MAIMON Origin of surname

Ada Fishman Maimon (1893- 1973), Zionist, pioneer, educator, and politician, born in Marculesti, Moldova (then part of the Russian Empire), sister of Yehuda Leib Maimon. She settled in Erets Israel in 1912. There she taught in a girls' school in Petah Tikva, worked on the land and founded a girls' school in Safed. She was the earliest promoter of the working women's movement in the country and from 1921 to 1930 was secretary of Moetzet ha-Poalot (Working Women's Council) which she had helped to organize. From 1920 Ada Maimon directed the Ayanot Agricultural High School near Ness Ziona. She was a deputy representing Mapai party in the first two Knessets.

Salomon Ben Joshua Maimon (1753-1800), philosopher. His original name was Salomon Ben Joshua, but he changed it to Maimon in honour of Maimonides (the Rambam). He was born in Nieszwicz, Lithuania and learned Hebrew and Talmud from his father. Later he studied in the Yeshiva of Ivenets near Minsk. At the age of seven Maimon was able to study the Talmud by himself, at 11 he was married, and at the age of fourteen he became a father. In his autobiography he describes his life from the time of his marriage in Poland to the time he moved to Koenigsberg in East Prussia as "a series of miseries with want of all means for the promotion of culture." His aspiration for knowledge went beyond Jewish studies and he yearned for general education. By the age of 20 he had read physics and optics as well as historical books, he studied Jewish philosophical literature including the Kabbalah and wrote Givat Hamoreh, a commentary on Maimonides' More Nebuchim [Guide of the Perplexed].

In 1778 Maimon went to Koenigsberg (which became Kalingrad when the area was annexed to the Soviet Union in 1946) and then to Berlin. He had taught himself German. He was however rejected on account of a disagreement over his opinions of Maimonides. He wandered through Prussia for six months until Rabbi Hirsch Janower at Posen (now Poznan) was ready to take care and provide him for two years. Upon his return to Berlin, this time with recommendations, he was supported by Moses Mendelssohn, (on whose ideas the Haskalah, Jewish enlightenment, was founded), Lazarus Bendavid (a philosopher who was one of the first to advocate reforms in Jewish practice in order to stem conversions to Christianity) and physician Marcus Herz. He studied German philosophers, especially Leibnitz and Wollf. His articles were appreciated, but his arrogant behavior, his life style and radical ideas soon antagonized his protectors. He left Berlin, went to Holland, and then to Hamburg where, in order to improve his position, made an attempt to convert to Christianity. While doing so he declared to the clergyman that he still considered Judaism nearer to the truth than Christianity. This declaration denied him baptism.

He however acquired the means to enter a gymnasium in Altona near Hamburg in order to improve his knowledge of languages. After two years Maimon returned to Berlin and then to Breslau, where he was assisted by Ephraim Kuh and by the philosopher Garve, a friend of Mendelssohn. He translated Mendelssohn's Morgenstunden into Hebrew. In 1790, Maimon published his first book Versuch ueber die Transcendentalphilosophy, which attracted the attention of the greatest philosophers of that time, including Kant. In the preface of this work, dedicated to the king of Poland, Maimon pleaded in favor of his coreligionists. In 1791 he published Philosophisches Woerterbuch, a fragment of a dictionary of philosophical terms, and articles previously printed. In 1792 he edited his Kommentar zur More Newuchim des Maimonides and the treatise Ankuendigung und Aufforderung zu einer allgemeinen Revision der Wissenschaften. In 1794 he published Versuch einer neuen Logik, and in 1797, perhaps his most important work, Kritische Untersuchungen ueber den menschlichen Geis which secured for him a prominent position amongst the historians of philosophy. He criticized certain aspects of Kant’s thoughts. He also wrote notes and commentaries on Bacon and Aristotle, and two works in Hebrew Taalumoth Hochmah and Heshek Shlomoh which were not published.

In 1793 Maimon’s autobiography Salomon Maimons Leben was published. It had been edited by the German philologist Karl Philipp Moritz and was translated into several languages. In this he sets out his opinion of Kabbalah and his views of Judaism. He censures the rabbis for “burdening” the people with minute ceremonies but praises them for their high moral standards.Salomon

Miamon died in Nieder-Siegersdorf, Silesia, in 1800.

Yehuda Leib Fishman Maimon (1876-1962), rabbi, Zionist, and politician, born in Marculesti, Moldova (then part of the Russian Empire). He attended Lithuanian yeshivot and was an early adherent of Zionism. He was rabbi in Marculesti (1900-05) and in Ungheni (Ungeny) (1905-1913). He was among the founders of the Mizrachi movement, participating in its first conference (Lida, 1904). In 1913 he settled in Tel Aviv but was deported by the Ottoman authorities in 1915 and went to the US where he was active in Mizrachi. In 1919 Maimon returned to the Land of Israel where he headed Mizrachi and developed the religious educational system. He founded the Rabbi Kook Foundation for the publication of religious literature. A member of the Jewish Agency Executive from 1935, he took an activist position against the British and was one of the Zionist leaders imprisoned in 1946. He was a signer of the 1948 Declaration of Independence and the first minister for religious affairs, serving in the cabinets of several governments until 1961. A prolific author, he wrote voluminously on religious subjects. He edited a series of volumes commemorating communities destroyed in the Holocaust.

Saadiah Ben Maimun Ibn Danan (15th century), linguist, philosopher, poet and halakhist. Saadiah Ben Maimun Ibn Danan was born in Granada, Spain. He served first there and later, after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, in Oran, Algeria, as dayyan. Several of his responsa include some very important information. His treatise “The Necessary Rule of the Hebrew Language” (written in Arabic) deals, among other things, with Hebrew prosody and was the first attempt at comparing the Hebrew meter with the Arabic. He also wrote a talmudic lexicon and a Hebrew dictionary in Arabic. In his poetry, he continued the tradition of his great predecessors in Muslim Spain and like them, composed poems which reflect the beauty of the language. He did not reject secular poetry. One of his poems was written in honour of Maimonides’ Moreh Nevukhim (Guide of the Perplexed). He died in Oran, Algeria.

Frat Maimon (also known as Prat Maimon or Solomon ben Menaham) (14th century), liturgical poet and scholar, lived in Provence. He is the author of four works: Edut le-Yisrael – a polemical treatise on religion, Netzer Mattai – about explanations of the haggadot found in the Talmud, a commentary on the poem Batte ha-Nefesh of Levi ben Abraham, and some commentaries on the biblical Book of Genesis. None of his works survived and there are known only from quoations by other authors, among them his disciple Solomon ben Judah of Lunel (1411-?) who incorporated Frat Maimon’s oral explanations into his Heshek Shlomo, a commentary to Kuzari by Judah Halevi that he composed at the age of thirteen. Frat Maimon’s explanations on Kuzari were also quoted by Nethanel ben Nehemia Kaspi, another of his students, in a commentary completed in 1424.