Asher Zvi Hirsch Ginsberg (1856 - 1927), known by his Hebrew name, Ahad Ha'am, was a Hebrew essayist, and one of the foremost pre-state Zionist thinkers. He is known as the founder of cultural Zionism. With his secular vision of a Jewish 'spiritual center' in Israel, he confronted Theodor Herzl. Unlike Herzl, the founder of political Zionism, Ha'am strived for 'a Jewish state and not merely a state of Jews'.