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Geoffrey Alderman

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Geoffrey Alderman,

Geoffrey Alderman

Opinion

A Bixenspanner in the works

December 23, 2015 10:15
2 min read

'Subject to contract," Shloime Yitzchok Bixenspanner will next year succeed Pinchas Roberts as rabbi of the Hendon Adass Yisroel synagogue . Unlike the very English sounding "Roberts," "Bixenspanner" does not trip easily off the tongue. But that should be the least of Bixenspanner's worries. What should concern him are the multiple fissures that have of late riven the synagogue over which he has agreed to preside and resulted in the exit particularly of younger members of the kehillah.

The Hendon AY synagogue was established pre-Second-World-War by Orthodox Jews who might have been expected to join the Hendon United Synagogue but who were alienated by what they perceived as weaknesses in its religious practices. The leading members of Raleigh Close were not for the most part Sabbath observant. The Raleigh Close building was constructed along Reform lines, with the Bimah right in front of the Ark (I hasten to add that the interior has long since been reconstructed). Worse still, Raleigh Close boasted a mixed choir! Prior to the construction of the Raleigh Close edifice, its congregation had worshipped in a building in Brent Street. So it was no doubt a source of satisfaction to the founders of the Hendon AY community that it was this very building plot that they purchased in 1940, and on which they constructed a house of worship that was kosher in every respect.

Pinchas Roberts has presided over this community for half-a-century. Respected rather than liked, over the recent past he has found it increasingly difficult to hold together a congregation deeply affected by demographic, social and political dynamics.

A constituent of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations, the Hendon Adass threatened to part company with its parent body in 2006, following revelations that the Union had made grants to the viciously anti-Zionist Neturei Karta sect. The Union itself is now heavily influenced by busy conventicles of anti-Zionist Satmar Chasidim. While the Hendon Adass is neither anti- nor pro-Zionist, many of its members are zionistically inclined: there is an "unofficial branch" of ex-Hendon Adass members in Netanya, Israel.