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Shahn, Ben

(Encyclopedia)Shahn, Ben (Benjamin Shahn), 1898–1969, American painter and graphic artist, b. Lithuania. Shahn emigrated to the United States in 1906. After working in lithography until 1930, his style crystalliz...

big-bang theory

(Encyclopedia)big-bang theory: see cosmology.

Big Black Mountain

(Encyclopedia)Big Black Mountain, peak, 4,145 ft (1,263 m) high, E Ky., in the Cumberland Mts.; highest point in Kentucky.

Big Stone Lake

(Encyclopedia)Big Stone Lake, narrow lake, c.25 mi (40 km) long, on the Minn.–S.Dak. line. Located in the outlet channel of glacial Lake Agassiz, it is the source of the Minnesota River and serves as a storage re...

Dunash ben Labrat

(Encyclopedia)Dunash ben Labrat do͞oˈnäsh bĕn läˈbrät [key], 920–90, Hebrew grammarian and poet, b. Fès. He was also called Rabbi Adonim Halevy (ha-Levi). He wrote an exhaustive criticism of Menahem's Heb...

Dunash ben Tamim

(Encyclopedia)Dunash ben Tamim täˈmēm [key] or Dunash ibn Tamim, c.900–c.960, Hebrew scholar, an astronomer and physician of North Africa. A pioneer in the field of scientific comparative philology, he tried t...

Akiba ben Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Akiba ben Joseph əkēˈbə [key], c.a.d. 50–c.a.d. 135, Jewish Palestinian religious leader, one of the founders of rabbinic Judaism. Although the facts of his life are obscured by legend, he is sa...

Elijah ben Solomon

(Encyclopedia)Elijah ben Solomon, 1720–97, Jewish scholar, called the Gaon of Vilna, b. Lithuania. A leading Jewish scholar of his time, he opposed the spread of Hasidism in Lithuania and Poland because he feared...

Immanuel ben Solomon

(Encyclopedia)Immanuel ben Solomon, c.1265–c.1330, Hebrew-Italian poet and scholar, b. Rome. He wrote biblical criticism and, in both Hebrew and Italian, satiric verse and lively stories. His work represents a sy...

Anan ben David

(Encyclopedia)Anan ben David änänˈ [key], fl. 8th cent., Babylonian Jewish theologian, founder of the Ananites from whom the Karaites claim spiritual descent. He is said to have been a descendant of Bostanai ben...