BEILINSON (Belinson), MOSES ELIEZER

BEILINSON (Belinson), MOSES ELIEZER (1835–1908), Hebrew and Yiddish writer and publisher. He was born in Dubrovna (Russia). In 1860 he published a brochure Ẓevi la-Ẓaddik containing an apologia for Judaism and an attack upon Christianity and Karaism. He translated Ludwig Philippson's novel Die Vertreibung der Juden aus Spanien und Portugal into Hebrew as Galut Sefarad in 1860. In the 1860s he established a Hebrew printing press in Odessa, and published Alei Hadas, a literary and scholarly periodical (1865), in which he printed his correspondence with Philippson on the situation of the Jews in Russia. Only four issues appeared. Perez *Smolenskin published his first pamphlets at Beilinson's press (1862–67); Beilinson wanted to "correct" Smolenskin's style, but most of his corrections were rejected. Kol Mevasser (1871), the first Yiddish weekly published in Russia, was also printed at Beilinson's press and Beilinson succeeded Moshe Leib *Lilienblum as its editor, using the pseudonym "M.E.B.N." He composed three genealogical histories (including one on his own family): Megillat Yuḥasin (1891), Yalkut Mishpaḥot (1892), and Millu'im le-Koveẓ Yalkut Mishpaḥot (1893). He published Toledot ha-Rav Yosef Shelomo Rofe Delmedigo mi-Kandia (1864), a biography based on Abraham Geiger's Melo Ḥofnayim (German section), and Shelomei Emunei Yisrael, three brochures dealing with literary and scientific topics (1898–1901). He also edited Koveẓ Yagdil Torah (1879–85) and Koveẓ Mekhilta de-Rabbanan (1885), dealing with halakhic matters. Beilinson adapted Longfellow's Judas Maccabaeus into a Yiddish Ḥanukkah play (1882), and also adapted Philippson's above-mentioned novel (1888). He additionally published Nutslikher Fremdvorterbukh (Part 1, 1887), a dictionary of foreign phrases used in Yiddish.

bibliography:

Zeitlin, Bibliotheca, 18–19; Rejzen, Leksikon 1 (1928), 328–30; Wachstein et al., Hebraische Publizistik in Wien, 1 (1930), 11, 293.

[Gedalyah Elkoshi]