Silbermann, Abraham Moritz

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SILBERMANN, ABRAHAM MORITZ

SILBERMANN, ABRAHAM MORITZ (1889–1939), publisher, lexicographer, and translator. Born in Hungary, Silbermann was ordained as a rabbi at Berlin Rabbinical Seminary, but engaged in publishing and bookselling. In Berlin he issued the Horeb (photographic) editions of Talmudim and Midrashim, while at the same time preparing a Hebrew-German, German-Hebrew dictionary (with S. *Gruenberg, 19222), as well as the Hebrew-English-German Talmudic Dictionary (with B. Krupnik-Karou, 2 vols., 1927). Silbermann later settled in England where, as publishing director of Shapiro, Vallentine and Co., he produced a translation of Rashi's Pentateuch commentary (with M. Rosenbaum, 5 vols., 1929–34), which did much to familiarize English-speaking Jews with this classic. Also popular was his Children's Haggadah (with A.S. Super; 1933, 19544). His last work was the one-volume Vallentine's Jewish Encyclopedia, which he edited in collaboration with A.M. *Hyamson (1938).