Yesterday the JSBPer’s headed off to one of my favorite field excursions yet, The Jewish Museum and Great Synagogue at the Astoria stop, not too far from our University. The excursion was filled with sad memories that the Hungarian Jewish population experienced before and during World War II. It was interesting and an important field studies trip to further connect our encounters while we’ve been here in Budapest. Our group also enjoyed learning much more about the Judaism and the specific aspects of their synagogues and holidays. I really enjoyed the museum because it was very fascinating to learn about another religion, especially one that I don’t know much about besides that they celebrate Hanukah and have Bat Mitzvah’s.
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| Inside of the Great Synagogue |
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| The beautiful and unchanged alter |
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| The outside of the Synagogue - One of these towers was a radio station |
Our short tour of the Great Synagogue was extremely interesting especially because of how similar the building has remained over the years. Our tour guide explained how the Synagogue was built with steel pillars, which fortunately survived the bombings that occurred during the War. He also described to us that the building was not targeted because ironically the Hungarian Nazi party built a radio station in one of the Synagogue towers. This was probably another horrifying sadistic move by the Nazi’s but at least in the end the Synagogue was not destroyed. Judaism itself has changed though which was another interesting aspect to learn about during this tour. For example, the Great Synagogue has recently allowed women to sit on the first floor, which was not even possible a couple years ago. Men are still the only people allowed in the center sections of the Synagogue but our tour guide described that it is extremely helpful, especially for the older women of the synagogue because they are allowed on the first level of the religious center now. Another fascinating part of the tour was how the guide described to us something that I know we all recognized when we walked in - how similar the Synagogue looked in comparison to a traditional Basilica. I have never seen another Synagogue so I did not have anything to relate it too, but I could imagine from what the tour guide was describing to us that this Great Synagogue is very special.
After the Great Synagogue the JSBPer’s went to the Jewish Museum right next door and had a brief tour of the different aspects of Judaism, the various holidays they celebrate, “a day in the life of a Jewish person” and lastly, a memorial to the thousands of Hungarian Jewish people who were killed during the 1940s. The entire museum was fascinating. It was really interesting to see the torahs and learn more about the Jewish holidays, but the best part in my opinion was the memorial at the end. I connected with this the most because recently Mary, Courtney and I traveled to Auschwitz-Birkenau where about 430,000 Jewish people were burned in the gas chambers. Even after seeing the execution camp in person within Poland, the pictures and descriptions were once again shocking to see in this memorial.
Overall, I am more than happy that I got to experience this field studies with the JSBP group. It was really interesting to learn about Judaism, specifically with Hungary and even more so, during the horrendous war times. In addition, the discussion of the shoe memorial on the edge of the Danube was yet another connection with all of our experiences here in Budapest. Another GREAT field studies! Definitely a keeper!
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| The Tree of Life - "aka the Weeping Willow" - many leaves of the tree have names of Jewish people killed during the 1930s and 40s |
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| A Torah - I REALLY enjoyed the pointers that they use - they have miniature hands and index fingers on them to point to the Hebrew writings |
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| Clothes used for the Jewish people - the Nazi's were mocking them and embarrassing them by making the Torah into drums and the prayer flags into clothing. Sadistic and disgusting |
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| A great view of the Synagogue and Jewish Museum from the air |
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