Leopold Zunz
Leopold Zunz | |
---|---|
Personal | |
Born | 10 August 1794 |
Died | 17 March 1886 |
Religion | Judaism |
Nationality | German |
Spouse | Adelheid Beermann (m. 1822) |
Occupation | Rabbi, writer, activist |
Leopold Zunz (
Biography
Leopold Zunz was born at Detmold, the son of Talmud scholar Immanuel Menachem Zunz (1759-1802) and Hendel Behrens (1773-1809), the daughter of Dov Beer,[2] an assistant cantor of the Detmold community.[3] The year following his birth his family moved to Hamburg, where, as a young boy, he began learning Hebrew grammar, the Pentateuch, and the Talmud.[2] His father, who was his first teacher, died in July 1802, when Zunz was not quite eight years old.[4] He subsequently gained admission to the Jewish "free school" (Freischule) founded by Philipp Samson, in Wolfenbüttel. Departing from home in July 1803, he saw his mother for the last time (she died in 1809 during his years in Wolfenbüttel).[4] A turning point in Zunz's development came in 1807, when Samuel Meyer Ehrenberg , a reform-minded educator, took over the directorship of the Samson School. Ehrenberg reorganized the curriculum, introducing, alongside traditional learning, new subjects such as religion, history, geography, French, and German; he became Zunz's mentor, and they remained friends until Ehrenberg's death in 1853.[2]
The summer of 1811 is noteworthy as the time when Zunz made his first acquaintance with Johann Christoph Wolf's Bibliotheca Hebræa, which, together with David Gans's Tzemach David, gave him his first introduction to Jewish literature and the first impulse to think of the "Science of Judaism."[5][1]
He settled in
Together with other young men, among them the poet
Although affiliated with the Reform movement, Zunz appeared to show little sympathy for it, though this has been attributed to his disdain for ecclesiastical ambition and fears that rabbinical autocracy would result from the Reform crusade. Further,
The violent outcry raised against the Talmud by some of the principal spirits of the Reform party was repugnant to Zunz's historic sense. Zunz himself was temperamentally inclined to assign a determinative potency to sentiment, this explaining his tender reverence for ceremonial usages. Although Zunz kept to the Jewish ritual practises, he understood them as symbols (see among others his meditation on tefillin, reprinted in "Gesammelte Schriften," ii. 172-176). This contrasts with the traditional view of the validity of divine ordinances according to which the faithful are bound to observe without inquiry into their meaning. His position accordingly approached that of the symbolists among the reformers who insisted that symbols had their function, provided their suggestive significance was spontaneously comprehensible. He emphasized most strongly the need of a moral regeneration of the Jews.
He wrote precise philological studies but also impassioned speeches on the Jewish nation and history that had an influence on later Jewish historians. Zunz wrote in 1855:
"If there are ranks in suffering, Israel takes precedence of all the nations; if the duration of sorrows and the patience with which they are borne ennoble, the Jews can challenge the aristocracy of every land; if a literature is called rich in the possession of a few classic tragedies—what shall we say to a National Tragedy lasting for fifteen hundred years, in which the poets and the actors were also the heroes?"[6]
In 1840 he became director of the Berlin Jewish Teachers' Seminary.
He was friendly with the traditional Enlightenment figure Nachman Krochmal whose Moreh Nebuke ha-Zeman (Lemberg, 1851), was edited, according to the author's last will, by his friend Leopold Zunz.
Zunz died in Berlin in 1886.
Works
Zunz’ famous article “Etwas über die rabbinische Litteratur” (“On Rabbinical Literature”), published in 1818, established the intellectual agenda of the Wissenschaft des Judentums (“Science of Judaism”), while adumbrating the main themes of his own future work as well. Even at this early stage of his academic career, Zunz mapped out his concept of the Wissenschaft des Judentums which he intended to serve as a medium for presenting, preserving, and transmitting the corpus of Jewish literary works. Zunz believed that only an academic approach to Jewish texts and a comprehensive and interdisciplinary academic framework would allow for the adequate study of Jewish themes and Judaism.
- Etwas über die rabbinische Litteratur. Berlin : Maurersche Buchhandlung, 1818. Digital Form SLUB Dresden via EOD
- Die gottesdienstlichen Vorträge der Juden historisch entwickelt : ein Beitrag zur Alterthumskunde u. biblischen Kritik, zur Literatur- u. Religionsgeschichte. Berlin : Asher, 1832. Digital Form Freimann-Sammlung, Frankfurt.
- Translated into Hebrew as הדרשות בישראל והשתלשלותן ההיסטורית (1947, Bialik Institute)
- Namen der Juden: Eine geschichtliche Untersuchung, Leipzig, L. Fort, 1837.
- Die vier und zwanzig Bücher der Heiligen Schrift : Nach dem masoretischen Texte / unter der Redaction von Dr. Zunz ; übersetzt von H. Arnheim, Dr. Julius Fürst, Dr. M. Sachs. Berlin : Veit, 1837/1839.
- Zur Geschichte und Literatur. Berlin : Veit, 1845. Digital Form Freimann-Sammlung, Frankfurt.
- Predigten gehalten in der neuen Israelitischen Synagoge zu Berlin. Berlin : Schlesinger 1846.
- Die synagogale Poesie des Mittelalters. Berlin, 1855. Digital Form Freimann-Sammlung, Frankfurt.
- Samuel Meyer Ehrenberg, Inspektor der Samsonschen Freischule zu Wolfenbüttel. Braunschweig : Gebrüder Meyer, 1854.
- Die [sic] Ritus des synagogalen Gottesdienstes geschichtlich entwickelt. Berlin : Springer, 1859. (Die synagogale Poesie des Mittelalters ; Bd. 2) Digital Form Freimann-Sammlung Frankfurt.
- Deutsche Briefe. Leipzig , F.A. Brockhaus, 1872.
- Die Monatstage des Kalenderjahres ; ein Andenken an Hingeschiedene. Berlin ; M. Poppelauer, 1872.
- Literaturgeschichte der synagogalen Poesie. Berlin : Gerschel, 1865, mit einem Ergänzungsband 1867. Digital Form Freimann-Sammlung, Frankfurt.
- Gesammelte Schriften. Berlin : Gerschel, 1875–76, Bd. 1, Bd. 2, Bd.3. Digital Form: Freimann-Sammlung, Frankfurt.
- Zeitschrift für die Wissenschaft des Judentums Jg. 1, Heft 1–3, 1822 (not more published). Edited by Leopold Zunz and Eduard Gans. Digital Form Compact Memory, Frankfurt. (About: J. Raphael Die Zeitschrift des Dr. L. Z. in: Zeitschrift f. d. Geschichte der Juden, Heft 1/1970, Tel Aviv: Olamenu, S. 31–36)
References
Citations
- ^ Nahum Glatzer, Pelger Gregor "Zunz, Leopold", Encyclopaedia Judaica (2nd ed., 2007)
- ^ ISBN 978-0-02-866097-4.
- ^ Kaufmann, David (1894). "Die Familie Zunz" (in German). Monatsschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judenthums vol. 38, no. 11, 481–493; here: p. 484.
- ^ a b Kaufmann, David (1900). "Zunz, Leopold." (in German) In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie. Vol. 45, p. 490-501. Online version retrieved 2016-12-10.
- ^ a b "Zunz, Leopold" By Isidore Singer, Emil G. Hirsch, Jewish Encyclopedia (1901-1906)
- ^ Zunz, L. Die Synagogale Poesie des Mittelalters
- ^ "LZA".
Sources
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Isidore Singer, Emil G. Hirsch (1901–1906). "Zunz, Leopold". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Zunz, Leopold". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 1056. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
- "Zunz, Leopold", entry by Nahum N. Glatzer and Gregor Pelger, Encyclopaedia Judaica (2nd ed., 2007)
- Leopold Zunz, myjewishlearning.com
- "Leopold Zunz". bh.org.il. The Museum of the Jewish People at Beit Hatfutsot.
- Elbogen, Ismar. "Leopold Zunz zum Gedächtnis." In: Fünfzigter Bericht der Lehranstalt fuer die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin. Berlin, 1936, 14-32.
- Glatzer, Nahum Norbert (ed.): Leopold and Adelheid Zunz, an account in letters 1815-1885. London : Published for the Institute by the East and West Library, 1958. (Publications of the Leo Baeck Institute of Jews from Germany)
- Glatzer, Nahum Norbert (ed.): Leopold Zunz, Jude, Deutscher, Europäer; ein jüdisches Gelehrtenschicksal des 19. Jahrhunderts in Briefen an Freunde. Tübingen : Mohr, 1964. (Schriftenreihe wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck Instituts, 11)
- ISBN 0-8143-1470-8
- ISBN 9780812248531.
- Veltri, Giuseppe. "A Jewish Luther? The academic dreams of Leopold Zunz." In: Jewish Studies Quarterly. 7/4 (2000), 338-351.
- Vetter, Dieter. "Leopold Zunz. (Mit-)Begründer der Wissenschaft des Judentums." In: Freiburger Rundbrief. 13/2 (2006), 111-122.
- Bautz, Traugott, ed. (1998). "ZUNZ, Leopold (eigentlich: Yom Tov [Jomtob] Lipman Z.), jüdischer Gelehrter". Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL) (in German). Vol. 14. Herzberg: Bautz. cols. 607–627. ISBN 3-88309-073-5.
- Wieseltier, Leon. „Etwas über die jüdische Historik. Leopold Zunz and the Inception of Modern Jewish Historiography." In: History and Theory. 20/2 (May, 1981), 135-149.
External links
- Guide to the digitized Leopold and Adelheid Zunz Collection at the Archives of the Leo Baeck Institute, New York (call number AR 3648)
- Works by Leopold Zunz in the Library Collection of the Leo Baeck Institute, New York.
- Digitized works by Leopold Zunz in the Freimann Collection at the Judaica Division of the University Library of the Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main.
- The Leopold Zunz Archives at the Archives of the National Library of Israel (call number ARC. 4* 792).
- Zunz-Moyal-Zentrum, (formerly Leopold Zunz Center), Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. The Leopold Zunz Center had worked on the digitization of the Leopold Zunz Archives at the Nation Library of Israel. The project is currently undergoing a revision.