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en temalyon
their position in trade in Morocco, especially in Mogador
and Marrakesh, where JOSHUA LéVY-BENSUSAN (19th cent.)
represented France in about 1881. SAMUEL LéVY BENSUSAN
(1872–1958), who lived in Essex, England, wrote a number
of books about the English countryside, such as Annals of
Maychester (1936), and also published studies of great artists.
He traveled widely and wrote about Morocco, Spain, Paris,
Germany, and the haunts of Shakespeare. Bensusan edited a
weekly newspaper, The Jewish World (1897–98), and The Theosophical
Review (1925–28).
Bibliography: A. Hyamson, Sephardim of England (1951),
247, 336, 397; J.M. Toledano, Ner ha-Ma’arav (1911), 25ff., 41, 63, 109,
191; REJ, 6 (1941), 12–25; Miège, Maroc, 2 (1961), 550; 3 (1962), 208;
4 (1963), 304.
[David Corcos]
BEN TEMALYON, name of a demon. According to talmudic
legend it accompanied R. *Simeon b. Yoḥai on his journey
to Rome where he pleaded with the authorities to annul
the decree compelling the Jews to have intercourse with their
menstruating wives, to desecrate the Sabbath, and not to circumcise
their children. The demon entered into the Roman
emperor’s daughter and when Simeon b. Yoḥai exorcised
it, his request was granted (Me’il. 17b). A more detailed account
of this miracle is contained in *Halakhot Gedolot (ed.
Hildesheimer, 603–4), where, however, the demon is called
“Shamdon” or “Ashmedai.” The story frequently recurs in
medieval folklore, sometimes with an anti-Jewish bias. Some
scholars have attempted to identify Ben Temalyon (or Bar Temalyon)
with the apostle Bartholomew about whom a similar
legend is related in connection with his missionary voyage
to India.
Ben Temalyon (or Telamyon) is also the name of a person
who technically avoided perjury by concealing a hundred
dinars which he owed to a plaintiff, in a hollowed cane which
he asked the latter to hold, and taking an oath that he had returned
him the money (cf. Ned. 25a).
Bibliography: I. Lévi, in: REJ, 8 (1884), 200–2; 10 (1885),
66–73; Halevy, ibid., 60–65; R. Margoliouth, Malakhei Elyon (Jerusalem,
1945), p. 222.
BENTOR, JACOB (1910–2002), geologist specializing in the
geology, petrology, and tectonics of the Middle East. Bentor
was born in Koenigsberg, Germany, and after studying linguistics
at the Sorbonne in Paris and physical science there
and in Berlin immigrated to Ereẓ Israel in 1933, where he continued
his studies, including geology, at the Hebrew University
as well as in Switzerland and France. Back in Palestine in
1940 he completed his Ph. D. theses at the Hebrew University
in 1945 and in Clermont-Ferrrand in 1952. During World
War II he was a consultant to the British administration on
various geological projects and in 1949 he joined Ḥemed Gimmel
(the Israeli army science corps) and headed the national
efforts to map the Negev’s natural resources and evaluate its
economic potential. One of the major products of this activ-
ity was the Geological Map of the Negev, 1:100,000, which included
the mapping of Israel’s major mineral deposits – the
Negev phosphates and the Timna copper. For this achievement
Bentor and his colleague A. Vroman were awarded the
Israel Prize for science in 1953. Until 1966 he was at the head
of all national mineral and energy resources enterprises, including
the Dead Sea resources, the Negev phosphates, Timna
copper ore, and petroleum exploration. During his work he
also discovered new geological phenomena, such as combustion
metamorphism, a contribution in the field of mineralogy
that has been recognized by the international mineralogical
community, with the mineral “bentorite” being named in his
honor. He introduced many new scientific disciplines, such
as geochemistry, marine geology, and seismology to the entire
earth science community in Israel, and especially to his
many students at the Hebrew University, where he was appointed
associate professor in 1957 and full professor in 1963.
In 1967–74 he headed a large-scale geological study of the
Sinai Peninsula. Focusing on the Precambrian Basement of
this area, he made a major contribution to the understanding
of the Precambrian Arabian Massif and guided many research
projects in the framework of this study. He also had a
long-term interest in the possible geological origin of many
events chronicled in myth and history and wrote on geological
events in the Bible. Bentor headed many national and international
scientific committees, including the Council for
Oceanographic Research, the World Geological Map Project,
and the Council of the International Committee for the Scientific
Research of the Mediterranean.
He retired from the Hebrew University in 1977 and was
associated with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography,
where he remained active in his studies on the Precambrian
realm and on the combustion metamorphism of the Hatrurim
Formation in Israel (“Mottled Zone”) as well as of similar
phenomena in California. He was a recipient of the Freund
Prize of the Israel Geological Society (1986).
[Yossi Bartov (2nd ed.)]
BENTOV (Gutgeld), MORDEKHAI (1900–1985). Israel
politician, member of the First to Fifth Knessets. Bentov was
born in Grodzisk, near Warsaw. He immigrated to Ereẓ Israel
in 1920, working for several years in road construction and
draining swamps. He graduated from the government law
classes in Jerusalem and later became a member of kibbutz
*Mishmar ha-Emek, where he lived for the rest of his life. As a
leader of the *Ha-Shomer ha- Ẓa’ir movement, Bentov served
as its representative in central bodies of the *Histadrut and
the Zionist Movement. He was one of the members of Ha-
Shomer ha-Ẓa’ir active from the late 1930s in trying to find
a peaceful solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict on the basis
of bi-nationalism, and was an active member in the League
for Jewish-Arab Rapprochement and Cooperation. He was
a member of the Jewish delegation to the 1939 Round Table
Conference with the British Government to discuss the future
of Palestine. Following the failure of the Conference, Bentov
380 ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 3