August 18

Asher Ginsberg, the essayist known as Ahad Ha'am and a leading voice of cultural Zionism, was born in Skvyra in the Russian Empire.

Yeshayahu Leibowitz, the Israeli scientist and religious philosopher known for his outspoken essays on faith and the state, died in Jerusalem.

During a total solar eclipse observed from Guntur, India, Pierre Janssen recorded a bright yellow line in the spectrum of the Sun's prominences, later identified as the element helium.