By SANDRA LEVI

Last updated at 23:20 16 February 2008

"Filth, filth, filth." Scrawled across an invitation to the launch of my new book, the words were full of furious indignation: How could I tell such disgusting lies about my own father?

He was a rabbi, no less, and a founding member of the Marriage Guidance Council; a pillar of his community who spent his whole life working tirelessly for others.

Twenty-six years after his death, I had thought enough time had passed to admit that, as well as being a celebrated philanthropist, my father, Selvin Goldberg, was a chronic womaniser who cheated on my mother many times.

But I had misjudged both the mood of the community and its capacity for self-deception.

During my childhood, almost everyone assumed I came from a warm, harmonious household.

I lived in a semi in a typical suburban street in north Manchester with two brothers.

David is three years older and has recently retired as a rabbi himself. Jonathan, who is six years younger, is now an eminent QC.

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Flawed hero: Selvin Goldberg with wife Frimette, the author and her brother Jonathan in the Sixties

My mother, Frimette, came from an orthodox Jewish family, originally from Poland, and was a shy woman; modest with her affections.

My father, Selvin, was almost her polar opposite. Charismatic and gregarious, he became the rabbi of the Jackson's Row synagogue in 1940 and remained there for 34 years.

He was adored by his community and the membership of the synagogue grew from 100 families to 1,000.

Everyone came to him with their problems. One member of the synagogue even proclaimed him the Messiah.

My father was a founder member of the Council of Christians and Jews and, for a while, the president of the Manchester branch of Save The Children, which brought him into contact with Princess Anne.

And ironically, in view of his extramarital activities, there was also his work with the Marriage Guidance Council.

I loved him and could see he had star quality, but I realised from an early age that things weren't as they should be in my family.

The first affair I knew about was with our Catholic maid, Peggy.

She was hired at the age of 19 to help my mother, who was often in hospital or bedridden at home with a kidney complaint.

I don't know when my father started sleeping with her, but I first realised there was something improper about their relationship when I was ten.

Arriving home early from school one day, I caught him coming out of her bedroom.

There were other women. Ostensibly they came to our house to seek his guidance with family or financial matters, but in many cases it was obvious they had another agenda.

To my mind, they were nothing short of predators, but my father was only too happy to respond.

One woman posed as my mother's friend and was at our house so often she became part of the furniture.

When my mother was in hospital, she would bring food for the family.

My father thought she was some sort of domestic goddess because she cooked without garlic.

He hated the stuff, but my mother insisted on putting garlic into everything, particularly when she was furious with him.

I remember one occasion when I was about nine shouting at the woman in front of other guests: "Why don't you just leave our family alone?"

But, in the main, my brothers and I had been trained by my mother to cover up for my father and present a united front.

She knew what was going on but, like many women of her generation, she was petrified of being on her own.

She also thought that if anyone found out about my father's infidelities, he'd lose his job.

So over the years we became adept at papering over our family's cracks.

On one occasion, a friend of mine said she had seen my parents at a country house hotel: "Your mother was wearing a fabulous ocelot coat," she said. I knew my mother didn't own such a coat, but I said nothing.

Of course, my mother's public loyalty didn't stop her complaining behind closed doors. My parents had terrible shouting matches which were awful for us children.

By the time I reached my teens I had come to resent my father enormously.

His preaching seemed so hypocritical and I couldn't believe it when he helped set up a branch of the Marriage Guidance Council, now Relate, in Manchester.

Years later, when I was getting married, I told my father I didn't want him to officiate, giving his usual sermon about the value of fidelity. In the end, he insisted.

I was about 28 when he embarked on his most significant relationship.

She was the wife of a local kosher butcher and I knew something was up the minute she walked into our lounge.

She was in her early 40s, blonde, buxom and flirtatious in a tight-fitting dress. I immediately thought: "Here we go again."

But in 1969 his luck ran out when the butcher sued his wife for divorce and cited my father.

My parents' marriage had more or less broken down by then anyway, but my mother was appalled that her husband's treachery was finally out in the open.

Most congregants were prepared to turn a blind eye – rumours about my father had abounded for years – and he was able to pull in favours.

According to my brother Jonathan, a rabbinical judge told the butcher he would take away his kosher licence if he didn't withdraw his petition.

Just three years later my father was offered a new position in America. He accepted, divorced my mother and moved there with the butcher's wife.

My mother stayed in Manchester and died in 1980, a year before my father.

I had visited him and his new wife a few times in Arkansas and had come to terms with his flaws.

Like him, I had trained as a marriage guidance counsellor and realised there were extenuating circumstances that partly explained his behaviour.

My parents had had an arranged marriage and both families had lied about their children's ages: my father's family said he was 24 when he was 19, and my mother's family said she was 20 when she was really 24.

It meant the marriage was founded on deception.

What's more, I suspect my mother's orthodox background, combined with her constant health problems, meant she wasn't particularly interested in the physical side of marriage.

I went to my father when he knew he was dying and he told me he had done everything he set out to do in life and was going without regrets.

I kept his secret for 24 years after his death, but then, two years ago, I decided it might be fun to write a novel based upon my life, growing up with a womanising rabbi.

The reaction of many from my father's congregation has been astonishing.

Instead of criticising him for his behaviour, they have turned on me. Letters have accused me of muck-raking.

But my critics are missing the point.

In fact, it was the very qualities that made my father such a popular rabbi that drove him into the arms of women: his optimism, his passion, his sheer love of life.

Did it make him less of a rabbi or pillar of the community?

I have come to the conclusion that it did not.

•:Rites And Wrongs by Sandra Levi is published by Melrose Books at £13.99. To order your copy with free p&p call The Review Bookstore on 0845 606 4213.