Chief Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler – An Appraisal on his 125th Yahrtzeit

R. Adler would travel the length and breadth of Great Britain to ensure that new congregations founded in the provinces would also receive his sermons. His schedule was demanding as far as synagogue consecration was concerned; he opened most of the resplendent Victorian synagogues in Great Britain, such as Birmingham’s Singer’s Hill in 1856 and Liverpool’s Princes Road in 1874. In 1863, accompanied by his son, he opened Sunderland’s Synagogue and in 1874 he officiated at the opening of Middlesborough’s, on which occasion the mayor came to the station to wave him goodbye!

The Chief Rabbi’s influence now extended across a rapidly developing British Empire, ‘upon which the sun never set.’ He received halachic questions from across the globe, with his role sometimes combining expounding halachawith providing psychological encouragement to colleagues in distant colonial outposts. He once solicitously informed a distraught Cape Town Rabbi in 1860 that if he wished him to speak with his community, “…I will readily do so, I will support you wholeheartedly and encourage them to pay attention to you and to strengthen what you have established.” He advised the Rabbi to stay in South Africa and continue his work.8

In 1847, to ensure that even the most far-flung colonial stations would remain true to the Torah, R. Adler instituted a list of ‘Takanoth’, entitled Laws and Regulations for all the Synagogues in the British Empire, which demanded that synagogues at all times conform to halacha. He approved of better decorum in synagogue and likewise supported regulations prohibiting talking during services and leaving before the very end of the service. Fines of half a crown were imposed for chewing tobacco in synagogue. R. Adler was halachically inflexible; for example, he ordered the removal of a stained glass window depicting G-d’s “All-seeing eye” because he deemed it to be a direct contravention of the Second Commandment.9 The Prince Consort, the Queen’s husband Prince Albert, shared a convivial friendship with R. Adler, and recruited him to assist with the Great Exhibition in 1851. It was arranged that Jews would not be obligated to sign the entry book of the Exhibition on their Sabbath.10

To ensure that no Reform challengers would emerge in any synagogue under his jurisdiction, R. Adler insisted that he would be the only British Minister to be entitled ‘Rabbi’. All other ministerial colleagues were to be entitled ‘Reverend’- even if they had semicha. Due to his towering stature, this arrangement to negate Reform credibility produced surprisingly little conflict.

The famed Rev. Simeon Singer (who married a descendant of R. Jonathan Eybeschutz) obtained his semicha from R. Isaac Hirsch Weiss in Vienna in 1890. R. Weiss, who’s most well-known work, Dor Dor ve-Dorshav, traces the history of the Oral Law from its inception until the expulsion from Spain, taught at the Vienna Beth HaMidrash. Singer spent two months being meticulously examined by him. However on his return, in deference to Chief Rabbi Adler’s directive, he continued to use the title of Reverend. His respect for R. Adler was evinced with the publication that year of his magnum opus, the Authorised Daily Prayer Book of the British Empire (based on the ‘Abodath Israel’ Siddur accepted by German Jewry). It appeared after R. Adler’s death, but the preface nonetheless declares, “As it was practically complete before the death of the late Chief Rabbi, Dr N. M. Adler, it was enabled to receive, and to be issued with the stamp of his sanction and authorisation.” The Singer Siddur became the most widely used Jewish prayer book in history, and is still in use.11

The orders of service R. Adler compiled reflected the national history of the 19th Century. Special services were composed for British victories in India, the birth of Queen Victoria’s children, cholera, famine, the sickness of Lady Rothschild, Sir Moses Montefiore’s journeys abroad, the funeral of the Prince Consort and, in later years, prayers for Jews in Russia.12 R. Adler’s seal of office had an eagle on it and it was said of him that he “watched over his international flock with the bird’s intensity.”13 He also attempted to better standards of kashruth, in which regard he opposed a certain method of slaughtering calves which involved stunning them before shechita (religious slaughter). Although the practice was upheld by certain members of the Sephardi community, to minimize the possibility of halachic inconsistency, he wrote, “Despite all this I said, perhaps there has been left for me an area in which to set a geder [halachic boundary] and I told the shochtim here not to slaughter calves such as these.” On occasion, his stringencies regarding kashruth provoked legal and bureaucratic challenges from his opponents but he remained resolute. His expertise on the kashruth of different species of birds led his office to receive enquiries from across the world and Gedolei HaDor (eminent rabbinic leaders) did not hesitate to consult him on such matters.

In all his endeavours, not least his war against Reformist deviations, R. Adler could count on his trusted and faithful confidant, Sir Moses Montefiore. The editor of Sir Moses’ diaries maintained that whenever Sir Moses, in his capacity as President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, was called upon to make a decision on religious matters, he invariably referred to R. Adler for guidance, regarding “a word from him as decisive and obeyed its injunctions at whatever cost to himself.” Elections to the Board of Deputies in 1853 produced four people who proclaimed they would represent the Reform secessionists. Sir Moses was adamant that they would not, pointing out that the first clause of the Board’s constitution aimed to prevent “infraction upon the religious rites, customs and privileges of the Jewish community”. Sir Moses held that the Reform breakaways had themselves committed this infraction and thus could not be represented! The arguments grew so fierce that Montefiore had to summon police to the hall where the meeting took place. Sir Moses eventually emerged victorious, having represented R. Adler’s views while keeping him out of the tempestuous confrontation.14

Anxious to improve the derisory Jewish educational scene in England at the time, R. Adler struggled from 1852-55 to raise enough funds for a decent Jewish religious school. He initially wanted to expand the Great Synagogue’s Beth HaMidrash to start a school or college, but this idea was scrapped due to objections from donors. When eventually R. Adler managed to open what was entitled Jews College, he recalled with displeasure that “some regarded [the school] unnecessary, nay injurious, to the progress of the community.” Even then it was a constant battle to keep the institution afloat. Indeed, it was a feat to have opened a religious college and school at all in the London of the mid-1850s, where there were only around 3700 synagogue pews available for approximately 23 000 Jews! Nonetheless, Jews College eventually helped train some of the world’s most outstanding chazanim and scholars, amongst them R. Immanuel Jakobovits, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from 1967-1991 (whose training was supplemented by Etz Chaim Yeshiva).

R. Adler was desirous of Torah instruction for all ages and himself delivered informed shiurim (lectures) in Gemara. In order to provide children from impecunious backgrounds with a decent Torah education, he began a free schooling system. There is little doubt that he would have wholeheartedly supported Sarah Schenirer’s Beth Ya’akov movement for girls’ education. “Those who believed that the destiny of a girl was poverty – that her destiny was an inferior one – might entertain such an erroneous opinion; but those who knew that she was fashioned for a higher life – for a better life – could not doubt that schools for girls was of the greatest moment” he once declared. He asserted that those not educating women about Judaism were “not in accordance with the spirit of the Torah.”

R. Adler made sure that the religious knowledge of his son Naftali (Hermann) would not be sacrificed because of the community’s failure to establish a yeshiva. Young Hermann was despatched to Prague in 1860 to receive a respectable semicha. Upon his return two years later, he often deputised for his sixty year-old father, became principal of Jews College and was appointed Rabbi of the affluent Bayswater Synagogue.

Despite his burdensome schedule, R. Adler found time for writing. This included a most scholarly commentary, entitled Nethina LaGer, on the Targum Onkelos, the famed Aramaic translation of the Torah by Onkelos, who converted to Judaism despite being the Roman General Titus’ nephew. Nethina LaGerwas published in a special edition of the Pentateuch during 5634/1874 by the prolific Rohm (“Brothers and Widow”) publishers of Vilna, who also published the renowned Vilna edition of the Talmud that is used to this day. R. Adler utilised this opportunity to view some ancient Hebrew manuscripts from the Bodleian Library in Oxford and London’s British Museum to complement his work. He also composed a short commentary on the exposition of Rav Hai Gaon on Seder Taharoth. Many of his works were also published in the vernacular for the benefit of the community.

Most unfortunately, the majority of R. Adler’s Torah works were never published. He left many of his own novellae on Talmud and the Poskim (religious rulings), and halachicquestions and responsa in his own handwriting. His commentary consisting of a staggering thirty volumes on Targum Jonathan on the Prophets (named Ahavath Yonathan). He also completed a German and English translation of Rabbi Judah HaLevi’s classic Kuzari.

Rabbi Adler was well known to the rabbinic leaders of the generation. The Chatam Soferrecorded how he had once given sanction to a German translation of the Talmud because it had been incorrectly pointed out to him that “a group of Gedolei Olam [world authorities] and anshei ma’aseh [distinguished men]” were partaking in this initiative; as an example of such leaders, he mentioned “HaRav HaGadol HaTzadik Morenu HaRav Nosan Adler KohenTzedek, Av Beth Din of the holy Kehillaof Hanover”. Continued the Chatam Sofer, “[because] according to my opinion, this Rabbi was held as a tzaddik [righteous man] and a talmid chacham [wise scholar], I said the one part would testify on all” (i.e., that R. Adler would testify to the suitability of the rest of the participating scholars). Whilst the facts regarding the edition had been incorrectly presented to the Chatam Sofer, nonetheless, the way he viewed R. Adler is noteworthy, particularly as the latter was only 32 years old at the time.15

Similary R. Yosef Shaul Nathanson, in his work Shoel U’Maishiv, wrote regarding a divorce case that he had been very cautious about delivering a ruling and therefore decided to ask “Morenu HaRav Yaakov Ettlinger…Av Beth Din…of Altona and the great eagle, HaRavMorenuHaRav Nosan Adler…Av Beth Din…of London if they agree with me.”16 The author of Melamed Leho’il, R. David Hoffman, also mentions R. Adler in glowing terms, while the illustrious R. Ezriel Hildesheimer called him one of the “Geonei Yisrael.”17 R. Isaac D. Bamberger, author of Yad Halevi, frequently sought R. Adler’s advice and advised others to turn to the “the Great Kohen Morenu HaRav Nosan Adler…Av Beth Din of the KehillaKedosha [holy community] London.”18

When it came to any matter that would assist his brethren, R. Adler was at the forefront of efforts to such ends. Thus, he established the Jewish Hospital in London, and worked hand in hand with Sir Moses Montefiore to assist Jews across the Diaspora. Towards the end of his life, he withdrew somewhat from the public’s eye and some of his duties were assumed by his son R. Hermann Adler. He finally retired to Brighton where, on 29 Teveth 5650/21 January 1890, at the age of 87 years, he returned his soul to his Maker. According to accounts from his descendants, Chief Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler expired whilst attired in his Tallith (prayer-shawl) and Tefillin (phylacteries) for the Shacharithprayers at the Brighton Synagogue. When he commenced the recitation of the Shema passageand reached the word ‘Echad’ [the Lord is One],he recited it in a fervently piercing voice and his soul left him at that hallowed instant. Numerous European Rabbis and communal leaders from across the world travelled to London to pay their respects at his funeral.