Jerusalem-aligned wall of the synagogue and a platform for
reading Scripture.
In all periods of Jewish history, the physical structure
of the purpose-built synagogue buildings generally followed
the styles prevailing in contemporary non-Jewish architec-
ture. Neither early rabbinic literature nor later medieval and
modern rabbinic scholars focused on the architectural aspects
of the synagogue. Architects, however, were confronted with
a major liturgical problem. Since two major components of
the synagogue were the Torah shrine and the platform
(bimah) from which it was read, the spatial relationship be-
tween the two had to be resolved. The sixteenth-century Se-
phardic legalist Joseph Caro (1488–1575) reflects on this
tension. Caro debates whether the platform must be placed
in the center of the hall or whether it could be joined with
the Torah shrine, usually on the Jerusalem-aligned side of the
building. Caro writes: “the placement [of the bimah] in
the center is not required, rather everything depends upon
the locality and the time.. .” (Kesef Mishneh to Maimoni-
des’ Mishneh Torah 11:3). Solutions (and nonsolutions) dif-
fered from community to community. In Central Europe,
for example, the center of attention was the almemor, the
reading podium, which dominated the entire space. In ba-
roque and rococo Italy, however, a harmonious solution was
found between the reading podium and the Torah shrine by
placing them at opposite ends of the hall, connected by a
broad and open central aisle. Seating was placed on the sides.
In such a way neither dominated but both contributed to a
sense of balance.
MEDIEVAL AND PRE-EMANCIPATION SYNAGOGUES. Much
of what we know about synagogues in Byzantine Palestine
and under medieval Islam is derived from the documents dis-
covered in the repository of the medieval Ben Ezra Syna-
gogue in old Cairo (Fostat), itself an exceptional example of
synagogue architecture under Islam. Archaeological evidence
for medieval European synagogues is widespread beginning
near the turn of the first millennium. The famous Worms
synagogue, built in 1175, is generally accepted by scholars
as the oldest surviving medieval synagogue. Although the
original was destroyed by the Nazis, a faithful reconstruction
now stands in its place. Its double-nave building, patterned
after Romanesque chapter houses of convents and monastic
refectories suggest a model that is found in such later Ashke-
nazic synagogues as the famous late thirteenth-century Alt-
neuschul of Prague, the old synagogue of Kraców (in the sub-
urb of Kazimierz), and those of Regensburg, in Bavaria, and
Buda (now part of the city of Budapest). The almemor
(bimah) in these synagogues predominated: it stood in the
center between two columns or piers.
There are two synagogues extant in Toledo, Spain, albe-
it transformed into churches after the expulsion in 1492: the
five-aisled synagogue later known as Santa María la Blanca
and the synagogue later known as El Tránsito. In style Santa
María la Blanca resembles twelfth-century Moroccan
mosques. El Tránsito was built around 1357 by Shemu’el ha-
Levi Abulafia, treasurer to King Pedro the Cruel of Castile.
Its ornamental plasterwork with Hebrew inscriptions and
Mudéjar designs is especially noteworthy. The Sephardic
(Spanish-Portuguese) synagogue of Amsterdam, designed by
the Dutch architect Elias Bouman around 1675, became the
prototype for synagogues for the entire Sephardic world. The
Amsterdam synagogue, a large, galleried basilican hall, was
clearly inspired by neighboring Protestant churches.The many rural wooden synagogues in Poland, Lithua-
nia, and the Ukraine, most destroyed by the Nazis, are most
interesting. Dating from the seventeenth to the nineteenth
centuries, these wooden synagogues, probably constructed
by anonymous Jewish craftsmen, had intricate multicolored
painted interiors. In many of them, four wooden columns
supported the interior domed bimah. Numerous synagogues
are extant from this period from Islamic countries, India, and
elsewhere in Asia and the Americas. Among the most exotic
is a synagogue known only from drawings dated 1722 by a
Jesuit missionary. The synagogue of Kaifeng, China, was
built in a local vernacular architecture and furnishings. A
raised bimah stood at the center of the prayer hall, with a
Torah shine aligned toward Jerusalem on the western wall.
MODERN SYNAGOGUE ARCHITECTURE. During the nine-
teenth century, when Jews in Western Europe were emanci-
pated and American Jews strove for full acceptance, promi-
nent architects, some of whom were Jewish, built large and
impressive synagogues as statements of the new status of Jews
in Western society. These synagogues were often built in
neo-Islamic and neo-Byzantine styles (although sometimes
the Romanesque was employed), ostensibly to emphasize the
Eastern origins of Judaism. Neoclassical synagogues were
also constructed, especially in America at the turn of the
twentieth century as an alternative to Christian and Moslem
architecture and as a statement of a developing Jewish-
American synthesis.In the modern period, many innovations have been in-
troduced to synagogue architecture, particularly within liber-
al communities. Separate seating for women has been elimi-
nated in liberal synagogues, thus generally making balconies
or separate rooms unnecessary. In America, Reform (and
today, many Conservative) synagogues are referred to as
“temples,” originally in an attempt to distance their commu-
nities from traditional beliefs in the messianic return to Zion
and the rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple and to avoid the
term “synagogue,” which had negative connotations in
Christian circles. Prayer services became far less participatory
and hierarchical, following Protestant liturgical models. This
was expressed architecturally through the construction of a
single podium at the focal point of the synagogue, which
housed a Torah shrine, a reading table (often turned toward
the congregation rather than toward the shrine), and a speak-
ing lectern. During the postwar years daring experimentation
by such leading architects as Frank Lloyd Wright and Erich
Mendelssohn employed a modernist aesthetic for American
synagogue buildings. Synagogues were consciously integrat-SYNAGOGUE 8925