Messages of condolence from Jewish organizations and leaders in all parts of the world were received here during the week-end by the family of the late Rabbi Solomon Goldman, former president of the Zionist Organization of America and well-known scholar, who died last Thursday at the age of 59. Funeral services will be held tomorrow. Rabbi Israel H. Levinthal of Brooklyn, and Maurice Samuel, noted author, will deliver the eulogies.
Dr. Goldman was the rabbi of the Anshe Emet Synagogue, one of the three largest Jewish congregations in America, since 1929 and recently completed his 36th year in the pulpit. Born in Kozin, Russia, Dr. Goldman was brought to America in childhood and was educated in New York public schools and at the Talmudic College of Rabbi Isaac Elchanan. He received his bachelor’s degree at New York University and his rabbinical degree at Jewish Theological Seminary of America.
He was the author of many important books in the field of Bible and Jewish scholarship. He completed two volumes, “The Book of Books” and” In the Beginning,” of a projected series of 13 books on the Bible entitled “The Book of Human Destiny,” described as a work of immense scope and depth on the origin, development, influence and interpretation of the Bible from its oral tradition to the present day. A third volume in this series, “From Slavery to Freedom,” is about finished.
His most recent book, “The Words of Justice Brandies,” which appeared in March, he completed shortly after his return from the West Coast in the midst of illness. In addition to the books mentioned, Rabbi Goldman also wrote “A Rabbi Takes Stock,” “The Jew and the Universe,” “The Golden Chain,” “Crisis and Decision,” “Prayers and Readings,” and “Undefeated.”
Rabbi Goldman was president of the Zionist Organization of America from 1938 to 1940. In recent years Rabbi Goldman carried on a vigorous campaign within the Conservative movement to reorient its philosophy and revise its practices so that they would more nearly meet the needs of modern Jewry.
(In New York, messages stressing that the death of Rabbi Goldman is a loss to American Jewry and the Zionist movement were issued by Dr. Nahum Goldmann, chairman of the Jewish Agency executive, Dr. Irving Miller, president of the Zionist Organization of America, and leaders of major Jewish organizations. Dr. Goldman was an officer or director of the Joint Distribution Committee, Jewish National Fund of America, and American Friends of the Hebrew University, Palestine Hebrew Culture Fund and the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. He served also as co-chairman of the United Jewish Appeal.)
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