Toward an Appreciation of the American Legacy of Rabbi Esriel Hildesheimer: The U.S. Rabbinate of Three Hildesheimer Students

Much has been written about the life, times, and impact of Rabbi Esriel Hildesheimer (1820-1899) on Western European Jewry. ¹ To date, however, the American legacy of this towering figure has not been explored. Living at a time of considerable acculturation and an erosion of traditional authority structures in Jewish life, Hildesheimer's embrace of modernity as compatible with Orthodoxy—symbolized by his substantial Talmudic learning combined with a university doctorate—was institutionalized in the rabbinical seminary (Rabbinerseminar für das Orthodoxe Judentum) that he established in Berlin in 1873. The Rabbinerseminar provided leadership for those Jews in Germany and elsewhere eager to participate in modern society while retaining allegiance to traditional Jewish norms.

Samson Raphael Hirsch's Nineteen Letters of Ben Uziel (1836) and subsequent writings and activities—particularly in Frankfurt where he served as rabbi of the Orthodox community, 1851-1888—provided an ideological approach to "Torah im Derekh Eretz," combining Torah with general education, and Hirsch was recognized as a significant representative of that Weltanschauung. It was Hildesheimer, however, who trained rabbis to serve in Jewish communities throughout Germany and beyond. ² While Hirsch consistently and categorically rejected Wissenschaft des Judentums ("Jewish Science") as having any place in Jewish study, Hildesheimer considered it imperative to train rabbis schooled in Wissenschaft des Judentums "inasmuch as such knowledge is a demand of our times." ³

After briefly sketching Esriel Hildesheimer's biography, this article will, by examining themes in the American rabbinate of three of his students—Henry W. Schneeberger (1848-1916), Philip Hillel Klein (1849-1926) and Schepschel Schaffer (1862-1933)—demonstrate that the influence of Hildesheimer's model of Orthodoxy in the modern world extended to the U.S. ⁴ Hildesheimer's commitment to Jewish learning coupled with general education, his interest in strengthening the yishuv in Israel and in meeting Jewish welfare needs internationally—and his readiness to join with Jews who did not share his Orthodoxy in addressing such needs—are richly reflected in the work of these three students who exercised significant impact over the course of their careers in the U.S. It is worthy to note that at the close of the twentieth century, when a new rabbinical school in New York opened championing Orthodoxy in a modern key, the name Hildesheimer Seminary was among those proposed for consideration. ⁵

Esriel Hildesheimer

Born in Halberstadt in 1820, Esriel Hildesheimer attended a Jewish day school that, in addition to six hours per day of Jewish studies, included general education. Hildesheimer's father, a prominent rabbinic scholar, died when Esriel was twelve years old. Esriel's older brother sent him to Altona, at age seventeen, for advanced Jewish learning at the yeshiva of noted Talmudist Rabbi Jacob Ettlinger. In addition to his studies of classical Jewish texts with Rabbi Ettlinger, Hildesheimer attended the philosophical lectures of Isaac Bernays in neighboring Hamburg. Both Bernays and Ettlinger—teachers of Samson Raphael Hirsch as well as of Hildesheimer, though not concurrently—had, themselves, studied at universities and encouraged general education in addition to Torah study. ⁶ After five years in Altona, Hildesheimer proceeded to university, first at Berlin and then at Halle, earning a PhD in 1846 for a dissertation titled, "The Correct Way to Interpret Scripture." Returning to Halberstadt, Hildesheimer married Henriette Hirsch, daughter of a wealthy industrialist—a circumstance that provided the Hildesheimers economic security. Henriette and Esriel Hildesheimer would have ten children in the ensuing years, six sons and four daughters.

In 1851, Hildesheimer, who had served in Halberstadt as secretary of the Jewish community, accepted an invitation to serve as Chief Rabbi in the Austro-Hungarian community of Eisenstadt. There, he founded the first yeshiva to include secular studies together with religious instruction within its curriculum. Of fifty-one to fifty-three weekly hours of study, approximately two-thirds were devoted to Jewish learning and one third to general education. Starting with only a few pupils, the yeshiva expanded to serve a population of more than 120 students. ⁷

Writing of life in Eisenstadt, one of Hildesheimer...