West London Synagogue
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West London Synagogue
The West London Synagogue, abbreviated WLS, and fully the West London Synagogue of British Jews () is a Reform Judaism, Reform Judaism, Jewish congregation and synagogue, located near Marble Arch, at 34 Upper Berkeley Street, in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England, in the United Kingdom. The congregation was established on 15 April 1840. The current synagogue building was dedicated in 1870, and was Listed building, Grade II listed in 1989. It is one of the oldest synagogues in the United Kingdom and it was the oldest house of prayer affiliated with the Movement for Reform Judaism, before its affiliation lapsed in February 2023. History 19th century On 15 April 1840, 24 members of the Mocatta, Goldsmid family, Goldsmid and other families announced their secession from their respective congregations, the Sephardi Bevis Marks Synagogue and the Ashkenazi Great Synagogue of London, and their intention to form a prayer group for neither "German nor Portuguese" Jews ...
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Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism, also known as Liberal Judaism or Progressive Judaism, is a major Jewish religious movements, Jewish denomination that emphasizes the evolving nature of Judaism, the superiority of its Jewish ethics, ethical aspects to its ceremonial ones, and belief in a continuous revelation which is closely intertwined with human reason and not limited to the Theophany at Mount Sinai (Bible), Mount Sinai. A highly Religious liberalism, liberal strand of Judaism, it is characterized by little stress on ritual and personal observance, regarding Jewish law as non-binding and the individual Jew as autonomous, and by a great openness to external influences and Progressivism, progressive values. The origins of Reform Judaism lie in German Confederation, mid-19th-century Germany, where Rabbi Abraham Geiger and his associates formulated its early principles, attempting to harmonize Jewish tradition with modern sensibilities in the age of Jewish emancipation, emancipation. Brought to Am ...
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The Jewish Chronicle
''The Jewish Chronicle'' (''The JC'') is a London-based Jewish weekly newspaper. Founded in 1841, it is the oldest continuously published Jewish newspaper in the world. Its editor () is Daniel Schwammenthal. The newspaper is published every Friday (except when this is a Jewish holidays, Jewish holiday, when it appears earlier in the week) providing news, opinion pieces, social, cultural and sports reports, as well as editorials and a spectrum of readers' opinions on the letter page. The news section of its website is updated several times a day. The average weekly circulation in 2024 was 10,082, of which 4,442 were free copies, down from 32,875 in 2008. In February 2020, it announced plans to merge with the ''Jewish News'' but, in April 2020, entered voluntary liquidation and was acquired from the liquidators by a private consortium of political insiders, broadcasters and bankers. The paper's political stance under editor Jake Wallis Simons subsequently moved to the right. In 2 ...
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Liturgy
Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembrance, supplication, or repentance. It forms a basis for establishing a relationship with God. Technically speaking, liturgy forms a subset of ritual. The word ''liturgy'', sometimes equated in English as " service", refers to a formal ritual enacted by those who understand themselves to be participating in an action with the divine. Etymology The word ''liturgy'' (), derived from the technical term in ancient Greek (), ''leitourgia'', which means "work or service for the people" is a literal translation of the two affixes λήϊτος, "leitos", derived from the Attic form of λαός ("people, public"), and ἔργον, "ergon", meaning "work, service". In origin, it signified the often expensive offerings wealthy Greeks made in serv ...
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Morris Joseph
Morris David Joseph (28 May 1848 – 17 April 1930) was a British rabbi. Joseph studied at Jews' College, London, and in 1868 was appointed rabbi of the North London Synagogue; in 1874 he went to the Old Hebrew Congregation of Liverpool, where he officiated as preacher until 1882. He became delegate senior minister of the West London Synagogue in 1893, when David Woolf Marks retired from active service. Joseph published a collection of sermons, ''The Ideal in Judaism'', London, 1893, and a valuable popular work on Jewish theology, ''Judaism as Creed and Life'', in 1903. His position on Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ... religious belief and practice was conservative, midway between Reform and strict Orthodox.'' The Jewish Encyclopedia: A Descriptive Record of ...
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Cavendish Square
Cavendish Square is a public square, public garden square in Marylebone in the West End of London. It has a double-helix underground commercial car park. Its northern road forms ends of four streets: of Wigmore Street that runs to Portman Square in the much larger Portman Estate to the west; of Harley Street which runs an alike distance; of Chandos Street which runs for one block and; of Cavendish Place which runs the same. The south side itself is modern: the rear façade and accesses to a flagship department store and office block. On the ground floors facing are Comptoir Libanais, Royal Bank of Scotland and Pret a Manger premises. Oxford Circus 150m south-east is where two main shopping streets meet. Only the south is broken by a full-width street, Holles Street. which also runs one block only; the north is broken by Dean's Mews in which Nos. 11–13 exist, the office conversion of a nunnery, retaining a chapel in its rear. Planning permission was granted in April 2020 for a ...
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Second Day Of Festivals
''Yom tov sheni shel galuyot'' (), also called in short ''yom tov sheni'' (), means "the second festival day in the Diaspora". This is a principle in halakha that mandates the observance of an additional day for Jewish holidays outside the Land of Israel. Yom tov sheni was established as a '' gezera'' (rabbinic law) by the rabbis of the Sanhedrin in the Second Temple period, approximately 2,000 years ago, and is observed to this day by Orthodox and Conservative Jews. Reform Judaism had abolished it in 1846, and Reconstructionist Judaism also largely did the same, although many Reform and Reconstructionist Jews observe two nights of Passover Seder. In Jewish sources The need for a second festival day arises from problems encountered by Jews living in the Diaspora following the Babylonian exile. The Jewish calendar is a lunar system with months of 29 or 30 days. In Temple times, the length of the month depended on witnesses who had seen the new moon coming to the Temple in Je ...
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Oral Torah
According to Rabbinic Judaism, the Oral Torah or Oral Law () are statutes and legal interpretations that were not recorded in the Five Books of Moses, the Written Torah (), and which are regarded by Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox Jews as prescriptive and given at the same time. This holistic Jewish code of conduct encompasses a wide swathe of rituals, worship practices, Godman and interpersonal relationships, from Kashrut, dietary laws to Sabbath and festival observance to marital relations, agricultural practices, and civil claims and damages. According to Rabbinic Jewish tradition, the Oral Torah was oral tradition, passed down orally in an unbroken chain from generation to generation until its contents were finally committed to writing following the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, when Jewish civilization was faced with an existential threat, by virtue of the dispersion of the Jewish people. The major repositories of the Oral Torah are the ''Mishnah'', compiled between 2 ...
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Karaism
Karaite Judaism or Karaism is a non-Rabbinical Jewish sect characterized by the recognition of the written Tanakh alone as its supreme authority in ''halakha'' (religious law) and theology. Karaites believe that all of the divine commandments which were handed down to Moses by God were recorded in the written Torah without any additional Oral Law or explanation. Unlike mainstream Rabbinic Judaism, which regards the Oral Torah, codified in the Talmud and subsequent works, as authoritative interpretations of the Torah, Karaite Jews do not treat the written collections of the oral tradition in the Midrash or the Talmud as binding. Karaite interpretation of the Torah strives to adhere to the plain or most obvious meaning ('' peshat'') of the text; this is not necessarily the literal meaning of the text—instead, it is the meaning of the text that would have been naturally understood by the ancient Hebrews when the books of the Torah were first written—without the use of the ...
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David Woolf Marks
David Woolf Marks (22 November 1811 – 3 May 1909) was a British Hebrew scholar and minister. He was the first religious leader of the West London Synagogue, which seceded from the authority of the Chief Rabbi, where he advocated a quasi- Karaite philosophy. Biography Marks was born in London. His father was a merchant named Woolf Marks and his mother's name was Mary. Marks senior died when his son was just nine years old, in July 1821, and the child was sent to attend Jews' Free School, where he soon emerged as a prodigy. He spent most of the time tutoring other pupils in Hebrew, while studying advanced material at night. He supported himself by iterating Kaddish for the soul of a deceased man and reading the Bible for the blind wife of Rabbi Solomon Hirschell, thus becoming his confidant. He earned a hundred pounds, a vast sum at the time, when the School's principal died and he replaced him for a while. That money sufficed to sustain him for five years in Hirschell's boar ...
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Great Synagogue Of London
The Great Synagogue of London was a former Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox Judaism, Jewish congregation and synagogue, located in the City of London, England, in the United Kingdom. The synagogue was, for centuries, the centre of Ashkenazi life in London. Built north of Aldgate in the 17th century, it was destroyed during World War II, in the Blitz. History The earliest Ashkenazi synagogue constructed in London, after the return of Jews to England in the 17th century, was built about 1690 at Duke's Place, north of Aldgate, in the City of London. In 1696–7, the synagogue also acquired a burial ground, at Jewish cemeteries in London, Alderney Road. The congregation grew, and in 1722 a new building was erected with the cost of £2,000 () being borne by businessman and philanthropist Moses Hart (1675-1756), Moses Hart. The building was consecrated on Rosh Hashana (September 18, 1722). An enlarged building, designed by George Dance the Elder, was consecrated on August 29, 1766. The ...
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Ashkenazi
Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that Ethnogenesis, emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium Common era, CE. They traditionally speak Yiddish, a language that originated in the 9th century, and largely migrated towards Northern Europe#UN geoscheme classification, northern and eastern Europe during the late Middle Ages due to Antisemitism in Europe, persecution. Hebrew was primarily used as a Literary language, literary and sacred language until its 20th-century Revival of the Hebrew language, revival as a common language in Israel. Ashkenazim adapted their traditions to Europe and underwent a transformation in their interpretation of Judaism. In the late 18th and 19th centuries, Jews who remained in or returned to historical German lands experienced a cultural reorientation. Under the influence of the Haskalah and the struggle for emancipation, as well as the intellec ...
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Bevis Marks Synagogue
Bevis Marks Synagogue, officially Qahal Kadosh Sha'ar ha-Shamayim (), is an Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox Judaism, Jewish congregation and synagogue, located off Bevis Marks, Aldgate, in the City of London, England, in the United Kingdom. The congregation is affiliated to London's historic Spanish and Portuguese Jews, Spanish and Portuguese Jewish community and worships in the Nusach Sefard, Sephardic Nusach (Jewish custom), rite. Built in 1701, the Grade I listed building is the Oldest synagogues in the United Kingdom, oldest synagogue in the United Kingdom in continuous use. It is the only synagogue building in Europe that has continuously held regular services for more than 320 years. History Construction The origins of the community date from an influx to London of Crypto-Judaism, crypto-Jews, or so called Marranos, from Spain and Portugal, mostly via the growing Sephardi Jews, Sephardi Jewish community in Amsterdam, in the early seventeenth century. These Jews began practisi ...
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