A new Hebrew grammar published for young students in Metz.

[Hebrew schools in Metz] / Lion Mayer Lambert. Abregé de la grammaire hébraïque, d’après une nouvelle méthode, avec les tables complettes des conjugaisons, déclinaisons, fléxions et nombres; à l’usage de la jeunesse israélite. Metz: Imprimerie d’E. Hadamard, 1820. 8vo [21.2 x 13.5 cm], 70 pp., with [1] f. manuscript alphabetical table loosely inserted. In contemporary blue paper wrappers. Some wear to wrappers at spine, minor toning and edge wear. Uncut, occasional minor spotting and staining, some edges dusty, toning to manuscript alphabet table.

Rare first edition of this elementary Hebrew grammar written by Lion Mayer Lambert (1781-1863) expressly for the use of “la jeunesse israélite” attending the Hebrew schools in Metz (“Ouvrage adopté par le comité d’administration des écoles israélites de Metz, pour l’usage de ces écoles”). The Abregé de la grammaire hébraïque is written in French, but conjugations are provided with both French and German translations. This copy includes a loosely inserted manuscript chart of the Hebrew alphabet apparently written out by a student as a sort of cheat sheet.

In his interesting preface, Lion Mayer Lambert notes that the grammar was meant to support his recently published trilingual catechism (Catéchisme du culte judaïque [1818]). He laments that too many fellow Jews, both men and women, lack an understanding of the fundamental principles of Judaism, and that recent events, i.e., the Hep-Hep riots of 1819 (pogroms against Ashkenazi Jews which began in Bavaria), showed that his coreligionists could not passively rely on wider Enlightenment sentiments to combat misunderstandings about their beliefs (“Le danger que nos frères ont couru l’année passée en allemagne, fait foi que nous ne pouvons reposer sur les lumière du siècle”). He calls for the publication of a French-Hebrew dictionary and a French translation of the Hebrew Bible aimed at a juvenile audience.

The Abregé de la grammaire hébraïque could be purchased directly from Lion Mayer Lambert at his house in Metz (rue de l’Arsenal, no. 122), from the Metz booksellers Olry Lévy and Gerson-Lévy, or in Paris chez Meyer Isaacsohn (on the rue Phelippeau).

The work was popular in Metz and was reprinted there in 1843, 1855, 1861, and 1868. Each of these later editions is rare today.

OCLC and KVK locate U.S. copies of this first edition at Yeshiva University, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and Hebrew Union College.

*E. Carmoly, ed., “De la thypographie hébraïque a Metz,” Revue orientale recueil périodique d’histoire, de géographie et de littérature, vol. 3 (1843-44), pp. 209-15 & 283-89, p. 287, no. 68.

$875.00