chief rabbinate

chief rabbinate, in Judaism, a supreme religious authority whose decisions bind all those under its jurisdiction. The prototype of the chief rabbinate was the Great Sanhedrin of Jerusalem, which, until the destruction of the Second Temple in ad 70, issued legislation and interpreted Jewish Law for all the Jewish people. The Patriarchate functioned with Roman support until about 425, since which Jewry has had no central authority. Various Jewish communities, however, have seen the practical...