Neighbours of the London Kabbalah Centre, frequented by celebrities including Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow, have made a formal complaint about excessive noise emanating from the headquarters during the recent Jewish festival of Sukkot.
One neighbour claimed there had been a 36-hour chanting session at the elegant Georgian house near Oxford Street. Pictures posted on the centre’s Facebook page last week showed followers gathered under a “sukkah”, a temporary outdoor branch-topped area constructed for Jews to eat and sleep under during the festival.
Katherine Corbett, who lives nearby, said visitors to the centre were “screaming and shouting” from Friday evening until Sunday morning. “I was sitting listening to my own music and I still couldn’t hear for the noise,” she told the Evening Standard.
“If it had been a daytime thing I would have put up with it but they were there from that point right through the night until Sunday morning. I woke up at 7.40am to hear chanting on Sunday. It was extremely hard.”
Westminster council confirmed it had received a complaint, which it was investigating. “When a noise complaint is made, our teams attend and issue advice,” it said in a statement. “We urge all organisations to be respectful of their neighbours, especially in the early hours of the morning.”
The centre did not respond to a request for comment.
Kabbalah, a mystical offshoot of Judaism, shot to prominence after being adopted by Madonna and other celebrities. On its website, the centre says Kabbalah is not a religion. “It’s simply timeless knowledge whose time has finally come.” Some critics have described it as a cult.
The London centre says more than 1,000 people attend free introductory classes each week, a doubling of numbers in the past two years. Last year Westminster council authorised a large extension to the house.
Marcus Weston, a former banker who became a full-time teacher at the centre in 2001, claimed earlier this year that Kabbalah had followers among the royal family. “There’s a host of people who sign confidentiality agreements, whether it is royal family members, some celebs, some business people,” he told the Times.
