Anshei Minsk is a synagogue in the Kensington Market neighbourhood of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1912 by poor Jewish immigrants from what is now Belarus, which at the time was part of the Russian Empire. The current Byzantine Revival building was completed in 1930.The congregation has had only three full-time rabbis: Meyer Levy, Meyer Zimmerman, and Shmuel Spero, who has served from 1988 to the present. It is the only Orthodox synagogue in Downtown Toronto with a full-time rabbi, and the only one that holds daily services.FoundingAnshei Minsk was the first congregation formed in the Kensington Market neighbourhood of Toronto, Ontario, Canada in 1912, at a time when most of Toronto's Jewish population still lived in The Ward but were moving westward in increasing numbers to the Market and the surrounding area.The Minsk originated as a landsmanshaft synagogue with its immigrant congregation based on a country, district or city of origin, in this case most of the Minsk's founders were poor Jews from Minsk (in Belarus), who had settled in Kensington Market at the turn of the century. At its founding, it was a shtibel or small storefront synagogue typical of poorer Jewish immigrant communities of the time.
