Arthur Zacharias Black

Arthur Zacharias Schwarz (born February 4, 1880 in Karlsruhe ; died February 16, 1939 in Jerusalem ) was an Austrian rabbi and codicologist (manuscript specialist).

Life

Arthur Zacharias Schwarz was a son of the Austro-Hungarian rabbi Adolf Schwarz . He passed the Abitur at the high school in Karlsruhe. He studied philosophy at the University of Vienna from 1898 to 1902 and received his doctorate in 1905 . At the same time he studied at the Israelite Theological Institute and obtained his diploma there in 1907.

From 1914 he worked professionally as a rabbi and religion teacher in Vienna and from 1933 to 1939 at the Israelitische Kultusgemeinde, while he specialized scientifically in Hebrew codicology and became one of the most outstanding representatives of this area. He is said to have been encouraged to do so on a study trip by the then prefect of the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan, Achille Ambrogio Damiano Ratti (later Pope Pius XI ).

As a first result, an exact catalog of the Hebrew manuscripts appeared in the Viennese court library in 1914 , which he subsequently expanded to include the holdings throughout Austria. After Austria was annexed in 1938, Schwarz was arrested and tortured. Physically and mentally broken, he reached Palestine , where he died on February 16, 1939. He was able to save the preparatory work for the second part of his catalog into emigration.

His daughter Tamar (Anna Helene) Kollek née Schwarz, born July 17, 1917 in Vienna; † July 25, 2013 in Jerusalem, was married to the longtime mayor of Jerusalem, Teddy (Theodore) Kollek . She was a teacher all her life. His son Binyamin (Hans Theodor) Schwarz, born December 7, 1919 in Vienna; † August 9, 2001 in Jerusalem, was a university professor of mathematics in the USA.

Web links

• N. Vielmetti:  Black, Arthur Zacharias. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 11, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-7001-2803-7 , p. 426.