KAUFMANN, YEḤEZKEL (1889–1963), was an Israeli Bible scholar and philosopher of Jewish history. Born in the Ukraine, Kaufmann was educated in Bible, Talmud, and Jewish history and received a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Bern in 1918. From 1914 to 1928 he lived in Germany, writing on Jewish nationalism. Immigrating to Israel (then Palestine) in 1928, he published a four-volume historical-sociological interpretation of Jewish history, Golah ve-nekhar (Exile and alienage; 1928–1932). His eight-volume Toldot ha-emunah ha-Yisreʾelit (A history of the religion of Israel; 1937–1956) is the most comprehensive study of biblical religion by a modern Jewish scholar. From 1949 until 1957 he was professor of Bible at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Kaufmann's major writings, historical and ideological, are distinguished by philosophical sophistication, methodological reflectiveness, and detailed textual analysis. In Toldot, a comprehensive, detailed analysis of the Bible and biblical religion, he argues (1) that the...