Born in the Russian Empire in what is now modern-day Belarus, Lubetzky worked as a teacher before he immigrated to the United States in 1927.

[2] He was fluent in six languages,[3] a fact that made him valuable both as a cataloger and a speaker at library conferences.

[2] Lubetzky published three books that influenced the discipline of cataloging, and that are still influential in area of information technology.

Librarianship in particular and information science in general had not been revolutionized as much since the likes of Antonio Panizzi, Charles Ammi Cutter or Paul Otlet.

His unfinished book, Code of Cataloging Rules... unfinished draft (1960), was the basis for modern cataloging adopted by the first International Conference on Cataloguing Principles (CCP) (1961) held in Paris, France, called the "Paris Principles" (PP).