Yehuda Kiel

Yehuda Kiel was born in 1916 in Saint Petersburg

Kiel was born in Saint Petersburg in 1916. After the revolution his family moved to Panevėžys in Lithuania and later to Latvia, where his father founded a Jewish state gymnasium. His parents and two brothers stayed in Europe and were killed in the Holocaust.

He immigrated to Mandate Palestine in 1936 and first worked as a porter. He then studied Knowledge of the Land of Israel, history, sociology and psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, finishing in 1940. He also served as secretary of the national executive of Bnei Akiva.

He taught at Kfar Haroeh, where he met Tamar, whom he married in 1941. In 1942 he founded and ran the religious high school in Afula, and later became an inspector of religious education in the Ministry of Education. He headed the ministry's religious education department until 1977.

From 1964 he led the Da'at Miqra Bible commentary project and served as its chief editor. He wrote the commentary on several books, including Genesis, Joshua, Samuel, Kings, Proverbs, Daniel and Chronicles. He received the Israel Prize for Jewish studies in 1992.

In 2002 he was named Yakir Yerushalayim. He died in Jerusalem on 16 June 2011. His grandson Matanyahu Englman is the State Comptroller of Israel.