Hershman, Abraham M.
HERSHMAN, ABRAHAM M.
HERSHMAN, ABRAHAM M. (1880–1959), U.S. Conservative rabbi. Hershman was born in Neustadt, Poland, immigrating to the U.S. in 1896. Ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1906), he served in Syracuse, New York, and then went to Detroit's Congregation Shaarey Zedek (1907), which he led until 1946, when he became rabbi emeritus. Founder and president of the Detroit Zionist Organization, Hershman was also principal of the Division Street Talmud Torah, Detroit's first Jewish communal school; delegate to the first American Jewish Congress, and a founder of the Jewish Community Council. His Rabbi Isaac ben Sheshet Perfet and his Times (1943) dealt with the history of the Jews in Spain in the 14th century. Hershman translated Book 14 of the Code of Maimonides as Book of Judges (1949), and wrote Israel's Fate and Faith (1952) and Religion of the Age and of the Ages (1953).
[Irving I. Katz]