R. Hirsch (1808–1888) was the leader and foremost exponent of Orthodoxy in Germany in the 19th century. He was born in Hamburg to R. Raphael (who had changed his surname from Frankfurter to Hirsch), where he studied Talmud with his grandfather R. Mendel Frankfurter, and was influenced by rabbis Jacob Ettlinger and Isaac Bernays. R. Hirsch served as Landrabbiner and rabbi in several communities, but is best remembered for his activity, from 1851, as rabbi of the Orthodox congregation Adass Jeschurun (known in German as the Israelitishe Religionsgesellschaft) in Frankfort on the Main, a position he held for 37 years until his death. In coming to Frankfort, R. Hirsch resigned a prestigious position to become rabbi of a small struggling traditionalist community, which he developed into the foremost Jewish community in Germany. Here R. Hirsch crystallized his conception of Judaism, developing his Torah im Derekh Eretz philosophy, and established the prototype for neo-Orthodoxy, which continued to develop in Germany and abroad. R. Hirsch was a prolific writer and his works, among them The Nineteen Letters (1836) and Horeb (1838), many translated into other languages, including English, continue to be read and studied to the present. R. Hirsch is a seminal figure in modern Jewish history.