Wolff, Abraham Alexander. Einweihungs-Feier des Israelitischen Gotteshauses in Kopenhagen [“Dedication Ceremony of Israelite Temple in Copenhagen.”]

German-born Abraham Alexander Wolff (1801-1891) was considered in his native Darmstadt a child prodigy. He studied Talmud under Rabbi Abraham Bing of Würzburg, doyen of German rabbis, and in 1821 received a Ph.D. from the University of Giessen. Wolff assumed the office of Chief Rabbi of Denmark in 1829. After the devastation of Copenhagen’s synagogue in 1795, the community splintered into several Sephardic and Aschkenazic congregations. With his arrival in Copenhagen, the new rabbi galvanized the community to erect a new edifice, dedicated on April 12, 1833. Wolff has been called “the father of Danish homiletics.” In the course of a rabbinic career spanning sixty-five years, he is said to have delivered 5,000 sermons. His crowning literary achievement was his Danish translation of the Pentateuch, published on his ninetieth birthday. See JE, Vol. XII, pp. 551-2.