MAGYAR ZSIDÓ SZEMLE

MAGYAR ZSIDÓ SZEMLE ("Hungarian Jewish Review"), Hungarian Jewish monthly journal which was established in 1884 and appeared until 1948 in a total of 65 volumes. During the first decade each volume of Magyar Zsidó Szemle contained more than 600 pages, but the number was subsequently reduced; in the period of crisis following the two world wars only individual issues were published annually. The aims of the journal were: to serve as a platform for Hungarian Jewry; to deal in Hungarian with Jewish scholarly subjects; to publish sources of the history of Hungarian Jewry; to discuss problems of religious education; and to review works on Judaica and Jewish history published outside Hungary. The editorial board was headed by professors and directors of the Budapest rabbinical seminary: W. *Bacher (1884–90), L. *Blau (1891–1930), and D.S. *Loewinger (1931–48). The first associate editors did not belong to the seminary (J. Bánóczi, 1884–90; F. Mezey, 1891–95), but the subsequent ones were professors and lecturers at that institute: *M.Guttmann, H. Guttman, S. *Hevesi, F. Hevesi, D. Friedmann, J. Hahn, A. *Scheiber, and M. Weiss.

Attempts were made to transfer some of the many and varied subjects covered by the journal to periodicals devoted to special topics: Yavneh, which dealt with problems of religious education (1928–30, vols. 1–3), and Moriah, in which sermons were published (1930, vol. 1). Of the appendices to the journal, the most important is the Hebrew supplementHa-Ẓofeh me-Ereẓ Hagar which appeared from 1911 onward. Among its contributors were distinguished Judaic scholars in the world. Until the outbreak of World War i its first four volumes appeared as a supplement to Magyar Zsidó Szemle. Subsequently from 1921 to 1930 it was published separately as a quarterly, under the title of Ha-Ẓofeh le-Ḥokhmat Yisrael.

During this decade the circle of its scholarly contributors widened still further and the journal became a focal point of scholarship of prime importance in the Jewish world. After Ha-Ẓofeh ceased publication, its role was continued by Ha-Soker, which appeared between 1933 and 1940 (i–vi) under the editorship of D.S. Loewenger, with J.M. Guttman, F. Hevesi, and D. Friedmann as associate editors. Between the two world wars a change also took place in the contents of Magyar Zsidó Szemle, in which there began to appear articles not only in Hungarian but also in other European languages, as well as in Hebrew. The authors of these articles were Hungarian Jewish scholars, as well as Jewish and non-Jewish scholars from Hungary and other countries.

bibliography:

S. Eden, in: S. Federbush (ed.), Ḥokhmat Yisrael be-Ma'arav Eiropah, 1 (1958), 554–9; S. Weingarten, ibid., 2 (1963), 380–402.

[David Samuel Loewinger]