Lifshits (Lifschitz) Khatskel (Hatzkel) Efimovich (30 November 1883, Novgorod-Seversky – 1941, Riga) — philologist, literary scholar, teacher.

In 1919 Khatskel Lifshits graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Vienna. Doctor of Philology, specialist in German literature. He defended a dissertation entitled Tolstoy and Dostoevsky and the Literary Movement of “Sturm und Drang” at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century.

From January 1923 he was granted permission to reside in Latvia. He taught, as acting teacher, German, history, art history and psychology in Riga at the Municipal Jewish Secondary School and the 2nd Municipal Jewish Primary School, and also worked at the Jewish Private Gymnasium and the Real School of the engineer Ya. Landau*, as well as at S. Gorfinkel’s Private Jewish Secondary and Primary School. In 1926 he was recognised as a fully qualified teacher.

In July 1937 the Teachers’ Qualification Commission of the Ministry of Education refused to recognise his University of Vienna diploma, depriving Lifshits of the right to receive the salary of a fully qualified teacher with higher education. He petitioned the Administrative Court, but his application was rejected. In the 1938–39 academic year he taught in Liepāja, then returned to Riga, where he taught at the Jewish Public Gymnasium and Primary School. From autumn 1940 he served as acting headmaster of the 5th Riga Municipal Jewish Secondary School. In November 1940 the Qualification Commission recognised his higher-education diploma.

In December 1924 his marriage to Rashel (Regina) Glezer (b. 1890) was sanctified by Rabbi M. Zak. Children — Ruta (b. 1925), Miryam (b. 1930).

Archival source: Latvian State Historical Archive, Fond 1632, Inventory 1, File 12761.