Leo Baeck (1873–1956)

Leo Baeck was born to a large Jewish family in Lissa, in the German Province of Posen (present-day Leszno, Poland). His parents were Eva (Placzek) and Rabbi Samuel Baeck and he had 10 siblings. After completing his traditional Jewish education, in 1894 Leo moved to Breslau (present-day Wrocław, Poland) to enroll at the Jewish Theological Seminary there. He also studied philosophy there and subsequently with Wilhelm Dilthey at the University of Berlin. In Berlin, he also studied at the Reform-oriented Higher Institute for Jewish Studies (Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums), where he received his rabbinic diploma in 1897. He served as a rabbi in Oppeln (now Opole), Düsseldorf, and Berlin. In 1905, Rabbi Baeck published The Essence of Judaism, which made him famous, and he became the most prominent Jewish leader in Germany. During World War I, Rabbi Baeck served as a chaplain in the German Imperial Army on both the eastern and western fronts. In 1933, after the Nazi regime took power, Rabbi Baeck refused all offers of escape. He was elected founding president of the Representative Council of German Jews, and worked tirelessly to provide social services to the Jewish community. In January 1943, he was arrested and deported to the Nazi concentration camp at Terezín (Theresienstadt) in Czechoslovakia. There he was put to hard labor; all four of his sisters all died in the camp. Rabbi Baeck was appointed honorary head of the Jewish Council of Elders (Ältestenrat) in Terezín. He gave talks from memory on classic works of Western philosophy, was active in interfaith dialogue, and worked in youth care. Although he received word of the fate awaiting Jews in the Nazi death camps, he made the decision — criticized after the war — not to share this knowledge with the other prisoners. After Terezín was liberated at the end of World War II, Baeck remained for a while to minister to the sick and dying. He then moved to London, where he accepted the presidency of the North Western Reform Synagogue. He taught periodically at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio. Eventually, he became chairman of the World Union for Progressive Judaism. In 1955, he published his second major work, This People Israel: The Meaning of Jewish Existence, which he had partially written while at Terezín. That same year, the Leo Baeck Institute was founded by leading German-Jewish émigré intellectuals, including Martin Buber, Max Grunewald, Hannah Arendt, and Robert Weltsch, to preserve the history and culture of German-speaking Jews that was nearly destroyed in the Holocaust. Rabbi Baeck became its first international president. The Institute now includes branches around the world including the Leo Baeck Institute of New York City, and the Leo Baeck Institute of London. The Leo Baeck Medal, created in his memory in 1978, is awarded each year by the Leo Baeck Institute NYC.