SAMSON

See also:

• RAPHAEL (Hebrew smm, " God heals ")

RAPHAEL

See also:

• HIRSCH, MAURICE DE, BARON HIRSCH AUF GEREUTH
• SAMSON RAPHAEL HIRSCH (r8o8-1888)

HIRSCH (r8o8-1888)  , Jewish theologian, was born in Hamburg in 18o8 and died at Frankfort-on-the-Main in 1888 . He opposed the reform tendency of Geiger (q.v.), and presented Jewish orthodoxy in a new and attractive light . His philosophical conception of tradition, associated as it was with conservatism in ritual practice, created what is often known as the Frankfort " Neo-Orthodoxy." Hirsch exercised a profound influence on the Synagogue and undoubtedly stemmed the tide of liberalism . His famous Nineteen Letters (1836), with which the Neo-Orthodoxy began, were translated into English by Drachmann (New York, 1899) . Other works by Hirsch were was born in Kufa, but spent much of his life in Bagdad . Like his father, on whose authority he relied largely, he collected information about the genealogies and history of the ancient Arabs . According to the Filirist (see NADIM) he wrote 140 works . As independent works they have almost entirely ceased to exist, but his account of the genealogies of the Arabs is continually quoted in the Kitdb ul-Aghani . Large extracts from another of his works, the Kitab ul-Asnam, are contained in the Khizanat ul-Adab (iii . 242-246) and in the geography of Yaqut (q.v.) . These latter have been translated with comments by J . Wellhausen in his Reste des arabischen Heidentums (2nd ed., Berlin, 1897) .

(G . W .