Saphir, Philipp, an elder brother of Adolph, was rather inclined to worldliness, but became serious when there was an inundation in Pesth [Budapest], and he had tried to save life. [Bernstein: Some Jewish Witnesses]

In 1842 Rev. Dr. Schwartz passed through Pesth on his way to Constantinople, and Philipp heard his addresses to Jews, and was impressed, becoming conscious of sin and the need of pardon. He was baptized in the Calvinistic Church of Pesth, in 1843, by Superintendent Paul Török. He wrote [448] afterwards to Mr. Schwartz:

“I was admitted into the Church of Christ. I cannot describe my feelings to you. Ah! the infinite love of God! He has given me much peace, nothing will deprive me of it. I am happy, joyful; my soul is with God. I praise Christ every hour.” He then, being nineteen years of age, went to Carlsruhe to be trained as a teacher, and on his return to Pesth in 1845, at once set to work and organized a Y.M.C.A.

Becoming ill, he taught poor Christian and Jewish children gratis from his sick bed “The Evangelical doctrine as he found it in the Word of God.” He died September 27, 1849, whilst his father knelt by his side with two friends engaged in prayer. The daughters of Israel Saphir all became devoted Christians. One was married to Rev. Dr. Schwartz, and the other to Rev. C. A. Schönberger, both well known in the Christian Church.

Prayer: Thank you Lord for the Saphir family, Israel, sons Adolph and Philip and three daughters, and the impact they had. May we similarly have families of Jewish believers in Yeshua who live out our faith in You, and share this faith with Israel and all nations. In Yeshua’s name we pray, Amen.

https://archive.org/details/lettersanddiari00saphgoog

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37734

http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/2nd-september-1893/23/adolph-saphir-vile-career-of-a-religious-convert-p

A Memoir of Adolph, Saphir, D.D. By the My, Gaviu Carlyle, .M.A. London; John Y. Shaw and Co. 1899. ‘The story of the Saphir conversion—or rather, series of simultaneous conversions—is a truly remarkable one. The Rev. Gavin Carlyle traces the ingathering of the Saphir family—father, son, wife, and three daughters—to the Free Kirk Mission to the Hungarian Jews under Dr. Duncan, in 1843. The Saphir family was by no means a commonplace Jewish family. Israel Saphir, the father, was the brother of Moritz Saphir, the German poet, a bosom.friend of the Chief Rabbi of Pesth, and said to be himself the most learned Jen in Hungary. It was from his zeal for learning, in the first instance, that Israel Saphir and his family came under the influence of Dr. Duncan and the Scottish missionaries, who were actively at work in Peeth under the direct protection of the wife of the Archduke Joseph, the Palatine. These Scottish missionaries, and particularly Dr. Duncan, who was afterwards Professor of Hebrew in Edinburgh, seem to have made a great impression on all classes of Hungarian society—on Roman Catholics, Protestants, and Jews—not only by their zeal and devotion, but by their learning and attainments. After his baptism, Adolph Saphir was in due course sent to Edinburgh, to be prepared for the Christian ministry, as his father wished; and he and two other neophytes—one of whom, Alfred Edersheim, the well-known author of The Life and Times of the Messiah, subsequently joined the English Church—were smuggled out of the Austrian Empire to evade the conscription. The Rev. Gavin Carlyle waxes eloquent in his denunciation of the subsequent destruction of the Scottish Mission; doubtless Roman Catholic intolerance was at the bottom of this, but one should remember that such laws as those of the conscription cannot be lightly broken in Continental States. After his college career at Edinburgh, Adolph Saphir was ordained as a missionary to his Jewish brethren on the Con- tinent. Before starting for Hamburg, he married a young Dublin lady, Miss Sara Owen, who to the last was his most affectionate and devoted wife and helpmate, and whose death he survived only three days. Adolph Saphir’e tracts and pamphlets to the Jews were too literary and imaginative for the taste of the Jewish Mission Committee, and he forthwith resigned and returned to Scotland, where at Glasgow he con- ducted services in German for some time; then he proceeded to the South Shields Presbyterian Church, which bad been erected by Mr. J. 0. Stevenson, M.P. Saphir had now joined what is called the Presbyterian Church of England, in which communion he continued to work (afterwards at Greenwich, the West End, and Bournemouth) until his death in 1891.