Jonas Daniel Meijer (15 September 1780 – 6 December 1834) was the first Jewish lawyer in the Netherlands. He has had a significant impact on

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

law, and is also known for his battle for (legal)

emancipation Emancipation generally means to free a person from a previous restraint or legal disability. More broadly, it is also used for efforts to procure Economic, social and cultural rights, economic and social rights, civil and political rights, po ...

of the Dutch Jews. The Jonas Daniel Meijerplein, a square in Amsterdam (where Meijer died), was named after him. Bordering the square are the

Esnoga The Portuguese Synagogue, also known as the Esnoga, or Snoge, is an Orthodox Jewish congregation and synagogue, located at Mr. Visserplein 3 in Central Amsterdam, Amsterdam, in the North Holland region of The Netherlands. The synagogue was com ...

and four former synagogues, now together home of the

Joods Historisch Museum The (; ), part of the Jewish Cultural Quarter, is a museum in Amsterdam dedicated to Jewish history, culture and religion, in the Netherlands and worldwide. It is the only museum in the Netherlands dedicated to Jewish history. History The Jood ...

(Jewish Historical Museum). The ''Dokwerker'' monument on Jonas Daniel Meijerplein commemorates the February strike of 1941, a general strike by many (non-Jewish) people of Amsterdam and surrounding cities after the arrest and deportation of 425 Jewish men from Amsterdam to

Mauthausen Mauthausen was a German Nazi concentration camp on a hill above the market town of Mauthausen (roughly east of Linz), Upper Austria. It was the main camp of a group with nearly 100 further subcamps located throughout Austria and southern ...

and

Buchenwald Buchenwald (; 'beech forest') was a German Nazi concentration camp established on Ettersberg hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within the Altreich (Old Reich) territori ...

following a clash between Nazi police and two Jewish men a couple of days earlier.

Early life

Jonas Daniel Meijer was born into a well-to-do Jewish family at

Arnhem Arnhem ( ; ; Central Dutch dialects, Ernems: ''Èrnem'') is a Cities of the Netherlands, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality situated in the eastern part of the Netherlands, near the German border. It is the capita ...

. His maternal grandfather was Benjamin Cohen (July or August 1725 – 10 February 1800), a well-known businessman and Jewish teacher, and a friend and supporter of

stadtholder In the Low Countries, a stadtholder ( ) was a steward, first appointed as a medieval official and ultimately functioning as a national leader. The ''stadtholder'' was the replacement of the duke or count of a province during the Burgundian and ...

Willem V. The Cohen family were tobacco traders, and had connections to prominent European Jewish families. Meijer's father was a German Jew, who hailed from the city of

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...

. Jonas Daniel Meijer had one brother and one sister, Abraham David (8 October 1781 – 17 March 1864) and Eva (15 October 1782 – 18 December 1850). At a startling young age, Jonas learned to read and was taught French and English by a private teacher. Although he was brought up with

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

as the liturgical language of his religion, Jonas also managed to learn

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

at the age of 5. After completing his school quite early, Meijer started to study Law in Amsterdam, where he moved with his mother and siblings after the death of his father in 1790. On 15 November 1796, at the age of just 16, Jonas Daniel Meijer took the lawyer's oath, becoming the first Jewish lawyer and one of the youngest lawyers in the history of the Netherlands. Despite his talents, he received only few customers, as many

Christians A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the world. The words '' Christ'' and ''C ...

avoided him. The small practice however gave Meijer ample chance of increasing his law expertise, specifically by studying the law of many countries, earning him fame across the European continent.

Publications

Meijer received international fame through his publication ''Kan de zedelijke waardering van een handeling in aanmerking komen bij de vaststelling en toepassing van een strafwet en zo ja, in hoeverre'' ("Can the moral appreciation of an act be taken into account when establishing and applying a criminal law and, if so, to what extent", 1803). In this work, Meijer is one of the first to question the extent to which living conditions and mental well-being of a criminal cause his felony. Meijer researched the possibility of such outcomes because of his acquaintance with financial and social positions of his fellow Jews, that made him understand why some of them would, for example, steal a loaf of bread. Jonas Daniel Meijer died on 6 December 1834 at the age of 54, in Amsterdam.

References

Biography of Jonas Daniel Meijer

Biography at Jewish Historical Museum Amsterdam
{{DEFAULTSORT:Meijer, Jonas Daniel 1780 births 1834 deaths Dutch Orthodox Jews People from Arnhem Lawyers from Amsterdam