Supreme Court Justice Lord Dyson is to take over as Master of the Rolls from October.
The 69-year-old, who was called to the bar in 1968, replaces Lord Neuberger, who was named as the next Supreme Court president in July.
Knighted in 1993, Lord Dyson was presiding judge of the Technology and Construction Court from 1998 to 2001 and became a Supreme Court justice in April 2010.
John Dyson, who grew up in Leeds before attending Oxford University, was a chairman of the British Friends of the Hebrew University's legal group.