ENELOW, HYMAN

ENELOW, HYMAN (Hillel Gershom ; 1877–1934), U.S. Reform rabbi, scholar, and writer. Enelow, who was born in Kovno, Lithuania, went to the U.S. as a young man, age 16, and was ordained by Hebrew Union College in 1898. Enelow served as rabbi of Temple Israel, Paducah, Kentucky (1898–1901), Temple Adath Israel, Louisville, Kentucky (1901–12), and Temple Emanu-El, New York (1912–34). During World War i, Enelow served in France with the Jewish Welfare Board. He was vice president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (1925–27), its president (1927–29), and a member of both the American Historical Association and the American Jewish Historical Society. Enelow was instrumental in having chairs for Jewish studies established at Harvard (with the aid of his friend Lucius *Littauer) and Columbia (aided by Mrs. Nathan Miller). His numerous books on Jewish religion include the following: The Synagogue in Modern Life (1916); The Faith of Israel (1917); and A Jewish View of Jesus (1920). His Selected Works were published in four volumes by F. Levy in 1935.

Enelow's four-volume edition of Israel *Al-Nakawa's Menorat ha-Ma'or (1929–32) was an important contribution to Jewish scholarship. His thesis that this work served as the model for Isaac *Aboab's work of the same name was widely discussed though not universally accepted. Of equal importance is Enelow's edition of Mishnat Eliezer (or Midrash of 32 Hermeneutic Rules, with an English introduction and full apparatus, 1933). A collection of manuscripts was presented in his memory to the Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, by his friend Mrs. Nathan Miller. His private library of over 20,000 volumes was also willed to the Seminary.

bibliography:

Philipson, in: ajyb, 36 (1934), 25–53; Rivkind, in: Essays … L.R. Miller (1938), 69–83 (Heb. sect.); Kressel, Leksikon, 1 (1965), 127–8.