author
Isaac Landman
1880–1946
A Reform rabbi, editor, and public educator, he helped shape Jewish reference publishing in America through his work on the ten-volume Universal Jewish Encyclopedia. His career also reflected a wide interest in community life, adult education, and public debate within American Judaism.
1 Audiobook
Stories of the Prophets (Before the Exile)
by Isaac Landman
About the author
Born in Sudilkov in the Russian Empire in 1880, he came to the United States as a child and grew up in Cincinnati. He studied at the University of Cincinnati and was ordained at Hebrew Union College, going on to serve as a Reform rabbi in Philadelphia and later in Brooklyn.
He is best remembered as the editor of the ten-volume Universal Jewish Encyclopedia, a major reference work that brought together scholarship for a broad readership. Beyond the pulpit and the page, he was active in Jewish education and communal projects, including efforts aimed at adult learning.
Landman also took part in public arguments within Jewish life, including anti-Zionist activism, which made him a visible and sometimes controversial figure in his era. He died in 1946, leaving behind a body of editorial and religious work closely tied to American Jewish culture in the first half of the twentieth century.