Tobias Lewenstein

In 1895, he returned to the Netherlands to serve as chief rabbi in Leeuwarden and then, in 1899, he became chief rabbi in The Hague.^[3][4]

On 1 May 1903, he was selected by Copenhagen's Community of the Mosaic Faith [da] to succeed David Simonsen as chief rabbi of Denmark. His term there was contentious due to his opposition to interfaith marriage, allowing children born of Jewish fathers and non-Jewish mothers to convert, and participation in a Danish ecumenical national day of prayer, among other issues, and he was removed from the post on 18 January 1910. Because Lewenstein's contract stated the position was a lifetime appointment, his dismissal sparked a legal battle that ended up before the Danish Supreme Court. In the end, Lewenstein was awarded DKK 80,000 in 1912 (equivalent to DKK 5,555,535 in 2022).^[5]

In 1912, Lewenstein became chief rabbi for the Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft [de], an Orthodox community in Zürich, Switzerland, that split from the Israelitische Cultusgemeinde community in 1898. He remained the chief rabbi there until 1940.^[2][3] From 1919 to 1923, he also served as president of World Agudath Israel.^[6] In 1945, he returned to The Hague for a brief time to help the Dutch Jewish community rebuild after World War II.^[4]

In 1895, Lewenstein married Flora Frumet Møller (1873–1945), the daughter of Alexander Møller and Therese Telzche Heymann.^[2][3]