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Leopold Immanuel Jacob van Dort

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Leopold Immanuel Jacob van Dort
Bornc. 1715
Died1761(1761-00-00) (aged 45–46)
NationalityDutch
Alma materUniversity of Leipzig
OccupationProfessor of Hebrew Language
Known forHebrew Quran of the Library of Congress, rabbinical Hebrew New Testament from Cochin

Leopold Immanuel Jacob van Dort (c. 1715–1761) was a Dutch Hebrew professor, responsible for translating an Indian version of the Hebrew New Testament and a Hebrew Quran.

Leopold Immanuel Jacob van Dort was born Jewish between 1714 and 1717 in Dordrecht, Netherlands.[1][2] He converted to Catholicism in December 1745 in Aachen.[1] He studied briefly philosophy at the University of Leipzig with professor Johann Friedrich May in 1753.[1] In 1754[1] he was enlisted by the Dutch East India Company (VOC) to work as a professor of Hebrew Language at the Seminary of Colombo, Ceylon.[1][3] In 1756 he traveled to Cochin,[1] India, where he was commissioned by Ezekiel Rahabi to finish the translation of the Hebrew New Testament (1741-1756),[4] which Claudius Buchanan took with him to England and currently resides in the Cambridge University Library. Ezekiel Rahabi also commissioned van Dort as the translator of the Hebrew Quran (1757-1761),[4][5] which resides in the Library of Congress in Washington.[6] Van Dort is further known for his 1757 translations of the excerpts of the chronicles of the Jews of Cochin.[3][7]

Van Dort died in 1761, at the age of 46.[1]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g van Dort, Mascha (June 2021). Leopold Immanuel Jacob van Dort, a learned Jewish-Christian man from Dordrecht. Mascha van Dort. ISBN 978-9464028386.
  2. ^ Campbell, Fiona Kumari (2007). "A Historical Appraisal of Jewish Presence in Sri Lanka". Griffith Law and the School of Human Services, Griffith University.
  3. ^ a b Fischel, Walter J. (July–September 1967). "Journal of the American Oriental Society". The Exploration of the Jewish Antiquities of Cochin on the Malabar Coast. 87 (3). American Oriental Society: 230–248. doi:10.2307/597717. JSTOR 597717.
  4. ^ a b van Dort, Mascha; Bar-Ilan, Meir (2021). "Commissioner, purpose, translators, copyist and age of the Hebrew New Testament of Cochin and the Quran of the Library of Congress".
  5. ^ Weinstein, Myron M. (1972). "Studies in Bibliography and Booklore". A Hebrew Quran Manuscript. 10 (1/2). Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion: 19–52. JSTOR 27943437.
  6. ^ "LC Hebr. Ms 183" (PDF). Library of Congress.
  7. ^ Eichorn, J. E. (1788). Allegemeine Biblothek der Biblischen Literatur. Vol. 1. Lepzig. p. 929.