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Ewald, Christian Ferdinand

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Ewald, Georg Heinrich August

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an Episcopal minister and famous missionary among the Jews, was born of Jewish parentage, September 14, 1802, at Maroldsweisach, near Bamberg. At the age of twenty he joined the Christian Church, studied at Basle, and was in 1826 licensed to preach the gospel. In 1829 he was called to London, and having duly prepared for missionary work, he connected himself in 1832 with the London Society for Propagating the Gospel among the Jews. In 1836 he was ordained by the bishop of London, having been previously in Lutheran orders. There are but few of the society's missionaries whose sphere of labor has been so lengthened in duration or so wide in extent. For nearly ten years he labored with great devotedness in one of the most trying portions of the Jewish mission field-the north coast of Africa-at Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and other large towns. In 1839 he left Tunis for a time and proceeded to Leghorn, and in 1841 finally left Tunis to accompany the first Anglican bishop, Dr. Alexander, to Jerusalem as his chaplain, and for some ten years was earnestly engaged in the Holy City. An account of the work is given in his Missionary Labors in the City of Jerusalem. In 1851 ill-health compelled him to leave the East, and, being appointed principal of the home mission, he took up his abode in London. In 1872 a general debility of constitution rendered it necessary for him- to resign his position. He died August 9, 1874. The University of Erlangen, of which Ewald was a graduate, on the publication of his German translation of the Talmudic treatise Aboda Sarah, in 1856, conferred upon him de religione Christiana inter barbaras gentes propaganda optime merito, linguarum orientalium gnarrissimo, the diploma of a doctor in philosophy, and the archbishop of Canterbury conferred upon him, in 1872, the degree of bachelor of divinity, as stated in the diploma, in consideration "of his uprightness of life, sound doctrine, and purity of morals; of his proficiency in the study of divinity, of Hebrew and Oriental languages and literature; and also of his missionary labors and eminent services in the promotion of Christianity among the Jews." (B.P.)