GEIGER, Abraham (1810-1874), one of the ablest leaders of the modern Jewish school of theology and criticism, was born at Frankfort-on-the-Main, May 24, 1810. After receiving from his father and uncle the elements of an ordinary rabbinical education, he was in his eleventh year sent to the gymnasium, whence in 1829 he passed to the university of Heidelberg, which he soon afterwards exchanged for that of Bonn. As a student he greatly distinguished himself both in philosophy and in philology, and at the close of his course wrote on the relations of Judaism and Mahometanism a prize-essay which was afterwards published, in 1833, under the title Was hat Mohammed aus dem Judenthum aufgenommen ? In November 1832 he went to Wiesbaden as rabbi of the synagogue there, and, still pursuing the line of scientific study upon which he had entered during his undergraduate course, became in 1835 one of the most active promoters of the Zeitschrift für Jüdische Theologie, which appeared from 1835 to 1839, and again from 1842 to 1847. In 1838 he removed to Breslau, where he continued to reside for the next twenty-five years, and where he wrote some of his most important works, including his Lehr-und Lesebuch zur Sprache der Mischna (1845), his Studien from Maimonides (1850), his translation into German of the poems of Juda ha-Levi (Abu’l Hassan) in 1851, and the Urschrift und Uebersetzungeη der Bibel in ihrer Abhängigkeit von der innern Entwickelung des Judenthums (1857). The last-named work especially attracted much attention at the time of its appearance, and may be said to have marked a new departure in the methods of studying the records of Judaism. In 1863 Geiger became head of the synagogue of his native town, whence he removed in 1870 to Berlin, where, in addition to his ...