JTA News Brief July 9, 1929

Stockholm

 

Dr. Marcus Ehrenpreis, chief rabbi of Stockholm, attained his sixtieth birthday today. Dr. Ehrenpreis, who was born in Lemebrg in 1869, studied in Germany. As a young man he took an active part in the movement for the renaissance of the Hebrew language and literature, and with N. J. Berdyczewsky he was one of the leaders of the young Hebrew movement.

 

He helped in the preparations for the first Zionist Congress and was an active worker in the Zionist movement in its early days. He acted as Rapporteur on cultural questions at the Zionist Congresses. He was chief rabbi of Bulgaria from 1900 to 1914, when he became chief rabbi of Sweden. In 1926 he was invited by the Jewish community of Salonica and all Greece, but he chose to remain in Stockholm.

 

He has done a great deal to awaken interest in Jewish cultural activities in Scandinavian countries. He has published many works, including a Palestine Travel Book in the Swedish language, and “New Hebrew Lyrics,” containing Swedish translations of poems by Chaim Nachman Bialik and twelve other Hebrew poets. He has also published works on the Cabbalah.

 

Dr. Ehrenpreis was very active in the Jewish relief work in the East European countries in the war and early post-war years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mordecai Ehrenpreis (later on: Marcus Ehrenpreis; (1869 - 1951) was a Hebrew author, publisher, Rabbi and Zionist. He was born in Lviv and started already as a young man to write in Yiddish, studied later at German universities and at the Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin. 

 

From 1900 to 1914 he was in Sofia as Chief rabbi of Bulgaria and also publisher of several Spaniolic magazines. After 1908 his interest in zionism and in the Hebrew literature decreased noticeably which earned him some criticism; he devoted himself to other literary works and to his tasks as a Rabbi. From 1914 up to his death he was Chief rabbi of Stockholm.

 

In 1928 he founded the Judisk Tidskrift, was engaged as a translator as well as scientific writer for different encyclopedias, since 1935 he became a professor at Stockholm University. During his time in Sweden he published some 20 books in Swedish.

 

Ehrenpreis, in his texts, emphasized the importance of seeking understanding for Jewish culture in the modern world and sought to create a synthesis between a general culture and the inherited culture of the Jewish minority.