Manchester's Machzikei Hadass still has more to give

Photos: Chayim Stanton

One hundred years ago, a tiny handful of principled men in Manchester, UK, decided to separate from the city’s Anglo-Jewish establishment and build their own independent citadel of uncompromising Yiddishkeit. They faced battle after battle but were ultimately blessed with success. Today, the demographics of Jewish Manchester are heavily in their favor

The beating heart of Manchester’s frum community is easy to find.

On a large corner lot, entered from Northumberland Street or Legh Street, the Machzikei Hadass shul hums with activity. Known locally as “MH,” it’s not a huge or dazzling edifice by today’s standards. But the streams of mispallelim coming and going, and the thick layers of signs stapled to its bulletin board, make it readily apparent that it’s the community’s flagship shul.

MH hosts around 40 minyanim daily, as well as the beis hora’ah, a mikveh, kashrus offices, and a hall. If you pass by on the right afternoon, you’ll see a chuppah set up in the front courtyard, and hear the strains of Od Yishama overflowing onto the street. At other times, levayahs leave from the parking lot. There’s something homey about the atmosphere, something that tells you that the people of this community know each other well, and share their daily lives in a manner still fairly close to the kehillah model of old.

In honor of the one hundredth anniversary of Machzikei Hadass, we sat down with Reb Elozor Reich, author and the kehillah’s historian, and his brother, Rosh Hakahal Reb Akiva Reich, both senior members of the kehillah who are grandchildren of one of its founders, to hear some more about the backstory of this iconic Manchester fixture.

A Kehillah Materializes

Welcome to the Minyan Line… for Shacharis, please press one.

The mornings start early in MH, cars and minivans piling in from 6:20 a.m., while men arrive on foot from the local streets and school boys park their bikes and scooters. If you’re not a local, though, you don’t have to guess when to catch Shacharis, Minchah, or Maariv. Just call the Minyan Line provided by the gabbai of Machzikei Hadass to hear the times of every minyan in town, as well as local zemanim, simchahs, and even a helpful recitation of Tefillas Haderech and Kiddush Levanah, so you can chant along in case you don’t have the text handy. But it wasn’t always this way.

During the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, streams of Jewish immigrants from Poland, Russia, and Romania stepped off the teeming steamships that brought them to British docks. The largest concentration of these Jews found their way to London and Glasgow, while some followed the textile trading routes to Manchester or Leeds, and slightly lesser numbers settled in other cities such as Newcastle, Liverpool, and Birmingham.

In the northwest of England, 200 miles from London, Manchester is considered by some historians to be the world’s “first industrial city.” During Great Britain’s industrial heyday as “workshop of the world,” the cotton industry had transformed Manchester from a medium-sized market town to a prominent industrial powerhouse. With factories and cotton mills concentrated at its heart, and canals connecting it to wholesalers and customers around the world, textiles underpinned the prosperity of the city (albeit on the backs of an exploited working class, but that’s another story).