FELIX POSEN

POSEN--Felix D. The family of Felix Posen is sad to report his death at home in New York on September 3, 2025 at the age of 96. Born in Berlin on October 24, 1928, Felix was the son of Jacob Posen, the city's premiere silversmith of Judaica, and Ruth Drucker Posen, a singer in the chorus of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra until the racial laws of 1935 forced her dismissal. Felix's mother possessed the foresight in 1936 to request a US immigration quota that allowed him, his parents, and two sisters to immigrate in 1940. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School and then Johns Hopkins University. After serving in a MASH unit in the Korean War, he returned to New York and began a long and successful career in commodities trading that took him in 1962 to Tokyo and in 1968 to London, where he lived happily with his family for 52 years. There Felix continued to pursue the passion for classical music he inherited from his mother, singing in the annual Messiah at the Royal Albert Hall and attending music festivals in Austria, Switzerland, and at the Glyndebourne Opera in England. In the 1980s, Felix launched the Posen Foundation to promote pluralistic Jewish cultural education. He played a key role in establishing the Center for the Study of Antisemitism at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and supported the Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies at Oxford University. As Felix met increasing numbers of scholars of Jewish studies, he decided to retire in 1992 to devote his efforts to disseminating knowledge of Judaism as a culture. The Posen Foundation funded degree courses in Judaism as a culture in American universities; at its peak, thirty universities taught the subject. In the early 21st century, the Foundation initiated its flagship project, the Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, a comprehensive ten-volume anthology of original sources translated into English compiled by over 120 scholars worldwide. Eight of the volumes have been published as of September 2025 and a free digital version is available online to chronicle the richness of Jewish civilization across generations. The Foundation, now led by Felix's son, Daniel Posen, continues to expand on Felix's impactful contributions to Jewish education and scholarship worldwide. He leaves an enormous cultural legacy. Felix is survived by his wife of 73 years, Jane Levy Posen; his children Stephanie, Daniel, and Melissa; their spouses Jonathan Levi, Diana Posen Suess, and Larry Hirschhorn; his grandchildren Rebecca, Gabriel, and Mimi Levi; Avi and Elias Posen; Jessica, Joshua, and Benjamin Hirschhorn; their spouses and partners; and great-grandson Emilio Uribe Levi.