Having an organ in a synagogue is a fairly recent innovation, related to the emancipation of the Jews and spread of reform Judaism in the 19th century.
The introduction of a pipe organ into a synagogue sometimes sparked heated polemics. Still, some of the grandest synagogues built at that time (and later) include organs in their design — we post some pictures below.
The ethnomusicologist Hervé Roten, the director of the European Institute of Jewish Music, presented a fascinating paper on the place of the organ in Jewish tradition at a recent conference marking the 10th anniversary of Orgue en France, an association dedicated to all aspects of the 8,000 pipe organs in the country.
He focused on synagogues France, where the conference of French chief rabbis in 1856 officially endorsed the use of pipe organs in synagogues — and he included many exerpts of music. He concludes.
For more than 150 years, the organ was the emblematic instrument of the emancipation of the Jews. Its usage, more present in the big agglomerations than in small provincial towns or in the countryside, was adapted to the spacialization of the new consistorial temples, of which its greatness and solemnity were to mark the regeneration of the French citizen of Jewish religion. Until 1874, the consistorial authorities even tried to merge the two main rites, Portuguese Sephardi and Ashkenazi, into one unique French rite, but this attempt failed.
This unitary conception, considered sometimes as an elitist one, was useful in its time as it allowed the integration of the Jews inside the French society. But today, facing the spreading of places of cult and the return to a more Orthodox Judaism, most of the worshippers (except those affiliated to the reformed movements) find their way back to the synagogues or small oratories where a cappella voices are heard again.
Click to read the English version of his talk and listen to the music tracks
Here are some photos of organs in synagogues.
