Rabbi Harry J. Brevis, a member of the faculty of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion at Los Angeles, left here for Jerusalem today to test a revision of the Hebrew Braille Code with students at the Jerusalem Institute for the Blind. Through his revised Code, Rabbi Brevis said before his departure, he hopes to condense many vital Hebrew works, including the Bible to proportions more easily managed by the sightless.
The Russian-born rabbi, educated in this country, lost his eyesight in 1927, after he had begun practicing law. He then shifted to study for the rabbinate, being ordained later at the Jewish Institute for Religion in New York. He evolved a Hebrew Braille code which is now standard for sightless persons using the Hebrew language. Among his works has been an anthology of Hebrew literature. While here on his way to Israel, he was feted by the Jewish Braille Institute of America, at its New York headquarters, in connection with publication of that anthology’s second edition. The first edition had been issued by the U.S. Library of Congress in 1935.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
