Zevi Scharfstein
{{short description|Hebrew-language educator and lexicographer}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Zevi Scharfstein
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| native_name = {{nobold|{{Script/Hebrew|צבי שרפשטיין}}}}
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| birth_date = {{birth date|1884|3|15|df=y}}
| birth_place = Dunaivtsi (Dinovitz), Podolia region, Russian Empire
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| death_date = {{death date and age|1972|10|11|1884|3|15|df=y}}
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| alma_mater = Honorary doctorate, Jewish Theological Seminary of America
| occupation = educator, writer, lexicographer
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| movement = Revival of the Hebrew language
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| organization = Shilo publishing house; Bureau of Jewish Education of NYC
| spouse = Rose Goldfarb
| children = Ben‐Ami Scharfstein, Shulamith Scharfstein Chernoff
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Zevi Scharfstein (Hebrew: צבי שרפשטיין) was a prolific Hebrew-language educator, writer, and publishing entrepreneur who authored 423 works in 698 publications during his career.{{cite web |title=Scharfstein, Ẓevi 1884-1972 |url=http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n89-640804/ |website=Worldcat.org |publisher=OCLC Inc. |access-date=19 September 2020}} The hosts of a special celebration in Detroit honoring Scharfstein on his seventieth birthday in 1954 described him as "one of the country's leading Jewish educators" whose Hebrew instructional materials were in very wide use in the United States.{{cite news |last1=Staff writer |title=Kvutzah, Teachers to Honor Birthday of Z. Scharfstein |url=https://digital.bentley.umich.edu/djnews/djn.1954.04.02.001/2 |access-date=19 September 2020 |issue=April 2, 1954 |publisher=Detroit Jewish News |date=April 2, 1954}} His 1972 obituary in the New York Times attributed a hundred Hebrew textbooks for children to his credit, many of which in the early 1970s were "still considered classics in Hebrew schools."{{cite news |last1=Staff writer |title=ZEVI SCHARFSTEIN, HEBREW EDUCATOR |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1972/10/12/archives/zevi-scharfstein-hebrew-educator.html |access-date=19 September 2020 |work=New York Times |date=October 12, 1972}}
Scharfstein was educated as a child by private tutors, and his only official academic degree was an honorary Doctor of Hebrew Letters, awarded by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. But his prolific career and founding of the Shilo publishing house made him "a teacher of teachers" in the Jewish Diaspora.{{cite news |last1=Staff writer |title=ZEVI SCHARFSTEIN, HEBREW EDUCATOR |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1972/10/12/archives/zevi-scharfstein-hebrew-educator.html |access-date=19 September 2020 |work=New York Times |date=October 12, 1972}}
Personal life
Scharfstein was born in Dunaivtsi in the Podolia region of the Russian Empire, in present-day Ukraine.{{cite book |last1=Scharfstein |first1=Zevi |title=Haya Aviv Ba-Aretz (It was Spring in the Land) |date=1953 |publisher=Masada |location=Tel Aviv}} During his childhood, he was strongly influenced by the Haskalah movement, and the movement's emphasis on childhood education and the development of a contemporary Hebrew press both shaped his life and career.{{cite thesis |type=PhD |last=Lyon|first=David A. |date=1990 |title=The culture of American Hebraist educators of the early 20th century as reflected in the life of Zevi Scharfstein |publisher=Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion}} After witnessing the violence of pogroms in the region followed by the onset of World War I, Scharfstein immigrated to the United States "without a broken heart." He wrote of "writing new textbooks intended and prepared for the young generation of America."{{cite book |editor-last1=Bavli |editor-first1=Hillel |title=Sefer ha-Yovel li-Khevod Ẓevi Scharfstein |date=1955 |publisher=Histadrut halvrit |location=New York City |edition=First}}
Career
Once in the US, he quickly founded a monthly magazine for children, Shaharut (Youth).{{cite web |title=Prof. Zvi Scharfstein |url=http://www.tidhar.tourolib.org/tidhar/view/15/4776 |website=Encyclopedia of the Founders and Builders of Israel |publisher=Touro College Libraries |access-date=19 September 2020}} Published by the Bureau of Jewish Education in New York City, Shaharut's original mission was to teach Jewish topics and Hebrew language. After the 1917 Balfour Declaration, the periodical shifted to short stories and articles about Jewish life in Palestine.{{cite book |last1=Raider |first1=Mark A. |title=The Emergence of American Zionism |date=1998-09-15 |publisher=NYU Press |location=New York City |isbn=9781479861279 |page=95}} Scharfstein also joined the Bureau of Jewish Education, founded by noted American Hebraist Samson Benderly in 1910, although Scharfstein was not among the group of proteges known as "the Benderly Boys," Scharfstein believing that Benderly often preferred American-born recruits over immigrants.{{cite journal |last1=Goren |first1=Arthur A. |title=Review: "Jewish Education in a Pluralist Society: Samson Benderly and Jewish Education in the United States" |journal=American Jewish Historical Quarterly |date=1 June 1969 |volume= 58 |issue=4 |pages=515–520 |jstor=23876029 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23876029 |access-date=22 September 2020}} Scharfstein was an instructor of Hebrew and Hebrew education at the Teachers Institute of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City from 1916 until his retirement in 1960.{{cite web |title=Scharfstein, Ẓevi|url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/scharfstein-zevi |website=Encyclopedia.com/religion | access-date=29 March 2024}}
In the early 1920s, he founded Shilo Publishing House with the help of his brother, Asher. Controlling his own press and going to market with his own materials freed Scharfstein from the limitations of working within the existing philosophical, pedagogical, and financial power structures of the Hebraist movement.{{cite thesis |type=PhD |last=Lyon|first=David A. |date=1990 |title=The culture of American Hebraist educators of the early 20th century as reflected in the life of Zevi Scharfstein |publisher=Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion}} One of his first books was emblematic of his mission: Sifurei ha-Torah le-yeladim (Torah Stories for Children).{{cite book |title=Sipurei ha-Torah le-yeladim |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/974504796 |via=Worldcat.org |year = 1921|publisher=OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. |oclc = 974504796|access-date=22 September 2020}} Shilo is still in operation, offering books on "the Hebrew language, studying to read the Haftorah, and the works of Nachmanides," as well as a widely used Siddur for children and Hebrew-English and English-Hebrew dictionaries.{{cite web |title=About Shilo Publishing |url=https://shilopublishing.com/ |website=Shilo Publishing |access-date=22 September 2020}}
Scharfstein's educational materials, textbooks writing, and curriculum development emphasized stories, pictures, and formats that modeled and extolled a lifestyle that was both Jewish and American. His textbooks featured stories about American Jewish children enjoying American life within the context of Jewish perspectives and values. He also penned biographic sketches and profiles of American Jews to illuminate how they could become both emblematically American and Jewish figures.{{cite thesis |type=PhD |last=Lyon|first=David A. |date=1990 |title=The culture of American Hebraist educators of the early 20th century as reflected in the life of Zevi Scharfstein |publisher=Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion}}
Together with his son, Ben-Ami Scharfstein, he authored the first Hebrew textbook for blind English-speaking readers with the Jewish Braille Institute.{{cite news |title=First Hebrew Braille Text Published in United States |url=http://pdfs.jta.org/1952/1952-04-25_081.pdf?_ga=2.264945103.1515893248.1600551647-1450158246.1600551647 |access-date=19 September 2020 |work=JTA Daily News |agency=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |date=25 April 1952}} Ben-Ami went on to teach philosophy at Tel Aviv University.{{cite news |last1=Lev-Ari |first1=Shiri |title=A Scholar From a Dying Breed |url=https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/culture/1.4770535 |access-date=19 September 2020 |publisher=Haaretz |date=March 15, 2005}}
Scharfstein was awarded the 1954 Louis Lamed Foundation annual prize for Hebrew literature, citing his autobiography "Haya Aviv Ba-Aretz" (It was Spring in the Land).{{cite news |title=Two Yiddish, One Hebrew Writer Receive Prizes for Best Books |url=http://pdfs.jta.org/1954/1954-12-13_234.pdf |access-date=31 July 2021 |work=JTA Daily News |agency=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |date=13 December 1954}}
Bibliography
- Sifurei ha-Torah le-yeladim (Torah Stories for Children) (1921)
- Shaʻar ha-lashon (The Gateway of Language) (1927)
- Shaʻar ha-tefilah (The Gateway of Prayer) (1929)
- Shaʻar la-sifruth (The Gateway to Literature) (1947)
- Shaʻar ha-lashon revised edition (The Gateway of Language) (1947)
- Hebrew self-taught (with Ben-Ami Scharfstein) (1950)
- Let's talk Hebrew, a beginner's book for parents and children (with Siegmund Forst) (1951)
- Haya Aviv Ba'Aretz (It was Spring in the Land) (היה אביב בארץ) (1952)
- Arbaʻim Shanah ba'Ameriḳa (Forty Years in America) (ארבעים שנה באמריקה) (1955)
- English-Hebrew dictionary (with Rose Scharfstein) (1957)
- Great Hebrew Educators (גדולי חינון בעמנו) (1964)
- Darkhei limud leshonenu (My Paths to Learning Our Language) (דרכי למוד לשוננו) (1965)
References
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Category:Modern Hebrew writers
Category:Jewish printing and publishing
Category:20th-century educational theorists
Category:American educational theorists
Category:20th-century lexicographers
Category:People from Dunaivtsi
Category:Jewish writers from the Russian Empire
Category:Russian emigrants to the United States