Leon Simon | |
|---|---|
אריה (לאון) סימון | |
 Simon in 1911 | |
| Born | (1881-07-11)11 July 1881 |
| Died | 27 April 1965(1965-04-27) (aged 83) |
| Nationality | British,Israeli |
| Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford |
| Occupation | Civil servant |
| Years active | 1904–1949 |
| Known for | Cultural Zionist, writer,Hebrew scholar,political activist |
| Spouse | |
Sir Leon SimonCB (11 July 1881 – 27 April 1965) was a leading BritishZionist intellectual and civil servant who took part in the drafting of theBalfour Declaration of 1917 and served on theZionist Commission withChaim Weizmann.[1] An advocate ofcultural Zionism and therevival of Hebrew language, Simon was a scholar and translator ofAhad Ha'am, and produced the first modern Hebrew translations ofPlato.[2] He served as the Chairman of theHebrew University of Jerusalem’s Executive Council, and from 1949–50 as the university's President.[3]
Simon was the son of Rabbi Isadore Simon of theSouth Manchester Synagogue and Kitty Avner, both of whom had moved to Britain in the late 19th century fromLithuania.[4] He studied atManchester Grammar School and readGreats atBalliol College at theUniversity of Oxford.[2]
In Manchester he became a core part of a group of young anglicised Jewish intellectuals that congregated aroundChaim Weizmann.[4] The group included the journalistHarry Sacher, Samuel Landman,Israel Sieff andSimon Marks ofMarks & Spencer. All of them had studied at Manchester Grammar School.[4]
The group were members of the Manchester Zionist Association, where Simon and his brother Maurice Simon would hold discussions in Hebrew.[5]Charles Dreyfus, Weizmann's employer in Manchester, was the President of the Society.[6]
Simon edited the newspaper "The Zionist Banner" with Sacher and the monthly journal "Palestine".[7]
In 1904 Simon joined theGeneral Post Office and rose to become Director of Telegraphs and Telephones and later Director of Savings.[8] He was made CB in 1931[9] and was knighted in 1944.[10] He married Ellen Umanski, (later called by the name Lady Ellen Simon), and they had two daughters.[11][12]
Under the influence of Chaim Weizmann, whose family had immigrated from Belarus to Manchester, Simon belonged to the first generation of leading British Jews who preferred Zionism to conventional religiosity and who pressed for Hebrew to supplantYiddish as the main language of the diaspora.[4]
Simon came under the influence ofAhad Ha'am (Asher Zvi Hirsch Ginsberg), a leading figure ofcultural Zionism, and went on to translate many of his works into English[13] as well as writing his biography.[14]
He also wrote the first translations intomodern Hebrew ofJohn Stuart Mill'sEssay on Liberty, and of several ofPlato's Dialogues, work for which he received theTchernichovsky Prize.[15]
A draft of theBalfour Declaration, written by Simon on paper of London's Imperial Hotel on July 17, 1917 was auctioned off in 2005 through Sotheby's for $884,000 US in New York. It is the only known surviving handwritten draft of the declaration.[16]
The draft of the declaration noted down by Simon read:
"H(is) M(ajesty's) G(overnment) accepts the principle that P(alestine) should be reconstituted as the Nat(ional) Home of the J(ewish) P(eople). HMG will use its best efforts to secure the achievement of this object, and will discuss the necessary methods and means with the Z(ionist) O(rganization)."[16]
Simon accompanied Weizmann as a member of theZionist Commission alongsideIsrael Sieff,M. D. Eder and others in 1918 to begin talks with the government ofDavid Lloyd George on the establishment of aJewish State inPalestine.
From 1946 to 1953 Simon lived in Jerusalem where he served as Chair of the Executive Council of theHebrew University and from 1949-50 as its President, preceded byJudah Leon Magnes and followed bySelig Brodetsky (1949-1952).[17] He also served as President ofIsrael Postal Company Bank.[18]
Simon wrote several works on Zionism, includingZionism and the Jewish Problem published in 1917 andStudies in Jewish Nationalism published in 1920. A collection of his papers are held atDuke University.[19]
