USA: A Sunday Synagogue Walk on Broome and Eldridge Streets
by Samuel D. Gruber
May 6th, 2018 was a lively Sunday on New York's Lower East Side. The Greek-Jewish Festival was in full swing on Broome Street, filling the street for a block with music, food, and souvenirs in front of the historic Romaniote KKJ (Kehila Kedosha Janina) synagogue, while a few blocks down Eldridge Street the great Eldridge Street Synagogue - now the Museum at Eldridge Street - was open to visitors as part of the state-wide New York Landmarks Society organized Sacred Sites weekend. There were self-guided and docent-guided tours, all culminating in a lively concert in the sanctuary by the Eyal Vilner Big Band.
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| New York, NY. Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue, Broome Street. Photo: Samuel Gruber |
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| New York, NY. Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue, Broome Street. Photo: Samuel Gruber |
These two poles of Eldridge Street, now embedded for many years in New York's expansive Chinatown, are the ying and yang (are those Yiddish terms?) of the former Lower East Side religious and architectural experience. The Eldridge Street Synagogue, opened in 1887, was the worship palace, the grand Moorish-style response of the Yiddish-speaking Eastern European downtown Jews to the often ostentatious architectural displays of their Uptown, German-speaking but increasingly Americanized "cousins". Meanwhile, gathered around Eldridge (and also around the nearby and now demolished Beth Hamedrash Hagadol), were dozens of small synagogues, what we now call "tenement shuls," tucked into the dense residential fabric of the neighborhood dominated bu over-crowded tenement buildings. Most of these shuls belonged to Yiddish-speaking Eastern European Jewish congregations and societies, too, all except for KKJ. This tenement shul, opened in the 1920s, was the home of different Jewish immigrant group.
KKJ's congregants came from Greece and mostly from the northern mainland city of Ioannina, for centuries the bastion of the Judeo-Greek language and culture and the ancient Romaniote liturgy - which predates the 15th- and 16th-century arrival and spread of Sepahrdi culture in the Ottoman empire, including modern Greece. A visit to KKJ allows one to experience the space and decor of a Lower East Side tenement Shul, but through the museum and the weekly services, to imbibe something of the Romaniote culture.The shul and museum are open the public every Sunday, and the congregation is always welcoming to participants for Shabbat morning and holiday services, but check the on-line schedule first (For a traditional Friday night or Saturday morning Ashkenazi service in another tenement shul, visit the Stanton Street Shul, located about a ten minute walk from KKJ).
A 5-minute walk down Eldridge Street from KKJ on Broome Street takes one to the great Eldridge Street Synagogue, but along the way one passes the former Tifereth Jerushelaim Synagogue, which for years was the studio of modern abstract artist Milton Resnick (1917-2004). Resnick, who was born in Bratslav, Ukraine, came to America in 1922. Thee former synagogue will soon re-open to the public as the exhibition space of the Resnick/Passlof Foundation celebrating the life and work of Resnick and his wife, artist Pat Passlof (1928-2011), who had her own studio in another former synagogue on Forsyth Street, also on the Lower East Side synagogue. Read more about Resnick and Passlof here. Nothing significant of the synagogue interior survives, but it appears to have had a large upstairs 2-level sanctuary, presumably with a women's gallery. The building was mostly lit by the large windows on the facade.
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| New York, NY. Former Tifereth Jerushelaim Synagogue in 2005 Photo: Samuel Gruber 2005. |
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| New York, NY. Former Tifereth Jerushelaim Synagogue, 87 Eldridge Street, now the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
According to the Foundation's website: "The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation will be a
largely traditional exhibition space upon its opening in February 2018. Housed
in Milton Resnick’s former studio building on Eldridge Street, the Foundation
will exhibit paintings on canvas and paper by Resnick, his wife Pat Passlof,
and other mature painters working out of the Abstract Expressionist tradition,
broadly defined. The emphasis will be placed squarely on the one-to-one
confrontation with painting itself." Word from the Foundation is that the opening is now hoped for at the end of this month, but you can follow progress with the Foundation Newsletter free to subscribers here.
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| New York, NY. Former Tifereth Jerushelaim Synagogue, 87 Eldridge Street, now the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
The use of the synagogue as exhibition space adds another dimension to the Jewish history of the Lower East Side, recognizing the second lives of many synagogues in the area, and the prominent by mostly-undocumented role the American Jewish post World War Ii artists played in the continued Jewish history of the area. There is more than a century of Jewish secular and cultural life in between, and later actually within the walls, of synagogues and former synagogues.
The highlight of any tour of Lower East Side synagogues is a visit to the Eldridge Street Synagogue. I never get tired of visiting. Each time I'm struck by the beauty of place and the lasting quality of the restoration. I've written and lectured about the Eldridge Street restoration many time in the past, and I'm sure i will again. One aspect of the restoration, however that may link this place with the Resnick/Passlof Foundation, is the large new rose window above the Ark - a window designed by contemporary artist Kiki Smith and a work that moves the 19th century Moorish-style synagogue, and the late 20th-century restoration into to the world of 21st century art. For me, the new window overpowers the decades of meticulous restoration work, but mine is a minority view. The new window is a very popular addition to the building that opens a new chapter in the building's life.
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| New York, NY. Eldridge Street Synagogue. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
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| New York, NY. Eldridge Street Synagogue. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
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| New York, NY. Eldridge Street Synagogue. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
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| New York, NY. Eldridge Street Synagogue. Photo: Samuel Gruber 2018. |
I always try to bring new visitors to Eldridge and I love seeing their expression as they first enter the sanctuary. If you have never been - be sure you take a Sunday walk on Eldridge Street your next time in the city. Walk form KKJ to Eldridge, or the other way around, and get of the Jewish religious and architectural diversity of a century ago. And for lunch - there are scores of Chinese restaurants in every direction.
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