Tony Bayfield

Bayfield was born in 1946 in Ilford, Essex (now in Greater London), the elder son of Sheila (née Mann) and Ron Bayfield, a head teacher.

He was educated at the Royal Liberty Grammar School in Romford and Magdalene College, Cambridge. He studied law and had a doctoral place at the Cambridge Institute of Criminology and then moved to the Leo Baeck College to train as a rabbi. He received rabbinic ordination (semichah) in 1972 from rabbis John Rayner, Hugo Gryn and Louis Jacobs.

After ten years as a congregational rabbi at North West Surrey Synagogue, Bayfield became director of the Sternberg Centre for Judaism in Finchley in 1985.{{Cite news |url=https://www.thejc.com/news/news-features/god-won-t-leave-us-alone-let-s-see-where-we-are-1.488457 |title=God won't leave us alone — let's see where we are |last=Rocker |first=Simon |date=11 September 2019 |work=The Jewish Chronicle |access-date=11 September 2019}} He was head of the Movement for Reform Judaism from 1994 (when the organisation was known as Reform Synagogues of Great Britain) until 2011.{{cite news | url=http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/40450/reform-leader-bayfield-retire-early | title=Reform leader Bayfield to retire early | work=The Jewish Chronicle | date=1 November 2010 | accessdate=6 August 2013 | author=Rocker, Simon}} From 2011 to 2016 he was President of the organisation.{{cite press release | url=http://www.reformjudaism.org.uk/sir-trevor-chinn-succeeds-rabbi-professor-tony-bayfield-reform-judaism-president/ | title=Sir Trevor Chinn succeeds Rabbi Professor Tony Bayfield as Reform Judaism President | publisher=Movement for Reform Judaism | date=27 June 2016 | accessdate=28 June 2016}}

Bayfield was awarded a CBE in the 2011 New Year Honours List for services to Reform Judaism.

London's National Portrait Gallery holds a photographic portrait of him by Don McCullin.{{cite web | url=http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp88361/anthony-michael-tony-bayfield | title=Tony Bayfield (1946–), Rabbi and Head of Movement for Reform Judaism | publisher=National Portrait Gallery | work=Collections | accessdate=4 April 2014}}

Tony Bayfield married Linda Rose, a teacher and Jewish educator in 1969; she died in 2003. In 2011, he met Jacqueline Fisher, whom he married in a small ceremony in June 2021.

Bayfield has three children and six grandchildren. His younger daughter, Miriam Berger, received semichah in July 2006 and is a respected rabbi in her own right.{{cite news | url=http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/style/make_it_work/article1068347.ece | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140407091739/http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/style/make_it_work/article1068347.ece | url-status=dead | archive-date=7 April 2014 | title=How I make it work: Miriam Berger | work=The Sunday Times | date=1 July 2012 | accessdate=4 April 2014 | author=Gordon, Olivia | location=London}}

Bayfield is a member of Finchley Reform Synagogue (FRS).

Bayfield is a specialist in modern Jewish thought and contemporary Reform Judaism. He also specialises in Jewish-Christian and Jewish-Muslim dialogue and has published quite widely in this area. Bayfield has also written about Christian–Jewish reconciliation.{{cite news|work= The Times|author= Bayfield, Tony|url= https://www.thetimes.com/article/the-vatican-and-jewry-vflrdk8mj8r |title=The Vatican and Jewry|date = 11 May 2009|access-date = 5 April 2021}}

• Prejudice (Jewish responses) (1973). London: Michael Goulston Educational Foundation
• Churban: The murder of the Jews of Europe (Jewish responses) (1981). London: Michael Goulston Educational Foundation {{ISBN|978-0-907372-00-4}}
• Sinai, Law and Responsible Autonomy: Reform Judaism and the Halakhic Tradition (1993). London: Reform Synagogues of Great Britain {{ISBN|978-0-947884-09-3}}
• (with Sidney Brichto and Eugene Fisher) He Kissed Him and They Wept: Towards a Theology of Jewish-Catholic Partnership (2001). London: SCM Press {{ISBN|978-0-334-02826-0}}
• (with Tony Brayfield and Marcus Braybrooke) Dialogue With a Difference: Manor House Group Experience (1992). London: SCM Press {{ISBN|978-0-334-01980-0}}
• "September 11: The Case Against Us All" in Roger Boase (ed.) Islam and Global Dialogue – Religious Pluralism and the Pursuit of Peace (2005), Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing {{ISBN|978-075465307-3}}
• (with Alan Race and Abdullah Siddiqui, eds.) Beyond the Dysfunctional Family: Jews, Christians and Muslims in Dialogue With Each Other and With Britain (2012) London: CreateSpace {{ISBN|978-1-468-16747-4}}
• Being Jewish Today – Confronting the Real Issues (2019). London: Bloomsbury Publishing {{ISBN|978-1-472962-08-9}}

{{reflist}}

• The Movement for Reform Judaism: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070927182559/http://www.reformjudaism.org.uk/profile-rabbi-tony-bayfield.html])
• The Guardian: [http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/tony_bayfield/profile.html])

{{Reform Judaism in the United Kingdom}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bayfield, Tony}}

Category:1946 births

Category:Living people

Category:20th-century British rabbis

Category:21st-century British rabbis

Category:Alumni of Leo Baeck College

Category:Alumni of Magdalene College, Cambridge

Category:British Reform rabbis

Category:Christian and Jewish interfaith dialogue

Category:Christian–Islamic–Jewish interfaith dialogue

Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire

Category:Jewish English writers

Category:People educated at the Royal Liberty Grammar School

Category:People from Ilford

Category:20th-century English writers

Category:20th-century English male writers

Category:21st-century English writers