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Isaiah Beer Bing

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Isaiah Beer Bing (Hebrew: ישי בער בינג, French: Isaïe Berr Bing; 1759 – 21 July 1805) was a French writer, translator, and Hebraist. He was one of the first members from France of the Haskalah movement.[3]

Isaiah Beer Bing
Born1759 (1759)
Metz, Three Bishoprics, Kingdom of France
Died (aged 45)
Paris, First French Empire
LanguageFrench, Hebrew
Literary movementHaskalah
SpouseEve Cahen Silny (1761–1796)[1]
RelativesMichel Berr [de] (son-in-law)[2]

Biography

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Isaiah Beer Bing was born in Metz to a distinguished Jewish family,[3] the son of merchant Moyse Hayem Bing.[1] Inspired by the work of Moses Mendelssohn,[4] he entered early upon a literary career, and at the age of twenty-five published French and Hebrew translations of Mendelssohn's Phaedon, under the titles Phédon, ou Traité sur l'immortalité de l'âme and Fedon: hu sefer hashʼarat ha-nefesh.[5][6]

He attracted the attention of Abbé Grégoire, Mirabeau, de la Fayette, and Roederer,[7] by his pamphlets on behalf of the Jews in the late 1780s, and especially by his Lettre, in which he defended his coreligionists against the anti-Semitic attacks of Aubert du Bayet.[8] Indeed, it was at Beer Bing's suggestion that Abbé Grégoire published his Essai sur la régénération physique, morale et politique des juifs ('An essay on the physical, moral, and political reformation of the Jews').[9][10] He was appointed to the 1878 Malesherbes Commission on the emancipation of French Jews,[11] and addressed the National Assembly the following year on behalf of the Jews of Lorraine.[12] He became a member of the Metz municipal council in 1790.[8]

As a member of its editorial committee,[13] Beer Bing contributed numerous literary compositions to the journal La Décade philosophique [fr], including a translation of Lessing's drama Nathan the Wise.[14] Especially noteworthy were translations into French of Jedaiah ha-Penini's Beḥinat ha-olam ('Examination of the World') and Judah ha-Levi's Tzion ha-lo tishali [he; fr] ('Zion, Will You Not Inquire'),[15] both of which were included in Abbé Grégoire's Essai.[16] In 1792 he issued a French translation of Moïse Ensheim's "Hebrew La Marseillaise", La-menatze'aḥ shir ('To the Conductor, a Song'),[17] albeit with its biblical references removed.[18]

Beer Bing was forced to interrupt his literary career to secure means to provide for his large family, and he obtained the position of administrator of the Salines de l'Est [fr] saltworks.[19] He died at Paris on 21 July 1805, at the age of 45.[20]

Publications

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  • Traduction de l'Hymne ou Cantique Hébraïque, que les Juifs de Metz ont récité, et fait exécuter en musique dans leurs Synagogue, le 18 Novembre 1781, jour de réjouissance faite pour la naissance de Monseigneur le Dauphin. Metz. 1781.
  • Phédon, ou Traité sur l'immortalité de l'âme. Berlin. 1786.
  • Fedon: hu sefer hashʼarat ha-nefesh. Berlin. 1786. With preface and commendatory verses by Naphtali Hirz Wessely.[21]
  • Lettre du Sr. I. B. B., juif de Metz, à l'auteur anonyme d'un écrit intitulé: " Le Cri du citoyen contre les juifs ". Metz: Jean-Baptiste Collignon. 1787.
  • Mémoire particulier pour la communauté des Juifs établis à Metz. 1789.
  • Cantique composée par le Citoyen Moyse Ensheim, à l'occasion de la fête civique célébrée à Metz, le 21 octobre, l'an 1er de la République, dans le Temple des Citoyens Israëlites. Metz. 1792.

References

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  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; Broydé, Isaac (1902). "Beer-Bing, Isaiah". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. p. 636.

  1. ^ a b Meyer, Pierre-André (1993). La communauté juive de Metz au XVIIIe siècle: histoire et démographie (in French). Nancy: Presses universitaires de Nancy. p. 208. ISBN 978-2-86480-698-1.
  2. ^ Quérard, Joseph-Marie (1854–1855). La France littéraire (in French). Vol. 11. Paris. p. 33.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  3. ^ a b Bégin, Émile-Auguste, ed. (1829). Biographie de la Moselle (in French). Vol. 1. Metz: Verronais. pp. 90–94.
  4. ^ Fuenn, Shmuel Yosef. Keneset Yiśraʼel: zikhronot le-toldot gedole Yiśraʼel ha-nodaʻim la-shem be-toratam, be-ḥokhmatam, uve-maʻaśeʻem (in Hebrew). Warsaw: A. Boymeriter ve-N. Gansher. p. 673.
  5. ^ Fürst, Julius (1863). Bibliotheca Judaica. Bibliographisches Handbuch der gesammten jüdischen Literatur, mit Einschluss der Schriften über Juden und Judenthum und einer Geschichte der jüdischen Bibliographie (in German). Vol. 1. Leipzig: Verlag von Wilhelm Engelmann. p. 116.
  6. ^ Zeitlin, William (1890). "Bing, Isaï-Beer". Bibliotheca hebraica post-Mendelssohniana (in German). Leipzig: K. F. Koehler's Antiquarium. pp. 31, 78.
  7. ^ Bégin, E.-A. (1835). "Bing (Isaïe-Beer)". In Michaud, L.-G. (ed.). Biographie universelle, ancienne et moderne. Supplément (in French). Vol. 58. Paris. pp. 299–300.
  8. ^ a b Sepinwall, Alyssa Goldstein (2004). "Strategic Friendships: Jewish Intellectuals, the Abbé Grégoire and the French Revolution". In Brann, Ross; Sutcliffe, Adam (eds.). Renewing the Past, Reconfiguring Jewish Culture: From al-Andalus to the Haskalah. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 189–212. ISBN 0-8122-3742-0.
  9. ^ Sepinwall, Alyssa Goldstein (2007). "L'abbé Grégoire and the Metz Contest: The View from New Documents". Revue des Études Juives. 166 (1–2): 273–288. doi:10.2143/REJ.166.1.2020283. hdl:10211.3/196075.
  10. ^ Landman, Isaac (1940). Universal Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. p. 135.
  11. ^ Berkovitz, Jay R. (2010). Rites and Passages: The Beginnings of Modern Jewish Culture in France, 1650–1860. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 96–99. ISBN 978-0-8122-0015-7.
  12. ^ Schechter, Ronald (May 1994). "Translating the 'Marseillaise': Biblical Republicanism and the Emancipation of Jews in Revolutionary France". Past and Present (143): 108–135. doi:10.1093/past/143.1.108. JSTOR 651163.
  13. ^ Catane, Moshe (2007). "Beer-Bing, Isaiah". In Berenbaum, Michael; Skolnik, Fred (eds.). Encyclopaedia Judaica (2nd ed.). Detroit: Macmillan Reference. ISBN 978-0-02-866097-4.
  14. ^ Carmoly, E. (1842). Revue orientale (in French). Vol. 2. Brussels. pp. 337–338.
  15. ^ Arnault, Antoine-Vincent (1820). Biographie nouvelle des contemporains (in French). Vol. 2. Paris: Librairie historique. p. 302.
  16. ^ Hoefer, Ferdinand (1852). "Bing (Isaïe-Beer)". Nouvelle biographie universelle (in French). Vol. 6. Paris: Firmin Didot fréres. p. 102.
  17. ^ "Le rabbinat de Metz pendant la période Française (1567–1871)". Revue des études juives (in French). 13. Paris: A. Durlacher: 108. 1886.
  18. ^ Schechter, Ronald (2003). Obstinate Hebrews: Representations of Jews in France, 1715-1815. University of California Press. pp. 119–127, 131, 136, 166, 170–175, 191. ISBN 978-0-520-23557-1.
  19. ^ Joskowicz, Ari (2011). "Jewish Anticlericalism and the Making of Modern Jewish Politics in Late Enlightenment Prussia and France". Jewish Social Studies. 17 (3): 40–77. doi:10.2979/jewisocistud.17.3.40. JSTOR 10.2979/jewisocistud.17.3.40. S2CID 154339921.
  20. ^ "Nécrologie". La Revue philosophique, littéraire et politique (in French). Paris: 316–318. 29 June 1805.
  21. ^ Katznelson, J. L.; Ginzburg, Baron D., eds. (1909). "Бер-Бинг, Исаия"  [Ber-Bing, Isaiah]. Jewish Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron (in Russian). Vol. 4. St. Petersburg: Brockhaus & Efron. p. 355.
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