Biography

Through her public appearances and widely circulated gilyonot (study sheets), Nehama Leibowitz engaged thousands in the study of Torah, becoming a respected and beloved figure within the religious-Zionist community and beyond.

Israelite religion developed from a revolutionary idea: monotheism. And religion alone, not external factors, accounted for the remarkable preservation of Jewish national identity and consciousness in exile.

To instill Jewish readers with a sense of pride in their religion, Rabbi Joseph Hertz, the Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom in the early 20th century, challenged Wellhausen’s Documentary Hypothesis, especially the claim that rabbinic Judaism was a degraded form of Israelite religion. Instead, Hertz went on the offensive, comparing Christian values unfavorably to Jewish values.

At the heart of the life and career of Moshe Greenberg, z”l, was a search for spiritual meaning through the scholarly study of the Bible.

He was British Jewry’s outstanding homegrown rabbinic scholar, a protégé of Rabbi Eliyahu Munk, and described as an ilui (genius in Torah study) by R. Eliyahu Dessler. Yet R. Louis Jacobs’ desire to reconcile Judaism with academic studies led to his exclusion from Britain's orthodox rabbinate.

Rabbi Dr. Louis Jacobs, voted “the greatest British Jew,” is best-known for his 1957 book that denied traditional notions of Torah min HaShamayim, the divine origin of the Torah. The resulting controversy still reverberates today.

A Biography by Prof. Marc Zvi Brettler, and Eulogy (delivered at the funeral) by Prof. Lawrence Schiffman.