1847 - 1915 (12 Kislev 5676) SOLOMON SCHECHTER (Romania-USA)
Author, scholar and leader of the American Conservative movement. Born into a Habad-Hassidic family, he studied in Berlin and lectured on Talmud at Cambridge University in England. Schechter won fame for his work in editing and publishing documents recovered from the Cairo Genezah (the synagogue repository for sacred books and articles that are old or torn). He later headed the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, and in 1913 established the United Synagogue of America. Schechter is considered to have developed much of the theory and ideology of Conservative Judaism, which was founded as a compromise between the Orthodox and Reform movements (see 1913). His works include "Studies in Judaism", "Midreshet Hagadol to Genesis" and "Some Aspects of Rabbinic Theology".
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