Kaatz, Saul
KAATZ, SAUL
KAATZ, SAUL (1870–1942?), rabbi and scholar. Kaatz, who was born in Schwersenz (Swarzedz), Poznania, served as rabbi at Hindenburg, Upper Silesia, from 1895. When the validity of the Nazis' anti-Jewish legislation in Upper Silesia was contested before the League of Nations in 1933 (see *Bernheim Petition), Kaatz was among those who courageously resisted the German government's intimidation. He spurned the possibility of emigration and was deported to his death with his congregation in 1942. Kaatz was an individualist and often upheld unpopular ideas against his fellows in the Orthodox rabbinate, just as he opposed, in 1897, the anti-Zionist line of the Allgemeiner Rabbinerverband. His published writings include Die Scholien des Gregorius Abulfaragius Bar Hebraeus zum Weisheitsbuch des Josua ben Sira… (1892); Das Wesen des juedischen Religionsunterrichts (1904); Wesen des prophetischen Judentums (1907); Abraham Geigers religioeser Charakter (1911); Die muendliche Lehre und ihr Dogma… (2 vols., 1922–23); Weltschoepfungsaera und Wissenschaft (1928); and Sendschreiben an den Vorstand… der Vereinigung traditionellgesetzestreuen Rabbiner Deutschlands, in which he opposed the custom of abbreviating the name of God in non-Hebrew languages. Kaatz was a regular contributor to Wohlgemuth's Jeschurun and the weekly Israelit. He also wrote short stories (Alter Vogel, 1919) and a play, Alexander der Grosse vor Jerusalem.