Judah Jeitteles

Judah ben-Jonah Jeitteles was a Bohemian maskil and Hebrew writer.

Biography

Judah Jeitteles was born to prominent Jewish physician in Prague, where he received a traditional Jewish education.
An advocate of education reform in Jewish schools, Jeitteles was appointed supervisor of the German-language Jewish school in Prague around 1812. At the age of 40, he was elected one of four communal leaders of [History of the Jews in Prague|Prague's Jews|Jewish community], but later settled in Vienna.
He devoted himself to the study of Oriental languages and literature under the direction of his brother Baruch Jeitteles. He was the first to compose in Hebrew a grammar of Biblical Aramaic, its title being Mevo lashon Aramit. He edited and wrote commentaries on the books of Samuel, Kings, the Twelve Minor Prophets, Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Daniel for Anton Edler von Schmid's new edition of the Bible with German translation. Among other works, Jeitteles also published Siḥah be-erez ha-ḥayyim, Mizmor le-todah, and Bene ha-neʻurim, besides contributing poetry and essays on history and philology to Ha-Meassef and . He left in manuscript a complete Aramaic-German dictionary, which explains especially the root words of the Aramaicisms occurring in the Hebrew text of the Tanakh.