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Born in Philadelphia, PA in 1928, Rabbi Martin A. Cohen, Ph.D., z”l, attended the University of Pennsylvania, earning a B.A. degree in 1946 and an M.A. in Romance Languages in 1949. He taught Romance Languages (Spanish, French, and Italian) at the University of Pennsylvania from 1946 to 1950, and Spanish at Rutgers University from 1950 to 1951 before enlisting in the United States Air Force.

Upon discharge in 1953, he entered 51������ in Cincinnati, OH with advanced standing, was ordained as a rabbi, and received an M.A. degree in Hebrew Letters in 1957 and a Ph.D. in 1960. He began teaching part-time at 51������ in Cincinnati in 1955 and was appointed to the tenure track faculty in 1960. In 1962 he transferred to 51������’s New York campus, where he was named its Adolph S. Ochs Professor of History and served for the remainder of his life.

In addition, Rabbi Cohen served as a visiting professor of history and theology in various colleges, among them Antioch College, Temple University, and Hunter College of the City University of New York. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa and was listed in the Dictionary of American Scholars.

A recognized authority on Judaism, Rabbi Cohen wrote extensively on Jewish history, theology and education. His historical books include��The Martyr, about the secret Jews under the Mexican Inquisition;��Two Sister Faiths, about early Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity, his edition of��Sephardim in the Americas,��and his two-volume edition entitled��The Jewish Experience in Latin America. An opera titled��The Conquistador, written by a professor at the Juilliard School of Music and based on��The Martyr, premiered in San Diego in 1997. Dr. Cohen’s translation into English of the Renaissance Portuguese classic, Samuel Usque’s��Consolation for the Tribulations of Israel,��has received wide acclaim.

His theological works include his co-editorship of the book��Jewish Mission/Christian Mission��and his monograph in French on Jewish, Christian, and Muslim eschatology published by Librairie Artheme Fayard. His work in education is exemplified by his co-editorship of the series��Adventures in Living Judaism, published by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. He contributed to many learned journals, beginning with the��Hispanic Review��in 1949,��and including, among others, the Journal of Biblical Literature, the��Jewish Quarterly Review, the��American Jewish Historical Quarterly, the��American Jewish Archives,��The American Sephardi, and Helmantica,��the organ of the University of Salamanca.

His entries can be found in various encyclopedias, among them the Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible��and the��Encyclopedia of Religion. Appointed by Dr. Cecil Roth, Editor-in-Chief of the��Encyclopedia Judaica, he served as editor of three of its departments (Portugal,��Marranos, and��Colonial Latin America) contributing twenty-two articles of his own. Dr. Cohen’s book��The Canonization of a Myth, based on lengthy research in Lisbon’s Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, plumbs the seminal role of the Inquisition in the politics of seventeenth century Portugal.��

Rabbi Cohen’s devotion to the Jewish community is evidenced by his service to congregations in Cleveland, Ohio; Muncie, Indiana; Louisville, Kentucky; Monroe, New York; Brooklyn, New York; and his home congregation, the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue of New York, which, on the completion of a year of interim service, named him its Rabbi Laureate.��For over forty years, Rabbi Cohen served as Chaplain of the Metropolitan [New York] Conference of the National Federation of Temple Brotherhoods, which conferred upon him its first annual Solon Miles Chadabee Award for outstanding achievement, twice designated him Man of the Year, and in 1998 bestowed upon him its Tikkun Olam award for distinguished service to Brotherhood, the Jewish people and the community at large.

In the broader community Rabbi Cohen served as President of the American Society of Sephardic Studies, the only Ashkenazic Jew ever to hold that office; Chairman of the Board of the Jewish Historical Society of New York; National Chaplain of the AMVETS, the first Korean War veteran to achieve national office in a major veterans’ organization; member of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Conciliation Board of America; Scholar and Consultant on International Affairs of the Foreign Relations Commission of the New York Board of Rabbis; Chairman of the International Scholars Committee of the Anti-Defamation League of the B’nai Brith; co-editor of��Nuestro Encuentro, the Anti-Defamation League’s first publication in Spanish; and, for the last nine years of his long service to that organization, Chairman of its Commission on Jewish-Catholic Relations and co-Chairman of its National Interfaith Department. Since 2005 Rabbi Cohen had also been the spiritual leader of the American Friends of the Jewish Museum of Greece.

Worthy of special mention among Rabbi Cohen’s other notable activities are his service in 1947 as interpreter in the training of Argentine helicopter pilots in Camden, New Jersey (there were no casualties); his keynote address in 1998 at��Santangel��98, an international conference on Sephardic and related scholarship sponsored by the Dominican University and focusing on the Iberian Inquisitions and the secret Jews; and his response in 2002 at the Law School of the Catholic University to the book, published originally in Italian, of the Pontifical Biblical Commission under Cardinal Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI)��The Jewish People and their Sacred Scriptures in the New Testament.

A longtime faculty member, colleague, and beloved mentor Rabbi Cohen passed away on January 23, 2026. He was predeceased by his beloved wife, Shelby Cohen,����”l, and is survived by his daughter, Anita Rogers.��

May his memory be a blessing.