A rabbi and leader of Orthodox Judaism in the United States, Bernard Illowy was descended from a prestigious central European rabbinic lineage. His great-grandfather, Phineas Illowy of Ungarisch-Brod in the province of Moravia in the Austrian Empire, served as haus-rebbe, or private chaplain, to the banker Emmanuel Oppenheim. His grandfather, Jacob Illowy, was appointed rabbi of Kolín, a town located to the east of Prague, on the Elbe River, then the second largest congregation in the kingdom of Bohemia. There Bernard’s father, Jacob Judah, also trained as a rabbi, though he pursued a career in trade. He married Rachel Schefteles, and they raised their eleven children in Kolín.
Bernard Illowy received his rabbinic ordination from the school of Moses Sofer in Pressburg, went on to attain a doctorate at the University of Budapest, and pursued further studies at the rabbinical college in Padua, Italy. He tutored the son of a high official in Znaim, Moravia, and served for a time as a professor of French and German at the Gynasium there. In 1845, he married Katherine Schiff, daughter of Wolff Schiff, a merchant from Raudnitz, Bohemia, and th ecouple would have four children.
Because the authorities became aware Illowy’s sympathies for failed revolution of 1848, he found it impossible to obtain a rabbinic posting anywhere in the German lands. He was selected to serve as chief rabbi of the Principality of Hessen, but the minister of the interior refused to approve his appointment. As a result, Bernard and Katherine immigrated to the United States, where, following brief stints at congregations in New York City, Philadelphia, Saint Louis, Syracuse,and Baltimore, he was appointed the rabbi of Shangarai Chasset in New Orleans, a position he held from 1861-65.
Illowy was known for his vocal opposition to Reform Judaism and his insistence on the importance of strict adherence to traditional religious observance. In 1855, he helped organize the Cleveland Conference, which was supposed to unify the American rabbinate around the goal of strengthening observance, but when it became clear to him that the conference would instead become a platform for spreading Reform Judaism, he refused to attend.
He was vocal in his support of the Confederacy, asking, during a sermon in 1861, “Who can blame our brethren of the South for seceding from a society whose government can not, or will not, protect the property rights and privileges of a great portion of the Union against the encroachments of a majority misguided by some influential, ambitious aspirants and selfish politicians who, under the color of religion and the disguise of philanthropy, have thrown the country into a general state of confusion, and millions into want and poverty?“
When Shangarai Chasset voted to become Reform, Illowy picked up once again, moving to Cincinnati to serve as rabbi of the new orthodox congregation Shearith Israel. He resigned in 1869 because of difficulties with his health, but remained in Cincinnati until his death in 1875.
