Fürst, JULIUS

Fürst, JULIUS, German Orientalist, was born of Jewish parentage, 12th May 1805, at Zerkowo, in Posen. Educated on the strictly orthodox rabbinical and Hebrew literature, he felt constrained, on proceeding to Berlin to study oriental languages and theology in 1825, to discard the intellectual pabulum of his fathers for the more stimulating results of modern scientific investigation. In 1833 he settled as privat-docent at Leipzig, and in 1864 became professor of the Aramaic and Talmudic Languages, a post he held down to his death on 9th February 1873. Among his numerous and useful writings may be mentioned Lehrgebäude der Aramäischen Idiome (1835); a praiseworthy edition of Buxtorf's Hebrew and Chaldee Concordance (1837-40); Die Jüdischen Religions-philosophen des Mittelalters (1845); Geschichte der Juden in Asien (1849); Bibliotheca Judaica (1849-63); Hebräisches und Chaldäisches Handwörterbuch (1851-54; translated by Dr S. Davidson, 5th ed. 1885); and Geschichte der Biblischen Literatur und des Jüdisch-Hellenischen Schriftthums (1867-70).