David Kohn (1838–1915) was a Russian archaeologist and Hebrew writer. He was born at

Odessa Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...

and received a rabbinic education, but at the age of fourteen he took up the study of medieval literature and modern languages, and soon afterward, history and archaeology. Some of his early writings included essays on fossil animals, the life of Rabbi

Solomon Bennet Solomon (; , ),, ; ar, سُلَيْمَان, ', , ; el, Σολομών, ; la, Salomon also called Jedidiah ( Hebrew: , Modern: , Tiberian: ''Yăḏīḏăyāh'', "beloved of Yah"), was a monarch of ancient Israel and the son and succe ...

, the

Messianic movement Messianic Judaism ( he, or , ) is a modernist and syncretic movement of Protestant Christianity that incorporates some elements of Judaism and other Jewish traditions into evangelicalism. It emerged in the 1960s and 1970s from the earlier H ...

, and the origin of

Hasidism Hasidism, sometimes spelled Chassidism, and also known as Hasidic Judaism (Ashkenazi Hebrew: חסידות ''Ḥăsīdus'', ; originally, "piety"), is a Jewish religious group that arose as a spiritual revival movement in the territory of contem ...

. He also contributed to "

Ha-Shiloaḥ ''Ha-Shiloaḥ'' () was a Hebrew-language literary journal, founded by Ahad Ha'am and the Ahi'asaf Publishing House in 1896. He edited the journal until December 1902, whereupon it came under the editorship of historian Joseph Klausner. It ceased ...

." Kohn was editor of the Aḥiasaf edition of Abraham ibn Ezra's "Diwan" (1894), as well as of Jacob Emden's autobiography and various other important works. He was also the first to attack Heinrich Graetz's criticism of the Biblical text, and to defend the Masorah. Besides the works already mentioned, he published: ''Meḥḳere Ḳohelet ben Dawid'', a historico-critical introduction to the

Book of Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes (; hbo, קֹהֶלֶת, Qōheleṯ, grc, Ἐκκλησιαστής, Ekklēsiastēs) is one of the Ketuvim ("Writings") of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Wisdom literature of the Christian Old Testament. The title commonly use ...

; ''Masoret Seyag le-Miḳra'', in defense of the Masorah against the hypercriticism of modern exegetes (1880); and ''Or we-Ḥoshek''.

Edition of Ben Sira

In Odessa he made an edition of the discovered Hebrew Text of the Wisdom Book of Ben Sira in Hebrew with introduction, a good reconstruction of the lost parts and vocalisation of the whole text, *Dawid Kohn
''Die Sprüche Simon des Sohnes Sirachs. Der gefundene hebräische Text mit Einleitung und Kommentar.''
Verlag "Tuschlija", Warschau, 1912

References

* 1838 births 1915 deaths 19th-century writers from the Russian Empire {{Russia-bio-stub