One of the most prominent figures in the British Reform movement post-War, Rabbi Dow Marmur, died in Israel on Sunday at the age of 87.

Born in Galicia, south-east Poland in 1935, he and his family were sent to Siberia by the Soviets after the Union but escaped to Uzbekhistan in 1941, where he sold soap on the streets.

Moving to Sweden, he met Fredzia, his wife of 66 years, and joined the Israeli legation. Encouraged to study at Leo Baeck College in London, he enrolled a year after its foundation and was ordained in 1962.

His rabbinic career began at South-West Essex Reform Synagogue, where he spent seven years before moving to North-Western Reform Synagogue (Alyth) and becoming its senior rabbi three years later.

There, said the former president of Reform Judaism Rabbi Tony Bayfield, he “transformed the community into a powerhouse of British Reform, his influence extending far beyond the walls of Alyth.”

He was the “first British Reform rabbi to embrace Jewish day schooling”, whose support led to the first Progressive Jewish school in the UK, Akiva.

His six books included Beyond Survival: Reflections on the Future of Judaism and The Star of Return, a theology of Israel.

In 1983, he moved to North America as senior rabbi of the Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto and in 2000 he and Fredzia went to Israel, where he became president of the World Union of Progressive Judaism.

He “established British Reform as uncompromising in its intellectuality and seriousness of theology,” Rabbi Bayfield said. “A man of great kindness and assiduous in his pastoral work, he nevertheless had no truck with those who would trivialise Judaism or set the bar of Jewish life too low.

“Rabbi Dow Marmur was a truly great man. He was my rabbinic father and I feel totally bereft.”