Hebrew

The Chair of Hebrew in Edinburgh University's Faculty of Divinity was created in 1642. Its first occupant Julius Conradus Otto was the first academic from mainland Europe to be elected to an Edinburgh chair and is the earliest-known person of Jewish origin to have lived in Scotland.

Creation of the Chair of Hebrew

The Chair of Hebrew and Oriental Languages was the second Professorship founded in Edinburgh University after the Chair of Divinity in 1620. Hebrew had hitherto been taught in a somewhat perfunctory fashion. Under the then prevalent Regenting System, students were given a basic grounding in Hebrew Grammar during their third year of studies. In 1628 the obligation to read Divinity students a weekly lesson in the Hebrew language was listed as one of the duties of the Professor of Divinity. In 1642, however, Alexander Henderson (c1583–1646), the Rector of Edinburgh University, was the prime mover in a nationwide campaign to raise academic standards through an influx of talent from abroad. He played a key role in instigating a resolution of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland calling on Scottish universities to seek abroad for able professors. In the same year, Henderson persuaded the Town Council of Edinburgh to introduce the specialized teaching of Hebrew into the University, and to employ a foreign scholar. The Council’s choice fell upon Julius Conradus Otto, described as ‘a learned Jew’.

Julius Conradus Otto

Sources vary considerably concerning Otto’s biographical details. Most historians identify him with the scholar Naphtali Margolioth, born in Vienna in 1562. Margolioth converted to Christianity in 1603, changed his name to Julius Conradus Otto, and became Professor of Hebrew at Altdorf, Germany. He later reverted to Judaism. George F. Black argues, however, that the holder of the Edinburgh Chair was a son of Margolioth, who assumed the same Christian name as his father. He was succeeded in the Chair by David Dickson in 1656, but A. Levy’s analysis of Town Council Minutes suggest that Otto may have died in 1649 and the Chair lain vacant for seven years.

Sources

• George F. Black, 'The Beginnings of the Study of Hebrew in Scotland', in Studies in Jewish Bibliography and Related Subjects: In Memory of A. S. Freidus, ed. Louis Ginzburg (New York: Alexander Kohut Memorial Fund, 1929), pp. 463-78.
• Thomas Craufurd, History of the University of Edinburgh, from 1580 to 1646: To Which is Prefixed the Charter Granted to the College by James VI of Scotland, in 1582 (Edinburgh: Printed by A. Neill & Co., 1808)
• Sir Alexander Grant, The Story of the University of Edinburgh during its First Three Hundred Years, 2 vols (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1884)