Synagogue

Synagogue Lengerich

BUILT 1820/21
CERSTÖRT 10.11.1938

The Old Synagogue is the oldest preserved monument of Jewish religious architecture in Poland. It was built in the 15th century as a two-nave hall with cross-ribbed vaults, supported on two pillars, and with a gable roof, which in its type of construction resembled the synagogues in Worms, Regensburg and Prague. In 1570 it was remodeled by the Florentine master builder Matteo Gucci. Its walls were crowned with an attic, which was used in this form for the first time in synagogue architecture in Poland.

The synagogue was built in 1907 by the Jewish community Bodenbach in Art Nouveau style with Moorish elements. Previously, services were held in premises provided by private individuals.

By the Münchner Abkommen of September 29, 1938, the Sudeten German territories were seceded from Czechoslovakia and incorporated into the German Reich. After this event and due to the pogrom night organized by the National Socialist regime on November 8-9, 1938, the Jüdische community in Děčín - Podmokly ceased to exist.

Zamość is a special city in its history and culture. Its founder - Jan Zamoyski, Great Ottoman of the Polish Crown – wanted the city to become perfect both in its arrangement and social composition. In order to promote the economic development of the city, he recruited merchants and specialized craftsmen – Armenians, Greeks and Jews –. The testimony of this great multicultural past of the city is the Renaissance synagogue, which is preserved to this day. Immediately after its construction, Jews settled in the city.

The Ez Chaim Synagogue was the largest orthodox synagogue in Saxony from 1922 to 1938. It was located in the inner western suburb of Leipzig in a small, inconspicuous alley called Apels Garten. In 1920, the Leipzig Talmud-Thora Association acquired the property. There was already a hall on the site, which had been used as a bicycle and gymnasium in previous years. The hall remained standing and, with the financial support of the fur merchant Chaim Eitingon (1857-1932), the architect Johann Gustav Pflaume (d. 1930) was commissioned to convert the gymnasium into a synagogue. 

The synagogue, built in 1863, was completely destroyed by fire in 1893. It was rebuilt between 1895 and 1896 on the former Gartenstraße (today Roosevelt-Straße). In the Reichspogromnacht 09-10 November 1938 it was probably only looted, but not set on fire. In 1945 a place of worship of the Greek Orthodox Church of the Transfiguration of the Lord was established in the synagogue, which exists to this day.

This is currently the only preserved synagogue in the Olsztyn district.