Rudnicki, Eduard, 1898-1979

Eduard Rudnicki, better known as Eli Rottner, was born on March 8, 1898 in Stryj, East Galicia. From the age of 8 until the age of 16 he was living in Kolomea and left this town and his parents for Vienna in 1910. He was fighting in World War I from 1916-1918 as a soldier on the Austrian side. In 1918, he returned to Kolomea with his troop which was demobilized there in November of the same year.

His friend Schlomo Ball introduced Rudnicki to the Jewish Zionist youth organization Haschomer being a member himself. In the spring of 1919, however, they formed their own youth group working on a farm in Slobodka-Lesna in order to enlarge their agricultural abilities aiming to immigrate to Palestine in the near future. In June 1919, a pogrom in this town, in which several were killed and others badly injured, forced Rudnicki and Ball to leave Slobodka-Lesna. They illegally fled to Czernowitz, which was Rumanian territory since 1918.

In Czernowitz, Rudnicki got to know Friedrich Katz. Friedrich Katz (1886-1957) was a teacher, philosophical author and poet, who called himself Frederick Kettner after his immigration to the U.S.A. Katz invited Rudnicki to his lectures dealing with the philosophy of Brunner, Spinoza, Plato and the Bible. Katz played an important role in the reception of the philosophy of Constantin Brunner, being the founder of the so-called 'Ethical Seminar' in Czernowitz, which Eduard Rudnicki joined. This seminar aimed to establish Constantin Brunner's ideas of an ideal community as a community of 'spiritual Spinozists'. In 1923, Rudnicki met Brunner in person, which led to a correspondence and friendship between the two.

After the seminar ended in 1922, Rudnicki moved to Berlin. In 1933, he was expelled by the Nazis as an 'Ostjude' and deported to Poland. He got married in 1935, and in 1936 his daughter Anna Elisabeth was born. He and his daughter survived in Poland in hiding, using the name Stanislaw Glac. His wife was killed by the Nazis. Rudnicki got severely wounded being shot into his left thigh. The wound didn’t get proper medical treatment due to the situation during World War II and for the rest of his life, Rudnicki was physically challenged. He also became profoundly deaf in both ears and blind in one eye.

Eduard Rudnicki married Dr. Anda Lewi-Rudincka in 1954. In 1957, he immigrated to Israel after having lived in Poland until then. Because of bad health, Rudnicki returned to Germany to his daughter in 1966, divorced his wife and died in 1979.

He was deeply involved with the Brunner circle throughout his life and worked with the Internationaal Constantin Brunner Instituut, which was established in The Hague by Magdalena Kasch in 1948. However, he fell out with Magdalena Kasch as well as the members of the Brunner circle in Israel during the 1970s.

• 1964: Studie zu Spinozas "Traktat über die Verbesserung des Verstandes und über den Weg, auf dem er am besten zur wahren Erkenntnis der Dinge geleitet wird".
• 1972: Aus Spinozas Heimat und Constantin Brunners letzter Zufluchtsstätte: Eindrücke.
• 1973: Das Ethische Seminar in Czernowitz: Die Wiege d. intern. Constantin-Brunner-Kreises.
• 1979: Spinoza in Israel: eine kritische Betrachtung.

From the guide to the Eduard Rudnicki Collection, 1907-1977, bulk 1922-1977, (Leo Baeck Institute)