{{short description|American historian}} {{Infobox person | name = Solomon Grayzel | image = | caption = | birth_date = {{birth date|1896|2|18}} | birth_place = Minsk, Russia | death_date = {{death date and age|1980|8|12|1896|2|18}} | death_place = | occupation = Scholar; Rabbi; Editor | known_for = Research on Church–Jewish relations; Editor of the Jewish Publication Society; Author of ''The Church and the Jews in the 13th Century'' | education = City College of New York (B.A., 1917); Columbia University (M.A., 1920); Dropsie College (Ph.D., 1926) | alma_mater = Jewish Theological Seminary; Columbia University; Dropsie College | employer = Gratz College; Jewish Publication Society | title = Editor, Jewish Publication Society (1939–1966) | spouse = Sophie Solomon (m. 1932–1980) | notable_works = ''The Church and the Jews in the 13th Century'' (1933); ''A History of the Jews'' (1947); ''History of Contemporary Jews'' (1960) }} '''Solomon Grayzel''' (February 18, 1896 – August 12, 1980) was an American historian who authored ''[https://search.worldcat.org/title/1313182 A History of the Jews]'' and testified<ref>{{cite web |title=Expert Testimony of Solomon Grayzel in Schemp v. Abington School District |url=https://philosophyofjewishhistory.home.blog/ |website=Philosophy of Jewish History blog |access-date=21 November 2021}}</ref> as an expert witness in ''Abington School District v. Schempp'', the case that declared school-sponsored Bible reading in American public schools to be unconstitutional.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lehman |first1=Jeffrey |last2=Phelps |first2=Shirelle |title=West's Encyclopedia of American Law, Vol. 1 | edition=2 |date=2005 |publisher=Thomson/Gale |location=Detroit |isbn=9780787663742 |page=8}}</ref> Among other topics, his scholarly research focused on the relationship between the Vatican and the Jews, including ''[https://search.worldcat.org/title/19589189 The Church and the Jews in the XIIIth Century]'' and many other scholarly essays and books on the topic.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/05/15/opinion/l-popes-and-the-jews-after-the-blessing-883586.html|title = Opinion | Popes and the Jews: After the Blessing|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 15 May 1986}}</ref>
Grayzel was born on February 18, 1896, in Minsk, a major hub of Eastern European Jewry prior to the Holocaust which is now the capital of Belarus. He emigrated to the United States as an adolescent, settling in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, New York, with his family in 1908.
Grayzel received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the City College of New York in 1917 and a Master of Arts degree in sociology from Columbia University in 1920. He received his ''semikhah'' (rabbinical ordination) from the Conservative Movement at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in 1921, and earned a Ph.D. in history from Dropsie College in Philadelphia in 1926.
While working on his doctorate, Grayzel took his first and only full-time pulpit position at Congregation Beth El in Camden, New Jersey where he was the congregation's first rabbi when the new synagogue opened.<ref>{{cite news |last=|first= |date=October 3, 1921|title=Jewish Synagogue Opened at Camden; Rosh Hoshana and Yom Kippur Services Conducted by Rabbi Solomon Gravzel|work=Philadelphia Inquirer|page=6|location=Philadelphia, Pennsylvania }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.jtsa.edu/The_Library/Collections/Archives/The_Ratner_Center/Finding_Aids_to_papers_of_Conservative_Rabbis_and_Synagogues/Grayzel_Solomon.xml |title=Solomon Grayzel (1896-1980), Papers. |access-date=2011-09-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111104002505/http://jtsa.edu/The_Library/Collections/Archives/The_Ratner_Center/Finding_Aids_to_papers_of_Conservative_Rabbis_and_Synagogues/Grayzel_Solomon.xml |archive-date=2011-11-04 }}</ref> He was the editor-in-chief of the Jewish Publication Society from 1939 to 1966.
== References == <!--- See Wikipedia:Footnotes on how to create references using <ref></ref> tags which will then appear here automatically --> {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Grayzel, Solomon}} Category:1896 births Category:1980 deaths Category:Belarusian Jews Category:American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Category:20th-century American historians Category:American male non-fiction writers Category:Jewish American historians Category:Historians of Jews and Judaism Category:Writers from Minsk Category:People from Brownsville, Brooklyn Category:Writers from Brooklyn Category:City College of New York alumni Category:Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni Category:Jewish Theological Seminary of America semikhah recipients Category:Dropsie College alumni Category:Belarusian emigrants to the United States Category:20th-century American rabbis Category:Historians from New York (state) Category:20th-century American male writers Category:Jewish translators of the Bible