The Israelite Epic

The historian and biblical scholar Umberto Cassuto was educated at the University of Florence and the Collegio Rabbinico. He taught at both institutions and, from 1914 to 1925, served as chief rabbi of Florence. In 1933, he was appointed to the chair in Hebrew and comparative Semitic languages at the University of Rome, where he taught until 1939. When the Fascist racial laws forced him from his position, he continued his academic career at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Early in his career he concentrated on the history of Jews in Renaissance Italy. Later he focused on biblical exegesis and the question of the redaction of the Hebrew Bible, especially the validity of Julius Wellhausen’s documentary theory of the formation of the Pentateuch. Toward the end of his career he made important contributions to the field of Ugaritic studies.