Dr. Henry Berkowitz, Noted Philadelphia Rabbi Dies Suddenly

Dr. Henry Berkowitz, Rabbi Emeritus of the Congregation Rodoph Sholom Philadelphia, died suddenly in an Atlantic City Hotel Thursday.

Dr. Berkowitz, who was 67 years of age was nationally known as an author, a Jewish communal leader and sociologist, as well as the most eminent Reform Rabbi in Philadelphia, where he officiated at the Rodoph Sholom Temple for the past thirty years. When Dr. Berkowitz was made Rabbi Emeritus in 1921 he was the first to receive such honor in Philadelphia.

Dr. Berkowitz was born in Pittsburgh and held degrees from the universities of Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and also from Cornell University, as well as from the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, of which he was Governor. He studied in Cornell for two years and was graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1881. He received his rabbinical training at the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati and entered the Rabbinate in 1885. His first congregation was in Mobile, Ala. where he remained for five years, after which he went to the Bnai Jehuda Congregation in Kansas City, remaining there for four years. Dr. Berkowitz was among the founders and was the first secretary of the Central Conference of America Rabbis in 1889, and since 1893 has been a member of the Publication Committee of the Jewish Publication Society of America. In 1893 he organized the Jewish Chautauqua Society of which he was Chancellor. In 1904 he visited England to address meetings at Ramsgate under the auspices of the Union of Jewish Literary Societies of Great Britain. Correspondence schools for the study of Jewish subjects and the education of Jewish teachers were instituted by Dr. Berkowitz in 1912. In the same year he was appointed by the Mayor of Philadelphia to be a member of the Vice Commission and made an official visit during the summer of 1912 to England, Scotland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Germany, following which he presented a learned report embodying the results of his investigation.