Congregation Beth Jacob is an Orthodox congregation located at 1855 Lavista Road in Atlanta, Georgia. It is Atlanta's largest Orthodox congregation.The synagogue first held services in the fall of 1942 for traditional Jews living on the north side of the railroad tracks (today's Old Fourth Ward). It was officially founded in 1943 by eight individuals who were concerned with what they saw as a move away from Orthodoxy by Atlanta's Ahavath Achim synagogue. The eleven petitioners for the original charter were Maurice Gavronski, Frank Taffel, M.S. Katz, A. Tenenbaum, E. Miller, Sam Kingloff, R. Shavin, H. Pfeffer, S. Miller, J. Prolotsky, and H. Epstein. The first location was a converted house on Boulevard.Yosef Saffra became the first rabbi in 1951; at the time the congregation had forty members. Emanuel Feldman joined as rabbi in 1952, then a newly married young graduate of Yeshivas Ner Yisroel of Baltimore, Maryland. In 1956 the congregation moved to a former church on Boulevard, and in 1962 moved to its current location in Toco Hills. At that time the synagogue had grown to 190 families. Membership reached 500 families in 1976, and 560 by 1994.Feldman remained with the synagogue for 39 years until his retirement in 1991. His son, Ilan D. Feldman, took over as rabbi, and is currently the spiritual leader of Beth Jacob.
