The Occident and American Jewish Advocate. A Monthly Periodical Devoted to the Diffusion of Jewish Knowledge. Edited by Isaac Leeser. Volumes I-XXV

Scarce SUBSTANTIAL RUN OF ISAAC LEESER'S THE OCCIDENT, "THE FIRST SUCCESSFUL JEWISH NEWSPAPER.“ THE FIRST EIGHT VOLUMES COMPLETE. "The Leeser legacy to American Jewish history is a well-documented life of pioneering accomplishments. As Bertram Korn succinctly put it: "Practically every form of Jewish activity which supports American Jewish life today was either established or envisaged by this one man." Perhaps the most lasting testament to Leeser's energy and hopes can be found in the pages of his journal The Occident... which contains arguably the single most important historical record of Jewish life in the Western Hemisphere in the mid-19th century. Chronicled there, for example, is Leeser's ongoing confrontation with the rising movement for Jewish religious reform in America. Of particular note are Leeser's many public battles to defend religious freedom, such as his losing effort to revoke Sunday closing laws, as well as his defense of Judaism in the face of widespread missionary activity. Through the agency of The Occident, Leeser hoped to accomplish in print what he never succeeded in doing in practice: to bring together in one common forum the many American Jewish communities that were otherwise divided-by either geography or ideology." While Leeser was generally content to remain behind the scenes, he would occasionally use his editorials to defend himself and his journal from critics and detractors, as in Volume X, Number 11: "The Occident, and Its Course," or in Volume XVI, Number 1, "About Myself." In 1843 Leeser founded the monthly The Occident, the first successful Jewish newspaper. For 25 years, this was an important forum for articles on Jewish life and thought. Leeser was its editor, chief contributor, bookkeeper, and sometimes even typesetter. The first seven numbers of The Occident which are present here, were published the year before Leeser died. Mayer Sulzberger continued to publish The Occident for one year after Leeser's death in 1868, but without Leeser's energy, vision and guidance, this important journal ceased publication. Thus the present collection offers a substantially complete run of this important forum for the American Jewish community from the first year of its publication through to its final numbers