TEITEL, JACOB

TEITEL, JACOB (1851–1939), jurist and communal worker. Teitel, the son of a wealthy family of maskilim, was born in Cherny Ostrov, Podolia. He graduated in law at the university of Moscow in 1875 and was appointed examining magistrate in the region of kuibyshev (Samara) and, in 1904, judge of the district tribunal of saratov , and was one of the first Jews in Russia to be employed in the judicial service during the czarist regime. He was often urged to convert. He was compelled to resign (1912), but continued to participate in the public life of the Volga region and maintained contact with the Russian intelligentsia, authors and artists, many of whom praised him in their works and memoirs (including M. Gorki ). He devoted himself to communal and philanthropic work, especially in assisting Jews oppressed by the authorities, and was among the founders of a large relief enterprise which supported the Jewish youth who felt compelled to leave to be able to pursue their studies at higher institutions in Western Europe. Teitel left the Soviet Union in 1921. He became president of the Union of Russian Jews in Germany, and collaborated with the relief organization for Russian-Jewish refugees. When the Nazis came to power, Teitel transferred his activities to France, where his memoirs, lz moyey zhizniza sorok let, were published in 1925. A festschrift, edited by N.L. Aronson and others, was published for his 80th birthday in 1931. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: A.A. Goldenweiser, Ya. L. Teitel, 1850–1939 (1944 = Yevreyskiy Mir, vol. 2, 1944); O.O. Gruzenberg, Ocherki i rechi (1944), 164–8. (Yehuda Slutsky)