SHMARYAHU
LEVIN (1867-June 9, 1935)
He was born in Svisloch (Svislovits),
Byelorussia. He attended religious
elementary school and yeshiva. He later
turned his attention to secular subject matter, graduating from a senior high
school in Minsk and going on to study at the Universities of Königsberg and
Berlin and receiving his doctor of philosophy degree. He joined the Ḥoveve-tsiyon (Lovers of Zion) movement in Minsk, while he
was a student there, and he was later influenced by Aḥad Haam’s idea of a
“Merkaz ruḥani” (Spiritual center) in the land of Israel. In his student years in Berlin, he founded
(together with Leo Motzkin) the union of Jewish students in Russia. After completing his university studies, he
lived for several years in Warsaw, where he worked for Aḥiasef publishing house
and compiled on commission for the press an anthology of Hebrew poetry entitled
Shirat yisrael, mivḥar hashira haivrit mikadmuta vead haet
haaḥarona (Poetry of Israel, a selection of Hebrew poems from the
beginning to the latest era) (Warsaw, 1896), 96 pp. Over the years 1896-1898, he served as crown
rabbi in Grodno and Ekaterinoslav. In
1904 the Reform synagogue of the followers of the Jewish Enlightenment in
Vilna—Taharat Hakodesh—accepted him as rabbi and preacher. Levin was a brilliant speaker, and his
sermons always attracted a large crowd, quickly making him well-known and
beloved in Vilna Zionist-inclined circles.
In 1906 he was elected on the national list as a deputy from Vilna to
the first State Duma. Afterward, as the
Tsarist reaction dispersed the Duma, Levin was among the deputies who signed
the historic Viborg appeal. The Black Hundreds,
who at that time murdered the Jewish deputy cadets, Grigori Iollos and Mikhail
Herzenstein, had him on their list, but he saw that the time was right to make
his escape to Berlin. He began writing
in Hebrew during his period in Warsaw. He
published his first journalistic articles in Hamagid (The preacher). Over
the years 1900-1902, he wrote for Hashiloaḥ
(The shiloah) a monthly survey of Jewish life around the world. In 1903 he published articles in Fraynd (Friend) in St. Petersburg, and
he later contributed work to Di naye velt
(The new world) and after the 1905 Revolution to the weekly newspaper Dos yudishe folk (The Jewish people)
which was founded by the Zionist Organization on his initiative in Vilna. In 1906 he was working at a position in the Benevolent
Society for German Jewry in Berlin.
Theoretically well-versed with technology from his years in senior high
school, he was especially drawn to the plan which originated at that time in
Zionist circles in Berlin to create a technical school in Haifa. In the interest of such a plan, in late 1906
he made his first trip to the United States, and his efforts provided
considerably for the rise of this technical school in Haifa. At the tenth Zionist congress in 1911, he was
elected to the Action Committee, and from that point he became a leading force
in the general Zionist movement. He
spent the years of WWI in America and Canada.
In addition to his Zionist party work, in this period he often published
journalistic articles and essays in Yiddish newspapers in New York, especiually
in Di varhayt (The truth). Together with Y. D. Berkovitsh, he edited the
journal Hatoran (The duty officer) in
New York, and he published in book form: In
milkhome-tsaytn, bleter fun a tog-bukh (In wartime, pages from a diary),
vol. 1 (New York, 1915), 317 pp., vol. 2 (New York, 1917), 316 pp. In the first volume, entitled “Undzer eygene
milkhome” (Our own war), he dealt with the language fight which arose around
the technical school. In 1920 he became
director of the Jewish Agency. Levin was
one of the most important leaders in the Jewish National Fund, and on his assignments
over the course of several years he traveled throughout Western Europe, North
and South America, and South Africa.
Levin’s own sayings and anecdotes and those of his that were retold by
others belong to the pearls of Jewish humor.
He was a sharp polemicist in writing and in speech. From 1924 he was a permanent resident of
Haifa, where from time to time he published articles in the Hebrew press. He worked for the publisher Devir, and he
cooperated with all the campaigns on behalf of the technical school in Haifa
and for the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
From September 1928 he published for several years in Forverts (Forward): “Zikhroynes fun mayn
lebn” (Memoirs of my life), which included, in addition to his own experiences
and efforts, the most important national and social events in Jewish life from
the last decade of the nineteenth century.
This work also appeared in Hebrew as Mizikhronot
ḥayai (From the memories of my life) (Tel Aviv:
Devir, 1935-1942), 4 vols. It has also
been published in English translation as The
Arena (New York, 1932), 305 pp.[1] A German translation also appeared in
Berlin. He died in Haifa.
Sources:
Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 2; D.
Tidhar, in Entsiklopedyah leḥalutse
hayishuv uvonav (Encyclopedia of the pioneers and builders of the yishuv),
vol. 4 (Tel Aviv, 1950), pp. 1855-56; P. Vyernik, in Morgn-zhurnal (New York) (April 7, 1932); H. Rogof, in Forverts (New York) (May 8, 1932); Tsvi
Vislavski (Zevi Wislavsky), Yeḥidim
bireshut harabim (Individuals in the public domain) (New York, 1943), see
index; Kh. Garber, in Grodner opklangen
(Grodno echoes) (Buenos Aires) 5-6 (1951); Dr. M. Reyzen, Groyse yidn vos ikh hob gekent (Great Jews whom I have known) (New York, 1950), see index; D. Perski,
in Hadoar (New York) (January 6, 1952; Iyar 26 [= May 12], 1961); Y.
Meyerson, in Keneder odler (Montreal) (April 1, 1954); Vl. Grosman, Amol
un haynt (Then and now) (Paris, 1955), p. 35; M. Ravitsh, Mayn leksikon
(My lexicon) (Montreal, 1958), see index; Dov Sadan, Kearat tsimukim (A bowl of raisins) (Tel
Aviv, 1950); Sadan, Kearat egozim o elef bediha ubediha, asufat humor
be-yisrael
(A bowl of nuts or one thousand and one
jokes, an anthology of humor in Israel) (Tel Aviv, 1953); A. L. Hurvits, Zikhronot meḥanekh
ivri
(Memoirs of a Jewish educator) (Jerusalem-Tel Aviv, 1959/1960), vol. 1, pp.
162-64; K. Blumenfeld, in Haarets
(Tel Aviv) (Sivan 8 [= June 3], 1960); M. Ḥizkuni, in Bitsaron (New York) (Sivan-Tamuz [= May-July] 1960), pp. 114-15; Dr.
Israel Klausner, Opozitsya lehertsl
(Opposition to Herzl) (Jerusalem, 1959/1960), see index; Bitsaron (Kislev [= November-December] 1960), pp. 106-12; A.
Kritshmar-Yizraeli, in Tog-morgn-zhurnal
(New York) (April 22, 1961).
Borekh Tshubinski
[1] Translator’s note.
This is actually the title of the first part of Levin’s autobiography. Two further parts, equally long, followed. They were all published as Forward from Exile: The Autobiography of
Shmarya Levin (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1967),
3 vols. (JAF)
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