Lajos Blau

Lajos Blau (German: Ludwig Blau; April 29, 1861 – 1936) was a Hungarian scholar and publicist born at Putnok, Hungary. Blau was educated at three different yeshivot, among them that of Presburg. In 1880-1888, he was a student at the Rabbinical Seminary of Budapest (Landesrabbinerschule, now the Budapest University of Jewish Studies). At the same time, he studied philosophy and Orientalia at the Budapest University, received there the degree of Ph.D. cum laude in 1887, and the rabbinical diploma at the Seminary in 1888.

In 1887, Blau became a teacher of the Talmud at the Landesrabbinerschule, in 1888 a substitute, and in 1889 professor of the Bible, the languages of Hebrew and Aramaic, and the Talmud. Beginning in 1899, he became a librarian and tutor in Jewish history. In 1902, Blau became president of the folk-lore section of the Jewish-Hungarian Literary Society, and editor of the Magyar Zsido Szemle. He died in 1936.

Blau's scientific publications have dealt chiefly with the following topics:

• Literature and life of the Jews in the Talmudic and early post-Talmudic periods, for example:
  • Beiträge zur Erklärung der Mechilta und des Sifre, in the Steinschneider Festschrift, 1896
  • Quelques Notes sur Jésus ben Sirach, in Revue Etudes Juives, xxxv. 19-47
  • Das Altjüdische Zauberwesen, Strasbourg, 1898
• The Jewish traditions regarding the Masorah, for example:
  • Massoretische Untersuchungen, Strasburg, 1891
  • Masoretic Studies, in Jewish Quarterly Review, viii., ix.)
• The canon of Scripture, for example:
  • Zur Einleitung in die Heilige Schrift, Strasburg, 1894. This work is especially valuable for the light it throws upon the history of the Bible text in the early synagogue.

Blau also published Der Concursus Vitiorum nach Talmudischem Recht, Budapest, 1887; and Die Erwählung Israel's (in Hungarian), ib. 1890; and contributed to the Monatsschrift, Zeitschrift für Hebräische Bibliographie, Jahrbuch des Ungarischen Litteraturvereines, Jahrbuch der Deutschen Litteraturvereines, etc.