Mekitze Nirdamim (
Hebrew : מְקִיצֵי נִרְדָּמִים , Meḳitse nirdamim ,
lit. "Rousers of Those Who Slumber") is a
literary society dedicated to the retrieval,
preservation , and
publication of
medieval Hebrew texts .
[1] It was first established at
Lyck ,
Prussia in 1861, and is now based out of
Jerusalem ,
Israel .
History
Mekitze Nirdamim was first established in
Lyck ,
Prussia in 1861, mainly by the efforts of
Eliezer L. Silbermann [
he ] , editor of the Hebrew weekly
Ha-Magid .
[2] The Society's first board consisted of prominent scholars and philanthropists such as Rabbi
Nathan Marcus Adler ,
Albert Cohn ,
S. D. Luzzatto ,
Moses Montefiore ,
Michael Sachs ,
Mattityahu Strashun , and
Joseph Zedner .
[3]
[4]
The organization's focus on realigning
Haskalah and
tradition among European Jews was met with opposition from some maskilim .
[5] By 1864, nonethelessss, the number of subscribers stood at 1,200.
[6] Among its early publications were Luzzatto's 1864 edition of
Judah Halevi 's
Diwan ,
[7]
Salomon Buber 's edition of the
Pesikta de-Rav Kahana (1868), and parts of
Isaac Lampronti 's rabbinic encyclopedia
Paḥad Yizhak [
he ] (1864–74).
[8]
The Society became increasingly inactive during the 1870s.
[9] After Silbermann's death in 1882, Mekitze Nirdamim was successfully revived at Berlin in 1885 by
Abraham Berliner , alongside
Moses Levi Ehrenreich ,
Joseph Derenbourg ,
David Günzburg ,
Solomon Joachim Halberstam ,
Abraham Harkavy ,
Marcus Jastrow ,
David Kaufmann , and Mattityahu Strashun.
[10] Amid the
rise of Nazism in Germany, the Society was moved to Jerusalem in 1934, under the leadership of then-president
Aron Freimann .
[9]
[11] Agnon served as president of the Society from 1954 to 1970, and was succeeded by
Gershom Scholem .
[6]
Notable members
References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
public domain : Gottheil, Richard; Waldstein, A. S. (1904).
"Meḳiẓe Nirdamim" . In
Singer, Isidore ; et al. (eds.).
The Jewish Encyclopedia . Vol. 8. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. pp. 447–448.
^
Roth, Cecil , ed. (1962).
"Mekitze Nirdamim" . The Standard Jewish Encyclopedia . Garden City, New York: Doubleday. p. 1294.
OCLC
1036870767 .
^
Peixotto, Benjamin Franklin, ed. (May 1887).
"Hebrew Works Published by the 'MeKitzē-Nirdamim' " . The Menorah . 2 (5). New York: Menorah Publishing Company: 263–264.
^ Posner, Raphael; Ta-Shma, Israel M., eds. (1975).
The Hebrew Book: An Historical Survey . Keter Publishing House Jerusalem. p. 138.
ISBN
978-0-7065-1389-9 .
OCLC
804898547 .
^ Raisin, Max (1919).
A History of the Jews in Modern Times . New York: Hebrew Publishing Company. pp. 15–16.
^
Boulouque, Clémence (2020).
Another Modernity: Elia Benamozegh's Jewish Universalism . Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. p. 62.
ISBN
978-1-5036-1311-9 .
LCCN
2020937846 .
^
a
b
c
d
e
f Ta-Shma, Israel Moses (2007).
"Mekiẓe Nirdamim" . In
Berenbaum, Michael ;
Skolnik, Fred (eds.).
Encyclopaedia Judaica . Vol. 13 (2nd ed.). Detroit: Macmillan Reference. p. 797.
ISBN
978-0-02-866097-4 .
^
a
b
Yahalom, Joseph (1995). "Diwan and Odyssey: Judah Halevi and the Secular Poetry of Medieval Spain in the Light of New Discoveries from Petersburg". Miscelánea de Estudios Árabes y Hebraicos . 44 : 23–45.
ISSN
0544-408X .
^ Spector, Shmuel, ed. (2001).
"Lyck" . The Encyclopedia of Jewish Life Before and During the Holocaust . Vol. 2. New York: New York University Press. p. 776.
ISBN
978-0-8147-9377-0 .
^
a
b Meir, Yonatan (2013).
"The Origins of Ḥevrat Mekiẓe Nirdamim in Eastern Europe" . In Elizur, Shulamit (ed.). From Oblivion to the Bookshelf: The 150th Anniversary of Mekize Nirdamim (in Hebrew). Jerusalem: Mekitze Nirdamim. pp. 33–45.
ISBN
978-965-462-012-3 .
^
Landman, Isaac , ed. (1942). "Mekize Nirdamim ('Awakers of Those Asleep')". The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia: An Authoritative and Popular Presentation of Jews and Judaism Since the Earliest Times . Vol. 7. New York. p. 449.
OCLC
999879047 . {{
cite encyclopedia }}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link )
^
a
b
c
d Heuberger, Rachel (2011).
"Aron Freimann and the Development of Jewish Bibliography in Germany in the 20th Century" . In Leicht, Reimund; Freudenthal, Gad (eds.). Studies on Steinschneider: Moritz Steinschneider and the Emergence of the Science of Judaism in Nineteenth-Century Germany . Leiden: Brill. p. 334.
ISBN
978-90-04-22645-6 .
^ Hoffman, Anne Golomb (1991).
Between Exile and Return: S. Y. Agnon and the Drama of Writing . Albany: SUNY Press. p. 7.
ISBN
978-0-7914-0540-6 .
^ Butler, Menachem (22 July 2020).
"In Memory of Shmuel Ashkenazi, Bibliographer of the Hebrew Book" .
Tablet . Retrieved 14 October 2020 .
^ Sassoon, Batsheva (20 November 2017).
"Ancient Jewish Poetry & the Amazing World of Piyut: Interview with Professor Shulamit Elizur" . The Seforim Blog .
^
a
b
Berliner, A. , ed. (1899).
Kobez Al Jad (in Hebrew). Vol. 9. Berlin: Vereins M'kize Nirdamim.