Manasseh ben Israel

Manasseh ben Israel (born 1604, Lisbon? [Port.]—died Nov. 20, 1657, Middelburg, Neth.) was a major Hebraic scholar of the Jewish community of Amsterdam and the founder of the modern Jewish community in England.

Manasseh was born into a family of Marranos (Jews of Spain and Portugal who publicly accepted Christianity but privately practiced Judaism). After his father appeared as a penitent in an auto da fé, the family escaped to Amsterdam, where Jewish settlement was officially authorized. Manasseh, a brilliant theological student, became the rabbi of a Portuguese Jewish congregation in Amsterdam in 1622. He founded that city’s first Hebrew printing press in 1626, publishing his works in Hebrew, Latin, Spanish, and Portuguese.

Among his writings, Conciliador, 3 vol. (1632–51), was an attempt to reconcile discordant passages in the Bible; it established his reputation as a scholar in the Jewish and Christian communities. Manasseh maintained friendships with Hugo Grotius and Rembrandt, corresponded with Queen Christina of Sweden, and was an early teacher of Benedict de Spinoza.

Manasseh believed that the messiah would return to lead the Jews to the Holy Land only after their dispersal throughout the world was achieved. He considered immigrating to Brazil in 1640 and reported the alleged discovery in South America of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel in Esperança de Israel (“Hope of Israel”). To support the settlement of Jews in Protestant England, where their presence had been officially banned since 1290, he dedicated the Latin edition of this work (1650) to the English Parliament.

Manasseh continued to plead for the formal recognition of Jewish settlement in England, and he appeared before Oliver Cromwell in London in 1655 to argue his cause. While in England he wrote Vindiciae Judaeorum (1656; “Vindication of the Jews”) in answer to contemporary attacks on Jews, including William Prynne’s Short Demurrer. He returned to Holland in 1657, believing his mission to have been unsuccessful. His efforts, however, initiated the unofficial English acceptance of Jewish settlement and led to the granting of an official charter of protection to the Jews of England in 1664, after Manasseh’s death.