Great Synagogue of Brest

(Translated from Russian)

"Cinema is the most important of the arts for us" - I think this was the case with Lenin. To what extent the authorities took the advice literally into practical use, Brest residents could judge in the autumn of 1939, and then immediately after the liberation from the German occupation. In 1944-45, three cinemas were opened in the city almost as a first. Only one of them had been such in previous years - "1st May Cinema" on Sovetskaya Street (during Polish rule "Adria", and during the Nazi occupation - "Wehrmacht Cinema" for German soldiers and officers). For the other two religious temples were repurposed: the former evangelical church on K. Marx Street became the Smena Cinema, and the great synagogue - Belorusia (then it was spelled with the letter "o").

The son of the famous Brest cyclist, Aleksandr Nikolaevich Dranko, told how as a boy he attended the first post-war film screening in Belarus. They were showing the feature film "Zigmund Kolosovskiy"  about a Polish patriot as understood in Soviet ideology, when suddenly, pieces ofstucco began to fall from the ceiling, landing on the heads of the viewers.

Old people attributed the incident to the sacred nature of the building, claiming that the spirits had awakened. But the rumor was quickly suppressed, and free film screenings and concerts continued to be held. Children and young people, who were being indoctrinated about religion as the 'opium of the people, filled the stalls and the second tier to capacity. A stage with side curtains made of white fabric was erected, where school amateur performances took place, and the drama theater gave first performances (before the reconstruction of the Swit Hall in Lenin Street).

After the war, the cinema-synagogue continued to operate on a paid basis. Tickets were sold for the balconies on the right and left, once designated for women to pray, reflected the Jewish tradition that prohibited them from being on the same floor as men during prayer services.

...The mysterious collapse of the plaster was forgotten for more than half a century. But in January 2002, after repairs and the installation of a Dolby system in the cinema hall was finished, the incidents resumed. On the very first Saturday, during a showing of the film "Pearl Harbor", the Dolby system malfunctioned, although it had been debugged and checked several times the day before. Speculation arose that the number of viewers in the hall that day - either 444 or 555 - carried some symbolic significance. The following Saturday, the malfunction repeated. This seemed mystical, because Saturday is a holy day for Jews. When problems arose for the third time, an Orthodox priest was invited to bless the hall.

The first synagogue in Brest, generously supported by Grand Duke Vitovt, who granted clay and brick for its construction, was built in the early 15th century. But in 1495, when Prince Alexander came to power, the Jews were banished from Brest, and the synagogue was handed over to Christians and subsequently transformed into a chapel.

After the return of the Jews, the Jewish Market was founded at the intersection of Zhidovskaya and Russkaya Streets (the territory of the present-day fortress), which became the center of community life. Among the ritual and public buildings of the Jewish community that grew up here, a large synagogue was erected, built with donations from wealthy people, including Saul Wahl.

The synagogue was so magnificent (they said it was one of the best in Europe) that it forced the kings to impose restrictions throughout Poland. In the 15th century, King Jan Kazimierz allowed the Jews to build a synagogue in the city of Kamenets with the stipulation that it must not surpass the churches in height or grandeur. And then the floors of the new synagogues were lowered, effectively increasing the interior space.

The finished appearance of the facade of the great Brest synagogue of that time can be seen in the famous Swedish engraving by Erik Dahlbergh from 1657: a tall two-tiered structure with features of Renaissance architecture, topped with a gable roof over the main nave and single-pitched roofs over the side naves. As the fortress was being constructed, the synagogue was demolished, a granite tablet was found, bearing an inscription which stated that the nobleman Saul Wahl had built a women's gallery of the synagogue in memory of his late wife Dvoira . A decade later, the tablet was walled up again - in the corridor of the great synagogue in the new city.

The construction of the great synagogue in the new city on the corner of Millionnaya and Zbirogovskaya Streets (today's Sovetskaya and Budennogo Streets) began in 1851, using donations from parishioners and 8,000 rubles received from the treasury as compensation for the demolited previous synagogue. The building was completed in 1862.

The synagogue was badly damaged by fire in 1895, but was soon rebuilt with some architectural changes. It existed in this form until World War 2.

It should be noted that in addition to the great synagogue in Brest-Litovsk there were also many smaller synagogues and prayer houses in this city. The political and social stability that characterized Brest in the 19th century brought a more measured and calm spiritual life, in contrast to the tumultuous events of earlier times We read in H. Sonenberg's book: ... The sanctity of prayer houses in Brest was often desecrated. The troops passing through Brest and staying for a day were housed in Jewish prayer houses, where the soldiers carved crosses and committed outrages. And the humiliated, dull-witted residents did not even consider this an insult. However, this was only in wartime .

Polish Brest-on-Bug continued to be a Jewish city, with about 40 synagogues and prayer houses. The original synagogues were the current building of the sports school on Dzerzhinsky Street, 25 (then Pierackogo, also known as Krzywa [Curved]), and the Progress Club on Sovetskykh Pogranichnikov Street, 52 (then Belostotskaya). More modest in size, but also two-story, the characteristically hexagonal synagogue was located on Unii Lubelska Street (today's Lenina Street) opposite the park, slightly in the back of the courtyards, hidden from prying eyes by private houses, the facades of which formed the red line of the building.

Another synagogue and Jewish school stood on 3 May Street (Pushkinskaya) in the block between Kobrinskaya and Bema Streets (Kirov and Gorky). According to the memoirs of Danuta Waszczukowna-Kamenetskaya, bearded Orthodox Jews, dressed in robes and yarmulkes, with tallit under their arms, gathered at this synagogue. They sang their prayers in hoarse voices, which could be heard from a very long distance.

Regarding the Jewish ORT school, when the Soviets arrived in 1939, it was closed in 1939 to make way for an orphanage, and after the war, it was repurposed as a school for medical assistants and midwives. This solid building made of bricks prior to WW1 was demolished in the 1970s, and now there is a multi-story building here.

But let's return to the great synagogue. Eyewitness accounts describe its interior. Raisa Andreyevna Shirnyuk and Lidiya Maksimovna Shiyko recall the modesty of the decor - whitewashed bare walls. Everything was compensated by the ceiling, decorated with luxurious paintings on Old Testament themes. Men and a rabbi in a striped black and white cape prayed below, women on the balconies.

The early 20th century Brest-Litovsk photograph shows a beggar on her knees by the synagogue. They say that such a phenomenon was extremely uncharacteristic, at least for the following Polish period. The synagogue was open only on strictly defined days and hours, which is probably why people went to the porch of Orthodox churches or to the Catholic church to beg. The second remark of my volunteer consultants concerned the children, chattering by the fence: they were certainly not Jews. According to Raisa Andreyevna, until the autumn of 1939 she had never met Jewish children playing in the street. They had other things to do.