Moses N. Nathan (translation)

Rabbi Moses Nathan Nathan (1807-1883) was one of the earliest teachers at the Jews' Free School, which was then situated in Ebenezer Square, Petticoat Lane. When only sixteen years of age, and whilst still engaged as junior master at the Free School, he was appointed Baal Ḳoreh at the Denmark Court Synagogue (a/k/a the Western Synagogue). After occupying these posts for some years, he removed to Liverpool, where he established a school. He subsequently received the appointment of Secretary to the Liverpool Old Hebrew Congregation, and occasionally delivered religious lectures in the English language in the synagogue. Under the guidance of the Abraham Abrahams, he introduced sermons in the vernacular some time before such sermons became the custom in London. In the year 1834 he received the appointment of Minister of the German Congregation at Kingston. Jamaica, where he did excellent service in arousing a new feeling of attachment to Judaism in improving the mode of worship, and in raising the Jews considerably the esteem of their Christian fellow-islanders. At a later period he removed to St. Thomas, and there likewise performed useful services as the minister of the congregation (Spanish and Portuguese) in that island. On his retirement from that post, he spent some years in New Orleans, where he became the intimate friend of the Jewish philanthropist, the late Judah Touro, who made his numerous bequests to Jewish institutions through Mr. Nathan's counsel. He returned to England in 1868, and before determining to which synagogue he should attach himself, he visited every synagogue in the metropolis. He at length fixed on the West London Synagogue for British Jews, where he was a constant attendant. He took an active and earnest part in the founding of the Anglo-Jewish Association; and for several years acted as Honorary Secretary of the Educational Committee of that Society. It was only on the failure of his health that he discontinued his exertions on behalf of the Association. He was also a member of the Roumanian Committee and of the Committee of the Society of Hebrew Literature.