Geoffrey Wigoder

Geoffrey Wigoder (3 August 1922 – 9 April 1999) was a British-born Israeli scholar, editor, and broadcaster, best known as editor-in-chief of the Encyclopaedia Judaica.¹²³

Wigoder was born in Leeds, England, into a family with both acting and rabbinic connections.¹ He studied at Trinity College Dublin, earning a degree in medieval Jewish history, and later completed doctoral work at the University of Oxford in Jewish philosophy.¹² He also trained for the rabbinate at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York City, where he met his future wife.¹² The couple married and emigrated in 1949 to the newly established State of Israel, settling in Jerusalem.²

In 1950, Wigoder became English-language director of The Voice of Zion to the Diaspora, an Israeli international broadcasting service.¹ He later served as a correspondent in Jerusalem for the BBC and The Yorkshire Post, reporting on major events including the Eichmann trial.² From 1960 to 1967 he directed Israel’s overseas broadcasts.¹

Wigoder collaborated with Cecil Roth on the New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia and succeeded him as editor-in-chief of the 16-volume Encyclopaedia Judaica following Roth's death in 1970.² He later oversaw the encyclopedia's digital release on CD-ROM.¹ His other editorial works include The Encyclopedia of the Jewish Religion, Jewish Art and Civilization, The Story of the Synagogue, Dictionary of the Jewish–Christian Dialogue,² Dictionary of Jewish biography, Jewish-Christian relations since the Second World War, Jewish-Christian interfaith relations : agendas for tomorrow, The Crown of wisdom : sixty years of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and The Vatican-Israel agreement : a watershed in Christian-Jewish relations.

At the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Wigoder founded Israel’s first oral history department and contributed to the establishment of the Museum of the Jewish Diaspora in Tel Aviv.²¹³

Wigoder continued teaching and writing into the 1990s, editing works such as the New Encyclopedia of Zionism and Israel.¹ He died in Jerusalem on 9 April 1999, aged 76, from a brain hemorrhage following a fall.² He was survived by his wife, two sons, a sister, and two grandchildren.²¹