The Maccabaean

important step without consulting the other. I lost in him a true friend, such as Fate gives one but rarely.

He was a thoroughly religious and observant Jew, an unswerving idealist, a man of sterling character, very modest and always ready to recognize the accomplishments of others. He made great efforts to understand every point of view, generous in this respect sometimes to a fault, and was ever ready to forgive for tout comprendre c'est tout pardonner. He never forgot a kind act done for him, while he never looked for thanks for kindness extended generously to others. He was especially grateful to his father for the many sacrifices that he had incurred for his son's education. He always remembered his loving care which had spared him from the many tribulations confronting young students away from home. One of his last acts was to restore to him his family which the war had kept in Poland.

Dr. Friedlaender's ideal was a self-respecting national Judaism, true to the religion of our fathers. All his activities were inspired by his love for his people. In its service he lived and in its service he died. His name will be inscribed in golden letters in its heart as one of the long roll of noble Jewish martyrs.

Israel Friedlaender Lover of His People

THROUGH the tragic murder of Prof. Friedlaender, the Jewish people has lost one of its foremost scholars and Zionism one of its most brilliant exponents and most faithful workers. He was a very warm-hearted Jew with deep convictions and large views, whose work in Jewish cultural and communal affairs had brought much honor and recognition to his people. His place in the life of American Jewry will unfortunately not be filled soon.

He was born forty-three years ago in a small town in the Government of Volhynia, Russia, and there received a good Jewish education. He received his secular education in Germany, where he was a student in the University of Berlin. There he studied Semitic languages and literature and, at the same time, attended the Rabbinical seminary at Hildesheimer. Later he was a pupil of the famous savant, Theodore Noeldeke, in the University of Strassburg, from whom he received his doctor’s degree for a treatise on Maimonides which appeared in 1902. In the same year he was given a position as privatdocent in the University of Strassburg. Even as a student he devoted himself to Jewish communal work, especially to Zionism and other national currents in Jewish life.

The late Prof. Solomon Schechter invited him to become a member of the faculty of the Jewish Theological Seminary and entrusted him with the department of Biblical Science. In addition, he was given the department of Jewish Religious Philosophy, which involved him in a fruitful scientific activity in the field of Jewish-Arabic literature. By means of his Jewish-Arabic studies which appeared in the American Jewish Quarterly Review, Prof. Friedlaender shed light on many obscure places and removed several doubts in the field of Jewish history and literature. With his little anthology from the Arabian writings of Maimonides, which

appeared in the "Semitic Series," under the editorship of Prof. Richard Gottheil and Prof. M. Jastrow, Dr. Friedlaender made it possible for parts of the finest works of Jewish-Arabic literature to be studied even by beginners.

Ye TI TTTOTTTITTTTT As is known, Prof. Friedlaender played an important part in the Zionist movement. He was one of its leaders and defenders in America.. This was because Prof. Friedlaender, unlike many another Jewish scholar, was more interested in the condition of the present-day Jew than of the Jew of other times. Not only was he one of the leaders of political Zionism, but also a great adherent and exponent of cultural Zionism in line with the system of Ahad Ha-Am and S. Dubnow. By his writings and speeches, he disseminated their thoughts and views on Jewish nationalism. He it was who acquainted the Jewish youth in the German-speaking lands with the Jewish national-philosophic system of Dubnow and Ahad Ha-Am. His German translation of Dubnow’s work on the philosophy of Jewish history and Dubnow’s letter to the Jewish youth which Prof. Friedlaender published in Germany under the title “Grundlagen des National-Judentums” was enthusiastically received. Later Miss Henrietta Szold used his German translation of Dubnow’s work on Jewish history to introduce Dubnow to the English reading public. Prof. Friedlaender himself also translated into English Dubnow’s “History of the Jews in Russia and Poland,” which the Jewish Publication Society is issuing in three volumes, and he also used Dubnow’s material to write a work of his own on the same subiect.

Prof. Friedlaender was the German translator of Ahad Ha-Am’s “On the Cross-Roads.” His translation went through two edition. He popularized the philosophy of Ahad Ha-Am among the Jewish intellectuals of America. One of the first lectures which he held in the Jewish Theological Seminary was on Ahad Ha-Am’s system, and through his influence the Jewish Publication Society issued a volume of selected essays of Ahad Ha-Am, translated into English by Leon Simon. Although Prof. Friedlaender was one of Ahad Ha-Am’s disciples, he was not always his blind follower. When the fourth part of Ahad Ha-Am’s “On the Cross-Roads” appeared, Prof. Friedlaender attempted to prove that Ahad Ha-Am in his essay, “The Supremacy of Reason,” did not understand Maimonides properly. Ahad Ha-Am declared that Maimonides placed reason above religion, while Friedlaender claimed rightly that, according to Mai- monides’ views, reason and religion are one and the same thing. On another occasion, however, Friedlaender admitted that in many of his own writings he was influenced by Ahad Ha-Am’s views. In all circles of Jewish intellectuals in America, England and Germany, Prof. Friedlaender used every opportunity to popularize Ahad Ha-Am’s views.

Prof. Friedlaender was a very active member of the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Publication Society and other national organizations, in which he always strove to introduce a strong Jewish national spirit. When several years ago there arose the movement to organize the American Jewish Congress—a movement which at that time divided American Jewry into two camps—Prof. Friedlaender was the first to strive to prevent a permanent cleavage in American Jewry. In an article, "The Present Crisis of American Jewry," which appeared in the Menorah Journal of December, 1915, he showed the way to a compromise. This article really served as a basis for the agreement which the opposing groups arrived at and which later made possible the holding of the first American Jewish Congress in