Leo Pinsker

Leo Pinsker (born 1821, Tomaszów, Pol., Russian Empire [now in Poland]—died Dec. 21, 1891, Odessa, Russian Empire [now in Ukraine]) was a Russian-Polish physician, polemicist, and pioneer Jewish nationalist, who was a forerunner of Theodor Herzl and other major political Zionists.

While conducting a medical practice in Odessa, Pinsker maintained a deep interest in Jewish community affairs. He joined the Society for the Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia, an assimilationist organization founded in 1863. He advocated secular education for Jews and the translation of the Bible and Hebrew prayer books into Russian. A pogrom in Odessa in 1871 shook but did not destroy his beliefs; in 1881, however, another severe pogrom broke out in Odessa, not only ignored but even abetted by the government and defended by the press. His assimilationist beliefs were shattered, and he turned to Jewish nationalism.

In 1882 Pinsker anonymously published in German an incisive, embittered, and impassioned pamphlet, “Auto-Emanzipation. Ein Mahnruf an seine Stammesgenossen. Von einem russischen Juden” (“Self-Emancipation. A Warning Addressed to His Brethren. By a Russian Jew”; Auto-Emancipation, 1884), which provoked strong reactions, both critical and commendatory, from Jewish leaders. In the pamphlet he contended that the only restorative for Jewish dignity and spiritual health lay in a Jewish homeland.

Pinsker’s authorship was soon discovered, and a newly formed Zionist group, Ḥibbat Ẕiyyon (“Love of Zion”), made him one of its leaders. In 1884 he convened the Kattowitz (Katowice, Pol.) Conference, which established a permanent committee with headquarters in Odessa. Although Ḥibbat Ẕiyyon (later Ḥovevei Ẕiyyon [“Lovers of Zion”]) was crippled by lack of funds, it did establish a few colonies in Palestine and founded the Society for the Support of Jewish Agriculturists and Handicraftsmen in Syria and Palestine.