DAVID
KAHANA (May 1838-ca. 1916)
He was born in Odessa, Russia. He studied in religious primary school, and
at fourteen years of age he began to study Jewish subjects on his own, later
German and French as well as other secular fields. At age eighteen he married in Izmail,
Bessarabia, but following his father’s death (1858) he returned to Odessa where
he remained until the end of his life.
He engaged in business and was a prominent community leader in the city,
contributing to the “Khevre mefitse haskole” (Society
for the promotion of enlightenment [among the Jews of Russia]), and he was an inspector of the orphanage and
Talmud Torah, to which in 1881 he brought Mendele Moykher-Sforim from Zhitomir
to be its administrator. From 1866 he
contributed to: Hamelits (The
advocate), Hashaḥar (The dawn), Hakarmel (The Carmel), Haboker or (Good morning), Haasif (The harvest), and Otsar hasifrut (Treasury of literature),
among others, in which he published historical writings and monographs on
Shabatai Tsvi, Kabala, Hassidism, Karaites, book critiques, and the like—in Shaḥar of 1884, he published a biography
of Elye Bokher. He brought out a
collection of poetry and rhymes by Ibn Ezra and the autobiography of Rabbi
Yaakov-Yisrael Emden, among other such work.
In Yiddish, among other items, he wrote for Kol mevaser (Herald) (nos. 1-3) in Odessa (1866) a series of
articles entitled “Oys di orime klasen” (Out of the poor classes)—images from
impoverished Jewish life—and an adaptation of Solomon Maimon’s autobiography
(no. 39-50) (1871-1872). His texts in
Hebrew were published in several editions in Odessa, Vienna, and (in the 1920s)
by the Devir publishing house in Tel Aviv.
Sources:
Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 2; Dr.
Joseph Klausner, introduction to Kahane’s volume, Toldot hamekubalim, hashabtaim vehaḥasidim (History of Cabalists,
Sabbateans, and Hassidim), vol. 2 (Tel Aviv, 1926).
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