Samuel Löb Lemon

Samuel Löb Lemon (1910)

Samuel Löb Zitron (also: Samuel Leib Zitron, Schmuel Leib Zitron ; May 24, 1862 in Minsk - November 8, 1930 ) was one of the most successful Hebrew and Yiddish national Jewish Zionist writers of his time; he was a literary and Zionism historian , critic and speaker.

The portraits of personalities of Eastern Jewish literature, Zionism and society in general, which he wrote, make an irreplaceable contribution to the Jewish cultural history of the 18th and 19th centuries.

Life

Samuel Löb Zitron was born in Minsk as the son of the esteemed President of the Jewish Community. He studied at the yeshiva of Valoschyn and began writing Hebrew articles for Hamagid at the age of 14 . For some time he also studied secular sciences at the Fraenckel'sche Stiftung Jewish Theological Seminar in Breslau , but returned to Minsk in 1883 and from then on devoted himself to Jewish literature and his extensive publication activities .

He wrote about the construction of Palestine, especially about Yiddish writers, wrote against the assimilation of the Jews , translated Pinsker's auto-emancipation into Hebrew in 1884 under the telling title Im en ani li mi li ( Hillel's famous saying If I am not for myself, who is for me? ). From 1886 to 1887 he was one of the most important contributors to Yossif Sapir's large collector's book Knesset Yisroel , then wrote about Mapu and Smolensky and wrote a work on Hebrew Literature in Russia during the 19th Century and other works on the literature of his time ( Hasifrut we-hachajim = "literature and life", Hameschorer be chajaw ube mota = "life and death of the poet").

After Herzl's appearance, he enthusiastically joined it and, as a reporter for Yiddish, Hebrew and Russian newspapers, took part in the 6th  Zionist Congress (1897 to 1903) and the 11th and 12th  Zionist Congress (1904 to 1948).

From 1916 Zitron was inspector of the Jewish schools in Vilnius during the German occupation .

In 1920 he became a permanent contributor to the Yiddish Moment , wrote countless articles and was also responsible for the series Meschummodim. Types of Jewish Renegades , The First Swallows. Types from the Chibath Zion movement and Stadlanim and Famous Jewish Women (later known as book summaries separately published).

In 1924 he completed his main work, the Hebrew Lexicon Zioni , which offers the life descriptions of the most important Zionists in a literarily appealing form (also for broader circles).

Samuel Löb Zitron died in 1930.

Works (selection)

• Asefat sippurim (collection of stories from German and French translated into Hebrew), 1885
• Ltoldoth haitonuth haiwrith , 1911–1914 in Haolam published an extremely thorough work on the history of the Hebrew press
• Toldoth chibath Zion , Odessa 1914
• Sefer Sikaron (Hebrew-Yiddish collector's book), 3 volumes, Vilnius 1920–1922
• Herzl - Chajaw upeuletow , Vilna 1921
• Anashim we sofrim. Memories from the Lives of Great Zionists , 1922
• Jozre hasifruth haiwrith hachadaschah (on young Hebrew writers), 2 volumes, Wilna 1922
• History fun of the Yiddish press , Vilnius 1923
• Lexicon Zioni. Chamesch Meoth Biographiot , Warsaw 1924
• Three literary doires , 4 volumes, Warsaw 1924–1928
• in addition, Hebrew translations of An-ski , Jehoasch (1871–1927, Yiddish poet) and Graetz (History of the Jews)
• his collected works appeared in 1930 in 10 volumes

literature

• Zalman Reisen : Lexicon of Jewish Literature, Press and Philology. 1926–1929, Vol. III., Pp. 286 ff.
• Jewish Lexicon . Berlin 1927, vol. IV / 2, col. 1628 f.
• Salomon Wininger : Large Jewish National Biography with more than 11,000 biographies of well-known Jewish men and women from all times and countries. A reference work for the Jewish people and their friends , Volume 6, Tipografia "Arta", Czernowitz, undated (1931), p. 365 f.

Web links

Commons : Samuel Löb Zitron  - Collection of images, videos and audio files