{"id":1220,"date":"2017-01-12T11:02:30","date_gmt":"2017-01-12T11:02:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?page_id=1220"},"modified":"2017-01-13T09:44:25","modified_gmt":"2017-01-13T09:44:25","slug":"benjamin-feigenbaum","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?page_id=1220","title":{"rendered":"Benjamin Feigenbaum"},"content":{"rendered":"

Benjamin Feigenbaum was one of a number of radicals active in\u00a0 the East End when it was a centre for Jewish immigration. Although not a household name, he has secured his place in history through the speech he made\u00a0 in 1885 on Yom Kippur (one of the holiest days of the year for religious jews).<\/p>\n

At a packed meeting in Christ Church Hall, Hanbury Street, he asked ‘Is there a God and if he is Almighty as the clergy claims he is, I give him just two minutes’ time to kill me on the spot so that he may prove his existence!’<\/em> Two minutes passed, the band struck up a revolutionary song and Feigenbaum triumphantly exclaimed: ‘See! There is no God!’<\/em><\/p>\n

Feigenbaum was one of the editors of the radical Yiddish newspaper ‘Der Arbeiter Fraint.’<\/em> The meeting was one of a number of similar events held during that period to challenge the religious orthodoxy that gripped the community.<\/p>\n

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Christ Church Hall, Hanbury Street, E1<\/p><\/div>\n

Christ Church Hall is an interesting microcosm of East London. Built in 1719 as a French Huguenot church, it was subsequently occupied by Lutherans, Baptists and Methodists, before being taken over by Christ Church, Spitalfields, in 1887. As a public hall it served the community in many ways. Charles Dickens gave readings\u00a0 of his works there. The Bryant & May match\u00a0 girls held strike meetings there in 1888,\u00a0 organised by another freethinker featured here, Annie Besant, <\/a><\/span>and Eleanor Marx.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Benjamin Feigenbaum was one of a number of radicals active in\u00a0 the East End when it was a centre for Jewish immigration. Although not a household name, he has secured his place in history through the speech he made\u00a0 in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"spay_email":""},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P9c4oP-jG","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1220"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1220"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1276,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1220\/revisions\/1276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}