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Concept
Naphtali Hirz Wessely
Summary
Naphtali Hirz (Hartwig) Wessely (נפתלי הירץ וויזעל; 9 December 1725 – 28 February 1805) was an 18th-century German-Jewish Hebraist and educationist.
One of Wessely's ancestors, Joseph Reis, fled from Podolia in 1648 on account of the Chmielnicki persecutions, during which his whole family had perished. After a brief sojourn in Cracow, Reis settled in Amsterdam, where he acquired great wealth, and where he, in 1671, was one of the signers of a petition to the Dutch government requesting permission to erect a synagogue. Together with his younger son Moses (Naphtali Hirz's father), Reis later settled in Wesel on the Rhine, whence the family name "Wessely" originated. In the synagogue at Wesel (destroyed during Kristallnacht) preserved some ritual paraphernalia presented to it by Moses Reis Wessely, who, upon the advice of the Prince of Holstein, whose purveyor he was, removed to Glückstadt, then the capital of Sleswick. He established there a factory of arms. King Frederick VI of Denmark later sent Moses to Hamburg as his agent, and while there he transacted important business for Peter the Great as well. Moses' son, Issachar Ber Wessely, was the father of Naphtali Hirz.
Naphtali Herz Wessely passed his childhood at Copenhagen, where his father was purveyor to the king. In addition to rabbinical studies under Jonathan Eybeschütz, he studied modern languages. As the representative of the banker Feitel, he later visited Amsterdam, where he published (1765–66) his Lebanon, or Gan Na'ul, a philological investigation of Hebrew roots and synonyms. Although prolix in style, and lacking scientific method, this work established his reputation. After his marriage at Copenhagen, he represented Feitel at Berlin, and there became associated with Moses Mendelssohn. Wessely encouraged the latter in his labors by publishing Alim li-Terufah, a work advocating the bi'ur and the translation of the Bible into German. To this work Wessely himself contributed a commentary on Leviticus (Berlin, 1782), having published, two years previously, a Hebrew edition of the Book of Wisdom, together with a commentary.
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