Ahad Ha'am (1856–1927)

Ahad Ha'am was the pen name of Asher Hirsch Ginsberg, born to a pious Orthodox Jewish family in Skvyra, Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine). He received a Jewish education from his father and private teachers, and studied Russian, German, French, English, and Latin on his own. After his marriage in 1873, he studied philosophy and science at home as well, as he was unable to attend university. He was attracted to the Jewish Enlightenment movement that attempted to integrate Judaism with modern Western thought. At age 22, he went to Odessa, where he joined the Jewish group Hibbat Zion, formed in response to anti-Semitic pogroms in the Russian Empire. In 1889, he published his first major essay, This Is Not the Way, written in Hebrew under the pseudonym Ahad Ha-Am (One of the People), which made him famous. His collected essays comprise four volumes, published in 1895, 1903, 1904, and 1913. In 1897, after two visits to the British Mandate of Palestine, he founded the journal Ha-Shiloaḥ, which Hayim Nahman Bialik served as literary editor for six years. Ha'am advocated for a renaissance of the Hebrew language and was an influential force in modern Hebrew literature. However, he remained outside the Zionist establishment because he believed that re-creating Jewish nationhood could not be achieved by purely political means but required spiritual rebirth. In 1903, he retired from running Ha-Shiloaḥ and moved to London, England, to work for the Wissotzky tea firm office there. He continued writing and played a part as an advisor to Chaim Weizmann in securing the Balfour Declaration in 1917. Ha'am spent his last years in Palestine, editing his letters and memoirs, which were published posthumously in 1931.