In 1846, Spektor was chosen as rabbi of Nishvez, Minsk Governorate, but the community of Baresa was unwilling to let him go, and he was obliged to leave the town at night. The salary of his new position, four rubles a week, was a munificent one for those days; and at first many of the older members of the community objected to so young a rabbi. After he had become known, however, his popularity was such that when he decided to accept the rabbinate of Novohrodok (Kovno Governorate), whose community had exonerated him of a false charge made against him by an informer of Nishvez, the people of the latter town wished to restrain him; he had to leave it, as he had left Baresa, stealthily at night. He went to Novohrodok in May, 1851, and remained there until the same month in 1864, when he was appointed chief rabbi of Kovno, which he occupied until his death.