Moses Lemans (November 5, 1785, Naarden, Netherlands – October 17, 1832,

Amsterdam, Netherlands Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the urban area and 2,480,394 in the metropolitan area. Located in the D ...

) was a Dutch-Jewish

Hebraist A Hebraist is a specialist in Jewish, Hebrew and Hebraic studies. Specifically, British and German scholars of the 18th and 19th centuries who were involved in the study of Hebrew language and literature were commonly known by this designation, a ...

and

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

, and a leader of the

Haskalah The ''Haskalah'' (; literally, "wisdom", "erudition" or "education"), often termed the Jewish Enlightenment, was an intellectual movement among the Jews of Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, with a certain influence on those in Wester ...

movement in Holland. He was a founder of the Jewish Mathematicians' Association, ''Mathesis Artium Genetrix'', and published a number of works on

Hebrew grammar Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until ...

and mathematics. Born in

Naarden Naarden () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and former List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Gooi region in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Holland, Netherlands. It has been part ...

, Lemans was educated by his father and (in mathematics) by Judah Littwack. He helped found ''Hanokh la na'ar al pi darkho'', a society for

reform Reform refers to the improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, unsatisfactory, etc. The modern usage of the word emerged in the late 18th century and is believed to have originated from Christopher Wyvill's Association movement, which ...

Jewish education Jewish education (, ''Chinuch'') is the transmission of the tenets, principles, and religious laws of Judaism. Jews value education, and the value of education is strongly embedded in Jewish culture. Judaism places a heavy emphasis on Torah ...

, for which he published a number of Hebrew textbooks. In 1818 he was appointed head of the first school for needy Jews in Amsterdam, and in 1828 teacher of mathematics in the Amsterdam gymnasium.

Works

In 1808 he published ''Ma'amar Imrah Ẓerufah'' (Article on Pure Speech), in which he advocated for the abandonment of

Ashkenazi pronunciation Ashkenazi Hebrew (, ) is the pronunciation system for Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew favored for Jewish liturgical use and Torah study by Ashkenazi Jewish practice. Features As it is used parallel with Modern Hebrew, its phonological differences ar ...

of Hebrew in favour of the Sephardi one,Rädecker, T. S. (2015).
Making Jews Dutch: Secular discourse and Jewish responses, 1796-1848
. Groningen: University of Groningen. and some years later a Hebrew grammar, ''Rudimenta'' (1820). In collaboration with

Samuel Israel Mulder Samuel Israel Mulder (born Amsterdam 20 June 1792; died 29 December 1862) was a Dutch-Jewish educationalist. He was educated by his father and David Friedrichsfeld, and then studied with his brother-in-law, H. A. Wagenaar. His friends were Lemans ...

he published a Hebrew-Dutch dictionary in 1829-1831. The most notable of his Hebrew poems is an

epic Epic commonly refers to: * Epic poetry, a long narrative poem celebrating heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation * Epic film, a genre of film defined by the spectacular presentation of human drama on a grandiose scale Epic(s) ...

on the

Belgian Revolution The Belgian Revolution (, ) was a conflict which led to the secession of the southern provinces (mainly the former Southern Netherlands) from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and the establishment of an independent Kingdom of Belgium. The ...

. Lemans was also involved in efforts to propagate among Jews of the Netherlands a knowledge of the Dutch language, by translating prayer-books into Dutch.

Works

References

Further reading