Science of Judaism

Leopold Zunz (Hebrew: יום טוב צונץ—Yom Tov Tzuntz, Yiddish: ליפמן צונץ—Lipmann Zunz; 10 August 1794 – 17 March 1886) was the founder of academic Judaic Studies (Wissenschaft des Judentums), the critical investigation of Jewish literature, hymnology and ritual. Zunz's historical investigations and contemporary writings had an important influence on contemporary Judaism.

Leopold Zunz was born at Detmold, the son of Talmud scholar Immanuel Menachem Zunz (1759-1802) and Hendel Behrens (1773-1809), the daughter of Dov Beer, an assistant cantor of the Detmold community. The year following his birth his family moved to Hamburg, where, as a young boy, he began learning Hebrew grammar, the Pentateuch, and the Talmud. His father, who was his first teacher, died in July 1802, when Zunz was not quite eight years old. He subsequently gained admission to the Jewish "free school" (Freischule) founded by Philipp Samson, in Wolfenbüttel. Departing from home in July 1803, he saw his mother for the last time (she died in 1809 during his years in Wolfenbüttel). A turning point in Zunz's development came in 1807, when Samuel Meyer Ehrenberg (), a reform-minded educator, took over the directorship of the Samson School. Ehrenberg reorganized the curriculum, introducing, alongside traditional learning, new subjects such as religion, history, geography, French, and German; he became Zunz's mentor, and they remained friends until Ehrenberg's death in 1853.

He settled in Berlin in 1815, studying at the University of Berlin and obtaining a doctorate from the University of Halle. He was ordained by the Hungarian rabbi Aaron Chorin, an early supporter of religious reform, and served for two years teaching and giving sermons in the Beer reformed synagogue in Berlin. He found the career uncongenial, and in 1840 he was appointed director of a Lehrerseminar, a post which relieved him from pecuniary troubles. Zunz was always interested in politics, and in 1848 addressed many public meetings. In 1850 he resigned his headship of the Teachers' Seminary, and was awarded a pension. Throughout his early and married life he was the champion of Jewish rights, and he did not withdraw from public affairs until 1874, the year of the death of his wife Adelheid Beermann, whom he had married in 1822.

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