women (m. Megillah 2:4), recitation of the hallel psalms (t.
Pesahim 10:8), eulogies (t. Megillah 2:18), public oaths (m.
Shevuot 4:10), local charity collection (t. Shabbat 16:22; t.
Terumah 1:10; t. Baba Batra 8:4; Matt. 6:2), communal
meals (m. Zavim 3:2; m. Bekhorot 5:5). By the third century
they were also used as elementary schools (y. Megillah 3:4,
73a). Rabbinic literature suggests the development of an in-
creasingly standardized public liturgical tradition, important
elements of which were enacted within synagogues (e.g., m.
Berakhot 7:3). Rabbinic public prayer (the “public” defined
as a quorum of at least ten men) took place in formal thrice-
daily sessions as well as in the context of communal meals.
This format continues to this day. In liberal Jewish commu-
nities the quorum now includes women. In antiquity there
was considerable variation in custom dependent on locality
and scholar, modern scholars differing on the balance be-
tween variation and standardization. Rabbinic liturgy was
built around the recitation of the “Shema (Deut. 6:4–9,
11:13–21; Num. 15:37–40) and its blessings” together with
the Eighteen Benedictions (also known as the “Standing
prayer,” the Amidah) morning and evening, and the Eigh-
teen Benedictions with accompanying liturgy in afternoon
prayers. Prayer times, though not the content of these rituals,
were associated with the times of the Temple sacrifices. By
the third century public prayer was described homiletically
as being equivalent in efficacy to sacrifices in the Temple, al-
though the notion of the rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple
was never questioned in liturgical terms until the advent of
modern Reform Judaism. In rabbinic times synagogue prayer
and the preexisting public reading of Scripture melded into
a single liturgical structure. The Torah was publicly read,
with attendant blessings, in the morning and afternoon ser-
vices on the Sabbath and festivals and on Monday and
Thursday mornings. A reading from the prophets (the hafta-
rah) accompanied the Sabbath morning and festival Torah
reading. Scripture reading was simultaneously translated into
Aramaic (later concretized in Targum texts such those pre-
served in Targum Neofiti and Targum Onkelos), a tradition
that was popular into the early Middle Ages and is still fol-
lowed by Yemenite Jews. Various cycles for reading Torah
existed in antiquity. Palestinians generally completed the en-
tire Pentateuch in something more than three years, while
Babylonians read on a yearly cycle. The Babylonian custom
is followed in all traditional communities today.
The increase in synagogue functions was paralleled by
the developing notion that synagogues were in some way
holy. Mishnah Megillah 3:1–3 describes the centrality of
Scripture within the synagogue, as well as the transient holi-
ness ascribed to this institution by the early rabbis. At the
focal point of the synagogue, this text suggests, was the
Torah scroll, which stood at the top of a hierarchy:
The people of a town who sold their town square: They
must buy a synagogue with its proceeds; If they sell a
synagogue, they must acquire a (scroll) chest. If they sell
a (scroll) chest, they must acquire cloths (to wrap sacred
scrolls). If they sell cloths, they must acquire books (ofthe Prophets and Writings). If they sell books, they
must acquire a Pentateuch (scroll). But, if they sell a
Pentateuch, they may not acquire books (of the Proph-
ets and Writings). And if they sell books, they may not
acquire cloths. And if they sell cloths, they may not ac-
quire a chest, And if they sell a chest, they may not ac-
quire a synagogue. And if they sell a synagogue, they
may not acquire town square.
Tosefta Sukkah 4:6 projects a second-century Palestinian re-
ality onto a great synagogue in Alexandria. This text focuses
attention upon a large podium (bimah) upon which the bib-
lical texts were read, with no mention of a Torah shrine. An
ideal synagogue is described in Tosefta Megillah 21–23,
which establishes categories that set the parameters of Jewish
legal discussions of synagogue architecture for the next two
millennia. At the same time it suggests a second focal point
within synagogues: orientation toward Jerusalem.
The Community leader (hazan ha-knesset) arises to
read, someone stands until the time when he reads.
How do the elders sit? Facing the people, their backs
to the qodesh. When they set down the (Scroll) chest—
its front is toward the people, its back to the qodesh. The
hazan ha-knesset faces the qodesh. All the people face the
qodesh. For it is said: “and the congregation was assem-
bled at the door of the tent of meeting (Lev. 8:4).” The
doors of the synagogue are built on the eastern side, for
thus we find in the Tabernacle, for it is said: “Before the
Tabernacle toward the east, before the tent of meeting
eastward (Num. 3:38).” It is only built at the highest
point of the town, for it is written: “Above the bustling
(streets) she (wisdom, i.e., Torah) calls out (Prov.
1:21).”
The location of the synagogue and some of its internal ar-
rangement are articulated through reference to the biblical
Tabernacle and the Temple of Jerusalem. Alignment toward
Jerusalem as focused through a Torah cabinet became basic
to synagogue architecture, as did the notion that the ideal
synagogue should be higher than the surrounding structures
(the latter having generally been kept in the breach). The
identification of the synagogue with the Temple was a devel-
oping concept throughout antiquity and the medieval peri-
od. By the third century the cabinet (teva) was being called
arona (cabinet, reminiscent of the Ark of the Covenant), and
its curtain parokhta, reminiscent of the Temple curtain.
There is no evidence for the physical separation of men and
women in ancient synagogues, though a social distinction ex-
isted. Physical gender separation is known beginning during
the early Middle Ages, when it was seen as an expression of
the holiness of the synagogue due to its conceptual relation-
ship with the Temple (where gender separation sometimes
occurred).
The dual foci—the scrolls as local cult object along with
a more subtle physical alignment in the direction of Jerusa-
lem—became ideologically significant features of almost all
synagogues until modern times. While the standard codes of
Jewish law all legislate that the synagogue interior be aligned
toward the Torah shrine on the Jerusalem wall of the syna-8922 SYNAGOGUE