), 1347. Add. Bibliography: G. Romano, Attilio Milano ebreo letterato, in: Rassegna Mensile di Israel, 36:79
(1970), 1320; R. Bachi, Il primo lavoro storico di Attilio, Milano,
in: Rassegna Mensile di Israel, 36:79 (1970), 3134.
232
Milgrom, Jacob
erow. At the age of 20, he was sent by Y. *Tschlenow on a
propaganda tour of Siberia, and from that time he became a
preacher and speaker on behalf of Zionism. In 1908 he settled
in Poland, taught in the Hebrew high school of M. Krinski
in Warsaw, and participated in its management. He continued his propaganda tours in the cities and towns of Poland.
During World War I he was a preacher in the Ohel Yaakov
synagogue in Lodz. In 1920 Mileykowsky settled in Palestine,
where he served as the principal of a school in Safed. From
1924 to 1929 he was sent to England, Carpatho-Russia (then
part of Czechoslovakia), and the United States on a mission
for the Jewish National Fund and the Keren Hayesod. Toward
the end of his life, he settled in Herzliyyah and was active in
the Farmers Association. During the *Arlosoroff murder trial
(193334), he set up a committee for the defense of the accused. Some of his speeches are included in his anthologies
Ha-Neviim ve-ha-Am (The Prophets and the People, 1913)
and Folk un Land (1928).
Bibliography: Tidhar, 1 (1947), 1867; Ez D, 3 (1965) 4179;
LNYL, 5 (1963), 621.
[Yehuda Slutsky]
MILGRAM, STANLEY (19331984), U.S. social psychologist. Born in New York City, Milgram attended public schools
in the Bronx, then earned a bachelors degree in political science at Queens College in 1954. Convinced by an advisor to
change his field of study to psychology, Milgram entered Harvard University, where he studied under Solomon Asch and
Gordon Allport, receiving his doctoral degree in social psychology in 1960.
That year Milgram joined the faculty of Yale University
as an assistant professor, and in 1961 he began his experiments
on obedience to authority. He found, in studies conducted at
Linsly-Chittenden Hall, that 65 percent of the subjects (ordinary citizens of New Haven) followed instructions to administer what they believed were harmful, even potentially fatal,
electric shocks to an unwilling stranger simply because they
were directed to do so by an authority figure dressed in a lab
coat. At the end of the experiment, the subjects were told that
the victim did not actually receive shocks. Milgrams findings,
released in 1963, were considered alarming; critics, including
the American Psychiatric Association, initially questioned the
ethics of the experiment. In time, however, Milgrams experiment was considered a milestone in the study of the social aspects of obedience and the primary documentation of what
came to be called situationism, whereby external situations
override internal perceptions and moral standards. It is widely
regarded as the most powerful experiment ever conducted in
social psychology. Milgram, in his work Obedience to Authority (1974), used his findings to explain a range of shocking behavior, from guards in Nazi concentration camps to American
soldiers at the My Lai massacre.
Milgram taught at Harvard from 1963 to 1967, where he
conducted other noteworthy research, including the lost-letter technique and the small world problem, which both conENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
233
milhaud, darius
MILHAUD, DARIUS (18921974), French composer. Milhaud was born in Aix-en-Provence and was descended from
an old Jewish family that claimed to have been among the
first settlers in southern France after the fall of Jerusalem. He
entered the Paris Conservatory at the age of 17, was soon attracted by the theater, and between 1910 and 1916 composed La
Brebis egare, Agamemnon, and Le pauvre matelot. He became
acquainted with the composer Eric Satie and the writers Paul
Claudel and Jean Cocteau and, when Claudel was appointed
French minister to Brazil, he asked Milhaud to become his
secretary. Milhaud spent almost two years (191718) in Rio de
Janeiro, and his musical impressions of Brazil echo in many of
his compositions. After his return to Paris, he joined a circle
of progressive artists, the musicians of which formed an inner
circle later known as Les Six. A versatile and prolific composer, Milhaud wrote music for concert, stage, and screen, and
for voice and orchestra. South American rhythms, U.S. jazz,
Jewish synagogal traditions (especially those of his native region, the *Comtat Venaissin), 12-tone music, and trends and
styles of great divergence merge in his works. Yet the mixture
is always unmistakably his own.
Milhauds most important contributions to 20t-century
music are to be found in some of his operas: Les Chophores
(1915); Esther de Carpentras (1925, with text by Armand *Lunel); Christophe Colomb (1928); Bolivar (1943); and the biblical opera David which Milhaud composed with Lunel for
the Jerusalem Festival of 1954. Milhaud wrote concertos for
almost every orchestral instrument, ballets, short and fullscale symphonies, chamber music, songs, piano music, and
cantatas. Among the best known of his compositions on Jewish themes are his Service Sacr (1947), and two song cycles
with piano accompaniment: Pomes juifs (1916) and Chants
populaires hbraques (1925). He also wrote musical settings
of Psalms for solo voices and chorus; the ballet La Cration
du Monde (1923); a piano suite, Le Candlabre sept branches
(1951); and music for various festival prayers.
When France collapsed in 1940 Milhaud immigrated to
the U.S. and became a professor at Mills College, Oakland,
California. After 1947 he divided his time between the U.S.
and Paris, where he became a professor of composition at the
Conservatory. The story of his life and musical beliefs was
told in Notes sans musique (1949; Notes Without Music, 1953),
which also appeared in Hebrew, and in Entretiens avec Claude
Rostand (1952). During his later years Milhaud suffered from
rheumatoid arthritis which confined him to a wheelchair for
long periods of time.
Bibliography: P. Collaer, Darius Milhaud (Fr., 1947); H.H.
Stuckenschmidt, Schoepfer der neuen Musik (1958), 20416; P. Claudel,
Correspondence Paul Claudel and Darius Milhaud 19121953 (1961);
Grove, Dict.; Riemann-Gurlitt; MGG.
[Peter Emanuel Gradenwitz]
MILIAN, MAXIMIN (Mendel Gruenberg; 18851953), Romanian journalist and short-story writer. Born in Ploeti,
Milian wrote for various papers and was editorial secretary of
234
military law
MILITARY LAW.
Morality and War in Judaism
The prophetic view of the end of days is expressed in the
words: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and
their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword
against nation, neither shall they learn war any more (Isa.
2:4). But until those days arrive, there may be times when
war is required. In such circumstances, halakhah views war
as a necessity, and participation therein as an obligation under certain circumstances.
A soldier acting in accordance with halakhah may not
indulge in the naked exercise of force, brutality, or vandalism,
but rather must be guided by the recognition of an obligation
imposed by an exigency brought about by reality. The Torah
establishes the boundaries of what is permitted and forbidden in war for both individual and for society, with the view
of achieving the military objective while striking a balance between recognition of the nature of soldiers in war who must,
at times, be permitted to behave in ways that would be forbidden in peacetime and the need to imbue those soldiers with
the qualities of compassion and holiness, even during times of
war. It is instructive that the laws of prayer and of the sanctity
of the synagogue are derived from the laws governing a military camp (Ber. 25a). Although under certain circumstances
the Torah views war as an obligation incumbent upon every
man in Israel, King David was not allowed to build the Temple because he had fought many wars (I Chron. 22:710). This
exemplifies the potentially problematic nature of war, and the
need to strike an appropriate balance between single-minded
combat against the enemy and preserving the moral standards
of the combatants.
In this entry, we shall briefly consider the salient issues
of military law in Jewish law. We shall examine the classic
commandments related to war as they appear in the Bible, in
Talmudic literature, and in halakhic decisions, and consider
the contemporary ramifications of some of them and their
expression in modern society.
The Sanctity of the Camp in Time of War
The Torah states (Deut. 23:10): When you go forth against
your enemies and are in camp, then you shall keep yourself
from every evil thing. In the tannaitic Midrash, the Sages interpreted this verse as implying a special warning in time of
war to be careful regarding matters of defilement and purity,
tithes, incest, idolatry, bloodshed, and slander (Sif. Deut. 254,
ed. Finkelstein). In his commentary to Deuteronomy 23:10,
Nah manides explains that human nature is such that moral
restraints are loosened at time of war, and we shed the sense
of shame felt in normal human society, with regard to such
acts as licentiousness and theft. This is a by-product of the
cruelty that envelops soldiers when they go to war. The Torah
therefore saw need for reinforcement of these matters through
a special proscription. In the ensuing verses, the Torah cautions about purity and physical cleanliness in the military
camp. The section concludes with a general explanation that
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
235
military law
priests speech, the officers address the people and exempt
the following four categories of people: (a) one who has built
a home and not dedicated it; (b) one who has planted a vineyard but not yet enjoyed its fruit (the fruit can only be used
after the fourth year); (c) one who has betrothed a woman but
not yet married her (see *Marriage); (d) one who is afraid and
fainthearted, lest he cause his comrades to be afraid. Later
sources explain the application of these exemptions in practice. Thus, prior to the battle with the Midianites, God commands Gideon to tell the fearful to return home; more than
one third of the force leaves (Judges 7:3). The Book of Maccabees (I Maccabees 3:55) relates that soldiers were exempted
for the same reasons. There is some disagreement among the
tannaim regarding the nature of the fear that exempts a person
from going to war (Mish. Sot. 8:5; Sot. 44a). In Rabbi Akivas
view, this alludes to fear of war. According to the mishnaic
citation of R. Akiva, his concern was fear of the dangers of
war, whereas according to the Tosefta (Sot. 7:24), R. Akivas
concern was not the fear of war per se, but rather the fear
that his sense of mercy would affect his ability to fight, and
even a stony and mighty warrior was commanded to return
home in the event of his feelings of mercy being likely to impair his ability to fight. According to R. Yose the Galilean, this
exemption also refers to a person who is fearful because he
knows himself to be a sinner, his feelings of guilt leading him
to fear that he will be punished for his sins by death in battle.
Although these four categories of people are exempted from
battle, they are commanded to contribute to the war effort by
providing food and water for the troops, and by repairing the
roads (Mish., Sot. 8; Yad, Melakhim 7:9).
In addition to the above, a man is exempt from going
to war during the first year of his marriage, in order to make
his wife happy (Deut. 24:5). The Sages extended this one-year
exemption to building a house and harvesting a vineyard, as
well (TJ, Sot. 8:8; Yad, Melakhim 7:9). Unlike the other exemptions, a person exempt for these reasons is not required
to contribute to the war effort, but simply stays home (Deut.
24:5; Sot. 44a).
All these exemptions apply exclusively to a discretionary
war; in the case of an obligatory war, all go forth, even the
bridegroom out of his chamber and the bride from her bridal
pavilion (Mish., Sot. 8:8).
The Israel Supreme Court discussed these issues at length
in its decision in the Schein case (HC 734/83 Shein v. Minister
of Defense, 38 (III) PD 393, per M. Elon). The petitioner in that
case was a reserve soldier who refused a call-up order to serve
in southern Lebanon, on grounds of conscience. He argued
that he opposed the Israeli armys presence in Lebanon, and
believed that presence to be illegal. The petitioner had already
been tried for a previous refusal, and the petition related to
a new call-up order and to the sentence that he had served.
In denying the petition, Justice Elon surveyed philosophical
and legal positions accepted by various states in regard to conscientious objection, and addressed the distinction between
general conscientious objection and selective conscientious
objection, that only relates to a specific type of military service. Justice Elon went on to examine the view of Jewish law.
In principle, the issue before us was addressed by Jewish law
in its earliest days, as a matter related to the subject of exemption from the obligation of military service (p. 403). After reviewing the above-mentioned sources and the opinions
expressed by the tannaim, he concluded: The foregoing quotations reflect the various opinions in Jewish law concerning
an issue essentially comparable to the question of exemption
from military service for reasons of conscience. The reasons
for exemption are general and inclusive, and they concern
the character of the person and his attitude to violence. They
are not selective. They do not pertain to a particular time and
place, and they are not based on ideological-social outlooks.
Finally, even the general and inclusive reasons are applicable
only to a discretionary war, but not to an obligatory war in
a time of emergency (p. 405).
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speaking, this approach sees the purpose of the offer of peace
as a means for achieving the objectives of war in an easier,
more efficient manner, while avoiding the loss of life. Under
this approach, the call for peace applies to an obligatory war as
well, inasmuch as it is clearly preferable to achieve the objectives of an obligatory war without resort to combat. Another
approach sees the call for peace as an end in itself, which prevents war and teaches compassion (Sefer ha-H innukh, Mitzvah
527). Therefore, it is not required in an obligatory war.
This mitzvah led the Sages to the midrashic statement regarding the importance of peace in Judaism: Great is peace,
for Israel requires it even in war (Sif. Deut., loc. cit.).
The Laws of Siege
THE DUTY TO LEAVE ONE DIRECTION OPEN FOR ESCAPE.
The Midrash (Sif. Num., ed. Horowitz, 157) cites the opinion
of the tanna Rabbi Nathan, that when Israel laid siege in its
war with Midian (Num. 31), one side was left open so that
the Midianites could flee. Nah manides (Hassagot al Sefer haMitzvot la-Rambam, 5), suggests two reasons for this. The
first is educational, namely, to encourage compassion even
for an enemy in time of war. The second reason is tactical: to
avoid emboldening the enemy by putting it in a position from
which there can be no escape, and in which it has nothing to
lose. In his opinion, this rule only applies to a discretionary
war. As opposed to this, Maimonides sees it as a duty in every war. Rabbi Meir Simh ah ha-Kohen of Dvinsk (Meshekh
H okhmah, at Num. 31:6) explains that the source of the disagreement between Nah manides and Maimonides is that Maimonides views this primarily as a matter of military tactics.
Therefore it is not an obligation, but rather a recommendation applying even to an obligatory war. Nah manides sees the
underlying reason as that of compassion, which applies only
to a discretionary war.
This dispute has practical ramifications to this day. Is
there a halakhic obligation to allow the enemy an avenue of
escape? Contemporary halakhic authorities disagreed as to
whether the halakhah required the Israeli army to allow PLO
terrorists to escape during the 1982 siege of Beirut. Rabbi S.
Goren rejected the distinction of the Meshekh H okhmah, and
ruled that according to Maimonides there was a duty to allow
them to escape, even in an obligatory war. Rabbi S. Yisraeli accepted the distinction and ruled that according to Maimonides
there was no such duty in an obligatory war, and the matter
was subject to the discretion of the military commanders and
the government (see Bibliography).
DESTRUCTION OF TREES DURING A SIEGE. A special provision of the rules of siege concerns the status of trees in and
around the besieged city: When you besiege a city for a long
time, making war against it in order to take it, you shall not
destroy its trees by wielding an axe against them; for you may
eat of them, but you shall not cut them down. For is the tree
of the field man that it should be besieged by you? (Deut.
20:19). This rule applies only to a discretionary war (Sif. Deut.,
ed. Finkelstein, 203).
237
military service
Although permitted, it would seem to be considered inappropriate to take more than the costs of war. This is concluded from Abrahams decision to take from the king of Sodom nothing but what the young men have eaten, and the
share of the men who went with me (Gen. 14:24; Radak and
Sforno, loc. cit.). In the Scroll of Esther we find that the Jews
were permitted to plunder the property of their enemies, yet
the text emphasizes but they laid no hands on the plunder
(Esther 8:11; 9:15).
Taking spoils can bring about the undesirable result of
lowered moral standards in war, such as occurred at the time
of King Saul (I Samuel 14:3132), when the people, in their
excitement over the spoils, transgressed the prohibition of
eating with the blood. As earlier noted, the Torah considers maintaining the moral standards of the army to be an exalted goal and this is another argument against taking spoils.
In view of this, some are of the opinion that taking spoils is
permitted only for the army as a whole, in accordance with
the instructions of the relevant authorities, but is not permitted to individual soldiers.
Harming Innocent Civilians
The language of the Torah leads to the conclusion that if, in a
discretionary war, the enemy does not accept the terms of surrender offered by the Israelite army, then all the men are to be
killed: But if it makes no peace with you you shall put all
its males to the sword (Deut. 20:1213). This is the conclusion
drawn by Maimonides (Melakhim 6:4), who emphasizes the
corollary that women and children are not to be killed. Maimonides does not distinguish between combatants and noncombatants. This should perhaps be viewed in its historical
and cultural context. In the ancient world, the enemy army
comprised the entire male population, whether as direct participants in the fighting or as support. The correct translation
of this rule to contemporary law might be that only combatants may be targeted, and that the innocent civilian population must not be harmed.
Over the last few generations, since the beginning of the
Zionist enterprise, and particularly since the establishment of
the State of Israel, contemporary halakhic authorities have addressed these issues. Rabbi S. Yisraeli (see Bibliography) was
of the opinion that there is justification for harming a civilian
population that supports the enemy forces and voluntarily assists them, even under the doctrine of the pursuer (rodef )
(see *Penal Law). However, when the enemy forces compel
that assistance from the civilian population, there is no justification for harming non-combatant civilians.
The biblical story of Simeon and Levi and the city of
Shechem (Gen. 34) is germane to this discussion. After
Shechem ben Hamor, son of the citys king, rapes Jacobs
daughter Dinah, Simeon and Levi kill all of the males of the
city. Some commentators (Nah manides, at Gen. 34:13) take a
dim view of what they see as their immoral conduct, and argue that this is why Simeon and Levi were reprimanded by
their father Jacob (Gen. 49:57). Others justify the act, argu-
238
ing that it is of the nature of war that the acts of one obligate
all (Maharal, Gur Aryeh al ha-Torah, Gen. 34:13), or that it
was justifiable from a formal halakhic point of view (Yad,
Melakhim 9:14). Some have responded that, even if it were
halakhically permitted, it must nevertheless be morally condemned, as we should be strict in capital matters (Rabbi S.
Goren, Bibliography, 1:28).
Rabbi S. Yisraeli addressed the question of the relationship between the international law of armed conflicts and
Torah law (see Bibliography), expressing the view that the
rule that the law of the country is binding (see entry *Dina deMalkhuta Dina) may apply not only to the spheres of civil and
criminal law, but to international law, as well. According to
this approach, international conventions on what is permitted
and forbidden in war are halakhically valid (except, of course,
in regard to what constitutes an obligatory war).
Bibliography: M. Elon, Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri (1988), 1:454;
idem, Jewish Law (1994), 2:554; idem, Jewish Law (Cases and Materials) (1999), 53944; G. Garman, Melekh Yisrael, 297313; S. Goren,
Meshiv Milh amah, 3 vols. (198386); I.Y. Herzog, S. Yisraeli, D. Lishinsky, S. Cohen, Y. Gershuni, S. Min-Ha-Har, Y. Shaviv, M. Ushpizai,
in: Teh umin, 4 (1983), 1396; S. Rosenfeld, H alukat Shalal u-Bizzah
be-Milh amot Yamenu, in: Teh umin, 23 (2003), 5259; N.D. Shapira,
Ha-Kriah le-Shalom, in: Torah she-be-al Peh, 39 (1998), 8290; A.
Sharir, Etika Z evait al pi ha-Halakhah, in: Teh umin, 25 (2005), 426;
E. Shochetman, Sikkun H ayyalei Z ahal le-shem Meniat Pegiah beEzrah ei ha-Oyev, in: Netiv, 2 (2003), 25; 3 (2003), 28; Y. Unger and M.
Finkelstein, Parashot Lekh Lekha, Va-Yishlah, in: Parshat ha-Shavua
(2006); S. Yisraeli, Amud ha-Yemini (1992).
[Ariel Ehrlich (2nd ed.)]
military service
239
250,000
50,000
8,000
450,000
275,000
8,000
35,000
90,000
6,000
1,172,000
550,000
62,000
16,000
10,000
3,000
35,000
7,000
7,000
500,000
13,000
35,000
140,000
8,000
1,397,000
military service
the battleship Nevada and was later responsible for placing
a barrage of mines across the English Channel, Commander
Walter F. Jacobs, who commanded a flotilla of minesweepers,
and Captain Joseph K. *Taussig who was responsible for the
safe escort of convoys against submarine attacks. Six Jews won
the Congressional Medal of Honor: William Sawelson, Benjamin Kaufman (18941981), Sydney G. Gumpertz (18791953),
Charles W. Hoffman, Samuel Sampler, and Philip C. Katz. In
addition over 200 Jews were awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. The Jewish contribution to the U.S. fighting force in
World War II was no less impressive. Over half a million U.S.
Jews fought in the Allied armies, many of whom crossed the
Canadian border early in the war to volunteer for the Canadian army before the United States entered the fighting. More
than 50,000 Jewish servicemen were killed or wounded and
two Jewish soldiers were awarded the Congressional Medal
of Honor, one of whom was Lieutenant Raymond Lussman
who single-handedly killed 17 German soldiers and captured
another 32. An outstanding army officer who fell in battle was
Major General Maurice Rose (18991945) who commanded
the U.S. third armored division in the final offensive against
Germany in 1945 and who was killed at Paderborn only a few
weeks before the end of the war. In addition Lewis *Strauss was
promoted to rear admiral during World War II. In 1953 Hyman
*Rickover, a naval captain in World War II, was promoted to
rear admiral and retired in 1958 with the rank of vice admiral.
Jews also played an important part in the United States armies
in Korea and in Vietnam; 150,000 Jews saw service in the Korean War and nearly 30,000 Jews fought in Vietnam, where
Ben Sternberg (1914 ) served as major general.
Great Britain
Until the repeal of the 1673 Test Act in 1828, professing Jews
were debarred by religious tests from serving as officers in the
regular armed forces of the crown. English Jews were, however,
like their counterparts, the Continental Court Jews, prominent
as army contractors for pay and supplies in the 18t century:
the most famous were Sir Solomon de *Medina, the associate of Marlborough, and Abraham Prado (the diary and letter-book of the latters subordinate, David Mendes da Costa,
have survived). Aaron *Hart was commissary officer at the
taking of Montreal and settled in Canada. Professing Jews
could serve in the ranks and a number served especially in the
navy, among them Barnett Abraham Simmons (later minister
in the Penzance synagogue) and Isaac Vallentine, founder of
the Jewish Chronicle. When invasion threatened, volunteers
were enlisted and many professing Jews served, particularly
in the London Volunteers. Jews could hold nonregular commissions and Sir Moses *Montefiore served as an officer in
the Kent Militia; Daniel *Mendoza, the boxer, was a sergeant
in the Fifeshire, then Aberdeenshire, Fencibles. There were
a number of officers of Jewish origin before 1828 Wellington said 15 served under him at Waterloo in 1815 but they
were presumably converts or at least not professing Jews: the
most famous were the descendants of Meyer Low Schomberg,
physician to the Great Synagogue; among his sons were Captain Sir Alexander Schomberg RN (Royal Navy), founder of
a naval and military dynasty still flourishing, and Lieutenant
Colonel Henry Schomberg, probably the first Anglo-Jewish
army officer.
After the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, some
professing Jews entered the army and became regular officers,
particularly in the Indian army (e.g., Captain Lionel Gomez
da Costa, who died of wounds at Lucknow in 1857, and Ensign Edmund Helbert Ellis, who died in 1851 at the age of 22),
in which Indian native Jews had previously served. The most
distinguished soldier in the community was Col. Albert E.W.
*Goldsmid. An increasing number of professing Jews served
in the ranks, including veterans of the Crimean War. Judaism
was not, however, recognized in the British army as a separate denomination until 1886, partly owing to the efforts of
Trooper Woolf Cohen of the 5t Lancers. In the South African
War (18991902), between 3,000 and 4,000 Jews served, with
127 killed in action; many of those serving were South African colonials and outlanders, notably Colonel Sir David
*Harris who commanded the Kimberley Town Guard during the siege. During World War I the number of Jews in the
British army rose to 50,000. Several Anglo-Jewish families
provided large numbers of Jewish soldiers. The *Rothschild
family contributed five officers, the *Sassoon family 14 officers,
and five sons of Arthur *Sebag-Montefiore held commissions,
while 41 descendants of Sir Isidore *Spielmann were said to
have served as officers. Five Jewish soldiers won the Victoria Cross: Captain Robert Gee, Lieutenant Frank Alexander
De Pass, Sergeant Issy Smith (Shmulevitsch), and Privates J.
White and Leonard Keysor; 50 Jewish soldiers received the
Distinguished Service Order. In addition the Jews formed
their own unit, the Zion Mule Corps, which fought at Gallipoli and in the Dardanelles in 1915. Later, three Jewish units,
the 38t, 39t, and 40t battalions of the Royal Fusiliers participated in the conquest of Palestine in 1918 under General
Allenby (see *Jewish Legion). The regiments were disbanded
after World War I. In World War II over 60,000 Jews fought
in the British army. Jewish soldiers included volunteers from
Central and Eastern Europe who were not British subjects and
Palestinian volunteers who enlisted after the German advance
across North Africa threatened the yishuv in Palestine. Two
Jewish soldiers won the Victoria Cross in World War II: Captain David Hirsch, and naval lieutenant T. Gould. Several others rose to high military rank including Major General William Beddington (1893?), Brigadier Sir Edward Beddington
(18841966), who was deputy director of military intelligence
at the War Office, Brigadier Barnard Goldstone (1896?),
Brigadier Fredrick Morris (18881941), Brigadier Bernard
Schlesinger (18961945), and Brigadier Frederick *Kisch, who
was killed in action. In addition, Irish-born Abraham Briscoe
(1892?) was the first Jew to reach the rank of air-commodore
in the Royal Air Force. Jewish soldiers also fought in the British army in Korea and in Egypt where Brigadier Edmund Meyers (1906?) was chief engineer to the British forces at the Suez
240
military service
Canal. Major General James A. *DAvigdor-Goldsmid became
colonel of the 4/7t Dragoon Guards and director-general of
the Territorial army.
British Commonwealth
No discrimination existed against Jews serving in the armed
forces of Canada, Australia, and South Africa and a number
of Jewish officers rose to high rank. In World War I Lieutenant General Sir John *Monash commanded the Australian
army corps in France from June 1918 and was responsible for
the breach of the German lines on August 8 which led to the
collapse of German resistance. He was considered the outstanding army commander of World War I and in 1930 was
promoted to full general. Major General Sir Charles Rosenthal also achieved prominence in the Australian army during
World War I, commanding the ANZAC artillery and later the
second Australian army division under Monashs supreme
command. Another Australian, Private Leonard Keysor, was
awarded the Victoria Cross during the Gallipoli campaign
of 1915. In World War II 16,000 Jews fought in the Canadian
army in Europe and North Africa, and one of them, Colonel Phinias Rothschild (1914 ), was later promoted to major general and quartermaster-general of the Canadian army.
10,000 Jews fought in the South African army in which Major General Alexander Ohrenstein was director-general of the
medical services.
Czarist Russia
Before 1827 Jews were exempted from military service on payment of a money tax. In that year, however, on the accession
of Nicholas I, Jews were conscripted into the Russian army for
periods of up to 25 years. Ten Jews for every thousand males
were conscripted, recruitment being of boys aged between 12
and 25 while those under 18 were placed in special schools
(see *Cantonists). Jewish soldiers were subjected to persistent pressure to convert, young Jewish children were seized
and pressed into military service for 25-year periods, and Jews
were excluded from the ranks of officers. Not unnaturally Jews
sought every opportunity to evade military service in Russia
under these conditions. These conscription laws did not apply
to Jews in Polish territories annexed by Russia at the end of
the Napoleonic wars. Thousands of Jews fought in the czarist
army in the Crimean War (185456) and about 500 were killed.
In 1864 a monument was erected to the Jewish soldiers who
fell in the siege of Sebastopol and one Jewish soldier, Chaim
Zaitchikoff, was congratulated by Prince Gortchakoff for his
valor. Following the accession of Alexander II the condition
of the Jews improved slightly and they were given the right to
be promoted to sergeant while demobilized Jewish soldiers
were allowed to live outside the *Pale of Settlement. The seizure of Jewish children for military service was abolished and
the maximum period of service was reduced to 15 years. In
1874 a law was enacted introducing universal military service
obliging all Russian citizens to report for military service at the
age of 21. The effect of the new law was to grant Jews equality
Austro-Hungary
The Austro-Hungarian Empire generally adopted an enlightened policy toward its Jews. In 1782 Joseph II granted civic
rights to the Jews and six years later Jews were declared fit for
military service, though the right was at first restricted to serving in the supply corps in the province of Galicia where most
Jews lived. Later Jews were allowed to serve in all branches of
the Hapsburg army. During the Revolutionary and Napoleonic
wars (17921813) many Jews served in the Austro-Hungarian
army. Some were allowed to become officers. In 1818 Jews were
officially accepted as officers even in the conservative cavalry regiments. Nevertheless, several professing Jews rose to
the rank of general in the Hapsburg army, among them Field
Marshal-Lieutenant Joseph *Singer who was chief of staff of
the Third Army, and Major General Alexander von *Eis and
Field Marshal-Lieutenant Eduard von *Schweitzer, both of
whom commanded major Austrian army units. The comparatively generous treatment of Jews in the Austro-Hungarian
army led many Jews to take up a military career, especially as
certain other professions were closed to them. In 1855 there
were 157 Jewish officers in the Hapsburg army and by 1893 this
number had risen to 2,179 or 8 of all the officers in the Hapsburg army. A number of Jews also became prominent in the
navy, including Tobias von Oesterreicher, who was the first
Austrian Jew to be promoted to rear admiral, and two battleship commanders (sea captains), Friedrich Pick (18391908)
and Moritz von Funk (18311905). Nearly 300,000 Jews fought
in the Austro-Hungarian army during World War I. Among
2,500 officers were three field marshal-lieutenants, Eduard von
Schweitzer, Adolph Kornhaber (18561925), and Hazai *Samu,
and five major generals, Simon *Vogel, Johann Mestitz, Leopold Austerlitz, Emil von *Sommer, and Mrton Zld. Nearly
30,000 Jewish soldiers were killed during the four years of war,
including 600 Austrian Jewish officers. After the collapse of
the Hapsburg Empire Jews played an increasingly smaller part
in the armed forces of both Austria and Hungary, and following the advent of Fascist and pro-Nazi regimes in the 1930s
they ceased to serve in the armed forces altogether. One out-
241
military service
standing figure of the post-World War I period was General
Vilmos Bhm (18801947) who was commander in chief of
the Hungarian army during the four-month Soviet dictatorship of Bla *Kun in 1919.
U.S.S.R.
Following the Revolution of February 1917, Jews were granted
equal rights and for the first time were allowed to become
army officers. Many were transferred to officers schools and
on graduating received the rank of sub-officer (praporshchik). When the Bolsheviks seized power in November 1917,
many Jewish soldiers fought in the Red Army organized by
Leon *Trotsky, aided by Skliansky and Jacob Sverdlov. Four
divisional commanders were Jews and a few units consisted
solely of Jews such as the brigade commanded by Joseph Furman. After the civil war J.B. Goldberg became commander of
a reserve army. Among Jews who obtained senior army commands were Grigori Stern, Jan Gamarnik, and Feldman. Most
of them were executed during Stalins purges, a notable exception being Stern, who was sent to the Far East (1935), where he
routed the Japanese army which had invaded Soviet territory.
He later commanded the Soviet Far Eastern Forces with the
rank of full general and drove the Japanese from Mongolian
territory. Sterns army was assisted by air force units under
Yaacov *Shmushkevich, appointed commander in chief of the
Soviet air force in 1940.
WORLD WAR II. Following the outbreak of World War II, the
Soviet Union annexed the Baltic state and territories in eastern
Poland and Belorussia thus incorporating a large number of
Jews within its borders. After the German invasion of Russia,
Polish and Belorussian soldiers in the Soviet army were considered of suspect loyalty and were transferred to labor battalions. In December 1941, however, the order was revoked and
Jews from the Baltic states were permitted to serve in all units
of the Soviet army. Subsequently four Lithuanian Jews were
made Heroes of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Jewish historian
Jacob Kantor estimated that almost half a million Jews fought
in the Soviet army in World War II of whom at least 140 were
awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union (the official Soviet
Number of Jewish Generals in the Soviet Army during World War II,
by Corps
No. of Jewish Generals
13
13
10
10
6
5
4
4
2
2
2
1
242
Corps
figure is 107). Jews constituted a disproportionately large number of senior officers, largely because the percentage of Jews
having a university education was higher than that of other
nationalities. More than 100 Jews held the rank of general (see
the partial Table: Jewish Generals in the Soviet Army).
Jewish generals were particularly prominent as field
commanders, notably General Jacob *Kreiser. Other Jewish
commanders at the battle of Stalingrad included Lt. Gen. I.S.
Beskin and Major Gen. (later Lt. Gen.) Matvey Weinrub. Jewish generals also held key commands during the final assault
on Berlin. Lieutenant General Hirsh Plaskov was artillery
commander of the Second Guards Army, Lieutenant General Semion Krivoshein commanded one of the first corps to
break into Berlin in the spring of 1945, and Lieutenant General Weinrub was artillery commander of the Eighth Guards
Army. Special mention should also be made of the Jewish Cossack commander, Major General Lev Dovator, who was killed
during the first Soviet offensive in December 1941, Lieutenant
General David Dragunski, who was twice made a Hero of the
Soviet Union, and Major Caesar Konikov, whose courageous
defense of the fishing village of Stanichka for seven months
led to the village being renamed Kunikovo after his death. In
addition Colonel General Leonti Kotlyar was commander
of the engineering corps and six Jews held the rank of major general in the medical services (where there were a large
number of Jewish doctors and nurses): Vovsy, Levitt, David
Entin, Reingold, Gurvich, and Slavin. A number of Jews were
given the award Hero of the Soviet Union in the Soviet air
force, among them Michael Plotkin, who flew in the first Soviet bombing raid on Berlin in August 1941, Henryk Hofman,
and four women: Polina Gelman, Zina Hofman, Lila Litvak,
and Rachel Zlotina, who belonged to a womens air regiment.
Two Jewish Soviet submarine commanders became Heroes
of the Soviet Union Israel Fisanovich and Isaac Kabar as
did Abraham Sverdlov who commanded a flotilla of torpedo
boats. Jews were also prominent among the partisans, constituting more than 20,000 men in separate units in the Polish-Russian border areas. The official Soviet history of the war
mentions the names of several Jewish partisan heroes, among
them N.S. Kagan, one of seven Moscow Komsomol members
hanged by the Germans while on a mission behind enemy
lines, L.E. Bernstein, commander of the Pozharski unit which
joined the Slovak rising against the Germans, and Vladimir
Epstein, who escaped from Auschwitz to form a partisan unit
in Poland. (See also *Partisans.)
AFTER WORLD WAR II. Although famous Jewish generals
such as Dragunski and Kreiser retained their popularity after
World War II, Soviet policy toward the Jewish soldier changed
for the worse, in accordance with general Soviet policy toward
the Jews. It is believed that nearly all the Jewish generals of
World War II were retired by 1953 as were nearly 300 Jewish
colonels and lieutenant colonels. By 1970 the number of Jewish senior officers on active service in the Soviet army had
declined drastically.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
military service
Italy
Before the beginning of the 19t century Jews were forbidden
to bear arms in any of the Italian states or to be a member of
any military organization. The French Revolution, however,
led to the demand for equal rights in Italy as elsewhere and
the Jews were among the beneficiaries of progressive legislation. Following the conquest of north Italy by Napoleon, Italian Jews even established their own units and fought with the
emperor all over Europe. However, during the reactionary period in north Italy following the final defeat of Napoleon in
1815, Jews were debarred from military service. After the decree of March 1848 granting Jews full equality in Piedmont, 235
Jews volunteered for the Piedmontese army in the war against
Austria. Enrico *Guastalla was among the Italian soldiers who
captured Rome in 1849, and among the Piedmontese troops
fighting on the allied side in the Crimean War (185456) was
Colonel Cesare Rovighi who later became aide-de-camp to
King Victor Emanuel I. In the war against Austria, 185960,
260 Jews volunteered for the Piedmontese armies and several
were awarded medals. There were 11 Jews among the 1,000 led
by Garibaldi who captured southern Italy and Sicily from the
Bourbons and Enrico Guastalla later became one of Garibaldis chief lieutenants. In 1870, 236 Jews were among the victorious Italian army which conquered Rome. Jewish soldiers
were subject to no restrictions in the army of united Italy
and the percentage of Jewish officers was disproportionately
large. Many Jews held the rank of general in the Italian army.
They included Lieutenant General Achille Coen (18511925),
Lieutenant General Emanuele *Pugliese, Lieutenant General
Roberto *Segre, Lieutenant General Angelo *Arbib (Arbid),
Lieutenant General Angelo Modena, and others. Other Jewish soldiers rose to high military rank, among them Lieutenant General Giuseppe *Ottolenghi who was minister of war
from 1902 to 1904. In all, several thousand Jewish officers and
men fought in the Italian army in World War I.
Other Jewish officers included four major generals: Carlo
Archivolti (18731944), Armando *Bachi, Adolfo Olivetti
(18781944), and Giacomo Almagia (18761947), and 12 brigadier generals. Five Jews became admirals in the Italian navy.
Augusto Capon, Franco Nunes (18681943), and Guido Segre
(18711942) were full admirals, and Vice Admiral Paolo Marani
(18841950) and Rear Admiral Aldo Ascoli (18821956) commanded ships in the invasion of Abyssinia in 1935. In November
1938 a new law was promulgated prohibiting Jews from serving in the armed forces and all the Jewish generals and admirals were forced to retire. During World War II no Jews fought
in the army of Benito Mussolini, and some joined the partisan
underground movement. Nevertheless two Jews were specially
recalled to service because of particular skills: these were Rear
Admiral Pontremoli and Major General Umberto Pugliese
(18801961). The latter was given the task of raising Italian naval
vessels sunk by the British at Taranto. After World War II Giorgio *Liuzzi who was one of the senior officers retired in 1938
was recalled to active service and was chief of staff of the Italian
army from 1956 to 1958 with the rank of lieutenant general.
Germany
In the early Middle Ages, Jews were accorded the right to bear
arms. Later on, however, with the deterioration in their social
and political standing after the upheavals of the *Crusades,
this right was gradually withdrawn until by the middle of the
13t century Jews, numbered with women, children, and clerics, as being forbidden to bear arms. Exceptions to this rule
were rare during the following centuries (see Jud *Michel),
though Jews were very prominent as military *contractors
(purveyors of livestock, fodder, food, uniforms, etc.) in the
17t and 18t centuries.
The first German Jews conscripted in modern times were
from the left bank of the Rhine occupied by revolutionary and
Napoleonic France. German states under French influence
followed suit (*Westphalia). In 1812 Prussia decreed that Jews
were liable to military service and when the War of Liberation
broke out a year later many hundreds volunteered, 82 of them
receiving decorations. Nevertheless, Frederick William II repudiated his promise that war veterans could receive positions,
irrespective of religion, and even wounded veterans suffered
discrimination. The sole Jewish officer in the army during his
reign was Major Meno Burg (17871853), who owed his position to the influence of the kings brother, the commander of
the artillery. It was commonly accepted that Jews were inferior soldiers and that their service was mainly of educational
and assimilatory value.
In 1845 the first Jewish officers were commissioned into
the Prussian reserve forces, the Landwehr. Until about 1885,
Jewish officers, primarily university graduates, were commissioned by co-option; but after this date virtually none became
officers, despite their exemplary service in the Austro-Prussian
(1866) and Franco-Prussian (187071) wars, because of growing antisemitism. An exception was Walther von *Mossner, the
sole senior Jewish officer in the Prussian army, and he owed his
position to personal connections with the king and converted
to Christianity during his career. Most German states followed
Prussias discriminatory policy (particularly Hanover) while
others were more liberal, Bavaria permitting Jewish officers
to rise to the upper ranks in the standing army. During the
1848 Revolution Jews enlisted in the National Guard, where
they were reluctantly accepted. That year the first Jewish doctor was commissioned in Prussia, and subsequently, due to
the lack of physicians, the medical corps harbored Jewish officers in large numbers without permitting them to become
senior officers.
Many thousands of Jews fought in the German army in
World War I. About 2,000 Jewish officers were commissioned
and 12,000 Jews were killed in battle. Nevertheless, during and
after the war there was an ugly upsurge of accusations that
Jews had either not enlisted or shirked front-line service. To
combat this propaganda the Reichsbund juedischer Frontsoldaten, an association of Jewish war veterans, was founded. In
1917 the War Ministry ordered a thorough survey conducted
to find the number and proportion of Jews serving in frontline units. The results and the dubious manner in which they
243
military service
had been obtained became the subject of a bitter public controversy. In fact, the percentage of Jews was almost equal to
that of Christians; that it was not higher is explained by the diminishing birthrate among German Jewry (between 1880 and
1930) which resulted in a lower proportion of those of military
age relative to the non-Jewish population. After World War I
the small professional army of the Weimar Republic contained
few Jews, who were all removed in 1933.
[Henry Wasserman]
France
During the Middle Ages Jews were generally excluded from
military service except in times of emergency. Their position
remained unchanged until 1789 when, following the outbreak
of the French Revolution, all Frenchmen, including Jews, were
made liable for military service. Many Jews served in Napoleons armies, among them Brigadier General Marc-Jean-Jerome Wolffe (17761848) who commanded the first cavalry
brigade of the Grande Arme and Captain Alexandre Marcquefoy who was awarded the Legion of Honor by Napoleon
himself; 800 Jews were estimated to be serving under Napoleon in 1808, among them a number of Italians and Poles.
Berek (Berko) *Joselewicz, the Polish patriot, commanded a
regiment in Napoleons Polish Legion. The outstanding Jewish soldier in Napoleons army was Henri *Rottenbourg who
was made major general in 1814. Nevertheless, conditions of
the Jewish soldiers were made difficult by the refusal of many
commanding officers to allow Jews into their ranks and the
restrictions on the rights of promotion.
During the early part of the 19t century an increasing
number of Jews fought in the French army and a few achieved
considerable prominence, among them Colonel Martin Cerfbeer, Captain Abraham Lvy, Captain M. Vormess, and Captain Benot Lvy who were all awarded the Legion of Honor.
No exact details are available as to the number of Jews who
fought in the Crimean War (185456) but several won awards
for gallantry, among them Leopold *See and Colonel Abraham Lvy. In the Italian war of 1859 See and Lvy were again
decorated as was Major Adolph Abraham, and in the FrancoPrussian War (187071), Colonel Jules Moch and Captain Halphen broke through the Prussian lines after the French army
had been surrounded at Metz. In that war Major Franchetti
was posthumously decorated having fallen during the siege
of Paris. During the Third Republic (18701940), Jews entered
the French army in unprecedented numbers and 23 rose to
the rank of general. Although subject to no official restrictions, Jews were frequently the target of antisemitic attacks,
the most notable occasion being the *Dreyfus case. The outstanding Jewish officers of the period before World War I
were: Major Generals Leopold See, Aim *Lambert, Abraham Lvy, and Naquet-Laroque (18431921), and Brigadier
Generals Edgar Wolffe (c. 18401901), Gabriel Gustave Brisac
(1817c. 1890), Adolphe Hinstin (c. 1820c. 1890), Bernard
Abraham (1824c. 1900), and Adolphe Aron (c. 1840c. 1910).
On the outbreak of World War I, several hundred Jews vol-
244
military service
hundred. During the uprising in the year following the second
partition of Poland of 1793, numbers of Jews joined the revolutionary army along with other Poles and many Jews fought
in the Polish force which drove the Russians out of Warsaw.
Later in 1794, a Jewish cavalry legion was formed under the
command of Berek Joselewicz, initially numbering 500 men
and later nearly 2,000. The Jewish legion distinguished itself
in the defense of Warsaw but was completely wiped out in the
Russian massacre in the suburb of Praga after the collapse of
the rebellion. At the turn of the 19t century a number of Jews
joined Napoleons army and fought for France in Italy and
Eastern Europe. Joselewicz himself commanded a regiment
of Polish cavalry, and another Polish Jew, Caspar Junghof, was
awarded the Legion of Honor. Similarly Jews volunteered for
the army of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw established by Napoleon in 1807. Among them was Josef *Berkowicz, the son of
Joselewicz, who fought with other Poles in the French army
which invaded Russia in 1812.
After the defeat of Napoleon in 1814, Jews in the area of
Poland under czarist rule played an active part in the Polish
uprisings of 1830, 1848, and 1863. During World War I, Polish
Jews fought in units of both the armies of the Allies and the
central powers. A number of Polish Jews in the Russian Austro-Hungarian and French armies were decorated. After the
war thousands of Jews fought in the Polish army against Russia, among them Colonel Goldman, Colonel Karaffa-Kreutenkraft, and Colonel Floyar-Reichman. Nevertheless, Polish
antisemitism permeated the army and all the other organs of
state, and although there were never less than 20,000 Jews in
the Polish army between the wars, very few Jewish soldiers
held high military rank. An outstanding exception was Bernhard *Mond who was promoted to colonel in 1924 and on
the outbreak of World War II commanded the Fifth Infantry
Division with the rank of major general. The condition of the
Jewish soldier improved during the nine-year rule of Joseph
Pilsudski (192635) but deteriorated after his death. Nevertheless, 400,000 Jews were recruited into the Polish army on the
outbreak of World War II and many thousands were killed in
battle during the four weeks of fighting. A large number of
Jewish soldiers were taken prisoner by the Russians and interned in the Soviet Union. In 1942 an agreement between
the U.S.S.R. and the Polish government in exile resulted in
the formation of a Polish army in Russia under General Anders. Although Jews were generally excluded from this army,
usually on the pretext that they were unsuitable for military
service, 4,000 fought in General Anders army in Western Europe while over 5,000 Jews fought in a second Polish army in
Russia, a large number of them holding officers rank. In addition many more Jews fought in Polish units serving in the
armies of other Allied states.
Despite the fact that the Jewish population of Poland was
decimated by the Holocaust, a large number of Jews joined the
Polish army and after World War II many held senior ranks.
Following the Six-Day *War in 1967, however, nearly all of
them were removed from their posts.
Romania
Romania became an independent kingdom in 1881. Restrictions were subsequently placed upon the right of Jews to serve
in the armed forces despite the fact that nearly 1,000 Romanian Jews had fought against the Turks in the Balkan War of
1877. An outstanding Jewish soldier in the Romanian army was
Colonel Maurice Brociner (18551942) who was decorated for
gallantry in 1877 and in 1882 was made secretary to Charles I,
king of Romania. In 1896 a law was enacted prohibiting Jews
from volunteering for the Romanian army but in 1913, following the involvement of Romania in the Balkan Wars, the law
was rescinded. During World War I, 20,000 Jews fought in the
Romanian army, including several hundred officers. Thirtyseven Jewish officers and 845 men were known to have died.
After World War I a large number of Jews served in the Romanian army, and some rose to the rank of officer. During World
War II, however, Nazi pressure led the Romanian government
to remove all the Jews from the Romanian army. Few Jews
served in the army of Communist Romania after 1945.
245
Bulgaria
Following Bulgarian independence in 1878 Jews were given
equal rights with the rest of the population. Bulgarian Jews
fought in the Turkish army when Bulgaria was under Turkish
rule, and after independence they joined the Bulgarian army
in the thousands. Many Jewish soldiers distinguished themselves during the Serbo-Bulgarian war of 1885 and were described by Prince Alexander of Bulgaria as true descendants
of the ancient Maccabeans. Despite growing antisemitism,
no restrictions were placed on Jews entering the army or even
the officers training schools. Five thousand Jews fought in the
Bulgarian army in the Balkan Wars (191213) and several hundreds of them were killed. In World War I a number of Jews
reached senior army ranks, among them three Jewish colonels
Graziani, Tajar, and Mushanov. Over 700 Jews were killed in
the war, among them 28 officers. Between the wars, Jewish soldiers continued to enjoy equal rights in the Bulgarian army
until 1940 when Bulgaria allied herself with Nazi Germany. All
Jews were removed from the Bulgarian army and organized
into labor units to perform manual work. Many of them were
later sent to concentration camps but some succeeded in joining the partisans headed by the Fatherland Front. After the
war most of Bulgarias surviving Jews emigrated to Israel and
hardly any joined the army of Communist Bulgaria.
Greece
Greek Jews were subject to continual persecution for many
years after Greek independence in 1821. Very few Jews joined
the army until the outbreak of the Greco-Turkish War of 1897
in which 200 Jews fought in the Greek army. Abraham Matalon rose to the rank of colonel during World War I and was
one of several Jewish soldiers to have been decorated. The
total number of Greek Jews fighting in World War I was estimated at 500. Many Jews fought in the Greek army against
Italy in 1940 and by 1942, when the Germans invaded Greece,
over 13,000 Jews had been recruited, many of them from Sa-
military service
lonika and Macedonia where there were large concentrations of Jews. Five hundred and thirteen Jews were known to
have been killed in action, among them Colonel Mordechai
Parisi, who was killed after holding off an entire Italian brigade for nine days. A monument was erected in his memory
in his native town of Chalcis and 25 Greek towns have streets
named after him. Following the German conquest of Greece,
many Jews were deported to concentration camps. Among the
Greek Jews deported to Auschwitz was Colonel Baruch who
set fire to part of the gas chambers and was later killed by the
Nazis. A few Greek Jews joined the partisan movement in the
mountains of northern Greece and some fought in the Allied
armies in North Africa.
Switzerland
Before 1850 Jews were exempted from military service upon
payment of a tax. In 1866 Jews were granted equal rights including the obligation of military service but even before the
law of 1866 certain cantons permitted Jews to bear arms, the
first of them being Aargau where the civil authorities acceded
to a request of Marcus Dreyfus, head of the Jewish community. In 1855 Moritz Meyer from Aargau was made an officer
and several other Jews became officers during the latter part
of the 19t century. Several hundred Jews were recruited into
the Swiss army for border defense during the two world wars
and two Jewish soldiers rose to the rank of colonel: A. Nordman and his son, Jean Nordman.
Holland
Jews were allowed to bear arms in Holland from the 17t century when the country became an independent state under the
House of Orange. In 1808, during Napoleonic rule, Jews were
granted equal rights and were therefore obliged to do military
service along with the rest of the population. The number of
Jews serving in the Dutch army grew steadily during the 19t
century and a few Jewish soldiers were singled out for merit,
one of them, Michael Kohen (b. 1877), being decorated for
outstanding bravery in the fighting in Surinam. Thousands of
Jews fought against the Nazi invasion of Holland in May 1940
and a small number of them succeeded in escaping to Britain
to continue fighting from there. After World War II, hardly
any Jews served in the Dutch armed forces.
Other Countries
A small number of Jewish soldiers rose to fame in India,
the Middle East, and North Africa, some of them serving as
soldiers of fortune. Some of the Jewish soldiers of fortune
achieved fame in the Turkish army in which several thousand Jews fought during the Balkan wars of the 19t century.
Fischel-Freind (18851928), a Polish Jew, became a colonel
in the Turkish army and was later governor of Syria with the
title Magyar Mahmud Pasha. An English Jew, Stephen Lakeman (18121897), was briefly a Turkish general with the title,
Mazar Pasha. In addition David Effendi Molcho, a Jew from
Salonika, was made head of the Turkish navys medical services with the rank of vice admiral. Another Jewish soldier of
246
military service
take up arms was considered a privilege to which Jews were
not entitled. Even where they did fight they were usually restricted in their right to hold officers rank (as in Prussia and
Russia) or were excluded from certain branches of the army
such as the general staff in Austria-Hungary. In the 20t century most restrictions on Jews as soldiers were removed but
only in France, Italy, and Austria-Hungary was the number of
Jewish senior officers relatively high. Vilmos Bhm and Giorgio Liuzzi were the only Jews to become commanders in chief
of an army, the former when he held this post in the shortlived regime of Bela Kun in Hungary, the latter in Italy. Three
other Jews reached the rank of full general: John *Monash,
Grigori Stern, and Jacob *Kreyzer; and three Jews the rank
of full admiral: Ben Moreel (1892?), Augusto *Capon, and
Roberto Segre (18721942). One Jew, Yaacov *Shmushkevich,
was commander of an air force.
Jewish Chaplaincy
In most countries of Europe where Jews have volunteered or
been enlisted into the armed forces, provision has been made
for the appointment of chaplains to look after the religious
needs of servicemen and women in times of war and peace.
One can generally say that from the middle of the 19t century, following the political emancipation of the Jews, Judaism became a recognized denomination having more or less
the same privileges and obligations as those of other denominations. Commissioned chaplains were given relative military rank, senior chaplains having the relative rank of colonel, lieutenant colonel, or major. This was the case in Austria,
France, Prussia, Britain, Belgium, Italy, Holland, and Poland.
In Britain in 1889 Judaism was recognized as a denomination
for the purpose of chaplaincy in the forces. The first Jewish
chaplain was Rabbi Francis L. Cohen who was appointed in
1892. In European countries, such as Italy and Belgium, chaplains were first commissioned during World War I when the
number of Jews serving in the various national armies increased considerably. In World War I Jewish chaplains, with
the approval, and sometimes at the request of the superior
commanding officer, rendered service to the Jews in occupied
territories. Thus German Jewish chaplains acted as intermediaries between the German army authorities and Jewish civilians in Poland and in northern France. They also provided
religious appurtenances and Passover requirements (such as
maz z ot and haggadot). British chaplains performed similar
services for Jewish civilians in northern France and Belgium.
They were supported by chaplains attached to the forces of
Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa, and chaplains also served with the Jewish units serving in Palestine and
Egypt. A number of chaplains in both the Allied and central
armies were decorated for bravery. An outstanding example
of bravery was that of Rabbi A. Bloch of the French army who
was killed by a shell in 1914 after seeking a crucifix for a severely wounded Frenchman when there was no priest available. During World War II there was a further increase in the
number of chaplains in the Allied forces. On the other hand
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
247
military service
Leonard Levy of Philadelphia were commissioned. Rabbi Joseph *Krauskopf of Philadelphia spent the summer of 1898
at military camps in the United States and in Cuba as a field
commissioner for the National Relief Commission, and conducted religious services for Jewish personnel. A number of
other rabbis also conducted services at camps adjacent to the
communities in which their congregations were located.
In 1917 the *National Jewish Welfare Board (JWB) was organized to serve the religious and morale needs of Jewish soldiers and sailors in the U.S. armed forces during World War I.
One of the duties assigned to the JWB by the government was
the recruiting and endorsing of Jewish military chaplains. In
October 1917 Congress authorized the appointment of chaplains-at-large of faiths not now represented in the body of
Chaplains of the Army. As a result, 149 of the 400 Englishspeaking rabbis in the United States volunteered, and 34 received the ecclesiastical endorsement of the JWBs Chaplains
Committee. Of these, 26 received commissions. The first Jewish chaplain commissioned was Rabbi Elkan C. Voorsanger of
St. Louis, who earned two decorations for gallantry under fire,
and became senior chaplain of the 77t Division.
After World War I, some chaplains maintained reserve
commissions, and a number of younger rabbis enlisted in the
reserves between 1918 and 1940. As World War II approached,
the chaplaincy underwent a major reorganization. Cyrus
*Adler was succeeded by Rabbi David de Sola *Pool as chairman of the JWB Chaplaincy Committee, and the committee
was renamed Committee on Army and Navy Religious Activities (CANRA) of the JWB. Rabbi Phillip S. *Bernstein was
named executive director. By the time the United States entered World War II, 24 Jewish chaplains were on active duty.
By the end of the war 311 rabbis had been commissioned and
served in the armed forces; seven died in service, among them
Alexander Goode who was one of four chaplains who lost their
lives on the military transport, S.S. Dorchester. CANRA provided the chaplains with vast supplies of religious literature,
equipment, and kosher foods in a supply line that reached
around the world. Two tasks of special importance performed
by Jewish chaplains were their work as leaders in the first penetration of areas cut off from Jewish contacts during the Nazi
occupation, and their aid to concentration camp survivors.
After World War II the chaplaincy became a career for some,
and a way for the promotion of senior Jewish chaplains to key
administrative chaplaincy posts. Many of those who did not
choose a career in the chaplaincy retained their reserve commission. Only 18 Jewish chaplains remained on active duty at
the outbreak of war in Korea in 1950. Twelve Jewish chaplains
were decorated in that war.
After World War II CANRA was renamed to emphasize
its function within the JWB organization, which finances it,
first as the Division of Religious Activities and, after the outbreak of the Korean War, as the Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy of the JWB Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox rabbis rotated as commission chairmen for three-year terms. The
commission instituted a draft to supply 100 Jewish chaplains;
248
milken, michael R.
ite zur Abwehr Anti-semitischer Angriffe in Berlin, Juden als Soldaten
(1896); M. Fruehling, Biographisches Handbuch (1911); Wiener Library,
German Jewry (1958), 2014; H. Fischer, Judentum, Staat und Heer in
Preussen (1968); R. Ainsztein, in: L. Kochan (ed.), Jews in Soviet Russia
(1970), 26987. JEWISH CHAPLAINCY OUTSIDE THE U.S.: I. Brodie,
in: AJYB, 48 (1946/47), 58ff.; Ha-Gedudim ha Ivriyyim be-Milh emet
ha-Olam ha-Rishonah (1968); A. Tabian, Australian Jewish Historical Society Transactions, 6 (1965), 344; South African Jewry in World
War II (1950); Illustrierte Neue Welt (June 1970), 26; LAumz nerie militaire belge (1966), 88; Redier et Honesque, LAumz nerie militaire franaise (1960). IN THE U.S.: L. Barish (ed.), Rabbis in Uniform (1962);
O.I. Janowsky et al., Change and Challenge: A History of Fifty Years of
JWB (1966), 8083; JWB Circle, 1 (1946 ), index. Add. Bibliography: A.I. Slomovitz, The Fighting Rabbis: Jewish Military Chaplains
and American History (1998).
MILKEN, MICHAEL R. (1946 ), U.S. investor, philanthropist. Nicknamed the junk bond king, Milken, by using
a little-noticed financial tool, transformed corporate takeovers
and financing in the 1970s and 1980s, amassing great personal
wealth $200 million to $550 million a year through what
some considered questionable financial dealings. In 1989 a
federal grand jury indicted Milken for violations of federal
securities and racketeering laws. He pleaded guilty to securities fraud and related charges in 1990, and the government
dropped the more serious charges of insider trading and racketeering. Milken was fined and sentenced to 10 years in prison
but in 1991 his sentence was reduced to two years plus three
years probation. Barred from the securities business for life,
Milken worked as a strategic business consultant after his release from prison. The Securities and Exchange Commission
charged that this work was a violation of his probation, and
in 1998 Milken settled with the SEC and paid the government
$42 million in fees that he had earned plus interest.
Michael Robert Milken grew up in Encino, Calif. His
paternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Poland.
He attended the University of California at Berkeley during the height of protest movements in the mid-1960s and
graduated as a business major with highest honors. He began
his financial career at the university, when he invested money
for his fraternity brothers in return for 50 percent of the
profits. With no returns to his clients on losses, Milken had
virtual assurance of profitability. At that time he developed
a theory about low-grade junk bonds. Milken believed
that under a revised rating system, one that also factored the
potentials for return on investment, cash flow, business plans,
personnel and corporate vision, junk bonds might pose
a worthwhile risk. In 1970, after earning a masters degree
from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania,
Milken went to work for the Drexel Corporation as assistant
to the chairman and later became head of bond research.
When Drexel merged with Burnham & Co. in 1973, Milken
headed the noninvestment-grade bond-trading department,
an operation that earned 100 percent return on investment.
In 1977 Milken returned to California and moved his HighYield Bond Department to Los Angeles. Milkens younger
brother Lowell joined him. In the early 1980s Drexel-Burnham
began using the highly confident letter, a correspondence
designed to convince commercial banks to finance corporate
takeovers. The letters stated that Drexel was highly confident
the funds could be raised to finance the deal. In the companys first attempt at this scheme, Milken raised $1.5 billion in
48 hours. In 1982, Drexel-Burnham took on a new client, the
financier Ivan *Boesky. Milkens dealings with him violated
the securities law. In June 1989 Milken resigned from Drexel
to form his own company, International Capital Access
Group. The new venture was unsuccessful largely because
Milken was fighting the SEC charges in a 98-count indictment. Eventually, he issued an apology and admitted that he
cheated clients and plotted with Boesky to accomplish a corporate raid.
249
In Halakhah
The milk of clean animals such as cows, sheep, and goats, etc.,
although it comes from the living (min ha-h ai, Bek. 6b), is
permitted for consumption, but not the milk of unclean animals or of those suffering from visible disease which causes the
animal to be ritually unfit for consumption (terefah), or that or
an animal which after ritual slaughtering is found to have suffered from such a disease. In the latter case, all milk which the
animal produced during the three days before it was slaughtered is forbidden to be used (Sh. Ar., YD 81:2). Milk bought
from a non-Jew is forbidden for consumption out of fear that
he may have mixed it, either through carelessness or in order to
improve it, with milk of unclean animals. If a Jew was present at
the milking, the milk may be used (ibid., 115:1). There are, however, opinions that nowadays, even if the Jews did not supervise
the milking, the milk is permitted since the law of the land forbids adulterating the milk. By many authorities butter made by
gentiles is permitted for consumption on the grounds that butter cannot be produced from the milk of unclean animals (Av.
Zar. 35b, Maim. Yad, Maakhalot Asurot, 3:12, 15, 16).
milkweed
Milken completed his prison term in 1993. He cofounded a company called Education Entertainment Network, which produces business videos. In 1996 he and Larry
*Ellison founded Knowledge Universe, a company dealing in
a diverse variety of goods and services, including day care,
executive education, corporate training, and toys. The SEC
came after him again. He admitted no wrongdoing but paid a
fine of $47 million in response to accusations that he served
as a broker.
Milken used his personal fortune and high-level contacts
to become an influential voice in economics, education, and
medical research. In 1982 he co-founded the Milken Family
Foundation to support medical education and research. In
1991 he founded the Milken Institute, a kind of think tank
that sponsors prestigious international conferences. In 1993,
after he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, he founded the
Prostate Cancer Foundation, the worlds largest philanthropic
source of funds for prostate cancer research. The Milken
Family Foundation, through the Milken National Educator
Awards, founded in 1985, awarded $52 million to honor more
than 2,000 teachers and principals, with each educator receiving an unrestricted $25,000 prize.
Milkens philanthropy some critics questioned his motives was widespread. In 1995 he donated $5 million to a
large Jewish secondary school in Los Angeles. In gratitude the
school was to be renamed Milken Community High School
of Stephen Wise Temple until parents and students objected.
However, a number of Milken grants to Jewish causes endure.
The Skirball Cultural Center, one of the most prominent cultural venues in the United States, has a Milken Gallery, for
which the Milken Family Foundation was the lead benefactor. It contains exhibits that explore the connections between
the 4,000 years of Jewish heritage and the vitality of American
democratic ideals. The Milken Archive of American Jewish
Music is an international undertaking to record, preserve, and
distribute a vast cross-section of American Jewish music covering 350 years. The archive comprises 50 CDs and 600 works
on the Naxos American Classical label, the largest collection of
American Jewish music ever assembled. The archive has also
videotaped more than 100 oral histories of composers, conductors and performers and commissioned a comprehensive
history of American Jewish music. The Milken Family Foundation is also a major supporter of American Friends of the
Hebrew University, and the foundation for many years has
supported the College of Judea and Samaria, the largest public college in Israel. It has a Milken Family Campus, embodying its teaching and research laboratories as well as its library,
main administration building and computer center.
[Stewart Kampel (2nd ed.)]
MILKWEED, plant of the Euphorbiaceae family. Many genera comprising scores of species are found in Israel. Attempts
have been made to identify them with plants mentioned in
the Bible, but such attempts are without foundation. One
plant mentioned in the Mishnah belongs to the Asclepiada-
250
ceae family: the Calotropis procera, the mishnaic Petilat haMidbar (desert wick, Shab. 2:1). It is a shrub growing in the
salt Jordan valley and the Arabah. It has large leaves and its
fruit is like a big lemon, but instead of juice it contains many
seeds enveloped in shining silky fibers. These are used for
making cushions, and wicks too can be prepared from them,
but since the oil does not rise well in the fiber its use for the
Sabbath lamp is forbidden (Shab. ibid.). The popular name
of the fruit is Sodom apple, which has no connection with
the vine of Sodom (Deut. 32:32). Milkweed is mentioned by
Josephus (Wars, 4:484) who points out that this fruit of Sodom appears edible but on being opened turns to dust. The
reference is to the seeds, which have hairy adhesions by which
they are broadcast.
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 282f.; J. Feliks, Olam
ha-Z omeah ha-Mikrai (19683), 82. Add. Bibliography: Feliks,
Ha-Tzomeah , 131.
[Jehuda Feliks]
Miller, Arthur
unknowable complexity in his work. Very often the motivations of his characters are vague and mysterious. He offered
no succinct answers to the problems he presented; indeed he
may have believed there were none.
He acquired an international reputation after World
War II, following the publication of two plays and of Focus
(1945), a novel about antisemitism. In it, a pair of glasses allows a man to see better as it encourages others to see him
differently. A meek gentile, who, as part of his job, identifies
Jewish job applicants, is mistaken to be Jewish when he begins
wearing a pair of glasses. He loses his job and can only find
employment in the office of Jewish businessmen. He passively
participates in the antisemitism in his initial job, in his neighborhood, where hatred of Jews reaches a virulent level, and at
home. Ultimately he redeems himself by trying to stop vandals
from destroying the store of a Jewish shopkeeper.
The play All My Sons (1947) revealed his ability to portray characters involved in emotional conflicts. It is a realistic
play, intended for the general public. The dialogue is of common speech. The plot involves an overwhelming crisis growing out of smaller crises. The play has symbolic overtones
despite the realistic characters and plot, which combine to
help Miller focus on his themes of mutual responsibility and
survivor guilt.
His reputation was really established with Death of a
Salesman (1949), which won the Pulitzer Prize for drama. The
play, later made into a motion picture, owed its success to the
delineation of Willy Loman, the unsuccessful traveling salesman, and was regarded as an indictment of the false sense of
values of American life. Miller has stated his initial idea for
the play came from one notion: that the main character would
kill himself. Lomans is a realistic portrayal of decline, of never
quite giving up on the American dream, despite all evidence
to the contrary. His sacrifice is a hopeless attempt to preserve
some personal dignity and to help his family. The audience is
never told if the insurance from his death properly provides
for his family, but there are hints in the play that his death is
in vain, that his plan does not work. Because of his drastic and
self-destructive behavior for what may be an ideological misconception, Willy Loman is one of the great tragic characters
of American drama.
In 1951, engaged by the problem of freedom of speech,
Miller wrote an adaptation of Henrik Ibsens An Enemy of the
People, and in 1953, in his own play The Crucible, he turned to
the Salem witch trials of 1692, and spoke for freedom of conscience during the period of Senator McCarthys anti-communist campaign. Miller hoped the play would be seen as an
affirmation of the struggle for liberty, for keeping ones own
conscience. John Proctor is a strong protagonist, flawed, but
with no misplaced idealism. With Proctor at the center, Miller
plays with the theme of retaining ones sense of morality in the
face of public pressure. The witch-hunt mentality (reminiscent
of the antisemitic hysteria in Focus) has both rational and irrational origins: some, like those causing the fuss, are conscious
of the social and economic power it brings, while others are
251
MILLS VALLICROSA, JOS MARI (18971970), Spanish scholar and historian. Mills Vallicrosa was born in Santa
Coloma de Farns, Spain. From 1925 onward he was professor of Hebrew studies at the University of Barcelona, having
also taught at the University of Madrid. Mills Vallicrosa did
research into the history of Spanish Jewry, medieval Hebrew
poetry, the Bible, and the history of the sciences. He also translated medieval works from Hebrew and Arabic into Spanish.
One of his important studies on Spanish Jewry is Documents
hebraics de jueus catalans (1927), in which he compiled and
explained Hebrew documents of the Catalonian Jews in the
11t12t centuries. Another work of his is Assaig dhistu ria de
les idees fsiques i matemtiques a la Catalunya medieval (1931),
on the history of the development of science in Catalonia. In
the field of the history of science, Mills Vallicrosas studies
on Abraham ibn Ezra and *Abraham bar H iyya are notable,
while in the research into Hebrew poetry and literature a special place is occupied by his work, La poesa sagrada hebraicoespaola (1940). He suggested that antecedents of poetic forms
in medieval Hebrew poetry in Spain can be traced to biblical
poetry (in Sefarad, 1 (1941), 4587). In this field he also published the studies, Yehuda ha-Lev, como poeta y apologista
(1947), and lom ibn Gabirol, como poeta y filsofo (1945).
Mills Vallicrosa published scores of articles in scholarly journals, including Al-Andalus, Sefarad, Revue Internationale de
lHistoire des Sciences, and Osiris: Archeion. Many of his pupils
earned scholarly reputations, among them his own sons. His
wife, FRANCISCA VENDRELL, also a scholar, studied the history of medieval Spanish Jewry. A two-volume Homenaje
containing scholarly articles by Jewish and non-Jewish scholars was published in honor of Mills Vallicrosa in 195456. A
list of his works was published under the title Ttulos y Trabajos de Profesor D. Jos M. Mills Vallicrosa (1950).
add. Bibliography: T.F. Glick, in: Isis, 68 (1977), 27683.
[Haim Beinart]
miller, ben-zion
merely swept up in the supernatural paranoia. Miller adeptly
portrays the act of ruination by accusation. When one character is accused of witchcraft, he has two choices: to confess
and lose his land, or deny and lose his land. When he remains
silent, even to his death, his land at least stays with his family. During the political climate of the McCarthy Red Scare,
this proved to be a profoundly important lesson in social and
individual responsibility. In an odd case of life imitating art,
Miller played Proctor for real. Summoned before McCarthys
House Un-American Activities Committee, Miller was asked
about Communist meetings he had attended. He did not refuse to answer, telling the committee everything they wanted
to know about him, while denying he was a Communist. But
he stopped short of implicating others. As Proctor refused
to speak about people already known to his questioners, so
did Miller. He was found guilty of contempt of court, but
that charge was later reversed. This play was screened as the
Witches of Salem (1957).
A View from the Bridge (1955) again won a Pulitzer Prize.
It showed Miller still striving for significant realistic drama
and imaginative dramatic form. In the play he continued his
practice of trying to mythologize the ordinary and everyday.
Falling short of being entirely uplifting, the play has a positive
message: that life goes on despite any tragedy.
The film script The Misfits (1961), written after his marriage to the screen star Marilyn Monroe, and acted in by her
and Clark Gable, was an unusually sensitive, though commercially unsuccessful, study of loneliness and divorce.
Miller returned to the theater with an autobiographical drama, After the Fall (1964), based largely on his life with
Marilyn Monroe, whom he had divorced in 1962, and relating his own conflicts in love and friendship to the state of the
world. This expressionistic drama concerns the various crises
of Quentin, one of which is his sense of guilt at not experiencing the Nazi death camps. His proximity to Holga, a woman
who has escaped Auschwitz, exacerbates this feeling in him.
He laments his inability to atone for what he feels are sins,
because they are sins of omission, that is, he is guilty, not for
things he has done, but for things he has not done.
Incident at Vichy (1965) deals with the arrest of a number
of Frenchmen, including some Jews, during the Nazi occupation. Each prisoner separates himself from the others while
trying to understand why the Nazis want to destroy them. The
gypsy, the Communist, the Catholic, and the Jew are unable to
come together even as fellow prisoners, even in their hatred of
the Nazis. There is no sense of union, that each is responsible
for the others. One Nazi officer is shown having feelings of
guilt, but he ultimately does nothing about it. Miller stresses
that guilt is not enough, that action is necessary. To deny ones
connection to humanity is to deny ones own humanity.
The Price (1968), depicting a dramatic conflict between
two brothers, had as a central character an old Jew who acted
as a wise commentator.
Miller stated his intention as a dramatist as being to
bring to the stage the thickness, awareness, and complex-
252
miller, louis
London Child Guidance Clinic and chairman and honorary
president of the Association of Child Psychiatry. He showed
a keen interest in the development of medicine in Israel and
in 1953 was elected president of the British Friends of Magen
David Adom. His publications include Modern Psychotherapy
(1930) and Neurosis in War (1940). His wife, BETTY MILLER
(ne Spiro; 19101965), born in Cork, Ireland, was the author
of various novels including Farewell Leicester Square (1940), A
Room in Regents Park (1942), On the Side of the Angels (1945),
and The Death of the Nightingale (1949). She also wrote a biographical study, Robert Browning: A Portrait (1952), and was
elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Their son
JONATHAN MILLER (1934 ) was educated at St. Pauls school
and Cambridge and qualified as a doctor but established his
reputation as an actor in the revue Beyond the Fringe, a satire
on various aspects of British life from Shakespeare to the Royal
Family, which played in London and New York. Later he directed many successful theatrical and television productions,
frequently winning acclaim for his originality. His television
series on the history of medicine, The Body in Question, became internationally known.
Add. Bibliography: ODNB online.
253
miller, louis E.
salem region. In 1959 he returned to his post of director of
Mental Health Services, and in 1970 became chief national
psychiatrist. In 196667, as visiting professor at Northwestern University, he planned and initiated a community mental
health program in Chicago for the State of Illinois. His contributions to mental health theory, research, and practice were
concerned particularly with the effects of socio-cultural and
community influences on mental health and ill health and its
treatment. He integrated this approach with the biological and
psychological interpretations of personality. His publications
include studies concerning the incidence of psychiatric conditions in various cultures in Israel, immigration and mental
health, child rearing on the kibbutz and among Tripolitanian
Jews, aging, urbanization, and social change. He was chairman
of the National Committee for the Study of Drug Abuse and
the Encyclopaedia Judaica (first edition) departmental editor
for Jews in psychiatry.
MILLER, LOUIS E. (pseudonym of Louis E. Bandes; 1866
1927), Yiddish editor and labor leader. Miller was born in Vilna
and became involved in socialist and revolutionary activities
in his boyhood. He fled from Russia at 14 and participated in
migr revolutionary circles in Berlin, Switzerland, Paris, and,
after 1886, in New York. In the U.S. Miller worked in a shirt
factory, and helped found the first shirtmakers union among
Jewish workers. Miller was also deeply involved in the political life of socialist and other labor organizations. In his early
years he remained close to organizations which used Russian
as their language, but in 1889 he represented the Yiddish-language-oriented United Hebrew Trades at the Second International in Paris.
Miller was most influential as editor and writer in Yiddish. In 1890, with Philip *Krantz, Morris *Hillquit, and Abraham *Cahan, he founded the Yiddish-socialist Die Arbeiter
Zeitung (1890). In 1897 he joined Cahan in launching the
daily Forward (1897). In 1905 he broke with Cahan, the editor
in chief of this daily, and founded his own paper Die Wahrheit (1905) which stressed Jewish national aspirations no less
than socialism. When World War I broke out, he espoused the
cause of the Allies, while most of his dailys 100,000 readers
favored Germany as against czarist Russia. The paper continued to lose circulation, and he preferred to resign rather than
to keep silent. He attempted several journalistic ventures after
1917, but never regained his earlier influence with the Yiddish
reading masses.
Bibliography: Rejzen, Leksikon, 2 (1927), 40914; LNYL,
5 (1963), 62831.
[Alexander Tobias]
254
millet
MILLER, MITCH (Mitchell William; 1911 ), U.S. oboist,
record producer, arranger, and conductor. Miller studied piano and oboe and later attended Rochesters Eastman School
of Music (B. Mus., 1932). Miller played oboe with the Rochester Philharmonic (193033) and the CBS symphony orchestra
(193547). In the 1950s he became a major force in the recording industry. Miller was appointed director of artists and repertoire for the classical division of Mercury Records (194750)
and produced a series of major hits, including Frankie Laines
That Lucky Old Sun. When he was in charge of the popular division of Columbia Records (195061), he recorded Guy
Mitchell and Tony Bennett, and signed artists like Mahalia Jackson and Rosemary Clooney. He got Laine to record
High Noon, the title song from the Gary Cooper western,
and played an important role in fostering the 1950s folk revival. Millers own recording career, mostly credited to Mitch
Miller and His Gang, began with his adaptation of the Israeli
folk song Tzena, Tzena, The Civil War Marching Song,
The Yellow Rose of Texas, and the Colonel Bogey March
from The Bridge on the River Kwai. His series of Sing Along
With Mitch albums, in which he led an all-male chorus in
spirited versions of mostly older tunes, led to his own television program Sing Along with Mitch (196065), which became
extremely popular. By 1965 Millers influence had waned. He
appeared as guest conductor of pop concerts and light classical recordings with orchestras in and outside the U.S. Miller
and Freedman edited his Mitch Miller Community Song Book:
A Collection for Group Singing for All Occasions (1999).
Bibliography: Bakers Biographical Dictionary of Musicians
(1997); The Audio Interview Mitch Miller: A Hidden Classic, in:
Audio, 69 (Nov 1985), 4051, (Dec 1985), 4253.
[Naama Ramot (2nd ed.)]
and gestures of his marginal, semi-assimilated Jews. His posthumously published essays Skeptishe Makhshoves (Sceptical
Thoughts, 1959) deal with basic questions of American-Jewish cultural survival and cast light upon his own personality
and approach to literary craftsmanship.
Bibliography: Rejzen, Leksikon, 2 (1927), 417ff.; LNYL, 5
(1963), 6314; J. Glatstein, In Tokh Genumen (1960), 32833; S. Bickel,
Shrayber fun Mayn Dor (1958), 32734. Add. Bibliography: Sh.
Niger, Dertseylers un Romanistn (1946), 133; Y. Botoshansky, Pshat
(1952), 35599.
[Sol Liptzin]
MILLET, the Panicum miliaceum, a summer plant of the Gramineae family, whose small seeds are utilized as fodder or are
sometimes ground to produce a poor quality flour. It is regarded by some as identical with doh an, one of the ingredients
of the flour mixture that Ezekiel was commanded to eat for
390 days (Ezek. 4:9). The probability is, however, that doh an is
*sorghum. Doh an is mentioned a number of times in rabbinic
literature together with orez (rice), peragim, and shumshemin (sesame; Shev. 2:7), as summer plants from which occasionally bread is made (H al. 1:4). Peragim cannot therefore
be poppy as is stated in the Arukh of Nathan b. Jehiel (and
as the word is used in modern Hebrew), since the poppy is a
winter plant and is used only as a spice. From Syrian Aramaic
it would seem that peragim is to be identified with millet, an
identification compatible with the talmudic sources.
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 73840; H.N. and
A.L. Moldenke, Plants of the Bible (1952), index; J. Feliks, Olam haZ omeah ha-Mikrai (19682), 154f. Add. Bibliography: Feliks,
Ha-Z omeah , 46.
[Jehuda Feliks]
255
256
MILLMAN, JACOB (1911 ), U.S. electrical engineer. Millman was born in Russia and taken to the U.S. in 1913. He
was a faculty member of City College, New York from 1936
to 1951, and from 1952 professor of electrical engineering at
Columbia University. He wrote Electronics (1941), Pulse and
Digital Circuits (1956), and Vacuum-Tube and Semiconductor
Electronics (1958).
latter (1967). Millo translated into Hebrew Goldonis The Servant of Two Masters and apeks The World We Live In. He directed plays at drama festivals in Paris (1956), Venice (1965),
and other European cities. In 1968 he was awarded the Israel
Prize for theater.
Bibliography: Ohad, in: Teatron (Heb., JuneAug. 1963),
2326.
257
milo, roni
musical director of the Jewish Voice Ensemble in Leningrad
(193141), and coach of the choir of the Leningrad Bolshoi
Theater from 1941 until his death.
Milners renown began with the publication of his songs
in 1914 by the *Society for Jewish Folk Music which he had
helped to found. His works indicated new possibilities for the
harmonization of traditional melodic material in the dramatic
style of Moussorgsky. Until the mid-1930s he wrote many
works on Jewish themes, mainly for the stage. The opera, Die
Himlen Brenen, based on S. *An-Skis Dibbuk and adapted by
M. Rivesman, performed in 1923, was later denounced as reactionary and its performance was forbidden. Among his other
works are Der Najer Veg (1933); Josephus Flavius (1935), based
on L. *Feuchtwangers novel; stage music for the Habimah
performances of H. Leiviks Golem and R. *Beer-Hoffmanns
Jaakobs Traum; and a ballet, Ashmedai. In addition, he also
wrote settings of Jewish folk songs and liturgical texts. After
the repression of Jewish art, Milner turned to more general
subjects and wrote a symphony (1937); a symphonic poem,
The Partisans (1944); and a piano concerto.
258
milstein
of 1998 he started to talk about the eventual establishment of
a Palestinian State.
In the elections to the Fifteenth Knesset Milo was elected
to the Knesset on the list of the Central Party, of which he was
one of the founders. Until he joined the government formed
by Ehud *Barak as minister of health in August 2000, he
served on the Finance Committee, the House Committee,
and the Economics Committee, and chaired the lobby for Tel
Aviv-Jaffa in the Knesset. Milo joined the government formed
by Ariel *Sharon in August 2001 on behalf of the Center Party
as minister for regional cooperation, returning to the Likud
in November 2002, after establishing a parliamentary group
by the name of Ha-Lev. Milo was not elected to the Sixteenth
Knesset. From November 2003 he served as chairman of the
board of Azorim Investment Co. Ltd., in the IDB group.
Bibliography: A. Richter, Milosz (Fr., 1965); J. Buge, Milosz en qute du divin (1963); A. Godoy, Milosz, le Pote de lAmour
(1961); G.I. idonis, O.V. de L. Milosz (Fr., 1951); J. Rousselot, O.V. de
L. Milosz (Fr., 1949).
MILSTEIN, U.S. family with vast interests in real estate, banking, and philanthropy. SEYMOUR MILSTEIN (19202001) was
born in New York City and graduated from New York University. His father, Morris, had founded Circle Floor Company, which installed the floors at Rockefeller Center, the
World Trade Center, and other buildings. Shortly after World
War II, Milstein joined a second company founded by his father, Mastic Tile Company. Both companies flourished in the
postwar housing boom in the United States and in 1955 Seymour Milstein became Mastics president. Four years later,
the company was sold to Ruberoid, a building products company, for $24 million. Seymour became a Ruberoid director
and vice president, but when it was bought by GAF in 1967, he
was not offered a top job. Milstein and his brother tried and
failed to take control of GAF. In 1970 the family took control
of United Brands, a large food company, and Starrett Housing Corporation. They later sold the companies. In 1986 they
took over the failing Emigrant Savings Bank and pumped $90
million into it.
In the early 1960s PAUL MILSTEIN (1923 ), who was
born in New York City and graduated from NYUs School
of Architecture, built the familys first apartment house, the
Dorchester Tower near Lincoln Center. It was the first luxury
building in that area since World War II. He also developed
two other Manhattan landmarks, 1 Lincoln Plaza in 1972 and
30 Lincoln Plaza in 1978. Two of the buildings overlook a plaza
that is one of Lincoln Centers most popular thoroughfares,
and it was renamed in Milsteins honor in 1992. In the 1980s
the Milsteins built tens of thousands of apartment, office, and
hotel units in New York. The Milsteins were also responsible
for buying and refurbishing the Milford Plaza Hotel in the
Broadway area.
During their partnership, Seymour Milstein handled the
financial details and was in charge of dealing with banks. Paul
was more boisterous, and they were classic risk takers. Then
they became more famous for litigation than for development.
In 1981 they promised city officials that they would protect the
famous and fabled gilded clock and Palm Court lounge of the
Biltmore Hotel, and then demolished both. For nearly five
decades the brothers presided over a multibillion-dollar real
estate and banking empire with three million square feet of
office space, 8,000 apartments, and one of New Yorks oldest
financial institutions, Emigrant Savings Bank, which in 2003
had 36 branches in the New York area. The brothers lunched
together daily and took family vacations together, but in later
years, as succession issues loomed, the rivalry between their
sons escalated into a legal battle of operatic intensity. By the
end, the brothers were no longer speaking. In 2003, the family ended a decade-long feud and withdrew several lawsuits
against one another.
The Milsteins gave widely to medical, educational, and
Jewish causes. Among Seymour Milsteins beneficiaries was
New York Presbyterian Hospital, where he was chairman
from 1989 to 1996. His familys $25 million gift, in 1989, made
possible the construction of the Milstein Hospital Building,
259
MILOSZ, OSCAR (originally Oscar Venceslas De LubiczMilosz, 18771939), French poet, mystical writer, and diplomat. Milosz, who was born in Chereya, Belorussia to a Lithuanian nobleman and the baptized daughter of a Warsaw
Hebrew teacher, was raised as a Catholic. He nevertheless retained a warm regard for his Jewish heritage and developed
a keen interest in the Kabbalah. At the age of 12 he was taken
to Paris, where he later studied Hebrew and Assyrian at the
Ecole des Langues Orientales. He was Lithuanias minister
resident in Paris (191926) but, despite his eventual assumption of French citizenship, remained attached to his ancestral land, which inspired his Contes et fabliaux de la vieille
Lithuanie (1930) and Contes lithuan iennes de ma Mre LOye
(1933). In his poetry Milosz progressed from erotic mysticism to spiritual and metaphysical speculation. Among his
early works were LAmoureuse initiation (1910), a novel in
the form of a poetic monologue, and two plays, Miguel Maara (1912; Eng. tr. in Poet Lore, 1919) and Mphiboseth (1914),
the second of which dealt with David and Bathsheba. His mystical experiences inspired two metaphysical works, Ars magna
(1924) and Le Pome des Arcanes (1927). These mingle Catholic theology with mystical and kabbalistic doctrine, stressing
the belief that man possesses the ability to perceive reality as
it is seen by God and that this faculty, at present hidden, will
one day be recovered. In his Arcanes, Milosz glorified the
Jewish people as the servant of humanity who preserved the
sacred treasure of the original Revelation in all its purity
through a thousand vicissitudes for the sole purpose of the
worlds future regeneration. Les origines ibriques du peuple
juif (1932), a product of Milosz last, kabbalistic, and eschatological period, attempted to prove, by comparing Andalusian
and biblical place-names and Basque and Hebrew etymology, that the Hebrews emigrated to Canaan from southern
Spain.
milstein, cesar
a ten-story addition above the Hudson River in Washington
Heights. The donation was in the name of Seymour and Paul
Milstein and their sister, Gloria Milstein Flanzer. Eight children of the three donors were born at Presbyterian. Seymour
also supported research on interferon, the hepatitis and cancer drug. From 1964 to 1973, Seymour was chairman of Bronx
Lebanon Hospital Center. He was also a founder of the United
States Holocaust Memorial Museum and a contributor to
many Jewish philanthropies.
In 1994 the family of Paul Milstein gave $10 million to
Cornell University for its Architecture, Art, and Planning College. The New York Public Library was also a beneficiary of
the Milsteins, establishing the Irma and Paul Milstein Division of United States History, Local History, and Genealogy,
in 2000 with a $5 million gift. The division brought together
microfilm and other research materials long scattered in other
parts of the library and a specialized staff to handle public inquiries, particularly on genealogical research.
[Stewart Kampel (2nd ed.)]
MILSTEIN, CESAR (19272002), immunologist and Nobel Prize laureate in medicine. Milstein was born in Bahia
Blanca, Argentina. He studied at the University of Buenos
Aires and received his doctorate from Cambridge University
in 1960. From 1961 to 1963, when he emigrated from Argentina to England, he was affiliated with the National Institute of
Microbiology in Buenos Aires. From 1963 he was with Cambridge University and in 198193 the joint head of the division
of protein and nucleic acid chemistry. In 1980 he became head
of the molecular immunobiology subdivision. He was the recipient of many awards, including the Wolf Prize in medicine.
In 1984 he was a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in medicine
with George Koehler and Niels Jerne for their research into
the bodys immunological system and their development of a
revolutionary method for producing antibodies, a technique
which gave rise to new fields of endeavor for theoretical and
applied biomedical research. From 1995 until his retirement
in 2002 he was deputy director of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology.
MILSTEIN, NATHAN (19041992), U.S. violinist. Born in
Odessa, Russia, he was a child prodigy and studied with L.
*Auer and E. Ysaye, making his debut in 1914. He toured Russia after the revolution with Vladimir *Horovitz and Gregor
*Piatigorsky but left for Paris in 1925 where he soon became
famous as a soloist. He went to the United States in 1929 and
first appeared there with the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra under Stokowski. He made his home in the United States
but toured widely and gained a reputation as one of the great
virtuosos of his time. He wrote arrangements and cadenzas
for the violin.
Bibliography: B. Gavoty, Nathan Milstein (Fr., 1956, Eng.
tr., 1956); The International Who Is Who in Music (1951).
[Uri (Erich) Toeplitz]
260
Milwaukee
MILWAUKEE, Wisconsins largest city, located on the southeast tip of the shores of Lake Michigan. A few Jews are known
to have lived in the area in the latter part of the 18t and early
19t centuries. Ezekial Solomon, perceived to be Jewish, was
one of 14 fur traders permitted by the British to come to the
area in 1770. An 1820 newspaper account refers to a Jew peddler who was a victim of murder by three Indians who committed the deed to obtain the goods he carried on his back,
going on foot from place to place an incident in Kaukauna.
Gabriel Shoyer arrived in 1836, followed shortly by his brothers, Charles, Gabriel, Emanuel, Meyer, Samuel, and William.
Several of the brothers opened a clothing store, Emanuel
Shoyer a tailor shop, and in 1851 Charles began to practice
medicine.
Early settlers, in 1842, were the families of Solomon
Adler, Isaac Neustadt, and Moses Weil. Other immigrants arrived shortly afterwards from Germany, Bohemia, Hungary,
Austria. From 70 families in 1850, the population grew to 200
in 1856 and to an estimated 2,074 in 1875. Intensive czarist persecutions in 1882 generated a flow of immigrants from Russia. By 1895, Russian Jews represented 39 percent of the Jewish population, then 7,000 people. The population grew to an
estimated 22,000 by 1925. Several thousand Jewish refugees
fleeing Nazi Germany and World War II came from 1938 on.
The Jewish population was estimated at 23,900 in 1968 and
21,000 in 2001.
The earliest settlers from Western Europe settled on the
near east side. Those settlers were soon vastly outnumbered
by immigrants from Eastern Europe who settled on the near
north side. There were two centers of Jewish population by
the mid-1940s, the largest on the northwest side; the older
east side settlers increased in number and moved northward
into suburbs along Lake Michigan. By 1990, the majority of
261
Milwaukee
the Milwaukee Jewish Federation. In the early 1990s, it became
non-sectarian in sponsorship as well as in service.
The Milwaukee Jewish Council, organized initially to
combat antisemitism, and then xenophobia in all forms, was
created in 1938. A Bureau of Jewish Education was organized
by the Jewish Federation in 1944 to develop, strengthen, and
coordinate Jewish education activity. The Milwaukee Jewish
Home for Jewish elderly (1904) and the Jewish Convalescent
Hospital (1950) merged in the late 1990s into one entity, which
provides a variety of forms of assisted living, including intensive nursing home care.
All communal agencies came together in 1902 to create
the Federated Jewish Charities in order to unify fundraising
efforts and to help strengthen the work of all communal agencies. During the Depression, the organization foundered and
discontinued operations. The pressing need to aid refugees in
the 1930s resulted in the creation of a successor organization,
the Milwaukee Jewish Welfare Fund, with a name change to
Milwaukee Jewish Federation in 1972 to reflect its functions
as a central communal organization for planning of services
and centralized fundraising to meet needs deemed to be the
responsibility of the total Jewish community. To coordinate
work with refugees, the Federation created the Milwaukee
Committee for Jewish Refugees in 1938 and in 1948 developed
the Central Planning Committee for Jewish Services, its community-planning arm to avoid duplication and waste in efforts,
etc. Orderliness in fundraising was served by the Committee
on Unified and Coordinated Fund Raising beginning in 1957.
Major community buildings include the Max and Anita
Karl Campus, which houses the Jewish Community Center,
the Bnai Brith Youth Organization, the Coalition for Jewish Learning (previously the Board of Jewish Education), the
Milwaukee Jewish Day School, the Hillel Academy, and the
Childrens Lubavitch Living and Learning Center. The Helfaer
Community Services building houses the Federation, the Milwaukee Jewish Council, and the Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle.
The Milwaukee Jewish Home, which is adjacent to the Helfaer
Building, and a new additional campus of the Jewish Home
created in the suburb of Mequon in 2004 serve the elderly. The
Jewish Community Center runs a summer overnight camp
situated in Eagle River, 300 miles north of Milwaukee, and a
summer day camp.
The first Jew elected to the state legislature was Bernard
Schlesinger Weil in 1851. Henry M. Benjamin, one of eight
Jewish aldermen before 1900, also was acting mayor of Milwaukee in 1875. Three Jews sat on the Common Council after 1920: Arthur Shutkin until 1928, Samuel Soref until 1940,
and Fred P. Meyers after that. Charles L. Aarons served as a
county judge from 1926 to 1950; Max Raskin, a city attorney
from 1932 to 1936, later was a circuit court judge. Maurice M.
Spracker served in a similar capacity for many years, beginning in 1968. Charles Schudson served as a circuit court judge
until 2004. Myron L. Gordon, who had served as a justice on
the Wisconsin State Supreme Court, became a federal judge
for the Wisconsin Eastern District beginning in 1967.
262
min
263
minc, hilary
the twelfth benediction (see E.J. Bickerman, in HTR, 55 (1962),
171, n. 35). This was directed primarily against Judeo-Christians (specifically mentioned in one old text see Schechter,
JQR 10 (1897/98)), either to keep them out of the synagogue or
to proclaim a definite breach between the two religions. This
undoubtedly represented the formal recognition by official
Judaism of the severance of all ties between the Christian and
other schismatic bodies, and the national body of Judaism
(Baron, Social2, 2 (1952), 135, 381, n. 8, incl. bibl.). This severance of the minim from the national body of Judaism had obvious halakhic implications. Thus, meat slaughtered by a min
was forbidden to a Jew (H ul. 13a). Likewise Torah scrolls, tefillin, and mezuzot written by him are barred from use (Git. 45b;
cf. Tosef., H ul. 2:20). For Maimonides five-fold classification
of minim see Mishneh Torah, Teshuvah, 3:7. On the books of
the minim, see *Sifrei ha-Minim.
Bibliography: Daphne Meijer, Joodse tradities in de literatuur (1998); Johan P. Snapper, De wegen van Marga Minco (1999).
MINCO, MARGA (1920 ), Dutch author, born in Ginneken (near Breda), who lived in Amsterdam. Her first book,
the short novel Het bittere kruid (1957; The Bitter Herb, 1960),
describes the deportation of her family and her own survival
in hiding during World War II. It was translated into many
languages. The book, like the ones that were to follow, was
praised for its sparing yet impressive style. Marga Minco was
one of the first Dutch writers to deal with survivors guilt.
Most of her books are partly autobiographical; they often re-
264
[Hilde Pach]
minhag
MINDEN, town in Germany. Jews are mentioned for the
first time in 1270 as being under the bishops protection. After 1336 the town agreed to recognize the bishops prerogatives over the Jews provided that they paid municipal taxes
as well as protection money to the bishop. Moneylending was
the only authorized Jewish occupation at the time. The small
community numbered no more than 12 families in 1318 and
ten in 1340. They were expelled in 1350 following the *Black
Death persecutions.
Jews did not settle in Minden again until the 16t century.
In 1571 the council granted them residence permits of 12 years
duration and allowed them to engage in commerce and moneylending and to hold religious services. From that time Jewish settlement was continuous, even after the town had come
under the rule of Brandenburg, whose authorities claimed all
prerogatives over the Jews. After 1652 no Jew was permitted
to settle in Minden without permission from the elector; the
numbers of tolerated Jews were ten in 1682 and 12 in 1700. In
Prussian Minden, the Jews engaged not only in moneylending
but also in commerce and the slaughtering and sale of meat.
Between 1806 and 1810 Minden belonged to the kingdom of
*Westphalia, where the Jews received equal civil rights. After
emancipation, when Minden reverted to Prussia, the small
community grew steadily, from 65 in 1787 to 81 in 1810; 193 in
1840; and 267 in 1880. Their numbers later decreased to 192 in
1933 and 107 in 1939, when there were 228 Jews in the district
of Minden. In October of 1939, there were 54 Jews in Minden.
During World War II, 179 Jews were deported from the town
and district. The *Memorbuch of the synagogue from the 17t
and 18t centuries has been preserved. The synagogue built in
1867 was destroyed in 1938. After World War II a small community was reconstituted, which had 44 members in 1962. A
new synagogue was consecrated on June 15, 1958. The ethnologist Franz *Boas and the astronomer Philip S. Wolfers were
born in Minden. The Jewish community numbered 43 in 1989
and 113 in 2005. The increase is explained by the immigration
of Jews from the former Soviet Union.
Custom is one of the most important foundations of the halakhah. It can be assumed that the Written Law (cf. *Oral Law)
already takes for granted the continuation of some customs
that were common practice before the giving of the law. This
is probably the reason why the Torah makes no mention of
laws which are fundamental in some domains, in spite of their
importance and central position in life (such as the detailed
laws of *betrothal and *marriage, modes of acquisition, *buying and selling). On the other hand, external customs entered
the world of the precepts during later periods as a result of
prevailing conditions, and were either temporarily integrated
or remained permanently. An instructive example is that of
the *New Moon, which the Torah only mentions with regard to the additional sacrifice and the blowing of the trumpets (and this too was probably only intended against those
who believed it to be a festival to the god of the *Moon as was
common in the ancient Middle East). During the days of the
First Temple, however, as a result of Canaanite-Phoenician
influence, the day became an accepted and important festival in Israel to such a degree that work and commerce were
interrupted (with the difference that with the Jewish people
the New Moon lost its pagan character and assumed a purified Jewish value of a statute for Israel a law of the God of
Jacob (Ps. 81:5)). Frequently, a particular matter of the halakhah is nothing but the consolidation of customs created
among the people over the generations (e.g., see *Mourning,
*Fasts). There are some customs which are as binding as legal
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minhag
regulations (see Tosef., Nid. 9:17) while others are no more
than a consensus (ajm with Muslims) which is accepted in
cases where there is no fixed and decided halakhah (Go out
and see what the custom of the public is and act likewise (TJ,
Peah 7:5, 20c); cf. Go out and see how the people act or the
people are accustomed (TB, many times)). There are also individual customs in situations where there is no existing halakhah; these may be a local custom (the custom of the country (Suk. 3:11; Ket. 6:4; BM 7:1, 9:1; et al.); in a place where
the custom has been (Pes. 4:15; Suk. 3:11; Av. Zar. 1:6; et al.);
the custom in Jerusalem (BB 93b; Sof. 18:7)), or a custom of
a section of the public (the custom of those traveling with a
caravan (Tosef., BM 7:13); the custom of the sailors (ibid.),
the custom of women (TJ, Pes. 4:1; 30cd); the custom of
landlords (Tosef., Peah 2:21); the custom of the priests (ibid.
4:3)), and even from one of these there must be no deviation
(Tosef., BK 11:18; et al.). There are, however, also customs which
are in opposition to the halakhah, and of these the sages said:
The custom annuls the halakhah (TJ, Yev. 12:1, 12c; and cf.:
R. Judah said, the halakhah is according to the opinion of
Bet Shammai, but the majority acts according to the opinion of Bet Hillel; Tosef., Ter. 3:12). It is obvious that just as
punishment is inflicted for transgression of the halakhah, so
it is inflicted for transgression of a custom (TJ, Pes. 4:3, 30d)
and permitted things [or actions] which the custom of others considers as prohibited, you are not authorized to permit
them in their presence (Pes. 50b51a). It has also been prescribed many times that a man should deviate neither from
the custom of the place nor from that of his ancestors (see TJ,
Pes. 4:1, 30d; etc.), even though the reason for the custom has
become obsolete. The following saying indicates the importance of the custom as a basis of the halakhah: It has become
accepted by the people that the halakhah cannot be fixed until a custom exists; and the saying, that a custom annuls the
halakhah, applies to a custom of the earnest, while a custom
for which there is no proof from the Torah is nothing but an
error in reasoning (Sof. 14:16).
Indeed, to prevent vain and foolish customs superseding the halakhah, the rabbis opposed following stupid customs which had their origin in error or even in periods of
persecution. *Yehudai Gaon, who wrote to the population of
Palestine in order to abolish the custom of the persecution
era which they respected against the halakhah was unsuccessful. He received the reply that A custom annuls the halakhah (Pirkoi b. Baboi, L. Ginzberg, Genizah Studies, 2 (1929),
55960). Maimonides violently attacked erroneous customs
(see, e.g., Yad, Issurei Biah 11:1415, even in opposition to the
opinion of the geonim; cf. responsa of Maimonides, ed. A.H.
Freimann, 9899), but even he stressed that there are certain cases which depend on the custom (see, e.g., Yad, Issurei
Biah 11:57). Customs arising from ignorance, however, and
even those of which it was evident, not only from their origin
but by their very nature, that they belonged to the ways of
the Amorites and were to be suspected as idolatrous, often
penetrated within the limits of the halakhah and secured a
permanent place. It is significant that such customs often became so popular with the public, in spite of the opposition of
the rabbis, that more importance was attached to them than
to some of the strictest precepts of the Torah. There were instances where strange and doubtful customs became sanctified with the masses only because of the superstitious beliefs
attaching to them. Such customs penetrated not only the text
of the prayers but also the field of the prohibited and the permitted (see *Issur ve-Hetter). They were especially tenacious
in critical periods of human life (birth, marriage, death) or in
the calendar (Day of Atonement, New Year). Thus, for example, some consider that the essentials of repentance and expiation can be found in the customs of *Kapparot (expiation
ceremony) and *Tashlikh, and throughout the whole year do
not visit the synagogue except for the Kol Nidrei ceremony.
One common denominator of all these customs is their foreign
origin and nature. However, they became so popular with the
masses that even some of the rabbis attempted to find grounds
to permit them, even through some kind of compromise. This
was naturally even more true of customs which did not stem
from a foreign origin, such as the recitation of piyyutim in the
morning benedictions of Shema and during the repetition of
the Amidah prayer by the h azzan, which became the accepted
practice in many countries in spite of the opposition of many
authorities. The same also applies to the foreign custom of addressing prayers to angels or mentioning their names in the
mezuzah. This situation, whereby nonsensical customs found
a home in Jewish life, still remains and has possibly even been
strengthened in modern times. It is sufficient to mention the
demonological customs connected with birth and circumcision (the night of vigil before the circumcision) or with death
and burial, such as the strange custom current among Ashkenazim that a person whose parents are alive leaves the synagogue when the souls of the dead are remembered, or the prohibition of the sons from entering the cemetery during their
fathers funeral, which is widespread among the Ashkenazim
of Jerusalem. Thus it can be said that the custom has been the
most important channel through which external influences,
even odd and unwanted ones, penetrated and still penetrate
into the domain of halakhah. The general importance of customs is also reflected in literature.
266
in jewish law
minhag
legal systems, sometimes serves as the historical source of a
particular legal norm and sometimes as the legal source.
AS A HISTORICAL SOURCE. A study of the formative stages
of any legal system will reveal that to some extent its directions originated from customs evolved in the practical life of
the society concerned, and that only at a later stage was legal
recognition conferred on such customs by way of legislation
or decision on the part of the legislator or judge. This phenomenon is also evidenced in Jewish law. Thus, for instance,
certain legal usages which had been prevalent in pre-Mosaic
Hebrew society later came to be affirmed in the Torah, as, for
example, the law of the bailees liability (see *Shomerim), and
sometimes also with material modifications, as with regard to
the laws of yibbum (see *Levirate Marriage and H aliz ah). The
historical source of such directions is the pre-Mosaic usage,
but their legal source is the Written Law, which gave them recognition and validity. Custom has fulfilled this historical function in all stages of the development of Jewish law, by serving
to prepare a particular normative direction for acceptance
into this legal system.
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minhag
the explanation for the rule that custom overrides the law in
matters of the civil law, which is certainly a classic illustration
of the creative activity of custom.
Elucidation of Terms
At times, a particular halakhic direction which has its source
in custom is also called dat (Bez . 25b and Rashi thereto) or
dat yehudit (Ket 7:6 and Rashi to Ket. 72a; Tosef., Ket. 7:7). At
other times the term minhag is used by the halakhic scholars
to describe a normative direction having its source in takkanah (e.g., TJ, Ket. 1:5, 25c; Mid. Prov. to 22:28) and even the
verb is sometimes used to describe the enactment of a
takkanah (cf. Tosef., RH 4:3 with RH 4:1 and Suk. 3:12). The
use of a common term to describe both takkanah and custom
(cf. further Yad, Mamrim 1:23; Resp. Rashba, vol. 2, no. 268)
is attributable to their common function, namely legislative
activity (each in its own different way, as already mentioned).
Sometimes the term minhag is also used to describe halakhah
which has its source in the Bible itself (see Sifra, Emor 17:8,
the law concerning habitation of a sukkah etc., described as
minhag le-dorot; in Suk. 43a/b, the phrase is mitzvah le-dorot).
Contrariwise, a normative direction having its source in custom is sometimes called halakhah (BM 7:8; Kid. 38b; and see
Samuels interpretation, in TJ, Or. 3:8, 63b of the term halakhah
appearing in Or. 3:9). Such use of common labels of minhag,
takkanah, and halakhah for differing concepts not only calls
for the exercise of great care in distinguishing the correct identity of each law appearing under such a name, but also offers
proof of the legal efficacy of normative directions which have
their source in custom and are integrated into the general halakhic system as a substantive part of it (even though there is
a variance at times between the force of a direction originating from takkanah and one originating from custom; see below). Transgression against a direction decreed by custom is
punishable by sanction: Just as a fine is imposed in matters of
halakhah, so a fine is imposed in matters of minhag (TJ, Pes.
4:3, 30d) and R. Abbahu even sought to have punishment by
flogging imposed on a person who transgressed a prohibition
decreed by custom (TJ, Kid. 4:6, 66b; see also Kid. 77a).
At the same time, the scholars occasionally distinguished,
primarily in the field of the ritual law, between a rule originating from custom and one originating from another legal
source. Such distinctions, particularly from the amoraic period onward, are illustrated by the following examples: the
majority of the amoraim held that the prohibition of *orlah
(eating the fruit of young trees) outside of Erez Israel had
its source in custom, and therefore they sought various legal ways in which to permit the fruit of orlah outside of Erez
Israel something they would not have done had the prohibition belonged to the category of halakhah le-Moshe mi-Sinai
(Kid. 38b39a and see above). Similarly, there is recorded the
talmudic dispute between R. Johanan and R. Joshua b. Levi
as to whether the rite of taking the willow-branch on Sukkot
(the branch that is raised and beaten on Hoshana Rabba) was
an enactment of the prophets or a custom of the latter i.e.,
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minhag
such circumstance, from which there could be no departure.
The factor which is common to all legal sources is that a norm
which has been followed for some considerable time (see below) acquires for itself a fixed place in the halakhah and may
not be overlooked nor trespassed upon (cf. the comment of
Philo on the above scriptural passage, Spec. 4:149).
there are no established rules of decision concerning the particular matter, or in circumstances where the custom stands
in contradiction to the accepted rules of decision. The matter is illustrated by the following examples: It is recorded that
R. Tarfon differed from the majority opinion of the scholars
with regard to the blessing to be recited over water (Ber. 6:8)
and the amoraim, when asked how to decide the halakhah,
replied: go and see what is the practice of the people (Ber.
45a; Eruv. 14b); this was also stated with regard to a similar
question concerning the eating of *terumah (TJ, Peah 7:6, 20c;
Maas. Sh. 5:3, 56b; and Yev. 7:2, 8a). In another case R. Judah
and R. Yose held the view that just as the priests generally did
not lift their hands when reciting the priestly benediction at
the Minh ah (afternoon) service because of the proximity
of the service to the meal and the apprehension that a priest
might lift his hands while intoxicated so this was forbidden
at the Minh ah service on the Day of Atonement (even though
the above apprehension would not exist) lest this lead the
priests to the erroneous practice of lifting their hands during
weekday Minh ah services; however, R. Meir differed, holding
that such lifting of the hands was permissible at the Minh ah
service on the Day of Atonement (Taan. 26b). Although the
accepted rules of decision required that the halakhah on the
matter be decided according to R. Yose (see Eruv. 46b) who
in this case represented the stringent view it was nevertheless decided according to the view of R. Meir representing
in this case the lenient view for the reason that the people
followed the view of R. Meir (Taan. 26b; see also Resp. Maharik no. 171).
According to some of the Babylonian amoraim, the power
of determining the halakhah contrary to the accepted rules of
decision was to be withheld from custom in matters concerning the ritual law (dinei hetter ve-issur). Thus in response to R.
Johanans statement, In regard to carob trees, it has become the
custom of the people to follow the rule of R. Nehemiah (RH
15b) i.e., contrary to the majority of the scholars the question is asked: In a matter of prohibition, shall it be permitted
to follow a custom? (ibid.). On the other hand, the amoraim of
Erez Israel along with some Babylonian amoraim conferred
on custom the power of deciding the law in any case of dispute,
even in matters of ritual law and even when it was contrary
to the accepted rules of decision, for instance when decreeing
in favor of an individual opinion against the majority opinion
(TJ, Shev. 5:1, the opinion of R. Johanan quoted in RH 15b; cf.
the statement of Rava, The custom accords with the view of
R. Meir Taan. 26b; see also Pes. 103a and Ber. 52b, contrary to
the unqualified statement of the law in the Mishnah).
In the 13t century, *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg stated,
For in all matters on which the great halakhic scholars are
in dispute, I hold that a stringent approach must be followed,
save when the permissibility of a matter has spread in accordance with the custom of the scholars by whom we have
been preceded (Resp. Maharam of Rothenburg, ed. Berlin,
no. 386). At this time too the dispute concerning the extent
to which it was within the power of custom to determine the
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minhag
halakhah was continued. Thus Jacob *Moellin justified the custom of lending the money of orphans at fixed interest (ribbit
kez uz ah, see *Usury), contrary to the opinion of the majority of scholars, who held this to be prohibited; Moellin based
his view on a solitary opinion (Resp. Maharil no. 37), which
in fact only permitted such interest in respect of loans given
from charitable funds (Or Zarua, Hil. Z edakah, no. 30), but
Moellin extended the opinion to embrace also money lent by
orphans, for all matters concerning orphans are deemed to be
matters of mitzvah, and this is truly so because they are alone
and meek (Maharil, loc. cit.). Other scholars contested this
view: There are places where it is customary for an *apotropos
[guardian] to lend orphans money at fixed interest, but this is
an erroneous custom and should not be followed (Rema to
YD 160:18; see also Siftei Kohen thereto, n. 27).
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minhag
individual members of that public by way of express stipulation, i.e., in the field of civil law.
COINAGE OF THE PHRASE MINHAG MEVATTEL HALAKHAH. The essential principle that in the field of civil law
custom overrides the law is mentioned in various parts of
talmudic and post-talmudic halakhic literature (see below).
However, the characteristic phrase for this principle, minhag mevattel halakhah, is quoted in the Jerusalem Talmud in
connection with the following two matters: The first relates
to the determination in the Mishnah (BM 7:1) of the laborers
working hours in two different ways: one whereby he goes to
work early in the morning and returns home late, these being the hours of work according to law (BM 83ab); the other,
whereby the laborer goes to work at a later hour and returns
home earlier. The Mishnah lays down that local custom determines the hours of work even if this is contrary to the hours
laid down by law; the comment of R. Hoshaiah is, that is to
say the custom overrides the halakhah (TJ, BM 7:1, 11b), so
that the employer may not withhold the wages of the worker
by requiring that he abide by the legally prescribed working
hours, but will himself have to abide by the working-hours
decreed by custom this without need for any proof that
the parties had so intended (TJ, ibid.). The second matter in
which the phrase is quoted relates to the laws of h aliz ah (see
*Levirate Marriage); the fact that this forms part of ritual law
does not affect the premise that in the latter field of the law
the doctrine of minhag mevattel halakhah does not operate.
In the Mishnah (Yev. 12:1) it is stated that the h aliz ah rite may
be performed with a shoe or sandal (both of leather) but not
with anpilya (sock or shoe made of cloth) since only the first
two are included in the Pentateuchal term naal (Deut. 25:9).
In the Jerusalem Talmud (Yev. 12:1, 12c) it is stated: If Elijah
should come and state that h aliz ah may be performed with a
shoe he would be obeyed; that h aliz ah may not be performed
with a sandal he would not be obeyed, for it has been the
practice of the public to perform h aliz ah with a sandal, and
custom overrides the law. In this particular case custom supports the existing halakhah, since the Mishnah permits h aliz ah
with a sandal and this is not prohibited by any extant talmudic source; accordingly, if Elijah were to come and forbid performance of h aliz ah with a sandal he would be determining a
new rule, contradicting the existing halakhah, and in such an
event custom in supporting the existing halakhah would
serve to override the new halakhah being laid down by Elijah,
a function of custom effective in the field of the ritual law. (It
is also possible that the phrase minhag mevattel halakhah was
originally stated in relation to the laborers hours of work and
its application extended to the case of h aliz ah by the redactor of the talmudic discussion. It may be noted that the above
version of the doctrine does not occur in Yev. 102a, where the
rule, if Elijah should come is also found, nor in BM 83ab;
see also Men. 31b32a.)
The rule that it is not within the power of custom to
render permissible an undisputed prohibition is stressed by
the use, on several occasions, of the phrase, Does the matter then depend on custom? (H ul. 63a; BM 69b70a). On the
other hand, custom does have the power, even in the field of
the ritual law, to render prohibited something that has been
permitted, since the law is not abrogated thereby but only rendered more stringent: Custom cannot set aside a prohibition,
it can only prohibit that which has been permitted (Yad, Shevitat Asor 3:3; see also Resp. Rosh 55:10). According to some
scholars, custom even in civil law matters only overrides
halakhah when it has been accepted by way of a communal
enactment (see *Takkanot ha-Kahal; and see Nimmukei Yosef
BB 144b; Nov. Ritba to Ket. 100a and Shittah Mekubbez et ad
loc.; Bedek ha-Bayit h M 368:6, commentary on the statement
of Sherira Gaon). This view seems to be in conflict with the
plain meaning of a number of talmudic discussions, particularly as regards the rule of sitomta (affixing of a mark; see
below), and was not accepted by the majority of the scholars.
The matter was succinctly summarized by Solomon b. Simeon
*Duran after a detailed discussion of the two relevant talmudic references as follows: It will be seen that the doctrine
of custom overrides halakhah is true in matters of civil law,
but erroneous when applied to a matter in which it has been
the practice to permit something that is prohibited, for custom only has the power to prohibit something that has been
permitted, and not to render permissible something that has
been prohibited (Resp. Rashbash no. 562).
MINHAG AS VARYING THE LAW IN VARIOUS FIELDS. The
facility of custom to override the law in civil matters has lent
Jewish law great flexibility in adapting to changing economic
realities, and many rules sometimes even entire branches
of the law have come to be based on the legal source of
custom.
In the Talmudic Period. The following are some of the rules
that were laid down: deeds that are not signed as required by
law are valid if prepared in accordance with local custom (BB
10:1; BB 165a; Kid. 49a); debts which according to law may only
be recovered from the debtors immovable property (Ket. 51a,
69b) may also be recovered from his movable property when
it is local custom to recover them in this way (TJ, Git. 5:3, 46d;
in geonic times a special takkanah was enacted permitting the
recovery of debts from the debtors movable property since at
that time most Jews had ceased to be landowners (see *Execution, Civil); this is an illustration of halakhah received first
by way of custom and later by expressly enacted takkanah).
Similarly, many illustrations of the rule that custom overrides the law are to be found in matters of the financial relationship between *husband and wife (see Ket. 6:34; Tosef.,
Ket. 6:56; see also Beit ha-Beh irah, Nov. Rashba, and Shitah
Mekubbez et to Ket. 68b).
In the Post-Talmudic Period. In this period too custom actively fulfilled the far-reaching function of changing the law,
this phenomenon sometimes leading to sharp dispute even
in the case of one specific matter only and at other times ac-
271
minhag
cepted by all scholars in relation to an entire branch of the law.
Thus, as regards the authentication of deeds (see *Shetar)
which according to law must be done by three judges and is
ineffective if done by a single judge (Ket. 22a) it was stated
in the 15t century: For the scholars of the yeshivot it is the
accepted custom for deeds to be authenticated by the signature
of one [judge], and this is a possible application of the doctrine
that custom overrides the law in matters of the civil law (Terumat ha-Deshen, Resp. no. 332). This custom was accepted by
Moses Isserles (Rema h M 46:4), but others differed (see Yam
shel Shelomo, BK 10:11; Siftei Kohen h M 46, n. 8). On the other
hand, it is generally accepted that the extensive field of tax law
is largely founded on the legal source of custom. This is due to
the fact that halakhic principles stated in the Talmud in this
field (including also the rule of *dina de-malkhuta dina and the
laws of *partnership) were unable to offer adequate solutions
to the multiple legal problem that had arisen commencing
from the tenth century onward in this field of the law (see
*Taxation). At first a certain hesitation was expressed concerning the extent to which it was within the power of custom to
create an obligation even when it was contrary to established
and known halakhah of the Talmud concerning tax law matters (see statement of Baruch of Mainz, 12t-century author
of the Sefer ha-H okhmah, quoted in Mordekhai BB no. 477);
later, however, this hesitation gave way to full recognition of
the validity of any legal rule or usage sanctioned by custom,
even when it was contrary to the existing halakhah.
Nowhere are the tax laws founded on talmudic sanctity
and everywhere there are to be found variations of such laws
deriving from local usage and the consent of earlier scholars;
and the town residents are entitled to establish fixed takkanot
and uphold recognized customs as they please, even if these
are not according to halakhah, this being a matter of civil law.
Therefore if in this matter they have an established custom, it
should be followed, since custom overrides the halakhah in
matters of this kind (Resp. Rashba, vol. 4, nos. 177, 260 and
see *Taxation for further particulars).
The preference for flexible custom above rule of halakhah
as regards the legal order in all public matters was emphasized
by Israel *Isserlein:
In all matters affecting the public, their custom shall be
followed in accordance with the order they set for themselves
as dictated by their needs and the matter under consideration,
for if they be required to follow the strict law in every matter,
there will always be strife among themselves; furthermore, at
the outset they allow each other to waive the strict law and
make up their minds to follow the decree of their own custom
(Terumat ha-Deshen, Resp. no. 342).
At the same time, the halakhic scholars made every effort
to integrate the legal norm originating from custom into the
pattern and spirit of the rules within the Jewish legal system,
and in this regard Isserlein adds (ibid.):
Even though it has been said that in tax matters custom
overrides the law, it is at any rate desirable and proper to examine carefully whether we can reconcile all customs with
the strict law and even if not entirely so, it is yet preferable
that we find support and authority in the statements of the
scholars and substantiate them with the aid of reason and legal logic (ibid.).
In this and in other ways for instance by means of the
control exercised by the halakhic scholars to ensure that rules
originating from custom should not depart from the Jewish law principles of justice and equity the rules of tax law,
largely derived from custom, became an integral part of the
Jewish legal system.
272
In Jewish Law in the State of Israel. The stated power of custom continues even in present times actively to assert itself in
Jewish law, a fact that finds expression particularly in the decisions of the rabbinical courts in Israel. A notable example
concerns the matter of severance pay, payable to the employee
on his dismissal. The rabbinical courts have sought various legal ways of conferring binding legal force on the employers
duty to pay this (see *Haanakah), and one of the principal
ways has been reliance on the legal source of custom. Thus it
was held, since in our times there has spread this custom of
paying compensation to employees we have to enforce this
as an obligation according to the law of the Torah, in terms of
the rule stated in regard to the hire of workers: all in accordance with local custom (PDR, 1:330); moreover, by virtue of
custom the claim for severance pay is not a matter of grace,
but a claim founded on law, for which the employer, even if
a charitable institution, is liable (PDR, 3:286f.). Particular importance was held to attach to custom in this case, since we
have found support for it in the Torah and halakhah this
custom being based on the Pentateuchal law of the grant payable by the master to his Hebrew bound servant (haanakat
eved Ivri, PDR, 4:129; Yam ha-Gadol no. 22), and as such represented a proper and just custom (PDR, 1:330f.; cf. Terumat
ha-Deshen, Resp. no. 342 concerning reliance on the Pentateuchal law on tax matters).
MINHAG IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MODES OF ACQUISITION AND OF ESTABLISHING OBLIGATION. In the above
field one that is particularly sensitive to changing trends in
commercial life, the nature and scope of which is subject to
constant fluctuation custom was destined to exercise a decisive influence. A transaction executed in a verbal manner
alone attains no legal validity in Jewish law, which provides
for the transfer of ownership and establishment of an obligation in prescribed ways, generally requiring much formality,
as by way of kinyan meshikhah or hagbahah, etc. (acquisition
by pulling or lifting, etc.; see *Contract; *Acquisition). Such
formality was not in keeping with the demands of developing commerce, which called for more convenient and flexible
modes of acquisition. Custom, in the form of mercantile or
trade usage, was instrumental in providing a large part of the
forthcoming answer to the stated demands.
As early as talmudic times (BM 74a), it was laid down that
where it was the custom of the merchants for a sale of wine to
be concluded by the purchaser affixing a mark (sitomta, Rashi
minhag
ad loc. and Targ. Jon., Gen. 38:18) on the barrel of wine, this
action would complete the sale even though the purchaser had
not yet pulled the barrel and it remained in the sellers possession. This is an illustration of law overridden by custom,
since in law acquisition was not complete until the purchaser
had pulled the barrel, and until then both the seller and
the purchaser remained free to retract; thus, in law the barrel
would still have remained in the ownership of the seller but
custom decreed that ownership of the chattel would pass to
the purchaser after it was marked in the customary manner
and after this the parties might no longer retract. From this
halakhah Solomon b. Abraham *Adret concluded: From this
we learn that custom overrides the law in all matters of the
civil law, in which everything is acquired and transferred in
accordance with custom; hence the merchants effect kinyan
in any mode according with their own usage (Nov. Rashba
BM 73b; see also Nimmukei Yosef BM, loc. cit.; Maggid Mishneh
Mekhirah 7:6; Sma h M 201, n. 2). In the course of time and on
the basis of this principle, Jewish law came to recognize new
modes of acquisition and of establishing obligation. Thus the
fact that it was the trade custom to conclude a transaction by
shaking hands, by making an advance on the purchase price
(Piskei ha-Rosh, BM 5:72), or by delivering a key to the place
where the goods were stored was held to be sufficient to confer
full legal validity on a transaction concluded in any of these
ways (Sh. Ar., h M 201:2).
The extent of the creative power of custom in relation to
the modes of acquisition has been the subject of much discussion founded on halakhic and economic considerations.
R. Joel *Sirkes held that custom served to create new modes
of acquisition in respect of transactions of movables only, as
there is much trade in these and he [the purchaser] has not
the time to pull all the goods into his possession (Bah h M
201:2), but the majority of scholars took the view that custom
also served to do so as regards various transactions of immovable property (Yam shel Shelomo, BK 5:36; Sma h M 201, n. 6;
Siftei Kohen thereto, n. 1). Similarly, many scholars held that
custom served to lend full legal validity to an acquisition of
something not yet in existence (see *Acquisition, Modes of;
*Contract; Resp. Rosh 13:20; other scholars differed see Kez ot
ha-H oshen 201, n. 1; Netivot ha-Mishpat, Mishpat ha-Urim, 201,
n. 1). At times custom operated with such far-reaching effect
that not only were new modes of acquisition added to those
halakhically recognized but even certain substantive elements
of the existing acquisitory modes as determined by the halakhic scholars were changed (see, e.g., Resp. Ribash no. 345 on
the custom concerning acquisition incidental to four cubits of
land (kinyan aggav arba ammot karka), without specification
of the land, contrary to the opinion of Maimonides, when locally the latters statement of the law was otherwise followed;
similarly, in Resp. Rosh 79:4).
In the 13t century a question of principle arose whose
answer was to be of great significance as regards the measure
of the creative power attaching to custom in general. The fundamental idea underlying the need in Jewish law for acquisi-
273
minhag
In cases before the rabbinical courts in the State of Israel
reliance on custom (see above) is particularly evident in the
field of the modes of kinyan. In several cases acquisition by
way of registration in the registry in accordance with the state
law is recognized as a valid kinyan according to Jewish law,
by the force of custom (see, e.g., PDR 4:81). In another leading
decision it was laid down that in our times a signed contract
between purchaser and seller constitutes a kinyan by virtue
of the rule of sitomta, whether relating to immovable or to
movable property, since this is a trade custom (PDR 6:216,
and see also the distinction drawn with regard to the text of
the contract).
274
minhag
ter is of decisive importance (BB 166b; Yad, Malveh 27:15; and
see *Interpretation).
275
minhag
Thus although the law permitted the performance of all labor
on the 14t day of Nisan i.e., on the eve of Passover it became the general custom to refrain from labor from noon onward, since from that time the paschal sacrifice could properly
be brought, so that the rest of the day was treated as a festival day; the Mishnah records that there were places where it
was customary to perform labor until noon, and other places
where it was customary not to do so lest the need for burning
the leaven and other requirements of the festival be forgotten,
and the Mishnah prescribes that the local inhabitants should
follow their own custom. The halakhic validity of a custom
that prohibited what was legally permissible was justified by
regarding this as a form of vow undertaken by the public, and
the sanction against breaking such a custom as akin to that
of the prohibition against breaking a vow: Matters which are
permitted [in law] but prohibited by others by virtue of their
custom may not be rendered permissible to the latter, as it is
said (Num. 30:3), he shall not break his word (Ned. 15a; see
also H . Albeck, Shishah Sidrei Mishnah, Nashim, p. 137f.). It
seems however that the Babylonian amoraim restricted the
operation of the prohibition deriving from the above rule,
holding it as applicable only to a custom of the Cuthites (nonJews), or of Jews amidst whom there were no scholars out of
apprehension that if the latter persons were permitted matters
which their own custom prohibited, even though these were
permissible in law, they would make light also of other prohibitions stemming from the law itself (Pes. 50b51a).
These local customs were also discussed in relation to the
biblical injunction, you shall not cut yourselves (Deut. 14:1),
interpreted by the halakhic scholars as a stringent prohibition
against the formation of separate societies in relation to the
rules of halakhah, so that the Torah should not become like
several Torot. In R. Johanans opinion this prohibition only applied in circumstances where in one place a decision is given
according to one opinion for instance according to Bet Hillel, and in another place according to another opinion for instance according to Bet Shammai, for in this way the halakhah
itself would be divided; however, if from the standpoint of the
law all decide according to the same opinion but part of the
public renders the law additionally stringent for itself, this does
not amount to a division of the halakhah, and it is permissible
in the same way as any individual may take a vow and render
prohibited for himself that which is permissible in law (TJ, Pes.
4:1, 30d; Yev. 13b; see also L. Ginzberg, Perushim ve-H iddushim
ba-Yerushalmi, 1 (1941), 15260). Despite this theoretical distinction, the halakhic scholars maintained that in practice the
diversity of customs might lead to division and strife and therefore laid down that a person should follow no custom but that
of the place where he finds himself at any given time, if to do
otherwise might lead to dispute (Pes. 4:1 and 51a; Yad, Yom Tov
8:20; see also in detail Peri Hadash, OH 468 and 496).
276
minhag
by a woman, concluding that this is certainly an erroneous
custom and even if widespread, it is not a custom that may
properly be relied upon for purposes of the disposition of
property the custom is wrong and it must be invalidated
(Resp. Rosh 55:10). Similarly Mordecai *Jaffe opposed the custom of not reciting birkat ha-mazon (*Grace after Meals) in
the home of a gentile, holding that the spread of this nonsensical custom originated from an erroneous understanding
of a talmudic statement completely unconnected with such a
custom (Levush ha-Tekhelet, 193:6). In another instance it became customary to take a stringent view and regard a woman
as married in circumstances where in the opinion of all
scholars there was no kiddushin at all in law; Simeon Duran
strongly condemned this custom: In circumstances where
the whole world holds that there is no kiddushin, some people
wish to impose on themselves such a stringent rendering of
the law this is a custom born in ignorance which the public
must not be compelled to uphold (Tashbez , 1:154).
277
minhagim books
spirit of the halakhah. Hence a tax custom which did not adequately distinguish between rich and poor was held to have
no legal validity: The contention of the rich has no justification, for certainly according to the law of the Torah taxes
must be shared according to financial means and there can
be no greater injustice than to make the rich and the poor
bear the tax burden in virtually equal measure, and even if
the custom has been in existence for some years it must not
be upheld (Moses Rothenburg, quoted in Pith ei Teshuvah,
H m 163, n. 16).
[Menachem Elon]
Middle Ages
Sefer ha-Minhagot of *Asher b. Saul of Lunel, which describes
the customs of southern France over a very wide range of
subjects and is apparently the earliest minhagim book to
come down to us from Europe, belongs to this category. To
this period also belongs Ha-Manhig of *Abraham b. Nathan
ha-Yarh i which is, however, of a different character. It limits
itself mainly to the laws of prayer, Sabbath, and festival, but
in it are described Spanish, Provenal, French, and German
customs which the author himself saw while traveling in these
countries. Consequently the aim of the two books also differs.
While Asher of Lunel explicitly states that his purpose is to
indicate the sources in rabbinical literature of the customs in
order to prove their authenticity and prevent the disrespect
for them which stems from lack of knowledge, the aim of HaManhig was to show that all customs, even when contradicting
one another, have a halakhic source, and that none of them
should be rejected, but each locality should maintain its minhag. These two books were of great importance and played a
prominent role in molding the halakhah in succeeding generations. A book, unique of its kind, though of the same type
as the Ha-Manhig, discusses a collection of 25 variant customs
between Catalonia and Provence. It was written by Menahem
b. Solomon with the aim of proving that despite the great
halakhic authority of *Nah manides, the ancient customs of
Provence were not to be undermined because of him, and Menahem exerted himself to show their sources in the halakhah
(see Magen Avot, London, 1909). In 12t-century Germany,
halakhic compilations were known of the type of Minhagei
Spira, Kunteres Magenz a, and the like, which are mentioned
for example in Ha-Rokeah of *Eleazar b. Judah of Worms and
the works of the school of Rashi. There are already allusions
to it in Sefer Rabban of *Eliezer b. Nathan which was the first
Hebrew book written in Germany. From the quotations it is
278
minhagim books
recognizable that although these were not actually complete
books, like the Provenal and Spanish minhag books of the
13t century, they were nevertheless the first minhag books in
this region, and some 300 years later they were to serve as the
main source for the growth of a ramified and developed minhagim literature. These early Ashkenazi compilations committed to writing for the first time the great fragmentation in the
sphere of custom that prevailed in Germany, each city, including even adjacent cities, having different customs.
Another type, much more rare, confines itself to the
customs appertaining to one single theme, in most cases an
actual professional sphere, like the book of Jacob *Hagozer
which describes the comprehensive customs applying to the
laws of circumcision, and was intended to serve as a handbook
for those performing the ceremony. Despite the rarity of this
type, it is of great importance, since through it the close connection which exists between minhagim literature and professional literature is well recognized, an affinity which became blurred in the course of time, but which is still apparent
in one sphere of halakhah, *Issur ve-Hetter. The various types
of works of Issur ve-Hetter are in fact merely minhagim books
intended to ease the burden of giving decisions from rabbis,
and to a large extent they transmit different local customs in
accordance with the different evidence they adduced, including visual evidence.
During the period of the rishonim, minhagim literature
dealt mainly with the description of the customs of distinguished rabbis, with the avowed aim of establishing as the accepted norm their personal customs down to their last detail.
The beginnings of this category are connected with the personality of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg, who was the central figure in Germany in the 13t century and whose disciples
created a complete minhagim literature, known as that of the
school of Maharam of Rothenburg, basing themselves on his
customs and rulings. The first apparently was H ayyim *Paltiel, whose minhagim served as the foundation for the Sefer
ha-Minhagim of Abraham *Klausner, regarded as the father
of the minhag Ashkenaz. In contrast to H ayyim Paltiel, who
does not mention Meir of Rothenburg by name in his work,
the Ha-Parnes, also compiled in conformity with the views
and practices of Meir by his pupil Moses Parnes, in most cases
refers to him by name. The personality of Meir is especially
recognizable in the Tashbez of his pupil Samson b. Zadok,
and in the anonymous minhagim book published by I. Eifenbein (New York, 1938). A century later this type of literature
received powerful stimulus, chiefly in the Rhine region, and
the description of the customs of outstanding rabbis became
a widespread activity, in great demand by the public. It was
engaged in by disciple-attendants who were in close personal
contact with a certain scholar at times living with him for
decades and these included in their descriptions the actual
minute-by-minute practice of their master, including the very
smallest details even of the most intimate and private kind.
They saw in each such detail a model worthy of emulation by
every pious Jew. The best-known writers in this field are *Jo-
279
Modern Period
In more recent times, the minhagim literature was enriched
by works that sought to give reasons for each minhag. Among
minH ah
the more popular were Taamei ha-Minhagim (1896), by A.I.
Sperling and Oz ar kol Minhagei Yeshurun (1917), by A.E. Hirshovitz. The reasons given are often far fetched and jarring to
the modern ear. More recent works describe the minhagim
lucidly and give reasons based on research and scholarship.
Two examples are Ziv ha-Minhagim by J.D. Singer (1965), and
Sefer ha-Todaah by Eliyahu Kitov, 2 vols. (195860; Book of
our Heritage, 3 vols., 1968). Both follow the traditional pattern of the calendar.
The establishment of the State of Israel and the ingathering of the exiles has added impetus to the study of the
minhagim of the various communities of the Diaspora, particularly of the Oriental communities. The latter is pursued
particularly by the Ben Zvi Institute in Jerusalem, which has
already published a number of studies. Of the minhagim of
other communities the following have been republished: Sefer
Erez H ayyim, by H ayyim Sithon (1968), and Sefer Erez Yisrael,
by Y.M. Tukazinsky (1966). Of special note is the exhaustive
study of Jacob Gellis on Minhagei Erez Israel (1968).
[Isaac Klein]
280
281
minkowski, eugne
strengthened his position in Yiddish literature. He wrote studies of Elijah *Levita (1950), *Glueckel of Hameln (1952), and
a monumental work in three volumes, Pionern fun Yidisher
Poezye in Amerike (Pioneers of Yiddish Poetry in America,
1956). Regarding literary criticism as a scientific discipline,
he attempted an intellectual, objective evaluation and classification of writers and their works an approach which had
found embodiment in his earlier works of criticism in the
books Yidishe Klasiker Poetn (Yiddish Classic Poets, 1939),
Zeks Yidishe Kritiker (Six Yiddish Critics, 1954), and Literarishe Vegn (Literary Ways, 1955).
Bibliography: Rejzen, Leksikon, 2 (1927), 425ff.; LNYL, 5
(1963), 65662; N.B. Minkoff 18931958 (1959); A. Glantz-Leyeles,
Velt un Vort (1958), 11035; S. Bickel, Shrayber fun Mayn Dor (1958),
22230; J. Glatstein, In Tokh Genumen (1960), 3015.
[Shlomo Bickel]
MINKOWSKI, EUGNE (18851972), French existentialist psychiatrist. Eugne Minkowski, born in St. Petersburg,
studied medicine and was appointed psychiatrist at the Henri
Rousselle Hospital in Paris from 1925. He had already come
under the influence of the Zurich school of psychiatry led
by Eugen Bleuler, which included Ludwig Binswanger the
existentialist psychiatrist whom he met in 1922. In 1921 he
wrote an analysis of Bleulers conception of schizophrenia,
La schizophrnie et la notion de la maladie mentale. This
was a precursor of his book, La Schizophrnie (1927), in which
Minkowski maintained that insanity was nothing more than
an exaggeration of the individuals habitual character. The influence of Henri *Bergson is seen in his belief that the patients
impetus toward integration with reality was reduced and he
existed in a world of his own. In the case of the schizophrenic,
the dynamic functions of mental life were impaired and contact with reality lost. From Edmund *Husserl, he took his
views on phenomenology as the study of immediate experiences in a living and concrete fashion of reality. Minkowskis
existentialist views are in evidence generally in his writings.
In Les notions de distance vecue et dampleur de la vie (Journal
de Psychologie, 1930), he stated that the patient affirms his relation to a becoming around himself in which relationship
he is able to grow and which contains all the vital dynamics
of the human personality. In 1933 he published Le Temps Vcu
and in 1936, Vers une Cosmologie. His many shorter works appeared regularly each year from 1921, except for the war years,
in various medical journals. He served on the executive of
the French *ORT and was honorary president of the world
*OSE union. His wife FRANCOISE MINKOWSKI, a psychologist, carried out clinical work with the Rorschach test in the
area of epilepsy, the typology of personality, and the rapport
or detachment of the schizophrenic. In her book Le Rorschach
(1956), she developed the Rorschach test as a clinical instrument analyzing specific dynamic factors rather than providing only a diagnosis. Her study of Van Gogh, Van Gogh, sa vie,
sa maladie et son oeuvre (1963), confirmed her findings that
the sensory type lives in the abstract and her work on child-
282
MINKOWSKI, HERMANN (18641909), German mathematician. Minkowski, who was born in Alexoten, Lithuania,
was taken to Koenigsberg, Germany, by his parents when he
was eight years old. He held chairs of mathematics at Koenigsberg in 1895, Zurich in 1896, and in Goettingen (where
a special chair was created for him) in 1902. In 1881 the Paris
Academy of Science offered their prize for an investigation of
the representation of integers as sums of squares. Although
only a freshman, he produced a brilliant paper which went far
beyond his terms of reference. The Academy overlooked his
writing in German, a language not permitted by the prize regulations, and awarded him a prize. Minkowskis early work was
on the theory of numbers. Apart from some work of *Eisenstein and others, Minkowski is entitled to nearly all the credit
for creating the geometry of numbers. He was one of the earliest mathematicians to realize the significance of *Cantors
theory of sets at a time when this theory was not appreciated
by most mathematicians. The later work of Minkowski was
inspired by *Einsteins special theory of relativity which was
first published in 1905. He produced the four-dimensional
formulation of relativity which has given rise to the term
Minkowski space. He also made contributions to the theories
of electrodynamics and hydrodynamics. The collected works
of Minkowski were edited by D. Hilbert in two volumes and
published in 1911 in Leipzig. The first volume contains a biographical article by Hilbert. In addition to his papers, he published the book Diophantische Approximationen (1907).
Bibliography: J.C. Poggendorff, Biographisch-literarisches
Handwoerterbuchder exakten Wissenschaften, 5 (1926), S.V.
[Barry Spain]
minneapolis-st. paul
St. Paul
Jews were among the earliest settlers in the city, which was
incorporated in 1849. By 1856 there were enough Jews to establish Mount Zion Hebrew Congregation. Despite internal
rancor, the congregation endured and hired their first rabbi
in 1871. The congregation moved toward Reform during his
283
*Spivak (Belzer) in Kishinev. At the age of 18, he was appointed Spivaks successor and three years later became chief
cantor of the Choral Synagogue (Chor-Schul) in Kishinev.
After further study in Vienna, he sang in Kherson, Lemberg,
and Odessa, and spent three years at the Kahal Adas Yeshurun
Synagogue in New York, but was recalled to Odessa in 1892
as chief cantor of the Brody Synagogue, an office he held for
30 years. Minkowski had a tenor voice of natural sweetness
though lacking in power. He avoided extraneous effects such
as word repetition, falsetto, and needless coloraturas. A prominent member of the intellectual group which flourished in
Odessa, headed by *Bialik, he lectured at the Jewish Conservatory, was chairman of the Ha-Zamir (The Nightingale)
musical society, and published many articles on h azzanut
and Jewish music, in Hebrew, Yiddish, and German. After
the Russian Revolution he left for the United States, where he
continued to sing and lecture.
Many of Minkowskis compositions remained in manuscript and are preserved, with his papers, in the Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem. His setting of Bialiks
poem Shabbat ha-Malkah (Sabbath the Queen), to a choralelike melody, became a much-loved song for Friday evening in
Israel and in many communities and synagogues abroad.
Bibliography: Sendrey, Music, indexes; Friedmann, Lebensbilder, 3 (1927), 55; idem, Dem Andenken Eduard Birnbaums, 1
(1922), 131ff.; Di Khazonim Velt (Dec. 1933); Jewish Ministers-Cantors Association of America and Canada, Di Geshikhte fun Khazones
(1924), 88.
[Joshua Leib Neeman]
minneapolis-st. paul
in the 1970s and were well looked after by the community.
During the 1960s, the Lubavitchers established a synagogue
and later a day school. They also maintain Bais Chanah, established in 1971, which draws women from all over the world.
The community founded a Jewish day school in 1982. Beth
Jacob, a newer Conservative synagogue, was founded in 1985.
Norman Coleman was the mayor of St. Paul before his election to the Senate.
Minneapolis
Minneapoliss Jews did not establish a synagogue until 1878
although the city was incorporated in 1866. Shaarei Tov (later
Temple Israel) was founded by German Jews who lived south
of the downtown area near a chain of lakes. They evinced Reform practices as early as the 1880s. Although south Minneapolis had a Romanian Jewish neighborhood until the early
1950s, Eastern European Jews tended to settle on the north
side of downtown. The area housed Jews from the 1880s
through the 1950s. Interestingly, the same area contained public housing near the downtown section, built in the 1930s and
one quarter of which was reserved for Jews, as well as mansions near the opposite end bordering the city limits. Jews of
every economic stratum mixed in the public schools, Talmud
Torah, and in neighborhood businesses.
The citys civic structure was tightly controlled by a group
who had arrived from New England and who developed the
citys industries, particularly that of flour milling. They were
not hospitable to sharing power with the enormous Scandinavian population and certainly not with Jews. A few women
of intellect were spared this treatment: Nina Morais Cohen,
daughter of Rabbi Sabato Morais and wife of attorney Emanuel
Cohen, was a founding member of the Womens City Club.
She also founded the Minneapolis chapter of NCJW in 1894
and educated a cadre of women, even those of Eastern European origin.
It may be a result of this exclusion, or the long-term effects of a community unifier such as Rabbi Samuel Deinard,
Lithuanian-born rabbi of Temple Israel, who attended services at Orthodox synagogues on the second day of Jewish
holidays and preached in Yiddish, but the German and Eastern European Jews of Minneapolis coalesced more rapidly
and created a strong infrastructure with the full panoply of
Jewish institutions
Chief among these was the community-sponsored Minneapolis Talmud Torah, founded in 1894 and renowned for
its early embrace of teaching Ivrit be-Ivrit and the number of
students who became rabbis. Beth El (Conservative) Synagogue, founded in 1921 is also an offshoot of the Talmud
Torah. The community also supported an orphanage for
the temporary placement of children in need, a community
center, Zionist and Socialist meeting halls, numerous synagogues, loan societies, and a Hachnosses Orchim. An Orthodox day school was founded in 1944 and a non-denominational day school in the 1980s. A number of these institutions
were beneficiaries of the Minneapolis Jewish Federation,
284
minnesota
Bibliography: H. Berman and L.M. Schloff, Jews in Minnesota, (2002); L.M. Schloff, And Prairie Dogs Werent Kosher: Jewish
Women in the Upper Midwest Since 1854 (1997); W.G. Plaut, The Jews
in Minnesota-the First Seventy-Five Years (1959); A.I. Gordon, Jews in
Transition, Twin Cities Jewish Population Study (2004).
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285
minnith
Nevertheless, there are major challenges such as integrating the Jews from the FSU into the general Jewish community
and devising ways of embracing the intermarried and their
children. Only by inculcating both with a sense of allegiance
to Jewish communal institutions will the Minnesota Jewish
community remain healthy in the 21st century.
Bibliography: H. Berman & L.M. Schloff, Jews in Minnesota (2002); L.M. Schloff, And Prairie Dogs Werent Kosher: Jewish
Women in the Upper Midwest Since 1854 (1997); W.G. Plaut, The Jews
in Minnesota-the First Seventy-Five Years (1959); Twin Cities Jewish
Population Study (2004).
[Linda M. Schloff (2nd ed.)]
286
minority bloc
again in Minorca during the temporary English occupation
in the 18t century (172056; 176281).
Bibliography: Baer, Spain, 1 (1961), 17, 174, 381, 404; P.G. Segeni, Carta encclica del obispo Severo (1937); C. Roth, in: B. Schindler
(ed.), Gaster Anniversary Volume (1936), 4927; B. Braunstein, Chuetas of Majorca (1936), 118ff.; J. Parkes, Conflict of the Church and
the Synagogue (1963), 2045; Lpez de Meneses, in: Estudios de edad
media de la Corona de Aragon, 6 (1956), 255, 353, 388. Add. Bibliography: R. Moulinas, in: REJ, 132 (1973), 60515; E.D. Hunt, in:
Journal of Theological Studies, n. s. 33 (1982), 10623; J. Mascar Pasarius, in: Revista de Menorca, 74 (1983), 24181; F. Lotter, in: Proceedings of 9t World Congress of Jewish Studies (1986), Division B, vol. 1,
2330; R. Rossell Vaquer, Els jueus dins la societat menorquina del
segle XIV (1990).
[Haim Beinart]
MINORITY BLOC (192230), political alliance of representatives of the national minorities in Poland created with the
aim of obtaining representation in the Sejm corresponding to
their numbers in the population up to 40. The Bloc was
formed in 1922 in reaction to the election regulations issued
under the pressure of the extreme nationalist bloc led by the
clergymen Lutoslawski, which sought to present to the world
an artificial image of a monolithic national state. In the mapping of the constituencies there was blatant discrimination between the Polish ethnographic region and the mixed regions,
as well as the intentional addition of rural and urban units
to the disadvantage of scattered minorities such as the Jews
and the Germans. The common objective of assuring their
national rights enabled the parties to overcome the wide differences which prevailed among the various ethnic sections
and to establish a countrywide bloc. Its initiator was the German Hasbach, and its executor and organizer was the Zionist
leader Yiz h ak *Gruenbaum. The Ukrainians of Galicia boycotted the elections because in theory they did not yet recognize
the Polish government; the Zionists of Galicia therefore presented their own national list. On the other hand, in Congress
Poland and in the Belorussian border regions (Kresy) the
overwhelming majority of the Jewish public, with the exception of the *Folkspartei, the *Bund, and the *Poalei Zion, supported the Bloc. The Poles regarded this union as a hostile act
because they suspected its partners of irredentist tendencies
and anti-national aims. The elections brought an impressive
victory for the Minority Bloc, which won 66 seats, including
17 Jewish ones. The drastic defeat of the Polish lists was most
evident in the mixed border regions. In eastern Galicia 15 Jewish representatives were elected as a result of the Ukrainians
abstention and in western Galicia two, so that the Jewish club
consisted of 34 seats in the Sejm and 12 in the Senate. During the parliamentary term of 192227 only loose links were
maintained between the minority clubs, because the policy
of all the Polish factions was to achieve the dissolution of
the Bloc either by fomenting disunion within its ranks or by
promising to fulfill specific demands. In 1923 Premier Sikorski, who headed the Leftist coalition, attempted to win over
the Ukrainians and the Belorussians, while in 1925 the *GrabENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
287
minority rights
ha-Leummiyot (1980), 282314; M. Landau, Gush ha-Miutim (1922);
Makhshir Beh irot o Etgar Medini, in: Galed, 45 (1978), 36596; P.
Korzec, Der Block der Nationalen Minderheiten im Parlamentarismus Polens des Jahres 1922, in: Zeitschrift fuer Ostforschung, 2
(1975); S. Rudnicki, Zydzi w Parlamencie drugiej Rzecyzpospolitej
(2004), 12674, 24964, 30726.
[Moshe Landau]
MINORITY RIGHTS, rights enjoyed by Jews and other ethnic minorities between the two world wars in some countries,
mainly eastern and southeastern Europe, according to the provisions of the minorities treaties at the Versailles Peace Conference, 1919. In all the other states the treatment of minority
nationals was regarded as an internal matter, subject only to
the states own laws and not to international law. In those states
which were bound, between the two world wars, by the minorities treaties, Jews and other minority nationals were guaranteed certain minimal rights, and the *League of Nations created a machinery for supervising their implementation. These
were rights granted in addition to civil, political, and religious
freedoms. Whereas the *French Revolution and *Napoleon
brought *emancipation of the individual in parts of Europe as
an equal citizen of the state, the minority rights expanded the
concept of equality to include ethnic and cultural distinctions
within the territory of the state. These national rights differed
from medieval *autonomy in that the latter presupposed a society that is subdivided into corporations, each of which lives
according to its own distinct law. The minority rights, on the
other hand, posited an egalitarian society, where the individual
enjoyed individual rights plus his rights as a person belonging
to an ethnic or religious minority. The proponents of the idea
gave it widely differing interpretations. Minority rights tended
to embrace largely secular, as opposed to religious, elements;
therefore the terms cultural, national, ethnic, or linguistic are
interchangeable with the term minority.
with all peoples and asserted that only through the Yiddish
language could the social and national revival of the Jewish
people be effected. He maintained that one could remain identified with the Jewish nationality even if abandoning the Jewish religion. He urged the Jewish masses to participate in the
class struggle as a national unit. Alone among the cosmopolitan Jewish socialists he favored national socialism.
In 1897 he began publishing philosophical studies in Jewish history and a comprehensive program of action which later
appeared in book form as Pisma o starom i novom yevreystvie
(Letters on Old and Modern Judaism, 1907). His main thesis
was that national consciousness consists mainly of spiritualcultural determinants and that these national characteristics
can be maintained by the Jews in the future in the lands of
their dispersion, just as they have survived the lack of territory or unity of language since the end of the second commonwealth. After emancipation of the individual the Jews as a
group should be granted national self-government within the
framework of the state along with other national minorities.
His secularization of the national idea as opposed to those who
saw the essence of Judaism in religion, and his optimistic view
of the future of Judaism in the Diaspora, were the main underpinnings of his insistence on national cultural autonomy.
Popular Movement
These meager beginnings in academic speculation turned into
a powerful popular movement during the 1905 revolution in
Russia (190407), petered out from 1907 to 1914, and then
gained in volume in both east and west during World War I.
A number of middle-class parties and socialists tended toward *assimilation; i.e. they sought only civil and political
rights, and shied away from nationalist identification. Before
long, however, *autonomism developed into a mighty stream;
most Jewish parties adopted Diaspora nationalist plans in their
platforms. The League for Equal Rights for Jews, consisting
of middle-class liberals and Zionists, met illegally in 1905 and
declared in favor of civil, political, and national rights the
freedom of national-cultural self-determination a comprehensive kehillah autonomy, freedom of language and of
school education. This was adopted despite the wishes of
the top leadership which was anti-nationalistic. The Zionists,
too, at their conference in *Helsingfors, Finland, in 1906, demanded the recognition of the Jewish nationality with the
right of self-government in all affairs of Jewish life. This was
achieved although large segments of political Zionists clung to
the doctrine that creative Jewish living was possible in Palestine only. In 1918 the Zionist headquarters issued the Copenhagen Manifesto, which demanded a national home in Palestine, and in all other countries full equality of rights, including
national autonomy, cultural, social, and political, for the Jewish population of countries largely settled by Jews, as well as
of all other countries whose Jewish population demands it;
and admission into the League of Free Nations.
The followers of Dubnows Diaspora nationalism formed
the *Folkspartei (Peoples Party) in 1906, only to remain a
288
minority rights
mere handful. The *Bund in Russia, Poland, and Lithuania
was organized in 1897. Though it initially had made the class
struggle paramount in its program, it soon became a major
protagonist of autonomism, with especial emphasis on Yiddish as the national language. The proletarian Zionist groups,
the *Jewish Socialist Workers Party (Sejmists), the *Jewish Social Democratic Party, *Poalei Zion, and the *Zionist
Socialist Workers Party, more or less hesitantly, also came
around to demand national self-determination. Similar agitation took place in Austrian Jewry and to a lesser extent in the
Ottoman Empire and the United States. Thus in the space of
less than two decades national autonomy grew from a mere
theory into a mass movement. During World War I activity
was transferred to the west. In the United States, after several
years of numerous meetings, the *American Jewish Congress
was organized in 1918 to present the Jewish case for Palestine and minority rights for the Jews of Europe at the Peace
Conference. They adopted a Jewish Bill of Rights to be presented to the conference. In addition to guarantees of equal
civil, political, religious, and national rights, it proposed autonomous management of communal institutions by minorities, respect for the languages of ethnic groups, and no discrimination against Sabbath observance. Whereas in the U.S.
a modicum of accommodations was arrived at between the
nationalists and the members of the non-nationalist *American Jewish Committee, no such rapprochement was achieved
in England or France.
At the Peace Conference
At the Versailles Conference the Jews assumed leadership in
the struggle for minority rights. Delegations and petitions
from Jews in many countries began to arrive in Paris. Immediately an attempt was made to form a united front, and a Committee of Jewish Delegations (*Comit des Dlgations Juives)
was formed. Most of the erstwhile opponents bowed to the desires of the East European Jews who were directly concerned.
The French and British delegations, who refused to join the
Committee of Jewish Delegations, agreed not to oppose actively the efforts of the majority to attain national rights.
teed the use of their own language, either orally or in writing, before the courts. They were also authorized to establish
and control, at their own expense, charitable, educational, religious and social institutions, with the right to use their own
language and to exercise their religion freely therein. Minorities were guaranteed the right to establish schools in their own
language, and to obtain an equitable share of public funds for
their educational, religious, and charitable purposes. Finally,
in view of the special position of the Jews in Poland, who were
not concentrated in any one area in compact masses but were
diffused over the entire country, and in view of Polish antisemitism, two special Jewish articles were inserted to safeguard their unique position. Article 10 read:
Educational Committees appointed locally by the Jewish communities of Poland will, subject to the general control of the
State, provide for the distribution of the proportional share of
public funds allocated to Jewish schools in accordance with
article 9, and for the organization and management of these
schools.
Article 11 provided that: Jews shall not be compelled to perform any act which constitutes a violation of their Sabbath,
with specific reference to attendance at courts of law, and elections or registration for electoral or other purposes. Other articles dealt with enforcement. The minority obligations must
be recognized as fundamental law of the country. Infractions
were to be supervised by the League of Nations, and member-states of the League Council were entitled to appeal to a
world court. Some of the other countries resolutely resisted
the minorities provisions, but were forced to sign them. The
Jewish articles were omitted in some treaties. There was
general satisfaction among Jews with the provisions of the
Minorities Treaties. Some were jubilant over the new era that
had dawned to enable them to live their own lives and to develop their own culture.
Minority Treaties
After prolonged and stubborn negotiations that lasted in some
cases until 1923, minorities treaties were signed by the newly
created states of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Yugoslavia, and Greece; and by the defeated states of Austria, Hungary,
Bulgaria, and Turkey; declarations of willingness to abide by
minority stipulations were secured from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Albania, and several other localities. Iraq made its Minorities Declaration when it became independent in 1932. The
Polish Minority Treaty became the model for all the rest. It had
12 articles. Some of them dealt with the basic civil, political,
and religious rights of minorities. The specific rights of minority nations were dealt with in detail. Polish nationals were
to have the free use of any language in private intercourse, in
commerce, in religion, in the press, or in publications of any
kind, or at public meetings. Minority nationals were guaran-
289
minority rights
and public order. All this was to no avail. In 1934 the world was
stunned by the declaration of Col. Jzef Beck (Polish minister
of foreign affairs) renouncing minority obligations. The whole
structure toppled along with the League of Nations. World
War II put an abrupt end to the experiment.
Treatment of Jews by Countries
The Jews had been most instrumental in the promulgation of
minority rights. They set out full of hope for a new deal. They
were the ones to be most disappointed. Unlike other minorities they did not constitute a threat to the state by irredentist
or restoration dreams. Except for three cases, they did not resort to petitioning Geneva on their grievances, as did other
minorities; they feared antagonizing their governments. Only
Estonia excelled in granting its minorities, including the Jews,
complete autonomy. A chair of Jewish studies was established
there at the University of Dorpat (*Tartu).
LATVIA. Although Latvia by a law of 1921 narrowed the grant
of rights, including minority rights, to those who could prove
residence over a period of 20 years, it provided liberal allowances for minority schools until 1934. The Education Law
of 1919 provided for compulsory education in the language of
the family. Central and local authorities were to establish such
schools and to bear the necessary expense. Such a class was
to be established if at least 30 pupils were enrolled. The minority section of the ministry of education had a Jewish division, its head nominated by the Jews, subject to the approval of
the Council of Ministers. The Jewish educational system
thrived. This autonomy, however, was limited to schools; Latvia never enacted laws regarding cultural, religious, and welfare organizations of minorities. In 1934, with the abolition of
the democratic regime, school autonomy was virtually nullified
by a new law which provided that paid officials of the state administer minorities school systems, that a child be instructed
in his familys language provided he could express his thoughts
in that language, and that state and local subventions to minority education not exceed their ratio in the population.
290
minor prophets
Nov. 15, 1917, the new Soviet government issued the Declaration of the Rights of Peoples which proclaimed the principle
of national self-determination, even to the point of secession.
In the Ukraine the Jews were the leading spirits in a flurry of
legislative plans designed to establish national-personal autonomy as a fundamental law. On Jan. 9, 1918, the Ukrainian
parliament enacted into law a detailed set of articles prepared
by the Jewish secretariat. It all came to naught, however, in
the political turmoil that ensued with the occupation of the
Ukraine by the Germans. It fell to Soviet Russia to launch an
experiment in autonomy for minorities on a vast scale. The Soviet government departed from the personal principle of minority rights, namely, that they would apply to all members of a
particular nationality throughout the country, and proclaimed,
instead, the rights of territorial nationalities. A soviet or a region with a national majority could enjoy cultural autonomy.
Since the Jews were scattered all over the country in the large
cities, this privilege did not apply to them. Only in hamlets and
villages or certain regions where they constituted a majority
did they enjoy linguistic, judicial, and educational self-rule.
Jews had 67 courts of their own where the official language was
Yiddish. In the late 1930s they had five autonomous regions in
the Ukraine and the Crimea and 224 local Jewish soviets. In
1931, 160,000 pupils attended Yiddish schools. The high point
of this policy was reached in 1927 when *Birobidzhan, a territory in eastern Siberia, was proclaimed a Jewish autonomous
region inviting Jewish settlers. None of these efforts, however,
were directed at the perpetuation of Jewish identity. On the
contrary, the stated purpose of the Soviet government and of
the *yevsektsiya (the Jewish sections of the ruling Communist
Party) was to eradicate Judaism in favor of atheism and Communism. The Yiddish courts aimed at weaning the Jews away
from their accustomed rabbinic courts. The schools proscribed
all religious and traditional Jewish content. They declined rapidly before World War II and were not reopened after the war.
In the last years of the Stalin era all vestiges of Jewish national
life were cruelly obliterated.
In the Western world the demand for minority rights was
seldom heard. There the Jews were satisfied with civil rights
and the freedom to foster their own religion and culture.
MINOR PROPHETS, a collection of the books of 12 prophets: *Hosea, *Joel, *Amos, *Obadiah, *Jonah, *Micah, *Nahum, *Habbakuk, *Zephaniah, *Haggai, *Zechariah, and
*Malachi. This collection counts as a single book (the last)
of the second division the Prophets (Heb. Neviim) of
the Palestinian Canon. In the Alexandrian Canon (according
to the Septuagint), Minor Prophets, again as a single book,
occurs in the fourth and last division, that of prophecy, and
is the first of the ten books enumerated there, but the order
of the first six of the 12 is there Hosea, Amos, Micah, Joel, Obadiah, and Jonah. The designation Minor Prophets alternates
with the title The Twelve as the designation of this collection,
the latter being the native Jewish one (Heb. ; Aram.
, BB 14b) and that of the Septuagint (Dodekapropheton), while the former seems to be rooted in the Latin designation of the Vulgate (Prophetae Minores). The adjective minor
in the title Minor Prophets does not reflect upon the relative importance of the 12 prophets in comparison to Isaiah,
Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, but rather upon their much smaller
size. This is implied by the observation about Hosea in Bava
Batra 14b. The order of the prophets within the anthology
is based on a combination of Midrash, the chronological
understanding current at the time of compilation, and certain word associations. For example, Hosea is first because
his book opens (1:2): When God first spoke to Hosea (cf.
BB 14b). Amos is placed third after the Book of Joel because
of the occurrence of two very similar verses, one at the end
of Joel (4:16) and the second at the beginning of Amos (1:2).
Finally, the last three books, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, were put at the very end of the anthology because they
were thought to be the only prophets of the 12 who belonged
chronologically to the Second Temple period. The Minor
Prophets could not have been compiled as an anthology
any earlier than the fourth century B.C.E., the probable date
of the Book of Jonah, the latest of the 12 books. Its compilation can be no later than the time of Ben Sira (c. 180 B.C.E.),
however, since the latter, in praising the Israelite heroes in
chronological order, mentions all the other prophets by
name, each one in his own age, while the Minor Prophets are
grouped together namelessly as the twelve prophets (Ecclus. 4449).
291
minor tractates
Bibliography: M.L. Margolis, The Hebrew Scriptures in the
Making (1922), 18; M.Z. Segal, Mevo ha-Mikra, 4 (1964), 838; O. Eissfeldt, The Old Testament, an Introduction (1965), 3824, incl. bibl.
[Chayim Cohen]
MINOR TRACTATES. In addition to the 63 regular tractates of the Mishnah and Talmud, there are appended at the
end of the fourth order, *Nezikin, 14 smaller or minor tractates which were first published together in their present format in the Romm-Vilna edition (1886). These tractates contain a wealth of legal and aggadic material. In manuscript
and published form, these uncanonical treatises may also be
found under different titles, arrangements, and order. Their
appellation as minor or smaller tractates does not necessarily refer to their size, but rather to the fact that they were not
canonized. *Avot de-Rabbi Nathan for instance, consists of 41
chapters. *Soferim, Semah ot (Evel Rabbati), and Kallah Rabbati are also of considerable length. The other main tractates
are *Kallah, *Derekh Erez Rabbah, and Derekh Erez Zuta. For
additional details see the articles on the individual tractates.
Also included in this section, however, are seven more brief
treaties which were compiled to give in a methodological form
the rules of topics which were not dealt with in specific tractates of the Talmud. These are Gerim, about proselytes; Kutim, about Samaritans; Avadim, about Hebrew slaves; Sefer
Torah, on the writing of a Torah scroll; Tefillin, on the precept of *tefillin; Z iz it, on the fringes (*z iz it); and Mezuzah, on
the *mezuzah; and it is sometimes only to them that the term
minor tractates applies (see Shem ha-Gedolim, II, 161 and cf.
Eccles. R. 5:8, 2). The time when these works were compiled
remains uncertain. Some scholars assign them to the end of
the geonic period, but recent scholarship favors a much earlier
date. M. Higger, in the introduction to his critical edition of
these seven minor tractates, judges them to be the first postmishnaic compendia regulating specific Jewish practices and
usages. His opinion is that most of the Minor Tractates are
Palestinian in origin, but were later modified or elaborated
in Babylonia. Thus it may be that the original composition
of these codes was already completed by 400 C.E. Since they
were of Palestinian origin, they were not included in the final
redaction of the Babylonian Talmud.
The first medieval scholar to clearly cite one of these brief
codes is *Nah manides. In his Torat ha-Adam Inyan ha-Hoz aah
(Kitvei Rabbenu Moshe b. Nah man, ed. by C.D. Chavel, 2
(1964), 100) and in his Milh emet ha-Shem to Alfasi (Alfasi; MK
16a), he cites the passage in Z iz it which discusses whether the
fringes in the tallit in which the deceased is buried should be
untied. Menahem b. Solomon *Meiri likewise makes reference
to this same passage in Z iz it (Beit ha-Beh irah al Massekhet
Berakhot, ed. by S. Dikman (19652), 61b). A similar passage,
to be found in Semah ot (ch. 12), is twice cited by tosafot (Pes.
40b and Av. Zar. 65b). Although a substantial portion of these
tractates consists of material already in the Talmud, they occasionally contain items which are not found elsewhere, such
as the above-cited text from Z iz it. Another example of such
292
minsk
the manner and time of wearing them, and those persons who
are obligated to wear them.
Z iz it
Z iz it consists of only one chapter which details the regulations of
the fringes (Num. 15:3840; Deut. 22:12). It discusses such topics
as the persons who are obligated to obey this law, the garments
which are exempt, the number of threads in each fringe, and the
manner of dyeing the blue thread that is part of the fringes.
Mezuzah
Mezuzah has two chapters:
(1) details are given of the parchment to be used and the
types of doorposts that require a mezuzah;
(2) the exact spot for the mezuzah, its case, and differences in regulations for houses within and outside of Palestine are discussed.
In the Romm edition of the Talmud, only Gerim has a
detailed commentary, titled Nah alat Yaakov, by R. Jacob Neuberg of Offenbach. His commentary on the first five chapters
of Soferim also serves as a commentary to Sefer Torah. More
recent commentaries to these tractates were published by
Samuel I. Hillman of London and R. H ayyim Kanievsky of
Bene-Berak (196365). These seven tractates have been twice
translated into English. Michael Higger published his edited
text and translation in 1930. In 1965, the Soncino Press issued
a new English translation.
Bibliography: M. Higger (ed.), Sheva Massekhtot Ketannot (1930), introd.; idem (ed.), Massekhet Semah ot (1931), introd.;
J. Goldin, The Fathers according to Rabbi Nathan (1956), introd.; D.
Zlotnick, The Tractate Mourning (1966), introd.
293
[Aaron Rothkoff]
minsk
established by the local rabbi, Moses Mordecai. Among the
rabbis and rashei yeshivah of Minsk during the 18t century
were Jehiel b. Solomon *Heilprin, Aryeh Leib b. Asher *Gunzberg, and Raphael *Cohen.
During the 19t century, Minsk was one of the largest
and most important communities in Russia. In 1847 the Jewish population numbered 12,976, rising to 47,562 (52.3 of
the total population) in 1897, which made Minsk the fourth
largest community in the *Pale of Settlement. Jewish life in
the first half of the 19t century is reflected in the community
records, which were published with a Russian translation by
Jacob *Brafman. Mitnaggedim were influential in Minsk, and
H asidism was relatively weak. There were several yeshivot in
the town, the largest of which was known as Blumkes Kloyz.
At the end of the 19t century Jeroham Judah Leib *Perelmann,
who was known as the gadol [the great scholar] of Minsk,
officiated there as rabbi. A circle of maskilim also existed in
the town, and in the 1840s several Jewish schools which included secular subjects in their curricula were opened there.
Minsk was one of the places where the Jewish labor movement
originated and developed. In the mid-1870s circles of Jewish
Socialists were organized, which were very active during the
1880s and 1890s. The years 189394 also saw the birth of the
national opposition to them, led by A. *Liessin. In 1895 a
convention of Jewish Socialists was held in Minsk, which discussed the projected establishment of a Jewish Socialist Federation. The Jewish Socialists of Minsk sent delegates to the
founding convention of the *Bund in 1897, and Minsk became
one of the centers of the Bunds activities, being the first seat
of the movements central committee until 1898, when it was
dispersed by the police. From 1901 to 1903, Minsk likewise became the center of the activities of the *Independent Jewish
Workers Party. Jews were predominant in the demonstrations
and revolutionary meetings held in the town in 1905 and were
also the principal victims of the riots directed against liberal
elements in general which took place in October 1905. Groups
of H ovevei Zion (see *H ibbat Zion) were first organized in
Minsk in the early 1880s. In 1882 the Kibbutz Niddeh ei Israel
association was founded there, and in 1890 the Agudat haElef. Later, Zionism became very influential. In 1902, with
the authorization of the government, the Second Convention of Russian Zionists was held in Minsk. In the communal
elections of 1918, the Zionists and *Poalei Zion won 33 seats,
the Orthodox 25 seats, the Bund 17 seats, the nonaffiliated six
seats, and the *Folkspartei and the *United Jewish Socialists
Workers Party two seats each.
After the establishment of the Soviet regime, Jewish communal and religious life was silenced at Minsk as elsewhere in
the Soviet Union. The suppressed religious and national institutions were replaced by institutions of Jewish culture based
on the Yiddish language and Communist ideology, and Minsk
became an important center of Jewish-Communist cultural
activity in the Soviet Union. Yiddish schools were established,
and at the Institute of Belorussian Culture, founded in 1924,
a Jewish section was organized. It published several scientific
works, including Tsaytshrift (5 vols., 192631) devoted to Jewish history, literature, and folklore. A Jewish department was
also established (1921) within the faculty of education of the
University of Minsk. These institutions, however, were closed
down in the mid-1930s. Various newspapers, periodicals, and
other publications in Yiddish were issued in the town. These
included the daily newspaper Der Shtern (191821), Der Veker
(191725; until 1921 the organ of the Bund), Oktyabr (192541),
and the literary monthly Shtern (192541). In 1926 the Belorussian Jewish State Theater was opened, presenting performances until June 1941. In 1926 there were 53,686 Jews in
Minsk (40.8 of the population), increasing to 70,998 by 1939
(29.7 of the total population).
294
Hebrew Printing
In 1808 Simh ah Zimel set up in Minsk a Hebrew printing
press which he had brought from *Grodno. Up to 1823, he
had printed at least 12 books, mostly liturgical. Another press
was established in 1820 by Gerson Blaustein, who by 1837 had
also printed 12 books, again mostly liturgical, though including one volume of Hebrew poetry by M. *Letteris (1832). In
the 20t century a Hebrew press once more operated in Minsk,
printing books and newspapers mainly for local use. After
the Russian Revolution, the studies in the history of Russian
Jewry and Yiddish literature which were published in Yiddish
by the Jewish section of the Institute of Belorussian Culture
were printed in Minsk.
The Minsk Province
In czarist Russia, the province of Minsk was one of the western provinces of the Pale of Settlement. In 1797 its gubernator presented Czar Paul I with the resolutions of the meetings
of the province noblemen, who alleged that the Jews were
responsible for the sorry plight of the peasants of the province and for the famine which then raged. This statement was
the forerunner of the program to expel the Jews from the
villages, which later took the form of the Jewish Statute of
1804 (see *Russia). In 1847 there were 37 Jewish kahal administrations, in which 87,633 Jews were registered. In 1897 the
Jews of the province numbered 345,015 (16 of its population); 37.5 of them lived in the towns, the same number in
the townlets, and 25 in the villages. The largest communities of the province (with the exception of Minsk itself) were
then *Pinsk (21,065 Jews), *Bobruisk (20,759), *Slutsk (10,264),
*Borisov (7,722), *Mozyr (5,631), *Rechitsa (5,334), *Novogrudok (5,015), *Nesvizh (4,687), and Shchedrin (4,002); 41.5
of the provinces Jews earned their livelihood in crafts and as
hired labor, and 28.9 from commerce. About 21,000 Jews
(6.1 of all those in the province) depended on agriculture,
and over 6,000 of them lived in the mostly small Jewish agricultural settlements. In Minsk oblast there were 70,713 Jews
(13.1 of the total population) in 1926; in the Minsk oblast as
it had been organized in 1938 (with the exception of the town
of Minsk itself), there were 9,054 Jews (0.61 of the population) in 1959.
[Yehuda Slutsky]
minsk
Holocaust Period
Some 100,000 inhabitants were left in the city when the German forces entered on June 28. The population rose to 150,000
as the front line moved farther east, and tens of thousands who
had fled and had been overtaken by the speed of the German
advance, turned back. About one-third of these were local
Jews. Their number was increased by refugees from as far west
as *Bialystok, as well as by survivors of mass executions carried
out by the Einsatzkommandos (mobile killing squads) in the
vicinity, so that another 30,000 Jews were added. Later, about
23,500 German, Austrian, and Czech Jews were deported to
Minsk, and settled in a separate ghetto, so that despite the fact
that a large number of Minsk Jews had been murdered before
the establishment of the ghetto, at least 85,000 Jews were confined in it. Their choice of Minsk as a site for a large Jewish
slave labor camp was dictated by military needs and the geographical position of the city in the rear of two German army
groups advancing on Leningrad and Moscow.
Immediately following the occupation of Minsk, the German city commandant ordered all males between the ages
of 15 and 45 to report for registration under the penalty of
death. About 40,000 reported and, in a field at Drozdy outside Minsk, were segregated in three sections: Jews, Red Army
men, and non-Jewish civilians. On the fifth day the non-Jewish
civilians were released. All Jewish members of the intelligentsia were ordered to step forward; the several thousand who
did so were marched off to the nearby woods and machinegunned. The remaining Jews were moved to Minsk prison and
released on Aug. 20, 1941. On the same day the city commandant issued an ordinance for the establishment of a ghetto in
a suburb consisting mostly of wooden cottages, and ordered
every Jew to wear the yellow badge. All Jews had to be inside
the ghetto by July 25, but the Judenrat managed to delay the
date until the middle of August by means of bribes. As there
were no Jewish communal organizations to provide the Germans with officials to carry out their orders, a group of Jews
was arrested. One of them, Ilya Mushkin, who knew a little
German, was appointed head of a Judenrat and ordered to select the other officials.
Once inside the ghetto, the Jews were terrorized by
nightly murders and kidnappings carried out by the Germans and their local henchmen. On the nights of August 14,
25, and 31, thousands were taken away and only a few appeared
in the dreaded labor camp on Shirokaya Street, where in
addition to Jews the Germans held non-Jewish Red Army
men. On Nov. 7, 1941, 12,000 Jews were seized and taken to
Tuchinka, where they were machine-gunned at the side of the
newly dug pits. Some of the emptied streets were used to house
1,500 German Jews, most of them from *Hamburg. By means
of barbed wire fences, the ghetto was henceforth divided into
three sections: the main ghetto for unskilled Jews; a section
for skilled workers and Judenrat employees, including the
ghetto police; and a section housing the German, Austrian,
and Czech Jews. On Nov. 20, 1941, 5,000 people were removed
to Tuchinka, where they were murdered. Some of the emptied
295
minsk
became one of the most successful Soviet partisan leaders. This
event speeded up the final liquidation of the ghetto, which
took place on Oct. 21, 1943.
sive role in rebuilding the city organization. Gebelev was actually captured when preparing the escape of a group of Russian prisoners of war to the forests. The first organized group
of Jewish partisans left the ghetto in December 1941 to join
Captain Sergeyev-Bystrovs detachment, which in time grew
into the Stalin Brigade. Many Jews escaped with the help of
the railwaymens resistance group headed by Kuznetsov; they
formed a large proportion of the Narodny Mstitel (Peoples
Avenger) Brigade, which Kuznetsov later commanded. The
Jews of Minsk created the 406, Kutuzov, Budyonny, Dzerzhinskiy, Sergei Lazo, and Parkhomenko Detachments, as well as
the 106 Family Detachment commanded by Semion Zorin
(who immigrated to Israel), which provided protection in
the forests for over 600 Jewish women and children. Jews also
formed a large percentage of the Frunze Detachment. The Kutuzov Detachment became the nucleus of the Second Minsk
Brigade, while the Parkhomenko Detachment, formed mostly
by Jews who had been helped to escape from the ghetto by
boys and girls ranging in age from 11 to 15, served as the basis
of the Chapayev Brigade. Hundreds of Minsk Jews were also
active in other brigades. After the liberation about 5,000 Jews
returned from the forests.
Resistance
The resistance record of the Jews imprisoned in Minsk ghetto
is unique. One Sunday in 1941, within days of finding themselves inside the ghetto, a group of local Jews and Jewish Communists from Poland met and decided that it was the duty of
the Minsk Jews to take an active part in the war against the
German invaders. They rejected the possibility of armed resistance inside the ghetto and decided to devote all their efforts
to effecting the escape of the largest possible number of Jews
into the forests in order to become partisans. Four resistance
groups arose in the Aryan part of the city in August and September 1941. However, it was only after the November 7 massacre that Hersh Smolar, the Polish-born leader of the Jewish
resistance, met Isai Pavlovich Kozinets, known as Slavek, the
leader of one of the four groups, who subsequently became
the leader of the entire underground movement in Minsk. It
was only in 1969 that it became known that Kozinets was a
Jew born at Genichesk on the Azov Sea and that his first name
was Joshua. A petroleum engineer by profession, Kozinets had
been in charge of the installations in Bialystok at the outbreak
of the war. The underground organization inside the ghetto
then became an integral part of the city underground and was
known as the Ernst Thaelmann district, in recognition of the
part played by the ghetto inhabitants in the struggle against
the Nazis. The Judenrat itself, under Mushkin, took orders
from the city-underground committee and played a unique
part in diverting much of the production from the workshops
and factories manned by Jews to the needs of the partisans.
The Jewish organization provided the city underground with
news of what was happening in the outside world by establishing a radio monitoring station. It also supplied a printing
press and printers, while the ghetto hospital provided surgical and other treatment for wounded partisans. Moreover,
Jews employed in the factories working for the Wehrmacht
set an example to their Belorussian fellow workers in how to
sabotage production. In 1942 the ghetto resistance was better
organized and more efficient than the city organization, and
the Jews, who ran incomparably greater risks than their Russian and Belorussian fellow citizens, contributed greatly in
the common fight against the Germans. In return, the Jewish
resistance leaders asked their Aryan comrades to help them
save the maximum number of Jews from slaughter by making
possible their escape into the forests to become partisans. As
their assistance proved inadequate, the Jews also had to take
the initiative in developing the partisan movement. They organized the nuclei of future partisan detachments inside the
ghetto, while M. Gebelev and M. Pruslin, two of the Jewish
resistance leaders, helped organize similar ten-man teams in
the Aryan part of the city. Furthermore, when most of the
Aryan resistance leaders fell into the hands of the Germans
in the spring of 1942, Gebelev and other Jews played a deci-
296
[Reuben Ainsztein]
Contemporary Jewry
A memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust was erected
in Minsk immediately after World War II the only one in
the U.S.S.R. bearing a Yiddish inscription which explicitly
mentions Jewish victims. On Jan. 13, 1948, Solomon *Mikhoels,
the chairman of the Jewish *Anti-Fascist Committee and the
director of the Jewish State Theater in Moscow, was murdered
on Lodochnaya Street in Minsk while visiting the city on an
official mission. Later the murder was acknowledged to have
been the work of the secret police (on Stalins orders). In the
1959 census 38,842 Jews were registered in Minsk, 5,716 of
whom declared Yiddish to be their mother tongue. However,
the population figure was estimated to be in fact between
50,000 and 60,000. The Great Synagogue of Minsk was closed
down by the authorities in 1959, and in the same year private
religious services were dispersed by the militia. A small synagogue was left, but in 1964 it was destroyed, as the site was
earmarked for new apartment buildings. Eventually the Jewish congregation was allowed to open a small synagogue in a
wooden house on the outskirts of the city. There is no Jewish
cemetery in Minsk, but Jews are buried in a separate section
in the general cemetery. Matzah baking was banned for several
years, and on March 23, 1964, an article in the local newspaper, Sovetskaya Belorussiya, condemned the sending of packages of matzah to Minsk from Jewish communities abroad.
Kosher poultry, however, was available. In 1968 several young
Jews were arrested for Zionist activity. In the 1990s most Jews
left for Israel and the West.
minsk mazowiecki
Minsk va-H akhameha (1898); Regesty i nadpisi, 3 vols. (18891913), indexes; Khorosh, in: Voskhod, 12 (1901), 10010; A.H. Shabad, Toledot
ha-Yamim she-Averu al haH evra Kaddisha Shivah Keruim u-Veit
ha-Midrash ha-Gadol ba-Ir Minsk, 2 vols. (190412); Die Judenpogrome in Russland, 2 (1909), 45865; S. Dubnow (ed.), Pinkas ha-Medinah (1925), index; Alexandrov, in: Institute of Belorussian Culture,
Tsaytshrift, 1 (1926), 23949; 23 (1928), 76378; 4 (1930), 199224; S.
Agurski, Revolyutsionnoye dvizheniye v Belorussii (1928), 13943 and
passim ( = Di Revolutsionere Bavegung in Vaysrusland (1931), 16871);
Levitats, in: Zion, 3 (1938), 1708; A. Liessin, Zikhronot ve-H avayot
(1943), 178, 11631; A. Yaari, in: KS, 20 (1943/44), 16370; Yahadut
Lita, 1 (1959), index; A. Greenbaum, Jewish Scholarship in Soviet Russia (1959), 2227, 6673, passim; J.S. Hertz (ed.), Geshikhte fun Bund, 3
vols. (196066), indexes; Goldstein, in: He-Avar, 14 (1967), 327. HOLOCAUST AND AFTER: H. Smolar, Fun Minsker Geto (1946); idem,
Resistance in Minsk (1966); S. Schwarz, Jews in the Soviet Union (1951),
index; J. Greenstein, in: Sefer Pabianice (1956), 34973 (Yid.); Sefer
ha-Partizanim ha-Yehudim, 1 (1958), 50137; K. Loewenstein, Minsk:
im Lager der deutschen Juden (1961).
297
minsky, louis
population of 770, while by 1864 they numbered 620 (46.3
of the total population). In 1897 there were 3,445 Jews (55.6).
During World War I the number of Jews decreased as a result
of migration to Warsaw and other large centers. In 1921 the
Jewish population numbered 4,130 (39.3). During the period
between the two world wars the Polish population increased
considerably, while the Jewish population grew at a slower
rate. On the eve of World War II, 5,845 Jews lived there.
The Jewish community was not at first independent; at
the close of the 18t century the rabbi also served the Kaluszyn
community. During the 19t century h asidic groups such
as those of Gur (*Gora Kalwaria) and Parysow gained in
strength, and the court of the z addik of Minsk Mazowiecki
was established by R. Jacob Perlov at the close of the 19t century. After World War I his successor, the z addik Alter Israel
Simeon, removed his seat to Warsaw. There were eight Jews
among the 24 members of the municipal council elected in
1927. The Jewish populations political affiliations may be deduced from the 1931 elections to the community council,
which included seven members of *Agudat Israel, four craftsmen, and one member of right *Poalei Zion. The Jews of
Minsk Mazowiecki earned their livelihood principally from
small trade and crafts. During the 1930s they aroused the jealousy of the Polish tradesmen and craftsmen, who declared
an economic war on them. As a result of this struggle, severe
anti-Jewish riots broke out in May 1936, which were fomented
by the antisemitic *Endecja party and destroyed the means of
livelihood of the Jews. Antisemitic agitation was particularly
violent in the town on the eve of World War II.
[Shimshon Leib Kirshenboim]
Holocaust Period
In 1940 about 2,000 Jews from Pabianice, Kalisz, and Lipno
were forced to settle in Minsk Mazowiecki. In August 1940 a
ghetto was established and on Aug. 21, 1942, the great aktion
in Minsk Mazowiecki took place when about 1,000 were shot
on the spot. Almost all of the rest of the Jewish population was
transferred to the *Treblinka death camp and exterminated
there. Only two groups of workers in the town were left: one,
with about 150 men, was transferred to a camp in the Rudzki
factory; and the second, with over 500 men, was placed in a
camp in the Kopernik school building. Another several hundred succeeded in fleeing the town. Some of them organized
small partisan units which became mixed Jewish-Russian
units and operated for some time in the region. On Dec. 24,
1942, the Germans shot 218 workers from the Kopernik camp.
On Jan. 10, 1943, this camp was liquidated. On the same day
the Jewish prisoners offered armed resistance, during which
a few Germans were killed or wounded. On June 5, 1943, the
camp in the Rudzki factory was liquidated and all its inmates
were shot. No Jewish community in Minsk Mazowiecki was
reconstituted.
MINSKY, LOUIS (19091957), U.S. journalist. Born in England, Minsky went to the U.S. in his youth. He became a special writer on religious topics and in 1934 established the Religious News Service as an independent affiliate of the National
Conference of Christians and Jews. It was dedicated to providing authoritative and bias-free news about religion and ethics to both the secular and religious press. Minsky remained
head of this interfaith press agency, serving daily newspapers,
religious periodicals, radio, and television.
Now the oldest secular news agency covering religion
and ethics, RNS is owned by Newhouse News Service and its
parent, Advance Publications, Inc. Its daily and weekly news
wires are syndicated in hundreds of newspapers, reaching
more than 20 million readers worldwide. In the past, it covered such stories as the civil rights movement, the persecution
of the Jews during World War II, the rise of the evangelical
movement, the Vietnam antiwar movement, and the founding of the State of Israel, as well as Pope John Paul IIs visit to
the Holy Land in 2000. Ever widening its scope, its coverage
includes such topics as Islam, Asian religions, New Age, tribal
beliefs, gay rights, and sexual harassment.
[Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
[Stefan Krakowski]
Bibliography: T. Brustin-Berenstein, in: BIH, 1 (1952),
83125, passim. Add. Bibliography: Sefer Minsk Mazowiecki
(1977).
298
the coins of his son Bela IV and his grandson Stephen V bear
Hebrew letters, apparently standing for the initials or signs of
Jewish mintmasters.
The first Jew recorded by name in Austria was *Shlom
the mintmaster, massacred by crusaders in 1195. The nobility obtained a decree in 1222 specifically excluding Jews from
the post, but Jews were again employed in this capacity some
40 years later. Jewish mintmasters were found in other German states and principalities, particularly in the 12t century,
though their role was much less significant in the centuries
that followed. In the Wetterau region, thin coins stamped on
one side only, known as bracteates, were issued between 1170
and 1180, with the name David ha-Kohen imprinted in Hebrew. In this same period Otto the Rich, margrave of Meissen, employed Gershon, who also struck his name in Hebrew
on bracteates. Nearby, at Lausitz and Pegau, Jews operated
mints for the local nobility. Twelfth-century bracteates from
Saxony, made under both Count von Mansfeld and Duke
Bernhard I, show Hebrew letters. Similarly Jehiel, the name
of a Jewish mintmaster at Wuerzburg in the early 13t century, is clearly marked in Hebrew on numerous bracteates.
The question of whether a Jewish mintmaster might operate
on the Sabbath appears twice in contemporary responsa; he
might do so only if he had a Christian partner. The number
of Jewish mintmasters was restricted, however, both by the
appearance of Christian symbols and formulas on coins and
by guild regulations.
The 16t and 17t centuries witnessed political and economic developments in central Europe which enabled Jews
to play an unprecedented role in purveying. The growing independence of the many petty German states, the mercantilist theory of the supreme value of precious metals for state
economy, as well as the readiness of the unprincipled rulers
to issue debased coin, combined to create a need for expertise and initiative. The increased demand for currency was
thwarted by the depletion of the silver mines; the metals had
to be imported from the Americas or bought at the entrepts
of Amsterdam, London, and Hamburg, where Sephardi Jews
were prominent in the bullion trade. In Poland, too, Jews were
experts in all aspects of the coin trade. The princes and rulers
of the petty and larger states of the Holy Roman Empire and
elsewhere turned to them for purveying, minting, and distributing currency. This was done by means of contracts (see
*contractors) between the ruler and his Muenzjude (mint
Jew), who was to be found at virtually every court. The purveying of silver was conducted by a sophisticated network of
contractors and subcontractors reaching down to the level of
the peddler (see *peddling), entrusted with the task of buying
up foreign coinage, silver and copper wares, and anything else
suitable. The actual minting was supervised by Jews, contractors of the mint. The coin dies were often made by Jewish seal
engravers, a profession which Jews tended to monopolize, by
virtue of its being free of medieval guild restrictions. The distribution of the freshly minted, often inferior quality coinage
was often entrusted to military contractors, frequently Jews.
299
Bibliography: MEDIEVAL EUROPE: P. Grierson, Bibliographie Numismatique (1966); S. Stern, Court Jew (1950), 47, 157, 16276,
211, 218; M. Hoffmann, Geldhandel der deutschen Juden (1910); S.
Katz, Jews in the Visigothic and Frankish Kingdoms of France and Gaul
300
mintz, paul
(1934), 122f.; dAmecourt, in: Annuaire de la Socit franaise de Numismatique et dArchologie, 4 (1873), 12831; J. Cahn, in: Zeitschrift
fuer Numismatik, 33 (1922); Biographical Dictionary of Medalists, 8
vols. (190230); Baer, Spain, 1 (1961), 146, 327, 1312; 2 (1966), 29;
Neuman, Spain, 2 (1942), 237, 245, 252; D.M. Friedenberg, in: Numismatist, 130 (1967), 151528; W. Gumowski, Handbuch der polnischen
Numismatik (1960), 9196; I. Schiper, Di Virtshaft Geshikhte fun di
Yidn in Poyln Beysn Mittelalter (1929), 235ff.; A. Wolf, in: MGJV, 9
(1902), 2425; L. Rthy and G. Probszt, Corpus Nummorum Hungariae, 71, 74, 77, 89. CENTRAL EUROPE AND MODERN ERA: H.I.
Bloom, Economic Activities of the Jews of Amsterdam (1933); B. Brilling, Geschichte der Juden in Breslau 17541802 (1960); idem, in: JGGJC, 7 (1935), 38798; F. Redlich, in: Explorations in Entrepreneurial
History, 3 (1951), 16198; H. Kellenbenz, Sephardim an der unteren
Elbe (1958), 21044; H. Schnee, Hoffinanz und der Moderne Staat, 5
vols. (195367); A. Pribram, Urkunden und Akten zur Geschichte der
Juden in Wien (1918), index, S.V. Muenzjuden; M. Koehler, Juden in
Halberstadt (1927), 4148; S. Stern, Preussische Staat und die Juden,
2 (1962), Akten: no. 4671; no. 1248; no. 14469; no. 177; M. Grunwald, Samuel Oppenheimer und sein Kreis (1913), index. MUSLIM
COUNTRIES: S.D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society, 1 (1967), 362,
365; S. Poznaski, Babylonische Geonim (1914), 133; S. Assaf, in: Zion,
1 (1937), 256f.; A.N. Pollak, ibid., 2430.
[Daniel M. Friedenberg and Henry Wasserman]
MINTZ, MOSES BEN ISAAC (15t century), German talmudist. Moses was born in Mainz sometime between 1420 and
1430. He studied under his father, Israel *Isserlein, and Jacob
*Weil. During his extensive travels, he visited various towns,
investigating their customs and communal regulations. His
first rabbinate was at Wuerzburg where he served for a short
time, until the expulsion of the Jews from the town in 1453.
He proceeded to Mainz, where he stayed until the expulsion
of 1462. From there he went to Landau and in 1464 to Ulm. In
1469 he was appointed rabbi of Bamberg. Four years later he
went to Nuremberg and the following year to Posen. While
there he decided to immigrate to Erez Israel; he had already
made all final preparations when for some reason he had to
abandon his plan, and it appears that he remained in Posen
until the end of his life. The year of his death is unknown.
Mintzs influence spread in Germany and beyond. He
was involved in communal affairs and individuals, including
outstanding scholars, as well as communities turned to him
with their problems and disputes. Concern for the community and its general welfare was of paramount importance to
him. He directed a yeshivah and engaged in discussions with
his pupils. In 145657 R. Seligman Bing Oppenheim and R.
Menahem Bachrach convened a council in *Bingen for the
purpose of enacting takkanot that would be binding on other
communities also a step which did not meet with the approval of the rabbis of Germany. Despite his esteem for Seligman Bing, Mintz strongly opposed them and the takkanot
were not adopted. Similarly, when he felt that Bing had been
guilty of faulty judgment, he did not hesitate to criticize him,
though there was nothing personal in his criticism. In another
dispute in Italy, when Liva Landa placed a ban upon the rabbis of Padua, including Mintzs cousin Isaac Mintz, Moses
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
agreed to place Landa under a ban although he was a venerable scholar and teacher, unless he withdraw his ban and appease the rabbis of Padua, and at the same time he appealed
to the rabbis of Padua to waive their rights and show respect
for a sage. Should Landa remain obdurate, however, then
the ban on him is to remain in force. Moses concludes: I do
this neither for my own honor nor for the honor of my family, but for the sake of Heaven to prevent the increase of strife
in Israel. Moses was an accomplished h azzan and conducted
the services on the high holidays. His best-known pupil is *Joseph b. Moses, author of the Leket Yosher.
Moses Mintzs fame rests on his responsa (Cracow, 1617);
the 119 published, chiefly on civil and matrimonial law, abound
in references to local customs and takkanot, ancient and new,
including those ascribed to *Gershom b. Judah of Mainz and
takkanot ShUM (Speyer, Worms, and Mainz). The index lists
120 responsa, but the last one has been omitted from all editions. This may be because of its subject, which the author
describes as: The stern words I wrote to the seven elders of
the Regensburg community. It lays down that one who has a
right of settlement in a community and leaves, subsequently
to return, has not lost his previous right And it explains that
a scholar should not take advantage of his status to act haughtily. The main source for Moses biography is the responsa,
where it is related that his wife Minlan was crowned with the
crown of the Torah and piety. They also include many local
takkanot introduced by Mintz, some of a social character, including rulings on the vestments a reader should don when
conducting the service, how a man should conduct himself
during prayer, etc.
Of special value are three responsa in manuscript entitled
The Three Branches, which are an important source for the
history of the yeshivot of Germany in the 15t century. They
depict the woeful condition of pupil-teacher relations, which
had broken down as a result of the arrogance of the teachers and their exaggerated concern for their dignity, as well as
because of the pupils desire for greater freedom of activity
and the acquisition of social status. The laymen, too, did not
accept the authority of the rabbis and disregarded their rulings. The responsa reflect other aspects of the life of the Jews
in Germany: their economic, social, family, and religious life,
study, the attitude of the Jews to gentiles, persecutions, and
expulsions, etc.
Bibliography: Joseph b. Moses, Leket Yosher, ed. by J. Freimann, 2 (1904), 45 no. 103 (introd.); Guedemann, Gesch Erz, 3 (1888),
index; M.A. Szulwas, Die Juden in Wuerzburg (1934), 77; Tal, in: Sinai,
40 (1957), 22847, 27892.
[Shlomo Tal]
301
mintz, shlomo
Jewish member of the Latvian government, serving as state
controller. He published various legal works and was chairman of the commission preparing the Latvian code of criminal law. He was also active in Jewish affairs as founder of the
H evrat Mefiz ei Haskalah (*Society for the Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia), in Riga, chairman of the Jewish National-Democratic Party, chairman of the commission
preparing a draft for the legal framework of Jewish national
autonomy, a non-Zionist member of the *Jewish Agency for
Palestine, and chairman of the Jewish Lawyers Society in Latvia. In 1940, when Latvia was occupied by the Soviet forces,
Mintz was arrested together with other Jewish and non-Jewish
leaders and deported to Kansk, near Krasnoyarsk, and later to
a Soviet labor camp, where he died.
Bibliography: Yahadut Latvia (1953), index.
[Joseph Gar]
MINYAT ZIFTA, town in Lower *Egypt, on the eastern tributary of the Nile. In the *Ftimid period, there was an important Jewish community in this town. R. *Abraham b. Shabbetai, who wrote several works on halakhah, was rabbi (h aver)
of the community at the beginning of the 12t century, and after him, his son Shabbetai held the same position for many
years. In a list of contributions to a collection among the communities of Lower Egypt at the middle of the same century,
Minyat Zifta is mentioned as the second largest contributor.
From the *Genizah documents it appears that the social status of the Jews was variegated; among them were craftsmen,
302
MINZ, ABRAHAM BEN JUDAH HALEVI (d. 1525), Italian scholar and rabbi. Some time before 1509, acting on behalf
of his father, Judah b. Eliezer ha-Levi *Minz of Padua, he insulted the famous rabbi, Jacob Margolis of Regensburg. Both
father and son subsequently made public apology. In January
1509, after his fathers death, Abraham was appointed to succeed him, but in July of the same year a decree of expulsion
was issued against him by the Venetian authorities for having
presented a gift in the name of the Padua community to the
chief of the conquering imperial German army during the sack
of Padua. The decree was apparently revoked some time thereafter, as Minz is known to have visited Padua about ten years
later. After leaving Padua, Abraham spent 15 months in Ferrara,
being supported there by the wealthy parnas, Norsa, whom he
later sided with in the notorious *Finzi-Norsa controversy, at
the height of which Jacob *Pollak, a partisan of Abraham Raphael Finzi, and Minz excommunicated each other. Abraham
subsequently became rabbi in Mantua. His son-in-law, Meir
*Katzenellenbogen, occupied the Padua rabbinate.
Abraham was the author of a number of responsa, which
are printed together with those of his uncle by marriage, R.
Liwa of Ferrara (Venice, 1511). He was the author, too, of Seder
Gittin va-H aliz ah, printed together with the responsa of his
father and his son-in-law (Venice, 1553). He died in Padua.
Bibliography: A. Marx, Studies in Jewish History and Booklore (1944), 10754 (= Abhandlungen Chajes (1933), 14993); I.T.
Eisenstadt and S. Wiener, Daat Kedoshim (1897/98), 538, 88 (third
pagination).
[Shlomo Eidelberg]
as its head led the movement into close cooperation with the
institutions of the yishuv, in opposition to the policy of *Agudat Israel. Minz was a member of the Provisional State Council of Israel (1948) and later of the Knesset. He was elected
deputy speaker of the Second Knesset and held the post until
the Fourth Knesset. He overruled a decision of the Council
of Torah Sages of Agudat Israel and joined the coalition government as minister of posts in 1960, thus causing a rift between his party and Agudat Israel. Minz wrote several books,
mainly on h asidic topics.
[Menachem Friedman]
MINZ, BENJAMIN (19031961), leader of the *Poalei Agudat Israel movement. Born in Lodz, Poland, Minz went to
Palestine in 1925. A member of Agudat Israel from his youth,
he persistently advocated cooperation with the Zionist Movement, despite the opposition of his leaders. At the Third Great
Assembly of Agudat Israel (Marienbad, 1937), he was elected
a member of the Central Council, and in 1938 was elected to
the Poalei Agudat Israel Executive. During World War II, he
was active on the Vaad ha-Haz z alah (rescue committee), and
after the war he worked in DP camps in Germany (see *Displaced Persons). He initiated the founding of the World Union
of Poalei Agudat Israel at the Antwerp Conference (1946), and
303
mir
MIR, town in Grodno district, Belarus. From 1569 until 1813
the town and the surrounding estates were the property of the
Radziwill princes. Jews first settled in Mir at the beginning of
the 17t century. To begin with they were under the jurisdiction
of the community of *Nesvizh, but within a few years their
numbers had rapidly increased, and it can be assumed that
they then had their own communal organizations. The Jews
became an important factor in local trade and at the two annual fairs held in Mir. Many of them also earned their livelihood as carters. Jewish merchants from every part of Lithuania
and Poland were attracted to the fairs of Mir, where they carried on an extensive trade in furs (exporting them especially
to Leipzig), horses, oxen, spices, grain, textiles, tobacco (from
1672), and wine. In the records of the Lithuanian council (see
*Councils of the Lands) Mir is mentioned for the first time in
1662. The Council convened there four times: 1687, 1697, 1702,
1751. From 1673, the taxes owed by the Jews of Lithuania to
state institutions and debts to other creditors were occasionally
collected at the Mir fairs. In 1685, after complaints by the Jewish representatives, Catherine Sapieha of the Radziwill family
instructed the administrator of the town to respect the rights
of the Jews and to refrain from dispensing justice or arbitrating in their internal affairs.
During the early decades of the 18t century, the Jewish
population of Mir increased considerably. The local Jewish
contribution to the poll tax rose from 45 zlotys in 1673 to 1,160
zlotys in 1700 and 1,350 zlotys in 1720. During this period the
merchants of Mir maintained fruitful commercial relations
with *Leipzig, *Koenigsberg, *Memel, and Libau (*Liepaja).
From the second half of the 18t century, the economic situation of the community declined. In 1760 the Jews of Mir paid
480 zlotys in poll tax; the census of 1765 recorded 607 Jews in
the town and the vicinity who paid this tax.
Prominent rabbis officiated in Mir during the 18t century. The first av bet din known by name (in the late 1720s)
was R. Meir b. Isaac *Eisenstadt, followed by R. Z evi Hirsch
ha-Kohen Rappoport; during the middle of that century, R.
Solomon Zalman b. Judah Mirkish, author of Shulh an Shelomo (Frankfurt on the Oder, 1771), held rabbinical office for
15 years. He was succeeded by R. Z evi Hirsh Eisenstadt. During the rabbinate of R. Joseph David Ajzensztat (17761826),
the famous yeshivah of Mir was founded, functioning there
until the eve of WWII. At the beginning of the 19t century
*H abad H asidism acquired considerable influence in the
community.
In 1806 the Mir community numbered 807, including
106 tailors, five goldsmiths, six cord-makers, and about 30
merchants. In the 65 nearby villages, there were 494 Jews in
1818. The numbers in Mir itself rose to 2,273 in 1847 and 3,319
(about 62 of the total population) in 1897. From the second
half of the 19t century, with the exception of the wood, grain,
horse, and textile merchants who formed the upper class, the
majority of the local Jews were craftsmen such as scribes, carters, butchers, and tailors. The wooden synagogue, which had
been erected in the middle of the 18t century, was burnt down
Holocaust Period
Under Soviet rule (193941) private enterprise was gradually stifled and factories, businesses, and even large buildings
were taken over by the state. The yeshivah students and rabbis,
headed by R. Eliezer Judah Finkel, moved to Vilna in still independent Lithuania (Finkel managed to reach Palestine and
founded the Mir Yeshivah in Jerusalem). The Germans captured Mir on June 27, 1941. They immediately executed scores
of Jews on charges of Soviet collaboration. On Nov. 9, 1941,
1,300 Jews were murdered on the outskirts of the town. The
surviving 850 Jews were segregated into a ghetto and transferred in May 1942 to the ancient fortress in the city. A young
Jew, Shemuel (Oswald) Rufeisen, born in the Cracow district,
played a key role in the Mir resistance movement. He posed
as a Volksdeutscher, Joseph Oswald. After the removal of the
Jews to the Mirski fortress, a resistance movement of 80 members was organized to offer armed resistance to the imminent
Aktion (action) against the Jewish population. Working in
groups of five, they acquired weapons and trained themselves.
Their central command was made up of Ha-Shomer ha-Z air,
Deror, Bund, and Communists.
Early in August 1942 Rufeisen informed the underground
that the Germans would begin their liquidation campaign on
Aug. 13. On Aug. 9 about 300 young people left for the forests
on the assumption that no effective resistance action against
the Germans could be taken inside the ghetto. On August 13
the liquidation action began, and all those who had remained
304
in 1901. With the threat of pogroms in 190405, Mir Jews organized a *self-defense organization. During this period, the
*Bund and *Poalei Zion movements won many adherents
in the town. The Zionist movement was organized there in
1914. In 1921 there were 2,074 Jews (c. 55 of the population)
living in the town. Their difficult economic situation deteriorated even further from the late 1920s. A Yiddish elementary
school and kindergarten were founded in 1917; during the
1920s they were administered by CYSHO and during the 1930s
by the Shul-Kult. During the same period, *Tarbut, Yavneh,
and *Beth Jacob schools functioned in Mir. The Jewish library
was founded in 1908.
The yeshivah of Mir, founded by Samuel b. H ayyim *Tiktinski in 1815 and directed by his son Abraham after his death,
played a central role in the spiritual life of the community.
From 1836 it was headed by Moses Abraham b. Joseph Ajzensztat and later by H ayyim Zalman Bresler, rabbi of the town,
who resigned as the result of a dispute. From then on, the offices of town rabbi and rosh yeshivah were separated. From
the 1880s, the rabbi was Yom Tov Lipman (R. Lipa). In 1903 he
was succeeded by R. Elijah David *Rabinowitz-Teomim, who
served until his aliyah to Erez Israel. The last rabbi of Mir was
Abraham Z evi Kamai (from 1917 until the Holocaust). During World War I, the yeshivah of Mir was transferred to Poltava but returned to the town in 1921, and was then headed
by R. Eliezer Judah Finkel. Mir was the birthplace of Zalman
*Shazar (Rubashov).
[Arthur Cygielman]
miracle
in the ghetto were murdered in Yablonoshchina and buried
in mass graves. Those who had escaped to the forests were
confronted with many difficulties. Russian partisan units often refused to accept Jews into their ranks, and many of the
Mir Jews who came to the forests were killed by antisemitic
Russian partisans. Despite all these difficulties, Mir Jews managed to join Soviet partisan units, mainly the Brothers Bielski
brigade, and took part in sabotage activities. Following the arrival of the Soviet army, the Jewish partisans from Mir joined
the Soviet forces to continue the fight against the Nazis up till
the end of the war.
The student body of the yeshivah was saved during
the war by escaping to *Shanghai. After the war (1947), the
yeshivah was transferred to Brooklyn, New York (Mirrer
Yeshivah Central Institute). Some of its scholars later joined
the Mir Yeshivah in Jerusalem.
he denied Rewbells assertion that they [the Jews] do not regard themselves as citizens, and followed *Clermont-Tonnerre in stating that the very fact that the Jews were requesting equality was proof of their desire to cease being Jewish in
any separatist way.
Bibliography: L. Kahn, Les juifs de Paris pendant la rvolution (1898); H. de Jouvenel, Stormy Life of Mirabeau (1929); A. Hertzberg, French Enlightenment and the Jews (1968), index.
[Emmanuel Beeri]
305
[Aharon Weiss]
miracle
In the Talmud
The almost universal word for a miracle in the talmudical literature is the term ( nes), used in the Bible for a sign or
standard. The biblical miracles are unquestionably accepted
by the sages of the Talmud. Insofar as their theological aspect
is concerned, three main considerations exercised the minds of
the sages: (1) the reversal of the order of creation with its corollary of an insufficiency in the act of creation; (2) the miracle as
a testimony of the truth of religion; and (3) the daily miracles
which do not involve a disturbance of the order of creation.
(1) According to the rabbis, the miracles were, so to
speak, preordained and provided for in the act of creation.
R. Johanan said, God made a condition with the sea that
it would part before the Children of Israel R. Jeremiah b.
Eleazar said, not with the sea alone, but with whatever God
created on the six days of creation God commanded heaven
and earth that they should be silent before Moses; the sun and
moon that they should stand still before Joshua; the ravens that
they should feed Elijah; the fire that it should not harm Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah; the lions that they injure not Daniel; the heavens that they should open to the voice of Ezekiel;
and the fish that it should cast up Jonah (Gen. R. 5:45). Another passage emphasizes this idea even more strongly. When
God commanded Moses to lift up his staff and part the Red
Sea, Moses argued with God that it would involve a breach of
his own act of creation, God answered him, Thou hast not
read the beginning of the Torah I made a condition at the
time; and only then did Moses heed the divine behest (Ex.
R. 21:6). In the same vein, the Mishnah (Avot 5:6) enumerates
ten things which were created on the eve of the Sabbath [of
creation] at twilight, including the mouth of the earth which
opened up to swallow Korah (Num. 16:32), the mouth of the
ass of Balaam which spoke (Num. 22:28), the manna (Ex.
16:14), and the rod of Moses (Ex. 4:17). As Zangwill (quoted by
J.H. Hertz, Comm. to Prayer Book) puts it, the Talmud sages
discovered the reign of universal law through exceptions, the
miracles that had to be created specially and were still a part of
the order of the world, bound to appear in due time.
(2) That miracles are not evidence of religious truth is
clearly and explicitly stated in the Bible (Deut. 13:24). The
rabbis emphasize this in a striking incident wherein R. Eliezer
b. Hyrcanus called for, and achieved, a series of miracles for
the purpose of proving that his halakhic ruling was correct,
but R. Joshua disdainfully rejected them, quoting the Torah is
not in heaven and his contrary view was accepted (BM 59a).
(3) The rabbis, however, almost go out of their way to emphasize the daily miracle of life which does not express itself
in violations of the laws of nature. Come and consider how
many miracles the Holy One, blessed be He, performs for man,
and he is unaware of it. If a man were to swallow unmasticated
bread, it would descend into his bowels and scratch him, but
God created a well in the throat of man which enables it to
descend safely (Ex. R. 24:1). This thought is expressed in the
formula of thanksgiving prayer (Modim) which forms part of
the daily Amidah, for Thy miracles which are daily with us,
and for Thy wonders and Thy benefits, which are wrought at
all times, evening, morning, and night.
In this connection is it not without interest that the
formula of thanksgiving for the miracles which Thou
didst wage for our fathers is confined to the two festivals of
H anukkah and Purim (Sof. 20:6; the formula is found in Seder
R. Amram). It is true that the rabbis emphasize the miraculous aspect of the H annukah legend of the pure oil which was
sufficient for one day only but lasted for eight until new oil
could be brought (Shab. 21b), to which there is no reference
in the Book of Maccabees, and that many of the regulations
of the festival are enjoined in order to publicize the miracle
(Shab. 23b), but this miracle cannot compare with the biblical
miracles, and there is no deus ex machina miracle in the story
of Purim. On the whole they belong to the class of natural
miracles. The parting of the Red Sea is regarded as the greatest
(most difficult) of the biblical miracles (Pes. 118a).
Although the Talmud is replete with stories and legends of miracles wrought for its worthies (cf. especially Taan.
2125), it is generally accepted that the age of miracles (probably for the benefit of the people as a whole) has ceased, because they were performed for those who were willing to
sacrifice themselves for the sanctification of the Name, and
we are not worthy of having miracles performed for us (Ber.
20a; Taan. 18b; Sanh. 94b).
306
miracle
Nevertheless ten minor miracles happened in the time of
the Temple (Avot 5:5). They include such mundane miracles
as that no person was ever bitten by a snake or scorpion in
Jerusalem, that there was always accommodation to be found
there (during the pilgrim festivals), and that rain never extinguished the altar fire.
It is forbidden to rely upon miracles (Pes. 64b). One
should never stand in a place of danger and say a miracle
will happen to me since perhaps it will not happen, and if it
does, it will be deducted from his merits (Taan. 20b). But the
recipient of a miracle does not recognize the miracle (Nid.
31a). When coming to a place where miracles were wrought
for the Jewish people, one must recite a special blessing (Ber.
9:1 and 54a).
[Louis Isaac Rabinowitz]
307
miracle
the revelation at Sinai was established by the fact that all of
Israel were granted prophecy together with Moses and could
bear witness to revelation out of their own experience. This
fact confirmed the revelation for all time, and any prophecy
which conflicts with it must be invalid even if it is supposedly
supported by miracles (1:8090).
Nah manides
Among Jewish philosophers after Maimonides there were
those who repudiated the belief in the temporal origin of the
world and in miracles, explaining biblical references to them
as allegories. There were also renewed attempts to prove that
miracles did take place, notably by Nah manides, who disputed Maimonides conception of miracles from a kabbalistic viewpoint. In opposition to Maimonides view of nature
as a necessary effect of divine wisdom, Nah manides posited
the miracle as preceding nature. The miracle is not a singular
occurrence it is an immutable supranatural reality. According to Nah manides, nature and worldly order do not affect
the ends of the Torah, and therefore the destiny of Israel is
not natural but miraculous. However, miracles do not necessarily conflict with, or deviate from, the natural order. Nah manides postulated a distinction between self-evident miracles, i.e., those which deviate from the natural order thus
serving to impart faith to unbelievers and the ignorant, and
hidden miracles, which consist in the unusual coincidence of
a number of natural events. The miraculous nature of the latter will be evident only to the believer (A. Jellinek (ed.), Torat
Adonai Temimah, passim).
Maimonides
While Maimonides adopted Aristotelian physics and metaphysics, he deviated from the Aristotelian view that the world
is eternal. He upheld the assumption of the temporal origin
of the world, although he maintained that it can be neither
proved or disproved conclusively, as the only one which allows
for miracles (Guide 2:25). Miracles, according to Maimonides,
are necessary in order to sustain the authority of revelation
for the masses, as well as to support the biblical assumption
that God guides men by giving them the Law.
In his attempt to reconcile the concept of miracles with
the Aristotelianism that he accepted, Maimonides maintained
that the creation of the world as well as miracles are voluntary
acts of God, and that in its essence and constitution the world
reflects divine reason. Thus there is no conflict between divine wisdom and divine will, both of which were impressed
upon the original mold of creation (3:25). According to Maimonides, miracles are predetermined at the time of creation
and thus do not indicate a change in Gods will or wisdom.
The difference between the act of nature and the miracle is a
difference between the regular and the unique, although the
unique is also governed by its own laws. Indeed, the miracle,
like creation, is a unique occurrence which establishes a reality or an order. For example, the miracles of the patriarchs and
Moses established the existence of a nation with a particular
role to play in the order of the world. The Sinaitic revelation
established an ideal legislation for human conduct. Maimonides was careful not to define the miracle as an abrogation
of the laws of nature. He explained that in the miracle of the
crossing of the Red Sea (Sea of Reeds), for example, the nature of the water was not changed but was affected by another
natural force, the wind. A miracle, such as the revelation at
Mt. Sinai, was the manifestation of a particular act of creation,
and thus may be considered an addition to nature rather than
an abrogation thereof.
In sum, Maimonides concurred with Aristotles position that reality derives from divine reason and therefore not
everything imaginable is necessarily possible. While he did
maintain that there are things which nature disallows, he differed with Aristotle on the limitation of the possible. Aristotle maintained that only that which exists is possible, whereas
Maimonides posited the possibility of singular, constitutive
occurrences as equally a necessary effect of divine wisdom
(3:15). In accordance with his definition of miracles as constitutive events of general significance, Maimonides elevated
the miracles of Moses above all others, while he interpreted
allegorically many other biblical episodes which when understood literally are miraculous (2:46, 47).
H asdai Crescas
The most fully developed critique of Maimonides position
is found in H asdai *Crescas writings. Crescas held that the
world was created ex nihilo but had no temporal beginning.
The world is eternal and continually renewed by God, characterized by Crescas as infinite grace. As well as being infinitely
good, God is omnipotent, and therefore miracles, which are
instruments of good, are not merely within His power and in
harmony with His wisdom but are a necessary effect of His
being (Or Adonai, 2, proposition 3:1).
For Crescas, miracles were neither a deviation from
nature nor in conflict with it, but an expression of a supranatural order. What distinguishes miracles from natural occurrences is not the fact of their deviation from the natural
order, which is after all an external manifestation, but an
intrinsic quality. Whereas the natural occurrence is brought
about by God indirectly, expresses a limited force, occurs as
part of a process, and has only a relative existence, the miracle is brought about directly by God, expresses unlimited
power, is a singular event, is not part of a process, and has an
absolute existence (ibid., proposition 3:2). This conception
of miracles fits in with Crescas view that the world is continually recreated ex nihilo by the divine will: the world itself
is actually a perpetual miracle which encompasses the natural
order. Thus the miracle is not an aberration of nature, rather
it precedes nature. The ultimate purpose of the miracle is
to impart faith to unbelievers and to strengthen the faith of
believers. However, he did not regard the miracle as an
external verification of prophecy, but, along the lines of Judah
Halevi, he believed that in every event in which the infinite
power of God is revealed, God becomes present to man,
and thus heresy and doubt are abolished (ibid., 3, proposition
308
miracle
4:2). In Crescas doctrine there is a strong universalistic orientation, although emphasis is placed on the particular supranatural providence of Israel: Gods grace, being infinite,
must reveal itself to everyone, and the miracle which will
bring this about, the resurrection of the dead, will be superior even to the miracles performed by Moses (ibid., 3, proposition 4:2).
An analysis of Crescas doctrine illustrates the development of the concept of miracles through the confrontation
with Platonism and Aristotelianism, in that it represents a
critical synthesis of both. The miracle, which had been regarded as an external confirmation of revelation, came to be
viewed not as a non-natural occurrence but as an immediate
revelation of the truth of the Torah. In his critical synthetic
doctrine, Crescas also anticipated ideas which were fully developed only by modern Jewish philosophers.
Contemporary Views
There have been two trends in modern Jewish thought concerning miracles. The first, represented by such thinkers as
F. *Rosenzweig, M. *Buber, and A.J. *Heschel, has returned
to an almost biblical conception of miracles, based upon the
idea that the miracle is a sign of Gods presence. The second
trend, represented by M. *Kaplan, may be said to follow the
rationalistic approach of the medieval philosophers. However,
it goes beyond the medievals in denying the significance of
miracles qua miracles. The first trend explains away the problem of the miracle being contrary to natural law by proposing a new definition of the miracle, according to which the
essence of the miracle does not lie in its being contradictory
to nature, but in its having a particular significance in history.
The second trend, in a sense, chooses science over miracles,
denying any validity to the miracle, insofar as it supposedly
goes against natural law.
Rosenzweig holds, as does Maimonides, that the miracles of the Bible were built into the scheme of things from
creation, hence, they were part of the natural order. These
events were miracles because they played a significant role in
history. Rosenzweig attempts to connect science and miracles,
or what he called objectivity (idealism) and subjectivity (personal meaning), revelation being the point at which they are
joined. The man who receives and lives a revelation carries
both in him. The miracle of personal revelation is genuine. It
infuses meaning into a particular moment, while its impact
carries over into the future (see F. Rosenzweig, Kokhav haGeullah (1970), 13148).
Buber also stressed that no miracle is contrary to nature,
maintaining that the miracle and nature are two different aspects of the same phenomenon revelation. For Buber, mans
attitude is the essential element in the miracle: the miracle is
our receptivity to the eternal revelation. Buber approaches
biblical miracles by asking, what human relation to real
events this could have been (which) grew into the written
account we have read (Moses (1958), 61ff.). A man today can
experience the same relation to real events, the same miracle,
that biblical man experienced. The attitude that a man has to
events, the world, or other people is the raw material out of
which experiences that are miracles arise. For a person properly attuned, any event may be considered a miracle, in terms
of its meaning for him.
Heschel stresses the same points using various terms
such as the legacy of wonder (God in Search of Man (1959),
43), or radical amazement, terms that he gives to the sense
of mystery and awe that he attributed to biblical figures. He
writes that, What stirred their souls was neither the hidden
nor the apparent, but the hidden in the apparent; not the order but the mystery of the order that prevails in the universe
(ibid., 56). He also speaks of the ineffable, and of a sudden
extraordinary and meaningful moment which he calls an
309
[Eliezer Schweid]
MIRANSKY, PERETZ (19081993), Yiddish poet and fable-writer. Miransky was born in Vilnius (Vilna), Lithuania,
where he attended h eder and then public high school. He
made his literary debut in 1934 with two fables in the Vilner
Tog. He joined the *Yung Vilne (Young Vilna) group of poets
and artists, and contributed to its literary publications such
as Yung Vilne. He was one of the groups last remaining members along with Abraham *Sutzkever. His fables appeared in
Yiddish periodicals, including the Warsaw Literarishe Bleter
and the Kovno (Kaunas) Emes, and newspapers in Bialystok,
Grodno, and Gluboke (Hlybokaye, Belarus). His fables were
used in pedagogical materials for the Yiddish schools. He
wrote pieces that were performed in the Vilna ARRT revue
theater and in the Maydim Yiddish puppet theater.
Miransky fled the Nazi invasion to Samarkand, Uzbekistan, and worked in an artel. After the war he lived in the
Tempelhof DP camp in Berlin, where he was culturally active
among the refugees and coedited the journal Undzer Lebn.
He immigrated to Canada in 1949 and settled in Montreal. He
moved permanently to Toronto in 1955 and greatly enriched
the Toronto Yiddish cultural scene. His Yiddish poetry and
fables were published widely in the Yiddish press and in literary journals including the Keneder Odler, Yidisher Zhurnal,
Goldene Keyt, Svive, Tsukunft, Afn Shvel, Yidishe Kultur, and
the Forverts. He published several volumes of his writing in
Canada and Israel: A Likht far a Groshn (1951), Shures Shire:
Lider un Mesholim (1974), Tsvishn Shmeykhl un Trer: Mesho-
310
miriam
lim Bukh (1979), Nit Derzogt (1983), and A Zemer fun Demer
(1991). His writing, with its eternal themes and emphasis on issues of social justice, has been widely published in translation,
most recently in a bilingual English-Yiddish edition: Selected
Poems and Fables: An English/Yiddish Collection (ed. Anna Miransky, 2000). His poetry has also been set to music, found in
Marilyn Lerner and David Walls Still Soft Voiced Heart: New
Yiddish Lieder (2002) and the Flying Bulgar Klezmer Bands
Sweet Return (2003).
Bibliography: C.L. Fuks, Hundert Yor Yidishe un Hebreyishe Literatur in Kanade. (1982) 16465; S. Niger et al., (eds.), Leksikon fun der Nayer Yidisher Literatur, vol. 5 (195681), 669; Peretz
Miransky, in: M. Ravitch, Mayn Leksikon: Yidishe Shraybers, Kintslers, Aktiorn, oykh Klal-tuers in di Amerikes un Andere Lender, vol.
6, book 2 (1982), 10810.
[Rebecca Margolis (2nd ed.)]
MIRELMAN, family of Argentine industrialists and Jewish leaders. SIMON (18941978) was born in London, moved
to Russia and Switzerland, and settled in Buenos Aires in
1914. Three of his brothers, ROBERTO (18981991), JACOB
(19001990), and JOSE (19021996), were born in Russia, educated in Switzerland, and eventually joined Simon in Buenos
Aires at different stages after World War I. LEON (19072003)
was born in Switzerland and moved to Buenos Aires in 1927.
There the brothers founded a highly successful textile factory.
Simon was president of the Hospital Israelita, Bnai Brith, the
Committee Against Antisemitism (later *DAIA), the Argentine-Israel Cultural Institute, the United Jewish Appeal, and
the Israel Bond Drive. He also had a prominent role in the establishment of an office of the American Jewish Committee
in Buenos Aires, and was a member if the Board of Governors of the Hebrew University. Roberto was president of the
Congregacion Israelita and later among the founders of Bet
El synagogue. Jose became a strong Zionist advocate and a
leader of the Revisionists in Argentina. In 1949 he moved to
Israel. Already in the 1960s he became an activist for the immigration of Russian Jews to Israel, and printed over a million Russian-Hebrew dictionaries, haggadot in Russian, and
other educational materials, to be forwarded to Jewish communities in Russia. In the 1970s he supported the exchange of
Russian Jews for hard currency, which enabled the exit of over
100,000 Jews. Leon was president of the board of the Seminario Rabinico Latinoamericano from its inception in 1962
until 1969, and for many years the president of the United
Jewish Appeal.
The Mirelman brothers were benefactors of many Jewish
causes, especially those connected with Israel. In the 1930s they
founded Editorial Israel, a pioneering effort to publish books
of Jewish content in Spanish. Over 100 titles were published.
Joses son, DAVID (1938 ), born in Argentina, emigrated
to Israel in 1949 and became a biochemist at the Weizmann
Institute of Science, known for his investigation of infectious
and parasitic diseases in less developed countries, and in particular as an expert in the molecular biology of host-pathogen interactions.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
In the Aggadah:
Miriam was so called in reference to the bitterness of the
bondage of Egypt (, bitter; Ex. R. 26:1). Although she is
referred to as a prophetess in the Bible (Ex. 15:20), none of her
prophecies is mentioned there. The aggadah, however, fills the
lacuna. It explains that her father *Amram, unwilling to have
children who would be doomed to death, divorced his wife
after Pharaohs decree. Miriam urged him to remarry *Jochebed, rebuking him for being even more cruel than Pharaoh
since the latter had decreed only against the male children,
and prophesying that a child would be born from them who
would be the liberator of Israel. Amram acceded and Miriam
311
In Islam
In his early prophecies Muhammad speaks about Miriam
(Mary, Ar. Maryam) and her son Jesus, who was born of the
Holy Spirit (Sura 19:20; 23:52; 66:12). It is, however, also said
in Sura 19:29 that she was the sister of Aaron, while in the
third Sura (3:31), known as the sura of the family of Imrn,
she is described as the daughter of Imrn. In connection
with the decrees of Firawn (*Pharaoh), Muhammad related
that the mother of Ms (Moses) ordered his sister to watch
over the ark in which Moses had been placed (20:4142;
28:1012) without mentioning her name. On another occasion (66:1112), he mentions the wife of Pharaoh and Miriam
(the mother of Jesus) among the righteous women. According
to Tabar and Thalab, Miriam was married to Caleb, while in
Kiss tale about Qrn (*Korah), it is said that Miriam was
his wife and that it was from her he had learned the science of
alchemy, the reason for his attainment to wealth.
59; Rozelaar, in: VT, 2 (1952), 226; CH Gordon, Ugaritic Manual (1955),
292, no. 1170. Add. Bibliography: S.D. Sperling, in: HUCA, 7071
(200001), 3955. IN THE AGGADAH: M. Haran, in: JSS, 5 (1960),
5455; Ginzberg, Legends, index. IN ISLAM: T abar, Tarkh, 1 (1357
A.H.), 307; Thalab Qis as (1356 A.H.), 141, 203; Kis, Qis as , ed. by
Eisenberg (192223), 22930; A. Geiger, Was hat Mohammed aus dem
Judenthume aufgenommen? (1902), 154; H. Speyer, Die biblischen Erzhlungen im Qoran (1931, repr. 1961), 2423; Maryam, in EIS 2, 6
(1991), 62832 (includes bibliography).
312
miron, issachar
pany subsequent films included The Apartment (1960), The
Magnificent Seven (1960), By Love Possessed (1961), West Side
Story (1961), The Childrens Hour (1962), Two for the Seesaw
(1962), The Great Escape (1963), Toys in the Attic (1963), The
Pink Panther (1964), The Russians Are Coming (1966), Hawaii
(1966), In the Heat of the Night (Academy Award winner for
Best Picture, 1967), Fitzwilly (1967), They Call Me Mr. Tibbs
(1970), The Organization (1971), Scorpio (1973), Mr. Majestyk
(1974), Midway (1976), Gray Lady Down (1977), Same Time
Next Year (1978), The Prisoner of Zenda (1979), Dracula (1979),
Romantic Comedy (1983), Lily in Winter (1994), and the TV series The Magnificent Seven (1998).
Walter Mirisch was president of the Academy of Motion
Picture Arts and Sciences from 1973 through 1978. In 1978 the
Academy awarded him the Irving Thalberg Memorial Award,
and in 1983 he received the Academys Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.
[Jonathan Licht / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
ism, and French Structuralism, he was never content to remain within the bounds of textual and semiotic analyses, or
of an internal investigation of literary dynamics. At the same
time he never abandoned them. His interpretations combine
a subtle and sensitive recording of the finest nuances of a text,
of its multiple levels of meaning, its poetics and its aesthetics
with an awareness of the texts historical, biographical, social
and cultural contexts. These contexts he describes in lively
detail, mapping their reciprocal and cross-fertilizing links to
a group of texts.
Form
Mirons critical work takes the form of brilliantly organized
essays, possessing a high artistic quality of their own. Their
organization is of a rigorously classical kind, which functions
by way of discovering an ordering idea within a primordial
mass of heterogeneous material, thus imposing a boldly contoured clarity upon diversity and confusion. The aesthetics of
masterly ordering in the essays has an emotional effect, due to
its narrative, even dramatic character. Mirons essays tell a
story, and they employ intuitively the tactics and strategies
of effective storytelling to arouse interest, to maintain suspense and to provide enough information to satisfy the readers natural curiosity without quenching a desire to investigate further.
Mirons oeuvre, developing since the 1950s, is a profoundly searching multidimensional project, which delineates a richly detailed map of modern Jewish literature and
culture. It uncovers hidden areas and throws new light upon
well-known territory. It offers the student of contemporary
Jewish literature a superb entry route to the many faces of
the subject.
Among his works are Shalom Aleikhem: Pirkei Masah
(1970); Sholem Aleykhem: Person, Persona, Presence (1972);
Arba Panim ba-Sifrut ha-Ivrit (1975); Bein H azon le-Emet:
Niz z anei ha-Roman ha-Ivri (1979); Kivvun Orot: Tah anot baSipporet ha-Ivrit ha-Modernit (1979); Der imazsh fun Shtetl:
Dray literarishe Shtudyes (1981); Ha-Preidah min ha-Ani heAni (1986); Mul ha-Ah ha-Shotek: Iyyunim be-Shirat Milh emet
ha-Az maut (1992); H.N. Bialik and the Prophetic Mode in
Modern Hebrew Poetry (2000); Parpar min ha-Tolaat: Natan
Alterman ha-Z air (2001); Akdamot le-Az ag (= U.Z. Greenberg) (2002); Ha-Z ad ha-Afel bi-Z eh oko shel Shalom Aleikhem
(2004).
[Gidi Nevo]
Methodology
Although Mirons intellectual heritage derived from the related
trends of Anglo-American New Criticism, Russian Formal-
MIRON (Michrovsky), ISSACHAR (1920 ), Israeli composer. Born in Poland, Miron studied composition and conducting at the Warsaw Conservatory. He settled in Erez Israel
in 1939. He served in the British Armys Jewish Brigade and
during that period composed his most popular song Tzena,
Tzena (Come Out, Come Out). This song was performed
and recorded all over the world by singers such as Pete Seeger,
Bing Crosby, Judy Garland, and Richard *Tucker. Following
the establishment of the State of Israel, he served in the Israeli
Army as the director of music and art programs. From 1957 to
313
miroslav
1961 he edited Zemirot, the Jewish Agency folk music periodical. In 1959 he was awarded the Engel Prize for his compositions. In 1963 he went to the U.S. where he continued to compose music. Among his many compositions of instrumental
and liturgical music are: Kol Rinah be-Ohalei Yisrael: A Sabbath Service of Israel for Cantor, Chorus (SATB) and Organ
(1963), Tripartiture Epigram for violoncello and piano (1975),
Sephardic nocturno for violoncello and piano (1975), Klezmer
Reflections for oboe and piano (1980), and many popular
songs. His archive is at the Music Department at the Jewish
National University Library, Jerusalem.
[Israela Stein and Gila Flam (2nd ed.)]
MIROSLAV (Ger. Misslitz), town in S. Moravia, Czech Republic. Jews apparently settled there after their expulsion from
the Moravian royal cities (1454). There is a record of a community during the Turkish wars; subsequently it diminished
to only three families, but later absorbed refugees from the
*Chmielnicki massacres (1648). In 1666, 20 Jews were put in
chains and expelled from the town. Subsequently Jews from
*Vienna settled in the town, bringing the total Jewish population to 18 families. The oldest legible tombstone in the Jewish cemetery dates from 1692. The *Familiants laws allotted
119 families to Miroslav, where in 1753, 64 families lived in 18
houses. Their number had risen to 448 persons (18 of the total population) in 1801 and remained the same in 1820. In 1831
Rafael Koenig (b. 1808) became the first Jewish locksmith in
the Hapsburg Empire. A synagogue in the Reform style was
erected in 1845. In 1867 a political community (see *politische
Gemeinden) was established, which was incorporated in the
municipality in 1924. The Jewish population reached its peak
in 1857, when it numbered 1,032, subsequently declining to 424
in 1869 and then rising slightly to 528 in 1900. During World
War I some 350 refugees fled to Miroslav, but few of them settled. In 1930 the community numbered 291 (6.6 of the total).
The remainder of the community was deported to Nazi extermination camps in 1942, and the synagogue equipment was
sent to the Central Jewish Museum in Prague. Although the
community was not revived after the war, the Jewish quarter
was preserved in its original plan.
Bibliography: E. Reich, in: H. Gold (ed.), Die Juden und
Judengemeinden Boehmens in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart (1934),
387405; D. Kaufmann, in: MWJ, 17 (1890), 289301.
MIROWSKI, MICHEL (19241990), doctor and co-inventor of the implantable defibrillator. Born in Poland, Mirowski
survived the Nazi Holocaust as a teenager and was left without
family. He immigrated to Lyon, France, to study medicine. He
completed his postdoctoral studies in Israel at Tel Hashomer
Hospital and fellowships with Professor Demetrio Sodi Pallares in Mexico City and with Dr. Helen Taussig at Johns Hopkins in the U.S. In 1963, he returned to Israel and became the
chief cardiologist at Asaf Harofe Hospital, where he focused
his research on abnormal heart rhythms.
MIRSKY, AARON (19142001), Hebrew writer. Born in Novogrodek, Poland, he was ordained as a rabbi and immigrated
to Erez Israel in 1935. He was an editor at the Mosad Bialik
publishing house (195060), and from 1952 taught Hebrew literature at The Hebrew University (professor, 1965). He published studies on ancient and medieval Hebrew poetry and on
the Hebrew language. His books include Yalkut ha-Piyyutim
(1958), an annotated anthology of medieval Hebrew religious
poetry; Shirei Yiz h ak Ibn H alfon (1961), with an introduction
and textual variants; Reshit ha-Piyyut (1965); and volumes of
his own poetry, Alei Siah (1966), Sefer ha-Gai ve-ha-Kaddish
(1986), and Din ha-Shir (1994). Among his other works are
Ha-Pisuk shel ha-Signon ha-Ivri (1978), a study of the piyyut
tradition in the Diaspora and in Erez Israel (1990) as well as
314
[Meir Lamed]
Misgav am
a book on Hebrew style (Signon Ivri, 1999). A bibliography of
his works was published in 1986.
[Getzel Kressel]
315
MI SHEBERAKH (Heb. ; He Who Blessed), initial words of a prayer formula said on various occasions and
invoking Gods blessing on the community and on individuals.
During the Sabbath morning service after the Torah
reading a blessing is invoked May He who blessed our forefathers bless this holy congregation The wording of this
Mi she-Berakh varies in the various rites, but in its essence
can be found in the oldest manuscripts. In different communities there are various additional Mi she-Berakh prayers,
e.g., for one who does not interrupt his prayers from *Barukh
she-Amar through the *Amidah, for one who always comes on
time to the synagogue, etc. In Israel there is a Mi she-Berakh
for the soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces. A personal Mi
she-Berakh is generally recited for every person called to the
reading of the law sometimes specifying the donation being
made to the synagogue. If the person called to the Torah is
316
celebrating a special occasion, such as his bar mitzvah, forthcoming marriage, or the birth of a child, the prayer is worded
so as to make reference to the event. For a female child the
name is usually given in the prayer. The usual Mi she-Berakh
starts with the words May He who blessed our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob bless, however, when the blessing is
invoked for a sick female or one recovering from childbirth,
the names of the matriarchs, Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, and Leah
are added to the invocation. It is also customary to recite relevant versions of the prayer at banquets celebrating events of
religious importance.
Bibliography: Eisenstein, Dinim, S.V.
Historical
According to I Chronicles 2426 and rabbinic tradition, the
priests and the Levites were organized into courses or divisions. According to post-biblical evidence, these divisions
used to serve in rotation. The term which is rendered as
course (Heb. mishmar, mishmarot) is the one used in postbiblical sources (The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light
Against the Sons of Darkness, p. 2, 2ff.; Suk. 5:67; Taan. 2:67,
et al.), whereas the Bible generally employs the term division
(Heb. mah lakah, mah lakot).
According to I Chronicles 23:1ff., it was King David who
divided all the priests and Levites according to their families
and clans and assigned them their tasks in the *Temple. This
arrangement is attributed to David also in the description of
the dedication of the Temple by Solomon in II Chronicles
8:14. The text of Nehemiah 12:4546 ascribes the assignment
of tasks to the Levites and priests to both David and Solomon.
There is no information about the working arrangements in
the Temple anywhere else in the Bible; neither is there any
allusion to courses among the detailed instructions for the
priests and Levites in the Bible. It would appear that even the
listing of the divisions of priests and singers and porters, as
given in I Chronicles 2426, dates from the Second Temple
era, and that they reflect a Second Temple reality, a conclusion based on the comparison of the list in I Chronicles 24
with the lists of the priestly families in the Book of Ezra and
Nehemiah and post-biblical sources.
In the list of returnees in Ezra 2:3639 (Neh. 7:3941) apparently a record of a general census after the rebuilding of the
Temple only four priestly clans are listed: the sons of Jedaiah
(of the house of Jeshua), the sons of Immer, the sons of Pashhur, and the sons of Harim. They totaled 4,289, which was a
tenth of the number of returnees. This is a complete record of
all the priests as of that date, and they belonged to only four
families or clans. Of these four clans, three Jedaiah, Immer,
and Harim appear again in the list of the 24 divisions of the
priesthood in I Chronicles 24:7ff. Again, a detailed list of priests
(as representatives of clans) leads the list of 22 names of those
who signed the covenant in Nehemiah 10:29. Eight of these
Immer (Amariah), Malchijah, Shebaniah (Shecaniah), Harim,
Abijah, Mijamin, Maaziah, and Bilgai (Bilgah) recur in the list
in I Chronicles 24. With minor differences, these names are the
same as those of the priestly clans listed in Nehemiah 12:1220,
which is attributed to the time of Joiakim, the high priest and
the father of the high priest Eliashib of the period of Nehemiah.
Fifteen names in the latter list are identical with the names of the
signers of the covenant, including the eight clans which figure
in the list of divisions in Chronicles; and it includes two names
which recur in the Chronicles list, including Jehoiarib (Joiarib),
the division to which the Hasmoneans belonged. These two
lists of Nehemiah 10 and of Nehemiah 12 also predate the
list of 24 priestly divisions in the book of Chronicles.
317
Website: www.mhash.org.il.
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
MISHMAROT (Heb. ; Guard Posts), kibbutz in central Israel, near *Pardes H annah, affiliated with Ih ud ha-Kevuzot ve-ha-Kibbutzim, founded in 1933. Mishmarot developed
citrus, and field crops, became a partner in a large plywood
factory, and set up smaller plants for metal products and furniture parts. Its population in 1968 was 240; in 2002, 290. The
kibbutz is known as the birthplace of such pop singers as Shalom *Hanoch, Hanan Yovel, and the late Meir Ariel.
It would appear, then, that the author of Chronicles ascribed to David certain later arrangements of divine service,
and that the priestly courses were actually not established until the Second Temple era. On the other hand, it may be argued that, although the list of courses in I Chronicles 2426
reflects reality at the time of the author, the fact that priestly
tasks were performed by established divisions serving in rotation indicates a historical tradition. Indeed, the theory that
some sort of courses existed in the First Temple is supported
by the parallel with the system of divisions in Egyptian temples, despite the generally dissimilar natures of the two priesthoods. The four priestly families mentioned in the list of returnees in Ezra 2:3639 may possibly have corresponded to the
four priestly divisions of the First Temple, which also served
in rotation. Comparison of the list of priests in the Book of
Ezra and Nehemiah and the list of the 24 priestly courses in
Chronicles illustrates the relationship between all these lists,
on the one hand, and the priority of the lists in the Book of
Ezra and Nehemiah, on the other. The earliest among them
is the list of four priestly families, mentioned in Ezra 2, from
the time of the Return, which is based on the divisions in the
First Temple. According to this list, the number of priests
was already very large (4,289 men), and even the number of
priests in one family was so great that they could not serve
in the Temple simultaneously. An arrangement whereby the
groups of priests would serve in rotation was necessary. The
families were divided into clans, and the clans into courses (cf.
rabbinic tradition: four divisions returned from Exile Jedaiah, Harim, Pashhur, and Immer; and the prophets in Jerusalem organized them into four-and-twenty divisions, Tosef.,
Taan. 2:1; TJ, Taan. 4:2, 67d, et al.). Perhaps to be included in
the same framework is the account given by Josephus (Apion,
2: 108) concerning four priestly tribes that rotated service in
the Temple at regular intervals. Indeed, there are those who
would amend the text to read twenty-four in this place as
well (cf. Jos., Life, 2; Jos., Ant., 7:366). A tradition concerning
the gradual consolidation of the 24 priestly courses appear
also in Tosefta, Taanit 4:2, and TJ, Taanit 4:2, 67d.
The establishment of 24 priestly courses and the order
of their service as described in I Chronicles 24 was meant to
be a permanent arrangement. When this order was established and at what time the list was made is not known. In any
event, it was a late development, at least one or two generations after the time of High Priest Joiakim, to which the list of
priestly clans in Nehemiah 12 is attributed. Various scholars
date this list at the beginning of the Hasmonean era, since Jehoiarib, the representative of the Hasmonean clan, heads the
list (I Chron. 24), whereas in Nehemiah his name is 16t on
the list. According to this theory, the family of Jehoiarib was
primarily a provincial one, which did not achieve greatness
until the Hasmonean period. However, according to I Maccabees 2:1, the house of Joiarib (Jehoiarib) was Jerusalemite;
only Mattathias moved to Modin (Modiin, presumably because of the perilous times.). Although he is mentioned 16t
on the Nehemiah list, he appears before Jedaiah, whose fam-
Talmudic Data
As the priests were numerous and scattered throughout Palestine, it was impossible for all of them to officiate at the same
time. An arrangement was therefore made whereby they were
divided (in the final stage) regionally into 24 mishmarot (lit.
guards; Taan. 4:2), which served in a regular weekly rotation.
The mishmarot were further broken up into a varying number of battei avot (houses or families). Each division and
subdivision was presided over by a head, called rosh mishmar
and rosh bet av respectively (Tosef., Hor. 2: 10); there is also
mention made of a bet av (Tam. 1:1; Mid. 1:8; cf. Yoma 1:5).
The levites were similarly divided into 24 mishmarot, which
replaced each other every week (I Chron. 25:8ff, et al.; Jos.,
Ant., 7:363ff.; Taan. 4:2). These were in turn subdivided into
seven battei avot, and presided over by heads. Finally, there
was an analogous division of the Israelites themselves into 24
mishmarot, each of which had to take its turn in coming to
Jerusalem for a week. They served to represent the whole body
of the people while the daily (communal) offerings were sacrificed, for how can a mans offering be offered while he does
not stand by it? (Taan. 4:2, et al.).
That part of the mishmar of priests, Levites, or Israelites actually engaged in the performance of its duty was
called a maamad or ammud (station) and was headed by a
rosh maamad (Tam. 5:6). When the time for the service of a
mishmar came round, all the priests and Levites belonging to
it would go to Jerusalem. Not all the Israelites of that mishmar, however, proceeded to Jerusalem. A portion of them
certainly did (Taan. 4:2; cf. Tosef., Taan. 4:3) but those who
could not do so assembled in their own towns and read the
story of creation, etc. Only those in Jerusalem who actually
stood by while the sacrifice was being offered could, strictly
speaking, be called a maamad, or ammud (see Sof. 17:5; but
see Lieberman, Tosefta ki-Feshutah 5, 1962, 1104, who shows
that according to a different opinion the maamadot were of
Israelites alone).
318
[Jacob Liver]
Activities
These 24 mishmarot conducted the daily Temple service, each
in turn officiating for one week. Every Sabbath they changed,
the retiring mishmar offering the morning and musaf additional sacrifices, whereas the new mishmar offered the evening one, and laid the fresh shewbread on the table (Tosef.,
Suk. 4:2425). On the three pilgrim festivals, all the 24 mishmarot officiated together (Suk. 5:78). Each priestly mishmar
had in the Temple its own ring at which its members slaugh-
mishnah
tered their animals (Mid. 3:5) and its own niche in which their
vestments were kept (Tam. 5:3). Bilgas niche was, however,
permanently blocked up and its ring immovable (Suk. 5:8), a
sign of disgrace, because one of its members had once acted
shamefully (Suk. 56b). The weekly mishmarot of priests were
broken up into between four and nine subdivisions (battei
avot). If there were fewer than seven, some would officiate
twice during the week. If, on the other hand, there were more
than seven, then on some days two would have to serve together (Tosef., Taan. 2:2, et al.). Furthermore, as only a small
part of a bet av was required to serve at any given time, lots
were drawn to decide which individual priests should officiate each day (Yoma 2:24, et al.).
A number of restrictions were placed upon members of
the mishmar and bet av during their week (or day) of office.
Thus, members of the mishmar were permitted to drink wine
by night but not by day, whereas those of the bet av could not
drink wine either by day or night, as they might be called upon
to assist in the Temple service at any conceivable hour. Members of the mishmar and of the (Israelite) maamad alike were
forbidden to cut their hair or wash their clothes throughout
the week as this should have been done earlier except on
Thursday, so that due honor be accorded the Sabbath (Taan.
2:7). On certain communal fast days, members of the mishmar
and the bet av were permitted to eat, or else to fast only partially, so as to have enough strength to carry out their Temple
duties (Taan. 2:6). The men of the Israelite maamad, however,
would fast from Monday to Thursday on their week of service,
while from Sunday to Friday they read (in sections) the chapter
of Creation (Gen. 1; Taan. 4:23). Members of the mishmar who
were not engaged in actual service would pray that the sacrifices of their officiating brethren be acceptable; while those of
the Israelite maamad who could not come to Jerusalem gathered in their local synagogues (or meeting places) and prayed
for the welfare of sailors, wayfarers, children, pregnant women,
etc. The maamadot were considered to be of such importance
that it was said that without them heaven and earth could not
have survived (Taan. 27b; cf. the reading in Sof. 17:15). The institution of the maamadot, which dates back to the beginning
of the Second Temple (see sources cited below), seems to have
formed the basis of what later became the synagogal system.
History
Concerning the origins of the mishmar system, there are
three conflicting (tannaitic) traditions recorded in rabbinic
literature:
(1) Moses established eight (priestly) mishmarot, to which
David and Samuel added another eight. Finally, on the return
from the Babylonian Exile, 24 were established (TJ, Taan.
4:2, 67);
(2) Moses established eight (priestly and levitical) mishmarot; David and Samuel increased them to 24, and on the
return from the Exile 24 (Israelite) ammudim (maamadot)
were established, parallel to the priestly and levitical mishmarot (Tosef., Taan. 4:2);
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
(3) Moses established 16 mishmarot, which were later increased to 24 (Taan. 27a). Relative unanimity of opinion is to
be found only in the account of the restoration of the mishmar
system after the Babylonian Exile. Four mishmarot are said to
have returned from the Exile, Jedaiah, Harim, Pashchur, and
Immer. And the prophets among them [or in Jerusalem, according to the Tosefta; i.e., Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi]
arose and made 24 lots, and put them into an urn. Then each
of the four mishmarot drew five lots in addition to his own,
making a total of six. Finally, the rashei mishmarot divided
them into battei avot (TJ, Taan. 4:4, 68a, et al.). It would seem
(from tradition (2) above) that only at this stage were the Israelite maamadot introduced.
Thus rabbinic sources trace the first origins of the mishmarot via David and Samuel back to Moses. However, these
accounts do not appear to have the value of independent traditions but rather to be based upon inferences drawn from
scriptural passages. Thus, whom David and Samuel the
seer did ordain, in their set office (I Chron. 9:22) is said to
refer to the priestly and levitical mishmarot (Tosef., ibid.; cf.
TJ, ibid., citing I Chron. 2:4). Nevertheless, the resultant picture presented by rabbinic sources probably has considerable
historical validity. The system remained unchanged even till
Josephus time (Jos., Ant., 7:363ff.; Life, 1:2).
Long after the destruction of the Temple, memories of
the mishmarot lingered on. In Erez Israel their names were
mentioned each Sabbath in the piyyutim. Tablets, fragments of
which have survived, were fixed on synagogue walls, engraved
with a list of mishmarot and their geographical provenance.
Karaite liturgy preserved echoes of both the mishmarot and
the maamadot. Even as late as 1034, it was still the custom in
some communities to announce on each Sabbath: Today is
the holy Sabbath, holy to the Lord. Today is [the Sabbath of]
which mishmeret? [That of] mishmeret May the Merciful
One restore the mishmeret to its place, speedily and in our
days. Amen.
[Daniel Sperber]
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CE. The Mishnah supplements, complements, clarifies and
systematizes the commandments of the Torah. The Torah,
for example, commands: Remember the Sabbath day (Ex.
20:8). The Mishnah provides this abstract commandment
with a concrete form the kiddush and havdalah rituals which
mark the beginning and the ending of the Sabbath day. The
Torah commands Observe the Sabbath day (Deut. 6:12). The
Mishnah specifies 39 categories of forbidden labor which are
prohibited by this commandment, subsuming dozens of other
kinds of labor under these 39 headings. The Torah commands:
When you eat and are satisfied, give thanks to your God
for the good land which He has given you (Deut. 8:10). The
Mishnah spells out specific blessings to be recited before and
after each kind of food, and what to do if the wrong blessing
is recited by mistake. It also extends the recitation of blessings
to areas other than food, detailing blessings to be recited before and after the performance of commandments, blessings
of praise and thanksgiving, even establishing a regular order of
daily prayers. When the commandments seem chaotic or inconsistent, as in Lev. 1314 (leprosy), the Mishnah organizes
these rules into a consistent system. When they are already
relatively detailed and systematic, as in Lev. 17 (sacrifices), the
Mishnah deals with additional aspects of the halakhah, either
ignored or mentioned only in passing in the Torah, such as
the proper intentions which should accompany the sacrifices,
and the consequences of improper intention.
The contents of the Mishnah are the product of an ongoing process of elaborating and explaining the foundations,
the details and the significance of the Torahs commandments. This process began long before the redaction of the
Mishnah, and continued throughout the talmudic period (1st
to 6t centuries CE) and beyond. Nevertheless, the Mishnah
has a unique place within the rabbinic tradition. It was the
central literary document of the entire talmudic period, providing the framework for the redaction of its companion volume, the *Tosefta, and serving as the foundation for both the
Jerusalem Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud. Through these
works the Mishnah has shaped most of the actual practice of
the Jewish religion down to the present day. In the post-talmudic period commentaries were composed to the Mishnah,
and together with them the Mishnah came to serve as the authoritative epitome of the talmudic tradition as a whole. In
these two roles as the foundation underlying the talmudic
tradition and as the authoritative epitome of that tradition
the Mishnah has played a decisive role in the religious life of
the Jewish people.
Below we will examine the formal structure of the
Mishnah as a literary work, and provide an overview of certain aspects of the Mishnahs content, focusing on its two primary components halakhah and aggadah including an
analysis of the logical structure of mishnaic halakhah. We will
then discuss the sources of the Mishnah, its redaction, and its
dissemination and acceptance in the later talmudic academies.
After a discussion of the contributions of traditional and academic scholarship to the understanding of the Mishnah, we
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naitic period and the later, amoraic period. The tannaitic literature consists primarily of the Mishnah, the Tosefta, and
tannaitic midrashim Sifra, Sifre, and Mekhilta, etc. Amoraic literature is included primarily in the Jerusalem Talmud,
the Babylonian Talmud, and the classic midrashei aggadah
*Genesis R., *Lamentations R., *Leviticus R., *Pesikta de-Rav
Kahana, etc.
Since Rabbis Mishnah was the most important and authoritative work of halakhah to come down to us from antiquity, the term mishnah came to be equated with the term
halakhot, and was often used in opposition to the term midrash. In a parallel development, the term hilkhata (halakhot in Aramaic), apparently referring to Rabbis Mishnah, is
listed in later talmudic sources (TB Shav. 41b) along with sifra,
sifre and tosefta apparently referring to compilations similar
to the tannaitic works known by these names today.
Finally, the individual unit of tannaitic tradition was
called a mishnah (pl. mishnayot), or matnita (pl. matneyata)
in Aramaic. Here also, the unique status of Rabbis Mishnah
within tannaitic literature leads to the further distinction between matnitin (our mishnah), a tradition included in Rabbis Mishnah, and matnita baraita (an external mishnah),
or baraita (pl. baraitot) for short, a tannaitic tradition not included in Rabbis Mishnah. The baraitot were preserved not
only in the Tosefta, but were also included in and transmitted
as part of the amoraic tradition in the two Talmudim.
Our discussions below of tannaitic halakhah and aggadah
apply not only to Rabbis Mishnah, but also to the Tosefta and
to many of the talmudic baraitot. However, the discussions of
the place of the Mishnah in the development of talmudic literature, in the history of Jewish tradition, its redaction, and
so on, apply to Rabbis Mishnah alone, but not to the Tosefta
or to the talmudic baraitot.
Halakhah in the Mishnah
The Mishnah itself uses the term halakhah to designate ancient or authoritative traditions (Peah 2:6, Or. 3:9, Yev. 8:3), as
well as accepted religious practices (Naz. 7:4, BK 3:9, Edu. 1:5,
Men. 4:3, Nid. 4:3). It is also used to refer to individual units of
tradition, irrespective of their authoritative status (Avot 6:3),
and even to incorrect traditions (Oha. 16:1). These traditions
may involve no more than the simple restatement or brief
elaboration of some custom or practice. But by far the most
characteristic tendency of the individual tannaitic halakhah
is the close examination of some dimension of ordinary human life or experience, and the careful categorization of certain aspects of that experience in line with a limited number
of formal dichotomies.
The most obvious and familiar halakhic dichotomy is
the one between forbidden (asur) and permitted (mutar).
This dichotomy is most regularly applied to human behavior.
For example, the Mishnah may categorize sexual relations between two individuals under certain circumstances as permitted, and under other circumstances as forbidden. While eating on the Day of Atonement is certainly forbidden, tannaitic
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plies the dichotomy between ritually pure (tahor) and ritually impure (tame) to virtually every aspect of ordinary life.
These terms can signify either that an object is susceptible to
becoming impure, or that it is actually impure and capable of
transmitting this impurity to something else. Certain tractates define the purity or impurity of tools, garments, vessels,
and places of residence. Others define the purity or impurity
of foods and drinks. Others categorize certain individuals as
themselves being sources of ritual impurity, and other individuals as impure as a result of contact with other sources of
ritual impurity. This area of halakhah seems to have played
a decisive role in the life of the tannaitic sages, even among
non-priestly families, and with no obvious connection to the
Temple (see Alon).
Tosefta Demai (2:2ff.) describes the procedure by which
a candidate is accepted into the elite association called the
h avura. It lists in detail the responsibilities which the candidate must freely accept upon himself or herself in order to be
considered a h aver including the responsibility to observe
all the rules of ritual purity (cf. Demai 2:3). From these descriptions it seems fairly clear that many or most of the purity rules involved no formal obligation (h ova) whatsoever,
but were rather purely voluntary practices (reshut). This example of Toharot should serve as a warning against viewing
tannaitic halakhah as a legal system consisting entirely of formal obligations enforceable by earthly courts. While true in
part, other aspects of tannaitic halakhah could be more accurately described as a moral or a spiritual discipline which
the initiate freely accepts in order to draw closer to the ideal
of divine service.
Aggadah in the Mishnah
The other primary component of the Mishnah is the aggadah.
This term is notoriously difficult to define, and it has become
the custom among scholars to define aggadah by means of
negation as the non-halakhic component of rabbinic tradition (Frankel, Midrash and Aggadah, 20). While fair enough,
we must be careful in adopting this approach not to define
halakhah itself too narrowly. As we have seen, the halakhah
of the Mishnah can be described in part as a system of laws,
but not infrequently it also has the character of a personal
moral and spiritual discipline. It can be expressed in the form
of concrete judgments about specific cases, but also in rules
involving varying degrees of abstraction and generality. The
Mishnah may even use stories to express a halakhah. This is
obviously so when the story reports an explicit legal precedent.
But it may also be true when a story merely describes the behavior of a notable sage, if it is understood that this behavior
is worthy of imitation.
Despite these differences in form, the rules, judgments
and precedents included in the Mishnah all have one thing in
common. They all categorize specific forms of behavior and
well defined areas of concrete experience in line with formal
dichotomies of the sort described in the previous section.
Aggadah, on the other hand, investigates and interprets the
meaning, the values, and the ideas which underlie the concrete forms of religious life as opposed to the specific rules
which actually govern that life. Continuing the tendency to
define aggadah as that which is not halakhah, we could say
that the relation between aggadah and halakhah is similar in
many ways to the relations between theory and practice, between idea and application, and, in the area of ethics, between
character and behavior.
Starting from the last distinction, it is clear that the
Mishnah makes extraordinary demands upon the external
behavior of the sages and their disciples. Along with these
external demands, the Mishnah makes equally extraordinary internal demands on the character, the faith, and the
understanding of the sages and their disciples. The Mishnah
contains a tractate Avot devoted in its entirety to these
principles of character, faith, divine providence, justice, etc.
Moreover, the Mishnah introduces related aggadic elements
into the context of specific halakhic discussions. For example,
after defining the obligation to recite a blessing on hearing bad
tidings, the Mishnah adds the aggadic statement that ones love
for God should never falter, even if He takes your life (Ber.
9:5). Similarly tractate Peah, which deals with specific obligatory gifts to the poor, opens with an aggadic description of
the unlimited nature of acts of loving kindness and charity,
and of the rewards that await those who show love, respect
and kindness to others. After defining the specific sums one
is obligated to pay in restitution for assault, the Mishnah declares that one is not absolved [of the sin] until one asks [the
victim for forgiveness] (BK 8:7). The Mishnah then goes on
to state that the victim should not be cruel but rather should
be merciful and forgiving.
It is in this sense that we should understand the programmatic statement concerning the nature and the purpose of the
aggadah, found in the tannaitic midrash, Sifre Deut. 49: If
you desire to know the One who spoke and the world came
to be, then you should study the aggadah, for in this way you
will come to know the One who spoke and the world came
to be, and you will cleave to his ways. As is made clear there,
Gods ways are the aspects of justice, mercy, etc., which both
define the holy character of the righteous individual and underlie those forms of normative behavior which constitute
much of the halakhah.
The aggadah of the Mishnah also deals with classic theological issues such as divine providence, theodicy and the afterlife. These issues, however, are regularly integrated into
some appropriate halakhic context. For example, one of the
most highly developed aggadic themes running throughout
tannaitic literature is the doctrine of measure for measure.
At its foundation lies an ancient saying The vessel which
you use to measure out [for others], will itself be used to measure for you which is already quoted in the New Testament
(Matt. 7:2) as a warning not to be judgmental of others, lest
one suffer the same fate at their hands. The tannaitic literature develops it into a general theory of divine justice. More
specifically, it is used to explain and to justify the details of
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Continuing this line of thought, Mishnah BK 1:4 states
that the owner of a domesticated animal is held strictly liable
for full damages if it ate something appropriate for it. From
this one can infer that if the animal ate something not appropriate for it, the owner would not be liable for full damages, but rather only for half-damages. This then gives rise to
the following question: Why should this change in the object
consumed from appropriate for it to inappropriate for
it affect the degree of liability for the damages caused by
ones animal? An answer to this question requires a determination of the extent of the owners responsibility to anticipate
possible damages. This in turn would involve a more precise
definition of the exact boundary between appropriate and
inappropriate.
In BK 2:2 the Mishnah provides such a definition. First
it quotes BK 1:4 and then explains it by means of the following two halakhot: If the animal ate fruits and vegetables the
owner is fully liable; [if the animal ate] clothes or vessels the
owner is liable only for half-damages. The first halakhah defines the case where the animal ate something appropriate for
it. The second halakhah defines the alternative case, where the
animal ate something not appropriate for it. A naive reader of
BK 1:4 would probably have understood the words appropriate for it i.e., for the animal itself to signify some kind of
feed which the animal is accustomed to eating, and to exclude
other foodstuffs, such as avocados, artichokes, etc., which are
not appropriate for it. BK 2:2 draws a very different distinction, between fruits and vegetables, generally consumed only
by humans, and clothes or vessels, which are totally inedible.
While the tanna of BK 2:2 may not have given us a very precise
interpretation of the original language of BK 1:4, he has, nevertheless, expressed a very clear and unequivocal judgment
regarding his understanding of the notions of responsibility,
negligence, and liability which underlie that halakhah.
The procedure outlined above is very characteristic of talmudic analysis. Starting from one halakhah, taught explicitly
in the Mishnah, the student infers another halakhah parallel
to the original halakhah, but differing in two ways. First, the
case description of the second halakhah differs from the original with respect to one detail e.g. inappropriate instead
of appropriate. Second, the ruling in the second halakhah is
totally different from the original not liable for full damages instead of liable for full damages. This analysis presupposes that the difference in the rulings of these two halakhot
follows necessarily from the change in their case descriptions.
If we then explain why a certain change in the ruling follows
from the change in the case description, we will, in effect, have
grasped the legal principle which underlies the original halakhah. In fact, the only way we can ever understand the essential connection between the case description and the ruling in
a tannaitic halakhah is by explaining why, if the case changed,
the ruling would necessarily be different.
From this perspective, it becomes clear how tannaitic
halakhah even an individual tannaitic halakhah can be
considered both dialectical and conceptual. It is dialectical
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which may have served as the background for the formulation
of the earliest level of tannaitic literary activity.
With regard to this third sense, it has been claimed that
the roots of tannaitic halakhah extend backward, long before
the destruction of the Second Temple (Albeck, Unter. 3). In
support of this position, scholars have pointed out numerous
parallels between certain assumptions of tannaitic halakhah
and similar positions reflected in the books of Judith and
Jubilees, the Septuagint, as well as Philo, Josephus, and the
Dead Sea writings (Safrai, 134146). As further testimony to
the antiquity of tannaitic halakhah, scholars have pointed to
internal evidence within the Mishnah itself (Hoffmann, Die
Erste Mischna; Epstein, Tannaim, 18ff.). This testimony, however, usually involves little more than descriptions of events
or practices which supposedly took place in Second Temple
times (Tann. 36, 57), without any concrete proof that the tannaitic formulations themselves actually derive from an earlier
period. As impressive as these arguments are, they concern
at best the cultural prehistory of tannaitic halakhah, but not
the concrete history of the development of tannaitic literature itself. So long as this distinction remains clear, these investigations into the roots of tannaitic halakhah against the
background of earlier periods can only contribute to our understanding of the Mishnah and its content.
We also speak (in the second sense mentioned above) of
the sources of the Mishnah with regard to the earliest historical
levels of tannaitic literature. Even the most conservative talmudic scholars admit that tannaitic literature (as opposed to tradition) is the product of a change which occurred, at the very
earliest, around the end of the Second Temple period. Our
Mishnah collection is the result of the intellectual work of
several generations, extending over hundreds of years, which
served to preserve, transmit, and to develop the oral tradition
which was transmitted along with the written teaching the
Torah. The halakhot, which up to that time remained undecided and to a certain extent fluid, received in our Mishnah a
fixed form, and so were preserved and not forgotten (Albeck,
Unter. 3). Even the earliest strata of tannaitic sources possess
a literary form. These literary forms were capable of being
repeated and memorized, and so preserved and not forgotten. In this way tradition became mishnah.
If this were the whole story, the historical study of the
Mishnah would be quite simple. However, the simple fact
is that the Mishna found its final redaction only by the end
of the second century C.E., and that much development had
taken place in the Tannaitic period which preceded (Safrai
133). At some point in the history of the tannaitic period, these
early mishnaic sources became the object of intense study and
analysis, and, as we saw in the previous section above, tannaitic analysis can result in radical reinterpretation of these
earlier mishnaic sources.
Albeck described in detail (Unter. 513) many of the
ways in which later tannaim interpreted and expanded earlier, relatively primitive halakhic sources. Sometimes, taking
a relatively short and simple tradition as their starting point,
they would posit a series of additional layers of interpretation and elaboration. Sometimes later scholars would analyze
the words of an earlier Rabbi, concluding that his halakhah
reflected a more general principle. They would then take his
words from their original context and copy them over, virtually verbatim, in another context, in which, according to
their understanding, they should equally apply. Sometimes
they would interpolate the original halakhah, i.e., insert interpretive comments of various lengths into the language of
the original source. Albeck showed that these interpretive additions were sometimes drawn from other mishnaic sources
found nearby in the same tractate. Sometimes an identical
source was preserved in different schools or in different tractates within the Mishnah itself. In this case, the same original
source might be expanded and interpolated in different ways,
resulting in divergent, and even in contradictory versions of
the same original tradition.
Other scholars went further than Albeck, asserting that
tannaitic interpolation could also involve the elimination of
words or passages from an original source, or even the reformulation of the original language itself, in line with some interpretation accepted by a later Rabbi. Epstein, for example,
held that even the most ancient traditions were reworked by
later tannaim, and passed through the channels of intermediate redactors, who added to them and subtracted from them
(Tann. 57). Albeck explicitly rejected both of these notions
(Unter. 12), and the reasons for his position will be examined
below in the following section. It is nevertheless quite clear
that the extant tannaitic sources cannot be relied upon to preserve traditions in the original form in which they were studied by earlier generations of tannaim.
This reservation should be kept in mind, not only with
regard to the earliest literary layers of the Mishnah, but also
with regard to traditions ascribed to the intermediate and later
generations of tannaim. The tannaim who were active from the
destruction of the Temple and up to the time of Rabbi are usually divided into four generations. The earliest tannaitic traditions ascribed to Bet Hillel and Bet Shammai are often the
subject of debate, not only regarding the correct interpretation
of their words, but even with regard to the words themselves.
Similar disputes, however, are also found concerning Rabbi
Joshua, Rabbi Eliezer, as well as Rabbi Akiva and his disciples,
Meir, Simeon, Judah, etc. The attempt, therefore, to analyze
the text of Rabbis Mishnah into four distinct literary levels,
and then to assign each level to a particular historical period
or personality as attempted by A. Goldberg in his commentaries on the Mishnah is suggestive, but remains somewhat
problematic for the reasons outlined above.
The most promising method for recovering earlier forms
of tannaitic tradition remains the exhaustive analysis of particular cases, based on the detailed reconstruction of the process of interpretation and interpolation which resulted in the
various parallel versions of a given source which we possess
today. Albeck, and most notably Epstein, provide solid models
and many excellent examples of this kind of analysis.
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In the short span of these four generations, the tannaim produced a considerable body of halakhic and aggadic
traditions traditions which served as the immediate literary sources (in the first sense mentioned above) for Rabbis
Mishnah. Much of the evidence for these literary sources is
found in the other extant tannaitic works, the Tosefta and the
tannaitic midrashim, which were edited in the Land of Israel
in the generations immediately following Rabbi, and in part
by his own disciples. These works preserve many parallel traditions to those included in the Mishnah, in forms which often seem to be more original than those found in Rabbis
Mishnah itself. The comparison of these parallel traditions,
together with the results of the critical analysis of the Mishnah
text itself, provides the basis for an examination of the redaction of the Mishnah.
The Redaction of the Mishnah
The question of the form and purpose of the final redaction of
the Mishnah has long been a topic of scholarly debate. In the
twentieth century this debate focused on the question whether
the Mishnah should be seen as a code of relatively self-consistent and authoritative religious practice (Epstein), or as an
anthology of frequently contradictory sources (Albeck). As so
formulated, this dispute seems somewhat artificial. On the one
hand, there is no reason to assume that the final redaction of
the Mishnah was governed by one single overriding principle.
On the other hand, the redaction of the Mishnah could reflect a preliminary, but as yet incomplete, effort to bring order
and consistency to the body of tannaitic halakhah. Beneath
the surface of this discussion, however, lies a far more fundamental and significant disagreement concerning the way in
which Rabbi adapted and modified his source material in the
redaction of the Mishnah.
Albecks views on this issue are laid out in his German
work, Untersuchungen ueber die Redaktion der Mischna (1923).
This work, which is based almost exclusively on a critical examination of the Mishnah itself, describes a range of significant literary phenomena. From these phenomena Albeck drew
a number of important conclusions, some of which are highly
persuasive, others less so. Among the phenomena which Albeck described: (1) literary units including more than one
topic, brought intact in more than one tractate, even though
only part of the unit is relevant in each place; (2) parallel material found in more than one tractate, to which additions have
been made in one tractate only, even though these additions
seem equally relevant in the other tractate as well; (3) halakhot
found in a given tractate, which do not belong to the subject
matter of that tractate, and which are not found at all in the
relevant tractate; (4) halakhot found in more than one tractate, which in one place contain conditions and alternative
positions not found in the other tractate; (5) alternative versions of the same halakhah in different places in the Mishnah
which present the same content in different language; (6) lists
of phenomena with a common characteristic, which fail to include similar elements listed elsewhere in the Mishnah which
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Tosefta H ullin 8:6 transmits a tannaitic dispute about a
case in which a drop of milk fell into a pot containing pieces of
meat. Rabbi Judah adopted a strict position, while the sages adopted a more lenient position. The Tosefta then states: Rabbi
said: The position of Rabbi Judah seems reasonable in a case
where he didnt stir or cover the pot, and the position of the
sages in a case where he stirred and covered the pot. Rabbis
position in the Tosefta represents a compromise between the
extreme positions of Judah and the sages. The parallel anonymous halakhah found in Mishnah H ullin 8:3 matches precisely
the compromise position ascribed to Rabbi in the Tosefta. This
case of Mishnah and Tosefta H ullin provides a somewhat unusual opportunity to observe all three stages in Rabbis redaction of a tannaitic tradition: (1) raw source material received
from the previous generation of tannaim (R. Judah and the
sages); (2) Rabbis own editorial comments upon this source
(Tosef. H ul. 8:6, end); (3) the final result of the editorial process
(Mishnah H ullin 8:3). It would stretch the limits of credulity to
maintain that Rabbi did not interfere in any way with the internal composition of his sources in the redaction of Mishnah
H ullin 8:3. On the contrary, it is quite clear that he adopted part
of R. Judahs ruling, part of the sages ruling, and applied them
to new and modified case descriptions, introducing the distinction between a situation where he stirred and covered the pot
and one where he didnt stir or cover the pot a distinction
which neither R. Judah or the sages ever entertained.
This example shows that Rabbi indeed dared and allowed himself to add, to subtract, and to reformulate his
source material in the process of redacting the Mishnah. Epstein, in his various works, adduced many examples of this
kind of creative redactional activity. Recently, S. Friedman
has revisited this issue in an extended redactional study of
the parallel traditions found in Mishnah and Tosefta Pesah im
(Tosefta Atiqta). Nevertheless, the question still remains open
as to the relative weight we should ascribe to these two competing redactional tendencies the creative (Epstein, Friedman) and the conservative (Albeck) within Rabbis literary
activity as a whole.
The Later Development of the Text of the Mishnah
In the generations following its redaction, Rabbis Mishnah
achieved an unparalleled prominence and authority in the
religious life of the Jewish communities both in Erez Israel
and in Babylonia. To a large extent this story belongs to the
history of later tannaitic and amoraic literature. In one regard, however, it is relevant to the history of the Mishnah itself. During and as a result of this gradual process of disseminaton and acceptance, the Mishnah changed. Instead of
a single uniquely authoritative Mishnah as redacted by Rabbi,
the amoraic period is characterized by a multiplicity of different versions of Rabbis Mishnah. The Mishnah as studied and
transmitted in the Babylonian rabbinic tradition differed significantly from the Mishnah as studied and transmitted in
the Palestinian rabbinic tradition. Moreover, there are clear
indications of considerable differences between different ver-
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As the amoraic period went on, the text of Rabbis
Mishnah became more and more sanctified in the eyes of the
talmudic scholars. As a result, emendations of the Mishnah
text became rarer and rarer. When confronted with an apparent contradiction between the text of the Mishnah and an alternative halakhic position, found in a baraita or in the words
of an early amora, the later talmudic tradition had recourse
to various kinds of forced interpretation of the Mishnah. In
this way it resolved contradictions between these competing
sources of halakhic authority. These forced interpretations of
the Mishnah often bear a striking resemblance to the editorial
emendations of the earlier generations of amoraim. Epstein
went to great lengths to distinguish between these phenomena, as well as to describe and to categorize the various forms
in which they appear.
By providing a comprehensive analysis and categorization of both the real and the apparent textual variants of the
Mishnah attested in talmudic sources and in medieval manuscripts, Epsteins work was supposed to provide the foundation for a critical edition of the Mishnah. After more than 50
years since the publication of his work, this critical edition is
still in preparation. Various other attempts have been made
to produce modern scientific editions of different parts of the
Mishnah, and in the meantime scholars are still involved in
the analysis and assimilation of the ramifications of Epsteins
groundbreaking research for the future study of the Mishnah.
Finally, we should note that Epsteins notion of editorial
emendation has far-reaching ramifications for the entire field
of talmudic research: for the relation between Mishnah and
Tosefta; for the relation between talmudic baraitot and parallel traditions in tannaitic works; for the relation between the
various redactional levels of talmudic texts; for the understanding of the textual variants found in the manuscript traditions of the Babylonian Talmud. At the same time, it must
be emphasized that this notion was unequivocally rejected
by Albeck and by a number of his followers. The reasons for
Albecks position (and some reservations regarding it) were
outlined in the previous section.
The Traditional Interpretation of the Mishnah
Evidence for the interpretation of Rabbis Mishnah can be
found in the statements of the earliest amoraim their memrot many of which take the form of comments and additions
to the text of the Mishnah. Also, the talmudic sugya (discussion) as a literary whole often takes as its starting point the text
of the Mishnah and its interpretation, and even when a sugya
begins elsewhere, the text of the Mishnah and its interpretation usually come up at some point in discussion, playing a
significant role in the development of the argument. The sugya
may begin by asking for the scriptural source of the halakhah
of the Mishnah, and then proceed to quote the relevant parallel text from the midrash halakhah. The sugya may ask about
the identity of the tanna who taught an anonymous halakhah
brought in the Mishnah. In answer, the sugya will often quote
a parallel baraita which ascribes the halakhah of the Mishnah
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mishnah
T oharot. Similarly, he composed introductions to individual
tractates and chapters, and even to individual halakhot, outlining the general principles and specific premises necessary for
the proper comprehension of the halakhot under discussion.
On the other hand, Maimonides often seems uninterested in
how these principles actually apply to the specific cases mentioned in the Mishnah. He sometimes indicates that the student should focus on the general rules, the analysis of the details being relegated to a secondary role.
Maimonides commentary was originally composed in
Arabic and was revised constantly during his own lifetime. A
new edition and translation by Rabbi J. Kafih has made both
the final version and the various stages of revision available in
an accurate modern Hebrew translation. Recent scholars have
continued to expand and improve our knowledge and understanding of his commentary (Blau and Scheiber, Hopkins).
Special note should be made of two other commentaries
from the period of the rishonim. The first is the commentary
of R. *Jonathan ha-Kohen of Lunel. Although included in his
commentary on the halakhot of Isaac *Alfasi, R. Jonathans
interpretations of the Mishnah are treated with a degree of
attention and independence unusual for Mishnah commentaries from this period (cf. Friedman, R. Jonathan Ha-Kohen
of Lunel, 79). The second commentary is that of the Meiri.
While also part of his commentary to the Talmud, he included
within it the entire text of Maimonides commentary to the
Mishnah and provided an extensive super-commentary of
his own. The Meiri incorporates many of the issues raised
by the Talmud into his commentary on the Mishnah, as opposed to other rishonim, who, following Rashi, tend to incorporate their commentary on the Mishnah into their discussion of the Talmud.
From the 15t century onward, talmudic scholarship underwent a series of important changes which had an impact
on the study of the Mishnah. The exposition of normative
halakhah gradually became divorced from the interpretation of the Talmud and began to center on the interpretation
of the Arbaah Turim and the Shulh an Arukh, forming a new
and specialized halakhic literature. As a result, the study of
the classical talmudic works became more autonomous and
more academic. No longer subordinated to the exposition of
normative halakhah, commentaries were composed on the
Mishnah, on the Tosefta, on the Midrashei Halakhah, and on
the Jerusalem Talmud. While these commentaries remained,
at first, rooted in traditional Talmud interpretation, they nevertheless began to investigate texts and traditions which had
no direct bearing on any practical halakhic issues.
The earliest of these commentaries was that of R. Obadiah *Bertinoro. This relatively brief commentary is largely
derivative in character, drawing mainly on Rashis interpretations of the Mishnah imbedded in his commentary to
the Talmud. Bertinoro also drew upon the commentaries
of R. Samson ben Abraham, Maimonides, and others. Next
in time is the commentary of R. Yom Tov Lipman *Heller,
Tosefot Yom Tov. This work takes Bertinoros as its starting
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mishnah
While Epsteins own works contain analyses of hundreds
of individual mishnah passages, he himself composed no extended or continuous commentary to the Mishnah. Commentaries and editions of individual tractates have addressed various aspects of this critical agenda, but the attempts made so
far at producing a critical edition of the Mishnah fall far short
of this ideal (Stemberger, 139144). To date, the works which
come closest to realizing this critical ideal are the Mishnah
commentaries of A. Goldberg (Ohalot, Shabbat, Eruvin, Bava
Kamma) and S. Friedmans comparative study of Mishnah and
Tosefta Pesah im, Tosefta Atiqta.
Starting in the 1970s, a new approach to the study of the
Mishnah began to emerge, centered around the person of
Jacob *Neusner, and reflecting the creation of autonomous
Judaic study programs within the modern secular university.
In keeping with the interests and agenda of the modern academic world, the Mishnah came to be viewed historically, not
only in the context of the talmudic tradition, but also in the
broader context of ancient Judaism as a whole, and as part of
the general intellectual and spiritual trends of late antiquity.
New questions were raised regarding the formal structure of
tannaitic halakhah; the literary relations between Mishnah,
Tosefta and tannaitic midrash; the historical reliability of attributions and biographical traditions; the changing agenda of
the different tannaitic schools over time, and so on. The mere
quantity of scholarly studies produced over a short period of
time both by Neusner himself, and by colleagues and students make it difficult to assimilate all the innovations, regarding content as well as methodology, which this new approach has generated. For example, Neusners monumental
work on Seder Toharot, A History of the Mishnaic Law of Purities (22 vol., 19741977), has never been properly reviewed
or evaluated, and Neusner found it necessary briefly to restate
some of his more important conclusions (From Mishnah to
Scripture (1984); The Mishnah Before 70 (1987)) in order to
make them available to the general scholarly community. For
a brief outline of Neusners contribution to the study of the
Mishnah, see The Study of Ancient Judaism I, pp. 1423, which
must of course be supplemented by reference to his subsequent work, especially his four volumes on The Philosophical
Mishnah (198889).
Editions, Translations, and Aids to Mishnah Study
The edition of the Mishnah printed in Naples in 1492 is usually regarded as the first edition of the Mishnah. It includes
the complete text of the Mishnah and Maimonides commentary in Hebrew translation. The edition published by Tom Tov
Lipman Heller, printed in Prague 161417 along with his commentary Tosefot Yom Tov, has exerted significant influence on
subsequent editions of the Mishnah (see: Goldberg, Literature, 247248). The 13-volume Romm edition (Vilna, 1908ff.)
included for the first time the Melechet Shlomo commentary,
in addition to Bartenura, Tosefot Yom Tov, and Tiferet Yisrael.
It also included references to citations of Mishnah passages
in Talmudic and rabbinic literature, alternative readings, and
more than 70 commentaries. Most of these consist of little more than collections of isolated comments on sporadic
Mishnah passages, but some are quite significant, including
the important commentaries of R. Efraim Yitzhak (Mishnah
Rishonah and Mishnah Ah aronah) and the commentaries of
the Gaon R. Elijah of Vilna. The text of the Mishnah found in
most editions currently available today varies little from that
of the Romm Mishnah, a notable exception being the new edition of Maimonides Commentary to the Mishnah, translated
and published by J. Kafih (1963ff.), which includes Maimonides own (12t century) text of the entire Mishnah. For a list
of the many manuscripts of the Mishnah with Maimonidess
Arabic commentary, see Krupp, 260262.
Other works include important information relating
to the text of the Mishnah. For example, a critical edition
of Mishnah Zeraim, based on all known manuscripts and
genizah fragments, including comprehensive references to
all Mishnah citations in talmudic and rabbinic literature, was
published in 19721975 by the Yad ha-Rav Herzog Institute for
the Complete Israeli Talmud. They have also included similar material in their critical edition of the Babylonian Talmud
of Seder Nashim (Yev., Ket., Ned., Sot., and part of Gittin).
Critical editions of various individual tractates have also appeared (Stemberger, 143144). For the manuscripts of the
Mishnah, see Krupp, 252257; Stemberger. 139142, and it
should be noted that digital images of many of the most important Mishnah manuscripts have been posted on the website
of the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem,
either directly (Kaufman A50, Parma de Rossi 138, Parma de
Rossi 497, the original manuscript of Maimonides Mishnah
text and commentary) or through links to other libraries
(Munich 95). Similarly, the Talmud Text Data Bank published
by the Saul Lieberman Institute of Talmudic Research of the
Jewish Theological Seminary of America (available on CDROM) includes all the Mishnah texts and all partial Mishnah
citations found in the manuscripts of the Babylonian Talmud. For translations, see Goldberg, in Literature, 248249
and Stemberger, 144145, the most common English translations being those of Danby (1933), Blackman (195156), and
Neusner (1988).
The language of the Mishnah both its grammar and
its vocabulary represent a distinct phase in the history of
the Hebrew language, and as such it has been the object of
intense critical study over the past fifty years. E.Y. Kutscher,
Z. Ben-Haim, H. Yalon, S. Morag and many others have examined many important aspects of Mishnaic Hebrew. Much
of this work, however, has remained in the form of scholarly
articles aimed at professional linguists, and the fruits of this
labor have yet to be made available in a form which can be of
help to the ordinary student of Mishnah. We still await a new
synthetic grammar book comparable in size and scope to M.H.
Segals now outdated Grammar of Mishnaic Hebrew (1927).
Similarly, the modern student of mishnaic Hebrew must still
make use of the old talmudic dictionaries of J. Levy, A. Kohut,
M. Jastrow; a notable exception to this rule is M. Moreshets
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mishpat ivri
extremely useful Lexicon of the New Verbs in Tannaitic Hebrew (1980). The archaelogy and realia of the Mishnah have
also been treated by many scholars (most notably D. Sperber),
but again no comprehensive handbooks like S. Krauss Talmudische Archologie have been produced in almost a century.
J. Feliks small book, The Plants and Animals of the Mishnah
(1983), provides simple and useful information on these topics. A regular survey of recent books and articles dealing with
different facets of Mishnah study is provided by A. Walfish in
the Hebrew language journal Netuim.
Bibliography: Iggeret Rav Sherira Gaon, ed. by B.M. Lewin
(1921); Frankel, Mishnah; J. Bruell, Mevo ha-Mishnah (187685); I.
Lewy, in: Zweiter Bericht ueber die Hochschule fuer die Wissenschaft
des Judenthums in Berlin (1876); D. Hoffmann, Die erste Mischna und
die Controversen der Tannaim (1881); L. Ginzberg, Studies in the Origin of the Mishna (1920); Epstein, Mishnah; Epstein, Tannaim, 13240;
H . Albeck, Untersuchungen ueber die Redaktion der Mischna (1923);
idem, Mavo la-Mishnah (1959); S. Lieberman, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (1950), 8399; H. Yalon, Mavo le-Nikkud ha-Mishnah (1964); A.
Goldberg, The Mishnah Treatise Ohalot Critically Edited (1955); idem,
Commentary to the Mishna Shabbat, Critically Edited, and Provided
with Introduction, Commentary and Notes (1976); idem, The Mishna
Treatise Eruvin, Critically Edited, and Provided with Introduction,
Commentary and Notes (1986); idem, in: The Literature of the Sages,
Part One, ed. S. Safrai (1987), 211251; idem, Tosefta Bava Kama: A
Structural and Analytic Commentary with a Mishna-Tosefta Synopsis
(2001); M. Krupp, in: The Literature of the Sages, Part One, ed. S. Safrai
(1987), 252262; Strack-Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and
Midrash (1996), 108148; S. Safrai, in: The Literature of the Sages, Part
One, ed. S. Safrai (1987), 35209; Strack-Stemberger, Introduction to
the Talmud and Midrash (1996), 108148; Kovez Maamarim be-Lashon
H azal, ed. M. Bar Asher (1972, 1980); S. Morag, Studies in Hebrew,
Aramaic and Jewish Languages (2003), 397; A. Samely, Rabbinic Interpretation of Scripture in the Mishnah (2002); D. Raviv, Analysis of
Midrashic Passages in Mishna Sanhedrin, Ph.D. Thesis, Bar-Ilan University (1998); Netuim, Journal of Mishnah Study (1993ff.); G. Alon,
Jews, Judaism and the Classical World (1977), 146234; E.Z. Melamed,
The Relationship between the Halakhic Midrashim and the Mishna and
Tosefta (1967); S. Friedman, Tosefta Atiqta (2002); idem, R. Jonathan
Ha-Kohen of Lunel (1969), 79; J. Neusner, The Modern Study of the
Mishnah (1973), idem, A History of the Mishnaic Law of Purities (22
vol. 19741977); idem, Judaism, The Evidence of the Mishnah (1981);
idem, The Study of Ancient Judaism I (1981); idem, From Mishnah
to Scripture (1984); idem, The Mishnah before 70 (1987); J. Blau and
A. Scheiber, An Autograph of Maimonides from the Adler Collection
and the Leningrad Library: Draft of the Introduction to Seder Tohorot
(1981); S. Hopkins, Maimonides Commentary on Tractate Shabbat:
The Draft Commentary According to the Autograph Fragments from
the Cairo Geniza (2001).
[Stephen G. Wald (2nd ed.)]
the biblical 3 is homiletically justified. One of the extant manuscripts has a sixth chapter dealing with the Tabernacle which
is similar to sections of the *Baraita de-Melekhet ha-Mishkan.
In spite of the similar names, there seems to be no connection between this work and the Baraita de-49 Middot which
is frequently cited by medieval commentators. This treatise is
written in a distinctive Hebrew that combines mishnaic style
with a technical terminology that has affinities with Arabic,
although it stands apart from the Hebrew mathematical terminology of the Hispano-Arabic period. In content, the Mishnat ha-Middot belongs to the stream of Oriental mathematics
represented, e.g., by Heron, Greek mathematician (c. 100 C.E.)
in the Hellenistic period, and al-Khwarizmi (c. 825 C.E.) in the
Arabic period, to both of whose works it offers striking parallels. Some attribute it to R. *Nehemiah (c. 150 C.E.), and see it
as a link between the Hellenistic and Arabic texts, while others
assign it to an unknown author of the Arabic period.
Bibliography: S. Gandz (ed.), Mishnat ha-Middot (Eng.,
trans. 1932); Z arefati, in: Leshonenu, 23 (1958/59), 15671; 24 (1959/60),
7394.
[Benjamin Weiss]
MISHPAT IVRI.
This article is arranged according to the following outline:
Definition and Terminology
Religious Halakhah and Legal Halakhah
Common Features
Distinguishing between Religious and Legal Halakhah
Ritual and Civil Law
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mishpat ivri
Law and Morals
De-Oraita and De-Rabbanan
Distinguishing Between the Two Categories
Legal Consequences of the Classification
The Basic Norm and the Sources of Jewish Law
Three Meanings of the Expression Source of Law
The Literary Sources of Jewish Law
Various Classes of Informative Sources of Law
From the Written Law Until the Period of the
Tannaim
From the Tannaitic Period Until the Redaction
of the Talmud
The Post-Talmudic Period
The Historical Sources of Jewish Law
The Legal Sources of Jewish Law
The Basic Norm of Jewish Law
The Different Periods of Jewish Law
Jewish Law A Law of Life and Practice
Introduction
The Religious and National Character of Jewish Law
The Jewish Judicial System the Scope of Its Jurisdiction
The Available Sanctions of the Jewish Judicial System
The Prohibition on Litigation in the Gentile Courts
Arbitration and the Jurisdiction of Lay Jewish Tribunals
The Judicial-Political Position and Social-Fiscal Relations
The Evolution of Jewish Law
The Evolution of Jewish Law Reflected in its Literary
Sources
The Different Branches of Jewish Law
Illustrations of Development and Change in the Different
Branches of Jewish Law
Laws of Obligation
Administrative Law
Conflict of Laws
Criminal Law
Classification of the Different Branches of Jewish Law
The Sources of Law
General
The Laws of Property
The Laws of Obligation
The Laws of Tort
Family Law and Inheritance
Criminal Law
The Laws of Procedure and Evidence
Mercantile Law
Public and Administrative Law
Conflict of Laws
Public Jewish Leadership in the Development of Jewish
Law
Introduction
The Kings Law
Local Jewish Government
The Relationship between Jewish Law and Foreign Law
Introduction
Reciprocal Influences
332
mishpat ivri
term refers not only to matters between man and man (in the
sense of jus, ius humanum) but also to the precepts between
man and his Maker (in the sense of fas, ius divinum). Thus
for instance in Exodus 21:1 the words ve-elleh ha-mishpatim
are stated by way of introduction to chapters 21, 22, and 23,
which deal not only with matters of civil and criminal law
but also with the laws of the sabbatical year, the Sabbath, first
fruits, and so on.
Another Hebrew term for law is the word dinim (sing.
din), used to designate matters included in the fourth mishnaic order, Nezikin (see Deut. 17:8; H ag. 1:8; Nah manides, Gen.
34:13). The term comprises two main classes of laws, namely
dinei mamonot and dinei nefashot. The concept of dinei mamonot corresponds to but is not identical with civil law, since
it is wider than the latter in some respects (see Sanh. 2:2 and
see below) and narrower in others, excluding, for instance,
that part of family law dealing with what is ritually permitted and prohibited, the laws of usury, and so on. (Subject to
this qualification, the term civil law will be used below and
in the other articles on Jewish law as the equivalent of dinei
mamonot.) The concept dinei nefashot takes in that part of
the criminal law dealing with matters that call for capital and
certain other forms of corporal punishment. (The term dinei
kenasot relates to matters which are part of dinei mamonot;
see *Obligations, Law of.) However, even the term dinim does
not exclude matters concerning the precepts between man
and God, as is evident from the concept of dinei issur ve-hetter ritual prohibitions and permissions.
The reason for the absence in Hebrew sources of an accepted term describing legal norms pertaining exclusively to
relations between man and man for instance in the sense of
English law or Swiss law lies in the basic fact that both
the laws applicable between man and man and the precepts
concerning man and God have a single and common source,
namely the *Written and the *Oral Law. This fact further
asserts itself in the phenomenon that all parts of the entire
halakhic system share and are subject to common modes of
creation, thought, and expression, as well as principles and
rules (see below). This, however, constitutes no hindrance to
the acceptance of the term mishpat Ivri in the sense here described. The term first came to be used in this sense around
the beginning of the 20t century, when the Jewish national
awakening which to some extent stimulated also the desire
for a return to Jewish law prompted a search for a Hebrew
term to designate that part of the halakhah whose subject matter paralleled that which normally comprises other legal systems. What was sought was a suitable term that would circumscribe the bounds of the legal research and preparatory work
to be undertaken. Thus there was accepted the term mishpat
Ivri, in the same way as safah Ivrit and later also medinah
Ivrit. Today the term mishpat Ivri, as defined above, is generally accepted in all fields of practical legal life and research
in the sense here described. In the Knesset legislation use is
made of the term din Torah (authorized English translation,
Jewish religious law: see, e.g., sec. 2, Rabbinical Courts Ju-
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mishpat ivri
nearest to him (Ket. 49b; Sh. Ar., YD 251:3; EH 71:1). Another
illustration is found in the post-talmudic development regarding the establishment of an obligation by way of the promisors
vow or oath or undertaking on pain of ban to give or do according to his promise whose fulfillment is imposed on him
as a religious duty. This method was employed especially in the
case of obligations which were incapable of being established
in terms of the legal rules of the halakhah, such as an obligation relating to something not yet in existence (Rema, h M
209:4), or one tainted with the defect of *asmakhta (Sh. Ar.,
h M 207:19) and so on (see *Obligation, Law of).
Distinguishing between Religious and Legal
Halakhah Ritual and Civil Law
A study of the halakhic sources reveals that the halakhah,
notwithstanding its overall unity, distinguishes materially between the two main fields of its subject matter, between matters of mamon or mamona and matters not of mamon
or issura (lit. prohibitions, i.e., ritual law). Although the
concepts of issura and mamona are not coextensive with the
modern concepts of religious and legal law (see above),
the material distinction made between them exerted a decisive influence on the evolutionary path taken by that large part
of the halakhah embraced in the term mishpat Ivri. The first
manifestations of the distinction date back to the time of Bet
Shammai and Bet Hillel (Yev. 15ab; Eduy. 1:12 If you have
permitted in a matter relating to the stringent prohibition of
incest, shall you not permit in civil matters (mamon) which
are less stringent?) and in the course of time it became entrenched in many fields of the halakhah, as illustrated in the
following examples: As regards the freedom of stipulation, the
principle was laid down that when a person contracts out of
the law contained in the Torah, a stipulation which relates to
a matter of mamon is valid but one that relates to a matter not
of mamon is invalid (Tosef., Kid. 3:78). The explanation is
that the legal order prescribed by the Torah in civil matters
was not enjoined in the form of a binding obligation (i.e., jus
cogens), but as conditional on the will of the parties (i.e., jus
dispositivum; Nah manides, Nov. BB 126b) except in cases of
a stipulation inimical to personal freedom or the public weal
(for details see *Contract). In case of an illegal contract the
rule is that a contract whose fulfillment involves the transgression of law shall not be enforced, but transgression of a
religious prohibition does not deprive the contract of legal
validity and it will be enforced by the court; hence, if a person sells or gives on the Sabbath, and certainly on festivals,
even though he should be flogged, his act is effective and an
obligation undertaken on the Sabbath is similarly valid, and
a kinyan performed on the Sabbath (i.e., kinyan sudar, see
*Acquisition) is valid, and the writing and handing over take
place after the Sabbath (Yad, Mekhirah 30:7).
The distinction between issura and mamona also has an
important bearing on the question of legislative authority in
Jewish law. While such authority was to some extent limited
in matters of issura, it remained fully effective in matters of
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mishpat ivri
causality between his act and the resultant damage, or because
he acted with license, or for other reasons yet with reference
to many of these cases the rule was laid down that the person
occasioning damage to another is exempt according to the
laws of man but liable according to the law of Heaven (BK
6:4; BK 55b; and codes), or he is exempt according to the law
of man but his judgment is entrusted to Heaven (Tosef., BK
6:617). Liability according to the law of Heaven means, according to some scholars, that although the court should not
compel compliance by regular sanction it should bring pressure to bear on him, verbally, without compulsion (Yam shel
Shelomo, BK 6:6); others held that the court should exercise
no constraint not even verbal but should inform the individual: We do not compel you, but you shall have to fulfill
your duty to Heaven (ibid.). Hence even the adjuration that
the duty to Heaven must be fulfilled is addressed to the individual concerned by the court.
An instance of the conversion of a moral imperative into
a legally sanctioned norm is to be found in the direction to
act li-fenim mi-shurat ha-din (i.e., leniently, beyond the requirements of the law). In the Talmud this direction does not
generally carry the import of a norm fortified by some form
of sanction, and means only that it is fitting for the person
who has a concern for his manner of conduct not to base his
deeds on the strict letter of the law but to act leniently beyond
the requirements of the law (as in the matter of restoring lost
property or that of paying compensation for damage resulting from an erroneous opinion: BM 24b and 30b; BK 99b).
As regards the talmudic matter concerning the exemption
of workers from liability for damage caused by them even
though they are unable to prove the absence of negligence
on their part the posekim were divided on whether or not
this involved an enforceable duty to act beyond the requirements of the law (Mordekhai and others; see Bah , H M 12:4). In
the post-talmudic era the direction to act li-fenim mi-shurat
ha-din became, according to the majority of scholars, a full
fledged legal norm enforced in certain instances by the court
(for instance in the case of a wealthy litigant; Bah , loc. cit. and
Rema, h M 12:2). See also *Law and Morality.
de-oraita and de-rabbanan
Jewish law, in fact the entire halakhah, distinguishes between
two categories of law, expressed in the two Aramaic terms deoraita (of the Torah) and de-rabbanan (of the scholars). The
second category is sometimes also termed mi-divrei soferim
(a term which has an additional meaning, see Sanh. 88b, but
is normally used as the equivalent of de-rabbanan) or takkanat h akhamim.
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mishpat ivri
Ket. 13 (12):3 and Ket. 110b; see also *Conflict of Laws) when
special circumstances justified such leniency (Ket. 86a; Rashbam, BB 132b). In general, however, the scholars imparted
to their enactments the force of rules of the Torah (see Git.
64b65a; Ket. 84a). When the scholars saw the need for introducing a basic legal institution into daily life, they sometimes
even enforced a rule of the rabbinical law more restrictively
than a rule of the Torah. For this reason it was laid down that
the parties may not stipulate for the payment of a lesser *ketubbah amount than that determined by the scholars, notwithstanding the rule of freedom of stipulation in civil matters,
even those pertaining to the de-oraita law (Ket. 56a). The rule
that a legal obligation classified as part of the rabbinical law
has the same legal efficacy as a de-oraita obligation is of special
importance in view of the fact that so many of the rules in all
the different branches of Jewish law belong to the de-rabbanan
category (particularly those concerning the modes of acquisition, and the laws of obligation and tort). Any diminished
regard for the standing and validity of a rule of the rabbinical law would have entailed the possibility of a far-reaching
effect on the manner of execution and enforcement of such
rules (see detailed discussion in Radbaz, 1,503).
the basic norm and the sources of jewish law
Three Meanings of the Expression Source of Law
Every legal system gives occasion for inquiry into the sources
of its law (fontes juris, Die Quellen des Rechts). The expression
source of law has three principal meanings, which may be
distinguished as literary, historical, and legal sources of law.
The literary sources of law (in German, Die Erkenntnisquellen des Rechts) are those sources which serve as the recognized and authentic literary repository of the various rules
and directions of a particular legal system for purpose of ascertaining their content.
The historical sources are those sources which constitute
the historical-factual origin of particular legal norms. Legal
research is largely concerned with an investigation of the historical sources of the directions comprising a particular legal
system, of the various influences of one legal system on another, and other similar questions. The historical sources of
law, in the wide sense of the expression, may also include any
economic, social, moral, or other factor that led to the creation of a particular legal norm and there are many instances
of laws which were enacted in answer to particular economic
or social needs.
The legal sources (in German Die Entstehungsquellen des
Rechts) are the sources of law and means of creating law recognized by a legal system itself as conferring binding force
on the norms of that system (see J.W. Salmond, Jurisprudence
(1966), 109ff.).
The distinction between a legal and a historical source
of law is of a material nature. The quest for the legal source
of a particular norm is aimed at ascertaining the source from
which the latter derives the force of law, that is, the principle
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mishpat ivri
and the degree of the authors accuracy and objectivity carefully examined in each case. These informative sources avail
also in Jewish law. While its authoritative literary sources are
the most important informative class, both literature of the
law and general literature serve the important function of
filling in the social and economic background to many legal
norms. They are of added importance subject to the above
cautionary remarks in relation to those periods when there
were few authoritative literary sources, as was the position
in Jewish law until the literary redactions undertaken in the
tannaitic period. The different literary sources of the halakhah are briefly reviewed below in a general manner. (These
are separately discussed elsewhere in greater detail; see, e.g.,
*Mishnah; *Talmud.)
FROM THE WRITTEN LAW UNTIL THE PERIOD OF THE
TANNAIM. The Bible is not only the source of authority of
the whole of the Jewish legal system (see below), it is also its
first and foremost authoritative literary source. It contains legal directions which date from patriarchal times onward and
are dispersed in specific books and chapters of the Pentateuch
(Gen. 23:320; 31:4143; Ex. 2023; Lev. 5; 1821; 2425; 27;
Num. 27:3536; Deut. 1; 45; 1517; 1925). The next authoritative literary source is represented by the Books of the Prophets
and the Hagiographa. From these information may be gained
on the laws concerning the modes of acquisition (Ruth 4; Jer.
32 and see TJ, Kid. 1:5; 60c), the monarchy (I Sam. 8; I Kings
21), suretyship (Prov. 6:15; 1115, et al.), the laws confining
criminal responsibility to the transgressor (II Kings 14:6), and
so on. It may be noted that the Prophets and Hagiographa
contain scant material of a legal nature. The attention of the
prophets and chroniclers was mainly directed to the numerous
internal and external wars of their times, to moral, social, and
religious problems. Therefore the silence of these sources on
different matters of the law cannot be interpreted as pointing
to the absence of a legal order on such matters.
Much of the accumulated knowledge of Jewish law in
the above period and for some time after can be found in the
informative sources termed literature of the law and general
literature. These include the *papyri (such as the Elephantine
papyri of the fifth century B.C.E.), the *Septuagint (end of
the third century B.C.E.), the writings of *Philo (first half of
the first century), the writings of Josephus (the period of the
Temple destruction), the *Apocrypha (from the fourth century B.C.E. until the year 200), and other works. This literature
contains some halakhot which are identical to those quoted
in talmudic literature and others which are sometimes contrary to it. This may indicate a possible development in certain norms of Jewish law or it may also be that this literature
preserved halakhot that appeared in talmudic sources which
are no longer extant. Great care is needed in deducing conclusions from this literature: sometimes it represents the viewpoint of small sects or even a single individual; sometimes it
may show the influence of a surrounding legal system (as in
the case of the Elephantine papyri); sometimes the particular
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problems, or they arose from disputes between the individual
and the community, or between different communities, which
came directly before the competent scholars of the particular area. The responsa represent legal decisions on concrete
questions arising in daily life and served as the main vehicle
for the creativity and evolution of Jewish law in post-talmudic
times. This body of literature is the case law of the Jewish legal
system, estimated to include a total of approximately 300,000
judgments and decisions (see also *Maaseh; *Responsa).
(3) The Codes (see in detail under *Codification of
Law).
Besides these three main sources two other classes of
literary sources belonging to this period may be mentioned:
first, the collections of bonds and deeds (see *Shetarot), i.e.,
forms of written documents in use at various times during
this period and serving to order the legal relations between
parties in different fields of the law such as deeds of sale,
indebtedness, lease, marriage, and ketubbah; secondly, the
collections of takkanot, particularly the takkanot enacted by
the community and its leadership, namely takkanot ha-kahal. In addition, there is the auxiliary literature of Jewish law
consisting of various works of aid and reference, which may
conveniently be classified into five categories: (1) works of introduction to the Talmud or to the halakhah in general (such
as the Iggeret R. *Sherira Gaon; the Sefer ha-Keritot of *Samson b. Isaac of Chinon; et al.); (2) encyclopedias of the halakhah (such as Pah ad Yiz hak by Isaac *Lampronti and, more
recently, the Enz iklopedyah Talmudit, etc.); (3) biographies of
the halakhic scholars (such as the Sefer ha-Kabbalah of Abraham ibn Daud; first part of Shem ha-Gedolim of H .J.D. Azulai); (4) bibliographies of halakhic works (such as the Oz ar haSefarim by Benjacob, the second part of Shem ha-Gedolim by
H .J.D. Azulai); and (5) lexicons and dictionaries (such as HeArukh by Nathan b. Jehiel of Rome; the Arukh Completum by
A. Kohut; Levis Wrterbuch; and Jastrows Aramaic Dictionary
of the Talmud). The main literary source in the post-talmudic
period, however, remained the Talmud while around it and in
continuation thereof there grew up a vast and profound literature in the form of all the aforementioned branches, sources,
and auxiliary works.
The Historical Sources of Jewish Law
It is possible to point to the historical background of many
norms of Jewish law to the economic, social, and moral conditions leading to their creation (particularly in the case of
the norms originating from takkanot), or to the influence of
a different legal system (see below) and similar historical influences. General research on such historical sources is to be
found in various works dealing with the history of the halakhah and some special research has been done on this subject (latterly, for instance, Y. Baer, Yisrael ba-Ammim; idem,
in: Zion, 17 (1951/52), 155; 27 (1961/62), 11755). Ascertaining
the precise historical sources of a particular legal norm is often
a formidable task which offers no assurance that the correct
answer will be found. Some proffered answers lie in the realm
338
of mere conjecture and are unacceptable without adequate further investigation and proof (see for instance the strictures of
G. Alon in his Meh karim, 2 (1958), 181247).
The Legal Sources of Jewish Law
There are six legal sources of Jewish law (as regards the Written Law see below): (1) kabbalah (tradition), based on tradition transmitted from person to person back to Moses from
God (Avot 1:1; ARN ibid.; Yad, Mamrim 1:2; Maim., Introd. to
Comm. Mishnah); it is materially different from the other legal sources of Jewish law, since it is not subject to change or
development but is, by its very nature, static and immutable,
whereas the other legal sources are dynamic by nature and
mainly serve as the means toward the continued creativity and
evolution of Jewish law; (2) Midrash (exegesis and interpretation), embracing the norms derived from interpretation
of the Written Law and of the halakhah in all periods, and to
a certain extent also taking in other principles relating to interpretation of deeds, communal enactments, and so on; (3)
takkanah and gezerah, representing the legislative activities of
the competent halakhic authorities and public bodies in every
generation; (4) minhag, representing the legal norms derived
from custom in all its different forms; (5) maaseh, representing
the legal norms derived from judicial decision or the conduct
of a halakhic scholar in a particular concrete case; (6) sevarah,
representing the legal norms originating directly from the legal-human logic of the halakhic scholars.
The last five of these are recognized in Jewish law as being capable of both solving new legal and social problems and
changing existing legal norms, when this need arises from the
prevailing economic, social, and moral realities. In making
use of these legal sources the halakhic scholars continued to
shape and develop the Jewish legal system, which gave direction to the daily realities of life while being itself directed by
them. This task the halakhic scholars carried out with a constant concern for the continued creativity and evolution of the
halakhah, tempered at the same time by the heavy responsibility of preserving its spirit, objective, and continuity. This
twofold assignment is entrusted in Jewish law to the halakhic
scholars in every generation: the judge that shall be in those
days (Deut. 17:9 and Sif. Deut. 153), in accordance with the
fundamental principle that the court of Jephthah is as that of
Samuel for the contemporary judge is in his generation as
the judge who was in earlier generations (Eccles. R. 1:4, no. 4;
Tosef., RH 2 (1):3; RH 25b). No supra-human power such as
a heavenly voice or the prophet acting as bearer of the divine
vision has ever had any authority or influence in the determination and decision of the halakhah (Sifra, Be-H ukkotai
13:78; BM 59b; TJ, MK 3:1, 81d; for further particulars see *Authority, Rabbinical).
The Basic Norm of Jewish Law
As already mentioned, by the legal sources of a legal system
is meant those sources which that legal system itself recognizes as valid sources from which its legal norms derive their
binding force. Whence do these legal sources themselves deENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mishpat ivri
rive their authority and validity? How and by whom have they
been recognized as having the efficacy to determine and introduce legal norms into the legal system concerned? Salmond
(loc. cit.) states (1112): There must be found in every legal
system certain ultimate principles, from which all others are
derived, but which are themselves self-existent. Before there
can be any talk of legal sources, there must be already in existence some law which establishes them and gives them their
authority These ultimate principles are the Grundnorm or
basic rules of recognition of the legal system. Thus the direct
legal source of a municipal bylaw is the authority of the municipality to make bylaws; the bylaw has legal validity because
parliament has delegated power to the municipality to make
bylaws, while there exists a further rule the Grundnorm
which determines that an act of parliament has binding authority in the English legal system.
So in any legal system there is to be found a chain of delegation of power extending from the ultimate legal value the
Grundnorm to lower ones. The source of authority of the
ultimate legal principle must be sought beyond the concepts
of law and within the confines of history, religious faith, and
beliefs, and the like: But whence comes the rule that acts of
parliament have the force of law? This is legally ultimate; its
source is historical only, not legal. The historians of the constitution know its origin, but lawyers must accept it as selfexistent. It is the law because it is the law, and for no other
reason than that it is possible for the law itself to take notice
of (Salmond, op. cit., p. 111).
In the above-mentioned sense the basic norm of the Jewish legal system is the rule that everything stated in the Written
Law is of binding authority for the Jewish legal system. The
basic norm of Jewish law therefore not only expresses the concept of the delegation of power, but it is actually woven into
the substantive content of the Written Law, the latter constituting the eternal and immutable constitution of Jewish law.
This norm is the fountain of authority and starting point for
the entire halakhic system with all its changes and evolution
throughout the generations, and it is this norm that delegates
authority to the legal sources of Jewish law rendering them
valid means toward the continuing creativity and evolution of
the latter. The source of authority of this basic norm itself is
the basic tenet of Judaism that the source of authority of the
Torah is divine command. In considering the matter from the
aspect of Judaism as a whole it has to be said that there cannot be seen in it a system of legal norms isolated from and
independent of other constellations of norms. All these constellations of norms have a single and uniform ultimate value,
namely divine command as expressed in the Torah given to
Moses at Sinai. Hence even the pre-Mosaic laws mentioned in
the Written Torah for instance concerning circumcision and
the prohibition on flesh torn from a living animal, robbery,
incest and so on have binding force because the Holy One
commanded us through Moses (Maim., Comm. H ul. 7:6) and
because at the time the Torah was given Israel entered into a
covenant to observe them (Rashbam, Gen. 26:5).
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the creativity and development of Jewish law in this and in
the post-talmudic period.
The first general period can be subdivided in six eras:
(1) the biblical age (up to the time of Ezra and Nehemiah,
about the middle of the fifth century B.C.E.); (2) the period
from Ezra and Nehemiah until the age of the zugot (up to
160 B.C.E. approximately), the greater part of which is customarily described as the age of the soferim (the scribes; see
N. Krochmal, Moreh Nevukhei ha-Zeman, ed. Rawidowicz, 56,
194), but latterly the use of the term as descriptive of the scholars of this period only has been criticized (see Kaufmann, Y.,
Toledot, 4 pt. 1 (1960), 4815); (3) the age of the zugot (the
pairs; from 160 B.C.E. up to the beginning of the Common
Era), which takes its name from the five pairs of leading scholars who headed the battei din during this period (the names of
the zugot, of whom the last pair were Hillel and Shammai, are
given in H ag. 2 and Avot 1); (4) the age of the tannaim (up to
220 C.E.) which spans the activities of six generations of tannaim, from *Gamaliel the Elder (grandson of Hillel) and his
contemporaries to *Judah ha-Nasi (redactor of the Mishnah).
The generation succeeding R. Judah (that of R. *H iyya Rabbah
and his contemporaries) saw the transition from the tannaitic
age to that of the amoraim. Besides the Mishnah, there are extant from the end of this period also collections of halakhic
Midrashim, the Tosefta, and other tannaitic literary sources;
(5) the age of the amoraim embracing the activities of five generations of amoraim in Erez Israel (until the end of the fourth
century C.E.) and eight generations of amoraim in Babylon
(up to the end of the fifth century). Extant from this period
are the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds; (6) the age of the
savoraim (up to the end of the sixth century or, according to
some scholars, the middle of the seventh century). This age
must be regarded as the closing part of the talmudic period
since the savoraim were mainly occupied with completing the
redaction of the Babylonian Talmud and determining rules of
decision (see *Codification of Law).
In the second period there are two main subdivisions,
the age of the geonim and the rabbinic age, but the latter may
be subdivided into six further categories. (1) The age of the
geonim (from the end of the age of the savoraim until approximately the middle of the 11t century). The name is derived
from the official title by which the heads of the academies of
*Sura and *Pumbedita were known during this period. For
most of this period the Babylonian academies remained the
spiritual center of Jewry as a whole and most Jewish communities assigned absolute legal validity to the decisions and
responsa of the geonim. For internal Jewish and external political reasons, the ties of the Babylonian geonim with the
centers of learning that had arisen in North Africa and Spain
became loosened towards the end of this period and, commencing from the middle of the 11t century, the phenomenon
of a single spiritual center for the various centers of Jewish
life came to an end and each of the latter began to rely on its
leaders and teachers. This new reality was to exercise a great
deal of influence on the subsequent modes of development
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jewish law A law of life and practice
Introduction
For the greater part of its history of over 3,000 years, Jewish
law has served the Jewish people while they not only lacked
political independence but were for a considerable part of this
period deprived of their own homeland Erez Israel and
dispersed throughout the various countries of the Diaspora.
The legal systems of other ancient peoples went into decline
as soon as they lost their political sovereignty, eventually ceasing to exist except in scattered archaeological remains. Even
Roman law, which has left an imprint upon and still nourishes many other legal systems, ceased to exist as a creative
law of life and practice after having reached its peak of development in Justinians Corpus Juris, in the middle of the sixth
century. In the case of Jewish law, the position is otherwise.
Despite loss of political independence and lack of physical
tie with the homeland, the Jewish people retained judicial
autonomy and Jewish law not only did not decline, but it experienced most of its creativity and structural evolution the
Babylonian Talmud and all the other post-talmudic creativity after the exile. Two factors explain this unique phenomenon: an internal one resting on the substance and nature of
Jewish law and its place in the cultural life of the Jewish people,
and an external one resting on the general juridical-political
outlook that was common in the political history of the nations among whom the Jews lived up to the 18t century.
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mishpat ivri
of judicial autonomy was generally extended (up to the 18t
century), even in times and places of restriction of the rights
of Jews. In many centers such autonomy extended even to
criminal matters, varying from place to place in its scope
and modes of execution. In certain places it also extended
to capital offenses, particularly with reference to *informers
(e.g., in Spain, see Resp. Rashba, 1:181; 5:290; Resp. Rosh, 17:1,
8; Zikhron Yehudah, 58 and 79; Resp. Ritba, 131; Resp. Ribash,
251; in Poland see Resp. Maharam of Lublin, 138, etc.; see
also *Capital Punishment); in other places it extended merely
to religious offenses, offenses against property, and police administrative offenses.
The wide range of matters over which the Jews enjoyed
autonomous jurisdiction may be gathered from a study of the
responsa literature containing decisions given by the leading
halakhic scholars of different periods on concrete questions
arising from the daily realities. Thus, out of some 1,050 responsa of *Asher b. Jehiel one of the leading scholars of German and Spanish Jewry in the second half of the 13t century
and the beginning of the 14t one-fifth (about 200) deal with
precepts concerning man and God (such as the laws of prayer,
festivals, forbidden food, and the like) and the remaining fourfifths with Jewish law (i.e., matters for the greater part included
in Sh. Ar., EH and h M). Of the latter group, some 170 questions
deal with matters of Jewish family law (marriage and divorce,
parent and child, and the like) and the rest, more than 600,
are concerned with all other legal branches of Jewish law
(civil, criminal, and public-administrative; see Elon, Mafteah ,
introd. (Heb. and Eng.)). A similar ratio of subject matter is
found to be more or less constant in all the responsa literature up to the 16t century, and slightly different in that of the
17t and 18t centuries, where the percentage of matters concerning religious law is somewhat higher. A material change
can be detected in the responsa literature from the 18t century onward following the era of emancipation, which saw
the abrogation of Jewish judicial autonomy and by far the
greater part of these responsa deal with matters of religious
precepts and family law, with a modest and minor place reserved for the remaining branches of Jewish law.
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putes before Jewish judges even if the latter were not versed
in the law rather than resort to the gentile courts. These tribunals were composed of three members, one of whom had to
be gamir i.e., to have acquired some knowledge of the halakhah while the other two had to be persons fit at least to understand any matter explained to them (Sanh. 3a, Rashi and
Nov. Ran ad loc.). The scholars bestowed on the lay tribunal
authority to deal with all matters of civil law, to the exclusion
of criminal matters (Sanh. 3a and Piskei Rosh thereto, 1) along
with power to compel the appearance of the parties (Piskei Rosh
thereto, 2; Tos. to Sanh. 5a; Tur, M 3:3; Sh. Ar., h M 3:1). In order
to prevent resort to the gentile courts at all costs in post-talmudic times the scholars laid down that in any community where
not even one gamir was to be found, three laymen could make
up the tribunal even if none of them possessed this minimal
qualification, provided that they were fit and God-fearing persons, spurning corruption and equipped with sense and understanding; such tribunals could deal also with criminal matters,
in cases of great need and after much prior forethought and
consultation (Resp. Rashba, vol. 2, no. 290). The existence of
tribunals composed entirely of lay judges is confirmed in other
historical sources (see, e.g., the Valladolid takkanot of 1432, in
Finkelstein, bibl., pp. 3567), and the validity of such courts
was halakhically recognized (Rema, h M 8:1).
In general, the major part of the legal hearings, in disputes between individual Jews and between the individual
and the communal authorities, took place before a court composed of three dayyanim expert in Jewish law and deciding in
accordance therewith (a court of this kind called simply, bet
din; Resp. Rashba, vol. 1, no. 1010); however, in most Jewish
centers there were also lay tribunals functioning alongside
these courts as a permanent judicial institution (a court of this
nature being referred to as bet din shel hedyotot; Rashba loc.
cit.). Many factors social, economic, standards of knowledge
and education determined the measure of resort to lay tribunals. Their judges (known by different names: tovei ha-ir,
berurei teviot, berurei averot, piskei baalei battim, parnasim,
zekenim, etc.) generally based their decisions on communal
enactments (see *Takkanot ha-Kahal), trade usages (see *Minhag), appraisal, justice, and equity (see, e.g., Resp. Rashba, vol.
2, no. 290; vol. 3, no. 393 et al.; Resp. Maharshal, no. 93; Resp.
Rema, no. 33) and at times even upon a particular branch of
a foreign legal system (Beit ha-Beh irah, Sanh. 23a concerning
courts in Syria; see also takkanot of the Leghorn community:
S. Toaff, in: Sefunot, 9 (1964/65), 190f.). Sometimes lay tribunals turned to halakhic scholars for their opinion and advice
(Zikhron Yehudah, no. 58). In some places the limits of their
jurisdiction were clearly defined. Mention is made of a tribunal composed of tovei ha-ir which dealt with tax matters (Resp.
Rosh, no. 7:11). At times there was a predetermined division
of matters over which the different courts were to have jurisdiction; thus a takkanah of the Lithuanian community prescribed that the courts of the communal leaders were to deal
with matters of monopolies as well as certain tax and penal
matters, and the dayyanim of the community with matters of
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mishpat ivri
civil law (Pinkas ha-Medinah [Lita], no. 364); in a takkanah
of the Leghorn community it was laid down that all matters
of trade, insurance, and the like were to be dealt with by the
communal leaders (adonei ha-maamad) judging in accordance with the general law as regards trade customs, but that
matters of marriage and divorce, inheritance, mortgage, interest, and the like were to be dealt with according to Jewish
law (Toaff, in: Sefunot loc. cit.).
The lay tribunals were originally and primarily instituted
for the purpose of preventing resort to the gentile courts and
also so as to enable certain matters of trade and the like, which
were dependent on local custom, to come before a tribunal of
merchants and professional experts. These tribunals tended,
however, to gain in influence and to assume jurisdiction in additional matters, notwithstanding the existence of courts composed of dayyanim learned in the law. The halakhic scholars
regarded this development as posing a threat to the ordered
evolution of Jewish jurisdiction and application of Jewish law
(see, e.g., Resp. Maharyu, no. 146). The fact that these tribunals tried matters according to appraisal and a subjective feel
for justice, rather than according to any fixed legal rules, led
the scholars to apprehend the danger of possible partiality and
perversion of justice, especially since the tribunals were generally composed of the leaders and wealthy members of the community with the poorer and less influential members of society
almost completely unrepresented. Strong criticism to this effect
was often expressed by the scholars (see, e.g., Keneh H okhmah,
Derush ha-Dayyanim, pp. 25f.; Derushei ha-Z elah , 3:124).
However, such criticism never challenged the basic existence
and positive merits of an institution which served as a vital
additional means of preventing recourse to the gentile courts.
For this reason adjudication by lay tribunals was also held to
accord with the Torah, even if it had not always the same
merit as adjudication by the courts of dayyanim, and only the
practice in a few places to turn without hesitation to the gentile
courts is actually contrary to the Torah and amounts to a public profanation of the Divine Name for which those who act in
this way will have to account (Sefer ha-Zikhronot, 10:3). To do
so was to undermine Jewish judicial autonomy. (In Sh. Ar., h M
the matter of lay tribunals (ch. 8) is clearly distinguished from
the stringent prohibition on recourse to the gentile courts (ch.
26); see also M. Elon, in: ILR, 2 (1967), 52937.)
The Judicial-Political Position and Social-Fiscal Relations
The national-religious character of Jewish law, and the profound awareness that a zealous watch over this inalienable asset
would ensure the continued existence and unity of the Jewish
people, thus constituted the primary element in the application
of Jewish law in the daily life of the Jewish people even when
dispersed in exile. Yet it may be asked how it proved possible
for the Jews to maintain judicial autonomy under the political
sovereignty of the governments under whose rule they lived,
and what motivated the state authorities to respond to the demand of the Jewish collectivity for its own autonomy. The answer lies in the second of the two factors mentioned above, that
344
is the judicial-political concepts of government and jurisdiction as these were common up to the 18t century, and the fiscal
and social relations between the central authorities and the different strata, including foreigners, who dwelt under their rule.
The judicial system was based on the individuals adherence to
one of a number of distinctive groups with different legal systems which were recognized by the state. Unlike modern centralistic states, the medieval state was corporative in nature and
comprised of a series of autonomous strata and bodies, such as
the nobility, the burghers, the guilds, etc. The latter frequently
competed with one another and some of them with the central authority, and the Jewish community was often the object
of rivalry among these different strata, bodies, and the central
authority. This political-legal reality rendered possible the existence of an autonomous Jewish group with its own judicial
autonomy. The central authority, as well as the different strata
and bodies amidst whom the Jews lived, regarded it as their
duty and right to impose on the Jews heavy taxes in return
for the privileges of settlement and residence. The collection of
such taxation from each individual involved many difficulties,
especially as the Jews were counted as members of a separate
and foreign national group. The authorities accordingly found
it convenient to impose an aggregate tax on the Jewish collectivity as a whole and for this purpose to enable the latter to be
a unitary autonomous body, functioning in such manner that
its leaders would bear the responsibility of producing the total
amount of the tax apportioned and collected by each community from among its individual members. The existence of an
autonomous public Jewish body also made it possible to give
directions and conduct negotiations on other state rights and
obligations through the recognized leaders of this body. Considerations of faith and religious opinions held by the Christian
rulers may also have contributed to the grant of autonomous
Jewish jurisdiction (see H.H. Ben-Sasson, Perakim be-Toledot
ha-Yehudim bi-Ymei ha-Beinayim (196), 9091).
In this manner a zealously pursued desire of the Jewish people coincided with the existence of external historical
conditions and factors to enable this people to preserve its
religious and national law as a law of life and practice, faithfully served and interpreted by Jewish courts throughout the
dispersion. The preservation by the Jews of their national law
has been the main factor in the preservation of Jewish national
existence. In the words of Y. Kaufmann (Golah ve-Nekhar), It
was judicial autonomy which truly made of the Jewish nation
in exile a state within a state (1 (1929), 518) and This autonomy derived from the striving of the nation to embody in its
life the ideal of the Torah to the utmost limits. It derived especially from the striving to uphold the Jewish legal system,
the Law of the Torah, and to base thereon the order of internal
life. For this reason the ancient autonomy was fundamentally
a judicial autonomy (ibid., 2 (1930), 312).
the evolution of jewish law
A material feature of Jewish law is the fact of its ever-continuing evolution. This is the logical and necessary outcome of the
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mishpat ivri
fact of Jewish laws being a living and practical law, since constant evolution is a characteristic feature of every living thing
whether it is discernible during the passage from one state
to another or only clearly distinguishable in the perspective
of history. It will be clear to anyone taking up the halakhah
that he has before him one large unit in which the earlier and
later, the basis and the construction, are all interwoven and
arranged according to subject matter with no particular regard shown for historical-epochal distinctions. The halakhic
scholars rightly considered that Jewish law was of a nature
which required them to unite and integrate the various periods of the halakhah into a single, all-embracing epoch of
unitary halakhah, and not to divide and differentiate between
different stages and periods. This is a legitimate and accepted
conception in any system of legal thought, especially in a legal
system which, by its very nature, deems the existing body of
laws to be the starting point for its own renewal and further
development. This is also largely true, as regards, for instance,
the development of most of English law. However, this conception does not in any way bar the scholar from examining
each and every one of the institutions of Jewish law in historical perspective, with a view to determining the different stages
of development they may have undergone. Moreover, an examination of such different stages of development and of the
legal sources through which these stages were integrated into
the fabric of Jewish law will reveal that the halakhic scholars
themselves frequently emphasized the changes and development through which one or other institution of Jewish law had
passed. This is evidenced in their resort not only to takkanah
a means of expressly adding to or changing the existing law
but also to Midrash and the other legal sources of Jewish law
(see M. Elon, H erut ha-Perat, 12 (introd.), 2614).
Submission to Jewish law and the Jewish courts brought
in its wake an unending creative development of the Jewish
legal system. Social realities and economic exigencies change
from period to period, and among the special conditions of
the Jewish people must be included the social and economic
variations that marked the different centers of the dispersion.
Even when the Jewish people had possessed a single political
center and later on a spiritual center there had existed a
various and widely scattered Diaspora; however, geographical dispersion really began to impress its mark more critically
at the end of the tenth and the beginning of the 11t century
when the one center, the Babylonian, which had until then
held sway over the entire Diaspora, declined and a number of
centers made their appearance side by side and successively in
North Africa, in Spain and Germany, in France and Italy, in
Turkey, Egypt, and the Balkan countries, in Poland-Lithuania,
and elsewhere. It is certainly true that despite the geographical
scattering, Jewish scholars everywhere dealt with the same talmudic and rabbinic sources and that very often contact, personal and by correspondence, was also maintained among the
different centers. But the variations in the social, commercial,
and economic life of the Jews in each center, their communal
organization and representative institutions in each locality,
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shows that the part of the halakhah which was of practical application came to occupy an increasingly and incomparably
larger place than the part that was not of such application.
The Mishnah as compiled by Judah ha-Nasi contains six
orders, each of which treats one basic branch of the halakhah,
and together they embrace the whole halakhic system. In the
two Talmuds, the literary creations following immediately
upon the Mishnah, the following phenomenon is apparent: the
Babylonian Talmud, unlike the Jerusalem Talmud, contains
no Talmud on the order of Zeraim (apart from the tractate
Berakhot dealing with prayers and benedictions). There is no
doubt that the Babylonian amoraim, like those of Erez Israel,
studied all the six orders of the Mishnah and their deliberations on Zeraim are largely scattered throughout the tractates
of the other orders. That no Babylonian Talmud was edited
for this order is due to the fact that the rules therein stated
precepts which are dependent on the land (these being applicable only in Erez Israel), such as the laws of sheviit (the
Sabbatical Year) and peah (the corner of the field) were not
of practical concern in Babylonia, whereas in Erez Israel itself, where these rules were actually applied, a Talmud on this
order was compiled and edited. In the post-talmudic period
the overwhelming part of the halakhic literary creativity was
also concentrated on the precepts contemporaneously in use,
that is on the branches of the halakhah which were of everyday use and not on the laws connected with the precepts dependent on the land, with the Temple, ritual purity, and the
like. It is found that sometimes even theoretical study itself
was centered around the practical orders Moed, Nashim,
and Nezikin and those tractates of the other orders containing precepts in contemporaneous use such as Berakhot,
H ullin (concerning the laws of ritual slaughter and kashrut),
and Niddah (concerning ritual purity of women) were arranged together with these three orders (see Beit ha-Beh irah
(ed. Jerusalem, 19652), Introd. to Ber., p. 32). In geonic times
many monographs were written on various halakhic subjects,
most of them on strictly legal topics and part on matters of
ritual law, the majority of both kinds dealing exclusively with
the laws of everyday use. These monographs were primarily
compiled for practical use in the battei din.
This phenomenon recurs in two branches of the post-talmudic literature in the responsa and in the codifications
and to a certain extent also in the third branch, the commentaries and novellae. Thus Alfasi included in his code only those
laws then operative and not, for instance, the laws of the order
of Kodashim (except the tractate H ullin in which the topics
discussed remained of contemporaneous significance). The
only one to deviate from this path was Maimonides in his
code, Mishneh Torah. He sought to restore the halakhah to its
original dimensions by including in his code even matters of
faith and belief, which he formulated in legal style. However,
this undertaking was unique and in all subsequent codifications, such as Piskei Rosh, Arbaah Turim, and Shulh an Arukh,
the example set by Alfasi was followed and only the rules in
current application were included. The responsa literature also
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Law of). In the course of time, the nature of the contractual
obligation in Jewish law underwent a substantive change, one
that found expression in a series of basic innovations introduced and given recognition in successive stages; these included the possibility, contrary to the laws of property, of establishing an obligation with regard to something not yet in
existence; the possibility of establishing an obligation whether
or not the property in the debtors possession at such a time
was capable of satisfying the debt, and a long series of further
developments (see *Contract). Such a substantive change in
the subject matter of a legal institution is an important factor in its classification or reclassification as belonging, for instance, to the field of the laws of obligation rather than the
laws of property.
ADMINISTRATIVE LAW. A different phenomenon is evidenced in the field of administrative law, for the central subjects of this branch changed almost completely in consequence
of the material changes in the nature of public Jewish leadership and administration in different periods. Whereas in ancient times the institutions of public law determined relations
between the individual leader the king (see *King and Kingdom), the *nasi, the exilarch and the people, new social realities spurred the development of a pervasive system of administrative law based on collective leadership, elected or appointed.
The representative and elective institutions of local Jewish
government and intercommunal organization were built up
on the principles of Jewish law, and the halakhic scholars as
well as the communal leaders were called upon to resolve (the
latter by way of communal enactments) the numerous problems arising in the field of administrative law. These related,
among others, to the determination of relations between the
individual and the public authority, between the latter and its
servants; to the composition of the communal institutions and
the methods of election and appointment to the latter and to
other public positions (see *Public Authority); to the modes
of legislation of the community and to the legal administration of its institutions (see *Hekdesh; *Takkanot ha-Kahal); to
the imposition and collection of taxes (see *Taxation), and to
many additional problems concerning economic and fiscal
relations in the community. This wide range of problems was
dealt with in a very large number of responsa and communal
enactments, in the course of which the halakhic scholars and
public leaders developed a new and complete system of public law within the framework of the halakhah.
CONFLICT OF LAWS. In the field of the conflict of laws development came mainly in consequence of periodic migratory
movements and social changes in the life of the Jewish people.
The conflict of laws is not usually regarded as a distinct branch
of Jewish law, because of the substantive nature of Jewish law
as a personal law purporting to apply to each and every Jew
wherever he may be even beyond the territorial limits of
Jewish sovereignty or autonomy. From this it naturally follows
that in Jewish law no importance attaches to the fact, as such,
that a contract between two Jews is scheduled to mature in a
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
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cases the principles of Jewish law correspond to parallel principles in other legal systems. Such differences and similarities
are dealt with elsewhere under the heading of the subject to
which they pertain.
A full enumeration of the articles on Jewish law appearing in this Encyclopaedia is given below, some articles being
repeated since they pertain to more than one branch of law:
THE SOURCES OF LAW. Authority, *Rabbinical; *Codification of Law; *Interpretation; *Maaseh; *Minhag; *Mishpat
Ivri; *Sevarah; *Takkanot; *Takkanot ha-Kahal.
GENERAL. *Agency, Law of; *Asmakhta; *Conditions; *H azakah (in part); *Law and Morals; *Legal Person; *Majority Rule;
*Legal Maxims; *Mistake; *Noachide Laws; *Ones; *Shetar;
*Slavery.
THE LAWS OF PROPERTY. *Acquisition; *Gifts; *Hazakah;
*Hefker; *Hekdesh; *Lost Property, Finder of; *Maz ranut;
*Onaah; *Ownership; *Property; *Sale; *Servitude; *Slavery; *Yeush.
THE LAWS OF OBLIGATION. *Antichresis; *Assignment;
*Contract; *Gifts; *Haanakah; *Hassagat Gevul; *Labor Law;
*Lease and Hire; *Lien; *Loans; *Maritime Law; *Meh ilah;
*Obligation, Law of; *Partnership; *Pledge; *Sale; *Shalish;
*Shibuda de-Rabbi Nathan; *Shomerim; *Surety; Unjust *Enrichment; *Usury.
THE LAWS OF TORT. *Avot Nezikin; *Damages; *Gerama;
*Nuisance; *Theft and Robbery (civil aspects); *Torts.
FAMILY LAW AND INHERITANCE. *Adoption; *Agunah;
*Apostate (Family Law); *Apotropos; *Betrothal; *Bigamy;
Child *Marriage; *Civil Marriage; *Concubine; *Divorce;
*Dowry; *Embryo; *Firstborn; *Husband and Wife; *Ketubbah; *Levirate Marriage and H aliz ah; *Maintenance; *Mamzer;
*Marriage; *Marriage, Prohibited; *Mixed Marriage (Legal
Aspects); *Orphan; *Parent and Child (legal aspects); *Rape;
*Succession; *Widow; *Wills; *Yuh asin.
CRIMINAL LAW. *Abduction; *Abortion; *Adultery; *Assault;
*Blood-Avenger; *Bribery; *Capital Punishment; *City of Refuge; *Compounding Offenses; *Confiscation; *Crucifixion;
*Expropriation and Forfeiture; *Contempt of Court; *Divine
Punishment; *Extraordinary Remedies; *Fines; *Flogging;
*Forgery; *Fraud; *Gambling; *Hafkaat Shearim; *H erem;
*Homicide; *Imprisonment; *Incest; *Informer (legal aspects); *Oppression; *Ordeal; *Penal Law; *Perjury; Police
*Offenses; *Punishment; *Rape; Rebellious *Son; *Sexual
Offenses; *Slander; *Sorcery; *Suicide; *Talion; *Theft and
Robbery (criminal aspects); *Usury; *Weights and Measures
(criminal aspects).
Introduction
The halakhic scholars and the battei din filled the central role
in the development of the Jewish legal system. In addition, an
important creative role was filled by the public leadership and
representation of the Jewish people in all the different institutional forms it assumed throughout the history of the Jews:
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mishpat ivri
from the kings, the nesiim, and exilarchs down to the elected
or appointed representatives of the community.
The Kings Law
The fundamentals of the laws concerning the king and his
kingdom are enjoined in the Pentateuch (Deut. 17:1420,
dealing mainly with the duties of the king and his modes of
conduct), in the first Book of Samuel (ch. 8, in which the prerogatives of the king and the duties owed him by the people
are defined), and in other biblical passages (see for instance
I Kings 21, concerning the matter of Naboths vineyard). The
scholars also learned about the powers of the king from certain biblical statements concerning leaders of the people other
than the kings (see for instance Josh. 1:18 concerning rebellion against the kingdom; cf. Sanh. 49a). The king was vested
with wide powers in the legislative (see *Takkanot), judicial,
and executive fields, with authority to deviate in various matters from the rules as laid down in the halakhah. His authority
was not confined solely to fiscal and economic matters relating directly to the rule of the kingdom, such as taxation and
the mobilization of manpower or property, but extended also
to the field of criminal law. In the latter field he had authority, for instance, to impose the death sentence on a murderer,
despite the existence of formal defects in the evidence against
him, when this was required for the sake of good order in
accordance with the needs of the hour (Yad, Melakhim 3:10;
5:13 ibid., Roz eah 2:4; and Sanhedrin 14:2, 18:6).
The kings law represents the earliest determination in
Jewish law of a creative factor not directly attributable to halakhic scholars, and the halakhah conferred similar creative
authority on the various other post-monarchic institutions
of central Jewish government. Thus for instance it was said
of the exilarchs who headed the internal Jewish government
in the Babylonian exile that they take the place of the king
(Yad, Sanhedrin 4:13, based on Sanh. 5a and Rashi ad loc.)
and that the kings law applies in every generation in favor of the leaders of each generation (Beit ha-Beh irah, Sanh.
52b; see also Mishpat Kohen, no. 144). The question of the relationship between the regular law and the kings law is often
the subject of discussion in halakhic literature, particularly
of the post-talmudic period. R. Nissim b. Reuben *Gerondi
explains the parallel existence of the two systems on the basis that justice administered according to law, while correct
and ideal, does not always answer the social and other needs
of the hour, and that this function is filled by administration
of the kings law; for this reason Scripture enjoins the king to
have the Torah with him always, that his heart be not lifted
up above his brethren (Deut. 17:1420), because inasmuch as
he is not always subject to the law he must at all times, when
making use of his powers, take particular care to ensure that
he does not deviate from the general object of the Torah and
its principles of justice and equity (Derashot Ran, Derush no.
11). All subsequent creative authority permitted in Jewish law
to deviate, in certain cases, from the rules of the halakhah
was subject to this above basic requirement (see Minhag; TakENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
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validity of a foreign legal principle entails, in certain cases,
some measure of recognition witting or unwitting of the
correctness of the foreign principle and of the possibility that
the contents of the host legal system may be influenced in a
manner leading to the integration of a foreign legal principle
into its own framework.
350
Reciprocal Influences
From the 17t century onward a great deal of research in Jewish law has been devoted to the subject of mutual influence
between Jewish law and other legal systems (latterly see B.
Cohen, bibl., Introd. and ch. 1). More than any other, this field
of research has been particularly conducive to the adoption
of an apologetic approach in the form of both an over-emphasis on the influence of foreign law on the Jewish legal system and exaggeration of the influence of Jewish law on other
legal systems. Moreover, the influence of one legal system on
another is no easy matter to prove because of the possibility
that similar circumstances may have led to the evolution of
like institutions in different legal systems, uninfluenced by
each other. However, in general it may be said that there were
reciprocal relations and influences between Jewish law and the
surrounding legal systems or that of the nation under whose
political sovereignty Jewish law functioned in any particular
period of its history. The fact that the Jewish collectivity lived
its social and economic life in accordance with its own law,
yet all the while was under the patronage of many different
nations with their own legal systems, inevitably left the mark
of Jewish law on the other legal systems. The reverse process
applied equally: the halakhic scholars were familiar with the
law applied in the general courts of the land and sometimes
even recommended the adoption of a foreign legal practice
which commended itself to them (see, e.g., Elon, Mafteah
425; Pesakim u-Khetavim, no. 83; Resp. Israel of Bruna, no.
132). In certain cases the halakhic scholars recognized the
particular social efficacy of certain aspects of the foreign law
(see *Derashot Ran, Derush no. 11) and sometimes they were
not even deterred from lauding the gentile administration
of justice when they found this superior to that of the Jews
(Sefer ha-H asidim, no. 1301). To some extent directives of the
foreign law were absorbed by Jewish law by means of the legal source of custom (see *Minhag). When absorption of a
foreign principle did take place, such a principle underwent
a process of internal digestion designed to accommodate
it to the general principles and objectives of Jewish law. If in
particular social circumstances a foreign principle was occasionally absorbed which conflicted with the fundamental
doctrines of Jewish law, such a principle was usually rejected
in the end by the Jewish legal system (see, e.g., M. Elon, H erut
ha-Perat, pp. 23854, 259f.).
mishpat ivri
because such conduct contraverts the principle which prohibits the imposition of a collective fine and vicarious criminal
responsibility (Resp. Ribash Ha-H adashot, no. 9; in support
the following references are cited: Gen. 18:25; Num. 15:22; Pes.
113b; see also Deut. 24:15 and II Kings 14:6).
the era of emancipation
Inner Spiritual and External Political Changes
On the eve of emancipation and the end of Jewish autonomy,
substantial changes began to manifest themselves in Jewish
law which were crucial to its development. As already indicated, two basic factors account for the survival of Jewish law
as an operative law, even when it was deprived of its single territorial center and political sovereignty: the first the internal
discipline of traditional Jewish society which regarded itself
enjoined from a national-religious point of view to preserve
Jewish law as a living force, and the second the political circumstances of the corporative medieval state. Both these elements now underwent a decisive change. At the same time
as the rise of pressures for equality of rights for all, including
Jews, the governments of Europe in turn deprived the Jewish
community of the mandatory jurisdictional rights of the Jewish courts, even in matters of civil law; the use of the h erem
as well as other means of execution were forbidden. But the
main factor for the progressive ending of the living practice of
Jewish law was the social-spiritual change that began to assert
itself among the Jewish people. The Jewish community, which
had hitherto regarded the halakhah as the supreme value of
its existence, split into a society part of which remained traditional while part no longer regarded itself as bound to the
observance of the Torah and its precepts, and this decisively
weakened the internal factor of a religious imperative to order
daily practical life in accordance with Jewish law. This substantive change in the spiritual outlook of the Jewish world carried
with it also a disregard for the national element in Jewish law
and not only did the leaders of the community not oppose
the abolition of Jewish judicial autonomy but a good number
of them welcomed the ending of the separation between
the Jewish and the general public, regarding it as promising
achievement of the hoped-for freedoms and equality of rights
as well as organic integration into the vibrant Europe of the
emancipation era.
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actual events in everyday life, while the responsa literature of
European Jewry of this period is very poor in this respect and
even then is more of a theoretical study than a consideration
of practical problems.
Consequences of the Abrogation of Judicial Autonomy
The abrogation of Jewish judicial autonomy carried with it two
far-reaching consequences with regard to the world of Jewish
law. In the first place, Jewish laws dynamism as a living law
of practice was greatly inhibited and its organic development
suffered a marked curtailment. It was unfortunate for Jewish
law that this development occurred in the course of the 19t
century, a period which saw a revolution in social, economic,
and industrial life that left a decisive imprint on different legal fields. The other consequence was the loss, by the greater
part of the 19t-century Diaspora communities, of the former
deep national and religious awareness that daily practical life,
ordered in accordance with Jewish law, in all fields, became
as an integral part of the way of life of the Jewish people. This
consequence, as was later to become apparent, carried even
more fateful implications for Jewish law than those stemming
from the first-mentioned consequence.
the period of jewish national awakening
Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri Society and Mishpat ha-Shalom ha-Ivri
The Jewish national awakening and the rise of Zionism also
evoked a change in the mental attitude of the Jewish people
toward Jewish law. Soon after the *Balfour Declaration the HaMishpat ha-Ivri Society was founded in Moscow. Its members
drawn from all sections of the Jewish public regarded the
return of Jewish society to Jewish law as an aspect of national
renaissance parallel to the building of the Jewish homeland
and revival of the Hebrew language. Among the goals set by
the society was the preparation of suitable literature on Jewish
law and the establishment in Jerusalem of an institute within
the framework of a university for research into that law preparatory to its adoption in the future Jewish state. In the editorial introduction to the first volume of the journal Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri (Moscow, 1918) it is noted that the legal halakhah
has been integrally bound up with the religious halakhah
[yet] over the last decades a process has begun of separating out our law from its religion and ethics, and we intend to
continue this process in order to prepare our law for a secular
existence. The pursuit of this object was and still is a controversial one and its desirability as well as manner of achievement
remain central problems relating to the integration of Jewish
law into the legal system of the State of Israel (see below).
In 190910, on the initiative of the head of the Palestine
office of the Zionist Organization, Mishpat ha-Shalom ha-Ivri
was established in Jaffa as a judicial institution for the adjudication of disputes between Jews in Erez Israel. In the course of
time district tribunals were established in a number of places
and over them a supreme tribunal. Between the years 1918
and 1936 rules and regulations were issued containing directives as to judicial organs, procedure, evidence, and so on. The
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personal status, but in all other areas of Jewish law almost
nothing was achieved.
MATTERS OF PROCEDURE AND PERSONAL STATUS. An
important takkanah enacted immediately in 1921 established
the Rabbinical Supreme Court of Appeal, thus introducing a
regular appellate tribunal which had not previously existed in
Jewish law (see *Practice and Procedure). That this takkanah
rendered the appellate court an integral part of the Jewish legal system was made clear in a judgment of the Rabbinical
High Court of Appeal of Jerusalem which rejected the contention that no right of appeal existed in Jewish law, holding that the right of appeal has been enacted by a rabbinical
takkanah, the force of which is as that of a rule of our Holy
Torah (OPD, p. 71).
At first the rules of procedure in the rabbinical court left
much to be desired, but improvement followed upon the publication in 1943 of procedural regulations by the Chief Rabbinate Council. These included detailed provisions on the
initiation of proceedings, on procedure during the hearing,
rules of evidence, modes of appeal, and on other matters. A
series of forms were also appended, among them statements
of claim, summonses of parties and witnesses, applications
for appeal and so on. In part these regulations were based on
Jewish law and in part they showed the influence of existing
practice in the general legal system. An innovation in Jewish
law was the detailed rules laid down concerning the payment
of various court fees and the adoption of children. The most
radical innovation introduced by the above regulations involved an engagement by the rabbinical courts to distribute
the estate of a deceased person in accordance with the provisions of the Succession Ordinance of 1923, which prescribed
an order of distribution treating husband and wife and son
and daughter in terms of equality. In 1944 a number of takkanot were enacted introducing further important changes:
the customary minimum sum of the ketubbah was increased;
the levir refusing to grant the widow of his brother h aliz ah
was rendered obliged to maintain her until releasing her (see
*Levirate Marriage and H aliz ah); an important takkanah imposed on the father the legal duty to maintain his sons and
daughters up to the age of 15 years and not merely until the
age of six years in accordance with talmudic law (see *Parent
and Child; M. Elon, H akikah Datit, 157ff.).
After 1944, however, creativity by way of takkanot ceased
almost entirely, except for three additional takkanot enacted
by the Chief Rabbinate in 1950 (the principal one involving a
prohibition on the marriage of children under the age of 16
years; see *Child Marriage). This may be regarded as a matter
for great regret since a number of urgent problems in the area
of personal status still await solution by way of takkanah (such
as certain cases of hardship for the *agunah, problems relating to the joint property of the spouses, and other matters).
On the other hand, there has since the 1940s been halakhic
creativity in the area of personal status by means of interpretation as applied in actual cases. In this manner, for instance,
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ther and further removed from life even the spiritual and cultural of the Jewish people. Many of the faithful followers of the
Zionist movement in its early stages entertained doubt about
the possibility of using Hebrew in modern conditions: Who
among us knows sufficient Hebrew to ask for a train ticket in
this language? asked Herzl, who contemplated a Jewish state
without Hebrew as its commonly spoken language (The Jewish
State, ch. 5). Yet an inner awareness that the use of Hebrew in
the social, economic, and cultural life of the people was a prime
requisite without which there could be no complete national
revival led eventually to Hebrew becoming not merely a holy
tongue, but the national language, written and spoken, of the
Jewish people returning to its homeland. As a result of the untiring efforts of individuals and public bodies expressions and
terms were coined and style and forms created, largely drawn
from the ancient treasure houses of the language, and in this
manner there flowered a modern living language based on and
preserving continuity with the ancient holy tongue.
In other respects the possibility of restoring Jewish law
was more limited than the revival of Hebrew, which is not so
dependent on political sovereignty or assistance from the ruling authorities and is more closely connected with individual
inclination and the wishes of interested bodies; legal norms
encroach more on the realm of philosophy and ideological
outlook than do the byways of a language and the task of restoring Jewish law demanded more comprehensive study and
preparation than did the revival of Hebrew. Yet it is conceivable that these obstacles to the restoration of Jewish law could
have been overcome by a determined effort. To a large extent
the political autonomy of the Jews in Erez Israel in the pre-state
period was similar to that enjoyed by the Jewish people in the
Diaspora until emancipation, an autonomy which also allowed
for judicial independence. Moreover, by far the greater part of
the subject matter with which Jewish law deals such as obligations, property, public administration, and so on is free of
fundamental religious or ideological dispute. However, emancipation had produced a weakened religious and national consciousness of the need for daily life to be ordered in accordance
with Jewish law, and all sections of the population displayed an
irresolute apathy toward the preparation of Jewish law for its
historic task. It is true that research was undertaken and books
were written by scholars such as A. *Gulak, S. *Assaf, and A.
*Freimann, which were of importance for the scientific research
of Jewish law. But the required auxiliary literature of the law,
written in convenient form with the law phrased and classified
in accordance with modern legal concepts and terminology,
was not prepared, nor were possible solutions to modern legal
problems for which Jewish law has no ready or adequate existing answer, although it allows for one to be found by way of
takkanah or any other of its recognized creative legal sources.
THE RABBINICAL COURTS. Matters entrusted to the jurisdiction of the rabbinical courts are naturally dealt with
in accordance with Jewish law. In the course of their activities these courts have given decisions introducing a number
of important innovations in Jewish law, such as a married
womans right to the income deriving from the pursuit of her
own profession, and recognition of the existence of mutual
pecuniary rights between spouses married abroad in a civil
ceremony only, and so on (see M. Elon, H akikah Datit,
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16672). In certain matters the law prescribes that the rabbinical courts too must decide in accordance with the general
law. In the Succession Ordinance of 1923 provision was made
for the treatment of son and daughter, husband and wife, on
terms of equality as regards the division of certain kinds of
property on succession, and the Womens Equal Rights Law,
1951, extended the directive to all other property. Some of the
other main provisions of this law are the following: men and
women are equated as regards all legal acts; the father and
mother are given natural guardianship of their children; a
married woman is given full capacity of acquisition during
marriage and retention of her rights to property acquired by
her prior to the marriage. In addition this law allows the litigants, if they are above the age of 18 years, to consent to having their case tried according to the laws of their community.
It also states that its provisions shall not affect any halakhic
prohibition or permission relating to marriage or divorce. In
the main its provisions accord with the position under Jewish law as it has evolved (for instance as regards equal rights
on succession), a notable exception relating to the husbands
right to the fruits of his wifes melog property (see *Husband
and Wife). A law of 1955 prescribes the status and manner of
appointment of rabbinical court dayyanim and, except for
two variations, its provisions correspond closely to those laid
down in the Judges Law, 1953. (As regards two variations see
M. Elon, H akikah Datit, 4749.)
THE GENERAL COURTS. In matters of personal status concerning Jewish parties the general courts are also required
to decide according to Jewish law, except when a law of the
state makes express provision on the matter. As already mentioned, the general courts have jurisdiction in all matters not
entrusted to the exclusive jurisdiction of the rabbinical courts.
Matters of marriage and divorce may also be pronounced on
by the general courts, either when the problem arises incidentally to the matter before the court (for instance in a claim by
the wife for maintenance there may arise incidentally thereto
the question of the validity of her marriage), or in a matter
brought before the Supreme Court sitting as a High Court of
Justice. Possibly a rabbinical court and a general court, even
though both apply Jewish law, may arrive at entirely different
conclusions. Thus, for instance, the general courts first resort
to the principles of private international law before applying
Jewish law and therefore may recognize a marriage entered
into abroad as valid in accordance with the law of the country concerned, even when it is invalid according to Jewish law.
In addition the general courts apply only substantive Jewish
law and not its laws of evidence and procedure, thus for instance admitting the testimony of the parties themselves and
that of their relatives.
(wife as well as husband) numerous rights. These provisions relate to rights of a social-economic nature (pensions,
tenants protection, and so on), rights under the Succession
Law, and include also the right conferred on a woman to give
her child born of the man reputed to be her husband the latters family name, even without his consent. These rights were
held by the Supreme Court to extend to the commonly reputed spouse even though the latter (or even both parties) be
validly married to another (except with regard to the right of
succession, which is only available if, upon the death of one of
the parties who have lived together as husband and wife in a
common household, neither is then married to another). The
explanation that the above enactments were made in order to
alleviate the hardship which is sometimes suffered by a couple
who are unable to marry on account of Jewish law prohibition
(for instance in certain cases of the agunah) is indeed weighty
and hope may be expressed that the Chief Rabbinate will
speedily find solutions to these problems. Nevertheless, it does
not seem to justify the institution of the reputed spouse with
its threat to the orderly existence of the family unit. This institution is the subject of controversy in Israel society and there
are recent indications of a tendency by the Supreme Court to
limit its scope (see M. Elon, H akikah Datit, 11954).
WHO IS A JEW? ANSWERED ACCORDING TO JEWISH
LAW. In March 1970 an amendment to the Law of Return
of 1950 incorporated into this law a most material principle
of Jewish law. This law, which ensures for every Jew the right
to come to Israel as an oleh and automatic citizenship from
the moment of his arrival, was amended to define the term
Jew as a person born of a Jewish mother or converted to
Judaism, who is not a member of a different religious faith.
This definition, including the latter part, is entirely in accord
with Jewish law. A Jew converted to a different faith remains
a Jew as regards his personal status and all this entails such
as the need for him to grant a divorce to his Jewish wife but
he is deprived of various religio-social rights and is not numbered as a member of the Jewish community (i.e., he cannot
be counted toward *minyan and so on); for this reason he is
also deprived of the rights of a Jew under the Law of Return.
The stated definition applies also for purposes of registering
an individuals Jewish nationality (leom) in the population
register and related documents, including the identity card
(see also *Jew).
LEGISLATIVE PROVISIONS CONTRARY TO JEWISH LAW. Legislation in the area of personal status contrary to Jewish law
is reflected in a number of provisions, scattered in various
Knesset laws, which confer on the commonly reputed spouse
LEGISLATION CONFORMING WITH RITUAL LAW. In addition to the already mentioned cases, Israel law is also based
on the halakhah in the wide sense of the term in a number of different matters. Thus in 1948 the Provisional Council
of State enacted that the supply of kasher food be ensured to
all Jewish soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces; a law of 1962
prohibits the raising, keeping, or slaughtering of pigs in Israel
except in specified areas (populated mainly by non-Jews) and
for certain other limited purposes; the provisions of the Law
and Administration Ordinance of 1948 (as amended) lay down
355
mishpat ivri
that the Sabbath and the Jewish festivals shall be prescribed
days of rest in the state (but do not prohibit labor on such days,
such matters being ordered in certain respects in the Hours of
Work and Rest Law of 1951) and allows non-Jews the right to
observe their own Sabbath and festivals as days of rest.
The Unofficial Application of Jewish Law in the State
INDEPENDENCE OF THE ISRAEL LEGAL SYSTEM. As already
mentioned, Jewish law is reserved no official place in the
Israeli legal system, except in matters of personal status. The
proposal (made by P. Daikan on the eve of the states establishment and subsequently raised again by others) that Israel
law be freed from its dependence on the English common
law and principles of equity and that Jewish law be resorted
to in any case of lacuna in the law of the state (see above, Art.
46 of the Palestine Order in Council) was not accepted. Until the present time there is to be found in two Laws only, the
Succession Law of 1965 and the Land Law of 1969, a provision
(entitled Autarky of this Law) which excludes the operation
of the aforementioned article 46 in all matters with which the
relevant law is concerned. None of the other laws so far passed
by the Knesset proclaims its own independent operation. To
some extent such independence has been established in the
case law in consequence of decisions by the Supreme Court
to the effect that the post-1948 English case law does not have
binding force in Israel law as does that of the pre-1948 period,
and even reliance on the pre-1948 English case law is also
gradually diminishing.
LEGISLATION BASED ON JEWISH LAW PRINCIPLES. In some
measure law in the State of Israel follows the principles of
Jewish law even in areas where the latter system has not officially been rendered applicable. In the introduction to a draft
bill for one of the early comprehensive laws there were set
out the general legislative guidelines adopted for the entire
area of the civil law. The legislative policy thus enunciated assigned to Jewish law the status of the main but not the only
or binding source and enumerated the existing legal and factual position in Israel as well as the laws of other countries as
additional sources (Draft Bill for a Succession Law, published
by the Ministry of Justice in 1952). To some extent this policy
has been adhered to in practice and some of the matters enacted in accordance with the principles of Jewish law are the
following: the possibility of separate ownership of dwellings
in a cooperative house (see *Ownership); the prohibition of
delay in the payment of wages (see *Labor Law); the right of
the dismissed employee to severance pay (see *Haanakah);
the legal arrangement concerning imprisonment for debt; the
laws of bailment (see *Shomerim), and so on. Particular reliance on Jewish law is to be found in the provisions of various
Knesset laws in the area of family law, relating among others
to the following matters: the duty of a person to maintain,
besides his wife and children, also his other relatives (on the
Jewish law principle of obliging a person to uphold the mitzvah of z edakah; see *Maintenance); in matters of guardianship
that the minors own good is the primary consideration and
356
that the court is the father of all orphans and a complete departure expressed in various provisions from the Roman
law concept of patria potestas (see *Apotropos); in matters of
succession Jewish law is followed in the conferment of equal
rights on all children of the deceased whether born in or out
of wedlock, in the solution provided to the problem which
arises in the case of commorientes (see *Succession), in acceptance of the Jewish law institution of a shekhiv mera will
(see *Wills), and in the provision made for maintenance out
of the estate of the deceased (see *Widow).
LEGISLATION CONTRARY TO JEWISH LAW. In contrast, there
are Knesset laws containing provisions which are without
any real justification contrary to the position taken by Jewish law. Some of the matters so enacted are the following: the
right of the creditor to turn directly to the surety even without
initial agreement to this effect (see *Surety); the right of a party
to plead prescription of a claim along with an admission as to
the existence of the debt (see *Limitation of Actions); the automatic administration of an oath to all witnesses whereas Jewish law leaves the matter to the discretion of the court (Resp.
Ribash, no. 170; Tashbez , 3:15; Rema, h M 28:2; for further illustrations see Elon, in: ILR, 4 (1969), 80140).
JEWISH LAW IN THE CASE LAW OF THE GENERAL COURTS.
The decisions of the courts, particularly of the Supreme Court,
represent a further channel through which the influence of
Jewish law is brought to bear on the Israel legal system. In numerous decisions of the Supreme Court diverse legal matters
have been dealt with by way of a comparison between the position under the general law and Jewish law respectively, the two
systems sometimes leading the judges to the same conclusion
and sometimes otherwise. In some cases Jewish law has been
quoted for the purpose of construing legal terms and definitions and on occasion Jewish law has constituted the primary
legal source relied on by the Supreme Court, even in areas in
which Jewish law is not expressly rendered applicable. This
integration of Jewish law through the case law of the general
courts is of great practical significance from the aspect of the
confrontation between Jewish law and the legal problems that
arose before the courts in the 1950s and 1960s.
JEWISH LAW IN THE CASE LAW OF THE RABBINICAL
COURTS. A noteworthy phenomenon is the existence of a
proliferous case law of the rabbinical courts, in diverse areas
of the civil law, in matters coming before these courts as arbitral bodies. Some 30 of the judgments of these courts published since the middle of the 1960s deal with matters unrelated to personal status and concern, for instance, labor law,
contracts, copyright, partnership, pledge, administrative law,
and so on. These offer an instructive insight into the manner
in which concrete questions of everyday life are dealt with
in accordance with Jewish law and represent an important
contribution to the solution of modern social and economic
problems (see, e.g., *Contract; *Haanakah; *Labor Law; *Public Authority).
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mishpat ivri
Attitudes toward Jewish Law in the Law of the State
Integration of Jewish law into the legal system of Israel is
sometimes opposed because it entails a secularization of
the halakhah since the acceptance by the state of a Jewish law
principle does not stem from recognition of the binding validity of such a principle from the religious point of view, but
is dictated by purely human and national interests. The argument views that by such integration the Knessets own binding authority substitutes itself as the source of authority of any
Jewish law principle it has adopted, and that neither the Knesset nor the general courts possess the necessary qualifications
postulated by the halakhic system for deciding any of its rules.
This view is decried by a decisive majority of religious Jewry
and its spiritual leaders, who consider that the halakhah does
not become secularized for the mere reason that the theory
of the general law may hold a change to have taken place as
regards the basic norm of a particular halakhic rule. It is argued that neither the Knesset nor the courts purport nor indeed is it possible for them to do so to decide the halakhah
within the religious meaning of such activity; that not only is
the halakhah not prejudiced by its integration into the legal
system of the state, but the halakhic system itself commends
that the legal order in the Jewish state shall, even if not based
on religious faith, correspond with the substance of Jewish law
and its principles of justice and equity rather than be founded
on other legal systems. For some generations now this middle path has been followed by a decisive majority of religious
Jewry, also with regard to other fundamental Jewish values,
as with the revived use of the holy tongue in everyday secular life and with the settlement of the holy land even without
observance of the religious precepts. The declared attitude of
non-observant Jewry also favors the assignment of first priority to the reception of Jewish law principles when these
are in keeping with present-day social and economic needs
(see, e.g., the statement made in the session of Nov. 29, 1965,
by Knesset members belonging to almost all political parties
with reference to the Gift Law and Pledge Law Bills (Divrei
ha-Keneset, v. 44, pp. 2436)). It should be borne in mind that
except in the area of family law the subject matter of Jewish
law is generally free of fundamental public dispute of a religious or ideological nature.
The integration of Jewish law into the legal system of
Israel is of importance to the former since it has a vital need
to contend with the problems of practical everyday life as the
only means toward the restoration of its former, almost unbroken, creative and evolutionary function, and this in its natural
environment the Jewish state and its legal system. Such an
integration of Jewish law is no less important for the legal system of the state. Israel legislation is of an eclectic nature, the
legislator choosing as he sees fit from many different legal systems. There is well-founded apprehension that this must necessarily result in a lack of homogeneity and lead to contradictions in Israel law due to the absence of a common axis around
which the entire legal structure may revolve. A legal system so
constructed moreover lacks roots and a past. If, as the revival
357
Modes of Integration
Achievement of the desired integration of Jewish law with the
Israel legal system demands strict observance of the rule that
in all legislative activity preference be given to every principle of Jewish law which is in keeping with the existing social
and economic exigencies. It is also necessary to ensure that
all principles of Jewish law adopted in the laws of the state
shall be construed within the spirit of the Jewish sources of
law from which they were derived. Finally, it is necessary to
lay down a Jewish version of the controversial Article 46, to
the effect that the Jewish sources of law shall be resorted to
in the event of any lacuna in the existing law. The decisions
of the Supreme Court and of the rabbinical courts in matters
involving Jewish law not only in the area of personal status but in all its different fields and a long series of varied
research studies undertaken in recent years, point to the fact
that it is within the power of Jewish law to contend successfully with the overall range of new problems that arise. In addition, Jewish law occupies a substantial part of the law faculty
study curriculum at different universities in Israel and to the
new generation of Israel lawyers and jurists Jewish law is no
longer a remote and unfamiliar subject. Accelerated research
activity in the different fields of Jewish law and the preparation
of an auxiliary literature to facilitate study of and resort to the
latter will be invaluable aids to the process of integrating the
legal system of the State of Israel and Jewish law.
Legal Creativity
During various periods of its history Jewish law has experienced the reality of jurisdiction and legislation existing alongside the jurisdictional and legislative system of the halakhic
authority itself as illustrated by the kings law, jurisdiction
of the public leadership, lay jurisdiction, and communal enactments. In numerous matters such jurisdiction and legislation of the Jewish leadership diverged from the rules of Jewish law, but the halakhic system evolved a series of rules and
principles which ensured that such jurisdiction and legislation of the public leadership became an integral part of the
overall system (see above Takkanot ha-Kahal). It is true that
during all the above-mentioned periods the entire Jewish
people looked upon Jewish law as the ultimate and binding
value, whereas the same cannot be said of the present-day
Jewish public, which, in the existing socio-cultural realities,
finds itself divided on matters of religious faith and ideologi-
mishpat ivri
cal outlook. Yet in this society there have developed certain
cultural and social values such as the restored language and
homeland which exist as the undisputed assets of all. Consequently the hope may be expressed that the acceptance of
Jewish law principles into the legal system of Israel in a proper
and consistent manner, along with the latters formation of a
tie with Jewish law for purposes of its own supplementation,
will ensure that at some time in the future unity and integrity and thereby continuity as well will also be restored to
this precious cultural and spiritual asset of the Jewish nation,
that is, Jewish law.
THE FOUNDATIONS OF LAW ACT, 5740 1980. The Foundations of Law Act, 5740 1980, repealed Article 46 of the
Palestine Order in Council, 19221947, thereby revoking the
binding link between Israeli law and English law, and rendering complete the autonomy of the Israeli legal system. Instead of having recourse to English law, the Foundations of
Law Act sets forth a different arrangement in cases involving
a lacuna in the law, where the court is unable to find an answer to a legal question in the conventional sources of law:
Where the court, faced with a legal question requiring decision, finds no answer to it in statute law or case law or by
analogy, it shall decide the issue in the light of the principles
of freedom, justice, equity and peace of the Jewish heritage
(sec. 1). This was the first fundamental change wrought in the
status of Jewish law in the State of Israel, as for the first time
the legislator required the judge, in confronting questions to
which no answer was available in the regular sources of law,
to have recourse to Jewish law, and left no discretion to the
judge in this regard.
Opinions are divided on two main issues regarding this
section. First, in what cases must the court, pursuant to the
provisions of the law, rule in accordance with the principles
of freedom, justice, equity and peace of the Jewish heritage?
Second, what is the nature and essence of these principles of
the Jewish heritage?
Thus, in the case of Hendeles (CFH 13/80, Hendeles et al.
v. Kupat Am Bank Ltd., PD 35(2), 785), the Court discussed
the meaning of the phrase another persons domain in the
Lost Property Law, 5733 1973 (see at length *Lost Property).
Justice Cohn stated that, when a statute incorporates a given
term or phrase borrowed from Jewish law, it is clear that the
court must resolve questions that arise in connection with that
358
[Menachem Elon]
mishpat ivri
islation has recourse to such fundamental terms as justice,
good faith, public policy and other such value-laden concepts, the task of the court is to infuse them with concrete
content according to the statutory purpose and with regard
to the actual and ideal conditions of life in Israel. Here, the
judge is not at all confronted with a lacuna, since the legislature has stipulated the applicable norm. I therefore can see
no possibility in such a case of applying the provisions of the
Foundations of Law Act, which contemplates only the filling of a lacuna (p. 797). Regarding the use of Jewish law as a
source for interpretative inspiration in cases of doubt as to a
terms interpretation, Justice Barak held one cannot say that
such inspiration must come primarily from the principles of
Jewish law. Rather, he held, a piece of legislation must be interpreted from within the legislation itself, and where it is influenced by a foreign system, we must turn to that system for
interpretative inspiration.
Justice Moshe Landau held that, where a lacuna exists,
the court must have recourse to the principles of the Jewish
heritage contained in the Foundations of Law Act. However,
the legislator avoided referring to Jewish law by name and instead selected the concept, thus far undefined in point of law,
of Israels heritage. According to Justice Landau, similar to
the opinion of Prof. Barak, the very idea that the interpreter
must refer specifically to any particular source for answers in
the event of a doubt as to the proper construction of a particular term conflicts with the rules of interpretation. Therefore, in his view, the recourse to Jewish law should be to enrich our legal thinking; however, there can be no obligation
to turn primarily to Jewish legal sources in order to interpret
a legal term the meaning of which is in doubt.
Justice Menachem Elon criticized Justice Baraks highly
restrictive approach to the function of the Foundations of Law
Act, to the extent of almost divesting it of all legal content:
We take it for granted that one of the basic rules of interpretation is that the legislature does not waste words and that some
content must be given to the words it chooses to use. This rule
has particular force when an entirely novel law is involved, and
utmost force when the statute is a basic statute that occupies an
important place in the legal system of the State. Even before
this law became part of the Israeli legal system, the court was
at liberty to engage in the worthy task of turning to Jewish Law
for the purpose of expanding the judges horizons and field of
vision, so as to produce additional depth of interpretive creativity. What change has then been generated with the adoption of
the statute entitled the Foundations of Law Act? If the response
is that Jewish Law will have its day in the event of a lacuna, and
if we define lacuna as my distinguished colleague [i.e., Justice
Barak] did in the Hendeles case and if a lacuna does not include what he said it does not include, I would very much like
to know when and how it will ever be possible to find a lacuna
totally unaddressed in legislation or judicial precedent or by
means of analogy. Is it indeed possible to construe a statute so
that the legislators words are devoid of all legal meaning?
How many debates did the Knesset and lawyers generally have,
and how many versions did they draft, before the enactment of
this basic statute? Was this solely for the purpose of address-
ing the problem of a lacuna which has never yet nor will ever
likely occur and which, if and when it does occur, will more
than likely encounter the refusal of the majority of the court to
acknowledge its existence? I wonder. (FH 40/80 Koenig v. Cohen,
PD 36(3) 701, 742743)
359
mishpat ivri
from matters of a personal status, only in cases of a lacuna,
according to the Foundations of Law Act. With the enactment
of the Basic Laws, Jewish law acquired constitutional status,
with ramifications for the validity and construction of all the
laws in the State of Israel. Jewish legal principles have accordingly been implemented on many occasions by the courts in
the course of turning to the values of the State of Israel as a
Jewish and democratic state. Thus, for example, the courts
have ruled, on the basis of Israels Jewish and democratic status, that there was no room for active euthanasia in the State
of Israel (see Justice Menachem Elons ruling in 506/88 Shefer v. State of Israel, PD 48 (1) 87; see entries: *Medicine and
Law: Euthanasia; *Values of a Jewish and Democratic State).
The court similarly ruled that the Execution Law, 5727 1967
must be construed so as to permit a debtors imprisonment
only in cases in which it is clear that the debtor is concealing his assets and refuses to pay (HC 5304/92 Perach v. Justice
Minister, 47(4) 715, Justice Elon; see *Imprisonment for Debt).
It similarly ruled that the severity of an offense of which an
accused has been charged is not in itself sufficient to justify
his imprisonment until the termination of legal proceedings
against him (Cr.A. 2169/92 Suissa v. State of Israel PD 46(3)
388, Justice Menachem Elon; see *Detention).
The key phrase Jewish and democratic state has merited a variety of interpretations. According to Justice Elon,
the court is required to examine the principles of Jewish law
and the principles of democracy, in order to create a synthesis between the two when interpreting the Basic Laws. Where
a number of different approaches exist in respect of the democracy component, the approach which befits the Jewish
component should be adopted (see, for example, the case of
active euthanasia, which some democracies permit and others outlaw; in such a case, that approach which is compatible with the Jewish approach prevails and active euthanasia becomes outlawed (see the Shefer case, on pp. 167168,
and *Medicine and Law: Euthanasia)). According to Justice
Barak: The values of the State of Israel as a Jewish state are
the same universal values that are common to democratic
societies, which emerged from the Jewish tradition and history. These values are accompanied by the same values of the
State of Israel and which spring from the democratic nature
of the state. The combination and synthesis between the two
are what has shaped the values of the State of Israel (see Bibliography, A. Barak, Ha-Mahapeikhah ha-H ukatit , p. 31). It
should be noted that Justice Barak has recently attributed more
weight to Jewish law in the framework of the relevant sources
for interpreting the Basic Laws, and for the construction of
legislation in general (see Bibliography, A. Barak, Shofet beH evrah Demokratit). For a detailed discussion of these Basic
Laws, see entries: *Values of a Jewish and Democratic State;
*Human Dignity and Freedom; *Rights, Human).
According to Section 1 of the law: Notwithstanding anything provided in any other law, a witness about to testify in
360
mishpat ivri
any judicial or quasi judicial proceeding, shall not be sworn.
In place of an oath, the law prescribes the administering of
a warning, under which the witness is cautioned to tell the
truth only, and is told that if he fails to do so he will be penalized in the manner prescribed by law. According to the law,
the court is authorized to administer an oath to a witness if it
has reasonable grounds to assume that an oath will assist in
discovering the truth; notwithstanding, the witness is entitled
to affirm by giving his word of honor in place of an oath on
the grounds of religion and conscience unless the court is
convinced that the witnesss refusal to swear is not in good
faith (see, at length, *Oath).
For numerous additional laws which are based on Jewish
Law, see bibliography, M. Elon, Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri, p. 1361ff.;
idem, Jewish Law (1994), p. 1624ff.
INFLUENCE OF ISRAELI LAW ON JEWISH LAW. In the relationship between Jewish law and Israeli law, there is also influence in the opposite direction, i.e., the influence of Israeli law
on Jewish law. The Supreme Court first dealt with this matter
in the Wilozni case (HC 323/81 Wilozni v. Rabbinical Court of
Appeals, PD 36(2) 733). The petitioner requested the Court to
annul the decision of the Rabbinical Court of Appeals, which
ruled that the petitioner must leave the apartment in which he
continued to reside alone after his wife had left it owing to the
husbands violent behavior, following a judgment for divorce.
According to the petitioner, the Rabbinical Court should have
ruled that the apartment was regarded as property occupied
by the husband, pursuant to the Tenants Protection Law (Con-
361
mishpat ivri
ment in respect of cooperative houses appearing in the Land
Law, 5729 1969, was recognized by the rabbinical courts.
This, notwithstanding that this arrangement regulates the interrelationships between all the apartment owners, a subject
already governed by detailed regulations in Jewish law which
differ from those prescribed by the relevant sections in the
Tenants Protection Law, which came to resolve a public problem of poor housing and does not contradict specific arrangements prescribed in this regard in Jewish law.
A further example is the recognition of the validity of
the arrangement for the transfer of rights in land. According to section 7 of the Land Law, 5729 1969, in rem rights in
immovable property are only transferred via registration in
the Land Registry. By contrast, according to Jewish law such
rights pass at the time of payment, and in a locale where it is
conventional for property transactions to be executed solely
via a written document, the rights pass under the terms of
the deed. Notwithstanding this difference between Jewish law
and Israeli law, many authorities have ruled, on the basis of
the principle of dina de-malkhuta dina and minhag ha-medinah (custom of the state), that proprietary rights in rem
rights in land pass, in general, upon their registration in the
Land Registry, as prescribed by Israeli law. (On the differences
between the halakhic authorities in this regard, see further the
article of D. Frimer, bibliography, ad. loc.)
general law, nor is it able to do so, because its judges lack the
requisite expertise. Justice Elon held that the Supreme Courts
intervention in the rulings of the rabbinical courts stymies
the development of Jewish law, as developed by the rabbinical
courts throughout the generations, because according to this
precedent the need to turn to the rabbinical courts is limited
only to matters of personal status, and does not enable Jewish
law to develop in other branches of law. In addition, Justice
Elon held that this ruling creates needless tension between the
civil courts and the rabbinical courts, who will find it difficult,
and rightfully so, to accept such a broad encroachment upon
their authority and freedom of action.
Regarding the presumption of joint property, Justice
Elon opined that the rabbinical courts were under a duty to
adopt this presumption as part of Jewish law, whether by way
of regulation (see *Takkanot) or whether by other means conventionally used in Jewish law, but not in accordance with the
binding precedent of the Supreme Court (see Bibliography,
M. Elon, These Are Obiter Dicta). Opinions are divided
among the judges of the rabbinical court as to the possibility of adopting the presumption of joint property as part of
Jewish law (see *Dina de-Malkhuta Dina). With regard to a
husbands right to enjoy the proceeds of his wifes usufruct
property, the law has now been amended, entitling the court
to take account of the wifes income from usufruct property,
when determining the amount of maintenance which the husband owes to her (see *Husband and Wife).
362
mi-sinai niggunim
Mishpatim, 25 (5755), appendix; S. Deutsch, Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri bePesikat Batei ha-Mishpat, in: Meh karei Mishpat, 6 (5748), 7; A. Edrei,
Madua Lanu Mishpat Ivri? in: Iyyunei Mishpat, 25 (5762), 467; Y.
Englard, Maamado shel ha-Din ha-Dati ba-Mishpat ha-Yisraeli, in:
Mishpatim, 2 (5731), 268 and 488; idem, Mishpatim, 4 (5732); idem,
Mishpatim, 6 (5735), 5; D. Frimer, Hashpaat ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri al
ha-Misphat ha-Yisraeli, in: Madaei ha-Yahadut, 39 (5759), 133; M.
Hacohen, Writings of Menachem Elon, in: Shenaton ha-Mishpat
ha-Ivri, 13 (1988), 1; S. Lifshitz, Nissuin Baal Korh am? Nituah Liberali shel Mosad ha-Yeduin be-Z ibbur, in: Iyyunei Mishpat, 25:741;
N. Rakover, Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri be-H akikat ha-Keneset (1988); idem,
N. Rakover, Ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri bi-Pesikat Batei ha-Mishpat beYisrael (1988); B.Z. Schereschewsky, The Foundations of Law Act,
5740 1980, in: Shenaton ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri, 13 (1988), 379; P. Shifman, Jewish Law in the Civil Courts Decisions of the Courts, in:
Shenaton ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri, 13 (1988), 371; S. Shilo, The Foundations of Law Act Comments and Some New Light on the Foundations of Law Act, in: Shenaton ha-Mishpat ha-Ivri, 13 (1988), 351; E.
Shochetman, Ha-Yesh H ashash Kiddushin be-Kisherei Ishut im Yedua
be-Z ibbur, in: Meh karei Mishpat, 10 (1993), 7.
MISINAI NIGGUNIM (Heb.-Yid. , Melodies from Mt. Sinai), Hebrew term for a traditional group of
cantorial melodies sung in the Ashkenazi synagogues of both
East and West European rite and regarded as obligatory, and
for which no other melody may be substituted. Located at
those points in the service where the liturgical and emotional
elements join in equal force, the Mi-Sinai tunes may be called
the heart of Ashkenazi synagogue song.
Mi-Sinai is an abbreviated form of *Halakhah le-Moshe
mi-Sinai, referring to an ordinance going back to Moses, who
received it on Mt. Sinai. The term was connected with biblical
chant in the 12t century (Sefer H asidim, ed. Wistinezki-Freimann 3); its present application is due to A.Z. *Idelsohn. In
cantorial circles, the Mi-Sinai melodies are called Tunes of
our Rabbi Maharil (erroneously, also Maharal), or, in Eastern
Europe, skarbowe niggunim (Polish: official tunes).
The family of Mi-Sinai tunes includes about ten solemn
compositions that are associated mainly with prayers of the
Penitential Days (see ex. 17). The exact scope cannot be determined precisely, since the tradition is not unanimous and
was never codified authoritatively. The distinctive features of
363
miskolc
but are not maintained rigorously (ex. 1, no. 3; see full version
in *Music, ex. 30).
In East Ashkenazi tradition, the bond between music and
text has been loosened: entire sections may be sung without
words. Certain themes, still found in the earlier Western notated documents, have become lost, and others changed their
places in the established order. As a result those themes or sections which were preserved came to be repeated in order to
provide for the full text. This regressive evolution in the East
was apparently caused by the early displacement of these communities from the birthplace and centers of Mi-Sinai song.
The Western h azzanim, on the other hand, developed extensive and elaborate compositions from the original tunes. Such
Fantasias were in fashion from about 1750 to 1850.
That the musical ideas and outlines of the Mi-Sinai niggunim originated in the Middle Ages can be concluded from
musical evidence, a few references in literature, and, above
all, the fact that they are found in two Ashkenazi rites, which
separated early in their history. It may be supposed that the
sufferings during Crusader times made Ashkenazi Jewry ripe
for expressing in music the deep feelings that emanate from
these melodies. Their character and profound musicality also
attracted gentile composers, such as Max Bruch (Kol Nidrei,
op. 47) and Maurice Ravel (Kaddish, 1914); their confrontation with the idioms of contemporary music is demonstrated
in A. *Schoenbergs Kol Nidrei (1938).
Bibliography: A.Z. Idelsohn, in: Zeitschrift fuer Musikwissenschaft, 8 (1926), 44972; H. Avenary, in: Yuval, 1 (1968), 6585.
[Hanoch Avenary]
MISKOLC, town in N.E. Hungary. Jews attended the Miskolc fairs at the beginning of the 18t century, and the first
Jewish settlers earned their livelihood from the sale of alcoholic beverages. In 1717 the municipal council sought to expel
them but reconsidered its attitude in 1728 and granted them
the right to sell at the market. The number of Jews gradually
increased, supplanting the Greek merchants from Macedonia.
In 1765 several Jews owned houses. They enjoyed judicial independence and were authorized to impose fines and corporal
punishment. Early in the 19t century there were two rabbis
in the community. Many Jews acquired houses and land, but
the majority engaged in commerce and crafts. When the local guild excluded Jews from membership in the unions, the
Jews organized their own guild. The cemetery, dating from
1759, was still in use in 1970. The first synagogue was erected
in 1765. The Great Synagogue was built in 1861; it was here
that a choir, which aroused violent reactions on the part of
the Orthodox, appeared for the first time. In 1870 the community joined the Neologians (see *Neology), but in 1875 a
single Orthodox community was formed.
The educational institutions were among the most developed and ramified throughout the country. There were three
yeshivot, an elementary school, two sub-secondary schools,
and the only seminary for female teachers in Hungary. The
H asidim established a separate elementary school. In the
364
course of time the percentage of Jews of the general population became the highest in Hungary (around 20), numbering 1,096 in 1840, 3,412 in 1857; 4,117 in 1880, 10,029 in 1910,
and 11,300 in 1920.
Holocaust Period and After
In 1941, when there were 10,428 Jews in the town, 500 were
deported to the German-occupied part of Poland for alleged
irregularities in their nationality, and were murdered in *Kamenets-Podolski. Large numbers of youths, as well as elderly
people, were conscripted into labor battalions and taken to
the Ukrainian front, where most of them were exterminated.
After the German occupation of Hungary (March 19, 1944)
the Jews of the town, about 10,000 in number, were deported
to *Auschwitz; only 400 of them survived.
After the liberation Miskolc became an important transit
center for those who returned from the concentration camps.
The elementary school was reopened and existed until the nationalization of elementary schools (1948). The reconstituted
community had 2,353 members in 1946 but dropped to around
300 in the 1970s as most left for Israel.
Bibliography: B. Halmay and A. Leszik, Miskolc (1929);
Miskolci zsid let, 1 (1948); Uj let, 23 no. 7 (1968), 4; 24, no. 20
(1969), 1; E. Lszl, in: R.L. Braham (ed.), Hungarian Jewish Studies,
2 (1969), 13782.
[Laszlo Harsanyi]
MISREPHOTHMAIM (Heb. ) , one of the farthest limits of the flight of the Canaanites after defeat by the
waters of Merom (Josh. 11:8) and a boundary of the Sidonians (Josh. 13:6). Some scholars suggest reading Misrefot
mi-Yam (at the sea, i.e., on the west). It may be mentioned
in the Egyptian Execration texts, dating to approximately
1800 B.C.E., as isrpi, which appears beside Achsaph. Abel
and others identified it with Khirbat al-Mushayrifa, near Rosh
ha-Nikrah. This site was partly excavated in 1951 by Miriam
Tadmor and M. Prausnitz, and remains dating to the early
Bronze Age, including a wall of early Bronze IIIII, and to
middle Bronze Age I, were uncovered. However, the site did
not yield remains of the late Bronze Age, which corresponds
to the time of the biblical descriptions. Recently, Aharoni suggested that it is not the name of a city, but a definition of the
border of Sidon, which may be identified with the outlet of
the Litani River.
Bibliography: Prausnitz, in: Atiqot, 1 (1955), 139ff.; Tadmor
and Prausnitz, ibid., 2 (1959), 72ff.; Abel, Gog, 2 (1938), 388; Aharoni,
Land, index; M. Noth, Das Buch Josua (1938), 43.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
MISSISSIPPI, southern state of the U.S. The 2001 Jewish population of Mississippi was 1,500 out of a total of 2,849,000, and
has been in decline for several decades. Jews settled along the
Gulf of Mexico from earliest times; they came via Mobile, Alabama, and New Orleans, Louisiana. There are extant records of
their early presence in what is now Biloxi, on the Gulf Coast,
and Natchez, on the Mississippi River. By the 1830s these comENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mississippi
365
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Although they have always been a tiny minority of the
states population, Mississippi Jews have worked hard to preserve and pass on their traditions. In 1970, after years of effort, Jewish leaders of the region opened the Henry S. Jacobs
Camp for Living Judaism in Utica. In 1986, camp director
Macy B. Hart created the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience, which now has branches in Utica and Natchez. In
2000, the museum became the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life, based in Jackson, which works
to preserve and document the practice, culture, and legacy of
Judaism in the South.
In August 2005 Hurricane Katrina badly damaged the
Congregation Beth Israel Synagogue, two blocks from the
Mississippi Gulf Coast in Biloxi. Other synagogues in Mississippi were also damaged.
Bibliography: L.E. Turitz and E. Turitz, Jews in Early Mississippi (1983); J. Nelson, Terror in the Night: The Klans Campaign
Against the Jews (1993); United States, Work Projects Administration,
The Mississippi Historical Records Survey Project, Inventory of the
Church and Synagogue Archives of Mississippi: Jewish Congregations
and Organizations (1940).
[Perry E. Nussbaum / Stuart Rockoff (2nd ed.)]
366
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Wood, and in Cape Girardeau (southeast). In 1948 Eddie Jacobson, a once failed Missouri Jewish merchant, played a
role whose importance is a matter of dispute when he approached his former partner Harry S Truman and pressed for
the recognition of the State of Israel. By the early 1960s the
Jews of Sedalia (west-central) had organized their own congregation. Two of the most popular organizations in outstate
Missouri are Bnai Brith and Anti-Defamation League. Washington University had a fine Judaic studies program. Steven
Schwarczchild taught there for a generation and Hillel Kieval
was the Gloria M. Goldstein Professor of Jewish Thought. The
University of Missouri had an active Hillel program. The St.
Louis Jewish Light was the Jewish publication for the St. Louis
area. Kansas City, Missouri, was covered by the Kansas City
Jewish Chronicle, which was based in Kansas.
Bibliography: AJHSP (1914), index; D.I. Makovsky, The Philipsons; the First Jewish Settlers in St. Louis 18071858 (1958); S. Bowman, Tribute to Isidore Busch (1920).
[Donald J. Makovsky]
mistake
missing is mistake, whether caused by the mistaken party
himself or by the other party, whether willfully or unintentionally or whether relating to the subject matter of the transaction, its price, or any other aspect of the transaction. In all
these cases the mistaken party is allowed to withdraw from
the transaction, provided that the mistake is outwardly and
objectively revealed, and not of a subjective nature only, even
if it can be proved.
The contracts of *sale and *marriage exemplify the rules
of mistake in Jewish law. An error as to price is generally
termed onaah (overreaching), but when relating to the subject matter or any other aspect of the transaction it is termed
mikkah taut (mistake). If the mistake is common to both parties the contract is voidable at the instance of either of them,
otherwise it is voidable only at the instance of the mistaken
party (Maim., Yad, Mekhirah 17:12). If however the latter
consented to the transaction as actually carried out, such
consent being demonstrated by him either explicitly or by his
subsequent use of the subject matter of the transaction with
knowledge of the mistake (ibid. 15:3), he may not withdraw
from the transaction, even though it does not accord with his
original intention. Since the test for mistake is an objective
one, the transaction will be voidable only if the majority of
those of a particular place and time would consider it material, so that one would generally be expected to refuse to accept the property sold if the true position were made known
(ibid. 15:5). Thus, if bad wheat is sold as good, i.e., a mistake
as to quality, the purchaser may withdraw. Similarly the seller
may withdraw if he purported to sell bad wheat, which is in
fact found to be good. If the mistake concerns the nature of
the object sold, e.g., when a person sells dark-colored wheat
which is found to be white, or olive wood that turns out to be
sycamore, both parties may withdraw since this is not what
was agreed upon (ibid. 17:12). Similarly the discovery of a
defect in the property sold entitles the purchaser to void the
transaction, provided that he has not waived such right by his
interim use of the property (ibid. 15:3). The purchaser retains
the right even if the seller mentioned the defect at the time
the transaction was negotiated, but did so in a manner that
would not normally be taken as revealing the true existence of
the defect. An example of this kind of mistake would be if the
seller declares, this cow is blind, lame, given to biting, and to
lying down under a load, and it is found to have one or other
of these latter two defects but is neither blind nor lame, since
the purchaser naturally assumed that the latter defects were
as nonexistent as the two former ones (ibid. 15:78).
are not words (Kid. 49b). The rationale for this rule is that
when the mistake is the consequence of the persons misleading himself, by keeping his thoughts to himself and not sharing them with the other party, the misunderstanding is not
considered a mistake (Tosafot Rif ha-Zaken, ad loc.). However,
there is a category of facts that need not be expressed, where
one can presume that the parties understood each other (umdana mukhah at = presumption of common sense; see: *Evidence; *H azakah). In reliance on this principle, the court can
determine which facts can be presumed [even when unexpressed], because they constitute information known and
understood by everyone (Ran on Rif, Kid. 20b [Comm. on
Rif]; Tos., Kid. 49b).
Mistake in Motivation for Performing Transaction
The Babylonian Talmud (Ket. 97a) records a discussion between amoraim concerning a person with a specific motive
for a particular sale, and who after its completion found out
that the grounds for his motivation did not exist. Can this
person, under these circumstances, annul the sale? The Talmud concludes that he can: If a man sold [a plot of land] and
[on concluding the sale] was no longer in need of money the
sale may be withdrawn. Nonetheless, according to halakhic
rulings, this case of mistake, based on an unproven motive,
is governed by the same rule that governs all other cases of
mistake: namely that the transaction can only be voided if the
seller formally stipulated that the transaction was conditional.
Absent such an express stipulation, the sellers intention would
be considered unexpressed, as explained above (Rif, Ket. 56a;
Yad, Mekhirah 11:8).
Unexpressed Intentions
The Talmud determines that for non-conformity with the parties intentions to be regarded as a mistake, there must be an
expression and disclosure of the intention; it is not sufficient
for the error to arise as a result of unspoken intentions. The
rule formulated by the amoraim was that: devarim she-ba-lev
einam devarim (lit: words of the heart [unexpressed words],
Deceit
An error by one party caused by or under the influence of
another constitutes deceit. If this deceit is intentional, it constitutes a fraud or onaah (see *Onaah; *Fraud; *Theft and
Robbery). Such a deceit is considered a transgression of the
biblical prohibition: When you make a sale to your fellow
or make a purchase from the hand of your fellow, you shall
not wrong one another (Lev. 25:14). This prohibition does
not only refer to fraud regarding the value of a sale, but also
to any form of swindle as proscribed by the Torah (R. Moses
di Trani, Kiryat Sefer, Mekhirah, 18). There is yet another explicit prohibition regarding deceiving a purchaser in weights
and measures: You shall do no unrighteousness in judgment,
in measure of length, weight, or volume. You shall have just
scales, just weights, just dry measures, and just liquid measures (Lev. 19:3536); and: You shall not have in your house
diverse weights and measures, a great and a small For an
abomination to the Lord your God are all who do such things,
all who act corruptly (Deut. 25:1316). Talmudic literature
extends this ruling of the prohibition of willfully defrauding
others with weights and measures, to include the merchants
duty to ensure that his weights and measures are accurate.
Thus, the Mishnah states (BB 88a) that weights and measure
must be regularly cleaned from the residue that tends to settle and congeal therein, and the Talmud states that weights
367
[Shalom Albeck]
mistake
must not be made of materials which corrode and wear away
(ibid. 89b).
The validity of a fraudulent sale is the same as that of a
mistaken sale, and as in the case of an intentional deceit, the
sale may be rescinded, as explained above.
The laws of marriage provide an example of deceit which
can result in the annulment of the transaction. The Rashba
rules that where a person betrothed a woman using a cup (see
*Marriage), but told her: You are betrothed to me with this
ring, and she accepted the cup, without noticing the object
being handed to her she is not betrothed, because he misled
her, and even if the cup was worth more than the ring (Resp.
Rashba, vol. 3, no. 1186).
A person causing deceit, including deceit by failure to
disclose, e.g., the sellers silence when he knows that the buyer
is making a mistake in a particular transaction (because the
sale involves a defective item which was unnoticed by the
buyer), is obligated to compensate the buyer. The Babylonian
Talmud (BB 93b) records a dispute concerning a person who
sold garden seeds that did not grow. In such a case, is the
seller required to reimburse the buyer for the seeds alone, or
also for the buyers expenses incurred during the unsuccessful planting, such as plowing expenses, hiring laborers to sow
the field, etc. (Rashbam, ad loc.)? The particular talmudic passage deals with a case where the seller was not aware that the
seeds were defective. Yet, if the seller had been aware that they
were defective and unable to sprout, the Talmud rules that he
is also required to pay the buyers expenses. Thus, the Tur (h M
232:20) cites the Remas ruling that: One who purchases an
item which is defective if the seller knew of the defect he
is even obligated to pay the expenses the buyer incurred, because of the law of garmi (see *Gerama and Garme); and the
Shulh an Arukh rules accordingly (h M 232:21).
value and not to the quantities their weight, size, or number (ad loc.).
368
mitchell, yvonne
which public money is to be administered, the Rashba ruled
that the latter sum is binding; this presumes that the latter
sum constituted a retraction of the former sum (Resp. Rashba,
vol. 3, no. 386). In another case of mistaken phraseology in
a regulation affecting debts between two people, the Rashba
ruled that the claimant has the lower hand. This ruling relied both on the rule which states that the burden of proof
rests on the claimant as well as on the fact that the regulation
goes beyond the requirements of the law, and therefore in the
case of doubt, the existing law is followed, and not the regulation (Resp. Rashba, vol. 3, no. 397). In yet another case the
Rashba addressed the issue of an alleged error in the drafting
of a regulation. The question was one of interpretation of a
communal enactment concerning taxes, the objective of which
was to enable a more extensive collection of taxes from the
population. However, the wording of the enactment created
a situation in which a particular citizen paid less than what
he would have paid prior to the enactment. The community
argued that the enactment should be interpreted in terms of
its objective, i.e., its intent, even if this absolutely contradicts
its explicit wording. The Rashba rejected their claim, ruling
that the communitys claims were unexpressed intentions and
as such had no legal weight (lit. words in the heart are not
words); thus, the clear language of the enactment was binding (Resp. Rashba, vol. 5, no. 282).
For a detailed discussion on this topic, see *Interpretation.
is discovered, the custom should be annulled and the prohibition undone (TJ, Pes. 4:1; 30:4).
In the post-talmudic period, the authorities discussed at
length the annulment of a custom which originated in a mistake of fact. In certain cases, in addition to the sharp attacks
against customs that are referred to as foolish customs, if investigation into a customs roots indicates its mistaken premise, even if the custom was extremely widespread it was annulled, and if this is not a custom which ought to be relied
upon in matters involving financial outlay the custom is a
mistake and needs to be cancelled (Resp. Rosh 55:10).
The Law in the State of Israel
The Contracts (General Part) Law, 5733 1973, contains provisions concerning mistake and deceit. Section 14 provides that
a party may rescind a contract which was entered into in consequence of a mistake, whether of fact or of law, when it may
be assumed that but for the mistake he would not have
entered into the contract, and the other party knew or should
have known this. When the other party did not know or need
not have known this, the court may exercise its discretion. As
in Jewish law, if the contract can be maintained by rectifying
the mistake, provided the other party is prepared to rectify the
mistake, then this course should be followed.
Section 15 establishes that in a case of deceit, the contract
may be rescinded, even if the deceit includes the non-disclosure of facts which the other party by law, custom, or circumstances should have disclosed.
The law emphasizes that a mistake as to the worthwhileness of a transaction does not constitute grounds for rescission of the contract.
369
mithredath
MITHREDATH (Heb. ; LXX, Mithradates), a popular Persian name meaning Given by Mithra, and borne by
kings of Parthia and Pontus and a king of Armenia. The name
Mithredath occurs in the Elephantine papyri (Cowley, Aramaic, 26:2, 7; E.G. Kraeling, The Brooklyn Museum Aramaic
Papyri (1953), 3:23b) and designates two individuals in the
Bible. One is the treasurer whom Cyrus ordered to deliver the
Temple vessels to Sheshbazzar, for return to Jerusalem (Ezra
1:8). The other is an official who apparently wrote a letter to
Artaxerxes I against Jerusalem (Ezra 4:7).
Bibliography: R.A. Bowman, in: The Interpreters Bible, 3
(1954), 574, 5989; J.M. Myers, Ezra-Nehemiah (1965, Anchor Bible),
9, 32ff.
[Bezalel Porten]
MITHRIDATES, FLAVIUS, sobriquet of a 15t-century humanist and Orientalist (apparently Samuel b. Nissim Bulfarag)
of Caltabellotta, Sicily. He became converted to Christianity around 1466, taking the name Guglielmo Raimondo
de Moncada, probably conferred by Guglielmo Raimondo
Moncada Esfanoller, count of Adern, who may have acted
as godfather at his baptism. He is also referred to as Guglielmus Siculus (the Sicilian). After his conversion, he studied
at the University of Catania where he learned Latin. He later
stayed for a time in Messina. In 1470 he left Sicily to study at
the University of Naples. He had the financial support of several Sicilian cities and several private persons who financed
his studies, which shows that he must have enjoyed the patronage of influential figures in Sicily. Between 1476 and 1478,
he acquired ecclesiastical benefices in several Sicilian cities.
In 1477 he was accused of heresy but he was able to refute the
accusations. Notarial acts preserved in Sicily in the archives
of Sciacca and Caltabellotta show that he maintained his connections with the Jews of Caltabellotta but Mithridates attitudes toward his former coreligionists were for the most part
antagonistic. While at the court of King John II of Aragon,
around 1474, he took part in religious disputations with Jews
and was praised for converting some of them to Christianity. Later in his life he disputed with Jewish scholars in Florence. In 1474 he appealed to Pope Sixtus IV to be granted the
legacy left by the Jew Salomone Anello of Agrigento for the
foundation and maintenance of a Jewish school confiscated
and used to further the Christian faith rather than Judaism.
The heirs of Anello contested the decision to close the school,
and the litigation continued for several years, until a kind of
compromise was reached and the Jews of Agrigento were ordered to provide Moncada/Mithridates with a house in Palermo instead of the school building in their city. Around 1478
he moved to Rome and came under the patronage of Giovanni
Battista Cibo, bishop of Molfetta, later Pope Innocent VIII,
and became a lecturer in theology at the Sapienza in Rome. In
1481, on Good Friday, he preached a sermon before Pope Sixtus IV and the College of Cardinals on the sufferings of Jesus
(Sermo de Passione Domini, ed. by H. Wirszubski, 1963), offering Christological interpretations of Jewish texts. Wirszubski
370
mittwoch, eugen
daica, 7:1 (2002), 9095; The Great Parchment: Flavius Mithridates
Latin Translation, the Hebrew Text, and an English Version, eds. G.
Busi et al. (2004); S. Simonsohn, The Jews in Sicily, 6 (2004), index; A.
Scandaliato, Le radici familiari e culturali di Guglielmo Raimondo
Moncada. Ebreo convertito del rinascimento nellisola dello specchio, in: Una manna buona per Mantova. Studi in onore di Vittorio
Colorni (2004), 20340.
[Menachem E. Artom / Nadia Zeldes (2nd ed.)]
MITIN, MARK BORISOVICH (19011987), Russian ideologist. Born in Zhitomir, he joined the Communist Party in
1919. Educated in Moscow, he held executive positions at the
Krupskaya Communist Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, a
training school for party theoreticians. At the same time he
worked in the Institute of Philosophy of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences. In 1939, he became director of the Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin Institute, and five years later he assumed the
position of chief of the philosophy department of the Central
Committees higher party school. For his services to the party,
Mitin was awarded two Orders of Lenin, two Orders of the
Red Banner of Labor, and the Stalin Prize in 1949. Between
1939 and 1961, he served as a member of the Party Central
Committee, one of the few Jews permitted to occupy such a
high party post. Never deviating from Stalinism, and taking an
active part in the anti-Jewish campaign during the *Doctors
Plot, etc., Mitins philosophical and historical books included
Dialekticheskiy i istoricheskiy materializm (1934); Istoricheskaya
rol G.V. Plekhanova v russkom i mezhdunarodnom rabochem
dvizhenii (1957); Filosofiya i sovremennost (1960). He was coeditor of the massive five-volume Istoriya filosofii (195761),
and was editor of the journal Voprosy filosofii.
MITNAGGEDIM (Heb. ; sing. Mitnagged; lit. opponents), a designation for the opponents of the *H asidim.
The name originally arose from the bitter opposition evinced
to the rise, way of life, and leadership of the h asidic movement founded by *Israel b. Eliezer Baal Shem Tov, but in the
course of time lost its connotation of actual strife, and became
a positive description, representative of a way of life. Since it
was the personality and genius of *Elijah b. Solomon Zalman
the Gaon of Vilna (17201797) which gave the powerful impetus to the rise of the Mitnaggedim, this way of life became
especially characteristic of Lithuanian Jewry (except for the
Lithuanian H asidim, particularly the *Karlin dynasty and
the H abad trend). His iron will and intellectual perseverance
shaped, through an elect circle of pupils, both adamant opposition to H asidism, as well as the patterning of institutions,
tendencies of thought and expression, and a way of life which
formed a specific culture. One of its characteristics, which derived from the opposition to the charismatic, miracleworking
leadership of the h asidic rabbis, was a pronounced skepticism
and a severe criticism of credulity and authoritarianism. After
the death of Elijah the Gaon of Vilna the struggle between the
H asidim and the Mitnaggedim assumed even more bitter pro-
371
[William Korey]
mitzvah
and Sabean inscriptions. Among his other works is Die arabischen Lehrbuecher der Augenheilkunde (with J. Hirschberg
and J. Lippert, 1905). Mittwoch also wrote about Islamic art
and modern Islamic politics. He was a coeditor of the jubilee edition of the works of Moses Mendelssohn (seven vols.,
192938). In 1937 the Gesellschaft presented him with a Festschrift (see bibliography).
Bibliography: I. Elbogen, Eugen Mittwoch, zum 60. Geburtstag (1937), 18693, incl. bibl. ( = MGWJ, 81 (1937), 24350. Add. Bibliography: W. Gottschalk, Die Schriften Eugen Mittwochs (1937).
[Bjoern Siegel (2nd ed.)]
MITZVAH (Heb. ) , a commandment, precept, or religious duty. The term is derived from the Hebrew root
which means to command or to ordain. In common usage,
mitzvah has taken on the meaning of a good deed. Already in
the Talmud, this word was used for a meritorious act as distinct from a positive commandment. The rabbis for instance
declared it a mitzvah to hearken to the words of the sages
(H ul. 106a; cf. Git. 15a). Although many different terms such
as h ukkah (statute, Ex. 27:21), mishpat (ordinance, Deut.
4:5), edut (testimony, Deut. 4:45), mishmeret (observance,
Lev. 8:35), and torah (teaching, Ex. 16:28) are mentioned in
the Pentateuch to indicate laws, only the word mitzvah is generally used to include all its commandments. There are traditionally 613 biblical *Commandments which are divided
into 248 positive mandates and 365 prohibitions. With the
increased ritual obligations imposed by the rabbis, the mitzvot were also separated into two main categories: mitzvot deoraita, the biblical commandments, and mitzvot de-rabbanan,
the rabbinic commandments (Pes. 10a; Suk. 44a). There are
also instances when the mitzvot were classified as mitzvot kallot, less important mitzvot, and mitzvot h amurot, more important mitzvot (e.g., H ul. 12:5; Yev. 47b; Av. Zar. 3a). Nevertheless,
the rabbis exhorted the people to be mindful of all the mitzvot, both light and grave, since the reward for the fulfillment
of each precept is not known to man (Avot 2:1). The mitzvot
were further divided into sikhliyyot (rational) and shimiyyot
(revealed) by medieval Jewish philosophers (see *Commandments, Reasons for). Other distinctions have also been made,
such as commandments performed with the external limbs
of the body and those by the heart; commandments regulating conduct between man and his Maker and between man
and his fellows; and commandments applicable only to Erez
Israel and those not dependent upon Erez Israel. Responsibility for the mitzvot is formally assumed by boys at the age of 13
plus one day, and by girls at 12 plus one day (see *Bar Mitzvah,
Bat Mitzvah, and *Puberty). Women are exempt from all affirmative precepts contingent upon a particular time or season, although the Talmud also makes those of the Sabbath,
H anukkah, Purim, and Passover obligatory on them. All negative precepts, whether limited to a certain time or not, are
binding upon both men and women (Kid. 1:7). The performance of most mitzvot is preceded by a *benediction which
is usually worded: Who has sanctified us by His command-
372
ments and commanded us to The omission of the benediction, however, does not invalidate the performance of the
mitzvah. The opposite of mitzvah is *averah, a transgression.
A precept fulfilled through a transgression is considered as
an averah, e.g., one does not discharge his obligation through
a stolen lulav (Suk. 30a; see *Four Species). Although mitzvot were not meant to provide material enjoyment (RH 28a),
and the final reward for their performance is in the hereafter
(Kid. 39b), true joy and sanctity can be attained only through
their observance (Shab. 30b; Sifra 9:2). Man should not anticipate any material recompense for performing the mitzvot, but
one mitzvah brings another in its train (Avot 1:3; 4:2). God
desired to make Israel worthy, therefore He enlarged the Law
and multiplied its mitzvot (Mak. 3:16).
Bibliography: M. Steckelmacher, in: Festschrift A.
Schwartz (1917), 25968; J.M. Guttmann, in: Bericht des juedischtheologischen Seminars Fraenckelscher Stiftung fuer das Jahr 1927
(1928); idem, Beh inat Kiyyum ha-Mitzvot, in: Bericht 1930 (1931);
J. Heinemann, Taamei ha-Mitzvot be-Sifrut Yisrael, 1 (19543), 2235;
Alon, Meh karim, 2 (1958), 1119; E.E. Urbach, H azal Pirkei Emunot
re-Deot (1967), 279347.
[Aaron Rothkoff]
MIXED MARRIAGE, INTERMARRIAGE. The terms intermarriage and mixed marriage are used interchangeably.
Intermarriage in the present context is defined as a marriage
where one partner professes a religion different from that of
his spouse. Marriages in which a partner has converted to the
faith of the other are not considered intermarriages. Therefore, marriages between *converts to Judaism and born Jews
are not treated here.
Problems of Measurement
FORMATION DATA VERSUS STATUS DATA. Statistical data
on the frequency of religious intermarriage are obtained from
marriage licenses on which groom and bride state their religions, and from questionnaires connected with censuses or
community surveys. Questionnaires reveal the religious com-
373
00.9%
14.9%
514.9%
1524.9%
2534.9%
1930
Country b
Total
Poland1, Lithuania1, Greece2,
Palestine2, Iran4, Yemen4, Ethiopia4
Latvia1, Canada1, United States2,
Latin America4, United Kingdom4,
Spain-Portugal4, Other Asia4,
Maghreb2, Egypt1, Libya4, Southern
Africa4
Switzerland1, France2, Austria1,
Luxembourg1, Hungary1, Romania2,
Czechoslovakia1, USSR1, Estonia1,
Belgium4, Bulgaria4, Yugoslavia4
Italy1, Germany1, Netherlands1
2000
16,600
4,130
100.0
24.9
6,700
40.4
Israel1, Yemen4
5,340
32.1
385
2.3
45
0.3
3544.9%
4554.9%
5574.9%
75% +
Average rate
a
b
World
Diaspora
Country b
Jewish pop.
in thousands
5.1%
5.2%
Jewish pop.
in thousands
12,950
215
100.0
1.7
4,879
37.7
60
0.4
101
0.8
535
4.1
1,176
9.1
5,400
41.7
194
1.5
Total
West Bank-Gaza (Yesha)1
World
Diaspora
390
3.0
30.8%
48.3%
Not Jewish at time of marriage. Out-marriage gures are countrywide or regional estimates. This table ignores variation in out-marriage frequencies within countries.
Data quality rated as follows: 1 Recent and reliable data; 2 Partial or less recent data of sufcient quality; 3 Rather outdated or incomplete data; 4 Conjectural.
374
lar workers 46.8. Thus the expectation that Jews who adhere
to the traditional occupational pattern are less likely to intermarry was borne out.
SECULAR EDUCATION. Secular education in the Western
world has two major functions. One is to ensure the continuity
of cultural tradition and values, the acquisition of basic skills,
and of occupational training. The other is to provide for cultural change, the production of new ideas, and technical innovation. Students who are oriented to or exposed to the first
type of schooling should be less inclined to intermarry than
students enrolled in the second type. The Greater Washington
survey supports the expectation for the native-born of native
parentage. The intermarriage rate of those who had enrolled
in the first type was nearly one-third lower than of those who
had attended the second type.
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. There is a widespread belief that
Jewish education, including a bar mitzvah ceremony, helps
to keep young men from marrying outside the Jewish faith.
The Greater Washington survey showed that this belief is well
founded as far as the native-born of native parentage (the third
and subsequent generation) is concerned. Religious education
cut the intermarriage status rate in half. It was 16.4 for those
husbands who had been exposed to religious school as compared to 30.2 who had not had such instruction. Since the
ethnic bond expressed in secular activities and in a common
language has been virtually dissolved in the third generation, exposure to religious instruction, which usually includes
some learning of Jewish history and some identification with
Israel, serves as a check to intermarriage.
SEX DISTRIBUTION AND INTERMARRIAGE. In the beginning of the last quarter of the 20t century Jewish men were
more likely to intermarry than Jewish women. One reason
for this differential was that men take the initiative in proposing marriage. This was especially significant in localities
where Jewish families are sparsely settled. Jewish parents allowed their sons more freedom in dating across religious
lines. However, the following years witnessed an increase in
the proportion of Jewish women who intermarry, and it is
likely that the sex differential will diminish in the future. The
proportion of Jewish men who intermarry varied from country to country and within a country from place to place. In
Canada only 10.2 of all bridegrooms intermarried between
1955 and 1960, as compared with 26.7 in Iowa between 1953
and 1959. In the Netherlands, the percentage of such bridegrooms rose from 36.4 in 1946 to 44 in 1958. In Indiana,
only about half as many Jewish bridegrooms intermarried in
the five relatively large Jewish communities of the state (30
versus 55.8). Jewish brides exhibit similar variations in their
propensity to intermarry.
PREVIOUS MARITAL STATUS. Data available for the United
States and the Netherlands demonstrate that the previous
marital status of a person affects his decision to intermarry.
Previously widowed persons, upon remarriage, have a lower
375
Legal Aspects
THE CONCEPT. A mixed marriage is a marriage of a non-Jew
to a Jew, i.e., one born of Jewish parents, or whose mother
alone was Jewish, or who has become a proselyte in accordance with Jewish law (see *Jew; *Yuh asin). Conversion from
the Jewish religion, both in the case of a Jew by birth and of a
proselyte who reverts to his evil ways, has no halakhic significance in respect of the law on mixed marriages. For an
Israelite, even if he has sinned, is still an Israelite (Sanh. 44a;
Rashi thereto; see *Apostasy).
MIXED MARRIAGES ARE PROHIBITED AND INVALID. From
the biblical passage (Deut. 7:3) neither shalt thou make marriages with them: thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his
son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son, the sages
inferred that marriage with a non-Jew is forbidden as a negative precept by the Torah (Av. Zar. 36b; Yad, Issurei Biah 12:12;
Sh. Ar., EH 16:1). As the passage cited refers to the seven nations (The Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and
the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, Deut. 7:1), according to one opinion, the prohibition
applies only to intermarriage with those seven nations. Others
maintain, however, that the prohibition applies to all gentiles
because after the prohibition neither shalt thou make marriages the biblical passage continues: For he will turn away
thy son from following after Me (Deut. 7:4), which serves to
include all who would turn [their children] away (Av. Zar.
36b; Yev. 77a; and codes). The prohibition against marrying
a gentile is also explicitly stated in the period of the return to
Zion: And that we would not give our daughters unto the peoples of the land, nor take their daughters for our sons (Neh.
10:31; see Maim., ibid.). It was also inferred from the passage
in Deuteronomy that in a mixed marriage there is no institution of marriage, i.e., mixed marriages are not legally valid
and cause no change in personal status (Kid. 68b; Yev. 45a;
and codes). Hence if the Jewish partner of such a marriage
subsequently wishes to marry a Jew there is no need, according to the halakhah, for divorce from the previous marriage.
376
377
378
organizations in more than one category of Jewish self-expression, most Jews tended to express themselves primarily
in one or another mode.
379
ever, molded a Jewish identity which, though generally positive, was not compelling. Although the Holocaust and the
establishment of the State of Israel certainly affected Jewish
identity, they did not alter its basic structure of place in the
lives of most American Jews.
The key point is that the kind of Jewish identity described
here is not a barrier to intermarriage, nor is intermarriage incompatible with that kind of Jewish identity. America is an
open society, and the American ethos places overwhelming
importance on individual choice in most things. While some
group-based hurdles to individual choice remain, marriage
across religious and ethnic lines is not discouraged. Rather,
even in a period which has for the last two or three decades
seen increasing emphasis placed on religion and on ethnic
identity, interreligious and interethnic marriages are likely
to be viewed as helping to demonstrate the compatibility of
disparate traditions and the possibility of amity, even of love,
across lines. Other factors encouraging intermarriage are
improvement in the socioeconomic standing of Jews and increased acceptance of Jews as friends and potential marriage
partners. As a result, most Jews have circles of colleagues,
classmates, and friends that include non-Jewish peers. Inevitably, these relationships often lead to romance.
When subjective feelings of romance begin to grow between two people, they make judgments about whether their
differences are numerous enough, large enough, or profound
enough to be a barrier to marriage. If not, then the differences
become the issues over which the compromises that are part
of any marriage are worked out. Otherwise, one party or the
other will end the relationship.
If Jewishness is seen to consist of some vague ideas about
Gods existence and providence, a number of almost universally endorsed ethical principles, two or three holiday dinners
a year, a H anukkah lamp in the house in December, brief attendance at synagogue services once or twice a year, the obligation to give some emphasis to Jewish causes among ones
charitable donations, a somewhat higher and more consistent level of political support for Israel than other pro-Israel
Americans offer, a political stance generally in the liberal
camp, and pride in the Jewish achievements of the past, then
Jewishness is compatible with intermarriage. No loving nonJewish spouse is likely to find these behaviors and attitudes
objectionable, and none of them requires the kind of joint
participation by a spouse that a non-Jew cannot easily and
readily provide. If we add some Jewish art and artifacts to the
decorations of the home, a few hours of Jewish education for
ones children for a few years, and some ceremonial recognition that those children are (at least partly) Jewish, which is
how ritual circumcision and Bar and Bat Mitzvah are sometimes conceptualized, exogamy still need not be an impediment to continued Jewishness. It is possible for a Jew to be
proud of his/her Jewishness, enjoy it, consider it important
and yet give it a form which is not pervasive enough and a
content which is not distinguishing enough to interfere with
a satisfying intermarriage. By contrast, when Jewishness or-
380
381
382
383
384
Residence. Size and density of a Jewish community can be importantly correlated to marriage opportunities. The relation
of out-marriage to place of residence reflects both the cause
and the consequence. Internet and distance connections may
have an impact on these relations in the future.
Jewish identification. This is the most important predictor of
in- versus out-marriage. We have good evidence that Jewishness of the parental home is probably the most powerful factor,
followed by formal Jewish education received. Patterns of socialization that begin very early in life appear to have a crucial
effect on subsequent patterns of affiliation, social networks,
and the subsequent opportunities for marital choice.
Marital stability. Out-marriages are more unstable than inmarriages. The reasons may be complex. The couples assortment in re-marriages tends to be often of the opposite sign
than in first marriages.
Acceptance. A circular relation emerges between frequencies
of out-marriage and its social acceptance. Something that is
more frequent is more acceptable, and something that is more
acceptable becomes more frequent. Attitudes tend to be more
open to intermarriage than actual behaviors.
Transmitted identity. Theoretically, if one half of the children
of out-marriages are affiliated with one side and one half is
affiliated with the other, there is no gain and no loss to either side. In reality, according to nearly all research evidence
available, the Jewish side has received less than half of all the
children of out-marriages. During the 1990s, less than 20 of
the children of out-marriages were affiliated with the Jewish
side both in the U.S. and in the Russian Republic. In the U.S.,
Canada, and other English-speaking countries, the mother is
the dominant parent in transmitting a group identity to the
children. If the mother is Jewish, the child tends to be Jewish,
and if the mother is not Jewish the child tends to be non-Jewish. This conforms to the Jewish halakhah. In other societies,
such as Latin American or Southern and Eastern European
countries, where the father is the dominant parent in the allocation of the childs public identity, children mostly follow
the fathers identity.
IMPLICATIONS. Second and Third Generation. While the
evidence is not massive, it points to a spectacular increase in
the rate of out-marriage among the children of out-marriage,
even if they have grown up as Jews. Possibly because of the
model gauged from their parents, children may consider outmarriage a normal option. The childrens social networks, too,
tend to be more open to people of different backgrounds. Outmarriage in effect becomes very high in the 2nd generation.
Collective consequences. Broader implications affect the Jewish
collective beyond individual experiences. What out-marriage
does to the Jewish people needs to be considered in terms of
the major actors and processes such as Israel-Diaspora relations, consensus on core values, polarization among the Jewish
polity, and even Jewish theology. Inasmuch as it is perceived
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mixed species
as contradicting prevailing norms, besides its likely erosive
effects on population size and composition, out-marriage is
a factor of internal tension and stress. This is a fundamental
question for Jewish policy making, and one of the major challenges world Jewry faces at the beginning of the 21st century.
[Sergio DellaPergola (2nd ed.)]
MIXED SPECIES (Heb. ; kilayim), prohibition mentioned twice in the Bible. Leviticus 19:19 states: Ye shall keep
my statutes. Thou shalt not let thy cattle gender with a diverse
kind; thou shalt not sow thy field with two kinds of seed; neither shall there come upon thee a garment of two kinds of stuff
mingled together. Deuteronomy 22:911 states: Thou shalt
not sow thy vineyard with two kinds of seed; lest the fulness of
the seed which thou hast sown be forfeited together with the
increase of the vineyard. Thou shalt not plow with an ox and
an ass together. Thou shalt not wear a mingled stuff, wool and
linen together. From these two passages the sages deduced
six types of mixing of species which are forbidden: the mixing of seeds; the grafting of different species of trees and vegetables; the mixing of seed in a vineyard; the hybridization of
domestic and wild animals; plowing or driving with domestic
or non-domestic animals of different species; and the mixing
of wool and linen (*shaatnez).
385
mixed species
The prohibitions against mixing species are defined in
Mishnah Kilayim 8:1 It is forbidden to sow diverse kinds in
a vineyard or to suffer them to grow, and it is forbidden to
have any benefit from them. It is forbidden to sow diverse
kinds of seed or to suffer them to grow, but they may be eaten
and certainly benefit may be derived from them. Mixed materials are permitted for all purposes, only the weaving of
them being forbidden. Hybrid cattle may be reared and maintained; it is forbidden only to breed them. The many halakhot connected with the laws of mixed species are taught in
the Mishnah, Tosefta, and Jerusalem Talmud of the tractate
*Kilayim. The chief problems relating to those laws are detailed below.
Mixing of Cattle
According to the Mishnah (Kil. 8:1) they may be reared and
maintained, and it is only forbidden to breed them. To rear
and maintain means that different species of cattle may be
reared together without the fear that they will crossbreed.
Some explain it to mean that the product of crossbreeding
(e.g., a mule) may be reared. This prohibition applies to domestic and wild animals and to birds (BK 5:7).
Plowing and Driving with Two Species
The Bible forbids only plowing with an ox and an ass. The
rabbis, however, explained that Scripture spoke what was
customary, i.e., people were accustomed to plow with an ox
or an ass, but the prohibition applies equally to plowing with
any two other species and to riding, leading, and driving with
them (Kil. 8:2).
Problems of Definition
In the discussion of the laws of mixed species the problem of
defining like and unlike species arises. Although criteria for
determining whether a plant or animal belongs to one species
or another are laid down, an examination of the pairs enumerated in the Mishnah that do or do not constitute mixed species shows that there is no identity between the term species
used in the law of mixed species and the term as applied by
the modern system of botanical and zoological classification.
Mixed species were determined by a tradition crystallized in
the course of many generations (cf. Tosef., Kil. 1:34). Indeed
two plants which are now classified as belonging to different
species or even to different genera are reckoned as the same
species for the law of mixed species (e.g., wheat and tares; Kil.
1:1). In contrast, however, different strains of the same species are regarded as different species (Kil. 1:6). With regard to
mixed seeds an amora in the Jerusalem Talmud (Kil. 1:5, 27a)
summarizes: in some cases [the form of] the fruit is the determinant, and in others the leaf, while another amora notes:
in some cases the taste of the fruit is the determinant.
One of the assumptions in the prohibitions of mixed trees
is the possibility of crossbreeding by grafting the scion of one
species onto the stock of a second. Thus it is pointed out in
the Jerusalem Talmud that grafting the almond onto the terebinth produces the *pistachio, a fruit similar to that of both
386
miZ pah
these species but systematically very far removed from the
almond. It is almost certain that a graft of such a nature will
not take, and it is certain that a species which has the median
characteristics of the scion and the stock cannot be obtained
by grafting. The early scholars saw an analogy between the
grafting of plants and the crossbreeding of animals, but this
latter could be compared to the cross-pollination of plants, a
technique unknown to the ancients.
These views on grafting stem from the once-accepted assumption that environmental factors were liable to change the
hereditary characteristics of the creature (see *Biology). The
opinion that new species could be created by grafting belongs
to agricultural folklore, and also to Greco-Roman science,
and from there entered into rabbinic literature. Because of
the prohibition of mixed species, Jews were unable to test the
truth of this notion. Many halakhot on the subject commence
with the formula: If a gentile grafted species A with species
B, then species C is produced. It should be stressed, however,
that halakhot of this nature, common in the Tosefta and the
Jerusalem Talmud, were not incorporated in the Mishnah
(see *Kilayim).
Reasons for the Precept of Mixed Species
Some of the reasons given for the prohibition stemmed from
the above-mentioned belief that the effects of environmental
factors are hereditary. To the same category belongs the reason
for forbidding change in the order of Creation. Nah manides
gives this reason in his biblical commentary (to Lev. 19: 19),
adding that if the crossbreeding of a horse and an ass produces
a mule, which is a miserable creature that cannot beget, so too
when mixed species of trees are grafted, their fruit does not
grow thereafter. Maimonides (Guide 3, 49) explains that the
man who couples creatures of different species defies the laws
of nature and of ethics, and similarly in the grafting and mixing of plants. It was part of the false beliefs of idolators that
this served as a specific for fertility (ibid. 3, 37). That crossbreeding was unnatural was an early belief: Josephus (Ant.,
4:229) explained that nature delighteth not in the conjunction of things dissimilar. Rabbenu Nathan, av ha-yeshivah
(Erez Israel in the 11t century), gives an agricultural reason,
that one species prevents the development of the adjacent one
(commentary to Mishnah Kil. ch. 1). A similar reason for the
prohibition of mixed seeds in the vineyard was given earlier
by Philo: since as a result of it too great a burden is put upon
the earth (Spec. 4:211). Some Greek and Roman agricultural
writers laid down that summer plants which impoverish the
soil should not be sown in the vineyard (Pliny, Naturalis 18,
101) and that it is forbidden to sow intermediate plantings in
a vineyard (Geoponica 5, 11).
As against those who sought to rationalize the prohibition, Rashi concluded: These statutes are a royal decree, for
which there is no reason. In point of fact it is impossible to determine the reasons for the prohibition. Post factum, however,
it seems that, as a result of the care taken by Jews in this matter,
the fields were kept free of weeds and the purity of plant speENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
MIZ PAH (Heb. ; lookout point), moshavah in northern Israel, W. of Tiberias, founded in 1908 by Second *Aliyah
pioneers from Russia, on *Jewish Colonization Association
(ICA) land. For many years the small village, based on mixed
farming, preserved its original layout of closely grouped farm-
387
miZpeh or miZpah
steads interconnected by a surrounding basalt wall. It only began to expand after it was connected to a water line in 1979, its
population increasing from 39 in 1968 to 167 in 2002.
[Efram Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
388
mizrachi
MIZRACHI (term coined from some of the letters of the Hebrew words merkaz ruh ani, spiritual center), religious Zionist
movement whose aim was expressed in its motto: The Land
of Israel for the people of Israel according to the Torah of
Israel (coined by Rabbi Meir Berlin Bar-Ilan). Mizrachi
was founded in 1902 as a religious faction in the World Zionist
Organization. The name was first used by Samuel *Mohilewer,
an early leader of *H ibbat Zion, to express the idea that the
Torah should be the spiritual center for Zionism.
The Beginning of Mizrachi
Many religious Jews, including famous rabbis, joined the
movement of political Zionism, which worked toward the establishment of a Jewish state in the Land of Israel. Among the
first to join was Rabbi Isaac *Reines, who responded to Theodor *Herzls call and devoted his energies to spreading the
idea of a national renaissance among Orthodox Jews. Reines
believed that the Zionist movement must be dedicated exclusively to a political goal, and he led the fight against the
inclusion of cultural activities in the Zionist program. After
the Fifth Zionist Congress, however, when the strength of the
cultural camp grew and official permission was granted to
establish factions (federations) within the framework of the
Zionist Organization. Reines decided to found a federation of
religious Zionists. Toward this end, he convened the founding
convention in Vilna on March 45, 1902, and it established the
national-religious organization within the Zionist Organization. At the suggestion of Rabbi Abraham *Slutzky, the organization was called Mizrachi.
An outstanding participant at the founding convention
was Rabbi Zeev *Jawitz, who was charged with composing
the organizations first manifesto. Two groups clashed at the
founding convention: the political faction, which called for
the preservation of the purely political character of the Zionist
movement and opposed the decision of the Fifth Zionist Congress (1901) obligating the Zionist Organization to include
cultural activities in its program; and the cultural faction,
which demanded that Mizrachi, as a spiritual center, influence the Zionist movement and its work in the Land of Israel
in its traditional-religious spirit. The Mizrachi program, which
was accepted by the majority of the participants at the founding convention, stated that the Zionist Organization should
not engage in activities that do not have a direct relationship
to Zionism. and it was stated in the manifesto that Mizrachi
should try to gather around it all those Zionists who wish to
purge practical Zionism of any alien element that is not directly related to political and practical Zionism. These decisions seem to reveal the victory of the political faction.
Jawitz, however, who formulated the manifesto, succeeded in
reflecting in it both viewpoints and thus satisfied both trends.
An opening was thus created for cultural activities, albeit only
in the framework of branches, in line with local conditions
and in the spirit of Orthodoxy.
A year after its establishment, Mizrachis second conference was convened in Lida on March 2224, 1903. During its
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
389
mizrachi
struggle within its ranks. This decision brought about a rift in
the ranks of Mizrachi, and a number of its leaders, including
members of the head office in Frankfurt, left the organization.
As a result the center of Mizrachi was moved to Altona, near
Hamburg. Louis Frank was elected chairman and was later
the second president of World Mizrachi.
During the term of the Hamburg executive, the central
office of Mizrachi was established in the Land of Israel under
the direction of Rabbi Fishman. Also during the Hamburg period, Rabbi Meir Berlin (Bar-Ilan) began working as the general secretary organizer of the Mizrachi World Organization.
He left Lithuania for Berlin and there published the weekly
Ha-Ivri. When Rabbi Berlin entered office, Mizrachi received
a great impetus in its work and became a strong and influential factor both in the Zionist movement and among religious
Jewry. Under his leadership, the first conference of Mizrachi
to take place in the United States was convened in 1914, in
Cincinnati, Ohio, and he succeeded in making the movement
into an important factor in the lives of American Jewry and
in the American Zionist movement. Rabbi Berlin was joined
there by Rabbi Fishman, who had been expelled from Erez
Israel during World War I by the Turkish authorities and who
added projects of his own and the atmosphere of Erez Israel
to the American movement. The first world conference of
Mizrachi that took place after World War I (Amsterdam, Jan.
1415, 1920) decided to transfer the seat of the world center to
Jerusalem. Mizrachi was thus the first Zionist party to establish its center in Erez Israel (and specifically in Jerusalem). In
1923 Rabbi Berlin, who was the leader of the movement and
expanded its activities, settled in Erez Israel. Some time later
he was also elected president of the world organization and
remained in this position until his death.
as one of the major points on the agenda. It subsequently devoted much effort to ensure the success of the conference to
establish the chief rabbinate of Erez Israel, which took place
through the initiative of Rabbi Abraham Isaac *Kook in Jerusalem in February 1921. After great efforts, in December 1919
Mizrachi succeeded in acquiring the recognition of the Zionist
institutions for its trend of religious education as a part of the
educational system of the Zionist Organization.
With the end of World War I and the publication of the
*Balfour Declaration, the Third Aliyah began to arrive in Palestine and brought with it members of Z eirei Mizrachi, who
strove to build up the land on the basis of pioneering labor
and religious renewal. As young pioneers they called for personal fulfillment, i.e., for religious Zionists to settle in Erez
Israel and build it in the spirit of the Torah. Their vision was
expressed in the short motto Torah va-Avodah, which became the basis for the religious labor movement and the establishment of *Ha-Poel ha-Mizrachi in Erez Israel. The idea
struck roots in the Diaspora as well and became the slogan of
the mass movement, called Torah va-Avodah, throughout the
world. It was an active participant in the Jewish Agency prior
to 1948 and was an active partner in Israels government coalitions since the birth of the State (from 1956 as the National
Religious Party; see below). Through the early 1980s it consistently polled about 10 of the total vote in Israel, but then
dropped sharply to under 5 as less moderate parties to the
right attracted many of its voters. (See *Israel, State of: Political
Life and Parties.) The party was also active in the municipal
level and was the main supporter of the chief rabbinate.
Educational Work
After the crisis that overcame Russian Jewry with the outbreak
of the Russo-Japanese War, the revolution, and the pogroms
that followed (1905), it was practically impossible to maintain the world center of Mizrachi in Russia. It was therefore
decided to transfer the seat of its executive to Frankfurt, Germany. During the Frankfurt period, Mizrachi activities became more systematic. Their most important aspect was the
beginning of the educational work of Mizrachi in Erez Israel.
The world center decided to send Rabbi Fishman to study the
situation of education in Erez Israel and find ways to develop
educational and cultural activities there. He laid the foundation for the establishment of the Tah kemoni School in Jaffa,
the first educational institution of Mizrachi in the country,
which inaugurated Mizrachis educational system based on a
synthesis of the people of Israel, the Torah, and Zion.
In 1920 an agreement was reached in the World Zionist
Organization that ensured Mizrachi autonomy in the field of
religious education in Erez Israel. An educational program
began to be designed, followed by the establishment of a network of Mizrachi schools, which included kindergartens, elementary schools, high schools, yeshivot, vocational schools,
and teachers seminaries. The educational network of Mizrachi continued to exist as a separate trend in Israel until the establishment of the State religious school system in the 1953/54
390
mizrachi
school year (see *Israel, State of: Education). The large majority of Mizrachi schools, which then encompassed more than
60,000 students and about 3,000 teachers, were integrated
into the new framework of governmental religious education. The yeshivot have been the most outstanding achievement of Mizrachi education. In 16 high school-level yeshivot
of *Bnei Akiva, students receive both a yeshivah and general
education; in 12 girls schools the educational program is parallel to that of the yeshivot. The network includes Midrashiat
Noam in Pardes H annah, Torah and Melakhah yeshivot, the
agricultural yeshivah at Kefar ha-Roeh, and the yeshivah for
higher studies at Kerem Yavneh. At *Bar-Ilan University in
Ramat Gan, which was established by Mizrachi in the United
States, there were more than 7,000 students in 1970, with extensions in Safed, Ashkelon, and the Jordan Valley. In 2005 it
had over 30,000 students. After the 20t world conference of
Mizrachi (1962), the educational work of the movement was
administered by the Center for Religious Education in Israel,
affiliated with the world center of Mizrachi-Ha-Poel ha-Mizrachi and the movement in Israel. In 2005 the Center provided
supplementary religious education in 255 secondary schools
in Israel. The Emunah womens organization operated 120 day
care centers throughout the country.
gration and absorption, labor and vocational affairs, housing, settlement, culture, pension funds and economic affairs,
matters concerning free professionals, and departments for
elderly members and development towns.
391
mizrachi, shimon
the economic institutions and programs of the movement; the
cooperative of Ha-Poel ha-Mizrachi; pension funds; etc.
[Itzhak Goldshlag]
392
[Louis Bernstein]
Bibliography: M. Waxman, Mizrachi, its Aims and Purposes (1918); P. Churgin and L. Gellman (eds.), Mizrachi Jubilee Publication of the Mizrachi Organization of America 19111936 (1936);
J.L. Maimon, History of the Mizrachi Movement (1938); S.Z. Shragai,
Vision and Realization (1945); S. Rosenblatt, History of the Mizrachi
Movement (1951); Y. Tirosh, Essence of Religious Zionism (1964); idem,
Religion and State in Israel: The Religious Zionist Standpoint (1965);
Mizrachi-Ha-Poel ha-Mizrachi, The Length and Breadth of the Land
(1965); B. Cohen, Religious Zionism a Revaluation (1966); M. Berlin, Mi-Volozhin ad Yerushalayim, 2 vols. (193940); idem, Bi-Shevilei
ha-Teh iyyah (1940); idem, Kitvei (1940); M. Ostrovsky, Toledot haMizrachi be-Erez -Yisrael (1944); I. Goldschlag, Mi-Vilna ad Yerushalayim (1954); Mizrachi Woman (1933 ); Mizrachi Outlook (193657);
Jewish Horizon (1957 ).
mizraH I, elijah
immediately faced both the scrolls and Jerusalem. However,
in those sanctuaries found in Hammath, Yafa in Galilee, and
Eshtemoa in Judea, the sacred direction is properly south in
the first two cases and north in the third, while the entrance is
from the eastern side. This may be in imitation of the Tent of
Meeting, which had its gates on the eastern side (Num. 2:23;
3:38), or of Solomons Temple, the portals of which were to the
east (Ezek. 43:14), although the precise reason is not known.
Maimonides, quoting the second passage in Numbers, states
that the doors of the synagogue should face east, while the
Ark should be placed in the direction in which people pray
in that city, i.e., toward Jerusalem (Yad, Tefillah, 11:2). The
Shulh an Arukh records the same rule, but to avoid the semblance of worshiping the sun by facing east, it recommends
that one turn toward the southeast (Isserles Oh 94:2; also Suk.
5:4). If a person is unable to ascertain the points of the compass, he should direct his heart toward Jerusalem. This was
also the opinion of R. Tarfon and R. Sheshet, who held that,
since the Divine Presence is everywhere, the essential requirement is to direct ones heart to God (BB 25a). It is customary
in traditional homes to mark the eastern wall to enable a person to recite his prayers in the proper direction. Artistic wall
plaques inscribed with the word mizrah and scriptural passages like From the rising (mi-mizrah ) of the sun unto the
going down thereof, the Lords name is to be praised (Ps.
113:3), kabbalistic inscriptions, or pictures of holy places are
used for this purpose.
Bibliography: Goodenough, Symbols, 1 (1953), 216; F.
Landsberger, in: HUCA, 28 (1957), 181203; L.A. Mayer, Bibliography
of Jewish Art (1967), index; E.L. Sukenik, The Ancient Synagogue of
Beth Alpha (1932), 11; idem, The Ancient Synagogue of El-H ammeh
(1935), 7881; idem, Ancient Synagogues in Palestine and Greece (1934),
27, 5052; Y. Yadin, Masada (Eng., 1966), 180, 184.
was a great admirer of the Egyptian singer and composer Muhammad Abd al-Wahhab, set many of his own Hebrew poems to his melodies. Thus, in addition to his essential role in
developing the religious musical life of the community and
the appropriate musical education he provided to the communitys children and youth by means of the childrens choir,
he created awlad al-Biyyut (the children of the piyyut). He
distinguished himself as an interpreter of Arab music and ud
playing. In this latter activity he gained the favor of the Tunisian president, Habib Bourguiba.
In Tunisia, Mizrahi published an anthology of Hebrew
poems for singing, the title of which is Maadanei Melekh (The
Kings Delicacies, Sousse: Makhluf Najjar, 1945; republished
in Israel in 1968).
In Tunis he established choirs that performed his songs.
Among his outstanding pupils were Rabbi Getz, the late
rabbi of the Western Wall, and David Riyahi, who established
a synagogue choir in Netanyah that accompanied the services
and performed many of his piyyutim.
[Amnon Shiloah (2nd ed.)]
393
mizraH I, elijah
tervention of Capsali in these disputes, an intervention which
reveals a certain tension between them. Perhaps for this reason
he took no part in the famous controversy between Capsali
and Joseph Colon. After the death of Capsali in 1498, Mizrah i
became the foremost rabbinical authority in Constantinople
and in fact throughout the whole Ottoman Empire. From far
and near, problems of halakhah and procedure were addressed
to him. There is reason to believe that he filled the position of
head of the rabbis of Constantinople (though he did not have
the title of h akham bashi, appointed by the sultan, since that
office did not exist in that period). Nevertheless, it would seem
that his authority derived not from any official position, but
from the recognition of his personality and strength. He was
considered both by his contemporaries and later generations
as the greatest posek of his time in *Turkey. He was firm and
unbending in his decisions, and even the great rabbis among
the Spanish exiles accepted his authority.
In his responsa (56) he gives a description of his daily
routine, which reveals the strain under which he worked. Fulfilling a number of functions simultaneously, he conducted the
affairs of the community, gave decisions on all matters, headed
a yeshivah, and taught not only Talmud but secular subjects.
At the same time he wrote commentaries on both religious and
scientific works, had an inner circle of select students whom
he taught the codes, and wrote responsa in answer to queries
addressed to him from afar. Like Moses Capsali, he was active in the problem of the absorption of the exiles from Spain
and Portugal, collecting funds on their behalf, and forcing the
wealthy members of the community to pay the amounts imposed on them (Resp. 66). Mizrah is attitude to these exiles
was one of respect and high regard. He appreciated that their
standards of culture and knowledge were higher than those of
the native Turkish Jews, but nevertheless he came out firmly
against attempts by some of them to impose their will on the
old community. He resisted attempts on their part to impose
customs and procedures to which they were accustomed, but
which were contrary to those ruling in Turkey. Of special importance was his attitude toward the *Karaites. On the one
hand he exerted himself to attract them to the Rabbanites,
and, in opposition to Moses Capsali, to give them instruction in both secular subjects and even in the Oral Law, and in
this context firmly resisted every attempt to isolate them. On
the other hand he completely rejected on halakhic grounds
the permissibility of intermarriage between Karaites and Rabbanites. Mizrah is halakhic method is distinctive and clear.
He lays down fundamental principles and raises possible objections to his own statements, so that every topic is exhaustively examined and clarified. His responsa were accepted as
authoritative by his and succeeding generations, despite the
fact that some of the leading contemporary scholars opposed
his views.
His best-known pupils and colleagues were Elijah haLevi, *Tam ibn Yah ya, and Abraham ibn Yaish. Mizrah i suffered greatly from ill health, financial strain, and family misfortunes. Three of his sons are known, Gershon, Israel, and
Reuben, and a daughter. There are legends about his son-inlaws connections with the court of the sultan. Reuben died
during his fathers lifetime. Gershon was the victim of a libel
that during a severe illness he had sought to be converted to
*Islam. He had to abandon his family and, after paying heavy
bribes, escaped to Naxos, but even there he suffered persecution and strife. These two incidents, as well as the death of
his wife, affected Mizrah i greatly. His third son, Israel, published his fathers Rashi commentary and Sefer ha-Mispar.
Mizrah i died in Constantinople and Joseph *Taitaz ak eulogized his works.
Mizrah is personality and multi-faceted character emerge
clearly from his works. His main activity was in the writing
and teaching of both halakhah and general knowledge, but
his main fame rests upon his crowning achievement, his supercommentary to Rashi (1st ed. Venice, 1527), a fact which he
himself states. In this work he exhaustively discusses almost
every word in Rashi, but does not refrain from disagreeing
with him on numerous occasions. On the other hand he defends Rashi against the criticism of Nah manides. This work
has given rise to a veritable literature. Later commentators answered his criticism and justified Rashi. The two works, Rashis
commentary and Mizrah is supercommentary, became a main
subject of study of rabbinical commentators of the Bible from
the 16t century onward. The work has an added importance
as a result of the quotations it gives from the Romaniot scholars of the 14t and 15t centuries for which his work is the sole
source, side by side with those of Ibn Ezra and the French and
German scholars. Mizrah is responsa, published in two collections, number 140, but of them only 110 are his, although they
undoubtedly represent only a fraction of his many responsa.
More than 40 are still in various manuscripts. A comparison between the two reveals the many errors in the printed
responsa, particularly in the Constantinople edition. An extant fragment (Resp. Const. 96) reveals the method of teaching in his yeshivah, consisting of notes made at the time by
one of his pupils.
The only other rabbinic work of Mizrah i published is his
novellae on the Sefer Mitzvot Gadol of *Moses of Coucy (Constantinople, 1521), the only work of his published in his lifetime. His work on the Halakhot of Isaac Alfasi is not extant. In
the field of secular knowledge his Sefer ha-Mispar (Constantinople, 1533) on mathematics is famous. It was highly thought
of in its time and has been translated into Latin. He also
wrote a commentary on Ptolemys Almagest and on Euclids
Elements. R. Moses Almosnino possessed a commentary by
Mizrah i on the Intentions of the Philosophers of al-*Ghazl.
Mizrah i took a negative attitude toward Kabbalah, particularly
against relying on it for halakhic decisions, and the introduction of kabbalistic ideas into the prayer book.
394
mlawa
7077; A. Freimann, in: Zion, 1 (1936), 18891; Ha-Segullah, 5 no. 5
(1938); A. Ovadyah, Ketavim Nivh arim, 1 (1942), 63198; S. Assaf, BeOholei Yaakov (1953), 14596; Steinschneider, Uebersetzungen, 322,
508, 524; A. David, in: KS 45 (1970), 299.
[Joseph Hacker]
MIZRAHI, HANINAH (18861974), teacher. Born in Teheran in 1886, he immigrated to the Land of Israel in 1895
and died in Jerusalem. His father, Haim Elazar, was a paytan.
Mizrahi began his studies at the Alliance school in Jerusalem,
where he learned French. He also learned German by himself
and could read the Judeo-Persian works by Wilhelm Bacher
of Budapest. In 1907, he received his teaching certificate from
the Ezra school in Jerusalem, where he also improved his German language. In 1911 he married Sarah, the daughter of R.
Shalom Yehezqel. For 15 years, beginning in 1921, he taught
at the talmud torah of the Sephardim in Old Jerusalem. After
Israels War of Independence, the school fell into the hands
of Jordan, so Mizrahi continued to teach at Harel school in
West Jerusalem until his retirement in 1951. He is regarded
as one of the founders of the Bet ha-Kerem quarter in Jerusalem. Mizrahi published the following books on the Jews of
Iran: Yehudei Paras (1959); Toldot Yehudei Paras (1966); BiYshishim H okhmah (1967). He was mainly a folklorist in his
education and writings.
Bibliography: A rather full account of Mizrahis life and
works can be found in A. Netzer, Ydi az yek shakhsiyat-e farhangi,
in: Pdyvand: Judeo-Iranian and Jewish Studies Series, vol. 3 (1999),
36170.
[Amnon Netzer (2nd ed.)]
MIZ RAYIM (Heb. ) , Hebrew place-name. In the Septuagint it is rendered as Egypt. The Hebrew proper noun,
however, has a broader range of meaning. As Aiguptos, the
name of the country was derived from a name for the city of
Memphis, H et-kau-ptah (Castle of the ka-souls of Ptah),
so the name of Miz rayim may have been derived from the
name of a city of Lower Egypt, if not of Lower Egypt itself.
This is based on the occurrences in the Bible of Miz rayim in
combination with Pathros (pa to resy; the southern country,
i.e., Upper Egypt), in which cases Miz rayim seems to mean
Lower Egypt (To Mehy). Secondarily, it came to mean both all
of Egypt and Egyptians, and was and still is the common
Hebrew word for Egypt.
MLADA BOLESLAV (Czech Mlad Boleslav; Ger. Jungbunzlau), town in N. Bohemia, Czech Republic. One of the
important communities in Bohemia, it is first mentioned
in 1471 and is noted in a Hebrew document of 1556. Eleven
families lived there in 1570, and a synagogue was recorded in
1579. The cemetery (well known mainly because of the tombstone of Jacob *Bassevi von Treuenberg) was consecrated in
1584 and still existed in 1970. The number of adult Jews in the
town in 1615 was 120. In 1643 the community came under the
protection of the Swedish king for a time. The community elders were forced to sign an agreement in 1661 which greatly
395
mlotek, chana
Until 1753, the community of Mlawa was under the jurisdiction of that of *Ciechanow. The growth of economic
activity in the region during the last third of the 18t century
brought an increase in the Jewish population. The 1765 census showed 70 Jewish families numbering 487 poll tax payers
in Mlawa and the neighboring villages. Fifteen houses in the
town were owned by Jews. Sources of 1781 mention a Jewish
population of 718. After the Prussian conquest (1793), the town
was granted a de non tolerandis Judaeis privilege, and the Jews
then moved to the suburb of Zabrody.
The Jews returned to Mlawa with the establishment of
the grand duchy of Warsaw (1807). In 1808 they numbered 137,
forming 15 of the population. Following restrictions on Jewish settlement, a special quarter was established in 1824, and
only there (with some rare exceptions) were Jews permitted
to live. In addition, the entry of Jews from other regions was
almost completely prohibited, because of the location of the
town in the border area. In 1827, there were 792 Jews (36 of
the population) living in the town. The ghetto and the other
restrictions on residence and ownership of real estate were
abolished in 1862. Once the railway lines from Mlawa to Warsaw (1877) and Gdansk (1883) were opened, the trade in grain,
livestock, wood, and army supplies, from which many Jews
earned their livelihood, increased considerably. Between 1857
and 1897, the Jewish population of Mlawa grew from 1,650 to
4,845 (41 of the population).
The influence of H asidism manifested itself among the
Jews of Mlawa from the beginning of the 19t century. With
the consolidation of their economic situation at the close of
that century, the influence of Mitnaggedim circles gained in
strength (in 1870, Wolf Lipszie was appointed rabbi of the
town). The last rabbi of Mlawa, R. Jehiel Moses Segalowicz
(appointed 1901), was known as one of the Mitnaggedim. In
the late 1890s, a *H ovevei Zion circle was organized in the
town. During the revolution and pogroms of 190506, the
*Bund and the *Poalei Zion wielded considerable influence
among the Jewish workers, youth, and intelligentsia of Mlawa.
The Jewish author Joseph *Opatoshu, the Hebrew author Jakir *Warshavsky, and the publicist and leader of the Bund in
Poland, Victor *Alter, were born in Mlawa, where they also
began their careers. Between 1921 and 1927 the Jewish population of Mlawa increased from 5,923 to 6,301. A newspaper,
Dos Mlauer Lebn, was published; its editors included Bunim
Warshavsky, Moses Lichtensztain, and Moses Laska.
Holocaust Period
At the outbreak of World War II there were about 6,500 Jews in
Mlawa. At the beginning of November 1939 the Germans destroyed all the synagogues in Mlawa and vicinity. The first deportation took place on Dec. 6, 1940, when 300 Jews were deported to Miedzyrzec *Podlaski, *Lubartow, and *Lublin; they
shared the fate of the Jews there. The ghetto was established on
Dec. 78, 1940, and liquidated two years later on Nov. 24, 1942.
The last deportations took place from Nov. 10, 1942, to Dec. 10,
1942; almost all the Jews were deported to *Treblinka death
396
integral part of the text, forming part of its body, and those
in which a passage is preceded by the mnemonic as an aid to
the memory of what is to follow. The former are usually designated as simankha, i.e., your mnemonic, while for the latter
the simple word siman is given. Since the essence of the mnemonic is to call to mind the unfamiliar by use of the familiar,
it naturally follows that it consists of the use of a well-known
phrase. These phrases can be divided into biblical verses, since
knowledge of the text of the Bible was regarded as axiomatic,
well-known talmudic phrases, popular proverbs, or readily
remembered catchphrases.
Biblical Mnemonics
Examples of biblical verses used for this purpose are numerous. For the six orders into which the Mishnah is divided, Isaiah 33:6 was cited: There shall be faith in thy times, strength,
salvation, wisdom, and knowledge, each of the nouns indicating a specific order (Shab. 31a). That basilicas attached to
royal buildings are forbidden because of idolatry, but those of
baths and storehouses permitted, was to be remembered by
the mnemonic to bind [forbid] their kings with chains (Ps.
149:8; Av. Zar. 16b). The law that if the lungs of animals are
liver-colored they are permitted, but if flesh-colored forbidden, had the mnemonic and if flesh in the field, it is terefah
(Ex. 22:30; H ul. 47b). The mnemonic to remember that one
should not curse ones parents in the presence of ones children is the verse (Gen. 48:5), Ephraim and Manasseh [the
grandchildren] shall be mine even as Reuben and Simeon [the
children] (Ket. 72b).
Talmudic Phrases
The bird called the moor-cock is forbidden as food, but the
moor-hen permitted; the mnemonic is the rabbinic interpretation of the prohibition of an Ammonite to enter the congregation (Deut. 23:4): An Ammonite, but not an Ammonite woman. A bird called the wine-drinker is also forbidden,
and the mnemonic is a drunkard is forbidden to officiate
(cf. Sanh. 22b). These are two examples given from a list in
H ullin 62b.
Catchphrases
By their nature these are pithy statements in which the element of apparent paradox is often used. Thus the fact that a
fish called the sea ass is permitted while one termed the
sea bull is forbidden produces the mnemonic the unclean is
clean, the clean unclean, since the ass is forbidden and the ox
permitted for consumption. To remember that meditating on
sin can be worse than its actual commission, the mnemonic
was devised the odor of meat (i.e., the odor of the meat excites the appetite more than the meat itself).
Mnemonics are used as an easy way to remember different statements in the name of one authority. Thus three
statements on charity by R. Eleazar (BB 9a) provide the mnemonic great is the sanctuary of Moses. Three statements of
R. Manasseh found in different parts of the tractate H ullin
(4a, 31a, 51a) are mnemonically connected by the sentence,
397
mnouchkine, alexandre
Inserting a blade into rams (H ul. 4a). It is one of the characteristics of the methodology of the Talmud that a statement
in the name of a sage which is relevant to the discussion is
followed by a number of statements in the name of the same
sage which have no connection with the subject under discussion. The need for mnemonics in these cases was obvious, and
as far as possible they are made into a sentence. Thus three
statements of Samuel b. Nah amani in the name of R. Johanan
(the first has Nah amani in the texts) were to be remembered
by the sentence In truth money shall he see. An interesting example is provided in the same passage. Six anonymous
popular epigrams are quoted, for all of which Samuel finds a
biblical proof verse. They are combined in a mnemonic which
(probably) means Hear, Vashti, Seven Songs, (and) another
(Sanh. 7a). It is obvious, however, that any device which aided
the memory was pressed into service. There was a difference
of opinion between the scholars of Pumbedita and Sura as to
the number of nails permitted in a shoe for walking on the
Sabbath. R. H iyya reported that the former said 24, the latter
22. The mnemonic was H iyya lost two nails in walking from
Pumbedita to Sura (Shab. 60b).
Popular Proverbs
The wealthy Simeon b. Judah ha-Nasi was of the opinion that
a certain defect in an animal did not render the animal invalid
and he ate its meat, while the poor R. H iyya discarded it as
invalid; they had a similar disagreement about the oil for the
Temple. In both cases the mnemonic was the popular proverb,
the wealthy are parsimonious (H ul. 46a; Men. 86a). Among
the most frequent devisors of mnemonics are Rava, R. Papa,
R. Safra, and especially R. Nah man b. Isaac.
The second category of mnemonics (indicated by the
word siman without the suffix) is usually merely a combination of words, each indicating a topic. Sometimes it is possible to make a sentence out of them (e.g., a mnemonic in
H ullin 46b, Date, Red, Dry Scabs may be read as A date,
red and dry with scabs), but sometimes this is quite impossible. These simanim appear to be post-talmudic and were often omitted from the text. In Bava Batra 113a the mnemonic
has been omitted from the printed texts, but the word siman
has been retained, giving rise to the erroneous view that it was
the name of an amora. There was in fact a tendency to ignore
the simanim even if they were printed, a practice of which Isaiah *Horowitz strongly disapproved, insisting that they had a
mystic connotation (Torah she-be-Al Peh, ayin, Shenei Luhot
ha-Berit (Amsterdam, 1698), 407b).
Another type of mnemonic consisted merely of the initial letters of words. The best known example is the mnemonic DeZ a-KH ADa-SH Be-AH a-B for the ten plagues. The
Midrash states that it was engraved on the staff of Moses and
calls it a *notarikon (Ex. R. 5:6), but in the Passover Haggadah it is referred to as simanim. Another example is the
word Ma-NZ e-Pa-Kh for the letters of the alphabet which
have a final form. The Talmud makes a kind of mnemonic of
this mnemonic, seeing in it a reference to the fact that the
398
moab
operated from 1935 to 1940, and from 1945 he was chairman
of Ariane Films.
Among the films he produced were Les parents terribles
(1948), Fanfan la Tulipe (1951), Babette sen va-t-en guerre
(1959), Cartouche (1961), LHomme de Rio (1965), Le Train
(1964), Stavisky (1974), Garde a vue (1981), and La Balance
(1983).
His daughter ARIANE (1939 ) is the founder and main
director of the world-famous theater, Theatre du Soleil (established 1964). Mnouchkine and the actors in her company
most of whom come from academic backgrounds live together in a kind of commune. Their creative activities take
place in a former ammunition warehouse in a Paris suburb
which was put at their disposal in 1972. They renovated the
building and turned it into a theater setting, La Cartouche
de Vincennes.
In 1960 Mnouchkine established the ATEP, the Paris
University Theater. She studied the forms of Oriental theater in Cambodia and Japan in 1962. The Theatre du Soleil
had its initial success with its presentation of The Kitchen by
Arnold Wesker which was given in a Circus Medrano tent.
The world-wide reputation of the theater was gained by its
performance of 1789 in Milan in 1970 and of 1793 in Paris
in 1972. The Mnouchkine formula for total theater includes
physical expression and body language, the use of elements
taken from the circus world, and audience participation. The
performances also demonstrated a politically left-wing outlook on life.
A movie made by the Theatre du Soleil on the life of
Molire was also a great success. In 1984 Mnouchkine participated very successfully in the Los Angeles international
theater festival where the troupe presented three plays by
Shakespeare, Richard II, Henry IV, and Twelfth Night in a Japanese-Oriental adaptation. In 1992 she presented her production of Les Atrides in England.
14t century B.C.E., not long before the Exodus. They were of
Semitic stock, closely akin to the Israelites.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
399
[Gideon Kouts]
moab
It is rich in pasturage and fertile farmland (cf. Num. 32:14).
South of the Arnon, the land of Moab extended over a mountainous plateau, which is suitable for cattle raising; it rises to
approximately 3,750 ft. (1,250 m.) above sea level. The Zered
River (Wd al-H as) marked the border between Moab and
*Edom. Moab was bounded on the west by the Dead Sea and
the southernmost part of the Jordan up to the Nimrin Valley.
The mountains of Abarim and the slopes of Pisgah (Num.
27:12; Deut. 3:17) refer to the steep slopes of the Moabite plateau which descend to the Dead Sea. The Moabite plateau terminates on the east in shelving slopes which descend to the
desert that marked the eastern border of Moab.
Throughout the entire area of Moab, there have been discovered the remains of numerous settlements which existed
from the 13t to the sixth centuries B.C.E. The capital of Moab
was Kir-Hareseth or Kir of Moab (II Kings 3:25; Isa. 15:1, 16:11;
Jer. 48:31, 36), modern Karak, in the heart of Moabite territory
south of the Arnon. However, most of the large settlements
were situated in the fertile tableland (Num. 32; Josh. 13:1627).
Prominent in their importance were: Aroer (Khirbat Arir),
overlooking the fords of the Arnon, Dibon (Dhbn), Ataroth
(Khirbat Attrs), Medeba (Mdab), and Nebo (Muh ayyit).
The topographical conformation of Moab does not favor easy
communications. The many wadis flowing into the Dead Sea
have sawed deep ravines that make passage difficult. Only in
the northern plateau region, in the territory of Medeba, was
there a wide, convenient road, which connected the regions
on both sides of the Jordan. Great importance was attached to
the Kings Highway, the international route which connected
Arabia and Egypt with Syria and Mesopotamia, and of which
a section passed through the Moabite plateau.
The geographical and economic conditions of Moab
made it easy for the Moabites to achieve a suitable blend of
their desert heritage with the values of an urban and rural society; this is to be attributed to Moabs position on the border
of the desert and to its economy, which was based, on the one
hand, upon agriculture, and on the other, upon cattle raising and trade conducted along the desert routes. Living in a
border country, the Moabites, like the Edomites and Ammonites, were in need of effective defense against sudden attacks
by raiders from the desert, as well as against invasion by the
regular armies of neighboring countries. For this reason, the
Moabites organized themselves into a national kingdom administered from a single center at the beginning of their settlement in Moab; only a permanent and strong leadership was
capable of establishing a system of border fortresses, of setting up a permanent force able to match itself against external
dangers, and of organizing guards for protection of the section
of the Kings Highway which passed through Moab. The archaeological survey of Moab and the excavations at Aroer and
Dibon, as well as the epigraphic material, have revealed the
technical skill of the Moabites in the building of strongholds,
watchtowers, walled cities, and installations for collecting
water. They built fortresses along the borders. On the eastern
border, along the edge of the desert, strong and impressive
400
moab
Jo r d a n
R iv e r
Jazer
Beth-Nimrah
Rabbath-Ammon
A M
M O
N
Plains of Abel-Shittim
Moab
Heshbon
Beth-Jeshimoth
Bezer
Nebo
Medeba
Beth-Baal-Meon
Beth-Diblathaim
Bamoth-Baal
Jahaz
Ataroth
U
J
DEAD
Arno
n
R iv e r
Dibon
Aroer
ay
SEA
King's Highw
O
M
Rabbath Moab
Kir of Moab
Nimrin
Zoar
Zere
d
Va
lle
y
Moab in the time of Mesha (9th century B.C.E.). Based on Y. Aharoni, Cartas Atlas of the Bible, Jerusalem, 1964.
401
moab
that had developed between David, a descendant of Ruth the
Moabite, and the king of Moab (I Sam. 22:35). The actions
taken by David against Moab after he had subjugated them
(II Sam. 8:2, I Chron. 18:2), although not sufficiently clarified,
are indicative of the intense enmity that prevailed between
Israel and Moab. David did not abolish the monarchy in Moab
but contented himself with its subjection (II Sam. 8:2; I Chron.
18:2). After the division of Solomons kingdom, Moab came
under the domination of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. As
indicated by the stele of Mesha, king of Moab, it is probable
that a long time before the death of Ahab, the Moabites threw
off the rule of Israel and seized control over areas north of the
Arnon (cf. II Kings 1:1, 3:5). The rise to power of Aram-Damascus immediately after the death of Solomon and its pressure on Israel (I Kings 15:1620), the expedition of *Shishak
against the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and the intense
struggle between the house of Jeroboam son of Nebat and the
house of David, especially in the time of Baasha and Asa, presented an opportunity to throw off the domination of Israel.
The Moabites seized control of the tableland up to Medeba.
Since Mesha called himself king of Moab, the Dibonite, it is
possible that his father, whose name, as far as can be seen, was
Chemoshyatti (?), had already established Dibon as the royal
capital. The period of Moabs independence came to an end
when the political and military situation of Israel improved
under the rule of Omri. Omri took possession of the land of
Medeba, but out of political and military considerations did
not conquer the region of Dibon from Moab. Instead, he imposed his authority on the king of Moab, who resided in Dibon. The subjection continued throughout the days of Omri
and part of the days of his son, apparently Ahab. When the
pressure of the Arameans on Israel in the time of Ahab increased, Mesha withheld tribute from Ahab. The king of Moab
took steps to strengthen his kingdom against the expected attack by the king of Israel. Mesha first secured communications
between the region of Moab south of the Arnon and the region
of Dibon by fortifying Aroer and building roads along the Arnon. He strengthened his city of residence, built an acropolis in it and prepared the city to withstand a protracted siege.
Ahab did not turn his attention to Moab but satisfied himself
with fortifying Jericho (I Kings 16:34), which commanded the
fords of the Jordan. Mesha, who had rebelled against Israel,
chose not to participate in the joint campaign of Aram and
Israel against Shalmaneser III in the year 853 B.C.E. (battle of
*Karkar). Only after the death of Ahab did Mesha find the
time ripe to begin the conquest of the entire tableland. He
conquered Ataroth and the land of Ataroth, inhabited by the
tribe of *Gad, Beth-Diblathaim, and the strong fortress of Jahaz on the border of the desert. He then continued northward,
conquering Medeba and the land of Medeba, together with
the large fortress of Bezer. The capture of Medeba opened the
road to the plains of Moab for the Moabites; Mesha continued in a northwesterly direction to the plains of Moab by way
of Wd al-Har, and seized control of the largest Israelite city
of *Nebo, which he consecrated to Ashtar-Chemosh. Toward
402
moab
latter for the state of affairs in Moab. An Assyrian letter from
Nimrud of the last third of the eighth century B.C.E. mentions a delegation from Moab which came to the city of Calah
(Nimrud) to present a gift of horses to the Assyrian king. The
king of Moab did not heed the words of incitement of Iamani,
king of Ashdod, to rebel against Sargon II in 713 B.C.E. When
Sennacherib conducted a military campaign against H ezekiah
in 701 B.C.E., Chemosh-nadab the Moabite (Kam-mu-suna-ad-bi KUR Ma--ba-ai) came to meet him, bearing many
gifts. In approximately 677 B.C.E., Esarhaddon, king of Assyria, ordered the 22 kings of H atti, the sea coast and within
the sea to drag cedar and pine beams from the mountains of
Lebanon and Sirion to the capital Nineveh in order to build
his palace. Included among these kings is Mus uri, the king of
Moab (Mu-s ur-i ar KUR Ma-a-ab). Ashurbanipal also relates
that 22 kings of the seacoast, of the islands of the sea and of
the mainland, servants subject to me brought him numerous
gifts and accompanied him with their troops on his first expedition to Egypt in 667 B.C.E. It is highly probable that Mus uri
the Moabite was among these kings. An Assyrian list of tribute from the time of Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal states that
the Moabites tendered one gold mina as tribute to Assyria.
The kings of Transjordan bore Assyrian sovereignty without
attempting to throw it off because they were aware that the
Assyrian government, in the prevailing circumstances, was of
greater benefit than harm. The Assyrian government usually
defended loyal vassal kings from neighboring enemies. Danger to the peace of the countries of Transjordan came chiefly
from the inhabitants of the desert, whose pressure on the border countries increased, beginning in the eighth century B.C.E.
From the description of the wars of Ashurbanipal against the
Arabs, it is clear that the Assyrians stationed garrisons along
the border of the desert in order to prevent attempts by the
nomadic tribes to penetrate into the cultivated areas. The Assyrians were interested in strengthening the border countries
against the desert raiders and consequently the former were
included in the defense system of the empire. The defeat of
Amuladi, king of Kedar, by Chemosh-halta, king of Moab (Kama-as-h al-ta-a ar KUR Ma-a-ab), is merely one episode in a
chain of similar events that are no different from that which
occurred 500 years previously, when Hadad son of Bedad the
Edomite defeated the tribes of Midian in the field of Moab
(Gen. 36:35). Furthermore, under the Assyrian rule, the peoples of Transjordan extended the borders of their kingdoms
into areas with an Israelite population, and they enjoyed economic prosperity. The Assyrians managed the defense of the
desert caravan routes that connected Egypt and Arabia with
Syria and Mesopotamia. Echoes of Moabs economic prosperity and of the extent of its territory appear in the prophecies about Moab (Isa. 25:1012; Jer. 48, chiefly verses 7 and 29;
Ezek. 25:9; Zeph. 2:8).
The passage from Assyrian to Babylonian rule did not
involve a great change in the status of the kingdom of Moab.
The king of Moab was apparently numbered with all the
kings of the land of H eth [H atti] who brought tribute to Ne-
403
[Bustanay Oded]
Bibliography: H. Tristram, The Land of Moab (1873); A.H.
Van Zyl, The Moabites (1960); A. Musil, Arabia Petraea, 1 (1907);
Aharoni, Land, index; EM, S.V. (incl. bibl.); N. Glueck, in: AASOR, 14
(1934), 1114; 15 (1935), 1202; 1819 (1939), 1288; 2528 (1951), 1423;
moati, serge
H.L. Ginsberg, in: Alexander Marx Jubilee Volume (1950), 34768; R.E.
Murphy, in: CBQ, 15 (1953), 40917; W.L. Reed and F.V. Winnett, in:
BASOR, 172 (1963), 19; F.V. Winnett and W.L. Reed, in: AASOR, 3637
(1964), 179; W.H. Ward and M.F. Martin, in: ADAJ, 89 (1964), 529;
J. Liver, in: PEQ, 99 (1967), 1431.
MOCATTA, English family of Marrano origin. MOSES MOCATTA (d. 1693), who came from Amsterdam, appears in a Bevis Marks (London) synagogue list in 1671. He was a diamond
broker and merchant. His granddaughter REBECCA married
as her second husband Moses Lumbrozo de Mattos. Their son
ABRAHAM (d. 1751), (who added the name Mocatta and later
dropped Lumbrozo de Mattos) joined with Asher Goldsmid
to found Mocatta and *Goldsmid, later bullion brokers to the
Bank of England, engaging in enormous transactions. Abraham Mocatta had 11 children (including Rachel, mother of Sir
Moses *Montefiore). His son MOSES (17681857) retired early
from business to devote himself to scholarship. He published
Faith Strengthened (1851), a translation of Isaac b. Abraham
*Trokis H izzuk Emunah, and The Inquisition and Judaism
(1845), a translation of a Portuguese inquisitorial sermon and
the reply to it. In communal life, he was especially concerned
with education and the reorganization of the Sephardi schools,
Shaarei Tikvah.
Moses children included DAVID (18061882), an architect, a pupil of Sir John Soane, and best-known for his railway
stations on the London to Brighton line. As architect for his
cousin Sir Moses Montefiore at Ramsgate, he was the first Jew
to design an English synagogue. Another son, ISAAC LINDO
(18181879), wrote tracts on Jewish moral teachings and social
questions. Nine of the 24 founders of the Reform Congregation were Mocattas, including Moses and his nephew Abraham, father of FREDERICK DAVID MOCATTA (18281905).
Philanthropist, scholar, and communal leader, Frederick was
the representative ideal of late Victorian Anglo-Jewry. Active in both the Charity Organization Society and the Jewish
Board of Guardians, he campaigned for the reform of voting charities. Widely traveled, he lectured on contemporary
Jewish communities and wrote on Jewish history, publishing
The Jews and the Inquisition in 1887. A munificent patron of
scholarship, he was a correspondent and supporter of *Zunz.
Sympathetic to most Jewish causes (although disapproving
of nascent Zionism), he was an observant Jew and member
404
modai, H ayyim
1945 to 1947 Moch was minister of public works and between
1946 and 1951 be held important posts in 11 successive cabinets,
serving as minister of the interior, vice premier, and minister of defense. In 1949 he was nominated premier but failed
to secure a majority. Between 1953 and 1960 he served as
French representative at the Geneva disarmament conference. He returned to the Ministry of the Interior in 1958 for
a short period but resigned when General De Gaulle came
to power.
Moch was one of the most respected figures in the French
socialist movement. As a member of the French government
he gave considerable assistance to Jewish refugees, as he took
a keen interest in Zionism. He was an enthusiastic supporter
of Israel, paying several visits, and closely following the development of the Israel labor movement. Among Mochs many
publications were Restitutions et rparations (1921) and La
Russie des Soviets (1925). He also wrote a number of books on
financial questions including Le Parti Socialiste et la politique financire (1928), which were issued as handbooks by the
French Socialist Party to demonstrate their ability to handle
economic affairs.
405
[Moshe Rosetti]
modai, yitzhak
Sefer Torah they expressed opposing views; the correspondence between them continued until 1787.
Bibliography: S. H azan, Ha-Maalot li-Shelomo (1894),
31a32a, 39b; M. Benayahu, R. H ayyim Yosef David Azulai, 1 (Heb.,
1959), 3626; 2 (1959), 4123; I. Ben Zvi, in: Sefunot, 6 (1962), 360,
3813; S. Emmanuel, ibid., 4067, 411, 419; S. Simonsohn, ibid., 334,
3489: Yaari, Sheluh ei, 1301, 4515.
[Josef Horovitz]
MODAI (Madzovitch), YITZHAK (19261998), Israeli politician and businessman, member of the Eighth to Twelfth
Knessets. Modai was born in Tel Aviv. He studied at the
Geulah High School in Tel Aviv, and as a high-school student
joined the Haganah in 1941. He joined the British mandatory
police in 1943. He served in the IDF in 194850 as a field officer and as a staff officer, reaching the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 195153 he served as military attach in London, and
in 1953 headed the Israeli-Syrian and Israeli-Lebanese Mixed
Armistice Commissions. Modai completed his studies in
the Technion in Haifa as a chemical engineer in 1957 and received a law degree from the Tel Aviv branch of the Hebrew
University in 1959. After that he entered the business world,
and in 196177 was director general of the Revlon cosmetics
company in Israel.
Modai joined the *Israel Liberal Party in 1961 and was appointed chairman of its Young Guard in 1962. He was a staunch
supporter of the establishment of *Gah al, and as member of
the Liberal Party executive consistently advocated full unity
with the *H erut Movement. In the course of the Six-Day War
he was appointed military governor of Gaza. In 196973 he
served as member of the Herzliyyah city council. Modai was
elected to the Eighth Knesset in 1973, on the Likud list. Even
though he objected to Israeli withdrawal from the territories,
he expressed support for concessions on the Egyptian front, as
long as Western Erez Israel would not be redivided. In the government formed by Menah em *Begin in June 1977 he was appointed minister of energy and infrastructures, serving also as
minister of communications from January 1979 to December
1980. In May 1980 Modai was elected chairman of the Liberal
Party presidium. In the second government formed by Begin
in August 1981, he was appointed minister without portfolio,
and in October 1982 returned to the Ministry of Energy and
Infrastructures. In the National Unity government formed in
September 1984, Modai was appointed minister of finance.
At first he worked in harmony with Prime Minister Shimon
*Peres, and together they passed the Economic Stabilization
Plan of 1985 that was designed to deal with a three-digit inflation rate and balance of payments difficulties. However, due to
growing tensions in the government, Peres decided to switch
him with Minister of Justice Moshe Nissim. As minister of
justice Modai dealt with the GSS Affair, following the scandal
over the killing of a terrorist that had been taken prisoner. In
July 1986 Modai was forced to resign from the government
after insulting the prime minister. Following the rotation in
the premiership in October, Modai returned to the government as minister without portfolio. In 1984 he was elected
406
modena
Jew; Model served the latter as agent and supplier of silver
for the mint and aided him in revoking an expulsion order
against the Jews of Rothenburg. Model maintained his own
synagogue and cantor in Ansbach. His unsuccessful attempt
to unite the rival Jewish communities of *Fuerth was utilized
by his rival Elkan *Fraenkel, who undermined his position
at court and subjected the Jews to a harsher rule. However,
Fraenkels triumph was short-lived; Models sons inherited
their fathers position and intrigued to bring about the eventual fall of the Fraenkels.
407
Bibliography: S. Haenle, Geschichte der Juden im ehemaligen Fuerstenthum Ansbach (1867); L. Loewenstein, in: JJLG, 8 (1910),
1314; L. Lamm, ibid., 22 (1932), 1529: M. Grunwald, Samuel Oppenheimer (1913), 305; S. Stern, The Court Jew (1950), 100, 193; H. Schnee,
Die Hoffinanz und der moderne Staat, 4 (1963), 2728; D.J. Cohen, in:
Kovez al Yad, 6 pt. 2 (1966), 470, 5145.
modena, angelo
He took part in the Lyon consultation in 1802 and in the Great
Sanhedrin of Paris in 1806. In 1796 he moved to Milan, where
he expanded his entrepreneurial activities and became a public figure, uniting the Jewish communities of Northern Italy.
At the same time, with his brother Salomone, the merchant
Angelo Sanguinetti and the rabbis Buonaventura Modena
and Ishmael Cohen he continued to lead the Modena community. During the Restoration, the ghetto restrictions were
renewed, but the Jews of Modena contributed effectively to
the Italian Risorgimento, collaborating with the Carbonari,
the secret revolutionary movement. Angelo and Emilio Usiglio in particular were among the supporters of Giuseppe
Mazzini. With the arrival of the Piedmontese troupes of the
Savoy in 1859 the Jews of Modena were granted full equality
with the other citizens. Yet the community, which up to the
middle of the 19t century still consisted of about 1,000 Jews,
then began to diminish numerically because of immigration,
mostly to Milan. Devotion to Erez Israel was particularly
strong in Modena in the ghetto period, and later on Zionism
obtained an early foothold there: the monthly LIdea Sionnista
was published in Modena from 1900 to 1910, founded by Professor Carlo Conegliano, of the Faculty of Economics. Moreover in the 1930s, thanks the educational activity of Angelo da
Fano, the Jewish community contributed greatly to the Italian
Zionism movement.
In 1931 the community of Modena had a membership
of 474 Jews. During the Holocaust 70 Jews were deported to
the death camps from the province of Modena, and over 15
Modenese Jews died. Many Jews of Modena participated in
antifascist activities and the Resistenza movement. Angelo
Donati organized the escape of thousands of Jews from Nice
to Palestine; the president of the community, Gino Freidman, was one of the organizers of the rescue of young refugees at Villa Emma. After the war 185 Jews remained in the
community; by 1959 their number had decreased to 150 and
by 2005 to 100, though the main synagogue remained open
and there were regular Sabbath services. In the last quarter
of the 20t century the community president Massimiliano
Eckert (19082004) and Rabbi Adolfo *Lattes (19101995)
did encourage the immigration to Israel of young people and
the maintenance of religious life. In spite of its small number
the Jewish community of Modena is very active in promoting cultural activities on Jewish and Israeli themes and Jewish
education at the primary and secondary levels.
Bibliography: Milano, Bibliotheca, index; Milano, Italia,
index; Roth, Italy, index; A. Balletti, Gli ebrei e gli estensi (19302),
passim; C. Bernheimer, Catalogo dei manuscritti orientali della Biblioteca Estense (1960); J. Vaccari, Villa Emma: un episodio agli albori
della Resistenza modenese nel quadro delle persecuzioni razziste (1960);
Levi Minzi, in: Israel (Feb. 19, 1931); C. Levi, in: Riforma sociale,
4 (1897), 96269; Milano, in: RMI, 11 (1936/37), 45055; Artom,
ibid., 4449. Add. Bibliography: F. Francesconi, A Network
of Families from Modena: Italian Jewish Life between the Renaissance and Modernity (16001810), (Ph.D. thesis, University of Haifa,
2006).
[Ariel Toaff / Federica Francesconi (2nd ed.)]
408
Modena, Leon
which settled in Modena and, after they moved to Bologna
and later Ferrara, retained the surname Modena. His mother,
named Rachel, but renamed Diana by his father, came from an
Ashkenazi family that had resettled in Italy. Leon Modena was
born in Venice but spent his youth in Ferrara, Cologna, and
Montagnana. He studied Bible, rabbinics, Hebrew language,
poetry, letter writing, voice, music, dancing, Italian, and Latin.
At the age of 13, he composed Kinah Shemor, a macaronic
poem, sounding and meaning the same in Hebrew and Italian; translated sections of Ludovico Ariostos Orlando furioso;
and wrote a pastoral dialogue on gambling (1595/6).
In 1590, at the age of 19 after the death of his fiance, his
cousin Esther Simh ah, Modena married her sister Rachel and
received the title of h aver. He wished to embark on a rabbinic
career, so in 1592 he returned to Venice, but the Jewish lay leaders raised the age of ordination to 35 and then 40. Modena,
therefore, had to create his own opportunities for income and
recognition until he was ordained in 1609.
Modena used his skills to serve as a legal clerk for the
leading rabbis of Venice; a teacher of Hebrew and rabbinics
for students of all ages; a popular preacher; a proofreader,
expediter, and author of dedicatory poems in the Venetian
Hebrew publishing industry; author of many Hebrew tombstone epitaphs, including his own; and a letter writer for his
students. He also turned to gambling, a popular form of entertainment in Venice. Indeed, due to both emotional and financial distress, he gambled intermittently, despite his own
better judgment, with both Christians and Jews, for the rest
of his life.
Unable to earn a living in Venice, Modena moved to Ferrara from 1604 to 1607 where he functioned as a rabbi and
taught for a wealthy family. During these years Modena made
a successful presentation concerning Jewish moneylending before the papal legate, sided with most of the rabbis of northern
Italy against the rabbis of Venice in a continuing controversy
over a ritual bath in Rovigo, and supported a major musical
performance in Ferrara that took place in the synagogue on
Friday evening, Tu be-Av. He spent another year abroad in
Florence (160910).
Modena met with and taught Hebrew to many English
and French Christians. One offered him a chair in Oriental
languages in Paris which he refused, probably because he
would have had to convert. Another commissioned him to
write for James I a description of Judaism, the Riti Ebraica, the
first vernacular description of Judaism written by a Jew for a
non-Jewish audience, first published in Paris in 1637 and subsequently republished and translated many times.
In his published books, Modena demonstrated his skills
as an author, teacher, and popularizer of rabbinic teachings.
In Sod Yesharim (1594/5), he prefaced magic tricks, folk remedies, and Jewish riddles to a curriculum of biblical and rabbinic studies to make it attractive to young students. In Z emah
Z addik (1600), he embellished a Hebrew translation of the
most popular Italian book of the period, Fior di Virt, removing Christian references and adding citations from tra-
ditional Jewish sources. In Midbar Yehudah (1602), he translated some of his Italian sermons into Hebrew. In Z eli Esh he
made the first Italian translation of the Passover Haggadah
(1609). In Galut Yehudah (1612), he tried to overcome Church
laws against translating the Bible by providing a translation
of difficult words, to which he later added a rabbinic glossary
as well (1640). In Lev Aryeh (1612), he presented a Hebrew
system of memory improvement, based on those popular in
Venice, as a preface to a work on the 613 commandments of
Judaism. In his play, LEster (1619) he combined the current
dramatic standards with traditional rabbinic sources. To the
anthology Ein Yaakov, the major source for rabbinic materials
in Italy where the Talmud was banned, Modena contributed
an index, Beit Leh em Yehudah (1625); a supplementary collection, Beit Yehudah (1635); and a commentary (Ha-Boneh,
1635). Modenas devotion to rabbinic learning and his educational program found expression in these books.
During his early years as a rabbi in Venice, Modena wrote
some interesting responsa on contemporary Jewish cultural
and legal issues, such as going about bareheaded and playing tennis or traveling by boat on the Sabbath. From his ordination until his death, Modena served as the chief Hebrew
translator for the government and secretary for several organizations, including the Italian synagogue, where he also was
elected cantor. In 1622 he prepared for press the first book
of Hebrew music, Ha-Shirim asher li-Shelomo, by Salamone
Rossi. He ordained candidates for the degrees of h aver and
rabbi, including medical students in Padua, approved the decisions of other rabbis, and authorized books for publication,
with the result that by 1618 he was referred to as a gaon, and
an excellent, well-known, honored and brilliant preacher. By
1627 Modena signed his name first in order among the Venetian rabbis. In 1628 he was maestro di cappella for a Jewish academy of music, Accademia degli Impediti, which was
popular both inside and outside the ghetto..
In 1630, when the leaders of the Jewish community tried
to ban gambling, he published a Hebrew pamphlet in the form
of a rabbinic responsum in which he questioned whether gambling was a sin according to Jewish belief and challenged the
lay leaders authority to issue such a ban without rabbinic approval. But even the rabbis of Venice, on whose behalf he argued, opposed his views.
Modenas most important writings remained unpublished during his lifetime. These included his defenses of
rabbinic Judaism against Jewish critics, Christianity, and
Jewish mysticism. He wrote Shaagat Aryeh (1622) against
Kol Sakhal, an anti-rabbinic work; Magen ve-Z innah (c. 1618),
a response against attacks on rabbinic Judaism; and Diffesa
(1626), a defense of the Talmud against the apostate Sixtus
of Sienna, whose appeal was based in part on his use of Kabbalah.
His critique of recent trends in Jewish mysticism, especially the spread of the new school of Lurianic Kabbalah and
the impact of Christian utilization of Kabbalah on Jewish
apostasy, included a trilogy of works: a tract against reincar-
409
modern, judah
nation, Ben David (1636); a text challenging the authenticity
of the Kabbalah, Ari Noh em (1639); an attack on Christian
Kabbalah, Magen va-H erev (1645, incomplete).
In H ayyei Yehudah, the first full-length Hebrew autobiography, Modena recorded many of the details of his unhappy but productive life. His difficult family life included, in
addition to the death of two infants, the loss of his three
adult sons: Mordecai, who died by inhaling fumes during alchemy experiments; Zebulun, who was murdered by a Jewish
gang over a Jewish woman; and Isaac, whom he banished to
the Levant and who traveled as far as South America. His
main source of solace remained his two daughters: Diana,
who would become the executrix of his estate, and Esther or
Sterella, married to Jacob of La Motta. Modenas intellectual
and spiritual heirs were Dianas first husband, Jacob Halevi,
and Jacobs son, Isaac min Haleviim. After his beloved sonin-law died in the plague of 1629, Diana soon remarried Moses
Saltaro Fano, with whom Modena did not get along, and
who moved away, leaving her father to raise her son. Modena
and his wife, Rachel, quarreled a great deal, especially after
all the family moved out and their health deteriorated. According to the Venetian Ministry of Health she died on March
7, 1648, and he two weeks later. After his death the Italian
congregation made extensive plans for his burial, and he was
eulogized by the Jewish community and by Christian writers abroad.
As Modenas manuscripts were discovered during the 19t
century, they were viewed as attacks on traditional Judaism.
The early proponents of Reform Judaism looked to Modena
as a precursor and, in the same tendentious spirit, those who
wished to undermine the Reform appropriation presented
him as a gambler, a heretic, a hypocrite, or someone racked
by contradictions. Trying to make sense of these complexities, some have sought to identify him as the personification
of the Renaissance Jew or the first modern rabbi. The fact
is, however, that in Italy the Renaissance was over by the time
he lived and to see him as modern is to miss the fact that he
spent much of his life defending traditional medieval rabbinic
authority against attempts by the Jewish laity to limit their coercive power. Indeed, it may be more apt to view Modena as
one of the last medieval rabbis and to see the period in which
he lived as the earliest beginnings of the modern period for
the Jews.
Leon Modenas life, however, is not only an important
example of the struggles of early-modern rabbinic authority
but also of social history. His candid and extensive writings
provide details about the social and economic conditions of
the family, women, and children and about daily life, community, and religion, including the occult, magic amulets, and
especially, Jewish-Christian relations.
netian Rabbi: Leon Modenas Life of Judah, ed. and tr. Mark R. Cohen
(1988); B. Richler, Ketavim bilti Yeduim shel Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh
mi-Modena, in: Asufot, 7 (1992/3), 15772.
[Howard Tzvi Adelman (2nd ed.)]
410
modiin
(A Pedigree, 2005), in which Modiano evokes his conflictladen relationship with his father.
Modiano also wrote childrens books. They include Catherine Certitude (1988) and 28 Paradis (2005), illustrated by his
wife, Dominique Zehrfuss.
[Gideon Kouts / Anny Dayan Rosenman (2nd ed.)]
York he studied at the New School for Social Research, obtaining his Ph.D. in social sciences in 1944. Modigliani taught at
the New School from 1944 to 1949 and was a research consultant to the Cowles Commission at the University of Chicago
from 1949 to 1952. He was a professor at Carnegie Institute of
Technology from 1952 to 1960 and at Northwestern University
from 1960 to 1962. He was on the faculty of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology from 1962, becoming professor emeritus in 1988. He served as president of the American Economic
Association in 1976.
Modiglianis research work focused on the analysis of
household savings, wherein he determined that people save
towards retirement rather than amass money to be left as inheritance for the next generation, and on the different types
of national pension programs and their effects. He also was
highly influential in the area of corporate finance by directing
attention to the fact that future earnings of a company serve
to determine stock market values. The Nobel Prize in economic science for 1985 was awarded to him for his pioneering analyses of saving and financial markets, for work that he
published in the second half of the 1950s.
Modiglianis autobiography is entitled Adventures of an
Economist (2001). His other publications include The Debate over Stabilization Policy (1986); Capital Markets (with F.
Fabozzi, 1992); Foundations of Financial Markets and Institutions (with F. Fabozzi and M. Ferri, 1994); and Rethinking Pension Reform (with A. Muralidhar, 2004).
[Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
MODIGLIANI, FRANCO (19182003), economist and Nobel Prize laureate. Modigliani was born in Rome. After earning
a law degree at the University of Rome, he escaped the Fascist
regime in Italy and moved to the United States in 1939. In New
MODIIN (Heb.
, , or Modiim), town or village in the toparchy of Lydda, the family home of Mattathias
the Maccabean and of his Hasmonean descendants; here the
Maccabean revolt broke out (I Macc. 2:1, 15, 23; cf. Jos., Ant.
1213). Nothing much is said in the sources about the place,
411
modon
its size and situation. Although the rebels were soon forced to
evacuate the village, they were able to bury their dead there
(I Macc. 2:70, 9:1821, 13:2530). Simeon the Hasmonean
eventually built a splendid mausoleum at Modiin, which
was adorned with seven pyramids and high columns with
sculptures of ships that were said to be visible from the sea
(I Macc. 13:2530; Jos., Ant. 13:21011). In the time of Jonathan, Modiin passed into Jewish possession with the rest
of the toparchy of Lydda. An important battle was undertaken against the Seleucid Kendebaois from a camp situated
close to Modiin. Judas Maccabaeus is mentioned as having
marched out of Modiin in order to fight Seleucid forces sent
against him by Antiochus V (II Macc. 13:14ff.), suggesting that
the town was unfortified (but some historians, notably Longstaff, have cast doubt on the veracity of this story). John and
Judah, the sons of Simeon, camped close to Modiin before
the battle of Kidron (I Macc. 16:4). In the Mishnah, it is described as a town on the border of Judah (Pes. 9:2; H ag. 3:5).
It was the home town of R. Eleazar of Modiin, a close relative of Bar Kokhba and perhaps identical with Eleazar the
high priest, who appears on coins of the Second Jewish War.
R. *Eleazar was put to death in 135 C.E. on grounds of treason.
Another teacher associated with Modiin is Rabbi Yossi, but details regarding this person and his teachings are sparse. In the
Onomasticon (132:16) of *Eusebius Pamphili (c. 260339 C.E.)
and on the Madaba mosaic map (mid-sixth century), it is located east of Lydda. The whereabouts of Modiin the village/
town and burial-place of the Maccabean family is a subject
that has intrigued pilgrims and travelers since the 12t century
when the Crusaders identified it at the site of Belmont, next
to present-day kibbutz Z ova, west of Jerusalem, a mistake
that was maintained until the 19t century by visitors to the
region. E. Robinson (1852), however, suggested that Modiin
should be identified at Latrun on the grounds of its position
and elevation. In the mid-19t century, considerable efforts
were made by scholars (notably E. Forner, Ch. Sandreckzi, V.
Gurin, C.R. Conder and Ch. Clermont-Ganneau) to identify
Modiin at Khirbet el-Midya and Sheikh al-Gharbw, about
7 mi. (12 km.) east of Lydda in the northern Shephelah, but
the famous Tombs of the Maccabees seen there today are
mostly of Byzantine date. During an archaeological project
conducted by S. Gibson and E. Lass in the area of the modern city of Modiin from 1995 to 1999, a proposal was put forward to identify ancient Modiin at Horvat Titora (Khirbet
el-Burj) as a result of the finds made there from the Iron Age,
Hellenistic and Early Roman periods, including large numbers of subterranean hideaways from the Bar Kokhba period.
More recently, Khirbet Umm el-Umdan, which is the site of
an Early-Roman period village with a public building (perhaps a synagogue), excavated by S. Weksler-Bdolach and A.
Onn, has also been proposed as the site of Modiin. To sum
up: unless an inscription were to be found at one of these
sites, the exact location of Modiin will apparently always remain a mystery.
[Michael Avi-Yonah / Shimon Gibson (2nd ed.)]
412
moed katan
don, and it became of importance during the Venetian rule.
Four travelers in the late 15t century recorded details about
this Jewish community ruled by the Venetians (12061500). In
1481 Meshullam of Volterra found 300 Jewish families in Modon in a ghetto on the outskirts of the city engaged in trade
and handicrafts. Jews were engaged in the silk and tanning
industries, as well as the maritime trade. Jews were excluded
from citizenship and obliged to provide an executioner, as in
other Venetian colonies. Jewish men and women had to perform forced labor. Modon fell to the Turks in 1501, whereupon
many exiles from Spain settled there. Venice demanded an
exorbitant sum from its Jewish population. In the assault on
the town in 1531 by the Knights of Malta, Jewish captives were
presumed to have been among those non-Christians carried
off by the invaders. The Jewish community ceased to exist after the Venetian-Turkish war of 1646.
Bibliography: J. Starr, Romania (1949), 6372.
[Simon Marcus]
MOED (Heb. ) , the second of the six orders of the Mishnah according to the accepted order established by *Simeon b.
Lakish. He interpreted the verse (Isa. 33:6), and the stability
of thy times shall be a hoard of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge such that stability refers to the order Zeraim, thy
times to the order Moed (Shab. 31a, et al.). In the order
given by R. Tanh um, however, it is the fourth (Num. R. 13:15).
Moed treats comprehensively of the Sabbath and the festivals
of the Jewish calendar, but it includes tractates *Eruvin, which
MOED KATAN (Heb. ; small festival), 11t tractate in the Mishnah order of Moed, concerned mainly with
*h ol ha-moed (the intermediate days of the festivals of *Passover and *Sukkot). The original name of this tractate seems
to have been Moed (TJ, MK, 2:5, 81b), and in fact, throughout
this tractate, the intermediate days are referred to as Moed and
not as h ol ha-moed. To distinguish the tractate *Moed from
the mishnaic order of that name, the former was sometimes
referred to as Mashkin (Lev. R. 34:4), its opening word. The
present designation, Moed Katan, prevailed to distinguish the
tractate from its order.
While the Scripture does not explicitly forbid work on
h ol ha-moed, Leviticus 23:37, speaking of the daily festival
sacrifices, includes the intermediate days of the festival in
the term holy convocation and on account of this h ol hamoed is considered as semi-festival, days on which certain kinds of work (and as a rule all unnecessary work) are
forbidden. Chapter 1 of the tractate discusses a great variety of activities (e.g., agriculture, burial, marriage, sowing,
repairs) which in certain circumstances may be allowed on
h ol ha-moed.
413
Bibliography: M.S. Geshuri (ed.), La-H asidim Mizmor (1936); idem, Neginah va-H asidut be-Veit Kuzmir u-Venoteha
(1952).
[Avraham Rubinstein]
MOELLIN, JACOB BEN MOSES (1360?1427), usually referred to as Maharil (Morenu ha-Rav Jacob ha-Levi) and also
as Mahari Segal and Mahari Molin), the foremost talmudist
of his generation and head of the Jewish communities of Germany, Austria, and Bohemia. Born in Mainz, Jacob was taught
by his father, one of its leading rabbis, and then proceeded to
Austria, where he studied under Meir ha-Levi and Shalom b.
Isaac, who ordained him rabbi with the title morenu. Summoned to Mainz while still young to succeed his father who
had died in 1387, Jacob founded a yeshivah there to which
many students streamed. The students lived in his house and
were supported by the means provided for him by the leaders of the country (Sefer Maharil). From this yeshivah came
the greatest rabbis of Germany and Austria of the next generation, among them Jacob *Weil.
Moellin became famous throughout Europe. While he
was still young, halakhic problems were addressed to him
since from your mouth Torah goes forth to all Israel (Maharil, resp. no. 148). He was also regarded as the leader of the
people in that troubled period. During the Hussite wars and
the strengthening of Catholic reaction various communities
turned to him for help. On this occasion he decreed a threeday fast upon the whole community, even upon sucklings,
and also took the matter up with the government, with successful results. His rulings, together with those of Israel *Isserlein, serve as the foundation of all the traditions which were
414
kept in German Jewry. In his decisions Moellin took prevailing conditions into consideration, and when a matter which
affected the economic position of the community came before
him, he assembled the scholars and investigated the matter
until he found a favorable solution. When he felt he had been
too strict, he excused himself saying, I have been very strict
with you because you are without a rabbi (resp. no. 26). He
attacked rabbis who bought rabbinical positions which they
were unqualified to fill (Jacob Weil, Dinim ve-Halakhot, no.
68, Kapust ed. (1834), 59b), and protested against the neglect
of Torah study and against the widespread practice of giving
decisions based on abridged halakhic works. In his sermons
he placed particular emphasis upon the mitzvah of charity, and
he was keenly solicitous of the honor of the poor.
Moellin also occupied himself with astronomy and applied himself to the solution of astronomical problems with
the aid of instruments, and the study of the astronomical work
Shesh Kenafayim of Immanuel b. Jacob *Bonfils. Jacob was
well-versed in the different German dialects and composed
Hebrew rhymed verse (in Ms.) and piyyutim (Joseph b. Moses,
Leket Yosher, ed. by J. Freimann, 1 (1903), 50). Though, like all
the rabbis of Germany, he shunned philosophy, he acted with
a degree of tolerance toward those who, attracted by it, had
strayed in matters of belief. He declared valid the sheh itah of
one who accepted resurrection only as a traditional belief,
but denied that there was a biblical basis for it, even declaring that though his sin is too great to be tolerated, he is not
under suspicion of deliberately transgressing the Torah (resp.
no. 194, p. 64ab).
Moellin was renowned as a h azzan and his activities
left a lasting influence on the Ashkenazi tradition. His opinion that traditional tunes should not be changed was a constantly stabilizing factor. The so-called Niggunei Maharil, attributed to him (or at least thought to have been sanctioned
by him) were in use in the Mainz community until modern
times (see Idelsohn, Music, 170, 177, 206, 456, and see *MiSinai melodies).
His known works are (1) Minhagei Maharil (Sefer Maharil, first published in Sabionetta, 1556), compiled by his pupil
Zalman of St. Goar who for many years noted down his halakhic statements, customs and, in particular, the explanations
he heard from him. Through the efforts of various copyists, the
work enjoyed wide circulation. Most of the customs noted in it
were included by Moses Isserles in his glosses to the Shulh an
Arukh; (2) Responsa, some copied and arranged by Eleazar b.
Jacob and published for the first time in Venice in 1549. A far
more complete collection has been preserved in manuscript
(Margoliouth, Cat. No. 575). The printed editions of the Maharil are full of errors, apparently having been published from
a corrupt copy. Moellin died in Worms.
Bibliography: G. Steiman, Custom and Survival A Study of
the Life and Work of R. Jacob Molin (1963); G. Polak, Halikhot Kedem
(1846), 7986; Guedemann, Gesch Erz, 3 (1888), 1720; D. Kaufmann,
in: MGWJ, 42 (1898), 2239; Weiss, Dor, 5 (19044), 81f., 23942; Joseph
b. Moses, Leket Yosher, ed. by J. Freimann, 2 (1904), XXXV, 132; Fin-
mogador
kelstein, Middle Ages, index, S.V. Maharil; L. Rosenthal, in: MGWJ,
71 (1927), 3647; J.J. (L.) Greenwald (Grunwald), Maharil u-Zemanno
(1944); M.S. Geshuri, in: Sinai, 13 (1943/44), 31749; Hacohen, ibid.,
57 (1965), 1337.
[Ephraim Kupfer]
415
mogilev
were recruited by the sultan to take charge of developing trade
activity and relations in Mogador vis--vis Europe.
The sultan chose 10 or 12 of them, especially from the
Corcos, Afriat, Coriat, Knafo, Pinto, and Elmaleh families,
for the task and granted them the status of tujjr al-sultn (the
kings merchants). In sharp contrast to ordinary Jews who
dwelt in the cramped Jewish *ghetto (*mellah), the sultanate
offered them the most luxurious dwellings of Mogador within
the more prestigious casbah quarter. They not only became the
leading merchants of the sultans court parallel to a tiny elite
of Muslim tujjr but were entrusted with the role of mediation and diplomacy with European consuls and entrepreneurs.
Not only were they influential in Moroccan economic affairs,
but their functions extended to include the leadership of the
local Jewish community. From their ranks the Jews chose the
tujjr as presidents, vice presidents, and treasurers. The extraordinary and privileged Jewish tujjr elite controlled all of
the major imports of Mogador and other Moroccan trade centers where their influence was gradually extended. These included sugar, tea, metals, gunpowder, and tobacco. The tujjr
also managed such vital exports as wheat, hides, cereals, and
wool, items which became government monopolies at the time,
resulting from the makhzans fears of the political and social
consequences of European penetration. Some tujjr were in
fact dispatched by the Palace to European trade centers as economic attachs and were given interest-free loans to undertake
major trade transactions and augment the sultans profits. Unlike the rest of the Jews, they were not required to pay the traditional poll-tax (jizya) commonly imposed on non-Muslim
minorities throughout the Muslim world, and they received
full protection legal and political from the makhzan (Moroccan government) from those in Muslim society who sought
to harass or undermine them. The tujjr declined in influence
after the 1890s with the aggressive penetration of the European
powers into the Sharifian Empire of Morocco. By the early part
of the 20t century, and certainly following the formation of the
French protectorate (1912), they disappeared from the scene.
A new elite of Jewish entrepreneurs, recruited by the French,
Spaniards, Italians, and British commercial houses replaced
them, as did foreign merchants who settled in Mogador and
other parts of the country, controlling commerce until Moroccan independence in 1956.
Spiritually and religiously, the Mogador community was
led over the years by the old established rabbis and *dayyanim
such as Abraham Coriat, Abraham b. Attar, Masud Knafo,
and Haim Pinto. Mogador Jewry was relatively well educated.
Their musicians were renowned throughout Morocco. The
town had exceptionally beautiful synagogues, with the community being dotted by numerous battei midrash and yeshivot.
As British influence in Mogador became particularly dominant from the 18t century, English schools flourished there,
including those of the London-based Anglo-Jewish Association and the Board of Deputies for British Jewry. The schools
helped spread the English language and culture among the
Jews. The French-based *Alliance Isralite Universelle also
opened schools for boys and girls in Mogador. As British influence declined in the town after 1912, the Alliance schools
and those of the Protectorate, which propagated French influences, emerged supreme and oriented local Jews toward
new cultural currents. By the mid-1950s, on the eve of largescale Jewish immigration to Israel and the West, most young
men and women spoke French in addition to the Moroccan
Judeo-Arabic dialect.
During the 19t century the Jewish population grew from
4,000 in the 1830s and 1840s to approximately 12,000 in 1912,
only to decline to 6,150 in 1936 and to once again rise slightly
to 6,500 in 1951. This is attributed to the decline of commerce
and other economic activity during the French Protectorate
era in Mogador (and other inland or coastal cities which in
the past enjoyed prosperity) in favor of Casablanca and Agadir. The immigration trends of the 1950s and 1960s caused the
Mogador community to dwindle. Once Moroccos most important commercial seaport, a phenomenon largely attributed
to Jewish initiatives, Mogador became a sleepy and relatively
unimportant town. In the early 1970s most of its Jewish community members resided in the Americas, Europe, and Israel.
By 2005, the community had all but disappeared.
416
mogilev
lodgings. This too was confirmed by King Ladislaus IV. When
Mogilev was occupied by the invading Russian armies in 1654,
on the request of the townspeople Czar Alexis Mikhailovich
ordered the expulsion of the Jews. Their houses were to be
shared equally between the municipality and the Russians.
The order was not immediately carried out, but as the Polish
army approached Mogilev in 1655, the Russian commander
drove the Jews out of the town and ordered their massacre.
Those Jews who remained became apostates. After the end of
the war the community was renewed and most of the apostates
returned to Judaism. In 1656 John II Casimir granted letters
patent to the town, according to which the Jews were forbidden to live within the walls of the city and to build houses or
maintain shops there. There was a *blood libel in Mogilev in
1692. In 1736 King Augustus III confirmed the earlier letters
patent of John II Casimir, adding further anti-Jewish restrictions. Restrictive orders on settlement and occupations were
later reissued, but were not applied in practice.
In spite of opposition, the community continued to develop. By 1692 there were two synagogues. In 1748 the municipality reprimanded the townspeople because they themselves had helped the Jews to settle in the center of the town
and to engage in commerce. In 1766, 642 poll tax paying Jews
were registered within the community of Mogilev and the
surrounding villages. In the *Councils of the Lands Mogilev was subordinated to *Brest-Litovsk, and a few gatherings
of the Council were held in Mogilev. The community developed to a considerable extent after Mogilev was annexed by
Russia. The Jews of the annexed region were granted judicial
autonomy, and the community of Mogilev was designated as
the central community of the whole province, its bet din being given authority to hear appeals against the legal decisions
of the provinces communities. The Jews played a principal
role in Mogilevs extensive trade with Riga, Memel, Koenigsberg, and Danzig (*Gdansk), and later with southern Russia.
In 1847 there were 7,897 Jews registered in Mogilev. The Jews
were greatly influenced by *Chabad H asidism, but by the end
of the 18t century there were several maskilim among the
wealthy merchants. In 1783 one of them, Jacob Hirsch, addressed a memorandum to the Russian government in which
he suggested that the h adarim and talmud torah schools in
both the district of Mogilev and the town itself be converted
into schools where secular studies would also be taught. During the 1860s and early 1870s Pavel (Pesah ) *Axelrod, who had
studied at the local secondary school and later spread the ideas
of the Haskalah among Jewish youth, lived in Mogilev. In 1870
the *Malbim (Meir Leib b. Jehiel Michael) was invited to become rabbi of Mogilev, but was soon compelled to leave the
town after the maskilim denounced him to the authorities as
disloyal to Russia. In 1897 there were 21,539 Jews in Mogilev
(about 50 of the total population). In October 1904 pogroms
were initiated by soldiers mobilized for the war against Japan.
Mogilev was one of the important centers of the *Bund and of
the Zionist Movement. Jews owned 219 small factories, where
667 workers were engaged, and also the 93 distilleries (except
417
mogilev-podolski
Bibliography: Belkind, in: Keneset Yisrael, 1 (1886),
699704; Dubnow, in: Pardes, 3 (1896), 94100; Darin-Drabkin,
in: Haaretz (Dec. 6, 1963); Mstislavskiy, in: Voskhod (Sept. 110,
Oct. 116, Dec. 18, 1886); P.B. Axelrod, Perezhitoye i peredumanoye
(1923), 3367.
[Yehuda Slutsky]
writing career as a literary journalist. A man of great versatility who wrote poetry and Hungarian and German prose, he
was outstanding as a translator and was instrumental in gaining a world public for Hungarian literature. His best work was
a literary biography of Imre Madch (182364), author of the
dramatic poem Az ember tragdija (The Tragedy of Man),
of which Mohcsi also made a complete German translation (19044). He translated such classics of Hungarian drama
as Bnk Bn, a historical play by Jzsef Katona (17911830),
and Csongor s Tnde, a fairy tale by Mihly Vrsmarty
(18001855). His original works include Heged s koldusbot
(A Violin and a Beggars Staff, 1942); Madch (1935), a playlet; and Gemma, Dante Hitvese (Gemma, Dantes Wife, 1944).
Mohcsi was secretary of the Judah Halevi Society for the dissemination of Hebrew literature and wrote a book about the
poet (1941). Together with many other Jewish journalists he
was arrested by the Nazis in 1944 and scheduled for deportation. His exemption certificate, signed by the regent of Hungary, Admiral Horthy, never reached him, and he died during transport.
Bibliography: Magyar Irodalmi Lexikon, 2 (1965), 259.
[Baruch Yaron]
MOHCSI, JEN (18861944), Hungarian author and translator. Born in Mohcs, Mohcsi studied law and began his
418
moholy-nagy, lszl
coming from Russia (*Ekron). He then influenced Jews in
Bialystok and its surroundings to settle in *Petah Tikvah. In
1883 he was chosen as rabbi of Bialystok under an agreement
with the members of the community that he be allowed to devote himself to his public activities several months a year. Mohilewer was the honorary president of the *Kattowitz Conference of H ovevei Zion (1884). His speech at the closing session
of the conference on the Dry Bones (Ezek. 37) served as a
foundation for the sermons of the preachers of H ibbat Zion
and of Zionism for the following years. In 1888 he joined I.E.
*Spektor, M. *Eliasberg, and others who allowed the farmers
to work the fields during the shemittah year in the Jewish settlements in Erez Israel. He chaired the H ovevei Zion conferences in Druskininkai (1887) and in Vilna (1889) and struggled
for the influence of the Orthodox circles in the movement.
Through his influence a board of rabbis was chosen to ensure
that the settlement work in Erez Israel was carried out in a
traditional Jewish spirit.
In 1890 Mohilewer was among the first speakers at the
Odessa founding assembly of The Society in Support of Jewish Farmers and Artisans in Syria and Palestine (the official
name of the Odessa Committee of H ovevei Zion). After the
meeting he headed a H ovevei Zion group on a tour of Erez
Israel and, upon his return, published his open letter titled
The Purpose of My Trip to the Holy Land, in which he called
upon H ovevei Zion to work physically and financially for the
sake of Erez Israel. At a gathering of H ovevei Zion in Druskininkai (1893), it was decided, at Mohilewers initiative, to
establish a Spiritual Center (Merkaz Ruh ani *Mizrachi) for
the movement to direct public relations activities and explain
ideas connected with the settlement of Erez Israel. It was also
decided to plant a citron orchard on land adjoining H aderah
and to name it Gan Shemuel, in honor of Mohilewers 70t
birthday. Mohilewer and his close associates continued in their
propaganda work, especially among the Orthodox Jews, and
the Mizrachi became the foundation for the development of
the religious Zionist movement, which four years after Mohilewers death became a faction in the Zionist Organization
(assuming officially the name Mizrachi).
Mohilewer joined the World Zionist Organization when
it was founded by *Herzl, but because of his physical weakness
he was not able to participate in the First Congress in 1897. His
letter was read to the delegates, however, and created a great
impression upon them. He was chosen as one of the four leaders who were charged with directing the work of the Zionist
Movement in Russia and as the head of its spiritual center
which disseminated directives to the members in their work.
In his last letter before his death, Mohilewer called upon the
Jews of Russia to support the *Jewish Colonial Trust. The basic goals in his public relations work were the attainment of
a deep attachment to the commandment to settle Erez Israel,
which is the foundation of the existence of our people; and
tolerance toward the maskilim as a prerequisite to the unity
of the Jewish people, which was necessary for the rebuilding
of the Jewish homeland.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
419
420
read avidly, showing a literary talent at an early age and becoming a prolific writer of verse. She frequently contributed
poems to the Charleston Courier which were on a variety of
subjects, many on current events. She also wrote for the leading papers and periodicals of her day. In 1833 she published
a small volume of her poems, Fancys Sketch Book. She was
admired by Charlestons antebellum writers. A devout Jew,
she was superintendent of Beth Elohim Congregations Sunday school and was the author of the first American Jewish
hymnal. When the congregation installed the first American
synagogue organ in 1841, she composed hymns for the organ
service. A book of her hymns was published by Beth Elohim;
later editions were used by other Reform temples. Many are
still found in the Union Hymnal of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. They are notable for a spirit of submission to the will of God. In her sixties Penina Mose gradually
became blind, but, with rare courage, she continued to write,
using her niece as an amanuensis. She was widely known as
Charlestons blind poetess. Reduced to poverty after the Civil
War, she, her sister, and niece eked out a modest living with a
small private girls school, in which she gave oral instruction
by drawing on her remarkable memory. Her warmth and sympathy made her a favorite confidante of youth. Her hymns and
poetry were published, as Secular and Religious Works (1911).
She never married.
Bibliography: B.A. Elzas, Jews of South Carolina (1905),
1814; S.A. Dinkins, in: American Jews Annual, 5646 (1885/86), ch.
5.
[Thomas J. Tobias]
421
moiseiwitsch, benno
as the American 19t century painter Rembrandt Peale. John
Freeland commissioned the artist to paint a portrait of the
senator and orator Henry Clay the year of Moses arrival in
New Orleans. Moses painting of General Jackson on horseback (1815, City Hall, New Orleans) took a $1,000 prize for its
accurate likeness of the general. When the portrait was cleaned
in 1844, the signature Amans and Mose was revealed; historians speculate that Mose painted the horse, while Amans
depicted General Jackson. Other portraits by Mose include
Mordecai Cohen and Governor Herbert (State Library, New
Orleans). The Court House of New Orleans contains many
portraits of judges by Mose, as well as Life on the Metairie,
which he completed in collaboration with Victor Pierson. Depicting portraits of 44 distinguished citizens of New Orleans
at the last meeting of the old Metairie Race Track, this painting won Grand State-Fair First Prize in 1868 for best historical
painting. The New Orleans Court House also houses a massive
painting by Mose which depicts portraits of 64 members of
the Volunteer Fire Brigade marching in the citys Canal Street.
Mose attained the rank of major in the Confederate Army.
He participated in the defense of the lower Mississippi during
the Civil War by helping to deploy floating fire rafts to repel
the Federal fleet. Works by Mose are owned by private collectors, as well as by the Filson Historical Society in Louisville,
Kentucky, the Louisiana State Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, and the S.J.
Schwartz Historical Collection in Maison Blanche, Louisiana,
among other museums and public buildings.
Bibliography: H. Mose, The Moise Family of South Carolina and Their Descendants (1961); C. Roth, (ed.), Jewish Art: An Illustrated History (rev. ed. by Bezalel Narkiss, 1971); P.B. Schmit (ed.),
Encyclopaedia of New Orleans Artists, 17181918 (1987).
[Nancy Buchwald (2nd ed.)]
MOISSAN, HENRI (18521907), French inorganic chemist and Nobel Prize winner. Moissan was born in Paris of a
422
molcho, solomon
MOJECKI, PRZECLAW (second half of 16t and early 17t
century), Polish Catholic priest and antisemitic author. His
principle work, O zydowskich okruciestwach, mordach y zabobonach (The Cruelty, Murders, and Superstitions of the
Jews), was the first outright attack on the Jews and Judaism
in Polish political writings. The pamphlet, which first appeared
in Cracow in 1589 and was later printed in 1598 (Cracow) and
in 1636 (Lvov), was dedicated to Prince Janusz Ostrogski a
newly converted Catholic in the hope of convincing him to
support the expulsion of the Jews from Poland. The author
gives 25 stories of *blood libels from various countries and
nine from Poland. Mojecki complains that Jewish trade finally
results in the depletion of the countrys resources in waste and
corruption because of the encouragement of luxury, and that
the Jews are not under the jurisdiction of the authorities of the
towns in which they live. Moreover, Mojecki is of the opinion that the Jews are traitors to Poland and spy for the Turks,
the Tatars, and the rulers of Moscow. The author attempts to
convince his readers that God rewards those who persecute
and expel the Jews and commends the measures adopted by
the kingdoms of France, Spain, and Germany toward the Jews.
This work, which was influenced by German and Italian antisemitic literature, was influential in the propagation of antisemitic ideas in Polish literature of the 17t century.
Bibliography: K. Bartoszewicz, Antysemityzm w literaturze
polskiej XVXVII w. (1914), 4050; S. Dubnow, Divrei Yemei Am Olam,
6 (19586), 1612.
[Arthur Cygielman]
MOLADAH (Heb. ) , city in the Negev of Judah, described in Joshua 19:2 and I Chronicles 4:28 as a town of the
tribe of Simeon, and in Joshua 15:26 as a town of the tribe of
Judah in the Negev, near Beer-Sheba. It is among the cities
listed in Nehemiah 11:26, apparently settlements which endured through the Babylonian Exile. The commonly proposed
identification with the Malatha of Josephus (Ant., 18:147) and
the Malaatha of Eusebius (Onom. 14:3; 88:4; 108:3) is baseless.
Khirbat al-Watan, approximately 8 mi. (13 km.) east of Beersheba, has been suggested as a possible identification. Pottery
found on the site dates from the Iron Age. The Arabic name
may be a translation of the Hebrew (both Ar. wat en and Heb.
moladah; birthplace).
Bibliography: Abel, Geog, 2 (1938), 3912; EM, S.V. (incl.
bibl.); Press, Erez , S.V.; Avi-Yonah, Geog, index.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
MOLCHO, SOLOMON (c. 15001532), kabbalist and pseudomessiah. Born in Lisbon of Marrano parents, he was originally
called Diogo Pires. Though details on his early life are scarce, it
is clear that he received a secular education and, at the age of
21, was appointed secretary to the kings council and recorder
at the court of appeals. It is probable that Molcho secretly
423
moldova
studied the Kabbalah. On meeting David *Reuveni after the
latters arrival in Portugal in 1525, he asked to be circumcised.
Reuveni dissuaded him but, undeterred, Molcho circumcised
himself and took a Hebrew name. While the symbolic meaning of the name is obscure, some scholarly opinion takes it
as referring to Molchos spiritual kinship with Reuveni (the
name Molcho deriving from the Hebrew melekh = king).
Reuveni suggested to Molcho that he flee, while he himself
was forced to leave Portugal because of the suspicion that he
had had a part in Molchos conversion. The details of Molchos
flight are uncertain. Reuveni later claimed that he had sent
him on a mysterious diplomatic mission to *Turkey; Molcho himself stated that a divine command had directed his
departure. His destination is also somewhat obscure. There
are those who claim that he spent some time in Italy, *Jerusalem, *Safed, *Damascus, and even Constantinople. All authorities agree, however, that he settled for a period in *Salonika where he studied Kabbalah in the bet ha-midrash of
Joseph *Taitaz ak. There he probably met R. Joseph b. Ephraim
*Caro, whose writings reflect his admiration for Molcho.
In Salonika Molcho gathered disciples and students who
prevailed upon him to publish a collection of his sermons
which are filled with expectation of coming redemption,
Derashot (Salonika, 1529). In later editions the work is entitled
Sefer ha-Mefoar. In the sack of Rome in 1527 he saw the signs
of the coming redemption, and returned to Italy in 1529 and
began to preach about it in Ancona. His sermons attracted
many people, including Christians. The accusations of an informer that he was a Marrano who had reverted to Judaism
caused him to flee to Pesaro and eventually to Rome. By then
Molcho had become convinced that he was indeed the Messiah. In fulfillment of the talmudic legend (Sanh. 98a) that
recounted the suffering of the Messiah, Molcho, dressed as a
beggar, sat for 30 days, tasting no meat or wine, among the
sick and the infirm on a bridge over the Tiber by the popes
palace.
Molcho succeeded in gaining the confidence of Pope
*Clement VII, who granted him protection (1530). His standing was further strengthened when his prophecies of a flood
in Rome (1530) and an earthquake in Portugal (January 1531)
came true. He preached widely and was successful in preventing the spread of the Inquisition to Portugal. He left Rome for
Venice at the end of 1530 for an unsuccessful meeting with
Reuveni. Attempting to mediate in a dispute between Jacob
*Mantino, the popes physician, and Elijah H alfon, kabbalist
and physician, Molcho succeeded only in arousing the enmity
of Mantino. Molcho fled to Rome and a friendlier atmosphere,
but Mantino, seeing danger in Molchos activities, followed
him and intrigued against him. Molcho was accused by an
inquisitional court of judaizing and was condemned to be
burned at the stake. He was saved by the personal intervention of the pope, and another man was burned in his place.
In 1532 Molcho left for northern Italy, where he again met
with Reuveni. Together they went on a mission to Emperor
Charles V who was then at Regensburg. Although the nature
424
MOLHO, ISAAC RAPHAEL (18941976), Greek journalist and Zionist. Molho was born in Salonika, a descendant of
Rabbi Joseph Molho, author of Shulh an Gaviyyah, and Rabbi
Abraham di *Boton, author of Leh em Rav. He studied at the
talmud torah, the Alliance Isralite Universelle, and the Beit
Yosef Rabbinical Seminary in Salonika. In Salonika he was
active in commerce and journalism becoming a partner in
the Recanati firm and founding the newspapers Pro-Israel
(French) and La Renaissanca (Judeo-Spanish). Pro-Israel was
the organ of the Zionist league, Bnai Moshe, which Molho
started with Yitzhak David Cohen and Yitzhak Samuel Amarilio. He also served as librarian and secretary of the Kadima
society, which disseminated the Hebrew language and culture.
While a student at Beit Yosef, he worked as a reporter for the
French daily newspaper La Liberte.
Molho worked to win the support of the French and
the Italian governments as well as the Greek Parliament and
government for the Balfour Declaration. In 1918 he met with
the king of Greece, Alexandros, at the time Allenby conquered Jerusalem, and afterward in Salonika he organized a
Jewish Legion to fight in Erez Israel. In 1919 he emigrated to
Jerusalem.
In Jerusalem he worked as an agent and representative of several film companies. He was manager of the Rainois film company and the Gaumont and Metro Goldwyn
Mayer movie theaters for the entire region from Jerusalem to
Teheran. Molho brought cinema to Baghdad and was elected
chairman of the Film Distributors Union in Erez Israel. He
also helped organize the mass immigration of more than
15,000 Salonikan Jews to Erez Israel, many of whom worked
in fishing or as port workers. In 1924 he met with King Hussein Abu-Ali in Amman.
In Jerusalem, he was one of the founders of the Rehavia
neighborhood, and also served as its chairman and mukhtar.
Also as a member of the Bayit ve-Gan neighborhood committee, he helped found its commercial center.
In Sephardi affairs, he was chairman of the Union of
Sephardi Communities in Israel, and in 1938 he was elected
by the World Zionist Organization executive and Jerusalem
Sephardi Council as the Jerusalem delegate to the Amsterdam gathering of the World Union of Sephardi Communities
and was later elected to the Unions Central Committee in
Paris.
425
MOLE, rodent. The only mole found in Israel is the mole rat
(Spalax ehrenbergi), a small mammal belonging to the order
Rodentia. It is blind, its rudimentary eyes being covered with
a membrane. Inhabiting subterranean burrows which it digs,
it throws up the ground in a continuous series of mounds.
Sometimes it builds a nest in a small mound. Into these burrows, Isaiah prophesied (2:20) a man would cast away his
idols of silver, and his idols of gold to the moles and to the
bats, the biblical word here for moles, h afor perot, denoting a burrower in Aramaic (pina, i.e., burrower). According to another opinion h afor perot refers to an animal which
digs up fruits in the ground. In talmudic literature the mole
rat is called eishut which, because of the damage it causes to
crops, may be hunted also on the intermediate days of a festival (MK 1:4). The word eshet, which occurs in Psalms (58:9)
in a reference to those that have not seen the sun, has been
identified by some with eishut, i.e., mole rats which do not
see the sun but burrow in the ground and live there (Mid.
Ps. to 58:9). In modern Hebrew the mole rat is called h oled,
mentioned among the unclean creeping things (Lev. 11:29).
The biblical h oled, however, is the *rat.
The identification of h afor perot with the mole rat is most
plausible. However, some scholars believe that it is a kind of
bat (cf. Tur-Sinai, in: Leshonenu, no. 26, 77ff.), and S. Lieberman holds that it is the flying fox (which is not found in
Israel) or the fruit bat (cf. Leshonenu, no. 29, 132f.).
Bibliography: Lewysohn, Zool, 101, no. 135; J. Feliks, The
Animal World of the Bible (1962), 43; M. Dor, Leksikon Zoologi (1965),
121.
[Jehuda Feliks]
MOLITOR, FRANZ JOSEPH (17791860), Christian philosopher and kabbalist. Born into a Catholic family at Oberursel, near Frankfurt, Molitor at first studied law. Later he concentrated on research into the philosophy of history and was
deeply influenced by *Schelling. His first book, Ideen zu einer
kuenftigen Dynamik der Geschichte (Frankfurt, 1805), was an
evaluation of the various books of idealistic philosophy. He
pursued this inquiry in his next two books, in which he established Schellings central position, although he criticized
the latters Philosophy and Religion. Molitor moved in liberal
intellectual circles and consequently came into contact with
Jews. He advocated the establishment of the Jewish school at
Frankfurt, later known as the Philanthropin, and was one of its
first teachers. Full of enthusiasm, he joined the *Freemasons
and in 1808 he became a member of their Jewish lodge, Zur
aufgehenden Morgenroethe, which he fought to have recognized. He headed this lodge in 1812, but finally succumbed to
the opposition of the Masonic leaders and closed it in 1816.
426
moloch, cult of
father, Simon Katzau in Babi (Bohemia). They both went to
Palestine in 1933 and in 1934 founded Ata Textile Company at
Kefar Ata. They finally settled in Palestine in 1938. This was the
first integrated cotton, spinning, weaving, dyeing, and finishing plant in the country, manufacturing and retailing readyto-wear clothing and supplying the Allied forces in the Middle
East during World War II. Originally a family business, Ata
became a public company. In 1967 it had 1,861 employees. In
1948 a subsidiary company, Kurdaneh Textile Works Ltd., was
founded. Erich left Ata in 1949 to build Moller Textile Ltd.,
a spinning, twisting, and dyeing plant in Nahariyyah. Both
plants made major contributions to Israel export.
but immigrated to the U.S. in 1940. His last major work was
the autobiographical titrs a szmzetshen (1958; appeared
in English as Companion in Exile, 1950).
Bibliography: B. Halmi, Molnr Ferenc (Hung., 1929);
Magyar Irodalmi Lexicon, 2 (1965), 2636; S.J. Kunitz and H. Haycroft
(eds.), Twentieth Century Authors (1942), 970f.
[Baruch Yaron]
MOLNR, FERENC (originally Neumann, 18781952), Hungarian playwright and novelist. Born in Budapest, Molnrs
first novel, Az hes vros (The Hungry City, 1900) was a historical picture of Budapest, and particularly of its Jewish quarter. The childrens story, A Pl utcai fik (1907; The Paul Street
Boys, 1927), was Molnrs outstanding work. Another of his
social novels, Andor (19182), symbolized the young Jewish intellectual destroyed by the defects of his own character. During
World War I Molnr was a war correspondent, and some of his
experiences appeared in his Egy haditudsto emlekei (Memoirs of a War Correspondent, 1916). In Molnrs books, which
brilliantly expose contemporary Hungarian social problems,
the central figure is always a weak-willed Jew who makes himself ridiculous by trying to imitate his surroundings.
It was as a dramatist that Molnr was most distinguished.
His witty dialogue owes much to Oscar Wilde. His ideas are
sometimes fantastic, but never ridiculous. His first play was
A doktor r (The Lawyer, 1902). He achieved world fame
with Az rdg (1907; The Devil, 1908); the tragicomedy Liliom (1909; Eng. vers., 1921), A testr (1910; The Guardsman,
1924); and A farkas (1912; The Tale of the Wolf, 1914). All these
characters deal with the problems of a changing society, and
the characters are, almost without exception, Jews fighting to
improve their image, sometimes turning into caricatures in
the process. The Guardsman inspired Oscar *Strauss musical
comedy The Chocolate Soldier; Liliom became the musical Carousel (1945), by Richard *Rodgers and Oscar *Hammerstein.
Molnr also wrote lyrical, symbolic dramas. Most of his plays
have been translated into English. There are two anthologies
of his stage works, Plays (1927) and The Plays of Ferenc Molnr (1929, 19372); and a prose anthology, Husbands and Lovers
(1924). During the end of the 1930s, antisemitism drove Molnr from Hungary, and he lived in France and Switzerland,
427
[Kurt Gruenberger]
MOLNR, KOS (18951945), Hungarian author. An outstanding storyteller, Molnr wrote many books including A
csszr dajkja (The Emperors Nurse, 1935) and Az g csipkebokor (The Burning Bush, 1940). He also wrote A hitehagyott (The Apostate, 1937), the biography of Imre *Szerencses (Fortunatus), a baptized court Jew. Molnar was murdered
by the Nazis.
moloch, cult of
not instances of natural death appear to conflict with the classical reports. There is as yet no evidence of child sacrifice in
the Carthaginian homeland, the cities of Phoenicia (Lebanon)
proper, where far less excavation has been done.
The Name
The accepted view since A. *Geiger is that Moloch is a tendentious mis-vocalization of the word melekh, king, the original
vowels being changed and patterned after the vocalization of
boshet, shame, which was often used as an intentional substitute for Baal (see *Euphemism and Dysphemism). It is true
that the names Moloch (I Kings 11:7) and Milcom occur in the
Bible in reference to an Ammonite god, and that deities by
the name Malik/Muluk are attested to from the 18t century
B.C.E. onward. However, the laws and warnings against the
worship of the Moloch could hardly refer to these particular
deities. It is unlikely that one particular god who is not especially famous would be singled out for mention, while other
prominent gods, e.g., Baal, are not mentioned by name in the
Torah even once. That the original vocalization was melekh
may be learned from Isaiah 30:33, which undoubtedly alludes
to the fiery ceremony of the Moloch rites. The fact that the
Septuagint of the Pentateuch (which was the first to be translated by the Greek translators) translates molekh as king
(archon) seems also to indicate that at the time of the translation of the Torah, the reading molekh instead of melekh was
as yet unknown.
A new dimension was added to the problem of the name
Moloch with the discovery of some Latin dedicatory inscriptions in North Africa. In these inscriptions the term molchomor which has been equated with in the Punic inscriptions, the meaning of which was also unclear occurs
in the context of a lamb offering. The context has provided a
clue to the meaning of both molchomor and . Molchomor has been interpreted as molech immer, i.e., molech, sacrifice (see below) and ommor, a lamb. This interpretation,
however, is beset by difficulties. First, it is hard to explain how
immer (Aram. and Akk. lamb) became ommor; no less difficult is the interpretation of molech as sacrifice. O. Eissfeldt
argued (on the basis of Syriac) that molech means vow, but
this can hardly be reconciled with the biblical text. It would
be futile to translate li-znot ah are ha-molekh ()
in Leviticus 20:5: to go astray after the vow. Besides, it is
methodologically unsound to explain a Hebrew word in the
Bible on the sole basis of a late Aramaic word. Another expression occurring in the Punic inscriptions , turned
out to be even more crucial for the understanding of the Hebrew molekh. Here again some scholars understood the term
as human sacrifice. However, as in the case of , no
objective evidence has been found for this interpretation of
. The most plausible explanation is, as has already been
suggested, that the term means king of humankind, and is
the epithet of the god to whom the inscription is dedicated.
The word king was indeed a common attribute of the deities in the Phoenician-Punic sphere, e.g., Melkart (king of
the city, i.e., Tyre), , etc. El, the head of the Canaanite pantheon, later identified with Kronos, was named Malkandros (Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, 16) which means king
of man (Greek aner [gen. andros], man), in other words
. This is corroborated by evidence from the Assyrian-Aramean sphere where the epithet King is applied to
the god Adad/Hadad, who is identified with the CanaanitePhoenician Baal was also called King, cf. Baal is
king. The identification of Hadad-Baal with Moloch provides
the background to Jeremiah 32:35, which fulminates against
the bamot-altars of Baal in the valley of Ben-Hinnom where
male and female children were burnt to Moloch, i.e., Baal-Hadad. Furthermore, a series of Assyrian-Aramean documents
analyzed by K. Deller showed that Adadmilki or Adadarru
(Adad the king) was actually the god to whom children,
sometimes firstborn, were burned (see below). The Assyrian
material sheds new light on II Kings 17 where Adadmelech (to
be read instead of Adrammelech) is the god to whom the Sepharvites burn/dedicate their children (verse 31). Adadmelech
in this verse stands next to Anammelech who has been correctly related by scholars to Anath who bears the title Queen
of Heaven, the standard term for Ishtar in Akkadian (arrat
am; cf. Sum. nin.anna.ak = Inanna). The pair Adad and
Ishtar, or the king and the queen, are the ones to whom
children are dedicated in the Assyrian-Aramean documents
quoted above. Adad and Ashtart were actually the dominant
gods in Syro-Palestine until the beginning of the common
era, as may be deduced from the passage preserved by Philo
of Byblos (ascribed to Sanchuniaton): Ashtart the great and
Zeus Demarus who is Hadad, the king of the gods, were enthroned on the earth (Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica 1:10,
31; cf. O. Eissfeldt, Kleine Schriften, 3 (1966), 3359). Another
instructive example is the second century B.C.E. Greek inscription, found in Acre, that is dedicated to Hadad and Atargatis (= combination of Ishtar and Anath) who listen to prayer
(M. Avi-Yonah, in: IEJ, 9 (1959), 12). As will be shown below,
the introduction of the Moloch coincided with the introduction of the worship of the queen of the heaven, although the
latter persisted after the reform of Josiah whereas the Moloch
cult seems to have perished following the reform. The worship of the Moloch along with the worship of the queen of the
heaven are therefore to be seen against the background of the
widespread worship in the Assyro-Aramean culture of Adad/
Hadad, the king, and Ishtar Ashtarth/Anath, the queen, that
began in the ninth-eighth century B.C.E. This sheds new light
on the controversial passage Amos 5:26: You carried the
canopy [Heb. sikkut is a deliberate misvocalization of sukkat or
sukkot to make it resemble to ; shikkuz , abhorrence, cf.
LXX and 6QD 1417] of your king and the kaiwanu [changed
deliberately into kiyyun, as skikkuz ] of your image[s] the star
of your god[s] which you made for yourselves. The kamnu/
kawnu, found in Jeremiah 7:18, and 44:19, is a cultic cake in
the form of a star which is the image of Ishtar, who is called in
Akkadian kakkab am, the star of the Heaven. The image of
Ishtar , is depicted here as having been car-
428
molodowsky, kadia
ried under a canopy in a procession, a procedure attested in
the Assyrian documents (cf. L. Waterman, Royal Correspondence of the Assyrian Empire, 1 (1930), no. 1212, rev. 110 =
SAA XIII: 192; for corrected reading see A.L. Oppenheim, in:
BASOR, 107 (1947), 8, n. 4), but unrecognized until now. Your
king in this verse is none other than her consort, Adad the
king, sometimes identical with the sun-god Shamash.
The Nature of the Worship
As already indicated above, the legal and historical sources
speak about passing children to Moloch in fire. According to
the rabbinic interpretation, this prohibition is against passing
children through fire and then delivering them to the pagan
priests. In other words, according to this interpretation, this
refers to an initiation rite. This kind of initiation or consecration is actually attested to in various cultures (see T.H. Gaster, in bibl.) and the Septuagint interprets Deuteronomy 18:10
in a similar manner. This is a Midrash of the rabbis likewise
attested by the Septuagint. A similar non-sacrificial tradition, perhaps more ancient, is found in the Book of Jubilees.
The Book of Jubilees 30:7ff. connects intermarrriage or rather
the marrying off of ones children to pagans with the sin of
Moloch. This tradition seems to be echoed in the dissenting
opinion of R. Ishmael (cf. Meg. 4:9) in Sifrei Deuteronomy
18, who explains the prohibition of Moloch as the impregnation of a pagan woman, an interpretation lying behind
the Syriac translation in Leviticus 18 and 20. The common
denominator of all these traditions is the understanding of
Moloch worship as the transfer of Jewish children to paganism either by delivering them directly to pagan priests or by
procreation through intercourse with a pagan woman. This
tradition is in keeping with the general rabbinic tendency
to make biblical texts relevant to their audiences, who were
more likely to be attracted to Greco-Roman cults and to intercourse with pagan women than to the sacrifice of humans
to a long-forgotten god.
In the framework of the penalty clauses of some neoAssyrian contracts, there is the threat that if one of the parties
violates the contract, he will burn his son to Adad the king and
give his daughter to Ishtar, or Belet-s ri. Some of these documents showed that Adadmilki or Adadarru (Adad the king)
was actually the god to whom children, sometimes firstborn,
were burned. Ch.W. Johns, who first published these documents, contended that burning is used here in the figurative
sense, meaning dedication (Assyrian Deeds and Documents, 3
(1923), 3456). This figurative interpretation was accepted by
Deller and Weinfeld, but context indicates that they are to be
taken literally (see CAD /II, 53; SAA VI: 102). From the fact
that Ahaz, who opened the door to Assyria and Assyrian culture and religion (see e.g., II Kings 16:6ff.), was the first king
to indulge in the worship of Moloch, it may be deduced that
this was introduced through Assyrian influence, along with
other practices such as the burning of incense on the roofs
(II Kings 23:12), the sun chariots (23:11), and the tents for the
Asherah (23:7). There is no reason to suppose that the Moloch
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
was introduced as a result of Phoenician influence, as is commonly supposed. Were this true, one would expect to find the
Moloch worship in Northern Israel, which was overwhelmed
by Phoenician influence, especially at the period of the Omri
dynasty. No allusion, however, to this practice in the Northern Kingdom has been found. The worship of Moloch, which
was practiced at a special site (outside the walls of Jerusalem
in the valley of Ben-Hinnom) called Topheth, became firmly
established in the time of King Manasseh, his son Amon, and
at the beginning of Josiahs reign. If it was completely eradicated by Josiah within the framework of his reform activities
(II Kings 23:10), then Jeremiahs references to this worship
(7:31, 19:1ff., 32:35) might apply to the days of Manasseh and
also to the time of Josiah before the reform (see Y. Kaufmann,
Toledot, 3 (1960), 38290).
Bibliography: H . Albeck, Das Buch der Jubilen und die
Halacha (1930), 26ff.; O. Eissfeldt, Molk als Opferbegriff im Punischen
und Hebrischen (1935), 46ff.; N.H. Tur-Sinai, Ha-Lashon veha-Sefer, 1 (19542). 81ff.; H. Cazelles, in: DBI Supplment, 5 (1957),
133746; R. de Vaux, Studies in Old Testament Sacrifice (1964), 5290;
M. Buber, Malkhut Shamayim (1965), 99100; K. Deller, in; Orientalia, 34 (1965), 3826; T.H. Gaster, Myth, Legend and Custom in the Old
Testament (1969), 5868. Add. Bibliography: M. Weinfeld, in:
UF, 4 (1972), 13354; M. Smith, in: JAOS, 95 (1975), 47779; M. Held,
in: ErIsr, 16 (1982), 7677; B. Levine, JPS Torah Commentary Leviticus
(1989), 25860; R. Clifford, in: BASOR, 279 (1990), 5564; A. Millard,
in: DDD, 3435; G. Heider, in: DDD, 58185, incl. bibl.; K. Friebel, in:
R. Troxel et al. (eds.), Seeking Out the Wisdom of Ancients..Essays
M. Fox (2005), 2136.
[Moshe Weinfeld / S. David Sperling (2nd ed.)]
429
mombert, alfred
Warsaw and Odessa to prepare for a teaching career. Following the 1917 Revolution, she participated in the publications of
the Kiev Yiddish Group before returning to Warsaw to teach
in the cysho Yiddish secular schools; she also taught Hebrew
to workers in a Jewish community night school. For her pupils she wrote playful verses, ballads, and poetic tales, some of
which were set to music and sung in Yiddish schools throughout the world. In 1935 she settled in New York and founded
and edited the journal, Svive (19434 and 196074). Her many
volumes of poetry reflect her experiences in Europe, the U.S.,
and Israel, displaying her concerns for women, the oppressed
poor, the tragedy of war, and the Holocaust. After the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, a new joyous tone appeared in her lyrics, many of which were publicly sung and
broadcast in Israel. A book of her childrens poems translated
into Hebrew, Pith u et ha-Shaar (Open the Gate, 1945), was
taught in Israeli schools. Her drama Nokhn Got fun Midber
(Toward the God of the Desert, 1949) was staged by Israels
Ohel Theater in 1956, and her novel Baym Toyer (At the Gate,
1967) described the fate of new immigrants, life in the kibbutz,
and the forging of a nation. Other works of fiction include a
novel, Fun Lublin biz Nyu York (From Lublin to New York,
1942), and a short story collection, A Shtub mit Zibn Fentster
(A House with Seven Windows, 1957). Among her volumes
of poetry are Kheshvendike Nekht (Nights of Kheshvan,
1927); Dzshike Gas (Dszhike Street, 1933), Freydke (1935), In
Land fun Mayn Gebeyn (In the Country of My Bones, 1937),
Der Melekh Dovid Aleyn iz Geblibn (Only King David Remained, 1946) and Likht fun Dornboym (Light of the Thorn
Bush, 1965).
Bibliography: M. Ravitch, Mayn Leksikon (1945), 1224; E.
Auerbach, in: JBA, 24 (19667), 97106; C. Madison, Yiddish Literature (1968), 31920. Add. Bibliography: K. Hellerstein, Paper
Bridges: Selected Poems of Kadya Molodowsky (1999).
[Sol Liptzin / Kathryn Hellerstein (2nd ed.)]
MOMBERT, ALFRED (18721942), German poet. Descended from a family of Jewish merchants that had settled in
Karlsruhe, Mombert studied law in Heidelberg, where he later
went into practice as a lawyer. In 1894, he published his first
volume of poetry, Tag und Nacht. Despite the clear stylistic influence of naturalist and impressionist poetics, it nonetheless
maintained a unique tone. From the start, it is an ostentatious
cosmological focus that gives Momberts early poem cycles
Der Gluehende (1896), Die Schoepfung (1897), Die Bluete des
Chaos, and Der Sonne-Geist (both 1905) their characteristic setting, necessitating a new language on which Mombert
continued to work throughout his career. Only marginally
integrated into contemporary artistic and intellectual circles
(Martin Buber, Hans Carossa, and Richard Dehmel were his
only partners in spiritual exchange), Mombert adopted a 19tcentury aesthetic of monism and neo-romanticism. Impressed
by the totalizing view of his poetry and its mythic and religious allusions, contemporaries likened Mombert to William
Blake; the German poet Richard Dehmel detected in him the
430
fervor of the ancient Hebrew prophets. Abandoning the practice of law, Mombert turned toward cosmic verse-drama of
epic scope. The trilogy Aeon (190711) established an imagery and dramatic figures to which Mombert would cling in
all his further works, such as in Der Held der Erde (1919) and
in Atair (1925).
In 1933, Mombert, with other Jewish members, was expelled from the German Academy of Arts. His last publication
during his lifetime, Sfaira der Alte, was printed at Bubers
insistence by the Schocken Verlag in 1936. Four years later,
Mombert, already seriously ill, was arrested by the Gestapo
in Heidelberg and deported to the Gurs concentration camp.
With the intercession of non-Jewish friends and admirers
(among them Hans Carossa and Momberts biographer, Richard Benz), he was allowed to leave for Switzerland in 1941,
where he died in Winterthur only a few months later.
Bibliography: R. Benz, Der Dichter Alfred Mombert (1947);
M. Buber, in: G. Krojanker (ed.), Juden in der deutschen Literatur (1922), 11320. Add. Bibliography: R. Haehling von Lanzenauer, Alfred Mombert. Dichter und Jurist (2001); S. Himmelheber (ed.), Alfred Mombert (18721942) (1993); F.A. Schmitt, Alfred
Mombert (1967).
[Sol Liptzin / Philipp Theisohn (2nd ed.)]
MOMENT, DER, Yiddish daily newspaper in Poland. The paper was founded in Warsaw in November 1910 by Z evi Hirsch
*Prylucki. Working with him were his son, Noah *Prylucki,
and Hillel *Zeitlin. Der Moment became one of the most influential of the Jewish dailies of Poland, with a circulation of
about 30,000, although that figure was far exceeded in times
of tension: during the *Beilis blood libel proceedings, 191113,
it reached a circulation of 150,000, and shortly before World
War II it printed 60,000 copies daily.
In 1914 Der Moment published its first dispatches from
Erez Israel; its contributor was Izhak *Ben-Zvi. The Russians
suspended the paper in July 1915, but 18 days later the invading Germans allowed it to continue under censorship. During
the Warsaw municipal elections of 1916, the paper backed the
*Folkspartei. Prominent among the papers contributors after
the war were Hirsh David *Nomberg, Julius Schwalbe, Ignacy
*Schiper, and from 1925 Isaac *Schwarzbart. In 1936 the paper became a cooperative and two years later was taken over
by a syndicate which adopted a Revisionist policy. It printed
Vladimir Jabotinskys article The Eleventh Hour in 1938 and
also his series Fun Mayn Tagebukh. The publication of Der
Moment was discontinued in September 1939 with the Nazi
invasion of Poland.
Add. Bibliography: M. Mozes, Der Moment, in: Fun Noenten Over II, Yidishe Presse in Varshe (1956), 24199; J. Gothelf (ed.),
Ittonut Yehudit she-Hayeta (1973), 95125; M. Fuks, Prasa zydowska
w Warszawie 19231939 (1979), index.
[Artur Fiszer]
MOMIGLIANO, ARNALDO DANTE (19081987), historian of antiquity; born in Caraglio (Cuneo), Italy. After the
Italian antisemitic legislation of 1938 he settled in England,
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mommsen, theodor
where from 1951 to 1975 he was professor of ancient history
at University College, London. Momigliano wrote, in Italian,
books on Thucydides, Claudius, Philip of Macedon, as well
as works on classical historiography. His best-known English
books are Conflict Between Paganism and Christianity in the
Fourth Century (1963), and Studies in Historiography (1966).
One of his earlier works, Prime Linee di Storia della Tradizione
Maccabaica (1930, 3d ed. 1968), was an impressive contribution to Jewish history of the Hellenistic and Roman periods.
Also notable were his Ricerche sull organizzazione della Giudea sotte il dominio romano (1934, 1967) and his chapters on
the Second Temple period in the Cambridge Ancient History.
A comprehensive bibliography of Momiglianos works is included in his Quarto contributo alia storia depli studi classici
e del mondo antico (pp. 669719). He was renowned for his
deep learning and erudition.
Add. Bibliography: ODNB online.
[Bernard Semmel]
poranea (1967), index; N. Libertini, in: Annuario dellIstituto tecnicostatale G. Galilei di Firenze (1966), 333. Add. Bibliography: G.
Di Pino, in: G. Grana (ed.), Letteratura italiana. I critici, vol. 3 (1973),
2091111; A. Biondi (ed.), Attilio Momigliano. Atti del Convegno di
studi nel centenario della nascita (1990); R. Bonavita, in: Storia e problemi contemporanei, 32 (2003), 4552.
[Louisa Cuomo / Alessandro Guetta (2nd ed.)]
Bibliography: H. Liebeschuetz, Judentum im deutschen Geschichtsbild (1967), index. Add. Bibliography: A. Heuss, Theodor
Mommsen und das 19. Jahrhundert (1956, 1996); L. Wickert, Theodor
Mommsen, 4 vols. (195980); C. Hoffmann, Juden und Judentum im
Werk deutscher Althistoriker (1988), index; St. Rebenich, Theodor
Mommsen (2002); K. Krieger (ed.), Berliner Antisemitismusstreit, 2
vols. (2003), index..
[Michael J. Graetz]
431
432
Bibliography: I.A. Isaacs, Australias Greatest Military Genius (1937); E. Rubin, 140 Jewish Marshals, Generals and Admirals
(1952), 4157; J. Ben Hirsch, Jewish General Officers, 1 (1967), 57; P.H.
Emden, Jews of Britain (1943), 4537, index; F.M. Cutlack (ed.), War
Letters of General Monash (19342); The Australian (Oct. 17, 1931); Gordon, in: Australian Jewish Historical Society, 6, no. 2 (1966), 6980.
Add. Bibliography: ADB; B. Callinan, Sir John Monash (1981);
P.A. Pedersen, Monash as Military Commander (1985).
Holocaust Period
By 1939 the number of Jews had grown again and was close to
3,000. During the period of Soviet rule (193941), the activities
of the Jewish community were stopped. The Jewish social services were also liquidated. The Jews tried to adjust to the new
conditions and some of the youth moved to the large cities.
With the outbreak of war between Germany and the U.S.S.R.
(June 22, 1941), the Ukrainian nationalists began to attack the
Jews. These attacks intensified after the Soviets withdrew from
the city on July 4. On July 13 hundreds of Jews deported from
Hungary were brought to the city. In March 1942 the Jews of
Kopyczynce and Koropiec were brought to the city. At the beginning of October 1942 an Aktion was carried out and 800
were sent to the *Belzec death camp. At the end of October,
the Jews of Monastyriska were transported to Buczacz, where
they perished together with the Jews of this city. Jewish life in
the town was not revived after the war.
433
moncalvo
351ff. Add. Bibliography: A. Brmer, in: M. Nagel (ed.), Zwischen
Selbstbehauptung und Verfolgung (2002), 139ff.
MOND (Melchett), British family of chemists and industrialists, of German origin. Ludwig Mond (18391909) was born in
Cassel, Germany. In 1859, while working at a small soda works,
434
[Nahum N. Glatzer]
money changers
gress. Henry, also an ardent Zionist, succeeded his father as
chairman of the council of the Jewish Agency and was president of the *World Union of Maccabi. Henrys son, Julian Edward Alfred (19251973), third Baron Melchett, was appointed
chairman of the nationalized steel industry in 1967.
Bibliography: H.H. Bolitho, Alfred Mond, First Lord
Melchett (1933); J.M. Cohen, Life of Ludwig Mond (1956); P. Emden,
Jews of Britain (1943), index; W.J. Reader, Imperial Chemical Industries;
A History, vol. 1 The Forerunners (1970). Add. Bibliography: J.R.
Lischka, Ludwig Mond and the British Alkali Industry, 1985; J. Goodman, The Mond Legacy, 1982.
[Moshe Rosetti]
435
moneylending
from distant countries would bring their money in large denominations rather than in cumbersome small coins. The provision of small change was a further function of the shulh ani
(cf. Sif. Deut., 306; Maas Sh., 2:9). For both of these kinds of
transactions the shulh ani charged a small fee (agio), called in
rabbinic literature a kolbon (a word of doubtful etymology but
perhaps from the Greek small coin; TJ, Shek. 1:6,
46b). This premium seems to have varied from 4 percent to 8
percent (Shek. 1:6, et al.). The shulh ani served also as a banker,
and would receive money on deposit for investment and pay
out an interest at a fixed rate (Matt. 25:27), although this was
contrary to Jewish law (see below; *Moneylending).
Thus the shulh ani fulfilled three major functions:
(a) foreign exchange, (b) the changing of large denominations into small ones, and vice versa, and (c) banking. Three
terms for money-changer are found in the New Testament:
(a) kermatists (John 2:14), (b) kollybists (Matt. 21:12), and
(c) trapezits (literally, shulh ani; Matt. 25:27, et al.) It seems
probable that these three terms correspond to the three functions of the shulh ani outlined above. Thus kermatists, from
kermatiz. to cut small, is one who gives small change;
kollybists, from kollybos, changed foreign currency; while the
trapezits was a banker (from trapeza, table).
The shulh anim in Jerusalem used to set up their tables
in the outer court of the Temple for the convenience of the
numerous worshipers, especially those from foreign countries
(Matt. 21:1213). Excavations around the Temple walls have
uncovered stores or kiosks, some of which, it has been surmised, were occupied by money changers. The Mishnah states
that on the 15t of Adar, every year, tables were set up in the
provinces (or in Jerusalem) for the collection of the statutory
annual half-shekel, and on the 25t of Adar they were set up in
the Temple itself (Shek. 1:3). The activity of the Jewish banker,
shulh ani, was of a closely defined nature, as his transactions
had to be in accordance with the biblical prohibition against
taking interest (ribit). The Talmud records much information
relating to his activities. An additional and interesting feature
of his business was the payment on request of sums deposited
with him for that purpose (BM 9:12).
See also: S arrf.
436
MONEYLENDING.
moneylending
elitic source material. Exodus 22:24 is a mixture of both. The
casuistic beginning, If you lend money to my people,
which would logically be followed by a reference to the rate
of interest or to the punishment to be meted out to a defaulting debtor, concludes apodictically with: You shall not act
as a creditor.
The Holiness and the Deuteronomic Codes are normally assigned to a much later date than that of the Book of
the Covenant. The problem of their editing and ultimate incorporation into the Pentateuch is a difficult one, but as far as
the laws on interest are concerned, all of them have elements
in common, which stress, directly or indirectly, a special covenant between God and Israel and the consequent obligations
of brotherhood between the members of the community. Just
as biblical history with its predominantly theological tendencies has been described as Heilsgeschichte, much of biblical
law may be classified as Heilsgesetz, addressing itself to the
pre-state sacred institution of the 12 tribes. Moreover, Ancient
Near Eastern codes do not claim divine inspiration, while all
Hebrew laws are presented as having been revealed by God to
Moses, even if, as in the case of the prohibitions against taking interest from a brother, no guidance is given as to judicial
procedures against ruthless exploitation of the poor. The few
other passages in the Bible which refer to money-lending confirm the impression that the relevant pentateuchal ordinances
were interpreted by the prophets, psalmists, wisdom-writers,
and chroniclers more as moral exhortations than as laws (cf.
Hab. 2:6; Ezek. 18; Ps. 15:5; Prov. 28:8; II Kings 4:12; and Neh.
5:111; for apocryphal and pseudepigraphical literature, see Ecclus. 20:15;29 and IV Macc. 2:8). Neither indignation nor pious
hopes could replace the jurisdiction of established courts.
Documentary evidence of the nonobservance of these
pentateuchal admonitions comes only from the Diaspora,
but affords an even clearer picture of prevailing conditions.
Thus, the Aramaic Papyri show that the Jews of the military
colony in Elephantine lent each other money on interest at the
rate of 60 percent per annum in the fifth century (cf. Cowley,
Aramaic nos. 10 and 11). In the Tebtunis Papyri, numbers 815,
817, and 818, loans at interest between Jews are also referred
to. These documents belong to the third and second centuries
respectively, and reflect typical Hellenistic usage in their formulation (cf. Tcherikover, Corpus, 1 (1957)). In the talmudic
period such documents would be invalid. Aristotle had expressed contempt for the taking of interest in a well-known
utterance in his Ethics (4:3), basing his opinion on the nature
of money which is in itself not subject to physical growth. In
addition, on several occasions during the last few pre-Christian centuries, popular resentment against impoverishment
through usury forced Greek and Roman legislators to forbid
the taking of interest altogether, although enactments of this
sort did not remain in force for long. Among Jewish Hellenistic writers, Philo appears to have been the first to add his
own comment to Deuteronomy 23:20, by extending the prohibition about taking interest from the brother to anyone of
the same citizenship (astos), or nation (homofulos) in De Vir-
437
THE TALMUDIC PERIOD. After the destruction of the Temple, halakhists and aggadists determined the development of
Jewish religious law proper, at least until the 17t century. The
tannaitic Midrash Sifrei Deuteronomy 23:20f. understands
la-nokhri tashikh as a positive commandment; i.e., you shall
lend at interest to a foreigner. Although this is possible on
philological grounds, heavy oppression under Roman rule in
the first part of the second century may have led to such an
interpretation, particularly since R. Akiva was closely connected with the revolt of Bar Kokhba and with the editing of
the Sifrei. The contemporary Mekhilta of R. Ishmael offers a
different explanation on the related passage in Exodus 22:24.
Interest-free money should be lent to Jews and gentiles alike,
although a Jew should be given preference. In addition, one
commentator states that it is only toward the poor that one
should not act as a professional moneylender, but one may do
so toward the rich. From the third century onward, the prohibition against taking interest had been accepted as applicable to every Jew, rich or poor. The Mekhilta on Exodus 22:24,
ends with a homiletic statement by R. Meir: He who lends
on interest has no share in Him who decreed against taking interest. Similar denunciations occur frequently in halakhic and aggadic Midrashim, in Mishnah, Tosefta, baraita,
and the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds. Transgressors
against the ever growing injunctions are called robbers and
murderers. They are likened to those who rear pigs, described
as denying the fundamental tenets of the Jewish faith and declared to be unfit as witnesses. The frequency of such utterances implies the frequency of the offenses. It is to be stressed,
however, against apologetic tendencies that still prevail in the
relevant literature, that views of this kind refer to inter-Jewish transactions only, unless the gentile is explicitly included
in the prohibition. The expression even interest from a nonJew (afillu ribbit de-goi) implies that the difference between
them is still clearly felt.
As to inter-Jewish transactions, discussions continue as
to whether paid interest, fixed or unfixed, can be taken back
for the debtor by the judges. Also proposed are the relinquishment of the principal and the rescinding of written contracts
or shetarot on which interest was specified. The Mishnah (BM
5:6) says quite plainly that one may lend to and borrow from
gentiles at interest. In the course of the debate in the Gemara
(ad loc.) R. Nah man transmits Rav Hunas objection to taking
interest from anybody, but it is, apparently again for apologetic
reasons, generally overlooked that his view is challenged by
Rava on the basis of the Deuteronomic law and the Mishnah
which precedes the Gemara. R. H iyya replies that money may
only be lent on interest to the non-Jew, as far as it is necessary for the sustenance of the Jew (bi-khedei h ayyav). Ravina
maintains that the reason for this restriction is based on religious self-protection. The lender should reduce his contact
moneylending
with the alien to a minimum, lest he learn from the debtors
deeds (shema yilmad mi-maasav; see also Rashi on Mak. 24a,
S.V. afillu le-akkum). The Jewish scholar, on the other hand,
is allowed to take interest from non-Jews, even where there is
no economic necessity, because he would not be influenced
by the practices of the latter.
There is one further aspect regarding money-lending at
interest in talmudic literature which calls for attention the
regulations against the employment of a non-Jewish intermediary, a device sometimes resorted to in order to make illegal
inter-Jewish loan transactions possible. A number of tannaitic
traditions have a bearing on the subject (cf. BM 71bf. and TJ,
BM 10c; Tos., BM 5:15). This convention has a prehistory in
Roman law. Livy mentions that at the beginning of the second
century B.C.E., Roman creditors had found a device (fraus) for
collecting interest by transferring the ownership of accounts to
citizens of allied states, who thus became the real or fictitious
lenders without being subject to internal Roman legislation
(ed. by E.T. Sage (1935), 10:18). That such evasive tactics were
current among Jews of the talmudic period is evident not only
from the various halakhot, but also from the following homiletic statement in Bava Mez ia 61b: Why did the All-Merciful
mention the Exodus from Egypt in connection with the law
on interest? The Holy One, blessed be He, answered: I, who
distinguished between the firstborn and those who were not
firstborn in Egypt, shall in future punish him who hangs his
money on a gentile and lends it on interest to a Jew.
438
moneylending
David *Kimh i of Narbonne says the following about Psalms
15:5: the Hebrew must not overreach or rob the alien or steal
from him, but interest which he takes by full agreement [with
a non-Jewish lender] is permitted If the gentile is kind to
the Jew, the Jew must certainly be kind and good to him
He adds explicitly that his views should serve as an answer to
those Christians who maintain that David did not distinguish
between the Israelite and the gentile.
Meir b. Simeons only partly edited manuscript (Parma
2749) Milh emet Mitzvah (Obligatory War) contains by far
the richest source material on Jewish-gentile moneylending
transactions. His attempts to defend old and established practices show greater knowledge of former privileges granted by
popes, emperors, and feudal lords than that of any of his predecessors, and he makes the widest possible and often ingenious use of practically all biblical and talmudic data on the
subject. One or two generations older than David Kimh i and
also from Narbonne, he had frequent discussions with the
lower and higher clergy, including two archbishops, the second of whom was probably Guido Fulcodi, who later became
Pope Clement IV.
It was on this occasion that Meir was confronted with the
same accusations about gentile disadvantages in Jewish law as
those which had been made in the famous Paris disputation in
1240 at the palace of Louis IX. No Latin record of his disputation appears to be extant, and it is doubtful whether he could
have said all he wrote down in the diary of his public activities. The whole historical background of his time is unfolded
in his work anti-Jewish legislation, persecutions, expulsions,
and his able and often successful efforts to counter them. His
sharp criticism of the release of interest and sometimes even
of the principal, owed to Jews by the Crusaders, is of special
significance. Fearless defense and daring attack are often juxtaposed. Thus, Joseph b. Nathan ha-Mekanne *Official, a contemporary and fellow-citizen of Meir b. Simeon, refutes the
attacks against Jewish money-lending with the by now usual
arguments, and subsequently adds: You lend money at high
rates of 100 and take reward for delayed payment (Z.
Kahn, in: Birkhat Avraham Berliner (1903), 89).
Jewish moneylenders in England acted, as far as one can
judge from their documents, in exactly the same way as those
on the continent i.e., in accordance with the ordinances of
the sages (ke-tikkun h akhamin), even if there are certain peculiarities which seem to be influenced by non-Jewish legal
practice. Thus, ribbit (interest), unless used in connection
with ribbit al yedei goi (inter-Jewish interest charges, made
possible through a gentile proxy), occurs only four out of
about 30 times in M.D. Davis Hebrew Deeds (1888). Instead
of ribbit, shevah (profit) is used. In some inter-gentile promissory notes, too, the expression lucrum (gain) is found for
fenus (usury). There is also the sudden emergence of the
formula if the stipulated time for repayment of the loan is
over (im yaavor zeman) in Hebrew shetarot (promissory
notes see *Shetar) of English provenance. According to talmudic law, there is no justification for this, but contemporary
439
moneylending
tar mamono kol she-ken; ed. Husik, 3 (1946), 237). Albos words
are an almost literal translation of Ambroses ubi enim jus est
belli, ibi est usurae (cf. also Platos Laws, 10:909). In a position of defense vis--vis the archbishop of Narbonne, Meir b.
Simeon had advanced a similar argument. Albos statement is
not part of the public disputation in Tortosa (1413) in which
he was one of the Jewish spokesmen, but a record of another
encounter with a Christian opponent. It is clear, however, that
he did not refer to current halakhic practices, although some
talmudic proof texts can be found in their support. Other Jewish writings, not concerned with interdenominational altercations, do not question the legality of charging interest from
gentiles. Thus, Joseph Colon, who came from France and held
a distinguished position in the Italian rabbinate during the
second part of the 15t century, states casually that the Jews of
both countries hardly engaged in any other business (Resp.
Maharik 118, 132). Abraham b. Mordecai Farissol (14511526)
confirms Colons assessment of circumstances prevailing in
Italy. Conditions of this kind were bound to bring about irregularities, but they were not restricted to Jews. Early propaganda of the Franciscans was, in fact, not specifically directed
against the Jews. Hebraei et Christiani usurarii were the target
of Bernardino da Feltre.
The establishment of Jewish loan banks was subject to a
license of the papal administration or of the local rulers or of
both. The stipulations of these condotte varied from time to
time and from place to place. They were often changed unexpectedly, and as a result the insecurity of the Jewish moneylender increased, however much he might have profited from
an occasional boom. Matters came to a climax through the
propaganda for the establishment of Christian loan-banks, the
montes pietatis, which were originally meant to work on a nonprofit basis. Particularly during the Lenten period the friars
[ha-doreshim] are a strap of castigation for Israel and preach
every day to destroy us Their hand is heavy upon us and
the situation reaches a point when both body and property
are endangered (Colon, ed. princeps, no. 192).
Isaac Abrabanels view on interest-bearing loans to gentiles is laid down in his commentary on Deuteronomy 23:21,
and forms part of his elaborate exegesis of the whole book,
which was completed in Monopoli in 1496 and published in
uncensored form in Sabbioneta in 1551. He expounded his theories before Christian scholars and the masters of the land.
The first three of his arguments offer nothing new; only the
fourth is straightforward and assailable on philological and
historical grounds. At the same time, it foreshadows the general development toward capitalism, so characteristic of the
16t century: There is nothing unworthy about interest because it is proper that people should make profit out of their
money, wine, and corn, and if someone wants money from
someone else why should a farmer who received wheat
to sow his field not give the lender 10 if he is successful, as
he usually should be? This is an ordinary business transaction
and correct. Interest-free loans should only be given to the
coreligionist, to whom we owe special kindness. Abrabanel
440
moneylending
tion. The enunciation of his program became the decisive
formula for the new spirit of capitalism.
FROM OTHERHOOD TO BROTHERHOOD? From the 17t century onward, the collapse of the traditional Christian exegesis of Deuteronomy 23 is apparent in Europe and in the U.S.
On the Jewish side, too, responsa on the subject become less
frequent; even the records of the Council of the Four Lands
have relatively little to say on the matter. The hetter iska (see
*Usury) had opened the path to a mercantilistic interpretation
of talmudic law. Nevertheless, on the readmission of the Jews
to England, Manasseh Ben Israel, in his Humble Address to His
Highness the Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England,
did not deem it necessary to revoke the ancient distinction:
For to lay out the money without any profit was commanded
only toward their brethren of the same nation of the Jews, but
not to any other nation (cf. B.N. Nelson, Idea of Usury (1949),
73109). In spite of occasional regressions, a gradual improvement of the position of the Jews in Western Europe became
noticeable. Money-lending still remained one of their main occupations, but they also traded, sometimes simultaneously, in
all kinds of merchandise, or they earned their living as craftsmen and artisans. Above all, there was the ascendancy of the
Court Jew who, in spite of his fluctuating fortunes, played an
important part in the economic administration of the estate
of many a duke and king in peace and war (cf. H. Schnee, Die
Hoffinanz und der moderne Staat, 6 vols., 195367). The Age
of Reason further contributed to the disappearance of barriers between the various denominations. Although Leopold I
expelled the Jews from Vienna and Lower Austria in 1670, Joseph II issued his Toleranzpatent only about 100 years later.
In 1807, the ecclesiastical and lay representatives of
French, Italian, and German Jewry assembled in Paris to attend a meeting that had been convened by Napoleon. Bearing the proud title, Grand Sanhedrin, it concluded a development of 2,000 years and to many of those who had come
seemed to open a new era. Two of the 12 questions they were
asked concerned the problem of inter-Jewish and Jewish-gentile loan transactions. Although eminent rabbinic scholars of
personal integrity were present, the answers, Dcisions Doctrinales or, in their Hebrew version, takkanot, reveal neither
any depth of historical understanding nor sincerity on the part
of those who were responsible for their formulation. Neshekh,
for example, is defined as a rate of interest to be determined
by the Code Civil (Code Napoleon) of France. Such interest
may be charged by one Jew from another, provided that the
lender share the risk of loss and the chance of gain, and that
the debtor give indemnification to the creditor in the case of
damnum emergens. Only the poor Jew must be charged no
interest at all. Gentiles, particularly those living in France or
Italy, are to be considered as brothers of the Jews, and there
must not be any difference between them if charity is required.
Those who disregard this ordinance will be called sinners and
transgressors of the law of the holy Torah. All this may, to a
degree, be defensible from the standpoint of the halakhah, but
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
441
moneylending
the First Crusade (109699) on the status and livelihood of the
Jews in France, Germany, and England drove them out of trade
through the lack of security arising from the inimical attitude
of society in general; at the same time, Jewish merchants and
craftsmen were denied any share in the Christian towns and
*guilds which were rapidly evolving as the only social framework for trade and crafts in those countries. This crystallized
at a time when European trade, agriculture, and building were
expanding and in need of financing. Ready cash which then
meant precious metals was scarce. Available means in Christian hands were channeled into credit for merchant ventures
and other relatively creative loans, in which it was also easier
to formulate partnerships that evaded the stigma of usury.
Under such circumstances the Church found it easy to act
in accordance with the agricultural ethos of its upper strata,
and to insist on the prohibition of usury. There remained the
field of loans for consumption the need for which arose in
cases of illness, litigation, and unforeseen expenses for which
Christian capital was not readily available and where usury
was least avoidable. Deprived of its former uses, Jewish capital
entered this field, as well as granting any other possible loan.
Hence among the Jews of the region between the Pyrenees and
Scotland, between the Atlantic and the Elbe, usury became the
main source of livelihood from about the 12t to the 15t centuries. They were not the only people to lend money on interest in that region: there were also the Cahorsins of southern
France, the Catalans, and the Lombards. But religious enmity,
the social separateness of the Jews, and their hateful image,
combined to identify Jew with usurer in the western Christian imagination. In those countries Jews sometimes lent on a
debt deed only, without surety. Medieval Hebrew sources from
those regions described this kind of loan as be-emunah (on
trust), a practice usually reserved for established and proved
clients. Most loans were given on the double surety of a written deed and a collateral (Heb. mashkon). Since repayment of
a loan for consumption was often difficult, the needy debtor
came to hate the infidel Jewish creditor who, out of his own
need, had helped him. Many anti-Jewish persecutions hence
acquired an economic as well as a religious character, the instigators being no less anxious to destroy incriminating bonds
than to eliminate accursed infidels.
In England the extent as well as the problems of Jewish
money-lending were seen at their clearest. The most common
interest rate was two pence in the pound a week (43 1/3 annually), though half and twice as much were also common. There
were many partnerships, often between members of the same
family; this form was utilized by the extremely wealthy *Aaron
of Lincoln. To supervise Jewish lending, to insure maximum
tax exactions from the Jewish lenders, and to make certain
that debt deeds would not be lost even in times of massacres,
the *Archa system was introduced. In the 13t century Jewish
money-lending was conducted through tenants of the commons and of the middle class, whose bonds were bought up,
on default, by the nobility and ecclesiastical institutions. This
too, aroused the enmity of the commoners toward the Jews. In
1275 Edward III passed severe anti-usury laws, at the same time
exacting extremely high tallages and calling in Italian moneylenders to replace the Jews. Some of the latter turned to coinclipping, which led in part to the total expulsion in 1290.
Though in the heterogeneous Holy Roman Empire
money-lending practices varied greatly according to time
and place, the history of Jewish money-lending in *Regensburg may be typical of Rhenish and south German cities.
Until about 1250 the municipality was the chief beneficiary
of Jewish loans; until about 1400 the nobility and clergy were
the main recipients; while after 1400 knights, burghers, and
artisans pawned objects for short terms, and borrowed small
sums at high rates of interest. This latter situation eventually
became the focus of lower-class enmity toward the Jews and
contributed to their expulsion in 1519.
Interest rates in Germany fluctuated greatly in practice
and even in their legal norms. Frederick II of Austria fixed the
Jews maximum interest rate at 173 in 1244; in the more
developed cities of the Rhineland and south Germany 43
was more common, though this rate did not apply in the case
of foreigners or peasants; 86 was also common and acceptable. An investigation in 1676, motivated by anti-Jewish feeling, in the electoral Palatinate in western Germany, showed
that an interest rate of 14.5 was honored there by the Jewish
moneylenders. The Christian rulers who exploited Jews as
their agents for usury and then extorted from them a large
part of their usurious gains, especially when the Jews became
impoverished used to proclaim moratoriums on the individual, partial, or total debts to Jews. The respective treasuries all profited by such measures, the best known being those
of Emperor Wenceslaus in 1385 and 1390, which utterly impoverished the Jews while barely alleviating the burdens of
the treasury. Likewise, total and bare-faced confiscation was
often resorted to, as was expulsion, which left the field open
to the Jews remaining competitors. Because of the collateral
in their hands Jewish moneylenders frequently engaged in related occupations, such as the repair and upkeep of clothes, armor, and precious objects, and in their sale when pledges were
not redeemed, a frequent occurrence. Hence the rudiments of
certain crafts, as well as the sale of *secondhand goods, were
an integral part of this occupation. Articles regulating moneylending constituted the core of all charters issued to Jews in
medieval Germany from the 12t century. They determined
not only the rates of interest, but also ensured the rights of
the creditor to the collateral, even if it had been stolen. The
moneylender had to take an oath that he had received it in
good faith and in daylight whereupon the legal owner of the
collateral had to repay him the amount loaned on the pledge.
This right clashed with Germanic legal conceptions, which
demanded the return of the object to the rightful owner without any payment; hence the misconception that the charters
allowed the Jews to act as fences.
When it became apparent in Italy that the citizens had
need of cash loans, the activities of Jewish moneylenders
were regulated by means of the condotta, conditions set out
442
Mongols
in charter treaties between municipalities or rulers and Jewish moneylenders, first signed in the late 13t century in Umbria. The interest rate varied between 15 and 25 and was
never to exceed the value of the pledge. The profit of the loanbanks in 15t-century Florence was approximately 4 (see also
*Monti di Piet).
The first privilege granted to Jews in Poland in 1264 regarded them mainly as moneylenders. However, under favorable conditions, Jews soon took part in other economic
activities, so that within a century money-lending became
only one of their many-sided economic functions in the Polish cities and countryside. The *arenda system, for example,
stems from a change from lending to leasing. By the end of
the 16t century, Jewish trade demanded more capital than
the Jews themselves possessed, so that many Jewish traders
became indebted to Christians. Lending on interest between
Jews was explicitly initiated and legalized there, in the institution hetter iska, a legal device which created a formal partnership between creditor and debtor. Interest rates inside the
Jewish business community in the latter half of the 17t century
were between 25 and 33, whereas the Christians loaned
at 610, and interest rates between Jews and Christians
ranged between these two figures. Jews also developed their
own system of credit bonds the mamran (membranum)
used mainly at the great fairs of Poland-Lithuania. With the
rise of modern *banking, Jewish money-lending of the conventional type gradually decreased in importance, though in
Western Germany and in *Alsace-Lorraine it was sufficiently
widespread to be detrimental to *emancipation of the Jews
during the French Revolution, and later on to influence the
attitude of Napoleon *Bonaparte to Jewish emancipation. It
likewise was one of the causes of the anti-Jewish *Hep! Hep!
disturbances of 1819, as well as 1830 and 1848.
When Jews moved to western countries in the late 19tearly 20t centuries, moneylending was a frequent occupation,
especially in the first and second generation, and the Jewish
moneylender became a familiar stereotype.
Bibliography: S. Stein, in: Essays J.H. Hertz (1942), 403f.;
idem, in: JTS, 4 (1953), 16170; idem, in: HJ, 17 (1955), 340; idem, in:
JSS, 1 (1956), 14164; 2 (1957), 94; idem, in: JJS, 10 (1959), 4561; idem,
Jewish-Christian Disputations in 13t Century Narbonne (Inaugural
Lecture, University College, London, 1969), 127; D. Tama, Transactions of the Parisian Sanhedrin (1807); W. Sombart, Die Juden und das
Wirtschaftsleben (1911); Roth, Italy; J.T. Noonan, Jr., Scholastic Analysis of Usury (1957); R.W. Emery, Jews of Perpignan in the 13t Century (1959); J. Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance (1961); Baer, Spain;
S. Stern, Der preussische Staat und die Juden, 2 vols. (1962); J. Parkes,
Jew in the Medieval Community (1938), index, S.V. usury; B.N. Nelson, Idea of Usury (1949), index, S.V. Jews; L. Poliakov, Les banchieri
juifs et le Saint-Sige (1965); M. Neumann, Geschichte des Wuchers
in Deutschland (1865), 292347; J.E. Scherer, Die Rechtsverhaeltnisse
der Juden in den deutsch-oesterreichischen Laendern (1901), 18596;
G. Caro, Sozial-und Wirtschaftsgeschichte der Juden im Mittelalter, 2
vols. (190820), index, S.V. Wucher; M. Hoffmann, Der Geldhandel
der deutschen Juden waehrend des Mittelalters (1910); R. Straus, Die
Judengemeinde Regensburg (1932); idem, Regensburg und Augsburg
(1939); idem, Die Juden in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft (1964); Kisch,
Germany, index; M. Breger, Zur Handelsgeschichte der Juden in Polen im 17. Jahrhundert (1932); W.J. Fischel, Jews in the Economic and
Political Life of Medieval Islam (1937); Z. Szajkowski, Agricultural
Credit and Napoleons Anti-Jewish Decrees (1953); idem, Economic
Status of the Jews in Alsace, Metz and Lorraine (1954); H.H. Ben-Sasson, Hagut ve-Hanhagah (1959); idem, Toledot Am Yisrael, 2 (1969),
9298; S. Simonsohn, Toledot ha-Yehudim be-Dukkasut Mantovah, 2
vols. (196264), index, S.V. Halvaah u-Malvim be-Ribbit; H.G. Richardson, English Jewry under Angevin Kings (1960), index, S.V. usury; S.
Grayzel, The Church and the Jews in the XIIIt Century (19662), index;
S.D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 1 (1967), index, S.V. loans on interest; F.R. Salter, in: Cambridge Historical Journal, 5 (193537), 193211;
P. Elman, in: Economic History Review, 7 (193637), 14554.
443
monis, judah
(Chinggis) Khan in the late 12t and early 13t centuries into
a state that created the largest land-based empire in history.
Mongol successor states ruled much of Eurasia well into the
14t century, and smaller states of Mongol provenance ruled
more restricted areas even longer. In contemporary sources,
the Mongols are often referred to as Tatars/Tartars, and modern day Tatars, although speaking Turkic languages, are of at
least partial Mongol descent. The Mongols touched upon and
influenced the history of the Jews in Central and Eastern Europe as well as the Islamic world.
At the beginning of 1260 Mongol forces invaded *Syria,
and their raiders reached as far as *Jerusalem, *Hebron, and
*Gaza. A report of the arrival of the Mongols in Jerusalem and
their depredations in the area is found in the famous letter of
*Nah manides to his son from 1267. Mongol advanced forces,
however, were defeated by the *Mamluks at the battle of Ayn
Jalut in northern *Palestine in August 1260, and the Euphrates River became the frontier between the two hostile states.
Mongol raiders again reached Palestine, including Jerusalem,
in 1300 after their defeat of the Mamluks near Homs at the end
of 1299. In Western Asia, including the Middle East, Central
Asia, and Eastern Europe the Mongols eventually underwent a
double process of Islamization and Turkification, i.e., conversion to Islam and the replacement of Mongolian by Turkish,
the language of many of their soldiers and officers.
The Mongols played an important role in world history,
not the least in facilitating cultural contact between east and
west Asia, as well as creating the conditions by which western
Europe learned about China and East Asia, thereby contributing to European seaborne expansion. Latin Christian writers,
such as Matthew of Paris, saw them as descendants of the Ten
Tribes. Some Jews themselves in Central and Eastern Europe
appear to have harbored messianic expectations of the Mongol
advance, which combined with a desire for revenge against the
Christians. Again, Matthew of Paris saw the Jews as encouraging and abetting the Mongols. This perceived cooperation,
together with a more concrete understanding of a contemporary messianic upsurge among the Jews, may have contributed
to increased antisemitic feelings among Christians.
The situation of the Jews in the Islamic countries conquered and ruled by the Mongols appears to have dramatically improved. Jews, as well as Christians, enjoyed relative
religious freedom and the restrictive laws derived from the
so-called Covenant of *Omar were abolished for several decades. The activity of the free-thinking Jewish philosopher
and scholar of comparative religion *Ibn Kammna (d. 1285)
in *Baghdad can be attributed to some degree to the relatively
tolerant atmosphere in the realm of religion introduced by
the Mongols. One prominent Jewish personality was Sad alDawla, who rose to become the wazir of the Ilkhan Arghun in
1289. His efficiency in raising funds is noted in the sources, as
are the many enemies that he made. His being a Jew certainly
exacerbated the dissatisfaction with him. He was removed
and executed in 1291 when his patron was on his deathbed.
Another important individual of Jewish origin, albeit one
who converted to Islam, was *Rashd al-Dn (al-Dawla) alHamadn, who served as the co-wazir to three Ilkhans until
his final dismissal and execution in 1318. Besides his success
as a senior bureaucrat, Rashd al-Dn has gained fame as the
author of the great historical work, Jmi al-Tawrkh (Collection of Chronicles) written in Persian, although some
parts have come down to us in Arabic. Not only is this the
most important extant source on Mongol history, it is perhaps the earliest attempt at writing a comprehensive history
of humankind. This may reflect the open atmosphere prevalent under the Mongols, the communication between all of
Asia, and the fact that Rashd al-Dn himself was living on a
frontier of two cultures. In any event, his Jewish origins were
not forgotten. After his death, his head was paraded around,
and common people shouted: This is the head of the Jew who
abused the name of God; may Gods curse be upon him. In
spite of these outbursts, there was much to commend Mongol rule to the Jews who came under their control, compared
to many contemporary rulers in both the Muslim and Christian countries.
444
MONIS, JUDAH (16831764), Colonial American Hebraist. Monis, who was born in Algiers or Italy, was educated in
Leghorn and Amsterdam. Very little is known about his career before he went to America. On Feb. 28, 1715/16, he was
admitted as a freeman of New York, his occupation being
that of merchant, although at a later period he was described
as having been a rabbi in Jamaica and in New York. Much
of his erudition may have been secondhand. He appears in
the Boston area in 1720, and on March 27, 1722 was publicly
baptized in the College Hall at Cambridge, at which time the
Reverend Benjamin Colman delivered A Discourse Before
the Baptism of R. Judah Monis, to which were added Three Discourses, Written by Mr. Monis himself, The Truth, The Whole
Truth, Nothing but the Truth. One of which was deliverd by
him at his Baptism (Boston, 1722). Monis essays are an apology and defense of his new faith, and in support of the doctrine of the Trinity drawn from the Old Testament, and with
the Authority of the Cabalistical Rabbies, Ancient and Modern. Shortly after his conversion, on April 30, 1722, he was appointed instructor of Hebrew at Harvard College, a position he
monmouth county
445
monmouth county
Several other German Jewish entrepreneurs stand out:
John Steinbach, proprietor of large department stores in Long
Branch and Asbury Park; Frank Marx of Shrewsbury, cattle
dealer and meat supplier; Joseph Goldstein, dry goods department store owner; Clarence Steiner and his sleepware factories in Long Branch and Freehold, Manasquan and Keyport;
Walter Rosenberg founder of the Walter Reade Theater chain;
Berthold Sussman and Siegfried Hirschfield and their hotels.
Political acceptance followed; William Levy served as mayor
of Deal in 1916, Clarence Housman was elected mayor of Long
Branch in 1920, and Aaron J. Bach, mayor of Deal in 1922.
A wave of Eastern European immigration also hit Monmouth at the turn of the 19t century. Most of these poor Yiddish-speaking newcomers settled in the more established
communities along the shore and to the south, working in factories and the retail trades. Finding that the existing summer
German Jewish Temple Beth Miriam did not meet their yearround needs, the Orthodox residents of Long Branch formed
their own synagogue, Congregation Brothers of Israel, in 1898.
A larger building was completed in 1920. A YMHA and YHWA
was organized, followed by the Ladies Independent Hebrew
Sick Benefit Association, the Gemilath Chesed, the Hebrew
Ladies Hospital Auxiliary, and the Workmens Circle. Kosher
hotels and boarding houses catering to wealthy and moderate
income East European Jews proliferated.
In 1904 the Orthodox Jewish community in Asbury Park
incorporated as the Sons of Israel and were in their own building the following year replete with Hebrew school and mikveh.
The new Conservative Temple Beth El was dedicated in 1927.
Soon Asbury Park could boast its own community center providing a meeting place for the YMHA, Jewish War Veterans,
and other organizations. Similar activity occurred around the
same period in Red Bank, Keyport, Bradley Beach, Belmar,
and Manasquan. Belmar became a summer gathering place of
the New York intelligentsia attracting such luminaries as the
world renowned Yiddish writer Sholem Aleichem and Morris
Hillquit, the Social-Labor Party leader and author. Ira Gershwin, the famed lyricist, courted and married one of the daughters of the Strunsky family, owners of the local hotel.
A smaller number of East European immigrants moved
westward into the more rural areas surrounding Freehold,
Englishtown, Perrineville, and Farmingdale.
The Jewish Agricultural Society, which provided loans,
training and assistance to Jewish farmers, most often in Yiddish, described them as growers of vegetables, potatoes, and
general farm crops with a cow or two and some chickens. A
few, like Jacob Zlotkin, were horse and cattle dealers. In 1910
Jacob Grudin led a group of Millstone Township Jewish farm
families in setting up a congregation named the First Hebrew
Farmers Association of Perrineville. In 1913 the Perrineville
Co-operative Credit Union was organized, one of the first
farm credit unions in New Jersey. Local Jewish farmers were
also largely responsible for the formation of the Central Jersey Farmers Cooperative Association in 1930. Maurice Wolf
of Perrineville played an important role in the national Jewish
446
monogamy
majority of the scientists, engineers, physicians, and dentists
were Jewish men, and many of these stayed on at Ft. Monmouth blending into the great postwar movement from New
York City to the Monmouth suburbs that was about to begin.
The completion of the Garden State Parkway is 1955 facilitated
the construction of massive industrial parks and residential
subdivisions. Research organizations such as Bell Telephone
Laboratories in Holmdel brought in thousands of new employees as did other corporations that were part of Monmouths
burgeoning electronic industry. Older citizens also found attractive homes in Monmouth, in high rises and garden apartments along the shore and in massive adult communities such
as Covered Bridge in the western part of the county.
In addition, the postwar exodus to Monmouths suburbs
included a large contingent of Sephardi families with their
own distinct religious and cultural practices. Many originally
emigrated from Syria, settled in New York, and summered in
Monmouths shore communities before moving year round
into the Deal and Ocean Township area. The number of Sephardi Jews increased so dramatically that three new Sephardi
synagogues opened within a short period in the late 1970s.
From a prewar figure of 7,000 Monmouths total Jewish
population grew to 50,000 by 1977. Most of this growth was
in the western part of the county. Mayor Arthur Goldwizweig
estimated that in 1977 30 of Marlboros residents were Jewish; Mayor Stanley Kruschick put the figure in neighboring
Manalapan as 50.
This growth has continued into the 21st century. The
median age for Monmouths 72,500 Jewish residents (divided
into 26,000 households) is 41.1 years. They are well educated
(55 of the adults have a college degree) and well off (median
income is almost double that of all U.S. Jewish households);
54 live in western Monmouth, 32 in eastern Monmouth
and about 14 in northern Monmouth. Summer vacationers
number about 5,000. Of employed Jews, 52 work in Monmouth County, the rest commute to New York City or North
Jersey. Of households surveyed by the Jewish Federation of
Greater Monmouth 37 consider themselves Conservative,
26 Reform, 9 Orthodox, and 28 just Jewish. There are
9 Conservative synagogues in the county, 6 Reform, 18 Orthodox, and 2 Traditional.
Four separate Jewish day schools exist in the county: The
Hillel Yeshiva in Oakhurst, the Solomon Schechter Academy
in Howell, the Shore Hebrew High School in Oakhurst, and
the Solomon Schechter Day School in Marlboro.
An intense organizational life accompanied each stage of
Monmouths population growth. Local units of national Jewish organizations with a wide range of aims and purposes developed alongside synagogue religious and social clubs. The
Monmouth Jewish Community Council (MJCC) was formed
in 1969 to coordinate county-wide rallies for Jews overseas and
in Israel. In 1971 several organizations in the shore area affiliated with the Jewish Federation movement and by 1976 most
communities within the western and northern areas of the
county joined them to create the Jewish Federation of Greater
447
MONOGAMY, the custom and social or religious institution, often sanctioned by law, according to which a person
can be married to only one single mate at a time. The discussion in this article is restricted to polygamy and monogamy
in Jewish practice, since polyandry was absolutely forbidden
by biblical law.
The Bible does not limit the right of a man to have more
than one wife. Indeed, many instances are cited where a man
has several wives (and *concubines) a prevalent custom in
the Ancient Near East. It seems, however, that due to economic conditions, most of the people did not practice polygamy or even bigamy. Indeed, practice was more monoga-
monotheism
mous than theory. The ethos underlying the creation story
(Gen. 2), and the last chapter of Proverbs, is essentially monogamous. The situation changed during the Second Temple
period. In addition to the economic factors which gave justifiable grounds to monogamy factors applicable even more
than in the First Temple period the concept of mutual fidelity between husband and wife took root. Some men refrained
from taking more than one wife because of an explicit agreement they had made with their first wife. Such agreements,
preserved in Babylonian and Assyrian documents, are also to
be found in the *Elephantine (Yeb) documents (Cowley, Aramaic, 44ff., no. 15, line 31ff. Bigamy and polygamy, while on the
decrease, were mainly practiced among Hellenistic Jews (Joseph the *Tobiad, Herod, the administrator of Agrippa (Suk.
27a)), but they are also mentioned in the halakhah (Yev. 1:14;
Ket. 10:16; Git. 2:7; Kid. 2:67; cf. Justin Martyr, Dialogue
with Tryphon, 134:1; 141:4), and occurred even in the families
of sages (Yev. 15a). Bigamy took place sometimes because of a
*levirate marriage or the sterility of the first wife. Yet despite
the rare occurrence of polygamy, its explicit prohibition in the
halakhah of the Dead Sea Sect that saw polygamy as a Pentateuchal prohibition (Damascus Document 4:205:5) was a
complete innovation. Christianity adopted a similar attitude,
which was in conformity with Jesus approach to marriage and
to divorce (Tit. 1:6; I Tim. 3:2, 12).
But even the Mishnah and the baraitot clearly reflect a
situation which was almost completely monogamist (Yev. 2:10;
etc.). Some sages preferred *h aliz ah (levirate divorce) to yibbum (levirate marriage; Bek. 1:7); others violently condemned
marriage to two wives even for the purpose of procreation (Ket.
62b). According to R. Ammi a Palestinian amora, Whoever
takes a second wife in addition to his first one shall divorce the
first and pay her ketubbah (Yev. 65a). Such statements possibly reflect the influence of Roman custom which prohibited
polygamy, especially since all the Jews of the empire became
Roman citizens after 212 C.E. The Roman emperor *Theodosius
issued a prohibition against the practice of bigamy and polygamy among Jews, but it did not disappear completely.
The Jews of Babylonia also practiced bigamy and polygamy, despite the Persian monogamistic background, and Rava
said: A man may marry several women in addition to his wife,
on condition that he can provide for them (Yev. 65a; cf. Ket.
80b; Pes. 113a). The sages however advised that one should
not take more than four wives (and this would appear to be
the source of the Muslim law which permits only four wives).
Under the influence of the Muslim custom during the Babylonian geonic period, polygamous marriage became even more
common (see Lewin, Oz ar, Yevamot (1936), 14854). With the
*Karaites, polygamy was a controversial issue. Bigamy was
practiced among North African and Spanish Jews. There were
women, however, who demanded that it be explicitly written
in the document of marriage or in the ketubbah that the husband would not take a second wife.
In Germany and northern France polygamy was rare,
mainly due to the economic conditions and to the influence
448
MONOTHEISM, in its literal meaning, oneness of the godhead (i.e., one God). The concept of monotheism is embedded
in the domain of religious discourse, and its full and relevant
significance must be derived from the connotation which it
carries within this domain. Monotheism is usually attributed
to biblical faith as its unique and distinct contribution to the
history of religious thought. The significance of the word
monotheism in its biblical context is taken to lie in the mono,
in the godheads being one. As such, it is contrasted with paganism, the fundamental religious alternative to biblical faith,
whose distinctive religious concept is taken to be polytheism,
i.e., the plurality of the godhead (many gods). The difference
between the biblical and pagan orientation is thus constituted
here as a mere arithmetical difference, a difference between
one and many gods. On this basis, biblical monotheism is
seen by modern biblical scholars as emerging gradually and
in a continuous line from the polytheistic thought of paganism. The mediating stage in such a development is found in
monolatry, where the godhead is reduced to one only as far as
worship is concerned, while ontologically there is a plurality of
monotheism
gods. It is a mediating stage inasmuch as the arithmetical reduction to oneness is partial. The full reduction of the godhead
in all its aspects to oneness emerges from monolatry only later
in biblical classical prophecy, when God is claimed not only as
the one God of Israel but as the one God of universal history.
Here, by drawing the arithmetical reduction to oneness in all
the aspects of the godhead, biblical faith achieves ultimately its
distinctive, unique character. It is observed, however, that an
ontological arithmetical unity of the godhead is achieved also
in paganism, even with a remarkable degree of purity (e.g.,
Plotinus). It must be concluded, therefore, that paganism too
has a monotheistic formulation. Yet it is generally felt that a
fundamental difference between biblical faith and paganism
does exist, and that this difference is expressed in the respective concepts of monotheism. This difference, however, cannot be accounted for on the basis of monotheism understood
as the arithmetical oneness of the godhead.
Theistic Monotheism
Consequently, it has been suggested that the difference between biblical and pagan monotheism lies in the fact that the
former is theistic while the latter is pantheistic. While it is
true that biblical monotheism is exclusively theistic and that
pagan monotheism has a definite tendency toward pantheism, to formulate the difference between biblical and pagan
monotheism on this basis is to formulate the difference with
regard to a totally different aspect of the godhead from that to
which the concept of monotheism refers. Monotheism refers
to the being of the godhead as such, while theism and pantheism refer to the relation subsisting between the godhead and
the world. Thus, while this attempt locates a difference which
may follow from the fundamental difference within the concept of monotheism, it does not locate that fundamental difference itself.
Ethical Monotheism
The same point can be made regarding yet another attempt
to locate the difference between biblical and pagan monotheism, according to which biblical monotheism is ethical while
pagan monotheism is purely philosophical-ontological. Correlated to this is the suggestion that, while paganism arrives
at the oneness of its godhead through philosophical reasoning and because of ontological-metaphysical considerations,
biblical faith arrives at the oneness of its godhead because of
ethical considerations and through a direct insight into the absolute character of the moral law. Thus, biblical monotheism
can be distinguished from pagan monotheism in that it alone
is ethical monotheism. Here again, however, the distinction
is located in an aspect to which the concept of monotheism
as such does not refer; the concept of monotheism as such
conveys no ethical connotation. It may be that this distinction follows from the proper understanding of the difference
between the meaning of monotheism in the biblical context
and its use in the context of paganism, but this distinction as
such does not capture this difference. In attempting to define
the difference, it is interesting first to note that the two formuENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
lations above have already shifted the aspect where the difference is to be located from the mono to the theos part of
the concept of monotheism; the theistic-pantheistic distinction refers to the relation of the theos to the world, while
the ethical-metaphysical distinction refers to what kind of a
theos is involved. This means that the difference between
biblical faith and paganism is no longer seen as a quantitative
difference, i.e., how many gods are involved, but as a qualitative difference, i.e., what kind of a god is involved. This shift
is essential to a proper understanding of the difference and
must form the basis of the attempted formulation.
Ultimate Being
On this basis it can be asserted that the minimal necessary
connotation of the term theos in the concept of monotheism is that of ultimate being. As such, the arithmetical comparison between biblical monotheism and pagan polytheism
is clearly seen to be illegitimate. The theos in pagan polytheism is not ultimate. It is superhuman, or man writ large,
but still it remains finite and non-absolute. In polytheism a
plurality of ultimate beings is untenable and self-contradictory. Consequently, the theos in biblical monotheism and
the theos in pagan polytheism connote two different kinds
of being, for the difference between ultimate and non-ultimate being is not merely quantitative but qualitative. It is not
legitimate, however, to compare quantitatively entities which
belong to different orders of being. In order to locate the difference meaningfully it must be determined with reference
to the same kind of entity, i.e., to the ultimate being which is
connoted by the concept of monotheism. As such, however,
it is not correct to speak of the development of the concept
of monotheism in paganism. Paganism always had a conception of ultimate being transcending its gods and, as indicated
above, ultimate being necessitates oneness. There can be no
development from many to one with regard to ultimate being. Thus, if the theos in monotheism signifies ultimate being, paganism always had a conception of monotheism. The
only development that can be pointed to is a development in
its articulation, i.e., a development from the cultic-mythological to the speculative-philosophical expression. If the theos
in monotheism, however, signifies only ultimate being, then
it would not be possible to locate any difference between biblical and pagan monotheism, for then the mono conveys no
additional information which is not already conveyed by the
theos in itself. In order for the concept of monotheism to
have a distinct meaning, the theos has to stand for something more than ultimate being. It is here that the real, fundamental difference between pagan and biblical monotheism
becomes evident.
Personal Monotheism
In biblical monotheism the theos stands for a god who is
personal. The mono connotes essentially not arithmetical
oneness but oneness in the sense of uniqueness. Ultimate
being is uniquely one in that it excludes the existence of any
other qualitatively similar being. Thus, the authentic mean-
449
Monroe, Marilyn
ing of biblical monotheism is the assertion that the mono,
i.e., the unique, the ultimate, is theos, i.e., a personal being,
and this is the distinctive and unique feature of biblical faith
and its monotheistic formulation. Paganism, while it too always had a conception of ultimate being and thus a conception of a unitary being, never asserted that ultimate being as
personal. It follows from this analysis that the development
of biblical monotheism from paganism cannot be envisioned
as a linear, continuous development, but must be seen as a
jump from one orbit to another, for the change that biblical
monotheism introduced is qualitative and not quantitative.
There is no continuous line of development either from nonpersonal to personal being or from relative being to ultimate
being. This development involves a shift in perspective. While
the above articulates the distinctive and essential content of
the monotheistic conception of Judaism, it does not preclude
or invalidate the fact that the monotheistic conception in Judaism may convey also the arithmetical oneness and the ontological uniqueness of God. Indeed, in post-biblical Judaism (and even in some biblical instances) it is these notions
that come to the fore and become the main expressions of the
Jewish monotheistic conception. It would seem, however, that
the notion of the arithmetical unity of God arises mainly as
a reaction against pluralistic formulations found in other religions, such as the *dualism of the Zoroastrian, Manichean,
or Gnostic formulation and the trinitarianism of Christianity. The notion of the ontological uniqueness of the godhead
arises mainly when Judaism conceives and expresses itself in
the philosophical-metaphysical domain, i.e., when its God
becomes the god of the philosophers.
same God; Gods infinity in time as the one God in the past,
present, and future is declared. Although the concept of arithmetical oneness is involved also in the assertion of Gods
unity, the latter is distinct in that God is here distinguished
qualitatively rather than merely quantitatively. This assertion
finds its expression mainly in philosophical speculation, where
the uniqueness of God is understood as essentially conveying
the non-composite, non-divisible nature of His being (see Attributes of *God). This is expressed by Maimonides when he
says that God is not one of a genus nor of a species and not as
one human being who is a compound divisible into many unities; not a unity like the ordinary material body which is one
in number but takes on endless divisions and parts (Guide
of the Perplexed, 1:51ff.). This means that God is one in perfect simplicity (H asdai *Crescas, Or Adonai, 1:1, 1), that He
is wholly other (Saadiah Gaon, Book of Beliefs and Opinions,
2:1), and unique (Bah ya ibn Paquda, H ovot ha-Levavot, Shaar
ha-Yih ud). Even in rabbinic Judaism, although the emphasis
is clearly placed on the two aspects of the monotheistic idea,
i.e., the arithmetical oneness and the ontological uniqueness
of God, the fundamental underlying assertion is that God is
first and foremost a personal being. Thus, though shifting the
emphasis, rabbinic Judaism remains fully bound to that aspect
of the monotheistic idea where Judaism makes its fundamental
and distinctive contribution to the history of religions.
450
montagu
by Arthur Miller. The Huston film was a difficult shoot, and
was followed by the death of star Clark Gable 12 days after it
was completed. Monroe divorced Miller in 1961, and entered a
New York psychiatric clinic later that year. She returned to Fox
in 1962 to finish her part in the film Somethings Got to Give,
but was found dead in her Brentwood, California, home on
Aug. 5; an autopsy found a lethal dose of barbiturates.
451
montagu, lily
and lost his parliamentary seat the same year. In Jewish affairs, he was best known as an uncompromising opponent
of Zionism and of the Balfour Declaration, being largely responsible for the modification of the original text. In 1915 he
married (Beatrice) Venetia Stanley (18871948), the daughter
of the fourth Lord Sheffield, who had been the (probably nonsexual) confidante of Prime Minister Herbert Asquith. As a
result of her marriage she converted to Judaism, but without
enthusiasm. Samuel Montagus daughter, Lillian (Lilly) Helen
*Montagu (18731963), a social worker and magistrate, was
a pioneer of Liberal Judaism in Britain, and thus father and
daughter have the possibly unique distinction of founding
significant religious movements on opposite ends of the Jewish religious spectrum.
Bibliography: S.D. Waley, Edwin Montagu (1964); Ch.
Weizmann, Trial and Error (1950), index; L. Stein, Balfour Declaration
(1961), index; E.M.L. Umansky, Lily Montagu and the Advancement of
Liberal Judaism: From Vision to Vocation (1983); R.P. Lehmann, Nova
Bibliotheca Anglo-Judaica (1961), index; Roth, Mag Bibl, index; DNB,
s.v.; JC (June 17, 1927), 1112; (Jan. 25, 1963), 1, 7, 35; The Times (June 6,
1927; Jan. 24, 1963). Add. Bibliography: ODNB online; W.D. Rubinstein, Jews in Great Britain, index; G. Alderman, Modern British
Jewry, index; idem., The Federation of Synagogues, 18871987 (1987);
C. Bermant, The Cousinhood (1961), index; M. Brock and E. Brock
(eds.), H.H. Asquith: Letters to Venetia Stanley (1982); N.B. Levine,
Politics, Religion, and Love: The Story of H.H. Asquith, Venetia Stanley, and Edwin Montagu (1991); S. Bayme, Claude Montefiore, Lily
Montagu and the Origins of the Jewish Religious Union, in: JHSET,
XXVII (197880), 6171; E.C. Black, Edwin Montagu, in: JHSET, 30
(198788), 199218.
[Vivian David Lipman / William D. Rubinstein (2nd ed.)]
452
(JRU) in February 1902. The Union instituted Sabbath afternoon worship services conducted along Liberal Jewish lines
and held propaganda meetings, led by Montagu, to clarify and
spread its teachings. Montefiore agreed to serve as the groups
official leader, thus strengthening its credibility, but Montagu
assumed responsibility for daily affairs and major activities.
During the next few decades, Montagu helped form Liberal Jewish congregations throughout Great Britain, frequently
serving as their chairman or president. She became lay minister of the West Central Liberal Jewish Congregation in 1928,
a position to which she was formally inducted in November
1944, and which she held until her death in 1963. Following
Montefiores death in 1938, she became president of the JRU,
a position she held for 23 years. Montagu also helped found
and eventually became president of the World Union for Progressive Judaism, administering the organizations daily affairs
from 1926 through 1959. At the first WUPJ conference in Berlin, in 1928, Montagu delivered a sermon in German, on Personal Religion, at a worship service held in Berlins Reform
Temple; she was the first Jewish woman to occupy a German
pulpit. Through her efforts, the number of World Union constituencies steadily increased and new Liberal Jewish congregations were created in Europe, South America, Israel, South
Africa and Australia. In 1959, when the World Unions headquarters were transferred to the U.S., she was named honorary life president and elected to chair the Unions newly-established European Board. Many of her writings appear in
Lily Montagu: Sermons, Addresses, Letters, and Prayers (ed.
E.M. Umansky, 1985).
While most British Jews continued to maintain at least
a formal attachment to Orthodoxy, Montagu succeeded in
establishing Liberal Judaism as an important religious force
in Anglo-Jewish life. A Lily Montagu Centre of Living Judaism, housing the West Central Liberal Jewish Congregation,
the European Board of the World Union, and the offices of
the Union of Liberal and Progressive Synagogues (formerly
the JRU), was named in Montagus honor following her death
in 1963.
Bibliography: E.M. Umansky, Lily Montagu and the Advancement of Liberal Judaism: From Vision to Vocation (1983); idem,
Liberal Judaism in England: The Contribution of Lily H. Montagu,
in: HUCA, 55 (1985), 30922; L.G. Kuzmack, Womens Cause: The Jewish Womens Movement in England and the United States: 18811933
(1990); M.A. Meyer, A Response to Modernity: A History of the Reform
Movement in Judaism (1988).
[Ellen M. Umansky (2nd ed.)]
montana
pology department at Rutgers University (194555). An expert
in physical anthropology and evolutionary theory, he served
as rapporteur of the UNESCO committee of experts which formulated the 1950 UNESCO Statement on Race (1951, 19522), and
was a member of the second UNESCO committee of experts of
geneticists and physical anthropologists. Convinced that the
idea of race was not only fallacious but antihuman and socially
destructive, he dedicated his rhetorical and literary gifts to the
production of a number of popular books on this question
and on anthropological themes of large humanistic interest.
Among his best-known works are Coming into Being among
the Australian Aborigines (1937, 19382), Mans Most Dangerous
Myth: The Fallacy of Race (1942, 19986), The Natural Superiority of Women (1953, 19914), Human Heredity (1959, 19642),
Man in Process (1961), and The Direction of Human Evolution
(1955, 19593), Touching: The Human Significance of the Skin
(1971, 19853), and The Elephant Man (1971, 19963).
Bibliography: Current Biography Yearbook, 1967 (1968),
2947.
[Ephraim Fischoff]
453
montana
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454
Butte became the biggest city in the state following the silver
and gold booms around Anaconda in the 1870s, most of the
early Jewish settlers and the later arrivals settled there. There
was a Jewish congregation, Beth Israel, in Butte in 1877. It split
over ritual in 1897 and a second one came into being, but today
there is only one congregation with a synagogue dating from
1904. Long before Montana became a state in 1889, its Jewish
residents were counted among its leading citizens. Henry Jacobs was Buttes first mayor in 1879, and Henry Lupin held that
office from 1885 to 1889. Charles S. Cohan, editor of The Butte
Miner, wrote the words for the state song. One of the early cattlemen was Louis Kaufman, who employed the cowboy artist
Charlie Russell. Between 1873 and 1906 four Jews were grand
masters of the State Masonic Grand Lodge: Sol Star, Moses
Morris, H. Sol Hepner, and Henry I. Frank, a former mayor of
Butte. Livingston, Great Falls, and Havre also had Jewish mayors before 1900. Among the colorful figures in the early days
of the state were Daniel Bandman, a Shakespearean actor who
brought theater to the mining camps (Bandmans Bridge outside Missoula is named for him); Moses Solomon, a Buffalo
hunter and Indian fighter; and Philip Deidesheimer, a mining
superintendent, who invented the square set system of mining
timbers and for whom Philipsburg is named. The Bob Marshall
Wilderness Area of 950,000 acres in the Flathead National Forest is named for the son of Louis *Marshall, who was chief of
the division of recreation in the U.S. Forest Service.
The story of Billings, Montana, tells much about the paradox of Jewish life in Montana. In 1993 Billings had a population of 48 Jewish families among 81,000 residents. Hate literature appeared in mailboxes; the synagogue was painted
with a swastika along with a picture of a Jew being shot by
Einsatzgruppen, tombstones were overturned, Holocaust denial literature was circulated, and the homes of two Jewish
families including the symphony conductor, which had been
adorned with menorahs, had their windows broken. A cinder
block was thrown through a Jewish childs window. The local
Church Council and the senior minister of the First Congregational Church passed out menorahs to his congregation. He
put a menorah in his own window. The newspaper printed a
full page cutout of a menorah. The chief of police characterized the response: It became physically impossible for the
hate group to harass and intimidate thousands and thousand
of Billings citizens We have spoken one very loud voice.
In this case, the response to hatred was a united chorus of
solidarity. The specific motif of the Holocaust, which was the
threat of the hate groups, was embraced by the community
to say, We will behave differently. Hatred will not triumph.
The Jews will not be isolated but embraced. It was a hopeful
moment for all concerned.
Bibliography: B. Kelson, The Jews of Montana (thesis,
University of Montana, 1950); B. Postal and L. Koppman, A Jewish
Tourists Guide to the U.S. (1954), 2819. Add. Bibliography: E.
Linenthal, Preserving Memory: the Struggle to Create Americas Holocaust Museum (1995)
[Bernard Postal / Michael Berenbaum (2nd ed.)]
Thought
At the center of Montefiores thought was his complete conviction of the truth of Jewish theism. He acknowledged that the
Jewish conception of God and His relation to man and that
of the relation of religion to morality are akin to but not identical with Christian conceptions dealing with these themes.
The distinctiveness of Jewish theism lies in its insistence on
both the transcendence and immanence of God. Montefiore
holds that modern Biblical scholarship has demonstrated conclusively that the Pentateuchal Code is not Mosaic, homogeneous, and perfect. Yet this does not mean that the conception of law in religion should be abandoned. Man discovers
the Law within him but it is also revealed to him.
Montefiore was very suspicious of Jewish nationalism because of its narrowness and its betrayal, in his view, of Jewish universalism. He was so much at home in England that
his affinities were much closer to his native land than to the
community of Israel throughout the world.
The greatest cause of offense to traditionalists was Montefiores leaning toward Christianity. He viewed Christianity
entirely sympathetically, and seemed to look forward to the
455
MONTEFIORE, JOSEPH BARROW (18031893), Australian pioneer. A cousin of Sir Moses *Montefiore, Joseph
Barrow Montefiore was born in London. At the age of 23, he
bought a seat on the London Stock Exchange and became one
of the 12 Jew brokers in the city. He immigrated to Australia in 1829 with considerable means at his disposal and was
granted 5,000 acres of land. In Melbourne, Sydney, and later in
South Australia, he acquired extensive parcels of land. In 1838
he was invited to give evidence to the House of Lords on the
state of the islands of New Zealand. He and his elder brother
Jacob, who was one of the 11 commissioners appointed by King
William IV to organize the administration of South Australia,
helped to establish the Bank of Australasia. Montefiore, who
had ultimately made his home in Adelaide, became one of its
most prominent commercial and industrial figures. When in
Sydney, he was South Australias agent in New South Wales,
and one of the original trustees of the State Savings Bank of
456
South Australia. In 1832 Montefiore helped to organize Australias first congregation, the Sydney Synagogue, the predecessor of the Great Synagogue, and was its first president. He
was a trustee of the Jewish cemetery, for which he had secured
a land grant from the government. The township of Montefiore in New South Wales and Montefiore Hill in Adelaide are
tributes to the pioneering work of Montefiore and his family.
He spent the last years of his life in England.
Add. Bibliography: J.S. Levi and G.F.J. Bergman, Australian Genesis: Jewish Convicts and Settlers, 17881860 (2002), 17174,
index; ADB; H.L. Rubinstein, Australia I, index.
[Israel Porush]
MONTEFIORE, JUDITH (17841862), daughter of Levi Barent *Cohen and wife of Sir Moses *Montefiore, whom she married in 1812. Her influence on her husband was profound. She
left a diary of their first visit to Palestine in 1827 and described
their second visit in 1838 in her Notes from a Private Journal
(1844). She was the author, or coauthor, of the first AngloJewish cookbook, the Jewish Manual by A Lady (1846). She
was commemorated by her husband in the foundation of the
Judith Lady Montefiore College. Originally lax in observance,
she later returned to strict Orthodox practice.
Bibliography: See Sir Moses *Montefiore; Lipman, in:
JHSET, 21 (196267), 287303.
[Sonia L. Lipman]
montefiore, sebag-montefiore
MONTEFIORE, SIR MOSES (17841885), most famous Anglo-Jew of the 19t century. Montefiore was born in Leghorn
while his parents were on a visit from London, where he was
brought up, being taught elementary Hebrew by his maternal
uncle Moses *Mocatta. First apprenticed to a firm of wholesale grocers and tea merchants, he left to become one of the
12 Jew brokers in the City of London. After initial setbacks,
he went into partnership with his brother Abraham, and the
firm acquired a high reputation. His marriage in 1812 to Judith Cohen (see Judith *Montefiore) made him brother-inlaw of Nathan Mayer *Rothschild, for whom his firm acted
as stockbrokers. After his retirement from regular business in
1824, though he retained various commercial directorships,
he had the time and the fortune to undertake communal and
civic responsibilities.
Contrary to accepted opinion, he was apparently somewhat lax in religious observance in earlier life; but from 1827,
after his first visit to Erez Israel, until the end of his life, he
was a strictly observant Jew. Montefiore maintained his own
synagogue on his estate at Ramsgate from 1833 and in later
years traveled with his own shoh et. His determined opposition checked the growth of the Reform movement in England. Though a patron of scholars, he had no pretensions to
scholarship himself. He paid seven visits to Erez Israel, the last
in 1874. In 1838 his scheme for acquiring land to enable Jews
in Erez Israel to become self-supporting through agriculture
was frustrated when Mehmet Ali, viceroy of Egypt, who had
shown sympathy for the idea, was forced by the great powers
to give up his conquests from the Turks. He later attempted
to bring industry to the country, introducing a printing press
and a textile factory, and inspired the founding of several agricultural colonies. The Yemin Moshe quarter outside the Old
City of Jerusalem was due to his endeavors and named after
him. In 1855, by the will of Judah *Touro, the U.S. philanthropist, he was appointed to administer a bequest of $50,000 for
Jews of the Holy Land.
Montefiore was sheriff of London in 183738 and was
knighted by Queen Victoria on her first visit to the City. He
received a baronetcy in 1846 in recognition of his humanitarian efforts on behalf of his fellow Jews. Although president of
the *Board of Deputies of British Jews from 1835 to 1874 (with
only one brief interruption), he did not, after the early years,
play a prominent part in the emancipation struggle but devoted himself to helping oppressed Jewries overseas. He has
been described as the last of the *shtadlanim who by their
personal standing with their governments were able to further the cause of Jews elsewhere. He was active as such from
the time of the *Damascus Affair in 1840. In 1846, he visited
Russia to persuade the authorities to alleviate persecution
of the Jewish population, and went to *Morocco in 1863 and
*Romania in 1867 for the same purpose. His intervention in
the *Mortara Case in 1855, however, proved a failure. Some
of his achievements appear in retrospect as transitory. Although in 1872, after representing the Board of Deputies at
the bicentenary celebrations of Peter the Great, he reported
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
that a new age had dawned for the Jews of Russia, persecution was renewed in 1881. Lover of Erez Israel though he was
and believer in the messianic restoration of a Jewish state, he
did not conceive of large-scale, planned development of the
country as a solution to the Jewish problem. This was largely
because Montefiore (and his contemporaries) trusted absolutely in the inevitability of progress and with it worldwide
emancipation for the Jews.
Nevertheless, both in his own lifetime and since, he enjoyed enormous prestige. Montefiores physical presence (he
was 6 ft. 3 in. tall), his commanding personality, his philanthropy, and his complete disinterestedness, made him highly
respected and admired both in England and abroad. The
support of the British government for his activities consonant with British policies overseas and the personal regard
shown him by Queen Victoria added to his reputation. His
100t birthday was celebrated as a public holiday by Jewish
communities the world over.
One of the most famous Jews of the 19t century, Moses
Montefiore was important for many different reasons, for instance as an early, influential Zionist. His most significant
role, however, might have been as arguably the template of
a wealthy, influential, well-connected Jew in a Western democracy, who used his influence to ameliorate the condition
of persecuted Jews in countries where antisemitism was rife.
This model of Jewish leadership has persisted, perhaps as the
norm, into our own times.
Bibliography: Roth, Mag Bibl, 1406; Lehmann, Nova Bibl,
109, 112, 117; L. Wolf, Sir Moses Montefiore (1885, Eng.); L. Loewe, Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, 2 vols. (1890); P. Goodman,
Moses Montefiore (1925, Eng.); S.U. Nahon, Sir Moses Montefiore (Eng.
1965). Add. Bibliography: S. and V.D. Lipman (eds.), The Century of Moses Montefiore (1985); G. Alderman, Modern British Jewry,
index; W.D. Rubinstein, Jews in Great Britain, index; D.S. Katz, Jews
in England, 33640, index; T. Endelman, Jews of Britain, index.
[Vivian David Lipman]
457
458
RACHEL
OLIVETTI
JUDAH (LEON)
MONTEFIORE
b.c. 1605
MONTEFIORE
SEBAG-MONTEFIORE
FAMILY
SARAH
JOSEPH
b. 1647
DAVID
MEDINA
MOSES
RAPHAEL
SARAH
JUDAH
SIMON
BARROW
JOSEPH
b. 1723
DAVID
b. 1715
ESTHER HANNAH
RACAH
1735 1812
MOSES VITA
17121789
ABRAHAM
MOCATTA
13 others
JOSHUA
17621843
MAYER AMSCHEL
ROTHSCHILD
c. 1743 1812
RACHEL
17621841
JOSEPH ELIAS
1759 1804
LEVI BARENT
COHEN
GRACE
SAMUEL H AYYIM
17571784
ISAAC
MOCATTA
grand daughter
ELIEZER
SOLOMON
SEBAG
17831831
SARAH
b. 1789
ABRAHAM
1788 1824
1.
MARY
2.
HENRIETTA
17911866
JUDITH
1784 1862
STELLA HATCHEVELL
5 others
Sir MOSES
1st Bart.
1784 1885
ADELAIDE COHEN
Sir JOSEPH
SEBAG-MONTEFIORE
18221903
Sir ANTHONY
de ROTHSCHILD
1810 1876
LOUISA
18211910
EMMA
1819 1902
NATHANIEL
1819 1883
HORATIO
MONETEFIORE
CHARLOTTE
1818 1854
HENRIETTA
FRANCISCA SICHEL
d. 1915
JOSEPH MAYER
1816 1880
BENJAMIN MOCATTA
d. 1914
MARY
d. 1875
BARONETCY REVIVED
JEMIMA
b. 1819
4 others
JUDAH GUEDALLA
d. 1858
ABRAHAM
17881848
H AYYIM GUEDELLA
1815 1904
ESTHER
17871830
ESTHER
17871845
MOSES
1785 1838
JOSEPH BARROW
1803 1893
JACOB
18011895
JULIANA LUCAS
DAVIDSON
6 others
EDMUND
18691929
HARRIETTE
BEDDINGTON
ARTHUR
1853 1895
THERESE
SCHORSTEIN
d. 1889
CLAUDE JOSEPH
GOLDSMIDMONTEFIORE
1858 1938
MARIANNE
von GUTMANN
Sir FRANCIS
ABRAHAM
1st Bart.
1860 1935
VIOLET
SOLOMON
JOHN
18921972
IRENE CATHERINE
COHEN
Brigadier THOMAS H.
SEBAG-MONTEFIORE
18871954
MURIEL
ALICE RUTH
CHARLES EDWARD
18841960
ROBERT
1882 1915
4 others
HAROLD
b. 1924
Bishop
HUGH WILLIAM
19202005
HENRIETTA
WALEY COHEN
OLIVER R.M.
b. 1915
montefiore, sebag-montefiore
the end of the 19t century, was situated in the Rue de Juiverie or the Rue Puits-Neuf; the school (or possibly another
synagogue) was near the Porte Saint-Martin and the cemetery to the northwest of the present cemeteries. The community also maintained a special butchers shop. As late as
1452, the dauphin granted the Jews of Montlimar, with Jews
in several other localities of Dauphin, some advantageous
privileges; the municipal authorities, however, endeavored to
render the lives of the Jews intolerable, for instance by compelling them to attend missionary sermons from 1453 onward. The same situation occurred at the end of the century:
in 1476, King Louis XI had granted letters of protection to the
Jews of Montlimar; however, in 1486, when only seven Jewish families remained there, the townsmen accused them of
debauchery and shady practices and demanded their expulsion. From 1489, there no longer appear to have been Jews in
Montlimar and the Jewish cemetery was closed. At the beginning of World War II, 150 Jewish families found refuge in
Montlimar. There was no organized Jewish community in
Montlimar in the 1960s.
Bibliography: Gross, Gal Jud, 319; de Coston, Histoire de
Montlimar, 1 (1878), 516ff., 4 (1891), 521; Z. Szajkowski, Analytical
Franco-Jewish Gazetteer 19391945 (1966), 186.
[Bernhard Blumenkranz]
459
monteux, pierre
treat those who do not believe as you do If you do not want
to be Christian, at least be human. Nevertheless, he was not
entirely uncritical of the Jews. Also in the Lettres persanes, his
traveler writes: Know that wherever there is money there are
Jews. In a passage from Mlanges indits, which was published
posthumously (1892), the rabbinic texts are considered to have
fashioned the low taste and character of the Jews, for there was
not one among [the rabbis] of even a minor order of genius.
But this private opinion of Montesquieu at his most Christian
was unknown in the 18t century. His relativistic view, which
ran counter to *Voltaires absolute deism in favor of an appreciation of the Jew and Judaism as one of the many valid forms
of culture and religion, was one that influenced history.
Bibliography: J. Weill, in: REJ, 49 (1904), 150ff.; R.R. Lambert, in: Univers Isralite, 94 (1938/39), 421ff.; R. Shackleton, Montesquieu (Eng., 1961), 3545; A. Ages, in: Romanische Forschungen, 81
(1969), 214ff.; A. Hertzberg, French Enlightenment and the Jews (1968),
index; L. Poliakov, Histoire de lantismitisime, 3 (1968), index.
[Arthur Hertzberg]
460
MONTEZINOS, DAVID (18281916), librarian and bibliophile in Amsterdam. His father, Raphael Montezinos, served
as rabbi of the Portuguese community there from 1852 to 1866.
David studied at the Ez H ayyim seminary where he obtained
the title Maggid. An enthusiastic bibliophile, he acquired one
of the largest private libraries of the time. In 1866 he was appointed librarian of the Ez H ayyim library. In 1889, after the
death of his wife, he donated his private collection to the library of the seminary, including 20,000 books, pamphlets,
manuscripts, and illustrations. It contained extensive material relating to the Jews in Holland, and in particular to the
Spanish-Portuguese community. The library was named after
Montezinos and was directed by him until his death. Montezinos wrote a number of bibliographic studies, published in
Letterbode, as well as a monograph on David *Franco-Mendes,
published in 1867 in Joodsch-letterkundige bijdragen.
Bibliography: J.S. de Silva Rosa, David Montezinos, de
stichter der Livraria D. Montezinos (1914); idem, David Montezinos
(Dutch, 1917); idem, Geschiedenis der Portugeesche Joden te Amsterdam (1925), 153ff.
montor, henry
MONTI DI PIET (Montes pietatis), savings and loan agencies originally formed in Italian cities in the mid-15t century;
considered as the predecessors of the modern credit union.
Historically, the word mons was used during the Middle Ages
to designate funds collected for a specific purpose, pietatis being added to identify them as nonspeculative. The initial object of the monti was to provide loans at a relatively low rate of
interest (415) to small artisans and dealers and to the poor
in general, on the pledge of various goods. The interest was
used to defray administrative expenses and salaries of employees. The formation of the monti was the result of a combination of factors, both economic and theological. It arose from
the decline of handicrafts and the ensuing impoverishment
of the masses, and a scarcity of money; and from the desire
to oust the Jews from the business of *moneylending, which
they had successfully practiced as their principal profession.
The growing prosperity of Jewish bankers aroused the wrath
of the *Franciscans who, as some historians have pointed out,
themselves often came from the ranks of the new aristocracy,
the merchant class.
Previously the progressive monopolization of moneylending by Jewish bankers had been justified both morally
and theologically; on the one hand, it helped the poor, and on
the other hand, it saved Christians from committing the sin of
usury; but the founders of the monti advanced the argument
that it was necessary to protect Christians from the voracity
of Jewish usurers. The establishment of the first monti in *Perugia in 1462, after an earlier experiment eight years before
at Ancona, came at the climax of a campaign against Jewish
moneylenders waged by the Observant friars, the radical wing
of the Franciscans. Its primary sponsor was Fra Michele da
Milano, who protested vigorously against the arrangements
then existing between the Jewish loan bankers and the city of
Perugia. In subsequent years the Franciscans sought support
for the expansion of the institution, preaching on its behalf
throughout Italy, in opposition to the *Dominicans and the
Augustinians, who condemned what they called the montes impietatis is a breach of the prohibition on usury proclaimed by Jesus (Luke 6:33). Foremost among those in favor
of the institution was Bernardino of *Feltre, who bent all his
charismatic talent for rabble-rousing to denouncing the Jewish moneylender. His sermons led to the establishment of the
monti in many cities and were instrumental in the widespread
persecution of Jews during the blood libel in *Trent in 1475
as well as in many other parts of the country. Pope Paul II approved (1467) the establishment of a monte in Perugia, despite
theological opposition, and successive popes sanctioned monti
in other Italian cities. By 1494 there were 30 monti in central
and northern Italy. The controversy was finally settled by the
papal bull, Inter multiplicis (May 1515), issued by Leo *X at the
Fourth Lateran *Council, which declared the monti neither
sinful nor illicit but, on the contrary, meritorious.
The institution of the monti did not, in itself, arouse the
fears of the Jews. In some cases Jewish loan bankers, recognizing the charitable nature of the monti, actually gave them
support. One such loan banker, Manuele da Camerino, bequeathed a considerable sum to the monte of Florence which
had been set up by Girolamo Savonarola. At times Jewish loan
bankers utilized the monti for their own purposes, depositing
in it a pledge left with them, thereby raising capital for further
operations. The monti were not in a position to meet the growing need for capital, and, as a result, there were times when
Jewish loan bankers were allowed to reopen their condotte in
the Italian cities, as occurred in Florence after the return of the
Medici in 1512. Eventually, both monti and Jewish loan bankers found it possible to coexist and the first decades of the 16t
century proved to be among the most prosperous for the Italian Jewish banker. By the mid-16t century, it was common
practice for many monti to make loans to businessmen (at an
interest rate of from 8 to 10) as well as to the poor. The Monti
di Piet remained an essentially urban feature, an outgrowth of
conditions specific to Italy. The decision of the Lateran Council of 1515 to allow urbi et orbi the establishment of monti was
the signal for setting up official lending institutions sponsored
by governments in the Catholic countries of Europe.
461
Bibliography: L. Poliakov, Les Banquiers juifs et le SaintSige du XIIIue au XVIIue sicle (1965), 16998, passim; M. Weber,
Origines des Monts-de-Piet (1920); A. Sapori, History of the Principal Public Banks (1934), 3738; G. Fabiani, Gli Ebrei e il Monte di Piet
in Ascoli (1942), 16972; M. Ciardini, I banchieri ebrei in Firenze nel
secolo XV e il monte di piet fondato da Girolamo Savonarola (1907);
N. Mengozzi, Il Monte dei Paschi e le sue azende (1913); U. Cassuto,
Gli Ebrei a Firenze (1918), 5182; Roth, Italy, 16677; S. Simonsohn,
Toledot ha-Yehudim be-Dukkasut Mantovah (1963), 716; D. Carpi,
Ha-Yehudim be-Padovah bi-Tekufat ha-Renaissance (1967), unpublished thesis Hebr. Univ., Jerusalem.
[Emmanuel Beeri]
mntoro, antn de
with the United Palestine Appeal (193039) and as executive
vice president of the United Jewish Appeal (193950), Montor
directed the raising of previously unparalleled amounts from
overseas Jewry for Israel. In 1939, as chief fundraiser for the
United Palestine Appeal, he approached the prolific Zionist
organizer Meyer *Weisgal about Jewish participation in the
New York Worlds Fair. The Jewish Palestine Pavilion, which
Weisgal claimed was the first Palestine exhibit at an international exposition in the United States, attracted record-breaking crowds. The presence of Albert Einstein at the opening
helped produce the largest single days attendance in the history of the fair. In all, a total of more than two million people
were estimated to have visited the pavilion.
Although Montor was an ardent Zionist, the prevailing Zionist aim at the time was for selective immigration to
build a Jewish state, not the rescue of Jewish refugees. Therefore in 1940 Montor, as executive vice president of the United
Jewish Appeal, refused to intervene for a shipload of Jewish
refugees stranded on the Danube. He wrote a letter to a rabbi
in Maryland stating that Palestine cannot be flooded with
old people or with undesirables. He circulated thousands of
copies of the letter, which asked Jews not to support illegal
immigration to Palestine.
Yet for the UJA, Montor is credited with being the first
man to have the conviction to set $100 million as a campaign
goal and attain it. As vice president and chief executive of
the American Financial and Development Corporation for
Israel (195155), Montor established the Israel Bonds campaigns and supervised the sale of approximately $190 million
worth of bonds for Israel. He resigned his position as head
of the State of Israel Bonds organization in 1955 to found his
own brokerage firm.
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Montreal
During the 13t century, a Jewish quarter existed on the
present site of the Rue Barralerie (until the 15t century it was
named Sabatari Neuve); in the first house on this street there
are still some remains of the synagogue, and of the mikveh in
the cellar. Although James I gave the old Jewish cemetery to
the Cistercians of Valemagne in 1263, the latter were required
to refund the cost of the exhumation and the transfer of the
remains to the new cemetery. When the Jews were expelled
from France in 1306, the king of Majorca opposed the measure. After considerable delay, the expulsion finally took place.
It was little comfort to the Jews that the king of France was required to give to the king of Majorca two-thirds of the booty
seized from his Jews and one-third of that taken from the
other Jews of Montpellier.
In 1315, when the Jews were allowed to return to France,
the Jews of Montpellier, like those elsewhere, were again
placed under the authority of their former lords. In 1319 Sancho I, king of Majorca, permitted them to acquire a cemetery.
It is not known in which quarter the Jews lived during this
short stay, which lasted until 1322 (or 1323). In 1349 James III
of Majorca sold his seigneury over Montpellier to Phillip VI
of France. As a result, when the Jews resettled in the city in
1359 they found themselves under the direct sovereignty of the
king of France, Charles V. Originally assigned to the Castelmoton quarter, they were forced to move to the Rue de la Vielle Intendance quarter after complaints from the Christian
inhabitants. In their new settlement, they owned a synagogue
and a school (after 1365). The Jews of Montpellier had to provide large financial contributions to the defense of the town,
particularly in 1362 and 1363. In 1374 they were also obliged
to participate in guarding the gates. The construction of a
beautiful new synagogue in 1387 gave rise to a lawsuit with
the bishop of Maguelonne, to whom the Jews paid the then
enormous sum of 400 livres. In Montpellier the final expulsion of the Jews from France in 1394 was preceded by violent
accusations against them in the municipal council.
Scholars
Even though the town had numerous Jewish physicians who
were subjected to a probative examination from 1272 there
is no valid evidence that the Jews had a part in founding and
organizing the school of medicine there. Excluding those
scholars who only lived temporarily in Montpellier, such as
*Abraham b. David of Posquires, the foremost scholar in the
town was *Solomon b. Abraham b. Samuel, who denounced
the work of Moses Maimonides to the Inquisition. One of his
leading followers was *Jonah b. Abraham Gerondi, who died
in Toledo, Spain. The liturgical poet *Aryeh Judah Harari lived
in Montpellier during the second half of the 13t century, as
did *Aaron b. Joseph ha-Levi, the opponent of Solomon b.
Abraham *Adret; and Isaac b. Jacob ha-Kohen *Alfasi. From
1303 to 1306 Montpellier was again the scene of a renewed polemic between the supporters and opponents of the study of
philosophy. The latter were led by Jacob b. Machir ibn *Tibbon. In the later medieval community of Montpellier, the
Bibliography: Gross, Gal Jud, 32235; C. dAigrefeuille, Histoire de la ville de Montpellier, 2 (18752), 348ff.; A. Germain, Histoire du
Commerce de Montpellier, 2 vols. (1861), index S.V. Juifs, S. Kahn, in:
REJ, 19 (1889), 25981; 22 (1891), 26479; 23 (1891), 26578; 28 (1894),
11841; 33 (1896), 283303; G. Saige, Les Juifs du Languedoc (1881), index; L.H. Escuret, Vieilles rues de Montpellier, 2 (1964), 23ff., 2834;
Z. Szajkowski, Franco-Judaica (1962), index.
Later Centuries
In the middle of the 16t century, the presence in Montpellier
of *Conversos, who chiefly lived among the Protestant population, is vouched for by a Swiss traveler, a student named Platter. From the beginning of the 16t century, Jews from *Comtat Venaissin traded in the town. In 1653 the attorney general
of the parliament of Toulouse directed the town magistrates
to expel them. Similar orders were issued in 1679 and 1680. A
special register was opened at the town record office for the
Jews who entered Montpellier as a result of a general authorization granted from the end of the 17t century enabling them
to trade for one month during each season. From 1714 nine
Jews were allowed to settle in the town; others followed with
the tacit consent of the magistrates in spite of complaints by
the Christian merchants. In 1805, the Jewish community consisted of 105 persons and was headed by R. Mose Milhau, who
represented the department of Vaucluse at the great *Sanhedrin. Thirteen local Jews served in the armies of the revolution and of the empire, five as volunteers. The historian and
physician Joseph *Salvador was born in Montpellier of an old
Spanish-Jewish family that had fled the Inquisition. At the beginning of the 20t century there were about 35 Jewish families in Montpellier.
Holocaust and Contemporary Periods
After the 1940 armistice, Montpellier, which was in the free
zone, became a center for Jewish refugees from the occupied
part of France. After the North was occupied by the Germans
in November 1942, Montpellier became an important transit
stop for Jewish partisans. After the liberation, the community
was reorganized and by 1960 had 600 members. The arrival
of Jews from North Africa increased the number to 2,000 in
1969, and led to the construction of a communal center and
a Sephardi synagogue with 300 seats. There were two kosher
butchers and a Talmud Torah.
463
Montreal
assimilated into the English-language community, in part due
to the more favorable educational and economic opportunities
available in that sector. The Sephardim, largely French-speaking, have become increasingly important during the past 20
years. They are mainly the products of the post-1956 immigration from North Africa.
As Quebec nationalism, especially as manifested in demands to secede from Canada, became more assertive after the
founding of the Parti Qubcois (PQ) in 1968, minority ethnic
groups, including Jews, felt less secure. PQ election victories
and independence referenda between 1976 and 1995 sparked
an exodus of thousands of Jews, mainly young adults, and left
the remaining Jewish community on edge and apprehensive
about its future. In the face of continuing threats of secession,
the vast majority of Montreal Jews remains staunchly federalist
and vigorously opposes the idea of an independent Quebec.
History
The community was founded by Sephardim from New York in
1768 but remained minuscule until the emigration from Eastern Europe began late in the 19t century. By 1901 there were
about 7,000 Jews. During the 20t century there were rapid
growth spurts connected with immigration spurred by antisemitism, the destruction of the two world wars, and later by
upheavals in the Arab world after the creation of Israel. The
community reached its peak population of nearly 120,000 during the 1970s but has been in decline since then due to out-migration, mainly to other cities in Canada. During much of the
20t century Montreal was the leading force in the countrywide community, with most of the major organizations, notably the *Canadian Jewish Congress, headquartered there.
The flow of immigrants, almost all European until the Sephardi immigration that began in 1956, gave the community a
European character in many respects: religious, cultural, social, and linguistic. Montreal was home to numerous Yiddish
writers and a lively cultural life. The Jewish Public Library and
the Montreal Yiddish Theatre are two examples of institutions
with deep roots in the community. The geographical concentration of Jews in particular neighborhoods also produced a
sense of genuine community that had a positive effect on organizational life. One concrete manifestation was the Jewish
Federation, now known as Federation CJA, formed in 1965.
It is well known for effective fundraising and coordination
of a range of services to meet community needs. Through its
power to allocate the funds raised in the annual campaign to
the various agencies, the Federation is able to dominate Jewish
organizational life in the city. However, there are numerous
organizations that operate outside the orbit of the Federation,
including religious institutions, Bnai Brith, and bodies with
direct links to Israel.
Montreals Jews have always been consigned to minority status politically, even those who speak French. The same
was largely true in the business world as well. Opportunities
have been severely limited in both fields. In politics, there have
been a few Jews elected, usually to represent predominantly
464
Montreal
than 7,000 Jews are St. Laurent, Cte des Neiges, and Snowdon. Hampstead and Cte St. Luc have Jewish populations in
the 7075 percent range. There are h asidic enclaves in Outremont (mainly *Belz, Skver, and *Satmar), Cte des Neiges
(Lubavitch), and Boisbriand (Tosh), as well as an ultra-Orthodox community in Outremont and the Park Avenue area.
There are 6,795 Holocaust survivors, constituting nearly one
quarter of Jews over 55. About 18 percent of Montreals Jews
live below the poverty line.
Approximately one third of the Jewish population was
born outside Canada. The largest numbers of immigrants
came from North Africa and the Middle East (10 percent)
and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (11 percent).
Smaller proportions came from Western Europe, Israel, and
the United States. About two thirds of the Jews speak both
English and French, with English the predominant mother
tongue and language of home use. Another 26 percent speak
English only and four percent speak French only. About 10
percent have Yiddish as their mother tongue, with about 56
percent English, 18 percent French, and three percent each
for Russian and Hebrew. Some 70 percent now use English
at home.
Religious Life
Jewish religious life in Montreal is extensive and quite varied.
There are dozens of synagogues, the overwhelming majority
Orthodox. There is one major Reform temple, several Conservative synagogues, and a Reconstructionist congregation.
Even among the Orthodox there is a wide range, running from
the various h asidic sects to yeshivah-oriented ultra-Orthodox
to Modern Orthodox to Sephardi, each with its own type of
synagogue. Finally, there are also quite a number of informal
minyanim around the city, meeting in such venues as schools,
homes, synagogue buildings, and even shopping centers. Some
of these minyanim have been formally organized as congregations in order to enjoy certain legal advantages.
During the early years of the 21st century, *Chabad has
energetically tried to extend its impact in the community beyond traditional Lubavitcher h asidim by establishing a major presence in both Hampstead and Cte St. Luc. Among
the leading synagogues, the Shaar Hashomayim in suburban
Westmount, while originally Orthodox, was affiliated with
the Conservative movement through most of the 20t century. It is currently unaffiliated and has hired only Orthodox
rabbis since the retirement of long-time Rabbi Wilfrid Shuchat. The Conservatives decision to ordain women was the
key precipitating factor.
In addition to regional bodies representing the various
religious movements, there are community organizations
whose purpose is to facilitate religious life. The Montreal
Board of Rabbis and the Synagogue Council are inclusive. The
Vaad Hair, styled as the Jewish Community Council of Montreal, is Orthodox and has traditionally been the sole body to
offer kashrut supervision in the city. The long-time monopoly,
while objectionable to some, did serve a unifying purpose be-
465
monzn
The result of the government subsidy of tuition kept tuition charges relatively low in the North American context.
That, plus the tradition of Jews attending their own schools,
has resulted in over half the Jewish school age children enrolled in day schools at the elementary or high school level.
Only about half of those who complete Jewish elementary
schools remain in the Jewish system for high school. The
schools offer a wide range of ideological options, including
Religious Zionist-Modern Orthodox, Yiddishist, Conservative, community, and ultra-Orthodox (including h asidic).
Most of the schools maintain a strong commitment to Hebrew language studies, and the community is known for its
innovations in Hebrew language instruction.
There was an agreement with the Quebec government
in 2004 to increase the public support to 100 percent of the
amount allocated to the public schools (now non-confessional) for secular studies. However, the announcement triggered a political storm that included thinly disguised antisemitism. Within a month the government backtracked, leaving
the schools at 60 percent funding. The result was most embarrassing for both the community and the government, especially because of the way that opponents succeeded in ridiculing the government for proposing to channel additional
public funds to the affluent Jews.
Organizational and Institutional Structure
Ever since the early part of the 20t century, Montreals Jews
have created a host of organizations, largely to deliver services
to the community. Many of these were in the health care, social
welfare, recreation, cultural, or education areas. Eventually,
in 1965, a federation structure, similar to those in existence
in the United States, was established in order to bring more
coherence to fundraising, allocations, community planning,
and coordination of community affairs. What was originally
known as Allied Jewish Community Services was renamed
Federation CJA during the 1990s. It is one of the 16 large Jewish federations on the continent. The Federation has proven
to be exceptionally successful in the annual Combined Jewish
Appeal, giving the Montreal community the reputation of being one of the most generous in North America on a per capita
basis. In 2005 the expenditures on programs were about $45
million. Of that, about 38 percent supported Israel and related
activities, about 6 percent went to countrywide organizations
and programs, and 56 percent was retained for local services.
The local allocation is primarily for social services, education,
and culture (including tuition assistance at the day schools),
and various community initiatives.
The Canadian Jewish Congress, which had been the
dominant representative body of Canadian Jewry for nearly
a century, never established a solid fundraising base. Eventually it had to turn to the federations, including Federation
CJA, for support. Its Quebec regional operation is now somewhat limited and is supported by the Federation. Bnai Brith
Canada is outside the federation structure. It has a national
organization that raises money to fund its local activities, in-
466
moon
the local Knights Templar, dates back to the second half of
the 12t century. In 1232 the Monzn community joined the
communities which pronounced a counter-ban against the
scholars who banned the study of *Maimonides writings.
For taxation purposes, the community formed part of a collecta (tax administrative unit) with the neighboring communities of Albalate de Cinca, Alcoletge, Pomar, Estadilla, and
Granadella. In 1271 the annual tax paid to the crown by the
community of Monzn amounted to 4,000 slidos. A ruling
of Solomon b. Abraham ibn *Adret (Responsa, pt. 3, no. 242;
cf. Responsa of Isaac b. Sheshet, no. 19) indicates how the tax
was paid in Monzn. Anti-Jewish riots occurred in Monzn
in 1260. During the persecutions at the time of the *Black
Death (1348), the Jews of Monzn entrenched themselves inside their walled quarter and were thus saved. They suffered
no harm during the 1391 persecutions, although a number of
them subsequently became *Conversos. The community sent
Don Joseph ha-Levi and R. Yom Tov Caracosa as its representatives to the disputation of *Tortosa in 141314, which had
serious consequences for the Monzn community. In 1414 the
antipope *Benedict XIII wrote to the bishop of Lrida authorizing him to turn the synagogue of Monzn into a church,
since the majority of the communitys members had become
converted. He also ordered that property belonging to the
burial society and the Talmud Torah should be given as beneficium to the chapel to be erected in the new church. However
it seems that later the community revived. Forty-four names
of Jewish householders are mentioned in the notarial records
of 146578. No details are recorded regarding the departure
of the Jews from Monzn on the expulsion of the Jews from
Spain in 1492.
Bibliography: Baer, Spain, index; Baer, Studien, 149; Baer,
Urkunden, 1 (1929), index; Neuman, Spain, index: Ashtor, Korot, 2
(1966), 174; F. Cantera, Sinagogas espaolas (1955), 2512; Vendrell Gallostra, in: Sefarad, 3 (1943), 124; Romano, ibid., 13 (1953), 72ff.; Lopez
de Meneses, ibid., 14 (1954), 108; Cabezudo Astrain, ibid., 23 (1963),
266f., 274, 280, 282. Add. Bibliography: R. Pita Merc, in: Ilerda,
44 (1983), 287303; J.M. Vilads Castillo, in: Boletn de la Asociacin
Espan~ola de Orientalistas, 20 (1984), 30715.
[Haim Beinart]
(2) (18t century), rabbi and author. He was born in Tetuan, Morocco, where he engaged unsuccessfully in commerce.
He therefore wandered to Algiers and Oran and in about 1732
arrived in Egypt, where he was considered one of the most
prominent rabbis. His works are extant in manuscript.
Bibliography: J. Ayash, Responsa Beit Yehudah (Leghorn,
1746), H oshen Mishpat, no. 4 (75a); Conforte, Kore, 3943, 4849;
J.M.Toledano, Ner ha-Maarav (1911), 1589, 2301; J. Ben-Naim,
Malkhei Rabbanan (1931), 13b; Rosanes, Togarmah, 5 (1938), 3367;
S. Assaf, Mekorot u-Meh karim (1946), 2068; Hirschberg, Afrikah,
2 (1965), 115.
[Abraham David]
MOON (Heb. usually , yareah ; poetical form , levanah; Isa. 24:23, 30:26; Song 6:10). A deity for ancient Israels
neighbors, the moon is for Israel the lesser light created on
the fourth day of creation to rule the night (Gen. 1:16). The
calendar used in ancient Israel was probably lunisolar. At any
rate, the month was based on the periodical recurrence of
the moons phases. (For full details, see *Calendar.) The New
Moon, Rosh H odesh, the beginning of a new period, was
proclaimed by the Sanhedrin and marked by the blowing of
trumpets and special offerings (Num. 10:10, et al.), and was a
minor holiday of which liturgical traces have remained (see
*New Moon). Two main festivals, Passover and Sukkot, begin at the full moon.
Cult
As a male deity, the moon (Nanna) was worshiped by the Sumerians and by the Semites in general. Known as Sin among
the eastern Semites, the moon god was called Erah in the
west. Sin was the patron god of Ur and Haran, which were
connected with the origins of the Patriarchs. The popularity
of the moon cult is attested by the frequency of theophoric
names with the divine element Sin or Erah . The Israelites were
warned against worshiping the moon, and convicted transgressors were punished by stoning (Deut. 4:19, 17:35). The
moon cult was, nevertheless, introduced into Judah by King
Manasseh (II Kings 21:3) but was subsequently abolished by
King Josiah (II Kings 23:5).
For fuller details see *Host of Heaven.
In the Aggadah
Rabbinic literature uses levanah, and not yareah for the moon.
The moon and the sun were created on the 28t of Elul (Pd RE
8), and were originally equal in size (both being referred to as
the two great lights Gen. 1:16), but jealousy between them
caused dissensions, so that God decided to make one of them
smaller. The moon was chosen to be degraded because it had
unlawfully intruded into the sphere of the sun, and hence the
difference between the sun, the greater light. and the moon,
the lesser light, (ibid.). The unlawful intrusion is based on the
phenomenon that the moon is sometimes visible during the
day (Pd RE 6; Gen. R. 6:3). The remarkable statement is made
that the he-goat offered on the New Moon is a sin-offering
brought by God; according to the Midrash this was for hav-
467
MOON, BLESSING OF THE, prayer of thanksgiving recited at the periodical reappearance of the moons crescent.
In Hebrew, the prayer is known by several names: Birkat haLevanah (the blessing of the moon) or Kiddush Levanah
(sanctification of the moon). It can be recited front the third
evening after the appearance of the new moon until the 15t
of the lunar month; after that day, the moon begins to diminish. The prayer is recited only if the moon is clearly visible
(not when it is hidden by clouds), and it should preferably
be said in the open air. According to the Talmud (Sanh. 42a),
Whoever pronounces the benediction over the new moon in
its due time welcomes, as it were, the presence of the Shekhinah (Divine Presence) and hence it is recommended (Sof.
20:1) to pronounce the benediction, if possible, on the evening
after the departure of the Sabbath when one is still in a festive mood and clad in ones best clothes. The blessing of the
new moon in some rites is delayed in the month of Av until
after the Ninth of *Av, in Tishri, until after the *Day of Atonement, and in Tevet until after the fast of the tenth of *Tevet.
A mourner does not bless the moon until after *shivah (the
468
MOONMAN, ERIC (1929 ), British politician and communal leader. Moonman was born in Liverpool and left school at
13, when he was apprenticed to a printer. He worked for the
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mopp
Daily Mirror in Manchester and was involved in local politics
in Stepney, London, before becoming the Labour member of
Parliament for Billericay (196670) and Basildon (197479).
More recently he was an executive in the radio industry and,
despite leaving school at 13, a professor of management at the
City University Business School. Moonman was one of the
most visible and consistent pro-Israeli politicians in the British Labour Party, serving as chairman (197580) and president
(2001 ) of the Zionist Federation of Britain. He was vice president (19942000) of the Board of Deputies of British Jews and
served on many other bodies fighting antisemitism.
[William D. Rubinstein (2nd ed.)]
MOORE, GEORGE FOOT (18511931), U.S. teacher of religion. Moore graduated from Yale in 1872 and from Union
Theological Seminary in 1877, was ordained to the Presbyterian
ministry in 1878, and became professor of Hebrew at Andover
Theological Seminary in 1883. In 1902 he went to Harvard and
was made professor of the history of religion in 1904.
MOPP (Max Oppenheimer; 18851954), painter and printmaker. Born in Vienna, he studied there from 1900 to 1903 at
the Akademie der Bildenden Knste and at the Academy of
Fine Arts in Prague from 1903 to 1906. He returned to Vienna
in 1908. With the artists Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele,
Oppenheimer originated Austrian Expressionism, a style characterized by distorted form, exaggerated or unnatural color,
and intensely expressive lines intended to signify turbulent
emotion. Oppenheimer signed his name as Mopp beginning
in 1910. Both Mopps and Kokoschkas portraits, which share
very similar visual characteristics, helped to establish Expressionism as the major Viennese visual style by 1909. Mopp was
a masterly portraitist, with deep psychological insight. Among
469
mopsik, charles
his many sitters were the writer Thomas Mann (1913), writer
Arthur Schnitzler, composer Arnold Schnberg, and composer Anton Webern (1909). After travel and study in Holland, France, and Italy, Mopp moved to Berlin in 1911, where
he contributed drawings to the Expressionist periodical Die
Aktion. During the same year, the artist had his first solo exhibition at the Galerie Thannhauser in Munich. The poster for
the exhibition created a scandal because of its adaptation of
Mopps painting The Bleeding Man, an image of the artist as a
wounded, semi-nude Christ. Mopp often composed paintings
with religious, specifically Christian themes. In addition to The
Bleeding Man, among other works, the artist produced several
etchings for the German edition of Gustave Flauberts Legend
of St. Julian the Hospitable. Mopp fled from the rising National
Socialist movement in Germany to Berne in 1915 and then to
Zurich a year later. During this period, Mopp composed still
lifes in a Cubist and Futurist style and experimented with
Dada. With artist Marcel *Janco, Mopp created decorations
and the Dada dancers masks for the Cabaret Voltaire, and exhibited pictures there for the Cabarets 1916 opening night. In
addition, Mopp, with Guillaume Apollinaire, Jean Arp, Wassily Kandinsky, Janco, and Pablo Picasso, contributed to Hugo
Balls 1916 pamphlet titled Cabaret Voltaire. A music-lover and
an accomplished violinist, Mopp painted many group portraits
of celebrated string quartets. For example, Mopps painting
The Klinger Quartet (1916) is a tondo or circular composition
in which the repeated depiction of the musicians expressive
hands seeks to visually communicate the quality and rhythm
of the sound emanating from the instruments. Mopps massive painting The Symphony (192040), a work upon which
Thomas Mann commented in an essay, was intended as an
homage to the late Gustav Mahler. In 1924, 200 of the artists
now well-known orchestra works were shown in an exhibition organized by the Viennese Hagenbund artists association. Later, Mopps work revealed the influence of the Neue
Sachlichkeit. The artist relocated frequently in the years before and during World War II. Between 1917 and 1923, Mopp
lived in Geneva and Vienna; he resided in Berlin in 1924 and
1925, but returned once again to Vienna in 1932. In the latter
city, Mopp exhibited at the Wiener Knstlerhaus. After he was
labeled by the National Socialists as a degenerate artist, nine
pieces of Mopps work were removed from German museums
in 1937. The following year, the artist fled to New York. At the
end of his life, his work displayed an Impressionist style. In
addition to Flauberts book, Mopp illustrated several more
publications, including stories by Heinrich *Heine and two
works by the chess master, Emanuel *Lasker. Mopps work is
represented in numerous museums, including the Fine Arts
Museum of San Francisco; the Los Angeles County Museum
of Art; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the National
Gallery of Canada; the Jewish Museum, Prague; and the Leopold Museum, Vienna.
Leben und malerisches Werk mit einem Werkverzeichnis der Gemaelde (1999).
[Nancy Buchwald (2nd ed.)]
MORAG (Mirkin), SHLOMO (19261999), Hebrew philologist. Morag was born in Petah Tikvah. He graduated in Jewish
and Oriental Studies at The Hebrew University, receiving his
doctorate in 1955, and also studied at the School of Oriental
Languages of the Sorbonne, Paris. From 1950 he taught at The
Hebrew University, and in 1975 he was appointed professor of
Hebrew and Semitic languages as well as professor of Hebrew
philology at the Tel Aviv University. Morag was a member of
the Hebrew Language Academy. He was awarded the Israel
Prize for Jewish studies in 1966. He initiated and founded a
research project in the language traditions of the Jewish communities, becoming later The Jewish Oral Traditions Research
470
moravia
Center, which is part of the Institute of Jewish Studies of
The Hebrew University. He served as director of the project,
which collected and studied the language traditions of the
Jewish communities. Among his works are The Vocalization
Systems of Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic (1962), The Hebrew
Language Traditions of the Yemenite Jews (1963), and The Book
of Daniel, a Yemenite Babylonian MS (1973). A full list of
his works and scientific studies was published in Meh karim
ba-Lashon ha-Ivrit u-vi-Leshonot ha-Yehudim Muggashim liShelomo Morag (ed. M. Bar-Asher, 1996), 2138; an autobiographical sketch, ibid., 720; and an assessment by the editor, ibid. 16. To this list should be added Edah ve-Lashon,
vols. 2125.
Morags father, Moshe Aryeh Mirkin, published a long
commentary on the Midrash Rabbah.
MORAIS, SABATO (18231897), U.S. minister-h azzan as his
position was defined and founder of the *Jewish Theological
Seminary. Morais, who was born in Leghorn, Italy, received
his early Hebrew education from teachers in his community.
At the age of 22, he applied for the position of assistant h azzan
at the Spanish and Portuguese (Bevis Marks) congregation in
London and in 1846 he became director of that congregations
orphan school. During his five years in England he learned
much about Jewish life in an Anglo-Saxon environment, and
established a friendship with Moses *Montefiore and the Italian patriot Mazzini. In 1851 he arrived in the U.S. to become
h azzan of Mikveh Israel congregation, the oldest congregation in Philadelphia (and one that exists until this day), succeeding Isaac Leeser. He was a pioneer in introducing adult
education classes and supplemental religious schooling. He
had a discretionary fund for the distribution of money to the
poor. He served in this position until his death, 47 years later.
He opposed slavery during the pre-Civil War period, much
to the consternation of some of this congregants. He strove
to unite the Sephardi and the Ashkenazi elements in the congregation, and later to help the Russian Jewish immigrants.
Morais influenced many young men who became leaders of
American Jewry, including Cyrus *Adler, Mayer *Sulzberger,
and Solomon *Solis-Cohen. He was, in the words of Pamela
Nadel, a founder or a supporter, of nearly every Philadelphia
philanthropy and institution, at a time when Philadelphia was
a source of enormous Jewish creativity.
He had a deep love for Jewish music and a great interest in Jewish scholarship, especially in Sephardi studies. He
translated a work of S.D. Luzzatto and rendered the writings
of other Italian Jewish scholars into English. He was involved
in the revival of Hebrew and wrote prose and poetry and encouraged others to write in Hebrew. He published a commentary on the Book of Esther and translated Jeremiah that was
the initial draft used in the 1917 Jewish Publication Society
edition of the Bible. In 1887 he received an honorary LL.D.
from the University of Pennsylvania, the first Jew to receive
this distinction. He was a professor at Maimonides College,
one of the early attempts to create a rabbinical seminary, from
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
471
moravia
difficult to make any positive identification of a Jewish settlement in Moravia. It is likely that Jews lived in Moravia before
the date of conclusive documentary evidence for their presence. In the biography of Bishop Clement of Bulgaria (d. 916)
it is reported that, after the death of the Byzantine missionary
Methodius (885), when the Frankish Church prevailed in the
Byzantine Empire, about 200 Slav priests were sold to Jewish
slave traders. The Raffelstaetten toll regulations (903906),
which fixed relations between the Great Moravian and the
Carolingian empires, mention Jews as slave traders, but do not
say whether they resided in Moravia. According to the Bohemian chronicler Cosmas of Prague (1039?1125), a baptized
Jew built the Podivin castle in southern Moravia in 1067; Cosmas also mentions a community in *Brno (Bruenn) in 1091.
Isaac *Dorbelo, a student of R. Jacob b. Meir *Tam, speaks of
observing the rite of the *Olomouc (Olmuetz) community
around 1146 (Mah zor Vitry, Hurwitz ed. (1923), 247, 388). The
first extant document explicitly mentioning Jews in Moravia
is the *Jihlava (Iglau) city law of 1249. In 1254 *Premysl Ottokar II issued his charter, an adaptation of one originally issued
in 1244 by Duke Frederick II of Austria (123046). Among
other provisions it forbade forced conversion and condemned
the *blood libel. A gravestone excavated in *Znojmo (Znaim),
dated 1256, is the oldest known Jewish tombstone from Moravia. In 1268 Premysl Ottokar II renewed his charter; at the time
the Jews of Brno were expected to contribute a quarter of the
cost of strengthening the city wall. In an undated document
(probably from c. 127378), he exempted the Brno Jews from
all their dues for one year since they had become impoverished. Writing to the pope in 1273, Bishop Bruno of Olomouc
complained that the Jews of his diocese employed Christian
wet nurses and accepted sacred objects as pledges, and that
the interest they took during one year exceeded the initial
loan. The first time a Jew, Nathan, is mentioned by name is
in 1278, in connection with a lawsuit about church property.
Solomon b. Abraham *Adret (d. 1310), responding to a question addressed to him from Moravia, mentions the *Austerlitz
(Slavkov) and *Trest (Triesch) communities. Wenceslaus II
confirmed Premysl Ottokars charter (1283 and 1305) at the
request of the Jews of Moravia.
When Moravia passed under the rule of the Luxembourg
dynasty in 1311, the Jewish community of Brno, carrying their
Torah Scrolls, participated in the celebrations welcoming
King John of Luxembourg to the city. In 1322 John permitted
the bishop of Olomouc to settle one Jew in four of his towns
(*Kromeriz (Kremsier), Mohelnice, Vyskov, and Svitavy (Zwittau)), and to benefit from their tax payments. At that time
Jews earned their livelihood mainly as moneylenders, but
gentile moneylenders could also be found. Several Moravian
communities, such as Jemnice (Jamnitz), Trebic, and Znojmo, were affected by the wave of massacres evoked by the
*Pulkau *Host desecration in 1338. A toll privilege granted in
1341 to the monastery of Vilimov, which was on the main road
between Moravia and Bohemia, puts Jewish merchants on a
par with their gentile counterparts and mentions a great va-
472
moravia
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Jewish Communities in Moravia before World War I. After Th. Haas, Die Juden in Maehren, 1908.
Ingrowitz Jimramov
Jaegerndorf Krnov
Jamnitz Jemnice
Joslowitz Jaroslavice
Kanitz Dolni Kounice
Klobouk Klobouky
Kojetein Kojetin
Konitz Konice
Koritischan Korycany
Kostel Podivin
Kosteletz Kostelec
Kremsier Kromeriz
Kromau Moravsky Krumlov
Kunstadt Kunstat
Kwassitz Kvasice
Leipnik Lipnik nad Becvou
Liebau Libava
Littau Litovel
Lomnitz Lomnice
Loschitz Lostice
Lundenburg Breclav
Maehrisch Budwitz Moravske Budejovice
Maehrisch Neustatd Unicov
Maehrisch Ostrau Moravska Ostrava
Maehrisch Truebau Moravska Trebova
Misslitz Miroslav
Mistek
Mueglitz Mohelnice
Namest Namest nad Oslavou
Napagedl Napajedle
Neu Rausnitxz Rousinov
Neustadtl Nove Mesto na Morave
Neutitschein Novy Jicin
Nikolsburg Mikulov
Oderberg Bohumin
Olmuetz Olomouc
Pirnitz Pirnice
Plumenau Plumlov
Pohrlitz Pohrelice
Prerau Prerov
Prossnitz Prostejov
Puklitz Puklice
Pullitz Police
Roemerstadt Rymarov
Roznau Roznov pod Radhostem
Saar Zdar
Schaffa Safov
Schoenberg Sumperk
Seelowitz Zidlochovice
Shildberg Stity
Skotschau Skoczow
Steinitz Zdanice
Sernberg Sternberk
Strassnitz Straznice
Teltsch Telc
Teschen Cesky Tesin
Tischnowitz Tisnov
Tobitschau Tovacov
Trebitsch Trebic
Triesch Trest
Troppau Opava
Ungarisch Brod Uhersky Brod
Ungarisch Hradisch Uherske Hradiste
Ungarish Ostra Uhersky Ostroh
Wagstadt Bilovec
Wallachisch Klobouk Valasske Klobouky
Wallachisch Meseritsch Valasske Mezirici
Weisskirchen Hranice
Wessely Veseli nad Moravou
Wischau Vyskov
Wisowitz Vizovice
Witowitz Vitkovice
Woelking Bolikov
Wsetin Vsetin
Zdounek Zdounky
Zlabings Slavonice
Zlin Gottwaldov
Znaim Znojmo
Zwittau Svitavy
473
moravia
1650 the Moravian Diet decided that Jews could reside only
where they had been living before 1618, but the decision was
not enforced. Later this was modified by the Diet of 1681 to
permit Jews to dwell where they lived before 1657.
The Modern Era
On July 31, 1725, during the reign of Charles VI, an imperial
order fixed the number of registered Jewish families at 5,106
and threatened any locality which accepted Jews where they
had not been previously settled with a fine of 1,000 ducats.
On September 20 of that year the same penalty was imposed
on anyone who allowed Jews to come into possession of real
estate, particularly customhouses, mills, wool-shearing sheds,
and breweries. The first enactment was reinforced a year later
by allowing only one son in a family to marry (see *Familiants
Law); the second was never carried out, as it would have deprived noblemen of lucrative revenue and most Jews of their
livelihood. Under Charles VI the geographical separation of
the Jews was implemented in most Moravian towns.
*Maria Theresa threatened Moravian Jewry with expulsion (Jan. 2, 1745) but rescinded her order, permitting them
to remain for another ten years. In 1748, however, she raised
their toleration tax (Schutzgeld) from a total of 8,000 florins
(since 1723) to 87,700 for the next five years and 76,700 in the
following five; in 1752 the tax was fixed at 90,000 florins. Two
years later the empress definitive General Police Law and
Commercial Regulations for the Jewry of the Margravate of
Moravia appeared; as its name indicates it regulated all legal,
religious, and commercial aspects of Jewish life in Moravia.
The authority of the *Landesrabbiner was defined and his election regulated, as were those of the other offices of the *Landesjudenschaft. In essence the law was based on a translation
by Aloys von *Sonnenfels of the resolutions and ordinances
of the old Council of Moravian Jewry. Although the earliest
recorded session of the council had taken place in 1651, it was
at least a century older, for a Bendit Axelrod Levi was mentioned in 1519 as being head of all Moravian communities.
The names of most Moravian rabbis were recorded from the
mid-16t century.
A clearer picture of the council emerges after the Thirty
Years War (161848): Moravia (medinah) was divided into
three provinces (galil), in each of which two heads (rashei
galil) officiated; at the same time, each one was a member of
the governing body of Moravian Jewry (rashei ha-medinah).
The chief authority was the Landesrabbiner (rav medinah),
who had jurisdiction over both secular and religious matters. His seat was in *Mikulov (Nikolsburg). His presence at
council sessions was obligatory and he was the authoritative
interpreter of their decisions. There were two types of council: the governing small council of six heads of provinces,
and the large legislative one, which was attended by representatives of the communities and met every three years at a
different community. The franchise was very limited and the
council oligarchic in spirit and practice. The last large council, that of 1748, was attended by 61 representatives elected by
367 house owners. Its main function was the election of small
bodies of electors and legislators. The authority of the council
was undermined by the absolutist state, which in 1728 defined
its ordinances as temporary; from 1754 Maria Theresa limited the independence of the communities and their central
council. The main function of the council and the Landesrabbiner was to divide the tax load justly among the communities. When Landesrabbiner Menahem *Krochmal was called
upon to settle a dispute between the poor and the rich over
the control of the communities, he claimed that the decisive
voice belonged to those who contributed more to the community. Krochmals tenure (164861) was vital in the formulation
of the 311 ordinances (shai takkanot) of the Moravian council.
Among his noted predecessors were R. *Judah Loew b. Bezalel
(Maharal) and R. Yom Tov Lipmann *Heller. Among the more
distinguished holders of the office were David *Oppenheim
(from 1690 to 1704); Gabriel b. Judah Loew *Eskeles, nominated in 1690; and his son Issachar Berush (Bernard) *Eskeles,
(d. 1753), who also became chief rabbi of Hungary and successfully averted the 1745 expulsion threat. His successor, R.
Moses b. Aaron *Lemberger, ordained that henceforth at least
25 students should attend the Mikulov (Nikolsburg) yeshivah,
and that each Moravian sub-province should support two yeshivot with ten students each. R. Gershon Pullitz and R. Gershon *Chajes (Landesrabbiner 178089) fought against the insidious influence of Shabbateanism and Frankism in Moravia:
in 1773 Jacob *Frank resided in Brno, where the *Dobruschka
family were among his adherents; members of the *Prostejov
(Prossnitz) community were commonly called Schebse since
so many of them were followers of Shabbetai Z evi.
In spite of the hostile attitude of Charles VI and Maria
Theresa and the continuous curtailment of the authority of
the council and the Landesrabbiner, there was a thriving communal life in Moravia. In the first half of the 19t century the
Landesrabbiner Mordecai *Benet (d. 1829), Nehemiah (Menahem) Nahum *Trebitsch (d. 1842), and Samson Raphael
*Hirsch (served from 1846 to 1851) wielded great influence.
Besides the spiritual metropolis of Nikolsburg, there were
important centers of learning in Boskowitz (*Boskovice), Ungarisch-Brod (*Uhersky Brod), Kremsier, Leipnik (*Lipnik
nad Becvou), and Prossnitz.
The situation of Moravian Jews improved after Joseph IIs
*Toleranzpatent, which abolished the body tax (see *Leibzoll)
and other special taxes and permitted some freedom of movement. But the limitation of the number of Jewish families
remained, the number of licensed (systematisiert) Jewish
families being kept at 5,106, later raised to 5,400. An edict
of Francis II in 1798 limited their rights of settlement to an
area of 52 Jewish communities (Judengemeinden), mostly in
places where communities had existed from early times. The
six royal cities remained closed to the Jews. Like most of the
local Christian communities, the Jewish communities were
subject to the authority of the feudal lord. At that time the
largest communities were Mikulov with 620 families, Prostejov with 328, Boskovice with 326, and Holesov with 265. The
474
moravia
total number of registered Jews increased from 20,327 in 1754
to 28,396 in 1803 (the actual numbers might have been from
10 to 20 higher). The revolutionary year of 1848 brought the
abolition of most legal and economic restrictions, the right
of free movement and settlement, and freedom of worship,
but also gave rise to anti-Jewish disturbances: in Prostejov a
Jewish national guard, 200 men strong, was organized. These
measures of freedom were enacted by the Austrian parliament
which convened in Kromeriz. Landesrabbiner S.R. Hirsch sent
two messages to parliament. The process of legal emancipation
was completed in the Austrian constitution of 1867. In conformity with the new municipal laws (passed temporarily in
1849 and definitively in 1867) 27 of the 52 Jewish communities
were constituted as Jewish municipalities (*politische Gemeinden) with full municipal independence, and existed as such
until the end of the Hapsburg monarchy, in striking contrast
to the abolition of Jewish municipal autonomy in Prague in
1850 and in Galicia in 1866. The legalization of the Jewish religious autonomy, a longer process, was not completed until
1890, when 50 Jewish religious communities (Kultusgemeinden) were recognized, 39 in places where old communities existed and 11 in newly established Jewish centers.
The restrictions imposed on the Jews by Charles VI and
Maria Theresa, most of which remained in force until the
second half of the 19t century, led many Moravian Jews to
leave the country, mainly for Hungary (Slovakia) and later
for Austria. After equal rights and freedom of movement were
granted, new communities were established in the big cities
of Brno, Olomouc, Ostrava (Maehrisch Ostrau), and Jihlava,
while others were set up in small places that previously Jews
had only visited on market days. At the same time many Moravian Jews left for other parts of the Hapsburg Empire, particularly Vienna, and some emigrated. As a result, the Jewish population of Moravia remained relatively static at a time when the
world Jewish population was rising, and even declined slightly
from 1890. (See Table: Jewish Population in Moravia).
Jewish Population in Moravia
In 1787 Joseph II ordered that half of the main tax on Moravian Jewry (then 88,280 florins) be allowed to accumulate in
a fund (known as Landesmassafond) for the payment of the
Number of Jews
1830
1840
1848
1857
1869
1880
1890
1900
1910
1921
29,462
37,316
37,548
42,611
42,644
44,175
45,324
44,255
41,255
37,989
475
moravia, alberto
Duchy of Tesin. Even h asidic shtiblekh were not an oddity. Jews
from Carpatho-Russia, who migrated westward between the
wars and who left their country after World War II in fear of
Soviet domination, strengthened the religiosity of Moravian
Jewry still further. However, after World War II there were
only two communities in Moravia where religious observance
was the rule Brno and Ostrava. Between the wars, 60 of
Moravian Jews declared themselves as being of Jewish nationality, far above the figure for Bohemia.
The first provincial union of Jewish communities was established in November 1918 under the leadership of Alois Hilf
from Ostrava; this union became instrumental in the emergence and consolidation of the Jewish National Council, as
well as in the setting up of the Supreme Council of the Jewish
Religious Communities in Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia. The
Central Committee of the Zionist Organization in Czechoslovakia had its seat in Ostrava from 1921 to 1938, under the chairmanship of Joseph *Rufeisen; the center of *He-Halutz was
also located in Ostrava and the main office of Keren Hayesod
was in Brno for a long time. Brno had the only Jewish high
school in the western part of Czechoslovakia and Ostrava
had a fully equipped vocational school. Moravian Jews were
represented by a Zionist in the provincial Diet. However, the
number of Jews continued to decline, from 45,306 in Moravia
and Silesia in 1921 to 41,250 in 1930, almost half of whom were
concentrated in the three cities Brno, Ostrava, and Olomouc.
The venerable communities dwindled or even disintegrated.
When the Germans occupied Austria in March 1938, several thousand Jews escaped to Moravia, mainly to Brno. They
were followed in September and October of that year by a few
thousand more from the areas detached from Czechoslovakia
and incorporated in Germany by the Munich Agreement. The
majority of Jews in the Teschen (Tesin; Cieszyn) district, ceded
to Poland, did not flee. On March 15, 1939, the remaining parts
of Moravia were occupied by Nazi Germany and became part
of the Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia. Immediately after the
conquest, the lot of the Jews in northeast Moravia was especially disastrous. They constituted a high percentage of those
expelled to the Nisko reservate in the Lublin area. Many perished there in the first winter of the war; others returned, only
to join their fellows in *Theresienstadt and various extermination camps. After the war, very few survivors returned to
Moravia, and the majority of them later emigrated to Israel
and other countries. In 1970 barely 2,000 Jews remained in former Moravia, the largest community being in Brno. In Brno
there also existed a center of Carpatho-Rus Jewry which was
involved in communal problems such as indemnities from
Czech authorities, Carpatho-Rus authorities, and German
authorities. Brno was the seat of the chief rabbi of Moravia,
Richard *Feder. The rabbi was the only leading Jewish figure who dared criticize the Communist regime for its treatment of the Jews. He also publicly expressed longing for Erez
Israel and interest in the State Israel. When he died in 1970, at
the age of 95, the rabbinate remained vacant. In Brno and in
Ostrava a prayer room, cemetery, and religious services were
476
Morawetz, Oskar
he had himself been born, and the relentless psychological
analysis of the characters in his works came to the fore in Le
ambizioni sbagliate (1935; Wheel of Fortune, 1938) and dominated many later novels. Moravias early writings made it clear
that he had set out to combine the 19t-century narrative tradition of Dostoievski and Flaubert with the aesthetic principles of the realistic or naturalistic novel. Totally estranged
from Judaism, Moravia served during World War II as a foreign correspondent in Germany and the Far East. His postwar works dealt largely with themes such as adolescence and
relations between the sexes, and remained outside of any established literary current.
Moravias artistry and skillful characterization are especially evident in the novels which he published after World
War II: Agostino (1945, Eng. trans. 1947); La Romana (1947;
The Woman of Rome, 1949); La disubbidienza (1948; Disobedience, 1950); Il Conformista (1951; The Conformist, 1952); and Il
disprezzo (1954; A Ghost at Noon, 1955). However, some critics were sensitive to the writers preoccupation with sex and
to his disinclination to pass judgment on the amorality of his
heroes. There is a warmer, more sympathetic tone to his stories about the lower strata of society in Racconti romani (1954;
Roman Tales, 1956) and in Il Paradiso (1970). Moravia distinguished himself as a novelist most of all, perhaps, in La Ciociara (1957; Two Women, 1958), an acute study of two characters, contrasting intellect and sensuality, which was made
into a successful motion picture. His later works include La
noia (1960; The Empty Canvas, 1961); Lattenzione (1965; Fr.
trans. LAttention, 1966); and a volume of short stories, Una
cosa una cosa (1967). Moravia also published Luomo come
fine (1964; Man as an End: A Defense of Humanism, 1966), a
collection of major essays published between the years 1941
and 1962, and a book of plays, Teatro (1958). The variety of his
interests may be gauged from three other books Un mese in
U.R.S.S. (1958; Fr. trans. Un Mois en U.R.S.S., 1954), Un idea
dell India (1962), and La rivoluzione culturale in Cina (1967;
The Red Book and the Great Wall, 1968).
Bibliography: A. Limentani, Alberto Moravia tra esistenza
e realt (1962); E. Sanguineti, Alberto Moravia (It. 1962); O. Del
Buono, Moravia (Ital, 1962), incl. bibl.; M.F. Cimmino, Lettura di
Moravia (1967); P. Pancrazi, Scrittori italiani del Novecento (19392),
index; idem, Scrittori doggi, 1 (1942), index; G. De Robertis, Scrittori
del Novecento (19582), index; E. Kanduth, Wesenszuege der modernen
italienischen Erzaehlliteratur (1968), incl. Bibl. Add. Bibliography: G. Pandini, Invito alla lettura di Alberto Moravia (1990);
F. Alfonsi, Alberto Moravia in America: un quarantennio di critica
(19291969) (1984); idem, Alberto Moravia in Italia: un quarantennio
di critica (19291969), (1986); A. Elkann, Vita di Moravia (1991); R.
Paris, Alberto Moravia (1991); M. Piccinonno, Discorrendo di Alberto
Moravia (1992); T.E. Peterson, Alberto Moravia (1996); M. Procaccia,
Lebreo Pincherle; Moravia tra indifferenza e rimozione, Appartenenza
e differenza (1998), 16175.
[Giorgio Romano]
suffering from the wave of massacres following the Host desecration of *Pulkau in 1338. One Jew, Jacob, is mentioned in 1363
and in 1386 as a member of a consortium buying and selling
a village. From 1528 transactions between Jews and gentiles,
involving loans and the sale of houses, horses, and grain, are
mentioned frequently in the town records. In 1562 the community numbered 47, and its members were not permitted to
sell alcoholic beverages or to brew beer. The community was
expelled in 1564. There were no Jews in the town until 1774,
when a tobacco agent settled there, and in 1808 a Jew leased
a distillery. Between 1794 and 1842, 120 Jewish merchants attended the local fairs. There were 19 Jews in Moravske Budejovice in 1848, 58 in 1869, 127 in 1890, and 97 in 1900. A congregation was founded in 1867 and recognized as a community
in 1890. A cemetery was consecrated in 1908 and a synagogue
in 1910. From 1926 the community was administered by the
Safov (Schaffa) community. Its members numbered 77 in 1930
(1.8 of the total population). In 1942 those Jews remaining
after the German occupation were deported to extermination
camps, and the synagogue equipment was sent to the Central
Jewish Museum in Prague. No community was reestablished
after World War II.
Bibliography: J. Fiser, in: H. Gold (ed.), Juden und Judengemeinden Maehrens (1929), 34367; Bondy-Dworsk, 1 (1906), nos.
673, 679; Germ Jud, 2 pt. 2 (1968), 512 S.V. Maehrisch-Budwitz.
[Meir Lamed]
MORAWETZ, OSKAR (1917 ), Canadian composer. Morawetz was born in Svetla nad Sazavou, Czech Republic. Having
studied piano and music theory in Prague and Vienna, he applied to enter Canada after the Nazis entered the Sudetenland
(1938). Finally admitted in 1940, he continued music studies
477
MORAWITZ, KARL RITTER VON (18461914), Austrian banker. Born in Iglau (now Jihlava), Moravia, he was
educated in Prague and began working as a bank clerk in small
banking houses in Prague and Dresden. In 1860 he joined
the Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas in Paris, an establishment of Ludwig *Bamberger with whom Morawitz became
closely associated. Subsequently he entered the Paris office
of the Ottoman Bank, but, as a foreigner, had to leave that
post in 1870 after the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War.
He then worked for Baron Maurice de *Hirsch and his
railway enterprises. In 1906 he became president of the
Anglo-Austrian Bank, a post he held until his death. Morawitz
was an expert in international finance, and his experience
and connections made him an influential adviser. Shortly
before his death he was knighted by Emperor Franz Joseph. Morawitz frequently wrote and lectured, and his book,
Les Finances de la Turquie (1902), is a standard work on
the financial history of the Ottoman Empire. Other publications include: Aus der Werkstatt eines Bankmannes, Aus
Arbeitstagen und Mussestunden (1907), and a history of the
Anglo-Austrian Bank, 50 Jahre Geschichte einer Wiener Bank
(1913).
[Joachim O. Ronall]
478
mordecai, alfred
Hamans property (8:1f.) and being appointed vizier (10:3). His
fame spread abroad and all Persian officials aided the Jews in
destroying their enemies. Mordecai recorded all these events
and he and Esther wrote to all the Jews to commemorate the
days of deliverance annually (14t and 15t day of Adar; Esth.
9). In Hasmonean times, the 14t of Adar was known as the
Day of Mordecai (II Macc. 15:36).
A cuneiform tablet from the end of the reign of Darius I
or the beginning of that of Xerxes (Ahasuerus) mentions an
official named Marduka, whom some scholars have identified
with the biblical Mordecai. It has further been suggested that
the prominence of Jews in the Murashu tablets from the time
of Xerxes successors, Artaxerxes I and Darius II, and their
absence from documents of earlier reigns, accords with the
statement that Mordecai sought [and achieved] the welfare
of his people (Esth. 10:3).
[Bezalel Porten]
In the Aggadah
The fact that Mordecai is referred to as both a Benjamite (Yemini) and a Judean (Yehudi) (Esth. 2:5) is explained in various
ways: as a tribute to David, who belonged to the tribe of Judah,
for saving the life of Shimei the Benjamite who is regarded as
Mordecais ancestor, or because his mother was of this tribe.
His name is interpreted to mean pure myrrh (mor-myrrh,
decai-pure) for he was as refined and noble as pure myrrh
(Meg. 12a). Mordecai was a prophet and is sometimes identified with Malachi (ibid.). He prophesied in the second year of
Darius (Meg. 15a). Mordecai fasted from the eve of Passover
till its seventh day, supplicating God to mete out punishment
to Ahasuerus for his desecration of the Temple vessels (Targ.
Jon., Esth. 1:10).
Mordecai was appointed to the royal court at the request
of Esther (Yal., Esth. 10:53). Thus it was while attending on the
king that he discovered the plot of Bigthan and Teresh. They
were Tarseans and spoke their native language in plotting to
poison Ahasuerus, unaware that Mordecai knew 70 languages
(Meg. 13b). It was on account of his ability as a linguist that he
was called Bilshan (Men. 65a). When the court officials asked
Mordecai why he refused to pay homage to Haman while his
ancestor Jacob prostrated himself before Hamans ancestor
Esau, Mordecai answered, I am a descendant of Benjamin,
who was not yet born when that took place (Targ. Sheni, Esth.
3:4). The true reason for Hamans hatred of Mordecai and the
Jews was that he had once sold himself as a slave to Mordecai
and whenever they met his erstwhile master used to remind
him of this fact (Meg. 15b).
After the fatal decree had been signed, Mordecai asked
three school children to repeat to him the biblical verses they
had just learned. The children recited three different biblical verses, each containing a prophecy that Israel should not
fear the evil designs against them. Mordecai had been informed of the kings decree by Elijah. The prayer he and Esther prayed then unto God was the Hallel. The days Mordecai decided that Jews should fast were the first three days of
Passover (Meg. 15a). When Mordecai saw Haman coming to
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
him with the royal insignia, he thought his last moment had
come. He therefore told his pupils to flee and leave him alone
to his fate, but they refused. Mordecai spent what he thought
were his last moments in prayer and Haman had to wait until
he had finished. Since Mordecai had been fasting and mourning for several days he refused to don the kings apparel until he had bathed and trimmed his hair. But upon a decree of
Esther, the baths and all the barber shops were closed on this
day, so that Haman had to act as valet to Mordecai. Haman
had also to offer him his back to enable Mordecai to mount
the horse (Meg. 16a).
While Haman conducted Mordecai through the streets,
27,000 youths from the court marched before him, bearing
golden cups and beakers (Targ. Sheni, Esth. 6:11). As he rode,
Mordecai and his pupils gave praise to God (Lev. R. 28:6). As
soon as the procession was over, Mordecai put off the royal
attire and again covering himself with sackcloth, resumed his
prayers and fasting (Meg. 16a). He did not stop praying until Ahasuerus charged him with the execution of Haman. In
spite of Hamans pleas, Mordecai insisted upon hanging him
like the commonest criminal (Targ. Sheni, Esth. 7:10). Mordecai became king of the Jews (Esth. R. 10:12). As such he had
coins struck which bore sackcloth and ashes on one side and
a golden crown on the other (Gen. R. 39:11). However in the
measure in which Mordecai gained worldly power and consideration, he lost spiritually, because his high political function left him no time for study of the Torah. From first among
the scholars of Israel, he had dropped to seventh place among
them (Meg. 16b).
Bibliography: S.H. Horn, in: BRE, 9 (1964), 14ff. IN THE
AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, index.
479
mordecai, jacob
North Carolina Historical Review, 22 (1945), 58108; S.L. Falk, in: A.J.
Karp (ed.), The Jewish Experience in America, 3 (1969), 30022.
in: Sefer Dinaburg (1949), 240ff. (Heb.); I. Tishby, Netivei Emunah uMinut (1964), S.V. Eisenstadt, Mordecai.
[Stanley L. Falk]
[Theodore Friedman]
MORDECAI, JACOB (17621838), U.S. merchant and educator. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, his early formal
education was slight, but he studied at home and in the synagogue and later earned a reputation as a scholar and biblical authority. He moved to Richmond, Virginia, in 1782 and
became an independent businessman. In 1784 he was in New
York, where he formed a brief partnership with Haym *Salomon, but after the death of the latter in 1785, Mordecais business failed. He returned to Virginia, attempting various commercial ventures, and finally in 1792 moved to Warrenton,
North Carolina, where he became a successful merchant. In
1807 Mordecai lost heavily in tobacco speculations and was
forced to give up his business. In 1809, encouraged and backed
by a group of townspeople, he opened the Warrenton Female
Academy, which became famous throughout the South as a
school for girls. Mordecai and his family ran the Academy successfully until 1819, when he sold it and moved to a farm near
Richmond. He served as president of Beth Shalome, the first
synagogue in the city, which he had helped found. He lived
in Richmond from 1832.
MORDECAI BEN HILLEL HAKOHEN (1240?1298), author and rabbinic authority in Germany. The only biographical
details known of him are that he was a descendant of *Eliezer
b. Joel ha-Levi, a relative of *Asher b. Jehiel, and a brother-inlaw of Meir ha-Kohen, author of the Haggahot Maimoniyyot,
that he was an outstanding pupil of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg, *Isaac b. Moses (author of Or Zarua), and *Perez b. Elijah of Corbeil. He appears to have spent some time in Goslar (Resp. Maharam of Rothenburg, ed. Lemberg, 476), from
there moving to Nuremberg, where he died a martyrs death
in the *Rindfleisch massacres, together with his wife and five
children.
Mordecais fame rests on the Sefer Mordekhai, always referred to as the Mordekhai. This gigantic compendium consists of elaborations on talmudic problems in the style of the
*tosafot. However, it follows the arrangement of laws used by
Isaac *Alfasi, its aim having been to spread the learning of the
French and German scholars and of their predecessors by attaching them to the work of Alfasi, which had a wide circulation; but the Mordekhai does not refer at all to the content
of Alfasis book. Over 300 books and authors are cited in the
Mordekhai, including whole pages from Or Zarua and dozens
of responsa of Meir of Rothenburg in full. The absence of any
of the writings which Meir of Rothenburg sent to his pupils
while he was in prison proves that the book was completed
before 1286, the year of Meirs incarceration. On the other
hand, it is clear from the many references to my master, Rabbi
Mordecai that the book was not edited by Mordecai himself
but by his sons and pupils. If the Sefer ha-Dinim of Judah haKohen and Sefer ha-H okhmah of Baruch b. Samuel are still
known today, it is almost entirely thanks to the Mordekhai.
The history of the spread of the Mordekhai and the transmigrations of its many versions in manuscript and in print is one
of the most complicated in all of rabbinic literature. Because
of the books tremendous scope, two main compilations of
extracts, the Austrian and the Rhenish, were made from
it within a few decades, mainly reflecting regional laws and
customs, and differing greatly from one another. The Rhenish version which is the one extant includes the views of
many French and English scholars, and the customs of the
German communities. These customs had spread eastward
as far as Poland, but were not accepted west of Germany. The
Austrian version reflects the minhag of southeastern Europe
including the customs of Austria, Hungary, Bohemia, Saxony,
and Moravia, and mentions many Austrian scholars. This version was in the possession of Israel *Isserlein.
In 1376 Samuel *Schlettstadt edited an abridgment of
the Mordekhai (Mordekhai ha-Katan), adding glosses of his
own (Haggahot Mordekhai). In print, these appeared independently at the end of the book, but sometimes they were confused with the text. This abridgment was based on the Rhen-
480
the selih ah Mah Rav Tuvekh, a lament for Abraham the proselyte who died a martyrs death in 1264 at Augsburg.
[Israel Moses Ta-Shma]
Further Information
A study of the many manuscripts of Sefer Mordekhai reveals
that there are families of manuscripts. Manuscripts belonging to a certain family are based on the same version and use
the same linguistic expressions with the same additions as in
the printed text of Sefer Mordekhai printed in different editions of the Talmud. The manuscripts of the Mordekhai make
it possible to attempt to establish a text of the Mordekhai for
the Talmud tractates that will include as many sections of
the Mordekhai as possible, namely the text of the book as it
is printed and, in addition, different parts not yet published
and originating from the different manuscripts.
A. Halperin published a study called The Complete Sefer
Mordekhai for Tractate Bava Kamma (1978): Part I, Introduction; Part II, a critical edition of the Mordekhai for Bava
Kamma by Rabbi Samuel Schlettstadt. In addition, the complete Mordekhai for Tractate Beiz ah (edited by Yehoshua
Horowitz and Yiz h ak Kleinman) appeared in the Torat
H akhamei Ashkenaz series of the Jerusalem Institute (1983).
This edition is based on 18 manuscripts and early printed editions and includes notes, sources and variant readings.
[Yehoshua Horowitz]
Bibliography: S. Cohen, in: Sinai, 916 (1942/431946/47),
passim; I.A. Agus, Teshuvot Baalei ha-Tosafot (1954), introd.; Bialer, in: Genazim (1967), 1945; Urbach, Tosafot, index; Rosenthal,
in: Shanah be-Shanah (1967/68), 234; Zulbach, in: JJLG, 3 (1905);
5 (1907); Zunz, Lit Poesie, 364; Germ Jud, 404; Davidson, Oz ar, 4
(1933), 436; E.E. Urbach, Baalei ha-Tosafot, vol.2 (1980), 55660; A.
Halperin, Introduction to The Complete Sefer Mordekhai for tractate
Bava Kamma (1978); Y. Horowitz, The Quality of the Texts of the
Mordekhai for Tractates Rosh haShanah, Sukkah and Beiz ah, in:
Proceedings of the 8t World Congress of Jewish Studies (1982), 5762;
idem, Introduction to The Complete Sefer Mordekhai for tractate
Beiz ah (1983), 1015.
481
MORDELL, LOUIS JOEL (18881972), British mathematician. Mordell was professor of mathematics at Manchester
from 1923 to 1945 and professor at Cambridge from 1945. He
was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1924, and president of the London Mathematical Society from 1943 until 1945.
Mordell wrote many articles on the theory of numbers and
allied topics. In addition he published Three Lectures on Fermats Last Theorem (1921); A Chapter on the Theory of Numbers
(1947); Reflections of a Mathematician (1958); and Diophantine Equations (1969).
[Barry Spain]
MORDELL, PHINEHAS (18611934), Hebrew grammarian and scholar. Mordell was born in Shat (Kovno province)
and studied in Yelizavetgrad. In 1881, he went to the U.S. and
settled in Philadelphia. During his first years there Mordell
worked at various trades and was a beadle in a synagogue, at
the same time industriously pursuing the study of Hebrew
language and grammar. He was associated with the Wissenschaft scholars in the U.S., as well as with Hebrew writers. Finally, after achieving a wide reputation, he worked until 1903
partly as a teacher and partly as a night watchman in order
to devote the day to his studies. He was among the pioneer
proponents of Zionism and the Hebrew language movement
in the U.S. Mordell spent much of his time on the study of
Hebrew language and grammar and especially on the Sefer
*Yez irah which he edited and to which he wrote a comprehensive commentary in English (1914). In 1895 he published,
without commentary, the corrected text of Sefer Yez irah. He
was greatly encouraged in his linguistic studies by Ah ad HaAm (Asher Ginsberg), who published some of Mordells articles in Ha-Shiloah (vols. 3 (1898), 4789; 5 (1899), 23346;
10 (1902), 43142; see Iggerot Ah ad Ha-Am, 2 (1957), 4101).
He continued publishing linguistic studies in Ha-Toren, 4
(1917/18), 8f.; Ha-Ivri, 9 (1919), no. 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 12, 17, 19, 21,
22, 24 (a series of articles on the reading of Hebrew which
was also published separately); Ha-Olam ha-Yehudi (1924);
482
Bibliography: Fuerst, Karaeertum, 3 (1869), 87ff.; A. Neubauer, Aus der Petersburger Bibliothek (1866), 76ff.; S. Poznaski, The
Karaite Literary Opponents of Saadiah Gaon (1908), 87; Mann, Texts,
2 (1935), index.
[Leon Nemoy]
moreh, mordecai
and Leshonenu, 3 (1930). His articles were also published in
English (8 articles in JQR, 191234) and one was published in
Yiddish. Mordell left an extensive Hebrew commentary to the
Sefer Yez irah and chapters on grammar (unpublished). His son
was Louis Joel *Mordell, the mathematician.
Bibliography: J. Zausmer, Be-Ikvei ha-Dor (1957), 332.
[Getzel Kressel]
483
moreh, shmuel
used directly the portraits of his earlier works. A Renaissance
spirit is evident in his etchings. Moreh held a large number
of one-man shows and his work was exhibited at the Israel
prints exhibition held in 1961 at the Boston Public Library
and at the fourth Biennale of Paris-Israel Prints in 1968. His
work is displayed in many museums and private collections
in Israel and abroad.
Bibliography: M. Moreh, Radierungen 19601972, Heidelberg Kurpfaelzisches Museum (MarchApr., 1972).
[Judith Spitzer]
484
drama and sociodrama. In these, the conventional doctorpatient relationship is replaced by acting in which the participants purge themselves through reliving and acting out their
experience. These methods have been applied in a variety of
situations, especially in schools, industries, and armies.
Major publications of Moreno, apart from a great many
papers and monographs, are Das Stegreiftheater (1924; The
Theater of Spontaneity, tr. by the author, 1947); Who Shall Survive? (1934, rev. ed. 1953); Sociometry, Experimental Method
and the Science of Society (1951); The First Psychodramatic Family (1964); and Discovery of Spontaneous Man (1965).
[Werner J. Cahnman]
The primary incentive in all their activities was to make certain that future generations learn about the horrors of the Holocaust and to insure that it doesnt happen again.
As the years went by, Moreshet, expanded its field of
work. In the early 21st century Moreshet had developed into a
leading research and education center for Holocaust Studies. It
carries out activities in various fields with a publishing house;
Yalkut Moreshet, a journal; an educational Campus at Givat
H avivah; Holocaust Studies and Research Center: Moreshet
Archives; an exhibition annex; journeys to Poland; and the
Holocaust Remembrance Day Ceremony at Yad Mordechai.
Publications
MORESHET PUBLISHING HOUSE. The dozens of titles which
have appeared over the years encompass central issues, such
as personal testimonies, biographies, historical works, annals
of communities and literature for children and youth. The
books, covering important subjects of the Holocaust, are an
important resource for pupils and researchers.
YALKUT MORESHET. The journal Yalkut Moreshet is a prestigious research periodical appearing twice annually. First issued in December 1963, it is the oldest and most significant of
its kind in Israel and is dedicated to documentation, deliberation, and research of the Holocaust. The material that appears
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
moreshet
in Yalkut Moreshet has proven to be an invaluable source for
courses in Holocaust Studies both in Israel and abroad.
As of 2003, an English edition of Yalkut Moreshet has begun appearing on an annual basis, containing articles from the
current Hebrew edition, as well as articles from previous editions that have become classics in Holocaust research.
The Educational Campus at Givat H avivah
The characteristic and unique guidelines of Moreshets educational work are characterized by the participation of the
pupils in the educational process, through various interdisciplinary activity workshops. Less emphasis is placed on lectures and more on discussions, stories and opportunity for
self-expression. Major use is made of different means of illustration: films, pictures etc. Pupils are also given the opportunity to connect with the computerized archives for personal projects.
A significant portion of time is devoted to an encounter with Holocaust survivors. Since they were then the same
age the pupils are now, it is easy for the youngsters to listen to
them, ask questions and to identify.
Historical stress is placed on the role of youth, and especially graduates of the youth movements, in the resistance
against Nazism. Historiography points out the place of youth
as a leading element and stimulus to resistance, and at its
head graduates of the youth movements owing to the education and values which they absorbed in their movements.
A central theoretical guideline is the exposure of the
sources of racism and the roots of antisemitism and education
towards universal humanistic values as a way of preventing it
from happening again. Moreshet encourages participants to
confront the complex dilemmas of ones own experience, to
take a stand. and to make a moral choice.
Educational Programs
Among the educational programs carried out by Moreshet
are (a) programs for the Israel Defense Forces, which enrich
knowledge of moral struggles and values. Moreshet offers
seminars dealing with the effects of military service in reinforcing Jewish and Israeli identity. Programs touch on obedience to authority, the role of civilians in war, heroism, human
dignity. (b) Study days for pupils of all grades: the study units
and means of illustration in the programs offered are designed
with maximum consideration of the cognitive and emotional
ability of the various age groups. During the course various activities take place, including creative activity to work through
the experiences of the day. (c) A program on women Holocaust Resistance fighters, which deals with the role of women
in fighting in the ghettoes and forests and as liaisons with the
Aryan side. The seminar deals with conflicts stemming from
the three components of womens identity woman, Jew, and
Holocaust fighter. Emphasis is placed on the education these
women received in their youth, on the ways they overcame
difficulties and obstacles, the dilemmas they faced, and the
means they used to fulfill their missions. (d) A weekend seminar in Russian for new immigrants from the CIS, AntisemiENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
485
moresheth-gath
for the role of accompanying teacher. It also trains teachers to
deal with questions arising among young persons upon their
return from Poland and develops the teachers capabilities to
cope with problems, difficulties and reactions by individuals and groups.
[Ariel Hurwitz (2nd ed.)]
486
morgenstern, soma
antagonistic, but that both are necessary and each complements the other. Despite his official role within the Reform
movement, Morgenstern was dissatisfied with the term Reform Judaism, which he regarded as reflective of conditions
in 19t-century Germany rather than in 20t-century America,
and as carrying with it certain overtones of sectarian separatism. He preferred to speak (so far as the United States is concerned) of an emerging American Judaism, more pragmatic
and less dogmatic than early Reform; and he envisioned an ultimate synthesis of the Reform and Conservative movements,
in a pattern not yet evident.
Bibliography: M. Lieberman, in: HUCA, 32 (1961), 19; B.J.
Bamberger, in: CCAR Journal (April 1957); 14; L. Finkelstein (ed.),
Thirteen Americans: Their Spiritual Autobiographies (1953), 253372.
[Bernard J. Bamberger]
sultant on atomic energy matters. In addition to general economic theory, his principal interests were econometrics and
business cycles. One of Morgensterns major contributions to
the field was the formal conception of game theory as part
of economic theory, which he and John von Neumann first
organized in the classic book Theory of Games and Economic
Behavior (1944). Game theory was later expanded upon and
refined by John Nash and others. Morgenstern retired from
Princeton in 1970.
Morgensterns other publications include The Limits
of Economics (1937), Economic Activity Analysis (1954), The
Question of National Defense (1959), International Financial
Transactions and Business Cycles (1959), On the Accuracy of
Economic Observations (1950, 19632), Predictability of Stock
Market Prices (with C.W.J. Granger, 1970), Long-Term Projections of Power (1973), and Mathematical Theory of Expanding
and Contracting Economies (with G.L. Thompson, 1976).
Bibliography: M. Shubik (ed.), Essays in Mathematical Economics (1967), incl. bibl.
[Joachim O. Ronall / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
487
Bibliography: Wininger, Biog, 4 (1925), 42931. add. bibliography: NDB, Vol. 18 (1997). 109111.
[Shnayer Z. Leiman]
Morgentaler, Henry
Jew who returns to his fathers native village, where he rediscovers the values of authentic Jewish life. In his later work
The Third Pillar, translated by Lewisohn in 1955 (the German
original, written between 1946 and 1953, was published under
the title Die Blutsaeule in 1964, and a Hebrew translation appeared in 1976 under the title Ammud ha-Damim), he attempts
to come to terms with the Holocaust; combining realistic and
fantastic elements, it is set in the same locale as the trilogy,
and told in biblical language. Abraham *Heschel called it the
only Midrash about the Holocaust. A passage from it has been
incorporated in the liturgy of the Yom Kippur martyrology in
the Mah zor for Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur, published
by the Rabbinical Assembly of the Conservative Movement
(1972). Morgenstern died in New York.
488
obtain State Department approval of a plan of the World Jewish Congress to transfer private U.S. funds to Europe to rescue
French and Romanian Jews. It was at Morgenthaus suggestion that Roosevelt established the *War Refugee Board as a
presidential executive agency in January 1944.
As the end of the war approached, Morgenthau proposed a peace plan involving the partition of Germany and
its conversion into an essentially agrarian area. The Morgenthau Plan, presented in his Germany Is Our Problem (1945),
stirred much debate and Morgenthau resigned after Roosevelts death.
While still at the Treasury, Morgenthau worked with
such Jewish organizations as Mt. Sinai Hospital, Bnai Brith,
and the Jewish Welfare Board. In 194750 he served as general
chairman and in 195053 as honorary chairman of the United
Jewish Appeal; the unprecedented sums raised by the appeal
during these crucial years significantly aided the new State
of Israel. Morgenthau also served as chairman of the board
of governors of the Hebrew University (195051) and of the
American Financial and Development Corporation for Israel,
and the Israel Bond drive (195154).
Henry Morgenthau Jr.s son ROBERT MORRIS MORGENTHAU (1919 ) was born in New York. He served in the Navy
during World War II and engaged in private legal practice in
New York (194861). In 1961 he was appointed U.S. attorney
for the southern district of New York and served with distinction until 1970, winning a reputation for integrity and efficient
prosecution. He was an unsuccessful candidate for governor
of New York in 1962. In 1974 he was elected district attorney
of New York County (i.e., Manhattan), serving for 30 years
and being reelected unopposed in 2005. Among his Jewish
communal affiliations were the Anti-Defamation League, the
New York Federation of Jewish Philanthropies, and Brandeis
University.
489
morgenthau commission
Morgenthau was the predominant figure in the postWorld War II effort to refocus the study of international relations on the observed regularities of human conduct, rather
than on the idealistic pursuit of abstract norms. This political realism gained wide influence with the publication of his
Scientific Man vs. Power Politics (1947), and especially Politics among Nations (1949), which became the leading text in
the field. Morgenthau was also active as a commentator on
U.S. current affairs. His writings were published as Politics
in the Twentieth Century (3 vols., 1962) and in 1970 as Truth
and Power.
Morgenthau was a founder of the National Committee
on American Foreign Policy and served as its first chairman
in 1974. In his honor, in 1981 the committee established the
Hans J. Morgenthau Award, which is presented to an individual whose efforts have contributed to the advancement of
the national interests of the United States and to the achievement of U.S. foreign policy objectives within the framework
of political realism.
As a founding proponent of political realism, Morgenthau
was regarded as the central figure in international relations
scholarship of the 20t century. Some of his other publications
include In Defense of the National Interest (1951), Dilemmas of
Politics (1958), The Impasse of American Foreign Policy (1962),
The Restoration of American Politics (1962), Crossroad Papers
(1965), A New Foreign Policy for the United States (1969), and
Science: Servant or Master? (1972). Many of his writings were
translated into foreign languages, and he served as editor of
numerous philosophical, legal, and scientific journals.
Add. Bibliography: B. Mollov, Power and Transcendence:
Hans J. Morgenthau and the Jewish Experience (2002); C. Frei, Hans
J. Morgenthau: An Intellectual Biography (2001); S. Bucklin, Realism
and American Foreign Policy (2001); M. Griffiths, Realism, Idealism,
and International Politics (1995); G. Russell, Hans J. Morgenthau and
the Ethics of American Statecraft (1990).
[Alan Dowty / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
490
morin, edgar
ated in law and settled in Odessa. He joined the group which
published the Den, and in his Impressions from Abroad, he
presented a comparison between the situation of the Jews in
Western Europe and in Russia. Attacking antisemitism in numerous essays, he sought to reform Jewish life from within.
One of his longest essays dealt with the history of the education of the Jews (in Yevreyskaya Biblioteka, vols. 13).
Morgulis considered that Russian Jewry should accept
Russian culture while remaining loyal to the religious-national
values of Judaism. He therefore supported Yiddish literature,
contributed to the Jewish press, and cooperated with the moderate *H ibbat Zion inasmuch as they minimized their projects
for the settlement of Palestine. Although initially he was a
member of the committee of the Society for the Support of
Agricultural Workers and Craftsmen of Syria and Erez Israel,
his violent opposition to political Zionism led him to abandon such activities; he also combated attempts to strengthen
the Hebrew elements in the modern Jewish schools. A committee member of the Odessa branch of the *Society for the
Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia, he was also
actively involved in the communitys educational institutions,
especially the vocational school, Trud, and the talmud torah,
which were models for all the Russian communities. Morgulis principal essays and studies were published in his Voprosy
yevreyskoy zhizni (Problems of Jewish Life, 1889), and his
memoirs (in Voskhod, 189597 and in Yevreyskiy Mir, 1911) are
of historical value.
Bibliography: L.M. Bramson, Obshchestvenno-kulturnaya
deyatelnost M.G. Morgulisa (1912).
[Yehuda Slutsky]
tivity identified the Jewish writer and that French culture had
been enriched by the Jewish contribution. In Bless (1951) he
described Jewish suffering with violence and anguish. A prophetic tone dominates collections such as La vie est unique
(1933), Autocritique (1951), and La robe (1954).
MORIAH (Heb. ) , an unidentified locality mentioned
in the Bible. Abraham was ordered to offer Isaac as a burnt offering in the land of Moriah, which was three days distance
from Beersheba and visible [from] afar (Gen. 22:24). Early
tradition identifies mount Moriah with the place where Solomon built the Temple. Josephus also locates the sacrifice on
the mountain where David [sic] later built the Temple (Ant.,
1:226). Talmudic scholars explain the name Moriah as derived
from the the mountain of myrrh (in Song 4:6; Mekh., BeShallah 3; Gen. R. 50:7). The Septuagint, in translating Amoria (Amorite) for Moriah, offers another explanation. The
assumption that Abraham intended to sacrifice Isaac on the
threshing floor of Jebus (Jerusalem), in full view of the Canaanite city, is farfetched; nor is the Temple Mount visible
from afar, as it is hidden by the higher mountains around it. It
seems more probable that the biblical story left the location of
Moriah deliberately vague; the importance of the sacrifice of
Isaac in the series of covenants between God and Israel made
it natural that at an early time this supreme act of faith was
located on the site destined to become the most holy sanctuary of Israel, the Temple of Solomon, just as the Samaritans
transferred the act to their holy mountain, Mt. Gerizim.
Bibliography: Abel, Geog, 1 (1933), 3745; EM, 4 (1962),
7412.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
MORIAH, Hebrew publishing house. In 1901 H .N. *Bialik, together with Y.H. *Rawnitzki, S. Ben-Zion, and others, founded
the Moriah publishing house in Odessa, their primary intention being the printing of educational material for modern
Hebrew schools. Up to 1914 they issued a large amount of
such literature, including Bialik-Rawnitzkis famous anthology Sefer ha-Aggadah. Moriahs activities were expanded (under E.L. Lewinsky) to include the best in modern Hebrew literature, such as works by Mendele Mokher Seforim, Shalom
Aleichem, I.L. Peretz, S. Asch, and D. Frischmann; poetry by
Bialik, Tchernichowsky, and Z. Shneur; and scholarly works
by M.L. Lilienblum, D. Neumark, and S. Krauss. Moriah became the leading house for modern Hebrew publishing, but
World War I and the Russian Revolution caused the end of
this remarkably successful enterprise. It was succeeded by the
*Dvir publishing house, set up in Berlin after the war by some
of the founders of Moriah.
Bibliography: H .N. Bialik, Devir u-Moriyyah (1926).
[Bernhard Blumenkranz]
491
morning benedictions
clandestine activities in the French Resistance during World
War II. Formerly an active member of the Communist Party,
he published his Autocritique in 1959. An emeritus researcher
at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS),
Morin introduced the notion of inter-disciplinarity in his
work, from his first book, Lan zro de lAllemagne (1946) until
his last, La violence du monde, published with Jean Baudrillard
(2003)). His interests covered an extensive range of themes,
from cinema to modern biology, regardless of the current disciplinary boundaries. He became internationally famous especially in Latin America by attaching his name to the age
of complexity. He was president of the European Agency for
Culture (UNESCO), president of the Association for Complex
Thought (APC), and a member of the council of the International Center for Transdisciplinary Research and Studies
(CETSAP). His major work, on which he worked for over 20
years (197791), is the monumental six-volume series in which
he aimed at reforming our way of thinking: La mthode (1) la
nature de la nature, 1981; (2) La vie de la vie, 1985; (3) La connaissance de la connaissance, 1986; (4) Les ides, leur habitat,
leur vie, leurs moeurs, leur organisation, 1991; (5) Lhumanit
de lhumanit: LIdentit humaine, 2001; (6) thique, 2004.
He also published his intellectual biography, Mes dmons
(1998). Several of his books were translated into English: The
Stars (1960), The Red and the White: Report from a French
Village (1970), Method: Towards a Study of Mankind The
Nature of Nature (1992), Homeland Earth (1998), Seven Complex Lessons in Education for the Future (1999), Concept of
Europe (2006).
Acknowledging his Jewishness, he published his familys
biography, Vidal et les siens (1989), and contributed a preface
to Henry Mchoulans Les Juifs dEspagne: histoire dune diaspora: 14921992 (1992). Most of the following have been translated into Chinese, English, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese,
Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and
Turkish: Rumour in Orleans (1971); Human Race, Preceded
by an Homage to Robert Antelme (1992); Homeland Earth: A
Manifesto for the New Millennium (Advances in Systems Theory, Complexity and the Human Sciences) (1998).
Bibliography: M. Kofman, E. Morin, From Big Brother
to Fraternity (1996); R. Barbier, c. 2, Morin et la connaissance,in:
LApproche Transversale. Lcoute sensible en sciences humaines (1997);
J.B. Fages, Comprendre Edgar Morin (Pense) (1988), F. Bianchi, Le
Fil des ides: Une co-biographie intellectuelle dEdgar Morin (2001);
R. Fortin, Comprendre la complexit. introduction La Mthode
dEdgar Morin (2002).
[Sylvie-Anne Goldberg (2nd ed.)]
MORNING BENEDICTIONS (Heb. ) , designation of a series of benedictions (the number and sequence
varying in the different rituals), which constitute the first part
of the morning prayer (*Shah arit). After a number of preliminary hymns, the following blessings are recited: (1) for
ablution; (2) for the wondrous harmony of the bodily functions; (3) the three Torah blessings (*Birkat ha-Torah), which
in some versions appear in a different place; and (4) Elohai
492
MORNING FREIHEIT (Morgn-Frayhayt Morning Freedom), U.S. leftist Yiddish newspaper. In 1921, the U.S. group,
the Jewish Socialist Federation (JSF), split from the Socialist Party. During the ferment of the Jewish labor movement
at that time, the independent JSF was expelled from the
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
morocco
building of the Jewish Daily Forward, located in the heart
of Manhattans Lower East Side; many of the federations
intellectual leaders worked as staff of the widely read Yiddish daily. The JSF, renamed the Jewish Federation, together
with the just-formed Workers Party, founded the Frayhayt in
April 1922 as a leftist daily afternoon newspaper. The Frayhayt,
named for Germanys Independent Socialist Partys newspaper, initially tried to steer a third course between mainstream
social democracy and proletarian communism. The Frayhayt
managed for several years under the editorship of Moshe
*Olgin to maintain high journalistic and linguistic standards
and had a staff that included such first-rate writers as H.
*Leivick, Moyshe-Leyb *Halpern, David *Ignatoff, Moses
*Katz, and Moyshe *Nadir. In June 1927, the paper began
appearing in the morning, from then on known as the
Morgn-Frayhayt. As was the case with many Yiddish and
radical newspapers of the day, the Frayhayt made available
to a range of authors works under the Farlag-Frayhayt imprint.
By the late 1920s, with the consolidation of different
groups into what became known as the Communist Party,
the Morgn-Frayhayt had become an unswerving Party organ,
as was demonstrated by the reversal of its initial support of
the yishuv (the Jewish community in Mandatory Palestine) to
total support for the Arabs during the 1929 anti-Jewish riots.
The papers position alienated many of its readers and caused
its circulation to slip sharply from its peak of 14,000. The
Morgn-Frayhayt remained loyal to the Communist Party line
through the Hitler-Stalin pact and the Cold War, undergoing
a process of self-examination and eventual political and organizational independence beginning in late February 1956,
with Nikita Khrushchevs de-Stalinization of the U.S.S.R. In
1967, the Morgn-Frayhayt supported Israels right to defend
itself during the Six-Day War, in direct opposition to the position of the Communist Party of the U.S. Two years later, the
CPUSA attacked the Morgn-Frayhayt and its English-language
sister publication, Jewish Currents, for their increasingly independent position regarding Soviet intervention in Poland
and Czechoslovakia, although the Morgn-Frayhayt had not
yet openly broken with the Communist Party. The MorgnFrayhayts politics independently evolved to something akin
to the Eurocommunism of the 1970s and 1980s. By 1970,
the paper was appearing five times a week, with an estimated
8,000 circulation. Seven years later, it became a weekly, with
an English-language supplement. The Morgn-Frayhayt folded
in September 1988.
Bibliography: M. Epstein, Jew and Communism (1959); J.L.
Teller, Strangers and Natives (1968); G. Estraikh, Metamorphoses of
Morgn-frayhayt, in: G. Estraikh and M. Krutikov (eds.), Yiddish and
the Left; Papers of the Third Mendel Friedman International Conference
on Yiddish (2001); D. Hacker, Jewish Currents A History (n.d.); T.
Michels, Socialism with a Jewish Face: The Origins of the YiddishSpeaking Communist Movement in the United States, 19071923,
in: Yiddish and the Left; Papers of the Third Mendel Friedman International Conference on Yiddish, op. cit.
[Arieh Lebowitz (2nd ed.)]
493
morocco
PORTUGAL
SPAIN
Ceuta (Sp.)
Tangier
(Septa) (Abyla)
(Tingis)
Arcila
Tetun
(Zilis)
(Tamuda)
Larache
Xauen
al-Qasr
. al-Kabir Ouezzane
Sebo u R.
(Lixus)
ATLANTIC OCEAN
Sal
Rabat
Bo
u
Azemmour
O
Settat
um
Volubilis
Mekns
R.
greg
Re
Mazagan
(Jadida)
Casablanca
(Anfa)
Sala
MEDITERRANEAN SEA
Azrou
Fez
Sefrou
Melilla(Sp.)
(Rusaddir)
Badis
R.
ya
u
lo
Oujda
ou
Taza M
Taourirt
Guercif
Tahala
Snada
Debdou
Boulmane
Outat el Hadj
M O R O C C O
ALGERIA
Tafraout
Tahala
Akka
Oufran
Taghaoust
Tiznit
Illigh
Goulimine
Jewish communities of Morocco. Names in boldface type indicate communities existing in 1971.
ants of Fez revolted against the ruler Yah ya (860), who had
violated the chastity of a Jewish girl. The pogrom in Fez in
1033 is to be seen as an isolated event due to the Jewish support for the Maghrawas, the rivals of the Ifrenids. At a later
date, the *Almoravides prohibited the Jews to live in their
capital *Marrakesh. The most brilliant period of the Jews of
Morocco from the spiritual and intellectual point of view belongs to the reigns of the *Idrisids and their successors. The
numerous departures for Spain drained neither the strength
of Moroccan Jewry nor its intellectual activity. Even after the
departure of R. Isaac *Alfasi from Fez for Cordoba (1088), Judaism in Morocco retained its vigor. Under the Almoravides
there was even a trend in the opposite direction. Two of the
physicians of the Almoravide sovereigns, Meir ibn *Kamniel
and Solomon Abab Muallim in Marrakesh, were of Spanish
origin, one from Seville and the other from Saragossa. Both
were distinguished Torah scholars. There were also scholars
494
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Fez. Those who had been spared from the massacres and the
conversions were then able to resume a relatively normal life.
This situation changed with the advent of Abu Yaqb Ysuf
(116584). The recrudescence of fanaticism once more resulted
in the forced conversion of Jews. The dayyan of Fez, R. Judah
ha-Kohen ibn Shushan, who refused to submit to this, was
burnt alive, and at that time Maimonides left Morocco. The
situation deteriorated even further under al-Mansr (118499)
who imposed on the Jews, including those already converted,
the wearing of a distinctive sign, the Shikla, because he did
not believe in the sincerity of their conversion. The presence
of Jews was authorized once more by al-Mamn (122732),
but their appearance drew the anger of the Muslims who massacred all of them in Marrakesh (1232). The Jews did not return in considerable numbers until the time of the dynasty of
the *Merinids, who replaced the Almohads in 1269. During
Almohad rule, many Moroccan Jews had left the country for
the East, above all for Christian Spain. Large numbers of them
settled in the territories of the kings of Aragon, in Catalonia
and Majorca, where they were favorably received.
The Merinids proved themselves particularly friendly toward the Jews. When the still-fanatic mobs attacked them in
1275, the Merinid sultan intervened personally to save them.
The sovereigns of this dynasty benevolently received the Jewish ambassadors of the Christian kings of Spain and admitted Jews among their closest courtiers. Of these Jews, Khalifa
b. Waqqsa (Ruqqasa) became steward of the household of
the sultan Abu Yaqb and his intimate counselor. A victim
of palace intrigues, he was put to death in 1302. His nephew,
who was also named Khalifa, held the same office and suffered
the same fate (1310). However, there were no repercussions
against the Moroccan Jews as a result of the execution of their
powerful coreligionists. They were the principal factors in the
prosperity of the country. The Sahara gold trade, which was
of primary importance, and the exchange with the Christian
countries were completely under their control. Their relatives and associates in the kingdom of Aragon financed, when
necessary, the navies which defended the Moroccan ports. In
addition to the *jizya (poll tax), they paid enormous sums to
the treasury in customs duties for their imports and exports.
In the outlying areas, particularly in the Atlas region where
there were large concentrations of Jews of early origin, the Jews
wielded great influence in both the political and spiritual domains. Jewish physicians enjoyed well-deserved renown. The
study of Kabbalah, as well as philosophy, was then in vogue.
The last Moroccan philosopher of the Middle Ages was Judah
b. Nissim ibn *Malkah, who was still alive in 1365.
From 1375 the Muslim world of the West clearly entered
into its period of decline. The Jews of Morocco were all the
more affected by this development because, unlike in *Algeria, there was no revival due to the arrival of important Jewish personalities fleeing from the Spanish persecutions of
1391. The Jews who came to Morocco during this period were
mainly of average erudition; moreover, just like their native
brothers, they encountered the fanaticism which had been
495
morocco
worshiped in their own synagogues and sometimes had their
own lots in the cemeteries. In such northern communities as
*Tetun and *Tangier, the native Jews were completely assimilated among the descendants of the megorashim. Oblivious
to their own origin, they disdainfully referred to their brothers of the interior as Forasteros (aliens, i.e., to the Castilian
community). Until recently, most of these communities spoke
H aktia, a mixture of Spanish, Hebrew and an Arabic dialect.
The ancient Castilian language, which differs from the Ladino
spoken in the Orient, was, until the 19t century, in current
usage among a large number of families of Spanish origin in
both the north and south of the country.
At the beginning of the 16t century, Portugal occupied some of the Moroccan coast on the shores of the Atlantic. Communities of megorashim had settled in such ports as
Azemmour and Safi. From the beginning, cordial relations
were established between them and the Portuguese, who employed their members as official interpreters and negotiators. The political role of these men was of prime importance
to the kings of *Portugal. Indeed, the latter granted the Jews
of their Moroccan bases rights which may be considered as
extraordinary for that period; they loaded such families as
*Benzamero, Adibe and Dardeiro with favors. On the other
hand, these Jews, as loyal subjects, did not hesitate in sacrificing their property or even their lives when this was required
by Portuguese interests. The coreligionists who lived under
the sharifs of Marrakesh or the *Wattasids of Fez were the
principal factors in arranging the peace, always unstable, between the Portuguese and the Muslims. Jacob *Rosales and
Jacob *Roti, talented ministers of the Wattasids, endeavored
to create a lasting reconciliation between the Christians and
the Muslims. Counselors of Muslim princes such as Menahem Sananes or Abraham Cordovi pursued similar objectives. These exiles from Spain and Portugal often traveled to
the Portuguese kings as Moroccan ambassadors. During their
stay in the Iberian Peninsula, they also induced the *Marranos
to establish themselves in Morocco. During the 16t century,
Morocco became a haven for Marranos who arrived from
the Iberian Peninsula, the Madeira Islands, the Azores, the
Canary Islands and even the Americas. In Tetun, Fez, Mekns and Marrakesh, there were centers for reconversion to
Judaism. Some Jews succeeded in transferring their fortunes
there, while others, such as skillful craftsmen and especially
the gunsmiths, found immediate employment. It was early
Marranos who introduced a new process for the extracting
of sugar from sugarcane. Due to their methods, Morocco became the leading producer of the worlds best sugar during
the 16t17t centuries.
Until recent times, the Jews of Morocco engaged in a variety of professions. In some regions there were farmers and
cattle breeders among them; in general, however, they were
mostly craftsmen, small tradesmen, peddlers, and at times
moneylenders. Some industries, such as that of beeswax, and
the trading of rubber and ostrich feathers were exclusively
concentrated in the hands of the Jews. For religious reasons,
496
morocco
Amar; and Abraham Azulai. Initiates of the Kabbalah have
remained numerous in Morocco until the present day. Many
others followed *Shabbetai Z evi. During the middle of the
17t century, the movement of this pseudo-Messiah achieved
considerable success in Morocco. In the West, an important
role in checking it was played by the Moroccan rabbis Jacob
*Sasportas, Daniel Toledano and Aaron ha-*Siboni.
According to a tradition, a Jewish scholar of Wadi Draa
forecast to the Sadian sharifs that they would accede to the
throne of Morocco. Encouraged by this prediction, they set out
to conquer the country and took Marrakesh in 1525 and Fez
in 1549. In fact, the Jewish counselors of the sharifs were not
strangers to their progress. Their coreligionists administrators, merchants and bankers supplied their financial requirements; other Jews, former Marranos who maintained close
relations with Europe, supplied them with weapons in their
capacity as armorers. When the Portuguese army was defeated
by Abd al-Malik at the Battle of al-Qas r al-Kabr (or Battle of
the Three Kings, 1578), the Jews commemorated the event by a
joyful Purim (Purim de los Cristianos). On the other hand, the
tens of thousands of Christian prisoners taken in this battle
were fortunate enough to be ransomed by the descendants of
the megorashim, who treated them with indulgence. The liberation of these prisoners against ransom by their families and
the conquest of *Sudan in 1591 brought a considerable quantity
of gold to Morocco. Many Jewish families, especially those in
the retinue of Ahmad al-Mansr, were among the beneficiaries of this exceptional prosperity. Of an enterprising nature,
the Jews of Morocco traveled as far as India in the conduct of
their trade; they also had gained a hold in the financial world,
particularly in Tuscany, in one direction, and in northwestern
Europe, in the other. This activity was in concert with the politics of the young Netherlands, which sought to strangle the
economic power of Spain. In 1608 Samuel *Pallache arrived
in the Netherlands and in 1610 he signed the first pact of alliance between Morocco and a Christian country. The Pallache
family played an active role in the political and economic interests of Morocco in Europe over a long period. The sultan
Zidah (16031628) and his successors (16281659) took many
other Jews into their service. As in former times, every Muslim leader had his Jewish counselor. The latter were the natural protectors of the Jewish masses. As a result, these masses
generally lived in superior conditions to those of the Muslim
population, which resigned itself to its fate.
Frankish Jewish families from Leghorn and Holland
settled in Morocco. Some were attracted by the pirate traffic
which operated from Sal and Tetun. In Tangier, which was
under British domination, a small community of Frankish
Jews existed from 1661; relations with the Muslims, however, were maintained through the mediation of the Jews of
Tetun: until the evacuation of the town in 1684, the Parient
and the Falcon families played an important political role in
the relations between the English and the Muslims. Moroccan Jews had also inaugurated a migratory movement a long
while before.
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morocco
The 30 years of anarchy and plunder which followed
upon the death of Mulay Ismail exhausted and impoverished
the Jewish communities of the interior; they consequently
transformed their social framework. The Middle Atlas region was literally drained of its Jews. The departure of the
village Jews toward the urban centers changed the aspect of
the mellahs of Fez and Mekns. These quarters, which had
until then been well maintained, were converted into slums,
with the exception of a few middle-class streets. Most of the
ancient families were ruined and lost all power, only to be replaced by a few parvenus. Some Ben-Kikis and Mamans were
sent on diplomatic missions to Europe; their rivalry with the
former Jewish bourgeoisie caused controversies within the
community; some members of the Levy-Yuly family became
confidants of the sultans. Slowly, the towns of the interior
were abandoned by their leading Jewish elements in favor of
the ports, to which the new arrivals were already linked by
ancient ties with the Jewish financial circles living there. Rabat, Safi and especially Marrakesh replaced Fez and Mekns
as rabbinical centers.
Mulay Muhammad b. Abdallah (17571790) had formally
been viceroy of southern Morocco from 1745. He had established security and, with the assistance of Jewish and Christian
financial circles, an era of prosperity unknown in the north of
the country reigned there. As under the Sadians, Marrakesh
once more became the capital and royal residence. Its Jewish
community flourished but then entered a period of decline as
a result of the avariciousness of the sultan in his old age. The
community of Safi took over the leading place in the foreign
trade of Morocco, while that of Agadir acquired the monopoly
over the trading with the Sahara. These roles later became the
privilege of the community of Mogador (Essaouira), which
was founded in 1764. The operations of the big Jewish merchants in Morocco began to expand. Sugar production and
trade and maritime commerce were almost entirely concentrated in the hands of Jews. Commercial operations reached
the ports of the eastern coast of the United States at the end
of the 18t century. From the reign of Sidi Muhammad BenAbdallah (175790) down to the end of the 19t century, it
was usually Jews who acted as agents for the European Powers in Morocco.
The wide-ranging activities of the Jews of this circle promoted the development of such communities as Sala, Asfi,
Tetuan and Tangier and influenced the growth of new ones.
These latter communities also gained economic supremacy
over such older ones in the interior of the country as Fez and
Mekns and the communities of the Marrakesh and Tapilalti
regions. These Jews exploited their political and economic
position to improve their legal and social status and improve
the lot of the communities where they operated. In fact, beginning with the end of the 18t century, a circle of Jews arose
in Morocco with rights protected by agreements under the
aegis of the European Powers. Called protgs, their number reached a few thousand. An example of the prosperity of
the new type of community is Mogador in the last third of
the 18t century. The beginnings of its accelerated development are linked to Sultan Sidi Muhammad Ben-Abdallah,
who was interested in developing trade with Europe. He rebuilt the city and turned it into the chief port of Morocco. Ignoring the protests of the Muslim religious leaders, he levied
taxes and customs duties on imports and exports and all the
merchandise in the market place. He also brought to the city
dozens of Jewish families, giving them special rights and exempting some of them from all the strictures (aside from the
jizya tax) that applied to the Jews of Morocco. According to
one source, there were around 6,000 Jews in Mogador in 1785.
The city took on a Jewish character and the commercial center
closed down on the Sabbath. The Jews of the city developed
wide-ranging economic relations with Jewish communities
outside Morocco, such as Amsterdam, London, Leghorn and
*Algiers. The renewed desire of Morocco in the days of Mulai Abd Rahman (182259) to develop trade with Europe a
change caused partly by French pressure to open the gates of
Morocco to European commerce gave new impetus to the
tjjar esltan (Kings merchants), who had gone into decline
during the reign of Sultan Saliman (17921822).
Jewish merchants possessed various advantages: knowledge of Arabic and European languages, familiarity with local
conditions, a good name and the confidence of the Sultan. The
Sultan gave them greater freedom of movement in the country
and custom discounts, and a number of them received the title of Kings merchants. Mogador served as a base for Jewish
merchants operating in the south of Morocco and distributing
European goods in Sous (the southern region of the country)
and Sahara and exporting to Europe gold, ivory, ostrich feathers, almonds, olive oil, and goatskins. The familiarity of Jewish
merchants with local business practices and their connections
with the Sultan led European governments even to appoint local Jews as consuls (up to 1857). The condition of the Jews now
improved throughout the country. Jews from abroad came to
settle in Morocco. Among these were the Attals and Cardosos (Cordoza), who entered the service of the sovereign. Cardoso, however, drew the jealousy of the Attals upon himself
and paid for this with his life. The leading favorite of the sultan
was Samuel *Sunbal, a scholar, ambassador to Denmark, and
the last sheikh of Moroccan Jewry. Certain Jewish personalities encouraged friendship with the United States, where their
relatives had emigrated and with whom they had important
commercial ties. Isaac Cordoza Nues, an interpreter of the
sultan in Marrakesh, and Isaac Pinto, a Moroccan established
in the United States, were largely responsible for the signing
of a treaty between Morocco and the United States in 1787,
whereby the U.S. Congress paid Morocco for the protection
of U.S. shipping interests in the Mediterranean.
Mulay Muhammad entrusted the Jews with all his negotiations with the Christian countries. Those of the community
of Tetun, whose members included some wealthy merchants
and who, as in Mogador, acted as consuls, refused the rebellious son of the sultan, Mulay al-Yazid, an important loan
which he had requested from them. When he came to power,
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Mulay al-Yazid (179092) wreaked cruel vengeance upon them
and his hatred fell upon all the Jews of the kingdom. This was
the greatest disaster which befell them after the period of the
Almohads. In the first place, the community of Tetun was
handed over to the army, which plundered and perpetrated
murder and rape. The communities of Larache, Arcila, al-Qas r
al-Kabr, Taza, Fez and Mekns then suffered the same fate.
All the Jewish personalities who had been employed by the
late sultan and upon whom Mulay al-Yazid could lay his hands
were hanged by their feet at the gates of Mekns, where they
remained for 15 days before they died. The treasurer Mordecai Chriqui, who refused to convert, was handed over to the
executioner and Jacob Attal, who accepted such an offer, nevertheless died after being hanged by his heels. The notables
and the Muslim masses then rose to intervene on behalf of
the Jews. They hid many of them in their houses and saved a
great many others. In Rabat, the governor Bargash saved the
community from the worst. At the time Marrakesh had not
been subordinated. Once it fell, the Jewish community was
sacked, the men and children were massacred, and hundreds
of women were taken into captivity. Mulay al-Yazid had the
eyes of 300 Muslim notables of the town put out. Thousands
of others were convened to the Great Mosque for prayers
and massacred there. Shortly before he died as the result of a
wound received in a battle near Marrakesh, Mulay al-Yazid
ordered the drawing up of lengthy lists of Jewish and Muslim
notables in Fez, Mekns and Mogador who were to be massacred. He died before the order was carried out, however.
The advent of Mulay Suleiman (17921822) came as a
much needed respite. The new monarch was indeed opposed
to violence but he proved to be a fanatic and the Jews felt the
consequences. As he sought to seal off Morocco from foreign influence, he reduced trade with Europe to a considerable extent. He also decreed the establishment of ghettos in
the wealthiest communities. In 1808 the Jews of Tetun, Rabat, Sal and Mogador were for the first time enclosed within
mellahs. The only exceptions were a few families in Mogador
who continued to live in the residential quarter of the town.
Since they were economically indispensable to the country, he
restored to some of them their former prerogatives, notably
to the Aflalos, the Corcos, the Guedallas, the Levy-Yulys, the
Macnins, and the Sebags. He chose his diplomats, his bankers,
and his counselors from these families. The terrible epidemics of 1799 and 1818 depopulated Morocco and wrought havoc
with its social and economic conditions. As a result, some
of these families emigrated to England, where they gained a
prominent place within the Jewish society of London. One
of the members of the Levy-Yuly family, Moses, emigrated
to the United States, where his son David *Yulee became the
first senator of Jewish origin.
The reigns of Mulay Abd al-Rah man (182259) and his
successors Mulay Muhammad b. Abd al-Rah man (185973)
and Mulay al-H asan (187394) were marked by the pressure
of the Christian powers on Morocco and an increased activity of the Jews in the economic and diplomatic fields. Meyer
499
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as the basis for the justice dispensed by Jewish tribunals under
the French Protectorate. These scholars included: R. Abraham
*Coriat and R. Masd Knafo of Mogador, R. Masd BenMoha and R. Mordecai Serfaty of Marrakesh, R. Joseph *Elmaleh of Rabat, R. Raphael Encaoua of Sal, R. Vidal Serfaty
of Fez, R. Isaac Ben-Wald of Tetun and R. Mordecai Bengio
of Tangier. Many of these leaders realized the importance of
secular studies for the masses and they assisted the *Alliance
Isralite Universelle of Paris in founding its first schools in
Tetun in 1862, in Tangier in 1865, in Mogador in 1867, and in
other Moroccan towns from 1874. In contrast, other rabbis violently opposed the establishment of these schools, which they
foresaw would encourage an estrangement from Judaism.
Upon the death of Ba Ahmad (1900), an epidemic of
plague ravaged Morocco. In the mellah of Fez alone, there
were more than 3,000 victims; the country then entered a period of anarchy during which the Jewish population suffered
greatly. During the entire second half of the 19t century, thousands of impoverished Jews swelled the Jewish populations of
the large urban centers. The overcrowding of the Jewish quarters became indescribable. This exodus went on uninterruptedly into the 20t century. *Casablanca, which underwent a
tremendous expansion, was its final halting place. The misery
which prevailed in the Jewish quarters and which was partly
due to the inability of the ex-villagers to adapt to urban life,
became one of the social stains of Morocco. Jewish economic
activity reminiscent of years past was considerably curtailed,
also, because of the creation of the French Protectorate in 1912
which brought competition from French firms and large banks
(and later from other West European and American ones). But
at the same time a new bourgeoisie of middle-class merchants,
professionals and white-collar workers began to flourish.
In 1912 Morocco was divided into two colonial zones and
protectorates: French Morocco that encompassed central Morocco, the key inland cities and towns, the Atlas Mountains to
the south, and the Atlantic coastal areas; and Spanish Morocco
(in the north and the Rif Mountains). In December 1923, Tangier in the north became an international zone. The establishment of the French Protectorate in March 1912 was marked in
Fez by a pogrom which claimed over 100 victims (April 1819,
1912). However, there were no incidents in the zone assigned
to Spain or in Tangier, which was declared an international
town. Under the French and Spanish domination, the Jews
enjoyed complete freedom in all matters pertaining to their
traditions, religion, occupations and movement. France and
Spain did not interfere with the status of the Jews of Morocco,
who remained subject to the sultans protection this proved
to be advantageous for them when the anti-Jewish laws were
latter issued by the *Vichy government. In a dahir of May 22,
1918, the French authorities contented themselves with granting official status to the existing organization of the Jewish
communities, with a few modifications. These changes were
more particularly emphasized by the dahir of 1931. During the
19t century, a council of notables appointed by the population
was responsible for the administration of the community. A
gizbar (treasurer), who was elected by the leading personalities of the town, was co-opted to the council. The council
and the gizbar were responsible for the nomination of the
rabbis-judges (dayyanim). After 1912, the nation which assured the protectorate, i.e., France, claimed for itself, directly
or indirectly, most of the prerogatives emanating from this
organization and more particularly the tutelage of the community committees, which then became mere benevolent institutions. These committees, the number of whose members
varied with the numerical importance of the community, as
well as their presidents, were appointed by the grand vizier,
who in practice was dependent on the protectorate authorities. Moreover, the committees were supervised by a Jewish
official of the government, who was chosen because of his devotion to French interests. By the maintenance of such a strict
control over the Jewish elements of the country, the protectorate authorities revealed their distrust. Few Jews, however,
were politically hostile toward France. It was the task of the
community committees to bring relief to the numerous Jews
living in miserable conditions. Their budget continued to be
raised from the income derived from the sale of kasher wine
and meat, the revenues from charitable trusts (hekdesh) which
they administered, and the often generous contributions of the
upper classes and Jews from overseas. The authorities did not
grant them any subsidies.
With the exception of Tangier, where there were special
circumstances, and a few other rare cases, the old Jewish upper class kept its distance from these community committees.
They were constituted of new elements which came from a
middle class that until then had been practically nonexistent
in Morocco. The members of these committees were generally
all loyal to the French authorities. The children of the longtime upper class were usually sent to the French primary or
secondary schools. Their religious instruction was entrusted
to private teachers. Living within a traditional environment
which had withstood many a trial, they were sheltered from
religious estrangement and unreserved assimilation. The westernization of the new class, which was accomplished by the Alliance Isralite Universelle, did not alienate this stratum from
Jewish traditions and values. Their potential complete integration among the colonizers, however, was thwarted by the
antisemitism of the middle-class Frenchmen of North Africa.
A large number of Jews of this new social class amassed considerable wealth as a result of the accelerated development of
the country. This new middle class formed an important section of the larger, as well as the smaller, communities. Moroccan Jewry was consequently transformed. Some Jews took up
higher studies in Morocco itself or in French universities. At
the same time, however, the French refused requests by educated Jews to grant them French citizenship and thus release
them completely from Moroccan judicial jurisdiction. Unlike
Algeria where the Jews were granted French citizenship collectively in the spirit of the Crmieux Decree of October 24, 1870,
or Tunisian Jewry who were offered the same status on a more
selective basis in the context of the 1923 Morinaud Law, the
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501
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The Central Europeans had come mainly from Hungary and
Poland via Italy. As long as Tangier remained an international
zone, refugees were admitted without difficulty. After the fall
of France and Spains temporary occupation of Tangier, these
people were deprived of various rights, including work. The
indigenous Jewish elites of Tangier were far better off than
their counterparts in French Morocco before and during the
Spanish occupation. The small businessmen and lower middle
class, however, were heavily taxed and they could not renew
their import-export licenses. Politically, the Spanish occupiers dissolved the zones legislative assembly, while the zahir of
February 15, 1925, legalizing the Jewish community council,
was abrogated. All community activity came under Spanish
supervision. The Jewish community lost the subsidies that
the government had hitherto allocated generously, as well as
the right to elect a slate of community leaders from which the
Spaniards would select appointees. All these restrictions were
lifted with Spains withdrawal in 1945 and the restoration of
the international zone.
In 1948 about 238,000 Jews lived in French Morocco,
15,000 in Spanish Morocco, and 12,000 in the international
zone of Tangier. The 1951 census in French Morocco indicated
199,156 Jews and, together with the Jewish population of Spanish Morocco, the total number of Moroccan Jews reached then
about 222,000. The first census conducted in united Morocco
in 1960 recorded 159,806 Jews, while in 1962 an estimated
130,000 Jews lived in the whole of Morocco, decreasing to
85,000 in 1964 and about 42,000 in 1968. The two censuses
of 1951 and 1960 give valuable evidence of the demography of
the Jewish population in Morocco. In 1951 over a third of the
Jews lived in small towns and villages, but in 1961, as a result
of the mass exodus to Israel, only about a quarter of them still
lived there. The continued aliyah after 1960 reduced this number even further, so that the majority of Jews in the country in
the late 1960s were concentrated in the major cities. Census
data show that among the emigrants there were more young
people than old; this is confirmed by the census conducted
in Israel in 1961.
The dispersal of Moroccan Jews throughout scores of
towns, townlets, and villages, which sometimes contained
only a few dozen families, made it difficult to provide Jewish
*education for all who wanted it, and up to the time of the
mass exodus there were places in which there were no Jewish educational institutions. This is one of the reasons for the
high percentage of illiteracy among Moroccan Jewry, even in
1960. In a sample of 2 of the overall Jewish population aged
five and over, taken in Morocco in 1960, 43.2 were illiterate
(i.e., could not read Arabic or French, for those who knew
only Hebrew letters were counted as illiterate). However, the
1014 age group had an illiteracy rate of only 18.1, whereas
the age group 60 years and older had a rate of 76.3. The 52
schools of the Alliance Isralite Universelle had 21,823 pupils
in 1948, and in 1956 28,702 pupils attended its 82 institutions.
The number of its pupils subsequently dropped to 9,000 in
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morocco
Universelle schools at Boujad, Mazagan and elsewhere were
set on fire. Emigration subsequently increased. While between
1948 and 1953 about 30,000 Jews went to Israel, emigration figures in 195455 rose to 37,000 and in 1956, on the eve of Moroccan independence, to 36,301. Jews may have reached Israel
in greater numbers at the time had the State of Israel and the
Jewish Agency refrained from enforcing social and medical
selection policies which deprived numerous elderly, sick, and
economically disadvantaged elements from leaving Morocco.
The Jews, however, feared that in an independent post-colonial Morocco their situation would worsen.
However, when Sultan Muhammad ben Yusuf (King
Muhammad V since 1957) returned from exile in November
1955 and Morocco gained its independence in March 1956, the
situation of the Jews improved temporarily. For the first time
in their history, they were to enjoy greater equality with Muslims. A Jewish leader, Dr. Leon *Ben Zaqen, was appointed
minister of posts in the first independent government. Other
Jews began to gain important positions in the government administration as officials and in courts of law as judges. Jews
were also appointed to the advisory council, the first being
David Benazareff, shortly after his appointment to the presidency of the Casablanca community council. But on May 13,
1956, an order was issued forbidding Jews to leave for Israel.
Then in June 1956 the offices of the Cadima organization the
name under which the Jewish Agencys Immigration Department functioned inside Morocco since 1949 were closed.
The Israeli aliyah emissaries, as well as envoys of other Jewish
Agency departments dealing with Youth Aliyah, Zionist education and youth movements, were then compelled to leave
the country. After long negotiations with the representative
of the World Jewish Congress, the government permitted the
emigration of the 6,325 Jews in the Mazagan camp who were
ready to leave for Israel. At the same time, the Jewish Agency
succeeded through channels and the bribing of senior Moroccan officials in smuggling several thousand additional Jews
to Israel via Casablanca harbor and a special route through
Tangier. However, vigilance on the Moroccan frontiers increased in 1957, after pressure from the opposition parties,
and obstacles began to be placed in the way of those Jews requesting permission to travel legally for a short visit abroad,
if it was suspected that their final destination was Israel. From
that time on they had to show proof that they were able to support themselves abroad. Afterwards (195859), a number of
Jews were tried and sentenced for smuggling their currency, or
even for possessing an obsolete calendar issued by the Jewish
National Fund. In 1958 when a new government was formed,
Ben Zaqen was not included, and a number of Jewish officials
were dismissed. In 1959 all Zionist activity was forbidden in
Morocco and many Jewish organizations were forced to close
their doors. That year, swastikas were daubed in Casablanca
and Rabat. In September of that year Morocco severed postal
ties with Israel, ties that were renewed only in 1994. All these
measures were part and parcel of a Moroccan policy of avoiding conflicts with Egypt and Middle Eastern states in war with
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morocco
Morocco would then receive indemnities for the loss of
the Jews. Known as Operation Yakhin, between November
1961 and spring 1964 more than 90,000 Jews left for Israel by
chartered planes and ships from Casablanca and Tangier via
France and Italy. The secret negotiations leading to Yakhin also
paved the way for Moroccan-Israeli negotiations over behindthe-scenes cooperation in intelligence and defense endeavors
which yielded benefits in subsequent decades.
Until 1961, when the Moroccan authorities tightened
restrictions on immigration, the remaining Jewish elite still
held some privileges. In fact, the post-1956 elites were divided
into three currents. The first, influenced by French and European schooling, emphasized the central importance of European culture. In general, the members of this group were not
attracted to Zionism, and they eventually settled in France.
The second group included those who, despite the education they had received at the Alliance Isralite Universelle
schools, were still influenced by Zionism. The third group,
which favored a Judeo-Muslim entente, emerged during the
mid- and late 1950s and was by no means homogeneous.
This group included about 400 activists with strong leftist
tendencies and about 500 communists, as well as moderate
leftists and conservatives. Several activists in the third group
advocated Jewish-Muslim integration with Jews frequenting
the same clubs as Muslims and attending the same schools,
in order to bridge the political and intellectual gap between
the two peoples. Others were more cautious, arguing that
rapprochement should not compel Moroccan Jews to sever
their ties with Israel or to embrace Arabic language and literature at the expense of French culture. To achieve national
unity and engender reforms within the Jewish communities,
the leftist integrationists affiliated with the Istiqlal party, and
in 1956 the Union Marocaine de Travail, the Moroccan labor
union, founded a pro-entente movement known as al-Wifq
(Agreement). During the late 1950s, leaders sharing their political orientation gained some prominence within the community councils, although eventually they either moderated
their stance and remained in positions of authority or more
moderate elements prevailed.
When Morocco gained its independence, a royal decree
of January 1956 abolished rabbinical courts and turned them
into state courts of law, with the exception of the Supreme
Rabbinical Tribune in Rabat, which was abolished by government order in 1965. From 1945 the rabbinical court was
headed by Chief Rabbi Saul D. ibn Dann, who went to Israel
in 1966. From 1965, the other members of the rabbinical court
were appointed judges in state courts. Jews who remained in
Morocco were subject to military service.
Emigration continued to both Israel and other destinations. Aliyah reached a low point in the years 196567,
but picked up its pace after the June 1967 war. Between 1967
and 1970 as many as 4,000 Jews left for Israel annually. Israel
ceased to be attractive for most Moroccan Jewish immigrants
afterwards. Those who left Morocco in the 1960s included
wealthy and educated Jews, not only the lower socioeconomic
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morocco
the 1990s have wielded influence, playing a cardinal role
in politics. Their intimate ties to both the monarchy and opposition parties enabled them to promote diverse MoroccanIsraeli connections. While Berdugo was minister of tourism,
Israeli-Moroccan tourist exchange gained considerable momentum. This came in the wake of the Israeli-Palestinian Oslo
Accord of 1993 that led to the establishment of liaison offices
in Rabat and Tel Aviv. The primary purpose of the liaison apparatus was to promote even greater tourist activity, particularly from Israel to Morocco. In October 1994 Andr Azoulay,
a Jewish economist and one of King Hassans confidants, was
the driving force behind the first Middle East Economic Summit in Casablanca. The intermediary role played by the king
in bringing Israel and the Arab states closer together, leading
to the Egyptian-Israeli peace initiative back in 1977, also contributed to Muslim-Jewish coexistence at home.
After King Hassans death on July 23, 1999, his son, Muhammad VI, ascended to the throne. In sharp contrast to his
fathers aspirations of involving Morocco in regional and international politics, Muhammad VI seemed in the first years
of his royal tenure, at least to concentrate on domestic social reforms, greater equality for women, and democratizing
the nations political institutions. Thus far he has also demonstrated a belief in peaceful Muslim-Jewish coexistence. He
retained Azoulay as the monarchys chief adviser and facilitated the return from France of Abraham Sarfati, the exiled
communist activist, whom the king appointed as his chief expert on sources of energy. The terrorist acts of the Moroccan
al-Qaida-affiliated Salafiyya Jihadiyya Islamist radical group
in Casablanca (May 16, 2003) claimed many lives and also
caused damage to Jewish institutions. This and other acts by
Islamists may well hasten the departure of younger Moroccan
Jews who will be followed to the West by their parents. Nevertheless, the king vowed to punish the perpetrators while the
Moroccan press unanimously condemned the act. The latter
argued that Morocco had always been a haven for Muslims
and Jews, and no extremist forces would be allowed to sabotage the good relations between the two religions. Simultaneously, the outbreak of the second Palestinian uprising in 2000
compelled Morocco to shut down its liaison office in Tel Aviv
and ask Israel to recall its representative from Rabat a move
that is seen as a temporary break in ties.
In 2005, some 3,000 Jews live in Casablanca and there
were smaller communities in Rabat, Marrakesh, Mekns,
Tangier, Fez and Tetuan. The major Jewish organization is
the Conseil des Communauts Isralites in Casablanca. The
welfare organization in Casablanca is responsible for medical aid to the needy and hot meals for underprivileged Jewish students. Most of the community are of the upper middle
class and enjoy a comfortable economic position. Most Jewish schools are closed and only those in Casablanca under
the auspices of the Alliance Isralite Universelle, Ort, Chabad
and Oz ar ha-Torah remain active. Interestingly, the number of kosher restaurants in tourism-oriented cities is on the
rise. The community has initiated historical research toward
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morocco
parts of the *Ottoman Empire, tried to get these other teachers
dismissed. Filled with the zeal of pioneers in pursuit of their
aims, the Alliance director and teachers entrenched themselves in the communities, particularly from around 1900 on.
Not only did they assert their authority in educational matters
but often settled disputes within the community and served
as go-betweens for the community and the European consuls
with the aim of protecting the Jews from the Muslims. In addition, once they had consolidated their position, they came
out against slla education and its outdated methods. In the period from the mid-19t century to the early 1920s there were
rabbis, mainly representing communities in the interior of the
country less exposed to European influences, who regarded
the Alliance schools as centers of heresy. These rabbis clung
to a policy of keeping their youngsters out of these schools so
long as they had not completed their traditional educations.
As a result many young people did not go to these schools.
The Alliance personnel at this time were not conciliatory. Nurtured on secular Western education in the rabbinical seminary of Paris, they lacked sensitivity to the values of
Moroccan Jewry and their traditions. They sought to underscore the gap between the enlightened world and the tradition
and experience of the parental generation and the slla schools,
which they termed centers of reaction. In fact their depiction of the Talmud Torah schools as lacking any value was an
oversimplification. One of the problems that cropped up in
the 192445 period in Alliance educational activities derived
from its negative attitude to Jewish nationalism in the Land
of Israel and to Hebrew as a living language. Other organizations took advantage of its difficulties to step in and operate
in Morocco. First the Em ha-Banim Talmud Torah network,
which had started operating through the efforts of Rabbi Zar
Halperin, an East European Zionist who was in Morocco from
1914 to 1922, flourished. By 1935, it had important schools in
the interior of the country, mainly in Fez, Sefrou, Mekns,
and Marrakesh.
The stepped-up activities of the World Zionist Organization in the 1920s also constituted a challenge to the Alliance. At first the WZO tried to found societies for the renewal
of Hebrew culture and language and to collect money for the
development of Erez Israel. Later it became a focus of local
Zionist pressure exercised against the Alliance not only in the
name of pedagogic advancement and the creation of new educational structures but also to adapt education to the needs
of Zionism. The Alliances problems did not only stem from
its universalist ideology; it also had practical causes. The organization had received considerable financial support from
the French government, a fact which the French used to put
pressure on it to give priority to French and general studies
over Hebrew and Jewish education. This pressure had a positive effect, as many parents wanted their children to receive
an education that would prepare them for jobs in the modern bureaucracy of the Protectorate or in banks and business
firms. However, they were uneasy about the cutback in Jewish
studies. The arrangement also made life difficult for the pupils.
They, as well as those who had studied first in a slla and then
in an Alliance school, reached the fourth grade of elementary
school at the age of 17.
The only way the Alliance could reconcile various circles by teaching Jewish subjects while instituting teaching reforms was by training a special staff of teachers. An attempt
in this direction was made by supporting a local initiative
on the part of the Torah and H ayyim Society of Tangier to
set up a teachers seminar. Teachers from within the community taught Jewish subjects while general subjects were
taught by teachers from the French schools in the city and
the Alliance faculty. Another change was in the encouragement given by the Alliance chief representative in Morocco,
Yom Tov Smach, to the teaching of modern, spoken Hebrew.
Though not an adherent of political Zionism, but rather the
opposite, Smach argued that the teaching of living Hebrew
was an expression of Jewish solidarity, the first and foremost
means of communication in the Jewish world and part of the
renascence of Jewish culture. The Alliance administration in
Paris also did not heed the advice of the Tangier seminars director to bring over teachers from Erez Israel who had studied at the teacher training institute in Paris. Out of fear of the
nationalistic reactions of Moroccos Arabs and the possibility
that such a step would be interpreted as pro-Zionist, Hebrew
studies were not allowed at the institute. But the pressure exerted by rabbis and parents did not abate. The parents sought
a balanced curriculum in Alliance schools, with more Jewish
studies than in the past.
The period after World War II, from 1946 until the 1960s,
represented a major turning point in Jewish education in Morocco. The Zionist Organization contributed to the process by
accelerating the acclimatization to modern Jewish thought and
education in Jewish institutes. Another factor, after 1948, was
the growing importance of aspects of Hebrew as a language
representing the link between Moroccan Jewry and the State
of Israel. Moreover, with increasing financial assistance from
the Jews of America and Europe, the Alliance began to develop
Jewish programs of study that were not totally subordinate to
the French colonial administration in Morocco despite continued French aid to expand secular education.
Another factor contributing to the change was the disappointment of the Alliance leaders, who underwent bitter experiences during the war and witnessed the tragic failure of
the ideology of emancipation through assimilation (which
rather than being met with enthusiasm by colonial society
provoked antisemitic propaganda). And indeed, from 1946
on, though the Alliance did not cooperate with the emissaries of the Jewish Agency, it did cooperate with influential local Zionists. An excellent example of this is the establishment
of the Hebrew teachers seminar in Casablanca in cooperation
with the Zionist Magen David Society. In 1956 almost all the
teachers who were products of traditional education were replaced by graduates of the seminar. This produced big changes
in the Jewish studies in schools, not to mention the fact that
such an institute as the Hebrew University agreed to award
506
the work done by the Alliance and Oz ar Hatorah were impressive. On the eve of Moroccan independence in 1956 there were
83 Alliance schools with 33,000 students, representing 80 of
all Jewish children of school age. The Oz ar Hatorah system had
6,564 students, or 16, in 32 institutions. It is therefore correct to say that, in the 1940s and 1950s, the Jews of Morocco
rapidly entered a new era in their history.
Bibliography: H.Z. Hirschberg, Afrikah; Andr Chouraqui,
From East to West (1968); M. Nahon, Les Isralites au Maroc (1909);
J.M. Toledano, Ner ha-Maarav (1911); M.L. Ortega, Los Hebreos en
Marruecos (1919); M. Eisenbeth, Les Juifs du Maroc (1948); G. Vajda,
Un recueil de textes historiques Judo-Marocains (1951); I.D. Abbou,
Musulmans Andalous et Judo-Espagnols (1953); D. Corcos, Les Juifs
du Maroc et leurs Mellahs (1971); D. Noy (ed.), Moroccan Jewish FolkTales (1966); J. Goulven, in: Hesperis (1921), 31736; A. Laredo, Brberes y Hebreos en Marruecos (1954); C. Monteil, in: Hesperis, (1951),
26595; A. Halkin, in: Joshua Starr Memorial Volume (1953), 10210;
D. Corcos; Studies in the History of the Jews of Morocco (1976); idem,
in: Zion, 32 (1967), 13760; S.D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society, 1
(1967), passim; H. de Mendoa, Jornada de Africa (1607), passim; H.
Bentov, in: Sefunot, 10 (1966), 41495; J. Braithwaite, History of the
Revolutions in the Empire of Morocco (1729), passim; L. de Chenier,
Present State of the Empire of Morocco, 2 vols. (1788), passim; S.M.
Schiller-Szinessy, Massa be-Arav, Romanellis Travels in Morocco
(1886); J.-L. Mige, Maroc, passim; N. Leven, Cinquante ans dhistoire,
2 vols. (191420); D. Bensimon-Donath, Evolution du judasme marocain sous le protectorat franais 19121956 (1968); S. Romanelli, Ketavim Nivh arim, Massa ba-Arav, H. Schirmann (ed.), (1968); N. Robinson, in: J. Freid (ed.), Jews in the Modern World, 1 (1962), 5090;
J.S. Gerber, Jewish Society in Fez: Studies in Communal and Economic
Life; J.-L. Mige, Le Maroc et LEurope, 18301894, 1, 8698; 2, 560561;
A. Adam, Casablanca: Essai sur la transformation de la socit marocaine au contact de loccident (1968), 1, 183204 (Ch. 3, La Population Isralite). Add. Bibliography: M.M. Laskier, The Allliance
Isralite Universelle and the Jewish Communities of Morocco: 18621962
(1983); idem, North African Jewry in the Twentieth Century: The Jews
of Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria (1994); idem, Yehudei ha-Maghreb beZ el Vichy u-Z elav ha-Keres (1992); idem and E. Bashan, Morocco, in:
R. Spector Simon and M.M. Laskier (eds.), The Jews of the Middle East
and North Africa in Modern Times (2003), 471504; D.J. Schroeter,
Merchants of Essaouira: Urban Society and Imperialism in Southwestern Morocco, 18441886 (1988); idem, The Sultans Jews: Morocco
and the Sephardi World (2002); N.A. Stillman, Jews of Arab Lands:
A History and Source Book (1979); idem, The Jews of Arab Lands in
Modern Times (1991); Y. Tsur, Kehillah Keruah: Yehudei Marokko veha-Leummiyyut, 19431954 (2001); C.R. Pennell, Morocco since 1830:
A History (2000); M. Orfali and E. Hazan, Hith adeshut u-Massoret:
Yez irah, Hanhagah ve-Tahalikhei Tarbut be-Yahadut Z efon Afrikah; E.
Bashan, Yahadut Marokko: Avara ve-Tarbuta (2000); S. Deshen, The
Mellah Society: Jewish Community in Sharifian Morocco (1990).
507
morosini, giulio
services of his bet ha-midrash. He then officiated as h azzan
for five years in Kiev, where he studied music under the violinist Podhozer, and from 1881 to 1914 he officiated as h azzan
in the communities of Zaslavl, Rovno (hence the name Zaydl
Rovner), Kishinev (as the successor of Nisan *Belzer), Berdichev (as the successor of Yeruh am ha-Katan *Blindman),
London, and Lemberg, from where he returned to Rovno. In
all these posts he was accompanied by a large choir, and for
weekday services and festive occasions he also made use of
an orchestra. His compositions enthralled his audiences and
brought him worldwide fame. In 1914, Morogowski emigrated
to the United States, where he remained until his death. He
left a rich musical treasury of prayers for h azzan, choir and
orchestra as well as marches. All his works were characterized
by a true prayer style, fervent religious feeling, and h asidic
melody. Hundreds of h azzanim considered themselves as his
disciples. Some of his published compositions are Halleluyah,
for choir and orchestra (1897); Kinos (Heb. text, 1922); Uhawti,
for choir and orchestra (1899); and Tisborach (1874).
Bibliography: Wolf, Bibliotheca, 3 (1727), 1126f.; G. Bartolocci, Bibliotheca Magna Rabbinica, 3 (1683), 755f.; 4 (1693), 404;
Neubauer, Cat, 816f. n. 2341; M. Steinschneider, in: Vessillo Israelitico,
30 (1882), 372f.; idem, in: MGWJ, 43 (1899), 514f.; Vogelstein-Rieger, 2
(1896), 287; D. Simonsen, in: Festschrift A. Berliner (1903), 33744;
C. Roth, in: RMI, 3 (1928), 156f.
[Umberto (Moses David) Cassuto]
508
509
Morris, errol m.
disca dIsonzo, Friuli. While still young he was taken by his
parents to neighboring Gorizia, where he studied under
Jacob Hai Gentili, the rabbi of the community, and his son,
Manasseh. At the age of 12 or 13 he moved to Venice and there
received a thorough education in the yeshivah of Samuel
Aboab, as well as from his previous teacher Manasseh Gentili who had meanwhile moved to Venice. After some years he
went to Padua to study medicine in the university there and
in 1700 received the degree of doctor of philosophy and medicine. From then on he devoted himself to the study of Talmud,
traveling between Padua and Venice, and between Gorizia and
Mantua, where he studied under the outstanding scholar Briel,
who in 1709 ordained him rabbi. In that year he was appointed
a member of the bet din of the kabbalist Joseph Fiametta (Lehavah) whose daughter Rebecca he married. On the death of
his wife in 1716, he married her sister, Judith. On the death of
his father-in-law in 1721, Samson succeeded him as rabbi of
the community, a post he held until his death. Morpurgo had
connections with all the great scholars of his generation, who
turned to him for counsel on complicated cases in the field of
halakhah, among them Isaac Lampronti, who quotes Samsons
rulings in his Pah ad Yiz h ak, Moses H agiz, and Benjamin haKohen of Reggio. His skill as a doctor in Ancona, recognized
by both Jews and Christians, and his profound compassion,
particularly toward the suffering poor, won him the love and
respect of all. In 1730 a devastating influenza plague swept
Ancona, and, despite the Church ban against Jewish doctors
treating the Christian sick, Samson distinguished himself in
the care he gave to all the towns inhabitants. In consequence,
Cardinal Lambertini publicly presented him in 1731 with a
document which expressed his gratitude and his esteem for
Samsons devotion. Samson was involved in the polemics of
the rabbis of the generation against Nehemiah H iyya *H ayon,
and was among those who took up a tolerant attitude toward
him. There is extant correspondence between Morpurgo and
Moses H agiz on this subject from the end of 1711 to the beginning of 1715. The Or Boker (Venice, 1741) contains a prayer
that was said at his grave on the anniversary of his death. The
following of his works have been published: Confutazioni alle
Saette del Gionata del Benetelli (Venice, 170304), a polemic
against the Christian priest Luigi Maria Benetelli who wrote
Le Saette di Gionata scagliate a favor degli Ebrei (1703), a book
filled with hatred of the Jews and their religion; Ez ha-Daat
(ibid., 1704), a philosophical commentary on the Beh inat
Olam of Jedaiah Bedersi; and Shemesh Z edakah (ibid., 1743),
a collection of responsa published posthumously by his son
Moses H ayyim.
a history degree from the University of Wisconsin and attended Princeton University and then the University of California at Berkeley to earn his Ph.D. in philosophy. Morris first
film, Gates of Heaven (1978), was created after German film
director Werner Herzog said he would eat his shoes if Morris
made a documentary about pet cemeteries. Morris won the
bet and Herzog kept his end of the bargain, which is documented in Les Blanks Werner Herzog Eats His Shoes (1980).
Morris next documentary, Vernon, Florida (1981), recorded
the eccentric lives of the small town residents. Morris worked
as a private detective for two years, a profession that helped
him direct and write The Thin Blue Line (1988), a documentary about a man wrongly accused of murder. The man was
eventually released. In Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control (1997),
Morris used his own invention, the Interrotron. A play-off of
teleprompters, the Interrotron lets Morris project his image
onto a screen in front of the camera, allowing the interviewee
to look straight into the lens, not off to the side. It creates what
Morris calls the true first person. Morris used it in his TV
series First Person (20001) and for his Academy Award winning documentary, The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the
Life of Robert S. McNamara (2003). Other Morris films are
The Dark Wind (1991), A Brief History of Time (1991), and Mr.
Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. (1999), about
an execution device inventor who testified on behalf of Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel. Beyond films, Morris makes commercials and won an Emmy in 2001 for a PBS ad.
[Susannah Howland (2nd ed.)]
MORRIS, ERROL M. (1948 ), U.S. director, producer, editor, and writer. Born in Hewlett, Long Island, Morris received
510
MORRIS, NELSON (18391907), U.S. meat-packing executive. Morris, who was born in the Black Forest region of Germany, was taken to the U.S. at the age of 12. In 1854 he began
working in the New York stockyards and two years later, he
went into the meat-packing business for himself in Chicago.
At the outbreak of the Civil War, Morris received a contract to
supply meat to the Union armies. He subsequently supplied all
the meat for the Army of the West later in the war, and filled
meat-supply contracts for the governments of England, Germany, and France. His firm of Morris & Company was one of
the largest in the U.S.
His son IRA NELSON MORRIS (18751942), who was
born in Chicago, was a diplomat and author. Morris early severed his active connection with his fathers firm. He served as
commissioner-general to Italy (1913) and as U.S. minister to
Sweden (191423). His books include: With the Trade Winds
(1897); and From an American Legation (1926).
MORRIS, RICHARD BRANDON (19041989), U.S. historian. Born and educated in New York, Morris taught at City
College, New York, from 1927 to 1949, and became professor
of history at Columbia in 1949. Among his important books
are Studies in the History of American Law (1930); The Peacemakers (1965); Government and Labor in Early America (1946);
and The American Revolution Reconsidered (1967). He was coeditor of The New American Nation series (from 1953); The
Spirit of Seventy-Six (1958); the Encyclopedia of American History (1953, 1963; 1970; 1982); and a Documentary History of the
United States (from 1968). He also wrote John Jay, The Nation
and the Court (1967); The Emerging Nations and the American Revolution (1970); Seven Who Shaped Our Destiny (1973);
Witnesses at the Creation (1986); and The Forging of the Union
(1987). He made noteworthy contributions in the field of archival preservation. He also served as chairman of the board
of the editors of Labor History.
MORRIS AND SUSSEX COUNTIES, counties in New Jersey, U.S. The combined area of Morris and Sussex counties,
located in western and northwestern New Jersey, is 1,000 sq.
miles (2,700 sq. km.). In 2002, the Jewish population in Morris County was estimated at 33,000; Sussex County was estimated at 4,100. Morris-Sussex Federation merged with the
Jewish Community Federation of Metropolitan New Jersey in
1983 to establish United Jewish Communities of MetroWest.
A series of interstate highways, including Routes 280, 80, 78,
24, and 10, have made Morris County attractive to commuters. Hence, there is an active demographic shift of Jewish
families from neighboring Essex County to portions of western New Jersey.
Sussex County Synagogues
There are three synagogues in Sussex County, located in the
towns of Franklin, Newton, and Lake Hopatcong, and one
chavura, or social group, Congregation Bnai Emet, located
in Sparta. The membership of Newtons Jewish Center of Sussex County (100 member families), and Franklins Temple
Shalom of Sussex County (150 member families) is predominantly intermarried. Lake Hopatcong Jewish Center has a
scant 45 member families and has offered to sell its building
to the MetroWest federation. There is one Chabad Center located in Sparta.
511
were Morristowns Temple Bnai Or in 1954 and Temple Shalom of Succasunna in 1965. Other synagogues located in Morris County include Congregation Beth Torah in Florham Park,
Temple Hatikvah in Flanders, Congregation Ahavath Yisrael
in Morristown, Temple Beth Am in Parsippany, and Congregation for Humanistic Judaism of Morris County.
Morris Countys Alex Aidekman Jewish Community
Campus
With the 1983 merger of Essex, Morris, and Sussex Counties
into one umbrella federation, attention was paid to the demographic shift to western New Jersey. Hence, in 1990 the MetroWest community opened a second Y located in Whippany which moved Jewish services and agencies closer to
Morris County. The Jewish Historical Society of MetroWest
is located on this campus.
Bibliography: L. Forgos, The Jews of Morris and Sussex: A
Brief History and Source Guide (2003).
[Linda Forgosh (2nd ed.)]
512
mortara CASE
ditions. When the organization was awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1969, Morse accepted the award on behalf of the ILO.
In 1970 he resigned as ILO director general and became the
impartial chairman of the New York coat and suit industry.
[Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
Bibliography: G. Volli, Il caso Mortara nel primo centenario (1960); idem, in: Bolletino del Museo del Risorgimento, 5 (1960),
10871152; idem, in: Scritti Federico Luzzatto (1962), 30920; idem,
in: RMI, 26 (1960), with illustrations; A.F. Day, The Mortara Mystery
(1930); Meisl, in: MGWJ, 77 (1933), 3218; B.W. Korn, American Reaction to the Mortara Case: 18581859 (1957); J.L. Altholz, in: JSOS,
23 (1961), 1118.
[Giorgio Romano]
513
as consultant and lecturer at a number of military and civilian institutions, and from 1960 he was professor of history
at Dartmouth College. In 197172 he served as provost. He
was also president of the New England Historical Association (196869).
Mortons major scholarly interest was U.S. military history. Regarded as one of Americas foremost experts on the
history of World War II, he is best known for The Fall of the
Philippines (1953); The War in the Pacific: Strategy and Command (1962); and Writings on World War II (1967). He was
general editor of a 17-volume study, Wars and Military Institutions of the United States (1963).
MORWITZ, EDWARD (18151893), U.S. physician and journalist. Morwitz, who was born in Danzig, studied Oriental languages in Halle and medicine at the University of Berlin. He
participated in the revolutionary upheavals of 1848 and then
fled to the U.S. Settling in Philadelphia, Morwitz first practiced medicine (1850) but swiftly moved to leadership in German-language journalism and publishing. He took an active
role in the affairs of the Democratic Party but supported the
Union cause during the Civil War. When the German Dispensary (now Lankenau Hospital) in Philadelphia was threatened
with closure during the war, Morwitz himself took charge and
served as its medical director. He organized the German Press
Association of Pennsylvania in 1862, and through merger and
expansion ultimately controlled a large number of Germanlanguage and English-language newspapers. Morwitz primary
interests and contributions were in the area of German immigrant cultural and political activities, but he did maintain
ties with the Jewish community through his membership in
Kenesseth Israel Congregation and his ownership of the Philadelphia Jewish Record from 1875 to 1886.
Bibliography: DAB, 13 (1934), 2712, incl. bibl.; H.S. Morais, Jews of Philadelphia (1894), 33840; B.W. Korn, Eventful Years
and Experiences (1954), passim.
514
MOSCATI, SABATINO (1922 ), Italian semiticist and archaeologist. Moscati taught Hebrew, Semitic languages, and
the history of religions at the universities of Florence, Naples, and Rome. He is a member of the Accademia dei Lincei
and editor, the Rivista di Studi Orientali. His most important
works deal with the origins of the Semites, the language and
peoples of Palestine and Syria, and the history of the Arabs.
Among them are Le antiche civilt semitiche (1961; Ancient
Semitic Civilizations, 1957); Lepigrafia ebraica antica 193550
(1951); I manoscritti ebraici del Deserto di Giuda (1955); I predecessori dIsraele (1956); Il profilo dellOriente mediterraneo
(1956; The Face of the Ancient Orient, 1960, repr. 1963); and
Spheres of Interest
Moscatos range of learning and knowledge extended over all
fields of cultural interest to Jews of the Renaissance, and he
was better versed in them than most of his contemporaries.
Besides being steeped in Jewish traditional culture, rabbinic
literature, and aggadah, he was at home in Jewish medieval
philosophy and was also familiar with classical philosophy; he
was especially an advocate of Plato and of the medieval neoplatonists and Arab philosophies. Philosophic in his outlook,
Moscato was, nevertheless, familiar with the Kabbalah which
had become popular in the late 16t century and had begun to
influence Italian Jewish intellectuals. His approach to a number of subjects, especially ethics and prayer, was distinctly
mystical: he often quotes from the *Zohar, frequently using
its ideas without mentioning the source. He also quotes Moses
*Cordovero, mostly from his Pardes Rimmonim. Moscatos
educational and cultural horizons extended to such secular
sciences and disciplines as medicine, music, astronomy, and
especially classical rhetoric. In all these fields, he quotes from
the classical masters, as well as from medieval works. He was
acquainted with a number of contemporary Italian non-Jewish writers, such as Pico della Mirandola, whom he quotes
in his Nefuz ot Yehudah (sermon 8, fol. 23c), even supporting
a number of obviously christological passages. Moscato, explaining his reliance on non-Jewish sources and his frequent
reference to them, states that all the great philosophers had
been disciples of ancient Jewish kings and prophets; that philosophy, a Jewish science which was part of Israels ancient
culture, had been lost during the long period of exile and was
preserved only in the writings of the non-Jewish students of
Jewish teachers. This idea, in vogue from the 13t century, came
to explain the existence of non-Jewish philosophy in religious
515
moscheles, ignaz
Jewish works. Moscato used it effectively; in his sermon on
music, for instance (Nefuz ot Yehudah, sermon 1), he argues
in detail that the fundamental concepts of Renaissance music
were based on the terms and formulas found in the Psalms,
and concludes that King David was the inventor and teacher
of the discipline of music, even though in Moscatos times the
terms and forms were known in Latin and in Italian.
Moscatos Works
The spirit of the Jewish Renaissance is reflected in Moscatos
two major works, Kol Yehudah and Nefuz ot Yehudah. The former (Venice, 1594) is a commentary on *Judah Halevis Kuzari,
which became one of the major influences in 16t-century Jewish ideology in Italy and elsewhere. Moscatos exegesis was a
motivating factor in the process and reflected the new interest
taken in this author. In his commentary, Moscato also based
himself on the writings of other Jewish philosophers who were
little read or studied at the time, such as *Philo.
Moscatos second major work, Nefuz ot Yehudah (Venice,
1589), is a collection of sermons preached in Mantua on the
major holidays, on the special Sabbaths, at weddings, and at
funerals. The sermons, 52 in number, correspond to the number of weeks in a year, signifying a full cycle, even though
the sermons were not delivered weekly. Moscatos sermons
may be described as a revolutionary innovation in Hebrew
homiletic literature. None before him and very few, if any, after
him achieved such a high degree of aestheticism in the genre.
His sermons clearly reveal the influence of the Renaissance
on the dialectic method of Hebrew homiletics. His main purpose was not to teach or educate, but to give aesthetic pleasure
to his listeners the actual congregation sitting before him.
His sermons were, therefore, not written to be published as a
book; it is rather their oral delivery which is reflected at every point. It is possible that Moscato preached both in Hebrew
and in Italian, for it is known that many non-Jewish scholars
came to listen to his sermons. However, the sermons collected
in Nefuz ot Yehudah were undoubtedly delivered in Hebrew
on special occasions; this fact is sometimes referred to directly,
sometimes is reflected in the contents. Moscatos great achievement in the field of rhetoric and homiletics lies in the fact
that, even though his primary aim was to please his listeners, he also succeeded in being instructive, and in developing
some ideas, original either in content or in formulation.
He drew on his vast knowledge of philosophy and of the
Kabbalah in order to develop ethical ideas and to interpret
them in a new way so that they might be acceptable to Jewish culture in Renaissance Italy (see *Preaching). Many of the
great preachers in Italy who came after him, including Azariah *Figo (Picho) and Leone *Modena, applied Moscatos
ideas and methods of preaching, creating thus a new school
in homiletics.
Besides these two major works, Moscato also wrote some
poetry: a prayer for rain to be recited in time of drought, composed in 1590; a dirge on the death of R. Joseph *Caro; a dirge
on the death of the Duchess of Savoy; and a few other poems.
516
Bibliography: Baker, Biog Dict, s.v.; MGG, s.v.; RiemannGurlitt, s.v., incl. bibl.; J. Roche, in: Musical Times (March 1970),
2646.
[Claude Abravanel]
moscow
then an important commercial center in Belorussia. One of
these was the contractor and merchant Nathan Note *Notkin.
In 1790 Moscow merchants requested that the presence and
commercial activities of the Jews in the city be prohibited. A
royal decree forbidding Jewish merchants to settle in the inner districts of Russia was issued in 1791. However, they were
authorized to stay for temporary periods in Moscow to carry
on their trade. Most of the Jews who came to Moscow lodged
at the Glebovskoye podvorye, an inn which was situated in
the center of the market quarter. Jewish merchants continued to play an important role in the trade between Moscow
and the southern and western regions of Russia, as well as
in the export of Moscows goods, and in 1828 the turnover
of this trade was estimated at 27,000,000 rubles. As a result,
Russian industrialists in Moscow supported the rights of the
Jews. In 1828 Jewish merchants who were members of the first
and second guilds were authorized to remain in Moscow on
business for a period of one month only. They were forbidden
to open shops or to engage in trade within the city boundaries. To facilitate the execution of these regulations, the Jews
were compelled to lodge solely in the Glebovskoye podvorye.
The inn was a charitable trust which had been handed over
to the Moscow city council to use its income for the maintenance of a municipal eye clinic. Exorbitant prices were soon
extorted from Jewish merchants who had to stay at the inn.
After a few years, third-class merchants were also authorized
to enter the town under the same conditions and the period
of their stay was prolonged to six months. About 250 people
made use of this right every year. As a result of these restrictions, Jewish trade decreased to about 12,000,000 rubles annually during subsequent years. When Alexander II came to
the throne (1855), Jewish merchants were permitted to reside
temporarily in all the sections of the town.
The first Jews to settle permanently in Moscow, and the
founders of the community, were *Cantonists who had finished military service, some of whom had married Jewish
women from the *Pale of Settlement. In 1858 there were 340
Jewish men and 104 Jewish women in the whole of the district
of Moscow. After Jewish merchants of the first guild, university graduates, and craftsmen were allowed to settle in the interior of Russia, the number of Jews increased rapidly. Some
were extremely wealthy, such as Eliezer *Polyakov, one of the
most important bankers in Russia and head of the community,
and K.Z. *Wissotzki. From 1865 to 1884 H ayyim Berlin officiated as rabbi of Moscow, and in 1869 the community invited
S.Z. *Minor, one of the outstanding students of the Vilna rabbinical seminary, to serve as the *kazyonny ravvin (government-appointed rabbi). There was an estimated Jewish population of 8,000 in the city in 1871, which had grown to around
12,000 in 1882 and 35,000 (over 3 of the total population)
in 1890, just before the expulsion. The governor of Moscow,
Prince Dolgorukov, was known for his liberal attitude toward
the Jews, and (after receiving bribes and gifts) the local administration overlooked their illegal presence (as in the case
of fictive craftsmen). A considerable number of industrial-
517
The Expulsion
On March 28, 1891 (Passover Eve 5651), a law was issued abolishing the right of Jewish craftsmen to reside in Moscow and
prohibiting their entry into the city in the future. The police
immediately began to expel thousands of families, some of
whom had lived in Moscow for several decades or were even
born there. They were granted a period of from three months
to a year to dispose of their property, and many were compelled to sell out to their neighbors at derisory prices. The
poor and destitute were sent to the Pale of Settlement with
criminal transports. On October 15 the right of descendants of
the Cantonists to live in the town was abrogated, if they were
not registered with the Moscow community. The expulsion
reached its climax during the cold winter days of 1892. While
the police made a concerted effort to search out the Jews and
drive them out of the city, generous rewards were offered for
the seizure of any still in hiding. The press was not permitted to report on the details of the expulsion. An appeal to the
government made by merchants and industrialists in 1892
and their warning of the economic damage that would result
from the expulsion were of no avail. Police sources estimated
that about 30,000 persons were expelled. About 5,000 Jews
remained families of some Cantonists, wealthy merchants
and their servants, and members of the liberal professions. The
Moscow expulsion came as a deep shock to Russian Jewry. A
considerable number of those expelled arrived in Warsaw and
Lodz and transferred their economic activities there. Decrees
regulating residence in Moscow became even more severe. In
1899 the authorities ordered that no more Jewish merchants
were to be registered in the first guild unless authorized by
the minister of finance. At the height of the expulsion period, the authorities closed down the new synagogue, as well
as nine of the 14 prayer houses. Rabbi S.Z. Minor, who requested the reopening of the synagogue, was expelled from
the city. The struggle for the use of the synagogue continued
for many years and it was not until 1906 that permission was
granted for its reopening. In 1897 there were 8,095 Jews and
216 Karaites in Moscow (0.8 of the total population). In
1902 there were 9,339 Jews there, and half of them declared
Yiddish as their mother tongue; the overwhelming majority
of the others declared it to be Russian. In 1893 J. *Mazeh was
elected as rabbi of Moscow, remaining its spiritual leader un-
moscow
til his death in 1923. A considerable number of the members
of the small community were wealthy merchants and intellectuals. Assimilated Jews (some of whom apostatized) held
an important place in the cultural life of the city. In 1911 there
were around 700 Jewish students in the higher institutions of
learning in Moscow.
After the outbreak of World War I, from 1915, a stream
of Jewish refugees began to arrive in Moscow from the German-occupied regions. They took part in the development of
war industries in the town and some of them amassed large
fortunes. In a short time, Moscow became a Jewish center.
Hebrew printing presses were set up, and in the town of Bogorodsk (near Moscow) a large yeshivah was established on
the pattern of the Lithuanian yeshivot. The foundations of the
Hebrew theater *Habimah were then laid. Among the new rich
were Zionists and nationally conscious Jews who were ready
to support every cultural activity. Most outstanding of these
were H. *Zlatopolsky, his son-in-law Y. Persitz, and A.J. *Stybel. Authorization was given for the publication of a Hebrew
weekly, Ha-Am. Cultural activity increased in scope with the
outbreak of the February 1917 Revolution. It was symbolical
that O. *Minor, the son of S.Z. Minor, a leader of the Social
Revolutionary Party, was elected as chairman of the Moscow
municipal council. Ha-Am became a daily newspaper and two
large publishing houses, Ommanut (founded by Zlatopolsky
and Persitz) and that of A.J. Stybel, were set up. The founding
conference of the organization for Hebrew education and culture, *Tarbut, was held in Moscow in the spring of 1917. This
activity also continued during the first year of the Bolshevik
Revolution (three volumes of Ha-Tekufah were published in
1918, as well as others) but the new regime, with the assistance
of its Jewish supporters, rapidly liquidated the institutions of
Hebrew culture in Moscow. The Habimah theater was more
fortunate; it presented An-Skis Dibbuk (Dybbuk) in Moscow
for the first time in January 1922 and continued to exist under
the protection of several prominent members of the Russian
artistic and literary world who defended it as a first class artistic institution, until it left the Soviet Union in 1926.
When Moscow became the capital of the Soviet Union,
its Jewish population rapidly increased. In 1920 there were
28,000 Jews in the city, which had become severely depopulated as a result of the civil war. By 1923 the number had increased to 86,000 and by 1926 to 131,000 (6.5 of the total
population). In 1939 the Jews there numbered 250,181 (6.05
of the total population). The headquarters of the *Yevsektsiya
was situated in Moscow, and there its central newspaper. Der
Emes (192038) was published, as well as many other Yiddish
newspapers and books. The Jewish State Theater (known in
Russian as GOSET from its initials), directed by S. *Mikhoels,
was also situated in Moscow. For a number of years, small circles of organized Zionists continued to exist in the city, which
was the central seat of the legal *He-H alutz (which published
its own newspaper from 1924 to 1926) and of the groups of
the Left *Poalei Zion. All these were liquidated by 1928. During World War II, the Jews shared the sufferings of the war
with the citys other inhabitants. From 1943 Moscow was the
seat of the Jewish *Anti-Fascist Committee which gathered
together personalities of Jewish origin who were outstanding
in Soviet public affairs. Founded to assist the Soviet Union in
its war effort against Nazi Germany and to mobilize world
Jewish opinion and aid for this purpose, it published a newspaper, Eynikeyt.
518
[Yehuda Slutsky]
moscow
In the 1950s and 1960s the Great Synagogue was allowed to
issue a Jewish calendar and to send it to other synagogues in
the U.S.S.R. In 1956 Rabbi Schliefer was granted permission
to print a prayer book, by photostat from old prayer books.
He named it Siddur ha-Shalom (peace prayer book) and deleted from it all references to wars and victories (as, e.g., in the
H anukkah benedictions). It was said to have been printed in
3,000 copies, but it was very rarely seen in other synagogues
in the Soviet Union. (A second edition of it was printed, ostensibly in 10,000 copies, in 1968 by Rabbi Levin, but it also
was not much in use in Soviet synagogues.) In 1957 Rabbi
Schliefer received permission from the authorities to open a
yeshivah on the premises of the Great Synagogue. He called it
Kol Yaakov, and for several years a small number of young
and middle-aged Jews (about 12 persons a year), mostly from
Georgia, were trained there, almost all of them as *shoh atim
(ritual slaughterers), whereas the number of ordained rabbis
did not exceed one or two. In 1961 the yeshivah, though officially still in existence, almost ceased to function, mainly because of the refusal of the Soviet authorities to grant permission
to yeshivah students, who went for the holiday to their homes
outside Moscow, to come back and register again as temporary
residents of the city for the purpose of study. By 1963, 37 students had passed through the yeshivah; 25 of them were trained
as shoh atim. In 1965 only one student was there, and in 1966 the
number was six. The unrestricted baking of matzah in a rented
bakery and its distribution in food stores was discontinued in
Moscow, as in most areas of the Soviet Union, in 1962. However, it was partially permitted again in 1964 and definitely in
1965, but under a different system: it was done under the supervision of the synagogue board and was only for believers
who brought their own flour and registered their names. The
ritual slaughtering of poultry was allowed in the precincts of
the Great Synagogue, whereas kosher beef was obtainable until 1964 twice a week at a special store on the outskirts of the
city. From 1961 a barrier was erected in the Great Synagogue to
separate foreign visitors, including Israeli diplomats, from the
congregation, and the synagogue officers were responsible to
the authorities for strictly enforcing the segregation.
In 1959, on Rosh Ha-Shanah eve, an anti-Jewish riot took
place in Malakhovka, a suburb of Moscow. The synagogue
was set afire, but quickly extinguished; the shammash of the
Jewish cemetery was murdered by unknown persons and on
the walls a typewritten antisemitic tract appeared, signed by
the B. Zh. S.R. Committee, the Russian initials of the prerevolutionary antisemitic slogan Hit the Yids and save Russia. At first Soviet spokesmen denied the facts, but several
months later admitted them to foreign visitors, assuring them
that the hooligans were apprehended and severely punished.
The Soviet press did not mention the incident at all. In 1960
a stir was created among Moscow Jewry when interment at
the Jewish cemetery was almost discontinued and Jews were
forced to bury their dead in a separate section of a general
cemetery. This section was filled up in 1963 and subsequent
Jewish burials had to take place alongside non-Jewish ones.
519
moscow
these, 132,223 were women and 107,023 were men. 20,331 of
them (about 8.5) declared Yiddish to be their mother tongue.
These numbers are thought to be a gross underestimate because many tens of thousands of Jews declared at the census
their nationality to be Russian (some opinions evaluate the
number of Moscows Jews as high as 500,000).
Developments from the 1970s
The Six-Day War had a major impact on the life of Moscow
Jews, as it had on the life of all Soviet Jewry. It also resulted in
a considerable increase in the anti-Israel policy of the Soviet
regime in international affairs and an increase in antisemitism domestically. The process of national rebirth which had
already begun among many thousands of completely assimilated Jews took various forms. Tens of thousands of young
Jews began to congregate in and around Moscows Choral
Synagogue during Jewish holidays, especially Simh at Torah.
With the beginning of mass aliyah, the Jews of Moscow played
a significant role in the struggle for the right to emigrate.
Demonstrations took place in Moscow which attracted Jews
from various cities of the Soviet Union. On February 27, 1971,
for example, 26 Jewish activists declared a hunger strike in
the entrance to the presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the
U.S.S.R., demanding permission to leave for Israel. Similar
demonstrations followed.
Despite resistance from the authorities, the period from
the 1960s to the early 1980s saw a process of revival in the cultural and religious life of Moscows Jews. Dozens of teachers
taught Hebrew in their apartments, there were seminars and
groups studying Judaism and Jewish history and culture, and
a Jewish kindergarten and Sunday schools were organized. In
the 1970s and early 1980s a number of Jewish samizdat publications appeared in Moscow. These included Evrei v S.S.R.
(Jews in the U.S.S.R., 197279, nos. 120); Tarbut, 197579,
113, Nash ivrit (Our Hebrew, 197880, 14). Many aliyah activists were arrested during this time. One of the most severe
sentences was meted out to Anatoly *Sharansky in 1978, and
in 1982 Yosef Begun was imprisoned for the third time.
In 1972 the synagogue in the Cherkizov district was
closed. Thereafter, until the early 1990s, only two synagogues
were functioning in the city: the Choral Synagogue and the
hasidic prayer house in the district of Marina Roshcha. Jacob
Fischman served as rabbi of Moscow from 1972 to 1982, when
he was succeeded by Adolf Shayevich.
While basically conducting an overtly antisemitic policy, the Soviet authorities occasionally resorted to gestures
intended to persuade world public opinion that Jewish culture was flourishing in the country. Thus, in 1978 the so-called
Birobidzhan Jewish Musical Chamber Theater was established;
from 1981 this theater, despite its name, was based in Moscow.
In 1986 the Moscow Jewish Dramatic Ensemble became the
Jewish Drama Studio Shalom.
From 1987, during the evolution of glasnost and perestroika, Jewish public life in the Soviet Union flourished. Centers of a number of informal Jewish national organizations
were established in Moscow including the Jewish Culture Association (EKA, headed by Mikhail Chlenov), the Zionist Federation of Soviet Jews (president Arye (Lev) Gorodetsky), and
the Association for Friendship and Cultural Ties with Israel.
A number of Moscow bodies began to function as well: the
Moscow Jewish Cultural and Educational Association, the
Jewish Information Center, and the cultural religious center
Mah anayim. As part of the an effort to maintain some control
of this burgeoning cultural revival, the authorities established
the Association of Activists and Friends of Soviet Jewish Culture, which, starting in April 1989, published the newspaper
Vestnik sovetso-evreiskoi kultury (Bulletin of Soviet Jewish
Culture). A number of Jewish libraries were founded. In late
1988, a yeshivah (headed by the Israeli scholar Rabbi Adin
Steinsaltz) was established within the framework of the Academy of World Cultures. Also in 198889, branches of the international Jewish organizations Beta, WIZO, and Bnai Brith
were set up in Moscow.
After the failure of the August 1921, 1991, coup in Moscow, the last barriers to free cultural and political activity in
the country fell. Numerous Jewish bodies functioned in the
city. Some of these had an All-Russian character, e.g., Vaad
Rosii (the Federation of Jewish Communities and Organizations of Russia (president: M. Chlenov), the Zionist Federation of Russia (chairman: A. Gorodetsky); Tkhiya, the International Center for Research and the Spreading of Jewish Culture
(chairman: Leonid Roitman); the Orthodox All-Russian Jewish Religious Community (headed by the now chief rabbi of
Russia, Adolf Shayevich). In 1991 a synagogue was opened
on Malaya Bronnaya Street. Since that time three Orthodox
synagogues have been operating (Rabbi Pinhas Goldschmidt
now serves as chief rabbi of the city), as well as Reform and
Conservative congregations.
Jewish cultural life exhibits new life. There are several
Jewish high schools as well as evening and Sunday schools;
a Jewish university, a Jewish Historical Society (chairman:
Rashid Kaplanov), and a Jewish Scientific Center (chairman:
Vladimir Shapiro). There has been a renewal of the publication
of scientific works in Jewish studies: from 1992 Vestnik evreskogo universiteta v Moskve (Bulletin of the Jewish University
of Moscow) has appeared regularly, and in 1994 the Moscowbased Rossiiskaya evreiskaya entsiklopedia (The Encyclopedia
of Russian Jewry, editor-in-chief: Herman Branover) began
publication. Mazhdunarodnaya evreiskaya gazeta (International Jewish Newspaper, editor-in-chief: Tancred Galinpolsky) appears in Russia, while the Yiddish monthly Idishe gas
(Jewish Street, editor-in-chief: Aaron Vergelis, formerly the
editor of the now defunct Yiddish journal Sovetish Heymland)
began to appear in January 1993.
With the onset of political freedom, however, various,
antisemitic groups also became active. In the late 1980s antisemitic slogans were heard with increasing frequency at
public meetings of the Pamyat association. Antisemitic articles were printed in the journals Nash sovremennik (Our
Contemporary), Molodaya Gvardiya (Young Guard), and
520
MOSENTHAL, South African family, who, in successive generations, played a major part in the 19t-century development
of the countrys commerce, banking, and, especially, agricultural export trade. The family came from Hesse-Cassel, Germany, and the first to immigrate was JOSEPH MOSENTHAL
(18131871), who settled at the Cape in 1839. He was joined by
his brothers ADOLPH (18121882) and JULIUS (18191880), and
the three set up in business in Cape Town as Mosenthal Brothers. The firm continued to flourish under family control until
well into the 20t century. From their main business centers in
Cape Town, Port Elizabeth, and Graaff Reinet, the Mosenthals
spread their activities throughout the Cape Colony, and later
through the Transvaal. They established numerous trading
posts in the interior and organized transport to and from the
coast. Their first interest was the marketing of wool and hides,
but they gradually expanded their activities to embrace gold
and diamond mining, industrial enterprises, and banking. In
the early years they issued their own banknotes, which were
widely circulated but were withdrawn by the firm with the development of the colonys commercial banking system.
The Mosenthals made a special study of ostrich farming and opened up export markets for its products. They introduced merino sheep from France and Angora goats from
Turkey; Adolph Mosenthal himself went to the Black Sea to
MOSENTHAL, SALOMON HERMANN (18211877), German playwright. Mosenthal, who was born in Cassel, was a
member of the *Mosenthal family. While studying engineering
in Karlsruhe, he published his first poems under the pseudonym Friedrich Lehner, bringing him into contact with the
Swabian Romantic circle. Though intellectual tendencies at
that time were turning toward democracy and liberalism,
Mosenthal neglected revolutionary impulses and turned toward conservatism. As a consequence, he moved to Vienna
(where he worked as a private tutor) in 1842 just as artistic
life was fleeing the Austrian capital and its absolutistic, autocratic spirit. Soon he changed his aesthetic focus and embarked on a career as a playwright. Mosenthals biggest success
was the play Deborah (1850), which was adapted for the English stage as Leah, the Forsaken. After premiering in Hamburg,
it was a success in New York and was performed more than
600 times in London. The play presents an 18t-century love
story between Joseph, a ministers son, and Deborah, a passionate, gypsy-like Jewess, who ultimately renounces her love
for the sake of Josephs happiness. Though the highly emotionally charged scenes are soaked with social criticism, it nonetheless never targets contemporary political issues. On the
contrary, it celebrates Joseph II as a founding figure of Jewish
emancipation. Besides Deborah and a few other plays such as
Sonnenwendhof (1857), Mosenthal wrote several opera libretti,
some of them dealing explicitly with Jewish topics, including
Judith (set to music by Albert Franz Doppler in 1870), Moses,
and Die Makkaber (set to music by Anton Rubinstein in 1892
and 1874, respectively). His most popular libretto in his lifetime was surely that for Otto Nikolais Die lustigen Weiber von
Windsor (Merry Wives of Windsor, 1849). In addition, Mosenthal published a volume of stories of characteristic Jewish life,
Bilder aus dem juedischen Familienleben (1878). Obviously influenced by the genre of Ghettoliteratur and its most prom-
521
MOSER, SIR CLAUDE, BARON (1922 ), British statistician and academic. Born in Berlin, Moser immigrated to
Britain in 1936. He taught at the London School of Economics
from 1946 to 1970, where he was professor of social statistics,
as well as serving as senior statistician to the British government and, from 1967 to 1978, as head of the Government Statistical Survey. An eminent statistician, he was elected to the
British Academy in 1969. A distinguished academic, Moser
served as warden (president) of Wadham College, Oxford, in
198493, as president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and as a trustee of the British Museum
(19882002) and chairman of the British Museum Development Trust. He was chancellor of Keele University from 1986
to 2002 and received no fewer than 16 honorary degrees, as
well as serving as chancellor of the Open University of Israel
from 1994. He received a knighthood in 1973 and a life peerage in 2001.
[William D. Rubinstein (2nd ed.)]
522
moses
Intercessor
Mediator of the Covenant and Lawgiver
Cult Founder and Priest
Death and Burial
Unique Status
Final Considerations
In Hellenistic Literature
Inventor and Civilizer, Lawgiver and Philosopher
Antisemitic Attacks on Moses
The Biography of Moses
Moses in the Apocalyptic Tradition
Moses as Magician
Rabbinic View
In the Aggadah
In Medieval Jewish Thought
Modern Interpretations
In Christian Tradition
In Islam
Moses Journey
In the Arts
Literary Works by 20t-Century Non-Jewish Writers
20t-Century Jewish Writers
In Art
In Music
Biography
The primary sources for the story of Moses life and works are
contained in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.
Additional references are to be found in Joshua, Judges, I Samuel, I and II Kings, Isaiah, Hosea, Micah, Malachi, Psalms,
Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and I and II Chronicles. The salient
references will be given in the course of the article. Because
the stories of Moses originate from different times and places
we cannot really reconstruct a biography of Moses. We cannot even be sure that Moses was a historical character. Even
if he was, later writers wrote stories about Moses in which the
ancient worthy represented their viewpoints. For example,
the story in Numbers 12, in which all prophecy other than
EARLY LIFE. Moses father and mother Amram and Jochebed were both of the tribe of Levi; he had an older sister, Miriam, and an older brother, Aaron (Ex. 2:1; 6:1620; 7:7;
Num. 26:59; I Chron. 23:1214). The future redeemer of Israel
was born at the height of the Egyptian persecution of the Israelites. The Pharaoh that knew not Joseph (Ex. 1:8) had
set taskmasters over the Children of Israel to oppress them
with forced labor (Ex. 1:11). In order to reduce their numbers
he had also instructed the Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and
Puah, to kill the Israelite boys at birth, but owing to the piety
of these women the plan failed (Ex. 1:15ff.). Thereupon Pharaoh
charged all his people to throw every newborn Hebrew boy
into the Nile (Ex. 1:22). Jochebed succeeded in concealing the
infant Moses for three months (Ex. 2:2). Thereafter she made
a wicker basket for him, caulked with bitumen and pitch, and
placed it among the reeds of the river, while his unnamed sister
watched from a distance. Pharaohs daughter, spying the basket
when she came down to bathe, ordered one of her maids to
fetch it. The princess took pity on the crying babe and decided
to adopt him. At the sisters suggestion Moses own mother was
given the task of nursing the child until he was old enough to
be returned to Pharaohs daughter. In this way Moses the Hebrew was, ironically, brought up as a prince in Pharaohs own
palace. The hand of providence is manifest in these events;
Pharaohs very plan of destruction became part of the divine
design of redemption. The wondrous story is also intended to
indicate the historic destiny awaiting the child. Possibly even
his name Moshe is a pointer in this direction. The popular etymology (undoubtedly Moshe is an Egyptian name, probably
meaning son) I drew him out of the water (Ex. 2:10) should
logically have required the form mashui (one that has been
drawn out), not moshe (one that draws out). But the infant
was one day to draw out his people from the Sea of Reeds
and bondage. (See Isa. 63:1112 and below.)
Although Moses was reared as an Egyptian, he remained
conscious of his origin and sympathetic to his kindred. When
he grew to manhood, he went out to his brethren and witnessed their tribulations. His early Egyptian upbringing seems
to have been a necessary stage in the process of fitting him for
his future role as Israels liberator. His outlook was molded by
a sense of freedom that his kinsfolk could not enjoy. Though
learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians (Acts 7:22), he
was outraged by his first contact with the realities of the bondage. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave and, overcome
by an irresistible feeling of righteous indignation, he slew the
Egyptian and hid him in the sand, thinking his deed would
not be discovered. His second experience was even sadder: he
found two Hebrews fighting. His intervention drew from the
aggressor the retort: Who made you chief and ruler over us?
Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian? To escape
Pharaohs wrath, Moses fled to Midian (Ex. 2:1115).
523
biblical view
The individual accounts of Moses combine to make him the
most important biblical figure after God. As a prophet he is
incomparable (Num. 12:68; Deut. 34:10). In the Bible, he is
not only a national leader; it is he who fashions the nation of
Israel, transforming a horde of slaves into a people potentially
capable of becoming a treasured possession and a kingdom
of priests (Ex. 19:56). He is portrayed as Israels first religious
teacher; he gave Israel the Torah a law of justice, holiness,
and loving-kindness. Nevertheless, Scripture portrays Moses
as human (Ex. 33:21ff.) and mortal (Deut. 34:5). He had faults
as well as virtues, and was punished by the very God whom
he taught Israel to worship. Not till the advent of Hellenism
was the lawgiver described as theos aner (a divine man). In
the Bible he is only the human rod with which God performs wonders.
moses
FLIGHT TO MIDIAN AND THE MISSION. In Midian, Moses,
always the foe of unrighteousness rose again in defense of
the persecuted. He saved the daughters of the priest Reuel
(also called Jethro, Jether, and Hobab), who had come to water their fathers flocks, from the hands of the bullying local
shepherds. As a result of the incident Moses stayed with the
priest and married his daughter Zipporah, by whom he had
two sons, Gershom and Eliezer (Ex. 2:1522; 18:34; cf. Judg.
18:30; I Chron. 23:1517). A turning point in his life came when
he witnessed a theophany in the region of Horeb. He saw a
bush aflame with a fire that did not consume it. On turning
aside to investigate the marvelous sight, he heard the voice of
a god, whose name he did not know, calling him. In the vision God bade Moses redeem Israel from Egypt, where a new
king now reigned. Moses resisted the divine commission, with
many new excuses. The dialogue veers in different directions.
Four times Moses changes the course of his argument: he feels
inadequate to the task; he inquires by what name God is to
be announced to the Israelites; he doubts that the Children of
Israel will listen to him; he protests that he is slow of speech.
Patiently God answers each objection. He would be with
Moses and the fact that the Israelites, when they left Egypt,
would serve the Lord at this mountain would be a sign to him
that God had sent him; he was to tell his people that I am
that I am had spoken to him; and He who gives humans the
power of speech would teach him what to say. Together with
the elders he was to ask Pharaohs permission for the Israelites
to go on a three-day journey into the wilderness to sacrifice to
the Lord, although the request would certainly be refused. To
help him convince the Israelites, the Lord gave Moses three
wondrous signs (the rod becomes a snake and is restored to
its former state; his hand becomes afflicted with a skin disease
(see *Leprosy) and is healed; the Nile water, poured out on
the ground, turns to blood). But still, without further rational
argument, Moses refuses. The Lord is angered, but promises
to let Aaron be Moses spokesman, and bids him take the rod
with which to perform the signs (Ex. 3:14:17; 7:1).
The wonders wrought by Moses both in Egypt and in the
wilderness have special quality. Moses signs and portents
served as evidence of Gods will. Moses call has no biblical
parallel. Even Gideon (Judg. 6:1124) and Jeremiah (1:410) in
the end accepted the divine commission unconditionally.
THE RETURN TO EGYPT AND THE EXODUS. Moses initial efforts were frustrating. At the very beginning of his homeward
journey an obscure incident occurred that almost proved fatal
to Moses; he was only saved by the timely action of Zipporah
in circumcising their son (Ex. 4:2426). Pharaoh responded
to the request of Moses and Aaron by augmenting the peoples
burdens. Henceforth they were to provide their own straw for
making the bricks. Understandably the Israelites lost confidence in their would-be redeemer, who was himself discouraged (Ex. 4:275:23).
Events now assume a new dynamic. In a second revelation God announced: I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham,
CROSSING THE SEA OF REEDS. Pharaoh, however, soon repented his liberating act. The urgency with which the Israelites were expelled from Egypt was matched by the haste with
which Pharaoh sought to recapture his slaves. The final scene
was enacted by the Sea of Reeds. Hemmed in between the sea
and the Egyptian cohorts, with only the pillar of cloud (of fire,
by night) between the fugitives and their pursuers, the Israelites cried to the Lord, the only power that could now save
them. The end came with dramatic swiftness. Moses sundered
the waters with his rod; Israel crossed the seabed dry-shod, but
their would-be captors were drowned by the returning waters
(Ex. 14). The ode of triumph that Moses and the Children of
Israel sang after their deliverance from the Egyptians (Ex. 15)
is one of the most beautiful psalms in the Bible. Characteristically it contains no mention of Moses, just as the creedal
recital in connection with the first fruits has no reference to
524
moses
the liberator (Deut. 26:59). The glory and the thanksgiving
are accorded solely to the Lord.
COVENANT AT SINAI AND THE DESERT PERIOD. The ultimate goal lay ahead at Mount Horeb (Sinai), where in the third
month after the Exodus the people were to witness the revelation of God, hear the Decalogue issuing forth from Sinai, and
declare their eternal loyalty to the Divine Law in the words,
All that the Lord has spoken we will do and obey (Ex. 19:
1ff.; 24:7). Israel entered into a covenant with the Lord (24:8),
of which the Ten Words or *Decalogue, usually called the Ten
Commandments, formed the preamble and the Torah precepts
the conditions. The covenant with YHWH is depicted as the
real purpose of the Exodus. Freedom was not just the negation
of servitude. Even the plagues were intended not only to humble Pharaoh, but to establish divine sovereignty over Israel.
The Torahs narratives describe a descent; from the sublime heights of Gods mountain Israel plunged into the abyss
of the *Golden Calf. The narrative is not descriptive history but rather a polemic against the cult established by *Jeroboam I. According to the calf narrative, Moses had ascended
the mountain of the Lord to receive the tablets of the Decalogue and spent 40 days and nights there. Disturbed by Moses
delay in returning to the camp, the Israelites persuaded Aaron
to make them a god that would go before them, since they did
not know what had happened to their leader. The bovine image that Aaron produced was to serve as a surrogate for Moses,
and in Aarons view probably only represented Gods visible
throne. It nevertheless constituted unforgivable religious treason, for the people regarded the calf as an actual deity (These
are your gods, O Israel), and the lawgiver, conscious of the
spiritual catastrophe that had befallen Israel, shattered the
tablets of the Decalogue. For the Judahite author of this antiNorthern polemic, the covenant had been broken; the calf and
the Ten Words could not exist in juxtaposition.
Moses ground the idol to dust and made the Israelites
drink its powdered remains. With the help of the loyal tribe
of Levi he slew 3,000 of the idolators. Then, in a heartrending
supplication, he interceded with the Lord for his people: But
now, if Thou will forgive their sin and if not, blot me, I pray
Thee, out of Thy book which Thou has written. God forgave,
in accordance with His attributes (cf. Ex. 34:7). Again Moses
ascended the mountain and received a new copy of the Decalogue. He was also vouchsafed deeper insight into the divine
glory and character (Ex. 34:67). Moses was also given credit
for the establishment of the Mishkan (Dwelling Place; usually called the Tabernacle). It was the sequel, as it were, of the
theophany on Mount Sinai; it was the symbol of Gods continuing presence. Although Moses performed certain sacerdotal functions on special occasions (Ex. 24:6; Lev. 8:6ff.), and
is even called a priest in Psalm 99:6, he is never actually portrayed as such in the Torah. The Tent of Meeting, referred to
in Exodus 33:711, is not to be identified with the Tabernacle.
It was Moses own tent, which served temporarily as a meeting place between him and God, until the time of wrath was
past. It was pitched outside the camp, which had been recently
defiled by idolatry (see Rashi, Ibn Ezra, and Nah manides to
Ex. 33:7; Cassuto, Exodus (1967), 429ff.).
The desert wanderings were, according to the Torah, a
period of constant tension and crisis. The people lacked food
and were not content with the manna; at times they demanded
meat (Ex. 16:12ff.; Num. 11:46; 21:5). Often they were in need
of drinking water (Ex. 15:23ff.; 17:27; Num. 20:113). On one
occasion, when Moses struck the rock to produce water, instead of speaking to it, he was himself condemned for lack of
faith (Num. 20:713). Repeatedly the people murmured and
even threatened to leader to redirect themselves and return
to Egypt (Ex. 5:21; 14:1112; 15:24; 16:28; 17:27; Num. 11:46;
14:14; 20:25; 21:45). Of the 12 spies sent to investigate the
nature of the Promised Land, ten brought back an unfavorable report: the land was exceedingly fertile (as evidence they
showed a huge cluster of grapes), but unconquerable; moreover it devoured its inhabitants. Caleb and Joshua, who gave
an encouraging account, failed to convince the people, and in
consequence the entire generation (except Joshua and Caleb)
were condemned to die in the wilderness and not enter the
Land (Num. 1314). The weary people were prey to all kinds
of dangers. The Levite *Korah (Moses cousin), aided by Dathan, Abiram, and On of the tribe of Reuben, accused Moses
and Aaron of self-aggrandizement, and advanced a claim to
the priesthood. The challenge and its implicit peril are reflected in the punishment meted out to the rebels: the earth
swallowed them up and thousands of others died through
plague (Num. 1617). Even Miriam and Aaron criticized
Moses on account of the Cushite woman (a black woman
whose origin was Cush, modern day Sudan) whom he had
married (Num. 12). Only after 40 years of wandering was
Israels goal in sight. Skirting Edom (Esaus territory), which
would not permit them to pass through, and warned not to
seize any Ammonite territory (Deut. 2:19), the wanderers
were engaged in battle by Sihon the Amorite and Og, king of
Bashan. The Israelites defeated both these kings and divided
their lands among the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the halftribe of Manasseh (Num. 21:435; 32:142). While the period
of the wilderness is depicted in the Pentateuch as a turbulent
age, the prophets, in contrast, emphasize its positive aspects.
In the desert the Children of Israel had evinced an unforgettable love of the Lord (Jer. 2:13).
Interestingly, though the Torah describes the priesthood
as hereditary, Joshua, and not one of Moses sons, was appointed by the lawgiver to be his successor. In regard to the
judiciary, Moses accepts Jethros advice in reorganizing the
judicial system and selecting judges who can be taught
the laws and expected to be honest (Ex. 18); in contrast to
Numbers 11 in which judges are deemed to have prophetic
vision. The numbering of the people (Num. 1:2ff.; 26:1ff.),
the sending of emissaries to Edom (Num. 20:14) and to Sihon (21:2122), and even the appointment of scouts to spy
out the land (13:2ff.; 21:32; Deut. 1:2223) are more secular
than prophetic.
525
moses
THE LAST DAYS. In the Plains of Moab Moses life began to
draw to its close. Miriam and Aaron had already died (Num.
20:1, 2429); Moses, too, was denied entry by the Lord into
the land that was the lodestar of his hopes. All his pleadings
were in vain (Deut. 3:25). Instead Moses was bidden to appoint
Joshua as his successor (Num. 27:1623; Deut. 1:8; 31:3, 14, 23),
and on the borders of the Promised Land the aged leader delivered three hortatory addresses (Deut. 14; 528; 2930)
in which he reviewed the history of the 40-years wandering
and gave a resume of the Torah Code. After admonishing and
blessing his people and viewing the land from the top of Pisgah, he died at the age of 120 by the command of the Lord,
and was buried by Him in an unknown grave (Deut. 34). The
tomb of Moses was not to become a cultic site, a clear indication that such claims about the site were known to the writer
(see below). The valedictory song (Haazinu) that Moses taught
the Children of Israel (Deut. 32) and the testamentary benedictions (Deut. 33) form an epilogue to the biblical account of
Moses. The tribute to Moses with which the Torah concludes
(Deut. 34:1012) underscores the uniqueness of Moses character and achievements.
[Israel Abrahams]
Critical Assessment
(Note: Although there are certain overlaps between this section and that preceding, they have been retained so as not to
impair the unity of either section (Ed.)).
No primary source of information on Moses exists outside the Bible. The Pentateuch is the main repository of the traditions regarding Moses life and work. Some biblical allusions
to Moses depend on the Pentateuch, while others are independent, e.g., Hosea 12:14, Micah 6:4 and Isaiah 63:11, and genealogical notices in Judges 1:16; 4:11; 18:30; I Chronicles 23:1415.
For critical treatment, the data are collected by topics in the
following paragraphs: the pentateuchal data are followed by
the extra-pentateuchal, and then assessed critically. The order
of appearance in the narrative is followed in the main.
526
moses
gan in the pre-settlement age and continued for generations
(Num. 22:4ff.; 31:1ff.; Judg. 67), supports the historicity of an
early connection between Israel and a Midianite group the
Kenites, relatives of Moses.
THE COMMISSIONING AND THE EXODUS. Once while tending the flocks deep in the wilderness at the Mountain of God,
Moses was surprised by a call out of a burning bush to become
Gods agent in the deliverance of Israel front bondage. Gods
name, YHWH, was revealed and interpreted to him, and identified with the God of the Patriarchs. Returning to Egypt with
(Ex. 4:20) or without (18:2) his family, Moses was rebuffed by
Pharaoh, re-commissioned by God, and armed with wonders
to bring Pharaoh to his knees. A climactic series of plagues
forced the king to release the Israelites. After executing the
protective rite of the paschal sacrifice, which saved them from
the final plague of the firstborn, the Israelites marched out of
Egypt. Soon, however, the Egyptians set out to retake them.
Overtaken at the Sea of Reeds, the Israelites escaped through
the miraculously divided sea, while the pursuing Egyptians
were drowned as the waters closed back on them. Thereupon
the people believed (i.e., attributed the quality of reliability
to) in YHWH and in Moses, his servant and sang a triumphal
hymn to God (Ex. 315).
The present form of the burning bush story is a composite and elaborated account of the call of the first messenger
of God to Israel. Its essence the overpowering, unavoidable command to go on Gods mission reappears in all accounts of prophetic calls; there is little reason to doubt that it
was the experience of the founder of the line (cf. the succession listed in I Sam. 12:8, 11). An allusion to this story seems
to be contained in the divine epithet Bush-Dweller found
in the (tenth-century?) Blessing of Moses (Deut. 33:16). The
antiquity of the worship of YHWH and of his association with
the Mountain of God variously named Horeb and Sinai is
problematic. Pre-Mosaic worship of YHWH as a deity whose
seat was in the wilderness south of Palestine is hinted at by
14t-century Egyptian references to a land of the bedouin of
YHWH adjacent to Edom the (cf. provenance of YHWH in the
old poems, Deut. 33:2; Judg. 5:45, and in Hab. 3:3), and the association of YHWH with Horeb-Sinai prior to Israels coming
there is suggested by Exodus 19:4 (and brought you to me).
To be sure, Moses is depicted as ignorant of the sanctity of
the place (as Jacob was of the sanctity of Beth-El, the gate of
heaven (Gen. 18:16)) and his experience and conception of
YHWH have no known antecedents, but some link with prior
religious data cannot be ruled out (though the speculative
association of *Kenites-*Midianites with YHWH worship has
little to stand on).
The new significance of YHWH with the advent of Moses
is indicated by the appearance of the first names bearing an
element of the tetragrammaton in connection with Moses:
Jochebed and Joshua; no such element occurs in theophoric
names of the patriarchal age (on which fact light is shed by
Ex. 6:3; modern criticism follows the acute suggestion of the
Karaite Jeshua b. Judah (cited by Ibn Ezra, ad loc.) that occurrences of the tetragrammaton in divine communications with
the Patriarchs is anachronistic, cf. *Pentateuch). The conception of the messenger or agent of YHWH, sent and equipped
with wondrous signs to help Israel, has its first embodiment
in Moses and is a distinctive and dominant feature of Israelite
religion thereafter. That a new start was made with the God
YHWH and his apostle Moses is the core of the burning bush
story; the discontinuity that must be postulated at the beginning of Israels history makes it credible. Moses plays a central
role in the story of the *Plagues of Egypt and the Exodus, dramatically woven out of various strands of tradition (see *Exodus, Book of). The line of song ascribed to Miriam in Exodus 15:21 appears as the opening of a triumphal hymn to God
in 15:1, which can hardly be detached from it (though verses
1218 may be a later element), and must be allowed the same
antiquity. Reflexes of these traditions, assigning a primary role
to Moses, appear in Hosea 12:14 and Micah 6:4 datable to the
eighth century; of indeterminate pre-Exilic date are the references in Joshua 24:5 and Psalms 105:26 to the role of Moses
and Aaron in the plagues, and in I Samuel 12:6, 8 and Psalms
77:21 (where an echo of Ex. 15:13 occurs) to the brothers part
in the Exodus. Moses is linked with the parting of the sea in
the post-Exilic Isaiah 63:11 (where, in the received Hebrew, a
pun on Moses name may appear (mosheh ammo, who drew
his people out [of the water]); but the Septuagint lacks these
words, and various manuscripts and the Syriac version read
mosheh avdo, his servant Moses).
LEADER OF THE WANDERINGS THROUGH THE WILDERNESS. Moses conducted the people into the wilderness, aiming for the Mountain of God (cf. Ex. 3:12). On the way he
had to organize them under the headship of his aide-de-camp,
Joshua, into a fighting force to fend off marauding Amalekites (Ex. 17:8ff.). At Sinai, the first threat to his new faith appeared in the Golden Calf apostasy; Moses met it with harsh
resolution, executing the offenders with the help of his Levite kinsmen (Ex. 32). At Sinai, too, Moses established the administrative organs of the people: advised by Jethro, he appointed a hierarchy of deputies to govern and judge them (Ex.
18:13ff.; Deut. 1:9ff.), whose military titles (officers of thousands, hundreds, fifties, tens) accord with the disposition of
the people, after their census, as an army (Num. 12). (For
the revelation at Sinai, see below.) After celebrating the second Passover (Num. 9), Israel made ready to march on to the
Promised Land. Moses requested his father-in-laws service
as guide along the way (Num. 10:29ff.); then, with the Ark in
the lead, Moses invoked YHWHs victory over all his enemies,
and set off (Num. 10:3536). The post-Sinai part of the wilderness wanderings was filled with challenges to Moses authority (see next section). Numbers 11:1112, 16ff. tells of the appointment of 70 elders, inspired by God with some of Moses
spirit to enable them to share the burden of leadership with
Moses (but Ex. 24:9ff. seems to suppose their presence already
at Sinai). The worst crises came with the demoralizing report
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of the spies sent from Kadesh to reconnoiter Canaan, and the
failure of the subsequent rash attempt to invade directly, made
in defiance of Moses prohibition (Num. 1314). Frustration
induced by the prolonged, forced stay in the wilderness bred
the revolt of *Korah and 250 chief men against the authority of Moses and Aaron (Num. 16), which ended with their
miraculous destruction. Moses had to crush a second apostasy, incited by Moabite-Midianite women (on the advice of
Balaam (Num. 22:16)), at Shittim, in Transjordan (Num. 25).
Moses martial achievements came at the close of his career.
His request for peaceful passage through Amorite Transjordan having been denied, Moses led successful campaigns
against the kings *Sihon and *Og and, after a preliminary reconnaissance, against the region of Jazer (Num. 21:21ff.; Deut.
2:243:11). He allocated the land to the tribes of Reuben, Gad,
and half-Manasseh after their oath to participate in the conquest of Cisjordan (Num. 32; Deut. 3:12ff.; Josh. 13:15ff.), and
reserved in it three cities of refuge (Deut. 4:41ff.; but cf. Josh.
20:8, which dates this act to the time of Joshua). His last campaign was a retributive war against Midian (Num. 31). In the
last year of the wanderings, Moses appointed Eleazar to succeed his father, Aaron, in the priestly duties (Num. 20:23ff.),
and his aide, Joshua, to succeed him in the leadership of the
people (Num. 27:15ff.; Deut. 31).
The credibility of the wilderness narratives is impaired by
their inconsistency (e.g., with respect to the 70 elders; and see
the next section), chronological obscurities (e.g., the events in
Num. 2021 and their relation to Deut. 12), apparent doublets
(e.g., Num. 21:13 and 14:45), and divergent itineraries (especially in Num. 33:17ff., which, e.g., has no trace of a southern
movement from Kadesh, contrast 14:25, and in 14:41ff. which
traces a route arriving at the Plains of Moab without circling
the lands of Edom and Moab; contrast Num. 21:4; Deut. 2).
Moreover, the presence of Moses is not consistent throughout
this material (e.g., Num. 21:13), so that critics have assumed
that data on tribal movements other than those led by Moses
have been combined in these narratives (on the supposition
that the migration of the Hebrews was not the single movement into which tradition has characteristically simplified it).
Finally, the trek through the Sinai desert at the necessary time
period is belied by the extensive archaeological studies of the
Sinai following the 1967 Israeli victory.
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moses
tion with warnings, blessings, and curses, then committed it to
writing and deposited the document the Book of Torah
in the Ark, alongside the tablets (Deut. 31:9, 24ff.). In between
the two covenant-makings, at the beginning and at the end of
the journey through the wilderness, Moses received a host of
ritual, religious, and moral injunctions, in the Tent of Meeting at Sinai and in the Plains of Moab (Lev. 1:1ff.; 26:46; 27:34;
Num. 36:13). In addition to these large and small collections of
injunctions, issued at the initiative of God, Moses sought and
received oracular decisions in difficult cases, as need arose.
This role was reserved for him in the administrative organization of the camp suggested by Jethro (Ex. 18:1920) and its
performance is illustrated in the cases of the blasphemer (Lev.
24), the Sabbath breaker (Num. 15:32ff.), and the daughters of
Zelophehad (Num. 27; cf. Num. 36). The figure of Moses as
the mediator of Gods laws and admonitions to Israel appears
in biblical literature influenced by Deuteronomy and in postExilic writings. Thus the deuteronomistically edited Book of
Joshua is haunted by Moses, the lawgiver; indeed it reads as the
record of fulfillment of Moses admonitions (e.g., 1:1ff.; 4:10ff.;
8:31ff.; 11:15ff.; 14:6, 9; 17:4; 20:2). Material in the same spirit
and style is found in Kings: I Kings 2:3; 8:53, 56; II Kings 14:6;
18:6; 21:8; 23:25. In writings of the Persian period, Moses appears exclusively as the author of the Torah and the founder of
Israels sacred institutions (Mal. 3:22; Ezra 3:2; Neh. 1:7ff.; 8:1,
14; 9:14; 10:30; I Chron. 6:34; 21:29; II Chron. 8:13; 24:6; 35:6,
12). For a critical assessment of this representation of Moses,
see the end of the next section.
CULT FOUNDER AND PRIEST. Moses not only proclaimed
the proper name of God, by which He was henceforth to be
invoked in worship (This shall be My name forever/This My
appellation [zikhri, lit. call-word] for all time, Ex. 3:15), he
instructed Israel in YHWHs sacred seasons-starting with Passover and maz z ot (Ex. 12) and the Sabbath (Ex. 16) and proceeding to the whole cultic calendar and its related prescribed
sacrifices (Ex. 23:14ff.; 34:18ff.; Lev. 23; Num. 28:29; Deut. 16).
The non-festival sacrificial system, too, was ordained by him
(Lev. 17). He received the blueprint of the Tabernacle and supervised its construction (Ex. 2531; 3540). He inaugurated it
and consecrated its clergy (Lev. 8). Moses is described as exercising specific priestly functions (e.g., handling the blood of
sacrifice) both in the ceremony of covenant ratification (Ex.
24:6, 8) and during the inauguration of the Tabernacle and
priesthood (Lev. 8).
Only two allusions to Moses priestly aspect occur in extra-pentateuchal writing: Psalm 99:6 counts Moses with Aaron
as a priest of YHWH (traditional exegetes refer this to his role
in Lev. 8), and the priesthood of the Danite sanctuary traced
their line to a descendant of Moses (Judg. 18:30 crediting
the talmudic notice that the suspended nun of Manasseh is
a deliberate device to obscure the derivation of this ignoble
priesthood from Moses; BB 109b). According to the post-Exilic record, and in line with the Aaronide monopoly of the
priesthood prescribed by the Torah, the descendants of Moses
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moses
raelites (Num. 20:12) is obscure. The interpretation in Psalms
106:3233 is ambiguous: this much seems clear, however: that
Moses is blamed for speaking rashly. In Deuteronomy, in contrast, Moses is denied entry into the Promised Land on account of the people: their display of faithlessness during the
incident of the spies made God turn upon Moses as well. It
was then He decreed that Moses (as well as his whole generation) would not enter the land (Deut. 1:37; 3:26; 4:21). When
his time had come, Moses was commanded to ascend Mount
Nebo, from which he could view the length and breadth of the
Promised Land. There he died and was buried in the valley, in
the land of Moab, opposite Beth-Peor; and no man knows his
burial place, to this day (Deut. 34; cf. Num. 27:12ff.). The various theological explanations of Moses death in Transjordan
vouch for the existence of a grave tradition. Inasmuch as grave
traditions were attached to such worthies as the patriarchs
and matriarchs, the surprising obliteration of his burial-place
savors of a deliberate aversion toward his apotheosis, which
might have grown out of veneration of his grave as a shrine.
Such an apotheosis was likely in view of the singular status accorded Moses in Israelite tradition (see Houtman).
UNIQUE STATUS. The wonders performed by Moses on behalf of Israel exceed those of any subsequent prophet (Deut.
34:1112). He not only outdid Egypts magicians (whose virtuosity, as displayed, e.g., in the Westcar Papyrus (A. Erman, The
Ancient Egyptians, 36ff.), illuminates the issue of the first part
of the plague narratives), he also prevailed over the mightiest
forces of nature splitting both the sea (Ex. 14) and the earth
(Num. 16). That in so doing he no more than activated the
power of God, and in Gods own cause, is unfailingly noted;
no room is left for regarding Moses as a magician, aggrandizing himself through native powers or occult arts. One superhuman trait, however, does pertain to him: the ability to
endure, on more than one occasion, a fast of forty days (Ex.
24:18; 34:28; Deut. 9:9, 18; cf. Elijahs similar feat, I Kings 19:8).
Miraculous features, part of the traditional image of the man
of God, are ascribed to Moses in the highest degree as befits
his heroic role. No later figure is portrayed so close to God
as Moses. God spoke with him face to face (Ex. 33:11), and
allowed him such a prolonged intimacy that as a result (after
Moses intercession in the wake of the Golden Calf apostasy)
Moses face was fearsomely radiant, so that he had to wear a
mask in ordinary intercourse with people (Ex. 34:19ff.). The
covenant made after this apostasy, on the basis of Moses favor
with God, specifically names Moses as an equal party with the
people (Ex. 34:27; cf. 34:10, and the corresponding usage in
the intercession in Ex. 33:16 (I and your people, twice)). The
equation corresponds to Gods substitution of Moses for all the
rest of the people in Exodus 32:10 (cf. Num. 14:12) and Moses
readiness to lay down his life on their behalf (Ex. 32:32). That
Moses cannot simply be subsumed under the rubric prophet
(navi) is the lesson taught to Aaron and Miriam in Numbers
12:6ff.: prophetic revelation is in the form of dream or vision; Moses, however, has the freedom of YHWHs house (i.e.,
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moses
that whatever historical basis there might have been for the
activity of Moses is beyond recovery.
[Moshe Greenberg / S. David Sperling (2nd ed.)]
in hellenistic literature
that Plato was just a Moses who spoke Greek (fragment 10,
L). Philo also asserts that Moses was the best of all lawgivers
in all countries, and that his laws are most excellent and truly
come from God. This is proved by the fact that while other
law codes have been upset for innumerable reasons, the laws
of Moses have remained firm and immovable, and we may
hope that they will remain for all future ages so long as the
sun and moon and the whole heaven and universe exist (II
Mos. 12). Furthermore, not only Jews but almost every other
people have attained enough holiness to value and honor these
laws. In fact, says Philo, it is only natural that when people
are not flourishing, their belongings to some degree are under
a cloud, but if a fresh start should be made to brighter prospects each nation would throw overboard its ancestral
customs and turn to honoring our laws alone (ibid. 44). In
spite of the declining political fortunes of the Jews during the
period of the Roman Empire, an occasional note of admiration for Moses is still found in writers like Pseudo-Longinus,
who speaks glowingly of the great legislators lofty genius (On
the Sublime 9:9), but Numenius, Tacitus, Galen, Celsus, Porphyry, and Julian, on the other hand, are highly critical of, and
even hostile to, Moses.
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in kingship for one destined to command the herd of mankind. Since Moses abjured the accumulation of wealth, God
rewarded him by placing the whole world in his hands. Therefore each element obeyed him as its master, and submitted to
his command (cf. II Mos., 201; Wisd. 19:6). His partnership
with God also entitled him to bear the same title: For he was
named god and the king of the whole nation, and entered into
the darkness where God was, that is, into the unseen, invisible,
incorporeal, and archetypal essence of existing things.
A few further details may be added from Josephus account of Moses (Ant. 2: 201ff.). Pharaoh decreed that all male
infants of the Hebrews be drowned on the advice of a sacred
scribe who had divined the birth of one who, if allowed to
live, would abase Egypt and exalt Israel. Moses easy birth
spared his mother violent pangs and discovery by the watchful Egyptian midwives. His size and beauty enchanted princess
Thermuthis, who found him on the Nile. Because he refused
to take the breast of any Egyptian wet nurse, his mother was
engaged to suckle him. Moses precocity was displayed in his
very games. Moreover, when the princess laid the babe in her
fathers arms, and the latter, to please his daughter, placed his
diadem upon the childs head, Moses tore it off, flung it to the
ground, and trampled it underfoot. This was taken as an ill
omen, and the sacred scribe who had foretold his birth rushed
forward to kill him. Thermuthis, however, was too quick for
him and snatched the child away. Carried away by his Hellenistic ambience, Josephus says that, after crossing the Red Sea,
Moses composed a song to God in hexameter verse.
Some last points of interest may be gleaned from PseudoPhilos Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum (first century C.E.). According to this work, Moses was born circumcised (cf. Sot. 12a,
Ex. R. 1:20). Pharaohs daughter comes down to bathe in the
Nile at this particular time because she had had a dream. Before Moses smashes the tablets, he looks upon them and sees
that there is no writing on them. The reason given for his not
entering the Promised Land was that he should be spared the
sight of the idols that were to mislead his people. Moses dies
at the hands of God, who buries him personally (cf. Deut. R.
11:10), and on the day of his death the heavenly praise of God
was omitted, something which never occurred before and was
never to occur again.
words, Satan grants God Moses soul, but claims his body
as belonging to his exclusive domain. The author, speaking
through Michael, rejects this gnostic dualism by insisting that
God is Lord of both spirit and flesh, since he is the creator of
all (R.H. Charles, Apocrypha, 2 (1897), 1057). It may be well
to allude here to the apocalyptic tradition connected with the
name of Moses and also with Ezra, the second Moses. In the
Assumption of Moses, Moses gives Joshua secret books which
are to be preserved and hidden until the day of repentance in
the visitation wherewith the Lord shall visit thee in the consummation of the end of days (1:18). In Jubilees, too, the account is given of a secret tradition revealed to Moses on Sinai
in which he is shown all the events of history both past and
future (1:26). With this may be compared II Esdras 14, where
Ezra, the second Moses, receives by divine revelation the 24
books of canonical Scripture which he has to publish openly
and the 70 books representing the apocalyptic tradition which
he has to keep secret.
MOSES AS MAGICIAN. In pagan literature, Moses was, naturally enough, sometimes represented as a great magician. Numenius of Apamea, for example, presents him as a magician
greater than his rivals Iannes and Iambres because his prayers
were more powerful than theirs (fragments 18 and 19, L; cf.
Pliny, Natural History, 30:1, 11; Reinach, op. cit. 282; Trogus
Pompeius = Justin Epitome 36:2; Reinach, op. cit., 253). Moreover, in some of the magic papyri, Moses appears as the possessor of mysteries given to him by God (K. Preisendanz, Papyri Graecae Magicae, 2, 87f.). Finally, it may be noted that in
some of the Qumran fragments, secret astrological teachings
were ascribed to Moses (J.T. Milik, in: RB, 63 (1956), 61).
[David Winston]
rabbinic view
A marked ambivalence is to be observed in the Jewish tradition with regard to the personality of Moses. On the one hand,
Moses is the greatest of all the Jewish teachers, a powerfully
numinous figure, the man with whom God speaks face to
face, the intermediary between God and man, the master of
the prophets, and the recipient of Gods law for mankind. On
the other hand, the utmost care is taken to avoid the ascription of divine or semi-divine powers to Moses. Moses is a man,
with human faults and failings. Strenuous attempts are made
to reject any personality cult, even when the personality in
question is as towering as Moses. Judaism is not Mosaism
but the religion of the Jewish people. God, not Moses, gives
His Torah to His people Israel. There are to be found Jewish
thinkers, evidently in response to the claims made for Jesus
by Christianity and for Muhammad by Islam, who elevate the
role of Moses so that the religion is made to center around
him. However, the opposite tendency is equally notable. Precisely because Christianity and Islam center on a person, Jewish thinkers declared that Judaism, on the contrary, singles out
no one person, not even a Moses, as belonging to the heart
of the faith. The stresses in this matter vary in proportion to
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the particular strength of the challenge in the period during
which the role of Moses is considered. The need is keenly felt
to affirm the supremacy of Moses and yet, at the same time,
to deny him any divine honors.
Rav and Samuel said that 50 gates of understanding were
created in the world, and all but one were given to Moses, for
it is said (Ps. 8:6): For Thou hast made him [Moses] but a
little lower than the angels (Ned. 38a). All the prophets saw
God as one looks into a dim glass, but Moses as one who
looks through a clear glass (Yev. 49b). When Moses was born
the whole house was filled with light (Sot. 12a). Moses was so
kind, gentle, and considerate to his sheep when tending the
flock of Jethro that God made him the shepherd of Israel (Ex.
R. 2:2). For Moses such a great thing as the fear of God was
very easy of attainment (Ber. 33b). R. Johanan said: The Holy
One, blessed be He, causes His Divine Presence to rest only
upon him who is strong, wealthy, wise, and meek and Moses
had all these qualifications (Ned. 38a). According to one
opinion, Moses did not really die but still stands and ministers to God as he did while on Mount Sinai (Sot. 13b). Moses
was righteous from the beginning of his life to the end of it, as
was Aaron (Meg. 11a). Here, and frequently in the rabbinic literature, the praise of Moses is coupled with that of Aaron. The
humility of Moses and Aaron was greater than that of Abraham since Abraham spoke of himself as dust and ashes (Gen.
18:27) whereas Moses and Aaron declared that they were nothing at all (Ex. 16:8). The whole world exists only on account of
the merit of Moses and Aaron (H ul. 89a). These and similar
sayings are typical of the rabbinic determination to go to the
utmost lengths in lauding Moses; yet sayings of a not too different nature are found lauding other biblical heroes, and in
some of the passages Aaron is made to share Moses glory.
For the rabbis generally Moses is Moshe Rabbenu (Moses
our master, i.e., teacher), the teacher of the Torah par excellence. Neumark (Toledot ha-Ikkarim (19192), 85f.) has, however, conjectured that the absence of this title from the whole
of the Mishnah is a conscious anti-Christian reaction in which
the character of Moses is played down somewhat by avoiding
the giving to him of a title given to Jesus (Acts. 2:36). It is also
suggested in the Mishnah (RH 3:8) that the hands of Moses
did not in themselves have any effect on the fortunes of Israel
in the battle with Amalek. It was only when Israel lifted up
their eyes to God in response to Moses uplifted hands that
God helped them. R. Eleazar, commenting on the verse Go
down (Ex. 32:7), remarks: The Holy One, blessed be He, said
to Moses: Moses, descend from thy greatness. Have I given
to thee greatness except for the sake of Israel? And now Israel
have sinned; then why do I want thee? (Ber. 32a). R. Yose said
that if Moses had not preceded him, Ezra would have been
worthy of receiving the Torah for Israel (Sanh. 21b). Nor were
the rabbis averse on occasion to criticizing Moses for his quick
temper (Pes. 66b; Sot. 13b) and to stating that he erred, though
ready to acknowledge his mistake (Zev. 101a).
In the rabbinic tradition Moses was not only given the
Written Law but the Oral Law, including the laws given to
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[Louis Jacobs]
In the Aggadah
Heaven and earth were only created for the sake of Moses (Lev.
R. 36:4). The account of the creation of water on the second
day does not close with the customary formula and God saw
that it was good since Moses was destined to be punished
through water (Gen. R. 4:6). Noah was only rescued from the
Flood because Moses was destined to descend from him (Gen.
R. 26:6). The ascending and descending angels seen by Jacob
in his nocturnal vision (Gen. 28:12) were in reality Moses and
Aaron (Gen. R. 68:12).
His parents house was filled with light on the day of his
birth. He was born circumcised (Sot. 12a) on Adar 7t (Meg.
13b). He spoke with his parents on the day of his birth, and
prophesied at the age of three (Mid. Petirat Moshe, in: Jellinek, Beit ha-Midrash, 1:128). Pharaohs daughter went down
to bathe since she was afflicted with leprosy, but as soon as
she touched the ark of Moses she was healed. She therefore
took pity upon the child and saved him, despite the protests
of her maidens. When she opened the ark she saw the Shekhinah next to Moses, and heard his cry, which sounded like
that of a mature youngster (Ex. R. 1:23, 24). Pharaohs astrologers had previously predicted that the savior of Israel would
shortly be born and that he would be punished through water. After Moses was placed in the Nile, they told Pharaoh that
the redeemer had already been cast into the water, whereupon
Pharaoh rescinded his decree that the male children should
be put to death (Ex. R. 1:24). Not only were all the future children saved, but even the 600,000 children cast into the Nile
together with Moses were also rescued (Gen. R. 97:3). Moses
refused to suck at the breast of Egyptian foster-mothers because the mouth which was destined to speak with the Shekhinah would not take unclean milk (Sot. 12b). His unique
beauty captivated the royal household and he was adopted
by Pharaohs daughter, who constantly displayed her affection
for him. Even Pharaoh played with the baby, who often took
his crown and placed it upon his own head. The kings advis-
moses
ers were frightened by this behavior and they counseled Pharaoh to put him to death. However, Jethro, who was among
the royal counselors, insisted on first testing the youngster. A
gold vessel and a live coal were brought before Moses, and he
was about to reach for the gold when the angel Gabriel came
and deflected his hand to the hot coal. The baby placed a live
coal into his mouth, burning his tongue, and as a result he acquired the impediment in his speech (Ex. R. 1:26).
Moses not only sympathized with the sufferings of his
brethren, but he also aided them in their tasks by himself preparing the clay for the bricks. He also assigned them responsibilities in accordance with their abilities so that the strong
carried greater burdens while the weak discharged lesser tasks
(Ex. R. 1:27). He slew the cruel Egyptian taskmaster only after
the angels decreed his death since he had previously defiled
the wife of one of the Hebrew slaves in his charge and subsequently sought to slay the husband. Moses killed the Egyptian
either by means of the Divine Name or by his own physical
strength. After Dathan and Abiram informed on Moses to
Pharaoh, he was condemned to death, but the executioners
sword had no effect on him, since his neck became like a pillar
of ivory (Ex. R. 1: 2831). Moses saved the daughters of Jethro
after the shepherds had cast them into the well, and he also
protected them from their immoral designs. Moses drew out
only one bucketful and with this watered all the flock there assembled, since the water was blessed at his hands (Ex. R. 1:32).
According to one tradition, Moses could marry Zipporah only
after he agreed to Jethros condition that one of their children
be raised in Jethros faith while the rest could be trained in
the Hebraic tradition. Because of this agreement, Gershom
was not circumcised, and on the way to Egypt Moses almost
met his death because of this neglect (Ex. 4:2426; Mekh.,
Amalek), but in the opinion of other sages (Mekh. ibid.; TJ,
Ned. 3:14, 38b) Moses could not circumcise his second son
Eliezer, because he had been born just prior to his departure
for Egypt, and his only fault was that he did not do so immediately on reaching the resting place.
Before God confers greatness on a man he is first tested
through small matters and then promoted to importance.
Moses displayed his trustworthiness by leading the sheep into
the wilderness in order to keep them from despoiling the fields
of others. He then showed his mercy by carrying a young kid
on his shoulders after it had exhausted itself by running to a
pool of water (Ex. R. 2:23). God appeared to him in a burning bush to illustrate that the Jews were as indestructible as
the bush which was not consumed by the flames (Ex. R. 2:5).
Many reasons are given for Moses initial hesitancy in accepting the mission of redeeming his brethren: he recoiled from
the honor and prestige which would accrue to him for successfully completing the task (Tanh . va-Yikra, 3); he feared to
trespass upon the domain of his elder brother whom he felt
should be the redeemer (Ex. R. 3: 16); he desired the redeemer
to be God Himself rather than a mortal so that the redemption would be eternal (Ex. R. 3:4); he was angry because God
had already deserted the children of Israel for 210 years and
permitted many pious individuals to be slain by their Egyptian taskmasters (Mekh. Sb-Y to 6:2).
The sages likewise were perplexed by Moses seemingly
disrespectful reply to God that since he had spoken to Pharaoh the lot of his people had not improved (Ex. 5:2223).
Various explanations are given for the tone of Moses lament:
the taunts of Dathan and Abiram regarding his lack of success
provoked Moses anger (Ex. R. 6:2); Moses mistakenly thought
that the redemption would entirely come about through the
attribute of mercy and would therefore be instantaneous (Ex.
R. 6:3); he felt that his generation of Israelites did not deserve
the severe punishment of bondage; and he did not doubt that
God would ultimately redeem His people, but he was grieved
for those children who were being daily immured in the new
buildings and would not be redeemed. The attribute of justice
sought to strike Moses, but God protected him since He knew
that Moses only spoke out of his love for his brethren (Ex. R.
5:22). The elders started to accompany Moses and Aaron to
Pharaohs palace (Ex. 3:18) but gradually stole away furtively,
singly or in pairs, so that by the time the palace was reached
only Moses and Aaron were left (Ex. R. 5:14). Despite the harsh
messages which Moses delivered to Pharaoh, he constantly accorded him the respect due to royalty (Ex. R. 5:15; Zev. 102a).
Moses executed all the plagues except for those connected
with water and dust, since he had been saved through water
and the dust had concealed the body of the Egyptian he slew
(Ex. 2:12; Ex. R. 9:10; 10:7). When Moses announced the final
plague, he did not state the exact time of its incidence, saying
only that about midnight (Ex. 11:4) because he feared that
Pharaohs astrologers might miscalculate and declare him a liar
(Ber. 4a). During the Exodus, while the masses thought only of
taking the gold and silver of the Egyptians, Moses went and retrieved the coffin of Joseph which subsequently accompanied
the Israelites in the desert (Mekh. 2, Proem. Sot. 13a).
Moses went up to Mount Sinai, enveloped by a cloud
which sanctified him for receiving the Torah (Yoma 4a). After he ascended on high, the ministering angels contested the
right of one born of woman to receive the treasures of the
Torah. Encouraged by the Almighty, Moses demonstrated
to the angels that only mortals were subject to the Torahs
regulations and therefore it was rightfully theirs. The angels
thereupon became friendly with Moses, and each one revealed
its secret to him (Shab. 89a). In abstaining from food during
the 40 days on Mt. Sinai Moses acted as do the angels (BM
86b). He received instruction from God by day and reviewed
the teachings at night (Ex. R. 47:8). Not only were the Bible,
Mishnah, Talmud, and aggadah taught to Moses, but all interpretations that were destined to be propounded by future
students were also revealed to him (Ex. R. 47:1). Before Moses
ascended the mountain, he promised to return by midday of
the 41st day. On that day Satan confused the world so that to
the Israelites it appeared to be afternoon when it was actually
still morning. Satan told them that Moses had died and would
never return, whereupon the people made the Golden Calf
(Shab. 89a). Moses broke the tablets, and made it appear that
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the Torah had not been given, to prevent the sinners from being punished (ARN2 2:56). God approved of this action (Shab.
87a) and when Moses realized that Israels fate depended upon
him and his prayers, he began to defend them (Ber. 32a). He
argued that God had not enjoined the prohibition against
idolatry upon the children of Israel since the singular and not
the plural is used in the command (Ex. 20:35), and it applied
only to him (Ex. R. 47:9; for the additional justifications set
forth by Moses see *Golden Calf). Moses refused Gods offer
to make him the ancestor of a great nation since he feared that
he would be accused of seeking only his glory and not that of
the people (Ber. 32a).
God would not grant Moses wish to behold all His glory
since Moses had refused to look at him through the burning
bush (Ber. 7a). He was hidden in the same cave which was later
occupied by Elijah (I Kings 19:914). If there had been an aperture even as minute as the point of a needle, Moses would have
been consumed by the passing divine light (Meg. 19b). Moses
received only the reflection of this light, and from its radiance
his face subsequently shone (Ex. R. 47:6). During this revelation, Moses was granted profound insight into the problem of
theodicy (Ber. 7a). Afterward he was known as the master of
Torah, wisdom, and prophecy (Meg. 13a) since he possessed
49 of the 50 divisions of wisdom (RH 21b). He was the greatest prophet among the Israelites (Deut. 34:10) although, according to one view, Balaam was almost his equal so that the
heathen nations could not attribute their wickedness to the
lack of the prophetic spirit (Sif. Deut. 357; SER 26:1412; but
cf. TJ, Sot. 5:8, 20d; Lev. R. 1:1214). Moses insisted on giving
a complete account of the materials collected for the Tabernacle since he overheard scoffers claiming that he had embezzled a portion of the gold and silver (Ex. R. 51:6). During
the seven days of the dedication of the sanctuary, Moses officiated as the high priest. He was also considered the king of
Israel during the 40-year sojourn in the desert. When Moses
requested these two offices for a permanent heritage, he was
told that the priesthood was already assigned to Aaron, while
royalty was designated for David (Ex. R. 2:6).
Moses insisted that his sin of striking the rock be recorded in the Torah (Num. 20:11) so that future generations
would not mistakenly ascribe other transgressions or faults
to him (Sif. Deut. 26; Num. R. 19:12). The impatience of the
people and the jeers of the scoffers were the cause of his smiting the rock in anger (Num. R. 19:9). In reality, God had long
before decreed that Moses should not enter the Promised
Land and Moses offense in Kadesh was only a pretext so that
He might not appear unjust. God explained to Moses that if
he were not buried in the desert with the generation that left
Egypt, people would mistakenly declare that the generation
of the wilderness had no share in the world to come (Num. R.
19:13). Moses immediately obeyed Gods command to avenge
the Israelite people on the Midianites (Num. 31:2), although he
knew that after it was fulfilled he would die (Num. R. 22:22).
Before his death, Moses pleaded for the appointment of a successor who would successfully cope with the dissimilar tem-
536
[Aaron Rothkoff]
moses
Abrabanels commentary on this passage). He writes that while
other prophets can hear only in a dream of prophecy that God
has spoken to him Moses heard Him from above the ark
cover, from between the two cherubim, without action on the
part of the imaginative faculty (Guide, 2:45). Moses prophetic
experience, then, seems to have been dependent on the superior development of his rational faculty, and it is probable that
according to Maimonides although he does not say so explicitly Moses attained union with the active intellect (see S.
Pines (tr.), Guide of the Perplexed (1963), translators introduction, lxxviixcii). J. Guttmann has suggested that according to
Maimonides, Moses prophecy differed from that of the other
prophets insofar as it transcended the natural order and was
wholly due to a supernatural action of God, while the prophecies of the other prophets resulted from the development of
their rational and imaginative faculties. In this way, Guttmann
maintains, Maimonides safeguards the uniqueness of biblical
religion which Moses transmitted against the danger inherent
in a naturalistic interpretation of prophecy (Guttmann, Philosophies, 172). S. Atlas, on the other hand, interprets Maimonides as asserting that while Moses prophetic experience did
not depend on his imaginative faculty, it did depend to a large
extent on the superior development of his rational faculty, and
was hence not totally dependent on the supernatural action
of God. However, he too maintains that in Maimonides view
there was an important element in Moses prophetic experience an element not common to the experiences of the other
prophets which was the result of Gods creative will, namely,
the giving of laws (Atlas, in HUCA, 25 (1954), 369400). Medieval philosophers considered Moses qualities of courage,
modesty, and justice to be prerequisites for prophetic experience (see for example Guide, 2:3840).
[David Kadosh]
For Judah Loew b. Bazalel (the Maharal) of Prague (Tiferet Yisrael (1955), 6467), Moses is a superhuman being occupying a midway position between the supernatural beings
and humans. This is why he was able to be equally at home
in heaven and on earth and this is hinted at in his name since
the letter mem of Moshe is the middle letter of the alphabet.
Samson Raphael Hirsch (Comm. to Ex. 24:1), on the other
hand, denies any qualitative superiority to Moses. Very curious is the legend recorded by Israel Lipschuetz b. Gedaliah (Tiferet Yisrael to Kid. end, n. 77). A certain king, having heard of Moses fame, sent a renowned painter to portray
Moses features. On the painters return with the portrait the
king showed it to his sages, who unanimously proclaimed
that the features portrayed were those of a degenerate. The astonished king journeyed to the camp of Moses and observed
for himself that the portrait did not lie. Moses admitted that
the sages were right and that he had been given from birth
many evil traits of character but that he had held them under
control and succeeded in conquering them. This, the narrative concludes, was Moses greatness, that, in spite of his tremendous handicaps, he managed to become the man of God.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
537
moses
voice of God speaking to him in his heart urging him to become the deliverer of his downtrodden people. This God who
speaks to him and to the people is not a tribal god but the God
of all men, every one of whom is created in His image. Because
his vision is unqualified Moses must die without entering the
Promised Land. The prophet is too uncompromising to be the
leader of the people in the stark realities of the actual human
situation. The leadership must pass to another more capable of
coming to terms with life as it is, even though this involves a
diminution of the dream. Thus Moses is the symbol of Israels
divine discontent with the present. Like Moses, Israel learned
to live only in the past and the future, its life a pilgrimage from
past to future. For Israel as for Moses the present, as it falls
short of the ideal, has no real existence.
Sigmund *Freuds Moses and Monotheism (1939) is an
interpretation of Moses work and character which has been
widely discussed, though the majority of scholars reject Freuds
anthropology and his views on biblical scholarship. According to Freud, Moses was not an Israelite but an Egyptian. The
monotheism he taught was derived from a period of pure
monotheism established during the reign of Ikhnaton. Following a hint thrown out by Sellin based on an obscure passage in the Book of Hosea, Freud believed that the Israelites,
unable to accept Moses new ideas, eventually murdered him.
But Moses monotheistic teachings lived on in the racial unconscious of the Israelites to reappear hundreds of years later
in the monotheism of the prophets. The slaying of Moses repeated what, for Freud, was the sin of primitive man, the slaying of the primal father by his jealous sons. Because of this,
monotheistic religion is haunted by guilt feelings and the need
for atonement. Freud admits the speculative nature of his theory but feels that it is in accord with his ideas on how religion
began and on mans needs for a father figure.
Martin *Buber in his book Moses accepts the basic historicity of Moses but makes a distinction between saga and
history. The saga is not history but neither is it fiction. It follows in the footsteps of the historical events and describes the
impact they had. Creative memory is at work in the saga. But
the saga is not simply a matter of group psychology. We can
get behind it to the actual historical events which made such
an impact on the people that they could only explain these
events as of divine power at work in them. It is not a case of
historization of myth but of mythization of history. At the
same time, in the Moses saga, the mythical element is not
a myth of the gods. The human figure is not transfigured, so
that the element of sober historical recording is still present.
Describing the God of Moses, Buber writes: He is the One
who brings His own out, He is their leader and advance guard;
prince of the people, legislator and the sender of a great message. He acts on the level of history on the peoples and between the peoples. What He aims at and cares for is a people.
He makes His demand that the people shall be entirely His
people, a holy people; that means, a people whose entire life
is hallowed by justice and loyalty, a people for God and for
the world That Moses experiences Him in this fashion and
538
[Louis Jacobs]
in christian tradition
Moses is mentioned more often than any other biblical figure in the New Testament, which emphasizes the parallel between the ministries of Moses and Jesus (Matt. 8:4; 17:18;
Mark 7:10; 9:28; 10:29). As Israels lawgiver and liberator,
Moses according to Christian tradition prefigures the ministry of Jesus and prophesies the coming of the Savior and the
mediator of the new covenant. Moses is an example of deep
faith in God (Heb. 11:2329), and like Jesus, he encounters the
peoples incomprehension and hostility (Acts 7:1744). Jesus,
however, surpasses Moses in all respects. Unlike the face of
Moses, that of Jesus is unveiled and his superior glory is spiritual (II Cor. 3:618). Moses appears as Gods faithful servant,
but Jesus is Gods son (Heb. 3:56). Moses seals the covenant
with the blood of animals, but the Messiahs covenant, which
for Christians definitely supersedes the Mosaic Law, is sealed
by his own sacrifice (Heb. 9:1122). In addition, the events of
the Exodus appear to the Church Fathers as typological events
of Jesus life; the passage through the Red Sea is the type of
Salvation through baptism; and the water gushing out of the
rock that Moses struck is a symbol of the Eucharist.
in islam
The personality and deeds of Ms (Moses) occupy an important place in the Koran. The events of his life, from the moment of his birth, are related at length. Indeed Nh (*Noah),
Ibrhm (*Abraham), and Moses were the first believers, and it
was Moses who prophesied the coming of Muhammad, whose
faith was that of Moses (Sura 7:140, 156; 42:11). At the same
time of the decree of Firawn (Pharaoh) and his counselors,
Hmm and Qrn (Korah), Moses life was endangered when
he was placed in the ark. However, siya (see *Pharaoh), the
wife (!) of Firawn, pitied Moses, saved him, and brought him
up in her house (26:17; 28:610). Muhammad adapts the biblical tale of Jacobs labor for Laban inserting its years as those of
Moses employment by Shuayb (Jethro) in order to gain the
hand of his daughter (28:27). He also adds details from the
aggadah: Moses refused to suckle at the breasts of Egyptian
women (28:11); one of the believers at the court of Pharaoh
attempted to save Moses (40:29); Allah hung the mountain
over the people of Israel like a pail in order that they would
accept the Torah (2:60, 87; 7:170); on the sending of the spies
(see *Joshua b. Nun = Ysha); on Korah (Qrn) and his
treasures; and many similar details. The Koran also contains
themes and figures which are unknown in the ancient literature, such as the tale of al-Smir, who casts the Golden Calf,
and the journey of Moses and his servant to the end of the
world (18:5981; see below). Some of the tales about Moses are
also mentioned in the poetry of *Umayya ibn Abi al-S alt, and
moses
are embellished by Muslim legend, and interwoven with new
legends. The biblical Imrn (Amram), husband of Yukhbid
(Jochebed) and father of Moses and Aaron, is only mentioned
in post-koranic literature. Imrn (Amram) of the Koran is the
husband of Hannah (her name is not mentioned in the Koran,
but in later works) and the father of Miriam (Maryam), the
mother of Jesus (Sura 3, The House of Imrn). Imrn, the
father of Moses, was one of Pharaohs bodyguards; after the
decree against the male children was issued, he did not leave
the palace and did not have marital relations with his wife. A
great bird, however, brought his wife Yukhbid to him, to the
bedroom of Pharaoh, without drawing the attention of the
bodyguards; she became pregnant and gave birth to Moses (alKis, 201). The ark of Moses had marvelous healing powers
from which Pharaohs daughter benefited. The infant Moses
was saved from the fiery furnace just as Abraham had been;
Pharaoh examined the child by placing a plate of coals and a
plate full of gold in front of him. Moses wished to touch the
gold, but an angel diverted his hand and put a burning coal
in his mouth, which caused him later to stammer. The sheep
of Jethro gave birth to spotted and speckled lambs. The staff
of Moses came from a tree which had grown in the Garden of
Eden, and which he inherited from the prophets, from Adam
via Jacob. The death of Moses is described as an event unparalleled in world history, particularly in the tales of Umra
(Ms., fol. 23v). The number of pages devoted to Moses in the
Legends of the Prophets emphasizes the many legends which
have been circulated.
Moses Journey
The tale of the journey of Moses and his servant (Sura 18:5981)
is a departure from the framework of the biblical tales and legends. Moses set out to find the confluence of the two seas. On
the way the servant forgot the roasted fish which was to serve
as their provisions. They encountered the prophet of Allah and
Moses asked him for a sign which would teach him wisdom
and lead him along the proper course. The prophet consented
on the condition that he would not question the meaning of
the events which would occur en route. They boarded a ship
and the prophet drilled a hole in it. Moses wondered about
this act, forgot his promise, and asked the prophet whether
it was his intention to drown them. Continuing on their way,
the prophet killed a youth; and when they reached a town
whose inhabitants refused them hospitality, the prophet held
up a fence which was about to collapse. The prophet then explained to Moses the meaning of his surprising actions. The
ship, which was the property of poor men, was about to fall
into the hands of a pirate king. The youth would have caused
his upright parents to sin; in his place, an upright son was
born. Under the fence there was a treasure, the property of
orphans, which was discovered after a while.
Since this tale does not belong to the legends of Moses
which were widespread in the Orient, some of the Muslim
commentators attempted to explain that it did not refer to
Moses son of Imrn, but to another Moses. Most of the comENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
in the arts
Of all the major biblical figures, not excepting David, Jacob,
Joseph, and Solomon, Moses has inspired the largest amount
of creative endeavor in literature, art, and music. Treatment
of this figure also involves several associated themes, such as
the Ten Plagues, the Exodus, and the Revelation on Sinai. By
far the earliest literary work on the subject was Exagoge (The
Exodus from Egypt), a drama by the second-century B.C.E.
Alexandrian writer *Ezekiel (Ezekielos) the Poet, preserved as
a fragment by the Church Father *Eusebius of Caesarea (modern editions by E.H. Gifford, 1903; and by J. Bloch, 1929). The
first play known to have been written by a Jew, this was also
the first recorded biblical drama. The characters who appear
in it include Moses, Zipporah, Jethro, and an invented Chum.
The Exagoge, an interesting example of late classical Greek theater, anticipates the miracle and mystery plays of the Middle
Ages. In medieval drama, Moses figures in the Ordo Prophetarum, the French Mistre du Viel Testament, and in some of the
English cycles: the Ludus Coventriae of Lincoln (Moses and
the Two Tablets), the Towneley plays (Pharaoh), and the York
series (The Departure of the Israelites from Egypt). Interest in
the theme thereafter waned for a time. In the 16t century there
539
moses
were only a few works of note, such as a play by Diego Sanchez
(c. 1530), and the Meistersinger Hans Sachs Die Kintheit Mosi
(1553). Although Moses was one of the Old Testament heroes
that appealed to Protestant writers of the 17t century, most of
the works about him were of Catholic inspiration: one of the
English Stonyhurst Pageants (c. 1625); Exodus, a neo-Latin sacred tragedy by Balthasar Crusius (1605); Mose sauv (1653),
a tedious epic by Marc-Antoine de Grard Saint-Amant; and
Pascha, of tede verlossingte Israls uit Egypten (1612), a five-act
play by Joost van den Vondel.
In the 18t century, treatment was at first light, but more
serious attention was given by writers of the last decades, particularly with the rise of the oratorio and musical drama. The
Plagues of Egypt (London, 1708), an anonymous English poem,
was followed by Poissons one-act comedy, La Droute de Pharaon (1718), and by texts for many musical compositions; notably Joannes Theodorus neo-Latin drama Aaron a Moyse fratre
sacerdos inauguratus (1730); Charles Jennens Israel in Egypt
(c. 1738), which served as libretto for Handels well-known oratorio; and Benjamin Stillingfleets Moses and Zipporah (1765).
Three works of greater significance, all written at about the
same time, were Hannah Mores Moses in the Bulrushes, one of
her Sacred Dramas (1782); Friedrich *Schillers youthful epic,
Die Sendung Mosis (1783); and Naphtali (Hartwig) *Wesselys
18-canto Hebrew epic, Shirei Tiferet (17821829). Wesselys
poem, an account of the Exodus culminating in the giving of
the Law at Sinai, betrays the influence of F.G. Klopstocks Der
Messias (174873) and, in the spirit of the *Haskalah, presents
Moses as a devout philosopher battling against fanaticism and
ignorance. Shirei Tiferet was later translated into German (Die
Moseide, 1795) and part into French (1815).
A dramatic revival of literary interest in the theme took
place from the first decade of the 19t century, possibly as a
result of the political and social upheavals of the age. Among
the earlier works were August Klingmanns five-act drama,
Moses (1812); David Lyndsays The Plague of Darkness and The
Last Plague (in Drama of the Ancient World, 1822); and Antonio Maria Robiolas Italian verse epic, Il Mos (1823). Moses
was the hero of several poetic compositions by French writers, beginning with Les bergres de Madian, ou La jeunesse de
Moise (177980) by Stphanie Flicit Ducrest de Saint-Aubin,
countess de Genlis, which was translated into Hebrew (1834).
In Alfred de Vignys Mose (Pomes antiques et modernes,
1826), the Lawgiver is a tragic, weary figure, pleading with
God on Nebo for release from his consuming task. He is also
the central character in three other French works: Franois
Ren de Chateaubriands verse tragedy, Mose (1836); a 24canto poem of the same title (1850) by Ambroise Anatole de
Montesquiou-Fzensac; and Victor Hugos brief poem, Le
Temple (in La Legende des Siecles, 18591), which is based on
Exodus 31:16. Elsewhere, Imre Madch wrote the drama,
Mzes (1860), where the Hebrew Exodus was reinterpreted
in terms of the Hungarian struggle for liberation. During
the 19t century, Jewish authors also found inspiration in the
biblical and rabbinic accounts of the life of Moses. Solomon
540
moses
*Orvietos dramatic poem Mos (1905) was later set to music
by his fellow-Italian G. Orefice; and Naomi Nunes Carvalho
wrote three dialogues involving Moses (in Vox Humana, 1912).
Other literary treatments include the Czech play Mojzis (1919),
by Eduard *Leda, and Markus Gottfrieds Hebrew epic, Moshe,
published in the same year. After World War I, the subject
was treated by a number of eminent Jewish authors in various
genres. Midrashic legends were reworked by Rudolf *Kayser
(Moses Tod, 1921) and Edmond *Fleg (Moise recont par les
Sages, 1925; Eng. The Life of Moses, 1928); and there were narrative works in Hebrew by David *Frischmann (Sinai, in BaMidbar, 1923) and H ayyim *Hazaz who showed a modern
approach in H atan Damim (1925; Eng. tr. by I.M. Lask, Bridegroom of Blood). Three other novels of the interwar years were
Lina Eckensteins Tutankh-Aten; a Story of the Past (1924), a
fictionalized history; Louis *Untermeyers Moses (1928); and
Fertzig Yohr in Midbor (1934), a Yiddish work by Saul Saphire.
The U.S. poet Robert Nathans Moses on Nebo (in A Winter Tide, 1940) presented the sad vision of Israels millennial
wanderings; Kroly *Paps Mzes was staged by the Budapest
Jewish Theater just before the authors deportation in 1944.
Konrad Bercovicis The Exodus (1947) was probably the first
postwar attempt to recreate the Bible story in U.S. fiction. It
was followed by many new treatments, including Moyshe (1951;
Moses, 1951), one of the best-known Yiddish novels of Sholem
*Asch, and two Hebrew novels by Israel writers: Ben-Zion Firers Moshe (1959) and Y. Shuruns H alom Leil Setav (Dream
of an Autumn Night, 1960). Other works in the same genre
have been written by Howard *Fast (Moses, Prince of Egypt,
1958) and the Dutch author Manuel van *Loggem (Mozes, de
wording van een volk, 1947, 19602).
In Art
Together with David, Jacob, and Samson, Moses is one of
the most popular Old Testament figures in art. The medieval
church considered him both a type of the Messiah and one
of the prophets who foretold his coming. In early Christian
art until the end of the Carolingian period, Moses was often
represented as a beardless youth holding a rod. He was later
conceived in the form in which he still lives in popular imagination: as a patriarchal figure with a flowing, double-pointed
beard, clasping the Tablets of the Law. Two horns were shown
protruding from his head, because the Latin (Vulgate) translation of the Bible used during the Middle Ages mistranslated
the verb sent forth beams as horns (karan, )in Exodus
34:35. There are medieval sculptures of Moses at Chartres and
elsewhere, and a Renaissance figure by Donatello in the Campanile at Florence. The most striking examples are the horned
figure by Claus Sluter (1406) for the Well of the Prophets (or
Well of Moses) at Dijon, France, and the horned statue by Michelangelo at San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome. This work, the most
famous portrayal of Moses in art, was originally intended for
the mausoleum of Pope Julius II. Many art cycles relate the
various episodes in the life of Moses. Among the earliest is a
Jewish source, the third-century frescoes from the synagogue
541
moses
(Ex. 2:510) was painted with elegance by the Venetian artist
Paolo Veronese (two versions in the Hermitage and Prado).
There is also a painting of this subject by *Rembrandt (Johnson Collection, Philadelphia). Jochebed, the mother of Moses,
and her infant son are the subject of a tender family group by
the English artist Simeon *Solomon. Moses and the burning
bush (Ex. 3:114) occasionally appeared in early Christian art,
but this subject is particularly associated with the popularity
of the Marial cult in the Middle Ages. The burning bush was
held to symbolize virgin birth, in that the virgin was penetrated but not consumed by the flames of the Holy Spirit. In
medieval art Mary is therefore represented as rising out of
the bush which burns at her feet. An example of the Marial
interpretation is a major work of the 15t-century Provenal
school, The Coronation of the Virgin by Enguerrand Charenton (Hospice of Villeneuve-les-Avignon). There is a more
traditional representation of the burning bush episode in an
engraving by Hans Holbein the younger. The ten plagues of
Egypt (Ex. 712) are sometimes represented by the last plague,
the slaying of the firstborn. There is a treatment of this subject
by the English landscape painter J.M.W. Turner in the National Gallery, London. In one of the many illustrations to the
Bible executed by Paul Gustave Dor, Pharaoh, overwhelmed
by the disaster, implores Moses to lead the Israelites out of
Egypt. The crossing of the Red Sea (Ex. 1215) often appears
in Byzantine manuscripts. There is a painting of this subject
by the German Renaissance artist Lucas Cranach (Pinakothek,
Munich), who also depicted Miriams dance of triumph (Ex.
15:2021; Augsburg Gallery). Moses striking the rock (Ex.
17:17; Num. 10:13) was one of the most popular subjects in
early Christian art, where it is found in the murals of the catacombs, on Roman sarcophagi, and on gilded glass. Another
Holbein engraving shows the Israelites gathering the manna;
while Moses is seen with his hands supported by Aaron and
Hur in a painting of the battle with Amalek (Ex. 17:816) by
the English artist Sir John Millais. The giving of the Law (Ex.
20:118) appears on early Christian sarcophagi and in medieval art. Apart from the above-mentioned statue by Michelangelo, the most famous treatment of this episode is the painting
by Rembrandt (Berlin Museum) of Moses breaking the tablets
(Ex. 32:19). The raising of the serpent in the wilderness (Num.
21:69) was a popular subject in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, being understood as a prefiguration of the raising of the
cross. The subject also lent itself to the dramatic, convoluted
compositions of baroque artists. There is a painting by Rubens
in the National Gallery, London, and one by his pupil, Anthony Van Dyck in the Prado. The death of Moses (Deut. 34)
is depicted in a watercolor by William *Blake in accordance
with a legend that, when Moses died, Satan tried to snatch his
soul but was warded off by St. Michaels lance.
The lawgivers brother Aaron is shown clad in the long
robes of a high priest, a stone-studded breastplate on his chest
and a turban or tiara on his head. He carries his flowering rod
or censer, signifying priesthood. The revolt of Korah against
Moses and Aaron (Num. 16) and the tragic fate that overtakes
542
In Music
The story of Moses, interwoven with that of the Israelites, has
also inspired many musical compositions from the Renaissance era onward, as well as Jewish and other folk songs. The
following survey lists selected settings of texts and episodes
from the Pentateuch, including even the relatively few which
do not mention Moses himself.
(1) Oratorios, Operas, Cantatas, and Choral Works: Jachet
van Berchem, Locutus est Dominus ad Moysen; Stetit Moyses
coram Pharaone (motets, printed 153859); Claudio Monteverdi, Audi coelum (motets, added to the Vesperae of 1610);
Giovanni Paolo Colonna, Mos legato di Dio e liberatore del
popolo ebreo (oratorio, 1686); Giovanni Battista Bassani, Mos
risorto dalle acque (oratorio, 1694); Antonio Vivaldi, Moyses
Deus Pharaonis (oratorio, 1714; libretto only preserved); Johann Adolf Hasse (16991783), Serpentes in deserto (oratorio;
the authenticity of another oratorio, Mos, is doubtful); Nicolo
Porpora (16861768), Israel ab Aegyptiis liberatus (oratorio);
Georg Friedrich Handel, Israel in Egypt (oratorio) text compiled by Charles Jennens, first performed in London at the
Kings Theatre, April, 4, 1739. This is one of Handels major
compositions and ranks among the outstanding works in the
genre. Built mainly on the expression of the chorus, symbolizing the people of Israel, it reaches its climax with its description
of the crossing of the Red Sea and in the Song of Triumph;
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Die Israeliten in der Wueste (oratorio, text by Schiebeler, printed by the composer in Hamburg,
1775, and first performed in Breslau, 1798); Franois Giroust,
Le Mont-Sinai ou Le Dcalogue (oratorio, Latin text, 1785); Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach, Mosis Mutter und ihre Tochter (duodrama, 1788); Giovanni Paisello (17401816), Mos in
Egitto (cantata for three voices); Konradin Kreutzer, Die Sendung Mosis (oratorio, 1814); Gioacchino Rossini, Mos in Egitto
(opera, text by Lon Tottola, premiere in Italian at Naples,
1818) The revised version in French, Mose, first performed
in Paris (1827), included the famous Prayer of Moses which
was one of the favorite subjects for fantasias, variations, and
arrangements throughout the 19t century. The plot is that of
a typical grand opera, with an interwoven dramatic love story
not found in the biblical text; Franz Schubert, Miriams Siegesgesang (for soprano solo, mixed choir, and piano, opus 136;
text by Franz Grillparzer, 1828); Karl Loewe, Die eherne Schlange (cantata for mens choir a capella, 1834); Adolf Bernhard
*Marx, Moses (oratorio, 1841); Flicien David, Mose au Sinai
(ode symphonique, i.e., oratorio, 1846); Camille Saint-Sans,
Mose sauv des eaux (cantata, text by Victor Hugo, c. 1851);
Anton *Berlijn, Moses auf Nebo (oratorio) Anton *Rubinstein,
Moses (oratorio, 1892); Marcus *Hast, The Death of Moses (ora-
moses, adolph
torio, 1897); Jules Massenet, La terre promise (oratorio, 1900);
Bernard Rogers, The Exodus (cantata, 1932); Arnold *Schoenberg, Moses und Aaron (opera, text by the composer, two acts
completed in 1932; composition resumed in 1951; unfinished)
Moses und Aaron was first performed, in concert form, as a
radio broadcast from Hamburg (first two acts, 1954); and was
first staged in Zurich (June 6, 1957). In this highly philosophical work, the composer expresses the conflict between the
Lawgiver, who cannot communicate his vision to the people
(Moses = Schoenberg himself?), the weak and wavering people, and the glib mediator (Aaron = the critics, conventional
composers?). See K. Woerner, Gotteswort und Magie: die Oper
Moses und Aron [sic] (1959); D. Newlin, Yuval I (1968), 20420;
Darius Milhaud, Opus Americanum 2, op. 219 (orchestral suite,
originally composed as a ballet, The Man of Midian, for the
Ballet Theater (1940, not produced) and first performed as an
orchestral suite, 1940); Wadia Sabr (18761952), Lebanese Maronite composer, Le chant de Mose (oratorio); Roger Vuataz,
Mose (oratorio for five reciters, soprano, choir, and orchestra, 1947); Jacob *Weinberg, The Life of Moses (oratorio, 1955);
Josef Tal, Exodus (first version, for piano and drums, as choreagraphic poem for the dancer Deborah Bertonoff; second
version (Exodus I), for baritone and orchestra (1945/46);
third version (Exodus II), electronic composition, including processed human voices (1958/59); the first electronic work
produced in Israel).
(2) Jewish Folk Tradition. Among the musical notations
made by *Obadiah the (Norman) Proselyte (11t12t centuries) there is a setting of a piyyut in honor of Moses, Mi al Har
H orev ha-Amidi (see illus. in col. 13078). Jewish folk-song tradition contains a large number of songs about Moses, such as
Yismah Moshe, found in almost all communities; the religious
Ladino songs, e.g., Cantar vos quiero un mahase (on the birth
of Moses) and A catorce era del mes (on the Exodus); and the
epic Aramaic songs of the Jews of *Kurdistan about Moses
and Pharaohs daughter, the battle between Israel and Amalek, and the death of Moses. Many of these songs are sung on
Shavuot or Simh at Torah. Among modern Israel folk songs are
Yedidyah *Admons U-Moshe Hikkah al Z ur, and two childrens
songs, Benei Yisrael Po Kullanu (Joel *Engel, after a Yemenite
melody) and Dumam Shatah Tevah Ketannah (K.Y. Silman,
after an East Ashkenazi melody). Yehuda *Sharetts setting of
the *Haggadah (Nusah Yagur) is both a functional liturgy
for kibbutz use and an oratorio.
(3) Other Folk-Song Traditions. While a few songs about
Moses and the Exodus exist in older Christian music, the most
prominent examples can be found in the Afro-American spirituals notably the powerful Go Down Moses (When Israel
was in Egypt land let my people go!), which has become an
international favorite. The Palestinian Arab tradition of mass
pilgrimage to the legendary tomb of Moses on the festival of
Nebi Musa has given rise to its own repertory of mass chants.
One of these, Ya h alili ya h abibi, ya h awaja Musa, has become
an Israel Hora-song.
[Bathja Bayer]
543
moses, assumption of
for three years, then returned for secular studies at Schrimm
and Militsch. He moved on to Breslau, where he attended both
the University of Breslau and Zechariah *Frankels Rabbinical
Seminary. Idealistic and devoted to his studies, Moses was especially interested in history, philosophy, and philology and
like many young Jews of the time was strongly influenced by
Western civilization. In 1859, carrying only a walking stick,
he hiked to Italy where he fought under Garibaldi, attaining
the rank of corporal. Returning to Breslau, he felt rejected by
old friends who did not sympathize with some of his views.
In 1863, Moses joined the Polish insurrection. Captured by the
Russians, he later wrote a novel, Luser Segermacher, about his
prison experiences. After his release, Moses went to Frankfurt on Main to study under Abraham *Geiger, a leading Reform scholar, and later spent two years at the University of
Vienna, where he was close to Professor Adolph *Jellinek. In
1868, Moses took a teaching position in Steegnitz, Bavaria.
Two years later he accepted a call to a pulpit in Montgomery,
Alabama, and soon moved on to another in Mobile, where he
served 18711881. He devoted himself to learning to deliver
sermons in good English, rather than the German language
prevalent in the American synagogues at the time, and he developed a life-long fascination with Shakespeare, even giving
lectures on the Bard.
Moses leaned toward radical Reform, deprecating what
he would term physiological Judaism, by which he meant
its ritual and nationalistic aspects. He preferred instead to
see Judaism as a world monotheistic doctrine of truth and
morality.
In 1885, he was the first to rise to advocate acceptance
of the Platform at the famous meeting of Reform rabbis at
Pittsburgh. He joined a group of rabbis in 1890 in rejecting
the halakhic requirement of circumcision for male proselytes, although he criticized conversions for people who simply wanted to marry Jews. He opposed the budding Zionist
movement, and like many Reform rabbis of that era moved
his temples main weekly service to Sundays, starting in 1892.
He published many articles on Judaism, folklore, and anthropology and served as editor of Zeitgeist, a Jewish journal. A
collection of his essays, along with a brief biography, was published in 1903 by Hyman G. Enelow.
He graduated from the medical school of the University
of Louisville in 1893 and was particularly interested in working with the blind. From 1881, he served as rabbi of Temple
Adath Israel in Louisville, Kentucky, where he remained until
his death after a long illness.
MOSES, ASSUMPTION OF. Title of the incomplete text of
an apocryphal writing, which consists, largely, of an address,
in the form of a prophecy, by Moses to his successor, Joshua.
The substance of the prophecy concerns the future fate of
Israel and the End of Days. Only scant attention is paid to the
epochs of the Judges and Kings, the onslaught of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian Exile, and to the return of the ex-
544
moses, chronicles of
Gelasius of Cyzicus in his History of the Council of Nicaea
as being taken from the (The Ascension of Moses). Neither is any reference made to the ascent
of Moses in the Ceriani fragment. Indeed a more appropriate
title for the extant palimpsest would appear to be The Testament of Moses (which is also mentioned as a distinct work in
ancient Church documents); especially in light of the fact that
reference is made in the present text (1:10) to Deuteronomy
31:78. The words Liber Profetiae Moysis in the text itself
(1:5) could, however, indicate that this may have been its original title. Whatever the case, the present version of the text is
probably the result of an amalgamation between an original
work, Testamentum Moses (or Liber Profetiae Moysis), and a
later composition, the Assumptio Moysis.
Bibliography: E. Kautzsch, Apokryphen und Pseudepigraphen des Alten Testaments, 2 (1900), 31131; Kamenetzki, in: HaShiloah , 15 (1905), 3850; Beer, in: Herzog-Hauck, 16 (1905); O.
Holtzmann, Neutestamentliche Zeitgeschichte (19062), 3013; Schuerer,
Gesch, 3 (19094), 294305; Charles, Apocrypha, 2 (1913), 40724; Licht, in: JJS, 12 (1961), 95105.
[Werner Michaelis]
545
moses, isaac S.
liography: A. Shinan, in: Scripta Hiersolymitana, 27 (1978), 6678;
L. Girn, in: Sefarad, 48:2 (1988), 390425; M. Taube, in: Jews and
Slavs, I (1993), 84119.
[Joseph Dan]
MOSES, MARCUS (Mordecai Hamburger; d. 1735), AngloIndian pioneer. Son of Moses Libusch, a leader of Hamburg
Jewry, he married a daughter of the famous *Glueckel von
Hameln and settled in London. Here his criticism of a divorce
issued by R. Aaron *Hart brought him into conflict with the
established Ashkenazi community. He was excommunicated
and, in consequence, in 1707 set up his own synagogue (later
the Hambro synagogue). Becoming impoverished in 1712, he
went to Fort St. George (*Madras) in India and was involved
in the purchase for the governor of Madras, Thomas Pitt, of
the famous Pitt diamond, later sold to the regent of France.
In 1721 he returned to England a wealthy man and built his
congregation a new synagogue. In 1731 he went back to India
where he died. His eldest son, known as MOSES MARCUS (b.
1701), was converted to Christianity and published in 1724 an
autobiographical tract (later translated into Dutch) justifying
his action, as well as books on biblical study.
MOSES, RAPHAEL J. (18121893), U.S. lawyer and state legislator. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, into a family of colonial American origin, Moses attended grade school but left
school at the age of 13. After an apprenticeship in business, he
set himself up in Charleston as a merchant. After the 1838 fire
destroyed his business, he moved to St. Joseph, Florida, then
to Apalachicola, Florida, where he studied law and opened his
own practice. He then moved to Columbus, Georgia, where
his practice flourished and he became a leader of the bar. He
also ventured into fruit growing. Before the Civil War he was
the first to ship Georgia peaches to Savannah and thence by
steamer to New York City. An ardent secessionist, Moses, although over military age, quickly volunteered his services at
the outbreak of the Civil War. He rose to the rank of major
and served as Confederate Commissary for the State of Georgia until the wars end. Moses retained his deep feeling for the
Lost Cause to the end of his life.
Returning to Columbus, Moses resumed his law practice
and was elected to the first postwar Georgia state legislature,
where he was made chairman of the Judiciary Committee. In
1878, while campaigning for the U.S. Congress, Moses heard
that his opponent, W.O. Tuggle, had taunted him with being a Jew. In An Open Letter to the Hon. W.O. Tuggle, first
published in the Columbus Daily Times (Aug. 29, 1878) and
reprinted many times, he eloquently answered: I feel it an
honor to be one of a race whom persecution cannot crush
whom prejudice has in vain endeavored to subdue who
after nearly nineteen centuries of persecution still survive as
a nation and assert their manhood and intelligence Would
you honor me? Call me Jew. Would you place in unenviable
prominence your unchristian prejudices and narrow bigotry?
Call me Jew. Moses lost the election nevertheless.
Bibliography: B.A. Elzas, Jews of South Carolina (1905),
199202; C. Reznikoff and U.Z. Engelmann, Jews of Charleston (1950),
28990 (reprint of letter to Tuggle).
[Thomas J. Tobias]
MOSES, MYER (17791833), U.S. merchant, soldier, and public official. Moses, who was born in Charleston, South Carolina, was active in the South Carolina Society for Promotion
546
547
Bibliography: C. Rodgers, Robert Moses: Builder for Democracy (1952). Add. Bibliography: J. Schwartz, The New York
Approach (1993); B. Nicholson, Hi Ho, Come to the Fair (1990); E.
Lewis, Public Entrepreneurship (1980); R. Caro, The Power Broker:
Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (1975);
[Richard Skolnik / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
MOSES BEN ELIJAH PASHA, Karaite scholar from Chufut-Qaleh, h azzan of the community and a teacher of Torah
in the 16t century. In addition, he was mentioned in one
MOSES BEN H ANOKH (d. c. 965), Spanish rabbi. The principal source for the biographic details of this famous scholar
is the story of the *Four Captives told by Abraham *Ibn Daud
in his Sefer ha-Kabbalah (The Book of Tradition, ed. by G.D.
Cohen (1967), 6369). This story tells how R. Moses wife cast
herself into the sea in order to escape from her captor, how
he was sold as a slave at Cordoba and redeemed, and how his
erudition resulted in his becoming recognized as rabbi of the
community. But, according to sources which have since been
discovered, this story seems to be unacceptable. It would indeed seem that R. Moses probably came from southern Italy.
It is quite possible that he was indeed taken prisoner on a sea
548
Bibliography: A.B. Gottlober, Bikkoret le-Toledot haKaraim (1865), 204; H.Y. Gurland, Ginzei Yisrael, I (1865); Mann,
Texts, 2 (1935), 1363; 142728; A. Yaari, Massaot Erez Yisrael (1976),
30523.
[Golda Akhiezer (2nd ed.)]
549
MOSES BEN ISAIAH KATZ (end of 17t and early 18t centuries), Polish rabbi and homilist. Katz was a pupil of Solomon
*Luria and was rabbi successively of Medzibezh, Brody, and
Przemysl. He is the author of Penei Moshe (Wilhermsdorf,
1716), a commentary on the aggadic passages of 18 treatises
of the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds. (This work should
not be confused with Penei Moshe, the standard commentary
on the Jerusalem Talmud by Moses *Margoliot.) He reveals a
remarkable homiletic ingenuity in his work Keren Or (Zolkiew, 1721). As the title suggests, the work is a commentary on
this phrase which occurs in Exodus 34:30, 35 (the skin of his
face shone). He gives no less than 50 different explanations
of the phrase. It has been suggested that Katz may be identical with Moses b. Isaiah Wengrow, the author of Berit Matteh
Moshe (Berlin, 1701), a commentary on the Passover Haggadah with novellae on the tractate Zevah im.
Bibliography: Fuerst, Bibliotheca, 3 (1863), 120; Halpern,
Pinkas, 27981, 501.
550
Bibliography: E.E. Urbach, in: Zion, 12 (1946/47), 159; Urbach, Tosafot, 38495 and index; Ch. Tchernowitz, Toledot ha-Posekim, 2 (1947), 8792; Sonne, in: Sefer ha-Yovel A. Marx (1950),
20919; Gilat, in: Tarbiz, 28 (1958/59), 5458.
[Israel Moses Ta-Shema]
MOSES BEN JOAB (d. after 1530), Hebrew poet who lived
in Florence. His diwan (Montefiore Collection, Ms. 366) contains a colorful variety of poems, ranging from elegy to satire,
from love song to religious hymn, and from epigram to epithalamium. The collection consists of three groups: (1) satiric
verses, in which the poet presents a series of persons characteristic of his time, such as Isaac of Correggio and Solomon of
Poggibonsi; (2) love songs stylistically modeled on the Spanish
poets and Immanuel of Rome; (3) religious poetry artistically
the most important of his work. While it contains all the flavor of the early hymnology, some well-known secular motives
have also been included, without in any way detracting from
the poetic form. The greater part of his religious verse is consecrated to the festivals. One of his poems describes the tragic
conditions in Florence during the siege of 152930.
Bibliography: U. Cassuto, Gli ebrei a Firenze nellet del
Rinascimento (1918), 34054; idem, in: MGWJ, 77 (1933), 36584; Davidson, Oz ar, 4 (1933), 36, no. 204; Schirmann, Italyah, 23640.
[Yonah David]
MOSES BEN JOSEPH HALEVI (13t century), philosopher. Nothing is known about Moses life; the suggestion that
he was a member of the famous Abulafia family has not been
proven. He was highly regarded by Joseph b. Abraham *Ibn
Wakar, and is quoted by Crescas, Albo, and Isaac Abrabanel.
His major work Maamar Elohi (Metaphysical Treatise), as
well as fragments from two of his minor works (all written
in Arabic), were discovered and incorporated in Ibn Wakars
Treatise on the Harmony between Philosophy and the Revealed
Law (c. 1340). Two manuscripts of the Hebrew versions of the
Maamar are extant (Bodleian and Leningrad), while a third,
previously in the library of the cathedral of Pamplona, Spain,
can no longer be traced. The Maamar Elohi seeks to establish
the existence of the First Cause (God); to refute erroneous
views concerning this subject and concerning the attributes
of God; and to investigate the emanation of beings from the
First Cause. Moses, disagreeing with Aristotle, Alexander of
Aphrodisias, and Averroes, holds with Themistius, al-Frb,
and Avicenna, that the First Intellect, which emanated directly from God without an intermediary, is the Prime Mover
of the celestial spheres. His doctrine of Divine attributes seeks
to avoid plurality in God and therefore denies all attributes
superadded to His essence. He admits, however, not only negative attributes but also attributes of essence, such as knowledge, will, and power, as well as attributes denoting action as
Creator. (Moses makes no reference whatever to Maimonides thorough treatment of this theme.) Divine Providence,
according to him, does not involve Gods knowledge of individuals, but only the universal rule of God, employing the human intellect as an agent of the Active *Intellect. Of the two
other fragments, one deals with the problem of Divine Providence and the other with al-Ghazls doctrine of the Word
(Kalima). Approving of Ghazls doctrine, Moses establishes
a metaphysical entity above the First Intellect, the Prime
Mover, and immediately below God, the First Cause.
[Alexander Altmann]
Moses also wrote, assuming that Steinschneiders identification is correct, a work on musical harmonies, a short section
of which is quoted by Shemtov Shaprut b. Isaac of Tudela in
his Hebrew commentary on Avicennas Canon (Munich, Ms.
Hebr. 8, fol. 330b). Moses describes the mathematical relations
of musical intervals as well as some arithmetical operations
carried out with them. The rather elementary contents of this
text comply with Arabic musical theory. Its musical terminol-
551
552
553
MOSES BEN MEVORAKH (12t century), leader of Egyptian Jewry. He was the *nagid of Egyptian Jewry from c. 1110
to before 1141, having been appointed to the position after the
death of his father, the nagid *Mevorakh. He was assisted by
his two sons, Mevorakh and Judah, who acted as vice negidim. In his time the Jews of Egypt were oppressed, and he intervened in their favor. A kinah on his mothers death, which
appears to have been written by him, has been preserved in
the Cairo *Genizah. On her death, which made an impression
on Egyptian Jewry, another kinah is known to have been written by Z edakah b. Judah. From the kinah of Moses, it appears
that he was influenced by the poets of the Spanish school, an
influence evident in Z edakahs kinah as well. A poem written
554
555
MOSES BEN YOMTOV (d. 1268), London rabbi and grammarian, member of one of the most distinguished and wealthy
families in England at that time. Moses himself was a businessman who did a great deal for the Jewish community of
London. He was also known by the name of Magister Mosseus. His father, Yom-Tov, was the author of Sefer ha-Tenaim.
Moses wrote a commentary to the Talmud and to the halakhot of Isaac *Alfasi, after the manner of the tosafists. Part of
his commentaries were published by Urbach (see bibliography). In his commentary he quotes a great deal from the tosafist *Isaac b. Abraham. He was the first English talmudist
who made much use of the rulings of Maimonides. Many of
his contemporary scholars frequently mention and cite him
in their writings. A responsum he wrote to his friend *Moses
of Evreux is known. Among his pupils was the grammarian
*Moses (b. Isaac) Ha-Nesiah, the author of the Sefer ha-Shoham (Jerusalem, 1947), who was mistakenly identified by A.
Geiger with Moses ben Yom-Tov. Moses was the author of the
Darkhei ha-Nikkud ve-ha-Neginot, principles of biblical punctuation and accentuation, first published by Jacob b. H ayyim
ibn Adonijah in the margin of the masorah section at the end
of the Daniel Bomberg edition of the Bible (Venice, 152425).
From 1822 on this work was published separately several times.
A scientific edition was published by D.S. Loewinger (see bibliography). Moses was also the author of a book on forbidden foods that was not published. He was the father of two
556
MOSES ESRIM VEARBA (late 15t century), rabbi and emissary of Jerusalem. His unusual name (Moses twenty-four)
derives from the fact that he was born in Vierundzwanzig
Hoefe (24 courts) in the Aberndorf region of the province
of Wuerttemberg in Germany. In the opinion of Alfred *Freimann (disputed by others), who identifies this Moses with
the Moses Ashkenazi mentioned in various documents included in the journal of Michael *Balbo, Moses was sent in
1474 as an emissary of the Jewish community of *Jerusalem
to the island of Crete. There he became friendly with Michael
Balbo, who frequently discussed with him philosophical and
kabbalistic problems, such as the belief in metempsychosis,
which Moses rejected. In 1475 he arrived in Constantinople,
with the intention of collecting money to rebuild a synagogue
in Jerusalem destroyed by the Muslims. Elijah *Capsali wrote
to Joseph *Taitaz ak that when Moses was there he was the
cause of a bitter dispute between Moses *Capsali, chief rabbi
of Constantinople, and Joseph *Colon, one of the important
rabbis of Italy in the 15t century. Moses Capsali refused to assist Moses in collecting contributions for fear of the Turkish
government, which had forbidden the transfer of money from
*Turkey to Erez Israel, then under *Mamluk rule. Infuriated,
Moses joined the opponents of Capsali who endeavored to
undermine his reputation and spread allegations that he had
given incorrect decisions in matrimonial matters, so causing
many to enter unwittingly into prohibited relations. Moses
took the accusations of Capsalis opponents to Joseph Colon
who, without verifying the facts, excommunicated Capsali.
Moses proceeded to Italy in continuation of his mission. According to S.Z. *Shazar (Rubashow), it was Moses who compiled or copied the classical work, Dos *Shmuel Bukh (Augsburg, 1544), an epic in Yiddish based on the Book of Samuel.
From his signature on the colophon of the manuscript, it appears that he also compiled glosses to Abraham ibn Ezras
Pentateuch commentary.
Bibliography: M. Lattes (ed.), Likkutirn Shonim mi-Sefer
de-Bei Eliyahu Eliyahu Capsali (1896), 1315; Graetz-Rabbinowitz, 6 (1898), 3058, 4335; Rubashow, in: Zukunft, 32 (1927), 428f.;
Rosanes, Togarmah, 1 (19302), 44f.; Al. Freimann, in: Zion, 1 (1936),
188202; Yaari, Sheluh ei, 2147; Zinberg, Sifrut. 4 (1958), 6066, 185f.;
Gottlieb, in: Sefunot, 11(1967), 45.
[Abraham David]
MOSES HADARSHAN (11t century), scholar and aggadist of Narbonne. Moses was the teacher of *Nathan b. Jehiel
of Rome, who quotes him in the Arukh, sometimes anonyENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
557
moses isaac
whereas in previous generations (i.e., during the time of Israel
Baal Shem Tov) one might have hoped for the imminent advent of the messianic age, as a result of the spiritual decline in
his time, this possibility had diminished.
Bibliography: M. Gutman, Geza Kodesh (1951); Dubnow,
H asidut, 2048; Y. Tishby, in: Zion (1967), 3334; J. Weiss, in: I. Brodie Jubilee Volume (1967), 1678; R. Schatz-Uffenheimer, Ha-H asidut
ke-Mistikah (1968), 185, index.
[Moshe Hallamish]
MOSES ISAAC (Darshan; also known as the Kelmer Maggid; 18281899), the main preacher of the *Musar movement,
Moses Isaac was born near Slonim. In his youth he already
showed exceptional abilities as a preacher and delivered his
first sermon in Slonim at the age of 15. Moses Isaac became
a shopkeeper in a nearby town, but, failing to earn a livelihood, returned to Slonim to seek other means of subsistence.
Reluctant to make a living from religious activity, he refused
tempting offers to serve as a preacher, but at last accepted a
position as preacher to a synagogue in Slonim, requesting the
meager salary of half a ruble a week. Dissatisfied with his lack
of influence, he accepted a similar position at Novaya Mysh,
but there also he found no satisfaction. At the age of 21 he
relinquished his position and proceeded to Kovno (Kaunas)
in order to study under R. Israel *Lipkin, the founder of the
Musar movement. He remained there until he had absorbed
the teachings of that movement, and Lipkin, recognizing his
outstanding abilities as a preacher and his potential influence, charged him with propagating its ideals. For over half a
century Moses Isaac was the outstanding Maggid of the Musar movement. He accepted positions as preacher to various
communities Kelme (185053; whence his name, the Kelmer
Maggid), Zagare (185358), Oshmyany (185860), and Minsk
(186063) but essentially he was an itinerant preacher, traveling from town to town.
In his sermons Moses Isaac departed entirely from the
exegetical and expository method of preaching current in his
time and applied himself solely to raising the moral and ethical
standards of the communities. Wherever he went, he would
first pay a visit to the local rabbi in order to acquaint himself
with the social evils prevalent in the community and then
fearlessly denounce them. The following extract from one of
his published sermons (Tokhah at H ayyim, no. 7) is indicative
of the content of his homilies: If a man recites Psalms from
morning to night but tells lies and is guilty of slander; if he
prays with devotion and recites the Grace after Meals aloud,
but has no compassion for his fellowman; if with the same enthusiasm as he fulfills every precept between man and God, he
vindictively persecutes anyone who has done him a wrong
he can be called a wicked man. He inveighed particularly
against commercial malpractices, exploitation of the poor,
and dishonest practices toward non-Jews. His influence was
unbounded. Contemporary newspapers report how on the
morrow of his sermons he would visit the local market, and
shopkeepers would destroy their false weights and measures.
558
A dishonest shopkeeper is said to have lost his reason as a result of these denunciations, while another committed suicide.
He did not hesitate to name flagrant transgressors, especially
unworthy communal leaders, from the pulpit. As a result, on
more than one occasion he was maligned, denounced to the
government, and imprisoned, but, undeterred, he continued
his reproofs.
Moses Isaac used to preach in a unique singsong, sometimes bursting into song, and although he was ridiculed for
it, especially by the maskilim whom he vigorously attacked,
the effect upon the masses was hypnotic. J.L. Gordon, the
leader of the maskilim, complained (in Allgemeine Zeitung
des Judenthums, 25 (1861), 16870) of his obscurantism in
establishing Musar shtiebels (conventicles for the study of
Musar), and that he was so successful that he had established
one in Mitau (Jelgava), Latvia, a center of the maskilim. Moses
Isaac established scores of such Musar shtiebels throughout
the country, synagogues for humble workers, arranging study
courses for them, and philanthropic societies. In 1884 he visited London where the chief rabbi, Nathan Adler, and Samuel
Montagu (the first Lord Swaythling), founder and head of the
Federation of Synagogues, were greatly impressed by him and
defrayed the expenses of his visit. In 1898 he moved to Lida,
to settle with his son Ben Zion Darshan, and died in the following year. His only published work is the Tokhah at H ayyim
(Vilna, 1897), ten of his sermons which he chose as examples
of his teachings.
407.
moses of palermo
Moses wrote novellae on several tractates of the Talmud, parts
of which were published in the pamphlets Likkutei ha-ReMaL
(1856), Torat ha-ReMaL ha-Shalem (1903), and H iddushei haReMaL (1921). For several years he lived in Opatov. When he
moved to Sasov, he attracted many followers and the town became a great h asidic center. His disciples included Jacob Isaac
of *Przysucha (Peshiskhah), Z evi Hirsch of *Zhidachov, Menahem Mendel of Kosov, and others. Moses was known for
his abounding love for all Jews and for his charity, on account
of which he was called father of widows and orphans. He
composed many h asidic melodies and dances. His successor
was his only son, JEKUTHIEL SHMELKE, who was seven years
old when his father died. Jekuthiel grew up in the homes of
Abraham H ayyim of Zloczow, Menahem Mendel of Kosov,
and Israel of *Ruzhin in Sadagora (Sadgora), and returned
to Sasov in 1849.
Bibliography: Y. Raphael, Sefer ha-H asidut (1956); idem,
Sasov (1946); M. Buber, Tales of the H asidim, The Later Masters
(1966), 8195.
[Yitzchak Raphael]
MOSES (ben Nethanel) NATHAN (14t century), communal worker and poet. Moses, who lived in Tarrega, Catalonia, left a collection of moral parables in rhymed meter, entitled Toz eot H ayyim, which was published in the Shetei Yadot
(Venice, 1618, 14250) of Menahem b. Judah de *Lonzano. It
contains 58 sections with aphorisms on counsel, quickness,
industry, humility, and other virtues. A short acrostic poem
prefaces the proverbs, each word ending with a letter of his
name. While the work contains no original ideas, it is composed in a clear and beautiful style. A manuscript of the book
is extant in Paris (Bibliothque Nationale, no. 1284). It is possible that its author is identical with the communal worker
Moses Nathan who lived in the 14t century, known from
Hebrew sources and also from Christian documents, where
he is referred to as Moses Naan (Nazan). In the takkanot issued in 1354 by the representatives of the communities of Aragon when they met in Barcelona, Moses Nathan was the first
of the signatories. He may also be identical with the Mosse
Aan (Azan), who wrote a poem on chess that has survived
in a Castilian translation.
Bibliography: Schirmann, Sefarad, 2 (1956), 5413, 697; Davidson, Oz ar, 4 (1933), 449; Baer, Urkunden, 1 (1929), 3067, 3509.
MOSES OF KIEV (12t century), talmudist. No biographical details about him are known. He appears to have visited
Western Europe and probably knew the tosafist Jacob *Tam
personally. In Tams Sefer ha-Yashar (1811 Vienna edition, no.
522) a halakhic saying occurs that Moses of Kiev received
from Rabbenu Tam. It is possible that he stayed for some time
in the latters yeshivah in Ramerupt. A. Epstein (in MGWJ, 39
(1895), 511) attempts to identify Moses of Kiev with Moses of
Russia mentioned in the Sefer ha-Shoham. According to Epstein, Moses left Russia for France in 1124 following the expulsion of the Jews in that year from Kiev. Urbach (Tosafot, 193),
however, disagrees, since in 1124 Rabbenu Tam was still very
young. Moreover there is no information about an expulsion
of the Jews from Kiev in 1124, though a great fire did break
out there in that year. It appears that Moses arrived in France
at a much later period.
Moses addressed queries to *Samuel b. Ali, head of the
Babylonian academy: Thus sent Samuel b. Ali head of the
academy from Babylon to R. Moses of Kiev (Responsa Meir
of Rothenburg, ed. by R.N. Rabinowitz (1860), no. 443). The
connection between Moses and Samuel b. Ali is also referred
to in the Sefer Yih usei Tannaim ve-Amoraim of Judah b. Kalonymus.
Bibliography: A. Harkavy, H adashim Gam Yeshanim, 1 no.
7 (189596), 4445; F. Kupfer and T. Lewicki, roda hebrajskie do
dziejw sowian (1956).
[Shlomo Eidelberg]
559
[Abraham David]
moses of pavia
(Liber de curationibus infirmitatum equorum quem translavit de lingua arabica in latinam Magister Moyses de Palermo).
This was translated into Italian, together with another article on the same subject, and published in 1865 as Trattati di
mascalcia attribuiti ad Ippocrate, tradotti dallarabo in latino
da Maestro Moise da Palermo, volgarizzati nel sec. XIII (ed. P.
Delprato). One of the earliest scientific texts written in Italian,
this translation played an important part in the development
of scientific terminology in the Italian language. It was widely
circulated both in Italy and in other countries throughout the
Middle Ages. Another version of the treatise, also in Italian,
was entitled Libro della natura dei cavalli, and this was often
reprinted during the Renaissance era.
There is, however, a possibility that there was another
Moses of Palermo who flourished either at the court of the
Norman kings, in the 12t century, or at the court of *Frederick II Hohenstaufen. A work attributed to Moses of Palermo,
Liber mariscaltie equorum et cura eorum, is cited in the De Medicina equorum of Giordano Ruffo (c. 1200), thus indicating
that the writer of this text lived in an earlier period. A list of
the manuscripts attributed to Moses of Palermo was published
by Stefano Arieti, Mos da Palermo e le traduzioni dei trattati di mascalcia di Ippocrate Indiano, in: Gli ebrei in Sicilia,
ed. N. Bucaria (1998).
Bibliography: M. Steinschneider, in: HB, 10 (1870), 811;
Steinschneider, Uebersetzungen, 2 (1893), 985; U. Cassuto, in: Vessillo
Israelitico, 59 (1911), 341; Roth, Jews in the Renaissance (1959), 6970.
Add. Bibliography: C. Sirat, Les traducteurs juifs la cour de
Sicile et de Naples, in: Traduction et traducteurs au Moyen Age, Actes du Colloque International du CNRS (1989), 16991; D. Trolli, Le
traduzioni di Mos da Palermo, in: Studi su antichi trattati di veterinaria (1990), 4357; R. Bonfil, La cultura ebraica e Federico II, in:
Federico II e le nuove culture, in: Atti del XXXIo Convegno storico
internazionale (del Centro Italiano di Studi sul Basso Medioevo Accademia Tudertina & Centro di Studi sulla Spiritualit Medievale
dellUniversit degli Studi di Perugia), Todi, 912 ottobre 1994 (1995),
15371; S. Arieti, Mos da Palermo e le traduzioni dei trattati di mascalcia di Ippocrate Indiano, in: N. Bucaria (ed.), Gli ebrei in Sicilia
(1998), 5561; M. Zonta, La filosofia ebraica medievale in Sicilia, in:
N. Bucaria et al. (eds.), Ebrei e Sicilia (2002), 16368.
[Joseph Baruch Sermoneta / Nadia Zeldes (2nd ed.)]
560
561
moshav shittufi
a managing committee, a control board, and committees for
economic, social, educational, and cultural activities. Disputes
between members or between a member and the management
are submitted for arbitration and decision to the social committee or a judicial committee of the parent movement. The
moshav helps its members to obtain credit, purchase seed, fertilizer, and fodder, and to market their produce. It maintains
farming equipment and vehicles (sometimes together with
neighboring moshavim), workshops, cooperative stores, etc.
It provides members children with primary and post-primary
education in local or regional schools, and fosters cultural activities; members receive medical care in local clinics.
The society erects all the public buildings and installations including pumping installations, central irrigation network, supply stores, dairies, refrigeration and sorting plants,
schools, clinics, and sports facilities. It finances its investments
partly by direct taxation of members and partly by loans based
on a general mutual guarantee by the members. The general
assembly decides on the annual budget, composed of the local
government budget (covered by direct taxes) and the administrative budget (covered partly by taxes and partly by levies on
items of income and on various types of production outlays).
In the 1960s the moshav set itself new goals: securing production rights in nationally planned branches of agriculture (dairy
farming, poultry farming, orchards, etc.); the encouragement
of new crops, notably for export purposes; and the protection of members interests in taxation and social security. The
expansion and social development of the moshavim at the
time gave rise to the hope that they would continue to develop as an efficient and healthy unit of the national economy
and society, and a measure of prosperity did indeed continue
into the 1970s. However, with unmanageable debts piling up
in the inflationary 1980s, many farms were liquidated, and
with the younger generation leaving, some of the moshavim,
especially those located near large population concentrations in central Israel, began to build new neighborhoods and
absorb newcomers, mainly urbanites, in order to sustain the
settlement. Moshavim also began renting land for commercial purposes and many farmers, especially in northern Israel,
developed guest facilities and were occupied in tourism in
addition to agriculture. Thus the moshav, like the kibbutz,
found itself forced to adapt to changing realities and alter
its economic and social base in the last decades of the 20t
century.
The Moshav as an Example to Developing Countries
The moshav and its way of life attracted the interest of some
leaders and many students from Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Thousands of them came Israel to study the methods of
the moshav, which they regarded as a possible solution to the
problems of organizing agriculture in their own countries.
The moshav movement played host to students and organized
study courses for them. It also provided Israels technical assistance program (see State of Israel, Foreign *Policy) with many
instructors to establish and advise settlements of the moshav
562
type in these countries. Scores of such settlements were established in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, with moshav
members from Israel as instructors. The moshav movement,
together with the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, also established a volunteer movement for foreign service, and many
young men from moshavim served as volunteers in developing
countries, living and working with the local population.
Bibliography: H. Viteles, A History of the Cooperative Movement in Israel, 4 (1968), incl. bibl.; I.M. Klayman, The Moshav in Israel
(1970); D. Weintraub, M. Lissak, and Y. Azmon, Moshava, Kibbutz
and Moshav (1969); R. Tamsma, De Moshav Ovdiem (Dutch, 1966),
English summary; ibid., 34291, incl. bibl.; H. Darin-Drabkin, Patterns of Cooperative Agriculture in Israel (1962); S. Dayan, Man and
the Soil (1965); E. Meyer, Der Moshav 19481963 (1967); E. Joffe, Ketavim, 2 vols. (1947); idem, Yissud Moshevei Ovedim (1919); A. Assaf,
Moshevei ha-Ovedim be-Yisrael (1954); Y. Uri, Bi-Netivei Moshav haOvedim (1950); I. Korn, Kibbutz ha-Galuyyot be-Hitnah aluto (1964);
R. Weitz, Darkenu ba-H aklaut u-va-Hityashevut (1959); Y. Shapira
(ed.), Nahalal (1947); Kefar Yeh ezkel (Heb. anthol., 1948); E. Labes,
Handbook of the Moshav (1959); D. Weintraub, Immigration and Social Change (1971).
[Uzi Finerman / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
moskowitz, henry
MOSHINSKY, ELIJAH (1946 ), opera and theater producer-director. Moshinsky was educated at Melbourne University (B.A.) and St. Anthonys College, Oxford. He was appointed associate producer at the Royal Opera House in 1979
and became its principal producer. His most successful productions for Covent Garden included Peter Grimes, Othello,
Samson and Delilah, and Simon Boccanegra. West End productions have included the prizewinning Shadowlands and
Cyrano de Bergerac. He also produced five plays in the BBC
Shakespeare cycle.
Moshinskys preferences incline towards the classics,
which include Chekhov and Ibsen, and he is considered a
leading Verdi expert. However, the 20t century Ligetis Le
Grand Macabre, Bergs Wozzeck, and Sir Michael Tippetts A
Midsummer Marriage are among his operatic productions.
Moshinsky described his favored method of working; he
is first and foremost a respecter of the creative forces of composer and writer and is therefore not a believer in the current
vogue of innovation for its own sake.
Moshinsky also staged operas for the New York Metropolitan, Australian Opera, Welsh National Opera, Chicago
Lyric Opera, and the houses of Paris, Geneva, Amsterdam,
and the Maggio Musicale in Florence. He also directed several films, including The Midsummer Nights Dream (1981) and
The Green Man (1994), and has more recently been associated
with the English National Opera in London. The Australianborn Moshinsky also headed several Adelaide Festivals and
other cultural ventures in Australia.
563
mosler, henry
Commission of Women on National Defense. She championed such causes as public health and housing. Following
Smiths defeat in the 1928 presidential race, she became the
president of Publicity Associates, where she remained until
her death.
MOSLER, HENRY (18411920), U.S. painter and printmaker.
Although in his lifetime Mosler claimed to have been born
in America, he had immigrated from Germany at the age of
eight with his parents, settling in New York. Two years later
the family moved to Cincinnati. For years the Mosler family
led a peripatetic life, living in several places, including Nashville, Tennessee, where Mosler received his first art instruction
from a lithographer (1853) and again in Cincinnati (18591863),
where he studied with a genre and portrait painter named
James Henry Beard, whose subject matter and straightforward
storytelling style on canvases comprised of small-scale figures
influenced Moslers early imagery. By 1860 Mosler had his own
studio. During the Civil War, Mosler worked as an artist-correspondent for Harpers Weekly, which published 34 of his
drawings. These images show battle as well as the daily life of
soldiers. Later, three paintings explored war themes.
In 1863 Mosler began studying in Duesseldorf, Germany, a celebrated artistic center attractive to several American artists. Moslers schooling in Germany strengthened his
propensity for genre scenes and recording the intimate details of his subjects. Six months of study at the Ecole des
Beaux Arts in Paris completed Moslers extended training. The
nomadic pattern of his youth brought Mosler back to Cincinnati from 1866 to 1874, where Reform Judaism began to gain
prominence under the guidance of Isaac Mayer *Wise. Mosler
painted Plum Street Temple (c. 1866, Skirball Museum, Hebrew
Union College, Cincinnati), a canvas delineating the exterior of Wises temple, Bene Yeshurun. A reproduction of the
painting adorned the cover of the musical score Progress
March a year later. Portraits commissioned by the Jewish
community include a likeness of Wises wife Therese Bloch
Wise (c. 1867, Skirball Museum, Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati).
After eight years of living in cities in the United States,
Mosler returned to Europe, continuing his studies at various
times. He contributed entries to the French Salon from 1878
to 1897; his 1879 entry received honorable mention and was
purchased for the Muse du Luxembourg, making the canvas
the first by an American artist to be bought by the French government. Mosler began visiting Brittany in 1878, at which time
he made paintings of Breton peasants, a subject that preoccupied his art until the 1890s. He meticulously recorded Breton
dress, customs, and domestic interiors, and he painted wedding traditions on several occasions, including The Wedding
Feast (c. 1892, collection unknown), shown at the 1892 Paris
Salon. Returning permanently to the United States in 1894,
Mosler lived in New York and painted scenes from American
colonial history and genre works, employing a similar formula
of attention to details and extensive research.
564
MOSS, CELIA (18191873) and MARION (18211907), Anglo-Jewish writers and educators. The Moss sisters were born
in Portsmouth, England, two of the 12 children of Amelia
and Joseph Moss. Avid readers, they began writing poetry in
early childhood. Their first joint publication was a book of
poems, Early Efforts (1839). This was followed by two collections of short stories, The Romance of Jewish History (1840)
and its sequel, Tales of Jewish History (1843). Both collections,
which were highly successful, were intended to convey a positive view of Jewish history, religion, and customs to a somewhat hostile Victorian society. As the Moss sisters remarked
in their dedication to the writer Edward Bulwer Lytton, they
blended fiction with historical fact, to direct the attention of
the reader to a branch of history too long neglected. Celia and
Marion hoped their romantic tales would call the attention
of the reader to the records of our people to awaken curiosity not to satisfy it. Along with their compatriot Grace
*Aguilar (18161847), the Moss sisters were the first Jewish
women to publish narratives of this kind. They hoped their
work would support the struggle for Jewish emancipation,
and, more specifically, they wished to encourage improvement
of female education and religious reform within the English
Jewish community.
In 1840 the sisters moved to London to teach; in 1845
they opened their own day and boarding school for Jewish
children. That same year Marion married the French Jewish
scholar Alphonse Hartog. Five of their seven children survived
to adulthood; each went on to a distinguished career in scholarship, science, or the arts. In 1857 Celia married L. Levetus,
the ritual slaughterer of the New Synagogue in St. Helens; it is
not known if the couple had any children. Both sisters continued to write short stories while teaching and both contributed
to Isaac Leesers Jewish American periodical, The Occident.
In 185455, Marion Moss Hartog established the first Jewish
womens periodical, the Jewish Sabbath Journal: A Penny and
Moral Magazine for the Young, intended to provide mothers
with material with which to further their childrens Jewish education. Initially, a great success, prompting submissions of
all kinds from female authors and positively endorsed by the
chief rabbi of the British Empire, the journal foundered after
Hartog offended the editor of the powerful Jewish Chronicle,
who proceeded to write a harsh review. Funding declined and
publication ceased after five issues. Hartog, who was crushed,
wrote next to nothing more for the remaining 52 years of her
life. After moving to Birmingham with her husband, Celia
wrote a collection of stories on her own, The Kings Physician
and Other Tales (1865).
Bibliography: M. Galchinksy. The Origin of the Modern
Jewish Woman Writer (1996).
[Traci M. Klass (2nd ed.)]
mosse
MOSS, JOHN (17711847), Philadelphia merchant, shipping magnate, and civic leader. Moss emigrated to the U.S. as
a glass engraver from London in 1796. Opening a dry goods
store in Philadelphia in 1807, he quickly became a major importer, ultimately owning a large number of ships. After he
turned the active direction of his firm over to his brothers in
1823, Moss shifted his own concerns to banking and insurance, canal companies, and civic enterprises. In 1828 he was
elected to the Common Council on the Jacksonian Democratic Party ticket, and in this role he participated in the establishment of the world-famous Wills Eye Hospital. Moss was
one of the rich Philadelphia Jews who entered almost every
phase of civic activity: he was a steward of the Society of Sons
of St. George; a life subscriber to the Orphan Society; and a
founding member of the Musical Fund Society. This status
was not achieved at the sacrifice of Jewish identification; he
was an active member of Mikveh Israel Congregation, a major contributor to its building fund of 1818, and, late in life, a
supporter of Isaac Leesers American Jewish Publication Society. As presiding officer at the Philadelphia *Damascus Affair
protest meeting in 1840, Moss had become the representative
of his community.
several ministries and even prepared the Japanese constitution. Returning to Germany, he went to Koenigsberg, Prussia, where he became a state supreme court judge in 1890, the
highest position hitherto attained by an unbaptized Jew in the
Prussian judicial administration. Until his retirement, he was
engaged in academic pursuits in his profession, and received
a honorary doctorate and in 1904 even a honorary professorship at the University of Koenigsberg. Albert Mosse was
active in Jewish affairs all of his life; he was married to Caroline Meyer (18591934), daughter of the former president of
the Berlin Jewish community. After Mosses return to Berlin in
1907, he became vice president of the Verband der Deutschen
Juden and chairman of the board of the Hochschule fuer die
Wissenschaft des Judentums. In recognition of his intensive
work with its municipal administration, the City of Berlin
made him its honorary citizen in 1917.
RUDOLF MOSSE (18431920), another son of Markus,
founded in Berlin the Mosse publishing house, which acquired
a worldwide reputation during the Empire and the Weimar republic. Born in Graetz, he learned the profession of bookselling
in Posen and worked for several printing firms in Berlin and
Leipzig, where, in 1864, he produced the advertising section for
the widely read family magazine Die Gartenlaube. In 1867 he
opened his own advertising agency in Berlin and was joined
first by his brother-in-law Emil Cohn (18321905) and later
on by his brother Emil Mosse (18541911). The firm expanded
rapidly, established dozens of branch offices in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and other European states ,and published
the Deutsches Reichs-Adrebuch every year from 1898. Only
months after Germany had become an empire, Rudolf Mosse
started to publish the Berliner Tageblatt, the mouthpiece of German left-wing liberalism. With the takeover of the Allgemeine
Zeitung des Judentums (1890), the well-established Berliner
Volks-Zeitung (1904), and the founding of the weekly Berliner
Morgen-Zeitung (1889), the Mosse publishing house acquired
nationwide prestige in the course of half a century. Even after
World War I, the revolution, and the inflation, the House of
Mosse remained a prominent, solidly financed, and highly regarded enterprise throughout Germany and Europe.
Beside his outstanding career as a businessman and a
liberal-minded publisher, Rudolf Mosse was noted as a philanthropist. He established a hospital in Graetz and an educational institute in Wilhelmsdorf with an endowment of several
million marks. He set up a fund for his employees and made
large financial contributions to many literary, artistic, and,
foremost, social institutions as well as academies, universities,
and scientific pursuits. He was also active in the Jewish community in Berlin and was president of its Reform congregation from 1897 until 1910.
Rudolf s son-in-law Hans Lachmann-Mosse (18851944)
was the last head of the Mosse publishing house. He worked
in banking before entering the Mosse concern in 1910. Following the rise of Hitler, he resigned and the publishing house
was seized by the Nazis. He moved to Paris in 1935 and in 1940
emigrated to the United States.
565
mosse, george L.
Bibliography: R. Hamburger, Zeitungsverlag und Annoncen-Expedition Rudolf Mosse (1928); W.E. Mosse, in: YLBI, 4 (1959),
23759; O. Neumann, in: Juedische Familien-Forschung, 11 (1935),
665ff., 685ff.; E. Kraus, Die Familie Mosse (1999).
[Elisabeth Kraus (2nd ed.)]
566
Add. Bibliography: S. Drescher, A. Sharlin, and D. Sabean (eds.), Political Symbolism in Modern Europe: Essays in Honor
of George L. Mosse (1982).
[Theodore K. Rabb / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
MOSSINSOHN, YIGAL (19171994), Israeli author and playwright. Born in Ein-Gannim, Mossinsohn was a member of
kibbutz Naan from 1938 to 1950 and served in the Palmah and
the Israeli Defense Forces from 1943 to 1949. After six years in
the United States (195965), he returned to Israel. Mossinsohn
wrote stories, novels, plays, thrillers, and adventure books for
children, and dealt with topical and historical themes. His first
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mostel, zero
book, a collection of stories, Aforim ka-Sak (Gray as a Sack),
was published in 1946. In 1948 the Habimah Theater staged his
first play Be-Arvot ha-Negev (In the Negev Desert), which
was a popular success. The theme of the play was the heroic
stand of Kibbutz Negbah against the invading Egyptian army
during the Israeli War of Independence. Mossinsohn also
wrote several other topical plays. A great success was his series of thrillers for children and teenagers, H asambah, starting in 1950, which found a host of imitators.
Additional works include (1) Stories and novels: Mi Amar
she-Hu Shah or (1948); Ha Derekh li-Yrih o (1950); Derekh Gever
(1953); Yehudah Ish Keriyyot (1963, Judas, 1963); Cherchez la
femme (stories, 1971); Yeh i ha-Hevdel ha-Katan (1974); and
Taranella (novel, 1979).
(2) Plays: Tamar Eshet Er (1947); Im Yesh Z edek (1951);
Cambyses (Heb. 1955); Casablan (1958; later, the basis of a musical play); Eldorado (1963); Shimshon (1968); Ha-Meragelim
ba-Bordel shel Rahav ha-Zonah (1980). For English translations, see Goell Bibl.
Bibliography: A. Cohen, Soferim Ivriyyim Benei Zemannenu (1964), 7377; Kressel, Leksikon, 2 (1967), 327. add. bibliography: M. Dekel, Darkhei ha-Siah be-Mah azotav shel Y. Mossinsohn, in: Yerushalayim, 910 (1975), 31433; H. Shoham, Etgar
u-Meiut ba-Dramah ha-Yisraelit (1975); G. Shaked, Ha-Sipporet haIvrit, 4 (1993), 269289; S. Levy, Elem, Alimut ve-Almenut: Sippur
Tamar ke-Mah azeh Feministi, in: Ha-Kongres ha-Olami le-Madaei
ha-Yahadut bi-Yrushalayim, 11:3 (1994), 267274; idem, in: L. BenZvi (ed.), Theatre in Israel (1996), 31213; Z. Hisner, Hamifgash, in:
Bishvil ha-Zikkaron, 22 (1997), 1518; T. Gidron, Idan ha-Parodiyah:
Al H asambah, al H alaf im ha-Ruah ve-al Mah she-beinehem in: HaMishpat 17 (2004), 219.
[Gitta (Aszkenazy) Avinor]
567
mostiska
named Zero by the clubs press agent, who said, Heres a guy
who started from nothing. A successful career as a comedian
followed in Hollywood and on Broadway, mostly in portrayals of corpulent villains. His leftist views, however, led to his
blacklisting, and it was not until 1958, when the political climate
had changed, that he resumed full-scale activity. He appeared
as Leopold Bloom in an off-Broadway production, Ulysses in
Nighttown (1958), which was followed by stage successes in such
plays as Ionescos Rhinoceros (1961), A Funny Thing Happened
on the Way to the Forum (1962), Fiddler on the Roof (1964, and
a revival in 1977). Fiddler won nine Tony Awards in 1965 and a
special Tony in 1972 for the longest-running musical in Broadway history. Mostel won three Tony Awards: Best Actor in a
Drama for Rhinoceros (1961) and Best Actor in a Musical for A
Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1963) and Fiddler on the Roof (1965). He was also nominated in 1974 as Best
Actor in a Drama for a revival of Ulysses in Nighttown.
Mostel appeared in a number of movies, including Panic
in the Streets (1950), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to
the Forum (1966), The Producers (1968), The Angel Levine
(1970), The Hot Rock (1972), Rhinoceros (1974), Journey into
Fear (1975), Mastermind (1976), and The Front (1976).
Mostel co-authored Zero Mostels Book of Villains (with
Alex Gotfryd and Israel Shenker, 1976) and 170 Years of Show
Business (1978). His son Josh Mostel is an actor.
568
moth
most of them poor and ignorant, a few of them merchants.
Schools established by the *Alliance Isralite Universelle in
1906 (for boys) and in 1912 (for girls) were closed at the outbreak of World War I. In about 1930 schools for boys and girls
were established by the philanthropist Eliezer *Kadoorie, but
there was no Jewish high school. A few children attended government schools and a very small number attained a higher
education.
Probably because of their lowly position, the Jews of Mosul did not arouse the envy of their neighbors and were not
persecuted. Nevertheless, they lived in great fear throughout this entire period. The rabbis of the community were not
highly regarded. During World War I the chief rabbi of the
community was R. Elijah Barazani, and from the 1920s, his son
R. Solomon Barazani (d. 1960), who remained in this position
until he immigrated to Israel in 1951. In the years 195055 all
the Jews of Mosul immigrated to Israel.
Bibliography: D.S. Sassoon, History of the Jews in Baghdad
(1949), index; A. Ben-Yaacob, Yehudei Bavel (1965), index; idem. Kehillot Yehudei Kurdistan (1961), index. Add. Bibliography: E.
Laniado, Yehudei Mosul mi-Galut Shomron ad Mivz a Ezra ve-Nehemiah (1981); Enz iklopedya shel Yehudei Kurdistan (1993).
[Abraham Ben-Yaacob, Paul Borchardt, and Hayyim J. Cohen /
Nissim Kazzaz (2nd ed.)]
MOSZKOWSKI, MORITZ (18541925), pianist and composer. Born in Breslau, Moszkowski taught at the Kullak
Academy in Berlin until 1897 when he established his residence in Paris. He was renowned as a concert pianist, touring Europe and the United States, and also as a composer of
tuneful piano pieces. Of these, Spanish Dances have retained
a certain popularity, especially in the four-hand version. He
also wrote some orchestral works and an opera Boabdil, der
letzte Maurenkoenig (first performed in Berlin, 1892). His
brother ALEXANDER MOSZKOWSKI (18511934), a literary
critic, published two booklets of musical humor under the
pseudonym Anton Notenquetscher, of which excerpts still
appear in anthologies.
MOTA, NEHEMIA (d. 1615?), poet whose influence in *Kochi (Cochin) remains very tangible to this day. The Malabari Jews honor the anniversary of his death on the first day
of Hannukah with a special banquet followed by singing his
hashkavah (Sephardi memorial prayer). But his religious significance extends to the Paradesis as well, and his tomb in Jew
Town functions as the focal point of many vows, a spot for
consolation in times of distress, and as an object of pilgrimage
for Christians, Muslims, and Hindus as well as Jews.
The earliest reference in scholarship devoted to Nehemia
Mota is found in the 1907 edition of the Jewish Encyclopedia,
where it is stated rather misleadingly that in 1615 a false messiah appeared among the Jews of Cochin in the person of Nehemia Mota. Most authorities accept that Mota was from the
Yemen; others say he was an Italian Jew who came to Kochi
via Yemen, and still others hold that he was Polish. He marENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
569
motion pictures
destruction (Hos. 5:12; Ps. 39:12). These names refer to the
clothes-moth Tineola, the larva of which feeds on wool. The
metamorphosing larva (caterpillar) spins a cocoon, in which
it develops into a chrysalis, to be transformed later into an
imago. The tottering house of the wicked is compared to a
cocoon (Job 27:18). Other species of moth that damage seeds,
fruit, and trees are also to be found in Israel. The Talmud
speaks of the sasa that infests trees (TJ, H ag. 2:3, 78a, according
to the reading of Ha-Meiri; cf. Yoma 9b: the sas-magor which
attacks cedars). The noses that destroys trees (Isa. 10:18) may
be the sas, the reference here being to the moth which bores
into trees, such as the larvae of the Zeuzera pirina, one of the
worst arboreal pests in Israel.
570
MOTION PICTURES. Since the early years of motion pictures, Jews have played a major role in the development of the
industry and have been prominent in all its branches. This is
true not only of Hollywood, where the role played by Jews is
generally known and acknowledged, but of the German film
industry up to the Nazi era, Russian film production up to the
time of the Stalinist purges of the 1930s, the British film industry up to the present, and contemporary underground motion
pictures in the United States. The motion picture was created
at a time when the Jews were seeking entry into the economic
and cultural life of their host countries. Their involvement
with motion pictures was due to a number of factors: the film
business had not developed a tradition of its own and had no
vested interests to defend; participation in it required no intimate knowledge of the vernacular; and films were not yet
the realm of businessmen, entrepreneurs, or professional entertainers, but rather scientists, such as Edison and Lumire,
who had no idea of the economic and industrial future of
their inventions. In addition, the motion picture was initially
regarded as a low-grade form of entertainment suitable only
for the immigrant or the uneducated masses rather than a
valid art form, and those connected with films were held in
contempt. New immigrants, therefore, found it relatively easy
to enter this field, and Jewish immigrants used the opportunity
to transform the media from a marginal branch of entertainment into a multi-million dollar industry.
[Nahman Ingber]
motion pictures
that forced local exhibitors to rent an outline group of Paramounts films, rather than choose only those they desired.
One producer who tried to fight Paramount was Carl
Laemmle, who was developing Universal into one of the giants. William Fox, his former partner in the fight against the
Patents Co., joined Twentieth Century and also made it into
one of the large Hollywood companies.
Louis B. *Mayer, who owned a chain of movie theaters
(mainly in New England), purchased the Metro Co. in Hollywood (which had its own studios) and founded the MetroMayer Co. Samuel Goldwyn left Paramount in 1919 and, together with the Selwyn brothers, founded the Goldwyn Co. In
1924 it merged with Metro-Mayer to form Metro-GoldwynMayer (MGM), which was headed by Mayer; Goldwyn himself
did not join MGM and instead established one of Hollywoods
outstanding independent production companies.
Columbia, owned and dominated by Harry *Cohn from
1929 until his death in 1958, was built into a large company
during the 1930s by producing a series of successful films by
the clever use of stars and directors.
Warner Brothers was founded by Sam, Jack, Albert, and
Harry *Warner, who started out with a small exhibition hall
and later became the managers of the First National Theater
chain, and eventually formed their own company. In 1923 they
bought out the Vitagraph Company, owners of the Vitaphone,
which was a sort of record that played simultaneously with the
silent film. Seeking to improve their difficult financial situation, in 1926 they developed and presented the first film with
its own musical score.
A year later Warner Brothers produced The Jazz Singer,
starring Al *Jolson, containing both dialogue and singing
parts. Written by Samson Raphaelson, based on his play, and
starring Al Jolson as the son of a cantor torn between the observant and secular world, the film was a success and brought
about the sound revolution in motion pictures and made
Warner Brothers into one of the great Hollywood companies.
Thus the majority of large Hollywood Studios were founded
and controlled by Jews.
In addition, the first bank to finance the film industry
was the Jewish-owned Kuhn, Loeb and Co., in 1919.
These founding fathers of the movie studio were part of
a first generation who created the dream factory, where Jewish immigrant movie moguls, eager to leave the Old World
behind, became more American than the Americans (see N.
Gabler, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Created Hollywood).
Other Jews who played a leading role in the large companies were Barney *Balaban, who joined Paramount and became its president in 1936; Nicholas and Joseph M. Schenk,
who became presidents of MGM (while Mayer was in charge of
its Hollywood operations); and Irving *Thalberg, who was production manager of MGM from the end of the 1920s until his
death in 1936. Thalberg, who was responsible for production
at the age of 23, was the wunderkind of the film industry and
became the symbol of the successful Hollywood producer.
In the two years following Warners The Jazz Singer, Hollywood frantically set about converting to sound. As the studios began importing New York talent, many Jews landed in
Hollywood. Among the Jewish performers who made their
way west were Jack *Benny, Ben Blue, Fanny *Brice, George
*Burns, Harry Green, Ted Lewis, the *Marx Brothers, Sophie
*Tucker, and Ed *Wynn. In addition, directors and writers
shifted from theater to film, including men such as George
*Cukor, Sidney Buchman, Norman *Krasna, Charles Lederer,
Joseph *Mankiewicz, S.J. *Perelman, Robert Riskin, Morrie
Ryskind, and Ben *Hecht.
In the 1920s and 1930s another wave of Jewish migrs
came to Hollywood. They were mainly directors and actors.
Ernst *Lubitsch, who came to the United States in 1923
after achieving fame in Germany, was best known for directing sophisticated comedies with a finesse that became known
as the Lubitsch touch. Among his films were Ninotchka, To
Be Or Not To Be, and Cluny Brown. For several years Lubitsch
served as president of production of Paramount, the first
working director to also be head of a studio.
Erich van *Stroheim, an Austrian-born actor and director, became known in the 1920s for his realistic direction, especially in the film Greed. His acting captivated audiences for
a period of 30 years.
Josef von *Sternberg directed several films in the United
States in the 1920s; he directed Blue Angel in Germany in 1930
and became Marlene Dietrichs permanent director, famous
for a grand style that made Dietrich into a screen goddess.
William *Wyler, who was born in Germany, began his career
as a director in 1928; his films were based mainly on adaptations of literary works, and he was particularly successful in
the direction of female stars. Billy *Wilder also began his career in Germany, together with Fred Zinnemann and Robert
Siodmak. Wilders films were distinguished by their sharp humor and bitter irony.
Other Jewish actors and directors who arrived in Hollywood from Europe in the 1920s and 1930s leaving their past
and sometimes their names behind, were Leslie *Howard,
Peter *Lorre, and Michael *Curtiz.
Curtiz, a Hungarian, would go on to direct Casablanca
perhaps the greatest American movie as well as other American classics, including Captain Blood, Yankee Doodle Dandy,
Robin Hood, and White Christmas.
White Christmas is a great example of the ways in which
Jews assimilated American culture, making it their own.
White Christmas was first born as a song written by Irving
*Berlin (n Izzy Baline in Siberia) for the 1942 film Holiday
Inn. Wishing for an idealized world I used to know that is
merry and bright, the lyrics are, at the same time, wistful,
hopeful, and all-inclusive. The song was so popular (it is one
of the most popular songs of all time), it spawned a movie
of its own.
The movie White Christmas as directed by Curtiz pairs
Bing Crosby with the very versatile Danny Kaye (born David
Kaminsky) in a romantic musical comedy, written by Norman
571
motion pictures
*Krasna, about two World War II veterans who achieve success in show business and then success in love. Its message is
not religious, but universal.
Curtiz presents the world as it was and as it should be.
Curtiz, like Berlin, was often critiqued for having no signature
style. But for Curtiz and Berlins generation of Jews, being able
to work successfully in any number of styles was a virtue unto
itself. Making a Christmas movie was not about assimilation,
it was about versatility.
Curtiz had already assimilated back in Hungary when he
first changed his name from Mano Kaminer to Mihaly Kertesz
(a more Hungarian-sounding name). The jump from Kertesz
to Curtiz was itself a testament to having an identity that was
easily translated that worked, literally and figuratively, in
any culture. America was the land of freedom, and for Jewish directors and actors, it was a country where you could do
anything, even make a Christmas movie.
In 1951, when Mayer was dismissed from his post at MGM,
he was replaced by Dore *Schary, who had built a career as
a writer. A similar position was held by William Goetz, who
was head of 20t Century-Fox and, at a later stage, of Universal International Co.
Some of the most successful Jewish producers employed
by the studios included Joe *Pasternak, Walter Wanger, Arthur *Freed, Jerry Wald, Pandro S. *Berman, among others.
An even more important influence on the film industry because of their greater control over the nature of the finished
product were the independent producers, such as Mike
*Todd, producer of Around the World in 80 Days, who was
connected with the Todd-AO method of cinematography;
and David O. *Selznick, the son of Lewis J. Selznick, one of
the industrys pioneers. Next to Samuel Goldwyn, David Selznick became the most famous and successful independent
producer. He was responsible for the production of Gone with
the Wind (1939), which was one of the most profitable films
in Hollywoods history, having grossed $72,000,000 through
1970. Among his other films were David Copperfield, King
Kong, Spellbound, and Rebecca.
Hal Roach, one of the most prolific producers of comedies, was responsible for a part of the Harold Lloyd series and
for the Laurel and Hardy films during the 1920s and 1930s.
Sam *Spiegel, who maintained a high artistic standard, using outstanding directors and choosing serious subjects, produced such films as The African Queen, On the Waterfront,
The Bridge on the River Kwai, and Lawrence of Arabia. The
*Mirisch Brothers, originally theater owners, established their
own company in 1957. After the decline of the big studios, it
became one of the most successful Hollywood enterprises,
producing West Side Story and The Great Escape.
After 1945, Stanley *Kramer, an independent producer
who was connected with Columbia, produced such films as
Home of the Brave, Champion, High Noon, and Death of a
Salesman. Later on he also directed On the Beach, Judgment at
Nuremberg, and Ship of Fools. Kramer believed that audiences
wanted films that dealt with contemporary life.
Joseph E. *Levine, who began as a theater owner and became an importer of cheap or erotic Italian films, then turned
to the financing of outstanding European films (8), and later
produced such films as Where Love Has Gone, The Carpetbaggers, and Harlow.
Among Jewish directors who earned success at the box
office or received great critical acclaim one must include Jules
*Dassin, Garson *Kanin, Robert *Aldrich, James *Brooks, Fred
*Zinnemann, Joseph L. *Mankiewicz, Sidney *Lumet, John
*Frankenheimer, Alan Pakula, Martin *Ritt, Roman *Polanski, Michael Curtiz, Mervyn Le Roy, Otto *Preminger, Richard *Brooks, George *Cukor (d. 1983), Daniel *Mann (d. 1991),
Delbert *Mann, and Robert *Rossen.
The number of successful Jewish scriptwriters is so vast
that only a few can be mentioned here. Among the most famous were Ben *Hecht, Samson *Raphaelson; George *Axelrod; Carl *Forman; Herman *Mankiewicz; Aaron *Sorkin;
William *Goldman; Nora *Ephron; Eric Roth; Norman
Krasna; and Abby *Mann.
Among the prominent composers of musical scores are
Irving *Berlin, Alfred Newman, Franz Waxman, Dmitri Tiomkin (d. 1979), Elmer *Bernstein, and Burt *Bacharach.
The first great sex symbol was Theda *Bara (18851955),
born Theodisia Goodman, whose portrayal of a seductive
vampire inspired the appellation Vamp. Other Jewish actresses known as sex symbols included Mae *West, Mirna
Loy, Sylvia Sydney, Hedy *Lamarr, Judy *Holliday, and more
recently, Debra *Winger, Rachel Weisz, and Natalie Portman. There is also a long tradition of Jewish comediennes in
which Mae West would also be included, but which begins
with Fanny *Brice, and stretches to Barbra *Streisand and
Bette *Midler.
A small sample of well-known Jewish actors and actresses
includes the Marx Brothers, Danny *Kaye, Jerry *Lewis, Paul
*Muni, Edward G. *Robinson, Eddie *Cantor, John *Garfield,
Al Jolson, Peter Lorre, Zero *Mostel, Tony *Curtis, Alan *Arkin, Lee J. *Cobb, Kirk *Douglas, Melvyn *Douglas, Dustin
*Hoffman, Elliot *Gould, Alla *Nazimova, Louise *Rainer,
Paulette *Goddard, Shelley *Winters, Polly Bergen, Tovah
*Feldshuh, and Lilli *Palmer. A number of film stars converted
to Judaism including Sammy *Davis Junior, Marilyn *Monroe,
and Elizabeth *Taylor.
By the mid-1930s ethnically distinct characters, especially
Jews, were no longer considered desirable by studio heads. The
degree to which Hollywood eliminated a Jewish presence can
be assessed by comparing The House of Rothschild (1934) with
The Life of Emile Zola (1937). In the former there is no question of Rothschilds identity. By contrast, The Life of Emile Zola
treats the infamous *Dreyfus affair, yet oddly never reveals
that Dreyfus was a Jew.
Despite Hitlers election as chancellor of the Third Reich
in 1933, and the growing militarization, civilian restrictions,
and legislated discrimination against Jews in Germany, Hollywood remained totally silent on the subject throughout the
1930s. The producers reflected the neutralist philosophy em-
572
motion pictures
anating from Washington. MGMs Three Comrades (1938) and
the Warner Bros. film Confessions of a Nazi Spy (1939) merely
intimated at the true horror.
Charlie Chaplin, a non-Jew (whom antisemites often labeled Jewish), broke ranks by producing The Great Dictator
(1940), a comedy which lampooned Hitler and depicted contemporary conditions in his mythical Tomania.
With the onset of World War II, Hollywood set about
dealing with Fascism, although it was less explicit about Jewish persecution. But it was not until Pearl Harbor that Hollywood went to war in full force. Increasingly the victims were
identified as Jews rather than the previous nomenclature
non-Aryans (ironically a Nazi classification). Titles include
The Pied Piper (1942), None Shall Escape (1944), and Address
Unknown (1944).
The war also saw the rise of the combat film, which depicted a fighting unit of ethnically and geographically diverse
soldiers. Most typically Jews functioned as comic relief. More
serious depictions of the Jewish participation in World War II
can be found in The Purple Heart (1944) and Pride of the Marines (1945), where characters evidence intelligence, bravery,
and patriotism.
Following the war and the full knowledge of the Nazi
atrocities, it was natural to ask, How could this happen?
Could it happen here? The response to these questions was
Crossfire (1947), a murder thriller, and Gentlemans Agreement (1947), a drama which presented a journalist, played by
Gregory Peck, posing as a Jew to gain firsthand experience of
discrimination. Both films received critical and popular acclaim and, despite initial concern on the part of Jewish agencies, both works proved through testing to be effective tools
in combating prejudice.
However, it is important to note that when Hollywood
needed a handsome actor to play a role where the character
was Jewish, such as King David, they preferred a non-Jew such
as Gregory Peck to play him, as he did in David and Batsheba
(1951), later reprised by Richard Gere in King David (1985).
The postwar period also produced an unexpected backlash against Jews, most particularly in Hollywood. Spurred
on by anti-Communist fears, conservative individuals were
able to effect their prejudices through the workings of the
House Committee on Un-American Activities. Of the original Hollywood Ten who faced investigation and charges,
seven were Jewish.
However, the films of the 1950s consistently promoted
tolerance. In no decade are screen Jews so intelligent, patriotic, and unqualifiably likeable. At no other time is religious
tolerance and good will so consistently foregrounded.
Beginning in 1951 with The Magnificent Yankee, which
depicts Louis *Brandeis, to the screen adaptation of Dark at
the Top of the Stairs (1960), the films all preach the same message antisemitism is no longer acceptable; antisemitism is
un-American.
In between these two works, several important films
came to the screen. In 1952 Dore *Schary adapted Ivanhoe,
573
motion pictures
Favorite Year (1982), Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986),
Brighton Beach Memoirs (1987), and Radio Days (1987).
Meanwhile Jewish women began to have their say in films
such as The Way We Were (1973), starring Barbra Streisand;
Hester Street (written and directed by Joan Micklin *Silver);
and Girlfriends (1978, written and directed by Claudia Weill).
Jewish women came to the fore with great strength, in
large measure due to womens participation in production.
Beginning with Private Benjamin (1980), co-produced and
starring Goldie *Hawn as the Jewish American Princess who
finally grows into an autonomous woman, Jewish women are
admirably depicted in Tell Me a Riddle (1980), Baby, Its You
(1983), Hanna K (1983), Yentl (1983), St. Elmos Fire (1985),
Sweet Lorraine (1987), and Dirty Dancing (1987). Among the
Jewish women active in film as directors, screenwriters, and
producers were: Barbra Streisand, Susan Seidelman, Claudia
Weill, Lee *Grant, Joan Micklin Silver, Gail Parent, and Sherry
*Lansing (who would go on to be chairman of Paramount).
The 1970s also introduced many new types: the Jewish
gambler (The Gambler, 1974), the Jewish madam (For Petes
Sake, 1974), blacklisted artists (The Front, 1976), the Jewish
gumshoe (The Big Fix, 1976), the Jewish lesbian (A Different
Story, 1978), a Yiddish cowboy (The Frisco Kid, 1979), a Jewish
union organizer (Norma Rae, 1979), a Jewish murderess (The
Last Embrace, 1979), and an elderly Jew pushed to violence
(Boardwalk, 1979). The Frisco Kid deserves special mention.
Despite its high comedy, the film is one of the few Hollywood
works to treat Jewish values as a serious topic. Briefly stated,
the film shows the confrontation between talmudic piety and
American pragmatism, as personified by characters played by
Gene *Wilder and Harrison *Ford, as the two influenced each
other as Jew met Gentile in the New Land.
For the rest of the 20t Century Jews assumed a wide
variety of roles. From the romantic, such as Billy *Crystal in
When Harry met Sally to non-Jewish Ian McKellen as the evil
Holocaust survivor Dr. Magneto in X-Men (2000), Jewish actors and Jews on screen took on a democratic smorgasbord of
roles. Jewish leading men continue to be few and far between
but a new crop of handsome young and versatile actors such
as Ben *Stiller, Jason Schwartzman, Adam *Sandler, and David
Duchovny continue to redefine Jewish actors on the screen.
In other areas, some things never change. Just as the nonJewish Natalie Wood played Marjorie Morningstar, in the romantic comedy from Nancy Meyers, Somethings Got to Give
(2003), Diane Keaton is featured as playing a Jewish woman
and Frances McDormand as her sister.
Regarding the Holocaust as a subject for Hollywood,
prior to the 1980s, the Shoah was mainly used as a backdrop
from which to create thrillers such as The Odessa File (1974),
Marathon Man (1976), and The Boys from Brazil (1978). Only
The Man in the Glass Booth (1975), based on a stage play,
stands apart. However, after the successful 1978 TV broadcast
of the mini-series The Holocaust, a proliferation of Holocaustthemed or related films were made, most notably Schindlers
List (1993).
574
motion pictures
At the beginning of the 21st century, by contrast, the studios are owned by corporations and controlled in great part
by non-Jews. A great many Jewish people have continued to
work in Hollywood as executives, agents, and attorneys. They
are involved at every level in the creative decisions affecting
the movies made in America and seen the world over. But increasingly, they are making those decisions with their eyes on
a mass audience and for corporate masters concerned with the
bottom line, profits and stock performance. So although there
are many Jewish executives, they are merely employees, serving at the whim of the marketplace and their masters.
In this light, it is legitimate to wonder: can the movie industry still be considered Jewish?
[Tom Teicholz (2nd ed.)]
In Britain
Although the proportion of Jews involved in films was much
smaller than in America, they made a significant contribution to the British film industry and were among its pioneers.
For a long period, American competition made it impossible
for the British motion picture to gain a foothold in the world
market. It was a Hungarian Jew, Sir Alexander *Korda, who
finally pulled the British industry out of the doldrums. Korda
had been a pioneer of film making in Hungary and after World
War I had worked in Austria, Germany, France, and Hollywood. In 1930 he moved to Britain and founded the London
In France
What is a Jewish film? A film that is produced by a Jewish
producer? A film that is made by a Jewish director? A film
that has a Jewish theme? One may more specifically ask this
question about France, for until the 1950s characters were not
identified in French movies by religious or ethnic affiliation.
However, after World War II it was impossible to ignore the
Jewish presence in France, or the Holocaust.
In 1937, Jean Renoir directed La grande illusion (The
Great Illusion), a pacifist film which depicts a group of French
prisoners during World War I. One of them, Rosenthal, is a
stereotyped nouveau riche Jew who, however, stands by his
friends. At the end of the film, one of these friends, played by
Jean Gabin, lets the cat out of the bag. I never could stand
Jews! he says. This cutting remark and Rosenthals ambivalent portrait brought accusations of antisemitism against
Renoir. The controversy itself shows all the ambiguity of the
Jews situation in French society, for Rosenthal is generous
and human. In his next film, La rgle du jeu (The Rules of
the Game, 1938), the subtle and grand figure of the host goes
under the name La Chesnay, but it is clearly said that he is of
Jewish origin. It is significant that Marcel Dalio played both
these parts. He was himself a Jew and had to leave France in
575
[Geoffrey Wigoder]
motion pictures
1940. The clich about Jews who wish to believe they are accepted in French society is also the main theme of Julien Duviviers David Golder (1931), from Irne Nemirovskys book.
After becoming wealthy, David Goldet is despised by his wife
and daughter; he ends his days as a ruined and lonely old man.
Unlike Renoirs films, David Goldet is undoubtedly antisemitic, echoing all the physical and psychological stereotypes
spread by Frances extreme right in the 1930s.
From the 1950s, documentaries made from archives or
from witness interviews shed new light on the Jews lot in
French society during World War II. Thus in Nuit et Brouillard
(Night and Fog, 1955) by Alain Resnais, in Le temps du ghetto
(The Ghetto Time, 1968) by Frederic Rossif, Le chagrin et
la piti (Distress and Compassion, 1971) by Marcel Ophuls,
Franais si vous saviez (French Citizens, If Only You Knew,
1973) by Andr Harris and Alain de Sdouy, French eyes were
opened to the realities of French society and the behavior of
French politicians toward Jews under the German occupation.
In other respects, at the same time Frederic Rossif and Claude
Lanzmann made documentaries about Israel.
Some Jewish film makers were interested in making
semi-autobiographical films on this period as well. These include Claude Berri (Le vieil homme et lenfant, The Old Man
and the Boy, 1957), Henri Glaeser (Une larme dans locan,
A Tear in the Ocean, 1973), and Jacques Doillon (Un sac
de billes, A Bag of Marbles, 1976, from Joseph Joffos book).
Others produced stories in the context of collaboration: Le
dernier mtro (The Last Subway, 1980) by Franois Truffaut
tells the story of a Jewish director in Paris who hides in a cellar. Conversely, Lacombe Lucien (1974) by Louis Malle from
Patrick *Modianos book absolves the hero from responsibility (he becomes a militiaman by chance) and depicts Jews
as passive victims. Some years later, Malle made Au revoir les
enfants (Good Bye, Children), which expressed feelings of
guilt about the persecution of Jewish children. In 2005, La
maison de Nina (Ninas House) by Richard Dembo told the
story of young survivors of the Nazi camps.
Several documentaries have been made with survivors:
La mmoire est-elle soluble dans leau? (Is Memory Soluble in
Water? 1995) by Charles Najman and La petite maison dans
la fort de bouleaux (The Little House in the Birch-Tree Forest, 2003) by Marceline Loridan. One must mention too Emmanuel Finkiels work, especially Voyages (1999), dealing with
the memory of the Holocaust, moving on, and Jewish identity
in the Diaspora and Israel.
There have also been comedies with popular actors like
Louis de Funs and Roger Hanin. Their humor and optimism as they show reconciliation among people made them
successful films. Such films are Les aventures de Rabbi Jacob
(Rabbi Jacobs Adventures, 1973) by Grard Oury, Le coup
de sirocco (Gust of Sirocco, 1979), Le Grand Pardon (Yom
Kippur, 1982), and Le grand carnaval (The Great Carnival,
1985), the last three by Alexandre Arcady. La vrit si je mens
(Damn It If Im Lying, 1996) by Thomas Gilou gives Jewish
humor a different perspective with a Sephardi contribution
576
In Germany
As in the United States, the impetus to produce films catering to popular taste in Germany came from Jewish owners of
a chain of theaters. In 1913 Paul Davidson and Hermann Fellner, who had been exhibiting films since 1905, established their
own production company and made films based on German
folklore and legend, as well as comedies (it was for this company that Ernst Lubitsch made his early films). In 1919 Erich
Pommer directed the Deutsches Eclair (Decla) film company,
which some time later merged with UFA, a company that produced outstanding German films in the 1920s and the early
1930s. Pommer remained at the head of the company and determined the style and quality of the films in this period. He
went in for daring artistic experiments and provided ample
opportunity for talented film people to prove their mettle. As a
result, the German film became the most advanced of its time;
this was, in fact, the golden age of the German film industry.
Lubitsch began his career with a series of comedies (some of
them against a Jewish background) and then turned to the
direction of light-hearted historical films. His overwhelming
success resulted in his being invited to the United States. Another film produced by Pommer, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,
which became a prestigious success for the German cinema,
was written by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer. In general,
Jews made a great contribution to the German cultural life
in the 1920s and participated in the avant-garde artistic experimentation of this period. The painter Hans Richter produced experimental and abstract films and was a pioneer of
this genre. The leading German-Jewish film director was Fritz
*Lang, whose films are a marvelous portrayal of the social and
cultural atmosphere prevailing in Germany at the time. They
include Der muede Tod (The Weary Death), based on a medieval legend; two films based on the Nibelungen saga; two
terror films; Metropolis, sharply critical of various aspects of
industrial society; and M, the story of the Duesseldorf child
murderer, which was Langs last German film. When Hitler
came to power, the Jews working for the German film industry
were forced to flee the country. Most of them found their way
to Hollywood, others to London, Paris, and Prague.
In Poland
Before the rise of the Jewish state, Poland was the only country that offered possibilities for the development of a Jewish
film industry. Attempts to create a Jewish film tradition began before World War I, when film versions were made of the
plays of Jacob *Gordin. Mark Tovbin, a pioneer in the field,
filmed Mirele Efros with Esther Rachel *Kaminska in the title role and other members of her family in the cast. Nahum
motion pictures
Lipovski filmed Gordins play Hasa die Yesoeme (Hasa the
Orphan) with Esther Lipovska as the orphan. It was not until the 1920s, however, that attempts at making films were resumed. In 1924 Leah Farber worked with Henrik Baum, as
scenario writer, on producing films on Yiddish folk themes.
Among them was Tkies-Kaf (The Hand Contract), based on
a legend similar to that of The Dybbuk, directed by Zygmunt
*Turkow, who also played the role of Elijah. Other roles were
played by Esther Rachel Kaminska, her daughter Ida, and her
granddaughter Ruth Turkow, then a child. In 1927 the same
company filmed another legendary story, Der Lamedvovnik
(One of the Thirty-Six), by H. Baum, starring Jonas *Turkow
and directed by Henryk Shara (Shapira). In 1929 a company
known as Forbert after Leo Forbert, the first Jewish film
producer after the war filmed a version of Josef *Opatoshus
novel In the Polish Woods, with H. Baum as screenwriter, Jonas Turkow as director, and Dina Blumenfeld and Silver Rich
in the leading roles.
The first Yiddish talking pictures were made in 1932,
when Itzhak and Shaul Goskind formed a company known
as Sektor and made documentaries of the Jewish communities in Warsaw, Lodz, Vilna, Lvov, Cracow, and Bialystok
and then undertook popular productions with S. Dzigan and
I. Szumacher. They produced Al Khet, with screenplay by
the writer Israel Moshe Neiman, directed by A. Marten,
with Rachel Holtzer and A. Morewski in the leading roles;
Una Heim (Without a Home, by A. Kacyzne), directed by
Alexander Marten, with Ida Kaminska and the Dzigan-Szumacher partnership; and Freylikhe Kabtsonim (The Merry
Beggars), a story by Moshe *Broderzon, with Zygmunt
Turkow, Dzigan-Szumacher and Ruth Turkow in the cast.
They also did a documentary called Mir Kumen On (Were
on the Way), directed by Alexander Ford. Ford also did Sabra (1933).
Films of distinction were Josef Greens productions Yidl
mitn Fidl, lyrics by Itzik *Manger, starring Molly *Picon;
Mammele, also starring Molly Picon; Purim Shpiler, with Z.
Turkow, Anya Liton, L. Samberg, and Miriam Kressin (screenplays by Konrad Tam) and A Brivele der Mammen, written by
M. Osherowitz (screenplay by A. Kacyzne) and directed by L.
Tristan. This was the last Yiddish film made in Poland before
the outbreak of World War II. Leo-Film did a talking version
of Tkies-Kaf in 1937 with scenario by H. Baum, direction by
Henrik Shara, and Z. Turkow as Elijah. *An-Skys Dybbuk
was also filmed in 1937, with a scenario by Katzisne, direction by Michal Vashiasky, and a cast including A. Morewski,
Isaac Samberg, Moshe Lipman, Lili Liliana, and L. Leo Libgold. After World War II a cooperative, Kinor, for Yiddishspeaking films was organized in Lodz by Shaul Goskind and
Joseph Goldberg. From 1946 until 1950 two full-length films
and about 12 shorts were produced including Unzere Kinder,
which was made with Niusia Gold, Dzigan-Szumacher, and
orphans from Alenuwek (Lodz). In 1951 Kinor was liquidated and the members left, mostly for Israel. The Polish State
Film produced a work on the Warsaw Ghetto, Ulica Graniczna
577
In the U.S.S.R.
Jews also took a large part in the motion picture industry in
the U.S.S.R. Foremost among them was Sergei *Eisenstein,
the great genius of the Soviet cinema, whose contribution to
the progress made by motion pictures probably exceeds that
of any other single film artist. His films, including Battleship,
Strike, Alexander, Old and New, October, Potemkin, Ivan the
Terrible (1 and 2), and Alexander Nevski, are still regarded as
high achievements of the motion picture art and are studied
by scholars and artists alike. His theories on the cinematic art,
published in several volumes, remain an outstanding expression of motion picture aesthetics. The formalist experiments
made by Eisentein in the 1920s provoked the ire of the Soviet
authorities and caused him great hardship throughout the
1930s and 1940s; the controversy over Ivan the Terrible shortly
preceded his death. Other Jews who entered the Soviet motion
picture industry in the 1920s were Friedrich Ermler, Abraham
Room, Mikhail Romm, Juli Raizman, Leonid Trauberg, Esther
Schub, and L.O. Arnshtam. They sought formal solutions to
the artistic problems encountered, and when socialist realism
became the prescribed doctrine, they were forced to compromise with the new conditions. A noted Jewish director was
Dziga Vertov, a native of Poland, whose real name was Denis Kaufman and whose brother, Boris Kaufman, was a wellknown American cameraman. In 1924 Vertov propounded
the theory of Kino-Glas (Cinema-Eye): Kino-Glas films were
made outside the studio without actors, set, or a script. They
are written by the camera in the purest cine-language, and are
completely visual. Vertov became the father of the documentary film, and his newsreels, kino pravda, were the forerunners of cinma-verit.
A number of Jewish directors were also active in the
1930s, including Yosif Heifitz and Alexander Zarkhy (who
worked as a team for some time), Yosef Olshanski (also a
scriptwriter), Samson Samsonov, and Yakov Segal. Yiddish
motion pictures flourished in the Soviet Union in the 1930s,
centering on the great Yiddish actor Shlomo *Mikhoels (who
was later murdered during the Stalin purges), whose outstanding films were King Lear and Menahem Mendel.
Other European Countries
In other countries of Eastern Europe Jewish motion picture directors came to the fore after World War II, when film
production first entered a serious phase of development. In
Czechoslovakia Jan Kdar directed Shop on Main Street, and
Milos Forman earned his reputation with such comedies as
Peter and Pavla, Firemens Ball, and Loves of a Blonde. A Swedish director named Mauritz Stiller became famous in the 1910s
and 1920s for the style, humor, and aesthetic feeling of his
films. His claim to fame now rests on his discovery of Greta
motke H abad
Garbo, whom he accompanied to the United States where he
died soon after his arrival.
[Nahman Ingber]
MOTKE H ABAD (c. 1820c. 1885), Lithuanian jester (*badh an). Motke (familiar form of Mordecai) was the most famous
jester of Lithuania, the counterpart to Hershele *Ostropoler
of Galicia. He eked out a poor living by acting as badh an at
weddings and other festive occasions, and his barbed wit, directed against the rich and the powerful, as well as his practical
jokes, constituted a form of social protest, reflecting the condition of Jews in Russia generally and of the poor within the
Jewish community. His subjects include government bureaucracy, autocratic powers exercised both by lay and religious
authorities, the shrewish woman, and particularly the affluent
and miserly. Collections of anecdotes and sayings ascribed to
Motke, however, include many of apocryphal nature. Various
suggestions have been made as to the name H abad, which is
identical with that of the Lithuanian *h asidic sect. One is that
it is a distortion of his family name Hobat, another that he
married into a H abad family, and a third that it was a satirical anti-h asidic designation coined by Haskalah intellectuals,
whereby Badh an was changed to H abad.
Whereas in Jewish folklore Hershele Ostropoler is the
hero of the prankish deed, Motke is more the master of the
biting witticism; but both were directed against those who
hold the reins of wealth and power.
578
[Gershon Winer]
mountAIN JEWS
political agreement with the Ottoman government. Despite
his ideological closeness to Herzl, he joined the *Democratic
Fraction, which he represented at the Fifth Zionist Congress
(1901) and at the Conference of Russian Zionists in Minsk
(1902). He kept aloof from the controversy over the *Uganda
Scheme because of his deep attachment to Erez Israel, on the
one hand, and the urgent need to help the oppressed Jewish
masses, on the other.
In 1905 Motzkin anonymously edited the revolutionary
Russian Russische Korrespondenz, which was published in Berlin and provided West European newspapers with information on Russia in a radical spirit. He dedicated considerable
space to the fate of the Jews and the anti-Jewish excesses. The
Zionist Organization requested Motzkin to publish a book on
the wave of pogroms in Russia; it was written for the most part
by Motzkin himself (signed A. Linden) and was published in
two parts in 190910 under the name Die Judenpogrome in
Russland. The book contained thorough research into antiJewish violence in Russia from the beginning of the 19t century to its climax during the Russian Revolution of 190506,
including descriptions of pogroms in various areas and towns
and stressed the role of Jewish *self-defense. In 1912 Motzkins
pamphlet The Legal Sufferings of the Jews in Russia came out
in an English translation by an anonymous author. It was also
distributed in Russian among the Duma delegates in St. Petersburg. During the *Beilis trial (191113), Motzkin organized
an information service in West European countries and Russia and spurred public figures to speak out against the blood
libel. At the same time, he was a leading activist in the Hebrew language movement and among the first to speak Hebrew at conferences and meetings devoted to this subject.
During World War I, he was head of the Copenhagen Office
of the World Zionist Organization and the liaison between the
various Zionist organizations in the warring countries. At the
end of 1915 he left for the United States to mobilize support for
the Jewish war victims on the East European front, and also
for the struggle to ensure equal rights for the Jews of Russia.
At the end of the war, Motzkin demanded that the Zionist
Movement also concern itself with the civil rights of the
Jews in the Diaspora. Thus, he took a leading part in the establishment of the *Comit des Dlgations Juives at the Paris
Peace Conference, to which various Jewish bodies were affiliated, including the World Zionist Organization, and which
later became a standing institution at the League of Nations,
serving as a world Jewish representative for all affairs other
than those connected with Erez Israel. In the following years as
well, Motzkin continued to direct the committee, which concerned itself particularly with the struggle against antisemitism (inter alia with the legal defense of Shalom *Schwartzbard for the assassination of Simon *Petlyura, who was held
responsible for the pogroms in the Ukraine) and with the
defense of Jewish rights. For this purpose he was active in
the movement supporting the League of Nations and in the
international Congresses of National Minorities. He did not
abandon his Zionist work, however, and served as perma-
MOUNTAIN JEWS, a Jewish ethnic and linguistic group living mainly in *Azerbaijan and Daghestan. The name Mountain Jews emerged in the first half of the 19t century when
the Russian Empire annexed those territories. It is supposed
that the name derives from mountain of the Jews (Chufut or Dzuhud Dag in the Tat language), an ancient name of
Daghestan, indicating its large Jewish population.
The Mountain Jews call themselves Juhur. According to
estimates based on the Soviet censuses of 1959 and 1970, they
numbered between 50,000 and 70,000 in 1970. Of these, 17,109
registered as Tats in the 1970 census, so as to escape being registered as Jews and discriminated against by the authorities.
About 22,000 did so in the 1979 census.
They speak several dialects (similar to each other) of the
Tat language (see *Judeo-Tat), which belongs to the western
branch of the Iranian languages group.
Their main centers of settlement are: in Azerbaijan,
*Baku, capital of the republic, and the town of Kuba where
the majority of Mountain Jews live in the suburb of Krasnaya
Sloboda which has an all-Jewish population; in Daghestan,
*Derbent, Makhachkalah, capital of the republic (which was
called Petrovsk Port until 1922), and Buynaksk (Temir-Khan
Shurah prior to 1922). Outside Azerbaijan and Daghestan,
considerable numbers of Mountain Jews live in Nalchik, in
the suburb of Yevreyskaya Kolonka, and also in the town of
Grozny.
Linguistic and indirect historical evidence indicates that
the community of Mountain Jews was formed as a result of
579
mountAIN JEWS
constant emigration of Jews from northern Persia and perhaps also from nearby regions of the Byzantine Empire to
the Transcaucasian Azerbaijan, where they settled in its eastern and north-eastern regions among a population speaking
the Tat language which they also adopted in time. The Talmud
mentions a Jewish community in the city of Derbent as early as
the third century C.E., and the amora R. Simeon Safra taught
there (TJ, Meg. 4, 5, 75b).
The immigration of the Jews evidently began when the
Muslims invaded those regions in 639643, and it continued
for the whole period from the Arab to the 13t-century Mongol
invasion. Apparently the main waves of migration ceased in
the early 11t century under the impact of the mass invasion of
a Turkic nomadic tribe. This intrusion might also have forced
many of the Tat-speaking Jewish inhabitants of Transcaucasian
Azerbaijan to move further north to Daghestan.
There they contacted remnants of the *Khazars who had
adopted Judaism in the 8t century. Already in 1254 the monk
Wilhelm Rubruquis, a Flemish traveler, noted the existence
of a great number of Jews throughout eastern Caucasus, in
both Daghestan and Azerbaijan.
The Mountain Jews had contacts with the Jewish communities of the Mediterranean region. Tagriberdi (14091470),
the Muslim historiographer from Egypt, wrote of Jewish merchants from Circassia (i.e., from Caucasus) visiting Cairo.
Through such contacts printed books reached the Mountain
Jews. In the town of Kuba books were preserved until the beginning of the 20t century that had been printed in Venice
in the late 16t and early 17t centuries.
From the 14t to the 16t centuries European travelers did
not reach those regions, but rumors spread in Europe in the
16t and 17t centuries about nine and a half Jewish tribes
driven by Alexander the Great behind the Caspian Mountains, i.e., into Daghestan. Those rumors might have originated with Jewish merchants from the eastern Caucasus appearing at the time in Italy. N. Vitsen, a Dutch traveler, who
visited Daghestan in 1690 found many Jews there, especially
in the village of Buynak, not far from the present Buynaksk, as
well as in the Khanate of Qaraqaitagh where, according to him
15,000 Jews lived. The 17t and early 18t centuries can perhaps
be considered for the Jews a period of relative peace and prosperity. A solid area of Jewish settlement existed in the north
of present-day Azerbaidjan and in southern Daghestan, in the
region between the towns of Kuba and Derbent. A valley near
Derbent, called by the Muslim Juhud-Kata (Jewish Valley),
was inhabited evidently mainly by Jews. Its largest settlement,
named Aba-Sava, served as the spiritual center of the community. Several piyyutim (liturgical poems) written in Hebrew
by Elisha ben Samuel, who lived in the region, have been preserved. Also in Aba-Sava there lived a scholar called Gershon
Lalah ben Moses Naqdi who wrote a commentary on Maimonides Mishneh Torah. Mattathias ben Samuel ha-Kohen from
Shemakha to the south of Kuba wrote between 1806 and 1828
a kabbalistic work, Kol Mevasser, which is the last evidence of
religious creativity in Hebrew in the community.
580
mountain jews
early 20t century due to the development of aniline dye production; most Mountain Jews who had been involved in the
business lost their property and became casual workers. This
became their job mainly in Baku, where the number of Mountain Jews increased only toward the end of the 19t century,
and to some extent also in Derbent, where the bankrupt Jews
turned mostly to door to door trading or became seasonal
fishing workers.
Almost all the Mountain Jews engaged in viticulture
worked also in gardening. In some settlements of Azerbaijan
they grew tobacco, and in Qaitagh and Tabasaran (Daghestan)
they were engaged in land cultivation, an occupation which
was also common in several villages of Azerbaijan.
ln some of the villages their main employment was
leather processing. This branch came to a standstill in the early
20t century when the Russian authorities forbade Mountain
Jews to enter Central Asia where they used to buy the raw
skins. A significant part of the leather processors became
town laborers.
The number of Mountain Jews in petty trade, including
peddling, was relatively small in the initial period of Russian
power, but grew significantly from the late 19t century. The
few affluent Jewish merchants lived mainly in Kuba and Derbent, and from the end of the 19t century they also began to
settle in the towns of Baku and Temir-Khan-Shura, where they
most notably dealt in textiles and carpet selling.
In his travel book Sefer ha-Massaot be-Erez Kavkaz
(1886), Joseph Judah *Chorny, who traveled in the Caucasus
for eight years (186775), gives detailed information on the life
and settlements (about 30 at the time) of the Mountain Jews.
Another valuable source is the book of the Russian writer
Nemirovich-Danchenko (Voinstvuyushchii Izrail; Fighting
Israel, 1886), in which he records his vivid impressions of his
stay among the tribe. The Mountain Jews were then simple
people, mostly illiterate, but proud, courageous, and freedomloving. Farmers and hunters, they always carried a dagger or
similar weapon in their typical Caucasian dress. The Tat Jews
were prepared at any time to defend by their sword their family or their honor. Their dwellings were low mud huts, whose
inside walls were hung with polished weapons. The synagogue,
its exterior resembling a mosque, served as a h eder for the
children. Sitting on the floor they learned the Torah by heart
from the h akham. Of the Jewish festivals, Purim and Passover
were especially celebrated. Their Passover *seder had a special
form differing from the traditional seder. During the night
of *Hoshana Rabba the girls used to dance; according to Tat
tradition, this is the night when a mans fate is decided. The
marriage ceremony contained foreign influences, and the circumcision ceremony was generally held in the synagogue. Tat
family names are mostly biblical names, to which the Russian
suffix ov was added, e.g., Pinkhasov, Binyaminov, etc. The
custom of the vendetta was practiced until recently.
The main social framework of the Mountain Jews up to
the end of the 1920s was a large family unit encompassing
three or four generations and reaching 70 or more people in
581
mountain jews
The level of halakhic knowledge among the yeshivah
graduates was about that of a ritual slaughterer elsewhere, but
they were reverently called rabbi. From the middle of the 19t
century a number of Mountain Jews studied in Ashkenazi yeshivot in Russia, mostly in Lithuania; there they were granted
only the title of shoh et but, on returning to the Caucasus, they
served as rabbis. Very few of these Jews who studied in the
yeshivot of Russia received the title of rabbi. From the mid19t century, the Czarist authorities acknowledged the dayyan
of Temir-Khan-Shra as the chief rabbi of northern Daghestan
and northern Caucasus, and the dayyan of Derbent as chief
rabbi of southern Daghestan and Azerbaijan. Besides their traditional duties, they acted as *kazyonny ravvin (official rabbis
in behalf of the authorities).
In the pre-Russian period, relations between the Mountain Jews and Muslims were determined by the so-called Covenant of *Omar, the special set of Islamic directives regarding
*dhimmis (non-Muslim protected citizens). However, the application of those laws in these regions was accompanied by
special humiliation since the Mountain Jews depended to a
great extent on the local ruler. According to the description
of the German traveler I. Gerber, published in 1728, they had
to pay a special ransom to the Muslim rulers for protection.
Moreover, they had to perform all kinds of difficult, dirty
jobs which could not be enforced on a Muslim. The Jews had
to give the ruler some of their yields free of charge: tobacco,
rubia, tanned skins, and so on; they worked on his fields in
harvest time, built and repaired his house, did gardening jobs,
and were engaged in his vineyard. They also gave the ruler
their horses on special occasions. Muslim soldiers who were
feasting in the house of a Jew could demand money from their
host for causing them toothache.
Up to the end of the 1860s the Jews of certain mountain
regions in Daghestan continued to pay ransom to the previous Muslim rulers of those regions, or to their descendants to
whom the Czarist government has given rights equal to Russian noblemen, leaving the estates in their possession.
*Blood libels occurred in these regions only after they
came under Russian rule. In 1814 disturbances occurred as
the result of a blood libel in Baku; the Jews affected, mostly
originating from Iran, fled to Kuba for protection. In 1878 on
a similar allegation, dozens of Kuba Jews were arrested, and
in 1911 the Jews of the settlement of Tarki suffered after being
accused of kidnapping a Muslim girl.
The first contacts between the Mountain Jews and Ashkenazi Jews were established in the 1820s or 1830s. These links
were reinforced and became more frequent only after regulations appeared which allowed those Russian Jews permitted
to live outside the Pale of Settlement to move to areas where
Mountain Jews were living.
In the 1870s the chief rabbi of Derbent. R. Jacob Itzhakovich-Yiz h aki (18481917) contacted a number of Jewish scholars living in St. Petersburg. In 1884 R. Sharbat Nissim-Oghly,
the chief rabbi of Temir-Khan-Shura, sent his son Elijah to the
Higher Technical School in Moscow, and he became the first
582
mountain jews
the majority of Jews living in the mountains had to move to
towns situated along the coast of the Caspian Sea, mainly to
Derbent, Makhachkalah, and Buynaksk.
After Soviet power established itself in Daghestan, antisemitism did not disappear. In 1926 and 1929 the Jews faced
blood libels, that of 1926 being accompanied by pogroms.
In the early 1920s, about 300 families of Mountain Jews
from Azerbaijan and Daghestan managed to leave for Palestine. The majority of them settled in Tel Aviv where they established a Caucasian quarter. (One of the outstanding leaders
of this immigration was Yehuda Adamovich, father of Yekutiel
Adam, deputy chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces who
was killed in the 1982 Lebanon War.)
In 192122 organized Zionist activities among the Mountain Jews were disrupted; immigration to Erez Israel also subsided. In the period between the end of the Civil War in Russia and World War II, the main goal of the Soviet authorities
for the Mountain Jews was their productivization and eradication of religious feeling. With the former objective, Jewish collective farms were established. Two Jewish collective
farms were founded in the settlements of Bagdanovka and
Ganshtakovka where about 320 families worked in 1929. The
settlements were situated in the North-Caucasian Territory,
presently Krasnodar Territory. In 1931 about 970 Mountain
Jewish families were drawn into collective farms in Daghestan. In Azerbaijan collective farms were established in Jewish
villages and in the Jewish suburb of the town of Kuba. In 1927
members of 250 Mountain Jewish families became collective
farmers in the Republic.
However, toward the end of the 1930s the Mountain Jews
began to abandon collective farming, although many Jewish
collective farms were still in existence after World War II: in
the beginning of the 1970s about 10 percent of the community
members remained in collective farms.
As far as religion was concerned, the authorities preferred not to destroy it immediately, in accordance with their
general policy in the eastern provinces of the U.S.S.R., but
to undermine religious tradition gradually by secularizing
the community. For this purpose a wide network of schools
was established, and special attention given to indoctrinating
youth and adults in the framework of clubs.
In 1922 the first Soviet newspaper in Judeo-Tat appeared
in Baku called Karsokh (Worker). It was sponsored by the
Caucasian Regional Committee of the Jewish Communist
Party and its Youth Section. The Poalei Zion newspaper did
not find support among the authorities and soon ceased to
exist. In 1928 another Mountain Jewish newspaper appeared
called Zah matkash (The Laborers) and it was issued in
Derbent. From 1929 to 1930 Judeo-Tat was given in the Latin
script instead of Hebrew, and from 1938 the Russian (Cyrillic)
alphabet has been used. In 1934 the Tat Literary Circle was established in Derbent, and in 1936 a Tat Section was created in
the Union of Soviet Writers of Daghestan. In 1926, the only
census that registred Tats, they numbered 25,866, and probably reached 35,000 persons by 1941. Works by Mountain
Jewish writers of the period evince strong Communist indoctrination, especially in drama which was considered by the
authorities as the most effective propaganda weapon. As a
result, amateur theatrical groups proliferated and later, in
1935, the professional Mountain Jewish theater opened in
Derbent.
During World War II the Germans for a short time occupied the regions of the northern Caucasus populated by
Mountain Jews. In those areas with mixed Ashkenazi and
Mountain Jewish population in Kislovodsk, Pyatigorsk,
and so on all the Jews were killed. The same fate struck the
Mountain Jewish collective farms in Krasnodar Territory, and
also the Crimean settlements of Mountain Jews founded in
the 1920s. In the regions encompassing the towns of Nalchik
and Grozny the Germans were awaiting instructions on how
to deal with the Jewish problem, but these did not arrive before they had to retreat from these areas.
After World War II the anti-religious campaign gained
momentum. In the period 194853 teaching in Judeo-Tat
ended, and all the Mountain Jews schools were conducted in
Russian. Zakhmatash no longer appeared and all literary activities in Judeo-Tat were ended.
In the latter part of the 1970s, the Mountain Jews became
victims of assault in several towns, in particular Nalchik, because of their struggle to leave for Israel. Cultural and literary
activities in Judeo-Tat, revived after Stalins death remained
rudimentary in nature. From the end of 1953 up to 1986, two
books a year were published on the average.
The main and at times the sole language of the youth
was now Russian. Even the middle generation used the language of their community only at home in the family circle;
to discuss more sophisticated topics they had to turn to Russian. This development was most noticeable among the small
urban population of Mountain Jews, as for example, in Baku,
and also among persons of higher education.
Religious tradition suffered, but was still partly retained,
especially in comparison with the Ashkenazi community of the
Soviet Union. The majority of the Mountain Jews continued
to observe customs connected with the Jewish life cycle. The
dietary laws are observed in many homes. However, Sabbath
observance has been mostly abandoned, and the same is true
of the Jewish festivals, except Rosh ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur, the Passover seder and the eating of matzah. The knowledge of reading prayers and prayer rituals has been also largely
lost.
Despite all this, the level of Jewish consciousness among
the Mountain Jews has remained high and their Jewish identity is being preserved, even by those who formally register
themselves as Tats. The mass immigration to Israel was resumed rather later than among other groups of Soviet Jewry;
they began to leave not in 1971 but at the end of 1973 and early
1974 after the Yom Kippur War. About 12,000 Mountain Jews
had arrived in Israel by the mid-1980s, and from 1989 through
1992 about another 5,000 reached Israel. In 2002, 3,394 were
living in the Russian Federation.
583
mount of olives
Literature
The most important literary heritage of the Mountain Jews is
the national epic in Judeo-Tat, Shiraha (the name probably
derives from the Hebrew shirah, poem), which abounds in
biblical associations and figures. One of the most beautiful
poems is the Song of the Mountain Jews, which expresses
their yearning for the ancient homeland so near, in front
of your eyes, put out your hand and touch it. It also mentions the maids of Deborah, the brave horsemen of Samson, and the heirs of Bar Kokhba. The epic was translated
into Yiddish by the Soviet-Jewish writer M. Helmond. Mishi
(Moshe) Bakhsheyev, poet, novelist, and playwright, born in
Derbent in 1910, laid the foundations for the modern Tat literature, which began to develop in the 1930s. His publications
include Earth, a play dealing with life on a Jewish kolkhoz,
a novel Cluster of Grapes, and a collection of poetry. Other
poets are Amrami Isakov, whose collection of childrens songs
has been translated into Russian, and Zion Izagayev, who
has published three volumes of poems. A literary almanac,
Woton Sovetimag (Soviet Homeland), the first of its kind in
Judeo-Tat, edited by Hizigil (Ezekiel) Avshalomov and published in Makhachkala in 1963, assembled the works of 27 Tat
writers, selecting mainly works which reflect the integration
of the Mountain Jews in Soviet society. Visitors to the region
reported a deep-felt longing for the State of Israel among the
Mountain Jews, which became particularly strong after the
1967 Six-Day War, in spite of the official anti-Israel propaganda campaign (see also *Judeo-Tat).
MOUNT OF OLIVES (Olivet), mountain overlooking *Jerusalem from the east, beyond the *Kidron Brook. From the
orographic point of view, the Mount of Olives is part of a spur
projecting near Mount Scopus (Ras al-Mushrif), from the
country-long water divide which continues southward. The
Mount of Olives ridge has three peaks. Upon the highest,
2,684 ft. (826 meters) above sea level, the original buildings of
the *Hebrew University were constructed and opened in 1925.
This area is commonly, although mistakenly, known as Mount
Scopus. On the second peak, 2,645 ft. (814 meters) above the
sea, is the site of Augusta Victoria Hospital. On the third,
2,652 ft. (816 meters) high, lies the Arab village of al-Tr (hahar, the mountain), an epithet whose source is in the Aramaic
name of the Mount of Olives, Tura Zita. The Mount of Olives
ends in this peak, though a spur of it continues to Ras al-Amd
(2,444 ft.; 752 meters), draining to the Kidron brook southward, to the village of *Shiloah (Silwn). Even at its highest, the
Mount of Olives is lower than the highest point in the Rome-
584
Bibliography: M. Altschuler, The Jews of the Eastern Caucasus: The History of the Mountain Jews from the Beginning of the 19t
Century (1990); Z. Anisimov, in: Ha-Shiloah , 18 (1908); D.G. Maggid,
Yevrei na Kavkaze (1918); Yu. Larin, Yevrei i Anti-semitizm v S.S.S.R.
(1929); M.M. Ikhilov, in: Sovetskaya Etnologiya, 1 (1950); A.L. Eliav,
Between Hammer and Sickle (19692), 16671.
[Mordkhai Neishtat / Michael Zand /
The Shorter Jewish Encyclopaedia in Russian]
mourning
Once the Jews were authorized to return to Jerusalem by
the Arab conquerors, the pilgrimages to Jerusalem were also
resumed. These pilgrimages generally took place during the
month of Tishri. In these, the Mount of Olives held an important place, especially from the end of the eighth century, when
the Jews were no longer allowed to enter the Temple Mount.
On the festival of *Hoshana Rabba, they circled the Mount of
Olives seven times, in song and prayer. On Hoshana Rabba,
the Palestinian rosh yeshivah announced the Proclamation of
the Mount of Olives concerning the new moons, the festivals,
and the intercalation of years, a practice which was based on
the ancient kindling of beacons on new moons on the Mount
of Olives. On this same day, the rosh yeshivah appointed members to the Great Sanhedrin and accorded titles of honor to
those who had worked in favor of the Palestinian academy.
Bans on the unobservant and on those who rebelled against
authority, especially against the Karaites, were not lacking on
such occasions. The clashes with the Karaites resulted in the
intervention of the authorities, and they even prohibited the
rashei yeshivah from issuing bans.
The choice of the Mount of Olives as the site of pilgrimages and gatherings was based on midrashic tradition: The
Divine Presence traveled ten journeys, from the cover of the
Ark to the Cherub and from the Town to the Mount of Olives (RH 31a; Lam. R., Proem 25). In the letters of the rashei
yeshivah, the Mount of Olives is referred to as the site of the
footstool of our God. A tenth-century guidebook found in the
Cairo Genizah points out the site of the footstool of our God
on a stone whose length is ten cubits, its breadth two cubits,
and its height two cubits. The armchair of the Palestinian rosh
yeshivah was placed on this stool during the gatherings and
the festive ceremonies which accompanied the pilgrimages.
From this spot, the rosh yeshivah addressed the celebrants, and
it was here that he received their contributions.
The site of the prayers and the gatherings was, according to the documents of the Genizah, above Absaloms Monument, opposite the Temple and the Gate of the Priest, which
was situated along the southern third of the eastern wall of the
Temple Mount. This corresponds to the open space above the
slope of the Mount of Olives, which is today covered with Jewish graves, to the south of the Mounts summit. Here according
to a medieval tradition, was the site on which the priest who
burnt the [Red] Heifer stood, sought out, and saw the Temple
when he sprinkled the blood (Mid. 2:6; Yoma 16a). The Arabs
call this area al-Qada (The Sitting Place). This name might
be an echo of the seat of the Palestinian rosh yeshivah during
the pilgrimages to Jerusalem during the Arab period.
MOURNING (Heb. ) , the expression of grief and sorrow over the death of a close relative, friend, national leader,
or in response to a national calamity. The lamentation (Heb.
( kinah, qinah); , nehi) is the specifically literary and
musical expression of such grief. The rite of mourning most
frequently attested in the narrative and poetic sections of the
Bible is the rending of garments. Thus Reuben rends his garments on finding Joseph missing (Gen. 37:29). Jacob does so
on seeing Josephs bloodstained cloak (Gen. 37:34). Joshua
responds in this way to the defeat at Ai (Josh. 7:6), Hezekiah,
to the words of the Rab-Shakeh (II Kings 19:1 = Isa. 37:1), and
Mordecai, to news of the decree of genocide (Esth. 4:1). Job
rends his garments on hearing of the death of his children (Job
1:20), and his friends tear their clothing to commiserate with
him (2:12). The rending of garments may be simply an outlet
for pent-up emotions, or it may have developed as a symbolic
substitute for the mutilation of the flesh. Almost as frequent
as the rending of garments is the wearing of sackcloth (e.g.,
585
mourning
II Sam. 3:31; Ps. 30:12; Lam. 2:10). Ezekiel prophesies that Tyre
will mourn by the removal of embroidered garments and the
donning of special mourning robes (Ezek. 26:16; cf. 7:27). The
woman of Tekoa whom Joab sent to King David was likewise
dressed in mourning garments (II Sam. 14:2), which may be
identical with the garments of widowhood worn by Tamar,
the widow of Er (Gen. 38:14, 19). Micah suggests that it was
not unusual for a mourner to appear naked (Micah 1:8). Other
mourning practices which survived in later Judaism are the
placing of dust on the head (Josh. 7:6; II Sam. 13:19; Jer. 6:26;
25:34; Ezek. 27:30; Lam. 2:10 etc.; cf. Taan. 15b), refraining
from wearing ornaments (Ex. 33:4; cf. Sh. Ar., YD 389:3), abstaining from anointing and washing (II Sam. 12:20; cf. Taan.
1:6), and fasting (II Sam. 3:35; Esth. 4:3; Ezra 10:6; Neh. 1:4; cf.
Taan. 1:4ff.). Isaiah describes mourners beating their breasts
(Heb. safad, Isa. 32:12). The Hebrew term for beating the
breast (safad, misped; Akk. sipittu) becomes a general term
for mourning (e.g., Gen. 23:2), which takes on the sense of
wailing (I Kings 13:30; Micah 1:8). Other rites of mourning
related to the hair and beard. At the death of Nadab and Abihu,
apparently, the Israelites uncovered or disheveled their hair
as a sign of mourning. Aaron, Eleazar, and Ithamar, who as
priests were forbidden to mourn, were thus prohibited from
following this practice (Lev. 10:6). While it became obligatory in later Judaism for mourners to let their hair grow (MK
14b), the prophets (Isa. 22:12; Jer. 16:6; Ezek. 7:18; Amos 8:10)
describe tonsure as a standard rite of mourning. Similarly
Job shaves his head on hearing of the death of his children
(Job 1:20). Deuteronomy 21:12 even prescribes the shaving of
the head as a rite of mourning to be observed by the gentile
maiden taken captive in war. According to Ezekiel 24:17 it was
customary to remove ones turban as an expression of grief (cf.
Isa. 61:10). The covering of the head may also be attested as a
rite of mourning in II Samuel 15:30; Jeremiah 14:34 and Esther 6:12; 7:8, if the Hebrew h afui is derived from the Hebrew
verb h afah, to cover. If it is derived from the Arabic h fi,
barefoot, which is also the root of Hebrew yah ef, barefoot,
the latter references may corroborate the testimony of Ezekiel
and Deutero-Isaiah. Alongside tonsure and the shaving of the
beard, the prophets take for granted the practice of cutting
gashes in the flesh of the hands or elsewhere (Jer. 16:6; 41:5).
They seem unaware of any prohibition against these rites. Leviticus 21:5 prohibits only the priests from making incisions
in the flesh, shaving the beard, and tonsure, as from all other
rites of mourning, except on the occasion of the death of the
priests father, mother, son, daughter, brother, or unmarried
sister. Leviticus 19:2728 prohibits all Israel from shaving,
cutting the hair, *tattooing, and making incisions as a rite of
mourning. Deuteronomy 14:1 prohibits all Israel from making incisions in the flesh and from employing tonsure as a rite
of mourning. In Leviticus 19 the prohibitions are motivated
by the desire to avoid ritual impurity, while in Deuteronomy
14 they are motivated by the striving for holiness. Micah (3:7)
and Ezekiel (24:17) mention the covering of the upper lip as an
expression of grief. The same practice along with the uncover-
586
Lamentations
Lamentations are poetic compositions functionally equivalent to the modern eulogy. Composed by literary giants like
David (II Sam. 1:17ff.; 3:33ff.) and Jeremiah (II Chron. 35:25),
these tributes were, in accordance with the standard literary
usage, chanted rather than declaimed. These eulogies were
frequently composed in a special meter, which modern scholars have designated as the qinah meter (i.e., lamentation meter). It is characterized by the division of each verse into two
unequal parts, in contrast to the usually parallel structure
of biblical poetry. Jeremiah speaks of a professional class of
women who composed and chanted lamentations (mekonenot,
meqonenot, Jer. 9:16). Their art was regarded as a branch of
wisdom, and thus they are called skilled (Heb. h akhamot).
Men and women singers made lamentations and preserved
them for future generations as part of the general education
of the young (II Chron. 35:25). Another expression of grief
was the exclamation ho-ho (Amos 5:16) or hoi (I Kings 13:30;
Jer. 22:18; 34:5). A specified period of mourning is only prescribed by the Bible in connection with the captive gentile
maiden (Deut. 21:13). She is required to mourn her parents for
one month. The later Jewish custom of seven days of mourning is observed by Joseph on the death of Jacob (Gen. 50:10);
the Egyptians mourned him for 70 (50:3)), the inhabitants of
Jabesh-Gilead upon the burial of Saul and Jonathan (I Sam.
mourning
31:13 = I Chron. 10:12), and Job and his friends at the height of
Jobs suffering (Job 2:13). Daniels observance of three weeks
of mourning (Dan. 10:2) may reflect the authors awareness of
the week as a standard period of mourning. Moses and Aaron
were each mourned for 30 days (Num. 20:29; Deut. 34:8),
while Jacob and Ephraim each mourned many days (Gen.
37:34; I Chron. 7:22) for their children. While Jeremiah (41:5)
tells of contemporaries who expressed grief by bringing sacrifices to the Temple, Nehemiah (Neh. 8:9) suggests the incompatibility of religious festivities and mourning (cf. Taan. 2:8,
10). The comforting of mourners is accomplished by the tenderly spoken word (Isa. 40:12), by sitting with the mourner
(Job. 2:13), by providing him with compensation for his loss
(Gen. 24:67; Isa. 60:29), and by offering him bread and wine
(II Sam. 3:35; Jer. 16:7). The bread is called bread of agony
(leh em onashim, Ezek. 24:17; cf. leh em onim in Hos. 9:4), and
the wine, the cup of consolation (Jer. 16:7). The serving of
such a meal has been variously explained as an affirmation of
the bonds between the survivors, a reaffirmation of life itself
after a period of fasting from death to burial, and as an act of
conviviality with the soul of the deceased.
[Mayer Irwin Gruber]
587
mourning
SHELOSHIM. Modified mourning continued through the sheloshim period when the mourner was told not to cut the hair
and wear pressed clothes (MK 27b). During the sheloshim it
was also forbidden for the mourner to marry, to attend places
of entertainment or festive events (even when primarily of religious significance), to embark on a business journey, or to
participate in social gatherings (MK 22b23a; Yad, Avel 6:2).
When mourning for parents, some of the above prohibitions
remained applicable during the entire 12 months following the
day of death. The mourner was not permitted to trim his hair
until his companions rebuked him. He was also enjoined from
entering a house of rejoicing during this period (MK 22b).
RELATIONSHIPS REQUIRING MOURNING. The observance
of these formal rules of mourning was required for the nearest
of kin corresponding to those for whom a priest was to defile
himself, i.e., a wife (husband), father, mother, son, daughter,
brother, and sister (Lev. 21:13; MK 20b), but not an infant less
than 30 days old (Yad, Avel 1:6). The Talmud also relates instances when aspects of mourning were observed upon the
death of teachers and scholars. Thus when R. Johanan died,
R. Ammi observed the seven and the 30 days of mourning
(MK 25b). In mourning for a h akham one bared the arm and
shoulder on the right for the av bet din on the left, and for a
nasi on both sides (MK 22b; Sem. 9:2).
TERMINATION OF MOURNING. Although the Sabbath was
included in the seven days of mourning, no outward signs of
mourning were permitted on that day. Private observances
such as the prohibition against washing remained in force
on the Sabbath (MK 23b; Maim, Yad, Avel 10:1). If burial took
place before a festival and the mourner observed the mourning rite for even a short period prior to the festival, the entire
shivah period was annulled by the holiday. If the shivah had
been completed, then the incoming festival canceled the entire sheloshim period. If, however, the funeral took place on
*H ol ha-Moed, the shivah and sheloshim were observed after
the termination of the festival. In the Diaspora, the last day of
the festival counted as one of the days of the shivah and sheloshim (MK 3:57; Sh. Ar., YD 399, 13; 400).
Relatives and friends visited the mourner during the
week of shivah. Discreet individuals expressed their condolences in sympathetic silence (cf. Job. 2:13). In general, visitors were advised not to speak until the mourner began the
conversation (MK 28b). Upon leaving, it became customary
for the visitor to approach the mourner and say: May the Almighty comfort you among the other mourners for Zion and
Jerusalem. Rabbinical literature explained the reasons for the
choice of seven as the main period of mourning. Commenting
on the verse I will turn your feasts into mourning (Amos
8:10), it was explained that, just as the days of the feasts (Passover and Sukkot) are seven, so the period of mourning is also
for seven days (MK 20a). The Zohar gives a mystical reason:
For seven days the soul goes to and fro between the house and
the grave, mourning for the body (Zohar, Va-Yeh i, 226a). The
institution of shivah was considered even more ancient than
588
the flood. The rabbis interpreted And it came to pass after the
seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth
(Gen. 7:10) to mean that God postponed retribution until after the seven days of mourning for the righteous Methuselah (Gen. 5:27; Sanh. 108b). The rabbis discouraged excessive
mourning. Jeremiahs charge, Weep ye not for the dead, neither bemoan him (Jer. 22:10) was interpreted to mean weep
not in excess, nor bemoan too much. Accordingly, intensive
mourning ceased after the sheloshim. Thereafter, God declares
to the one who continues to mourn Ye are not more compassionate toward the departed than I. The rabbis stated that
whoever indulged in excessive grief over his dead finally had
to weep for another. It was related that a woman in the neighborhood of R. Huna ultimately lost all seven of her sons because she wept excessively for each one (MK 27b).
Modern Practice
Most of the observances described above are still practiced
by traditional Jews all over the world. In most communities
today there are burial societies or funeral chapels which arrange the details of the tohorah and the burial. The onenim
still have the responsibility of contacting the burial society, as
well as obtaining death and other certificates which may be required before the funeral can be held. They must also inform
relatives and friends so that proper honor and respect can be
paid to the deceased. In the house of shivah couches and beds
are no longer overturned, the mourners sitting instead on low
stools. With the exception that mourners no longer muffle
their heads, all the other restrictions are observed. Slippers
of cloth, felt, or rubber are worn instead of leather footwear.
Women also abstain from using cosmetics during the shivah
period. A candle burns continuously in the house of mourning for the entire seven days. It has also become customary
to cover mirrors or turn them to the wall. Among the explanations offered for this practice is that prayer is forbidden in
front of a mirror, since the reflection distracts the attention
of the worshiper. Another interpretation is that mirrors, often
associated with vanity, are out of place at such a time.
Prayers in the Home and Changes in the Liturgy
By the end of the Middle Ages, praying in the house of shivah was a well-established custom (cf. Shab. 152ab). Nowadays a *minyan gathers in the house of mourning for the
daily Shah arit and Minh ah-Maariv services. For the reading
of the Law during these home services a Torah Scroll may
be borrowed from the communal synagogue, provided that
proper facilities for its care are available and that it will be
read on three occasions. If it is not possible to obtain a minyan
in the home, the mourner may attend the synagogue for services and the recitation of *Kaddish. Generally the mourner
attends the synagogue for Sabbath and festival service. In the
house of mourning and in the mourners personal prayers,
the following changes in the normal order of the services are
made:
(1) The talmudical passage pittum ha-ketoret (Ker. 6a;
Hertz, Prayer, 546), describing the compounding of the inENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
mouse
censes for daily offering in the Temple, is omitted by the
mourner since he is forbidden to study Torah.
(2) Likewise the mourner omits the recitation of eizehu
mekoman, the chapter of the Mishnah which describes the
appointed places for the various animal sacrifices (Zev. 5:18;
Hertz, Prayer, 3840).
(3) The *Priestly Blessing (Num. 6:2426; Hertz, Prayer,
154), which concludes with the greeting of peace, is omitted in
the house of mourning because the mourner may not extend
greetings. In Jerusalem, however, it is recited.
(4) *Tah anun (Hertz, Prayer, 16886) is omitted because
its theme, I have sinned before thee, is deemed inappropriate for a mourner.
(5) Psalm 20 (Hertz, Prayer, 200) is also omitted because
it will intensify the mourners grief during his day of trouble (Ps. 20:2).
(6) The verse beginning, And as for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the Lord is omitted from the u-Va leZ iyyon (Hertz, Prayer, 202) because the mourner does not desire a covenant which will perpetuate his unhappy situation.
(7) Psalm 49, which declares that the injustices and inequalities of human existence are corrected in the hereafter, is
recited after the daily service in the house of mourning (Hertz,
Prayer, 108890).
(8) The mourner omits the six Psalms (9599; 29) recited before the Maariv service on Friday night (Hertz, Prayer,
34654). He remains in the anteroom until the conclusion
of *lekhah dodi. He then enters the synagogue and the congregation rises and greets him with the traditional greeting
extended to mourners: May the Almighty Hertz, Prayer,
358).
(9) *Hallel (Hertz, Prayer, 75672) is not recited in the
house of shivah on *Rosh H odesh because it contains such
verses as The dead praise not the Lord, neither any that go
down into silence (Ps. 115:17), and This is the day which the
Lord hath made, we will rejoice and be glad in it (Ps. 118:24).
In most rites, however, it is recited when the mourners leave
the room. If Rosh H odesh coincides with the Sabbath, Hallel should be recited even if the services are being held in the
house of mourning since no public display of mourning is
permissible on the Sabbath.
(10) The mourner is not called up to the reading of the
Law during the week of shivah even if he is the only kohen or
levite in the congregation.
There are indications that it was customary for mourners to wear black throughout the sheloshim (Yoma 39b; Shab.
114a; Sem. 2:8). Nowadays, however, Jews are not permitted
to dress in black clothing or to wear black armbands as signs
of mourning since these are considered non-Jewish customs
(see *H ukkat ha-Goi). Similarly, the bringing of gifts to the
house of shivah is considered an emulation of non-Jewish
practice. During the sheloshim period it is customary for the
mourner to change his synagogue seat for weekday services.
When mourning for parents, a different seat is occupied during the entire 12-month period. The *Kaddish, however, is reENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
589
MOWSHOWITZ, ISRAEL (19141991), U.S. rabbi, political intermediary. Mowshowitz was born in Poland and immigrated to the United States with his family in 1929. He attended Yeshiva University, where he earned a B.A., and was
ordained at its Rabbi Yitzhak Elchanan Theological Seminary
in 1937. He earned a Ph.D. in psychology from Duke University
and Yeshiva University awarded him an honorary doctorate
in 1966. Although trained as an Orthodox rabbi, the pulpits
he held were at Conservative synagogues, first in Durham,
N.C., and then at Omaha, Nebraska. In 1949, he was appointed
rabbi of Hillcrest Jewish Center in Queens, N.Y., becoming
rabbi emeritus in 1983.
Respected in both the Orthodox and Conservative movements, Mowshowitz rose to become arguably the most prominent Jewish communal leader in the city and state. He was a
founder of the International Synagogue at Kennedy International Airport and served as its honorary president. He also
served on the boards of numerous charitable, interfaith, and
interracial organizations in New York.
590
MOYAL, ESTHER (18731948), Arabic journalist and feminist. Esther Moyal, a member of the Lazari (al-Azhar) family
of *Beirut, began taking part in public affairs in 1893, while she
was teaching for the Scottish Church mission. She took over
the correspondence of the Lebanese Womens League and in
the same year was sent to Chicago to represent *Lebanon at
the International Womens Conference. She was active in various womens organizations such as Bkrat Sriya (The Dawn
of Syria) and Nahd at al-Nis (The Awakening Women). In
1894 she married a medical student, Simon Moyal, in *Jaffa.
After he qualified they settled in *Cairo, where in 1898 Esther
founded the monthly al-ila (The Family), which became a
weekly in 1904. She also became a frequent contributor to the
leading Cairo daily, al-Ahrm and the Egyptian literary periodical al-Hill. The Moyals moved to Jaffa in 1908 and the
following year she helped establish an organization of Jewish
women in the city. In 1913 she became joint editor with her
husband of the Jaffa periodical, S awt al-Uthmniyya (The
Voice of Ottomanism). Widowed in 1915, she went to live
in Marseilles, returning to Jaffa in the mid-1940s. Her writings include a life of Emile Zola and Arabic translations of
French books.
[Hayyim J. Cohen]
MOZ A or (Ha)Moz ah (Heb. ,) , town in Benjamin mentioned in the city list of Benjamin with Miz peh and
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
Mozes
Chephirah (Josh. 18:26) and in the genealogy of Benjamin
with Alemeth, Azmaveth, and Eleasah (I Chron. 8:36). The
name also occurs in the genealogy of Caleb (I Chron. 2:46),
but a connection between this Moz a and the Benjamite Moz a
is doubtful, as another locality might be meant. According to
one reading, the Ms h seal stamps found on jar handles at
Jericho and Tell ab-Nas ba and belonging to the Persian period attest the existence of an administrative center at Moza at
that time. It is identified with Khirbat Beit Mizza to the west
of Jerusalem and situated near a spring in a valley rich in olive
groves and vineyards. It is probably identical with the Roman
colony *Emmaus, established by Vespasian after the siege of
Jerusalem at a distance of 30 stadia (c. 3 mi.) from Jerusalem;
he settled 800 veterans there (Jos., Wars, 7:217). A village below Jerusalem called Moz a, where willow branches were cut
for the rites at the Sukkot, is mentioned in the Mishnah (Suk.
4:5), i.e., in reference to the times before the destruction of the
Second Temple. According to the Jerusalem Talmud (Suk. 4:3,
54b), the name of Moz a was changed to Colonia and a source
of Colonia is mentioned by Cyrillus Scythopolitanus (Vita
Sabae, 67). The latter locality was probably at the site of the
Arab village Qlnya (see below). Remains of a Roman road
station, a bath, Jewish and Roman tombs, and a Byzantine
monastery were found in the area.
591
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
Modern Times
The land of Moz a (moshavah), on the site of ancient Moza, was
the first rural site in Erez Israel acquired by Jews for farming
purposes (by inhabitants of the old city of Jerusalem headed by
Yehoshua *Yellin in 1859). A few families worked the land and
terraced the hillsides, but did not live permanently at Moz a.
In 1894 the Jerusalem chapter of the *Bnai Brith founded a
small village on the site. One of the first industrial enterprises
in the country was a tile and roof tile factory which used the
local Moz a marl as raw material. It was built by the Moz a settlers at the beginning of the 20t century. In the 1929 Arab riots the village was largely destroyed and seven of its inhabitants were murdered, but the village was soon restored and in
1933 Moz a Illit (Upper Moz a) was founded as an adjacent
moshav. On the hilltop southwest of Moz a, *Kuppat H olim,
the Histadrut Sick Fund, opened the Arza Convalescent Home
in the 1930s, in the place where Theodor *Herzl on his 1898
visit to the country planted a cypress tree (at the time erroneously identified as the biblical cedar from which the name
Arza was derived). The tree was felled in World War I by
unknown persons. In the Israel *War of Independence (1948)
Moz a was in grave danger until the neighboring Arab village
of Qlnya fell to Jewish forces and was abandoned by its inhabitants. Although most of the inhabitants in Moz a were
employed in Jerusalem, some kept farms. From the late 1950s
a garden suburb of Jerusalem developed there. In 2002 the
population of Moz a Illit was 796.
moznayim
allied with Noni Mozes based on a 1986 agreement that
the two men would share the two-man directorship of the
newspaper for a 20-year period he was subsequently eased
out and sold his shares in 1997 to Eliezer Fishman and Haim
Bar-On (the owners of the Globes financial newspaper). Zeev,
who was Noahs nephew and Yehudahs grandson, was also responsible for moving the newspapers printing press from the
newspapers editorial offices in Tel Aviv to a bigger site in Rishon le-Zion. Oded Mozes, son of Alexander, had been eased
out years earlier when Noah Mozes set up a separate printing
press, named after his son Gilad, killed in a traffic accident,
to print the newspaper.
When Paula Mozes, Noahs widow, died in 1997, she
bequeathed all her shares to her son, Noni, asking her two
daughters, Judy Shalom-Mozes, wife of the Likud MK and
former foreign minister Silvan *Shalom, and Tami-MozesBorowitz, to give their brother power of attorney to administer the newspaper. In building a coalition, Noni initially gave
Tami management of Yediot Tikshoret, the sister company
comprising the chain of local newspapers and magazines, as
well as Yedioth Aharonoths share in the Channel 2 subsidiary,
Reshet. But she sold her shares to Fishman and Bar-On in
1998. Noni Mozes received a setback in 1997 when the Israeli
courts acceded to a petition to broaden the structure of the
papers directorship from two to five members.
After Yudkovkys departure from the paper in 1989,
Moshe *Vardi, a managing editor, and Rozenblums son, was
appointed in his place. Vardi possessed an uncanny ability
for identifying news stories and for news writing. This helped
the paper maintain the lead which Yudkovsky had managed
to bring about in the cirulation war with Maariv. In the mid1990s the newspaper was embroiled in an affair involving mutual wiretapping among partners and editors of Maariv and
Yedioth Aharonoth. Yedioth Aharonoths assignments editor,
Ruth Ben-Ari, was charged with wiretapping Maariv boss
Ofer Nimrodi, and its editor Dov Yudkovsky. Though subsequently cleared, Vardi, suspended himself from the editorship
during the two year trial. During this period Alon Shalev, a
news executive on Channel 2, was appointed editor. Vardi was
subsequently reinstated, holding the post until his retirement
in 2004. Rafi Ginat, an Israel television reporter who edited
and presented the investigative Kolbotek consumer program,
replaced him.
In 2000 the newspaper created its website, Y-Net, with
its own separate reporting staff. In 2005 it had 3.3 million users monthly.
The Yedioth Aharonoth groups was valued in 1997 at
around $450 million. In addition to the daily newspaper, the
groups properties included 17 local newspapers, a womans
magazine and shares in another, a number of special interest
magazines, a Russian-language daily newspaper, three publishing houses, shares in the Channel 2 subsidiary Reshet, two
printing presses, and two modeling agencies. Noni Mozes
share alone was valued in 2004 at $200 million. Concerned
at the power of Yedioth Aharonoth, and of other newspaper
592
593
On Mubashshirs death in 925 his rival R. Kohen Z edek succeeded him as gaon.
Bibliography: B.M. Lewin (ed.), Iggeret Sherira Gaon (1921),
11920; Mann, in: Tarbiz, 5 (1933/34), 1508; Abramson, Merkazim,
2123.
[Abraham David]
594
MUELHAUSEN, YOM TOV LIPMANN (14t15t centuries), scholar, polemist, philosopher, kabbalist, and one of the
great rabbis of Bohemia in his time. His name indicates that
he, or his family, probably originally came from Mulhouse in
Alsace; all that is known with certainty, however, is that he
was active chiefly in Prague, where he lived before 1389, that
he was among those affected by the Edict of Prague which
took place in that year, and that in 1407 he was appointed Judex
Judaeorum (judge of the Jews) there. Yom Tov was the pupil
of the outstanding Austrian scholars, Meir b. Baruch *ha-Levi,
Sar Shalom of Neustadt, Samson b. Eleazar, and particularly
of the brothers, Menahem and Avigdor Kara, serving with the
last two as dayyan in Prague. He journeyed a great deal in Bohemia, Austria and Poland with the aim of acquainting himself
with shortcomings in the observance of halakhah and custom
and rectifying them. There is information of his activities and
his varied *takkanot in Cracow, Lindau (German Bavaria), and
Erfurt, where he introduced permanent and amended rules
for the writing of Scrolls of the Law, tefillin, and mezuzot, in
the making of a shofar and the manner in which it should be
sounded, the order of granting a bill of divorce, etc. These
rules were adopted in many districts of Austria and Bohemia
and named after him. He also had a ramified correspondence
with great contemporary talmudists, including Jacob *Moellin and Jacob b. Judah *Weil. Between 1440 and 1450 he was
one of the heads of the council of the Ashkenazi communities
known as Vaad Erfurt (The Council at Erfurt), but its exact
date and activities are not known.
Yom Tov Lipmanns activity as a polemist gave him lasting renown even among non-Jews, who over many years produced a complete and ramified literature in refutation of him
known by the general name of Anti-Lipmanniana. He began
these activities early in his life when he conducted polemics
with the bishop of Linda, on the initiative of the bishop, and
in a spirit of mutual tolerance and non-provocation. Some of
the other priests of Linda disputed with him also, and part of
this series of polemics was later included in his Niz z ah on (see
below). According to a Christian source, Muelhausen went
595
serve a threefold purpose: the refutation of heretics, the attainment of philosophical truth and the establishment of the
foundations of kabbalistic mysticism. His chief kabbalistic
work is the Sefer ha-Eshkol (ed. by J. Kaufman, 1927) written
in 1413, which is wholly influenced by the Spanish kabbalists
of the school of Azriel b. Menahem of *Gerona, and in his
Alfa Beta the great influence upon him of the H asidei Ashkenaz is recognizable.
Muelhausens halakhic writings reveal his complete command of all rabbinic literature up to his own time. Some of
his many polemics were assembled by him in the Sefer haNiz z ah on which he intended to serve as a handbook for the
ordinary Jew compelled at times to wrestle with complex
theological problems beyond his ability. The work was written in 1390 and was much copied in manuscript. It was first
published by the priest Theodore Hackspan (Altdorf, 1644).
Hackspan strove to edit it with maximum faithfulness to the
source, and with the aim of enabling Christian scholars to
oppose it, but he did not succeed because neither he nor the
workers in his press understood either the language of the
sources or their subject matter. As a result this edition is full
of errors; despite this, it has great value for correcting many
mistakes in the subsequent editions. The first Jewish edition
was published in Amsterdam in 1701. It was only rarely reprinted because of the papal decree against its publication and
circulation, and there is a variety of bibliographical problems
connected with the various editions of the book. Muelhausens
method was to expose the Christian lack of understanding of
the Hebrew sources with their linguistic and contextual associations and to ridicule aspects of the Christian religion. His
great superiority over other polemists was based on his knowledge of Latin and lay in his intimate knowledge of Christian
literature the New Testament, the Vulgate, and the leading Church Fathers, as well as the works of the late Christian
scholars. Frequently his polemics are based on sound philology. His familiarity with Christian sources was, however, less
than that of Isaac *Troki, and his arguments are more popular
in character and not so logical. He undoubtedly made use of
early Jewish polemic material included in various collections,
among them an earlier Sefer Niz z ah on (probably by Joseph *Official) as well as of oral traditions. He selected and summarized the best of the answers, according to his understanding
and according to the taste of his contemporaries, connecting
them with topical questions. Among Christian scholars who
applied themselves to refuting his arguments may be mentioned chiefly Bodker, Sebastian *Muenster, and J. *Buxtorf,
and especially J.C. *Wagenseil, who also included short fragments both from the Niz z ah on and from the Niz z ah on Yashan
in his book Tela Ignea Satanae.
Muelhausens Sefer Alfa Beta, on the shape of the letters
and their inner meaning, was written for the benefit of scribes
of Scrolls of the Law, tefillin, and mezuzot and of those who
wished to devote themselves to esoteric study. It was published
in the second part of the Barukh she-Amar (Shklov, 1804) of
Samson b. Eliezer and its identity was recognized only about
596
mueller, heinrich
a century ago (previously it had been regarded as part of the
Barukh she-Amar). Muelhausen also wrote *haggahot to the
Barukh she-Amar itself, but these were incorporated in the text
so that they cannot be recognized. He also wrote Tikkun Sefer
Torah, containing the order of open and closed sections of the
Torah (see Sefer *Torah) as well as many essential scribal regulations. This work was issued by E. Kupfer and S. Loewinger
(see bibl.). Other works are Sefer ha-Eshkol and Sefer Kavvanot
ha-Tefillah (appended to Sefer ha-Eshkol, 1927), a commentary
on the Shir ha-Yih ud (see J. Kaufman, p. 80f.), and various
prayers and piyyutim printed in different places. His Sefer haBerit, on the meaning of the 13 attributes, was published from
a manuscript by E. Kupfer (see bibl.). Other works written by
him have not been found. Muelhausens works have important
historical value, particularly regarding the status and the situation of the Jews at the time of the Hussite wars.
Bibliography: J. Kaufmann, R. Yom Tov Lipmann Muelhausen (Heb., 1927); B. Mark and E. Kupfer, in: Bleter far Geshikhte,
6 no. 4 (1953), 7983; E. Kupfer, in: Sinai, 56 (1965), 33042; idem and
S. Loewinger, ibid., 60 (1967), 23768; I. Sonne, in: Studies in Bibliography and Booklore, 1, no. 2 (1953), 60f., 68f.; I. Ta-Shema, in: KS, 45
(1969/70), 1202; M.M. Meshi-Zahav, Kovez Sifrei Setam (1970).
[Israel Moses Ta-Shma]
597
mueller, joel
ish attacks on Germany served as a pretext for the outbreak
of World War II. On Sept. 27, 1939, Mueller was appointed
chief of Office IV of the *RSHA (Reich Security Main Office).
Besides being responsible for the murder of hundreds of
thousands of Soviet prisoners of war and an untold number
of political prisoners, Mueller was one of the key figures of
the Final Solution (see *Holocaust, General Survey). *Eichmanns IVB 4 Section was part of his office and Eichmann his
subordinate. Mueller participated in the *Wannsee Conference, representing the Gestapo, where the Final Solution was
coordinated. In June 1942 he ordered that the evidence of the
Einsatzgruppen murders be destroyed. As the war drew to a
close, he opposed all efforts to spare Jews. He punished brutally those involved in the 1944 plot against Hitler, including
personal friends such as Arthur Nebe. He made every effort
to remain in the background throughout his career. Ruthless
and efficient, he preferred to work in the shadows. Last seen
in Hitlers bunker on April 29, 1945, he succeeded in quietly
disappearing when the Third Reich collapsed. There were rumors that he was killed by the Russians or that he was in Brazil, rumors also that he was the enforcer among the Nazis who
escaped. Clearly, he eluded capture.
Bibliography: H. Hoehne, Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf
(1967); Institut fuer Zeitgeschichte, Gutachten des Instituts fuer Zeitgeschichte, 1 (1958), 169, 219, 232, 297; G. Reitlinger, Final Solution
(19682), index; IMT, Trial of the Major War Criminals, 24 (1949), index. R. Hilberg, Destruction of the European Jews (1961. 1985, 2003),
index. J. Delarue, The Gestapo (1964). Add. Bibliography: S.
Aronson, Reinhard Heydrich und die Fruehgeschichte von Gestapo
und SD; idem, Beginnings of the Gestapo System: The Bavarian Model
in 1933 (1969); H.H. Wilhelm, Heinrich Muller, in: I. Gutman (ed.),
Encyclopedia of the Holocaust (1990).
[Yehuda Reshef]
MUELLER, JOEL (18271895), rabbinical scholar and authority on geonic texts. Born at Maehrisch Ostrau, Moravia, Mueller received his early talmudic education from his
father, rabbi in Maehrisch Ostrau, whom he succeeded in
1853. After a period as rabbi in Leipa, Bohemia, and
as a teacher of religion in Vienna, in 1884 he began teaching
at the Berlin Hochschule fuer die Wissenschaft des Judentums.
Mueller published a series of rabbinic texts, chiefly responsa, of the geonic and immediate post-geonic period,
which are models of scholarly editions. The most important
are the post-talmudic tractate Massekhet *Soferim (1878), with
an introduction and copious notes in German; a post-talmudic
work on ritual differences between Erez Israel and Babylon,
Hilluf Minhagim (in Ha-Shaar 7 (1876), and 8 (1877); published
separately, 1878); Teshuvot akhmei arefat ve-Loter (Responsa
of French and Lorraine Scholars, 1881, repr. 1959, 1967); Teshuvot Geonei Mizrah u-Maarav (Responsa of Eastern and
Western Geonim, in Bet Talmud, 4 (1885); and 5 (1886); published separately 1888; repr. 1959, 1966); Maftea li-Teshuvot
Geonim (Introduction to Geonic Responsa, 1891; repr. 1959);
and Halakhot Pesukot (Short Geonic Responsa, 1893). Muel-
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muenster, sebastian
Jews settled in the city; their residence there was legalized by
Prussia in 1819. They officially founded a new community in
1854. The first prayer house was situated in the Loerstrasse;
the cemetery was established in 1811, and the synagogue was
built in 1880.
From 1816 Landrabbiner Abraham *Sutro lived in Muenster, although he did not act as rabbi of the community, which
in 1879 appointed Dr. J. Mansbach as preacher and cantor.
He was succeeded by S. Kessler. The first rabbi, who took
office in 1919, was Dr. Fritz Steinthal (who immigrated to
South America in 1938). His successor, Dr. Julius Voos of
Kamen, was deported to *Auschwitz in 1943. Among the most
notable members of the community were Prof. Alexander
Haindorf (17821862), co-founder of the Marks-Haindorf
Foundation for the training of elementary school teachers
and for the advancement of artisans and artists among the
Jews, and the first Jewish professor at Muenster Academy
(university); and the poet Eli Marcus (18541935), co-founder
of the Zoological Evening Society, and author of poems
and many plays in the Low German dialect of the Muensterland.
During the Nazi era, the community was reduced from
558 Jews (0.4 of the population) in 1933 to 308 (0.2) in 1939.
The synagogue was destroyed in November 1938 (see *Kristallnacht). The first deportation from Muenster city and district
(to Riga) took place in December 1941 (403 persons); in 1942
the last large-scale transport went eastward, followed by individual deportations in 1943 and 1944. After World War II,
a new congregation was founded which included, besides
Muenster, the Jews of Ahaus, Beckum, Borken, Burgsteinfurt,
and Coesfeld. This new community of Muenster numbered 142
members in 1970. The synagogue was built in 1961. The community numbered 101 in 1989 and 766 in 2005. The increase
is explained by the immigration of Jews from the former Soviet Union after 1990.
Bibliography: Complete bibliography by B. Brilling, in:
H.C. Meyer, Aus Geschichte und Leben der Juden in Westfalen (1962),
2513; idem, in: Westfalen, 44 (1966), 2127; B. Brilling and H. Richtering (ed.), Westfalia Judaica, 1 (1967), index; idem (ed.), Juden in
Muenster 19331945 (1960); F. Lazarus, in: ZGJD, 7 (1937), 2403;
idem, in: MGWJ, 80 (1936), 10617; 81 (1937), 4445; J. Raphael, in:
Zeitschrift fuer die Geschichte der Juden, 6 (1969), 74f.; H. Schnee, Die
Hoffinanz und der moderne Staat, 3 (1955), 5467; 6 (1967), 15371;
Leeser, in: AZJ, 73 (1909), 583ff.; Germ Jud, 1 (1963), 2389; 2 (1968),
5613. Add. bibliography: U. Schnorbus, Quellen zur Geschichte
der Juden in Westfalen. Spezialinventar zu den Akten des NordrheinWestfaelischen Staatsarchivs Muenster (1983); Germania Judaica, vol.
3, 13501514 (1987), 909; B. Ernst, Die Marks-Haindorf-Stiftung. Ein
juedisches Lehrerseminar in Muenster als Beispiel fuer die Assimilation der Juden in Westfalen im 19. Jahrhundert (1989); A. Determann,
(ed.), Geschichte der Juden in Muenster (1989); D. Aschoff, Juden in
Muenster (Westfalen im Bild. Westfaelische Kulturgeschichte, vol. 9)
(1993); D. Aschoff, Quellen und Regesten zur Geschichte der Juden in
der Stadt Muenster (Westfalica Judaica, vol. 3, 1) (2000); G. Moellenhoff and R. Schlautmann-Overmeyer, Juedische Familien in Muenster 1918 bis 1945, vol. 1 and 2 (19952001).
[Bernhard Brilling / Larissa Daemmig (2nd ed.)]
MUENSTER, SEBASTIAN (Monsterus; 14881552), German *Hebraist and reformer. Born in Ingelheim, Muenster
entered the Franciscan order in 1505. Turning to the study of
Hebrew, he became a pupil of Conrad *Pellicanus from about
1510, first in Rouffach, and then in Pforzheim and Basle. He
converted to Protestantism in the 1520s, and was a professor of
Hebrew at the University of Heidelberg from 1524 to 1528. During this time he found his true master in the Jewish Hebraist
Elijah *Levita, whose major grammatical works he translated
and edited beginning in 1525. In 1528, Muenster was appointed
professor of Hebrew at the University of Basle, a position he
held until his death from the plague. Muenster was a prolific
author and translator. He contributed significantly to almost
every aspect of Hebrew and Jewish studies, and next to Johann
*Reuchlin, he was the outstanding Christian Hebraist of the
16t century. Muenster reissued Reuchlins De rudimentis Hebraicis and published about 40 works, including Epitome Hebraicae grammaticae (1520); Institutiones Grammaticae in Hebraeam Linguam (Basle, 1524); Chaldaica Grammatica (Basle,
1527), the first Aramaic grammar by a Christian, based on the
Arukh of *Nathan b. Jehiel of Rome; a list of the 613 Commandments (Basle, 1533) culled from the Sefer Mitzvot Katan
of *Isaac b. Joseph of Corbeil; translations of *Josippon, and
of works by David *Kimh i and E. Levita; and a grammar of
rabbinic Hebrew (Basle, 1542). His outstanding Hebraica Biblia (2 vols, Basle, 153435), which is provided with an original Latin text independent of the Vulgate, represents the first
Protestant translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew into
Latin. Like Paulus *Fagius, Muenster translated into Hebrew
the Apocryphal Book of Tobit (Basle, 1542), which later reappeared in the London Polyglot Bible (165457).
He also published several missionary works directed
toward the Jews, most notably Vikuach (1539), a dispute between a Christian and a Jew, and a Hebrew version (with annotations) of the Gospel of St. Matthew (Torat ha-Mashiah ,
Basle, 1537). This work, dedicated to Henry VIII of England,
was the first Hebrew translation of any portion of the New
Testament. Muensters use of Jewish polemical literature, as
in the preparation of his Hebrew edition of Matthew, as well
as his publications in the field of rabbinic thought, provoked
many accusations of Judaization against him, by Martin *Luther, Guillaume *Postel, and others.
Muenster was also a mathematician, cosmographer, and
cartographer. His Cosmographia (1544), the earliest German
description of the world, appeared in many editions, and was
translated into several European languages. He also annotated
the Latin version of Abraham b. H iyyas astronomical and geographical work, Z urat ha-Arez (Basle, 1546).
Bibliography: J. Perles, Beitraege zur Geschichte der hebraeischen und aramaeischen Studien, (1884), 2044, 154ff.; F. Secret,
Les Kabbalistes Chrtiens de la Renaissance (1964), 141, 144f.; idem, in:
Bibliothque dHumanisme et Renaissance, 22 (1960), 37780; Baron,
Social2, 13 (1969), 2334, 432; E.I.J. Rosenthal, in: I. Epstein (ed.), Essays J.H. Hertz (1943), 35069. Add. Bibliography: L. Geiger,
Das Studium der hebrischen Sprache in Deutschland (1870), 74ff.;
599
muensterberg, hugo
K.H. Burmeister, Sebastian Mnster (1969); J. Friedman, in: Archiv
fuer Reformationsgeschichte, 70 (1979), 23859; J. Friedman, The Most
Ancient Testimony (1983).
[Godfrey Edmond Silverman / Aya Elyada (2nd ed.)]
600
cepted and aroused violent feelings. In the midst of this controversy, he died as he was lecturing to his class.
Bibliography: F. Wunderlich, Hugo Muensterbergs Bedeutung fuer die Nationaloekonomie (1920); W. Stern, in: Journal of Applied Psychology, 1 (1917), 1868; A.A. Roback, History of American
Psychology (19642), 21239. Add. Bibliography: M. Hale, Psychology and Social Order: An Intellectual Biography of Hugo Muensterberg
(1977); M. Hale, Human Science and Social Order: Hugo Muensterberg and the Origins of Applied Psychology (1980); A. Langdale, Hugo
Muensterberg on Film (2002).
[Helmut E. Adler ]
muhammad
the reformers, Aaron *Chorin, but later he took a strong stand
against their aspirations in general and against Chorin in particular. In 1803 Chorins book Emek ha-Shaveh appeared with
the commendation of Muenz, but by 1805 Muenz was presiding over the *bet din that summoned Chorin before it and rebuked him sharply, compelling him to rescind his progressive
attitudes. Although the civil government revoked the ruling
of rabbis headed by Muenz it was supported by the Orthodox community. His responsa were published by his son Joseph Isaac, under the title Sefer Maharam Min (Prague, 1827).
He also published, with his annotations, Peri Yaakov (Ofen,
1830) of Jacob ben Moses. Orthodox Jews of Budapest used to
visit his grave in the cemetery of Alt-Ofen during the days of
Elul and of selih ot. In 1949 this cemetery was cleared by order
of the government and Muenzs remains and the tombstones
were transferred to another cemetery in Budapest and reinterred near the graves of those killed by the Nazis, where the
custom of visiting his grave continues.
MUHAMMAD (Muhammad ibn Abdallh ibn Abd alMuttalib ibn Hshim ibn Abd Manf ibn Qus ayy; c. 570
632), founder and prophet of *Islam. Muhammad was born in
Mecca around 570 C.E. In his twenties he married Khadja, in
whose service he was trading; she was a few years older and
bore him several children. According to the traditional account,
he received his first revelation at the age of 40, following which
he preached his religion with little success in his hometown
Mecca for about a decade. The turning point was Muhammads
conclusion of an agreement with Arabs from *Medina who adopted the new religion and provided him with a new basis for
continuing his mission. The hijra that followed the agreement
marks the beginning of Muhammads Medinan period, namely
the decade that made Islam a world power. It is mainly with
regard to the Medinan period that a student of Muhammads
biography finds himself on relatively firm ground.
The scholarly struggle with central issues of Muhammads biography has not yet gone far beyond the starting point,
because the accounts about specific events in Muhammads
life, their chronology, and their sequence are often incoherent
or contradictory. In addition, they reveal legal and exegetical
biases beside political and tribal ones. The famous biography
of Muhammad by Ibn Hishm and several other early mainstream compilations were the mainstay of Western scholarship
regarding the life of Muhammad. But in recent decades an increasingly critical attitude to these sources has been adopted
by several scholars, which for the time being rules out the writing of a narrative biography along the lines of the medieval
ones. The creators of the accounts that make up the medieval
biographies were not unsophisticated and often had agendas
of their own, beside their wish to tell the story of the Arabian
Prophet. Students of these accounts cannot afford to be gullible or unsophisticated. Moreover, one has to bear in mind
that many of the medieval scholars, on whom we sometimes
pass judgment as if they were fellow historians, did not consider themselves as such, or in any case they were not historians in the modern sense of the term. The liberty with which
these compilers treated the received texts, for example in creating combined reports by putting together fragments from
the texts of their predecessors, is most revealing with regard
to their concept of history. Besides, their compilations were
products of their own time. Their foundations had been laid
well before they came into being, and in the cultural context
of early Islam that was marked by extreme conservatism, the
compilers had little room for self-expression and creativity.
The sheer amount of evidence found in Muhammads
biography is misleading; for example, one looks in vain for
the name of a fortress in which a certain tribe was besieged.
To some extent the lack of concrete evidence in the biography
can be remedied by resorting to other sources, since accounts
about Muhammads life are found everywhere in the vast Islamic literature. Even relatively late sources sometimes contain valuable evidence, because compilers who lived several
centuries ago still included in their compilations extracts from
much older works which have meanwhile been lost. In sum,
one has to throw ones net beyond Muhammads medieval biographies and employ relatively late sources, too.
Paradoxically, as more and more texts on the Prophets
life are being made available electronically or through the publication of texts hitherto unknown to science, Western scholars
seem to be less and less interested in finding concrete evidence
in this huge repository of source material. Such evidence does
exist, mainly in the form of background information regarding the society of Arabia at the time of Muhammad. The thousands of persons mentioned in the sources, their families and
property, in addition to the geographical and topographical
data, provide a firm starting point for the study of events in
Muhammads life, their chronology, and their sequence. Between the naivet of certain past scholars who were unaware
of the complexity of Islamic accounts, and the total rejection of
these accounts as historical sources, there are several interim
positions. A rigorous scrutiny of the sources does point out
problematic areas in the evidence, but enough playing cards
remain in our hands to facilitate step-by-step progress in the
study of Muhammads life.
Many Jews are mentioned in the chapters of Muhammads Medinan period. The amount of evidence about their
relations with Muhammad is enormous and some of it goes
back to Jewish converts or their descendants. It makes up a
sizeable Jewish chapter in every medieval biography of Muhammad. Only a small number of Jews are treated positively
601
muhammad
in the biography and elsewhere in the Islamic literature. They
include several Jews who adopted Islam and several others
who helped Muhammad in one way or another. Other Jews
who appear in the sources were hostile to him: this has major
implications to this very day, far beyond the spheres of literature and culture.
Muhammad in Mecca
Arabia in general and Mecca in particular were not isolated
from the rest of the world, mainly because of the rivalry between Byzantium and the Sassanian Empire. Being a significant Arabian cultic and trade center, Mecca and its vicinity
must have attracted international traders of all religions. But
because of lack of interest on the part of Muslim informants,
and perhaps due to self-censorship and an apologetic attitude, concrete details about indigenous Meccans who abandoned idol worship and adhered to other religions, or about
foreigners living in Mecca, is scarce; after all, Muhammad was
accused by his Meccan adversaries of having had a human
teacher rather than a heavenly one. There is evidence about a
Jewish trader in Mecca who announced Muhammads birth,
lamenting the fact that prophecy had forsaken the Children
of Israel. This may well have been a legendary person created
in the context of the literary genre known as the proofs of
Muhammads prophecy. But he represents the Jewish trader
in Mecca and elsewhere in Arabia that must have been a wellknown figure. A relatively more convincing account concerns
a Jew from Najrn by the name of Udhayna who was a protg of Muhammads grandfather Abd al-Muttalib and was
trading on the latters behalf in the markets of Tihma or the
Arabian coast. When the Jew was murdered, Abd al-Muttalib
saw to it that blood money be given to the Jews cousin. Off
the beaten track one also finds relatively reliable data of Jewish women who before Islam married prominent members of
Muhammads tribe, Quraysh. For example, two elder brothers of Muhammads grandfather are said to have had a Jewish mother.
Since Muhammad himself was a trader, there can be no
doubt that he had had some contacts with Jews before becoming a prophet. Also his familys links with Medina, which had
a large and dominant Jewish population, point in the same
direction. His great-grandfather Hshim married a Medinan
woman, Salm, of the Arab tribe of Khazraj. Muhammads
grandfather Abd al-Muttalib was born in Medina and stayed
there with his mother for several years. Other Qurashs, too,
had close links with Medina in which both trade interests and
politics were involved. For example, when Ab Sufyn had
married Hind, who in due course gave birth to the future caliph Muwiya, the brides father, Utba ibn Raba, borrowed
the jewelry of the Ban Abl-H uqayq, a leading family of the
Jewish tribe *Nad r.
Muhammad at Medina
Negotiations between Muhammad and men from Medina
of the Khazraj and Aws tribes (mainly of the former, which
was stronger than the latter), referred to in Islam as al-Ans r
602
muhammad
It can be shown that the Jewish tribes, Nad r and Qurayz a,
in addition to several Arab clans of the Aws, owned castles or
special fortifications. Unlike the common tower-houses called
in Arabic ut um, pl. t m that were found everywhere in the
Medina area, these castles were military buildings only used
at times of war. In addition, the main Jewish tribes had huge
arsenals of weapons of different kinds that are listed in the
reports on the spoils taken from them. The above report also
refers to alliances between the Jews and the Arab tribes of
Medina. The Jewish tribes were part of the general system of
alliances that was supposed to preserve a balance of power in
Medina. In this system the Qaynuq and Nad r were allied
with the Khazraj, while the Qurayz a were allied with the Aws.
In the Battle of Buth several years before the hijra, the system was temporarily disturbed, when the Nad r fought against
their former allies, the Khazraj, alongside the Qurayz a and the
Aws. But after the battle there was a reconciliation between
the Nad r and the Khazraj following attempts by the Khazraj
leader Abdallh ibn Ubayy, who had not been involved in the
Battle of Buth. He was the most prominent leader among the
Khazraj, and probably in Medina at large, and was supported
by the Jewish allies of the Khazraj, namely the Qaynuq and
the Nad r.
The small group of muhjirn including Qurashs and
clients who arrived at Medina, followed by Muhammad himself, did not cause an immediate upheaval in Medinan politics.
Reconciliation between the Khazraj and the Aws was under
way, although several wounds and blood with claims were
still open. The tribal system was generally stable, with the exception of the occasional clan which had a dispute with its
brother clans. Muhammad did not pose as a political reformer
intent on destroying the existing equilibrium. It is true that his
monotheistic message had immediate political implications,
because the Arab tribal leadership of Medina was closely associated with idol worship. But as far as the Jewish tribes were
concerned, there was nothing alarming about that: they could
only rejoice at the sight of idols being destroyed.
The initial good intentions of Muhammad and the Jewish
tribes vis--vis each other were expressed, not long after the
hijra, by separate non-belligerency agreements with the three
main tribes, Qaynuq, Nad r, and Qurayz a. Besides having a
time limit, these agreements basically included an assurance
that the parties would not attack each other. Simply, the relationship between the newcomers and the native Jewish population had to be regulated by agreements so that trade and
agriculture could continue without interruption.
Muhammad directed his attention to his community
of disciples that included an increasing number of members
from the Khazraj and Aws tribes. One of his first political actions, dating back to the very first period after the hijra, was
the conclusion of the agreement known in Orientalist jargon
by the misnomer, The Constitution of Medina. The three
main Jewish tribes were not a party to the agreement, which
was far more binding than the basic non-belligerency agreements which they had concluded with Muhammad. The so-
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muhammad
But Muhammads brilliant achievement during the last decade of his life is proof enough that he knew how to choose a
propitious moment in the interest of his new religion. To understand why the Qaynuq were the first Jewish tribe to find
itself in conflict with Muhammad one has to consider two realities that can easily go unnoticed in the general tumult of the
evidence. The Qaynuq lived in Lower Medina, not far from
Muhammads territorial basis admittedly, this is also true of
the Nad r, who lived in the nearby town of Zuhra; both Jewish tribes were allied with the Khazraj. More significantly, the
Qaynuq lost most of their Arab allies. The Qaynuq were allied with the Khazraj, who were generally far more supportive
of Muhammad than the Aws. However, their alliance was not
with the Khazraj as a whole, but with a specific group within
the Khazraj, namely the Awf ibn al-Khazraj. The Awf were
divided into two subsections, the H ubl led by Abdallh ibn
Ubayy and the Qawqila led by Ubda ibn al-S mit. The two
leaders held equal shares of the alliance. Against the background of the conflict between Muhammad and the Qaynuq
Ubda repudiated his alliance with the Qaynuq. In practice this meant the collapse of their alliance with the Awf ibn
al-Khazraj, because it was inconceivable that one section of
the Awf, the H ubl, would fight against another section, the
Qawqila, in order to protect the Qaynuq.
This crucial account on the alliance a rarity in Muhammads biography that is otherwise poor in factual evidence provides a matter-of-fact behind-the-scenes insight
into the conflict with the Qaynuq. We owe it to Ubda ibn
al-S mits offspring. They were naturally proud of Ubdas repudiation of his alliance with the Qaynuq, which is emphasized against Abdallh ibn Ubayys refusal to move with the
times. According to Arab values, the abandonment of ones
allies was not a praiseworthy act; but there was a temporary
abandonment of these values in the context of Muhammads
conflict with the Jews. The reversal of values is reflected by
the expression the hearts have changed which is used as an
excuse at least twice in connection with the alliances between
the Jewish and Arab tribes of Medina. It is doubtful whether
the dialogues which include this expression really took place;
but obviously Islamic literature chose to refer in this manner
to the changing circumstances when the former Arab allies
of the Jews had to choose between their Jewish allies and Muhammad. By declaring their loyalty to Muhammad, they expunged the blemish of their former alliances.
The repudiation of former alliances with the Jews repeats
itself in connection with the other main Jewish tribes. The assassination of the Nad r leader Kab ibn al-Ashraf, the son of
an Arab tribesman and an aristocratic woman of the Nad r,
which was probably an introduction to the tribes siege and
expulsion, was carried out by his foster-brother, among others. The vivid account of how Kab was lured out of his fortress and the precise details of his assassination belong to the
change of heart theme.
As usual, one finds several alternative causes for the
conflict with the Nad r where one good cause would have suf-
ficed. Again a significant reality could easily have been overlooked. Some reports about the conflict with the Nad r have
it that Muhammad ordered his men to attack the Nad r who
were lamenting the death of their chief, Kab ibn al-Ashraf,
in their town of Zuhra. This suggests that the attack on the
Nad r was a surprise one. As has already been mentioned, in
addition to the common tower-houses which were also used
for residence, the Nad r had a castle only used at times of
war. But when Muhammad attacked them, they were in their
town, not in their castle. Indeed accounts of their war with
Muhammad speak of house-to-house fighting. The compilers of Muhammads biography felt an understandable aversion
to describing the attack on the Nad r as a surprise attack; the
attachment of a proper casus belli to every act of war was for
them a matter of high priority. The expelled Nad r probably
went to places with which they had had former trading links:
Edrei, Jericho, al-H ra, and Khaybar. Two leading families of
the Nad r, the Ban Abl-H uqayq and the family of H uyayy
ibn Akhtab, went to Khaybar.
Like the other main Jewish tribes, the Qurayz a concluded
a non-belligerency agreement with Muhammad not long after
his arrival at Medina. Agreements of this kind had a time limit.
In any case, some sources mention a later agreement that neutralized the Qurayz a and gave Muhammad a free hand to deal
with the Nad r. It is reported that Muhammad laid siege to the
Nad r, announcing that they would only be safe if they conclude an agreement (i.e. of non-belligerency) with him. They
refused and he fought them for one day. In the following day
he laid siege to the Qurayz a, demanding that they conclude
with him an agreement along the same lines. They consented
and he returned to the Nad r and fought them until they surrendered and went into exile. This valuable fragment seems to
have been marginalized in Islamic literature. Again, we realize that scholarly biographies of Muhammad which are solely
based on his mainstream biographies lack crucial evidence.
The war against the Qurayz a took place after the Battle
of the Ditch (Khandaq) during which Medina was besieged
by a coalition including Muhammads own tribe, Quraysh,
and several nomadic tribes. Unlike the war against the Nad r,
in this case one may speak of a real siege: the Qurayz a were
probably in their castle in a state of alert ever since the Battle
of the Ditch had started. The siege of the Qurayz a was rather
eventless, perhaps due to negotiations which were taking place
between Muhammad and the leaders of the besieged tribe. The
besiegers had only two casualties: a man who died of natural
causes and another who was killed by a millstone thrown from
the castle by a woman who was later executed.
The Qurayz a are said to have violated their non-belligerency agreement with Muhammad, although evidence about
hostile military actions on their part is meager. Reportedly, it
was the angel Gabriel who told Muhammad after the Battle
of the Ditch that the war was not over yet and that he had to
march on the Qurayz a. Obviously, the informant who brought
Gabriel into the story did not give much thought to the question of casus belli. Typically, when the Qurayz a surrendered
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muhammad alI
without conditions, Muhammad yielded the power to decide
their fate to a former ally of theirs from the Aws, who ordered
that their fighting men (i.e. all those who had reached puberty)
be killed and their wives and children be sold into slavery.
Several accounts make it clear that while this person, Sad ibn
Mudh, had undergone a full change of heart, other members of the Aws were embittered by the fact that the Qaynuq,
who had been allied with the Khazraj, had been allowed to
leave Medina unharmed through the intercession of Abdallh
ibn Ubayy, while their own allies were going to be slain. In
itself, the execution of a whole tribe was not a new idea: after
all, Muhammad had intended to execute the Qaynuq. The
Qurayz a could not rely on meaningful support from their allies, the Aws, for the simple reason that at the time of their
execution most of the Aws were not yet Muslims. Abdallh
ibn Ubayy, even after having lost some of his power among
the Khazraj following Muhammads arrival at Medina, commanded enough authority among the Khazraj to exert real
pressure on Muhammad and spare the lives of the Qaynuq.
It can be said that the execution of the Qurayz a is yet another
attestation of the collapse of the system of alliances that had
safeguarded the security of the Jewish tribes.
The last major episode in Muhammads conflict with the
Jews of Arabia was the conquest of Khaybar. Here too we come
across a little known chapter in Muhammads diplomatic history, one that is completely absent from his biographies, probably due to self-imposed censorship. The expedition of Khaybar (7/628) was immediately preceded by that of H udaybiyya
(6/628) in which Muhammad led an enormous army to the
fringes of the sacred area of Mecca. There he negotiated the
terms of a non-belligerency treaty with his tribe, Quraysh.
Muhammads medieval biographies include lengthy accounts
about the negotiations at H udaybiyya, making no secret of the
fact that Muhammad consented to far-reaching concessions
to the Qurash pagans. But there is no convincing explanation
of why he was prepared to yield to such an extent. It is an 11t
century doctor of law who has the answer. It is found in a discussion of whether it is legitimate for Muslims to accept humiliating demands if these are dictated by necessity. The case
in question concerns the demands made by the inhabitants
of a town which a Muslim troop needs to cross:
The Mecca-Khaybar conspiracy was adapted to the realities on the ground, since Medina is located between Khay-
605
Indeed the Messenger of God undertook in the non-belligerency agreement on the day of H udaybiyya, commitments which
were graver than this, since the people of Mecca imposed on
him to undertake to return to them any of those who would
come to him as a Muslim. He had fulfilled this undertaking
until it was abrogated, because there was in it a benefit for the
Muslims, owing to the conspiracy between the people of Mecca
and the people of Khaybar. It prescribed that if the Messenger of
God marched on one of the two parties, the other party would
attack Medina. He concluded a non-belligerency agreement
with the people of Mecca to secure his flank when he would
march on Khaybar.
Muhlstock, Louis
rebuilding Egypt. Despite his severity and his cruel punishments, the lot of his subjects improved. The public administration and the collection of taxes became more efficient, but
the reforms essentially took place in the fields of irrigation,
agriculture, industry, commerce, justice, health, and education. The relative security within Egypt encouraged commerce;
the members of the religious minorities, such as Christians
and Jews, also played an active role. Nevertheless, as a result
of his personal retention of various monopolies during most
of his rule, Muhammad Ali increased his income, but slowed
down the development of commerce. His experiments in reforming the system of justice ran foul of a lengthy tradition of
corruption among many qadis (religious judges); in order to
circumvent them, he established two new courts of justice, in
*Cairo and *Alexandria, to which he appointed Muslim and
Christian merchants as judges (in Alexandria, there was also
a Jewish judge); they were to deal with affairs of business and
commerce, especially between members of different religions.
Muhammad Alis generation did not complete the modernization of Egypt and some of his reforms were neglected after his
death; the seeds for the Arabization of the country had however been sown. In any event, the Jews of Egypt exchanged
the arbitrariness of the many rulers of the land namely the
Mamluks for the arbitrariness of a single ruler. Though they
were still oppressed, the authority of the law protected their
persons and their property. When taxes were levied, they were
treated in the same way as the other non-Muslims in Egypt,
i.e., without discrimination. Personal and material security resulted in an increase in the Jewish population in Egypt (Jews
immigrated there from *Italy and *Greece), and by the close
of Muhammad Alis rule there were over 7,000 Jews, including about 1,200 Karaites. Most of the Jews lived in towns and
were essentially occupied in commerce, crafts, and public
services. Under the influence of Sir Moses *Montefiore, Muhammad Ali did not allow the *Damascus blood libel (1840)
to spread to other places. The years of Muhammad Alis rule
of Palestine (183240) were a time of relief for the Jewish inhabitants of Erez Israel and especially *Jerusalem, which had
been troubled by the Fellaheen revolts.
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mukammIS , ibn marwn al-rqi al-shirazi alBibliography: M. Brann, Abraham Muhr, ein Lebensbild
(1918); idem, in: Festschrift Martin Philippson (1916), 34269; M. Antonov, in: BIH, no. 21 (1957), 11824, 177; Zur Judenfrage in Deutschland (1844); B. Mevorach, in: Zion, 34 (1969), 194f.
[Henry Wasserman ]
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mukdoni, A.
him a Jewish scholar. It is also not clear whether he was a Rabbanite or Karaite.
Al-Mukammis translated Christian commentaries on
Genesis and Ecclesiastes and wrote on different religions and
sects. A manuscript which contains most of his theologicalphilosophical work entitled Ishrn Maqlt (Twenty Treatises) is extant in the St. Petersburg library. Only a small portion of the Arabic original of the work has been published;
this corresponds to one of the sections of a partial Hebrew
translation of the work which forms part of Judah b. Barzillai
al-Bargelonis commentary on Sefer Yez irah. Al-Mukammis
work deals with such topics as knowledge and truth, substance
and accident, the existence of God, His unity and attributes,
prophecy, and the Divine commandments. The portions of the
work which are extant disclose that, like *Saadiah Gaon (Emunot ve-Deot, 1:1), al-Mukammis followed, generally speaking, the teachings of the Muslim Mutazilites (see *Kalm),
though he also accepted some of the views of the Greek philosophers. Like the Mutazilites he argued that the attributes
of God are not superadded to His essence, so that they would
introduce multiplicity into God. God and His attributes are
one, and only the shortcomings of human language require
that men use a multiplicity of terms in describing His attributes. Attributes describing God must be understood negatively, that is to say, they must be interpreted as stating what
God is not, rather than what He is (cf. *God, Attributes of).
Al-Mukammis holds further that a negative theology similar to his is already found in Aristotle. He rejects the Christian
doctrine of the Trinity as false, since it is based on the notion
that God possesses a multiplicity of attributes. He calls God
the uncaused cause. The soul, he holds, lives through itself,
not through a force in something else. The reward of the righteous and the punishment of the wicked takes place throughout eternity in the World to Come. Describing the history of
Christianity, he affirms that this religion has its root in two
Jewish sects: the Sadducees and the Jewish pre-Christian sect
of the Alkaraya. He points to the contradictions among the
various Gospels and shows that these writings contain no laws.
Laws were given to Christians only by the apostles Peter and
Paul, though Christians see the source of these laws in a secret
tradition stemming from Jesus. Since these apostolic laws were
few and insufficient, Christians added new laws at the Council
of Nicea, and still more laws were added later.
Al-Mukammis wrote extensively about Jewish sects, and
his discussion of this topic served, undoubtedly, as an important source for Jewish and Islamic authors.
Bibliography: G. Vajda, in: A. Altmann (ed.), Jewish Medieval and Renaissance Studies (1967), 4973 (Fr.); Steinschneider,
Uebersetzungen, 25962; Steinschneider, Arab Lit, 37; Baron, Social2
(1958), 9198, 2978, 327; Husik, Philosophy, 1722; Guttman, Philosophies, 7475.
[Shlomo Pines]
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mule
MULBERRY (Heb. , tut). Two species of mulberry grow
in Israel: the black, Morus nigra, and the white, Morus alba.
The latter is a comparative newcomer to the region, the ancient
sources referring only to the former. The mulberry seems to
have originated in Persia, from where it was transferred to the
Middle East. There is evidence that it was growing in Greece
in the sixth century B.C.E. In Aramaic literature it is first mentioned in the Book of *Ahikar, which was discovered among
*Elephantine papyri, where it says: My son, be not in a hurry,
like the almond tree whose blossom is the first to appear, but
whose fruit is the last to be eaten; but be equal and sensible,
like the mulberry tree whose blossom is the last to appear, but
whose fruit is the first to be eaten (Ahikar, Syriac Version A,
2:7). According to the Talmud the fruit of the mulberry ripens 52 days after the flowering (Bek. 8a). In I Maccabees 6:34
it is related that the elephants brought by the Syrians were
incited to battle with the juice of grapes and mulberries. The
staining of the hands by the juice is referred to by the rabbis
in their parable of the dialogue between God and Cain, who
pleaded Am I my brothers keeper? (Gen. 4:9): This may be
compared to one who stole mulberries and, on being caught
by the owner, pleaded his innocence. The owner replied: But
your hands are stained. Thus said the Holy One, blessed be
He, to Cain: Thy brothers blood crieth unto Me (Gen. R.
22: 9). The mulberry initially is white, then reddens and finally
becomes black (see Maas. 1:2). It is a large, long-living tree.
Until a generation ago, an old mulberry tree used to be shown
in Jerusalem near the Pool of Siloam about which there was a
legend (mentioned in a travel book of 1575) that Isaiah hid in
the hollow of its trunk when pursued by Manasseh. Apparently the town Bertotha (Or. 1:4; et al.) takes its name from the
mulberry. The white mulberry, the leaves of which are used
for feeding silkworms, originated in China and was brought
to Erez Israel at a late date. Joseph *Nasi planted extensive orchards of them in Tiberias in 1565 with the intention of developing a silk industry. This venture, however, failed. Another
effort was made in Petah Tikvah by the H ovevei Zion, who in
1891 planted 576 dunams (144 acres) with mulberry trees, but
this venture also failed. Nowadays the tree is grown in gardens
for its beauty and for the shade it gives. There is no basis for the
Authorized Versions rendering of bekhaim in II Samuel 5:23
and I Chronicles 14:14, as mulberry trees (see *Mastic).
Seminarium, the seminary for rabbis and teachers in Amsterdam. From 1835 he served as the superintendent of all Jewish
religious schools in Holland, and from 1849 was secretary of
the Amsterdam community.
Mulders scholarly and literary work qualifies him as
the Dutch equivalent of a late 18t-century Berlin maskil, his
oeuvre showing many parallels with that of Joel *Loewe (Joel
Brikl). Mulder made his name as a linguist, compiling, inter
alia, an abridgement of Loewes 1794 Ammudei ha-Lashon and
a Hebrew-Dutch dictionary (1831; with M. *Lemans), and as
a translator of the core texts of the Jewish liturgy. He translated large parts of the Bible (182738), the Passover Haggadah (1837), Keter Malkhut (1850), and Sefer ha-H ayyim (1851).
He also published a Dutch Bible for Jewish youth in 17 parts
(185055). In 1815 he had founded, together with Mozes Loonstein, the Hebrew literary society Tongeleth. Simultaneously,
Mulders work appears mildly influenced by the early German Wissenschaft des Judentums. He was the author of several
historical overviews, ranging from ancient history to Dutch
literature. As early as 1826 he published a (liberal) abridged
translation of Zunzs groundbreaking study of Rashi (1822).
Part of Mulders Dutch compositions were collected in Verspreide Lettervruchten (1844).
Bibliography: H.N. Shapira, Toledot ha-Sifrut ha-Ivrit haHadashah, 1 (1940), 55564; E.B. Asscher, Levensschets van Samuel Isral Mulder (1863); H. Boas, in: Amstelodamum, 52 (1965), 12635; I.
Maarsen, Tongeleth (1925). Add. Bibliography: F.J. Hoogewoud,
in: Studia Rosenthaliana 14 (1980), 12944.
[Yehuda Arye Klausner / Irene E. Zwiep (2nd ed.)]
MULE (Heb. ) , the offspring of a he-ass and a mare. Although a Jew is prohibited from producing such hybrids, their
use is permitted (Tosef., Kil. 5:6 cites an individual view prohibiting it). Since there were different strains of horses and
asses in Erez Israel, the mules were also of different strains.
The mule is a powerful, submissive animal, particularly suitable for riding and transporting goods in the mountainous
regions of Erez Israel, and hence was commonly used. Nor
was riding on it regarded as inferior to riding on a horse; Solomon, on the occasion of his proclamation as king, was made
to ride upon King Davids mule (I Kings 1:38), while Absalom
met his death while riding on a mule (II Sam. 18:9). Ezekiel
(27:14) speaks in praise of the mules of Togarmah (Turkey?).
The Talmud mentions white mules as being dangerous and
some sages were indignant with Judah ha-Nasi for harboring
them (ul. 7b). That the mule is sometimes dangerous, is sterile, and the female barren was regarded as proof that man is
prohibited from interfering with the work of creation. Rabban
Simeon b. Gamaliel maintained that the first to cross a horse
with an ass in order to produce a mule, thereby committing
an unworthy act, was Anah who discovered the yemim (Gen.
36: 24), which he explained as meaning mules. On the other
hand, R. Yose held that on the termination of the first Sabbath
after the Creation one of the two things which Adam did was
to cross two animals, and from them came forth the mule.
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mulhouse
He contended that thereby Adam performed an action of a
kind similar to that of Heaven, that is, he created something
new, to become, as it were, a partner with the Creator in the
work of creation (Pes. 54a; cf. TJ, Ber. 8:6, 12b). Some also
crossbred a stallion and a she-ass, and the Talmud gives the
characteristics of the two types of mule: if its ears are short,
it is the offspring of a mare and a he-ass, if large, of a she-ass
and a stallion (TJ, Kil. 7:3, 31c).
Bibliography: Lewysohn, Zool, 1446, nos. 168, 169; S.
Lieberman, Tosefta ki-Feshutah, 1 (1955), 99; F.S. Bodenheimer, Animal and Man in Bible Lands (1960), passim; J. Feliks, Kilei Zeraim
ve-Harkavah (1967), 1289. Add. Bibliography: Feliks, HaZ omeah , 266.
[Jehuda Feliks]
610
MULISCH, HARRY (1927 ), Dutch author. Born in Haarlem, Mulisch was of mixed descent, his father being a nonJewish Czech banker and his mother a Jewess born in Antwerp. Widely recognized as one of Hollands most original
modern writers, Mulisch published novels, short stories,
and other prose works notable for their imaginative use of
mythological, occult, and philosophical material to explore
the existential problems of contemporary society. His earlier works include the novels Archibald Strohalm (1952), De
diamant (The Diamond, 1954), and Het zwarte licht (The
Black Light, 1956); also a play about the 12t-century heretic
Tanchelijn (1960). Mulisch visited Israel in 1961 to cover the
*Eichmann trial, which inspired De zaak 40/61 (Case 40/61,
1961). Two other works on Jewish themes are the novel Het
stenen bruidsbed (The Stone Bridal Bed, 1959) and the autobiographical Voer voor psychologen (Food for Psychologists,
1961). In 1975 Mulisch published a novel on lesbian love, Twee
vrouwen (Two Women). Another novel, De aanslag (The
Assault, 1982), deals with the problem-filled life of a man orphaned in the war due to a cruel coincidence. In De ontdekking
van de hemel (The Discovery of Heaven, 1992), World War II
and its impact on private and public life take center stage once
more. This vast novel, with its multi-layered narrative, counts
as his masterpiece. The main story line has God renounce
His trust in humanity and reclaim Moses Stone Tablets with
the Ten Commandments. The novel comes to an apocalyptic end in Jerusalem. Mulischs work has been translated into
many languages.
Add. Bibliography: F.C. de Rover, De weg van het lachen:
Over het oeuvre van Harry Mulisch (1987); E.G.H.J. Kuipers, De furie van het systeem. Over het literaire werk van Harry Mulisch in de
jaren vijftig (1988); M. Mathijsen, Het voorbestemde toeval. Gesprekken met Harry Mulisch (2002); H. Mulisch and O. Blom, Mijn getijdenboek 19271951 & Zijn getijdenboek 19522002 (2002) (autobiography and biography).
[Gerda Alster-Thau / Maritha Mathijsen (2nd ed.)]
611
muni, paul
MUNICH (Heb. ) , capital of *Bavaria, central Germany. In 1229 a Jew called Abraham, from Munich, appeared
as a witness at a Regensburg trial. In the second half of the
13t century Munich appears to have had a sizable Jewish community; the Jews lived in their own quarter and possessed a
synagogue, a ritual bath, and a hospital. On Oct. 12, 1285, in
the wake of a *blood libel, 180 Jews who had sought refuge
in the synagogue were burnt to death; the names of 68 of the
victims are listed in the Nuremberg *Memorbuch, which dates
from 1296. The Jews obtained permission to rebuild the synagogue in 1287, but for several centuries they remained few in
number and suffered from various restrictions, which from
time to time were further exacerbated (e.g., in 1315 and 1347).
During the *Black Death (1348/49) the community was again
annihilated. However, by 1369 there were Jews in the city once
more, and in 1375 Duke Frederick of Bavaria granted them
(and the other Jews resident in Upper Bavaria) the privilege
of paying customs duties at the same rate as non-Jews. Some
612
MUNI, PAUL (Muni Weisenfreund; 18951967), U.S. actor. He started acting at the age of 12 in Chicago. Maurice
*Schwartz recognized his talent and persuaded him to join his
new Yiddish-speaking Jewish Art Theater in 1918. Muni got
his first real opportunity in an English role on Broadway in
We Americans in 1926 and his success was immediate. He had
a rich voice, good command of mime and facial expression,
and a capacity for varied characterization. He played his first
gangster in Four Walls, went to Hollywood and was acknowledged a star for his work in The Valiants (1929). Scarface established his reputation and I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang
seemed to confirm him as a player of tough roles. However,
he resisted typecasting and starred in The Story of Louis Pasteur (1935), which won him a Motion Picture Academy award,
The Good Earth (1936), The Life of Emile Zola (1937), and Juarez
(1939). These roles expressed his true stature as an interpreter
of heroism in spirit rather than in violence. Muni continued
to appear in Broadway plays, including Elmer Rices Counselor-at-Law (193133), Maxwell Andersons Key Largo (1939),
and in Inherit the Wind (1955). He also acted in the London
run of Death of a Salesman and played his last film role in The
Last Angry Man.
munich
Bavarian Judenmatrikel of 1813); among other privileges, the
Jews were permitted to inherit the right of domicile, to conduct services, and to reside in all parts of the city.
During the Napoleonic Wars, the number of Jews was
augmented by immigrants, and by 1814 there were 451 Jews in
the city. Two years later, the Jewish community was formally
organized. In the same year the community was given permission to establish a cemetery, and in 1824 a permit was issued
for the construction of a synagogue (dedicated in 1827). The
first Jewish religious school was founded in 1815 and a private
one in 1817. The community played a leading part in Bavarian
Jewrys struggle for civil rights, which lasted up to the founding of the German Reich (1871); delegates of the Bavarian communities frequently met in Munich (1819, 1821) to make common representations to the government. In the second half of
the century the community grew further (from 842 in 1848 to
4,144 in 1880, and 8,739 in 1900) as a result of increased immigration from the smaller communities (especially in the last
few decades of the 19t century). By 1910, some 20 of Bavarian Jews lived in the capital (11,000). There was also a steady
immigration of Jews from Eastern Europe, mainly from Galicia, which lasted up to World War I.
Jews were prominent in the cultural life of Munich, a
center of German arts, in the late 19t and 20t centuries, as
well as being more equally represented in Bavarian political
affairs than in other German states. After World War I a revolutionary government on the Soviet model was formed, in
which Kurt *Eisner, Eugene *Levine, and Gustav *Landauer
were prominent. It was routed by counterrevolutionary forces,
and a White Terror against Communists, Socialists, and Jews
was instigated. In the postwar years of economic and political upheaval, Munich was a hotbed of antisemitic activity and
the cradle of the Nazi *party; many Jews from Eastern Europe
were forced to leave Munich. Sporadic antisemitic outbursts
characterized the years until the Nazi seizure of power in
1933, when Reinhold *Heydrich and Heinrich *Himmler took
control of the police; the first concentration camp, *Dachau,
was erected near Munich. At the time, the community numbered 10,000 persons, including an independent Orthodox
community and many cultural, social, and charitable organizations. Munich Jewry was subjected to particularly vicious
and continuous acts of desecration, discrimination, terror,
and *boycotts but responded with a Jewish cultural and religious revival. Between 1933 and May 15, 1938, some 3,574 Jews
left Munich. On July 8, 1938, the main synagogue was torn
down on Hitlers express orders. During the Kristallnacht,
two synagogues were burnt down, 1,000 male Jews were arrested and interned in Dachau, and one was murdered. The
communal center was completely ransacked. During the war
a total of 4,500 Jews were deported from Munich (3,000 of
them to *Theresienstadt); only about 300 returned; 160 managed to outlive the war in Munich. A new community was
founded in 1945 by former concentration camp inmates, refugees, displaced persons, and local Jews. In the following five
years, about 120,000 Jews, refugees, and displaced persons
613
muiz-huberman, angelina
Juristischen Fakultaet (Abhandlungen zur rechtswissenschaftlichen
Grundlagenforschung, vol. 84) (2001); A. Heusler, et al., Biographisches Gedenkbuch der Muenchner Juden. 1933 1945 (2003); I. Petersdorf, Lebenswelten. Juedische buergerliche Familien im Muenchen
der Prinzregentenzeit (Studien zur Zeitgeschichte, vol. 32) (2003); W.
Selig, Arisierung in Muenchen. Die Vernichtung juedischer Existenz
19371939 (2004); A. Baumann and A. Heusler (eds.), Muenschen
arisiert. Entrechtung und Enteignung der Juden in der NS-Zeit (2004).
Websites: www.ikg-muenchen.de.
[Larissa Daemmig (2nd ed.)]
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munkcsi, bernt
function of the kidneys. He wrote Physiologie des Menschen
und der Saeugetiere (1881) and co-edited Zentralblatt fuer die
Medizinischen Wissenschaften.
Bibliography: S.R. Kagan, Jewish Medicine (1952), 163f.,
168f.; Biographisches Lexikon der hervorragenden Aerzte, 2 (1933).
[Suessmann Muntner]
their school system and to bring about a rapprochement between Rabbanites and Karaites. Munk also acquired valuable
manuscripts, particularly Karaitica, for the Bibliothque Nationale. Back in Paris, Munk joined the Consistoire Central and
was elected a member of the Acadmie des Inscriptions et des
Belles Lettres. In 1864 he succeeded E. *Renan as professor of
Hebrew and Syriac literature at the Collge de France.
Munk devoted himself to the study of the Hebrew and
Arabic literature of the Golden Age of *Spain. It was Munk
who discovered that the author of the philosophical work Fons
Vitae, which had been preserved only in a Latin translation
from the Arabic original, and whose author, called Avicebron,
was believed to have been either a Muslim or an Arab Christian, was none other than the 11t-century Hebrew poet Solomon ibn *Gabirol. He discovered a manuscript of Shem Tov
ibn *Falaqueras Hebrew translation of excerpts from Gabirols
original and identified this with passages in the Latin version
(in his Mlanges de philosophie juive et arabe (185759; text,
translation with an extensive essay on Gabirol, his writings,
and philosophy). The crowning work of Munks life was his
three-volume edition of the original Arabic text (in Hebrew
characters) of Maimonides Guide of the Perplexed from Paris,
Oxford, and Leyden manuscripts with a French translation
(Guide des Egars) and extensive notes (185666; Arabic text
re-edited by B.J. Joel, 1960). All subsequent translations are
based on this classic edition.
Bibliography: G.A. Kohut, Solomon Munk (Eng., 1902);
M. Schwab, Salomon Munk (1900); A. Jellinek, Salomon Munk (Ger.,
1865); H.S. Morais, Eminent Israelites (1880), 24752; P. Immanuel, in:
S. Federbush (ed.), H okhmat Yisrael be-Eiropah (1965), 23941; M.
Brann, in: JJGL, 2 (1899), 148203 (44 letters of Munk).
MUNKCSI, BERNT (Bernhard; 18601937), Hungarian philologist and ethnographer. Born in Nagyvrad (now
Oradea, Romania) into a family of rabbis, as a student in Budapest he came under the influence of several distinguished
specialists in Hungarian studies (including Arminius *Vmbry) and decided to dedicate himself to Hungarian linguistics
and ethnography. He and a fellow student undertook a journey, collecting linguistic and other data on the Sereth (Siret)
and Moldavo areas. Additional scientific trips were made from
1885 to study the language of the Votyak and Chuvash in the
Kama and Middle Volga regions. With grants from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Russian government, he
made ethnographic tours of the northern parts of the Urals.
After 1893 he served as editor of Ethnographia, and in 1900 he
was cofounder of a philological journal Keleti Szemle, Revue
orientale des tudes oural-altaques (190032), to which he
contributed numerous studies on Magyar culture, linguistics,
and history. During World War I he carried out linguistic research in Ossetic by interrogating Russian prisoners of war
who spoke this Iranian language of the Caucasus.
From 1890 to 1930 he served as an inspector of religious
instruction in the Jewish schools of Budapest. As a professional teacher, he helped raise the level of existing schools,
615
munkcsi, ern
specifically the Jewish ones in Pest which he had helped to
found. He prepared a program of studies for teachers, evolved
a series of tests, and edited textbooks published by the Jewish
community. Munkcsis Volksbraeuche und Volksdichtungen
der Wotjaken was edited by D.R. Fuchs and posthumously
published in 1952.
Bibliography: N. Munkcsi, Egy nagy magyar nyelvsz
(1943); D. Fokos, in: Munkcsi Bernt (1930), 1406 (incl. bibl.);
UJE, 8 (1942), 3940; Magyar Zsid Lexikon (1929), 6201.
[Ellen Friedman]
MUNTNER, ALEXANDER SUESSMAN (18971973), medical historian. Muntner was born in Kolomyya, Poland, and
received his medical education in Berlin, at the same time
pursuing Jewish studies. He graduated in 1928 and in 1933
immigrated to Erez Israel where, apart from his military ser-
General
The Murabbaat caves contained traces of human occupation at
six distinct periods in antiquity the Chalcolithic Age (4t millennium B.C.E.), the Middle Bronze Age (c. 20001500 B.C.E.),
the Iron Age (more specifically the 8t and 7t centuries B.C.E.),
the Hellenistic period, the Roman period, and the Arab period. From the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth of these periods
written documents were discovered. From the third period,
the era of the later kings of Judah, came a papyrus palimpsest
inscribed in Phoenician (paleo-Hebrew) characters. The ear-
616
murashuS sons
lier writing seems to have been a letter; part of it runs: yahu
says to you, I send greetings to your family. And now, do not
believe every word that tells you. The original writing
was washed out and replaced by four lines of script, each containing a personal name followed by numbers (perhaps listing
quantities of produce to be delivered by peasants to the royal
exchequer). From the Hellenistic period come two inscribed
potsherds (2nd century B.C.E.). From the Arab period come
some paper documents in Arabic and one or two Greek papyri. But the most numerous and by far the most interesting
manuscripts come from the Roman period. These last are specially interesting because their presence at Murabbaat is due
to the use made of the caves as outposts of guerrilla fighters
during the Bar Kokhba Revolt (1325 C.E.). There are fragments of Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Isaiah on skin,
a few tefillin fragments, and a piece of a mezuzah. The biblical texts are uniformly of protomasoretic type. The tefillin are
of the type which became standard from the beginning of the
second century C.E. onward, unlike those found at Qumrn,
which belong to an earlier type and include the Ten Commandments. There is a fragment of a liturgical document in
Hebrew and fragments of some literary works in Greek. There
are quite a number of contracts and deeds of sale in Hebrew,
Aramaic, and Greek; of those which are intelligibly dated, the
majority belong to the period preceding and during the Bar
Kokhba Revolt. There are several lists of deliveries of grain
and vegetables, one or two in Aramaic and/or Hebrew but
mostly in Greek. Some papyrus fragments and one potsherd
contain Latin writing.
The Ben Kosebah Letters
Chief interest attaches to some correspondence between
Joshua b. Galgula, apparently leader of the Murabbaat guerrillas, and other insurgents. One letter comes to him from the
administrators of Bet Mashiko (a village in southern Judea, it
appears) informing him that a certain cow has changed ownership. Another letter comes from the defenders of En-Gedi,
yet another from someone at Mez ad H asidin, the fortress
of the saints, perhaps meaning Khirbat Qumrn which is
shown by archaeological excavation to have been occupied by
insurgents during the Bar Kokhba Revolt. Two letters come to
Joshua from the leader of the revolt in person, whose name
is shown to have been Simeon b. Kosebah. (It was formerly
known that the name Bar Kokhba, son of the star, had been
given him by R. Akiva and other supporters on the basis of
Numbers 24:17, and the name Bar Koziba, son of falsehood,
given him by his opponents. His official designation Simeon
prince of Israel is also found on coins of the Second Revolt.)
One of the letters runs: From Simeon b. Kosebah to Joshua
b. Galgula and the people of Ha-Baruk (?), greeting! I call
heaven to witness against me that if any of the Galileans who
are with you is ill-treated, I will put fetters on your feet as I
did to Beni Aflul. Simeon b. Kosebah in [his own person].
It is not known who the luckless Beni Aflul was, or what he
had done; neither is there any information that would throw
light on the Galileans mentioned (there is no reason to suppose that they were Christians). The second letter (which, like
the other, is in Hebrew) runs: From Simeon to Joshua b. Galgula, greeting! Take cognizance of the fact that you must arrange for five kors of wheat to be sent by the [members of] my
household. So prepare for each of them his lodging place. Let
them stay with you over the Sabbath. See to it that the heart
of each is satisfied. Be brave and keep up the courage of the
people of the place. Peace! I have ordered whosoever delivers
his wheat to you to bring it the day after the Sabbath. Plainly
Simeon b. Kosebah was a man of peremptory temperament, a
quality no doubt desirable in the leader of a revolt. With this
requisition of wheat it is possible to correlate the lists of grain
and vegetables discovered in the same caves. The Murabbaat
caves seem to have been the last redoubt of Joshua and his
men and their families. The Romans pursued them there and
wiped them out, as they did to their comrades in Nah al H ever.
Some of the manuscripts bear signs of having been violently
torn up by the invaders.
Linguistic Importance
The Murabbaat scrolls provide evidence that the inhabitants of Judea were trilingual at the time of the Second Revolt
as they had been in the Herodian period: Hebrew, Aramaic,
and Greek were used by Jews with equal facility. One Aramaic
manuscript of earlier date than most (5556 C.E.) contains
the name of the Emperor Nero spelt in such a way as to yield
the total 666 (NRWN QSR) a pointer to the number of the
beast in Revelation 13:18.
Bibliography: Benoit et al., Discoveries in the Judaean Desert, 2 (1961); Yaron, in: JJS, 11 (1960), 15777.
[Frederick Fyvie Bruce]
MURASHUS SONS, prominent banking and commercial family in the Babylonian city of Nippur, active during
the reigns of Artaxerxes I and Darius II. In 1893 an expedition from the University of Pennsylvania uncovered 730 clay
tablets from the family archive dating from 455 to 403 B.C.E.
The texts deal with diverse undertakings such as payment of
taxes on behalf of others, land management, and the granting
of loans to be repaid at a high rate of interest. Some 50 of the
730 tablets contain names which were thought to be Jewish,
and this led some to deduce that the Murashu family itself was
Jewish. However, the conclusion is unfounded. Apart from
the purely indigenous name of the firm (mura means
wildcat in Akkadian), caution must be exercised in deciding
which of the names of the clients or witnesses are characteristically Jewish and which are merely of West Semitic origin.
The fact that names like Hanana (, Hanan), Minahhimmu
(, Menahem), Miniamini (, Minyamin), or names
compounded with l ( , El) are attested elsewhere in Jewish
contexts does not necessarily mean that their bearers at Nippur were Jews. They may have been Arameans or members
of some other West Semitic group living in Babylonia. Undisputed evidence for the presence of Jews is furnished by such
617
murcia
names as Ahiyama (, Ahijah, Aiyyah), Yahulakim (,
618
two of the community elders attended the meetings of the municipal council. Throughout the 15t century, Jews of Murcia
were often tax farmers, both in the kingdom of Murcia and
in other towns near and distant. In 1488 Samuel Abulafia was
taken under the protection of the Catholic monarchs for two
years in appreciation of his services to the crown during the
war against Granada. Solomon b. Maimon Zalmati printed
Hebrew books in Murcia in 1490.
Details on the departure of the Jews from Murcia at the
time of the expulsion are unknown but it may be assumed
that they left from the port of Cartagena. After the expulsion,
debts owed by Christians to the Jews were transferred to Fernando Nuez Coronel (formerly Abraham *Seneor) and Luis
de Alcalfor collection. Murcia also had Conversos, some of
whom remained faithful to Judaism. Conversos even used
to come there in order to return to Judaism; one such case is
mentioned in the La Guardia trial (1490). At an early date, an
Inquisition tribunal was established at Murcia.
Bibliography: Baer, Spain, index; Baer, Urkunden, 1 (1929),
index; H.C. Lea, A History of the Inquisition of Spain, 1 (1906), 550;
L. Piles Ros, in: Sefarad, 7 (1947), 357; J. Torres Fontes, Repartimiento
de Murcia (1960), passim; idem, Los judos murcianos en el siglo XIII
(1962); idem, Los judos murcianos en el reinado de Juan II (1965);
idem, La incorporacin a la caballera de los judos murcianos en el
siglo XV (1966); Surez Fernndez, Documentos, index; J. Valden
Baruque, Los judos de Castilla y la revolucin Trastamara (1968), 57,
69, 70, and passim.
[Haim Beinart]
murviedro
later as a commercial agent, taking no part in Jewish communal life. He published an account of events in Terezin-Ghetto
Modello di Eichmann (1961) and in several newspaper articles
(in Neue Zuercher Zeitung (Dec. 17, 1963), 3; Hamburg Die
Welt (Jan. 14, 1964)).
Bibliography: H.G. Adler, Theresienstadt (Ger., 19602),
introd. and index; Z. Lederer, Ghetto Theresienstadt (Eng., 1953),
1667.
MURRAY, ARTHUR (Moses Teichman, 18951991), Americas most famous ballroom dance instructor; businessman.
He was born in New York and trained with Irene and Vernon
Cast. After winning a waltz contest at the age of 17, he started
selling dance lessons via mail, by sending out footprint diagrams designed to teach students the steps of the popular social dances. Shortly after 1923 Murray opened a highly structured dance studio in New York occupying six floors and
employing dozens of teachers, which was followed by the establishment of an extensive network of other studios which
provided dance instruction in the U.S. and Europe.
In the 1950s, Murray and his wife, Kathryn Kohnfelder,
who became his dance and business partner, presented a longrunning television series, which helped to popularize ballroom
dancing. Murray is credited with creating many of the standard steps still used today in the foxtrot and the rumba.
In 1964, Murray resigned as president of the Arthur Murray Dance Studios but remained as a consultant.
[Amnon Shiloah (2nd ed.)]
619
musaf
MUSAF (Heb. ) , the additional sacrifice or prayer instituted on the Sabbath and the festivals. In addition to the daily
morning and afternoon sacrifices offered in the Temple, the
Bible prescribed additional offerings to be brought on Sabbaths, the three *Pilgrim festivals, Rosh Ha-Shanah, the Day
of Atonement, and the New Moon (Num. 2829; see *Sacrifice). These were offered after the regular morning sacrifices
(Yoma 33a). An additional prayer was already recited on these
days by some worshipers even when the sacrificial cult still existed (Tosef., Ber. 3:3; Suk. 53a). After the abolition of sacrifice
with the destruction of the Temple, the additional prayer was
formalized and took the place of these sacrifices (Ber. 26b; see
*Prayer, *Liturgy). There were some tannaim who regarded
the Musaf prayer service as exclusively communal, and they
held that it could only be recited when one worshiped with a
quorum (*minyan; Ber. 4:7 and Ber. 30ab). The rabbis, however, made the additional service obligatory upon every individual, both when praying alone or with a quorum, and they
endowed it with the same importance as the regular morning
service (Ber. 30b; Sh. Ar., Oh 286:2).
It is customary to recite the Musaf service immediately
after the reading of the weekly Torah and haftarah portions
which follow the morning prayers on Sabbaths and festivals.
It is, however, permissible to recite it at any time during the
day. Nevertheless, one who negligently postpones its recitation
until after the seventh hour of the day is considered a transgressor (Ber. 4:1 and Ber. 26b, 28a).
The Musaf is introduced by the readers recitation of the
Half *Kaddish. This is followed by the Musaf *Amidah which,
except on Rosh Ha-Shanah, consists of seven benedictions.
The first three benedictions of praise and the last three benedictions of thanks are identical with those of the daily Amidah.
The benediction Kedushat ha-Yom (Sanctity of the Day) is
inserted between these blessings. It consists of an introductory paragraph, followed by a prayer for the restoration of
the Temple service, and concludes with the appropriate selection from the Torah detailing the additional sacrifice for
the day. In the Musaf for Rosh Ha-Shanah three blessings are
added in the middle: the *malkhuyyot (malkhiyyot), *zikhronot, and *shofarot. In communal prayer, the Musaf Amidah is
generally repeated in full by the h azzan (Rema to Sh. Ar., Oh
286:2). In some congregations, however, particularly among
the Sephardi Jews, the h azzan chants the first three blessings
aloud with the congregation. This, however, is not done on
the High Holy Days, when the entire Amidah is always repeated by the h azzan.
The Sabbath Musaf Amidah, after the initial three regular
blessings, consists of a composition in which the initial letters
of the first 22 words follow the inverted order of the Hebrew
alphabet. This prayer concludes with the description of the
620
musar movement
Bibliography: Elbogen, Gottesdienst, 1157 and index;
Idelsohn, Liturgy, 1424, 284; E. Levy, Yesodot ha-Tefillah (19522),
4547; J. Heinemann, Ha-Tefillah bi-Tekufat ha-Tannaim ve-haAmoraim (19662), 34, 172; J.J. Petuchowski, Prayerbook Reform in Europe (1968), 24064, index (for Reform usage).
621
[Aaron Rothkoff]
musar movement
age. Blaser founded a kolel at Lubcz (Lyutcha). In 1872 Simah
Zissel founded a musar shtibl at Kelme. He also founded a
school for youngsters at Grobina, Courland, obtaining some
financial support from Orthodox circles in Germany. As
the Musar movement began to penetrate the yeshivot, both
through the indirect influence of its own institutions and
through the direct introduction of musar study and methods
(see below) into the yeshivot, sharp opposition arose from
the traditional yeshivah leadership. Rabbis and leaders, such
as Aryeh Leib *Shapiro and Isaac Elhanan *Spektor of Kovno,
openly opposed the new educational system, but without success. Subsequently some of its opponents explicitly renounced
their objection, while others ceased to speak openly against it.
By the beginning of the 20t century, musar had become the
prevailing trend in the Lithuanian yeshivot.
Methods and Goals
After its adoption by the yeshivot, and the earlier establishment of musar shtibl and educational institutions, the Musar
movement developed an individual institutional and educational pattern. The reading of ethical works, of isolated sayings from the Midrash and Talmud, and of verses from the
Bible served as vehicles for creating a certain mood and for
implanting certain feelings. The principal activity was to recite
passages from these works, or a saying or verse, to a melody
taken from the repertoire of the *maggidim suitable for evoking a pensive atmosphere of isolation and mood of emotional
receptivity toward God and His commandments, preferably
in twilight or subdued lighting (from a certain aspect this resembles the spiritual exercises recommended by Ignatius of
Loyola for the Jesuits). The reading of the intellectual matter
in the text served to stimulate an emotional response, which
was intended to help the student both in forming moral personality and in devotion to Talmud study.
Formally, the Musar movement was based on the study of
*ethical literature, although its conception of this was highly
eclectic, and its libraries included works by authors as diverse
as *Jonah b. Abraham Gerondi, Moses b. Jacob *Cordovero,
Moses H ayyim *Luzzatto (who had been excommunicated
in his time), and Naphtali Herz *Wessely (one of the leaders
of Enlightenment). However, several generations of study of
this variegated literature by many brilliant young men did not
produce for the movement, as far as is known, a single systematic commentary, either on the literature as a whole or on
an individual work.
In the minimalistic musar yeshivot, students devoted
at least half an hour daily to studying one of these texts in
unison, intoning them in the same plaintive melody. Unity
was demanded only in the melody used, each student being
allowed to read the book of his own choice. In these yeshivot, the *mashgiah (supervisor) became a second spiritual
mentor of the students, equal to the rosh yeshivah; in the case
of some personalities, such as Jeroham Lebovitch at the *Mir
yeshivah, he was even superior. The mashgiah held a shmues
(talk) with all the yeshivah students at least weekly, on either
622
623
museums
co-chaired by philanthropist and real estate developer George
Klein and Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau. The stated goal was the creation of a living memorial,
meaning a museum rather than only a monument. Kochs declared rationale was clear: New York City is regarded by all
as the cultural and spiritual nucleus of American Jewry and
is home to the largest number of Holocaust survivors It is
tragic that the city still does not have a fitting memorial to
the six million martyrs lost in the Second World War.
In February 1986, Governor Mario Cuomo was added
to Mayor Koch as founding chairman of the now State Commission. This new development allowed for greater leverage
in obtaining State-controlled properties on the tip of Manhattan in Battery Park. Other than allocation of land by the
State, the project was to be funded by private financing. Yet,
despite support by the local authorities, the project was unable to raise the required funds, resulting in repeated delays
and causing it to be nearly forsaken.
Finally in October 1994, ground-breaking ceremonies
unveiled Kevin Roches design for a substantially reduced
30,000 sq. ft. building in Battery Park, symbolically situated
opposite two major icons of American Jewish life, the Statue
of Liberty and Ellis Island.
Having weathered the ups and downs of creating the
new memorial since 1986, Museum director David Altshuler
enthusiastically moved ahead in 1995 to create the team that
would develop the Core Exhibit. Patrick Gallagher was hired
as exhibit designer, Yitzchak Mais, the former director of Yad
Vashems Historical Museum, was appointed chief curator and
together with filmmaker Max Lewkowicz combined to create
a novel approach to Holocaust commemoration.
The three floors of the Museum portray Jewish life in the
20t century, before, during and after the Holocaust, thus providing an essential but all too often overlooked context for this
tragic period in Jewish history. The exhibits integration of artifacts, photos, text and videos, depict the human drama and
highlight the personal narrative of individuals who actually
experienced the historical events. This allows the visitors to develop an intimacy with the historical participants, and results
in a powerful emotional experience that will be remembered
long after many of the facts, figures, and maps have faded.
The exhibits narrative, while emphasizing the particular
Jewish tragedy, permits its diverse audiences the opportunity
to also focus on themselves their own backgrounds, traditions and history as they encounter the values, customs, and
heritage of the Jewish people. The more universal a story is
in its appeal, the more it can bridge cultural differences. Any
groups life experiences are unique, but there are characteristics that are common to all people hope, desire, frustration,
fear, courage, and the instinct for survival. The museums innovative approach of highlighting Human history, with a capital
H, tells the particular Jewish story with universal relevance
for all audiences.
This approach is especially evident in the museums second floor, The War Against the Jews. In contrast to most
624
MUSEUMS. In her entry on museums for the 1948 Universal Jewish Encyclopedia the eminent historian of Jewish art
Rachel Bernstein Wischnitzer (18851989), founding curator
of the Jewish Museum in Berlin, cited the origin of collecting and exhibiting of objects of Jewish art and archaeology
as dating to 1863 when Flicien de Saulcy brought sarcophagi
discovered in Jerusalem to the Louvre. In this way, she wrote,
Since the excavations in Palestine and other sites of [Jewish]
archaeological interest were conducted by expeditions from
many countries, Jewish excavation finds found their way into
various museums all over the world Many finds were not
related to the Jewish cultural heritage, but the significance of
excavating in the Land of Israel was the study of the Bible.
Similarly, interest in the Bible and other texts of the people
of the Book led to the acquisition of important manuscripts
and printed texts as some ceremonial objects for libraries and
museums throughout Europe. The earliest group of Jewish ritual artifacts was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum,
then called the South Kensington Museum, in London in 1855,
just four years after the museum was established.
It is only in the modern age that there has been a concerted effort to develop museums of the Jewish cultural heritage with far-ranging collections to reflect the 4,000 year history of the Jewish people and Jewish life as it evolved in many
lands among many different peoples. Beginning in the 1890s,
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
museums
the formation of Jewish museums in Europe, the United States,
and in Erez Israel reflected the phenomenon in Europe of the
creation of public museums that began a century earlier and
specifically the establishment of ethnographic collections in
the mid-19t century. Prior to that time, collecting was the
provenance of the nobility and the wealthy. While private
wealth did enable some individuals to form collections of
Jewish art, in the period before World War I, with increasing
secularization, demographic changes, and the rise of nationalism, there was a growing trend to mobilize community preservation efforts and to raise public awareness of the importance of sustaining cultural heritage. Jewish art activities in
Europe continued to thrive in Europe even after the Russian
Revolution and World War I and heroically persisted even as
the Nazis came to power.
In the decades following the Holocaust, there was some
limited activity in Europe, but the major mantle of scholarship in the field of Jewish art became the responsibility of Jewish communities in the United States and in Israel. After the
Six-Day War in 1967, there was a tremendous upsurge in interest in Jewish life and culture. In America, this occurrence
paralleled a focus on ethnicity which significantly impacted
American life. Since the late 1970s the most profound aspect
of the emphasis on history as memory has been the building
of hundreds of Holocaust museums and memorials worldwide. The effort to preserve local Jewish history has been a
major impetus to establish Jewish museums in communities
across the globe by restoring historic synagogues, in many
cases where few Jews remain. Perhaps most astonishing is the
revival of Jewish museums in Europe even where the Jewish
community was largely destroyed during the Holocaust. By
the 1950s Jewish museums had been established or reopened
in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Greece, Italy, Spain,
England, Ireland, Scandinavia, France, and Belgium.
With the collapse of communism in the late 1980s, Jewish museums, many in restored synagogues and other former
Jewish communal buildings, have been created in the former
East Germany, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Belarus, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Latvia,
Lithuania, Romania, Serbia, and Ukraine. Several collections
thought to have been plundered during World War II have
been brought to light. An ironic consequence of the loss of cultural artifacts during the Holocaust, is the development of contemporary genizah projects, the search for once discarded and
hidden Judaica in Europe. The efforts of the Hidden Legacy
Foundation in London and the Jewish Museum in Prague for
example, have led to the discovery in genizot buried artifacts
of a number of communities in Germany and Czechoslovakia.
While these documents, sacred texts, and ritual objects were
buried because they were outworn or no longer usable, their
conservation has now become necessary because of the dire
fate of the locations in which they were placed for safekeeping
and the destruction of the communities that cared for them.
Over 20 countries with representation of several dozen
museums are members of the Association of European Jew-
625
museums
The first attempt to create a Jewish museum in Belgium
dates to 1932, but it was not successful. The 1981 exhibition,
150 years of Belgium Jewish Life, held at the Brussels town
hall was the impetus for establishing the Pro Museo Judaico.
The Jewish Museum in Brussels opened in 1990 and in 2004
moved to a building donated by the Belgian government.
The Anglo-Jewish Historical Exhibition presented at the
Royal Albert Hall in London in 1887 was the first major exposition organized to further interest in the historic preservation
of Judaic art and artifacts. Plans for the exhibition grew out of
the attempt to establish an Anglo-Jewish historical society and
motivated by the threatened demolition of the Bevis Marks
Synagogue, a landmark since its dedication in 1701. The exhibition was spearheaded by Lucien Wolf (18571930), a historian and publicist, and Alfred A. Newman (18511887), a collector of Anglo-Jewish books, pamphlets, and portraits, and
guided by Sir Isidore Spielmann (18541925), an organizer of
art exhibitions. Some 2,500 items were displayed, including
ceremonial objects, antiquities, paintings, prints, documents
and books on loan from some 345 lenders, both individuals and institutions and included the Strauss collection from
Paris. Another important collection was that of Reuben D.
Sassoon (18351905), largely purchased from Philip Salomons
(17961867), the brother of Sir David *Salomons, the first Jew
to serve as lord mayor of London.
A diverse, ecumenical general committee participated in
the planning of the exhibition and related public programs.
This inclusion reflects a political agenda that factored in the
rescue and preservation of the cultural artifacts of the Jewish
people. In England, as elsewhere in Europe and in the United
States, an underlying aim was to dispel age-old prejudices and
stereotypes and to increase awareness of the contributions
made by Jews and the Jewish community to society at large.
The Anglo-Jewish Historical Society was formed in 1893. The
London Jewish Museum was established in 1932, an effort
spearheaded by historian Cecil *Roth (18991970) and Wilfred *Samuel (18861958). The Jewish Museum is considered
the National Collection of Judaica. Important early collections
include objects from the Arthur Howitt collection purchased
in 1932, the Kahn Collection of 18t-century textiles, and the
Franklin Collection of ceremonial silver. For many years, the
collection was housed in the Library of the Jews college at
Woburn House in Tavistock Square, along with the main institutions of the Jewish community. Since 1995, the museum
has been located in the Raymond Burton House in Camden,
a restored 1844 building. Today, the London Jewish Museum
also encompasses the London Museum of Jewish Life founded
in 1983 to focus on the more recent history of Jewish life in
Britain from the late 19t century to the present. The Ben-Uri
Society was established in 1915. The founders, many of whom
were Yiddish-speaking immigrants, aspired to develop a collection of fine arts that would demonstrate the significant
contribution of Jewish artists. Today its collections represent
the work of some 350 artists and is one of the most important of its type in Europe. In Manchester the Jewish Museum
opened in 1984 in the former Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue built in 1874.
The Irish Jewish Museum, dedicated in 1985, is housed in
the now restored Walworth Road Synagogue, in the heart of
what was once a Jewish neighborhood of Dublin. The collections represent Jewish communities in Belfast, Cork, Derry,
Dublin, Limerick, and Waterford.
The Jewish community in Italy was the very first in Western Europe, and only in Italy has there been continuous settlement since Jews first arrived during the era of the Roman
Empire. Today few, if any, Jewish residents remain in many
of the once thriving communities. A number of synagogues
have been restored and often ceremonial objects, along with
a history of the particular locale, are displayed.
Rome is home to the largest Jewish community in Italy.
The Jewish Museum in Rome is located in the Tempio Israelitico, built in 1904 in the area of the old demolished ghetto.
The Jewish Museum in Florence is located in the historic 1882
Moorish revival style synagogue. Also in Tuscany, there is a
Jewish museum in Livorno, and the Sienna synagogue has
been restored. In Venice, all of the five synagogues in the area
that was the ghetto have been preserved. Each represents one
aspect of the communitys diverse background, the richly appointed interiors epitomizing the greatness of Italian Jewish
art. In nearby Padua, the museum is at the site of the last surviving synagogue, which dates back to 1548 and which was
actually closed from 1893 until after World War II. The Jewish
Museum in Bologna, located in the area of the former ghetto,
and along with the synagogue of Modena and the Jewish museums of Soragna and Ferrara promote an awareness of the
long, rich history of Jewish culture in the Emilia-Romagna region. In Piedmont, Jewish museums are found in the restored
synagogues in Asti, Casale Monferrato, and Turin. There is
also a Jewish Museum in Trieste.
Jewish settlement in Spain also dates to the first centuries
of the Roman Empire. The expulsion of the Jews from Spain
in 1492 was a major turning point in the history of the Jewish
people, and it was not until the second half of the 19t century that Jews returned. The Museo Sefardi in Toledo, Spain
established in 1964 which is now located in the restored El
Trnsito Synagogue, built between 1336 and 1357 by Samuel
ha-Levi, who held several important posts in the court of King
Pedro I of Castilla. Fortunately, in 1877, the building, which
had been used as a hospital and later a church, was declared
a National Monument. Preservation was begun by the government and completed under the auspices of the Museo Sefardi.
A museum has also been formed in Girona in conjunction
with the Nah manides Institute for Jewish Studies. Following the expulsion from Spain some 150,000 Jews fled to Portugal. But it was not to be a safe haven and in 1497 Jews were
forced to leave. The oldest existing synagogue in Portugal
was built in 1438 in Tomar. Classified as a national monument in 1921, it was donated to the state in 1939 for use as a
museum. Today it houses the Abraham Zacuto Luso Jewish
Museum.
626
museums
The Joodsch Historisch Museum (Jewish Historical Museum) in Amsterdam, founded in 1931 was re-opened in its
original home in the medieval Waagebouw (Weigh-House) in
1955. Eighty percent of its collection was lost during the war;
the rest was recovered in Germany. In 1974, the Amsterdam
City Council, which then held title to the buildings, voted that
the abandoned Ashkenazi Synagogue complex should become
the new home of the Jewish Historical Museum. Four historic
synagogues, two of which were built in the 17t century and
two in the 18t, were restored and physically linked to form the
museum. The buildings had been badly damaged in the war,
and the replacement elements are all of contemporary design,
symbolically serving as a reminder of what has been lost.
The effort to establish a Jewish museum in Denmark was
launched in 1985. The museum opened in 2003, in what was the
Royal Boat House, built by King Christian IV at the turn of the
17t century. The choice of this site is significant because it was
at the invitation of King Christian that Jews were fist invited to
settle in Scandinavia. Noted architect Daniel *Libeskind transformed the historic space for use as the Jewish museum using
the concept of mitzvah for the overall matrix of his plan.
The Jewish Museum in Basle exhibits objects and documents related to the history of the Jewish community in Switzerland. Basle was the site of the First Zionist Congress in
1897 and documents and mementos from the Congress are
on display. A group of tombstones from the 13t century are
installed in the courtyard.
The Jewish Museum in Stockholm, was founded in 1987.
In 1999, it was accorded the status of a national museum by
the Swedish government. In Norway, the Jewish Museum in
Trondheim opened in 1997 in the main building of the former
railway station, built in 1864, which was converted for use as a
synagogue in 1925 and rededicated after World War II.
The Jewish Museum of Greece in Athens was founded
in 1977 by Nikos Stavroulakis, who was also the founding
director of the Jewish Museum in Thessaloniki in 2000. In
addition to collecting archives and artifacts of the two-millennia-old Jewish heritage in Greece, both museums have undertaken the recording and photographing of Jewish monuments, synagogues, and cemeteries endangered because nearly
90 percent of the Jewish population perished during the Holocaust. The Jewish Museum of Rhodes was founded in 1997
and is located adjacent to the Kahal Shalom Synagogue built
in 1577. The Jewish community in Turkey also traces its roots
to antiquity. The Jewish Museum in Istanbul, housed in the
historic Zlfaris Synagogue, was founded in 2001 by the Quincentennial Foundation, which commemorates the 500t anniversary of the 1492 expulsion of the Jews from Spain and
the welcome to the Ottoman Empire. The Jewish Museum is
the first to be established in a predominantly Muslim country. The vast majority of Moroccan Jews left for Israel, France,
and the United States after 1948. The Jewish Museum in Casablanca, Morocco, preserves and records the long history of
Jewish life in Morocco and has been involved in the restoration of synagogues.
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museums
call in Hamburg in 1896 to establish a Museum fuer juedische
Volkskunde, which aimed to study Jewish folklore studies as a
means for Jews to represent what they shared in common with
other peoples. A Jewish museum was subsequently established
in Hamburg prior to World War I. Today, the Hamburg Historical Museum maintains Judaica department.
Salli *Kirschstein established a private museum in his
Berlin home to educate Jews and non-Jews alike through the
material evidence of Jewish culture. In particular this was
his response to the absence of any representation of Jewish
life in the Arts and Crafts and Ethnology Museum in Berlin.
Kirschsteins encyclopedic approach to collecting including
ceremonial objects, fine arts, manuscripts and rare books as
well as historic documents would later serve as a paradigm
for other Jewish museums.
There were other initiatives to bring Jewish art to Berlin.
The first exhibition of the work of Jewish artists sponsored by
the Verein zur Foederung juedischer Kunst (Society for the
Furthering of Jewish Art) was held in Berlin in 1908. Another
effort at establishing a Jewish Museum in Berlin was based on
the art collection of Albert Wolf (18411907). In 1917, the collection was displayed in the community administration building adjacent to the historic Neue Synagog on Oranienburgerstrasse. Lack of funding, and a theft in 1923, left the community
collection in compromised straits. A new society to support
a Jewish Museum in Berlin was established in 1924, with Salli
Kirschstein as a participant. However, his collection never became the nucleus of the expanded effort. In 1926, Kirschstein
sold his collection numbering over 6,000 items to the Hebrew
Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio, in the United States. A second group of objects he collected was sold at auction in 1932.
Fifteen of them became part of the collection of the Jewish
Museum in Berlin which was, at long last, dedicated on January 24, 1933, just six days before the Nazis came to power. The
Nazis closed the museum in 1938 and Allied bombing heavily damaged the Oranienburgerstrasse Synagogue. When the
city became divided, the synagogue was in the eastern sector.
A change in government policy precipitated by the declining
fortunes of communism led to the decision in 1988 to create the
Stiftung Centrum Judaicum-Neue Synagoge, which established
a memorial and cultural center in the synagogue. In West Berlin, a Jewish Department of the Berlin City Museum, which
was located in the Kollegienhaus, a former Baroque Prussian
courthouse, was established in the early 1970s. In 1989, Daniel
Libeskinds design won a competition for what was officially
the Expansion of the Berlin Museum with a Jewish-Museum
Section. The striking post-modern building became a destination in its own right and was visited by a quarter of a million
people during a year and a half period after the building was
completed in 1999 before closing to install the exhibitions. The
Jewish Museum Berlin opened officially on September 8, 2001.
Among its creators were two men exiled from Berlin by the
Nazis: Michael Blumenthal and Jeshajahu Weinberg,
In the interwar period, Jewish museums were also established in Kassel, Munich, and Mainz. Theodor Harbinger
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museums
ing information about the over 200,000 objects, books, and
archives handled by the museum staff. The museum, under
the aegis of the Prague Jewish Community Council, renewed
its work focusing on efforts to return property to individuals and to any re-established Jewish communities. However,
by 1949, the council determined it could no longer maintain
the historic buildings in Pragues Jewish Quarter or the museum collections. In April 1950 the Prague Jewish Museum
was taken over by the state and placed under the control of
the Ministry of Education. Finally, in October 1994, five years
after the fall of the Communist government, the museum was
returned to the Federation of Jewish communities of the Czech
Republic. In addition to the former ceremonial hall of the
Prague burial society, the exhibits are housed in five historic
synagogues. Across Bohemia and Moravia, with the leadership
of the Jewish Museum in Prague, sites are being researched,
reclaimed, and preserved. A number of restored synagogues,
some of which serve other functions such as concert halls,
also have museums including in Boskovice, Decn, Holeov,
Kolin, Mikulov-Nikolsburg, Plze, Poln, Rakovnik, Rychnov,
Slavkov-Austerlitz, and Trb.
In the Slovak Republic the Museum of Jewish Culture in
Slovakia was established in 1991 Bratislava as part of the Slovak National Museum. The Jewish Museum Preov housed
in the restored 1898 synagogue is seen as the successor to
the museum organized in 1928 by Rabbi Theodore Austerlitz
and Eugen Brkny. That collection was among those sent to
Prague during the war and when returned became part of the
Bratislava collection.
The Jewish museum in Budapest was founded in 1910
and officially opened in 1916. In 1932, under the direction of
Erno Namnyi (d. 1958), the museum, which had fallen on
hard times, reopened in a building attached to the famed
Dohny Synagogue. During the war, the most important of
the museums objects were crated and hidden in the basement
of the Hungarian National Museum, fortunately these were
returned in good order. After the war, Namnyi and others
worked to restore the museum. The museum was reopened
in 1947, but the next years would be difficult. Ilona Benoschofsky, director for two decades from 1963, with the expertise of
renowned manuscript scholar Alexander Scheiber catalogued
the collection. The museum underwent a major renovation
in the 1990s.
The Jewish Historical Museum in Belgrade, Serbia, was
established in 1948 and since 1969 has been housed in the
Federation of Jewish Communities building. The collection
includes many objects saved during World War II and later
returned to Jewish hands and the archives document many
destroyed Jewish communities. Marking the 400t anniversary
of Sephardi settlement in Bosnia-Herzegovina, a museum of
the history of the Jews was opened in Sarajevo in 1965 in the
synagogue built in 1580. Closed during the Bosnian War, the
museum has not reopened. The famed Sarajevo Haggadah
was put on display in the National Museum in 2002. The Jewish Museum in Sofia, Bulgaria is located adjacent to the Sofia
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museums
their plan Kruk and a few assistants known as the Paper Brigade attempted to hide rare books and documents. Two survivors of the Paper brigade, Abraham Sutzkever and Smerke
Kaczerginski, returned to Vilna in July 1944 with the Soviet
army liberating the city. Little remained, but they determined
to reopen the Jewish museum. Beset with difficulties from the
authorities, the museum staff shipped out what they could from
Soviet Vilnius. The museum was shut down in 1948. After the
breakup of the former Soviet Union, YIVO documents were discovered in Vilnius in a church used by the Lithuanian national
library for storage. Though not returned to YIVO, a compromise
was reached and the documents were sent to New York to be
microfilmed then sent back to Vilnius. In 1989, a new Jewish
museum was established in Vilnius as the Vilna Gaon State
Jewish Museum. On October 3, 2000, the Lithuanian Parliament voted to return 300 scrolls from the holdings of the National Library to the Jewish people. In January 2002, a delegation from Israel led by then Ashkenazi chief rabbi Israel Meir
*Lau, himself a survivor, traveled to Vilnius to bring the scrolls
to Israel. YIVO now a partner in the Center for Jewish History
which opened in New York in the spring of 2000 expanded its
scope of work after the move to New York, with the scholarly
mission adding a focus on the influence of East European Jewish culture as it has developed in the Americas.
Another group of objects rediscovered in the aftermath
of the collapse of the Soviet Union were artifacts from the
private collection of Maksymilian Goldstein (18801942)
and which, along with the contents of the Lvov (Lviv) Jewish
Community Museum, were feared to have been destroyed or
lost during World War II. Today the collection is housed in
the Ukrainian Museum of Ethnography and Artistic Crafts.
Goldstein had placed his collection with the museum after the
German occupation 1942. Though the movement to form a
collection in Lvov had been spearheaded by Goldstein, there
was interest in the general community to form such a collection. The nationalist impulse was a major factor, and indeed,
Jewish objects had already been displayed at the Municipal
Museum as early as 1894 as part of a regional exhibition.
A Jewish museum established by the Jewish Cultural
League in Kiev in 1920 existed for about a decade and another
in Odessa, also closed in the 1930s. Plundered by the Nazis, the
Odessa collection was removed to Germany and was discovered in Bavaria by British forces after the war. The Museum of
the History of Odessas Jews opened in 2002 during an international conference. Other Jewish Museums in the Ukraine
are located in Nikolaev, Simferopol, and Sevastopol.
In Belarus, the Marc Chagall Museum, opened in the artists boyhood home in Vitebsk in 1992. In Riga, the Museum
of the Jews in Latvia is housed in the Jewish Community Center and highlights many important Jewish personalities from
Latvia, including R. Abraham *Kook, the first Ashkenazi chief
rabbi of Palestine during the period of the British Mandate.
With the political change in Russia, there even are now plans
to develop a major Jewish museum in Moscow to be located
in a former bus depot donated by the government.
Erez Israel
The history of Jewish museums in Erez Israel began with the
efforts of Boris *Schatz, who founded the *Bezalel School for
Arts and Crafts in Jerusalem. The Lithuanian-born Schatz
(18661932) trained in Paris and in 1895 became court sculptor to Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria. In a meeting with Theodor Herzl in 1903 Schatz proposed his vision for an art school
that meshed with Zionist ideology. He chose the name of the
biblical artist Bezalel as a symbol of the continuity of art in
Jewish life. Schatz expressed that his mission was for a Jewish
art to come into being which would weave together the cultural threads that had been pulled apart and damaged during
the 2,000 years of the Diaspora experience. His idealism was
tempered with reality for he planned for the students to learn
crafts, which could be sold to help support the school. In the
wake of Herzls untimely death at age 44 in 1904, Schatz sought
the backing of various Zionist institutions. His proposal was
officially accepted at the 1905 Zionist Congress and the school
was launched a year later. The Bezalel Museum was founded
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museums
soon thereafter. By 1910, Bezalel had 32 different departments,
over 500 students and a ready market for its works in Jewish
communities in Europe and the United States. The school
was closed during World War I and again after Schatz passed
away in 1932. The museum was incorporated into the *Israel
Museum when it opened in 1964 as the national museum (see
below). The Bezalel Academy of Art and Design remains as a
premier art school today.
From its beginnings in the mid-19t century archaeologists have actively explored the land of Israel seeking evidence of the rich heritage of cultures and civilizations of the
peoples who have played a part in shaping its history. Some
15,000 archaeological sites are currently known and new ones
are discovered all the time. Though of course many date well
before the period of the Israelites and span in time to much
later settlers, the sense of being enveloped by history is allencompassing. Numerous excavation sites have become archaeological parks.
It is perhaps emblematic of how deeply museums are entwined with history that David Ben-Gurion announced the
establishment of the State of Israel in the Tel Aviv Museum of
Art. Independence Hall is located in what was originally the
home of Meir *Dizengoff, first mayor of Tel Aviv. Dizengoff
gave it to the city for the creation of an art museum. With its
rich collections of modern paintings, sculpture, and graphic
art, and its many visiting exhibits, the museum was housed in
a new building in 1971. Founded in 1932, it expanded with the
addition of the Helena Rubinstein Pavilion in 1958.
The complex Ha-Arez (Homeland) Museum started
with nine separate pavilions: museums for glass, ceramics,
numismatics, ethnography and folklore, science and technology (including a planetarium), antiquities of Jaffa and Tel
Aviv, the history of Tel Aviv, the alphabet, and Tel Qasile excavations. There are also ten other museums in Tel Aviv, including a Museum of Man and his Work, the Haganah, and
the Jabotinsky Museum.
The Israel Museum, situated in the heart of modern Jerusalem, houses a collection of Jewish and world art, the archaeology of the Holy Land, and the Dead Sea Scrolls. The museum was founded to collect, preserve, study, and display the
cultural and artistic treasures of the Jewish people throughout
its long history as well as the art, ethnology, and archeology of
the Land of Israel and its neighboring countries. It also aims
at encouraging original Israeli art. The exhibition area totaled
17,000 sq. m. (about 20,500 sq. yd.) with an additional 19,000
sq. m. (about 23,000 sq. yd.) for storage, laboratories, workshops, a library, and offices, including those of the Israel government Department of Antiquities. The museum includes the
Billy Rose Art Garden and the Shrine of the Book.
The Haifa municipality administers museums of ancient and modern art, a maritime museum, and the Dagon,
a grain museum showing the cultivation and storage of grain
through the ages.
No section of the country is without its regional and local museums, most of them created and maintained to satisfy
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The Americas
UNITED STATES. The oldest collection of Judaica in the
United States was established in 1887 as part of a department
of comparative religion at the Smithsonian Institution. The
collection was acquired under the direction of Cyrus *Adler
(18631940), a young curator who had just completed his
Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University, the first to be awarded in
the field of Semitics in the United States. Like his compatriots in England who organized the Anglo-Jewish Historical
Exhibition, Adler intended that the collection of Jewish ceremonial objects be used in educational exhibitions in order to
counteract ignorance of Judaism and prejudice against Jews.
museums
Adler was also a central figure in the founding of the *American Jewish Historical Society in 1892. The AJHS, which has the
distinction of being the first ethnic historical organization in
the United States, pioneered the collection of archives, books,
and artifacts of American Jewry.
In 1904, Judge Mayer *Sulzberger (18431923) presented
the Jewish Theological Seminary Library in New York with
a gift of 26 ceremonial objects to serve as the nucleus for
a Jewish museum. Judge Sulzberger was a cousin of Cyrus
Adlers, who by this time had become president of JTS in addition to his responsibilities at the Smithsonian. In 1925, Adler
was responsible for the acquisition of the collection of Hadji
Ephraim Benguiat (d. 1918), an antique dealer who amassed
the earliest collection of Sephardic Jewish objects, which he
brought to the United States in 1888 and which was displayed
at the 1893 Worlds Fair and subsequently at the Smithsonian
Institution. The ominous storm clouds gathering in Europe
in the late 1930s brought two additional collections to the
museum. The first, through the American Jewish *Joint Distribution Committee, was the Danzig Collection. The second
was the collection of Benjamin and Rose Mintz which they
brought to the United States from Poland in 1939. The Mintz
Collection was purchased by the museum in 1947.
In 1947, the *Jewish Museum moved to its own quarters
in the former Warburg Mansion on Fifth Avenue. Stephen
Kayser (19001988) and Guido Schoenberger (18911974),
both distinguished art historians and migrs from Nazi
Germany, set a standard of leadership in exhibitions and collections development for nearly two decades. The collection
would grow even more with the gift of 10,000 objects from
museum supporter Harry G. Friedman (d. 1965), who began acquiring Judaica during the war years. The Jewish Cultural Reconstruction (JCR) was based at the Jewish Museum
through 1952. In the aftermath of World War II, the JCR was
the organization given the authority by the U.S. State Department to identify and redistribute Nazi looted Jewish ceremonial objects, archives, and books for which no heirs could be
found that were located in the American Occupied Sector of
Germany. Salo W. *Baron (18951989), pre-eminent Jewish
historian, spearheaded the campaign to form the JCR, which
included representatives of all the major Jewish national and
international organizations and served as its president. Hannah *Arendt (19061979), political philosopher and author,
was the executive secretary for day-to-day operations.
A pioneering initiative was the establishment in 1956 of
the Tobe Pascher Workshop for contemporary ceremonial art,
whose founding director was Ludwig Wolpert (19001981), a
German-trained silversmith who came from his home in Jerusalem to direct the workshop. Another was the annual commission by collectors of contemporary art, Albert and Vera
List, to commission prominent American artists to make an
original graphic for the museum for the Jewish New Year.
From 1970, when Joy Ungerleider-Mayerson (19201994),
archaeologist and philanthropist, became director, and during the tenure of her successor Joan Rosenbaum beginning in
1980, the museum has continued to actively develop its collections and to present a wide-ranging series of exhibitions and
programs. In recent years, The Jewish Museum has focused on
presenting a series of major art exhibitions. The JTS Library
has maintained a large and important collection of illustrated
manuscripts, illuminated ceremonial texts, and prints.
A second Jewish Museum was founded at the Hebrew
Union College Library in Cincinnati in 1913 through the impetus of the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods, whose
members recognized the merit of saving family heirlooms.
The HUC Librarian Adolph Oko (18831944) undertook to develop the museum by acquiring important collections in Europe. His crowning achievement was the purchase of the Salli
Kirschstein collection in 1926. Unfortunately, the collections
remained in storage for many years until the museum was officially reestablished in 1948 by then president Dr. Nelson
*Glueck (19001971), a pioneering biblical archaeologist who
contributed to the museums growth by depositing artifacts
from his excavation in Israel. Franz Landsberger (18831964),
former director of the Berlin Jewish Museum, rescued through
the displaced European Jewish Scholars program, became director of the museum and he was succeeded by Joseph *Gutmann (19232004), who became one of the preeminent scholars in the field of Jewish art. In 1947, Jacob Rader *Marcus
(18961995) established the American Jewish Archives at HUC,
which now bears his name. The Union Museum was renamed
the Skirball Museum when the collection was moved to Los
Angeles in 1972. During a 30-year tenure as director, Nancy
Berman fostered the growth of the collection with a focus on
contemporary Judaica. In 1996, the museum opened in greatly
expanded quarters in the new *Skirball Cultural Center. Exhibitions and related programs reflect the mission of the cultural center to explore the connections between 4,000 years
of Jewish history and American democratic values. A branch
of the Skirball Museum is in Cincinnati and the HUC Klau Library in Cincinnati maintains an important collection of visual arts. Established in 1983, Hebrew Union College-Jewish
Institute of Religion Museum in New York presents exhibitions illuminating Jewish history, culture, and contemporary
creativity. The Skirball Museum of Biblical Archaeology in
Jerusalem exhibits archaeological artifacts discovered during
the HUC-JIR excavations from 1963 to the present.
Fortuitously some major synagogues saved historic commemorative artifacts as well as important ceremonial objects
that later formed the basis of museum collections in those congregations. Congregation Emanu-El of the City of New York
established a collection in 1928 with the gift of the private collection of Henry Toch, a trustee, and dedicated the Herbert
and Eileen Bernard Museum decades later in 1997. In the postWorld War II era, new Jewish museums slowly began to be
founded in the United States. While it took another generation
before the American Jewish community focused efforts on creating Holocaust memorials and museums, in the aftermath of
the destruction of the European Jewish community, there was
a new sense of the importance for Jews in the United States
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museums
and in the new state of Israel to preserve Jewish culture. The
first formally established synagogue museum, at Temple-Tifereth Israel in Cleveland, was dedicated in 1950 by the eminent
Rabbi Abba Hillel *Silver (18931963) in 1950 on the occasion
of the centennial anniversary of the congregation.
The Leo Baeck Institute, dedicated to the history of German-speaking Jewry, was founded in New York in 1955. The
Bnai Brith Klutznick National Museum in Washington, DC,
was founded in 1957. The core of its collection was the gift
of Joseph B. and Olyn Horwitz of Cleveland. The Judah L.
Magnes Museum is in Berkeley, California in 1962. The prime
mover behind the founding of the museum and its director for
more than 30 years was Seymour Fromer, who built the collection as a community-based endeavor, without the resources of
a parent institution. The Spertus Museum of Judaica was created in Chicago in 1968 in large measure with the private collection of Maurice Spertus. Two additional Jewish museums
were founded in the 1970s. The Yeshiva University Museum in
New York was officially opened in 1973, but the university did
maintain some collections of Jewish art in its library prior to
that time. Sylvia Herskowitz was the director of the museum
from its opening. The *National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia opened in 1976 in honor of the Bicentennial of the United States. The museum is located across
Independence Mall from the Liberty Bell and Independence
Hall. It shares its site with Congregation Mikveh Israel, one of
the oldest synagogues in America.
In 1977, at a meeting of the Association of Jewish Studies,
Dov Noy, professor of Jewish folklore of the Hebrew University, proposed that the U.S. Jewish museums form an organization to further the efforts of the museums to collect, preserve, and interpret Jewish art and artifacts. The Council of
American Jewish Museums (CAJM), affiliated since 1980 with
the National Foundation for Jewish Culture, has now grown to
represent over 80 institutional and associate members.
In the late 1970s planning began for the *United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. which
opened in 1993. The USHMM serves as Americas national institution for the documentation, study, and interpretation of
Holocaust history, and as the memorial of the United States to
the millions of victims. Through its multifaceted programs, the
museums mission is to advance and disseminate knowledge
about this unprecedented tragedy; to preserve the memory
of those who suffered; and to encourage its visitors to reflect
upon the moral and spiritual questions raised by the events of
the Holocaust as well as their own responsibilities as citizens of
a democracy. The USHMM is a Federal institution. There are
Holocaust memorials in communities throughout the United
States and many Holocaust museums. The *Simon Wiesenthal
Center, Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, which opened
in 1993 is named in honor of the survivor and well-known
Nazi hunter Simon *Wiesenthal and is dedicated to the cause
of human rights. The *Museum of Jewish Heritage: A Living
Memorial to the Holocaust in New York opened in 1997. It is
sited in view of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island and just
five blocks form the former site of the World Trade Center. The
museum was created as a living memorial to the Holocaust
to honor the lives and legacy of the victims of the Holocaust
even as it recounts the tragedy of their deaths.
The tremendous growth in interest in preserving Jewish
cultural heritage has reached communities large and small
throughout the United States. An important aspect of the work
of many of these museums is the focus on local and regional
history. The Gomez Hill House, built in Marlboro, New York
in 1714 by Luis Moses Gomez, a Sephardi immigrant, is the
oldest surviving homestead in the country and a foundation
to preserve it was established in 1979. Museums have been
formed in a number of historically important synagogues. The
Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, built in 1763, was
the first prominent synagogue to be built in America, and is
the only one to survive from the colonial era. The beginnings
of Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim in Charleston, South Carolina
can be traced to 1775. The temple and a museum are housed
in an 1841 Greek Revival building that is the second oldest
synagogue in the United States and the oldest in continuous
use. The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is
housed in the Adas Israel Synagogue dedicated in 1876. The
Beth Ahabah Museum and Archives in Richmond, Virginia,
maintains materials dating back to the 18t century. The Jewish
Museum of Maryland in Baltimore is unique in that it saved
and restored two historic structures the Lloyd Street Synagogue of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation built in 1845
and the original house of worship of the Chizuk Amuno Congregation which dates to 1876 and incorporated them into a
museum complex. The Eldridge Street Synagogue, completed
in 1887, was the first designed and built in America by immigrants from Eastern Europe. The Vilna Shul, built in 1919, is
now the Boston Center for Jewish Heritage.
The Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience, now
incorporated as part of the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute
of the Southern Jewish Experience, was founded in 1986,
through the initiative of Macy Hart to represent Jewish culture in the states of Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, and Tennessee and is now endeavoring to cover all 12
states of the South. With changing demographics especially
in rural communities and small towns, the Jewish population
in them has dwindled or no longer exists. The collection in
many ways serves as a rescue mission. In addition to collecting artifacts and archives, the museum provides planning assistance for congregations, works to save historic properties,
and to care for untended cemeteries. The museum is also a
genealogical center. The Jewish Museum of Florida in Miami
Beach restored Congregation Beth Jacob, an art deco building dating from 1936. The museum originated as MOSAIC, a
project organized by Marcia Kerstein Zerivitz, as a statewide
grassroots preservation effort on the history of Jewish life in
Florida. The Oregon Jewish Museum was founded in 1986 and
in 1996 merged with the Jewish Historical Society of Oregon,
acquiring its archives of 150 years of Jewish experience in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest.
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museums
Numerous other Jewish museums have been established
in synagogues and in Jewish community centers including: the
Sylvia Plotkin Museum at Temple Beth Israel in Scottsdale,
Arizona; the Elizabeth S. and Alvin I. Fine Museum of Congregation Emanu-El in San Francisco; the San Francisco Jewish Museum originated in 1982 at the Jewish Federation and
is developing a major new site designed by Daniel Libeskind; the Gotthelf Gallery at the San Diego Center for Jewish Culture; the Mizel Center for Arts and Culture in Denver;
the Chase/Freedman Gallery of the Greater Hartford Jewish
Community Center; the Harold and Vivian Beck Museum of
Judaica at the Beth David Congregation in Miami, Florida;
the William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum in Atlanta,
Georgia; the Rabbi Frank F. Rosenthal Memorial Museum
at Temple Anshe Sholom in Olympia Fields, Illinois; the Kansas City Jewish Museum; the Goldsmith Museum at Chizuk
Amuno Congregation in Baltimore, Maryland; the Janice
Charach Epstein Gallery at the Jewish Community Center
of Metropolitan Detroit, Michigan; the Temple Israel Judaic
Archival Museum in West Bloomfield, Michigan; the Benjamin and Dr. Edgar R. Cofeld Judaica Museum of Temple Beth
Zion; the Judaica Museum of the Hebrew Home for the Aged
in Riverdale; the Judaica Museum of Temple Beth Sholom in
Roslyn, New York; Judaica Museum of Central Synagogue in
New York City; Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and Museum in New York City; the Rosenzweig Museum and the
Jewish Heritage Foundation of North Carolina in Durham;
the Sherwin Miller Museum at the Tulsa Jewish Community
Center in Oklahoma; the American Jewish Museum of the
Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh; Philadelphia Museum of Jewish Art of Congregation Rodeph Shalom
in Philadelphia; Temple Judea Museum of Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; Mollie and
Louis Kaplan Judaica Museum at Congregation Beth Yeshurun
in Houston, Texas; Rabbi Joseph Baron Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
A unique initiative was the creation of the *National Yiddish Book Center founded in 1980 to rescue Yiddish books.
The centers headquarters in Amherst, Massachusetts, is described as a lively cultural shtetl. The newest and most ambitious Jewish cultural entity to be established in the United
States is the Center for Jewish History located in New York
City which opened in 2000. The center houses the combined holdings of the American Jewish Historical Society,
the American Sephardi Federation, the Leo Baeck Institute,
the Yeshiva University Museum, and the YIVO Institute for
Jewish Research. The Center for Jewish History is the largest
repository of Jewish artifacts, archives, and historical materials in the United States. Undoubtedly the brightest note in
the Jewish museum world in the United States is the focus
on special installations for children and the creation of independent Jewish childrens museums including the Zimmer
Childrens Museum in Los Angeles, the Jewish Childrens Museum in Brooklyn and the Jewish Childrens Learning Lab in
New York City.
CANADA. In Canada, the Beth Tzedec Reuben & Helene Dennis Museum in Toronto was established in 1965 with the purchase of Cecil Roths collection. Roth, a pre-eminent scholar
of Jewish history and founder of the London Jewish Museum,
formed his collection over a 50-year period. Also in Toronto is
the Silverman Heritage Museum, located at the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care. The Royal Ontario Museum maintains
a gallery of Jewish ceremonial objects. Jewish historical societies document life in several cities across Canada in Alberta;
Vancouver, British Columbia; Winnepeg, Manitoba; St. John,
New Brunswick; and in Montreal, Quebec.
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museums
has grappled with the responsibility of upholding moral and
religious values aimed to serve the needs of its own community and the needs of South Africans in general. It has walked
the tightrope in its integration in the South African context, at
the same time dedicating itself to Jewish continuity. Adjacent
to the new South Africa Jewish Museum is the Cape Town Holocaust Centre. There are also Jewish museums in Calvinia, in
Malmesbury in the former synagogue, the C.P. Nel Museum in
Oudtshoorn, the Jewish Pioneers Museum in Port Elizabeth,
and in Pretoria there is the Sammy Marks Museum, a historic
house of this South African Jewish pioneer who immigrated
from Lithuania in the mid-nineteenth century.
India
The Paradesi Synagogue in Cochin, India was built in 1568
by descendants of Spanish, Dutch, and other European Jews.
Though the synagogue is still functioning, the Cochin Jewish
community intends to deed the synagogue to the Indian government as a historic monument when the last Jews have left
Cochin. Restoration work on the synagogue was made possible by the Yad Hanadiv Foundation under the leadership of
Jacob Lord Rothschild. There are several historic synagogues
in Mumbai (Bombay) that are preserved including the Gate of
Mercy Synagogue (Shaar Harachmim) built in 1796, Keneseth
Eliyahoo Synagogue, and the Tifereth Israel Synagogue.
Ongoing Endeavors
The search for art and artifacts of the 4,000-year long Jewish
experience continues and new finds are regularly being discovered. The most ambitious effort to document the visual
culture of the Jewish people is the Index of Jewish Art of the
Centre for Jewish Art established in 1980 at the Hebrew University. Founded by Bezalel *Narkiss, the centre has ongoing
research projects in Europe and in Israel, presents symposia
on a wide-range of projects, maintains an active publications
program, including the annual journal Jewish Art and organizes tours to Jewish sites. A center for the study of Jewish art
has been created at Bar-Ilan University and has published its
first journal. The International Survey of Jewish Monuments,
spearheaded by Samuel Gruber in the United States, has been
635
China
The Ohel Rachel Synagogue in Shanghai, China, built in 1920
by Sir Victor Sassoon is currently being renovated, although
it is not yet in use again for worship services. Once a center of
Jewish life for the 30,000 Jews who found refuge in Shanghai,
first when fleeing the 1905 pogroms of Russia, and then from
Nazi persecution, the synagogue was last used for services in
1952. The building was then confiscated by the Communist government. Attention was given to the preservation efforts when
the synagogue was visited by then First Lady Hilary Rodham
Clinton in 1998. Ohel Rachel was added to the World Monuments Fund Watch List of 100 Most Endangered Sites in 2002.
The Ohel Moishe Synagogue, the Jewish Refugee Memorial Hall
of Shanghai, was the center of religious life for Jewish refugees
during World War II. The museum was established in 2002.
musher, sidney
Some are built in response to traditional Jewish injunctions
to remember, others according to a governments need to explain a nations past to itself. In 1993, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum opened in Washington, D.C., adjacent to the national mall and within view of monuments to
U.S. Presidents Washington, Lincoln and Jefferson. During the
1990s with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the reunification of Germany many more Holocaust memorials and museums have been created or are in the planning stages. Perhaps
most symbolic among them, a Holocaust Memorial in Berlin
is situated close by the restored Reichstag (parliament) under a
law passed on the Tenth Anniversary of the Treaty of German
Unity, the so- called Foundation for Remembrance, Responsibility and Future. (See also *Holocaust: Museums.)
[Grace Cohen Grossman (2nd ed.)]
Bibliography: G.C. Grossman, Jewish Museums of the World
(2003); N. Folberg, And I Shall Dwell Among Them: Historic Synagogues of the World (1995); B.G. Frank, A Travel Guide to Jewish Europe
(1996); R.E. Gruber, Jewish Heritage Travel Guide: A Guide to EastCentral Europe (1999); S. Offe, Juedische Museen in Deutschland und
Oesterreich (2000); N. Rosovsky and J. Ungerleider-Mayerson, Jewish
Museums of Israel (1989); A. Sacerdoti (series ed.), Itinerari Ebraici
(1992 ); J.E. Young, The Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials
and Meaning (1993); M. Zaidner (ed.), Jewish Travel Guide (2003).
MUSHER, SIDNEY (19051990), U.S. food and pharmaceutical chemist, born in New Jersey. His career was in industrial
chemical development and he was vice president of Cooper
Tinsley Laboratories Inc. from 1963. He took an active interest in the economic development of the State of Israel, being
treasurer of the Pan-American-Israel Economic Corporation,
president of the American Committee for Palestine Inc., and
a board member of Palestine Endowment Funds Inc., as well
as being member of the Jewish Reconstruction Foundation
and the American Jewish Historical Society, etc.
because they do not grow by being sown, or, because the earth
extrudes them (TJ, Maas. 1:1, 48d). The latter reason refers to
their quick growth, which makes it seem as if the earth is expelling them. The extensive sprouting of mushrooms after rain
is reflected in the aggadah about *Honi ha-Maagel who prayed
for rain after drought. After rain had fallen in abundance and
the heavens were free from clouds the people went into the
fields and brought home mushrooms and truffles (Taan. 23a).
Truffles are found chiefly in the light soils of the Judean wilderness and in the sands of the Negev. In contrast to mushrooms,
they grow under the surface. In addition to kemehim, truffles
are called shemarkaim (Uk. 3:2) in the Mishnah.
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 2644.
[Jehuda Feliks]
HISTORY
Biblical Period
Second Temple Period
The Emergence of Synagogue Song
The Roots of Synagogue Song in the Near Eastern Communities (c. 70950 C.E.)
The Formation of the Basic Pattern (c. 70500 C.E.)
Psalmody
Bible Reading by Chant
The Early Style of Prayer Chant
The Popular Background
Ideas about Music
Evolution of the Basic Pattern and Creation of New Forms
(c. 500950)
The Learned Art of Bible Chant
The Liturgical Hymn (Piyyut)
The H azzan and the Synagogal Solo Style
Music of the Medieval Diaspora (c. 9501500)
Integration in the Realm of Secular Music
The Science of Music
The Challenge of New Forms of Arts
Music at the Social and Popular Levels
The Formation of Concepts of Jewish Music (12th14th
centuries)
The Rabbinic Attitude to Music
Philosophy and Secular Education
Mystical Ideas and Forms
The Consolidation of Regional Styles
Musical Minhag
Modal Scales in Synagogue Song
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637
INTRODUCTION
music
more often is absent. The same holds for autonomous treatises
on the art of music, whether technical or philosophical. Literary sources of all kinds are the main storehouse of historical
fact, and very often the only source, since it is here that Jewish life has always documented itself most fully, including its
musical actions and thoughts. Yet another important source
are the relics of actual musical instruments (especially for the
biblical period) and the depictions of instruments and music
making ranging from the dawn of history through *illuminated manuscripts to the photographs of klezmer ensembles
in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust. The living oral traditions preserved and studied through sound recording, followed by sophisticated techniques of acoustical analysis and
musical transcription, are equal in importance to the written, notated, and visual relic, and the application of the historical evidence can very often give them a great measure of
historical dimension. Finally, there are the external sources.
Judicious comparisons with the musical heritage of those cultures, with which the Jewish people came into contact, taking
and especially in the case of the formation of Christianity
also giving, can yield valuable insights. In addition, through
still wider comparisons, even with historically unrelated cultures, Jewish music can be put into the overall perspective of
the music of mankind.
The following survey of the sources is intended to give a
general picture of the situation.
written sources of direct and
circumstantial evidence
Most of these do not appear as independent literary units but
as parts of larger works. Potentially, the field includes the entire
written heritage of Jewish culture. Some source categories have
proved to be particularly fruitful in information, such as rabbinic Responsa, community registers and regulations, the literature of philosophy and the sciences, the early Midrash, travelers accounts and various kinds of traditional exegesis. In many
cases, textual criticism must be applied before the source can be
utilized. Manuscripts of medieval and later poetry very often
contain indications that the poem is to be sung to the tune
of (be-lah an, be-noam, be-niggun); even if the tunes themselves cannot be recovered, the existence of the repertoire itself
is thus documented. When the tunes are taken from a gentile
environment, which uses notation as in the German-speaking
areas even the tunes themselves can often be recovered from
contemporary manuscripts or printed music. A further stage
is reached by the libretti of the cantata-like works, which were
written mainly in Italy from the 16t century onward. The music
for some of these has also survived or still waits to be recovered
from the archives; but even if only the texts remain, they often
contain indications such as aria, solo, and duetto. Finally, there
are also a certain number of theoretical and practical treatises
on music, as independent works or more often as chapters in
larger treatises. Except for the cantors books (such as Solomon Lipschitz Teudat Shelomo, Offenbach, 1718), the material
naturally reflects the theories and practices of the surrounding
638
music
which was found in the Cairo *Genizah). These documents
are most conveniently divided into two categories: notations
reflecting oral tradition, liturgical, religious, and secular; and
manuscript or printed compositions in the style of contemporary art music.
Several German humanists of the 16t century included
specimens of masoretic cantillation in their works on the Hebrew language, masorah, etc. The best known of these is the
notation in Johannes *Reuchlins De accentibus et orthographia
linguae hebraicae (Haguenau, 1518). Some 15 other gentile writers up to the end of the 18t century feature such notations of
masoretic cantillation in works on Judaist subjects and later
on also in chapters on the Music of the Hebrews in histories
of music. As a rule, they copied and recopied the specimens
from their predecessors, so that the total stock of notated documentation rises very slowly. The most prominent additions
are those by Athanasius Kircher (Musurgia Universalis, Rome,
1650), who features the German-Italian cantillation which he
heard in a Roman synagogue; by Daniel Jablonski, in his edition of the Hebrew Bible (Berlin, 1699), where a specimen of
notated cantillation of the Pentateuch according to the tradition of the Amsterdam Sephardi community was supplied by
David de Pinna (cf. *Masoretic Accents, Musical Rendition);
and the 12 specimens of Ashkenazi and Sephardi cantillation,
psalm intonation, and hymn tunes collected by the composer
Benedetto Marcello in Venice in order to base his collection
of Psalm compositions, Estro poetico-armonico (172427, and
subsequent editions), on authentic Jewish tunes. They are
featured in his own notation at the head of the respective settings. The musical scholar Giovanni Battista Martini gathered all the notations of his predecessors in the first volume
of his Storia della Musica (Bologna, 175781, repr. facsim.
1967), whence they were taken over (with one omission) by
Johann Nikolaus Forkel in his Allgemeine Geschichte der Musik
(Leipzig, 17881801, repr. facsim., 1967).
A few notations of other kinds of traditional music are
found from the beginning of the 17t century onward, such as
the learning tune of the Talmud, some of the songs of the
Passover *seder, the *Priestly Blessing, and the 13 religious folk
song tunes printed by Elhanan Kirchhan (Kirchhain) in his
Simh at ha-Nefesh, part 2 (Fuerth, 1726/27). The earliest cantorial manual found to date is that of Judah Elias of Hanover,
dated 1740, and it is followed by many others, especially toward the end of the 18t century (cf. Aaron *Beer; Isaac *Offenbach). Whether the Jew parodies found in the works of
several Renaissance and baroque composers actually reproduce what was heard in a synagogue or played by a Jewish musician still remains to be ascertained in each case.
Art music composed in the Western European style is
documented by a certain number of scores and parts of scores
from Italy, southern France and the Portuguese community
of Amsterdam. The earliest work of this kind is Salamon de
*Rossis Ha-Shirim Asher li-Shelomo (Venice, 1622/23); for a
more extended description of these sources see *Cantatas,
Hebrew.
oral tradition
The chief treasure house of Jewish music is the living oral
tradition the many thousands of melodies and variants still
current in the synagogues, schools, and homes in all Jewish
communities, which adhere, or at least have kept in some measure, to the ways of the past. Their systematic collection, now
being made by sound recording, is an awesome and theoretically endless task. A fairly representative selection of several
regional traditions was collected by A.Z. *Idelsohn in Jerusalem at the beginning of the 20t century and published in
his Thesaurus of Hebrew-Oriental Melodies (10 vols. 191432):
Yemen, Iraq, Persia (with some material from Bukhara and
Dagestan), the Jerusalem Sephardic tradition, Morocco
and Eastern Europe. Earlier and contemporary collections of
synagogal music (see bibliography), mainly of the Ashkenazi
and European Sephardi areas, also contain varying amounts
of truly traditional melodies, even if these are sometimes distorted by inadequate notation or attempts at modernization.
Much essential material still remains to be recorded.
639
[Bathja Bayer]
music
Samaritans of Israel; the collection of Leo *Levi made during
the late 1950s and the 1960s, including about 70 hours of Jewish musical traditions of the Italian Jews, Greek Jews, and Jews
from Holland, Ethiopia (in Israel), Georgia, Czechoslovakia,
and other locations; and the collection of Edith *Gerson-Kiwi,
who was a student of Lachmann, including 700 records and
240 reel-to-reel tapes of new immigrant Oriental traditions
made between the 1950s and 1970s.
A historical collection of commercial records and broadcasting material is included in the Jacob Michael Collection,
collected in New York during the 1950s and 1960s. The Jacob
Michael collection contains 3,000 records and 480 tapes,
mostly of Yiddish radio material.
Since 1965 the NSA has continuously expanded its collections by promoting new recordings both through fieldwork
and recordings at the NSA studio. Most of the Jewish liturgical
recordings are made in the studio or other locations, but not
during actual prayer services, since it is forbidden to use any
electrical equipment on the Sabbath and holidays. The NSA
also benefits from donations from scholars who deposit their
recordings at the NSA; to mention just a few of them: Amnon
*Shiloah, Shoshana Weich-Shahak, Mark Kligman, Yaakov
Mazor, Simha *Arom.
Since 2000, the Depository Law for books and prints
in Israel has been expanded to include all non-book material. Thus a copy of all CDs and videotapes produced in Israel
must be deposited at the NSA. Also, recordings made by Kol
Israel during the 1950s and the 1970s were deposited at the
NSA. These include mainly Israeli songs, Israeli art music, and
some traditional music. The NSA catalogue is available online
on the JNUL website. It is open to the public (at the JNUL) and
serves mainly scholars and educators. The NSA continues to
collect, preserve and publish its collections.
Other collections in Israel are at The Institute for Religious Jewish Music Renanot, which has its own archive as
well as copies at the NSA. It contains recordings of experts in
Jewish musical performance, especially h azzanim of different
traditions and their liturgical repertoire. The Beit Hatefutsot
Music Center has a good collection of commercial recordings,
which are available on site. All the departments of music and
musicology in Israel have collections of recorded sound; however, their focus is not on Jewish music.
In America, universities, libraries, museums and Jewish
institutions also have collections of recorded sound. Some of
the important collections of Jewish music are: The Robert and
Molly Freedman Jewish Music Archive, which was donated to
the University of Pennsylvanias Rare Book and Manuscript
Library. The Freedman Jewish Music Archive comprises over
1,800 recordings, primarily in Yiddish and Hebrew. The Harvard University Judaic Library has a large collection of Israeli
popular music. The YIVO Institute in New York holds a good
collection of commercial and broadcasting material of Yiddish music. The Library of Congress Folklife Center and the
Sound Archives also have Jewish recordings, both field recordings and commercial records.
640
Some institutions and private music lovers and collectors provide Jewish music databases and music online for research and teaching, for example Hazzanut Online and Virtual Cantor.
[Gila Flam (2nd ed.)]
HISTORY
biblical period
music
and instrumentalists, as planned by David and established by
Solomon. Since the lists of the returned exiles from Babylon,
in Ezra and Nehemiah, include a certain number of families
of Temple singers, it can be assumed that, at least toward the
end of the First Temple, there was already some kind of organized cult music in Jerusalem. On the other hand, there are
grounds to believe that the role of music in the First Temple
was minimal. In the sanctuaries outside Jerusalem, it was
probably much more prominent: witness the prophets orchestra at the high place of Gibeah (I Sam. 10:5) and Amos
fulminations against the external pomp in one of the cult centers of the northern tribes, perhaps in Shechem, take away
from me the roaring of thy songs and the playing of thy lyres
will I not hear (Amos 5:23).
After the return from Babylon, music as a sacred art and
an artistic sacred act was gradually given its place in the organization of the Temple services. It seems that this did not pass
without opposition. Some scholars have even tried to adduce
a power struggle between the levites and the priests. Although
the evidence does not mention music as a subject for quarrel, the striving of the levitic singers for prestige is implicit in
the chroniclers descriptions, and may even be the reason for
the insertion of the poem, or set of poems By the waters of
Babylon, in the collection of Psalms (Ps. 137). The weepers by
the waters of Exile were not an abstract personification; they
were the levitic singers, whom their captors would have join
the other exotic court orchestras that the Assyrian and Babylonian kings kept for entertainment and took care to replenish by their expeditions of conquest. The court and temple orchestras of Mesopotamia in this period are the prototype for
the Temple music established in Jerusalem after the return: a
large body of stringed instruments of one or two types only
(in Jerusalem kinnor and nevel); a small number, or a single
pair, of cymbals; and a large choir. The trumpets of the priests
constituted a separate body in every respect, with a ritual but
not really musical function. In the earlier stages of religious
organization, centered on inspirational ecstatic prophecy, the
role of music was understandably important (cf. I Sam. 10:5
and the story of Elishas musically-induced prophetic seizure
in II Kings 3:15). Davids playing and singing before Saul belongs to a related psychological aspect.
At coronations, the trumpets were blown as part of the
formal proclamation (II Kings 11:14), and the spontaneous and
organized rejoicings after victory in war were accompanied
by women who sang, drummed and danced; (a practice still
current among the Bedouin), cf. The Song of the *Sea, and the
womens welcome of David and Saul in I Sam. 18:67. Music at
popular feasts is described in Judges 21:19ff. Finally, the musical accompaniment at the feasts of the rich and, of course,
at the kings court is also described several times, often with
a note of reproach (II Sam. 19:36; Isa. 5:12; Amos 6:5; Eccles.
2:8). The musical expression of mourning is implicit in the
verses of Davids lament for Saul and Jonathan and explicit in
the mention of the male and female mourners who repeated
specially composed dirges (II Chron. 35:25). True folk music is
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thumb-loop. The average diameter of the finds is about 4.5 in.
(12 cm.). They were played by the Levites in the Temple. The
mez illot of the horses, mentioned in Zechariah 14:20, are probably the same metal ball-jingles as those depicted on Assyrian reliefs.
(10) Minnim () , an unclear term (Ps. 150:5 and perhaps also Ps. 45:9), presumably a stringed instrument, and
perhaps the lute, which was never an integral part of the Canaanite and Israelite instrumentarium.
(11) Nevel () , a type of lyre, perhaps originating in Asia
Minor, constructed differently from the kinnor-lyre larger,
and therefore of deeper tone. The coins of Bar Kokhba show it
in a schematized form. According to Josephus, it had 12 strings
and was played by plucking with the fingers (Ant., 7:306). Extra-biblical sources, which describe it under the name of nabla
mention its breathy or rumbling tone. It was the second
main instrument in the Temple orchestra. According to the
Mishnah (Kin. 3:6), its strings were made of the large intestines of sheep. The nevel asor () , or, in its brief form,
asor (Ps. 33:2; 92:4; 144:9), was perhaps a slightly smaller nevel
with ten strings only.
(12) Paamon () , mentioned only in Exodus 28:3334
and 39:2526 (and later by Josephus), as attached to the tunic of the High Priest alternating with the ornament called
rimmon (pomegranate) and made of gold. The usual meaning of the term is a bell. Bells came into use in the Near East
only in the seventh century B.C.E., so that the noise-making
attachments to the high priests garment in the desert Tabernacle could not have been bells proper. If the description in
Exodus is not a pure projection back from the period of the
First or Second Temple, the original paamonim must have
been metal platelets. Later on, real bells substituted these.
Most bells found in Palestine are small, made of bronze and
have an iron clapper.
(1314) Pesanterin and sabbekha ( /) , see
below, under Daniel instruments.
(15) Shalishim (
) , mentioned only in I Samuel
18:67, as played by women. By analogy with Ugaritic tlt-metal
(and not tlt and shlsh as meaning three), these may be cymbals or struck metal bowls.
(16) Shofar () , the horn of the ram or a wild ovine,
and the only instrument to have survived in Jewish usage,
probably identical with the keren ( ) and keren ha-yovel
() . In the Bible, its function is that of a signaling instrument especially in war; its famous appearance at the siege
of Jericho must be understood in this sense and not as a magical noisemaker. The shofar-like sound at the receiving of the
Ten Commandments is also a transfer from the same domain.
Only after the shofar was taken into the service in the Second
Temple did it regain its primitive magical connotation.
(17) Sumponyah () , cf. below, under Daniel instruments.
(18) Tof () , a shallow round frame drum, frequently
played by women (cf. *Miriam), and associated with the
dance.
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Levi, who was prefect of the singers and would not teach his
own technique of virtuoso voice production to others (Shek.
5:1; Yoma 3:11). Of the instruments mentioned in the Bible,
only the Temple instruments proper appear again: kinnor,
nevel, tziltzal and metziltayim, h az oz erah, and the newly accepted shofar. The h alil is also mentioned as a popular instrument, which was played in the Temple only on 12 days of the
year (Ar. 2:3). The term abbuv (pipe) is used for the separate
pipes of the h alil.
Other terms proposed as musical instruments by later
commentaries, from the Gemara onward, are very probably
not instruments at all, such as niktimon, batnun, markof, iros.
Neither is the magrefah, a rake, which was noisily thrown on
the floor after the cleaning of the altar to signal to the singers in their chambers to proceed to their stations, which talmudic exegesis later turned into the equivalent of the Byzantine organ.
A separate body of musical practice and doctrine was
evolved by the dissident sectarians of the period. The choral
singing of the *Therapeutae in Egypt is described by Philo
and Josephus and seems to be the musical base of some of the
hymns found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The sectarians seem to
have eschewed the use of musical instruments, holding the
fruit of the mouth, i.e., singing, as the more pure expression
of devotion. Some passages in their writings and in Ben Sira
may indicate the existence of ideas, which approach very
closely to the sphere of musical, or rather musical-poetical
theory. The catastrophe in 70 C.E. put an end to the Templecentered music of the Jewish people and opened a new period,
in which the *synagogue became the focal point of creativity
in word and tone.
[Bathja Bayer]
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together with the Holy Scriptures themselves. Many of its different forms, which are still employed by Jewish communities in many different parts of the world, were also described
in ancient literature. The findings point to a common source
of Bible song in the early synagogue.
PSALMODY. The singing of Psalms occupies an important
place in Jewish and in Christian worship. Both creeds share a
musical pattern, traditionally and also in musicological parlance known as psalmody (Greek-Christian psalmodia). Its outlines and internal organization follow closely those of the poetic
form. Each psalm may consist of a smaller or greater number
of verses, without being organized in symmetrical stanzas.
Accordingly, the melody of one verse may become a musical
unit, which is repeated, as many times as there are verses in
the psalm. Most of the verses are subdivided into two equal
parts (hemistichs) by a caesura; similarly, the psalmodic melody is given a bipartite structure. The biblical verse is formed
and characterized solely by the number of its stressed syllables,
disregarding completely how many weak syllables there are between the stresses. The verse of a psalm may consequently vary
widely in length, since the overall number of syllables is not
constant. The tune has to be adaptable to these floating conditions; a recitation note, which may be repeated according to
the particular situation, provides for the required elasticity.
In practice, the singer of a psalm verse reaches the recitation note through a short initial motion of the voice, dwells
on the former for the main part of the text, and concludes the
first hemistich with a medial cadence. The second hemistich
is performed in the same manner, but concludes with a final
cadence. Thus the basic psalmodic formula consists of:
Initial motion/recitation note/medial cadence//
initial motion/recitation note/final cadence (see Mus. ex. 1).
Example 1. The basic formula of psalmody. Verses of Psalm 19, as chanted in various communities. After Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 4, no. 25 (Oriental Sephardi): ibid., vol. 3, no. 51 (Persia); ibid., vol. 3, no. 171 (Morocco): I. Lachmann, Awaudas Yisroeil, vol. 1, 1897, no. 154 (Western Ashkenazi).
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old and well established. It demonstrates the transformation
of the first hemistich into an actual refrain. The exclamation
Hallelujah may be given this role when it is inserted at discretion between verses. This practice was described by Rava
(c. 300 C.E.; Suk. 38b), and is found in the Christian tradition
as Psalmus alleluiatus, and is still perpetuated by the Yemenite
Jews (see mus. ex. 2a)
Additions alien to the biblical text are very rare in Jewish tradition (mus. ex. 2b) but have become the rule in the
antiphonal psalmody of the churches. The Greek term antiphonos originally meant alternate singing in different pitches
(e.g., by men and women or men and boys); Philo heard this
performed by the sect of Therapeutae. However, worship in
the synagogue, which was a congregation exclusively of men
and lacked a separate clergy, was unfavorable to the formation of permanent choirs, and the embellishment of a psalm
was contrary to the obligation of faithfulness to the holy text.
There was no limitation, however, on the strictly musical development of psalmody, with the basic formula serving as a
mere skeleton for more complex forms. The musical evolution
is achieved mainly by means of variation just as the poetic
language of the Psalms draws largely upon variation within
the framework of Parallelismus membrorum. Once again, musical composition enhances the poetry.
Jewish psalmody prefers to have hemistichs recited on
different tone levels, which is very exceptional in Plain song.
Moreover, the recitation note need not remain rigid but may
hover around its axis, raising stressed syllables here, marking
a subdivision there, or simply adorning the tune. The initial
phrases may be redoubled as well as omitted. Finally, several
psalmodic formulas may be joined within the same psalm.
The device of variation is capable of producing true artistic effects by a gradual escalation of its resources as, for instance, in
Psalm 29 for Sabbath eve as sung in Iran (Idelsohn, Melodien,
III (1922), no. 3): here the melody gradually gains momentum
and increasingly dense texture in accord with the intensification of the poetic images. Psalmodic music may change its
features to a certain extent according to its multiple uses as
well as the contents of the text, nevertheless, it must be content to strengthen, but never outdo, the effect of the words.
The ancient pattern of psalmody is still extensively used in
Jewish communities all over the world. It is worth noting
that the detailed accents later added to the psalm text by the
Masoretes were disregarded: the traditional manner of intoning psalms was already too deeply rooted (see also *Psalms,
Musical Rendition).
BIBLE READING BY CHANT. Chapters from the Pentateuch
and the Prophets are regularly read in the synagogue service,
the other books of the Bible being reserved for certain feasts.
It is characteristic of the synagogue that the Bible is never
read like speech or declamation; it is always chanted to mu-
Example 2. Responsial psalmody. (a) Hallel Psalm 113, as chanted in Yemen, with a Hallelujah response by the congregation after each verse, similar to the
Gregorian Psalmus alleluiatus. After Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 1 no. 32; (b) Hallel Psalm 136, as chanted in Iraq, with the unwritten response, Hodu Lo ki
tov (Praise Him for [He] is good), by the congregation after each verse. After Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 2, no. 23.
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sical pitches and punctuated by melodic cadences attached
to clauses and periods. The reading of the Bible at home or
at school is performed in the same way (see also *Masoretic
Accents, Musical Rendition). This custom is strange to European habits. The ancient Greeks already knew well how to
distinguish between the rising and falling of the voice in rhetorical speech or stage declamation on the one hand, and true
musical intervals, on the other. When the Church took over
biblical chanting from the synagogue, its Roman branch retained the chant in a simple form and did not develop it any
further. Eastern Christianity, however, embarked on its own
development and elaboration of scriptual chanting, which
took a course parallel to the developments within Judaism.
There is ample evidence of Bible chant in Jewish sources
as early as the second century C.E., by which time it was an
old and well-established custom. In the third century, Rav
interpreted the verse And they read in the book, in the Law
of God and caused them to understand the reading (Neh.
8:8) as a reference to the piskei teamim, i.e., punctuation
by means of melodic cadences (Meg. 3a). Still earlier, Rabbi
Akiva expressed his demand for daily study also executed
in chant by the words Sing it every day, sing it every day
(Sanh. 99a). Finally, Johanan, head of the Tiberias Academy
(d. 279), formulated the central idea of chant in this categorical manner: Whoever reads [the Torah] without melody and
the studies [Mishnah] without song, to him may be applied
the verse (Ezek. 20:25): Wherefore I gave them also statutes
that were not good, and ordinances whereby they should not
live (Meg. 32a). As an external witness, Jerome (c. 400 C.E.,
in Bethlehem) testifies that the Jews chant off the Torah (decantant divina mandata: PL 24. 561).
Talmudic sources state that the biblical verse was subdivided into clauses according to its meaning and the rhythm
of speech. This division was called pissuk teamim and was
strictly an oral tradition, the transmission of which was incumbent upon the teachers of children. Their method of instruction was the ancient practice of chironomy hand and
finger signs that evoked the medial, final, and other cadences
of Bible chant (Ned. 37b; attested by R. Akiva, Ber. 62a). Chironomy had already been used by the singers of ancient Egypt
and was later also adopted by the Byzantines. Jews practiced
Example 3. Simple form of biblical cantillation. I Kings 3:15, as chanted in Bukhara to a psalmodic pattern. After Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 3, no. 138.
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always have to be balanced by musical gifts and skills. Prayer
tunes thus had to be simple and, simultaneously, of a plastic
and variable nature in order to be fitted to longer or shorter
phrases of the prose texts without difficulty. These demands
are met by the prayer modes (nusah im) traditional and
common in the Eastern and Western synagogues of today.
Although it is impossible to ascribe individual tunes heard
today to the early synagogue with any degree of certainty, it
is legitimate to speak of the principle of chanting according
to a nusah .
Jewish prayer chant is essentially an evolution of traditional melodic patterns classifiable as Tefillah-mode, Yotzermode, and so on. The melodic pattern of a certain nusah consists of several motives, which are not in any fixed rhythm or
meter, but are rather a melodic formula, which is apt to be expanded or shortened according to the text. The motives may
be repeated or omitted, they may change places and, above all,
they may be subjected to variation by the singer. Melodic patterns of this kind are used in Sephardi, Ashkenazi, and Oriental communities alike. Their nature may best be recognized
from their adaptation to metrical prayer texts (see mus. ex.
4a), as well as to free recitation (mus. ex. 4b).
The musical effect of an Ashkenazi prayer mode rests
on its varied unity; it establishes a common stock of motives for a whole group of prayers without imposing a rigid,
unchanging framework upon it. The melodic development
is stimulated by improvised variation which has always
been an important element in Jewish music (see *Nusah ;
*Shtayger).
THE POPULAR BACKGROUND. Psalmody, melodic reading
of Bible texts, and prayer chant were made to fulfill a function in collective Jewish worship; they grew organically from
a popular treasure of forms, under the guidance of basic religious ideas. The latter excluded from worship the use of the
multitude of instruments which were, in fact, in the hands
of Jews in Palestine and Babylonia: the frame drum tabla
(Ar. duff;) accompanied non-synagogal song and dance and
pleased the women especially (The sexagenarian as much as
the six-year-old runs after the drum: MK 9b); the reed-pipe
abbuv was blown; the long-necked lute tanbura (Ar. tunbr)
plucked. Workmen used to sing to lighten monotonous toil
such as plowing, boat towing, or weaving (Sot. 48a). Song was
heard in the tavern (Sanh. 101a), and every kind of musical
entertainment at the fair (Taan. 22a; BK 86a see Rashi) and
social gatherings (Sot. 48a).
Radical religious authorities of the Babylonian Jews opposed popular music making as unsuitable for a nation in distress (relying upon Sot. 9:11 and 14). Their negative attitude
(Song in the house destruction at the threshold, Sot. 48a)
became even more entrenched when the feudal aristocracy
of Sassanian Persia made music part of their hedonistic enjoyment of life, and even the exilarch Mar *Ukba I, who was,
according to the chronicle of the scribe R. Nathan ha-Bavli
(written in the 10t century), a poet-musician himself and
throughout the year composed and performed his own paeans of praise to the king, who allowed himself to be attended
with music at his ceremonial levee (TJ, Meg. 3:2, 74a; Git.
7a). At this time Rav *Huna issued his famous prohibition of
music, which, however, had undesirable side effects and was
dropped by his successor *H isda (Sot. 48a). Palestine was apparently spared this unrealizable prohibition. There was never
any intention to interfere with the music making at wedding
festivities (hillula); on the contrary, this was regarded as a religious duty (mitzvah).
Several legends tell of the rabbis eagerness to gladden
the groom and bride (Ber. 6b; TJ, Peah 1:1, 15d, etc.). On these
occasions, genuine responsorial singing was performed (Ber.
31a): an honored guest had to improvise a verse suitable for
the company to answer with one of the current refrains (such
as Ket. 16b17a). Responsorial psalmody may have been influenced by such common customs. Antiphony, in its original meaning of alternating choirs of different pitch, was also
employed at the popular level (Sot. 48a). Instrumental playing at the wedding hillula was officially encouraged, and this
favorable attitude of the Talmud teachers became a guideline
for later legal decisions.
It is not known when and why playing the flute before the
bridal pair (rooted in ancient life and fertility symbolism) was
abandoned; it was once a familiar and absolutely legal custom
(BM 6:1). The same question arises with regard to flute playing
at funerals, where this instrument symbolized life and resurrection; it was customary at the time of Josephus (Wars 3:437)
and the Gospels (Matt. 9:23), and its legal aspects were still
given consideration by the tannaim (Shab. 23:4; Ket. 4:4), but
it, too, disappeared without any trace. Lamentation of the dead
by wailing women could assume the form of a dirge (*kinah,
hesped) in responsorial patterns (MK 3:8; Meg. 3b; 6a); but it
often remained a short acclamation (MK 28b), probably repeated to current melodic phrases. A funeral song of the Diaspora Jews is attested in Canon 9 of the Council of Narbonne
in 589 (Juster, Juifs, 1 (1914), 368, n. 3).
A relationship between synagogal and domestic singing patterns has already been noted. Since responsorial and
antiphonal song is found as a frequent practice among many
peoples, it may be surmised that the related forms of psalmody also derived from popular usages. As far as can be judged
from the necessarily one-sided talmudic sources, Jewish folk
music remained relatively immune to the omnipresent Hellenistic influences. Near Eastern Jewry belonged to the Aramaic-speaking peoples (as evinced, for example, by the nomenclature of their musical instruments) and may have kept
away from Greek theaters and circuses at the behest of their
teachers (Av. Zar. 1:7; TJ, ibid., 1:7, 40a; Av. Zar. 18b, etc.). In
the Diaspora, however, the Jews of Miletus, Antioch, and
Carthage liked the stage and the arena (Juster, Juifs, 2 (1914),
23941). Jewish (Purim?) plays were restricted by the Codex
Theodosianus of 425 (ibid., 1 (1914), 360 n. 2). At any rate, the
lasting influence of Hellenistic musical activities in the Jewish
sphere cannot be proven.
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IDEAS ABOUT MUSIC. The influence of religious law (halakhah) on the structure of synagogue music, such as the discontinuation of instrument playing and the entire Levitical
tradition, has been noted above. To this should be added the
rejection of the female voice from the service and other public performances, exemplified by Ravs harsh statement: The
voice of a woman is indecency (Ber. 24a, etc.). The rabbis indifference or hostility to the sound of music changes, however,
in the aggadic parts of the Talmud, where many instances of
true musical feeling and appreciation of the charm of sounds
are recorded. The rabbis dwelled on King Davids allegoric
lyre, which was sounded by the midnight wind like an Aeolian harp (Ber. 4a, etc.), they perceived the song of the ears
of grain in the field (RH 8a), and let trees burst into song
(TJ, H ag. 2:1, 77a). They fostered ideas that became universal
sources of artistic inspiration: the parallel singing of celestial
music of the angels and the righteous (H ag. 12b; 14a; Av. Zar.
3b; Er. 21a; Sanh. 91b; Meg. 10b, etc.; Tosef. Sot. 6:2); and the
trump of doom (later Midrashim: Otiyyot de-Rabbi Akiva,
letter T; Midrash Daniel, etc.). In other Midrashim (of more
or less disputed date), the eternal link between mystical and
musical conceptions, already extant in some of the abovequoted Talmud passages, reveals its full strength in certain
peculiar hymns aimed at inducing a visionary trance. These
hymns were assembled in the treatise Heikhalot Rabbati (All
these songs Rabbi Akiva heard when approaching the *Merkabah and understood and learned before the heavenly throne
what its servants sang unto it). They are composed in a language rich in word-music and vocal harmony; and one can
imagine them being sung to the repetition of short melodic
phrases characteristic of suggestion-inducing and spell-casting songs all over the world.
The same Heikhalot treatise reveals a guiding idea of
sacred song in legendary form: R. Ishmael said: Blessed is
Israel how much dearer are they to the Holy One than the
servant-angels! Since as soon as the servant-angels wish to
proceed with their song in the heights, rivers of fire and hills
of flames encircle the throne of glory, and the Holy One says:
Let every angel, cherub, and seraph that I created be silenced
before Me, until I have heard and listened to the voice of song
and praise of Israel, my children! Human song of praise is
given preference over the pure and flawless beauty heard from
the heavenly hosts, and the standards of sacred song are set
by the warmth of devotion resounding from earthly voices,
imperfect and human as they may be.
This concept differs from the basic idea of ecclesiastical
song as laid down by Dionysius the Areopagite and repeated
throughout the Middle Ages. This notion propounds that the
perfect beauty of angelic song descends to the lower ranks in
heaven and reaches earth as a faint echo. Church music endeavored by imitation to approach the heavenly model; it had
to strive increasingly for superhuman, transcendental beauty,
thus creating a perfect but cold product of art. This fundamental difference between the Jewish and Christian view of
sacred music indicates what to look for in the evaluation of
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Finally, freely invented signs could also be used, as was done
by the masoretes of Tiberias.
The development of biblical accents (taamei mikra) was
a prolonged process which was completed definitely only between 900 and 930 by Aaron b. Moses *Ben-Asher of Tiberias. This final and authoritative system was imposed upon the
whole of Jewry. The earlier Palestinian and Babylonian accentuations fell into disuse and have only recently been recovered
from rare manuscripts. The general trend of development was
from simplicity to complexity. The masoretes in good faith
furnished the 24 biblical books with accents of correct judgment, with a clear manner of speech, with a sweetly enunciating palate, with beautiful oration Whoever reads shall hear,
whoever hears shall understand, and whoever sees shall grasp
(Moses Ben-Asher, autograph colophon of the Cairo Codex of
the Prophets, dated 895 C.E.). They proceeded from the subdivision of a sentence by accent pairs (Babylonian system)
to a total accentuation of one sign, and occasionally two, on
every word. Having begun with the simple indication of the
traditional places of the cadences, they ultimately arrived at a
learned art of Bible chant, prescribing how the reader was
to organize his recitation.
In evaluating the musical consequences of the Tiberian
total accentuation, one basic fact should be borne in mind:
an accent can seldom be regarded as a detached, self-contained
unit. Not only is a disjunctive accent (king) most often accompanied by a conjunctive one (servant), but also several
of these pairs are frequently combined to form typical groups.
In music, motive groups or melodic phrases match these accent groups: a chanted Bible verse is made into a continuous
chain of musical motives (see Mus. ex. 5) and is clearly distinguished from the old-fashioned, psalmody-like style (see
Mus. ex. 3 above).
Since the single motives are often linked by a short bridge
of linear recitation (see ex. 5), this kind of chant may also be
likened to a string of beads. An entire chapter read in this
manner resembles a mosaic in which the same pieces are assembled in constantly varying combinations.
Example 5. Ashkenazi biblical chant according to the masoretic accents. I Kings 3:15, following the rendition of Joshua 1:1 in Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 2, 50
no. 11.
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The early designation of the genre, *maamad, was soon
replaced by the borrowed Greek word piyyut. The choice of a
foreign term probably indicates the introduction of innovations, such as consequent rhyming and the division of a poem
into stanzas of identical structure. In time, the stanza form became highly important to musical form: it offered the opportunity of changing the unarticulated cumulation of verses into
a divisive organization of the song. This possibility, however,
is hardly exploited in tunes of the older style. In present-day
synagogue song, piyyut melodies continue the traditional usage of repeating the first line throughout the entire song. The
cause is certainly the poetic rhythm, which remained as it was
in biblical poetry: an equal number of stresses in the verses,
occurring at unequal intervals because of the changing number of unaccentuated syllables in between. Thus, a well-known
hymn of Eleazar *Kallir (early seventh century?) reads:
T al yaasis z uf harim = 3 accents, 6 syllables
taem bi-meodkha muvh arim = 3 accents, 8 syllables
h annunekha h alez mi-masgerim = 3 accents, 10 syllables
Example 6a. Hymn-tune constructed as a chain of variated motifs. Ashkenazi melody for the kerovah hymns for the High Holy Days: (a) for Neilah of the
Day of Atonement, Bavarian version c. 180040 (Loew Saenger, 17811843), after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 7 part 3, no. 211; (b) for Shah arit of the New Year,
Frankfurt version c. 1883 after F. Ogutsch (18451922), Der Frankfurter Kantor, 1930, no. 179; (c) for Musaf of the New Year, Ukrainian version, c. 186080,
after J. Bachmann, Schirath Jacob, 1884 no. 90; (d) for Musaf of the New Year, Jerusalem version of the Lithuanian tradition as noted in 1963, after J.L. Neeman, Nusah la-H azzan, vol. 1, 1963, part 2. no. 17; (e) Psalm 65:3, chanted at Kol Nidrei to motives A and B of the kerovah melody, Polish version, 19th
century, after A. Baer, Baal Tfillah, 18833, no. 1307.
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Example 6b. Hymn-tunes constructed of variations on a modal pattern. The penitential hymn, Atanu leh alot. Oriental Sephardi, after Idelsohn, Melodien,
vol. 4, no. 95 and Iraq, ibid., vol. 2, no 45. For the same as sung in Persia to a pattern comprising one tetrachord only, cf. ibid., vol. 3, no. 40.
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*Nahshons decision of about 875880: A h azzan who knows
piyyut shall not be admitted to the synagogue (B.M. Lewin,
Oz ar ha-Geonim, 1 (1928), 70). The assumption of the title
h azzan by the singer probably took place during the ninth
century. Since the function of h azzanut soon came to be
passed on from father to son, this vocation became almost a
closed social class, where it was the custom for a h azzan to
marry the daughter of his master or of a colleague. The ties
of certain families to a musical profession are important for
the growth and early training of talents and, in the long run,
for the preservation of a musical tradition. There is mention,
for instance, of a family of h azzanim flourishing in Baghdad
in the 10t and 11t centuries: Joseph *Albaradani, the Great
H azzan (d. 1006), left sons and grandsons who became successive incumbents of his position, and all of them also wrote
piyyutim.
The close connection between h azzanut and piyyut is
demonstrated by some letters preserved in the Cairo *Genizah
(S.D. Goitein, Sidrei H innukh (1962), 97102; idem, in: Tarbitz,
29 (1960), 357f.). The congregations in medieval Egypt were
always eager to hear new hymns, and the h azzanim were compelled to exchange piyyutim among themselves, write them
down secretly from the singing of a colleague, and engaged in
correspondence as far afield as Marseilles.
It is difficult to imagine the musical character of early
h azzanut. One can, however, attempt to demonstrate the common features of Oriental and European h azzanim of today
with comparable gentile melodies taken as a control group.
In addition, the tunes noted down by Obadiah the Norman
Proselyte in the first half of the 12t century is available for
comparison. With due precaution, it may be said that h azzanut
implies the free evolution of a melodic line (without reference to any system of harmony). The tune therefore proceeds
by seconds and other small steps, while leaping intervals are
avoided. The melodic texture is dense: there are no empty intervals, no extended notes that are enlivened by dissolution
into small steps (Mus. ex. 7).
The h azzan must command a good measure of musical
creativeness. He does not simple reproduce a preconceived
piece of music, but must give final shape to the general outlines of a theme by an improvisation of his own. In this way,
the stanza of a piyyut may develop in a series of variations on
the traditional theme (Mus. ex. 8a)
This feature is already found in the tunes notated by Obadiah the Norman Proselyte (Mus. ex. 8b) in the 12t century.
The expressive element so characteristic of h azzanut can also
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Example 8a. Improvisatory variation of a theme. Oriental Sephardi, after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 4, no. 255.
Example 8b. Variative development. Two of the melodies notated in the 12th century by Obadiah, the Norman proselyte. Transcription by H. Avenary (cf.
JJS 16, 1966, 87ff.).
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rapid decline of the academies and geonic authority. As a result, the hegemony of Eastern Jewry which, until then, had
supplied the Diaspora with legal decisions, books, piyyutim,
masorah, rabbis, teachers, and h azzanim came to an end.
The dispersed Jewish communities were compelled to take
matters into their own hands.
music
How It Is Most Proper for Man to Conduct Himself in This
World. It should be noted that the then prevailing ancient
doctrine of the ethical influence of music formulated by the
Greek philosophers, had been expressed earlier in the biblical
stories of David playing before the melancholy King Saul and
of prophetic ecstasy aroused by hearing musical instruments
(I Sam. 10:6, 16:16, 23; II Kings 3:15).
It is quite likely that Saadiahs major source was the Arabic Treatise Imparting Concise Information on Music of
the great Arab philosopher al-*Kind (d. after 870). However, a close comparison of the respective passages shows
that Saadiahs contains significant differences and deviations
from al-Kinds.
The historical significance of Saadiahs short chapter far
exceeds that of its musical content. It demonstrates the integration of musical theory into Jewish learning. It had now become a challenge for erudite Jews in the Islamic countries to
comprehend this art intellectually. Fragments of several books
on music discovered in the Cairo Genizah were written during
the 11t to 13t centuries in the Arabic language, but in Hebrew
letters. Among them are extracts from the famous treatise on
music of the secret 10t century Arab confraternity Ikhwn
al-S af, and a fragment on the elements of lute playing. Contemporary book lists also provide an indication of what could
be found on music in private libraries and on bookstalls, and
one can imagine how much must have been lost in Cairo and
in cities like Baghdad, Damascus, Kairouan, or Cordova.
The scientific approach also makes itself felt in the fields
of grammar and masorah, thus transferring the treatment of
biblical accentuation to a higher level. The system of accents
itself had been completed and summed up in somewhat nave
rhymes designed to aid memorization (Dikdukei ha-Teamim,
ascribed to Aaron Ben-Asher himself). This old-fashioned
method of teaching continued only by the Ashkenazim (versified teachings of Rabbenu Jacob *Tam in the 12t century
and of *Joseph b. Kalonymus in the 13t century). A completely different spirit governs the dry but scientific classification given to the accents by Judah *H ayyuj (late tenth century), *Ibn Balaam or *Ibn Janah (11t century). It is difficult
to gauge the extent to which these works influenced musical
performance proper, but they are witnesses to a new trend in
the theoretical foundations of synagogue chant.
The classes of literature mentioned so far were addressed
to a small stratum of society and never exerted as broad an
influence as the books of biblical exegesis, whose study was
everyones moral duty. Thus the exegetes and their works
achieved great power in the spiritual life of the nation and
inevitably played a part in forming a body of common ideas
about music. It was Saadiah Gaon who won the title head of
the speakers and first of the exegetes in the post-midrashic
era. His Arabic translation of and commentary on the Book
of Psalms adheres scrupulously to the principle that all instrumental music be prohibited until the Temple is rebuilt, and
he even claims that instrumental music was restricted to the
Temple in ancient times. Saadiah was very particular about ex-
plaining obscure musical passages in the Bible out of the biblical text alone, but, on the other hand, he rather unconcernedly
translated the Hebrew words nevel and kinnor by the Arabic
names of contemporary string instruments. His practice was
continued by Abraham *Ibn Ezra and innumerable others.
An example of an exegesis drawing on current philosophical opinions is *Bah ya b. Ashers comments on Ex. 32:19
and 15:20 (Beur, written 1291 in Spain). Relying upon the view
of the masters of musical science that the nine musical instruments of Psalm 150 allude to the nine heavenly spheres and
that seven of them derive their power from the seven planets,
he explains why the mah ol (= Mars = evil) was the instrument
played before the golden calf, while the tof (= Jupiter (z edek) =
Justice) was beaten by Miriam, sister of the just priest Aaron.
The mah ol, he points out, was the symbol of a sinful woman.
In the course of time the opinion took shape that mah ol and
other terms from the headings of the psalms, such as ayyelet
ha-shah ar and alamot, were musical instruments or names of
musical modes. This view recurs in literature until quite recent times. In general, the exegetical books spread an understanding and a high esteem of music; they endowed it with an
image of strong spiritual power not very different from that
developed by philosophy rather than of a self-sufficient art
or a despised entertainment.
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THE CHALLENGE OF NEW FORMS OF ARTS. The philosophy and theory of music were conceived by scholars and, as
an abstract science, were detached from musical composition and performance. This did not prevent leaders like Saadiah Gaon from writing hymns in the free rhythms of Kallirs school. The following generation (about 940950), with
Saadiahs disciple *Dunash b. Labrat as its leader, introduced
contemporary Arab metrics into Hebrew poetry. This was a
revolutionary act of immense influence on poetry and music.
Arabic poets had accepted the ancient Greek metrics based
upon measured syllable durations as early as the eighth century: Since the ancient Arabs by nature measured [their language], its very nature accorded with tonal proportions and
musical composition (*Ibn Danan, Perek be-H erez, 15t century). The differentiation of long and short syllables is foreign
to the Hebrew language; it was, rather, the intensity of enunciation that provided the poetic weight (mishkal). It may
be seen, for instance, from *Yose b. Yoses Darkekha Eloheinu
le-Haarikh Appekha that the singer had to utter one, two, or
three syllables, as the case may be, between the accents; this
precluded a regular beat and meter, and the tune had to be
either psalmodic or in free rhythm. It can be said that this
poetry did not include the dimension of time as an object of
artistic configuration.
This old Semitic heritage was challenged by the GrecoArab meters, which give a precise order and division to the
continuum of time. The heavy pace of the old piyyutim was
regarded as bothersome to the public, which now preferred
smoothly flowing rhythms flattering to the ear. The formal element had become autonomous, so to speak; its former depen-
music
dence upon an idea (expressed in a natural flow of speech) had
weakened. This process was justified by the slogan that the
beauty of Japheth should dwell in the tents of Shem. Aesthetic
appreciation was clearly a new aspect in Hebrew poetry and
song. Of course, it had to overcome stiff opposition, but its victory was almost complete and lasted more than half a millennium. A pleasant musical sound was henceforth demanded
when offering a prayer (Joseph *Albo, Ikkarim, 4:23, 8).
In the musical field, too, a new type of melody made
its appearance. Its novelty in Jewish musical tradition is signaled by the fact that there was no term to designate it, and
the Arabic word lah n had to be adopted for the purpose.
This type of melody demanded metrical texts, and an early
Muslim theoretician, Ibn Rashik, held that meter was also
the foundation of melody. This idea was repeated and developed by several Jewish writers down to the 17t century (e.g.,
Samuel *Archevolti). Both Moses and Abraham ibn Ezra
(Z ah ut (Venice, 1546), 142a, written in 1145) advocated that a
poem intended to be sung should be written in equal metrical units throughout. It is understandable that mixed meters
would have led to alternating double and triple time within
the melodic phrase and this seems to have been regarded as
unbalanced.
Since neither Islamic nor Jewish culture record their
music in writing, it is only by inference that the lah an can be
regarded as a melody according to European notions, i.e.,
a musical structure built of equal or corresponding sections
and shaped according to a rhythmic scheme (meter). This
design differs from the traditional tunes of free rhythm, as
metrical poetry differs from biblical verse, and has the same
advantages and drawbacks, as *Judah Halevi demonstrated
(Kuzari 2:69).
In modern Jewish singing practice, a lah an may be
very closely to the cyclic structure of the stanzas and can be
notated with bars according to the meter of the text (Mus.
Ex. 9).
It is evident from the example that a metrical tune need
not be syllabic; a series of short notes may appear on a long
syllable. To judge from present practice, however, the absolute
identity of poetic and musical rhythm is relatively rare. More
often the tune is given its own rhythm, but even then it will
be symmetrical or cyclic.
Example 9. Melodies shaped according to the meter of the poetry. (a) Oriental Sephardi, after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 4, no. 218; (b) basic Western Ashkenazi melody; cf. A. Baer, Baal Tfillah, 18833, no. 225.
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The new development in poetry and music may be reduced to one common formula: both arts are given a periodic
ordering, an artificial structuring of the dimension of time
acquired from Greco-Arabic precedents. The mere sound
of speech and song thereby becomes an experience of its own.
The listener may give himself up to rhythms and sounds more
harmonious and relaxed than those found in harsh reality;
the words may pass before him without posing a special challenge or demand. This phenomenon was alien to the older
forms of Hebrew poetry in which the weight of accents, like
pounding hammers, drove the words into the consciousness.
It is difficult to imagine that one could listen to the beautiful flow of speech of Isaiah or Job without being moved by
its message. The impact of a sensual and aesthetic appreciation of art was a new element in Jewish music, and the first
tangible sign of its progressive integration with the cultural
environment.
MUSIC AT THE SOCIAL AND POPULAR LEVELS. As a result
of the relative freedom in daily life that the Jews were granted,
musical elements that had no connection whatsoever with either religion or secular learning came to the fore. At the popular level, song and play had certainly never ceased to enliven
festival and ordinary activities, exactly as is related of the
Talmudic era (see above). An uninterrupted stream of reports
and notices from the Middle Ages tell about Jewish minstrels
and jugglers roaming the countries and performing before
Jews and gentiles. The wandering artist had a very low status
in medieval society; he was almost an outcast in Christian
civilization and was regarded with the same suspicion, as
sometimes were the Jews. Nevertheless, minstrelsy was a
very old vocation, which had spread over the continent in the
path of the Roman legions. When the Jews were expelled
from their country, many joined the universally open class
of ludarii (M. Jastrow, REJ, 17, 30810), ministrerii, and ioculatores. The movement of Jews into this way of life continued during the Middle Ages and later on. Most of the Jewish
communities could not offer a livelihood to all who possessed
an artistic gift and felt an urge to practice it. These artists
used to master not only singing and instrumental play but
also the recitation of long epics and the composition of various kinds of poetry, as well as dancing, rope walking, knife
throwing, etc.
This kind of art was acceptable not only in the villages
or market places; men of high standing were also fond of hearing and seeing the minstrel and juggler, and those they liked
best they would attach to their retinue. Since the roaming artist was an outsider in any case, his Jewish extraction was of
no consequence in making him the court musician of a caliph or emir or of a Christian king, bishop, or knight. Some
examples of the Jewish minstrels appearance before highclass audiences may shed some light on this continuously recurring phenomenon. From Jewish tribes who settled in seventh-century Hijaz and went to war with shawm and drum
came the famous singer *al-Gharid al-Yahudi of Medina, said
to have pleased Muhammad himself by his song. In Andalusia, *al-Mansur al-Yahudi was appointed court musician by
al-Hakam I, the caliph of Cordoba, early in the ninth century
and sent to Kairouan to escort the famous musician Ziryab to
Cordoba; others are known to have served the nobles of the
Ibn Shaprut family, such as a certain Isaac b. Simeon (c. 1100).
The Christian kings of Spain also held Jewish musicians in
high esteem. Their court accounts of the 14t16t centuries
repeatedly mention Jewish juglares (mostly vihuela players)
who received considerable remuneration and were granted
pompous titles (ministrerii de stroments de corda de casa de
la seora reyna). Wandering singer-poets of Jewish descent
were welcome with kings and aristocrats since they added a
popular flavor to the sophisticated, but sometimes dull, court
atmosphere. El Ropero, the son of a Jewish tailor, was maliciously called malvado cohen, judio, zafo, logrero by his rivals,
but nevertheless allowed to address Isabella the Catholic with
a protest song against the persecution of the Marranos in 1473.
One of his contemporaries Juan (Poeta) of Valladolid, pleased
the Spanish court of Naples.
The activities of Jewish singers immediately before the
expulsion of the Jews from Spain, testifies again that they
were regarded as outsiders in every respect. They also appear
in the company of Provenal troubadours, French trouvres,
or, like *Suesskind of Trimberg (c. 1220), at the seat of the
bishop of Wuerzburg. The poetries of these Jewish singers,
even the songs on biblical subjects and those obviously written
for a Jewish audience, were in the vernacular. They mastered
the international repertoire to no less a degree than their gentile colleagues and added to it subjects from Bible and Midrash. One of the unexpected discoveries in the Cairo Genizah
was the notebook of a Jewish minstrel of 1382, writing German in Hebrew letters. It contains a lengthy German epic, as
well as songs on Moses, Abraham, Joseph, and a parable from
the Midrash. The authors, Eizik and Abraham the Scribes,
rarely use Hebrew words (but church is pejoratively called
tifleh).
The wandering singers were a class between the nations
and, in general, rather estranged to their origin. They spread
the works and motifs of literature over the countries and continents (e.g., Samson Pine, who interpreted the French epic of
Parzival to German scribes in 1335). The tales of King Arthur
were introduced to the Jewish public as well when they were
transferred to the Jewish idiom or imitated, as in the *Shmuel
Bukh (15t century), the Akedat Yiz h ak poem, and similar
compositions. Reliable sources show that such Jewish epics
were sung to a fixed melodic phrase throughout the whole
work like the Chanson de Geste and similar poems the world
over. Regrettably, such tunes as the Niggun Shmuel Bukh were
never recorded in music, but their counterparts have been preserved in the biblical ballads of the Sephardim, which show
that the recurrent standard phrase was varied with every repetition (Mus. ex. 10).
Minstrelsy in general holds an important share in the formation of common European melody types. Its Jewish repre-
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initiated eyes, Shirei H ol, ed. Brody, no. 72), or *Al-H arizi
who gave his thankful greetings to a certain Isaiah, master on
the Arabic lute (he stirs up the lute strings to sing like a
child in mothers lap who smiles and emits exultant shouts, not
weeping His playing over a dead body would awaken it, and
the spirit of life would dwell upon it again, Tah kemoni, ed.
Kahana, 463). Those beautiful and poetic words bear witness
of the deep emotions felt on listening to elaborate art music.
However, the conditions of the Jewish exile did not allow for
a continued delight in the refined art; time and again the Jews
were thrown back to the level of poor people and to the kind
of music enjoyed by the same.
The Formation of Concepts of Jewish
Music (12th14th centuries)
Example 10. Standard phrase of epic song. In this example, the phrase is varied by alternating open and closed cadences. Ladino ballad on the sacrifice
of Isaac, Morocco, after A. Larrea Palacin, Cancionero Judio del Norte de
Marrucos, vol. 1, Romances de Tetuan, 1952, 123.
Example 11. International dance tunes in the Jewish klezmer repertoire. (a) Italian dance tune, Lamento di Tristano, late 14th century, after A. T. Davison and W. Apel (eds.), Historical Anthology of Music, vol. 1, 1950, no. 59; (b) klezmer tune, after Elhanan Kirchhan, Simh at ha-Nefesh, part II, Fuerth,
1727, fol. 4r.
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public worship was naturally subject to certain prohibitions,
e.g., the prohibition on playing instruments and listening
to them during the Sabbath, imitating rites of foreign worship, or listening to female singing voices. Regulations of this
kind impeded the introduction of the organ or the formation
of mixed choirs in synagogues, for example. Another rabbinical doctrine demands that everyone in full, including the
participants in responsorial chant, should enunciate the
psalms. This gave rise to the strange concatenated alternation of hemistichs still practiced in several Eastern communities:
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Example 12. Common European idioms in Western Ashkenazi melodies. (a) Psalm 144, Ashkenazi, as sung on Sabbath eve, notated by H. Avenary; (b)
German dance song, 1556, after W. Salmen, MGG, vol. 7, 1957, col, 227; (c) Bulgarian dance melody, ibid., (d) Bergamasca, a north Italian melody widely
known since the 16th century; here in a version by Salamon de Rossi, after P. Nettl, Altjuedische Spielleute und Musiker, 1923, 21; (e) Ashkenaz Passover
hymn, after G. Ephros, Cantorial Anthology, vol. 3, 1948, 85; (f) klezmer tune, 1727, after E. Kirchhan, Simh at ha-Nefesh, part 11. fol. 2v.; (g) klezmer tune
ibid., fol. 5v; (h) European dance-music formula, descending the major scale, after W. Wiora in Report, Sixth Congress of the International Musicological Society, Bamberg, 1953, 1954, 170.
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nal (albeit exalted) standards. Direct and constant relations
between religious experience and music are rather found in
the mystical approach to faith, which needed music for communicating ideas that cannot be expressed by words and as a
means of imparting visions and secret revelations. Such tendencies are already evident in the Midrashim of earlier Jewish
mysticism. During the 13t century, the mystical trend gained
in impetus and exerted an unprecedented power over both
the contemplative and the active modes of life.
When the Kabbalah attempts to reveal the secrets of
creation or of the heavens, it often has recourse to musical
symbols, metaphors, and allegories. The reciprocal relation
between the lower and the upper world, for exampe, is made
comprehensible by analogy with musical resonance; divine
love and grace are pictured by various allegories of song and
dance. The Zohar gathers almost every musical allusion to
mystical ideas found in the Talmud and Midrash, without
adding anything really new; but it renovates and strengthens
the impact of such visions as the angelical choirs (Va-Yetze, ed.
Mantua, fol. 158b159b) and their counterpart, Israels song of
praise (so that the Holy One may be exalted from above and
from below in harmony, Shemot, 164b; cf. Va-Yeh i, 231ab).
Images of this kind had earlier been drawn in the Heikhalot
literature (see above). Especially significant is the demand
for cheerfulness in prayer, concretely expressed in song and
melody: we know that the *Shekhinah does not dwell in
sad surroundings, but only amid cheerfulness. For this reason Elisha said (II Kings 3:15): But now bring me a minstrel;
and it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the hand
of God came upon him (Va-Yeshev, 180b; cf. Va-Yeh i, 216b;
249b). Contemporary and later kabbalists connect their allegories with a rather precise, almost scientific, description of
musical phenomena (e.g., Abraham *Abulafia; Isaac *Arama).
Mystical meditation, however, by its very nature, had to remain a privilege of the selected few. Its massive influence on
music was made effective by books or commentaries in the
prayer book and, more directly, by the personal example of
individual mystics acting as cantors and rabbis.
Among the *H asidei Ashkenaz, mystical ideas penetrated
the particular mode of devout life taught by Judah he-H asid
and his followers. Their aim was to demonstrate the love of
God and the joy in his commandments every day, and this
strongly emotional element shaped a musical idiom of its
own. Prayer and praise are the center of life, but they can be
conducted in true perfection only by inseparable union with
a tune. Singing is the natural expression of joy, and a frequent
change of melodies prevents daily prayer from becoming mere
routine. Absorption in song releases the abandonment of the
self and the innermost concentration on the words uttered.
Moreover, mystical prayer also has an active end in sight: *kavvanah, the intention or concentration on the mystical union
of world and creator, is to be brought about by contemplating
the hidden sense behind the plain meaning of the words. These
unspoken matters must be deliberated during the utterance
of certain key words of the prayers. In this context, the tune
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This trend necessarily led away from every artistic or elaborate kind of music. Although the Sefer H asidim clearly rejected music from the tavern, the door was thrown open
to a new invasion of foreign melodies, at least at the popular
level of Jewish mysticism. A time was even to come when the
redemption of a beautiful gentile tune, by its adaptation to a
sacred text, was to be regarded as a great merit. The concepts
of music developed by the H asidei Ashkenaz deeply penetrated the communities and lasted for a long time in Central
Europe. Made popular by the writings of *Eleazar b. Judah
(Ha-Rokeah ) of Worms and numerous prayer books with
commentaries of his inspiration, the musical expression of
kavvanot became an essential task of h azzanut. It remained
so as late as the 18t century, when it was replaced by the influence of East European H asidism.
music
The Consolidation of Regional Styles
The spiritual developments which shaped the various concepts
of sacred song were largely concluded by 1300. It fell to the
15t century to shape music itself according to the chosen ideal
and to direct the accepted patterns into the channels of a continuous tradition. Differences of ideology and taste gave rise
to separate musical traditions not only of the larger groups
(Minhag Ashkenaz, Sefarad, Italyah, Romanyah), but even on
the community level. Important but limited groups, such as
the Jews of Avignon (*Carpentras), Mainz, and Prague, developed a characteristic musical custom (minhag) of their own.
Musical Minhag
Scattered references related to the music of certain prayer or
hymn texts can already be found in the earlier compendia of
liturgical practice, such as *Abraham b. Nathan ha-Yarh is HaManhig (c. 1205). Moreover, their disciples passed down the
practices of venerable rabbis and h azzanim through oral tradition. Some of the musical minhagim go back to the talmudic period, such as extending the melodies of eh ad in Shema
Yisrael (Ber. 13b; 61b), (Mus. ex. 13a), of the *Amen (Ber. 47a),
and of the *Priestly Blessing (Kid. 71c), see Mus. ex. 13c. The
halakhic sayings that shofar and megillah are to be treated alike
(Ber. 30a; Meg. 4b, etc.) are evoked by the use of an identical
tune for the benedictions of both of them (Mus. ex. 13b).
The efforts to consolidate an Ashkenazi tradition of sacred song were concentrated in the school of Jacob b. Moses
*Moellin, commonly called the Maharil. Although a rabbi by
rank and authority, he liked to function as a h azzan (Sefer
Maharil, ed. Lemberg, 1860, fol. 55ab; 49b). The musical us-
age taught by him was, on the one hand, a continuation of existing traditions accepted from former H azzanim (ibid., 28a;
82b), but on the other, his personal choice and example became normative. As a rule, the Maharil used to acknowledge
the right of local custom:
Maharil said: Local custom should not be altered at any price,
even not by unfamiliar melodies. And he told us an event in his
life. Once he was h azzan during the High Holidays at the Regensburg community and sang all the prayers according to the
custom of the land of Austria, which is followed there. It was
difficult for him, however, so that he said the haftorah in the
tune customary in the settlements near the Rhine.
Example 13. Old tradition of melodic extension. (a) Italian Sephardi, after F. Consolo, op. cit., Ex. 4, no. 12; Western Ashkenazi, after I. Lachmann (see Mus.
ex. 1) no 8: (b) Western Ashkenazi, notated by H. Avenary: (c) Italian, after Mordecai Tzahalon, Metzitz u-Melitz, Venice, 1715; Eastern Ashkenazi, after
H. Wasserzug, Schirei Mikdosch, I, 1878, no. 65.
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Example 14. Old European scales in Ashkenazi melodies. Blessing formula, after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 7, part I, no. 10: motifs of masoretic cantillation,
after J. Reuchlin, De accentibus, Hagenau, 1518; Sabbath song after A. Nadel, Die haeuslichen Sabbatgesaenge.
Example 15. Scales and examples of two Ashkenazi shtayger. (a) after A.B. Birnbaum, Ommanut ha-H azzanut 2, 1912(?), no. 35; (b) after M. Deutsch,
Vorbeterschule, 1871, no. 409.
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manner of their music making. However, a special development in this field took place in the Ashkenazi synagogues.
Their cantors also attached to themselves two assistant singers, but they did so with a view to the enrichment and beauty
of their singing. According to a fixed rule, one of these assistants (meshorerim) had to be a boy-descant, called singer,
and the other an adult, called bass. It is not known, when and
why this custom was introduced; a picture in the so-called
Leipzig Mah zor of the 14t century may be regarded as the
earliest representation of such a trio. The heyday of h azzanut
with accompanying meshorerim was the 17t and 18t centuries, and it is only from the sources of this late period that
its nature can be inferred. According to it, the assistants improvised an accompaniment of hummed chords, drones, or
short figures; the singer also intoned thirds and sixths parallel to the cantilena of the h azzan. In addition, both singer and
bass had their solo parts most often extended coloraturas to
be performed while the cantor paused. Famous cantors traveled, with the meshorerim as a part of their household, from
one large center to another as guest ministers, while the less
famed undertook such wanderings in search for a hoped-for
Example 16. Typical Western Sephardi chromaticism. Amsterdam, 1699, as notated by David de Pinna in D. E. Jablonski, Biblica Hebraica, Berlin, 1699;
Rome, 1955(?), after E.Gerson-Kiwi, Bat Kol, I, 1955, 15; Rome, 1966, after E. Piattelli, Canti Liturgici di rito Italiano, 1967, 15; Leghorn, 1892, after F. Consolo, op. cit., Ex. 4, no. 335; Florence, 1956, after L. Levi, Scritti in memoria di Sally Mayer, 1956, 174.
Example 17. Mutations of a nusah pattern, Italian Sephardi, after F. Consolo, op.cit., nos. 3356.
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migration and blending of music
styles (c. 15001750/1800)
The era of the Middle Ages is generally regarded as completed
at about 1500. The Jews, however, were not yet relieved of the
pressure that had built up during medieval times. For them
the period between 1500 and about 1800 was a time of forced
migrations, of many a spiritual crisis, of ethno-geographical
regrouping, and the formation of new centers. The uprooting of large communities and their confrontation with new
environments inevitably left its imprint on their music. The
most conspicuous event was the migration of these exiled
from Spain to the Ottoman Empire, Italy, and other countries,
followed by a steadily trickling rearguard of *Marranos; the
persecutions in Central Europe also directed a Jewish mass
movement to the (then very spacious) Polish kingdom. The
eastbound migrations of both Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews
share the fact that the emigrants preserved their original vernacular and their liturgical customs, as well as part of their
music, and even imposed these on the local communities. In
the long run, however, the musical atmosphere of the new
lands permeated the intonation and scale structure of their
song, while its melodic structure was affected to a lesser degree. The developments were not left to mere chance. New
ideologies came into being and also became guiding stars for
the forms and contents of musical expression.
THE LURIANIC KABBALAH. Theories dealing with the meaning, power and function of song were, in particular, developed
and given important practical application in the kabbalistic
doctrine that flourished in Safed in the 16t century; this kabbalistic school had its wellsprings in the teachings of Isaac Luria,
reverently called ha-Ari ha-Kadosh (the saintly Ari). These
kabbalists, among whom were talented poets and musicians,
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[Hanoch Avenary]
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importance in the performance of the *Kedushah the Trisagion. This parallelism extends not only to the Kedushah, but
implies full concordance between the singing of those on high
and those below. Hence the singing of hymns on earth contributes to the establishment of perfect tuning and harmony
between man and the macrocosm.
(4) Evil forces constantly obstruct the way leading to this
perfect harmony meaning salvation; sacred music and prayer
directed by mystical intention are the most formidable weapons in the combat for salvation.
(5) This combat is partly related to the magical power of
the shofar and the symbolical roles it fulfills. Indeed many passages of the Zohar deal with its shape, the material it is made
of, and the sounds it emits. Among the salient roles assigned
to it are the dissipating of harsh divine judgment and to change
its nature from punishment to clemency; important historical
events in the life of the nation are associated with the sound of
its blowing (the Exodus, the revelation of Sinai) as are events
of the future that is to say the redemption.
Some of the many symbols developed in Jewish mystical
theories and practice, made their mark on and were bound up
with daily activities of the past several hundreds years.
[Amnon Shiloah (2nd ed.)]
song. Religious hymns designed both for the prayer house and
outside (pizmonim; bakkashot) propagated the pious mood of
Safed in the Jewish world. Among the most prominent songs
of this kind are: Asadder bi-Shevah in (ascribed to Isaac Luria
himself), *Lekhah Dodi by Solomon *Alkabez , Yedid Nefesh by
Azikri, and Yah Ribbon Olam by Israel *Najara. The last was
a very productive and inspired poet-musician gifted with a
sense for musical nuances. Many of his hymns (printed between 1587 and 1600) were written to the tunes of well-known
secular songs in the Spanish or Turkish vernacular, less often
in Greek and Arabic.
Najara continued an older custom of providing for a phonetic correspondence of the foreign and the Hebrew text. In
this manner, the singer of a gentile song was reminded of the
preferred religious alternative. The manuscript of Solomon
Mevorakh (Greece, 1555), for instance, shows the replacement
of the Spanish song Alma me llaman a mi alma by the very
similar sounding Hebrew Al mah ke-alman ammi, al mah.
Najara substituted for the Arabic Ana al-samra wa-sammuni
sumayra the words Anna El shomera nafshi mi-levayim. He
strengthened the associative bridge still further by giving the
plot of the gentile song a religious meaning. Thus the famous
romance on the knight-errant Amadis becomes a tour de force
of phonetic sound imitation and, at the same time, a fine allegory of Israel and Gods errant glory:
(Spanish-Jewish romance)
Arboleda, arboleda,
Arboleda tan gentil,
La rais tiene doro
Y la rama de marfil.
(Najara)
H il yoledah bi soledah
H il yoledah bi soledah
Keshurah al lev bi-fetil
Al dod meni histir oro
U-meoni me-az heefil
(Mevorakh)
Ashorerah li-feerah
Azamerah na be-shir
Najara fostered music in the broadest meaning by acknowledging the union of word and tone not as an artistic game
(as did later imitators), but for the pious inspiration of the
common people by ways of a musical language that was their
own.
Humanism and the Renaissance
Contemporary with the era of Safed mysticism, another encounter of East and West in the field of Jewish music was initiated by the Renaissance and Humanist movements in Italy
and other parts of Europe. This was an interlude in history
acted out in the circles of learned scholars and before an erudite and refined audience of art music.
THE HUMANISTIC APPROACH TO LETTERS AND MUSIC. In
the world of science, a direct dialogue with the authors of antiquity replaced the traditional definitions and views of the
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Middle Ages. This trend extended to the Bible and later Hebrew works. Several Christian scholars studied Hebrew language and grammar, including the rules of masorah and its
accentuation. After a short time, the students themselves wrote
books on Hebrew grammar, which contained chapters on
the teamim, sometimes adding the music of biblical chants.
Among these were Johannes Reuchlin (De accentibus et orthographia linguae Hebraicae; Hagenau, 1518), Sebastian *Muenster (Institutiones grammaticae in Hebraeam linguam; Basel,
1524), and Johann *Boeschenstein (Munich Cod. Hebr. 401).
Many later writers, such as Johannes Vallensis (Opus de prosodia Hebraeorum; Paris, 1545) and Ercole Bottrigari (Il Trimerone, Ms. dated 1599) took over their notated examples. The
Ashkenazi Pentateuch tunes, notated independently by several of the authors, are of very similar outlines and are based
upon that same semitoneless scale which is still recognizable
in the Bible chant of modern times. The renewed interest in
grammar and masorah seized Jewish circles as well. Early in
the 16t century, several Hebrew authors undertook the description of contemporary practices of biblical chant. The
features of the Sephardi version were described by Calo Kalonymus (Appendix to Abraham de *Balmes, Mikneh Avram,
1523), and compared with Ashkenazi practice by Elijah Levita
(Tuv Taam, 1538).
In the field of art proper, the open-mindedness of the
Renaissance period favored the reconciliation of a progressive Jewish public with art music, especially in the small
town-states of upper Italy and Tuscany. A very dry historical
source the book lists delivered to the papal censor by the
Jewish families of Mantua in 1559 speaks eloquently when
stating that a certain Samuel Ariano had Zarlinos voluminous
Instituzioni harmoniche in his library and that Isaac *Norzi
possesed madrigal books of Cipriano de Rore, Donato, Stabile, and others. Two influential leaders of the Mantua community discussed the integration of art music in Jewish life.
Judah *Moscato, rabbi of that town in 158794, preached a
long sermon titled Higgayon be-Khinnor (Meditations on
the Lyre), published in Nefuz ot Yehudah (Venice, 1589). He
examined the subject man and music under the aspects of
Jewish tradition from the Talmud and Midrash down to the
contemporary kabbalists, as well as with reference to the Greek
and Arabic philosophers. The rabbi stressed the interrelation
of the harmony found in music and the harmony imagined in
the soul and character of man, striving to show the legitimacy
of musical art in Judaism.
His contemporary, the physician and rabbi Abraham
*Portaleone II of Mantua, wrote the book Shiltei ha-Gibborim
(Shields of the Heroes; posthumously printed Venice, 1612)
which may be viewed as an early attempt at biblical archaeology based on the interpretation of literary sources, in the
spirit of Renaissance scholarship. The author dwells at length
on Levitic song and the form and nature of its musical instruments. Outstanding Christian writers soon regarded these
chapters as a source of Hebrew music, especially after Blasio Ugolino had translated them into Latin in 1767. Disregard-
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Copenhagen (1605) and Antwerp (1613; 1616). He also secured
a firm place in the general history of music, especially by his
progressive instrumental compositions and the early application of the thorough bass. Other Jewish composers whose
works have been preserved in print were Davit *Civita (1616;
1622; 1625) and Allegro Porto (1619).
Outside Italy Jewish folk musicians were very active but
were not given an opportunity to gain a footing in the ranks of
art music. The relative freedom prevailing in Renaissance Italy
came to a sudden end with one of the usual crises of Jewish
existence. When the House of Gonzaga died out and troubles
seized the duchy of Mantua, the Jewish musicians had to emigrate (most went to Venice). The prosperity of that city and its
large Jewish population encouraged them to found a Jewish
accademia musicale (concert society) called accademia degli
Impediti and later on Compagnia dei musici. The musicloving R. Leone *Modena promoted their activities. Attempts
were made to introduce instrumental play into the synagogue
at the feast of Simh at Torah; but the initiators had to yield to
rabbinical objections, since the organ used by them was too
reminiscent of the foreign cult. Finally it was again a catastrophe the plague of 1630 that cut off the manifestations
of Jewish integration in art music. Severe rabbis about the
middle of the century quenched the last flickering of such intentions, but not before the first works of synagogal art music
had come into existence.
EFFORTS TO ESTABLISH ART MUSIC IN THE SYNAGOGUE.
From the eloquent recommendation of Judah Moscato and
the delight in art music fostered in wide circles of Renaissance
Judaism, it was not a far cry to welcome art music in the synagogue as well. The enthusiasm for the ancient Temple music
(Abraham Portaleone, see above) suggested its reinstitution
in the house of prayer. The power of conservatism and exile
conditioned humility and pessimism, however, proved hard to
overcome. The power behind these progressive tendencies was
Leone Modena, who, although ordained as a rabbi, was actually rather one of the errant literati and jack-of-all-trades like
many a learned humanist or his younger contemporary Joseph
*Delmedigo. While music was for Delmedigo a matter of science (Sefer Elim, Amsterdam, 1629), it was one of the 26 crafts
in which Leone Modena claimed to have been engaged.
As a rabbi in his native Ferrara about 1605, he saw to the
installation of a synagogue choir and to the systematical instruction of its six to eight singers in music. They performed
hymns such as *Adon Olam, *Yigdal, *Ein ke-Eloheinu, and
Aleinu le-Shabbeah on the occasion of feasts and special Sabbaths, in honor of God according to the order and right proportion of the voices in the art [of music]. This innovation
met with the stiff resistance of a local rabbi who held that music was prohibited in exile; but Leone Modena secured a decision of four other rabbis in favor of polyphonic synagogue
singing. This document was to become the main weapon
for many later attempts in this direction. It was reprinted by
the progressive cantor Solomon Lipschitz in 1718, as well as
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
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ing to the Castilian vernacular and folk song did not prevent
them from yielding to the powerful influence of Oriental, especially Turkish, music. This is indicated, for instance, by the
increasing use of Turkish melodies for Hebrew hymns. Musical assimilation became more spectacular when the system
of *maqm was adopted in Jewish song. Israel Najjara, late in
the 16t century, appears to have been the first to assign every poem to a cetain maqm, even when he demands a Spanish folk tune for it. His Kumi Yonah Yekushah, for instance, is
accompanied by the instruction Tune: Linda era y fermosa
but, at the same time, is classified as belonging to the maqm
H usayn (today it is sung to the maqm Naw; see Mus. ex. 18)
According to the Eastern custom, Najjara arranged his hymns
for publication in a diwn of 12 maqmt. The framework of
maqmt, each of which also represents a certain mood or
ethos, was imposed on synagogue song in general and extended even beyond hymnody proper. The majestic Siga became the mode for reading the Torah and all texts referring to
it; the gay Ajam-Nawruz was used on Shabbat Shirah, Simh at
Torah, and for weddings; the mournful H ijz expressed the
mood of the Ninth of Av, funerals, and pericopes mentioning death. S ab (chaste love, filial affection) was reserved
for texts connected with circumcisions. The most systematic
adherence to the mood conventions of the maqmt was by
the Aleppo community.
Poetry books dating from the 17t century onward open
the section of every maqm with an introductory verse or
independent verses called (petih ah) an improvised vocal
piece rhythmically free and highly ornamented underlining
the characteristics of the maqm as well as the art skillfulness
of the performer. The Jews of North Africa (Maghreb) adhere to the Andalusian modal system called t ubu (natures,
maqmt), which include sequences of rhythmical pieces introduced and interspersed with improvised free rhythmical
short pieces similar to the petih ah, which are called Bitain
and mawwl and constitute part of the prestigious compound
form, the Nuba (see *North African Musical Tradition).
All musical characteristics quoted up to now demonstrate the progressive Orientalization of the Jews who came
from the Iberian Peninsula and intermingled with the veteran
settlers. However, while the melodic configuration itself came
670
Example 18. Hymn in Spanish villancico form. Poem by Israel Najara, from
his Zemirot Yisrael, Safed, 1587; melody as sung in Iraq, beginning of 20th
century, after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 2, no. 120.
music
Example 19. Turkish style of h azzanut. Refrain of a pizmon by Israel Najara. The addition by the singer of words and interjections such as those shown in
brackets is typical of this style of art music. Notated in Istanbul in 1936 and published by Th. Fuchs in Ommanut, Zagreb, 1, 193637, music supplement, 2.
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Example 20. Kaddish for Sabbath eve, from the notebook of the h azzan Joseph Sarfati, Amsterdam, middle of 18th century. The melody is adapted from the
composition Ha-Mesiah Illemim by Abraham Caceres (fl. 1720). Jerusalem, J.N.U.L., ms. 80 Mus 2, fol. [21]v.
Example 21. Oriental singing style in the Amsterdam synagogue, 18th century. Lamentation (kinah) for the Ninth of Av, after H. Krieg, Spanish Liturgical
Melodies of the Portuguese Israelitisch Community, Amsterdam, vol. 2, 1954, 2.
umny; his El Malei Rah amim, said after the *Kishinev pogrom
of 1913, has been taken over by many cantors (Mus. Ex. 22).
Common to the Russian and other East European peoples is the tendency to attribute to music a decisive power
over human behavior and mode of action; the same is true of
the Jews living among them. A highly significant characterization of East Ashkenazi h azzanut was given by Rabbi Selig
Margolis in 1715 (H ibburei Likkutim, 4b5a): a h azzan who
delivers his prayers devotedly and with beautiful melodies, he
holds, may stir up hearts more than any preacher. Margolis
gives as an example the fact that the h azzan Baruch of Kalish
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moved the congregation to tears by his expressive rendition
of Perhaps the feeble and miserable people may vanish or
even by the recitation of the Thirteen Attributes of God. In
particular, during the penitential days, when he chanted the
prayers that had always been the domain of individual cantorial creation (Zokhrenu le-H ayyim; Mekhalkel H ayyim; Seder
ha-Avodah), there was nobody in the synagogue whose heart
was not struck and moved to repentance all of them pouring out their hearts like water the like of which does not
occur in other countries that have neither melody (niggun)
nor emotion (hitorerut); the h azzanim of our country, however, know well how to arouse penitence by their voices. This
self-assertion stresses the emotional attitude, which already
distinguished Eastern Ashkenazi h azzanut in the pre-h asidic
period. Since the late 18t century, the Jews of the West have
called it the Polish style. This designation implied, inter alia,
a certain profile of rhythm shaped by syncopes and dancelike configurations. Western cantors wrote down some early
examples around 1800. It is possible that some of them reflect
the practices of h asidic singing, such as the dance tune to the
words He redeemeth from death and releaseth from perdition (Mus. ex. 23a); dancing is suggested here by the fourbar strains repeated with open and closed cadenzas and, especially, by the bridge bars between the phrases, which are
also known from the oberek and other Slavic dances.
A minor tune of the same type (Mus. ex. 23b) embodies the full pattern of what is called a Jewish dance. Since it
is very remote from the music written by Western cantors of
the 18t century, this may also be regarded as an echo of the
East Ashkenazi style.
Example 22. El Malei Rah amim, as sung by Shlomo Razummi, 1903. After A. Nadel, EJ, vol. 6, 1930, cols. 3812.
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Example 23. Dance-like melodies from cantorial manuals of the late 18th century. (a) After Idelsohn, Melodien, vol, 6, part 2, no. 20; (b) ibid., vol 10, no.
245; cf. sections C and D with sections A and B of the first melody.
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adoption of the European baroque style. A Purim niggun notated by cantor Judah Elias in 1744 (Mus. ex. 24c) exemplifies
the inorganic linking of a traditional Jewish tune (I, G minor)
through dance-like bridge bars (II), with a continuation in
the contemporary taste (III, D minor; IV, B-flat major, modulation and da capo); some strains of the melody are echoed
in the 1794 Purim tunes of Aaron Beer (Idelsohn, Melodien,
6, nos. 1178) suggesting a common popular source. Songs
in the vernacular followed the same direction as instrumental music. Although their foreign melodies were balanced by
original invention, their constant use advanced the Westernization of music at the popular level.
Since the 17t century, the affluent classes had become
accustomed to have their children, especially daughters, instructed in singing and instruments (cf. Jos. Kosman, Noheg ka-z on Yosef, 1718, 18a; Jos. Hahn, Yosif Omez , 1723, 890).
*Glueckel of Hameln relates that her stepsister knew how to
play the harpsichord well (c. 1650). During the Prague festival
of 1678, the granddaughter of the community chairman played
the cembalo, and Isaac Mahlers daughter the harpsichord. The
tendency toward integration in music grew stronger among
the upper classes during the late 18t century, when Rachel
(Levin) *Varnhagen could report: My musical instruction
consisted of nothing but the music of Sebastian (Bach) and
Example 24. Characteristics of early klezmer music. (a) parody, Der Juden Tantz, lute piece by Hans Newsidler, 1554, after P. Nettl, Alte juedische
Spielleute und Musiker, 6465; (b) Purim song, after E. Kirchhan, Simh at ha-Nefesh, part II, fol. 7r.; (c) Purim Niggun from the manual of Judah Elias
of Hanover, 1744, no. 224, after A. Nadel, unidentified facsimile publication, Jerusalem, J.N.U.L., Jakob Michael Collection of Jewish Music, JMA 3997.
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tion for neglecting the traditional mode of singing (saying:
Its outdated and does not satisfy us) and replacing it by their
own inventions or borrowings from the opera, dance bands,
of street singers.
Considering the isolation of Judaism in those days and
its divorce from secular art, these declarations could hardly
be called overstatement. A remedy was suggested about one
generation later by the cantor Solomon *Lipschitz (Teudat
Shelomo, Offenbach 1718, no. 30). He also censures the ambitious individualism of his colleagues (everybody builds a
stage for himself ), which mostly turned out to be imitations
of the simplest forms of music, since the cantors lacked any
formal musical education. Lipschitz wishes to replace the old
form of Jewish singing leaning on the lower strata of the music of the gentile environment, by more accomplished forms
of art: Making music without knowing the rules of musica is
like a prayer without true intention [kavvanah]!
The results of such ideas soon became manifest. Close
to the middle of the 18t century, cantors began to use musical notation and thus began the literary period of Ashkenazi h azzanut. It was not the old and venerable traditions of
synagogue song, however, which were put on paper, but rather
the new compositions of the individual h azzanim. The earliest known document of this kind is a manuscript from 1744
written by the Herr Musicus und Vor Saenger Juda Elias in
Hannover. After this work come the manuscripts of the most
eminent cantor of his age, Aaron *Beer (17381821); famous as
der Bamberger H azzan; from December 1764 in Berlin). His
collection contains both his own versions or new creations
of synagogue melodies and those of a dozen contemporaries
(published in Idelsohn, Melodien, 6). Other important manuscripts go back to meshorerim who also served their cantors
as musical secretaries (Idelsohn, op. cit.).
The character of these cantorial works is defined, first of
all, by its strict homophony, tailored to the needs of a virtuoso
singer wishing to display his coloraturas (lenaggen), while the
text is given a subordinate role. The structure of these compositions remains in the line of traditional h azzanut by developing a theme by means of variative improvisation. The
resources of the basic melodies, however, are borrowed from
the post-baroque music of about 1700 to 1760, often recalling
the fashionable composers of that period (Monn, Wagenseil,
Zach). There is little left of the strong pathos and dramatics of
the true baroque, although the artistic evolution of the opening theme statement and the extensive use of sequences were
imitated, as was the instrument-like treatment of the voice
(Mus. ex. 25a); later in the century, some influence of the early
classicists can be observed (Mus. Ex 25b).
The new trend of cantorial art catered to the musical
taste of about 1720, but the merger of traditional and modern
style was far from complete. The customary Jewish freedom
of rhythm and the roving melodical line could not easily be
harnessed; attempts to do so resulted in asymmetrical phrases,
awkward modulation, and other flaws in conventional workmanship. Most of these cantorial compositions shared only
the platitudes and the most insipid musical idioms of the period. They were the product of a superficial connection between incompatible styles the first sign of that dualism in
the West Ashkenazi musical practice that was to become the
hallmark of the 19t century.
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Modern Times
The Nineteenth Century
By the 18t century, conditions of life had become almost unbearable in the ghettos and crowded Jewish settlements of the
continent. The protracted persecutions aimed at economic,
moral, and physical ruins nearly accomplished their purpose
and were balanced only by the firm belief in final redemption, unbroken self-confidence, and vital energy. The growing pressure put European Jewry on two different paths of
self-deliverance, as divergent from each other as the leaders
Moses *Mendelssohn and *Israel b. Eliezer Baal Shem Tov.
Assimilation, aiming at civil emancipation, was the external
way toward joining the society of an enlightened Europe;
*H asidism, on the other hand, was entirely directed toward
intrinsic values and was coupled with a certain abrogation of
bitter reality. Both tendencies penetrated all aspects of life and
had strong repercussions on music. A specific kind of music
could demonstrate a certain ideology (e.g., use of the organ
in synagogue service) or be made an essential means of spiritual exaltation (the h asidic niggun); music became a vehicle
of both social integration and spiritual escapism.
THE H ASIDIC NIGGUN. East European Jewry, suffering from
increasing pauperization and the incessant menace of extermination for centuries, underwent a critical disillusionment
with the failure of *Shabbetai Z evi and its aftereffects. At this
doleful juncture, between 1730 and 1750, arose the h asidic
movement, with its message of delivery of the soul from its
detention in the body and the troubled earthly life by its ascent to spiritual, true values, thus partaking of a higher existence. As a continuation of the mystical tenets of Safed (see
above), a joyful heart and a devoted soul learning for our
Father in Heaven were made the cornerstone of prayer, and
singing became a focal point of religious experience. For the
first time, music of Jewish mysticism itself becomes known
and may still be heard today. H asidic singing spans the entire gamut from grief and deep concern to extreme joy, from
a meditative mood to ecstatic exaltation, from purposeful
melodic construction to open forms or shallow banality (see
*H asidism: Musical Tradition).
THE ABSORPTION OF THE EUROPEAN ART STYLE. While
the Jews of Eastern Europe decided to overcome their miseries
by a spiritual divorce from the environment, those of the West
witnessed Lessing declare the equivalence of religions and the
French Revolution proclaim freedom and equality for all men.
This atmosphere encouraged their striving for integration in
a future society of enlightened Europeans and tendencies of
assimilation that ranged from slight external changes to total
surrender. Music was regarded as an essential part of future
music
Example 25. Cantorial compositions in 18th-century style. (a) Hodu for H anukkah from the manual of Judah Elias of Hanover, 1744, after A. Nadel, Der
Orden Bne Briss 910, 95; (b) from Hodu for H anukkah by Moses Pan (before 1791), after Idelsohn, Melodien, vol. 6, no. 55. Both compositions use the
traditional melody of Maoz Z ur as a point of departure.
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The Reform Movement. Napoleon also conferred his synagogue constitution upon some annexed countries, such as the
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Kingdom of Westphalia; among them, the Koeniglich Wuerttembergische israelitische Oberkirchenbehoerde even survived
his rule. These authorities gave the official and legal framework
to the already existing tendencies of correcting and amending
the synagogue service. The disregard of external form, dignity,
and beauty was regarded by many as an abasing stigma of exile conditions. The mystical ideas and symbols that provided
so much content to h azzanut and its coloraturas were no longer understood; the congregations had changed into an audience that expected music to evoke feelings they could not find
within themselves. A small but energetic circle of extremists
used the communal constitution given to Westphalian Jewry
to materialize its vision of a liturgy modeled after European
ideas and aesthetics. Perspicaciously, they started working with
the young generation, on the initiative of Israel *Jacobsohn,
court factor of Jerome Bonaparte and fervent champion of synagogue reform. The pupils of the Jewish mechanics school at
Seesen were given formal instruction in music from 1804; they
formed the choir and sang to the *organ installed in the prayer
hall of their institution (1807). The music consisted of choralelike melodies composed by their Christian music teacher to
Hebrew and German texts. Soon afterward, Jacobsohn opened
another Reform synagogue with organ and part-singing in the
Westphalian capital of Kassel. Both his institutions were forced
to close, however, with the end of the kingdom in 1814. The
reformer and his musical assistant went to Berlin and opened
a private synagogue with an organ and a boys choir from the
free school (1815). Two years later (1817), they moved to the private synagogue established in the house of Meyerbeers father,
the banker Jacob Herz Beer, where an organ with two manuals
and pedal was put at their disposition. The bold innovations
of liturgy and liturgical singing aroused disputes and quarrels
with the conservatives, whereupon the government ordered
the synagogue to be closed (1818).
Meanwhile, the Reform movement has spread to other
communities. The Hungarian rabbi Aaron *Chorin published
a book in defense of the synagogue organ (Nogah ha-Z edek,
Dessau, 1818). Reform congregations had been founded at
Frankfurt (Philanthropin orphanage, 1816), Hamburg (1817),
and during the Leipzig Fair (a synagogue opened in 1820 with
tunes composed by Meyerbeer). The Hamburg synagogue was
joined by many of the local Sephardim and their cantors, was
very active, and existed until 1938. Its members regarded the
melodic recitation of prayers and Bible reading as opposed to
the spirit of the age and replaced them by plain declamation.
On the other hand, some Sephardi tunes (of the civilized
kind favored by the Marranos) were adopted. Above all, Reform congregations created German-language hymnals on
the pattern of the Protestant Gesangbuch (first: Jos. Joelsons
Shirei Yeshurun, Frankfurt (1816)). The Hamburg hymnal
(1819, many editions) contained some melodies composed
by well-known musicians like A.G. Methfessel and, later, the
Jewish-born Ferdinand *Hiller.
Reform congregations, however, were generally unable
to recruit composers with both stature and real involvement
with the task. The original tunes of their hymnals, mostly the
products of music teachers, match the feebleness and absence
of inspiration found in the texts. Furthermore, there existed
an ideological impulse to integrate prayers with the Christian
environment by adopting the tunes of well-known Protestant
chorales. Banal new texts were connected with the melodies of Christological songs (Sefer Zemirot Yisrael, Stuttgart,
1836). After all the effort, a few jewels also took root outside
Reform synagogues (Seele, was betruebst du dich, music by
J.H.G. Stoewing; Hoert, die Posaune toent mit Macht, poetry
by Abraham *Geiger). More important are two achievements
of a general nature. First, the instruction of the youth in part
singing no longer in the old, improvised manner, but of music written according to the rules of harmony through the
schools, orphanages, and seminaries spread the understanding of European music to the less-privileged classes as well.
Another innovation of lasting effect was playing the organ
during the service. An object of raging and never-settled debates, the use of the organ in synagogues was made a cornerstone and symbol of later liberalism against strict observance
in religious matters.
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The Improved Service and Its Music. Attempts at radical reformation of the liturgy and its music did not go beyond a certain sector of the larger communities; in the provinces, they
failed almost completely. This does not imply indifference or
sluggishness on the part of the majority. In fact, a more decided and massive move toward musical acculturation has
seldom been observed. Even where the liturgical tradition
was handled with caution or left untouched, the conditions
prevailing in prayer performance caused much indignation.
Western Jewry strove for an improvement for a geordneter
Gottesdienst and this concept included the entire field of sacred song (orderly music of the divine service; Sulzer).
First came the renunciation of the brilliant coloratura in
the cantorial solo, once regarded as an asset in its own right.
By 1800 h azzanut was hopelessly pervaded with foreign elements (mostly baroque) and had developed as a sort of halfbreed that, unfortunately, demonstrated the weak spots of
both its ancestors. Independent attempts at modernization
were initiated by provincial cantors (Mus. ex. 26) whose abilities and taste were not up to their exaggerated aspirations.
Therefore, these experimental works were discarded by the
more urbanized taste.
The changed attitude toward musical performance also
wished to dispose of the usual trio consisting of the cantor
and two assistant singers (meshorerim). The improvised accompaniment executed by the latter was to be replaced by
harmonies of academic regular structure, and their solo coloraturas were to be clipped as eccentricities of an outmoded
taste. Likewise, the boisterous chorus of the entire congregation lost its value as a moving acoustical experience with ancient roots and was to be silenced and substituted by well-rehearsed part singing. Such ideas and tendencies materialized
during the period between the Congress of Vienna (181415;
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disappointing the hope for emancipation) and the revolutions
of 1848 that led to the admission to citizenship. In the meantime, synagogue music was remodeled according to the ideas
of the Jewish European. Fortunately, a cadre of real talents
remained after the great exodus of musicians to devote itself
entirely to this task. All of them were proficient in synagogue
song and were backed by family tradition in this vocation.
Most of them were gifted with extraordinary voices, and some
had already excelled as child prodigies; rich patronage had
paved their way to studies of musical theory and instrumental
playing. They were given the chance to realize their ideas on
a large scale when they were between 19 and 30 years of age:
the ardent idealism of youth contributed much to the breakthrough of the new trend.
Two forerunners had already set the first standards. Israel
*Lovy, a cantor and concert singer with a phenomenal voice,
established a four-part choir in the new Paris synagogue in
1822. The music he composed for this body indiscriminately
combined the old meshorerim tradition and the choral style
of the opra comique. The other precursor of things to come,
Maier (Meir) *Kohn of Munich, did not demonstrate Lovys
creativeness when he was commissioned to establish a choir
of boys and men in 1832. He had to resort to local non-Jewish musicians for choral compositions or, at least, the harmonization of melodies arranged or composed by himself and
others. Kohns compilations, (Vollstaendiger Jahrgang von Terzett-und Chorgesaengen der Synagoge in Muenchen) known
as the Muenchner Terzettgesaenge (1839), became, for some
decades, a vademecum for small to medium-sized communities. The compositions offered by the early proponents of
the improved service extended to selected chapters of the
liturgy and touched upon only a small part of the highly important role of the h azzan. Thoroughgoing changes of the
whole extent of the musical liturgy were finally put into effect
by Solomon *Sulzer in Vienna (from 1826), Hirsch *Weintraub at Koenigsberg (1838), Louis *Lewandowski in Berlin
(1840), and Samuel *Naumbourg in Paris (1845). The principles guiding the various renovators of synagogue music have
much in common:
We might find out the original noble forms to which we should
anchor ourselves, developing them in an artistic style Jewish
liturgy must satisfy the musical demands while remaining Jewish; and it should not be necessary to sacrifice the Jewish characteristics to artistic forms The old tunes and singing modes,
which became national should be improved, selected, and adjusted to the rules of art. But new musical creations should also
not be avoided (Sulzer, Denkschrift, 1876).
Example 26. German provincial setting of the Amidah prayer for h azzan and singer. The indications are: singer begins, h azzan begins. From an anonymous
Ms., possibly Bavarian, probably early 19th century. Jerusalem, J.N.U.L., Jakob Michael Collection of Jewish Music, Ms. JMA 4249 (1), fol. 15v.
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Example 27. A traditional melody and its 19th-century adaptation. (a) A. Baer, Baal Tfillah, 18833, no. 1158; (b) Ch. Vinaver, Anthology of Jewish Music,
1955, no. 23; (c) S. Naumbourg, Zemirot Yisrael, vol. 2, 1847, no. 228; (d) L. Lewandowski, Todah WSimrah, part 2, 1882, no. 179.
The free composition of choral works in the contemporary style was challenged by still another factorthe need to
give shape to the songs and responses of the congregation itself. Sulzer and Lewandowski were gifted with the inventiveness and skill for creating choir pieces of high quality. The
religious element in Sulzers music exhibits delicate feeling
with a sentimental timbre, clad in simple but sweet harmonies, while Lewandowski expresses himself in a more forceful
manner and avoids that common intelligibility which is apt to
turn into triviality in a short while.
The first synagogue choirs were quite an experience to
the congregations who had been annoyed by singing habits
perpetuated by inertia alone or by barren experimentation.
Sulzers choir in the Vienna Seitenstettengassen Synagoge,
was also praised by Christian visitors such as Liszt, the Abb
Mainzer, and others as both a human and musical experience.
The impact of Sulzers achievements was felt very soon by the
brisk demand for his scores. Synagogue choirs were founded
in Prague, Copenhagen (before 1838), Breslau, Berlin, Dresden
(1840), and London (1841). Sulzers disciples or choir singers
transmitted the music of the improved service to the United
States as well (G.M. Cohen, New York 1845; A. Kaiser, Baltimore 1866; M. Goldstein, Cincinnati 1881; E.J. Stark); their
appearance antedated that of East Ashkenazi synagogue song
in the Western hemisphere (New York, 1852). Cantors from
the East European communities came to Vienna in order to
perfect themselves with the father of the new song in Israel
(Pinchas *Minkowski). The more important of Sulzers Eastern
disciples or followers were Osias *Abrass, Jacob *Bachmann,
Nissan *Blumenthal, Wolf *Shestapol, Spitzburg (the Russian
Sulzer), and others.
In these ways and by these men, the stage was set for musical life in the Western houses of prayer. During the second
half of the century, after 1848, the liberal wing of conservative
(non-Reform) synagogues added organ playing to the service
order. A progressive cadre of communal leaders had decreed
its admissability during the second Assembly of Rabbis held
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at Frankfurt in 1845. It was, however, a partial vote that did
not oblige or convince any sworn opponent. For instance, five
years before the Berlin New Synagogue was finally furnished
with an organ (1866), seven rabbis were consulted; Rabbi Michael Sachs was among the opponents, Abraham *Geiger was
with the advocates. In the end 74 German-Jewish communities came to have organs played at their service, according to
a count made in 1933. In Russia, the first synagogue organ was
installed not before 1901 (Union Temple, Odessa). Very few
of the composers writing for this instrument understood its
technique and spirit. Lewandowski, a pupil of E.A. Grell, was
the first to produce real organ music for the synagogue.
The absorption of European standards in the musical service was paid for later in the 19t century with the weakened
understanding and cultivation of the old tradition, especially
of the cantors role. The impending loss of acknowledged values was noticed in time and was averted by collecting and
publishing what remained of oral tradition. Some of the related publications exhibit a remarkable sense of authenticity:
outstanding is Abraham *Baers voluminous, almost singlehanded, collection, Baal Tfillah (1877); relatively reliable is F.
*Consolos Libro dei canti dIsraele (Leghorn-Sephardi tradition, 1892). Other authors who intended to create handbooks
for the cantors training imparted a little polish to the original tunes, but may still serve well for critical research (Moritz
*Deutsch, Vorbeterschule, 1871; Meier Wodak, Ha-Menaz z eah ,
1898; etc.). The Sephardi rite of Carpentras was noted by J.S.
& M. Crmieu (1887), that of Paris by E. Jonas (1854), and a
selection of London Portuguese melodies by the piano virtuoso E. *Aguilar and D.A. de *Sola (1857, unfortunately in a
harmonized and metricized arrangement).
Parallel with the activities in collecting and editing, inquisitive minds strove to answer the question of the distinctive elements in Jewish music. The particular nature of the
shtayger scales or modes, already noted by Weintraub (1854)
and Naumbourg (1874), was demonstrated by the Viennese
cantor and disciple of Sulzer, Josef *Singer in an attempt at
systematization (1886). Outstanding in this first generation
of researchers was Eduard *Birnbaum, Weintraubs successor
at Koenigsberg from 1879. A sound Jewish education enabled
him to place musical questions in the context of history and
literature and achieve an unusually high level. His inconspicuous article (later a booklet) Juedische Musiker am Hofe von
Mantua (1893) has become a classic in its field. An asset of
lasting value is Birnbaums collection of cantorial manuscripts
and other source material (at present in the Hebrew Union
College Library, Cincinnati); partly exploited by Idelsohn, it
holds research tasks for generations to come.
The 19t century also witnessed the professional organization of West European cantors and the edition of periodicals in which the publication of source material and research
had a place (Der Juedische Cantor, ed. A. Blaustein, 187998;
Oesterreichisch-Ungarische Cantorenzeitung, founded by Jacob
*Bauer, 18811902). In spite of all the activity and alertness in
matters of synagogue song, the West European communities
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Ashkenazi h azzanut represented an original and self-sufficient kind of music, comparable only with certain Oriental
styles of song. Its most conspicuous attribute is its expressivity,
the prayer of the community subsiding, as soon as the h azzans
voice is heard, and the mind completely identifies itself with
the voice. Unlike the self-imposed restraint of the Western
cantor, the aim is to produce an upsurge of religious feelings (hitorerut) and a strong and immediate response. The
music
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Example 29. Eastern Ashkenazi h azzanut, c. 1800. Introductory prayer to the confession of sins on the Day of Atonement, by Solomon Weintraub (Kashtan),
as notated from oral translation by D. Roitman, after G. Ephros (ed.), Cantorial Anthology, vol. 2, 1940, 135.
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Example 30. Eastern Ashkenazi h azzanut with singer soli, c. 1990. Retzeh, by Aryeh Lev Schlossberg (18411925), after G. Ephros (ed.), Cantorial Anthology, vol. 4, 1953, 3689.
governs both the melodic cells at every instance of recurrence and the whole structure of a piece. Often a cantorial
composition contains a double course of the same section first as an original statement and then as a variation of
the same (Mus. ex. 29). At times, the work is composed of
melodic cells arranged without any apparent order (Mus.
ex. 30) exactly as the ancient nusah style demands (see
above).
One of the rules of h azzanut, however, is that there is
no rule of adhering to one plan or the other: expression is
the element, which counts. The expressive intention is overwhelming: it dissolves the form of the underlying poetic text
past recognition; single words may be repeated over and over
(Mus. ex. 30), in spite of halakhic prohibition; emotional exclamations intermingle and long coloraturas expand certain
syllables, in particular towering above the penultima at the
end of compositions. These traits may appear exaggerated to
a taste accustomed to classicist restraint, but they are capable
of the most suggestive presentation of sentiments, mostly in
the pitiful and lachrymose mood (the expression of joy being channeled mostly through imitations of foreign song).
The h azzans voice plays on a variety of sound colors, complemented by a high falsetto (in the old contralto manner)
and prefers techniques such as the gliding passage from tone
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Strelisker (Dovidl *Brod), who assumed the airs of a noble
dilettante and would not give in to the modernistic tendencies of the Budapest chor shul of 1830.
The first waves of Sulzers musical reform reached Eastern Europe promptly and impressed both singers and ambitious community leaders. Cantor Nissan *Blumenthal of
Odessa was the first to adopt Western ways by cultivating
a smooth bel canto style. Some went or were sent to Sulzer
himself in Vienna (see above). Others acquired their formal
education in Eastern Europe, such as Joel David Strashunsky
(the Vilner Balabessl) with Moniuszko in Poland, and Jacob
*Bachmann with Anton Rubinstein in Russia. The Westernizing h azzanim limited the influence of art music to choral
composition, while the solo parts of their own were left almost untouched. In general, choral composition kept to the
meshorerim style, touched up with more regular harmonic
sequences; but those who were tempted to introduce fugues
or other musical devices of advanced academic training also
inserted showpieces of artful elaboration indiscriminately. In
addition, their works frequently reflect the fascination exerted
by Rossini and other idols of the day. The so-called choral synagogues soon brought forth specialists in choral leadership
and composition, such as A. Dunajewski, Eliezer *Gerovich,
and David *Nowakowski. Their creations do not lack touching moments, but are conductors music, incompatible with
the strong and style-conscious works of their older contemporary Nissan *Spivak (Nissi Belzer).
Research in traditional Jewish music was taken up by
cantor Pinchas *Minkowski, one of the prominent h azzanim
who left for the West. Immediately before the mass emigration
of star cantors, the splendor of Ukrainian h azzanut flashed
once again with Solomon *Razumny.
The Twentieth Century
At the beginning of the 20t century, the specific kind of music inherited by European Jewry had no good expectations.
The spiritual and social landslides in the West had buried
the characteristic features under the quicksand of fashionable tastes, leaving the original outlines barely recognizable.
The traditional solo style, still fostered in the East, drifted toward brilliant but shallow display and mingled with the first
attempts in formal artistry. The musical situation reflected
Example 31. Gustav Mahler, Das Lied von der Erde, opening melody of the last movement, Abschied (Parting), singled out by Arnold Schoenberg for its
unique melodic character (see A. Schoenberg, Style and Idea, 1950, 8586). Music, courtesy Universal Edition Vienna.
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ever, a far cry from the visionary and subconscious achievements of the great masters in the open field of pure music and
the practical solutions demanded for applied music, such as
synagogue song, which had to cope with tradition and habitude. But its composers also felt the need to express Jewish
identity much more strongly than in the past century. The
first obstacle to be overcome was their estrangement from
the genuine sources of inspiration; moreover, these sources
lay buried under much debris.
THE COLLECTION AND EXAMINATIONS OF THE INHERITANCE. Gathering and transcribing the oral tradition of synagogue song had begun in the Western countries during the
19t century and was almost completed by the end of that era.
This labor and the incipient research had been the work of cantors personally involved in maintaining the vocal traditions.
It became the task of the present century to approach the material under broader aspects and, above all, to extend its scope
to the Oriental Jewish communities. The decisive step was
taken by Abraham Zvi *Idelsohn (18821938), a disciple of
Eduard Birnbaum who imbued him with the inquisitive
and historical approach to tradition educated at German
conservatories and in the principles of the Leipzig school of
musicology.
The impact of Idelsohns publications made itself immediately felt in general musicology, especially in Plainchant
research (Peter Wagner, Einfuehrung in die Gregorianischen
Melodien 3, 1921; frequently borrowed and repeated in later
research). The reaction of specialized Jewish research came
with the confrontation of European and Oriental music in
Israel. A wave of re-recording and extensive or intensive surveying swept over the fields of folklore, now widened beyond
expectation by the ingathering of the exiles (from 1948).
These activities form a base for present research, in addition
to historical and liturgical studies by modern methods. The
integration of Jewish music in the general history of music (especially its comparative branch, foreshadowed in Curt *Sachs
writings) is close to being accomplished.
Parallel to the research in Jewish Oriental song went
the collection of musical folklore in the European communities. The collection and transcription of these treasures began
about 1900. It was not necessarily in the wake of Herders ideas
on folk song and national character that the Warsaw watchmaker Judah Leib *Cahan began his famous collection of folk
song texts and music in 1896 (published from 1912); rather
he felt the waning of his Jewish world so lovingly described
in I.L. *Peretzs and *Shalom Aleichems novels. The menace
came from secularization (*Haskalah) and the attraction of
the Russian big cities but it was the progressive and assimilated
circles themselves that approached Jewish folk music with the
methods of ethnomusicology. In 1898, the writers Saul *Ginsburg and Pesah *Marek initiated a collecting campaign of folk
song texts (published 1901), and the critic and composer Joel
*Engel began noting down Jewish folk tunes. Their motivation sprang from the conscious acceptance of the national
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The rediscovered treasures were quickly brought before
the public in unsophisticated arrangements for concert performance. Engel presented his folk song arrangements at concerts
of the Moscow Ethnographical Society as early as 190102.
The Petrograd Society for Jewish Folk Music (190818) had a
statistically splendid record of concert performances. Its publishing house, Juwal, produced 58 works of 16 composers up
to 1914, in addition to Engels numerous songs and a collective
songbook for schools. The results were sound craft-productions but not creative art. In consequence, the works of the
National School did not gain ground beyond a certain sector
of the Jewish audience. Talents like Joseph Achron struggled
tragically for the fusion of Eastern-rooted Jewish and Western art music. The important problem of connecting self-sufficient melodic lines and modal (anti-harmonic) structures
with harmonies was not solved; experiments went on in the
tracks of Balakirev and Mussorgsky and later with the application of sound shading la Debussy.
A short Russian spring after the October Revolution
promised a new efflorescence of national aspirations in art.
Hebrew and Yiddish *theaters (after having been banned since
1883) were founded (*Habimah, 1917; Vilna Troupe), and gave
a fresh stimulus to Jewish composers. In fact, the latters performances were at their best with incidental music such as Engels Dybbuk Suite (op. 35), or A. *Kreins music to I.L. Peretz
Night in the Old Market Place. But very soon Jewish national
art was dispersed for political reasons and its exponents went
westward. After a short rallying in Berlin (about 192022),
they made their way to the United States or Palestine. Others
rode the tide and became useful members of the Soviet musical establishment (M. Gnesin, A. Krein, A. *Veprik).
Those who remained in Central Europe continued the
national trend. The Juwal publications of music were transferred to Vienna and carried over to the new Jibneh series
(closed in 1938). This group of composers did much to foster
the conscience of Jewish identity in the Western communities (J. *Stutschewsky, A. *Nadel, J.S. Roskin, and singers like
cantor L. Gollanin); they also became closely associated with
the Zionist movement.
The earlier delegates of the National School who went to
Palestine left only a superficial and transitory imprint on local
art development because of their inflexible views and frozen
stylistic traits; but a few representatives of the old guard, such
as J. Engel and J. Stutschewsky (from 1938) played important
roles in musical life.
The massive immigration of Jewish composers and musicians to America was quickly absorbed in the well established communities of East Ashkenazi extraction with their
own music theaters, choral societies, and virtuoso star cantors. Members of the National School such as Lazare Saminsky, Joseph *Yasser, and others became important organizers
of both sacred and secular music. They remained indebted to
East Ashkenazi folk song or the styles based upon it, as can be
seen, for instance, from the proceedings of the Jewish Music
Forum (New York, from 1939) and similar institutions. The
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Example 32. Eastern Ashkenazi style h azzanut from the United States. Two compositions by Zawel Kwartin. After Z. Kwartin, Zmiroth Zebulon, vol. 1,
1928, nos. 35 and 18.
obtrusive sentimentality (to vitriol away the cello sentimentality of Messrs. Bruch, etc.; A. Schoenberg on his Kol Nidrei
version, letter to Paul *Dessau, 1914). Saminsky, for instance,
consciously renounced the plaintive shtayger scales in favour
of what he called the beautiful and majestic major and Aeolian minor of Hebrew melodies (Sabbath Evening Service,
preface, 1926). He drew much inspiration from the motive
stock of Ashkenazi biblical chant and its basically pentatonic
structure (ibid., ch. 36). He has the Sabbath Psalm 93 sung to
a tune derived from the motive-chains of Bible reading (Mus.
ex. 33). The effect is an unusual relaxed expression of joy, Jewish in substance, but completely divorced from the perpetual
tension of h azzanut. The composer evaded the problem of harmony by prescribing the unison of choir and organ.
Lazar *Weiner, too, relied upon pentatonics (Mus. ex.
34a), but in a more schematic way and took some of his inspiration from the earlier Israel song composers (Daniel *Sambursky, Marc *Lavry). Russian-born Isadore *Freed, educated
in America and in France with Vincent dIndy, approached the
problem of harmony by employing the subtle, somewhat pallid, chords of late French romanticism (Mus. ex. 34b).
The harder line of the expanded tonality featured by
Ernst *Toch or Hindemith, with its tonal flexibility and harsh
harmonies, had a refreshing influence on modern synagogue
composition: here was an antithesis to romanticism, and a certain affinity to the antiharmonic elements and heterophonic
performing habits of the earlier synagogue. Heinrich *Schalit
applied some of these topical principles to his Sabbath Eve Liturgy (Munich, 1933; revised ed. New York, 1951), using several
original Oriental-Sephardi tunes (e.g., the radiant ecstasy of
the Kedushah in Idelsohns Melodien 4, no. 41). A remarkable,
but isolated, progress toward a synagogue choral style was
made by American-born Frederick *Jacobi in one of his later
works. The harmonies brought forth by the four-part choir
have been severed from functionalism; the doubling of the
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Example 33. Choir tune developed from motifs of biblical cantillation. From L Saminsky, Sabbath Evening Service, op. 26, 1930.
mentals of Jewish song form the only common ground left for
any synthesis that may be in the offing.
voices serves rather for the acoustical strengthening and coloration as known, in principle, from meshorerim practice. The
voices go in unison at one time and move apart at another, as
in the natural heterophony of a praying congregation; there
are also reminiscences of choral psalmody.
Perhaps the most prolific innovator was Hugo Chaim
*Adler, cantor and disciple of Toch. When still in Germany,
in Mannheim, he recoined the concept of Brecht-Hindemiths
ethical cantata to the ideas of Bubers Juedisches Lehrhaus. After escaping to the United States in 1939, he gave a new shape
to the musical service and community life of his Worcester, Massachusetts, congregation (synagogue compositions
193452; cantatas 193448). Drawing upon the same techniques as Schalit and Jacobi, Adler was more consistent in
stressing the specific Jewish elements. Traditional features
such as shtayger modality, and restraint to the musical essentials endow his works with character and stature.
The specimens quoted so far may demonstrate some important trends and achievements in adapting contemporary
musical language to the synagogue. Among the considerable
number of commissioned works are the liturgies of L. Saminsky (1926), J. Achron (1932), Darius *Milhaud (op. 279; 1947),
and L. *Algazi (1952). In a different category are the para-synagogal cantatas and prayer arrangements with obligatory orchestra accompaniment that are suited to concerts or meetings
of religious or national celebration; this class is represented
by the important works of Ernest *Bloch (Avodat ha-Kodesh,
1930), which was commissioned for a Reform synagogue and
which entered the concert repertoire, and Arnold Schoenberg
(Kol Nidrei, 1938). Selected prayers were set to music, on the
commission of prominent communities, by Leonard Bernstein
(1946), Mario *Castelnuovo-Tedesco (op. 90; 1936), Lukas
*Foss, Morton *Gould (op. 164; 1943). Alexander *Tansmann
(1946), Kurt *Weill, and others. The composers names suggest the wide range of schools and individual styles employed
but do not guarantee a degree of personal involvement and
familiarity with the actual demands of the service. At any rate,
the publication of new synagogue compositions, both on the
traditional and the decidedly contemporary line, is growing
in number, the output of the 1960s exceeding by far that of the
1950s. The impact of modern tendencies on synagogue music
as a whole is checked, however, by the differences of approach
to liturgy and service which form part of more comprehensive principles and ideological controversies. A new factor
has been added to the question of conservativism or progress
in sacred music by the meeting and clash of widely differing
ritual and singing cultures in Israel. The most ancient funda-
FOLK MUSIC
It is today acknowledged that differences between folk music and art music, and what is called popular music, are not
clearly defined. However, major features are usually noted
as characteristic of folk music. It is transmitted orally from
mouth to ear and learned through listening rather than
through written notated documents. This suggests that the
music can change when passed from one individual to another depending on the memory and creative power of the
performer and the measure of acceptance in the performers
community. Gifted individuals who gave of the fruits of their
poetical and musical talents frequently borrowed familiar
pre-existing melodies and made new songs out of them. In
many cases the names of the composers were forgotten and
the compositions became anonymous. Folk song, primarily rural in origin, is functional, meaning that it is associated
with other activities; yet it also exists in cultures in which
there is a technically more sophisticated urban musical tradition and where this cultivated music is essentially the art of
a small social elite.
As a whole, these and other characteristics are hardly
applicable to the complex web of Jewish musical traditions,
which have been rooted in many and diverse cultures through
the long years of dispersion where alien traditions impinged
on Jews wherever they resided. Viewed as a unit they represent
a multiplicity of idioms, simple and more sophisticated musical styles in which the sacred and secular overlap. Considered
separately, each tradition has numerous forms of expression,
being partly folkloristic in character and partly drawing upon
the sophisticated art of the surrounding environment. Thus,
for instance, non-Jewish art music from the surrounding culture insinuates itself into the Oriental synagogues and other
forms through the the art music spread through the areas under Islamic control, which in itself, despite its considerable
sophistication, is based on oral transmission.
Another characteristic that sets Jewish musical traditions
apart from other musical traditions is the use of Hebrew as
a common language and the recourse to the same corpus of
sacred classical texts for reading from biblical books and the
liturgy. This has created a special blend of highly varied musical lore transmitted orally from generation to generation
and written textual lore that operates as a unifying and stabilizing factor.
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[Hanoch Avenary]
music
Example 34. Modern compositions for the synagogue. (a) Lazar Weiner, 1932, in G. Ephros (ed.), Cantorial Anthology, vol. 5, 1957,
64; (b) Isadore Freed, 1955, in G. Ephros, ibid.,66; (c) Frederick Jacobi, 1946, in D. Puttermand (ed.), Synagogue Music by Contemporary Composers, New York, 1951, 1802.
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Example 35. Modern psalmody for cantor and choir. Hugo Chaim Adler, Nachlat Israel Sabbath Eve Service, 1952, 2829. The organ accompaniment has
been omitted here.
There are times when the singing has a defined function, but
it may also be entirely dissociated from any specific happening. Individuals may express themselves in lyrical song even
if there is no apparent relation between the song and whatever evoked the urge to sing. The themes and contents of the
songs are as extensive as the range of occasions that inspire
them. Generally speaking they encompass events associated
with (1) the Jewish calendar such as Sabbath songs (zemirot),
the Purim plays, the Passover Seder and the like; (2) general
festive gatherings such as the songs of hillulot or pilgrimage
to the tombs of saints. Among those whose holiness has been
recognized by the entire nation the outstanding figure is certainly Simeon bar Yoh ai, whose grave at Meron attracts great
masses from all Jewish groups. One can add to this category
the celebrations of the *Maimuna by the Moroccans and the
Seherane by the Kurds; (3) The third category and undoubtedly the richest concerns the life cycle. A persons lifetime,
from birth to death, is filled with a succession of outstanding
occasions, many of which are celebrated in song and dance.
A new element enters the scene here, one that is totally nonexistent in synagogue singing: women take part and even create texts that are performed in suitable circumstances and on
occasions have unique reference to their world, some being
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considered their exclusive province, such as cradle songs and
dirges (see below).
Womens Folk Music
The phenomenon of women singing for other women on
various occasions was undoubtedly a way of circumventing
restrictions engendered by religious and social bias that limited their public musical activities and their participation in
synagogue rituals. Women are also circumscribed by the talmudic injunction to the effect that hearing a womans voice
is an abomination, which was interpreted as a prohibition
against their singing in public. In his extensive response to
the Jews of *Aleppo concerning the lawfulness of music, Maimonides, the prominent religious authority, included among
the major prohibitions Listening to the singing and playing
of a woman.
All this seems to have encouraged the emergence and
crystallization of songs with unique values and characteristics,
as women singing for other women became a way of getting
around these prohibitions. In their songs women can express
their world of experiences and the Jewish and human values
they uphold. The songs seem to have been a form of release
through which they could express even if only to themselves those experiences and aspects of their lives that were
special. They also often included Jewish ethical instructions,
reaction to public and political events, as well as various communal happenings.
The songs texts have a broad thematic scope: comments
on important historical and current events; songs of religious
character, which are in the form of translations or paraphrases
of biblical stories; the life cycle from birth to death with special
emphasis on the wedding and its colorful attendant ceremonies; lyrical songs that accompany a woman when she is alone,
when doing housework, when remembering the bitter experiences in her life, her troubles, complaints, and dreams, whether
in a lullaby or a song of love or jealousy. There are also humorous and satiric songs like the songs of curses ostensibly meant
to entertain women by introducing a light atmosphere.
With few exceptions, womens songs are in the language
and Jewish idiom spoken locally. Their singing falls within the
realm of oral tradition and consequently their songs are usually not fixed in permanent form so that gifted women can exhibit their creative ability by adding verses of their own or by
rearranging the material they include in their repertoires.
The songs are sung in public on occasions of a folk nature either by a group of women or by one individual with a
good voice. There are also professional performances by female musicians who are specialists in specific genres; particularly notable is the performance of funeral laments and
dirges, which are considered the province of women who excel as keeners. Professional performances, much like of those
of men, are given by one or two specialists the main singer
and her assistant. They are usually performed in responsorial form and the women accompany themselves on the most
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dox neighborhoods of Jerusalem). By contrast, the national
ideology first carried forward by the Zionist movement
and then as an official policy of the State of Israel activated
a drive for national unification around common values, most
importantly the revival of the Hebrew language. In the case
of music the national ideology was expressed in the endeavor
to create a new and inherently national style of folk, popular, and art music, which acted as a powerful unifying social
agent, including social gatherings in contexts of music making and concert activity. At the same time, the immigrants
from Europe were reluctant to discard their rich cultural heritage. The immigrants from Europe were thus dominated by
the dialectical conflict between the Vision of the East and the
Heritage of the West.
Within the narrower sphere of art (concert) music and
concert life, the maintenance and practice of European music whether as active music making at home or in passive
attendance of concerts played a paramount role in softening the trauma of immigration and resettlement. By contrast,
composers, strongly guided by the Vision of the East, endeavored to create a new, intrinsically national Israeli musical style.
Reaching beyond a blurred vision to actual musical parameters proved a nearly insurmountable obstacle, which composers have been struggling with to the present day.
The Yishuv Period
Music was second only to the revived Hebrew language as a
powerful agent in the creation of a unified, national culture
in the Yishuv and in Israel. As the most sociable art, it had the
power to bring people together, mostly for singing folk songs
at work and in leisure time, but also for group performance
and for passive listening.
Transplantation of Music Institutions
The Jewish immigrants from Europe took the momentous
step of transplanting the European institutional model to the
social setting of the yishuv. In 1895 a community orchestra
was founded in the early settlement of Rishon le-Zion. It was
a well-organized amateur wind band with a paid conductor,
which took part in all festive and social functions of the settlement (including playing at the historical visit by Herzl in
1897). The model was soon adapted by all other settlements,
such as Petah Tikvah, as well as in the Jewish community of
Jaffa. All of the orchestras were grouped under the rubric
Kinnor Zion (the Violin of Zion).
The German-born singer Shulamit Ruppin founded in
Jaffa in 1910 the first music school (named after her upon her
untimely death in 1912). The Shulamit School maintained a
pure German curriculum, with individual instrumental instruction of violin, piano, and voice, theory classes, and a student chorus and orchestra. The first director was the versatile
violinist, conductor, and concert manager Moshe Hopenko,
who also owned a music store and imported pianos to Palestine. The school stimulated lively interest with an unexpectedly large enrollment. Shulamit Ruppin founded a branch in
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Israel Philhamronic Orchestra) in 1936 was of paramount
importance in placing musical activity in Palestine on a high
international level. Hubermans original vision was to turn
the Jewish community of Palestine into an international center replacing what he considered the declining West. The
rapid deterioration of conditions in Europe made him take
the emergency step of establishing a first-class philharmonic
orchestra. He obtained the consent of the British Mandate
authorities to grant entry certificates to the musicians he auditioned in Europe from among the fine Jewish instrumentalists who had been fired from their orchestras by the Nazi
and Fascist managements. In this way he saved scores of musicians and their families from the Holocaust. The Palestine
Orchestra was inaugurated in December 1936 with a concert,
which served as a national celebration, conducted by the legendary Arturo Toscanini, who turned it into a powerful, internationally publicized anti-Nazi demonstration. The best
international conductors and soloists followed Toscanini and
performed with the orchestra, most of them gratis, and in this
way it maintained the strict professional standards, which
Toscanini had demanded. The core of the repertoire was the
mainstream Classic-Romantic symphonic repertoire, but the
orchestra also performed almost every new orchestral composition composed in Palestine. The members of the orchestra also founded fine chamber music ensembles and provided
high-level instrumental instruction to children.
The Palestine Conservatoire
In 1933 violinist Emil *Hauser founded the Palestine Conservatoire in Jerusalem, with a large faculty of over 30 teachers
and a comprehensive curriculum for most instruments as
well as classes in composition, history, and theory in addition to instruction in the Arabic d given by Ezra *Aharon
and courses in non-Western music given by Edith *GersonKiwi. The conservatoire also initiated advanced professional
studies. Hauser received 70 certificates from the Mandate authorities and in this way saved the most brilliant young Jewish
music students from the Nazis. The conservatoire gave rise in
the mid-1940s to the Academies of Music in Jerusalem and
Tel Aviv, which have continued to be the leading professional
music schools in the country
The Palestine Broadcast Service
In March 1936, the British founded the Palestine Broadcast
Service, which alternated broadcasts in Arabic, English, and
Hebrew. The Music Department included a large chamber
ensemble, which soon became the radio orchestra, later the
Jerusalem Symphony. The Music Department also initiated
an ensemble of Arabic instrumentalists and singers headed
by Ezra Aharon.
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called Mediterranean School is misleading. Each composer
responded to the powerful internal and external ideological
pressure in an individual way. Moreover, most composers
found ways to compose in different idioms and techniques at
the same time, thus maintaining their Western heritage on the
one hand and trying to find links with the East whether ethnic or imaginary at the same time. Such was Stefan *Wolpe
(19021972), who remained dedicated to the powerful expressionism and dodecaphonic technique of *Schoenberg in
his orchestral and piano works (193538) while composing at
the same time simple settings of modern Hebrew poetry for
voice and piano and arrangements of folk songs for kibbutz
choirs. Wolpes avant-garde approach was not accepted in
Jerusalem and in 1939 he emigrated to the U.S. All other major immigrant composers overcame the immigration trauma
and initiated intensive activity in creation and instruction in
Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
The only person who produced a clearly defined ideology
was Alexander U. *Boskovitch (19071964), who demanded
that the Israeli composer acts as a shaliah z ibbur representing
the collective and responding to the local static and dynamic
landscape, i.e., both the visual and acoustical scenery of the
country, especially the sound of biblical and modern Hebrew
as well as Arabic. Boskovitch created the regional concept
of Mediterranean Music, according to which Jewish music
from Europe had nothing to do with the future Israeli national style. Boskovitch turned to the sonorities and the melos of Arabic music, but stressed the difference between the
Jewish and the Arabic shepherds. Boskovitch systematically
realized his ideology in his early works, the Oboe Concerto
(1943), Semitic Suite (1946), and Adonai Roi (The Lord is
my Shepherd, 1943).
The other composers never subscribed to his ideology,
and the term itself was quoted only once, by Menahem *Avidom, in his Mediterranean Sinfonietta. Still, all composers responded to the ideological call of the Vision of the East. Most
characteristic was the substitution of modes (in the romantic
sense of scales with no leading tone) for the Western majorminor tonal system. Erich Walter *Sternberg (18911974) rejected all external ideological pressures and in his introduction
to his large-scale Twelve Tribes of Israel (1938) he proclaimed
his commitment to the inner call of a composer to respond
to new surroundings in his own individual way. His language
was deeply ingrained with late Romanticism, especially under
the influence of Brahms, Bruckner, Reger, and *Mahler. Joseph
*Tal (1910) repeatedly declared that the very fact of his being
a composer creating in the social and cultural environment
of Israel would shape his music in a new way. Tal insisted on
staying abreast of new developments in Western music. A concise illustration of Tals attitude is found in the second movement of his Piano sonata (1952) in which an ostinato quote of
simple, modal melody by his friend Yehudah *Sharett serves
as the basis for a series of extremely chromatic and dissonant
variations. The prolific Paul *Ben-Haim found his own manner of proceeding in simultaneous tracks. He produced over
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Following the demise of the Israeli Opera following de
Philippes death, a new opera company was founded in 1985
with a new house erected in Tel Aviv. The New Israeli Opera
(later named The Israeli Opera) soon reached high professional standards and brought about a significant change on the
Israeli musical scene, collaborating with major opera houses
in productions of operatic masterpieces. It started a project of
commissioning new operas from Israeli composers, the first
of which was Tals Joseph.
The large wave of immigration from the former Soviet
Union after 1990 effected an unprecedented expansion of the
community of professional musicians, leading to the founding
of several new orchestras, foremost among them the Rishon
le-Zion Symphony (which is also the opera orchestra) and the
Raanannah Orchestra.
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Musicological Research
The immigration of the ethnomusicologists Robert *Lachmann and Edith (Gerson) Kiwi in 1935 initiated a highly productive period of field research, now preserved and digitalized
at the Sound Archives of the Hebrew University. The Music
Department of the National and University Library and the
Center for Jewish Music Research, founded by Israel *Adler,
initiated studies and publications and became the world repository of archives of Jewish and Israeli music. The first Department of Musicology was founded at the Hebrew University in 1965, with scholars doing high-standard historical and
ethnomusicological research, including extensive field work
and recording in the ethnically extremely diverse Jewish and
Arab society in Israel, among them ethnomusicologists and
historians Amnon *Shiloah, Ruth *Katz, Dalia Cohen, and
Don *Harran. This was followed by musicology departments
at Tel Aviv University (1966) whose faculty included Edith
Gerson-Kiwi, Herzl *Shmueli, and Judith Cohen, and BarIlan University (1969) with Bathia *Churgin, Uri Sharvit, and
Judith Frygesi on the faculty.
music
The musical scene was further expanded with the largescale immigration from the former Soviet Union in the 1990s,
especially with a group of composers coming from the Central
Asian republics, such as Joseph *Bardanashvili and Benjamin
Yosupov (see below).
Interest in the performance of contemporary music was
stimulated through the regular performances of three fine
ensembles: Musica Nova, The Ensemble of the Twenty-FirstCentury, and Caprizma.
(See also Israel, State of: Culture Life Music and
Dance.)
[Jehoash Hirshberg (2nd ed.)]
Israel, Jewish elements were added (Yusupov, Pigovat, Davydov, Fel, Perez, Freidlin, Heifets). Most of the composers from
this group display a growing interest in Jewish themes. Many
new compositions have been written in the Jewish style. In
most cases it is only a simple rearrangement of popular Jewish
melodies. However, some composers have created remarkable
works (Bardanashvili, The Children of God; Yusupov, Sonata
for Two Pianos).
Among the winners of the Klon Prize for the best young
Israeli composer are also some newcomers: Benjamin Yusupov, Karel Volnianski, and Uri Brener.
In the field of electro-acoustic music, the most noted newcomer artists are Marcel Goldmann (from France) and Simon
Lazar (from Bulgaria). Among the musicologists, Marina Ritzareva and Yulia Kreinina achieved the best works.
Immigrant Artists
The wave of over one million immigrants from the former
Soviet Union since 1989 brought to Israel a great number of
musicians. To the 1,500 active professional musicians in Israel,
another 5,500 arrived from the U.S.S.R. Some of them went
back to their countries of origin; some moved on to other
countries, and some even changed their professions. Those
who continued their careers in Israel changed the musical
life of the country. They were employed in existing orchestras, chamber ensembles, and ballet troops, founded new orchestras (the Israel Symphony Orchestra of Rishon Le-Zion,
Camerata Jerusalem, the Hed Big Band of Tel Aviv and others). They have also filled pedagogical positions at academies
and conservatories. New concert halls were built for some of
these orchestras, like those in Rishon le-Zion and in Kefar
Shmaryahu. Concert life has also been enriched by the performances of new soloists. The most noted among them are the
singers Susanna Poretsky, Felix Lipshitz, and Yuri Shapovalov;
pianists Raimonda Sheinfeld, Irena Berkovich, Dinna Yoffe,
Gabriela Talrose, and Evgeny Shenderovich; jazz-pianists
Viacheslav Ganelin and Leonid Ptashka; violinists Maxim
Vengerov and Sergey Ostrovski; cellists Mikhail Homitzer and
Oleg Stolpner; clarinetist Evgeny Ehudin; bassoonist Alexander Fain; harpist Julia Sverdlova, and others. Many of the new
artists appear as guests in concerts.
As many as 50 new composers from the former Soviet
Union have joined the existing 150 members of the Israel
Composers League. The musicians imported a variety of
styles, from followers of socialist realism to followers of
Gubaidulina, Kancheli and other representatives of the Russian post-modernism. Among the post-modernists, the highest achievements were attained by Josef *Bardanashvili, who
in a few years won the most prestigious Israeli awards and became one of the leading composers (especially in the fields of
theater and film scores). His piano composition was selected
as the compulsory piece at the 2005 International Rubinstein
piano competition. Even though he spent only his last years
in Israel (from 1994), Valentin Bibik (19422003) had significant achievements and produced important new works. The
composers who came from the Asian republics of the former
Soviet Union also had interesting achievements combining
the elements of modernism and post-modernism along with
a variety of local musical elements from their regions. In
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music
played until April 1942, when the German authorities put an
end to the orchestra, punishing it for having performed works
by German composers. In Lodz, the Jewish Council chairman,
Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski, centrally directed musical activities. The community center organized musical and theatrical performances, a symphony orchestra, the Zamir choral
society, and a revue theater appeared on its stage. In the Cracow ghetto, chamber music recitals and concerts of liturgical music were performed. The Vilna ghetto had an extensive
program of musical activities, with a symphony orchestra and
several choirs. A revue theater presented many popular songs
composed in the ghetto on ghetto life. A conservatory with
100 students was established in the Vilna ghetto.
Many songs were heard in the ghettos some old, perhaps with new words, and some new. One of the first anthologies of songs was published in 1948, under the title Di Lider
fun Getos un Lagern (Songs of Ghettos and Camps), which
was collected and edited by the poet, teacher, and partisan
from Vilna Shmerke Kaczerginski (19081954). The anthology contains 236 songs (lyrics) and 100 melodies. However,
many songs were lost forever.
Among the best-known songs composed and performed
during the Holocaust are songs of the Vilna Ghetto Zog nit
Keymol (Never Say), also known by its postwar title Song
of the Partisans, written by Hirsh Glik (19221944) to a melody of Russian composer Dimitry Pokrass; Shtiler, Shtiler
(Quiet, Quiet) with words by S. Kaczerginski and music
by the 11-year-old Alexander Volkoviski (*Tamir; 1931 );
Friling (Spring), words by S. Kaczerginski, music by Abraham Brudno (1910(?)1943), and Yisrolik, words by Leyb
Rozental and music by Mischa Veksler (19071943). Songs
of the Vilna ghetto inspired the writer Yehoshua *Sobol in
his play Ghetto, which made the songs popular in many languages around the world. Many of the Vilna ghetto theater
songs became songs of remembrance and are still performed
in commemoration ceremonies, mainly in translation, especially in Hebrew and English. The songwriter Mordecai *Gebirtig (18771942) from Cracow wrote another song Es Brent
(It Burns) that became popular during the Holocaust and
afterward. The song was written in 1938 under the impact of
the pogrom in Przytyk and became a prophecy of the Holocaust. It became after the war a symbol for the fate of the Jews
in Eastern Europe.
Those who became partisans composed songs in a variety of languages, which were performed mostly in group singing. Some of the partisan groups also used an instrument for
accompaniment. The best-know partisans songs from Vilna
gained fame thanks to the collection work of Kaczerginski.
Many songs performed and composed in the camps were
popular prewar songs in a variety of languages and were not
transmitted from one ghetto to another. However, after the
war, at the DP camps, songs were also transmitted and were
shared by Holocaust survivors.
In the Theresienstadt ghetto, where professional composers as well as classical and jazz musicians were interned,
698
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699
music
braica, 2 (1938), 2831; M. Vital, Di Khazonim Velt, 3 (1939), 24; E.
Lifschutz, in: YIVO Annual of Jewish Social Science, 7 (1952), 4883;
H. Shmueli, Higgajon Bechinnor (Betrachtung zum Leierspiel) des Jehudah Moscato (1953); J. Stutschevsky, Ha-Klezmerim: Toledoteihem, Orah -H ayyeihem vi-Yz iroteihem (1959); A. Hemsi, in: Sefarad,
20 (1960), 148ff.; I. Adler, La Pratique musicale savante dans quelques
communauts juives en Europe aux XVIIe et XVIIIe sicles, 2 vols.
(1966); idem, in: A. Altmann (ed.), Jewish Medieval and Renaissance
Studies (1967), 32164; S. Simonsohn, in: Proceedings of the American
Academy for Jewish Research, 34 (1966), 99110; H. Avenary, in: Yuval
(1968), 6585, mus. ex. 2634; R.D. Barnett, in: JHSET, 22 (1968), 138;
R. Katz, in: Acta Musicologica, 40 (1968), 6585; M. Gorali, in: Tatzlil,
10 (1970), 928. FOURTH PERIOD, MODERN TIMES: D. Deutsch, Die
Orgel in der Synagoge (1863); S. Sulzer, Denkschrift an die hochgeehrte
Wiener israelitische Cultus-Gemeinde, zum 50 jaehr. Jubilaeum des alten Bethauses am 1. Nissan 5636 (1876); A. Berliner, Zur Lehr und zur
Wehr; ueber und gegen die Kirchliche Orgel im juedischen Gottesdienste (1904); J. Lebermann, Aus dem Kunstleben der Hessischen Residenz
am Anfang des vorigen Jahrhunderts (1904), 2231; A Friedmann, Lebensbilder beruehmter Kantoren, 3 vols, (191828); S. Krauss, Zur Orgelfrage (1919); M. Brod, in: Musikblaetter des Anbruch, 2 (1920); H. Berl,
Das Judentum in der Musik (1926); A. Einstein, in: Der Morgen, 2
(1926), 290602; L.L. Ssabanejew, Die nationale juedische Schule in
der Musik (1927); M. Joseph and L. Seligman, in: JL, 4 (1930), 6014;
L. Kornitzer, in: Juedisch-liberale Zeitung, 11, nos. 3133 (1931); O.
Guttmann, in: Der juedische Kantor (1934), nos. 14, 6; J. Stuschevsky,
Mein Weg zur juedischen Musik (1936); M.S. Geshuri, La-H asidim
Mizmor (1936); idem, Neginah va-H asidut be-Veit Kuzmir u-Venoteha
(1952); idem, Ha-Niggun ve-ha-Rikkud ba-H asidut, 3 vols. (195559);
idem, in: Sefer ha-Besht (1960); M. Ravina, Mikhtavim al Musikah
Yehudit meet Yoel Engel, M.M. Warshavsky, Shalom Aleichem (1942);
E. Werner, in: Contemporary Jewish Record, 6 (1943), 60715; A. Berliner, Ketavim Nivh arim, 1 (1945); R. Glanz, in: YIVO Bleter, 28 (1946),
39497; M. Lewison, in: Di Tsukunft, 52 no. 4 (1947); W.Z. Rabinowitsch, Ha-H asidut ha-Litait (1951), music appendix; H.D. Weisgal, in:
Judaism, 3 (1954), 42736; A. Weisser, The Modern Renaissance of Jewish Music, Events and Figures; Eastern Europe and America (1954);
A.W. Binder, in: The Jewish Forum, 38 (1955), 1921, 4446; I. Freed,
Harmonizing the Jewish Modes (1958); A.L. Holde, Jews in Music
(1959); O.D. Kulka, in: BLBI, 4 (1961), 281300; G. Krause, in: Mitteilungen aus dem Arbeitskreis fuer Jiddistik (1961), 3639; A.W. Binder,
The Jewish Music Movement in America (1963); N. Stolnitz, in: Canadian Jewish Reference Book and Directory (1963), 1014; A. Tarshish,
in: AJHSQ, 54 (1964), 41149; P. Nettl, in: Music and Letters, 45 (1964),
33744; D.S. Lifson, The Yiddish Theatre in America (1965); E. Werner, in: Central Conference of American Rabbis Journal, 13 (1965/66),
3540; A. Soltes, in: I. Heskes and A. Wolfson (eds.), The Historic
Contribution of Russian Jewry to Jewish Music (1967); A.L. Ringer, in:
Studia Musicologica, 11 (1969), 35570; P.E. Gradenwitz, in: Fourth
World Congress of Jewish Studies, Papers, 2 (1968), 14751. FOLK MUSIC; C. Seeger, Oral Traditions in Music, in: Funk and Wagnalls
Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend, 2 (1950); G.
Herzog, Song, Folk-Song and Music of Folk-Song, in: ibid.; Sendrey, Music; (1951), see table of contents; Waterman, in: Music Library
Association Notes (1950/51); Rpertoire International de Littrature
Musicale (RILM) (1967 ); The Music Index, 113 (1949 ); Shunami,
Bibl; I. Joel, Reshimat Maamarim be-Maddaei ha-Yahadut, 1 (1964),
4951, 8790; 2 (1967), 61f., 121f., 124f.; 3 (1968), 5658, 114f., 117f.; D.
Noy, in: Meh kerei ha-Merkaz le-H eker ha-Folklor, 1 (1970), 389423;
Taz lil, 10 (1970), 8291 (index to vols. 110). GENERAL ARTICLES: E.
Gerson-Kiwi, in: MGG, 7 (1958), 26180 (incl. bibl.); idem, in: Grove,
Dict, 3 (1954), 30413. RECENT PARTICULAR STUDIES AND SOURCE-
700
musolino, benedetto
Music by Israeli Composers (1989); M. Slobin, Chosen Voices, The Story
of the American Cantorate (1989); F. Alvarez-Pereyre, La transmission
orale de la misnah: une mthode danalyse applique la tradition
dAlep (Yuval Monograph Series 8) (1990); J. Hirschberg, Paul ben
Haim, His Life and Works (1990); S. Hofman, Music in the Talmud
(1990); Y.W. Cohen, The Heirs of the Psalmist: Israels New Music
(1990); P. Dorn, Change and Ideology: The Ethnomusicology of Turkish Jewry, UMI Dissertation Services (2001); W. Salmen, Juedische
Musikanten und Taenzer vom 13. bis 20 Jahrhundert (1991); P.V. Bohlman, The World Centre for Jewish Music in Palestine 19361940 (1992);
G. Flam, Singing for Survival: Songs of the Lodz Ghetto (1992); L.A.
Hoffman and J.R. Walton (eds.), Sacred Sound and Social Change:
Liturgical Music in Jewish and Christian Experience (1992); R. Flender,
Hebrew Psalmody; A Structural Investigation (Yuval Monograph Series IX) (1992); I. Heskes, Yiddish American Popular Songs 18951950,
a catalog based on the Lawrence Marwick Roster of Copyright Entries, Washington, Library of Congress (1992); A. Shiloah, Jewish Musical Traditions (1992); M. Slobin, Tenement Songs, The Popular Music
of the Jewish Immigrants (1992); A. Shiloah, The Dimension of Music
in Islamic and Jewish Cultures (1993); M. Gorali, The Old Testament
in Music (1993); A. Hemsi, Cancionero Sefardi, ed. and intro. by E.
Seroussi in collaboration with P. Diaz-Mas, J.M. Pedrosa, and E.
Romero (Yuval Music Series, IV) (1985); J. Hirshberg, Music in the
Jewish Community of Palestine 18801948 (1995); A. Tietze and J. Yahalom. Ottoman Melodies, Hebrew Hymns: A 16t Century Cross-Cultural Adventure (Bibliotrca Orientalis Hungarica, vol. 43) (1995); D.M.
Weil, The Masoretic Chant of the Bible (1995); I. Adler, The Study of
Jewish Music: A Bibliographical Guide (Yuval Monograph Series X)
(1995); P. Gradenwitz, The Music of Israel: From the Biblical Era to
Modern Times (1996); K.K. Shelemay, Let Jasmine Rain Down: Song
and Remembrance among Syrian Jews (1996); R. Fleisher, Twenty
Israeli Composers Voices of a Culture (1997); A. Shiloah (ed.), The Performance of Jewish and Arab Music in Israel Today, 2 vols. (1997); H.
Sapoznik, Klezmer Jewish Music from Old World to Our World (1999);
D. Harran, Salamone Rossi: Jewish Musician in Late Renaissance Mantua (1999); J. Braun, Die Musikkultur Altisraels/Palaestinas: Studien
zu archaeologischen, shriftischen un vergleichenden Quellen (1999)
(translated from the German by D.W. Stott, 2002); H. Rotten, Les
Traditions musicales Judo-portuguaise en France (2000); J. Levine, A
Synagogue Song in America (2000); Y. Mazor, The Klezmer Tradition
in the Land of Israel (2000); K.K. Shelemay (ed.), Studies in Jewish
Musical Traditions: Insights from the Harvard Collection of Judaica
Sound Recordings (2001); E. Koskoff, Music in Lubavitcher Life (2001);
F.C. Lemaire, Le Destin Juif et la musique (2001); M. Slobin (ed.),
American Klezmer Its Roots and Offshoots (2002); A.L. Ringer, Arnold Schoenberg das Leben im Werk, Mit einem nachwort von Thomas
Emmering (2002); Y. Strom, The Book of Klezmer: the History, the Music, the Folklore (2002); S. Kalib, The Musical Tradition of the Eastern
European Synagogue (2002); I. Heskes, Passport to Jewish Music: Its
History, Traditions and Culture (paperback ed., 2002); R. Katz, The
Lachmann Problem (Yuval Monograph Series XII) (2003); M. Regev,
and E. Seroussi, Popular Music and National Culture in Israel (2004).
HOLOCAUST: F. Fenelon, Playing for Time. trans. J. Landry (1979); J.
Karas, Music in Terezin, 19411945 (1985).
MUSOLINO, BENEDETTO (18091885), Italian statesman who foretold the return of the Jews to Erez Israel. Born
in Pizzo (Calabria), Musolino was an exile in his youth and
later joined Garibaldis army. From 1861 he served as member
of the Italian parliament and later as a senator in united Italy.
He published seven books on philosophy, law, and social justice. Musolino visited Erez Israel four times and wrote Gerusalemme ed il Popolo Ebreo (1851, first published in 1951). Based
upon an analysis of the situation of the Jews in the Diaspora
and their yearning to return to Erez Israel, the book suggests
that Britain support the establishment of a Jewish principality
in Erez Israel under the Turkish Crown. Musolino even formulated a complete constitution, which stipulates a prince at
the head of the principality and a bicameral parliament. The
official religion of the principality is Judaism and the language
is Hebrew. The right to vote and to be elected would be granted
only to those who read and write Hebrew. All the public offices, including jurisdiction, would be determined by the elections for one-year terms. Citizenship would automatically be
granted to Jews settling there and to non-Jews who request it.
Other laws include freedom of speech and assembly, the prohibition of polygamy, and compulsory education between the
ages of four and sixteen. Immigration and absorption would
be under the control of a domestic settlement company, and
the principality would guarantee the right to work.
701
mussafia, adolfo
Empire, 1883, in J.M. Landau, Exploring Ottoman and Turkish History (2004), 8993.
[Moshe Ishai]
702
mussolini, benito
collaboration with the enemy. Initially Mussert did not follow
an anti-Jewish policy, and even accepted Jews as members of
his party. From 1935, however, Jews could not hold office in the
party, and in 1940 it was decided under German pressure to
expel them altogether. Mussert unsuccessfully warned against
the introduction of the yellow badge. For this reason, and because he tried to save some of his Jewish comrades, the Germans regarded him as a Jew-servant.
Bibliography: Netherlands. Rijksinstituut voor oorlogsdocumentatie, Processen, no. 3, Het proces Mussert (1948); L. de
Jong, Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog, 1
(1969), 278385.
[Jozeph Michman (Melkman)]
703
mustarab, mustarabs
und Palstina, in: Zeitschrift fuer die Geschichte der Juden 4 (1967),
11318; M. Salomon, Mussolini et les juifs; un trange dialogue, in:
Les Nouveaux Cahiers, 34 (1973), 3033; S. I Minerbi, Gli ultimi due
incontri Weizmann-Mussolini (19331934), in: Storia Contemporanea
5 (1974), 431477; M. Michaelis, The Duce and the Jews: An Assessment of the Literature on Italian Jewry under Fascism 19221945, in:
YVS, 11 (1976), 732; A.M. Canepa, Half-Hearted Cynicism; Mussolinis Racial Politics, in: PaP 13, 6 (1979), 1827; A. Maillet, Hitler et
Mussolini dans la Bible: la vrit terrible et merveilleuse (1980); M.
Michaelis, Mussolini e la questione ebraica, Milano: Edizioni di Comunit (1982); E. Robertson, Race as a Factor in Mussolinis Policy
in Africa and Europe, in: Journal of Contemporary History, 23, 1
(1988), 3758; 1938 le leggi contro gli ebrei, in: Rassegna Mensile
di Israel, 54, 12 (1988); P. Blasina, Documenti e problemi. Mussolini, mons. Santin e il problema razziale (settembre 1938), in: QS, 23
(1990), 18996; L. Passerini, Mussolini Immaginario (1991); A. Spinosa, Mussolini razzista riluttante (1994); M. Sarfatti, Mussolini contro
gli ebrei: cronaca dellelaborazione delle leggi del 1938 (1994); A. Gillette, The Origins of the Manifesto of Racial Scientists, in: Journal
of Modern Italian Studies, 6, 3 (2001), 30523; L. Nemeth, The First
Anti-Semitic Campaign of the Fascist Regime, in: The Most Ancient
of Minorities (2002), 24758; I. Nidam Orvieto, Lettere a Mussolini;
gli ebrei italiani e le leggi antiebraiche, in: Rassegna Mensile di Israel,
69, 1 (2003), 32146; M. Michaelis, Linfluenza di Hitler sulla svolta
razzista adottata da Mussolini, in: Rassegna Mensile di Israel, 69, 1
(2003), 25766; G. Fabre, Mussolini e gli ebrei alla salita al potere di
Hitler, in: Rassegna Mensile di Israel, 69, 1 (2003), 187236; V. Pinto,
Between Imago and Res: The Revisionist-Zionist Movements Relationship with Fascist Italy, 19221938, in: Israel Affairs, 10, 3 (2004),
90109; S. Luconi, Recent Trends in the Study of Italian Antisemitism under the Fascist Regime, in: Patterns of Prejudice, 38, 1 (2004),
117; T. Schlemmer, Der italienische Faschismus und die Juden 1922
bis 1945, in: Vierteljahrshefte fuer Zeitgeschichte, 53, 2 (2005), 165201;
F.H. Adler, Why Mussolini Turned on the Jews, in: Patterns of Prejudice, 39, 3 (2005), 285300.
[Emmanuel Beeri]
704
from it being darker and more pungent than the former. This
species, like white mustard, grows wild in Erez Israel but was
also cultivated. Given favorable conditions, the plant reaches
a height of more than six feet. The aggadah relates that a man
having sown a single seed of mustard would climb it as he
would a fig tree (TJ, Peah 7:4, 206). The seed of this species is
very small (11.6 mm.) and was used to indicate the smallest
measure of size (Ber. 31a). The contrast between the size of the
plant and the seed is used in a parable in the New Testament
(Matt. 13:31). Although these two species of mustard belong
to different botanical genera they are very similar in appearance (except that the white mustard plant is smaller and its
seed larger). Hence the rule that mustard and Egyptian mustard do not constitute *mixed species (kilayim; Kil. 1:2). Both
have conspicuous yellow flowers (cf. Kil. 2:89). In Israel there
are many species belonging to the family of Cruciferae which
have yellow flowers and seeds with a pungent flavor. Among
these the species Sinapis arvensis is very widespread. This is
called in the Mishnah lafsan (charlock) and it was laid down
that mustard and charlock, although resembling one another,
do constitute kilayim (Kil. 1:5).
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 51627; H.N. and A.L.
Moldenke, Plants of the Bible (1952), 316 (index), s.v.; J. Feliks, Kilei
Zeraim ve-Harkavah (1967), 6567, 25669, 2846; idem, Z imh iyyat
ha-Mishnah, in: Marot ha-Mishnah, Seder Zeraim (1967), 55f. Add.
Bibliography: Feliks, Ha-Z omeah , 69, 70, 97.
[Jehuda Feliks]
MYER, MORRIS (Mayer; 18761944), Romanian-born Yiddish editor and Zionist worker, settled in London in 1902 and
became active in Yiddish journalism and the Labor movement. A member of the Poalei Zion, he became prominent
in the British Zionist Federation and was a delegate to Zionist
Congresses. From 1919 he sat on the Board of Deputies of British Jews and its joint foreign committee. Through the popular
Yiddish daily, Die Tsayt, which he founded in 1913 and which
existed until 1950, he was a prime molder of opinion among
Yiddish readers in England when Whitechapel was a hub of
Jewish life. He founded the Federation of Jewish Relief Organizations and was a Yiddish theater enthusiast and perceptive drama critic, as seen in his lively Yidish Teater in London
19021942 (Yiddish Theater in London, 19021942, 1943). His
Yiddish writings include Der Sveting System, Vi Vert Men fun
ihr Poter (The Sweating System, How to Abolish It? 1907),
A Yidishe Utopye (A Jewish Utopia, 1918), Dzhordzh Elyot,
di Englishe Nevie fun der Renesans fun Idishen Folk (George
Eliot, English Prophetess of the Jewish Peoples Renaissance,
1920), and Dos Organizirte Yidntum in England (Organized
Jewry in England, 1943).
Bibliography: Rejzen, Leksikon, 2 (1930), 38894; LNYL, 5
(1963), 6024 (incl. bibl.). Add. Bibliography: L. Prager, Yiddish
Culture in Britain: A Guide (1990), 4434.
[Joseph Leftwich / Leonard Prager (2nd ed.)]
MUYAL (Moyal), AVRAHAM (18471885), representative of H ovevei Zion in Erez Israel. Born in Rabat, Morocco,
Muyal went to Erez Israel with his parents in 1860, becoming
a wealthy merchant and banker. As a French national, he had
close ties with the French consul in Jaffa. He also had consid-
MYER, SIDNEY (Simcha) BAEVSKI (18781934), Australian retailer and philanthropist. Myer was born in Poland and
in 1897 he migrated to Australia. After working briefly at odd
jobs in Melbourne, he opened a shop in Bendigo in partnership with his brother, Elkan B. Myer. This venture failed, but
later Myer bought another shop in Bendigo, and this time his
business expanded rapidly. In 1911 Myer purchased a store in
Melbourne which he called the Myer Emporium and which
became the largest business of its kind in Australia. He had
705
706
and withholds visibility. One of her most important contributions to the study of women and religion was the concept of
domestic Judaism that she developed in Number Our Days.
Myerhoff effectively challenged the notion that religion can
best be understood from an elite, usually male perspective
linked to formal practices. Rather, her work demonstrated
that a well-articulated religious system for women ran parallel to mens sacred worlds.
Prior to the publication of Number Our Days, Myerhoff
collaborated with Lyn Littman on a documentary film with the
same title that was awarded an Oscar and two Emmys.
Bibliography: B. Myerhoff. Bobbes and Zeydes: Old and
New Roles for Elderly Jews, in: J. Hoch-Smith and A. Spring (eds.),
Women in Ritual and Symbolic Roles (1978); B. Kirshenblatt-Gimblett,
Forward, in: M. Kaminsky (ed.), Remembered Lives: The Work of
Ritual and Story Telling, and Growing Older (1992); R.E. Prell, The
Double Frame of Life History in the Work of Barbara Myerhoff, in:
Personal Narratives Group (ed.), Interpreting Womens Lives (1980).
[Riv-Ellen Prell (2nd ed.)]
MYERS, SIR ARTHUR MELZINER (18671926), New Zealand businessman and politician. Myers came from a family
of German immigrants who opened a brewery in New Zealand. His father, who became a jewelry salesman, drowned in
1870 and Myers was raised by an uncle in Wellington, where
he eventually became head of the family brewery. Myers became managing director of a large business concern in his native city, Auckland, and from 1905 to 1909 was mayor of Auckland. He entered the New Zealand parliament in 1910 and in
1912 became a member of the cabinet as minister of finance,
defense, and railways. In the National Government from 1915
to 1919, he was minister of customs, munitions, and supplies,
in which capacity he laid the foundations for compulsory military service. He retired from parliament in 1921. Myers was
noted for his benefactions to the city of Auckland, including
the Myers Park in which he built a kindergarten and a school
for backward children. He lived in England from 1923 and was
a member of the Royal Commission on Local Government.
He was knighted in 1924.
Add. Bibliography: R.C.J. Stone, Sir Arthur Myers, in:
The New Zealand Dictionary of Biography; A. Gluckman (ed.), Identity and Involvement: The Jewish Community in Auckland, 18401990
(1990).
MYERS, LAWRENCE E. (Lon; 18581899), U.S. track athlete. Born in Richmond, Virginia, Myers began his career as a
runner in 1878 and a year later became the first man to better
50 seconds for 440 yards. Between 1879 and 1884, Myers won
15 U.S., ten Canadian, and three British national titles at distances from 100 to 880 yards. He visited Great Britain in 1881,
1884, and 1885, and set the then world marks for 440 yards
(48.6 seconds) and 880 yards (1:55.4). In 1881 he became the
first foreign runner to win a British national title.
Myers faced his most formidable opponent, Britains
Walter George, for the first time in 1882. George won two of
three races at the Polo Grounds in New York City. Racing
three years later as a professional, Myers won all three races
at New Yorks Madison Square Garden. After repeating his
victory over George in Australia in 1887, Myers retired from
track the following year.
Bibliography: B. Postal et al. (eds.), Encyclopedia of Jews
in Sports (1965), 4758.
[Jesse Harold Silver]
707
myers, mordecai
terested in Jewish history and was patron of the Australian
Jewish Historical Society. On several occasions he acted for
the governor-general during the latters absences from New
Zealand.
Add. Bibliography: P. Spiller, Sir Michael Myers, in: The
Dictionary of New Zealand Biography.
[Maurice S. Pitt]
MYERS, MORDECAI (17761871), U.S. merchant, army officer, and politician. Myers was born in Newport, R.I. He lived
in New York State most of his life, while intermittently maintaining residence in Charleston, S.C. A member of New York
Citys Shearith Israel Congregation after 1792, he served as a
trustee from 1800 to 1805 and donated a generous sum toward
the construction of a new synagogue in Greenwich Village.
Subsequently he joined the army and was commissioned captain in the Third Regiment of the First Brigade Infantry (1811).
He served with the Thirteenth Infantry in the War of 1812, was
wounded in the battle of Chryslers Field, and was later promoted to major. In 1814 Myers married a non-Jewish woman,
and thereafter ceased to play a role in the Jewish community.
He was a ranking Mason from 1823 to 1834 and was offered
the office of grand master for New York State, which, however,
he declined. In 1828 and from 1831 to 1834 Myers served as a
Democratic assemblyman in the state legislature from New
York County. Subsequently he moved to Schenectady, where
he was elected mayor in 1851 and 1854. In 1860, at the age of 84,
he ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the U.S. Congress.
[Leo Hershkowitz]
708
MYERS, SAMUEL (17551836), U.S. merchant. Samuel Myers was the second child of New York silversmith Myer *Myers and his first wife, Elkaleh Myers-Cohen. As a child he
worked in his fathers silver shop, but soon joined his friend
Moses *Myers as a junior partner in Isaac *Moses import-export firm. A year after the firms bankruptcy in 1786, Samuel
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
myrrh
and Moses opened a store in Norfolk, Virginia, but two years
later they separated. Samuel moved to Petersburg, Virginia,
the first known Jewish resident of the town. His half-brothers
MOSES MEARS MYERS and SAMPSON MEARS MYERS joined
him there, all three becoming tobacco dealers. By 1798, Samuel
was active in Richmond, contributing to Congregation Beth
Shalome. He settled there permanently by 1803 and played an
active role in business and social life as a leading Jewish citizen. Samuels first wife, Sarah, daughter of Samuel *Judah of
New York, died a year after their marriage. In 1796 Samuel and
his brother Moses married daughters of the Boston merchant
Moses Michael Hays. His second son, GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS
MYERS (18011869), became Richmonds leading Jew, serving
for nearly three decades on the City Council and for 12 years
as its president.
Bibliography: Rosenbloom, Biogr Dict; J.W. Rosenbaum,
Myer Myers, Goldsmith (1954); H.T. Ezekiel and G. Lichtenstein, History of the Jews of Richmond (1917), index.
[Saul Viener]
MYERSON, BESS (1924 ), Miss America and philanthropist. Born to Louis and Bella Myerson in the Bronx, New York
City, Myerson grew up in the Sholom Aleichem Cooperative.
She attended the High School of Music and Art and graduated
from Hunter College in 1945. In 1945, the 5-foot-10 Myerson
won the Miss New York City pageant after her sister Sylvia
entered her in the contest, and on a lark she entered the Miss
America contest with the hope of winning a $5,000 scholarship to continue with her music studies and buy a piano. A
pageant official suggested she change her name to the less Jewish-sounding Beth Merrick, but she refused. After her win,
Myerson encountered blatant antisemitism among sponsors
and during her tour of the United States over the next year.
Inspired by the bigotry she encountered, she spoke out on
behalf of the Anti-Defamation League. Myerson went on to
study music at Juilliard School and Columbia University, and
appeared as a guest soloist for the New York Philharmonic in
1946. In October 1946, she married Allan Wayne. The couple
had a daughter together, but divorced in 1957. Myerson became a hostess and game show panelist on a variety of television programs from 1947 to 1968. In 1962, she married Arnold Grant, who adopted her daughter. Mayor John Lindsay
appointed Myerson as New York Citys commissioner of consumer affairs in 1969. During her four-year term, she helped
pass the citys Consumer Protection Act and hosted the consumer affairs television show, What Every Woman Wants to
Know. She went on two publish two books, The Complete Consumer Book and the I Love New York Diet. Myerson enjoyed
presidential appointments to a variety of commissions in the
1970s, but the decade also brought another divorce and a fight
with ovarian cancer. In 1980, she lost a Democratic Senate bid
and suffered a stroke. From 1983 to 1987 she served as New
Yorks commissioner of cultural affairs, but her reputation was
tarnished by bribery and conspiracy charges. Myerson was acquitted, but not before pleading guilty to separate shoplifting
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
MYNONA (Salomo Friedlaender; 18711946), German philosopher and author. Born in Gollantsch in Posen, Mynona
studied medicine, philosophy, German literature, archaeology, and art history in Munich, Berlin, and Jena between 1894
and 1902. In Jena he wrote his dissertation on Schopenhauer
and Kant (1902), seeing from then on in Kantian philosophy
not only the solution of the central problems of 20t century
in general, as did his contemporary teacher, the neo-Kantian
Ernst Marcus, but also an expression of modern Judaism.
Also in his later, main philosophical work Die schoepferische
Indifferenz (1918), Mynona relied on Kant to overcome the
classical dualism of subject and object in a purified, absolute
self. In 1906, Mynona went to Berlin, starting to write under
the literary name Mynona, an anagram of anonym (i.e.,
anonymous), poetry, which he published in books like Durch
blaue Schleier (1908) and expressionist publications like Der
Sturm and Die Aktion, being intimate with the Berlin expressionist circle of Herwarth *Walden, Else *Lasker-Schueler,
and Samuel *Lublinski. At the same time he wrote satirical
and grotesque prose works (Rosa, die schoene Schutzmannsfrau, 1913; Mein Papa und die Jungfrau von Orleans, 1921; Das
Eisenbahunglueck oder der Anti-Freud, 1925; Mein hundertster
Geburtstag und andere Grimassen, 1928); in these philosophical satires Mynona exposed the other side of Kantian rationalism. In 1933, he fled to Paris, where he wrote his last published literary work, the grotesque Der lachende Hiob (1935),
confronting the will to annihilation of the Nazis with his idea
of the purified self by answering torture with laughter. Other
works, like Vernunftgewitter and Das Experiment Mensch,
remained unpublished. The autobiographical work Ich was
published in 2003. Mynona died in Paris. In 1980, H. Geerken
published two volumes of Mynonas prose.
Bibliography: Salomo Friedlaender/Mynona. Ausstellungskatalog der Akademie der Kuenste (1972); P. Cardorff, Salomo Friedlaender (Mynona) (1988).
[Andreas Kilcher (2nd ed.)]
709
myrtle
ens were treated with it for six months before being presented
to Ahasuerus (Esth. 2:12). In the Song of Songs myrrh is mentioned no less than seven times. It grew in the imaginary spice
garden to which the charms of the beloved one are compared
(Song 4:14; 5:1). It is upon the mountain of myrrh that the
beloved dreams he will meet his hearts desire (4:6). The queen
arrives for a meeting with the king from the wilderness
perfumed with myrrh and frankincense (3:6). The beloved
one watched for her lover with her fingers dripping flowing
myrrh (5:5), i.e., oil of myrrh, and his lips too were dripping
with flowing myrrh (5:13). The man lying in the arms of his
beloved is likened to the crystallized myrrh which the women
used to wear as a bag of myrrh (1:13).
Myrrh is extracted from certain trees or shrubs growing
in Africa or in the Arabian peninsula: Commiphora abyssinica
and Commiphora schimperi. These plants contain a fragrant
sap under the bark like the sap of the *acacia, from which
gum arabic is prepared (Gr. ; mishnaic Heb. , kumos). The sages warned against those who adulterated myrrh
with this kumos (Sifra 1:12). Myrrh is variously interpreted
homiletically by the rabbis as referring to Moses and Aaron
or to Abraham: myrrh, the prince of spices, is Abraham who
offered his son Isaac on Mt. Moriah (connecting mor with
Moriah; Song R. 3:6, no. 2). They also connected it with
Mordecai whose name was explained to mean mor-dakhya:
pure myrrh (H ul. 139b). The mor over, flowering myrrh, of
the Song of Songs alludes to Israels troubles which will pass:
Read not mor over but mar over: passing bitterness (cf. Shab.
30b). Saadiah Gaon, followed by Maimonides, identified a bag
of mor with musk, the perfume extracted from the aromatic
gland of the musk deer (see *Incense and Perfumes) but there
is no basis for this.
Bibliography: Loew, Flora, 1 (1928), 249, 30511; H.N. and
A.L. Moldenke, Plants of the Bible (1952), 316 (index), S.V.; J. Feliks,
Olam ha-Z omeah ha-Mikrai (19682), 2524.
[Jehuda Feliks]
710
Mzab
during a dramatic representation of the event it narrates (e.g.,
the Enma eli was recited at the Babylonian New Year festival). Through the ritual, man becomes contemporary with the
mythical event and participates in the gods creative actions.
Thus man can create, maintain, or renew fecundity, life, etc.
Myths can be classified according to their subjects, as: theogonic, cosmogonic, anthropogonic, soteriological, and eschatological, myths of paradise, myths of flood, hero myths, etc.
In the Bible
The word myth was first applied to biblical narratives in the
18t century, when the question of the historicity of the first
chapters of Genesis arose. For J.G. Eichhorn, for instance, the
biblical narratives contain philosophical truth (e.g., the Garden of Eden narrative) or are based on a kernel of historical
truth (the narratives concerning the Patriarchs). In the mid19t century the term myth acquired a more precise meaning in biblical research. Biblical scholars who held that myth
and polytheism were inseparable (e.g., Y. Kaufmann and H.
Frankfort) denied any possibility of finding myths in the Bible,
though they do not deny the existence of residues of myths or
demythologized myths in the Bible. A number of apparent
myths and mythical subjects which found their way into the
Bible, have been collected and compared with extra-biblical
parallels. In the prophetic and poetic books, references are
made to the Lords struggle with the primeval dragon, variously named Tannin (Dragon, Isa. 27:1, 51:9; Ps. 74:13; Job
7:12), Yam (Sea, Isa. 51:10; Hab. 3:8; Ps. 74:13; Job 7:12), Nahar
(River, Hab. 3:8; Ps. 93?), Leviathan (Isa. 27:1; Ps. 74:14), and
Rahab (Isa. 30:7; 51:9; Ps. 89:11; Job 9:13; 26:1213). A special
parallel to this theme is found in the Ugaritic myth of Baal
and his struggle against Yam, in which mention is made of
Leviathan (ltn; C.H. Gordon, Ugaritic Textbook (1965), 67, 1:1)
and Tannin (tnn; nt, ibid., 3:37) as well as of Nahar (nhr). In
this myth the dragon is called, as in Isaiah 27:1, bariah (fleeing serpent) and aqallaton (twisting serpent; cf. Gordon,
ibid., 67, 1:23). The same theme is found in the Babylonian
creation epic Enma eli (Marduks fight with Tiamat, Sea)
and in the Hittite myth of the storm-god and the dragon Illuyankas (Pritchard, Texts, 1256), and with variations in Sumerian, Egyptian, Phoenician, and other literatures.
The idea that man was made out of clay (Gen. 2:7; Job
33:6) is common to the Bible and other extra-biblical literatures, especially the myth of Atrah asis (W.G. Lambert and A.R.
Millard, Atra-H ass (1969), 56ff.; cf. also Enma eli, 6:138 and
the creation of Enkidu, Gilgamesh 1:3040, in Pritchard, Texts,
68, 74). In Genesis 2:7, the Lord breathed into mans nostrils
the breath of life; in Atrah asis, man is the product of the mixture of clay and the flesh and blood of a slaughtered god. In
the latter source, man is created to do the work the inferior
gods refused to do (cf. Gen. 2:15).
The biblical story which has the most striking Mesopotamian parallel is the flood story (Gen. 68; Gilgamesh, tablet
11 in Pritchard, Texts, 9397, cf. also Atrah asis). In both accounts a man and his household escape the deluge thanks to
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
711
Mzab
ter of *Karaite Jews. Until 1300 the Jewish community of the
Mzab was reinforced demographically by Jews from the island
of *Djerba (southern Tunisia) and Jebel Nafusa (the region of
Tripolitania in modern Libya). Overwhelmingly residing in
Ghardaia, the Jews were mainly employed as goldsmiths as
well as being suppliers of ostrich feathers whose exports to
Europe were monopolized by their coreligionists in parts of
the Mediterranean.
The Jews of Ghardaia dwelled in their own special quarter, were forced to wear black clothes, and were not allowed to
engage in farming or to purchase rural land. Unlike the Jews
of the major urban centers of the regions of *Algiers, *Oran,
and *Constantine, Mzab Jewry were not beneficiaries of the
October 1870 Crmieux Decree which granted French citizenship to Algerias Jews. This is attributed to the fact that the
French could only grant this privilege to Jews in their sphere
of influence. The Mzab was not under French control until over a decade later. It was only in the early 1960s that the
Crmieux Decree was extended to include Mzabite Jews. By
then, however, it was too late, for in 1962 the French granted
Algerian Muslims independence. On the eve of Algerian independence, after numerous Mzabites Jews (out of 6,000) relocated to France (many resettled in Strasbourg), as many as
3,000 still remained behind.
In June 1962, as the Jewish Agency Israeli immigration
emissaries were about to leave Algerian soil, a cable arrived
at the Immigration Office in Algiers from Jerusalem. It instructed them to remain there for the time being because,
based on reliable information, Algerian Muslim rebels in the
south intended to harm the 3,000 remaining Jews of the Saharan community of Ghardaia. On June 12, 1962, the Jewish
Agency requested Ben-Zion Cohen, one of the emissaries in
Algiers, to fly to Ghardaia and warn that community about
712
Bibliography: A. Chouraqui, Between East and West: A History of the Jews of North Africa (1968); H.Z. Hirschberg, A History of
the Jews in North Africa2 (English trans., 1974); M.M. Laskier, North
African Jewry in the 20t Century (1994); N.A. Stillman, The Jews of
Arab Lands in Modern Times (1991).
[Michael M. Laskier (2nd ed.)]
The letter N, a part of the illuminated word In (diebus Assueri) at the beginning of the Book
of Esther in a 12thcentury Latin
Bible. On the right of King Ahasuerus, Haman is being hanged.
The I frames the figure of Esther.
Rheims. Bibliothque Municipale,
Ms. 159, fol. 5v.
NAAMAN (Heb. , pleasant; the name occurs in Ugaritic and is an epithet of heroes in Ugaritic epics), Syrian commander, healed of leprosy by the prophet *Elisha. According to
II Kings 5, Naaman, a valorous man, held by his king in great
esteem but afflicted with leprosy, had a female slave from the
land of Israel. From her, his wife learned that the prophet that
is in Samaria could cure Naaman of his leprosy. Naaman departed for the land of Israel taking with him a letter from the
king of Aram to the king of Israel, as well as lavish presents.
The king of Israel thought that the letter asking him to cure
Naaman was nothing but a trick to seek an occasion against
him. Elisha, however, asked that Naaman be brought to him.
When Naaman and his escort arrived at Elishas house, he was
told by a messenger to wash seven times in the Jordan River.
Offended by the prophets brusqueness and aloofness, Naaman
decided to leave the land of Israel, but on the way his servants
convinced him to do what the prophet prescribed. He washed
in the Jordan and was cured. Naaman then went back to EliENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
Naa-Nas
sha convinced that there was no God in all the earth but in
Israel. In vain he entreated the prophet to accept his presents.
He then asked for two mules burden of earth, for thy servant
will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifices unto
other gods, but unto the Lord. The fact that Naaman felt it was
necessary to take earth from the land of Israel to build an altar
for the Lord hints at the belief that sacrifices to YHWH could
only be offered on Israelite soil (cf. Josh. 22:10ff.; II Sam. 26:19).
Naaman also asked forgiveness for the fact that because of his
office at the court he would be obliged to perform acts that
could be interpreted as idolatry. Soon after Naamans departure, Gehazi, Elishas servant, ran after Naaman and through
deceit received from him two talents of silver and two changes
of clothing. As a punishment he was cursed with Naamans disease. That neither Naaman nor Gehazi was isolated from society (II Kings 8:4; cf. Lev. 1314) suggests that Naamans disease
was not what is now known as *leprosy.
In the Aggadah
Naaman was the archer who drew his bow at a venture and
mortally wounded Ahab, King of Israel (I Kings 22:34) and
thus it was that through him the Lord had given deliverance
unto Syria (II Kings 5:1). It would therefore follow that his
master, referred to in 5:18, was Ben Hadad (Mid. Ps. 90). Two
reasons are given for his leprosy, one that it was a punishment
713
naan
for his haughtiness (Num. R. 7:5; cf. Rashi to Lev. 14:4) and
the other that it was for taking an Israelite girl as maidservant
to his wife (Tanh . Tazria, end). According to the Mekhilta
(Yitro, Amalek 1), Naaman was an example of the righteous
proselyte, ranking even higher than Jethro; according to the
Talmud, however (Git. 57a), he became merely a ger toshav, a
resident alien who accepted only the seven Noachide laws
but not all the commandments.
NAAN (Heb. ) , kibbutz in central Israel, E. of Reh ovot, affiliated with Ha-Kibbutz ha-Meuh ad. It was founded in 1930
as the first village of *Ha-Noar ha-Oved youth. The founders
were later joined by immigrants from many countries. During the 193639 disturbances Naan maintained friendly ties
with Arab villages in the vicinity and was not attacked, but
it came under siege by the British army on Black Saturday,
June 29, 1946, when 23 settlers were wounded. In 1969 Naan
had 870 inhabitants; in 2002, 1,140. Its economy was based on
highly intensive farming (citrus groves, avocado plantations,
field crops, and dairy cattle) and it ran a metal plant producing irrigation and other equipment. The settlements name
is adapted from the Arabic name of the site, Naana, which
in turn may be the original town of Naamah of the tribe of
Judah (Josh. 15:41).
[Efram Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
714
nabal
Plan of the synagogue at Naarah, sixth century C.E., with drawing of the mosaic floors in the nave and in the narthex. Based on Encyclopaedia of Archaeological Excavation in the Holy Land, Jerusalem, 1970.
Davids wife (I Sam. 25:42). This tale is one of the finest narratives in the Bible and is a faithful description of the life of the
prosperous cattlemen on the border of the desert of Judah.
[Yohanan Aharoni]
In the Aggadah
In the Aggadah Nabal is referred to as a descendant of Caleb in
order to compare his own illustrious ancestry to that of David
who was descended from Ruth the Moabitess (TJ, Sanh. 2:3,
715
nabateans
20b). He denied God, had idolatrous thoughts and was guilty
of unchastity. Like *Laban, the letters of whose name are identical with those of Nabal, he was a scoundrel (Mid. Ps. 53:1).
Ten days intervened between his illness and his death (I Sam.
25:38) because he had given food to each of Davids ten men
(I Sam. 25:5; RH 18a); or because these were the Ten Days of
Penitence, when God hoped that Nabal would repent (TJ, Bik.
2:1, 64d). According to another opinion, however, Nabal was
smitten more than a week after Samuel died, his death being
delayed in order to avoid any confusion between the mourning for a righteous man and a wicked one (Mid. Ps. 26:7).
NABATEANS, ancient people in the Middle East. Originally
a pastoral, nomadic people, the Nabateans became merchants
in the trade of oils, aromatics and spices, frankincense and
myrrh from southern Arabia. By the second century B.C.E.,
they controlled the Red Sea coastal cities and were considered
unwelcome competition by Ptolemaic shipping interests (Diodorus 3, 43:5). Soon thereafter the expansionist Nabateans established settlements on the lucrative trade route, dominating
the passage from the Hejaz through Petra to Damascus, and
from Petra through the Negev to the Mediterranean port city
of Gaza. Nabatean remains are found at over 1,000 sites in
this area. At their height they controlled and colonized parts
of modern-day Syria, Jordan, the Israeli Negev, Sinai, parts of
eastern Egypt, and a northwestern section of Saudi Arabia.
Nabateas apogee is from the first century B.C.E. to the second
century C.E. Nabatean material culture reaches its zenith in
the second half of the first century B.C.E., before the Romans
established control in 106 C.E.
The Nabateans (Gk. Nabataioi) are identified as people
from the Arab kingdom of Nabatea. They refer to themselves
as Nabatu on their Aramaic inscriptions. Their origins are
controversial, but according to Graf the Nabateans arose
within the Aramaic-speaking world of the so-called Fertile
Crescent (Hieronymous of Cardia, apud Diodorus Siculus
19:95), and they may have been a sub-tribe from Qedar or the
Persian Gulf. Philip C. Hammond places their origins in the
Arabian Hejaz. However, the fact is that we do not know where
they come from; thus, their origins are unknown. Whatever
their origins, we do know that by 312 B.C.E. the Nabateans
were already living in Petra, where they defended themselves
successfully from an attack by Antigonus the One-Eyed, a
veteran commander from Alexander the Greats eastern campaigns.
The Nabatean Kingdom was strategically located. It was
interlaced with east-west routes traversing the desert of the region now designated as the Israeli Negev (south of Beersheba)
to the ports of Gaza, Ascalon, and Raphia (Rafa) in the Sinai,
the latter a border town between Gaza and Egypt on the Mediterranean Coast. It also included the vast desert of the Sinai.
From Petra, which served as the nexus for the redistribution
of goods for the caravan traffic, the most important route to
the west crossed the Negev to the Sinai. Here the Nabateans
established settlements in the Negev that served as their in-
716
nabateans
Nabatean Language and Writing
The Nabateans were apparently multilingual. Their native
language was Arabic, many of their personal names were in
Arabic, and they spoke Arabic, but they adopted the lingua
franca, Aramaic, which they wrote in their own script for formal inscriptions. After the Romans occupied and established a
strong military presence in the area, Petra continued to retain
its native language but used Greek for business. After 106 C.E.
the Nabateans incorporated Roman institutions and employed
Latin for government and business.
Nabatean Religion
The main deities of the Nabateans were Dushara, and Al-Uzza
(on the various deities see Sourdel, 1952). Dushara Dusares
in Greek, Dus-sara (pronounced Dushara, or Lord of the
Shara) was the tutelary deity of Petra, the supreme deity of
the Nabateans and of Petra. He is associated with vegetation
and fertility, and is also the everlasting, deathless god. At Petra
Dushara has been recognized by a black obelisk and huge rectangular blocks of stone that carried his spirit (Glueck 1965).
The tradition handed down by Arab folklore is that the djinn
blocks and tower tombs are representations of Dushara and
embody his spirit. The djinn are considered to be malevolent
spirits that inhabit some 26 of these blocks of stone found at
Petra. Dushara was also worshipped in carved quadrangular
niches with betyls in them.
In the Hellenistic period, Dushara became equated with
Dionysos, and was syncretized with the Egyptian gods Serapis and Osiris. Later he may be identified with the Hellenistic Zeus and Ares.
Al-Uzza (sometimes associated with the Syrian Atargatis, meaning the mighty One) is the Nabatean mother
goddess, the Arabian Aphrodite sometimes referred to as AlUzza-Aphrodite. She symbolizes fertility and vegetation, and
is also the paramount queen, the sky-mother, and the patroness of travelers. Most important of all, she is the creator and
sustainer of life.
Aretas I
(?) Rabbel I
Aretas II
Obedas I
Aretas III Philhellenos
Obedas II
Malichus I
Obedas III
Aretas IV Lover of his People
Malichus II
Rabbel II
717
nablus
Domaszewski, Die Provincia Arabia, 3 vols. (19041909); G. Crawford, Petra and the Nabateans: A Bibliography, ATLA Bibliography
Series (2003); Z.T. Fiema and R.N. Jones, The Nabatean King-List
Revised: Further Observations on the Second Nabatean Inscription
from Tell Esh-Shuqafiya, Egypt, in: Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan, 34 (1990), 23948; P.C. Hammond, The Nabateans:
Their History Culture and Archaeology (1973), 11; J.F. Healey, Were the
Nabateans Arabs? First International Conference, The Nabateans.
Oxford, September 2629, 1989, in: Aram, 1 (1989), 3844; N. Glueck,
Deities and Dolphins: The Story of the Nabateans (1965): Pl. 215a; J.S.
McKenzie, The Architecture of Petra, British Academy Monographs
in Archaeology (1990); Y. Meshorer, Nabatean Coins, Monographs of
the Institute of Archaeology of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
Qedem 3 (1975); F. Millar, The Roman Near East, 31 bcAD 337 (1993);
A. Negev, Nabatean Archaeology Today (1986); P.J. Parr, Sixty Years of
Excavation in Petra: A Critical Assessment, First International Conference, The Nabateans. Oxford, September 2629, 1989, in: Aram 2
(1990), 1 and 2:723; J. Patrich, The Formation of Nabatean Art: Prohibition of a Graven Image Among the Nabateans: The Evidence and
Its Significance, First International Conference, The Nabateans, Oxford, September 2629, 1989, in: Aram 2 (1990), 18596; R. RosenthalHeginbottom (ed.), The Nabateans in the Negev (2003); S.G. Schmid,
Die Feinkeramik der Nabater im Spiegel ihrer kulturhistorischen Kontakte, Hellenistische und kaiserzeitliche Keramik des oestlichen Mittelmeergebietes, Kolloquium, Frankfurt, April 2425, 1995 (1996), 12745;
Diodorus Siculus, trans. C.H. Oldfather et al. (193367); J. Starcky,
Ptra et la nabatne, in: Dictionnaire de la Bible, Supp. 7 (1966),
8861017; Tacitus, Histories and Annals, C.H. Moore and J. Jackson
(eds.), Loeb Classical Library; J. Taylor, Petra and the Lost Kingdom of
the Nabateans (2001); F. Villeneuve, Ptra et le royaume nabaten, in:
Lhistorie, 11 (1979), 5058; R. Wenning, Die Nabater Denkmler
und Geschichte, Eine Bestandesaufnahme des archologischen, in:
Befundes, Novum Testamentum et Orbis Antiquus, 3 (1987); idem,
Eine neuerstellte Liste der nabaaeische Dynastie, in: BOREAS, Munstersche Beitraege zur Archaeologie, vol. 16 (1993), 2538; F. Zayadine,
(ed.), Petra and the Caravan Cities, Proceedings of the Symposium
organized at Petra in September 1985 (1990).
[Martha Sharp Joukowsky (2nd ed.)]
Modern Period
After World War I Jews again tried to live there, but Nablus
was a center of Muslim fanaticism, and the 1929 Arab riots
ended these attempts. The town suffered severe damage in
the 1927 earthquake and was largely destroyed. The Mandatory Government aided its reconstruction along modern lines
but sought to preserve its Oriental character. The Samaritan quarter lies at the foot of Mt. Gerizim; wealthier inhabitants have built their homes, mostly in the last decades, on
the slopes of Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerizim. Under the Jordanian
regime (194867), the economy of Nablus, then the center
of the largest district of the West Bank, was based mainly on
administrative services and farming. In addition to its traditional industry of soapmaking (its raw material coming from
the extensive olive groves of the vicinity), the first modern
manufacturing enterprises made their appearance, most of
them in the Sokher Valley to the east. In the *Six-Day War,
on June 7, 1967, Nablus was taken by an Israeli column coming
from the east. In the census held by Israel in the fall of 1967,
Nablus had 44,000 inhabitants (as against 23,300 in 1943), of
whom all were Muslim, except for 370 Christians and about
250 Samaritans. When, however, the populations of villages
and refugee camps next to the town were added, the total
number amounted to about 70,000, making Nablus the largest urban center of Samaria.
By the early 21st century the population of the city had
reached 100,000, while the Nablus district had a population of 200,000. Nablus was one of the West Bank towns
from which Israeli troops withdrew in the wake of the 1995
Oslo II agreement signed at Taba. With the outbreak of
the second intifada in 2000 it became part of the terrorist
infrastructure and a jump-off point for terrorists making
their way to Israel. In 2002 it was targeted by Israeli forces
in Operation Defensive Shield and since then has been
718
naboth
subjected to roadblocks, searches, and security actions by
Israel.
[Efraim Orni]
Bibliography: Schuerer, Gesch, 2 (19072), 41ff.; Abel, Geog,
2 (1938), 3967; idem, in: RB, 32 (1923), 120ff. Add. Bibliography:
B. Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Samaria (2002), 6169; Y.
Tsafrir, L. Di Segni, and J. Green, Tabula Imperii Romani. Iudaea
Palaestina. Maps and Gazetteer. (1994), 19495; G.S.P. Grenville, R.L.
Chapman, and J.E. Taylor, Palestine in the Fourth Century. The Onomasticon by Eusebius of Caesarea (2003), 14748; Y. Magen, Flavia
Neapolis (Judea and Samaria Publications Series, 2005).
to Cyrus without battle. Nabonidus fled. The next day Babylon whose priests, especially the priest of Marduk, opposed
him opened its gates to Cyrus and his allies (the Gutians).
Nabonidus was later arrested upon his return to Babylon.
On the third day of the following month Cyrus made his triumphal entrance into Babylon. Great twigs were spread before him. The state of peace was imposed on the city. Nabonidus end is obscure; according to Josephus, however, he
was treated humanely by the conqueror, who assigned Carmania (Central Iran) for his residence (Jos., Apion 1:153). Aramaic fragments from Qumran in which Nabonidus (Nbny)
relates that while in Teman (so!) he was afflicted with an inflammation of the skin (sheh in) for seven years until an unnamed Jewish soothsayer (gazar, a word which also appears
in the Aramaic of *Daniel) advised him to pray to the God of
Heaven instead of to the idols, show what sort of speculations
the kings prolonged residence in remote Tema gave rise to.
This suggests that the story about the seven years lycanthropy
of Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4 goes back ultimately to such
malicious speculations about Nabonidus on the part of disaffected Babylonians.
Bibliography: S. Smith, Babylonian Historical Texts Relating to the Capture and Downfall of Babylon (1924) 27ff., 98ff.; R.P.
Dougherty, Nabonidus and Belshazzar (1929); J. Lewy, in: HUCA,
19 (1946), 40589; J.T. Milik, in: RB, 62 (1956), 407ff.; J. Roux, Ancient Iraq (1966), 346ff.; Pritchard, Texts, 30515; E. Bickerman, Four
Strange Books of the Bible (1967), 747.
[Laurentino Jose Afonso]
719
nachz, tivadar
Russia (Senior generalis ziem ruskich) he participated in meetings of the Council of the Four Lands. In 1589 he was parnas
of the Council and in 1590 he and his son Mordecai paid the
first installment of a tax in its behalf. Isaac attained his high
position in the community through his diversified activities as
a spice merchant and tax farmer. Among other undertakings
he leased an important customs station in Sniaty, in the Lvov
region, and held the rights to the lease of the state revenues in
the city of Lvov and the sub-district (starostwo). He was also
engaged in large-scale moneylending against pledges of real
estate and valuables. Through his wealth and prestige he was
able to appear in the Polish law courts without having to take
the Jewish *oath (more judaico). Isaac also had access to the
Polish kings Sigismund II Augustus and Stephen Bthory. In
1581, he was authorized to acquire a plot of municipal land
where he built a magnificent synagogue in Gothic style at his
own expense after the plans of an Italian architect. It became
known as the Turei Zahav synagogue.
Isaacs elder son, NAh MAN ISAAKOVICH (Nah man ben
Isaac; d. 1616), took over his fathers affairs, including his tax
farming and moneylending undertakings, and acquired the
lease of the market imposts and other revenues of Lvov. He
served as head of the community a number of times, and
was admitted to the citizenship of Lvov, being known among
Christians by the honorific Generosus. He was also a scholar.
Nah man, who was stringent in collecting the taxes, had frequent conflicts with the local inhabitants who accused him of
overcharging the customs dues, but the city council, which was
dependent on his loans, rejected their complaints. From 1603
Nah man headed a struggle to preserve the synagogue erected
by his father which the Jesuits in Lvov wished to convert into
a church and seminary. In 1609 a compromise was reached
which left the synagogue in the ownership of the Nachmanovich family, while the Jewish community undertook to procure
a suitable site for the needs of the Jesuits in the suburbs of Lvov
for a sum of 20,600 zlotys. Immediately afterward, Nah man
and his brother Mordecai completed the construction of the
synagogue, adding a womens gallery and magnificent religious
requisites. In honor of its opening R. Isaac ha-Levi composed
a Song of Redemption which was sung by the Jews of Lvov
for many generations. The deliverance of the synagogue was
preserved in the memory of the local community and gave
rise to a number of legends. It was connected in folklore with
Nah mans wife Rojse (Di gildene Rojse, as she was called by
the Jews) who was renowned for her beauty and wisdom. After the death of her husband, Rojse took charge of his business affairs until her death in 1637. Her tombstone, which was
preserved until the Nazi occupation, was inscribed with a Renaissance-style epitaph extolling her deeds.
The younger son of Isaac, MORDECAI (MARCUS) BEN
ISAAC (d. 1635?), ranked among the elders (seniores) of the Lvov
community, and also engaged in tax farming. In 1627 the merchants of Lvov accused him of overcharging the customs duties.
He became court purveyor in 1634 to King Ladislaus IV, furnishing supplies to the Polish army in the war with Russia.
720
In the Aggadah
Naboth was Ahabs cousin, with the result that the king, by
killing Naboths sons (II Kings 9:26), could claim his vineyard
by right of inheritance (Sanh. 48b). He used to make regular pilgrimages to Jerusalem, and as a great singer, many followed him. It was because he once failed to make his customary journey that his false conviction took place (PR 25, 127a).
Naboths opportunity for revenge, however, came when God
asked: Who shall entice Ahab that he may go up and fall at
Ramoth-Gilead? (I Kings 22:2021). It was the spirit of Naboth which volunteered for the task (Shab. 149b).
Bibliography: Ginzberg, Legends, 4 (1913), 1878; 6 (1928),
3112; I. H asida, Ishei ha-Tanakh (1964), 329.
NACHZ, TIVADAR (Theodor Naschitz; 18591930), violinist and composer. Born in Pest, Hungary, Nachz as a boy
played with Liszt and studied under *Joachim in Berlin. In
1889, after settling in London, he embarked on his career as
an internationally renowned violin virtuoso. His compositions include Danses Tsiganes, a violin concerto, and a string
quartet. He also edited Vivaldis violin concertos in A minor
and G minor.
NACHMANN, WERNER (19251988), industrialist and German-Jewish communal leader. Born in Karlsruhe (Baden), he
fled with his family to France in 1938 and returned as an officer in the French army to his native city in 1945. He was the
chairman of the Karlsruhe Jewish community (196188), of the
Association of Jewish Communities (Oberrat) in Baden, and
of the Central Council of Jews in Germany between 1969 and
his death in 1988. He received numerous awards, such as the
Theodor Heuss Prize, for his efforts regarding the improvement of Jewish-Christian relations. He was, however, also
criticized during his long tenure as top official of Germanys
Jewish communities as being too lenient toward former Nazis.
Thus, his defense of the minister president of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Hans Filbinger, who faced accusations over his role
as a judge during World War II, caused considerable protest
within and beyond the Jewish community. Immediately after
Nachmanns death it was discovered that he had embezzled
about DM 33 million of restitution money. Although his successor, Heinz Galinski, made this affair public and tried to
discover where the money had gone, it was never resolved
conclusively.
Bibliography: Y.M. Bodemann, Gedaechtnistheater (1996).
[Michael Brenner (2nd ed.)]
nadab
The son of Nah man Isaakovich and Rojse, ISAAC NACHMANOVICH (Junior; b. 1595), after years of apprenticeship under the tutelage of his mother and uncle, resumed the business in his own right and on occasion acted as court banker.
In 1626 he lent considerable sums of money to the royal treasury during the war with Sweden. In 1634 Isaac was given the
status *servus camerae by King Ladislaus IV, and exempted
from paying all customs duties and imposts, whether levied
by the crown or privately. He also expanded his commercial
activities, especially the trade in textiles and supply of oxen
to the army, and in partnership with others, leased the state
revenues in the districts of Lvov and *Drogobych. However,
by 1637 he was on the verge of bankruptcy, and in 1646 was
arrested for debt. He succeeded in escaping from prison and
disappeared.
Bibliography: Halpern, Pinkas, index; M. Balaban, ydzi
lwowscy na przelomie 16 i 17 wieku (1906), 4188; W. Lozinski, Patrycjat i mieszczanstwo lwowskie w 16 i 17 wieku (1892); J. Caro, Geschichte
der Juden in Lemberg (1894), 3443.
[Arthur Cygielman]
NACHOD, JACOB (18141882), merchant and second president of the *Deutsch-Israelitischer Gemeindebund. An orphan, he studied at the Wolfenbuettel Samsonschule and went
to Leipzig in 1830. There he founded in 1844 the Gesellschaft
der Freunde, the forerunner of the Leipzig communal organization established in 1868. He cooperated with M. Kohner
in the founding of the Deutsch-Israelitischer Gemeindebund
(1869) and succeeded him as its president on Kohners death
in 1877. Nachods main contributions were in the field of education and welfare.
Bibliography: Gedenkblaetter an J. Nachod (1882).
NACHOD, OSKAR (18591933), German historian and bibliographer. Born in Leipzig, Nachod began to write a definitive history of Japan. He abandoned the immense task after
completing two volumes. These volumes, Die Urzeit (1906)
and Die Uebernahme der chinesichen Kultur (1930), have remained classics. Nachods magnum opus was the seven-volume Bibliographie von Japan (192844), the last parts of which
were completed by other scholars. It is a catalog of books and
periodical articles dealing with Japan published in European
languages between 1906 and 1943.
NADAB (Heb. [ ; God] has been generous), eldest son
of *Aaron and Elisheba daughter of Amminadab (Ex. 6:23;
Num. 3:2, et al.). For details see *Abihu. (The two are always
mentioned together and what applies to Abihu is also true of
Nadab.) Nadab too left no sons (Num. 3:4; I Chron. 24:2).
[Morris M. Schnitzer]
721
nadab
saying, Our fathers brother [Moses] is a king, our mothers
brother [Nahshon] is a prince, our father [Aaron] is a high
priest, and we are both deputy high priests what woman is
worthy of us? (Lev. R. 20:10). They even went so far as to wish
for the death of Moses and Aaron so that they could assume
the mantle of leadership (Sanh. 52a; Lev. R. 20:10). Even in
the performance of the sacrifice they displayed their haughtiness by refraining from consulting with one another and by
neglecting to ask Moses and Aaron whether they might offer
such a sacrifice, depending instead upon their own judgment.
The sages deduce from this episode that it is forbidden for a
disciple to render a legal decision in the presence of his master (Lev. R. 20:7). It is, however, also suggested that their death
was a vicarious punishment for their fathers sin with regard
to the golden calf. Moses relates: Moreover the Lord was
very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him (Deut. 9:20),
and destruction means extinction of offspring (Lev. R. 10:5).
Moses attempted to comfort his brother by assuring him that
his two remaining sons were greater than Nadab and Abihu.
At Sinai, Moses was told that he would sanctify the Tabernacle
through the death of a great man. He thought that the reference was to himself or Aaron, but now he realized that Nadab
and Abihu were nearer to God (Lev. R. 12:2).
Their deaths were caused by two streams of fire,
branched off into four, and two entered into each of the nostrils of Nadab and Abihu. Their souls were burnt, although
no external injury was visible (Sanh. 52a). The whole House of
Israel was bidden to bewail the death of Nadab and Abihu (Lev.
R. 20:12) for the death of a pious man is a greater misfortune
to Israel than the destruction of the Temple (Sif. Deut. 31).
722
[Aaron Rothkoff]
Bibliography: H. Gressmann, Mose und seine Zeit (1913),
2579; Noth, Personennamen, 193, 251; T.J. Meek, in: AJSLL, 45 (1929),
157; K. Moehlenbrink, in: ZAW, 52 (1934), 2145; G. Ryckmans, Les
noms propres sud-smitiques, 1 (1934), 136; F. Dornseiff, in: ZAW, 53
(1935), 164; Kaufmann, Y., Toledot, 2 (1938), 264, 276; S. Feigin, Mysteries of the Past (1953), 430; L.A. Snijders, in: OTS, 10 (1954), 11623; M.
Haran, in: Tarbiz, 26 (1956/57), 116 idem, in: VT, 10 (1960), 115, 127; J.
Liver, in: Scripta Hierosolymitana, 8 (1961), 207, 216; R. Gradwohl, in:
ZAW, 75 (1963), 288ff.; U. Cassuto, A Commentary on the Book of Exodus (1967), 3105. IN THE AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, index.
nadelman, elie
translation of *Saadia Gaon) and a tikll (siddur). In 1903, he
represented the Yemenites of Jerusalem at the first assembly
of Erez -Israeli Jews in Zikhron Yaakovs kolel. He was the first
Yemenite rabbi in Erez Israel to investigate Yemenite traditions
and published several books and articles on the subject, such
as the first bibliography of the works of Yemenite scholars,
Seridei Teiman (Remnants of Yemen, 1928), Anaf H ayyim
(notes on tikll Ez H ayyim by R. Yih ye S alih ). In consequence
of a disagreement with younger leaders in the community he
retired and moved to Tel Aviv, devoting his last years to research. His rich literary legacy, preserved by his descendants,
was used by Prof. Y. Ratzaby for his research on Yemenite Jews,
including his memoir Zekhor le-Avraham.
Bibliography: Y. Ratzaby, The Diary of Rabbi Avraham
Alnadaf, in: Peraqim be-Toldot ha-Yishuv ha-Yehudi Bi-Yerushalayim, 2 (1976), 14491; Y. Tobi, The Yemenite Community of Jerusalem
18811921 (Hebr., 1994).
[Yosef Tobi (2nd ed.)]
NADEL, ARNO (18781943), German poet and liturgical musicologist. Born in Vilna, Lithuania, Nadel studied liturgical
music under Eduard *Birnbaum in Koenigsberg. In 1895, he
entered the Jewish Teachers Institute in Berlin and spent the
rest of his life in Berlin. His first book, a volume of aphorisms
and verse entitled Aus vorletzten und letzten Gruenden (1909),
betrayed the influence of Nietzschean philosophy. His later
works dealt mainly with biblical and Jewish themes. They include the play Adam, staged in Karlsruhe in 1917; Das Jahr des
Juden (1920), a collection of 12 poems; Rot und gluehend ist das
Auge des Juden (1920); Der Suendenfall (1920); and Juedische
Volkslieder (1923). His most important verse collection, Der
Ton (1921, enlarged 1926), constitutes his Jewish reply to the
nihilism of his time. He also published a German translation
of *An-Skis drama, Der Dybbuk (1921). Der weissagende Dionysos (1934), a collection of his later poetry, was republished
after World War II.
In 1916 Nadel was appointed conductor of the choir at the
synagogue in the Pestalozzistrasse, and later became musical
supervisor of the Berlin synagogues. He devoted much effort to
the collection and study of synagogal music and East European
Jewish folk song, searching for manuscripts and noting oral traditions. Many of these he published and discussed in the music
supplements of the Berlin Gemeindeblatt and Ost und West, and
in his articles on Jewish music in the Juedisches Lexicon and the
German Encyclopaedia Judaica. Some of the Yiddish folk songs
were also published separately, as in his Jonteff Lieder (1919) and
Juedische Liebeslieder (1923). Drawing on his researches, Nadel
restored old traditions and raised the standards of the synagogue choirs. His manuscript collection included several unique
cantors manuals, such as that of Judah Elias of Hanover (1744).
All of this he planned to incorporate in a multivolume compendium of synagogal music entitled Hallelujah, which was to
have been published under the auspices of the Berlin community. The preparation of the earlier volumes was apparently well
under way before Nadel was transported to Auschwitz, where
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
he was murdered. His papers were reported to have been hidden in time, but most have not been recovered.
Nadel was himself a composer, and wrote the incidental music for Stefan *Zweigs Jeremias (1918). A man of many
talents, he also excelled as a graphic artist and as a painter of
landscapes and portraits.
Bibliography: Stoessinger, in: Israelitisches Wochenblatt
fuer die Schweiz (Aug. 9, 1946); A. Nadel, Der weissagende Dionysos,
ed. by F. Kemp ([1934] 1959), contains a critical biography; Sendrey,
Music, indexes; Baker, Biog Dict.
[Sol Liptzin and Bathja Bayer]
NADEL, SIEGFRED FERDINAND STEPHAN (Frederick; 19031956), British anthropologist. Born in Austria, Nadel
studied with Moritz Schlick and Karl Buehler, and developed
a command of contemporary philosophical and psychological theory. In 1932 he began the serious study of anthropology
at the London School of Economics under B. Malinowski and
C.G. Seligman. He studied the music of primitive peoples, and
African linguistics with D. Westermann. He did field work in
the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and with the Nuba, from 1938 to
1940. During World War II he served with the British armed
forces and later as a lieutenant colonel with the British Military Administration, 194546. He successfully applied his anthropological knowledge to the administration of peoples of
various origins and traditions. When a department of anthropology was established at the University of Durham in 1948 he
was appointed to the chair, and in 1950 took the new chair of
anthropology and sociology at the Australian National University, and was dean of the Research School of Pacific Studies. His ethnographic work was shown in A Black Byzantium
(1942). In his research he investigated the deeper bases of cultures and employed new psychological techniques of investigation such as intelligence tests. Nadels primary accomplishment, however, is in theory, which he developed in two major
works, The Foundations of Social Anthropology (1951) and the
Theory of Social Structure (1957). His great concern was how
to unify the conceptual systems of social anthropology and
sociology with a psychological framework. His Theory of Social
Structure has been described as one of the great theoretical
teatises of twentieth century anthropology which will have
a lasting place in the fundamental literature of our subject
(Meyer Fortes). Nadel died unexpectedly of a heart attack at
the age of only 52.
Bibliography: R. Firth, in: American Anthropologist, 59
(1957), 11724, incl. bibl.; M. Fortes, in: S.F. Nadel, The Theory of Social Structure (1957), ixxvi; M. Janowitz, in: Current Anthropology,
4:2 (1963), 139, 14954; IESS, index. Add. Bibliography: ODNB
online; J. Salat, Reasoning as Enterprise: The Anthropology of S.F.
Nadel (1983).
[Ephraim Fischoff]
723
nder shah
time was mainly influenced by classical Greek art, but certain
drawings and pieces of sculpture hinted at a search for a new
direction. Andre Gide wrote in his Journal (1909): Nadelman
draws with a compass and sculpts by assembling rhombs. He
has discovered that each curve of the human body is accompanied by a reciprocal curve opposite it and corresponding to
it. Nadelman, who regarded himself as the father of cubism,
resented his not being recognized as such. He made his way
to the U.S. early in World War I, and had his first American
one-man show in New York at the end of 1915. Over the years
Nadelman became very successful with his fashionable, witty
portrait busts. Nadelman and his wealthy wife assembled one
of the finest collections of American folk art. The depression
of the 1930s, however, brought a change in his fortunes and
after 1932 he was virtually forgotten. He spent his last years
doing voluntary occupational therapy at the Bronx Veterans
Hospital and making sentimental little plaster figures for mass
reproduction. Nadelman was rediscovered when in 1948, two
years after his death, the New York Museum of Modern Art, in
collaboration with the Boston Institute of Contemporary Art
and the Baltimore Museum of Art, mounted a memorial exhibition of his work. This revealed him as an important sculptor, remarkable for the supple languor of his marble heads, his
translations of folk art, and his comments on human foibles.
NADICH, JUDAH (1912 ), Conservative rabbi and postwar special advisor for Jewish affairs to General Dwight David
Eisenhower. Nadich received his Bachelor of Arts degree with
Phi Beta Kappa honors from the City College of New York
and his Master of Arts degree from Columbia University. He
was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America,
which also awarded him the degrees of Master of Hebrew Literature, Doctor of Hebrew Literature, and Doctor of Divinity (honoris causa).
Upon ordination he served as rabbi of Temple Beth David
in Buffalo from 1936 to 1940 and of Anshe Emet Synagogue in
Chicago from 1940 to 1942. He then enlisted and served as an
army chaplain for four years, spending 3 years in the European Theater of Operations as senior Jewish chaplain with the
U.S. armed forces and deputy to the theater chaplain. After
the first German concentration camps were liberated, General
Eisenhower appointed him his advisor on Jewish affairs, in
which capacity he was instrumental in creating livable conditions for Jews who had survived the Holocaust, working with
Displaced Persons and with other Jewish chaplians to urgently
alleviate their desperate conditions. He received several American decorations, the French Croix de Guerre, and the Order
of the British Empire. He retired from active duty in 1946 with
the rank of lieutenant-colonel. The government of Israel decorated him with the Ittur Loh amei ha-Medinah for his service during wartime. The Jewish Welfare Board honored him
with the Frank L. Weil Award for distinguished service in the
Armed Forces. Following his retirement from the Army, Nadich
spent a year and a half on an extended speaking tour, addressing Jewish communities in 40 states on behalf of the *United
Jewish Appeal. On behalf of the *Joint Distribution Committee, he addressed Jewish communities throughout South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Zambia as the guest of the South African
Jewish War Appeal.
He then went on to serve in the pulpits of two major
Conservative congregations, very different in kind and in
constituency. He was rabbi of Kehillath Israel (KI) in Brookline, Massachusetts, from 1947 to 1957; and in 1957 he came to
Park Avenue Synagogue in Manhattan after the death of Mil-
724
nadir, moyshe
ton *Steinberg, where he remained for three decades as rabbi
and, after 1987, as rabbi emeritus. KI was located in a middle
class suburb of Boston and its congregants were arch traditionalists; a four-day a week Hebrew School was the norm,
followed by high school supplemental education at Boston
Hebrew College. The congregation produced dozens of rabbis and Judaic scholars from its student body. Park Avenue
Synagogue is located on the prestigious upper East Side. Its
congregants were leaders of business and industry, Wall Street
and the worlds of banking and finance. Nadich served both
communities well.
Active in national as well as local affairs, Nadich was
president of the Rabbinical Assembly; the Association of
Jewish Chaplains of the Armed Forces; and the Jewish Book
Council of America; vice president of Hadoar, the American
Hebrew weekly magazine and an honorary vice president of
the Jewish Braille Institute and a member of its board of directors from 1957. He was chairman of the Commission on Jewish
Chaplaincy of the Jewish Welfare Board. At the invitation of
the Department of Defense and the Armed Forces Chaplains
Board during November 1971, he conducted Torah Convocations in South Vietnam and Japan and visited Jewish chaplains
and servicemen in those countries and in Thailand, with the
brevet rank of major-general; similarly, in Germany in November 1974. In July 1990, he officiated at the first bat mitzvah
in China. In 1992 the secretary of the Army appointed him to
the commitee of the Department of Defense commemorating
the 50t anniversary of World War II.
He wrote Rabbi Akiba and His Contemporaries, The Legends of the Rabbis (2 vols.; 1994), The Jewish Legends of the
Second Commonwealth (1983), and Eisenhower and the Jews
(1953); he was the editor and translator of The Flowering of
Modern Hebrew Literature (1959) by his late father-in-law,
Menachem Ribalow; the editor of Al Halakhah ve-Aggadah
(1960), a volume of Hebrew essays by Louis Ginzberg. His
brochure on Yom Kippur, written for Jews in the armed forces
of the United States, has a distribution in the hundreds of
thousands.
[Michael Berenbaum (2nd ed.)]
725
726
NAEH, BARUKH BEN MENAHEM (18801943), Turkish translator and legal writer. Active in Adrianople (Edirne)
public affairs, he was a Turkish infantry officer during World
War I and immigrated to Palestine in 1923. Naehs translations
include works by Yehuda Burla, A.S. Friedberg, and Sholem
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
727
nagasaki
NAGASAKI, port in S. Japan. With the opening of Japan
to international relations in the mid-19t century, Nagasaki
gradually grew into a center of foreign trade. In the 1860s a
small number of Jews, mainly from Eastern Europe, settled
in the city. In the following years they organized religious
and communal activities, built a synagogue, and maintained
a burial ground. In the late 19t century (when the community numbered around 100) many of them earned a livelihood by catering to the needs of Russian sailors whose ships
called regularly at the port. When this business ceased with
the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, many of the
Jews moved elsewhere, and the organized Jewish community
came to an end.
728
[Hyman Kublin]
nagid
of Iranian traditions, but also of Jewish messianic traditions.
The Jewish elements in the Apocalypse of Adam are central,
yet mutated in a heretical direction.
This is the case, too, with very many of the other Nag
Hammadi documents. An Ophite version of the Paradise
story is recounted in On the Origin of the World (II, 5), The
Hypostasis of the Archons (II, 4), and, probably in its earliest
form, in a Midrash imbedded in The Testimony of Truth (IX,
3), wherein the serpent and Eve are the revealers of knowledge,
and the Creator is an envious villain. In addition to the Genesis story itself, aggadic traditions known from the Jewish Midrashim, including Aramaic word-plays (serpent / Eve
/ instruct , cf. Gen. R. 20:27) are utilized in the text,
but are, of course, retold in a gnostic, heretical direction.
The Apocryphon of John (II, 1; III, 1; IV, 1) is a document
which is attributed, in an obviously secondary redactional
framework, to *Jesus as a revelation to his disciple John. However, the basic revelation consists of a cosmogonic myth, with
a Midrash on the first six chapters of Genesis, in which the
figure of Jesus is altogether extraneous. At least a part of this
myth was known also to Irenaeus (Adversus haereses 1:29).
The myth contains speculations concerning the Highest God
and the divine world (maaseh merkabah) and on the creation
of the cosmos (maaseh bereshit). Speculation in, and study of,
both these subjects was severely limited if not actually condemned by the rabbis of the tannaitic period (cf. Hag. 2:1 and
see *Merkabah Mysticism). In accordance with a trend in postbiblical Jewish theology (cf. Jos., Apion, 2.167: uncreated
immutable unknowable), the Highest God is described in
negative terms which stress his utter transcendence. From him
emanate other divine beings, including four angelic lightbearers that serve as attendants (cf. the four h ayyot of Ezek.
1:5). However, what marks this document as heretical is that
the Transcendent God is not also the Creator. Creation results
from the fall of Sophia (Wisdom, cf. the role of h okhmah
in Prov. 8:22ff.; and sophia in Wisd. 7:22ff.), whose product is
Ialdabaoth (also called Saklas and Samael). Ialdabaoth is
the biblical Creator, and he, together with his fellow archons,
creates the world and the corporeal part of man. In his ignorance he claims to be the only God (he quotes Ex. 20:5 and
Isa. 45:5). This myth is found not only in the Apocryphon of
John, but in numerous other gnostic writings as well.
The creation of man in the Apocryphon of John is not only
a retelling of the Genesis story, but is based on Jewish traditions of interpretation of key biblical texts. For example, the
account of the fashioning of mans lower nature by Ialdabaoth
and his fellow-archons is based on the Alexandrian-Jewish interpretation of Genesis 1:26f. and 2:7, that God relegated the
creation of mans mortal nature to the angels (cf. Fug. 6870:
Justin, Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, 62). The duality of mans
soul, i.e., a lower psyche and a higher pneuma (spirit), is
based on the Hellenistic Jewish (probably Alexandrian) interpretation of the Septuagint of Genesis 2:7 (cf. Spec. 4.123;
Det. 84). The detail that Adam was inert and lifeless until he
received the heavenly inbreathing is developed from the
729
nagid
*Abbasid rule where Jewry was led by the *exilarchs). In the
Middle Ages, beginning with the tenth century, there were
negidim in *Spain, *Kairouan, *Egypt, and *Yemen; in *Morocco, *Algeria, and *Tunisia there were negidim from the 16t
to the 19t centuries.
History of the Institution of the Nagid
When the Abbasid caliphate was split up and independent
kingdoms came into being, the new rulers found it necessary to appoint a leader for each non-Muslim community.
Abd al-Rah mn I (751788), founder of the *Umayyad emirate in Spain, appointed a Visigoth prince to head the Christian community, and subsequent leaders of the Christians
were appointed from among Christian courtiers or candidates proposed by the community. The duties of the head of
the Christian community consisted of representing the community before the authorities, ensuring the payment of taxes,
supervising community life, and administering the judiciary,
which applied Visigoth law. In a similar manner, the heads of
the Jewish community were appointed from among persons
holding high rank at the court of the caliph or sultan, such as
vizier, secretary, or treasurer; most, however, were physicians.
Their task was to see to it that the Jewish community fulfilled
the duties imposed on it (such as observing the Covenant of
*Omar); they also appointed dayyanim and other community
officials. Thus, the office of nagid came into being to serve the
purposes of the Muslim state, but its existence was also in the
interests of the Jews, for these *nesiim (the term nagid was first
applied in the beginning of the 11t century) would intervene
in their behalf to obtain better conditions or to bring about
the cancellation of anti-Jewish decrees. The archetype of the
institution of nagid was the Babylonian exilarch, with certain
differences. The negidim did not claim Davidic descent, their
appointment being based on their own achievements and their
standing with the authorities, rather than their blood line,
and they did not, as a rule, derive their income from taxes
imposed on the community, as did the exilarchs. The similarity of the duties of the two institutions seems to account for
the legend mentioned by *David b. Solomon ibn Abi Zimra
(Responsa no. 944) and Joseph b. Isaac Sambari (Neubauer,
Chronicles, 1 (1887), 1156), according to which the office of
nagid in Egypt was created by a member of the Babylonian
exilarchs family who had been invited to Egypt by the Abbasid wife of the Egyptian ruler; D. Ayalon (Neustadt, see bibliography) has shown that there is no historical truth to this
legend, for there is no record of any daughter of an Abbasid
caliph marrying a Fatimid caliph, and, as stated, the negidim
did not claim Davidic descent.
Spain
Among those known to have held the office of nagid in Spain
are H isdai ibn *Shaprut, physician and statesman at the courts
of Abd al-Rah mn III (ruled 91261) and his son al-H akam
II (96176). Ibn Shaprut did a great deal for the Jews in his
own country, as well as for Jewish communities in other parts
of the world; Dunash b. *Labrat refers to him as judge.
Kairouan
During the same period, there was a separate Jewish leadership in Kairouan, Tunisia. The first official nagid who was
appointed by the Zirid emir was Abu Ish aq Ibrahim ibn Ata
(Natan), who served as court physician to the emir Badis
(9661016) and his son al-Muizz (101662), the rulers of the
eastern Maghreb (Tunisia and Algeria). The appointment apparently was made during the period of the Fatimid al-H kim
bi-Amrillah (10101221), at which time the opportunity was
grasped to free themselves from Fatimid rule. It may be assumed that even before this there was local Jewish government in Kairouan, but without formal independent status.
Ibrahim, like the Spanish negidim, extended aid to the Babylonian yeshivot, in addition to attending to the needs of his own
community, and earned the praise of Hai Gaon, who in 1015
awarded him the honorary title of negid ha-Golah (nagid of
the Diaspora). He died in about 1020 and was succeeded by
Jacob b. Amram, who was referred to by such titles as negid
ha-Golah, sar ha-Segullah (the chosen prince), and peer
ha-edah (pride of the community). There is no record of
his early activities and the last report about him dates from
1041. He helped the Kairouan community in times of need,
sent contributions to the yeshivot in Palestine and Babylonia,
730
nagid
Ashtor, Toledot, 1 (1944), 41; S.D. Goitein, in: HUCA, 34 (1963), 180.
2.
34.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
Ibid., 30022; 3 (1970), 88; A.H. Freimann, in: Minh ah li-Yhudah, dedicated to
J.L. Zlotnik (1950), 1758.
1317.
18.
19.
20.
Ibid., 505 ff.; A. Shoh et, in: Zion, 1314 (1948/49), 43.
21.
Egypt
In Egypt the office of nagid remained in existence for over
500 years; there are extant documents which contain a wealth
of details on the negidim and their authority and acts. Some
scholars accept the view that the first nagid of Egyptian Jewry
was *Paltiel, an Italian Jew who was brought to Egypt by alMuizz, the Fatimid conqueror of Egypt (969), and was part
of the rulers officialdom. The sole source for this information
is the *Ahimaaz Scroll; there is an assumption that the Shiite
Fatimids, who decreed themselves Imams (caliphs), did not
wish to depend in any way upon the Sunnite Abbasid caliphs,
preferring to appoint a separate head for the Jews under their
ruler rather than have them acknowledge the authority of the
Babylonian exilarch, an official who was part of the Abbasid hierarchy. There are various theories concerning the true
identity of Paltiel, the most recent being the one expressed
by M. Gil (see bibliography), according to which he was Fadl
ben Salih, a chief commander of the Fatimid army. Another
theory is B. Lewiss (see bibliography), according to which he
was Musa b. Eleazar, al-Muizzs physician. Mann (Egypt, 1920,
see bibliography) was the first to suggest this theory of Paltiels
being the first nagid on the Fatimids initiative.
The Genizah documents contain no proof of the existence of the office of nagid in the first half of the 11t century.
On this basis some scholars, such as Goitein (1971, see bibliography), Cohen (1980, see bibliography), and Gil (1992, see
bibliography), wrote against Manns theory. Today there are
certain scholars, such as Sela (1995, 1998, see bibliography)
and Bareket (1998, 1999, see bibliography) who are re-adapting
the old Mann theory. The first negidim for whom details are
found in the Genizah are Judah b. Saadiah, who was a court
physician, held the post of nagid in the 1060s and the 1070s,
and was referred to as nagid of the People of God, and his
brother *Mevorakh, who was nagid from about 1079 (with
temporary interruptions) to 1110. Mevorakh was the physician
and adviser of al-Malik al-Afdal, the acting ruler of Egypt, and
was awarded no less than 14 honorary titles, some of which
were typical of those used by the yeshivot in Babylonia and
Palestine. For a while, Mevorakh was removed from office, a
result of the machinations of David b. *Daniel, a member of
the house of the Babylonian exilarch who had succeeded in
gaining the governors support for his claim to the leadership
of Egyptian Jewry. Such competition for the office occurred
on several occasions, up to the 13t century. As a rule the challenge came from members of the Babylonian exilarchs house
or the Palestinian yeshivah.
731
2223.
nagid
*Zuta. The appointment of the nagid did not depend upon the
consent of the exilarch or the heads of the yeshivot, and the
mention of such consent in the existing documents must be
regarded as a mere formality. At times it was the son of the
deceased nagid who was appointed in his fathers place, while
on some occasions preference was given to a person who had
achieved a prominent position at the rulers court. Beginning
with Abraham b. Moses b. *Maimon, the son of *Maimonides, the office became hereditary, and four of his descendants served as negidim, the last being David b. Joshua *Maimuni. From the end of the Ayyubid dynasty and throughout
the Mamluk period, the office of nagid, or ras al-yahd, had
the character of a permanent institution, whose functions
were defined by the authorities. Several letters of appointment from the Mamluk period are extant which contain the
provision that the ras always be a Rabbanite and that he also
be in charge of the *Karaites and *Samaritans. It was his duty
to appoint a prominent Karaite as leader of that community,
although the head of the Samaritans received his own letter
of appointment from the government. According to Qalqashandi (d. 1418), the status of nagid was parallel in nature to
that of the Christian patriarch, and like any person of official
rank wore official dress, the khala. The Arab chronicler Ibn
Fad l Allah al-Omar, whose work was written in 1340, tells
about a nagids letter of appointment in which his authority and functions were described as follows: consolidation of
the community; administration of justice to the members of
the community on the basis of its religious law; responsibility for matters of personal status betrothals, marriages, and
divorces; the right of excommunication; supervision of the
observance of the commandments, according to the Law of
Moses and the decisions of the rabbis; the duty to ensure compliance with the Covenant of Omar, especially the prohibition
of constructing new synagogues, and the order concerning the
wearing of garb different from that of the Muslims; supervision of synagogues and prayer services; grading the status of
the members of the community (this apparently applies to tax
assessment, for there were three different rates for the poll tax,
depending upon a persons economic situation); and general
responsibility for the maintenance of law and order by the
community. Jewish sources, primarily Genizah documents
dating from the Fatimid period and after, give further information on the wide range of the nagids duties and activities.
He protected his community from oppression by government
officials and interceded with the authorities for the cancellation of unjust and severe decrees. He served as arbitrator in
cases of injustice, discrimination, and unfair economic competition; attended to the needs of the weak and the suffering;
and tried to retrieve lost goods, rescue Jews from prison and
captivity, and raise the ransoms required for such purposes.
It was he who authorized the payment of tuition fees from the
communal trust fund for the education of orphans and children of the poor (five such payment orders by a single nagid,
Abraham b. Moses b. Maimon, were found in the Genizah).
The nagid was not responsible for collecting the poll tax, but
732
nagin, harry S.
deposed from his office in 1517, when Egypt was taken over
by the Ottomans, and died in 1524. Under Ottoman rule, two
more negidim were appointed in Egypt: Abraham *Castro,
who was also the director of the Egyptian mint, and Jacob
b. H ayyim *Talmid, who was sent from *Istanbul to Egypt
in order to take up the post. According to a report by Joseph
*Sambari (Neubauer, Chronicles, 1 (1887), 1167), Jacob Talmid
became involved in a controversy with Bezalel *Ashkenazi,
whereupon the Egyptian governor decided to abolish the office of nagid in Egypt. Henceforth, it was the h akham (chief
rabbi) who acted as the representative of Egyptian Jewry before the authorities.
Yemen
The existence of the office of nagid in Yemen may be deduced
from fragmentary information contained in letters found in
the Genizah and from inscriptions on Yemenite tombstones,
both sources dating from the end of the 11t up to the beginning of the 14t centuries. The first nagid of whom there is
knowledge was Japheth (Hasan) b. Bendar, apparently of Persian origin, who in a document dating from 1097 is referred
to as a prince of the communities. He and his descendants
were residents of *Aden, were clerks for merchants, and dealt
in the trade with India; they exercised some measure of control over the trade routes and the price of the transit goods
which passed through Yemen on their way to Egypt. Japheths
son, Mad mun, mentioned in letters from the period 113251,
was granted the title of nagid of the Land of Yemen by the
exilarch; he also maintained contact with the gaon Maz liah
*ha-Kohen from Egypt and received an honorary title from
him (in addition to six other titles of honor that he bore). In
an official report of the bet din he is described as appointed
by the exilarchs and heads of the yeshivot over all of Israel
and acknowledged by the respective rulers in the lands of the
sea and of the desert; the latter passage seems to imply that
Mad mun had agreements with the pirate chiefs who controlled the sea routes. His son H alfon inherited the title of
nagid and served from 1152 to 1172. During his lifetime there
were two other negidim, R. Nethanel *al-Fayyumi (d. after
1164) and his son Jacob b. Nethanel *al-Fayyumi, who was
in charge of the communities in central Yemen; the latter received Maimonides famous Iggeret Teiman. There are reports
of another nagid by the name of Mad mun (he may be identical with Shemariah b. David), who served from 1202 to 1218.
Three negidim are known from the first half of the 13t century: Mad mun (apparently a descendant of the first Mad mun
mentioned above) and his sons, H alfon and Joshua. The title
of nagid was also held by David b. Amram *Adani, author of
Ha-Midrash ha-Gadol, who lived at the end of the 13t and the
beginning of the 14t centuries, and may have been a descendant of the Mad mun family.
North Africa
In the Jewish communities of the Maghreb from the 16t to
the 19t centuries the office of nagid was held either by prominent Jewish merchants or Jews who had close contacts at the
733
nagler, isadore
NAGLER, ISADORE (18951959), U.S. labor leader. Born
in Austria, Nagler went to the United States in 1909 and
worked as a cutter, joining Local 10 of the Cutters Union.
In 1920 he was made an official of the International Ladies
Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) and was a prominent
anti-communist. He became vice president of the ILGWU
in 1929 and worked closely with the union president, Benjamin *Schlesinger and his successor David *Dubinsky. Nagler
was general manager of the Joint Board of the Cloakmakers
Union from 1928 to 1939 and was one of the founders of the
American Labor Party (ALP). In 1944 he left the Labor Party
with Dubinsky in protest against its pro-communist line and
helped found the Liberal Party in which he was a prominent
figure. He was prominent in the New York Jewish Education
Committee, the Federation of Jewish Philanthropic Societies, and *ORT.
NAGYBACZONINAGY, VILMOS (18841976), Hungarian general and minister of defense. In 1942 NagybaczoniNagy was appointed minister of defense. At that time Jews
were excluded from the Hungarian army and were drafted
into the labor service. Their situation was at times intolerable,
particularly at the Russian front. When Nagybaczoni-Nagy
assumed office, he reviewed the labor battalions at the front
and immediately ordered an improvement in their conditions.
Claiming that labor service was the same as military service,
he abolished the discriminations against Jewish draftees and
their families, then in force through anti-Jewish legislation.
He ordered officers and commanders when dealing with Jews
to refrain from showing their personal feelings, and not to increase work norms and discipline by unlawful means. Nagybaczoni-Nagy expressly forbade attacking or humiliating Jews
in public. He was concerned with the release of the sick and
invalids, with healthy and sufficient food, a daily eight-hour
rest, and with the personal cleanliness of the members of the
labor battalions. In addition, he gave his attention to the religious needs of the draftees, e.g., the keeping of the Jewish festivals, as well as allotting sufficient time for donning the phylacteries. Nagybaczoni-Nagy did not hesitate to put on trial
officers and commanders who behaved with cruelty.
Following repeated pressure by the Arrow Cross opposition in the Hungarian parliament, Nagybaczoni-Nagy was
forced to resign. After the German occupation of Hungary
(March 19, 1944) Nagybaczoni-Nagy was arrested and de-
734
nahalal or nahalol
Bibliography: H. Villnyi, in: L. Barbarits, Nagykanizsa
(1929), 25162; E. Lszl, in: R.L. Braham (ed.), Hungarian Jewish
Studies, 1 (1966), 61136, incl. bibl. and notes.
[Jeno Zsoldos]
garin activity; and the Nah al brigade, which is a regular infantry brigade and part of the Central Command. It includes the
Nah al h aredi battalion for ultra-Orthodox soldiers. The Nah al
garinim focus on educational activity in civilian communities.
Bibliography: G. Levitas, Nah al Israels Pioneer Fighting
Youth (1967); Ministry of Defense, Israel, Nah al (1970).
[Yehuda Schuster / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
735
NAHARIN, OHAD (1952 ), Israeli dancer and choreographer. He was born in Israel on kibbutz Mizra, and grew up in
the town of Tivon, near Haifa; he is the son of artistic parents
who were involved in music and theater.
Naharin started professional dance training after he
finished his army service. After a year of training with the
*Batsheva Dance Company, he performed in The Dream (1974)
and was asked to stay on with the troupe for another year. He
then studied for a year at Juilliard in its Professional Studies
736
Website: www.nachlat.org.il.
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
NAH AL OZ (Heb. ) , kibbutz in southern Israel, established in 1951 as a border settlement by a *Nah al group near
the Gaza Strip, affiliated with Ih ud ha-Kevuz ot ve-ha-Kibbutzim. Later, pioneers from South America and other countries joined the kibbutz. Before the *Sinai Campaign (1956),
and in the days before the *Six-Day War (1967), Nah al Oz was
frequently a target for attacks and shelling from beyond the
Gaza Strip border. After June 1967, a point near the kibbutz
became an entrance gate to the Strip. The kibbutz economy
was based on intensive farming (field crops, dairy cattle, and
poultry) and a hi-tech enterprise in the field of video communications. In 199798 the kibbutz began going over to a
private wage economy. This was accompanied by a great crisis causing many residents to leave the kibbutz and the population to drop from 495 in the mid-1990s to 288 in 2002. The
name Nah al Oz points both to the original Nah al outpost, and
to nearby Gaza (whose Hebrew name, Azzah, is derived from
the same root as oz, meaning strength).
Website: www.sng.org.il/meida/yeshuvim/nahal-oz.htm.
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
nahwend, benjamin ben moses alelectrical appliances, fine mechanics, paper products, agricultural machinery, etc. A new industrial zone for large enterprises
was added in the north to supplement the older industrial zone
near the railroad station. The commercial center was laid out
along the central avenue on both sides of the Gaaton Stream.
The hotel zone stretched mainly along the beach and the city
had 21 public parks and ornamental gardens. At the turn of the
20t century, residents earned their living in industry (45),
services (40), tourism (11), and agriculture (4). The citys
name is derived from nahar (stream), referring to the Gaaton
Stream which passes through part of the city.
he is ranked next to *Anans son Saul, and in medieval Arabic accounts the Karaites as a group are sometimes referred
to as the followers of Anan and Benjamin. Al-*Kirkisn,
who lived a century later and whose information is usually
highly reliable, states that Nahwend was learned in the
lore of the Rabbanites and strong in Scripture, and served for
many years as a judge. Karaite tradition regards Nahwend
as the person who established early Karaite teaching on a
firm footing by purging it of Anans supposedly excessive leaning toward Rabbanite doctrines. It is true that Nahwend
disagreed with Anan on many points of law, but at the same
time he appears to have been rather tolerant; he not only had
no objection to adopting Rabbanite legal ordinances, including some which have no direct support in Scripture, but is
even said to have declared that every person may be guided
in legal matters by his own judgment and is not obliged to
submit to the decisions of commonly acknowledged authorities. On the other hand, later Karaites rejected some
of Nahwends views, particularly his theory that the world
was not created immediately by God, but that God created an
angel who, in turn, created the world. Further, he was of the
opinion that the Law was revealed by an angel, not by God,
and the prophets received their prophecy from an angel. The
purpose of this theory was to refer all the anthropomorphic
passages in Scripture, or those which might be contrary to
pure monotheism, to this angel-creator, and not to God Himself. This theory presumably represents an adaptation of a
Gnostic idea, subsequently modified into the Philonic-Christian doctrine of the *logos (creative word). Nahwends borrowings from Rabbanite law seem to testify to his realization
that the cry Back to the Bible! raised by Anan and earlier
pre-Karaite schismatics, while tactically useful for their purpose of basing their laws solely on the Bible, was impractical,
since biblical legislation alone could not efficiently govern
the Karaites social and economic life a thousand years later,
in the vastly different conditions prevailing in the Muhammadan empire. Hence he was forced to provide guidance
for his coreligionists (probably out of his own experience as
a practicing judge) in such matters as identification of witnesses, loans, agency, conjugal property rights, revokable gifts,
and inheritance and wills, for which Scripture supplies only
vague guide rules or none at all. Unlike Anan, who wrote (so
far as is known) only in Aramaic, and unlike his own successors who wrote in Arabic, Nahwend wrote (again, so far as
is known) in clear and fluent Hebrew, sharply distinct from
the stilted Hebrew of later Karaite scholars and translators in
the Byzantine Empire. His legal works comprise Sefer Mitzvot (Book of Precepts) and Sefer Dinim (Book of Rules),
both presumably parts of a comprehensive code of Karaite
law. The Sefer Dinim, dealing with civil and criminal law, was
published by A. Firkovich under the title Masat Binyamin
(1835); extracts in English translation are found in L. Nemoy,
Karaite Anthology (1952). Fragments, presumably of the Sefer
Mitzvot, were published by A. Harkavy (Studien und Mittheilungen, 8 (1903), 17584).
737
Website: www.nahariya.muni.il.
[Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)]
NAH MAN BAR RAV HUNA (first half of the fifth century
C.E.), Babylonian amora. According to the letter of Sherira
Gaon (ed. by B.M. Lewin (1921), 94f.), during 45255 Nah man
was head of the academy in Mata Meh asya which had been
revived by Ashi, succeeding Idi b. Avin, Ashis successor. According to Halevy, the amora Nah man mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud as a contemporary of Ravina and Ashi (Er.
27a; Ket. 7a; Kid. 6b; et al.) is the same person. Halevy suggests that he was the brother of the younger Ravina who was
considered by some scholars to have completed the editing
of the Babylonian Talmud, since, according to Sherira, the
father of Ravina was also Huna, but this is refuted by S. and
H . Albeck (see bibl.).
Bibliography: Hyman, Toledot, 940f.; Halevy, Dorot, 3
(1923), 9193; S. Albeck, in: Sinai Sefer Yovel (1958), 70f.; H . Albeck,
Mavo la-Talmudim (1969), 434.
[David Joseph Bornstein]
ters of teachings (Pes. 107a; Kid. 44a) and also made frequent
use of mnemonic formulae (Shab. 60b; Taan. 10a; et al.). He
devoted himself to biblical study and was well versed in the
masorah (Shab. 28b, 55b; Yoma 75b; et al.), often using it to
arrive at the correct text of the Mishnah (Shab. 77a; Bez ah
35b; BK 60a).
The Talmud relates that his mother was told by astrologers when she was pregnant that her son would be a thief,
so she watched over him from his childhood, taking care he
should always go about with his head covered in order to make
him conscious of the fear of Heaven. One day he was sitting
and studying under a palm tree when temptation overcame
him, and climbing up he bit off some of the dates. He then
realized why his mother insisted on his keeping his head covered. This is one of the talmudic sources for keeping the head
covered (ibid.; see *Head, Covering of the). It is also told that
since Nah mans father was not a scholar, Nah man showed
greater honor to his friend Nah man, son of the leading amora
H isda, than he would permit his namesake to show him (Taan.
21b). Among his colleagues were Mar son of Ravina (Shab.
61a, 108a), Papa, and H una son of Joshua (BB 22a). He died
in Pumbedita.
Bibliography: Halevy, Dorot, 2 (1923), 499502; S. Albeck,
Mishpeh ot Soferim (1903), 181ff.; Hyman, Toledot, 9415; H . Albeck,
Mavo la-Talmudim (1969), 371f. add. bibliography: E.S. Rosenthal, The Redaction of Pesah Rishon (Ph.D. diss., 1959), 22296.
[David Joseph Bornstein / Stephen G. Wald (2nd ed.)]
NAH MAN BEN JACOB (usually referred to without patronymic; d. c. 320 C.E.), Babylonian amora and a leading personality of his time. Born in Nehardea, where his father was a
scribe of Samuels bet din (BM 16b), Nah man sometimes quotes
his fathers teachings (Bez ah 26a; Zev. 56a). Nah man may have
studied under Samuel, since he transmits teachings in his
name (Ber. 27b; Shab. 57b) and refers to him as rabbenu (our
master; Ber. 38b, Er. 16b); but if so he must have then been
very young, since Samuel died in 254. Nah man also transmits
sayings in the names of Rav (Er. 72b; Pes. 13a), Adda b. Ahavah
(BK 24a), Shila (Ber. 49b), and Isaac (Shab. 131b), with whom
he was on close terms (Taan. 5a6a). His main teacher, however, was Rabbah b. Avuha (Yev. 80b; Git. 72a) in whose name
he frequently transmits statements (Ber. 36b; Shab. 17a). Rabbah b. Avuha wanted to give him his daughter in marriage
(Yev. 80b), although it is not clear whether this occurred. It is
known that Nah man ultimately married into the family of the
exilarch (H ul. 124a) and in consequence was held in high esteem (Kid. 70a), and that his wife, *Yalta, had influence in the
house of the exilarch (Rashi to Git. 67b). When Nehardea was
destroyed in 259 by Odenathus, Nah man went to Shekanzib,
but returned to Nehardea when it was rebuilt, teaching and
serving as dayyan there (Er. 34b; Kid. 70ab; BB 153a). There
are many statements by him on both halakhah and aggadah
in the Talmud, and his name is one of those most frequently
mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud and also appears quite
frequently in the Jerusalem Talmud. Huna held him equal to
738
Nah manides
NAH MANIDES (Moses b. Nah man, also known as Nah amani and RaMBaN an acronym of Rabbi Moses Ben
Nah man; 11941270), Spanish rabbi and scholar and one of
the leading authors of talmudic literature in the Middle Ages;
philosopher, kabbalist, biblical exegete, poet, and physician.
Nah manides was born in Gerona, Catalonia, and it was after his native town that he was also referred to as Rabbenu
Moses Gerondi or Yerondi. His Spanish name was Bonastrug
da Porta. Nah manides was a descendant of Isaac b. Reuben,
a contemporary of Isaac b. Jacob *Alfasi. His mother was the
739
Samuel as a judge in civil law (BK 96b), and Nah man regarded
himself as of sufficient standing to judge cases on his own
(Sanh. 5a). In later generations it was laid down that in any dispute between Nah man and a colleague, the formers opinion
was to prevail (Ket. 13a; Kid. 59b). He often visited Sura (Suk.
14b; Ket. 94a) and frequently transmitted teachings in the
name of Huna, who taught there (Pes. 40a), and with whom
Nah man frequently disputed (Er. 42a), referring to him as our
colleague Huna (Git. 52b). An important contemporary was
*Judah b. Ezekiel, the founder of the academy of Pumbedita;
Nah man often differed with him (BK 27b) but held him in
high esteem (BM 66a). On one occasion he summoned Judah
to court. Judah was advised by Huna to overlook the discourtesy, and he appeared. It was only then that Nah man realized
who the respondent was. Judah, however, plainly showed his
irritation, whereupon Yalta advised her husband to settle the
case quickly lest Judah make him appear an ignoramus (Kid.
70ab). Other of his colleagues were Ammi (Ber. 47b) and Assi
(Er. 32b), as well as H iyya b. Abba (ibid). and R. Isaac of Palestine. Once, when parting from Nah man, Isaac compared him
to a rich shady fruit tree growing by the side of a stream, not
lacking wealth, reputation, or honor, and said that he could
only pray that each shoot taken from the parent tree should
be the equal of the sire (Taan. 5b6a). Among his pupils were
Zera (RH 20b), Rabbah (Pes. 40a), Joseph (Yev. 66b) and Rava
(Ber. 23b). Some of his aggadic sayings are: When a woman
is talking she is spinning (a web to capture the male; Meg.
14b); Haughtiness does not become a woman (ibid.). There
is definite mention of a number of his sons, Rabbah (Shab.
119a), Hon (Yev. 34b), Mar Zutra (BB 7a), and H iyya (BB 46a).
Nah man is said to have had two daughters who were taken
captive. R. Elesh, taken captive with them, wanted to take
them with him when he was about to escape, but did not do
so, on discovering that they practiced witchcraft (Git. 45a).
On his deathbed Nah man requested Rava, who was sitting
by the bed, to pray to the angel of death to spare him a painful death. He later appeared to Rava in a dream and said that
though his death was not painful, he would prefer not to face
the fear of it again (MK 28a).
Bibliography: Hyman, Toledot, 92839; Frankel, Mevo,
116b; Halevy, Dorot, 2 (1923), 41721; Bacher, Bab. Amor., 7983; H .
Albeck, Mavo la-Talmudim (1969), 298301; Neusner, Babylonia, 3
(1968), index.
[David Joseph Bornstein]
Nah manides
Works
About 50 of Nah manides works have been preserved, in addition to many works which are doubtfully attributed to him.
The majority of his works are novellae on the Talmud and
halakhah. He also wrote books and letters connected with his
public activities, including the Sefer ha-Vikkuah already mentioned. He devoted a special work to the nature of the belief
in Redemption, the Sefer ha-Geullah, written in about 1263.
He was also a gifted paytan, writing a number of poems and
prayers, including a prayer which he composed on his entry
into Jerusalem. Four of his sermons have been preserved: HaDerashah la-H atunnah, dating from his youth; Torat ha-Shem
Temimah, which he apparently delivered after the disputation
of Barcelona; one on the Book of Ecclesiastes, which he delivered before his departure for Erez Israel; and the sermon
mentioned above, delivered in Acre on Rosh Ha-Shanah. All
his works bear the imprint of his original personality, a synthesis of the culture of Spain and the piety of Germany, a talmudic education together with the teachings of Kabbalah, as
well as a broad knowledge of sciences and Christian theological works. An edition of his works has been published by Ch.
D. Chavel (see bibliography).
As Biblical Commentator
Nah manides wrote his commentary on the Torah in his old
age. He composed the main part in Spain, but added to it after his arrival in Erez Israel. In the introduction he states the
purpose of his commentary: To appease the minds of the
students, weary through exile and trouble, when they read
the portion on Sabbaths and festivals. It is an extensive commentary, both on the narrative and legislative part of the Bible.
Unlike his most noted predecessors, *Rashi and Abraham *Ibn
Ezra, who devoted themselves chiefly to the elucidation of individual words and verses, Nah manides, though he followed
strict philological procedure when he deemed it necessary
to establish the exact meaning of a word, concerns himself
mainly with the sequence of the biblical passages and with the
deeper meaning of the Bibles laws and narrative. He makes
frequent use of the aggadic and halakhic interpretations of the
talmudic and midrashic sages, but whereas Rashi quotes these
without expressing his own opinions, Nah manides dwells on
them at length, analyzes them critically, develops their ideas,
and probes their compatibility with the biblical text.
The commentary of Nah manides is more than a mere
commentary. It reflects his views on God, the Torah, Israel,
and the world. The Torah is the word of God and is the source
of all knowledge. The narratives of the Bible are not simple records of the past, but are portents of the future. The account
of the six days of creation contains prophecies regarding the
most important events of the succeeding 6,000 years, while
the Sabbath foreshadows the seventh millennium which will
be the Day of the Lord, and the accounts told about the patriarchs foreshadow the history of the Jewish people as a whole.
Nah manides does not hesitate to criticize the patriarchs when
their actions seem to him unjustifiable. According to him
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[Joseph Kaplan]
Nah manides
(Gen. 12:11), Abraham unintentionally committed a great sin,
when, on coming to Egypt, he said out of fear for his life that
his wife Sarah was his sister, for in this way he exposed her to
moral corruption; rather, he should have had faith that God
would save both him and his wife. Nah manides demonstrates
great psychological insight when describing the behavior of
biblical personalities. In the story of Joseph the Bible relates
that he fell on his neck and wept on his neck for a while
(Gen. 46:29). The question arises: Who wept? Jacob or Joseph? It is obvious who is more likely to weep at such a time,
Nah manides says, the old father who finds his son alive after
he had mourned for him as lost, not the son who has risen to
become a king. Nah manides explains the laws in the light of
halakhic tradition. He maintains that there is a reason for every commandment. The commandments are all for the good
of man, either to keep from him something that is hurtful, to
remove from him evil beliefs and habits, to teach him mercy
and goodness, or to make him remember the miracles of the
Lord and to know him. He explains some of the dietary laws
in terms of health regulations; others he interprets as seeking
to keep us from eating foods that dull the mind and harden
the heart.
Nah manides very often quotes Rashi and Abraham ibn
Ezra. Despite his great reverence for Rashi, he polemicizes
with him. At times he praises Ibn Ezra, but attacks him sharply
for those of his views which run counter to tradition. He holds
Maimonides in high esteem, but rejects some of the reasons
given in the Guide of the Perplexed for the commandments.
He regards (Gen. 18:1) Maimonides view that the visit of the
angels to Abraham was a mere vision to contradict the Bible.
Nah manides was the first commentator to introduce Kabbalah
into his commentary.
The commentary, written in a lucid style, contains many
a word of encouragement and solace to the Jewish people. At
the end of the Song of Haazinu (Deut. 32), Nah manides writes:
And behold there is nothing conditional in this song. It is a
charter testifying that we shall have to suffer heavily for our
sins, but that, nevertheless, God will not destroy us, being reconciled to us (though we shall have no merits) and forgiving
our sins for His names sake alone. And so our rabbis said:
Great is the song, embracing as it does the present, the past
(of Israel) and the future, this world and the world to come.
And if this song were the composition of a mere astrologer
we should be constrained to believe in it, considering that
all its words were fulfilled. How much more have we to hope
with all our hearts and to trust to the word of God, through
the mouth of his prophet Moses, the faithful in all his house,
like unto whom there was none, whether before him or after
him. Nah manides commentary became very popular and has
been widely drawn upon by later commentators. Supercommentaries have been written upon it and kabbalistic treatises
have been composed on its kabbalistic allusions (see below).
Bah ya b. Asher and Jacob b. Asher incorporated large parts
of it into their commentaries. The commentary was printed
for the first time in Rome prior to 1480. A scholarly edition
741
[Tovia Preschel]
Nah manides
A further local Spanish factor which he synthesized
with the French system was his constant search for ancient,
critically examined, and established texts of the Talmud so as
not to become involved in needless discussions to solve questions arising from corrupt readings. The tosafists, too, were
aware of this problem, but not having access to enough ancient
texts, they were compelled to take such versions from secondary sources, such as Hananels glosses or the works of the
geonim, available to them largely at second or third hand, or
they made conjectural emendations of the talmudic text which
led to a grave and protracted controversy among the tosafists.
In this respect, Nah manides enjoyed an obvious advantage.
Living in Spain, he had at his disposal the best talmudic texts
that had been sent to that country direct from the academies
of the Babylonian geonim 200300 years earlier. Another factor, chiefly Spanish and conspicuous in Nah manides, is his extensive use of the geonic writings and the Jerusalem Talmud.
This system of Nah manides completely superseded the earlier
Spanish tradition. The greatest of his pupils, as also their pupils, having continued, developed, and improved this system,
established it as the method for future generations among ever
broadening circles of students of the Oral Law.
In addition to the teachings of the French scholars, of
whom he speaks with profound esteem, Nah manides works
also contain the teachings of Provence, which he incorporated
into his system of study as an inseparable part of it. The teachings of *Abraham b. Isaac of Narbonne, *Abraham b. David of
Posquires, *Isaac b. Abba Mari, and many others, form an
integral part of his works, the last mentioned to a large extent
anonymously. Although not very apparent from a superficial
reading, his associations with the teachings of Provence are
even closer than with those of Spain. Besides the earlier Provenal scholars, he mentions many others from Provence,
contemporaries of his, whose statements he discusses. This
threefold Spanish, French, and Provenal trend is undoubtedly
connected with two of his principal teachers, *Judah b. Yakar
and *Nathan b. Meir of Trinquetaille, both of whom were pupils of *Isaac b. Abraham of Dampierre, the well-known tosafist. Nah manides contemporary and relation, Jonah Gerondi,
who likewise studied under the tosafists, also based his teachings on a similar method of study.
Nah manides novellae are notable for their wealth of
sources and mode of presentation, their clear, lucid style and
logical structure. In his desire to arrive at the authentic literal
meaning, he did not hesitate to disagree even with the geonim
and the most illustrious of the earlier authorities, such as *Hai
Gaon, Isaac *Alfasi, and others. He was among the first of those
who in their writings developed the theoretical method, at
once logical and profound, that aimed at comprehending the
pivotal argument on which the sugyah as a whole depends.
Often his novellae range far beyond the limits of the sugyah
under discussion to a fundamental investigation of various
subjects central to the halakhah. He also devotes much space
to methodological discussions, to be found dispersed in his
glosses, on the principles of the Talmud. The novellae on the
Talmud were not published simultaneously, the first to appear having been those on Bava Batra (Venice, 1523) and the
last those on Bava Mez ia (Jerusalem, 1929) and, in a complete
edition, on H ullin (New York, ed. by S.Z. Reichmann, 1955).
Most of his novellae those on Berakhot, on Moed, Nashim,
Nezikin, and on H ullin and Niddah were published between
1740 and 1840. His novellae to Ketubbot go to this day under
the name of Solomon b. Adret. Nearly all these were known
throughout the intervening years from many manuscripts, and
leading scholars, particularly among the Sephardim, quoted
them in their works. His novellae were published in their entirety for the first time in 1928 in Jerusalem in two volumes.
Some of his novellae on a few tractates are extant in the form
of short extracts on several pages of a tractate only. He presumably composed them in this manner and was unable to
complete the entire work.
Until the expulsion from Spain, Nah manides novellae
occupied, alongside Rashis commentary, the place that the
tosafot do among students of the Talmud. To such an extent
were his words minutely examined and debated that methodological rules were laid down for them. In this respect,
Isaac *Campanton was especially notable, declaring that Nah manides statements are to be so closely studied that not a
single word should appear superfluous. He even established
many minute rules for extracting Nah manides underlying
meaning from every single passage. From the time his novellae first appeared in print their influence has become increasingly pronounced also among Ashkenazi students and
yeshivot. To this day their study occupies in yeshivot of Polish-Lithuanian origin a principal place together with Rashi,
the tosafot, and Maimonides.
The second class of Nah manides halakhic literary
works comprises his halakhic monographs, of which there
are seven:
(1) Dinei de-Garme deals with a clarification of the laws
regarding inconvenience to a neighbor, injury to his property, and their relation to the law of torts. Since the subject is
treated in the second chapter of Bava Batra, this short excellent monograph was appended to his novellae on that tractate from its first appearance in print. In it Nah manides summarizes the principal views of the earlier authorities on the
various aspects of the laws of the *assailant and his victim in
general, including damage to a neighbor. In presenting the
various opinions Nah manides treats of each with great profundity. On this subject he was, he says, forestalled by monographs of French scholars, whose names, however, he does not
mention. In recent years there was published (in Hadorom, 23
(1966), 3153), from a manuscript Gerama ve-Garme by one
of the tosafists, apparently *Ephraim b. Isaac of Regensburg,
and Nah manides may be referring to this or to a similar work.
This small work of Nah manides was highly praised by scholars, several of whom wrote commentaries on it. A comparison between his work and that of the scholar previously mentioned clearly reveals Nah manides superiority as a writer of
glosses and systematizer.
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Nah manides
(2) Mishpetei ha-H erem deals with the ways in which a
ban is imposed and release obtained from it. It also treats at
length of *Kol Nidrei, said on the eve of the Day of Atonement. Although casting some doubt on its value, he nevertheless states that those accustomed to say it should not be prevented from doing so, since they rely on a custom instituted
by the earlier authorities.
(35) Hilkhot Bekhorot and Hilkhot H allah written by
Nah manides as a supplement to Hilkhot ha-Rif of Alfasi, from
which these laws were omitted. Here Nah manides adopts, with
great fidelity, the Aramaic used by Alfasi, as well as his particular style and mode of writing. Nah manides also wrote Hilkhot Nedarim to fill a gap in Alfasi (those printed on tractate
Nedarim are not Alfasis). In this work Nah manides included,
to a much larger extent than is to be found in the writings of
Alfasi, novellae and argumentations in the style characteristic
of his glosses on the Talmud.
(6) Torat ha-Adam is a comprehensive and unique monograph on all the laws concerning death, starting with what is
prohibited and permitted and what is a mitzvah as regards the
sick and dying, and concluding with the laws of mourning.
In point of fact this work is also in the nature of a supplement to Hilkhot ha-Rif, but in it Nah manides, expatiating on
the subject, included many scores of talmudic and tannaitic
sources as also of Sephardi and Ashkenazi views, which he
compared and discussed at length in the light of the sources.
Very great importance was attached to the work by the leading codifiers, *Jacob b. Asher incorporated it, in its actual order and form and with corresponding sections, in his Tur, as
did Joseph *Caro later in his Shulh an Arukh. Commentators
on the Talmud set great store by it when dealing with the interpretation of the relevant sugyot in the Talmud. Of special
interest on its own account is Shaar ha-Gemul, the 30t chapter of the work which, published separately some 30 years
before the whole (Naples, 1490), deals with reward and punishment after death.
(7) Hilkhot Niddah was printed in Todat Shelamim (Venice, 1741) of Isaiah *Bassani.
The third category of Nah manides halakhic writings, and
the first to appear in print, comprises his works of criticism,
of which there are three:
(a) Hassagot (criticisms) of *Maimonides Sefer haMitzvot (Constantinople, 1510);
(b) Milh amot Adonai (in Rif, Venice, 1552) attacking *Zerahiah ha-Levi of Lunels criticisms of Hilkhot ha-Rif as well as
criticizing Zerahiahs Sefer ha-Z ava; and
(c) Sefer ha-Zekhut, (in Shivah Einayim, Leghorn, 1745)
attacking Abraham b. Davids criticisms of Alfasi.
These three share a common feature, namely Nah manides desire to vindicate the earlier authorities against
the criticism of later scholars, and hence their contents do
not everywhere reflect Nah manides own view; thus, Maimonides having written his Sefer ha-Mitzvot mainly against the
enumeration of the 613 commandments by the author of the
Halakhot Gedolot, Nah manides took upon himself the task of
743
In Kabbalah
There is evidence that in an earlier version of his Commentary on the Pentateuch (Rome, 1480) Nah manides intended
to discuss kabbalistic matters more explicitly, but he fell
ill and was informed in a dream that he should desist. An extant fragment from an earlier version seems to indicate such a
tendency. However, immediate doubts about the authenticity
of the fragment were raised by Nah manides students. Hints
of kabbalistic references sprinkle his prolific writings, especially his commentary on the Pentateuch (Naples, 1490), commentary on the Book of Job, and the sermons. Kabbalistic
concepts are woven into the eschatological discussion in the
Nah manides
last section of his halakhic work, Torat ha-Adam; this section
has often been printed as a separate work titled Shaar ha-Gemul. Kabbalistic elements are readily recognizable in his liturgical poems, e.g., in Shir ha-Neshamah, and in the prayer
on the death of R. Abraham H azzan, one of the kabbalists of
Gerona. Nah manides single work dealing exclusively with
the Kabbalah is his commentary on the first chapter of Sefer
Yez irah.
Despite the paucity of his kabbalistic writings, he came to
be known in his later years as an expert on the subject. Kabbalists in the late 13t and early 14t centuries made considerable
literary attempts to try and solve the secrets of Nah manides
commentary on the Pentateuch. The most important commentaries in this vein are Keter Shem Tov by R. Shem Tov *Ibn
Gaon and Meirat Einayim by R. Isaac b. Samuel of Acre. Even
as late as the beginning of the 14t century, Nah manides kabbalistic writings were studied and relied upon to a far greater
degree than the *Zohar itself; a definite preference for the
Zohar became apparent only in about 1325.
In the course of time Nah manides came to be regarded
as such an authority that other authors works were wrongly
attributed to him, e.g., Ha-Emunah ve-ha-Bittah on (Korets,
1485), which has been proven to be the work of R. Jacob b.
Sheshet *Gerondi. G. Scholem has made intensive surveys of
Nah manides method in Kabbalah in his Ursprung und Anfaenge der Kabbala (1962) and in his series of lectures, Ha-Kabbalah be-Geronah, ed. by I. Ben Shlomo (1964).
[Efraim Gottlieb]
MYSTICISM IN NAh MANIDES BIBLE COMMENTARIES. Bible commentaries formed the literary and spiritual context in
which Nah manides functioned as a kabbalist. His kabbalistic
creativity cannot be separated from its appearance in his Bible
commentary, and this exegetical work forms the essential context for understanding his kabbalistic teaching. Nah manides
functioned in a context in which the literary genre of Bible
exegesis especially exegesis of the peshat (plain meaning of
the text) had already been developed by its classical exponents: Abraham Ibn Ezra in Spain, and Rashi and his school
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naH manides
cal and social uncovering of the Kabbalah and its becoming
written down.
Rabbi Ezra and Rabbi Azriel, in contrast with Nah manides, chose to interpret the talmudic aggadot. Their choice
was simpler: they could review and write Kabbalistic commentaries on aggadot which had a mystical background or
tendency. In this respect they remained closely and obviously
related to rabbinic materials arranged in a midrashic manner.
At the same time, the connection between what they chose
to interpret is related to specific points in the Talmud, just as
Nah manides did in his commentary to the Torah, which reflects the fact that we are referring to a process of uncovering
existing knowledge, and not merely an exegetical decision.
CONCEPTIONS OF HISTORY AND TIME: CHRISTIANITY AND
ISLAM. Attitudes toward Christianity and Islam alike provide
additional contexts for Nah manides writings. His attitude toward the Christianity of 13t century Europe becomes blatant
in his concept of history and his historiosophy. His attitude
toward Islam also finds occasional expression, but less in historical references than in more substantive phenomenological parallels to contemporary mystical doctrines known from
the Ismaili Islam.
Nah manides method regarding the actions of the ancestors are a sign for their children and pictures of things,
implemented on the level of peshat, confirms the relationship
between his conception and Christian conceptions of history,
whereas his overall conception of time (of which the conception of history is a part), such as his theory of shemitot (sabbatical years of release) based on his theory of the *Sefirot, is
implemented on the mystical level, and is related to Ismaili
concepts of cyclical cosmic time.
NAh MANIDES THEOLOGY: THE RELATION BETWEEN CONCEPT AND SYMBOL. Nah manides thought, which can be
called kabbalistic thought or a religious system, connects
basic symbols of the mystical tradition and fundamental concepts in Jewish religion. Nah manides was a creative theologian, whose new system of thought includes such theological
and philosophical concepts as miracle, nature, providence,
exile, redemption, time, will, commandment, Torah, faith,
image and story. In turn, his thought influenced a broad spectrum of Jewish thinkers, kabbalists and non-kabbalists alike,
including thinkers of an opposite point of view from his, such
as Crescas, Judah Loew ben Bezalel (Maharal), Isaac Luria,
Cordovero, Abraham Cardozo, Elijah ben Solomon Zalman
(Vilna Gaon), Moses Sofer (H atam Sofer), Krochmal, Rabbi
Kook, the Satmar rebbe, and others. Basic ideas of his theology are also subtly connected to a body of symbolic knowledge and render Nah manides Kabbalah uniquely profound,
and resulted in its influencing a broader circle outside of Kabbalah alone.
and halakhic leadership as well as his being a kabbalist. However this conservatism was expressed more in the oral manner of his transmitting his theory than in its content. Recent
research has increasingly explored the social aspect of two different conceptions of mysticism, related to two strategies of
transmission and writing.
The controversy between Nah manides school and the
school of the Zohar surrounds a core issue: a differing view
of God and man, which in turn is reflected in a differing view
of reality and history. Nah manides conception of God contains a dimension of transcendence, absolutely beyond human
comprehension, expression, revelation or theurgy, and is experienced by Gods remoteness from language. By the language
of the Sefirot, Nah manides was able to express a hierarchy
between two levels of divinity: the known and the unknown,
reminiscent of Pseudo-Dionysius.
The school of the Zohar, by contrast, provides a different conception of God and man: the transcendent is open to
revelation, theurgic contact and even ecstasy (what can be
called theurgic ecstasy). The transcendent is experienced by
its absolute proximity to language. The concept of God and
man is thus realized in the concept of history as a gate open
to infinite fields. The acosmic vector of this concept applies
to historys beginning or pre-history, and not to its end. By
giving up on the concept of cyclical shemitot, it cuts any link
to an apocalyptic world-view, and thus the center of gravity
shifts from the cosmos seeking its end, to a cosmos moved
by its beginning, and the shift from a cosmic process to a historical process.
There is a close correlation between determining an unequivocal and sharp end to the cosmos and history, and the
concept of a defined reservoir of souls, just as there is between
the infinity of history, especially in the transition to messianic
times, and the continual renewal of souls and the perpetual
self-perfection of God.
In recent research there have been diverse claims regarding the pseudepigraphical authorship of the Zohar in relation
to the school of Nah manides, which faithfully preserved his
oral teachings in the generation after his death, and served
as guardians of canonical kabbalistic writing. The texts of
the school of the Zohar, on the other hand, did not exist as a
formed corpus in the 13t century, and only at the end of the
13t and beginning of the 14t century did the idea of the Book
of the Zohar take shape, in response to the canonization of
Nah manides commentary to the Torah and to the rise of a
genre of mystical exegesis.
THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN TWO MYSTICAL THEORIES: NAh MANIDES AND THE ZOHAR. The conservative and normative
aspect of Nah manides mystical theory reflects his communal
COMMENTATORS ON NAh MANIDES. Some of the commentators on Nah manides are known by name; others are anonymous. The supercommentaries of R. Joshua *Ibn Shuaib and
R. Shem Tov *Ibn Gaon are regarded as the most authoritative for the transmission of the teachings of Nah manides and
his students Solomon ben *Adret and *Isaac Todros, and are
important to understanding Nah manides. Although *Isaac
of Acres commentary Meirat Einayim also follows the order
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naH manides
of the biblical text, it is a topical key to Nah manides thought.
Other commentaries of an interpretative and homilectical
character are R. Joshua ibn Shuaibs Derashot on the Torah
and Bahya ben Ashers Torah commentary. R. Menahem Recanatis commentary to the Torah also contains commentary
on Nah manides and citations from the Zohar.
The works which present Nah manides teachings in a systematic manner are anonymous, and differ in strategy from
super-commentaries: they uncover a system, rather than follow step by step. These include Maarekhet ha-Elohut, and two
works referred to in scholarly literature as the unknown commentary of Nah manides mysteries, and an anonymous commentary from the circle of Solomon ben Adret, as well as a
commentary to the Sefer ha-Bahir.
Following these anonymous works written in Spain, the
literature of the circle of the Sefer ha-*Temunah in Byzantium
also needs to be mentioned. These writings discuss the meaning of the shapes of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet together
with the theory of Sabbatical cycles. A similar combination
may also be found in the thought of Nah manides grandson,
R. David ben Judah he-H asid, whose contacts with the circle
of the Zohar were complex. He combined knowledge of the
Zohar with knowledge of Nah manides teachings, and was a
primary conduit for the transmission of Nah manides Kabbalah to the circle of Sefer ha-Temunah.
In the first and second generations after Nah manides,
there were thus students who received his teachings and transmitted them, sometimes by personal word of mouth. Some of
them, however, combined his teachings with other kabbalistic
systems. In terms of content, many of the anonymous works
focus on the mysteries of time and the nature and character of
its historical or cosmic cycles. In this regard, they resemble ancient apocalyptic literature. In terms of form, the anonymous
works break out of the limits of oral transmission.
Later developments, which follow in the path of Sefer haTemunah and, like it, rely on Nah manides teachings, are Sefer
ha-*Kaneh and Sefer ha-Peliah, which reinforce its apocalyptic paradigm, in which the shemitot cycles are also used to
explain the commandments, in terms of the cycle of human
religious life. The mystical transmission is no longer only oral
and within the family, but now includes revelation and written
transmission, personal revelations and revelations of Elijah.
Such transmission by anonymous revelation is dialectically related to Nah manides own conceptions. It is not necessarily opposed to his strict rules of oral transmission. Rather,
the rich power and agitation already existing in the oral circles
branched out in writing and revelation. Nah manides himself
had been described, shortly after his life, as someone capable
of restraining his horses while galloping at full speed.
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The awareness of the peshat was critical for the development for Nah manides awareness of sod (mystical meaning)
as a defined exegetical layer of the text. Such refinement of
the concept of sod, not only in the content but also in the literary expressions and forms of the text and its transmission
led to mystical exegesis, but also to a reaction against Nah manides in the Zohar, which rejected the distinction between
the two layers.
Nah manides conceived of the transcendent as entailing a
level closed to human attainment. This accords with the concept of the infinite as a dimension lacking any representation
in the stories of the Torah, the concept of the three highest
Sefirot which the Torahs commandments can only hint at but
not aim at them or affect them. In other words, theurgic contact with them is absolutely precluded. Similarly, these sefirot
cannot be imagined in anthropomorphic terms of any human
bodily organ. There is a fundamental connection between the
concept of the divine image and the concept of the cycles of
shemitot, in other words between the anthropomorphic conception of God in terms of only some of the Sefirot and the
limitations of religious language, and the conception of the
cosmos as limiting history. This conception of two dimensions of God the revealed and the hidden may be congruent to mystical doctrines known from Hasidei Ashkenaz and
from ancient mysticism; but in Nah manides teachings they
find additional expression.
The Zohar, on the other hand, in most places, offers a
different view: it mentions the Ein Sof (infinite), and it relates
to all the Sefirot, even to the highest ones, in anthropomorphic terms, and provides a theurgic and ecstatic connection
with all of them.
allusions to a collective eschatology. Similar questions occupied other kabbalistic trends of thought: where are paradise
and hell located on heaven or on earth, or in both? What
is the essence of the judgment fortifying the soul for the life
of the world to come burning in fire (according to Moses
de Leon) or immersion in water (according to Nah manides
circle)? Is there an intermediate state, a liminal area in which
there is no right to be judged, or (in the Zohars terms) a naked state? Can the z addik effect an improvement of the sinful
souls of the dead? The kabbalists disagreed over these questions and over their answers. In some cases they accommodated their views to ideas they heard in contemporary Christianity, but generally they related to a broad range of options
found in rabbinic sources.
Questions of esoterics vs. exoterics, of closed vs. open
knowledge, were only the tip of the iceberg in a much deeper
struggle over a wide spectrum of religious issues (theology
and praxis) grounded in differing world-views. Nah manides
conservative theory of shemitot preserved a more ancient
worldview, which apparently no longer was relevant to the
contemporary experience of reality of some 13t century kabbalists. A different conception of time bursts out of the writings of the kabbalists in Castille, who rejected the theory of
shemitot. Instead, they regarded the present day as the time for
creative messianic activity, a view related to general processes
taking place in Christian European society, such as the rise of
the city and mercantile economy, with their concepts of time.
These new concepts of time were internalized in the religious
life of these kabbalists, and not merely in the way they supported themselves financially. These differences split the world
of 13t century Kabbalah, but we would not be witness to these
changes of seasons in the conception of time were it not for the
conservative component in Nah manides teaching.
747
748
eration should know it. The scroll was set out in writing but
only in brief hints and acronyms. In the book Yemei Moharanat, which is Reb Nosens autobiography, it was claimed by
the publisher that the scroll was lost. However it emerged that
contrary to what was declared, the scroll is still in existence
and is preserved by the Bratslav H asidim. Recently, the scroll
has also been exposed to research.
Nah man regularly traveled between the towns where his
supporters lived. One important journey that left an impression on him was his journey to Lemberg (Lvov). At the time,
there were important doctors staying in Lemberg and Nah man
went to see them because he was suffering from tuberculosis,
the disease from which he would eventually die. However,
apart from the medical aspect, the encounter with the doctors in Lemberg, which continued for some eight months, was
significant for Nah man in that, for the first time, he came into
lengthy and intensive contact with educated Jews. Nah man
also made other journeys, some of them incognito, whose
purpose and meaning he did not explain.
Some six months before his death, in the spring of 1810,
when he was already well aware that his days were numbered,
Nah man moved to the town of Uman. There were a number
of reasons for the move. Nah man, who had prayed for a long
time for the privilege of dying a martyrs death, apparently
wanted to be buried in the cemetery in *Uman, where many
Jews martyred in the 1788 Gonta massacre were buried, and
in this context declared that he had come to engage in tikkun
neshamot, the perfection of souls. Nah man was also interested in meeting with the Uman intellectuals. To the amazement of his disciples, he preferred to live in a house previously
occupied by one of the important intellectuals of the town,
Nah man Nathan Rapaport, and not in the home of one of
his followers. Nah man even used to meet with prominent
members of the circle of Uman intellectuals, and had a special connection with Hirsch Beer Horowitz, who some time
later immigrated to England, changed his name to Herman
Bernard, and became a professor of Oriental languages at
Cambridge University. It is not clear what they talked about
at these meetings, but we know that the meetings were social
in nature and that they played chess together. Nah man saw
them as an important mission and found them very interesting, even though they prompted surprise among his disciples. Bratslav tradition tells that these intellectuals almost
returned to their religious roots, and had Nah man not died
an untimely death they would certainly have fully returned
to the fold.
Bratslav H asidism was never a large sect, and after the
move to Uman it became even smaller, with only a few hundred loyal H asidim remaining and not put off by the disputes
and persecution, or by the strange actions of the rabbi.
The tuberculosis from which Nah man was suffering for
a third year become worse, and any conversation or speech
cost him great effort and severe pain. Nonetheless, to his last
days Nah man continued his homiletic and literary activities,
and even expounded doctrine to his congregation of disciples,
749
750
751
ings in the national religious yeshivah framework and in informal secular frameworks, and in the ever-increasing presence
of his personality and writings in Israeli literature and culture.
This phenomenon in itself is part of the wider phenomenon of
the rise of mysticism in Israeli and Western cultures as part of
the New Age phenomenon. Yet even against the background
of the New Age, the Bratslav renaissance provokes astonishment in its scale and power, and it seems today (2006) that
we are still in the midst of the process and that it is too early
to summarize it and predict its future.
The main and most significant event in Bratslav H asidism,
bringing together all the different factions, is the Rosh Ha-Shanah pilgrimage to Nah mans grave in Uman. Nah man felt a special connection with this holiday and instructed all his disciples
to gather together every Rosh Ha-Shanah, even if this involved
great effort and devotion. Not directly connected to this matter, Nah man also expressed his wish that his followers come
to visit him even after his death, and in preparation for this he
laid down a special ritual for the pilgrims visiting his grave, offering great benefits in return: Nah man promised anyone who
comes to his grave, no matter who he is and what his sins are,
providing he undertakes not to repeat his sins, gives charity for
the elevation of Nah mans soul, and says 10 particular verses of
Psalms, that he will intercede on his behalf and will drag him
up from the depths of Hell by his sidelocks. After his death, his
followers put these two dictates together and, under the leadership of Reb Nosen, made Rosh Ha-Shanah the holiday when all
the Bratslav H asidim gather in Uman at their rabbis graveside.
And indeed, throughout the generations the Bratslav H asidim
made great efforts to maintain this tradition. When they were
not able to reach Nah mans grave in Uman, the H asidim gathered in Lublin, Jerusalem, or Meron.
In the 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union, the gathering in Uman was reestablished and the number of participants
gradually increased. In 200405 over 20,000 people arrived
in Uman for Rosh ha-Shanah. The vast majority came from
Israel, by air, on the eve of the holiday, and a minority came
from the United States, Canada, and France. A new synagogue
was built. On the top floor and in the surrounding courtyard
over 4,000 people pray in the traditional Bratslav manner, and
on the ground floor some 2,000 people pray in Mizrachi style.
The other worshipers pray in smaller minyanim nearby. On
Rosh Ha-Shanah it is not only Nah mans H asidim who come
to Uman but also people who clearly belong to other streams
of Judaism, both religious and secular, and yet take an interest
in this gathering. Only men are allowed in Uman on Rosh haShanah. Not all Bratslav h asidism are able to join the gathering
on Rosh ha-Shanah and various Bratslav gatherings are held in
parallel in Israel and other parts of the world. Due to the fastchanging dynamics of the movement, it is difficult to estimate
the number of Bratslav H asidim in the different factions. It is
harder still to estimate the scope of the widening circles of people who see Nah man as a figure of authority and inspiration
with a significant influence on their lives but who do not belong
to any particular Bratslav community. The processes of change
752
NAH MAN OF HORODENKA (Gorodenka; d. 1780), disciple of *Israel b. Eliezer Baal Shem Tov; his son married Feige,
the granddaughter of the Baal Shem Tov, and their son was
*Nah man of Bratslav. Little information is available on the personality of Nah man of Horodenka and his teachings. From the
scattered quotations in the early h asidic literature attributed to
him, it appears that he occupied himself essentially with practi-
753
NAH MIAS, IBN (15t16 centuries), family of Hebrew printers from Spain. DAVID IBN NAH MIAS, his brother SAMUEL,
and Davids son SAMUEL left Spain in 1492 and made their
way to *Constantinople. There they published *Jacob b. Ashers Turim in 1493 (5254). The correctness of this date, written
out in words in the colophon, has been doubted by scholars
such as M. *Steinschneider (Juedische Typographie, 1938, 17),
who assume an error of ten years. More recently, the case for
the 1493 date has been strongly defended by A.K. Offenberg
(see bibliography). After an interval of over ten years, the Ibn
Nah mias brothers printed a Pentateuch with Rashi, including
haftarot with David Kimh is commentary and the Five Scrolls
with that of Abraham ibn Ezra (150506). Several other books
followed, among them Alfasis Halakhot and Maimonides
Code (both 1509), and three works by Abrabanel, the only
ones printed in the authors lifetime. Samuel Sr. died in 1509
or 1510, and David ibn Nah mias about a year later. Davids son
Samuel carried on, alone or with a partner, to 1518, when the
press was leased to others. The first two works printed (Turim
and Pentateuch) have as *printers mark a Magen David surrounded by leaves and flowers.
Bibliography: A.K. Offenberg, in: Studia Rosenthaliana, 2
(1969), 96112 (incl. illus. and bibl.); A. Yaari, Ha-Defus ha-Ivri beKushta (1967), 1718, 59ff.; idem, Diglei ha-Madpisim ha-Ivriyyim
(1944), 3, 123; A. Freimann, Thesaurus typographiae hebraicae saeculi
XV (1924), CI, 4; Rosanes, Togarmah, 1 (19302), 3168.
The following parts have been published with introductions by M.A. Bamberger: Esther (1891), Proverbs (1912), and
Jeremiah (1913). Bamberger also published Nah mias commentaries to Avot (1907) and to the piyyut Attah Konanta (in:
JJLG, 6 (1909)), on the order of the Temple service for the
Day of Atonement. His commentary to the tractate Nedarim
has been preserved in manuscript. Nah mias is also known
to have translated many parts of Maimonides Guide of the
Perplexed.
Bibliography: Bambergers introd. to his edition of the commentary to Jeremiah, Proverbs, Esther (all in German); Neubauer, in:
JQR, 5 (1892/93), 70913; Poznaski, in ZHB, 1 (1896/97), 11821.
[Israel Moses Ta-Shma]
NAH MIAS, JOSEPH BEN JOSEPH (first half of 14t century), biblical commentator in Toledo. Nah mias belonged to
an ancient and distinguished Spanish family. Apart from the
fact that he studied under *Asher b. Jehiel, little is known of his
life. His reputation rests upon his biblical commentary which
apparently originally encompassed most of the Bible.
754
nahor
(1) The son of Serug, the father of Terah, and the grandfather of Abraham. Of those enumerated in the genealogy of
the descendants of Shem, he had the shortest life 148 years
(Gen. 11:2225; I Chron. 1:26).
(2) The son of Terah, the brother of Abraham and Haran,
and the grandson of Nahor (1). His wife was Milcah, the
daughter of his brother Haran (Gen. 11:2629).
This was a consanguineous marriage such as is common in the narratives of the Patriarchs (for example, that of
Jacob with Rachel and Leah). According to E.A. Speiser, such
755
he developed a research unit devoted to French Jewish history, Nouvelle Gallia Judaica, which he directed until 1992.
In 1977 he becomes directeur dtudes at the Ecole Pratique
des Hautes Etudes, section des Sciences religieuses, where he
held the chair of medieval and modern Jewish history until
2000. He also taught Jewish history at the Sminaire isralite
de France, at the INALCO, and at the University of Brussels. A
former curator of the Archives of the Consistoire de Paris and
president of the Socit des tudes juives, he served from 1980
to 1996 as editor of the Revue des tudes juives. A student of
Georges *Vajda and I.S. *Revah, and an indefatigable archive
researcher, he devoted a large part of his studies to the scholarly edition of sources and documents and trained numerous
students in this rigorous craft.
Chronologically, his research and publications cover extensive ground with a clear focus on two distinct areas, French
medieval Jewry and early modern Sephardi history, and revolve around a few recurrent themes. He did research on the
history of rabbinical literature, institutions, and personae.
Through the study and publication of wills and epitaphs Nahon contributed to the historiographical emergence of the
issue of death in Jewish studies. The bulk of his work focuses
on the Sephardi Diaspora, particularly on the Portuguese nations of southwestern France, Bayonne, Bordeaux as well as
the lesser communities. Through works on the relations between the Portuguese nations of Western Europe and their
links to the Holy Land, he promoted the investigation of intercommunal links within the early modern Jewish world. Finally, he devoted several studies to the history of the Jews in
Erez Israel and translated Joshua Prawers works.
As well as numerous articles in the aforementioned
areas, his works and publications include: Communauts
judo-portugaises du Sud-Ouest de la France (Bayonne et
sa rgion) (16841791), unpubl. diss., 1969; Menasseh ben
Isral, The Hope of Israel, with Henry Mechoulan, (1987);
Les Nations juives portugaises du Sud-Ouest de la France
(16841791) Documents (1981); Inscriptions hbraques et juives
de France mdivale (1986); Mtropoles et priphries sefarades
dOccident. Kairouan, Amsterdam, Bayonne, Bordeaux, Jrusalem (1993); La Terre sainte au temps des Kabbalistes 14921592,
(1997); Juifs et judasme Bordeaux (2003).
[Evelyne Oliel-Grausz (2nd ed.)]
nahoum, H aim
in the Assyrian trade with Asia Minor. Much information on
the city during this period is contained in the *Mari archives,
from which it is clear that Nahor was a regional capital subject to Mari and a location of its agents. From Nahor supervision was exercised over the Balikh area and the upper stretch
of the Habor river; in Nahor intelligence was collected from
all parts of Aram-Naharaim. Nahor was also a center for nomadic tribes which, defying all authority, endangered the caravan trade. Accordingly, the rulers of Mari were from time to
time constrained to employ military means to suppress their
depredations.
In the Middle Assyrian period, Nahor belonged to the
kingdom of Hanigalbat, whose rulers erected a palace there.
In the 13t century it was captured by the Assyrian kings AdadNirari I and Shalmaneser I. During this period it was the seat
of a governor, as attested by Assyrian documents, from which
it appears that Nahor was included in a district whose capital
was Haran, near which it was apparently situated. Although
the sources, as well as the archaeological survey conducted
in the region of Haran, do not help to fix the exact site of Nahor, it is to be located at an important junction on the caravan route.
Bibliography: On Nahor and the Sons of Nahor: G. May,
in: JBL, 60 (1941), 1236; B. Meisler (Mazar), in: Zion, 11 (1946), 116;
R. de Vaux, in: RB, 55 (1948), 3234; 72 (1965), 10; N. Schneider, in:
Biblica, 33 (1952), 51922; J.P. Hyatt, in: VT, 5 (1955), 1306; A. Malamat, in: BIES, 20 (1956), 7172; idem, in: Sefer Y.F. Baer (1961), 17;
idem, in: Compte rendu, XVe Rencontre assyrienne internationale
(1966), 129ff.; idem, in: EM, 5 (1968), 8057; K.T. Andersen, in: Studia Theologica, 16 (1962), 170ff.; E.A. Speiser, in: A. Altmann (ed.),
Biblical and Other Studies (1963) 1528; U. Cassuto, Commentary on
the Book of Exodus (1964), 252. On the City of Nahor: W.F. Albright,
in: BASOR, 67 (1937), 27; 78 (1940), 2930; J. Lewy, in: Orientalia, 21
(1952), 272ff., 280ff.; A. Goetze, in: JCS, 7 (1953), 67; J. Bottro and A.
Finet, Archives royales de Mari, 5 (1954), 130, S.V. Nahur; E. Weidner,
20; F.J. Kupin: AFO, 17 (195556), 4546; M. Falkner, ibid., 18 (1957),
per, Les nomades en Msopotamie (1957), S.V. Nahur; F.M. Tocci,
Archives royLa Siria nellet di Mari (1960), S.V. Nahur; M. Birot, in:
ales de Mari, 9 (1960), 91; G. Dossin, et al., ibid., 13 (1964), 8182, 149;
A. Finet, in: Revue dassyriologie et darchologie orientale, 60 (1966),
17ff.; A. Malamat, in: EM, 5 (1968), 8078.
756
nahum
rived from the Nahrawn community (and from Jews living
in its vicinity), according to Nathan ha-Bavli the community
must have been of considerable size. In the first half of the
tenth century a blind scholar from Nahrawn, R. *Nissi (Nissim) al-Nahrawni was resh kallah at one of the academies.
He brought about a reconciliation between the exilarch David
b. Zakkai and the head of the Pumbedita academy. R. Nissi
subsequently became one of the exilarchs advisers. In the late
Middle Ages the caravans to Persia changed their route and
as a result Nahrawn fell into decay.
Bibliography: Neubauer, Chronicles, 2 (1893), 7980, 85;
A.E. Harkavy, Zikkaron la-Rishonim ve-gam la-Ah aronim, 1 (1887),
141, no. 285; G. Le Strange, The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate (1930),
61; Mann, in: Tarbiz, 5 (1934), 1545.
[Eliyahu Ashtor]
NAHSHON (Heb. ; little (?) serpent), son of Amminadab (Ex. 6:23; Num. 2:3, et al.). Nahshon was chieftain of
the tribe of Judah (Num. 2:3) which consisted of 74,600 men
(Num. 2:34; 10:14). He assisted Moses in taking a census of
the community (Num. 1:7). He was the first to present his offering at the dedication of the Tabernacle (Num. 7:1217)
and the first to proceed in the desert marches (Num. 10:14).
Elisheba, his sister, married Aaron (Ex. 6:23). He was the descendant of *Perez, the son of Judah and Tamar, and his son
Salmah (Ruth 4:20; Salmon, 4:21; Salma, I Chron. 2:11) was the
father of Boaz. King David was thus one of his descendants.
In the Aggadah
According to a well-known aggadah, Nahshon was the only
one among the Israelites on reaching the Red Sea to obey the
command of Moses to descend into the waters and courageously enter the waves, trusting that the promised miracle
would occur and the sea be parted. The members of the tribe
of Judah followed their leaders example (Mekh., Be-Shallah
5; Sot. 37a). This version of the story is attributed to Tarfon
(early second century).
According to an opposing version, all the tribes were eager to obey the command and competed among themselves,
who was to be the first; eventually, the tribe of Benjamin
jumped first into the water, but the tribe of Judah, infuriated
by Benjamins success, attacked them with stones (Mekh. loc.
cit.; Sot. 36b). Benjamins reward for being the first to descend
into the sea was that the first king of Israel Saul was chosen
from their tribe (Targum Ps. 68:28 and I Sam. 15:17), or else
that the Shekhinah (Divine Presence) dwelt in their territory
(the Temple was built in the territory of Benjamin; Mekh. and
Sot., loc. cit.). According to the version which ascribes the outstanding feat of courage to Nahshon, the reward to the tribe of
Judah was that kingship in Israel was accorded to them permanently. Tarfons version was probably meant to encourage
acts of rebellion in the period of unrest preceding the Bar
Kokhba Revolt as the one and only means to reattain kingship for Judah, that is to say, to regain political independence.
Various attempts to explain this aggadah against the background of other events remain unconvincing.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
NAHSHON BAR ZADOK, gaon of Sura from 87179, succeeding *Amram Gaon (who mentions him several times in
his Seder). Nahshons father, Zadok, had previously been gaon
of Sura for more than 50 years, and Nahshons son, Hai, held
the office from 88996.
Nahshon is the author of numerous responsa, in reply
to queries addressed to him from various countries. Various
works have been attributed to him, among them Sefer Reumah
(in J. Onkeneira, Z afenat Paneah , Constantinople, 1566), on
ritual slaughter, and he is thought by some to have been the
author of Seder Tannaim ve-Amoraim. Nahshon made a special study of the Jewish calendar, and is best known for his discovery that the Jewish calendar repeats itself exactly every 247
years. His writing on this phenomenon, known as the Iggul
de-R. Nah shon, was published under that name in the Sheerit
Yosef of *Joseph b. Shem Tov (Salonika, 1521). It is possible that
it was this calendrical research which led him to take up the
study of Karaite literature, since he had to familiarize himself
with the works of the founder of the Karaite sect for this purpose (L. Ginzberg, Gaonica. 1, (1909), 158), and his interpretations of words in the Bible and Talmud may well be related to
his polemics with the Karaites. Nahshons conservative outlook
led him to discourage the innovation of reciting piyyutim in
prayer, and he disapproved of the recitation of Kol Nidrei on
the eve of the Day of Atonement, as did his son Hai. Most of
Nahshons responsa are written in terse and difficult Aramaic,
but those ascribed to him in D. Cassels Teshuvot Geonim Kadmoniyyim (1848; see German introduction, 45) are written in a
simple and fluent Hebrew. Some of his decisions conflict with
the Talmud and his talmudic-aggadic interpretations do not
always agree with those of former aggadists.
Bibliography: B.Z. Kahana (ed.), Seder Tannaim ve-Amoraim (1935), introd. xff.; Baron, Social2, 5 (1957), 22; 6 (1958), 1245,
425; 7 (1958), 101; D. Cassel, Teshuvot Geonim Kadmoniyyim (1848), 9a/
b; Abramson, Merkazim, 12; L. Ginzberg, Geonica, 1 (1909), 1549.
[Meir Havazelet]
757
nahum
gested locating Elkosh at Capernaum (Village of Nahum).
More credible seems to be the tradition recorded by PseudoEpiphanius (De Vitis Prophetarum), which mentions a Judean
Elkesi, yonder, i.e., south of Eleutheropolis or Bet Guvrin,
but the name Elkesi may represent Lachish, since the town of
this name was situated directly south of Bet Guvrin. No definite identification of the locality denoted by the designation
Elkoshite can therefore be made.
Nahums literary activity took place after the capture of
the Egyptian Thebes (biblical No-Amon) by Ashurbanipal in
663 B.C.E., an event which is alluded to in Nahum 3:810. It
is not certain, however, whether he wrote before the fall of
Nineveh in August 612, when the Assyrian capital was captured and razed by the Babylonians and Medes, or shortly after its fall, when the joyful news of the oppressors defeat was
conveyed to Judah. The perfect tenses employed in chapters 2
and 3, where the event is depicted with poetic vividness and
force, suggest that Nineveh had already fallen. But several passages (such as 3:11, 1415) seem to indicate that the resistance
was not yet completely crushed. It may therefore be inferred
that the Book of Nahum was composed in the very year 612,
shortly before Ninevehs final downfall.
The Book of Nahum
The original title of the book as a whole is probably contained
in the second part of the superscription: The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite. The first part Oracle concerning Nineveh was perhaps the title of the oracle proper
on Ninevehs fall; in any case, it correctly describes the main
contents of the book. Chapter 1 is generally thought to form an
acrostic hymn of theophany. In the opinion of several scholars
the entire alphabet was represented in the original poem. The
text of Nahum 1 and 2:1, 3 has accordingly been rearranged and
reconstructed, mainly by G. Bickell and H. Gunkel, to form a
complete alphabetic psalm of an eschatological character which
they regarded as a later addition to the book. The restoration of
a complete acrostic, however, is impossible; in fact, the poem
seems to follow the alphabet only down to the letter samekh
(1:2a, 3b8, 9c10a, 9ab, 2b, 10bc), with verses 9ab and 2b having been transferred to their present position by the books last
editor. One can only conjecture whether the acrostic was composed by Nahum; it is more probable that this text, like other
similar ones in the Psalter, was a part of the Jerusalem liturgy.
The theophany proper, employing the ancient themes of Gods
rule over the primordial forces of nature, is contained in verses
3b6. It serves here as an introductory motif to a national
psalm of confidence (1:78, 9c10a, 9ab, 2b, 10bc), followed by
an oracle addressed to Judah (1:1213; 2:1). This liturgy actually
forms the exordium to the poem on the fall of Nineveh.
The oracle addressed to the Assyrian capital was perhaps
headed by the words Oracle concerning Nineveh (1:1). It
opens with the introduction 1:11, 14, and is followed by 2:2, 4ff.
and 3. The descriptions in Nahums masterful poetry are singularly picturesque and vivid (especially 2:46, 11; 3:23, 1719).
The absence of distinctly religious motifs is remarkable, and yet
758
nahum of gimzo
Bibliography: H. Gunkel, in: ZAW 13 (1893), 22344; W.R.
Arnold, ibid., 21 (1901), 22565; S.R. Driver, The Minor Prophets
(1906, The Century Bible); P. Haupt, in: JBL, 26 (1907), 153; J.M.P.
Smith, Micah, Zephaniah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Obadiah, and Joel (ICC,
1911); W. Nowack, Die kleinen Propheten (19222); G. Hirshler, in: Kahana (ed.), Terei Asar (1930), 5171; Th. H. Gaster, in: JBL, 63 (1944),
5152; A. Haldar, Studies in the Book of Nahum (1947); Th. Laetsch,
The Minor Prophets (1956); Kaufmann Y., Toledot; A. George, in: DBI,
s.v.; S.J. de Vries, in: VT, 16 (1966), 47681; E.G. Kraeling, Commentary
on the Prophets (1966); Y. Licht, in: EM, 5 (1968), S.V. Add. Bibliography: J. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk and Zephaniah (1991); M.
Floyd, in: JBL, 113 (1994), 42137; K. Cathcart, in: ABD, 4, 9981000;
Y. Avishur, in: Z. Weisman (ed.), Sefer Terei Asar Bet (Enz iklopediyah
Olam ha-Tanakh 15b, 1994), 6685; D. Christensen, in DBI, 2, 199201;
K. Spronk, Nahum (1997).
[Edward Lipinski / S. David Sperling (2nd ed.)]
759
NAIN, village in the Jezreel Valley, 2 mi. south of Mount Tabor, where according to the New Testament Jesus revived a
dead man (Luke 7:11). It was situated on the slopes of the hill
of Moreh. In the Midrash, it is located in the territory of Issachar (Gen. R. 98:12). For many centuries, it was one of the
villages of the district of Sepphoris. It was a large village, for it
had a gate and presumably a wall (if one accepts the testimony
of Luke). In the fourth century, Nain was made independent,
remaining a separate district within Palaestina Secunda until
760
the Arab conquest. The area of the village included the valley
of Iksalo (Exaloth). In 1101 Naym appeared in a list of villages
in the possession of the abbey of Mount Tabor. The presentday village (Kafr Naim) has retained the same name and is
built on a slope, 5 mi. (8 km.) south-southwest of Nazareth.
A spring in the village irrigates plantations of olives and figs.
Rock-cut graves were found in the crags along the road leading from the village to the southwest. In the area of the village are remains of a church or chapel, later transformed into
a mosque (maqam Sayidna), ruined buildings, and a mosaic
pavement.
Bibliography: Alt, in: PJB, 22 (1926), 60; idem, in: ZDPV, 68
(1951), 61; see also: ZDPV, 73 (1957), 1412. Add. Bibliography: B.
Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee (2001), 21824; Y. Tsafrir, L. Di Segni, and J. Green, Tabula Imperii Romani. Iudaea Palaestina. Maps and Gazetteer. (1994), 192; D. Pringle, The Churches of
the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. A Corpus. Vol. 2: LZ (excluding
Tyre) (1998) 11516.
[Michael Avi-Yonah / Shimon Gibson (2nd ed.)]
najdorf, miguel
mascus and corresponded with Moses di *Trani. He remained
in Damascus until after 1555. He spent some time in Safed as a
student of Isaac *Luria and wrote a commentary on the Torah,
Lekah Tov (Constantinople, 1571). Shaar ha-Kelalim, published
in the beginning of Ez H ayyim of H ayyim *Vital, is attributed
to Najara in several manuscripts. Different discourses on Lurianic Kabbalah are found in his name in manuscripts and in
published works of H ayyim Vital. According to Shabbatean
tradition, Baruchia (Russo), the head of the *Shabbateans in
*Salonika, is reputed to have been a reincarnation of Maharam Nayar, i.e., Moses Najara. In his last years he continued
to serve as rabbi in Damascus, where he died. His son was the
distinguished poet Israel *Najara. The son of Israel, MOSES (2),
succeeded his father as the head of the Jewish community in
*Gaza, according to David Conforte (Kore ha-Dorot, 49b),
who passed through Gaza in 1645 and studied Torah with
Najara. Kabbalistic sermons preserved in manuscript were
attributed to him but it is possible that they were written by
his grandfather, Moses Najara (1). JACOB, his son, who succeeded Moses (2), is known to have been a fervent believer in
Shabbetai *Z evi. When Shabbetai Z evi reached Gaza in 1665,
he stayed with Najara, whom he appointed High Priest, although Najara was not of a priestly family (Kohen). In 1666
Jacob Najara sent propagandistic letters abroad supporting the
messianism of Shabbetai Z evi and the prophecy of *Nathan of
Gaza. Even after Shabbetai Z evis apostasy, Najara believed in
him and visited him in Adrianople in 1671 (Sefunot, 5 (1961),
25461). MOSES (3), apparently a member of this family, may
have been a rabbinic emissary. Between 1760 and 1790 he was
one of the rabbis in Debdou, in eastern Morocco. JUDAH NAJARA, a rabbi in Constantinople, may also have been a member of this family.
Bibliography: Neubauer, Chronicles, 1 (1887), 151, 153;
Rosanes, Togarmah, 3 (1938), 2189; 4 (1935), 357; G. Scholem, Kitvei
Yad ba-Kabbalah (1930), 127; idem, in: Zion, 6 (1940/41), 129; Scholem,
Shabbetai Z evi, 1 (1967), index; J.M. Toledano, Sarid u-Falit (1945),
7374; I. Ben-Zvi, Shear Yashuv (1966), 378.
[Abraham David]
761
njera
oped his chess prowess, although for many years he worked
in insurance. Between 1943 and 1965 he won many international tournaments. In 1950 Najdorf became an International
Grandmaster. He played well in Candidates tournaments, in
1950 (finishing in fifth place) and 1953 (finishing sixth). He
won important contests in Mar del Plata (1961) and Havana
(1962 and 1964). In the Chess Olympiads in Helsinki he obtained second place. Najdorf was noted for some extraordinary feats of simultaneous play. At So Paulo in 1950 he played
250 boards, winning 226 and drawing 15. His blindfold exhibitions were also impressive. At one time he held the record
of 40 such games played simultaneously.
[Gerald Abrahams / Efraim Zadoff (2nd ed.)]
NAJB ALDAWLA (d. c. 1315), court physician and administrator at the court of the Il-Khns in Persia at the end of the
762
Bibliography: Baer, Spain, 1 (1961), 43, 53, 366; Baer, Urkunden, index; F. Cantera, Sinagogas espaolas (1955), 2523; idem, in:
Sefarad, 2 (1942), 326; 22 (1962), 89; L. Serrano, Cartulario de San
Milln de Cogolla (1930), 219; J. Gonzlez, El Reino de Castilla en la
poca de Alfonso VIII (1960), 132; F. Cantera Orive, Un cartulario de
Santa Mara la Real de Njera del ao 1209 (1960); Surez Fernndez, Documentos, 69, 76, 101; Ashtor, Korot, 2 (1966), 20; Ashtor, in:
Sefarad, 24 (1964), 44ff.
[Haim Beinart]
name, change of
Contemporary Period
According to Yemenite Jewish tradition, the Jews of Najrn
trace their origin to the Ten Tribes. They lived in the region of
Najrn in Saudi Arabia and were the only group of Yemenite
Jews who lived outside Yemen under the rule of another kingdom. On the strength of the laws of the desert and tribal protection, they were not subjected to persecution as were the
Jews of Yemen. They enjoyed the same equality of rights as
the Arabs of Saudi Arabia, were not taxed, and did not pay the
*jizya (the poll tax imposed on non-Muslims in the Muslim
countries in exchange for the protection granted them by
the government). The Bedouin of Saudi Arabia, who belonged
to the Sunni Islam sect, practiced religious tolerance toward
them and ate meat slaughtered under their laws of sheh itah.
The Jews of Najrn carried weapons in self-defense, as did the
other inhabitants, and were renowned for their courage and
strength. There was no other place in the Arabian Peninsula
where Jews lived in such dignity and freedom as in Najrn.
By profession they were craftsmen: they worked essentially
in goldsmithing and repairing arms. They earned a good
livelihood and their material conditions surpassed those of
Yemenite Jews. Their settlements were scattered throughout
Najrn in small units of two to forty families. They lived in clay
houses or in huts. Their clothes, of both men and women, were
slightly different from that of Saudi Arabians and Yemenite
Jews. The strict barrier between men and women, which was
customary in social life throughout Yemen, was nonexistent
among them. At festivities and celebrations men and women
sat together and women danced to the sound of the mens
singing. After 1936, their relations with Yemenite Jews were
not very close, because the two groups were under the rule of
different kingdoms which occasionally were at war with each
other. The life of the Jews of Najrn, dispersed as they were
in small settlements, did not encourage the development of
Torah studies among them or the fostering of an independent
spiritual culture. In matters of religion and halakhah they were
dependent on the community of nearby Sadah (one day away
from them), and when necessary, on the bet din of *Sana. The
Jews of Sadah served as their spiritual guardians in times of
need: they provided them with religious books and guided
them in their religious practices. Therefore, their prayers, customs, and system of study were very closely related. In Israel
they are concentrated in Kiryat Ekron, which is inhabited by
the Jews of Sadah. When the Jews of Najrn immigrated to
Israel in 1949, they numbered about 250.
Bibliography: H.Z. Hirschberg, Israel Ba-Arav (1947). Add.
Bibliography: Newby, The History of the Jews in Arabia; Y. Tobi,
Jews of Yemen (1999).
[Yehuda Ratzaby]
captured during the break into the Acre prison together with
Avshalom H aviv and Yaacov Weiss, was sentenced to death
and hanged with them.
Bibliography: Y. Nedava, Olei-ha-Gardom (1966); Y. Gurion, Ha-Niz z ah on Olei Gardom (1971).
763
namnyi, ernest
that among the four things that cancel the doom of man is
change of name (RH 16b). From this there developed in the
Middle Ages the custom of changing, or more accurately giving an additional name to, the name of a person who was dangerously ill, or suffered some other misfortune, in the belief
that the Angel of Death would be confused as a result of the
new name. This new name was sometimes chosen by opening
a Bible at random and selecting a name which occurred there,
except for such names of ill repute as Esau or Korah. The most
widespread custom, however, which persists to the present day,
was to choose auspicious names such as H ayyim or, among
the Sephardim, H ai (Life), Raphael (may God heal), Hezekiah
(may God give strength) for males, and H ayyah for females.
(The name Alter (old) was frequently given to a boy if several
children in the family had died during infancy, this name being regarded as a good omen that he should reach old age.)
In the Ashkenazi rite the change of name is effected by pronouncing a special *Mi she-Berakh prayer which contains the
following passage: Just as his [her] name has been changed,
so may the evil decree passed on him [her] be changed from
justice to mercy, from death to life, from illness to a complete
cure. The Sephardi rite has a different formula.
The new name given to a person is henceforth used in
addition to his former name (e.g., H ayyim Abraham) for all
religious purposes (e.g., to be called up to the Torah, in a bill
of divorce, on the tombstone, etc.).
NAMES.
NAMNYI, ERNEST (Ern; 18881957), Hungarian art historian, economist, and writer. Born in Nagykanizsa, Namnyi
was the son of Rabbi Ede Neumann. He studied in Budapest
and in Brussels, and after he received his doctorate in law was
appointed a research associate in the Institut de Sociologie
Solvay from 1911 to 1914. He specialized in banking with his
uncle, the noted banker P. *Philipson. With the outbreak of
World War I he returned to Hungary, and from 1916 to 1949
served as the secretary and later the director of Orszgos Iparegyeslet (National Industrial Association). He published
economic and sociological articles in Hungarian and French.
He also did research in Jewish art, which he felt was an educational means of striving for aesthetics and ethics in Judaism. This outlook led him to found the Jewish Liberal program movement known as zsajs Vallsos Trsasg (Isaiah
Religious Society). He was among the leaders of the Jewish
Museum, and from 1942 served as its director and from 1947
as chairman, succeeding in collecting for it the best works of
Jewish artists in and out of Hungary. He also worked for the
central Jewish library, which included the remnants of both
public and private Jewish libraries, and these collections were
housed in the Rabbinical Seminary in Budapest. When the
journal Libanon was transferred to the Jewish Museum, Namnyi participated in its editing until 1944. Together with P.
Gruenwald, he wrote the history of the synagogues in Buda-
In the Bible
Biblical proper names, together with proper names in Old
South Arabic, Canaanite (East-or Proto-Canaanite, Ugaritic,
and Phoenician), Old Aramaic, Akkadian, and with some
reservations Old Egyptian, comprise one division of the Semitic onomasticon. Within this division, the Hebrew names
have particularly archaic traits. In this respect they are connected with Old South Arabic, East-or Proto-Canaanite, and
Ugaritic proper names, and are distinguished from the Akkadian and Old Egyptian names, whose development led them
away from the early Semitic type of naming (cf. Stamm, in
Fourth World Congress, 1417).
The most important source for Hebrew proper names
is the Bible. In addition to individual proper names found
throughout the Bible, biblical genealogies from early and late
times also offer numerous examples. Other sources of Hebrew names are Palestinian inscriptions (ostraca and seals),
the Elephantine Papyri, and Babylonian clay tablets from the
Persian period.
In Hebrew, as in old Semitic generally, two forms of
proper names are to be distinguished: propositional names
and epithetic names. Propositional names can be classified as
either verbal or nominal sentences. A separate group is constituted by the very numerous short names, which cannot be
taken into consideration here (see Noth, in bibl., p. 36ff.).
In addition to these formal criteria, another distinction,
relating more to content, is that between theophoric and secular proper names.
The predicate of the (theophoric) verbal propositional
names is generally in the perfect or imperfect tense. In contrast to the Akkadian, the use of the imperative mood, directed either to the divinity or to the environment, is rare.
Late names such as
( Asiel, Do it, O God!) and
(Haziel, Look, O God!) may be considered as belonging to
the former, and ( Reuben, See, a son!; cf. also Noth, in
bibl., p. 32, and Stamm, op. cit., p. 142), as belonging to the
latter.
In the perfect-tense names the predicate-subject type
(e.g., , Nethanel) is, according to Hebrew syntax, on the
whole more frequent than the inverse, i.e., subject-predicate
(e.g., , Elnathan; cf. Noth, in bibl., pp. 2021). The meaning of these names is expressed by the use of the past tense:
they signify thanksgiving for an act of charity bestowed by the
divine (e.g., God has given).
764
names
In names formed with the imperfect tense, the subjectpredicate type is hardly represented. This type appears only
in the later monarchical and the post-Exilic periods ( ,
Jehoiachin; cf. Noth, in bibl., p. 28). On the other hand, the
predicate-subject type is much more frequent ( , Jechoniah). Certain of the oldest proper names are of this type,
some appearing as abridged forms not containing the word
of the complete form. Examples of these are ( Isaac),
(Jacob), ( Israel), ( Joseph), and ( Jerahmeel).
This type occurs more often in the periods of Moses and the
Judges. It becomes scarcer during the Davidic period, almost
disappearing, but regaining favor shortly before the Exile and
in post-Exilic times (cf. Noth, loc. cit.).
As the Hebrew imperfect tense is both preterit and jussive in character, its meaning in proper names is disputed.
Noth, probably because he believed that the perfect expresses
the past tense unequivocally, preferred the jussive interpretation for the imperfect, as expressing a wish. Several proper
names, which certainly contain such wishes, e.g.,
,
(Jehiel, Jehiah, may he live, O God/YHWH!), ( Joseph,
may he [God] add!), and
,( Jahdiel, Jehdeiah,
may he rejoice, O God/YHWH!), can be quoted in support
of this theory. In opposition to it, however, there are to be
found names which are vocalized not as jussive forms but as
statements, such as ( Eliakim, God had made [the deceased] stand up again), ( Eliashib, God has brought
back [the deceased]), and ( Jair, He has protected; for
the translation of this name on the basis of the Ugaritic and
Hebrew (Deut. 32:11a; Job 8:6b; root yr/wr), see Stamm, in:
Studies B. Landsberger, p. 421a). It should, therefore, be
taken into account that the imperfect tense should be rendered in proper names, as in general usage, sometimes as a
statement, sometimes as a wish. It is not always easy to decide
which of these it is, and the subject warrants further investigation. It appears that the past tense is to be preferred for the
oldest names, whereas in the case of the later names the jussive
is also to be considered (cf. Stamm, ibid., pp. 4145; Stamm,
in: Fourth World Congress, p. 142).
The content of theophoric propositional names is that
the divinity: (1) has given, created/made, or added the child
named; (2) has granted, helped, saved, and had mercy, spared,
restored justice, and cured, or that it may do so. Whereas in
Akkadian the content of groups 1 and 2 both refer to the child
named, insofar as it is not only the object of divine gift and
creation but also of mercy and salvation (cf. J.J. Stamm, Die
akkadische Namesgebung (1939), 23ff.), this is not the case in
Hebrew. Here, naturally, the content of group 1 also refers to
the child; however, the content of group 2 refers to the parents.
They are the ones whose prayer was granted or to whom justice was done. This is explained in the interpretation of names
in the Bible (Gen. 29:3130:24; Ex. 2:10, 22; I Sam. 1:2728).
This may well have been the case originally, while the situation in Akkadian (and in Egyptian) may represent a modernization which might have taken place under the influence of
liturgical literature.
765
names
(Joash), ( Jotham), (( ) Micaiah(u), ( Jonathan),
and ( Joel) should be mentioned. During the monarchical
period, names of this group became frequent and dominant
and even retained their lasting predominance together with
those containing the theophoric ( el) afterward. ( el) is
common in personal names up to the beginning of the monarchical period, during which time it fell into almost complete
disuse, reappearing again and becoming more frequent from
the seventh century onward, and remaining common after the
Exile (see Gray, in bibl., pp. 166ff.; Noth, in bibl., pp. 82ff.).
With other old Semitic personal names, especially South
Arabic and Proto-or East-Canaanite, Hebrew names have in
common the particularity that terms of kinship can take the
place of the theophoric element. These are terms like ( av,
father), ( ah , brother), and ( am, paternal uncle),
thus, for instance, ( Abiram), ( Ahitub), and
(Amram; for other examples, see Noth, in bibl., pp. 66ff.;
Stamm, in: Studies B. Landsberger, pp. 416ff.). These
names have their origin in the early Semitic and nomadic
conceptions of tribal and clan structure, according to which
deceased relatives enjoyed the divine privilege of being worshiped. In Israel, after the Conquest, this belief became extinct. If corresponding names continued to be used, this was
undoubtedly based on the supposition that terms denoting
kinship could be assimilated to YHWH. However, not all of
these originally had a theophoric meaning. There exist those
in which ( av), ( ah ), and ( am) designate the (deceased) father, brother, or uncle of the one named. These are
the so-called substitute names (see below). (On the problem
of distinguishing these secular names from the theophoric, see
Stamm, in: Studies B. Landsberger, p. 418.)
Other words, some of which are very ancient, which
can be used in a theophoric sense in names are ( z ur,
Rock), ( shaddai, the Almighty), ( adon, Lord),
( baal, Possessor/Lord), and ( melekh, king; cf.
Noth, in bibl., pp. 114ff.).
Secular epithetic names have in Hebrew, as in related
languages particularly Akkadian and Egyptian, the most
diverse and disparate contents. These retain the day of birth
( , Haggai, he who was born on the festival), or the origin
( , Jehudi, the Judean), or the position within the family
( , Becorath, firstborn). Other proper names give expression either to the relationship between the child and his
parents, or to their joy, such as ( Jedidah, the loved one)
and ( Samson, little sun). Also frequent are names
given on the basis of particularly distinctive physical traits or
flaws, e.g., /( Laban/Libni, white, probably after the
color of the skin, particularly of the face), ( tall; a proper
name from Elephantine), /( Hakkatan/Z uar, [the]
small one), ( Barzillai, as hard as iron), and /
(Kareah/Korah, the bald headed; for other examples see
Noth, in bibl., pp. 221ff.). In addition, names of animals and
plants are not infrequent as proper names.
Two other groups of names which should be mentioned
specially are substitute names, names in which expression is
given, in some manner, to the view that the bearer of the name
reincarnates a deceased relative, or that the latter has returned
to life in, or through, the former, and womens names. This is
an ancient idea which has its roots in the conception of tribal
and clan structure and which does not presuppose the belief
in the transmigration of souls. Parallel forms to this category
of proper names can be found in many peoples; among the
Semitic peoples they are particularly numerous with the Babylonians and the Egyptians.
Most groups which occur in other proper names can
be found also among the substitute names. Only a few examples of each will be given here (for further illustration of the
subject see Stamm, in: Studies B. Landsberger, 21324):
verbal proposition (secular): ( Jashobeam, the uncle
has come back), ( Jashub, he [the deceased] has returned); verbal proposition (theophoric): ( Eliakim),
( Eliashib), and ( Jair, see above); nominal proposition: ( Abiram), ( Amram; the father/uncle is
great), and ( Abihud), ( Ahihud), ( Ammihud; my father/brother/uncle is splendor). In these proper
names the praise of the deceased simultaneously keeps his
memory alive.
A form which cannot be found outside this category of
substitute names is represented by those uttering, in the sense
of a complaint, the quest after the deceased, thus ( Ichabod) and ( Ehud; where is the glory?), also ( Jezebel; where is nobility?), and
( Iezer; where is help?).
The interrogative particle ai/e/i, used in all these names, may
also be discerned in ( Job; where is the father?).
In the epithetic names, the child either simply bears the
epithet of the relative whom he replaces, thus ( Ahab;
fathers brother), or is named after the function which devolves to him as substitute, ( Meshullam, the replaced),
( Menahem, one that consoles), and ( Manasseh,
he who makes forget).
As for womens names, the theophoric ones are relatively scarce. Much more frequent are the secular ones, i.e.,
designations based on the time of birth, or the origin of the
bearer (of the name), on a characteristic physical or spiritual
quality, or the relationship with the parents. Names of jewels,
plants, and animals are also used as womens names (for details, see Stamm, in: VTS, 16, where the question as to the reasons for the relative scarceness of theophoric womens names
also is raised).
766
names
In the Talmud
Insofar as names are concerned the talmudic literature covers a period of some 700 years, from the time of Simeon the
Just (c. 200 B.C.E.) to 500 C.E. A distinction must be made
between fact and homiletical propaganda. Thus, the often repeated statement giving one of the causes of the deliverance of
the Children of Israel from bondage as they did not change
their names (e.g., Lev. R. 32:5) is certainly to be viewed as a
homily appealing for the retention or giving of Hebrew names,
in view of the prevalent tendency of adopting foreign names.
It is in this light that the interesting equivalents, Rofe (Rufus?) for Judah, Luliani (Julianus?) for Reuben, Lestim (Justus?) for Joseph, and Aleksandri for Benjamin, quoted there
are to be regarded. Zunz, somewhat casuistically, suggests that
these passages are to be understood as referring specifically
to the change from a Hebrew name already given to a gentile
name, a custom which was disapproved of as a sign of deliberate assimilation, but not to the initial granting of non-Jewish names. To be regarded in a similar light is the Targum to
Amos 6:1 which renders nekuvei reshit ha-goyim, they give
their children the same names as do gentiles. The Talmud
states only that the majority of Jews in the Diaspora have
the same names as the gentiles (Git. 11b; in Babylonia only
names of idols were avoided Git. 11a; the name Tammuza
(Judah b. Tammuza; TJ, Meg. 4:5, 75b) is not evidence of the
adoption of the name of the god Tammuz (= Adonis), since
Tammuz had already become Hebraized as the name of the
Hebrew month, cf. Dosa b. Tevet, Song R. 7:8). However, the
evidence of the widespread use of non-Jewish names also in
Erez Israel is too obvious to be overlooked.
All the characteristics and permutations of names which
are found in later generations are found among the names of
the rabbis. Examples of almost every type of nomenclature
can be found in the short list of the *zugot (including their fathers) as they appear in the first chapter of Avot. They include
purely traditional biblical names, such as Simeon (see later),
Joshua, and Judah; Hebrew names which are not those of biblical worthies, though they occur there, such as Hillel, Gamliel,
Johanan, and Joezer; purely Greek names such as Antigonus
(in the generation immediately after Alexander the Great; cogent evidence of the rapidity of the social assimilation in nomenclature) and Avtalyon; and Aramaized forms of Hebrew
names, such as Yose (twice) for Joseph, Tabbai (probably for
Tobiah), and what appears to be a purely Aramaic name, Nittai. Of special interest are purely Hebrew names which do not
occur in the Bible, such as Perah yah and (probably) Shetah .
With few exceptions, all other names fall into those categories. The only forms missing are Greek names which are
an obvious Grecization of Hebrew names, such as Dositheus
for Nethanel or Jonathan, and purely Roman names, such as
Julianus (Lulianus). There are fathers with non-Hebrew names
whose sons have Hebrew names, such as Eliezer b. Hyrcanus,
as there is the reverse, such as Dostai (Dositheus) b. Judah.
Of interest are the names of the five sons of R. Yose b. H alafta,
given as Ishmael, Eleazar, H alafta, Abtilus, and Menahem
(Shab. 118b). Three (Ishmael, Eleazar, and Menahem; for Ishmael see below) have purely biblical names; H alafta has an
Aramaic name, like his grandfather (cf. Gen. R. 37:7, where R.
Yose explicitly refers to the custom of giving a child the name
of our fathers, and the eight other examples in the Talmud,
of which the best known are the dynasty of Hillel, the son of
Eliezer b. Hyrcanus (Men. 35a), and R. Ishmael; this custom
is thought to have been derived from the Greeks L. Loew,
Beitraege zur jued. Alterskunde, 2, 9b); and the fifth Abtilus,
has a Greek name (probably a corruption of ). Another passage (TJ, Yev. 1:1) gives the names as Ishmael, Eleazar
(Lazar), Menahem, H alafta, and Avdimos (Eudymos) and asks
about another son of Yose called Vardimon; the Talmud explains that Vardimon is identical with Menahem, but he was so
called because his face was like [domeh] a rose [vered]. This
is a homiletical interpretation similar to that which makes of
Tiberias Tovah Reiyyatah (of goodly appearance; Meg. 6a).
These names raise the interesting question whether it was not
the custom to have two names, one Semitic (Hebrew or Aramaic) and one Greek, as was the case with Hasmonean rulers such as John (Johanan) Hyrcanus and Salome Alexandra,
and whether that is not the simple explanation of the names
of the five sons of Mattathias: Johanan called Gaddis, Simeon
called Thassi, Judas called Maccabeus, Eleazar called Avarah,
and Jonathan called Apphus (I Macc. 2:2).
It is equally natural that there were names which were
avoided because of their unhappy associations, and this is explicitly stated. The Talmud interprets the verse and the name
of the wicked shall rot (Prov. 10:7) to the effect that none
name their children after them and points to the grim example of a child being given the name of *Doeg, whose mother
would every day give the increase in his weight in gold to the
Temple, yet when the enemy prevailed she slaughtered and
ate him and, because of the unfortunate choice of the name
of a wicked person, see what happened to him (Yoma 38b).
Similarly the Midrash states, Have you ever heard that a
man should call his son Pharaoh, or Sisera or Sennacherib?
But (one does give the name) Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Reuben, Simeon, Levi or Judah (Gen. R. 49:1), and in general
it is stated that the name of a person determines his destiny
(Ber. 7b).
In respect to this, the repeated name of Ishmael raises a
difficulty. R. Yose (Gen. R. 71:3) divides names into four categories according to their beauty or ugliness as well as according to their bearers deeds and gives Ishmael as an example
of one whose name was beautiful but his actions ugly. How
then is this name so frequently found? The tosafot (loc. cit.)
explain that it was only because, according to rabbinic tradition, he repented; and because of the bad association of the
names they alter the name of Absalom, the father of Hanan
the Judge (Ket. 13:1), to Avishalom (because Absalom has no
portion in the world to come (Sanh. 103b)) and Shebna to
Shechna (Tos. Yoma 38b; Ket. 104b).
By the same token, there are homilies as to the efficacy
and desirability of giving names after those of biblical wor-
767
names
thies. To the above quoted passage that fathers call their children Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah,
there is the positive injunction One should ever examine
names, to give his son a name worthy for him to become a
righteous man, for sometimes the name is a contributory factor for good as for evil (Tanh . Haazinu 7). Ephraim is praised
that the best of my sons shall be called after thee (Lev. R. 3:2).
On the contemporary plane there are quoted cases of a woman
in gratitude calling her child after Nathan ha-Bavli because he
had saved its life (Shab. 134a) and children called Eleazar after
Eleazar b. Simeon because of a similar boon (BM 84b).
Despite that fact, however, there is one puzzling phenomenon, namely, the complete absence of names which one
would expect. Not a single rabbi is known by the name of
Moses (the name occurs only once in the whole talmudic literature as borne by the father-in-law of a certain scholar Huna
BB 174b, Ar. 23a), Abraham, Israel, David, or Solomon. Aaron
is borne by only two amoraim. Of the sons of Jacob, a decided
preference is given to Simeon and Judah, and among the amoraim to Levi and Joseph (there are no tannaim called Joseph
and only two called Levi though, as stated, the Aramaized
form Yose is common). Dan, Gad, and Asher do not occur at
all, the others only rarely. (Steinschneider draws attention to
a similar phenomenon among the Jews in Arabic-speaking
countries.) A similar position exists with regard to the names
of the prophets. Of the 15 prophets, Jeremiah, the name of one
tanna, appears to have become popular in the amoraic period,
and only one amora is known by the name of Ezekiel. Nahum
and Jonah are of greater frequency, but the former seems to
be in a class by itself, since the frequent occurrence of other
names of the same root, Nah man, Tanh um, Tanh uma, suggests that it was the root meaning comfort which decided its
choice. Similarly Jonah, which occurs only among the amoraim, may have been influenced by the many amoraic aggadot
(cf. Gen. R. 33:6) which identified the dove (Jonah) with Israel.
Zechariah is the only name which occurs with any frequency
(three tannaim and two amoraim) and Haggai (and H agga).
Isaiah, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Micah, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, and Malachi are not found at all.
It is specifically mentioned (ARN 12) that humans were
not given the names of angels, and in fact such names as Raphael and Gabriel are not found.
Lastly, attention should be drawn to a passage in Pesah im
113b to the effect that Joseph of Huz al is identical, inter alia,
with Issi, the son of Gur Aryeh, who is also named Issi b.
Judah. The alternatives Judah and Gur Aryeh seem to be the
only example known of the custom widely prevalent in later
ages to give double or alternative names on the basis of Genesis 49 and Deuteronomy 33: Judah Aryeh. Naphtali Zevi,
Benjamin Zeev, and Joseph Bekhor Shor.
On the other hand, there is clear evidence of the use of
different names. In Gittin 34b there is a case mentioned of a
woman in Babylonia known in one place as Miriam and in
another as Sarah, and of a query sent from the Diaspora to
Rabban Gamliel as to the procedure to be adopted with re-
768
names
were widespread, as was adoption of the names of prominent
ecclesiastical or secular sponsors.
Designations appended to the given name, to identify
more clearly the individual, developed already during antiquity.
This tendency grew more marked throughout the Middle Ages.
The most traditional of these surnames was the patronym,
readily adapted from the Hebrew ben to the Arabic ibn
and the French fils. A special Arabic usage was the identification of the father by his firstborn son, the ab designation.
In most areas a favored style of byname was that which derived
from locale, in some cases the bearers birthplace and others his
adult residence. In the Arab world prominent examples are R.
Isaac Alfasi and R. Saadiah al-Fayyumi. The great 13t-century
leader of French Jewry was known both by the Hebrew R. Jehiel of Paris and by the French Vivant of Meaux, the latter his
birthplace and the former the locus of his adult activities. Surnames derived from locale became particularly widespread in
the wake of the periodic expulsions suffered by medieval Jewry.
Both for ease of identification and out of nostalgia, Jews chose
names that recalled their earlier homes. Thus, for example, in
Turkish Jewry subsequent to 1492 surnames such as De Leon,
DAlvo, Zamora, and Toledano abounded. Another source of
bynames was occupation. Medicine, printing, masonry, tailoring, dyeing, minting all left their mark on Jewish onomastics.
Physical and spiritual characteristics, such as size, age, complexion, honesty, and piety, also gave rise to series of widely
used surnames. With the passage of time, in Jewish society as
in general, these surnames tended to crystallize into family
names, passed on from generation to generation.
There are two special types of designation, popular during the Middle Ages and early modern period, which deserve special mention. The first is the acronym. The components drawn upon for the acronym might include a title
(rabbi, morenu ha-rav, ha-gaon), the given name, or the surname. Well-known examples include RASHI (Rabbi Solomon
Yiz h aki), RAMBAM (Rabbi Moses b. Maimon), HA-GRA (HaGaon Rabbi Elijah). The second style of designation stems
from an authors magnum opus. In many instances, e.g., the
Rokeah (R. Eleazar b. Judah) and the Tur (R. Jacob b. Asher),
given names and surnames were almost totally obscured by
such literary appellations.
Modern Times
With the onset of emancipation there was growing imitation
of forenames current in general society. Study of Berlin Jewish forenames at the beginning of the 20t century has shown
a marked tendency toward appropriation of popular German
designations, although some names remained peculiarly Jewish. In the U.S., the transition from immigrant-generation to
first-, second-, and third-generation status has been accompanied by constantly changing given name styles. Certain
names extremely popular with an earlier generation have
subsequently been totally rejected, usually out of a sense that
such names were excessively identified with immigrant status
and with Jewishness.
769
namias, jerome
Jews in 1808, and in Prussia in 1812 emancipation of the Jews
was made contingent upon the adoption within six months of
acceptable surnames. In the United States the practical necessity of registration of immigrants coupled with ignorance of
English resulted in the creation of a host of new surnames for
bewildered newcomers. The Zionist experience has often been
associated with the Hebraization of family names. The major
political figures of the first few decades of the State of Israel
reflect this phenomenon: Ben-Zvi (formerly Shimshelevitz),
Shazar (Rubashov), Ben-Gurion (Gruen), Sharett (Shertok),
Eshkol (Shkolnik), Meir (Myerson). The most common methods of fashioning new Hebrew surnames have been the use
of patronyms, the translation of the non-Hebrew name into
a Hebrew equivalent, and the adoption of a Hebrew designation phonetically similar to the non-Hebrew.
The demographic upheavals and the ideological conflicts
of the 19t and 20t centuries have thoroughly shattered the
onomastic unity of many Jewish families. Brothers and cousins
spread across the Diaspora and Israel often bear totally different family appellations a curious testimony to the unparalleled disruptions of the past century of Jewish life.
[Robert Chazan]
Bibliography: IN THE BIBLE: G.B. Gray, Studies in Hebrew
Proper Names (1896); Noth, Personennamen; J.J. Stamm, in: VTS, 7
(1960), 16583; 16 (1967), 30139; idem, in: Theologische Zeitschrift, 16
(1960), 28597; idem, in: Studies in Honor of D. Landsberger (= Assyriological Studies, 16 (1965)), 41324; idem, in: Fourth World Congress of Jewish Studies, Papers, 1 (1967), 1417 301. IN THE TALMUD:
The two major studies of Jewish onomastics are L. Zunz, Namen der
Juden (1837), and H. Loewe, Geschichte der juedischen Namen (1929).
MEDIEVAL PERIOD AND ESTABLISHMENT OF SURNAMES: Useful source material can often be found in onomastic excursuses or
detailed indexes in descriptions of particular Jewish communities,
e.g., S. Rosanes, Togarmah, 1 (19302), and U. Cassuto, Gli Ebrei a Firenze (1918). Valuable information is also preserved in tax records,
e.g., Loeb, in: REJ, 1 (1880), and Levy, ibid., 19 (1889), and in funerary inscriptions, e.g., Schwab, in: Nouvelles archives des missions scientifiques et littraires, 12 (1904); Kober, in: PAAJR, 1415 (194445);
Avneri, ibid., 33 (1965); Ankori, ibid., 38 (1970); A. Beider, A Dictionary of Jewish Surnames from the Russian Empire (1993). Specialized studies of general interest include Steinschneider, in: JQR, 913
(18971901); Kober, in: HJ, 5 (1943); G. Kessler, Die Familiennamen
der Juden in Deutschland (1935); Glanz, in: JSOS, 23 (1961); Friedman,
in: HJ, 7 (1945). Add. Bibliography: A. Laredo, Les Noms des Juifs
du Maroc, Essai donomastique Judeo-Marocaine (1978); H.W. Guggenheimer and E.H. Guggenheimer, Jewish Family Names and Their
Origins (1992); A. Ariel, The Book of Names The 200 Most Popular
Surnames in Israel (Heb., 1997); and the series These Are the Names:
Studies in Jewish Onomastics (ed. by A. Demsky et al., 1997 ).
the war Namias was appointed assistant director of the National Meteorological Center at Suitland, Maryland. Here he
developed methods for the study of weather phenomena in
three dimensions.
[Dov Ashbel]
770
namir, mordechai
*Jewish Agency, with Blanche Dugdale, that Namier, with his
pedantic insistence on the niceties of formulation and protocol, made his chief contribution to the Zionist cause. He
played a considerable role as an intermediary in obtaining
the Ramsay MacDonald Letter, which in fact canceled the
Passfield *White Paper of 1930. Thanks to his friendship with
Reginald Coupland, the author of the 1937 report of the Peel
Commission (the first British document to bring up the idea
of a Jewish state in a partitioned Palestine), Namier was able
to exercise a direct impact on matters of great political importance. He served for a time as deputy to Chaim Weizmann
on the Anglo-Jewish Committee for Refugees from Germany,
taking up a determined stand against the barons of AngloJewry. At the time of the St. James Conference on Palestine,
which resulted in the anti-Zionist White Paper of May 1939,
Namier insisted on a forceful Zionist policy toward the British
government, occasionally criticizing the line taken by Weizmann. On the outbreak of World War II he was on loan full
time from Manchester University to the Jewish Agency, for
which he worked until 1945. Namier kept aloof from the ideological struggles among the Zionist factions. He disliked the
religious parties and had close friends in the Labor leadership.
His Zionism was a romantic nationalism in the tradition of
Mazzini and Pilsudski the vision of a historic breakthrough
conceived in messianic terms but it lacked any Jewish cultural sustenance.
Namiers historical research may be classified under four
headings: the social-political structure of England in the 18t
century; the 1848 revolutions; the twilight of the Hapsburg
monarchy; and the international crisis leading up to World
War II. All four inquiries may be said to be variations on
one theme: cohesion versus disintegration. His chief work,
The Structure of Politics, is a microscopic examination of
the composition of the successive Houses of Commons under George III. His concern was with how politics are made
by members of a governing elite, to the neglect of intellectual
trends and social forces. Namiers biographical method was
applied to the great collective History of Parliament (initiated
by Whitehall and Westminister), of which he was coeditor.
In recognition of his achievement as an historian, Namier
was elected a member of the British Academy in 1944, was
knighted in 1952, and was invited to give the prestigious Romanes Lecture at Oxford. These honors went some way to assuage his feelings of disappointment at having been bypassed
for the Regius Professorship of Modern History at Oxford
University. The rather eccentric and intensely self-centered
outsider with strong and forcefully expressed likes and dislikes
scared off many contemporaries. There has long been speculation as to whether his academic disappointments, beginning with his failure to be elected to a fellowship at All Souls
College, Oxford, in 1912, was chiefly due to his foreign Jewish background or to his unpleasant and gauche personality.
While capable of deep emotions, he lacked flexibility and was
very vulnerable. After an unhappy first marriage, Namier married in church the former Julia de Beausobre, a daughter of the
Russian gentry who was deeply committed to the Greek Orthodox Church and had suffered in Soviet prisons and concentration camps (described in her book The Woman Who Could
Not Die, 1938). She played a great role in Namiers life.
Namier paid many visits to Palestine. His only visit to
the State of Israel took place in 1959 in connection with the
scheme for the publication of the Weizmann papers, in which
he took great interest. On that occasion he gave a memorable
address to the modern history seminar at the Hebrew University. It contained a kind of confession and testament and
was preceded by the Hebrew incantation If I forget thee, O
Jerusalem tearfully.
Namiers publications include Skyscrapers (1931); Additions and Corrections to Sir John Fortescues Edition of the Correspondence of King George III (1957); In the Margin of History
(1939); Conflicts (1942); 1848: The Revolution of the Intellectuals
(1946); Facing East (1947); Diplomatic Prelude (193839, 1948);
Europe in Decay (193640, 1950); Avenues of History (1952); In
the Nazi Era (1952); Personalities and Powers (1958); and Vanished Supremacies (1958).
771
namir, ora
modernization and development schemes. Namir remained
mayor and a Knesset member until 1969.
Among his writings are a book about Ah dut ha-Avodah,
Ah dut ha-Avodah: Maasef Mifleget Poalei Erez Yisrael (1946)
and one about his years as consul in Moscow, Shelih ut beMoskva: Yerah Devash u-Shenot Zaam (1972).
Bibliography: S. Honigman, Be-Shem ha-Ir u-be-Sherutah: Eser Shenot Kehunat Mordekhai Namir ke-Rosh Iriyyat Tel Aviv
(1973).
[Susan Hattis Rolef (2nd ed.)]
NAMIR (ne Toib), ORA (1930 ), Israeli politician, member of the Eighth to Thirteenth Knessets. Namir was born in
H aderah, and grew up in Moshav H oglah. In the War of Independence she served as an officer in Upper Galilee. During
the Second Knesset she served as the secretary of the Mapai
parliamentary group, and secretary of the coalition administration. In Israel she studied at the Lewinsky Seminary and
the Givat ha-Sheloshah Seminary. In 195457 she studied English literature at Hunter College in New York, and served as a
secretary with the Israeli delegation to the United Nations, in
the years when Abba *Eban was ambassador. When she returned to Israel she went back to her job in the Knesset, and
for a while worked as the secretary of the architects office
that was designing the new Knesset building, under Tel Aviv
architect Shimon Powsner. In 1959, she married Mordechai
*Namir, who was elected as Mapais first mayor of Tel Aviv in
that year, and started to work in the field of social work. In
196779 she was secretary of Naamat (the Histadrut womens
section) in Tel Aviv, serving also on the secretariat of national
Naamat (197074).
Namir was first elected on the Labor Alignment list to
the Knesset in 1973. In 1975, after her husband had passed
away, she was appointed by Prime Minister Yitzhak *Rabin as
chairperson of a committee of inquiry concerning the status
of women in Israel. The committee completed its work after
the 1977 political upheaval, and Namir presented its report to
Prime Minister Menah em *Begin in 1978. After the publication of this report, which pointed to widespread discrimination against women in Israel, the official approach to the subject started to change.
In the Ninth and Tenth Knessets, Namir served as chairperson of the Knesset Education and Culture Committee, and
in the Eleventh and Twelfth as chairperson of the Labor and
Welfare Committee, earning for herself the reputation of a
hard-working and highly demanding MK. Her hope to be appointed minister in the National Unity government formed
in 1988 was not fulfilled. The following year she considered
running for secretary-general of the Labor Party opposite
Micha Harish, but withdrew her candidacy claiming that the
competition was not fair. In the primaries to the Labor Party
leadership in February 1992 she contended opposite Yitzhak
*Rabin, Shimon *Peres, and Israel *Kessar, but received less
than five percent of the vote. In the government formed by
Rabin after the elections to the Thirteenth Knesset she was
772
at first appointed minister of the environment, and in December 1992, minister of labor and welfare. Namir ran in the
Labor primaries for the elections to the Fourteenth Knesset,
but even though she received a realistic place in the list, she
was offended by the fact that among the women Dalia *Itzik
came before her. She then resigned from the Thirteenth Knesset shortly before the elections, after being appointed ambassador to Beijing a position she held from 1996 to 2000.
[Susan Hattis Rolef (2nd ed.)]
NANCY, capital of Meurthe-et-Moselle department, northeastern France; former capital of the Duchy of *Lorraine. In
1286 the Jews acquired a cemetery at nearby Laxou. In 1341,
and later in 1455, several Jews settled in Nancy itself but were
expelled from the Duchy in 1477. The Jews temporarily reappeared in Nancy in 1595. Maggino Gabrieli, known as the consul-general of the Hebrew and Levantine nation, attempted
to establish two banks and a pawnshop in 16371643. In 1707
and 1712 Duke Leopold authorized three Jewish bankers from
*Metz to settle in Nancy, one of whom, Samuel *Lvy, became
the dukes chief tax collector in 1715. After Lvy fell into disgrace, there was a hostile reaction toward the Jews. Nevertheless, in 1721 an edict authorized 70 Jewish families to remain
in Lorraine, eight of them in Nancy and its surroundings. The
90 Jewish families in Nancy in 1789 (50 of whom were without
authorization) included such wealthy merchants and manufacturers as the *Alcan, Goudchaux, and Berr families from
whom the trustees of the Duchys Jewish community were
chosen. Herz *Cerfberr became squire of Tomblaine, and
*Berr Isaac Berr became the leader of the Ashkenazi Jews in
1789. There was a house of prayer in 1745, but it was not until 1788 that a synagogue was officially built, eight years after
the chief rabbi of Lorraine established himself in Nancy. (The
synagogue was renovated in 1842 and again in 1935.) Notable
among the chief rabbis of the consistory formed in 1808 were
Marchand Ennery and Solomon *Ullmann. With the influx
of refugees from Alsace and Moselle after 1870, the number
of Jews in Nancy increased to some 4,000 by the end of the
century. Nancy made important contributions to French Jewish cultural life. The prayer room of the Polish Jews was decorated by the artist *Man-Katz. Nancy was the birthplace of the
writer Andr *Spire and Nobel Prize winner F. *Jacob.
[Gilbert Cahen]
Holocaust Period
Many of Nancys prewar Jewish population (about 3,800 in
1939) fled the city under the German occupation. Those who
stayed were brutally persecuted. In three Aktionen in 194243,
130 Jews of foreign origin were arrested and deported, while
over 400 others who had fled to the free zone in the south
were arrested and deported after it was overrun by the Germans in 1942. Only 22 survivors returned. Among the old
French Jewish families, 250 victims were deported, of whom
only two survived. The majority were arrested on March 2,
1944, along with 72-year-old Chief Rabbi Haguenauer, who
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
naphtali
despite his being forewarned, refused to desert the members
of his community. A street in postwar Nancy bears his name.
The synagogue, as well as other buildings belonging to the
Jews, were plundered by the Nazis. The synagogue interior
was destroyed, while the holy books were sold to a rag collector. Several of the art works and books in the local Muse
Historique Lorrain and departmental archives were saved. After the war the community of Nancy rapidly recovered, and
by 1969 it had about 3,000 members with a full range of Jewish communal institutions. A chair for Hebrew studies was
set up at the university. In 1987, the community was said to
number 4,000.
[Georges Levitte]
Bibliography: Gross, Gal Jud, 400: C. Pfister, Histoire de
Nancy, 1 (1902), 67881; 3 (1908), 31038; A. Gain et. al., in: Revue
juive de Lorraine, 23 (192627); 911 (193335), passim; J. Godchot,
in: REJ, 86 (1928), 135. add. bibliography: Guide de judasme
franais (1987), 39; Jewish Travel Guide (2002), 73.
NANTES, city in Brittany, capital of the department of LoireAtlantique, western France. The first mention of Jews there
dates from 1234. In 1236 the Jews of Nantes, as well as those
in the rest of *Brittany and other provinces of western France,
were victims of a riot that broke out during the Sixth Crusade. The attack was followed by their expulsion in 1240. The
importance of the community is shown by the cemetery for
which evidence exists from 1231. The Rue des Juifs which the
community occupied still retains its name.
From the second half of the 16t century many Portuguese of *Marrano origin settled in Nantes. The Vaz, Mendez,
Rodriguez, and other families found here generally became
loyal Christians, whose members frequently chose an ecclesiastical career. Some Marranos whose sympathies remained
with Judaism occasionally passed through Nantes but did
not settle there. Thus, toward the end of the 16t century, Abraham dEspinoza, the grandfather of Baruch *Spinoza, stayed
in Nantes with a few members of his family before establishing himself in Holland. In 1636, however, several Portuguese
Jews of *Bayonne, expelled from this frontier town at the
time of the Franco-Spanish War, settled in Nantes. At the
end of the 18t century local merchants, led largely by the old
clothes dealers, leveled legal charges against several Jewish
merchants who were newly established in the town. Public
opinion sympathized with the Jews, however, as evidenced
in articles in the Journal de la Correspondence de Nantes of
1789 to 1791, and in the Feuille Nantaise of 1795. There were 25
Jewish families in Nantes in 180809. In 1834 they established
an organized community with a membership of 18 families.
A synagogue was built in 1870, and by 1898 there were about
50 families.
According to the census of 1942 carried out by the Vichy
government, there were 531 Jews in Nantes. By the beginning
of September 1943, the number had been reduced to 53 as a
result of arrests and deportations. At first, some Jews were arrested and imprisoned in the Caserne Richemont of Nantes,
but in January 1944 they were deported. After World War II,
In the Aggadah
Naomi was of outstanding beauty. She and Elimelech were
cousins, their fathers being the sons of Nahshon son of Amminadab. From this the rabbis taught, even the merit of ones
ancestor is of no avail when one emigrates from Erez Israel
(BB 91a). Naomi was so anxious to return to Erez Israel that
she set out on her journey barefoot and in rags. She did not
even stop to rest on the Sabbath (Ruth R. 2: 12). On the way
she taught Ruth the laws concerning proselytes (ibid.). She arrived in Beth-Lehem on the day of the funeral of Boazs wife
(BB 91a). In her youth Naomi had been a nurse to Boaz as
she later became a nurse to Ruths son, Obed (Lekah Tov on
Ruth 4:16). Proverbs 31:19 is interpreted to refer to Naomi who
brought Ruth under the wings of the Shekhinah (Mid. Hag.,
Gen. 23:1). She is thus included in the 22 women of valor enumerated by the rabbis (ibid.).
773
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naples
with II Sam. 24:6; I Kings 15:20; II Chron. 2:13; 16:4.) The importance of the tribe and the districts is perhaps expressed in
the appointment of the kings son-in-law as his officer there
(I Kings 4: 15). Apparently deriving from the same period is the
list of three levitical cities in Naphtali Kedesh, HammothDor, and Kartan (Josh. 21:32, with minor variants in I Chron.
6:61), which were religious and administrative centers set up
by the central government. One of the important fortresses
established in the days of Solomon was the city of Hazor in
the territory of Naphtali (I Kings 9:15). Information about the
tribe and its territory after the division of the kingdom is exceedingly scanty. From the little available it is clear that the
tribe suffered from the protracted conflict between the kingdoms of Israel and Aram. In the reign of Baasha, Ben-Hadad,
the king of Aram, invaded and conquered Ijon, Dan, AbelBeth-Maacah and all Chinneroth, with all the land of Naphtali (I Kings 15:20), and he may possibly have annexed them
to his kingdom. However, in the time of Omri and Ahab the
tribe was certainly liberated. In 732 B.C.E., Tiglath-Pileser III
conquered, among other places, all the land of Naphtali and
he carried the people captive to Assyria (II Kings 15:29). It is
reasonable to assume that he exiled only a section of the population, and that the territory, along with those remaining, was
annexed as an Assyrian province with its center at Megiddo. In
the days of Josiah, an attempt was made to reunite the northern tribes with the kingdom of the house of David, and apparently Naphtali was among them (II Chron. 34:6). However, it
proved unsuccessful owing to the death of Josiah at Megiddo
and the subsequent subjugation of the land.
775
naples
Jewish disorders incited by Dominican preachers occurred;
they reached their height in 1290 when serious outrages were
committed and a synagogue was converted into a church.
However, in 1330, Robert of Anjou invited Jews from the Balearic Islands to settle in Naples and in the rest of his kingdom,
promising them protection against annoyance and the same
taxation rights as those enjoyed by Christians. From 1442,
under the rule of Aragon, conditions for the Jews in Naples
and its surroundings were favorable, and attracted Jews from
various parts of Europe.
At the end of 1492 and the beginning of 1493, a large
influx of refugees from Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain found
temporary asylum in Naples. The Spanish refugees, undernourished and sick, probably introduced the pestilence in
1492 that struck down 20,000 persons in Naples alone. Among
the Spanish refugees who landed in Naples in 1492 was Don
Isaac *Abrabanel, who became fiscal adviser to King Ferdinand I and Alfonso II. In 1495 the Kingdom of Naples
was conquered by the Spanish and in 1496 a decree for the
expulsion of the Jews was issued, although it was not implemented. The expulsion of the Jews was definitively ordered
in 1510 and finally carried out: exception was made for 200
wealthy Jewish families who undertook to pay an annual tax
of 300 ducats to the crown. In 1515 the *New Christians were
also expelled from the kingdom. The 200 wealthy families,
who had been joined by others in 1520, had increased to 600
within the following decade. Although a new decree of expulsion was issued in 1533, permission was granted to the Jews
in November 1535 to reside in Naples for a further ten years
against the payment of 10,000 ducats. However, the agreement was not respected by Emperor Charles V, and in 1541 he
ordered the total expulsion of the Jews; this coincided with
the establishment of a Christian loan bank (*Monte di Piet)
in Naples.
It was not until 1735, when the kingdom passed to the
Bourbons, that Jews were readmitted into Naples and the vicinity by an edict signed by Charles IV on Feb. 3, 1740. However, following pressure by Jesuits and the Church, the few
Jews who had accepted the invitation were again expelled
(Sept. 18, 1746). In 1822, under the suggestion of Metternich,
the Austrian premier, Solomon de Rothschild had his brother,
Karl Mayer von *Rothschild of Frankfurt on the Main, settled
in Naples as court banker of the Bourbons. There Rothschild
did much to help the ruling dynasty economically, and he
pushed for a liberalization of the government. Rothschild resided in Villa Acton-Pignatelli in Via Chiaia. Rothschilds task
came to an end in 1860, when Garibaldi conquered Naples. By
then a small Jewish community had developed around Rothschild. Religious services began to be held in Naples in 1831,
but a synagogue was not opened until June 1864. The synagogue located in the Palazzo Sessa was inaugurated in 1864
thanks to the influence of Baron Rothschild. In the entrance
there are two marble statues; one in honor of the community
president Dario Ascarelli who bought the premises for the
synagogue in 1910 and the other which commemorates the
Hebrew Printing
A Hebrew press was established in Naples not later than 1485,
and in the decade which followed nearly 20 books were published, making the city one of the most important cradles of
Hebrew *incunabula. Naples was then a center of general book
printing and the book trade, and wealthy members of the Jewish community including immigrants from Spain and Portugal, financed the publishing of Hebrew books. The first Jewish
printer there was the German Joseph b. Jacob *Gunzenhausen, who was followed in 1490 by Joshua Solomon *Soncino.
A third printer was Isaac b. Judah ibn Katorzo (of Calatayud in Spain). The first book published (in 1487) was Psalms
with David Kimh is commentary, followed by Proverbs with
a commentary by Immanuel of Rome (n.d.), and the rest of
the Hagiographa in 1488. A Pentateuch (with Rashi), the Five
Scrolls, and the Antiochus *Scroll appeared in 1491. The first
printed edition of Abraham ibn Ezras Pentateuch commentary came out in 1488; Nah manides Pentateuch commentary
was printed in 1490 by Katorzo; and that of Bah ya b. Asher in
1492. The magnificent first edition of the entire Mishnah (with
Maimonides commentary) was published in 1492. Halakhic
works included Jacob Landaus Agur (n.d.), the first Hebrew
work with approbations (*Haskamot) and the second printed
in the lifetime of the author (who was one of Gunzenhausens
typesetters); the first edition of the Kol Bo (n.d.); and Kimh is
Sefer ha-Shorashim was published by Gunzenhausen in 1490,
and by Soncino (and Katorzo?) in 1491. Bah ya b. Joseph ibn
Paqudas Duties of the Heart (H ovot ha-Levavot) appeared
in 1489, and Nah manides Shaar ha-Gemul in 1490. Of particular interest are Perez Trabots Makre Dardekei (1488), a
14t-century Hebrew glossary with Italian, Arabic, and also
French, Provenal, and German translations; Kalonymus b.
Kalonymus satirical Even Boh an (1489); a Hebrew grammar,
Petah Devarai (1492); a five-volume Hebrew translation of
Avicennas medical canon Ha-Kanon ha-Gadol printed for
the first and only time. The fourth edition of Dantes Divina
776
deportation of Neapolitan Jews during World War II. Restoration was carried out in 1992.
[Ariel Toaff / Samuele Rocca (2nd ed.)
napoleon bonaparte
Commedia was published by an anonymous Jewish printer
in Naples in 1477.
Bibliography: Roth, Italy, passim; Milano, Italia, passim;
E. Munkacsi, Der Jude von Neapel (Zurich, 1939); N. Ferorelli, Ebrei
nellItalia meridionale (1915), passim; idem, in: Vessillo Israelitico, 54
(1906), 397401, 46674; 63 (1915), 1467; Sacerdote, in: RMI, 31 (1965),
9096; L. Poliakov, Banquiers juifs et le Saint-Siege (1965), 1915.
PRINTING: J. Bloch, Hebrew Printing in Naples (1942) (= New York
Public Library Bulletin, June 1942); D.W. Amram, Makers of Hebrew
Books in Italy (1909), 63ff.; H.D. Friedberg, Toledot ha-Defus ha-Ivri
be-Italyah (1956), 4950; Roth, Renaissance, 1702, 176; A.M. Habermann, Ha-Madpisim Benei Soncino (1933), 2530, 3536. add. bibliography: D., Abulafia, Il Mezzogiorno peninsulare dai Bizantini
allespulsione (1541), in: C. Vivanti (ed.), Gli ebrei in Italia I, Storia
dItalia, Annali, 11 (1996) 546; C. Giordano and I. Kahn, Gli Ebrei in
Pompeii, in Ercolano e nelle citta della campania Felix (1965), 2023,
3540; V. Giura, Gli ebrei nel regno di Napoli tra Aragona e Spagna,
in: Ebrei e Venezia (1987), 77180; E. Serao, Nuove iscrizioni da un
sepolcro giudaico di Napoli, in: Puteoli, 1213 (198889), 10317; A.
Silvestri, Gli ebrei nel Regno di Napoli durante la dominazione aragonese, in: Campania sacra, 18 (1987), 2177.
777
778
Western Powers in Palestine as occupying an important international position. From a social-cultural point of view, the
importance of the campaign was much more limited. However, this was the first substantial contact made between the
inhabitants of Palestine and Westerners since the destruction
of Crusader Acre.
[Abraham J. Brawer]
NAQUET, ALFRED JOSEPH (18341916), French chemist and republican politician. Born at Carpentras, Vaucluse,
Naquet became professor of chemistry at the Polytechnic Institute at Palermo in 1863 and later professor of medicine in
Paris. He participated in the 1867 Peace Conference at Geneva, where he spoke out against the French Empire and
was imprisoned for 15 months. Naquet was again imprisoned
following the publication of Rligion, Proprit, Famille in
1869, in which he opposed religious marriage, and was also
deprived of his civic rights. Following his release he went to
Spain but returned to France in 1870, working for the republican government in Tours. In 1871 he was elected deputy for
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
narbonne
Vaucluse, and from 1882 was a member of the senate. Naquet
represented the left wing of the Assembly and the Senate and
repeatedly pressed for legislation on divorce, the laws of 1884
being known as the loi Naquet. His support for General
Boulanger in 1888 did considerable harm to his career, and
following allegations of complicity in the Panama scandal, he
fled to England. Although subsequently vindicated, Naquet
did not take any further part in French politics. His writings
include Principes de chimie fonds sur les thories modernes
(1865); Le Divorce (1877); LHumanit et la patrie (1901); La
Rpublique radicale (1873); and Socialisme collectiviste et socialisme libral (1890).
[Samuel Aaron Miller]
NARA (also ONR: Obz Narodowo-Radykalny: NationalRadical Camp), a nationalistic, antisemitic organization in
Poland, formed on April 14, 1934. The group was organized
by youth who seceded from the *Endecja (ND) Party, which
was also antisemitic. Whereas ND was anti-German, NARA, inspired and supported by the Nazis, wanted to serve as a bridge
between the antisemitic ideologies of both Germany and Poland. The program of NARA envisaged a fascist regime modeled on the Nazi plan. It called for the assimilation of the Slavic
minorities in Poland (Ukrainians, Belorussians), and the expulsion of Jews by means of economic boycott, by seizing
their sources of living, confiscating their assets, and denying
them all civil rights. With such forceful economic measures
against Jews, NARA aimed to win the sympathy of the masses
during a critical economic period and, at the same time, form
a strong movement in oppositon to *Pilsudskis regime. The
membership of NARA embraced mainly city youth and university students. After widespread terrorist activities against
Jews, particularly Jewish students, NARA was dissolved by the
government (July 10, 1934) and its newspaper Sztafeta, prohibited. The group continued its illegal activities, supported and
increased by various rightist groups, until it met with complete
defeat in the municipal elections of December 1938.
[Michael Avi-Yonah]
NARBONNE, town in S. France, 5 mi. (8 km.) from the Mediterranean. The capital of medieval Septimania, Narbonne was
ruled successively by the Visigoths (413?), the Saracens (719),
and the Franks (759). About 900 it became the possession of
the local viscount. In 1508 Louis XII of France annexed it to
his domains. The earliest written evidence of a Jewish presence
in France, from about 471, comes from Narbonne. Sidonius
Apollinaris, bishop of *Clermont, entrusted a Jew by the name
of Gozolas and a customer of Magnus Felix of Narbonne, with
a letter for the latter. Jews are not mentioned again in Narbonne until a *Church council was held there in 589, which
forbade Jews, under penalty of a heavy fine, to recite prayers
aloud, even in Jewish funeral processions (canon 9, in Mansi,
Collectio, IX, 1016). Soon after (597) Pope *Gregory I ordered
an inquiry into a report that four captive Christian brothers
had been bought by Jews of Narbonne who held them in their
service. The earliest known inscription relating to the Jews of
France also comes from Narbonne. It is an epitaph in Latin,
including the phrase Peace to Israel in Hebrew, to three siblings who died either at the same time or within a short period of one another, probably victims of a plague recorded in
Septimania at about the same period.
While there is no information about the Jews of Narbonne during the period of Muslim occupation, a legendary
tradition of the 12t and 13t centuries tells of the election of
Jewish kings there when the town was taken by Ppin the
Short in 759. According to some sources (Philomena, Gesta
Caroli Magni ad Carcassonam; Milh emet Mitzvah of *Meir
779
NARBATA, Jewish district E. of Caesarea, which perhaps inherited the name of Arubboth in the third district of Solomon
(I Kings 4:10); it appears in the Book of Maccabees (I Macc.
5:23) as Arbatta, a city from which Simeon evacuated Jews at
the beginning of the Hasmonean revolt. In 66 C.E., the Jews of
Caesarea moved to the toparchy of Narbata because of persecution (Jos., Wars. 2:291). It is mentioned (in a different form)
in the Jerusalem Talmud as the site of an inn (Ber. 6:1, 10b).
The district of Narbata was inhabited by a mixture of Jews,
Samaritans, and pagans. It is identified with Khirbat Bayds,
where there are remains of a town of the Roman period.
Bibliography: Avi-Yonah, Geog, 127 (incl. bibl.).
narbonne
Simeon ha-Meili), Jews helped to drive out the Muslims and
as a sure means of appreciation, were granted the right to be
governed by a Jewish king. Another source (the addition
to the Sefer ha-Kabbalah of Abraham *Ibn Daud) states that
Charlemagne invited a certain Machir to become the founder
of the dynasty of Jewish kings. Although this princely dynasty is confirmed authentically only from the 11t or 12t centuries, the Jews held freehold properties by 768. Pope Stephen
III in a letter addressed to Aribert, archbishop of Narbonne,
was critical of the fact that Jews, by virtue of the privileges
granted by the kings of France, not only owned alodial properties in both the towns and their surroundings, but also employed Christians to work in their vineyards and fields. At
the close of the ninth century King Charles III the Simple
(898923) tried to dispossess the Jews of Narbonne of their estates, at first those that had been recently acquired from Christians, and later all others. These measures did not remain in
force for long, and a short while later Jews again owned property, including mills which they also worked.
The partition of jurisdiction over the town between the
viscount and the archbishop resulted in the emergence of two
distinct groups of Jews, from the point of view of their civic
administration (among themselves the Jews formed a single community). In the 11t century Archbishop Pons dArce
nominated two Jews as toll gatherers. Between 1134 and 1143
clashes which broke out as a result of differences between Ermengarde, viscountess of Narbonne, and Alphonse Jourdain,
count of Toulouse, worsened the situation of Narbonnes Jews,
and many of them then emigrated to *Anjou, *Poitou, and to
the kingdom of France. According to the addition to the Sefer
ha-Kabbalah, the Jews of Narbonne numbered 2,000 around
1143; in 1161 Benjamin of Tudela mentions 300 Jews there (but
since this figure probably refers to heads of families there was
probably a Jewish population of some 1,500). In 1163 Jews were
the objects of attacks by the Spanish crusaders but were protected by both Viscount Brenger and Archbishop Guiffrey.
The Jewish quarter of the viscounty (known as Grande
Juiverie, Jouzaigas Majours, etc.), which was of considerable
size, situated to the north of the present Place de lHotel de
Ville and Cours de la Rpublique, did not constitute a closed
quarter and non-Jews and Jews lived side by side. From 1217
the Jews benefited from a very advantageous charter granted
by the viscount, in which they were represented by ten arbitrators. Although the Jewish quarter under the archbishops jurisdiction, situated in the Belvze quarter, did not obtain such
an advantageous charter until 1284, the two Jewish sections
shared all community resources. In the viscounty there were
at least two synagogues, a hospital, baths, and workrooms, and
in the archbishopric there was a cemetery, known as Mont judaque (or Montjuzaic), some of whose epitaphs were found
and preserved in the museum.
In 1236 a petty brawl between a Jew and a fisherman that
ended in an accidental homicide set off an anti-Jewish riot
which was rapidly suppressed by Viscount Aimeri IV, who ordered the restitution of all objects stolen during the pillage. The
780
narkiss, bezalel
liturgic poet (first half of the 13t century); Moses b. Joseph
b. Merwan ha-Levi, teacher of (among others) Abraham b.
David; Meir b. Simeon ha-Meili, author of Milh emet Mitzvah
(middle of the 13t century); and Maestro David de Caslari,
physician and poet famous for his commentary on *Maimonides Guide; and *Moses b. Joshua b. Har David Narboni
(late 13t century). There were others who stayed for a time in
Narbonne or who were born there but whose activities were
restricted to other places. Numerous personalities later bore
the surname *Narboni. The 13t-century Jewish troubadour,
Bofilh, also came from Narbonne.
From the beginning of the 18t century, Jewish merchants from Avignon were authorized to visit Narbonne four
times a year in order to trade there for a period of one month
each time. From the close of the 18t century Jews settled in
the town as permanent residents. On the eve of World War II
there were hardly any Jews in Narbonne, as was still the situation in subsequent decades.
Bibliography: Neubauer, Geog. 365; A. Berliner, in: Jahresbericht des Rabbiner-Seminars zu Berlin pro 5643 (18821883), 54; J.
Obermeyer, Die Landschaft Babylonien im Zeualter des Talmuds und
des Gaonates (1929), 30612. Add. Bibliography: B. Eshel, Jewish
Settlements in Babylonia during Talmudic Times (1979), 19193.
[Bernhard Blumenkranz]
[Moshe Beer]
781
narkiss, mordechai
into a specialized academic discipline. He stressed the relationship of the style to that of the general art of the region,
while pointing to specific Jewish elements and iconography.
The Center for Jewish Art at the Hebrew University, founded
and initially led by him (197991), established the Journal
of Jewish Art (now Jewish Art) and he served as its editor in
197486. He worked towards the computerization of the Index, while concomitantly encouraging the continuing documentation of Jewish art around the world. He also encouraged
documentation and preservation activities in areas of Eastern
Europe and the former Soviet Union that had been less accessible before 1989. As a result of his activity, a school of students and researchers has evolved since the mid-1980s and
the study of Jewish art as a discipline has spread from Israel
to Europe and the United States. For this significant work he
was awarded the Israel Prize in 1999. From 1999 he was a visiting scholar at Princeton and the National Gallery of Art in
Washington, DC. Narkiss published widely on the subject of
illuminated Hebrew Manuscripts, and his major work on the
subject, Hebrew Illuminated Manuscripts, has appeared in
several editions.
Bibliography: Bezalel Narkiss, List of Publications, in:
Jewish Art, 23/24 (199798), xvxviii; G. Sed-Rajna, From Bezalel to
Bezalel, in: Jewish Art, 23/24 (199798), xixiv; Y. Zirlin, The Publications of Bezalel Narkiss, in: Jewish Art 12/13 (198687), 34950.
[Susan Nashman Fraiman (2nd ed.)]
NAROT, JOSEPH (19131980), U.S. Reform rabbi and communal leader. Narot, who was born in Vilna, immigrated with
his family to Ohio where he grew up and was educated. He was
ordained by Hebrew Union College in 1940. He served first as
assistant rabbi (194041), then as rabbi (194150) of Temple
Beth Israel in Atlantic City, New Jersey. In 1950 he became
rabbi of Temple Israel, Miami, that citys oldest Reform synagogue. In Atlantic City, Narot was active in UJA drives and
was founder and president of the Atlantic City Forum, composed of 60 civic organizations. He continued to divide his
time between Jewish and civic concerns in Miami where he
was member and chairman of the Dade County Community
Board (196468). He was also president of the Dade County
Welfare Planning Council (196163) and a founder of the Interfaith Agency for Social Justice.
[Gladys Rosen]
NARROWE, MORTON (1932 ), rabbi. Born in Philadelphia in the U.S., Narrowe came to Sweden in 1965 as rabbi for
the Stockholm Jewish congregation, becoming chief rabbi in
1975 and emeritus in 1998. He was a member of the Swedish
Bible Commission from 1974 to 2000 and in 1975 cofounded
the Joint Jewish-Christian Interfaith Council. In 1977 he published a book entitled Handledning fr srjande (Guidelines
for the Bereaved) and in 1990 he received his doctorate at the
Jewish Theological Seminary of America. His thesis, Zionism
in Sweden: From Its Beginning until the End of World War I,
782
nash papyrus
provides unique insight into early Zionist history in Sweden.
Rabbi Narrowe also wrote numerous newspaper and magazine articles about Jews and Judaism, and participated in many
radio and TV programs.
Bibliography: Svensk-judisk litteratur 17751994 en litteraturhistorisk versikt (1995).
[Ilya Meyer (2nd ed.)]
NASATIR, ABRAHAM PHINEAS (19041991), U.S. historian. Born in Santa Ana, California, Nasatir taught at the
University of Iowa and then moved to San Diego State College. He was a fellow of the Social Science Research Council
and president of the Pacific Coast Branch of the American
Historical Association.
Nasatir specialized in the history of the United States
West and Southwest, and published Before Lewis and Clark
(2 vols., 1952). He edited Etienne Derbecs A French Journalist in the California Gold Rush (1964). Later his interest in the
southwest expanded beyond the U.S. frontier to include Hispanic America and led to a history of that area, together with
Helen M. Baily, Latin America (1960, 19682). He was active in
Jewish affairs.
In 1965 he received the Outstanding Professor Award
from the California State University Foundation. The Nasatir
Professorship of Modern Jewish History was established in
his honor at San Diego State University, where Nasatir taught
history for 46 years and was active in the community as an
advocate of Jewish education.
His writings include French Activities in California
(1945); with G.E. Monell, French Consuls in the United States
(1967); with N.M. Loomis, Pedro Vial and the Roads to Santa
Fe (1967); Spanish War Vessels on the Mississippi, 17921796
(1968); Borderland in Retreat (1976); and The Imperial Osages
(with G. Din, 1983).
Bibliography: Contemporary Authors, 1112 (1965), 287.
[Stanley J. Stein / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)]
NASAUD (Rom. Nasaud; Hung. Naszd), town in BistritaNasaud county (Transylvania), Romania. Until 1918 and between 1940 and 1945, Nasaud was part of Hungary. While still
under Hungarian rule, it was a center of the Romanian nationalist movement. Jews settled in Nasaud after the law prohibiting their settlement was abrogated in 1848 while residence in
the town itself was still barred. Jews lived in the nearby village
of Jidovitza (Entredam), today named *Rebreanu. The community was Orthodox and strongly influenced by *H asidism.
In 1885 the government designated the community as the administrative center for the Jews of all the villages in the district. At the beginning of their residence in Nasaud the Jews
belonged to two different communities: the Hungarian and
the Polish. This situation lasted until the 1880s, when they
decided to unite the congregations. The community possessed
a large synagogue, a bet midrash, and a h eder. Jewish children
attended elementary and secondary school in which the language of instruction was Romanian. The Jewish population in
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
Nasaud itself declined from 859 in 1866 to 425 (12 of the total)
in 1930, and 415 (12.9) in 1940. Between the two world wars
there was an important Zionist movement in the town. There
were 1,198 Jews living in the surrounding villages in 1930. Some
400 Jews were deported to Auschwitz in the summer of 1944.
In 1941 the Hungarian Horthiite authorities deported the foreign Jews to Kamenets-Podolski, in the Ukraine, where they
were soon murdered by the Nazis. In 1944 the remaining local
Jews were sent to a ghetto in Bistrita, the district capital, and
from there deported to Auschwitz. After World War II, about
110 Jews returned to Nasaud, including former residents who
had survived the camps and some who had previously lived in
the surrounding district. As a result of immigration to Israel
and elsewhere, the Jewish population dwindled and by 1971
only two families were left in the town.
[Yehouda Marton / Paul Schveiger (2nd ed.)]
NASH PAPYRUS, a second-century (c. 150) B.C.E. papyrus fragment written in square Hebrew script, containing
the *Decalogue and the *Shema. The Nash Papyrus was the
oldest biblical text known before the discovery of the *Dead
Sea Scrolls. A single sheet, not from a scroll, was purchased
from an Egyptian dealer by W.L. Nash, secretary of the Society of Biblical Archaeology in England, and published by
S.A. Cooke in 1903. The papyrus is of unknown provenance,
although allegedly from Fayyum. The text of the Decalogue
accords closely with the Septuagint of Exodus (20:2ff.), and
must resemble the Hebrew that underlay the Septuagint trans-
783
nashville
lation (see table of variants in article *Decalogue). The Shema
follows (Deut. 6:45), including the Septuagints preliminary
to verse 4: And these are the statutes and the judgments that
Moses (so Nash; LXX, the Lord) commanded [the Israelites]
in the wilderness when they left the land of Egypt. The papyrus breaks off after the second letter of verse 5. The combination of the Decalogue and the Shema indicates that the text
of the papyrus represents the Torah readings included in the
daily morning liturgy of Second Temple times (cf. Tam. 5:1:
they recited the Decalogue, the Shema, etc.).
784
nasi, gracia
was recognized as political head (Patriarch) of the people
by the Roman government (Cod. Theod. xvi. 8), an arrangement that allowed for more effective control and administration of its Jewish subjects. From the Jewish point of view,
the Patriarchate provided the people with a Roman official
sympathetic to their needs, and it placed significant power in
rabbinic hands. The rabbis, for their part, relaxed certain religious laws so as to allow the patriarch greater ease in Roman
society. Internally, the nasi presided over the Sanhedrin, fixed
the calendar together with the court by proclaiming the new
month and intercalating the year, led public prayers for rain,
and ordained scholars (the content and scope of this ordination being somewhat unclear). He kept in touch with the
Jewish communities of the Diaspora, dispatching apostles to
preach, teach, set up courts, and raise funds. His court possessed legislative powers, and so most takkanot (enactments)
were attributed to the presiding nasi.
[Gerald Y. Blidstein]
Post-Geonic Period
The title nasi persisted for many centuries and in different
lands throughout the Middle Ages, sometimes as the title of
a defined head of a Jewish institution, sometimes as an honorific title only, given to important personages and to sons of
illustrious families. The nasi as the leader of the community
(see *Autonomy) is found in Jerusalem; in Fostat, Egypt; in
Baghdad, Damascus, and Mosul, Syria; and in Spain under
Muslim rule. Some had considerable power, similar to that
of the exilarch, especially the nesiim of Erez Israel, Syria, and
Egypt. The earliest person known in the post-geonic period
to bear this title is Z emah in Egypt or Syria, with the latest Sar
Shalom b. Phinehas, who is mentioned in 1341 in Egypt and
Baghdad. Most of the other twenty-odd names are from the
11t century, among them *Daniel b. Azariah, *David b. *Daniel, and Jedidiah b. Zakkai. One, Shem Tov, a most respected
nasi of Jerusalem, could not prove Davidic descent and was
exiled. Some nesiim in Muslim Spain were appointed by the
court and repesented the Jews at court, collected taxes, and
acted as chief justices. The *Karaites also called their heads
nasi, from their founder *Anan b. David through the 18t century. From early modern times the title nasi was also given
to the heads of the *kolel institutions of the *H alukkah. In
later modern times the title president, especially of democratic political and social bodies, was translated into Hebrew
as nasi; as such it has been carried over into the political nomenclature of the State of Israel, being used to designate the
president of the State.
[Isaac Levitats]
785
nasi, joseph
dame juive de la Renaissance: Gracia Mendesia Nasi (1929); P. Grunebaum-Ballin, Joseph Naci duc de Naxos (1968), passim; Ginsberger,
in: REJ, 83 (1930), 17992.
[Cecil Roth]
SAMUEL
(AGOSTINHO MICAS)
d. 1525
SAMUEL
(MOSES)
d. 1569
786
GRACIA
BENVENISTE FAMILY
GRACIA
(BEATRICE de LUNA)
c. 1510 1569
JOSEPH
(JOO MICAS)
c. 1524 1579
FRANCISCO
MENDES
d. 1537
REYNA
(BRIANDA)
d. c. 1599
DIOGO
MENDES
d. c. 1542
REYNA
(BRIANDA
de LUNA)
nasna
Nasi encouraged Jewish scholarship by his patronage of
various scholars, such as Moses *Almosnino who composed
his Treatise on Dreams at Nasis request; the physician
*Amatus Lusitanus, who dedicated his fifth Centuria to Nasi;
Isaac *Akrish, whom he supported when he was impoverished
by the Constantinople fire of 1569; and Isaac Onkeneira, his
translator and director of the yeshivah and synagogue that
he maintained at Belvedere. A fine library from which some
manuscripts still survive adjoined these institutions. Josephs
only independent literary production, edited by the same Isaac
Onkeneira, was his Ben Porat Yosef (Constantinople, 1577) a
polemic against astrology, which records a dispute he had with
certain Christian dignitaries.
In 1569 Nasi threw his powerful influence on the side of
the war party in Constantinople, and was considered to be
mainly responsible for the Turkish war against Venice over
Cyprus. It was reported that the sultan had promised to make
him king of this island, though it would remain a Turkish fief.
Some suggest that Nasi thus planned to provide a political solution to the Jewish problem of the day. Although the Turks
conquered Cyprus in 1571 they suffered a naval disaster at Lepanto, in consequence of which the peace party led by Grand
Vizier Mehemet Sokolli gained the ascendant. Nasis influence henceforth waned, though he remained in possession
of his dignities and privileges until his death. The balance of
his achievement was disappointing, due to his inconstancy of
purpose. It is difficult to decide what credence can be placed in
the Spanish report that he repented of his action in abandoning Christianity and desired to return to Western Europe.
Joseph was survived by his widow, REYNA, duchess of
Naxos (d. c. 1599), who maintained his library and allowed
scholars access to it. In 1592 she set up a printing press in her
palace at Belvedere. It was directed by Joseph b. Isaac Ashkeloni, and operated until 1594; it operated again from 1597
to 1599. Some 12 works, commemorating Reynas generosity
on the title page, were issued from the press.
Bibliography: C. Roth, House of Nasi: The Duke of Naxos
(1948); P. Grunebaum-Ballin, Joseph Naci, duc de Naxos (1968); J.
Reznik, Le Duc Joseph de Naxos (1936); A. Galant, Don Joseph Nasi,
Duc de Naxos, daprs de nouveaux documents (1913); idem, in: REJ, 64
(1912), 23643; M.A. Levy, Don Joseph Nasi, Herzog von Naxos, seine
Familie, und zwei juedische Diplomaten seiner Zeit (1859); P. Wittek, in:
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 14 (1952), 3813;
Arce, in: Sefarad, 13 (1953), 25786; Kaufmann, in: JQR, 2 (1889/90),
2917; 4 (1891/92), 50912; 13 (1900/01), 52032; Besohn, in: MGWJ,
18 (1869), 4224; Rahn, ibid., 28 (1879), 11321.
[Cecil Roth]
Holocaust Period
During the Nazi occupation, Nasielsk belonged to Bezirk
Zichenau, established and incorporated into East Prussia by
Hitlers decree of Oct. 26, 1939. Before World War II Nasielsk
had about 3,000 Jews. During the bombardment of the town,
a considerable number of Jews fled eastward. After the Germans entered, the Jewish community there existed for only
three months. Existing data leave doubt whether the Jews were
deported in one mass Aktion (deportation) on Dec. 3, 1939,
or in two deportations, beginning in September or October.
Some of the victims were shut up for a day or more in the local synagogue, beaten, and herded to the station. They were
loaded onto trains and dispatched to Lukow, Mezhirech, and
Biala Podlaska railroad stations. There they were driven out
of the train and dispersed among various towns in the Lublin
region of the General Government. Some of them reached
the Warsaw Ghetto, where many Jews from Nasielsk, refugees
from the first days of the war, already lived. After the deportation from Nasielsk, the local Germans and soldiers seized all
Jewish property. Only about 80 Jews from Nasielsk survived
the Holocaust.
[Danuta Dombrowska]
NASNA (generally referred to in Hungarian Jewish historiography as Nznnfalva), village near Trgu-Mure in Transylvania, Romania, within Hungary to 1918 and from 1940 to
1945. With the exception of *Alba-Iulia, Nasna had the oldest
Jewish community within the borders of historic Transylvania. The first reliable information about the Jews there dates
from 1601. Several were members of the Turkish Sephardi
community and had family or communal connections with
Jews in Alba-Iulia. The curious wooden synagogue of Nasna,
of which only the eastern wall was constructed of brick, was
apparently built in 1747 (or according to some opinions in 1757
or 1785). The exterior resembled a granary or warehouse and
the walls, ceiling, pillars, and platform were painted and ornamented in the style of the contemporary church decoration of
the local Unitarians. Quotations from the Psalms and prayers
were inscribed on the walls and ceiling. The synagogue was
787
nassau
completely demolished in 1940. Some of the decorated boards
which were salvaged were transferred to the Jewish Museum
in Budapest. Members of the Nasna community were among
the first Jews to settle in Trgu-Mure from which Jews had
been excluded until 1848. After the prohibition was abolished
the Jewish population of Nasna dwindled. During the Holocaust the last two Jewish residents were deported to the ghetto
in Trgu-Mures (and from there to their deaths). After World
War II the Jewish community of Nasna was not revived.
Bibliography: M. Avi-Shaul, in: Reshumot, 4 (1926), 38790;
F. Lwy, in: Magyar Zsid Almanach (1911), 1447; G. Balzs, in: Libanon (Hung., 1941).
[Yehouda Marton]
788
nasz przegld
ploded in the *Sinai Campaign. In spite of Egypts total military defeat, Nasser, mainly with Soviet support, succeeded in
converting it, at least in the eyes of his devoted followers, into
a political victory that enhanced his prestige.
In 1956 and 1965 Nasser was the only candidate for presidential election. In the course of his reforms, Nasser nationalized the Egyptian press and removed his enemies and critics
from influential positions. Over the years his anti-imperialist policy became more and more pro-Soviet, until Egypt became so dependent on the U.S.S.R. in military and economic
spheres (heavy armament deliveries, military advisers, the
construction of the Aswan Dam and of individual industrial
plants, etc.) that in May 1967 Moscow was able to lead Nasser
into the adventurous steps that provoked the *Six-Day War.
After the defeat, Nasser resigned (on June 9) for a few hours,
but reassumed power in response to mass demonstrations in
the streets of Cairo demanding the continuation of his leadership. He tried to place the blame for the defeat on the senior military echelons, including his vice president, Marshal
Abdel H akm Amer, who committed suicide. Other military
leaders were convicted in show trials, and Nasser held a new
election to the Arab Socialist Union.
After 1967 Nasser visited the U.S.S.R. several times. In
his public pronouncements about Israel, he was careful to formulate the aim of Israels destruction in non-explicit terms,
though from time to time, particularly just before the Six-Day
War, he left no doubt that this was the real aim of his policy.
This again became clear at the Arab Summit Conference in
Khartoum (Aug. 29Sept. 2, 1967), when he initiated the policy
of pledging the Arabs not to recognize Israel, not to negotiate with her, and not to conclude peace agreements with her.
Nasser maintained that Egypts acceptance of the Nov. 22, 1967
Security Council resolution was compatible with the three
noes of Khartoum, but he interpreted the resolution as demanding an Israeli withdrawal from all occupied territories
without negotiations and a peace treaty. When his policy failed
to achieve any effective pressure on Israel, he renewed military
attacks along the Suez Canal zone. When this failed to achieve
its aim and ultimately turned into military setbacks for Egypt,
in August 1970 Nasser accepted a U.S. initiative for a limited
cease-fire period and indirect negotiations with Israel, under
the Security Council resolution, in exchange for an Israeli acceptance of the principle of withdrawal from occupied territories. Nasser died suddenly in September 1970 before the new
stage of his policy bore any fruit.
Nasser was adept at adjusting his personal image and
tone to whomever he addressed, so that while in Arab eyes
he was the incarnation of the fight against Israel and for Arab
glory, many Western circles and media were impressed by his
reasonableness and moderation. This diversity became particularly evident when, on the one hand, he gave an Indian
newspaper editor a copy of the Protocols of the *Elders of Zion
as an explanation of the Jewish world conspiracy, while on
the other, with Western people, he continuously stressed that
he clearly distinguished between Jewry and Zionism. These
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 14
declarations notwithstanding, Egypts Jews suffered persecution and humiliation during his rule, chiefly after Egypts defeat in 1967.
Bibliography: P. Mansfield, Nasser (Eng., 1969), incl. bibl.:
M.H. Kerr, Egypt under Nasser (1968), incl. bibl.; R. St. John, The Boss
(1960); J. Joesten, Nasser: The Rise to Power (1960); W. Wynn, Nasser
of Egypt (1959); K. Wheelock, Nassers New Egypt (1960), incl. bibl.; E.
Beeri, Army Officers in Arab Politics and Society (1969).
789
nasz przegld
and publicists, such as Samuel *Hirschhorn, Florian Sokolow,
Fishel *Rotenstreich, Janusz *Korczak, the political writer Bernard Singer (who wrote under the pseudonym Regnis), and
the historians Majer *Balaban and Emanuel *Ringelblum. Several prominent progressive Polish intellectuals worked within
the framework of the newspaper, including the philologist
Baudouin de Courtenay and the journalist W. Rzymowski. It
had many Polish non-Jews among its readers.
Nasz Przegld was not a campaigning newspaper and
did not take a fixed ideological stand, developing a tendency
to adapt to the changing political situation. The members of
its staff differed in their outlooks, although the pro-Zionist
trend was marked. While Nasz Przegld supported the Polonization of Jewish culture, many of the Jewish intelligentsia
790
Restored family houses from the talmudic era (3rd5th centuries c.e.) found
at Kazerin
in the Golan Heights. Photo: Z. Radovan, Jerusalem.
.
archaeology
(opposite page):
MasadaBackdrop of the
aerial view of Herods
reconstructed palace.
Photo: Albatross Aerial
Photography.
(this page): A mosaic of
the Galilean Mona Lisa,
found at Zippori, early
3rd century c.e.
Photo: Dinu Mendrea.
Bas relief of a menorah from the 3rd century c.e., Bet Shearim, which became a
center of Jewish learning as attested in rabbinic literature. Photo: Hanan Isachar.
A capital from the synagogue in Kazerin
with symbols of the menorah and the four species,
.
from the talmudic era (3rd5th centuries c.e.) Photo Katzerin Museum, Israel.
Interior of the Shrine of the Book housing the Dead Sea Scrolls, at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, designed by
American architects Armand Bartos and Frederick Kiesler. Photo: Hanan Isachar.
Isaiah scroll, 1st c. b.c.e.1st c. c.e., one of the Dead Sea scrolls found in Cave 1 at Qumran. The Shrine
of the Book at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem. Photo The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by David Harris.
Central medallion of the synagogue pavement (5th6th century c.e.). The birds are depicted
in the new, more orthodox abstract approach of Jewish art in the Byzantine period, breaking away
from the naturalistic forms of the earlier Hellenistic period. Photo: Z. Radovan, Jerusalem.
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