Edwin Samuel, 2nd Viscount Samuel

Edwin Herbert Samuel, 2nd Viscount Samuel GCB (Hebrew: אדווין הרברט סמואל; 11 September 1898 – 14 November 1978), was a British lord, also active in Mandatory Palestine and the State of Israel.

In the spring of 1917 he joined the Royal Artillery and was posted to the Egyptian Expeditionary Force.

One of his significant acts was to have the law that forbade marriage between a woman and her brother-in-law repealed.

His explicit intent was to allow a man to fulfil his responsibility under the Judaic Biblical law of levirate marriage, as described in the Book of Deuteronomy, whereby the brother of a man who dies childless must marry the widow.

Lord Samuel was the initiator of the Knesset Menorah project which eventually led to the huge bronze candelabrum presented by the British parliament to the State of Israel in 1956.