SALO BARON Salo Baron THE PAST AND FUTURE OF JEWISH STUDIES IN AMERICA Edited by Rebecca Kobrin Columbia University Press New York Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York Chichester, West Sussex cup.columbia.edu Copyright © 2022 Columbia University Press All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Kobrin, Rebecca, editor. Title: Salo Baron : the past and future of Jewish studies in America / edited by Rebecca Kobrin. Description: New York : Columbia University Press, [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021044684 (print) | LCCN 2021044685 (ebook) | ISBN 9780231204842 (hardback) | ISBN 9780231204859 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9780231555708 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Baron, Salo W. (Salo Wittmayer), 1895–1989. | Jewish historians—United States—Biography. | Judaism—History—Study and teaching (Higher)—United States. | Jews—History—Study and teaching (Higher)—United States. | Columbia University. Center of Israel and Jewish Studies. Classification: LCC DS115.9.B37 K63 2022 (print) | LCC DS115.9.B37 (ebook) | DDC 909/.04924007202 [B]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021044684 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021044685 Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper. Printed in the United States of America Cover design: Julia Kushnirsky Cover photograph: University Archives, Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University CONTENTS INTRODUCTION Salo Baron, Columbia University, and the Expansion of Jewish Studies in Twentieth-Century America REBECCA KOBRIN 1 Chapter One Salo Baron’s Legacy and the Shaping of Jewish Studies Into the Twenty-First Century JASON LUSTIG 25 Chapter Two Organizing the Jewish Past for American Students: Salo Baron at Columbia BERNARD D. COOPERMAN 37 Chapter Three Emancipation: Salo Baron’s Achievement DAVID SORKIN 81 Chapter Four An Economic Historian Reads Salo Baron FRANCESCA TRIVELLATO 97 Chapter Five Salo Baron on Anti-Semitism DAVID ENGEL 115 vi CONTENTS Chapter Six The Professor in the Courtroom: Salo W. Baron at the Eichmann Trial DEBORAH LIPSTADT 132 Chapter Seven Building the Foundations of Scholarship at Home: Salo Baron and the Judaica Collections at Columbia University Libraries MICHELLE MARGOLIS CHESNER 153 Chapter Eight From Europe to Pittsburgh: Salo W. Baron and Yosef H. Yerushalmi Between the Lachrymose Theory and the End of the Vertical Alliance PIERRE BIRNBAUM 174 Chapter Nine Salo Baron and His Innovative Reconstruction of the Jewish Past ROBERT CHAZAN 192 Chapter Ten Remembering Professor Salo Baron: Personal Recollections of a Former Student JANE C. GERBER 207 Chapter Eleven Recollections from the Baron Daughters SHOSHANA B. TANCER AND TOBEY B. GITELLE 219 BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE PUBLICATIONS OF PROFESSOR SALO WITTMAYER BARON (1895–1989) MENACHEM BUTLER 225 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 255 CONTRIBUTORS 259 INDEX 263 Introduction SALO BARON, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, AND THE EXPANSION OF JEWISH STUDIES IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY AMERICA REBECCA KOBRIN On December 14, 1929, Nicholas Butler, president of Columbia University, penned a letter that altered the course of academic Jewish Studies in America. On that fateful day ninety years ago, he wrote to Dr. Salo Wittmayer Baron (fig. 0.1), a young Eastern European scholar, who was teaching at the recently established Jewish Institute of Religion. There has been established at Columbia University by the generous bene- faction of Mrs. Nathan J. Miller, a chair of Jewish History, Literature and Institution, which it is our desire to fill by the appointment of a scholar of first rank, who will be able, because of his learning, his contacts and his point of view, to build up the strongest possible University department in this field of advanced instruction and research. . . . It is the recommen- dation of this committee that an invitation should be offered to you to become Professor of Jewish History, Literature and Institutions at Columbia University, from July 1, 1930 at an annual salary of $7,500 with a seat in the graduate faculty of philosophy.”1 Baron accepted the offer, and Butler ultimately placed Baron and this chair in the Department of History.2 These decisions not only altered the study of the Jewish past at Columbia but, as scholar Robert Liberles has noted, would “influence the growth of Jewish scholarship in universities throughout 2 INTRODUCTION the United States for the rest of the century.”3 In short, Baron’s arrival at Columbia was a transformational moment: thanks to Baron, the United States, long viewed as an intellectual backwater in the Jewish world, had a top-rate scholar; and the study of Jewish history, “long relegated to Jewish institutions with limited financial and human resources,” moved into “the general American university, which provided augmented resources, valu- able new perspectives and challenging new questions.”4 The explosion of Jewish studies in the American academy in the second half of the twentieth century, anchored in history, is a direct result of Butler’s decision to offer the position to Baron, whose erudition, professionalism, initiative, adept- ness at institution building and numerous publications set the “standard of excellence [that] almost single-handedly opened the American university to the field of Jewish studies.”5 The coming pages seek to mark this milestone by reflecting on Baron’s legacy within the context of American Jewish life, as he played an instru- mental role in transforming Jewish studies in the United States through his scholarship, teaching, institution building, and mentorship both at Columbia University and far beyond its walls. To be sure, this book does not mark the first attempt to reflect on Salo Wittmayer Baron’s legacy. Even while Baron was alive, his stature as a scholar, public intellectual, and com- munal leader prompted several publications to evaluate his scholarship, in both Hebrew and English, by enlisting leading scholars on both sides of the Atlantic.6 The scholarly volumes produced for him in his lifetime bespeak his influential role in shaping the academic study of Jewish history as well as the high esteem in which he was held. His very presence on the Columbia campus, as Robert Chazan notes, “added immeasurably to the arguments made for the academic seriousness of Jewish studies and Jewish history.”7 After his death in 1989, more reflections and reevaluations of Baron’s work surfaced, starting with a series of articles and a biography in 1995, along with numerous journal essays, anthologies, monographs, and popu- lar works.8 Recently, new work has examined the organizations he founded that restituted stolen Jewish intellectual property or supported the devel- oping field of Jewish studies in the United States.9 Many scholars have commented on Baron’s formative role as scholar, public intellectual, and communal leader, but none has yet delved into how Baron used his perch in Morningside Heights to train other scholars to transform the study of the Jewish past in America. 3 INTRODUCTION FIGURE 0.1. Salo Baron, circa 1934. From the private collection of Shoshana Tancer. Drawing on Columbia’s many resources, Baron trained numerous students across several fields, produced expansive scholarly tomes, and helped build up archives and Judaica collections not only at Columbia but throughout the United States. Although several authors in this volume debate whether Baron’s frameworks, concepts, insights, and arguments