Instructions for Use

Hours: 

To use our library, please register in advance by emailing shk-judaistik@uni-koeln.de. In your email, please also state the nature of your research project and whether you require a study space.

You can find the current opening hours during the semester break here.

Our library is a reference library. As a general rule, borrowing is permitted only in exceptional cases. 

The library of the Martin Buber Institute for Jewish Studies is a research reference library that was established in 1966 with the founding of the institute as one of the first specialized libraries in Jewish studies in Germany after World War II. With a total of approximately 18,000 volumes of standard and specialized literature in Hebrew and other languages, including extensive collections of historical value, it serves as a small but significant and internationally recognized specialized library in Jewish Studies, providing the Institute’s faculty and students with the specialized literature necessary for teaching, research, and study. It is open to the public and may be used by anyone by appointment.

The foundation of the library was laid by large portions of the private library of Kalman Schlesinger, a Cologne-based bookseller who lived in Jerusalem after 1933; these were acquired between 1972 and 1975 with support from the German Research Foundation (DFG) and private donations. The collection includes approximately 100 prints from before 1800, 30 of which are early 16th-century Hebrew prints, including some from the early modern centers of Hebrew book printing: Venice, Padua, and Mantua.

With the Schlesinger Collection, the Martin Buber Institute acquired original manuscripts from the 16th to the 18th centuries from North Africa, primarily liturgical poetry and mysticism, including some unpublished material from medieval Hebrew poetry, as well as letters from Jewish figures in the fields of science, culture, and religion from the 19th and 20th centuries. Among these are originals by Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Shmuel Josef Agnon, Abraham Berliner, Salomon Buber, Rav Naftali Zwi Jehuda Berlin, Isaak Chajes, Israel Davidson, Joseph Eschelbacher, Isaak Dov B. Markom, and Moritz Steinschneider.

The Martin Buber Institute Library focuses particularly on rabbinic and Talmudic literature, medieval religious and intellectual history—especially philosophy and mysticism—Halakha, liturgical and secular poetry, and, as a special area of focus, the history of medicine. In recent years, the collection has been expanded in the field of 19th- and 20th-century Jewish social and intellectual history. This includes numerous first editions of works by significant Jewish authors of the 19th and 20th centuries, including Max Nordau, Franz Rosenzweig, Martin Buber, and Hermann Cohen; a collection of German-language Zionist writings from the period 1890–1948, as well as more recent standard and specialized literature on the topics of persecution, the Shoah, and the history of modern Israel. 

If you have any questions about our holdings or our collection, please do not hesitate to contact us. Information on the library’s layout can be found here.

Library Rules

Rooms 306 (seminar room), 314 (Talmud room), and 315 (Medieval room) are available to library users as study areas, provided they are not currently in use for classes. Please take any books you need from the lecture halls to the study room well in advance of the start of classes. After use, the books must be returned exactly to the location indicated by their call number. Smoking, eating, and drinking are prohibited in the lecture and study rooms. 

The alphabetical author catalogs and the (systematic) location catalog are generally accessible. No cards may be removed from them, even temporarily. 

Retroactive Cataloging of the Martin Buber Institute's Library Holdings

The retro-cataloging project at the Martin Buber Institute for Jewish Studies Library has been underway since April 2025. The goal is to gradually enter the library holdings that have not yet been digitally cataloged into the ALMA library system, thereby making them accessible for research via the online catalog. 

The project team, which initially consisted of research associate Dr. Rodica Herlo-Lukowski and two student assistants—Matthis Bischof for the Hebrew titles and Viviane Uhrmann for the non-Hebrew titles—has since grown. In addition to Mr. Bischof and Ms. Uhrmann, who are now working as research assistants, two additional student assistants have joined the team: Marten Schkeklova for the Hebrew titles and Luisa Waschk for the non-Hebrew titles.

Since the project began, more than 5,000 book copies have already been cataloged in ALMA. As a result, a steadily growing portion of the library’s holdings—which had not previously been cataloged electronically—is now searchable via the online catalog and is easier for researchers, students, and other interested parties to locate and use.

In the course of this work, it has become apparent that retro-cataloging the Hebrew holdings, in particular, presents special challenges. One of these concerns the transcription of Hebrew titles and names. Over the decades and centuries, various transcription systems have been used for transliterating Hebrew, and these have also been carried over into the electronic library catalogs. As a result, the same title or name may appear in different spellings across library catalogs. What may initially seem like merely a variation in spelling can significantly complicate—or even make impossible—a targeted search for a specific work.

Based on the experience gained from previous cataloging work, the idea arose to consistently record the original Hebrew spelling alongside the transcription. In consultation with the Institute’s director, Prof. Dr. Mathias Lehmann, it was decided to additionally enter the Hebrew titles processed as part of the project into ALMA using Hebrew script—the only constant when searching for a title. 

However, the fact that retro-cataloging goes far beyond the mere transfer of existing catalog data into an electronic library system is particularly evident in the case of the older Hebrew prints in the Institute’s library. Especially for 19th-century editions, bibliographic details are not always readily identifiable. The place of publication, printer or publisher, or year of publication may be missing, given in abbreviated form, or require verification using other copies and bibliographic sources. Cataloging a single volume may therefore sometimes require more intensive bibliographic research.

We encounter similar, albeit different, difficulties with numerous Hebrew publications from the first decades following the founding of the State of Israel. The high demand for books at that time—particularly from the 1950s through the 1970s—led to numerous previously published works being reissued or reprinted. However, it is not uncommon for these editions to contain only abbreviated or incomplete information regarding the place of publication, publisher, or year of publication. If multiple new editions or reprints of the same work exist, it is therefore often necessary to first determine which specific edition is held in the Institute Library’s collection. In conducting this necessary bibliographic research, the online catalog of the National Library of Israel in Jerusalem has become an important tool. The extensive holdings and bibliographic records listed there often provide the necessary means of comparison to unambiguously identify editions, verify details, and supplement missing information. The additional cataloging of titles in Hebrew script, as well as the sometimes time-consuming bibliographic research, significantly increase the time required to process the Hebrew holdings, which made the aforementioned expansion of the team necessary. 

We are also pleased to report that, as part of the project, we were able to assist other libraries in cataloging Hebrew titles, including the University and City Library of Cologne. For individual Hebrew prints from their older collections, we were able to record bibliographic details, research missing information, and thus contribute to the complete cataloging of these titles.

After more than a year of project work and over 5,000 cataloged book copies, it is becoming increasingly clear what a significant contribution retro-cataloging makes to the library’s access to its collections. It makes holdings that were previously not electronically cataloged accessible for research and, in particular, improves the discoverability of the Hebrew collection. At the same time, our daily work with the books shows that retro-cataloging is not merely about transferring older holdings into a digital catalog. Especially in the case of Hebrew prints, it repeatedly requires bibliographic research, the identification of individual editions, and an examination of different publication contexts. With each newly cataloged copy, another part of the Martin Buber Institute’s library is digitally cataloged and made accessible for research and study.