Julius Fürst

Julius Fürst (German: [fʏʁst]; 12 May 1805, Żerków, South Prussia – 9 February 1873, Leipzig), born Joseph Alsari, was a Jewish German orientalist and the son of noted maggid, teacher, and Hebrew grammarian Jacob Alsari.

During his years as professor in the department of oriental languages and literature at the University of Leipzig (1864–1873), he wrote many works on literary history and linguistics.

[1] At an early age, Fürst had a remarkable knowledge of Hebrew literature, Old Testament scriptures and oriental languages.

In 1825, after having studied at Berlin, where Hegel and Neander were among his teachers, he took a course in Jewish theology at Posen.

Fürst was chief editor of Der Orient (Leipzig 1840-1851), a periodical dedicated to scientific study of the language, literature and history of the Jews.