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Object 8. Society for Old Testament Studies - menu card

22 July 1981

Description:

Raphael Loewe was heavily involved in Anglo-Jewish societies including the Jewish Historical Society of England, the Spanish and Portuguese Congregation, Lauderdale Road, West London, the Society for Old Testament Study, the British Association for Jewish Studies and the Cecil and Irene Roth Memorial Trust. The collection in Yarnton includes much correspondence relating to his involvement. In the synagogue he was Thesoureiro do Heshaim (i.e. chair of the Society), a Lavador and an elder; with others, including his wife, he also worked on the archives.

His involvement in the Society for Old Testament Study over many years included being elected to the position of Chair in 1980, previously held by his father Herbert Loewe in 1939. Raphael chose to dedicate the Society’s summer Guest night to his father and arranged for it take place at St. John’s, his former college in Cambridge. Jacob Haberman notes that this was one of the happiest achievements of his life. Read more ...

The Menu card was designed by Raphael using St. John’s Crest and Hebrew inscriptions.  Inside the cover he included a Hebrew poem with an English translation about his father’s presidency. Raphael writes about his memory of the Congress in 1939 when he was a ‘cub’, ‘but three months past his teens/ Their talk of text and Targum he imbibed’. His passion for the subject already inspired at this Congress in 1939. Raphael refers to himself as a ‘lion’ cub, the lion was his signature, as the meaning of his surname in German is 'lion'.

‘In nineteen eighty one with grizzled mane’.

Credits: Leopold Muller Memorial Library, Raphael Loewe Pamphlets Collection, shelfmark: Cong II 8Dw