In Memoriam: Sol Cohen

The Katz Center shares the sad news that Dr. Sol Cohen passed away on January 3, 2025. Until a few years ago, Sol served as an associate visiting scholar and resources person at the Katz Center, after serving for many decades as a professor of Assyriology at Dropsie College, the Center's predecessor institution. 

As a scholar, Sol did pathbreaking work in the field of Assyriology, uncovering connections between Sumerian culture and the Semitic cultures of Mesopotamia and Israel. His dissertation, a study of a mythological text known as Enmarkar and the Lord of Aratta that anticipates the biblical story of the tower of Babel, has been cited by dozens of scholars as the definitive study of this four-thousand-year-old text, and he would go on to uncover many other insights into the Mesopotamian prehistory of the Bible. The Sumerians developed the ancient writing system known as cuneiform, and their civilization has left behind some of the oldest known stories known to humankind. Sol brought a rare expertise in Sumerian to Dropsie and then to the Katz Center, helping to fit Jewish studies into a much bigger and older story of humankind.

Sol was also an indelible presence as part of the Katz Center community, a feisty intellectual, a font of knowledge about Judaica in general, and a dear friend to some of the Center’s staff members and fellows. Sam Cardillo, Katz Center business administrator emeritus, had a special friendship with Sol: they argued politics and biblical philology, did crossword puzzles, and watched old WW2 movies in black and white; Sam calls Sol “a good friend and teacher as well as a generous man in every way,” who “was never too busy to spend time with anyone.” The Katz Center wishes to convey its condolences to Sol's family members and its enduring gratitude for all that Sol contributed as a scholar, teacher, and friend.