- Samuel Löw Brill
Samuel Löw Brill (
September 14 ,1814 –April 8 ,1897 ) was a Hungarian rabbi andTalmudical scholar born inBudapest . He was educated by his father, Azriel Brill (1778-1853), who was teacher and associate rabbi atPest, Hungary , and the author of several works in theHebrew language . After having been carefully grounded at home in Hebrew studies, and graduating with honors from the Protestant Lyceum of his native city, he attended the Talmud schools at Eisenstadt (1832) [under M. J. Perls] , Presburg (1834-35) [underMoses Sofer ] , andPrague (1836), where he obtained, at the age of twenty-two, his rabbinical degree. In 1842-43 he was registered in theUniversity of Berlin , where he attended the courses of famous teachers, such asBoeckh , the classical philologist, Ritter, the geographer,Leopold Ranke , the historian,Schelling , and others, and associated withLeopold Zunz andMichael Sachs .Returning to his native city, he was appointed assistant rabbi in 1843, and associate rabbi in 1850. Although he did not come before the public at large either in print (his only publication was an anonymous necrology of his teacher
Moses Sofer , in the "Allg. Zeit. des Judenthums," 1838) or on the platform, he soon became widely known by his Talmudic lectures, which he enlivened with material drawn from Hebrew and general literature. Among his earliest pupils wereW. Bacher andI. Goldziher .Brill was highly esteemed not only by his coreligionists, but also by the Hungarian government, and was its first counselor when it was preparing to institute a rabbinical seminary (see
Moritz Bloch Ballagi ). He was also one of the founders of theJewish Theological Seminary in Budapest ("Landesrabbinerschule"), inaugurated in 1877, in which institution he held the position of teacher of Talmud from 1877 till 1887, having previously (since 1872) been president of the rabbinical college of Budapest. He also took part in the Israelitic county-congress of 1868-69. During Brill's lifetime a number of subtle extracts from his Talmudic glosses were published in the "Monatsschrift," 1896-97, and the "Magyar Zsidò Szèmle," of the same years, byLudwig Blau . A few sermons have also been printed in the last-named periodical.Brill's valuable Hebrew library became the property of the seminary at Budapest.
Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography
*
L. Blau , "Samuel Löw Brill: His Life and Character", in Hungarian, with portrait, Budapest, 1902.References
*JewishEncyclopedia
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