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Blum, Léon

(Encyclopedia)Blum, Léon lāôNˈ blo͝om [key], 1872–1950, French Socialist leader and writer. Well established in literary circles, he entered politics during the Dreyfus Affair and rose to party leadership. I...

Richler, Mordecai

(Encyclopedia)Richler, Mordecai, 1931–2001, Canadian novelist, b. Montreal. He fled his native city in the early 1950s and lived mainly in London, returning to Canada in 1972 and from then on spending part of his...

Holocaust

(Encyclopedia)Holocaust hŏlˈəkôstˌ, hōˈlə– [key], name given to the period of persecution and extermination of European Jews by Nazi Germany. Romani (Gypsies), homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, the disabl...

Feuchtwanger, Lion

(Encyclopedia)Feuchtwanger, Lion lēˈōn foikhtˈväng-ər [key], 1884–1958, German novelist. A pacifist, socialist, and friend of both Thomas Mann and Bertolt Brecht, he fled Germany for France in 1933; he was ...

Iconium

(Encyclopedia)Iconium īkōˈnēəm [key], ancient city of Asia Minor, the modern Konya, Turkey. In ancient days it was at various times in Phrygia, Lycaonia, Cappadocia, and the Roman province of Galatia. It was v...

Hartman, David

(Encyclopedia)Hartman, David, 1931–2013, Israeli rabbi and philosopher, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. The son of Hasidim who immigrated to the United States from Israel, he trained as a rabbi at Yeshiva Univ., New York City,...

Herodians

(Encyclopedia)Herodians hĕrōˈdēənz [key], Jewish political party of the early 1st cent. a.d., related to the dynasty of Herod. Some have supposed that they were largely Sadducees. In the New Testament the Hero...

Garnier, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Garnier, Robert gärnyāˈ [key], 1534?–1590, French dramatic poet. He wrote mainly closet dramas in the classical manner of Seneca. Les Juives [the Jewish women] (1583), based on the Bible, is per...

Rachel, in the Bible

(Encyclopedia)Rachel rāˈchəl [key], in the Bible, wife of Jacob and mother of Joseph and Benjamin. She is one of the four Jewish matriarchs. An alternate form is Rahel. ...

Zunser, Eliakum

(Encyclopedia)Zunser, Eliakum ĕlˈyōko͝om tso͝onˈzər [key], 1846–1913, Lithuanian folk poet and singer who wrote in Yiddish. The most popular Jewish folk singer of his time, he appeared at weddings all over...