David Hollander

Rabbi David B. (Dovid Dov) Hollander (1913–2009) was an American Orthodox rabbi, and president of The Rabbinical Council of America from 1954 to 1956. At the time of his death, he was the longest serving active pulpit rabbi in the United States. Early life David Hollander was born in Hungary in 1913 to Yonoson Binyomin (Jonathan Benjamin) and Rachel Hollander. Nine years later, Yonoson Binyomin accepted a rabbinical position in Upstate New York. The rest of the family soon followed, and together they moved to New York City shortly before David's Bar Mitzvah. Hollander initially studied at Yeshiva Torah Vodaath. Years later he received his semikha (rabbinical ordination) and law degree from Yeshiva Rabbeinu Yitzchok Elchonon (RIETS) at Yeshiva University. Rabbinate In 1943, Hollander was elected rabbi of Mount Eden Jewish Center in The Bronx, New York, and remained its rabbi until the synagogue disbanded in 1980. At the time, he had forfeited months of back-pay so that the building would not be sold to a church. In 2005, the building was demolished, and in the following year, a new apartment building was constructed in its place.