Some Jewish Witnesses For Christ
chief literary work, however, was posthumous--a Concordance of the
Hebrew and Chaldee Scriptures. Davidson was also actively engaged from
time to time in missionary work. In 1866 he laboured in Vienna and had
much intercourse with students. In Bordeaux he stirred up an interest in
the Jews among evangelical Christians, so that they founded the "Societé
d'amis d'Israel." In 1871 he became Superintendent of the Home for Aged
Converts and for Orphans, where he died the same year.
DAVIS, Joseph, a native of Poland, was baptized in 1819, in Edinburgh,
and was probably the first convert of the Edinburgh Jewish Missionary
Society, which was founded the year before. He afterwards laboured as a
missionary among his brethren.
DAVIS, Rev. Nathan, was one of the first missionaries of the Free Church
of Scotland. He was sent to Tunis in 1830, where he raised a spirit of
enquiry amongst the Jews, and baptized some of them. In 1848 he was
transferred to Gibraltar.
DENNIS, Rev. Dr. M. J., worked first as a missionary in Palestine. Later
on he left the Holy Land and joined Mr. Freshman's mission in New York,
but his station was at Boston.
DESAIR, Ludwig (Leopold Dessauer), born in Posen in 1809, embraced
Christianity. He is known as one of the greatest Shakespearian actors of
the nineteenth century.
DETMOND, Johann Hermann, son of the Court physician at Hanover, born in
1787. The whole family embraced Christianity, and Detmond, junior,
became a member of the German Parliament in 1848. ("Jewish
Intelligence," 1856, p. 329).
DEUTSCH, Christian Solomon, born at Temesvar, in Hungary, 1734. Up to
his twentieth year he studied scarcely anything but the Talmud at home
and in Prague. The Bible was a sealed book to him. He had married, as
the custom was then, very young, and had his board and lodging with his
father-in-law, so that he could apply all his energies to Talmudic
study, till he should be a light in Israel. In 1760 his wife died, and
after four months he married the second daughter, and was kept again. In
the same year he received from the Grand Rabbi of Moravia, the title of
Moreinu or D.D. However, he was not happy; he had read a passage in the
Talmud, tract Megillah 24 b, which troubled him. It is thus: "R. Jose
said: I was vexed all my life in not being able to understand the
prophecy in Deut. xxviii. 29. 'Thou shalt grope at noonday, as the blind
gropeth in darkness,' until one dark night I met a blind man carrying a
burning torch, and asked him, 'What good is that torch to you?' He
replied, 'Although I cannot myself see, yet others can see and take care
of me that I fall not into a pit or among thorns and briars." This
awakened serious thoughts in Solomon's mind. He felt that he was not
even like the blind man, for he had neglected the Word of God in the Old
Testament, and as for the New, he, living in a Roman Catholic country,
had never heard of it. So he began to practise penitence by wearing a
garment of horsehair over his body, fasting and castigations. At night
he often used to weep over his sins, and his wife could not console him.
Then she reproached him that he had some secret which he kept from her.
To this he replied, "I will confess the truth to you; we must choose
another way and get out of the darkness in which we are living, if we
wish to escape from hell." He had been already meditating about
embracing Christianity, and this he betrayed somewhat by his behaviour,
and the result was that he was compelled by the rabbi to divorce his
wife. When three Roman priests heard of this affair, they visited him,
and one of them assured him that he had prayed to the Virgin for his
conversion, therefore he ought at once to join the Church. But Solomon
refused, and left his home in 1762, praying on the way for guidance in
the name of Jesus. This prayer he records in full in his autobiography.
He came to Prague and then to Saxony, studying the Scriptures on the
way. Here in "a prominent town" (probably Dresden) he visited the rabbi,
and they enjoyed themselves in a discussion over some knotty Talmudic
subtleties. On October 24, he read for the first time Isa. liii. and
asked the rabbi concerning whom the prophet spoke. Then the rabbi
appointed an hour and a private place where he would speak to him about
this chapter. When they met together he was astonished to hear the rabbi
revealing as a secret his belief that the chapter was fulfilled in Jesus
of Nazareth. Thence Solomon went to Leipzig, Berlin, Amsterdam, and at
last to London, where he was very ill. After his recovery in 1763, he
returned to Holland. On his way by ship to Arnheim, he met a Swiss
Christian, who took a great fancy to him, and in a conversation
expressed a wish that the Lord might enlighten his eyes as he did Rabbi
Jechiel Hirschlein who had been baptized at Zurich. In short, after much
instruction, Solomon was baptized at Amsterdam, on June 25, 1767, after
handing in a written confession of his faith under the title, "Jehovah
Glorified through the acknowledgment of the true Messiah Jesus Christ,
proved from the writings of the Prophets, Evangelists, and Apostles,"
consisting of 175 pages, and printed at Amsterdam. He then studied
theology and became Pastor at Mydret in 1777, where he laboured
faithfully till his death in 1797. His chief literary work was,
"Israel's Verlosinge en eeuwige Behoudenis" (Israel's redemption and
eternal salvation), 3 vols., Amsterdam, 1769-93.
DEUTSCH, Ignaz Friedrich Gottlieb, a native of Perskretscham, and
evidently a relative of the next, was baptized in Berlin in 1825.
DEUTSCH, Siegmund Herman, was a remarkable personality. He was born in
Perskretscham, Silesia, in 1791. As usual he had an early Talmudical
education. Then he went to the Gymnasium, and then to the University of
Breslau, where he studied mathematics and astronomy. In 1815 he served
as a soldier in the Prussian army, took part in the war, and was
promoted to be an officer and teacher in the military school in 1817.
Then he had a duel with some one and was imprisoned in a fort. There he
was converted to Christianity, and afterwards served as an artillery
officer in the Greek liberation war.
Returning to Berlin in 1824, where he attended the ministry of the
celebrated Gossner, he associated with the convert Lachs, who was a
teacher in a school for deaf and dumb, sat under the theological
teachings of Neander, and was thus spiritually prepared for being called
to labour for the Master among his own people. This call came from Dr.
McCaul, and after a little more preparation in the Hebrew College in
Palestine Place, he was sent by the L.J.S. as a missionary to Warsaw in
1828, where he laboured (with a short interval at Breslau) till 1833. He
then was stationed in Bavaria. He died in 1864, leaving a MS. (not yet
printed) on the future of Israel.
DISRAELI, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield, born in London, December 21,
1804, died there April 19, 1881. Of this preeminently distinguished man
in the nineteenth century there are many biographies and lasting
monuments. We need only record very briefly here that he was one of
England's greatest sons and statesmen, and the greatest ornament of the
Jewish people in modern times. An ardent lover of his nation, a genuine
English patriot, a friend of his great Queen, a thorough Protestant
Churchman, yet with liberal tendencies, and a true believer in
Christianity, which he regarded as completed Judaism. His works are
these: "Vivian Grey," 1817; "The Infernal Marriage;" "Ixion in Heaven,"
and "Popanilla," 1828; "Contarini Fleming," and "The Wondrous Tale of
Alroy," 1832; "The Young Duke," about that time; "What is he?" 1833;
"Revolutionary Epic," 1834; "Coningsby," 1844; "Tancred," 1847; "Sybil,"
1845; "The rise of Iskander," "Vindication of the British
Constitution," "Venetia," "Henrietta Temple," "The Tragedy of Count
Alarcos," and "Lothair," were all productions of his great intellect at
different seasons. Benjamin's mother, his sister Sarah, born 1802, his
brother Ralph, 1809, and his brother James, 1813, were all Hebrew
Christians.
DISRAELI, Isaac, left the synagogue in 1817. Though we have no definite
information about his baptism, we may reasonably assume that he was a
member of the Church of England. This appears from his having his
children baptized, from his pamphlet, "The Spirit of Judaism," in which
he vindicated himself for the step he had taken, from his articles on
"The Talmud," "Psalm Singing," the Pearl Bibles and six thousand errata
in his "Curiosities of literature," &c., all shewing that he was an
earnest student of religious subjects and of the Scriptures, and that he
endeavoured to spread the light of truth.
DUCAT, H., a native of Warsaw, embraced Christianity, together with his
wife, about the middle of the nineteenth century. He was a saintly
Christian man, laboured as missionary for some time under the British
Society, was one of the founders of the Hebrew Christian Prayer Union
and of a Loan Fund for needy converts. His sons-in-law are the Rev. Dr.
Flecker and the Rev. John Schor.
DUSHAW, Amos I., spent the greater part of his youth in Jerusalem,
Palestine, where he attended the school of the London Jews' Society.
Here the seeds of Christian truth were sown in his young heart. He
afterwards came to London, where he was brought into close connexion
with the members of the above-mentioned society, and the germs of truth
gradually grew, budded, and blossomed into faith in our Lord as his
Messiah.
Dushaw went to America in 1895. The following year he was baptized, upon
confession of his faith in Christ, in the Fourth Congregational Church,
at Hartford, Conn.
He followed Horace Greeley's advice, "Young man, go West." He was
determined to obtain a classical education. After a hard struggle, that
perseverance and determination to conquer all obstacles always a
component of the Jewish character, enabled him, in 1901, to graduate
from Redfield College, South Dakota. He afterwards returned to New York,
and entered the Union Theological Seminary, from which he graduated in
1904. June 12, 1905, he received a preacher's license from the New York
Presbytery.
While pursuing his regular academic course he made a speciality of
sociology, literature and history. Especially was he interested in
Hebrew history and the present social, religious and political status of
Israel. He supplemented this study by personal observation as a worker
on the East Side of New York. This training enabled him to write for
"The People, the Land and the Book" some very choice articles. Several
secular papers quoted from one of his articles, "Moses and Jesus."
The production of this article was due to the following incident. Dushaw
called upon one of the leading reformed rabbis to discuss the general
condition of the Jews in the Ghetto. This rabbi was so much impressed
with his insight into the situation, and also with his information on
many facts pertaining to Israel's development, that he advised him to
return to the Hebrew ranks. Israel, he said, would appreciate his
ability, whereas the Church would simply cast him out, because he was a
member of Israel. He thought Dushaw was foolish to waste his time in the
Church. On separating, the rabbi gave him a lecture, "Moses and Jesus,"
delivered in his temple. Dushaw then decided to write one on the same
subject, from his own point of view. We quote from it.
"If Solon belongs to Athens, Lycurgus to Sparta, Moses belongs to
humanity. He is the greatest among the great, the deliverer of his
people, the world's legislator, and the apostle and prophet of
Monotheism...."
"I wonder how much Jesus, the brother and pupil of Moses, did to make
Moses as popular as he is to-day? It was Jesus who inspired the men to