Bernstein has a short note:
Moses Margoliouth (1815–1881) was a scholar and Jewish convert to Christianity. He became a minister in the Church of England. Alongside Elieser Bassin, he was also one of the first proponents of British Israelism to be of Jewish descent. He published History of the Jews in Great Britain (1851) and Vestiges of the Historic Anglo-Hebrews in East Anglia (1870).
His nephew was David Samuel Margoliouth.
Moses believed the British had Jewish origins, a heresy called British-Israelism then, and the Ephraimite error /Two House error today. His loft prose expresses this clearly, and bearing in mind the time in which he lived and his desire to see philosemitism increase in the UK, so of it is understandable. According to Margoliouth, both Peter and Paul visited the UK to preach to the Jewish descendants of those who built the Temple for Solomon. He wrote:
“A small remnant of (Solomon’s subjects) remained in Cornwall since that time (the time of the building of the Temple). I have traced that remnant by the paths of philology, and the byways of nomenclature. I might adduce an array of whole sentences, exactly alike in the languages of Hebrew and the ancient Cornish. I might adduce some of the proper names which prevailed among the aboriginal Britons long before they knew anything of Christianity, such as Adam, Abraham, Asaph…Daniel, Solomon…” (The Hebrews in East Anglia (1870), Margoliouth)
For this reason I think Bernstein did not devote much space to discussing this well-known but controversial writer who was his contemporary.
The Dictionary of National Biography article is more expansive and revealing:
| Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 36 Margoliouth, Moses by Gordon Goodwin |
| · MARGOLIOUTH, MOSES (1820–1881), divine, was born of Jewish parents at Suwalki, Poland, on 3 Dec. 1820. He was instructed at Pryerosl, Grodno, and Kalwarya in talmudic and rabbinical learning, and also acquired Russian and German. In August 1837, during a visit to Liverpool, he was induced to carefully study the Hebrew New Testament, with the result that on 13 April 1838 he was baptised a member of the church of England. For a time he obtained a livelihood by giving lessons in Hebrew, but in January 1840 he entered Trinity College, Dublin, to prepare for ordination, and during the vacations studied at the Hebrew College, London. In 1843 he became instructor of Hebrew, German, and English at the Liverpool Institution for inquiring Jews. On 30 June 1844 he was ordained to the curacy of St. Augustine, Liverpool. Three months later the Bishop of Kildare obtained for him the incumbency of Glasnevin, near Dublin, and made him his examining chaplain. The parish being small, Margoliouth had much leisure for literary pursuits. He started a Hebrew Christian monthly magazine, entitled ‘The Star of Jacob,’ which extended to six numbers (January- June 1847), and tried to establish a Philo-Hebraic Society for promoting the study of Hebrew literature, and for reprinting scarce Hebrew works. He subsequently served curacies at Tranmere, Cheshire; St. Bartholomew, Salford; Wybunbury, Cheshire (1853-5); St. Paul, Haggerston, London; Wyton, Huntingdonshire; and St. Paul, Onslow Square, London. Among his own people he was an indefatigable worker. In 1847 he visited the Holy Land, and on his return published an interesting account of his wanderings. During his travels he made the acquaintance of many celebrated men, among whom were Neander, Mendelssohn Bartholdy, and Mezzofanti. In 1877 he was presented to the vicarage of Little Linford, Buckinghamshire. He died in London on 25 Feb. 1881, and was buried in Little Linford churchyard. In 1857 he accepted the Ph.D. degree of Erlangen. |
Prayer: Thank you Lord for the great gifts of scholarship of the Margoliouths, Moses, Ezekiel, David and George. Thank you for the contribution they made to sharing the faith of Yeshua and helping Christians in the United Kingdom understand more of Jewish people and their history. May the works of their scholarship and the thoughts of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Where they were in error, may we have discernment and grace to understand, forgive, and built positively on the work they have done. In Yeshua’s name. Amen,
Margoliouth’s chief works are: 1. ‘The Fundamental Principles of Modern Judaism investigated,’ 8vo, London, 1843. 2. ‘An Exposition of the Fifty-third Chapter of Isaiah,’ 8vo, London, 1846 and 1856. 3. ‘ A Pilgrimage to the Land of my Fathers,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1850. 4. ‘The History of the Jews in Great Britain,’ 3 vols. 12mo, London, 1851. 5. ‘Genuine Repentance and its Effects: an Exposition of the Fourteenth Chapter of Hosea,’ 8vo, London, 1854. 6. ‘The Anglo-Hebrews, their Past Wrongs and Present Grievances,’ 8vo, London, 1856. 7. ‘The Curates of Riversdale: Recollections in the Life of a Clergyman,’ 3 vols. 8vo, London, 1860. 8. ‘The End of the Law, being a preliminary Examination of the “Essays and Reviews,”‘ 8vo, London, 1861. 9. ‘Abyssinia, its Past, Present, and probable Future,’ 8vo, London, 1866. 10. ‘Vestiges of the Historic Anglo-Hebrews in East Anglia,’ 8vo, London, 1870. 11. ‘The Poetry of the Hebrew Pentateuch,’ 8vo, London, 1871. 12. ‘The Lord’s Prayer no adaptation of existing Jewish Petitions, explained by the light of the Day of the Lord,’ 8vo, London, 1876. 13. ‘Some Triumphs and Trophies of the Light of the World,’ 8vo, London, 1882. By 1853 he had completed, but apparently did not publish, a Hebrew translation of the New Testament (Notes and Queries, 1st ser. viii. 196). In 1872 he projected a quarterly periodical called ‘The Hebrew Christian Witness and Prophetic Investigator,’ which he continued (with the exception of one year, when the magazine was in abeyance) until the end of 1877. To the early volumes of ‘Notes and Queries’ he contributed many curious articles on Jewish history and antiquities. A portrait of Margoliouth is prefixed to his ‘Pilgrimage,’ 1850.
[Autobiography before Modern Judaism; Memoir prefixed to Some Triumphs; Guardian, 9 March 1881, p. 348; Crockford’s Clerical Directory for 1880; Jacobs and Wolf’s Bibl. Angl. Jud. p. 138; Jewish World, 4 March 1881.]
There is some confusion about Moses and other Margoliouths in the UK, both in their lives and their theology. Who were they, what did they believe, and how were they related?
Bernstein gives details of three other Margoliouths, Ezekiel, David and George
Margoliouth, Ezekiel, was a very remarkable man, a typical Jew, and a typical convert to Christianity [SIC!]. As an Hebraist he was equal to any of his day. He had a profound knowledge of the Talmud, rare even[352]amongst Talmudists. It was, however, in the composition of modern Hebrew that his chief talent lay, and competent scholars often spoke enthusiastically of the elegance of his rabbinic writings. Like his namesake, Dr. Moses Margoliouth, he was a native of Suwalki in Poland, where he was born in November 1816. His father, Abraham, had been thirty-three years chief rabbi of the town, and his mother could trace twelve rabbis amongst her ancestors. It was natural that Ezekiel should study the Talmud and practise all the precepts of the rabbis with the utmost vigour. After he had become bar mitzvah, he studied with his father, and later on went to Brody, in order to perfect himself in rabbinic lore. There he met enlightened Jews, and often disputed with R. Solomon Kluger. He began to study the Bible, and philosophical works in Hebrew, like those of Maimonides; his desire for knowledge being fostered under Michael Perl of Tarnopol, the first Jewish reformer in Galicia. Later on he went to the rabbinical seminary at Warsaw, where he first met missionaries of the L.J. Society, through whom he was irresistibly drawn to Christ, His Person, and His teachings. At the age of twenty-seven he confessed faith in Christ as his Saviour, though his wife, whom he had married the previous year, for a long time refused to become a Christian. He then came over to England, where she afterwards joined him, and in 1848, also became a Christian. In the same year he entered the Operative Jewish Converts’ Institution to learn bookbinding. In 1852 he was appointed a missionary of the L.J.S. in[353] London, and worked as such almost to the end of his life. It was not as a popular preacher that he excelled, though his faith in, and knowledge of, the Word of God always profoundly attracted his audiences. His chief labours were literary, and in these he had no rival. His “Derech Emunah” and “Nethivoth Olam,” in Hebrew, are masterpieces. His greatest work was the revision of the New Testament in Hebrew in 1865. On May 2, 1894, he passed away in a gentle and peaceful death, greatly mourned both for himself and for the loss of his learning and piety.His son is the Rev. Professor David S. Margoliouth, D.Lit., Laudian Professor of Arabic at Oxford University, and examining chaplain to the Bishop of Liverpool. (emphasis mine)
Ezekiel’s New Testament with Cantillation marks is available at Vine of David here
Margoliouth, Rev. George, a nephew of Dr. Moses Margoliouth, was converted to Christianity at Strassburg. He studied philology at the University of Bonn, and theology at Cuddesdon College, was ordained in 1881-1883, held the curacy of St. Thomas’, Leeds, when he was also missionary of the Parochial Missions to the Jews; then at Carleton, Yorks., 1883-84; then again missionary curate of Holy Trinity, Stepney, 1884-87; then at St. Mary the Less, Cambridge, 1887-89; St. Botolph, Cambridge, 1889-91, when he took his degree in Semitic languages, at Queen’s College. He is the author of “Descriptive List of the Hebrew and Samaritan MSS. in the British Museum,” 1893; “The Superlinear Punctuation,” 1893; “The Liturgy of the Nile, Palestinian, Syriac and English,” 1896; “The Palestinian Syriac Version of Holy Scripture, four recently Discovered Portions,” 1896. He also[354] contributed valuable articles to the “Jewish Quarterly Review.”
For David Margoliouth, son of Ezekiel and nephew of Moses, we read:
David Samuel Margoliouth
David Samuel Margoliouth (17 October 1858, London – 23 March 1940, London) was an orientalist. He was briefly active as a priest in the Church of England. He wasLaudian Professor of Arabic at the University of Oxford from 1889 to 1937.[1][2]
His father, Ezekiel, had converted from Judaism to Anglicanism, and thereafter worked in Bethnal Green as a missionary to the Jews; he was also close to his uncle,[3] the Anglican convert Moses Margoliouth.[4] Margoliouth was educated at Winchester, where he was a scholar, and at New College, Oxford where he graduated with a double first in Greats and won an unprecedented number of prizes in Classics and Oriental languages, of which he had mastered Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Armenian and Syriac, in addition to Hebrew. His academic disseration, published in 1888, was entitled Analecta Orientalia ad Poeticam Aristoteleam. In 1889 he succeeded to the Laudian Chair in Arabic, a position he held until he retired, from ill health, in 1937.
Many of his works on the history of Islam became the standard treatises in English, including Mohammed and the Rise of Islam (1905), The Early Development of Mohammedanism (1914), and The Relations Between Arabs and Israelites Prior to the Rise of Islam (1924).[2]
He was described as brilliant editor and translator of Arabic works,[2] as seen in The Letters of Abu’l-‘Ala of Ma’arrat al-Nu’man (1898), Yaqut’s Dictionary of Learned Men, 6 vol. (1907–27), and the chronicle of Miskawayh, prepared in collaboration with H. F. Amedroz under the title The Eclipse of the ‘Abbasid Caliphate, 7 vol. (1920–21). Some of David Samuel Margoliouth’s studies are included in The Origins of The Koran: Classic Essays on Islam’s Holy Book edited by Ibn Warraq.
He identified a business letter written in the Judeo-Persian language, found in Danfan Uiliq, northwest China, in 1901, as dating from 718 C.E. (the earliest evidence showing the presence of Jews in China).[5]
He was a member of the council of the Royal Asiatic Society from 1905 onwards, its director in 1927, was awarded its triennial gold medal in 1928, and was its president 1934-37.[1]
Egyptian Poet Laureate Ahmed Shawqi dedicated his famous poem, The Nile, to Margoliouth.
On This Day In Messianic Jewish History 