Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Marks, David Woolf
MARKS, DAVID WOOLF (1811–1909), professor of Hebrew at University College, London, born in London on 22 Nov. 1811, was eldest son of Woolf Marks, merchant, by his wife Mary. From the Jews' free school, in Bell Lane, Spitalfields, he went for five years as pupil-teacher to Mr. H. N. Solomon's boarding school for Jews at Hammersmith. After acting as assistant reader at the Western Synagogue, St. Alban's Place, Haymarket, he became in 1833 assistant reader and secretary to the Hebrew congregation at Liverpool. There he taught Hebrew to John (afterwards Sir John) Simon [q. v.], and the two became close friends. Simon, who was an early advocate of reform in Jewish ritual and practices in England, enlisted Marks's aid in the movement, and in 1841 Marks was chosen senior minister of the newly-established reformed West London congregation of British Jews, retaining the post until the end of 1895, first at the synagogue in Burton Street, which was opened on 27 January 1842, then at Margaret Street, whither the congregation removed in 1849, and lastly at the existing building in Upper Berkeley Street which was opened in 1870 (J. Picciotto, Sketches of Anglo-Jewish History, 1875, pp. 374 seq.). With his colleague, Albert Lowy [q. v. Suppl. II], he prepared the reformed prayer-book, and mainly owing to his persistent efforts his synagogue was legalised for marriages. Sir Moses Montofiore, the orthodox president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, a body which alone enjoyed the right of registering or certifying places of worship for Jewish marriages, long refused to certify the reformed synagogue. A clause covering Marks's synagogue was removed in 1857 by Montefiore's influence during the committee stage in the House of Commons from a bill for legalising dissenters' marriages in their own places of worship. Bishop Wilberforce and the earl of Harrowby, however, at Marks's persuasion, reintroduced the clause in the House of Lords, and it became law.
Marks was Goldsmid professor of Hebrew at University College, London, from 1844 to 1898, and was dean of the college during the sessions 1875–7. He was also for a time professor of Hebrew at Regent's Park Baptist College, and was one of the Hibbert trustees, a trustee of Dr. Williams's library, and for thirty-five years member of the Marylebone vestry. The Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati conferred the honorary degree of D.D. upon him. He died at Maidenhead on 2 May 1909, and was buried at the Ball's Pond cemetery of the West London Synagogue.
Marks published four volumes of sermons (1851–85); a biography of Sir Francis Goldsmid (1879, part i., part ii. being by his colleague Lowy); and 'The Law is Light,' a course of lectures on the Mosaic law (1854). He was a contributor to Smith's 'Dictionary of the Bible.' In 1842 Marks married Cecilia (d. 1882), daughter of Moseley Woolf of Birmingham; by her he had two daughters and four sons, of whom Harry Hananel Marks, J.P., was at one time M.P. for the Isle of Thanet, and is proprietor and editor of the 'Financial News,' and Major Claude Laurie Marks, D.S.O. (1863-1910), served with distinction in the South African war.
A tablet in commemoration of his long ministry was placed in the hall of the West London Synagogue, Upper Berkeley Street, and in the committee room there hangs a portrait in oils, executed and presented by Julia Goodman [q. v. Suppl. II] in Nov. 1877. An oval crayon drawing by Abraham Solomon [q. v.] in 1863 (belonging to Mr. Israel Solomon) was engraved by S. Marks (see Cat. Anglo-Jewish Hist. Exhibition, 1887).
[Jewish Chronicle, 7 May 1900; private information.]