Name

Hermann Reckendorf

Original name

צבי חיים בן שלמה

Main activity

Professor

Secondary activity

Translator, Author

Title

Doctor

Name variations

צבי חיים רעקענדארף, Ḥayyim Ẓevi Ben Solomon, Herrmann Reckendorf"

Education place

Leipzig

Education institution

Leipzig University

Activity place

Heidelberg

Activity institution

Heidelberg University

Activity start date

Activity end date

Place of birth

Trebitsch

Date of birth

1825

Place of death

Date of death

1875

Bibliographical references

Sel M., "Reckendorf, Hermann (Ḥayyim Ẓevi Ben Solomon)", in Jewish Encyclopaedia, vol. 10, 1905, p. 343. Paudice A., "Hebrew Translations and Transcriptions of the Qur'an", in Meddeb A. and Stora B. (eds), A History of Jewish-Muslim Relations from the Origin to the Present Day, Princeton University Press, 2013, 640-652. Afif N. "De Leipzig à Fès: une copie sépharade de la traduction hébraïque du Coran d’Hermann Reckendorf", in BABELAO: Electronic Journal for Ancient and Oriental Studies, 9 (2020), p. 147-160.

Descriptive card

Hermann (or Herrmann) Reckendorf (1825-1875), also known by the Hebrew name of צבי חיים בן שלמה was a German orientalist and author, son of Salomon Reckendorf, rabbi of the town of Trebitsch in Moravia. Reckendorf studied history in Leipzig and later became a professor of Semitic languages at the University of Heidelberg. He is the author of the first direct translation of the Quran in Hebrew from Arabic. He also authored a five-volume fictionalized Jewish history, "Die Geheimnisse der Juden" (1856/1857) and of a biography of Moses, "Das Leben Mosis" (1868 ). Since these two works are written in German, it seems that Reckendorf's Hebrew translation of the Quran is his only work in Hebrew language. He is the father of his homonym Hermann Reckendorf (1893-1923), who was also an orientalist, and mostly know for his Arabische Syntax (1921).

Entry author

Naima Afif