Maharam Asch

Rabbi Meir Eisenstaedter (1780-1852), remembered by the acronym Maharam Asch, was a Hungarian Talmudist, halakhic authority, and liturgical poet. He drew his family name from Eisenstadt (Kismarton), where he settled in his youth, and studied at the Mattersdorf yeshiva under Rabbi Moses Sofer, the Chatam Sofer. His rabbinic career carried him through several communities: he led a yeshiva at Baja from about 1807, served in Balassagyarmat (Gyarmath) from 1815 to 1835, and then held the rabbinate of Ungvar until his death, presiding over a large yeshiva that trained many of the next generation's Hungarian rabbis. His responsa were gathered by his son and published as Imrei Esh, a title punning on the "Esh" of Eisenstadt; his sermons appeared as Imrei Yosher and his Talmudic novellae as Imrei Binah. He died in Ungvar in 1852.