1st Rabbi in 40 Years Hired for Warsaw

For the first time in at least 40 years, a rabbi has been hired by the Jewish community in Warsaw to serve as its spiritual leader.

Rabbi Baruch Rabinowicz, a modern Orthodox rabbi who was born in Russia, educated in Denmark and attended yeshiva in Israel, will take up his post this month, a community representative said from the Polish capital, describing Rabinowicz as “both Orthodox and open-minded.”

The appointment is seen by Polish Jews as a milestone in efforts to revive Jewish life and Jewish communal structures since the fall of Communism a decade ago.

Funding for the new rabbi will be provided by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the Ronald S. Lauder Foundation. Both organizations have been active in promoting Jewish revival and support most Jewish religious, educational and social welfare activities in Poland.

Before the Holocaust, in which more than 3 million of Poland’s Jews were killed, the country had one of the world’s largest Jewish populations. Of those who survived, many fled when Poland’s Communist government renewed anti-Semitism during the 1950s and 1960s.

The current Jewish population, estimated at 5,000 to 40,000, is growing because of new interest among the young.