Zalman Shazar

Zalman Shazar (Hebrew: זלמן שז"ר) (November 24, 1889 - October 5, 1974) was an Israeli politician, author and poet. Shazar served as the third President of Israel from 1963 to 1973.

Biography

Zalman Shazar (Shneur Zalman Rubashov) was born to a Hasidic family of the Chabad-Lubavitch denomination in Mir, near Minsk in the Russian Empire (today in Hrodna Voblast, Belarus), he received a religious education as a youth. In his teenage years he became involved in the Poale Zion Movement. Shazar immigrated to Mandate Palestine in 1924, and became a member of the secretariat of the Histadrut.

Shazar died on October 5, 1974. He is buried on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.

Journalistic and political career

Shazar served as the editor-in-chief of the Israeli newspaper Davar from 1944 to 1949. He was elected to the first Knesset in 1949 as a member of Mapai, and was appointed Minister of Education in David Ben-Gurion's first government. He was not a member of Ben-Gurion's second cabinet, but retained his seat in the 1951 and 1955 elections. He also became a member of the Jewish Agency Executive in 1952. He resigned from the Knesset in 1956, and from 1956 to 1960 was acting chairman of the Jewish Agency's Jerusalem Executive.

Presidency

Zalman Shazar was elected president by the Knesset in 1963. He was re-elected for a second term in 1968. In 1973 he was succeeded by Ephraim Katzir.In 1964, when Pope Paul VI visited Israel, Shazar read to him the verse in Micah stating that though other nations might follow other gods, “we will walk in the Name of our Lord God forever”. In 1969, Shazar sent one of 73 Apollo 11 Goodwill Messages to NASA for the historic first lunar landing. The message still rests on the lunar surface today. It states, "From the President of Israel in Jerusalem with hope for 'abundance of peace so long as the Moon endureth' (Psalms 72,7)."*

Published works

Morning Stars, Jewish Publication Society of America: Philadelphia, 1967. Translated from the Hebrew, Kochvei boker (Tel Aviv: Am Oved Publishers, 1950; 7th edition, 1966) by Shulamith Schwartz Nardi. Library of Congress Card Catalog Number: 66-17828.

Awards and commemoration

In 1966, Shazar was the co-recipient (jointly with Israel Efrat) of the Bialik Prize for literature.

Shazar's portrait appears on 200 shekel bills.

Translation

The phrase "Zalman Shazar" occurs as such in the following languages: English, Catalan, Spanish, French, Indonesian, Dutch, Norwegian (Bokmål), Portuguese, Romanian, Finnish, Swedish.

Translation(s) in other languages: Belarusian (Taraškievica): Зальман Шазар, Czech: Zalman Šazar, German: Salman Schasar, Hebrew: זלמן שזר, Georgian: ზალმან შაზარი, Japanese: ザルマン・シャザール, Polish: Zalman Szazar, Russian: Шазар, Залман, Chinese: 扎勒曼·夏扎尔.