LAZARUS, HARRIS (TZVI) MYER (Dayan of the London ...

LAZARUS, HARRIS (TZVI) MYER (Dayan of the London Beth Din, 1878-1962). Group of five letters.
Hebrew, one in English. Nine pages.
Some wear.

London, v.d.

* Autograph Letter Signed by Dayan Lazarus to Rabbi Moshe Avigdor Chaikin (1852-1928) a prominent rabbi of Chabad origin, who after a variety of rabbinic posts in Russia and France, became the rabbi of the Jewish immigrant community in Sheffield, England. Dayan Lazarus asks here for assistance regarding a Gett in Canada. 1924.

* Autograph Letter Signed by Dayan Lazarus to Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg (1860-1935), written the same week as the letter to Rabbi Chaikin, about the same Gett. The contents of these letters concern the technical aspects of writing the name and nicknames of the parties according to the laws of writing effective divorce bills. Rabbi Rosenberg, who settled in Montreal and was its leading rabbi, is best known for his work of Yiddish historical fiction, a dramatic telling of legends of the Maharal of Prague, but he was also a prolific halachist, who wrote responsa and translated the entire Zohar into Hebrew. 1924.

* Autograph Letter Signed by Dayan Lazarus to Rabbi Asher Grunis (1877-1937) concerning the proper spelling of a woman’s name in a Gett. 1926.

* Typed Letter to Dayan Lazarus upon the occasion of his 71st birthday, from Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld (1912-84), the head of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations. Dayan Lazarus later penned a lengthy note in the margin of this letter. 1950.

* Photostat (partial) of a handwritten document of the investigation of the London Beth Din into the sinking of the SS Waratah off the coast of South Africa in 1909. All 211 passengers and crew were lost, and no trace of them was found. As a result of this uncertainty, the wives of Jewish passengers were left Agunot. 1911.

    Dayan Lazarus was born in Riga and moved to England when he was 19 years old, just young enough to be trained as an English rabbi at Jews' College. From 1905 he held a variety of assistant rabbinic posts, and after achieving ordination in 1910, he became first an assistant dayan at the London Beth Din (1914), while also leading a congregation, and later a dayan in full (and full time), from 1938. In addition to his work as a rabbinic judge, he also served as acting chief rabbi for two-and-a-half years, after the death of Rabbi J. H. Hertz and before the appointment of Rabbi Israel Brodie.