This photograph depicts the Dohany Street Synagogue in Budapest, Hungary – the largest synagogue in Europe. The synagogue, built in 1858, belonged to the Neolog Jewish community and is situated in a very prominent position in the city centre. It was one of the first synagogues to be built in the Moorish style. The façade is red, blue, and yellow – the official colours of the Budapest flag at the time. Above the entrance to the synagogue are the two tablets and underneath is the Biblical inscription “And let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them”(Exodus 25:8). The interior is elaborately decorated with some very large chandeliers and a mosaic style roof. It is home to a very large organ, a typical feature of non-Orthodox synagogues of the time.
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Jewish Community in Hungary - Jews have lived in Hungary for approximately 600 years. Attitudes towards the Jewish community differed depending on the leaders at the time. Some were very welcoming, while at other times, Jews were subject to harsh taxation and blood libels and were expelled from certain areas of Hungary. By the mid-nineteenth century Jews had achieved full emancipation and the community prospered, which is reflected in the size, prominence, and central location of the synagogue. The Jewish community at the time consisted of Orthodox, traditionalists (Status Quo Ante) and Neolog communities. The Dohany Synagogue was used by the Neolog community who, like the Reform movement, wished to modernise Judaism.
Prior to World War I, the Jews comprised around 5% of the total Hungarian population and 23% of the population of Budapest. At the outbreak of World War II, the Jewish population numbered around 825,000 with fewer than 200,000 surviving. In 1944, towards the end of the war, the Nazis took over Hungary. The Jews of Budapest, and other cities were sent to live in crowded ghettos. In Budapest many Jews were assembled at the Dohany Synagogue from where they were sent to their deaths. Two thousand Jews who died in the ghetto were buried next to the Dohany Street Synagogue.
After the war, only 140,000 Jews remained in Hungary. Many left the country, immigrating to Israel and other Western countries. In the following years, the Jews remaining in Hungary were challenged once again, this time by Communist rule. However, after the fall of Communism in Hungary, the community was revitalised. In 1990, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, a memorial to the victims of the Holocaust, designed by Imre Varga, was erected in the courtyard of the Dohany Synagogue commemorating the individuals and communities that perished in the Shoah. Behind the memorial, there is also a tombstone memorial in honour of the Righteous Gentile Raoul Wallenberg who rescued many Hungarian Jews. Today the synagogue complex also houses the Jewish museum of Budapest and the Hungarian Jewish archives.
Today the Jewish community of Hungary is the largest in East Central Europe with most living in the capital, Budapest. Budapest has 20 active synagogues and a variety of Jewish religious and cultural institutions. There is debate about the number of Jews living in the country, ranging from 35,000 to 120,000, as most Hungarian Jews are unaffiliated and therefore the number is hard to verify.
