Samuel Holdheim (1806–1860), leader of Reform Judaism in Germany. Born in Kempno near Poznan, Holdheim received a talmudic education, but began to study German and secular subjects after marrying a woman with a modern education, daughter of a Poznan rabbi. The marriage was unsuccessful and after his divorce he moved to Prague where he began to study philosophy at the university. In 1836 Holdheim was appointed rabbi in Frankfort on the Oder. He preached in German, and in his sermons advocated educational reform which would adjust the younger generation to innovations in tradition. In 1840 he was appointed rabbi of the province of Mecklenburg–Schwerin where he began to introduce slight reforms in the service, such as reading the Torah without cantillation. He was also instrumental in founding a modern religious school in 1841. In 1843 he published Ueber die Autonomie der Rabbinen und das Prinzip der juedischen Ehe in which he expressed the principles of his reform ideology. At the rabbinical conferences (synods) in Brunswick (1844), Frankfort on the Main (1845), and Breslau (1846), Holdheim emerged as a representative of the extremist trend in the Reform movement. In 1847 he was asked to serve as rabbi of the new Reform congregation founded in Berlin where he officiated until his death. In Berlin he introduced radical reforms in the ritual. Services were conducted on both Saturdays and Sundays and after a while on Sundays only. After his death, his opponents, headed by M. J. Sachs, unsuccessfully contested his burial in the part of the cemetery reserved for rabbis. His eulogy was delivered by Abraham Geiger.