JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

autobiography under the title The Cold Wind and the Warm.
He also adapted the Duveen biography as a play, Lord Pengo
(1963). In 1964 he was one of three American authors whose
new works were chosen for the opening season of the Lincoln
Center Repertory Theatre in New York. Behrman’s play was
But For Whom Charlie (1964), a comedy about a conflict of
temperaments. His novel The Burning Glass (1968) was set in
pre-World War II Salzburg. Among other his works is People
in a Diary; A Memoir (1972).
Bibliography: S.J. Kunitz (ed.), Authors Today and Yesterday
(19342), 56–57; B. Mantle, Contemporary American Playwrights
(1941), 108–15; J. Mersand, Traditions in American Literature (1939),
51–67; O. Prescott, “Books of The Times” New York Times ( November
5, 1954), p.19.
[Bernard Grebanier]
BEI AVIDAN, meeting place in talmudic times where scholars
of various nations and faiths met for religious discussions
and disputations. Enjoying the protection of the authorities,
the institution was visited by some of the Jewish sages, while
others, such as *Joshua b. Hananiah (Shab. 152a) and Eleazar b.
Perata (Av. Zar. 17b), refrained from doing so, for which they
were compelled to apologize to the authorities. Similarly, the
amora Rav did not enter a Bei Avidan, whereas his colleague
Samuel did (Shab. 116a). The Bei Avidan is mentioned in this
context in association with a Bei Niẓrefei (or Bei Naẓrufei), to
which neither Rav nor Samuel would enter, and which was apparently
an idolatrous house of worship (cf. Er. 80a). R. Abbahu
was asked whether it was permitted to save the books
of a Bei Avidan from a fire on the Sabbath (Shab. loc. cit.). It
apparently contained books of the Bible (see R. Hananel, ad
loc.), but since it was not known whether a Jew or a sectarian
had copied them, the doubt arose whether or not they could
be saved on the Sabbath. Various theories have been advanced
to explain the origin of the word. According to S.J.L. Rapoport
(Erekh Millin (1852), 3), it derives from the Persian abdan (“a
forum”), the meeting place there being called Bei Avidan (i.e.,
“house of ”). L. Ginzberg (Festschrift … Schwarz, 1917, 329) suggests
that the word derives from the name of a person, possibly
the astrologer Abidas-Abidan, who was active in Persia at the
beginning of the third century. L. Loew (He-Ḥalutz, 2 (1853),
100ff.) contends that the correct reading is “Bei-Evyoni,” i.e.,
the meeting place of the Ebionites in the Land of Israel. However,
the fact that the word “Bei Avidan” is not found in Palestinian
sources and that, furthermore, the statement about
Joshua b. Hananiah and Eleazar b. Perata is in Aramaic indicate
that the Bei Avidan originated in Babylonia and that the
term was adopted by the rabbis to apply to the institution in
Ereẓ Israel. More recently, S. Shaked has suggested that the
term is derived from a Persian word meaning “temple”; see
Sokoloff, DPJA, p. 209b.
Bibliography: Levy J., Neuhebr Tal, 1 (19242), 9; Jastrow,
Dict. 1 (1950), 5; Neusner, Babylonia, 1 (1966), 73ff. (citing further
literature).
[Yitzhak Dov Gilat]
beilenson, anthony charles
BEIDER, CHAIM (1920–2003), Yiddish poet, journalist, and
literary historian. Beider was born in the shtetl of Kupel, near
the town of Proskurov (now Khmelnitski, Ukraine). After
finishing the local Yiddish school, he studied in the Yiddish
Department of the Odessa Teachers’ Training Institute and,
from 1933, published poems in periodicals. He graduated in
1940 and worked as a teacher. During the war he lived in Tadzhikistan.
From 1946 he lived in Khmelnitski and Kamenets-
Podolski, working on local Ukrainian dailies. In 1971 he moved
to Birobidzhan and worked there as a staff journalist for the
Yiddish newspaper Birobidzhaner Shtern. In 1973 he moved to
Moscow and joined the editorial staff of Sovetish Heymland,
first as an editor and later as associate editor. In 1998 he immigrated
to New York.
His first poetic collection, Khanukas Khabais (“Housewarming”),
appeared in Moscow in 1979. He also wrote numerous
articles devoted to the history of Yiddish literature
and culture, many of which were included in his collection Di
Vegn, Vos Mir Antdekn (“The Ways That We Find,” 1991). He
was especially interested in such topics as the life and work
of Sholem Jacob *Abramovitsh (Mendele Mokher Seforim),
the cultural history of Birobidzhan, and biographies of Soviet
Yiddish cultural and political activists. In New York, he briefly
edited the Yiddish journal Tsukunft and regularly contributed
to the Yiddish weekly Forverts.
Bibliography: Ch. Beider (ed.), Native Land (1980); Yiddish
Writers Almanac: Year After Year (1987).
[Gennady Estraikh (2nd ed.)]
BEIDERMAN, BERNARDO (1919– ), Argentine criminologist.
Beiderman was professor of criminal law at Buenos
Aires University from 1957 to 1966, when he resigned because
of government interference in the universities. He then became
a lecturer on the same subject at the university Museo
Social Argentino in Buenos Aires, and later dean of its faculty
of communication sciences. As a member of the Argentinian
Commission, he helped draft a model penal code for Latin
America. Beiderman wrote on criminal theory, female criminality,
obscenity and pornography, and penal reform.
BEILENSON, ANTHONY CHARLES (Tony; 1932– ), U.S.
congressman. Beilenson was born in New Rochelle, New York.
His parents, Peter and Edna Beilenson, were both first cousins
of the Hebrew journalist-writer-translator Moshe *Beilenson
(1889–1936). Like their cousin, Peter and Edna Beilenson were
involved in publishing; their firm, the Peter Pauper Press,
was one of the most successful small presses operating in the
United States from the 1930s to the 1950s.
At 16, Beilenson matriculated into Phillips Academy in
Andover, Massachusetts – the alma mater of many U.S. lawmakers.
Following his graduation in 1950, he entered Harvard,
going on to graduate from both Harvard College (1954) and its
school of law (1957) before striking out for California. Moving
to the Los Angeles area, Beilenson spent two years working for
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