The Social and Political Context of Lithuanian Rabbis in the UK during the Twentieth Centuy

During the first half of the twentieth century, a number of major Lithuanian Rabbis came to the UK and took up rabbinical positions throughout the country, including London, Leeds, Manchester, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Belfast and Dublin. They maintained strong connections with each other and, in many cases married their children to each other. These included significant families such as Hillman, Herzog, Rabinowitz, Unterman and Abramsky (to name but a few). With few exceptions all of them moved on, often in retirement, to Israel - three of them - Kook, Herzog and Unterman - eventually becoming Chief Rabbis of Israel. Some of them became part of the Anglo Jewish Rabbinate under the auspices of the Chief Rabbis, two of them - Hillman and Abramsky - heading up the London Beth Din. Others challenged what they saw as the liberal attitudes of the formal Rabbinate. This paper traces their history and intra-family connections examining their impact on the wider Anglo Jewish community. The presentation is based on much social and geneaological research, including the largely unused Yiddish newspapers of the Anglo Jewish community from the late 19th to mid 20th centuries, sources which have been ignored in much of the recent writing on Anglo jewish community histories.