Seven letters and two postcards handwritten and signed by Prof. Moritz (Moshe) Lazarus. Leipzig (one letter is from Nice), June to November 1878. German.
The postcards and letters are all in handwriting, signed "Lazarus" or "L". They are addressed on the postcards to Mr. Aldenhoven, secretary of the Society for German Literature (Verein für Deutsche Litteratur), and concern, for the most part, literary and research issues - essay publications in various periodicals, payment requests, and so on. Some of the letters are several pages long.
Prof. Moritz (Moshe) Lazarus (1824-1903) was a Jewish-German philosopher, ethnologist and psychologist, founder of national psychology and comparative psychology.
Lazarus's father, Aharon Levin Lazarus, was the head of the Beth Din and yeshiva in Filehne (today Wielen) and a pupil of Rabbi Akiva Eger. Lazarus himself studied Hebrew literature and history, and went on to study philosophy and law at Berlin University, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1850. Between 1860 and 1866 Lazarus was a professor at the University of Bern. In 1866 he returned to Berlin as a professor of philosophy at the Berlin Military Academy, and later, in 1868, at the University of Berlin.
Lazarus, considered a member of the Jewish elite of his period in Germany, had an important role in the public and intellectual life of Prussian Jewry. Among other things, he was a member of the Assembly of Delegates (Repräsentanten-Versammlung) of the Berlin Jewish community, served as the vice president of the Jewish-German Community Alliance (Deutsch-Israelitischer Gemeindebund), as president of the Berlin branch of the Alliance Israelite Universelle, as president of the Leipzig Convention (1869), as president of the aid committee to Russian and Romanian Jewry, and in other public roles. On his 70th birthday he was honored with the title of "Geheimrat", a title granted to the elite of the leading professors in German universities.
Size varies. Good to very good condition. Folding marks and some stains.