BIOGRAPHY

Rabbi

In the early years following my first marriage I took on various teaching assignments. We spent two happy years in Letchworth, Hertfordshire, where I taught English to refugee students at the yeshiva and Hebrew and religion to the local Jewish children. But with a growing family I had to look for a ‘real job’. With my Rabbinical Diploma safely in hand, and the blessing of Chief Rabbi Brodie, I was inducted in 1961as Rabbi of the newly formed community in Whitefield, Manchester, where I spent 5 years learning what Judaism meant in the lives of people in the ‘real world’, while simultaneously gaining my PhD from Manchester University on a very abstruse topic indeed (see BOOKS – The Analytic Movement).

My next rabbinic posting was to the (now defunct) Greenbank Drive Synagogue, Liverpool. I was, I admit, overshadowed by The Beatles (I lived a stone’s throw from Penny Lane), but they were happy years, blessed with a growing family and supportive friends and colleagues.

By 1974 we were on the move again, this time to Hampstead, London, where I remained as Rabbi until 1983. The Hampstead Synagogue is a constituent of the United Synagogue which, unlike the American organisation of the same name, is an Orthodox institution, under the aegis of the Chief Rabbi. I was, however, allowed considerable leeway and enjoyed support from my congregation; in addition to a full programme of pastoral duties including educational initiatives I began to engage seriously in interfaith dialogue. Devora and I particularly appreciated the warm reception accorded to our annual musical recitals, often together with members of the congregation – I still relish my memory of a performance, in 1980 or thereabouts, of Schubert’s “Trout” quintet in which we participated.