Wednesday, July 14, 2010

A Bet Din, 1920s style.

Here's an interesting depiction and description of the London Beth Din as it functioned in 1926. It is titled "The World's Oldest Tribunal, Dating From Moses, The Beth Din, Or Court of the Chief Rabbi."

Detail; that's Rabbi J.H. Hertz in the middle:



Click to enlarge and read. From the Illustrated London News, August 14, 1926.

8 comments:

  1. Is that R yechezkel Abramsky to the left of the Av Bais Din

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  2. See page 343 and 351 of Melech Biyofyo

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  3. R. Abramsky wasn't in London yet in 1926. If you click the image to read all the details, the dayanim are all named.

    I don't think I'll see Melech Biyofyo anytime soon. What does it say?

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  4. Where did you get the picture? I would love to get a high-quality jpeg of it (or order a reprint from whever you got it).

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  5. Anon, if you email me I'll send you a very high resolution version.

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  6. A book "So Strange My Path: The story of a former Catholic Priest," by Abraham Carmel (the former Father Kenneth C. Cox) quotes a later article (1959) about the workings of the London Beis Din, entitled "The Chief Rabbi's Court."

    Find it by searching http://archive.thejc.com/search/jcs.jsp# for the keyword "proselytisation" for the year 1959; the article is in the July 10 issue. I have a partial screenshot on my blog
    http://shasdaf.blogspot.com/2010/04/75b-kusim-geirus-shelo-lishma.html

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  7. Be very careful about using the Beth Din of America for your GET or other religious issue. Rabbi Shlomo Weissmann and Rabbi Gedalia Dov Schwartz both have seruv’s against them. Prior judges on this court have had a multitude of problems. Read more about it at www.thebethdin.com. Too many Beth Dins are corrupt and dishonest.

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