On his popular daily radio segment “B’ofen Miluli” on Galei Zahal (Army Radio), Dr. Avshalom Kor (“Mr. Hebrew”) focused on the Hebrew language, discussing B’nai B’rith and its crucial role in establishing Israel’s National Library.

Listen to the radio segment here (in Hebrew).

Shalom, and today the National library, B’nai B’rith and the Hebrew language.

The new building of the National Library opposite the Knesset attracts many visitors. It is built like a well – round stories upon stories – to express depth, but also to express the fact that people used to meet around the well. And so the library and the books are a meeting point. But, when did it start? I read from the Hebrew daily “Hamelitz” which was published in St. Petersburg, from a 1900 edition. The sub-title states that it is not a newspaper but a “periodical”. And there it was stated: “The B’nai B’rith Jerusalem Lodge is the first at doing everything useful and beneficial in Jerusalem. They started to build the house, bought 300 cubit of land in a good place.”  That was in the year 1900. But the beginning of the National Library was earlier, in 1892, exactly 400 years from the expulsion of Jews from Spain. The leader of the Spanish Jews during the massive expulsion was Don Isacc Abarbanel, therefore the founders of the library in Jerusalem, leaders of the B’nai B’rith Order, named the library “Midrash Abarbanel”. The library was merged with Eliezer Ben-Yehuda’s library. Ben-Yehuda named his library “Bet Eked Hasefarim”, meaning the books were bound together. That was in 1892, 5 years before the Herzl’s First Zionist Congress. 

Sallai Meridor, Chairman of the National Library Board of Directors, said about this that “You cannot bring the People of the Book to Zion without their books.  You do not transfer the fish without the water.”  The president of B’nai B’rith in the United States Julius Bien recruited overseas support for the original building. Dr. Joseph Chasanowitz, a great book collector from Bialystok, sent his collection of thousands of books, and therefore to honor him his name was added to the library – “Ginzei Yosef”. And so “Midrash Abarbanel”, “Bet Eked Hasefarim” and “Ginzei Yosef” were united in the first building as the core of the National Library. The impressive building is still stands today on B’nai B’rith Street, corner Joseph Chasanowitz. 

Brit Hamila (ritual circumcision) – the Abrahamic covenant – differentiates us from all the nations. In the prayer for the Jewish People we ask The Creator: “Inscribe for a good life all members of your covenant”. That is why the Jewish global organization, established 180 years ago in 1843, is named “B’nai B’rith”. Ba’al Brit (allies) are our partners from other nations, as it is written in the Book of Genesis on Abraham’s friends in the Hebron area: “Aner, Eshkol and Mamre who are his allies” (Ba’alli Brito). Jerusalem’s intellectuals,  founders of the General Library for B’nai Yisrael – the core of the National Library – were members of B’nai B’rith: Yechiel Michel Pines, David Yellin, Ben-Yehuda – and they were also the founding members of the Hebrew Language Committee. You can say about them, as Yaron London said about Itamar Ben-Avi, that each of them had an covenant (B’rith) with Hebrew.