kabbalah was cultivated by Moses Ḥayyīm Luzzatto (d. 1747) and by Elijah ben Solomon, called Gaon, of Wilna (d. 1797), who commented on the whole Bible and on many Talmudic and kabbalistic works. In spite of his own leaning towards mysticism he was a strong opponent of the Ḥasīdīm, a mystical sect founded by Israel Baʽal Shem Ṭōbh (Beshṭ) and promoted by Baer of Meseritz. Elijah’s son Abraham (d. 1808), the commentator, is valuable for his work on Midrash. An historical work which makes an attempt to be scientific, is the Seder ha-dōrōth of Yeḥiel Heilprin (d. 1746). These, however, belong in spirit to the previous century.
The characteristic of the 18th and 19th centuries is the endeavour, connected with the name of Moses Mendelssohn, to bring Judaism more into relation with external learning, and in using the Hebrew language to purify and develop it in accordance with the biblical standard. Modernizing tendencies. The result, while linguistically more uniform and pleasing, often lacks the spontaneity of medieval literature. It was Moses Mendelssohn’s German translation of the Pentateuch (1780–1793) which marked the new spirit, while the views of his opponents belong to a bygone age. In fact the controversy of which he was the centre may fitly be compared with the earlier battles between the Maimonists and anti-Maimonists. One of the most remarkable writers of the new Hebrew was Mendelssohn’s friend N. H. Wessely, of Hamburg (d. 1805), author of Shīrē Tiphe’reth, a long poem on the Exodus, Dibhrē Shalōm, a plea for liberalism, Sepher ha-middōth, on ethics, besides philological works and commentaries. A curious combination of new and old was Ḥayyīm Azulai (d. 1807), a kabbalist, but also the author of Shem ha-gedhōlīm, a valuable contribution to literary history.
In the 19th century the modernizing tendency continued to grow, though always side by side with a strong conservative opposition, and the most prominent names on both sides are those of scholars rather than literary men. Among them may be mentioned, Akiba (ʽAqībhā) Eger (d. 1837), Talmudist of the orthodox, conservative school; W. Heidenheim (d. 1832), a liberal, and editor of the Pentateuch and Maḥzor; N. Krochmal, of Galicia (d. 1840), author of Mōreh Nebhūkhē ha-zeman, on Jewish history and literature; his son Abraham (d. 1895), conservative commentator and philosopher. One consequence of the Mendelssohn movement was that many writers used their vernacular language besides or instead of Hebrew, or translated from one to the other. Thus Isaac Samuel Reggio (d. 1855), a strong liberal, wrote both in Hebrew and Italian; Joseph Almanzi, of Padua (d. 1860), a poet, translated Italian poems into Hebrew; S. D. Luzzatto, of Padua (d. 1865), a distinguished scholar and opponent of the philosophy of Maimonides, wrote much in Italian; M. H. Letteris, of Vienna (d. 1871), translated German poems into Hebrew; S. Bacher, of Hungary (d. 1891), was a poet and moderate liberal; L. Gordon (d. 1892), poet and prose-writer in Hebrew and Russian, of liberal views; A. Jellinek, of Vienna (d. 1893), preacher and scholar; Jacob Reifmann (d. 1895), scholar, wrote only in Hebrew. The endeavour to bring Judaism into relation with the modern world and to change the current impressions about Jews by making their teaching accessible to the rest of the world, is connected chiefly with the names of Z. Frankel (d. 1875), the first Jewish scholar to study the Septuagint; Abraham Geiger (d. 1874), critic of the first rank; L. Zunz (d. 1884) and L. Dukes (d. 1891), both scholarly investigators of Jewish literary history. Their most important works are in German. The question of the use of the vernacular or of Hebrew is bound up with the differences between the orthodox and the liberal or reform parties, complicated by the many problems involved. Patriotic efforts are made to encourage the use of Hebrew both for writing and speaking, but the continued existence of it as a literary language depends on the direction in which the future history of the Jews will develop.
Bibliography.—Only the more comprehensive works are mentioned here, omitting those relating to particular authors, and those already cited.
Introductory: Abrahams, Short History of Jewish Literature (London, 1906); Steinschneider, Jewish Literature (London, 1857); Winter and Wünsche, Die jüdische Literatur (Leipzig, 1893–1895) (containing selections translated into German).
For further study: Graetz, Geschichte der Juden (Leipzig, 1853, &c.) (the volumes are in various editions), with special reference to the notes; English translation by B. Löwy (London, 1891–1892) (without the notes); Zunz, Gottesdienstliche Vorträge der Juden (new ed., Frankfort-on-Main, 1892); Zur Geschichte und Literatur (Berlin, 1845). The Synagogale Poesie has been mentioned above. Steinschneider, Arabische Literatur der Juden (Frankfort-on-Main, 1902); Hebräische Übersetzungen des Mittelalters (Berlin, 1893).
On particular authors and subjects there are many excellent monographs in the Jewish Encyclopaedia (New York, 1901–6), to which the present article is much indebted.
Bibliographies of printed books: Steinschneider, Catalogus libr. Hebr. in Bibl. Bodleiana (Berlin, 1852–1860) (more than a catalogue); Zedner, Catalogue of the Hebr. Books in the British Museum (London, 1867; continued by van Straalen, London, 1894). Of manuscripts: Neubauer, Catal. of the Hebrew MSS. in the Bodleian Library (Oxford, 1886), vol. ii. by Neubauer and Cowley (Oxford, 1906); G. Margoliouth, Catal. of the Hebr. . . . MSS. in the British Museum (London, 1899, &c.). Of both: Benjacob, Ozar ha-sepharim (Wilna, 1880) (in Hebrew; arranged by titles).
Periodicals: Jewish Quarterly Review; Revue des études juives; Hebräische Bibliographie. (A. Cy.)
HEBREW RELIGION (1) Introductory.—To trace the history of the religion of the Hebrews is a complex task, because the literary sources from which our knowledge of that history is derived are themselves complex and replete with problems as to age and authorship, some of which have been solved according to the consensus of nearly all the best scholars, but some of which still await solution or are matters of dispute. Even if the analysis of the literature into component documents were complete, we should still possess a most imperfect record, since the documents themselves have passed through many redactions, and these redactions have proceeded from varying standpoints of religious tradition, successively eliminating or modifying certain elements deemed inconsistent with the canons of religious usage or propriety which prevailed in the age when the redaction took place. Lastly it should be recollected that the entire body of the fragments of tradition and literature belonging to northern Israel has come down to us through the channel of Judaean recensions.
The influence of the Deuteronomic tradition in redaction is seen in such passages as Genesis xxxiii. 20 (cf. xxxi. 45 fol.); Josh. iv. 9-20, xxiv. 26 fol.; 1 Sam. vii. 12, where the maṣṣēbhah or stone symbol of deity (forbidden in Deut. xii. 3, xvi. 22) is in some way got rid of (in Gen. xxxiii. 20 the word “altar” in Hebrew is substituted). Similarly in Gen. xiii. 18, xiv. 13, xviii. 1, the Septuagint shows that the singular form “terebinth” stood in the original text. But the Massoretes altered this to the plural as this form was less suggestive of tree-worship (see Smend, A. Tliche Religionsgesch. i. p. 134, footnote 1; Nowack, Heb. Archäol. p. 12, footnote 1). Many other examples might be cited, as the “suspended nun” which transforms the pronunciation of the original Mosheh (Moses) into Menashsheh (Manasseh) owing to the irregular practices of his descendant, Jonathan ben Gershom (Jud. xviii. 30). It is not improbable that in 2 Kings iii. 27 the words “from Kemōsh” stood after “great wrath” in the original document, as the phraseology seems bald without them, and the motives for their suppression are obvious.
So far as concerns the critical problems which stand at the threshold of our task, it must suffice to say that the main conclusions reached by the school of Kuenen and Wellhausen as to the literary problems of the Old Testament are assumed throughout this sketch of the evolution of Hebrew religion. The documents underlying the Pentateuch and book of Joshua, represented by the ciphers J, E, D and P, are assumed to have been drawn up in the chronological order in which those ciphers are here set down, and the period of their composition extends from the 9th century B.C., in which the earlier portions of J were written, to the 5th century B.C., in which P finally took shape. The view of Professor Dillmann, who placed P before D in the regal period (though he admitted exilic and post-exilic additions in Exod., Levit. and Numb.), a view which he
