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Gordon, Yehuda Leib (1831-1892)
 Poet, critic
and journalist, a key spokesman of the Haskalah, Judah Leib Gordon was born
in Vilna, and after a brilliant student career, became a teacher in various
Jewish government schools.
His first major poem -- The Love of David and Michal, an epic, was published
in 1857, and was followed two years later by Mishlei Yehudah ("Judah's
Parables"), translations and adaptations of works by Aesop. Phaedrus,
La Fontaine, Lessing, and Krylov. While serving a prison term for alleged
anti-Czarist activities, Gordon wrote Zidkiyyahu be- Veit ha-Pekuddot
("King Zedekiah in Prison" 1879), a historical biblical poem reflecting
his prison experiences. On his release from prison Gordon became editor
of the St. Petersburg Hebrew daily Ha-Meliz and also science editor of
the Russian Jewish monthly Voskhod (1881--82). His poem Kozo shel Yod
("The Point on Top of the Yod") was a protest against the oppressed situation
of Jewish women of the time.
Gordon at first blamed the troubles that plagued Russian Jewry on the
traditionalism of the rabbis. He urged Jews to stop speaking Yiddish,
to participate more in Russian life. He advocated universal general education
and the translation into Hebrew of all literature of general interest,
denouncing those who opposed this as wishing "to drive out our Hebrew
language from the land of the living." But Gordon's faith in the ability
of Russian Jewry to adapt happily under Russian liberalism proved shortlived.
After the 1881 pogroms in southern Russia he came to regard emigration
to western Europe and America as the only solution to Jewish oppression.
Although he actively upheld the Zionist cause, he believed that true redemption
could come about only after "our spiritual deliverance."
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by C.D.I. Systems 1992 (LTD) and Keter.
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