Esriel Hildesheimer

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Esriel Hildesheimer

Esriel Hildesheimer (also: Azriel or Israel Hildesheimer; born on May 11, 1820 in Halberstadt ; died on July 12, 1899 in Berlin ) was a German rabbi and applies - alongside SR Hirsch , from whom, however, despite the common teacher Jakob Ettlinger differed in essential points - as the founder of modern orthodoxy .

Through his students, he worked far beyond Germany's borders. Like Samson Raphael Hirsch, he represented the programmatic principle “talmud tora im derech eretz”, roughly translated as: “ Torah study in connection with the way of life in the country”.

Life

Esriel Hildesheimer was born as the son of Löb Glei and Golde Goslar in Halberstadt. From 1826 he attended the Hascharat-Zwi-Schule in Halberstadt and in 1834 began studying the Talmud with local rabbi Mathias Levian and the collegiate rabbis Joseph Eger and Gerson Josaphat.

He then studied four and a half semesters at the yeshiva with Jacob Ettlinger in Altona , and briefly with Isaak Bernays in Hamburg.

In 1843 he passed the Abitur examination at the grammar school in Halberstadt.

Hildesheimer studied Talmud and classical languages in Hamburg, enrolled in November 1843 at the University of Berlin Semitic languages , history , philosophy and mathematics . In 1845 he continued his studies at the University of Halle (among others with Wilhelm Gesenius ). There he received his doctorate in August 1846 . Then he returned to Halberstadt.

He married Henrietta Hirsch (1824-1883), sister of the factory owners Josef and Gustav-Mordechai Hirsch, in Halberstadt, and thus became financially independent. In future he never asked for compensation for his activities as a rabbi or for his other activities in the Jewish environment.

In 1851 he became a rabbi in Eisenstadt (Hungary, now Austria), where he founded a Jewish school, where both Jewish and secular knowledge was imparted, but where great importance was attached to the German language. Soon he also founded a yeshiva, which began in 1851 with six students; In 1868, 128 students were taught there.

Although Hildesheimer was an Orthodox rabbi himself, he was rejected by most of the Hungarian Orthodox rabbis because of his maladjusted manner. A congress of Hungarian Jews took place from 1868 to 1869 to discuss the establishment of a Hungarian rabbinical seminary. Hildesheimer and his followers had to assert themselves against the reformers and the Orthodox. His compromise proposals likely would have preserved the unity of Hungarian Jewry, but the Congress ended in split.

At that time, the Orthodox minority of Berlin Jews , comprising around 200 families , who were dissatisfied with the commitment of the “reformer” Abraham Geiger, was looking for a spiritual leader. The choice fell on Hildesheimer, who accepted the offer and moved to Berlin in 1869 as rabbi and chairman of the Beth Midrash . There, too, he founded a yeshiva and became the actual founder and rabbi of the Adass Yisroel community . With the support of Marcus Mayer Lehmann , editor of the newspaper Der Israelit in Mainz, he took up the fight against Reform Judaism .

In 1873 he established the orthodox rabbinical seminary in Berlin , which was to become the most important training center for rabbis from all over Europe. Hildesheimer's students received the idea based on Samson Raphael Hirsch that orthodoxy was compatible with the scientific study of Jewish sources. Hildesheimer advocated cooperation within the community in order to strengthen the Jewish people as a whole. Together with his reform colleagues, he fought against German anti-Semitism, but at the same time rejected the reform movement because, in his opinion, it was undermining Judaism.

In his personal demeanor, Hildesheimer is described as modest, but at the same time determined and fearless, hardworking, hardworking, compassionate and generous towards the poor and active for the oppressed Jewish communities worldwide, for which he asked for funds everywhere.

He campaigned for the victims of the Russian pogroms and advocated their settlement in Eretz Israel instead of fleeing to America. Hildesheimer was an enthusiastic supporter of the Jews of Palestine and the building of the Yishuv throughout his life.

In 1870 he founded the Jüdische Presse in Berlin , which was the only newspaper that advocated the emigration of German Jews to Palestine. In 1872 he founded the Palestine Association to raise the educational and professional level of the Jews in Jerusalem. In 1879 an orphanage was founded; this drew him the opposition to the ultra-orthodoxy of the old Yishuv , which placed Hildesheimer under a spell.

He supported the Chowewei-Tzijon movement and the settlement of Erez Israel . For formal legal reasons, the land that had been bought for the construction of Gedera was registered in his name.

His contributions to Jewish scholarship were also significant: he edited the Halachot Gedolot , a manuscript from the Vatican that was a previously unknown Gaonean work.

Hildesheimer's successor at the Berlin Rabbinical Seminary was his student David Hoffmann (1843–1921).

Esriel Hildesheimer's sons Hirsch Hildesheimer and Meier Hildesheimer (1864–1934) were lecturers at the seminar. Esriel (Erich) Hildesheimer, son of Meier Hildesheimer, was the head of the Tel-Aviver city library.

Works

  • Materials for the Evaluation of the Septuagint. In: The Orient: Reports, Studies, and Reviews for Jewish History and Literature. Edited by Julius Fürst , Leipzig 1848, No. 30ff.
  • First report of the provisional training institute for rabbinate candidates in Eisenstadt, which has existed for six and a half years and has been recognized for six months by the high Imperial and Royal Lieutenancy Department in Oedenburg. Vienna 1858.
  • Collected Essays. Published by Meier Hildesheimer. Hermon A.-G., Frankfurt am Main 1923.

Letters

  • Esriel Hildesheimer: Letters. Selected and edited by Mordechai Eliav, Mass, Jerusalem 1965 (in Hebrew).

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ David Ellenson, Rabbi Esriel Hildesheimer and the Creation of a Modern Jewish Orthodoxy . University of Alabama Press, 1990. p. 1 .; Ezriel Hildesheimer, Briefe , R. Mass, 1965. p. 294.
personal data
SURNAME Hildesheimer, Esriel
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hildesheimer, Azriel; Hildesheimer, Israel
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German rabbi
DATE OF BIRTH May 11, 1820
PLACE OF BIRTH Halberstadt
DATE OF DEATH July 12, 1899
Place of death Berlin