Wessely, Hartwig (or, according to his Jewish name, Hertz Wesel), a noted Jewish writer, was born in 1725 at Hamburg. Like his friend JMoses Mendelssohn, he was originally a Rabbinic Jew, and observed the tra- ditional law to the last. His thirst for knowledge led him to acquire the German, French, Danish, and Dutch languages, and to study mathematics, natural philoso- phy, geography, and history. An extraordinary power of writing Hebrew, both prose and poetry, secured him the esteem of his nation, and gave him an opportunity of communicating his acquirements in a national, and therefore an unsuspected, form. The edict of the em- peror Joseph II to establish elementary schools among the Jews first exhibited Wessely as a Reformer. He wrote a letter to the congregation at Trieste upon the subject, in which he related the importance of elementa- ry instruction, recommended the study of Hebrew gram- mar, and advised the postponing of the Talraudic studies to a riper age. This brought down upon him all the weight of Rabbinic indignation, especially that of the Polish rabbins, who attacked and anathematized him with vehemence, while those of Trieste, Venice, Ferra- ra, and Reggio supported him. Wessely, who died at Hamburg in 1805, may be considered the founder of modern Hebrew literature, in the same way as Mendels- sohn was of German literature among the Jews of his age and country. For though in destitute circumstances, he found time and strength to write a series of works which form a new agra in Hebrew composition, and have luiited his name with that of IMendelssohn in the hon- orable appellation of the " two restorers of science among the Jews." Jost's description of the effects of their labors is very striking. He says, " They found the Jews with- out any language; they gave them two at once — the German and the Hebrew." He wrote, ']U mi, The Spirit of Grace (Berlin, 1780, a. c), a commentary to the Book of Wisdom, translated into Hebrew by him- self:— !!t"ip'^" "1SD3 "iIND, a commentary on Levit- icus, which forms part of the commentary of Mendels- sohn's Pentateuch: — '1335 "j^"^, The Wine of Lebanon (ibid. 1775), a commentary on the treatise A both : —
■1535n, Lebanon, a gigantic work on the synonyms of the Hebrew language. The first volume (n"'3n "pUN"!."!) consists of 10 sections (a^mn), subdivided into 120 chapters (ri3lbn), and contains a most elabo- rate philological and psychological disquisition on the signification and development of the root D2n, as well as a treatise on a portion of the Mosaic law. It is pre- ceded by an extentive introduction entitled The En- trance into the Garden ("|an xmD), in which the plan of the work is set forth, and specimens of Hebrew syn- onyms are given. This first volume he edited when a book-keeper at Amsterdam in 1765. The second volume CSU^n rr^an) consists of 13 sections, subdivided into 180 chapters, and gives in a most learned manner a phil- osophico-traditional explanation of all the passages of the O. T. in which either the word WZTi or its deriv- atives occur. It is likewise preceded by an elaborate introduction, wherein those words are explained which constitute mixed forms. A second edition of it was pub- lished at Vienna in 1829, and a third at Warsaw in 1838 : — n^axi Dibo "^"121, Letters to the Jews of Austria concerning the reforms of the emperor Joseph II (Berlin, 1782): — ",11 "iipn '^•O^-Q, Defence of the Rabbinic Ti-adition (Konigsb. 1837, new ed.) : — miOrt D, Jew- ish Ethics ( Berlin, 1784 ; latest ed. Konigsb. 1851 ) : — mXSn iTiUJ, Songs of Glory, an epic on the life of Moses. Though the language of this poem is purely Biblical, and the style enriched with the finest embel- lishments of the inspired poetic writings, yet the cast of thought is not national, but European and secular. " The Songs of Glory," says Dr. Marjoliouth, " embodies the history of the exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt until the giving of the law at Sinai. It is, in- deed, a most unique production. An English Christian, who justly esteems Milton as the most successful epic poet, may, perhaps, not like to hear Wessely compared to their venerable bard. I have read them both, and have no hesitation in saying that they are equal to each other, with the only difference that Wessely is not so profuse in mythological terms as Milton. Wessely, like Milton, did not think rhyme a necessarj"^ adjunct or true ornament of a poem or good verse, and, there- fore, rejected it, which makes the poetry of the Shirey Tiphereth exceedingly sublime. Wessely also left in MS. a commentary on Genesis, which was edited by Isaac Reggio, with the title Commentarium in Genesin ex ejus Autographo Excudi Curavit (Goritioe, 1854). See Flirst, Bibliotheca Judaica, iii, 507 sq. ; De' Rossi, Dizionario Storico (Germ, transl.), p. 331 sq. ; Ethe- ridge. Introduction to Hebrew Literature, p. 393 sq. ; Kit to, Cyclopcedia, s. v. ; Da Costa, Israel and the Gen- tiles, p. 554 sq. ; McCaul, Sketches of Judaism and the Jews, p. 51 sq. ; Schmucker, Hist, of the Jews, p. 244 sq. ; Marjoliouth, The Fundamental Pi-inciples of Modem Ju- daism, p. 247 sq. ; Griitz, Gesch. d. Juden, xi, 91 sq. ; Jost, Gesch. d. Judenthiims und seiner Sekten, iii, 307 sq. ; Meisel, Leben u. Wirhen Wesselfs (Breslau, 1841); Gei- ger, in the Zeitschrift der D. M. G. xvii, 321 sq. ; De- litzsch, Gesch. der jiidischen Poesie, p. 85, 95, 106, 114, 174 sq. ; Stern, Gesch. d. Judenthums von Mendelssohn, etc., p. 104 sq. ; Dessauer, Ge^ch. d. Israeliten, p. 504 sq. ; Giidemaim, in Frankel-Gratz Monatsschrift, 1870, p. 478 sq. ; Cassel, Lehrbuch der Geschichte und Literatur (Leips. 1879), p. 499 sq. ; Morals, Eminent Israelites of the Nineteenth Century (Philadelphia, 1880), p. 344 sq. (B. P.)