One of Britain’s Oldest Printed Jewish Books, and Its Author

In 1772, the Jewish printer L. Alexander of London produced one of the country’s first Jewish books: an English translation of the talmudic tractate Pirkei Avot (“Ethics of the Fathers”) along with the commentary of Moses Maimonides. Jeffrey Maynard describes this work, and its historical context. (Reproductions of some pages can be found at the link below.)

The Ashkenazi community in London started to flourish under the . . . rabbinic leadership of Rabbi David Tevele Schiff, who was appointed chief rabbi in 1765. The rebuilt Great Synagogue was dedicated in 1766, and Hebrew printing in London started in 1770 with what was probably the first book by Jewish printers and typesetters, [an edition of the penitential prayers known as sliḥot]. At about the same time (1770), the first siddur in Hebrew with an English translation was printed in London by Alexander Alexander and Baruch Meyers. This was followed in 1771 by a set of Hebrew maḥzorim (festival prayer books).

The translator, the English scholar Abraham Tang (d. 1792) was a grandson of the [rabbinic judge] of Prague, Abraham Tausig Neu-Greschel. Like his grandfather, the author signed his name with the Hebrew initials TN”G, and is thus generally known as Tang. Tang wrote a number of other works, all unpublished, and his manuscripts were until recently in London. . . . In addition to his rabbinic knowledge, Tang was an enlightened scholar, well familiar with secular writings. He cites “a noble passage of my countryman, Milton” as an introduction to a comment by Maimonides. The late Cecil Roth described Abraham Tang as “the first Anglo-Jewish scholar of modern times.”

Abraham Tang was born in England, and we notice interesting accents in his transliterations. He drops his h like a London Cockney, and calls himself an “Ebrew.”

Read more at Jewish Miscellanies

More about: Anglo-Jewry, Moses Maimonides, Rare books

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023