Duenner, Joseph Ẓevi Hirsch

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DUENNER, JOSEPH ẒEVI HIRSCH

DUENNER, JOSEPH ẒEVI HIRSCH (1833–1911), rabbi and talmudist. Duenner was born in Cracow. He studied in the yeshivah there and subsequently at the University of Bonn. In 1862 Duenner was appointed director of the rabbinical seminary in Amsterdam and in 1874 chief rabbi of the Ashkenazi community there. Regarded as the spiritual leader of Orthodox Jewry in Holland, Duenner nevertheless combined traditional learning with a critico-historical approach. The results of his researches and his new interpretations were published as glosses to 19 tractates of the Talmud (1896–1929). His main work is Die Theorien ueber Wesen und Ursprung der Tosephta (1874). Duenner became a supporter of the early movement for settlement in Erez Israel in consequence of his contacts with Moses *Hess while studying in Bonn. He later became a leader of the *Mizrachi party.

bibliography:

B. de Vries, in: Shai li-Yshayahu… Wolfsberg (1955), 247–83; idem, in: L. Jung (ed.), Guardians of our Heritage (1958), 337–44; idem, in: L. Jung (ed.), Men of the Spirit (1964), 624–44; eẒd, 1 (1958), 652–5.

[Jacob S. Levinger]