MILLGRAM, ABRAHAM EZRA

MILLGRAM, ABRAHAM EZRA (1901–1998), U.S. rabbi, Jewish educator. Millgram was born in Russia and immigrated with his family to the United States where he was educated at the City College of New York (B.S., 1924. and at Columbia University (M.A. in 1927), the year he was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary where he also received his D.H.L. in 1959. While serving as the rabbi of Temple Beth Israel in Philadelphia (1930–40), Millgram attended Dropsie College for Cognate Learning where he received his Ph.D. in 1942. He went to work for the then new organization for Jewish college youth, Hillel, at the University of Minnesota from 1940 to 1945. (In the first generation of rabbis who served Hillel were many men who would have preferred an academic career but Judaic studies had not yet developed as a field so they joined Hillel to be close to the university environment.) He then came back to New York as the educational director of the United Synagogue of America, where he was responsible for their widespread educational activities at a time when it was most influential and respected. He retired to Jerusalem where he continued to write. Among his publications were Sabbath: Day of Delight (1944); Handbook for the Congregational School Board Member, United Synagogue Commission on Jewish Education (1953); Concepts That Distinguish Judaism (1985); Jerusalem Curiosities (1990); and A Short History of Jerusalem, published in the year of his death. He was also the editor of An Anthology of Medieval Hebrew Literature (1961), Great Jewish Ideas (1964), and Jewish Worship (Jewish Publication Society, 1971). (Michael Berenbaum (2nd ed.)