New Year — Synagogues: Budapest & Sofia

We continue our High Holidays feature highlighting synagogues that were inaugurated or rededicated after renovation on or around Rosh Hashanah. Today we feature the magnificent  Dohany St. Synagogue in Budapest and Great Synagogue in Sofia Bulgaria, — which were both inaugurated and also rededicated at this time of year.

JHE Coordinator Ruth Ellen Gruber wrote about both synagogues in a column in 2009 — when the Dohany St. Synagogue, built in 1859, celebrated its 150th anniversary and the Sofia Synagogue (on which the second stage of restoration had just been completed) marked its 100th.

The Dohany St. synagogue — the largest in Europe — is a striking, Moorish style building whose striped facade and slim towers topped by bulbous dome make it a city landmark. It was designed by the Viennese architect Ludwig von Forster and inaugurated on Sept. 6, 1859.

In her 2009 article,  Ruth Ellen Gruber recalled:

During World War II the synagogue was used as a concentration camp, where Jews were massed before their deportation to Auschwitz. The graves of Holocaust victims fill the courtyard.

After the war, under communism, the building languished for decades in a sorry state of disrepair. I vividly remember how its ceiling, held up by cables and plastic sheeting, sagged perilously over the congregation that would pack the sanctuary on Yom Kippur simply to make a statement of identity in the face of the regime’s religious suppression.

 

The synagogue was rededicated with a gala ceremony September 5, 1996 after a  five-year, fullscale, $10 million renovation largely funded by the Hungarian government. Among the 7,000 people in  attendance were former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, the president of Hungary and numerous foreign dignitaries.

The Sofia synagogue — the largest in the Balkans — was designed by Friedrich Grunanger and inaugurated on September 9, 1909, almost 50 years to the day after the Dohany St.

In her 2009 article, Ruth Ellen Gruber recalled:

Czar Ferdinand himself cut a ribbon to formally inaugurate the building, whose huge dome, slim turrets and lavish, Byzantine-Moorish style fit in with many other grand buildings in downtown Sofia. The prime minister, other government VIPs and local bishops were in the crowd, too, and a procession of rabbis bore Torah scrolls into the sanctuary and placed them in the ark.

“This synagogue will connect us with the past generations and will tell of us to the future ones,” the chief rabbi proudly told the congregation 100 years ago. “May God bless this land which we love dearly, for the good of all Bulgarians, in whose sufferings and joys we take an active part.”

 

Damaged in 1944 by Allied bombing, it stood neglected for decades, as Communist authorities unsuccessfully tried to turn it into a concert hall.

It reopened on Setpember 8, 1996  after a first stage of its renovation was completed — the full restoration took 13 more years to accomplish. Some 1,000 people attended, and speakers included the then speaker of the Knesset, Dan Tichon and Bulgarian President Zhelyu Zhelev.

 

See gallery of photos of Sofia Synagogue rededication

Read Ruth Ellen Gruber’s 2009 column on the two synagogues

Read JTA’s 1996 report on the reopening of the two synagogues