The Oxford Shul is a shul (synagogue) in Riviera, Johannesburg near the suburbs of Saxonwold, Houghton and Killarney.

It provides regular services, and also provides adult education and special services for children, youth and seniors in addition to cultural and social activities.

Yossi Chaikin has been the rabbi[1] since 2000. The synagogue campus covers several acres. The main sanctuary, which seats 1600, is the largest in Africa and is used on major Jewish holidays. A smaller synagogue on the campus is used for services on other days.

The synagogue has a youth centre, which a nursery school uses part of on weekdays.[2]

History

1943-1968 [3]

The Oxford Synagogue was founded in 1943 and a two-acre site was purchased.

In 1944 the Oxford Synagogue joined the United Hebrew Congregation as a third constituent synagogue. In 1945 the first High Festival Services were held in the large Tudor House, by then partly converted into a small synagogue accommodating 400 congregants. In November of the same year a Dedication Service was held with the Chief Rabbi Louis Isaac Rabinowitz officiating. The first rabbi was W. Yesorsky, who was succeeded in 1947 by J. Rozowski.

In 1949 building began on the Hall, a synagogue accommodatimg 800 worshippers. In 1954 two extra acres of land adjacent to the synagogue property and facing Riviera Road were purchased, and the present Nursery School and the double-storey Education block opened. The official opening of the synagogue took place in August 1962. In 1963 at a banquet the reconstructed Hall was named “The Simon Kuper Hall” in honour of a member of the Congregation.

In 1964 the architects, S. A. Abramowitch, Pinshow and Schneider, received an Award of Merit from the Transvaal Provincial Institute of Architects for the best Ecclesiastical building erected in the Transvaal from 1954 to 1964.

In 1965 the Menorah Primary School began as a branch of the Yeshiva College.

Clergy

Chaikin was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, and educated in Belgium and the United States.[1] He moved to South Africa in 1986 to be the Director of Activities at Chabad House in Johannesburg. In 1988 he became leader of the Constantia Hebrew Congregation in the Cape Peninsula. He was also Vice-Principal and Head of Department of Jewish Studies at Herzlia Constantia Primary School (on whose campus the shul was located). He became rabbi of the Oxford Synagogue in 2000.

References

  1. 1 2 "Oxford Shul Website - The Rabbi". Archived from the original on 2015-07-31. Retrieved 2009-07-19.
  2. ↑ Oxford Shul Website
  3. ↑ Oxford Shul Website - History
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