People Known for: philosophy and religion - Judaism

Caravaggio: The Conversion of St. Paul (second version)

St. Paul the Apostle

Christian Apostle

St. Paul the Apostle, one of the leaders of the first generation of Christians, often considered to be the most important person after Jesus in the history of Christianity. In his own day, although he......

Martin Buber

German religious philosopher

Martin Buber, German-Jewish religious philosopher, biblical translator and interpreter, and master of German prose style. Buber’s philosophy was centred on the encounter, or dialogue, of man with other......

Philo Judaeus

Jewish philosopher

Philo Judaeus, Greek-speaking Jewish philosopher, the most important representative of Hellenistic Judaism. His writings provide the clearest view of this development of Judaism in the Diaspora. As the......

Jeremiah

Hebrew prophet

Jeremiah, Hebrew prophet, reformer, and author of a biblical book that bears his name. He was closely involved in the political and religious events of a crucial era in the history of the ancient Near......

Edith Stein

German nun

Edith Stein, ; canonized October 11, 1998; feast day August 9), Roman Catholic convert from Judaism, Carmelite nun, philosopher, and spiritual writer who was executed by the Nazis because of her Jewish......

Sir Moses Montefiore, Baronet

British philanthropist

Sir Moses Montefiore, Baronet, Italian-born businessman who was noted for his philanthropy and support of Jewish rights. Scion of an old Italian Jewish merchant family, Montefiore was taken to England......

Ernest Bloch

American composer

Ernest Bloch, composer whose music reflects Jewish cultural and liturgical themes as well as European post-Romantic traditions. His students included Roger Sessions and Randall Thompson. Bloch studied......

Josiah

king of Judah

Josiah, king of Judah (c. 640–609 bce), who set in motion a reformation that bears his name and that left an indelible mark on Israel’s religious traditions (2 Kings 22–23:30). Josiah was the grandson......

Jonathan Eybeschütz

Polish rabbi and scholar

Jonathan Eybeschütz, rabbi and religious scholar noted for his bitter quarrel with Rabbi Jacob Emden, a dispute that split European Jewry and ended the effectiveness of rabbinic excommunication during......

Jacob ben Meir Tam

French Judaic scholar

Jacob ben Meir Tam, French Jew, an outstanding Talmudic authority of his time, who was responsible for a series of far-reaching decisions governing relationships between Christians and Jews in medieval......

Rebecca Gratz

American philanthropist

Rebecca Gratz, American philanthropist who was a proponent of Jewish education and a pioneer in establishing charitable institutions. Gratz grew up a celebrated beauty in a home frequently visited by the......

Salomon Sulzer

Austrian composer

Salomon Sulzer, Austrian Jewish cantor, considered the most important composer of synagogue music in the 19th century. Sulzer was trained in cantorial singing from childhood, studying in Austria and Switzerland......

Amram bar Sheshna

Jewish scholar

Amram bar Sheshna, head of the Talmudic academy at Sura, Babylonia, traditionally regarded as the first Jewish authority to write a complete domestic and synagogal liturgy for the year, the Siddur Rav......

Aaron David Gordon

Russian author and philosopher

Aaron David Gordon, Zionist writer and philosopher who inculcated the idea of a return of Jews to Palestine as agriculturists. After working for some 20 years as a minor official for the estate of Baron......

Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid, detail of an etching by Richard Dighton, 1824.

Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid, 1st Baronet

British political activist

Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid, 1st Baronet, financier, Britain’s first Jewish baronet, whose work for Jewish emancipation in that nation made possible the passage of the Jewish Disabilities Bill of 1859, granting......

Christian David Ginsburg

British biblical scholar

Christian David Ginsburg, Hebrew and biblical scholar who was the foremost authority in England on the Masorah (authoritative Jewish tradition concerning the correct text of the Hebrew Bible). Ginsburg,......

Johannes Pfefferkorn

German controversialist

Johannes Pfefferkorn, German controversialist—a Christianized Jew—and opponent of Jewish literature, whose dispute with the Humanist and Hebraist Johannes Reuchlin (q.v.) was a European cause célèbre in......

Ernest Renan

French scholar

Ernest Renan, French philosopher, historian, and scholar of religion, a leader of the school of critical philosophy in France. Renan was educated at the ecclesiastical college in his native town of Tréguier.......

Flavius Josephus

Jewish priest, scholar, and historian

Flavius Josephus, Jewish priest, scholar, and historian who wrote valuable works on the Jewish revolt of 66–70 and on earlier Jewish history. His major books are History of the Jewish War (75–79), The......

Moses Maimonides

Jewish philosopher, scholar, and physician

Moses Maimonides, Jewish philosopher, jurist, and physician, the foremost intellectual figure of medieval Judaism. His first major work, begun at age 23 and completed 10 years later, was a commentary on......

Sa?adia ben Joseph

Jewish exegete and philosopher

Sa?adia ben Joseph, Jewish exegete, philosopher, and polemicist whose influence on Jewish literary and communal activities made him one of the most important Jewish scholars of his time. His unique qualities......

Franz Rosenzweig

German philosopher

Franz Rosenzweig, German-Jewish religious Existentialist who, through his fresh handling of traditional religious themes, became one of the most influential modern Jewish theologians. In 1913, although......

Akiba ben Joseph

Jewish sage and rabbinic founder

Akiba ben Joseph, Jewish sage, a principal founder of rabbinic Judaism. He introduced a new method of interpreting Jewish oral law (Halakha), thereby laying the foundation of what was to become the Mishna,......

Moses Mendelssohn

German-Jewish philosopher and scholar

Moses Mendelssohn, German Jewish philosopher, critic, and Bible translator and commentator who greatly contributed to the efforts of Jews to assimilate to the German bourgeoisie. The son of an impoverished......

Emmanuel Lévinas

French philosopher

Emmanuel Lévinas, Lithuanian-born French philosopher renowned for his powerful critique of the preeminence of ontology (the philosophical study of being) in the history of Western philosophy, particularly......

Simon Markovich Dubnow

Russian historian

Simon Markovich Dubnow, Jewish historian who introduced a sociological emphasis into the study of Jewish history, particularly that of eastern Europe. Dubnow early ceased to practice Jewish rituals. He......

Leopold Zunz

German scholar

Leopold Zunz, German historian of Jewish literature who is often considered the greatest Jewish scholar of the 19th century. He began (1819) the movement called Wissenschaft des Judentums (“Science of......

Manasseh ben Israel

Dutch scholar

Manasseh ben Israel, major Hebraic scholar of the Jewish community of Amsterdam and the founder of the modern Jewish community in England. Manasseh was born into a family of Marranos (Jews of Spain and......

Abraham Isaac Kook

chief rabbi of Palestine

Abraham Isaac Kook, Jewish mystic, fervent Zionist, and first chief rabbi of Palestine under the League of Nations mandate to Great Britain to administer Palestine. After serving as rabbi in a number of......

Joseph Herman Hertz

British rabbi

Joseph Herman Hertz, chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth and author of books on Judaism and of influential commentaries on the Bible expressing a fundamentalist viewpoint.......

Abraham Joshua Heschel

Jewish theologian

Abraham Joshua Heschel, Jewish theologian and philosopher, noted for his presentation of the prophetic and mystical aspects of Judaism and for his attempt to construct a modern philosophy of religion on......

Moritz Lazarus

Jewish philosopher and psychologist

Moritz Lazarus, Jewish philosopher and psychologist, a leading opponent of anti-Semitism in his time and a founder of comparative psychology. The son of a rabbinical scholar, Lazarus studied Hebrew literature......

Solomon Schechter

American rabbi and scholar

Solomon Schechter, outstanding authority on the Talmud, and a researcher who discovered important ancient documents. He was also a leader of Conservative Judaism in the United States. Schechter studied......

Hermann Cohen

German philosopher

Hermann Cohen, German-Jewish philosopher and founder of the Marburg school of neo-Kantian philosophy, which emphasized “pure” thought and ethics rather than metaphysics. Cohen was the son of a cantor,......

Israel Abrahams

British scholar

Israel Abrahams, one of the most distinguished Jewish scholars of his time, who wrote a number of enduring works on Judaism, particularly Jewish Life in the Middle Ages (1896). In 1902, after teaching......

Cyrus Adler

American scholar

Cyrus Adler, scholar, educator, editor, and Conservative Jewish leader who had great influence on American Jewish life in his time. Adler received his Ph.D. in Semitics in 1887 from Johns Hopkins University,......

Nachman Krochmal

European scholar and philosopher

Nachman Krochmal, Jewish scholar and philosopher; his major, seminal work, Moreh nevukhe ha-zeman (1851; “Guide for the Perplexed of Our Time”), made pioneering contributions in the areas of Jewish religion,......

Meyer Waxman

American Judaic scholar

Meyer Waxman, Jewish literary historian, rabbi, educator, and scholar. Trained in ?asidic seminaries in Mir and Slutzk, Waxman continued his studies, after emigrating to the United States in 1905, at New......

Frederic David Mocatta

British philanthropist and historian

Frederic David Mocatta, British philanthropist, historian, bibliophile, and patron of learning who subsidized the publication of a number of major works of Jewish literature. From 1857 to 1874, Mocatta......

Heinrich Graetz

German historian

Heinrich Graetz, German author of a major history of the Jews that became the first standard work in the field. Greatly influenced by his studies with the renowned scholar Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch,......

Samuel Hirsch

American religious philosopher and rabbi

Samuel Hirsch, religious philosopher, rabbi, and a leading advocate of radical Reform Judaism. He was among the first to propose holding Jewish services on Sunday. Educated at the universities of Bonn,......

Leone Modena

Italian rabbi and writer

Leone Modena, Italian rabbi, preacher, poet, scholar, gambling addict, and polemicist who wrote an important attack on the Sefer ha-zohar (“Book of Splendour”), the chief text of Kabbala, the influential......

Abraham ben David Halevi ibn Daud

Jewish physician and historian

Abraham ben David Halevi ibn Daud, physician and historian who was the first Jewish philosopher to draw on Aristotle’s writings in a systematic fashion. He is probably more esteemed today for his history......

Isaac ben Moses Of Vienna

European scholar

Isaac ben Moses Of Vienna, medieval codifier of Jewish law (Halakha) whose vast compilation, Or Zaru?a (“Light Is Sown”), was widely quoted in later Halakhic works. Or Zaru?a is also valued by historians......

Samuel of Nehardea

Babylonian-Jewish scholar

Samuel of Nehardea, Babylonian amora (scholar), head of the important Jewish academy at Nehardea. His teachings, along with those of Rav (Abba Arika, head of the academy at Sura), figure prominently in......

Louis Ginzberg

Lithuanian-American scholar

Louis Ginzberg, Lithuanian-born American Judaic scholar. Ginzberg studied the Talmud at several rabbinical schools, as well as philosophy, history, and Oriental languages at three universities, and received......

Grace Aguilar

British author

Grace Aguilar, poet, novelist, and writer on Jewish history and religion, best known for her numerous sentimental novels of domestic life, especially for Home Influence (1847) and The Mother’s Recompense......

Joseph Albo

Spanish philosopher

Joseph Albo, Jewish philosopher and theologian of Spain who is noted for his classic work of Jewish dogmatics, Sefer ha-?iqqarim (1485; “Book of Principles”). Little is known of Albo’s life. He is known......

David, Baron Günzburg

Russian Hebraist and community leader

David, Baron Günzburg, prominent Orientalist and Hebraist, Russian Jewish community leader, and bibliophile. The son of Horace Günzburg and the grandson of Joseph Günzburg, both noted philanthropists,......

Yitzhak Kaduri

Israeli rabbi

Yitzhak Kaduri, Israeli rabbi (born probably 1898, Ottoman Empire [now Iraq]—died Jan. 28, 2006, Jerusalem, Israel), was a Kabbalist rabbi and a scholar of Jewish mysticism who rose from obscurity to become......

PEOPLE KNOWN FOR: Judaism