RABINOWITZ, ISAAC (ISH KOVNO):
Russian poet; born in Kovno Oct. 13, 1846; died in New York (U. S. A.) March 9, 1900. He began to compose Hebrew songs at an early age. When fourteen he took instruction in Hebrew grammar from Abraham Mapu. At eighteen he entered the rabbinical school at Wilna. In 1867 he married and settled in Telshi, where he enjoyed the friendship of Mordecai Nathansohn (his wife's grandfather) and of Leon Gordon, who was a teacher in that city. Rabinowitz lived there for twenty-two years, being engaged most of that time in business, and writing occasionally for Hebrew periodicals. In 1889 he removed to Vilkomir; in 1891 he went to New York, to which city his children had preceded him. Here he translated novels into Yiddish.
"Zemirot Yisrael" (Wilna, 1891) contains most of his Hebrew songs. Those written after his arrival in the United States fall below the standard of his former productions.
- Oẓar ha-Sifrut, iii. 74 et seq.;
- Zeitlin, Bibl. Post-Mendels. p. 285;
- G. Bader, in Die Welt, May 11, 1900.
