Photographs are of the Neue Synagogue in Berlin, now a memorial/museum
The New Synagogue (Neue Synagoge), along with the Jewish Museum and the Holocaust memorial is one of Berlin’s most significant Jewish landmarks. Built in 1866, to seat 3200 people as the largest Jewish place of worship in Germany, the Neue Synagogue was literally a symbol of the thriving Jewish community. With 160,000 Jewish citizens in 1933, Berlin was the centre of Liberal Judaism.
Today the building houses the Centrum Judaicum foundation which opened in 1995, an institution for the preservation of Jewish memory and tradition, a community congregation centre for study and teaching. The museum and information centre houses exhibits including Torahs and scrolls which were excavated as late as 1989 during the restoration phase. Only one prayer room remains in use today, with mixed seating in the reformed Judaism tradition. A guided tour is available here to see the open space which lies behind the restored facade of the building where the former huge, main Synagogue room once was. A glass and steel structure secures the remaining fragments of masonry of the former synagogue. The original ground plan dimensions can be seen by a traced perimeter which give an idea of the size of the destroyed sections.
I’m scared, Friderike. We have come too close to the same danger of Kristalnacht right here, just down the street. I tried to listen to Zorn, but just felt more scared.
November 9, 2018
Steve T.
I’m scared, Friderike. We have come too close to the same danger of Kristalnacht right here, just down the street. I tried to listen to Zorn, but just felt more scared.