Julius Eisenstein

Julius Eisenstein
J.D. Eisenstein, Orthodox Jewish scholar
Born	(1854-11-12)November 12, 1854 Międzyrzec Podlaski, Congress Poland
Died	May 17, 1956(1956-05-17) (aged 101) New York City, New York
Resting place	Queens, New York City, New York
Residence	Międzyrzec Podlaski (1854-1872), New York City (1872-1956)
Nationality	Polish, American
Other names	Judah David Eisenstein, the Ba'al ha-Otzrot
Known for	Hebrew language anthologies, editor of the first Hebrew encyclopedia
Spouse(s)	Rebecca Eisenstein (née Cohen)
Children	Four sons, five daughters
Parent(s)	Zeev Wolf Eisenstein and Toba Bluma Eisenstein (née Barg)
Relatives	Ira Eisenstein, Harry Fishbein
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Julius (Judah David) Eisenstein (November 12, 1854 – May 17, 1956) (Hebrew: יהודה דוד אייזנשטיין‎‎) was a Polish-Jewish-American anthologist, diarist, encyclopedist, Hebraist, historian, philanthropist, and Orthodox polemicist born in Międzyrzec Podlaski (known in Yiddish as Mezritch d'Lita), a town with a large Jewish majority in what was then Congress Poland. He died in New York City at the age of 101.

Yehuda Dovid Eizensztejn, as he was named at birth, was the second of two children born to Rabbi Zeev Wolf and Toba Bluma (née Barg). His sister, Henna, was a year-and-a-half older. When he was ten years old his father became the first Jew from Mezritch to emigrate to the United States.

As a child, therefore, his education in Talmud was left to his paternal grandfather, Azriel Zelig, the son of Noson Neta Eizensztejn, a Talmudic scholar and dyer of indigo originally from the village of Stawiska (in Yiddish, Stavisk). His antecedents had moved there from Königsberg, and claimed to be direct descendants of Rashi.

In 1872, Toba Bluma emigrated to the United States with her son and daughter and joined Zeev Wolf in New York. It was there that Yehuda Dovid anglicized his first name to Julius and adopted the American spelling of his family name. He married the following year.

Eisenstein's parents eventually divorced, after which his father made aliyah to Jerusalem, where he remarried and raised a second family. Both Zeev Wolf and Toiba Bluma's family were proto-Zionists. Her maternal grandfather, Rabbi Tzvi Zeev (in Yiddish, Hirsch Wolf) Fiszbejn, had already moved to Jerusalem with his two sons, Abraham and Isaac, and other descendants in 1863. Tzvi Zeev was a wealthy brush manufacturer in Mezritch and financed the construction of the original Etz Chaim Yeshiva in the Old City. They and Zeev Wolf are all buried in close proximity in the Mount of Olives Jewish Cemetery.