Ben-Zion Dinur
Encyclopedia
Ben-Zion Dinur was a Zionist activist, educator, historian and Israel
i politician.
(now Poltava Oblast
, Ukraine
). He received his education in Lithuania
n yeshivot. He studied under Shimon Shkop
in the Telz Yeshiva, and became interested in the Haskalah
through Rosh Yeshiva
Eliezer Gordon
's polemics. In 1898 he moved to the Slabodka yeshiva and in 1900 he traveled to Vilnius
and was certified a Rabbi
. He then went to Lyubavichi
to witness the Chabad-Lubavitch
branch of Hasidic Judaism
. Between 1902 and 1911 he was engaged in Zionist activism and teaching, which at some point resulted in a brief arrest. In 1910 he married Bilhah Feingold, a teacher who had worked with him in a girls' trade school in Poltava
. In 1911 he left his wife and son for two years to attend the Berlin University, where he studied under Semen Ivanovich Rostovzev and Eugen Täubler
. He then spent two more years at the University of Bern, where he began his dissertation under Rostovzev, on the Jews in the Land of Israel
under the Roman Empire
. The break of World War I
forced him to move to the University of Petrograd
. However, due to the October Revolution
, he did not receive his PhD. He was a lecturer at the University of Odessa from 1920 to 1921.
In 1921 he immigrated to Palestine and from 1923 to 1948 served as a teacher and later as head of the Jewish Teachers' Training College, Jerusalem. In 1936 he was appointed lecturer in modern Jewish history at the Hebrew University and became professor in 1948 and professor emeritus in 1952. As a historian he described Zionism in the diaspora as "a huge river into which flowed all the smaller streams and tributaries of the Jewish struggle down the ages", and tracing its origins to 1700, when history records a first wave of Polish Jews emigrating to Jerusalem. He believed "messianic ferment" played a crucial role in Jewish history, and introduced the idea of mered hagalut ("Revolt of the Diaspora").
He was elected to the first Knesset
on the Mapai
list and served as Minister of Education and Culture in the third
to sixth governments
(1952 to 1955), when he was responsible for the 1953 State Education Law, which put an end to the prevailing party "trend" education system. From 1953 to 1959 he was president of Yad Vashem
.
He died in 1973.
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i politician.
Biography
Dinaburg was born in 1884 in Khorol in the Russian EmpireRussian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
(now Poltava Oblast
Poltava Oblast
Poltava Oblast is an oblast of central Ukraine. The administrative center of the oblast is the city of Poltava.Other important cities within the oblast include: Komsomolsk, Kremenchuk, Lubny and Myrhorod.-Geography:...
, Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
). He received his education in Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
n yeshivot. He studied under Shimon Shkop
Shimon Shkop
Shimon Yehuda Hakohen Shkop was a rosh yeshiva in the Yeshiva Shaar Hatorah and in the Telshe yeshiva and a renowned Talmudic scholar. He was born in Torez in 1860. At the age of twelve he went to study in the Mir yeshiva, and at fifteen he went to Volozhin yeshiva where he studied six years...
in the Telz Yeshiva, and became interested in the Haskalah
Haskalah
Haskalah , the Jewish Enlightenment, was a movement among European Jews in the 18th–19th centuries that advocated adopting enlightenment values, pressing for better integration into European society, and increasing education in secular studies, Hebrew language, and Jewish history...
through Rosh Yeshiva
Rosh yeshiva
Rosh yeshiva, , , is the title given to the dean of a Talmudical academy . It is made up of the Hebrew words rosh — meaning head, and yeshiva — a school of religious Jewish education...
Eliezer Gordon
Eliezer Gordon
Eliezer Gordon also known as Reb Laizer Telzer, served as the Rabbi and Rosh Yeshiva of Telz, Lithuania.-Early years:...
's polemics. In 1898 he moved to the Slabodka yeshiva and in 1900 he traveled to Vilnius
Vilnius
Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...
and was certified a Rabbi
Rabbi
In Judaism, a rabbi is a teacher of Torah. This title derives from the Hebrew word רבי , meaning "My Master" , which is the way a student would address a master of Torah...
. He then went to Lyubavichi
Lyubavichi
Lyubavichi is a rural locality in Rudnyansky District of Smolensk Oblast, Russia.-History:The village is known to have existed in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth since at least 1654 . In 1784 mentioned as a small town , then a possession of the magnate Lubomirski family...
to witness the Chabad-Lubavitch
Chabad-Lubavitch
Chabad-Lubavitch is a Chasidic movement in Orthodox Judaism. One of the world's larger and best-known Chasidic movements, its official headquarters is in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York...
branch of Hasidic Judaism
Hasidic Judaism
Hasidic Judaism or Hasidism, from the Hebrew —Ḥasidut in Sephardi, Chasidus in Ashkenazi, meaning "piety" , is a branch of Orthodox Judaism that promotes spirituality and joy through the popularisation and internalisation of Jewish mysticism as the fundamental aspects of the Jewish faith...
. Between 1902 and 1911 he was engaged in Zionist activism and teaching, which at some point resulted in a brief arrest. In 1910 he married Bilhah Feingold, a teacher who had worked with him in a girls' trade school in Poltava
Poltava
Poltava is a city in located on the Vorskla River in central Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Poltava Oblast , as well as the surrounding Poltava Raion of the oblast. Poltava's estimated population is 298,652 ....
. In 1911 he left his wife and son for two years to attend the Berlin University, where he studied under Semen Ivanovich Rostovzev and Eugen Täubler
Eugen Täubler
Eugen Täubler was a German historian born in Gostyń.He studied history in Berlin under Otto Hirschfeld , receiving his doctorate in 1904 with a dissertation titled Die Parthernachrichten bei Josephus...
. He then spent two more years at the University of Bern, where he began his dissertation under Rostovzev, on the Jews in the Land of Israel
Land of Israel
The Land of Israel is the Biblical name for the territory roughly corresponding to the area encompassed by the Southern Levant, also known as Canaan and Palestine, Promised Land and Holy Land. The belief that the area is a God-given homeland of the Jewish people is based on the narrative of the...
under the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. The break of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
forced him to move to the University of Petrograd
Saint Petersburg State University
Saint Petersburg State University is a Russian federal state-owned higher education institution based in Saint Petersburg and one of the oldest and largest universities in Russia....
. However, due to the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, he did not receive his PhD. He was a lecturer at the University of Odessa from 1920 to 1921.
In 1921 he immigrated to Palestine and from 1923 to 1948 served as a teacher and later as head of the Jewish Teachers' Training College, Jerusalem. In 1936 he was appointed lecturer in modern Jewish history at the Hebrew University and became professor in 1948 and professor emeritus in 1952. As a historian he described Zionism in the diaspora as "a huge river into which flowed all the smaller streams and tributaries of the Jewish struggle down the ages", and tracing its origins to 1700, when history records a first wave of Polish Jews emigrating to Jerusalem. He believed "messianic ferment" played a crucial role in Jewish history, and introduced the idea of mered hagalut ("Revolt of the Diaspora").
He was elected to the first Knesset
Knesset
The Knesset is the unicameral legislature of Israel, located in Givat Ram, Jerusalem.-Role in Israeli Government :The legislative branch of the Israeli government, the Knesset passes all laws, elects the President and Prime Minister , approves the cabinet, and supervises the work of the government...
on the Mapai
Mapai
Mapai was a left-wing political party in Israel, and was the dominant force in Israeli politics until its merger into the Israeli Labor Party in 1968...
list and served as Minister of Education and Culture in the third
Third government of Israel
The third government of Israel was formed by David Ben Gurion on 8 October 1951, more than two months after the elections. His Mapai party formed a coalition with Mizrachi, Hapoel HaMizrachi, Agudat Yisrael, Poalei Agudat Yisrael and the three Israeli Arab parties, the Democratic List for Israeli...
to sixth governments
Sixth government of Israel
The sixth government of Israel was formed by Moshe Sharett during the second Knesset on 29 June 1955. Sharett dropped the General Zionists and the Progressive Party from his coalition, which included Mapai, Mizrachi, Hapoel HaMizrachi, the Democratic List for Israeli Arabs, Progress and Work and...
(1952 to 1955), when he was responsible for the 1953 State Education Law, which put an end to the prevailing party "trend" education system. From 1953 to 1959 he was president of Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem is Israel's official memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, established in 1953 through the Yad Vashem Law passed by the Knesset, Israel's parliament....
.
He died in 1973.
Awards
- Dinur was twice a recipient of the Israel PrizeIsrael PrizeThe Israel Prize is an award handed out by the State of Israel and is largely regarded as the state's highest honor. It is presented annually, on Israeli Independence Day, in a state ceremony in Jerusalem, in the presence of the President, the Prime Minister, the Knesset chairperson, and the...
, which was established at his initiative when he was Minister of Education: - in 1958 for Jewish studies; and
- in 1973 for education.
- He was a recipient of the Yakir YerushalayimYakir YerushalayimYakir Yerushalayim is an annual citizenship prize in Jerusalem, Israel, inaugurated in 1967.The prize is awarded annually by the municipality of the City of Jerusalem to one or more residents of the city who have contributed to the cultural and educational life of the city in some outstanding way....
(Worthy Citizen of Jerusalem) award in 1967, the year of the award's inauguration.
Published works
- Lovers of Zion (1932–1934)
- Our Rabbi Moshe Ben Maimon: His Life, Writings, Activities and Views (1935)
- Simon DubnowSimon DubnowSimon Dubnow was a Jewish historian, writer and activist...
: for his 75th Birthday (1936) - Israel in its Land: From the First Days of Israel until the Babylonian Exile: Sources and Documents (1938)
- Path Makers: Prominent Figures in the Sad History of the Return to Zion and the Renewal of Israel (1946)
- The Changing of the Generations: Researches and Studies in the History of Israel from Early Modern Times (1955)
- In Memory of Ahad Ha'am (1957)
- Values and Methods: Problems of Education (1958)
- A Vanished World: Memories of a Way of Life” (Biography) (1958)
- Remember: Issues of the Holocaust and its Lessons (1958)
- Israel in Exile 2nd Edition (expanded) five volumes (1958)
- Days of War and Revolution: Memories of a Way of Life (1961)
- My Generation: Characteristics and Traits of Scholars and Educators, Public Personalities and Gate Keepers (1964)
- Benjamin Zeev HerzlTheodor HerzlTheodor Herzl , born Benjamin Ze’ev Herzl was an Ashkenazi Jew Austro-Hungarian journalist and the father of modern political Zionism and in effect the State of Israel.-Early life:...
: the Man, his Path and Personality, his Vision and Activities (1968) - The Struggle of the Generations of Israel for its Land: from the Destruction of Betar until the Renewal of Israel (1975)
- Generations of the BibleBibleThe Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
: Research and Studies to Understand the Bible and the History of Israel in that Period (1977) - Generations and Impressions: Researches and Studies in Israeli Historiography, its Problems and its History (1978)