The Golden Rose Synagogue, known also as the Nachmanowicz Synagogue, or the Turei Zahav Synagogue ( he, בית הכנסת טורי זהב) was a

synagogue A synagogue, ', 'house of assembly', or ', "house of prayer"; Yiddish: ''shul'', Ladino: or ' (from synagogue); or ', "community". sometimes referred to as shul, and interchangeably used with the word temple, is a Jewish house of worshi ...

Lviv Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in western Ukraine, and the seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is one of the main cultural centres of Ukraine ...

, western

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

. The Golden Rose Synagogue was the oldest synagogue in what is now Ukraine.

History

A midtown plot of land was bought in 1580, and the synagogue was founded and funded in 1581 by Yitzhak ben Nachman (Izak Nachmanowicz), a financier to Stefan Batory,

King of Poland Poland was ruled at various times either by dukes and princes (10th to 14th centuries) or by kings (11th to 18th centuries). During the latter period, a tradition of free election of monarchs made it a uniquely electable position in Europe (16t ...

. Therefore, the oldest name of the synagogue was the Nachmanowicz Synagogue. It was built in 1582 by Paulus Italus ("Paolo the Italian") from

Tujetsch Tujetsch (; german: Tavetsch) is a municipality in the Surselva Region in the canton of Graubünden in Switzerland. It is the westernmost municipality of the canton, connected to Urseren ( canton of Uri) by the Oberalp Pass. History The uppe ...

(Tschamut) village in canton Graubünden,

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

, a master builder known by his guild nickname Paweł Szczęśliwy (Paul the Fortunate, in Polish). In 1595, the same Paolo, assisted by Ambrogio Nutclauss (alias Ambroży Przychylny), by Adam Pokora, and by master Zachariasz (most probably, Zachariasz Sprawny, alias Zaccaria de Lugano) built a

vestibule Vestibule or Vestibulum can have the following meanings, each primarily based upon a common origin, from early 17th century French, derived from Latin ''vestibulum, -i n.'' "entrance court". Anatomy In general, vestibule is a small space or cavity ...

and a women's gallery in the synagogue. Men prayed in a hall that was spanned by a cloister

rib vault A rib vault or ribbed vault is an architectural feature for covering a wide space, such as a church nave, composed of a framework of crossed or diagonal arched ribs. Variations were used in Roman architecture, Byzantine architecture, Islamic ...

with pointed

lunette A lunette (French ''lunette'', "little moon") is a half-moon shaped architectural space, variously filled with sculpture, painted, glazed, filled with recessed masonry, or void. A lunette may also be segmental, and the arch may be an arc take ...

s above the windows. An alabaster

Torah ark A Torah ark (also known as the ''Heikhal'', or the ''Aron Kodesh'') refers to an ornamental chamber in the synagogue that houses the Torah scrolls. History The ark, also known as the ''ark of law'', or in Hebrew the ''Aron Kodesh'' or ''aron ha- ...

renaissance style Renaissance architecture is the European architecture of the period between the early 15th and early 16th centuries in different regions, demonstrating a conscious revival and development of certain elements of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek and ...

was located at the eastern wall. A bimah was located in the middle of the prayer hall. The building was topped by an

attic An attic (sometimes referred to as a '' loft'') is a space found directly below the pitched roof of a house or other building; an attic may also be called a ''sky parlor'' or a garret. Because attics fill the space between the ceiling of the ...

Mannerist style Mannerism, which may also be known as Late Renaissance, is a style in European art that emerged in the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520, spreading by about 1530 and lasting until about the end of the 16th century in Italy, ...

. In 1606 the building was confiscated by the

Jesuits The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

. In 1609, after paying a ransom of 20,600 guilders the synagogue was returned to the Jewish community. A local legend (first published in 1863) ascribed the merit of the restitution of the synagogue to Rosa bat Ya'akov, Yitzhak's daughter-in-law. The synagogue was therefore also called the Golden Rose Synagogue after her. Rabbi Yitzhak ben Shemuel HaLevi composed in 1609 ''Shir Ge'ula'' (a Song of Deliverance) – which was read each year as a part of the

shacharit ''Shacharit'' ( he, שַחֲרִית ''šaḥăriṯ''), or ''Shacharis'' in Ashkenazi Hebrew, is the morning ''tefillah'' (prayer) of Judaism, one of the three daily prayers. Different traditions identify different primary components of ...

prayer on Shabbat following

Purim Purim (; , ; see Name below) is a Jewish holiday which commemorates the saving of the Jews, Jewish people from Haman, an official of the Achaemenid Empire who was planning to have all of Persia's Jewish subjects killed, as recounted in the Boo ...

. The Song of Deliverance compared the return of the synagogue to the Jewish community to the salvation of the Jews from the Babylonian and Egyptian captivities. In 1654-67, rabbi

David HaLevi Segal David ha-Levi Segal (c. 1586 – 20 February 1667), also known as the Turei Zahav (abbreviated Taz ()) after the title of his significant ''halakhic'' commentary on the ''Shulchan Aruch'', was one of the greatest Polish rabbinical authorities. ...

, called TaZ after his main work Sefer

Turei Zahav David ha-Levi Segal (c. 1586 – 20 February 1667), also known as the Turei Zahav (abbreviated Taz ()) after the title of his significant '' halakhic'' commentary on the ''Shulchan Aruch'', was one of the greatest Polish rabbinical authorities. ...

, the younger brother of Yitzhak HaLevi and his pupil, prayed in this synagogue. For that reason the building was also named the TaZ Synagogue. In 1941, the synagogue was desecrated, and in 1943 ruined by the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

. There is a plaque commemorating the Golden Rose Synagogue: "Remnant of the old temple called 'Di Goldene Royz'. Built during 1580-1595 by the Nachmanowicz family in the memory of Nachmanowicz's wife. The building designed by the Italian architect Pablo Romano was destroyed by Nazis and burnt in summer 1942." The members of the Jewish community of Lviv desire a reconstruction of the synagogue "as it once was". The project by the Office of Historic Environment Preservation of Lviv City Council, commissioned 2016, envisages a commemorative space. "Rebuilding of the Golden Rose Synagogue is not foreseen in the plan."

Conservation

The synagogue was designated a

World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...

in 1998. The article by Tom Gross published in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

''s "comment is free" section on September 2, 2011 under the headline "Goodbye Golden Rose" reported that the authorities in Lviv, contrary to Ukraine's laws designed to preserve historic sites, were allowing a private developer to demolish parts of the adjacent remnants of the synagogue complex in order to build a hotel, which would endanger the

mikvah Mikveh or mikvah (, ''mikva'ot'', ''mikvoth'', ''mikvot'', or (Yiddish) ''mikves'', lit., "a collection") is a bath used for the purpose of ritual immersion in Judaism to achieve ritual purity. Most forms of ritual impurity can be purifi ...

and other Jewish artifacts, as well as possibly the remaining outer walls of the synagogue itself. Lviv officials refuted that information. Reacting to international pressure generated by Gross's article, and by pressure from the Ukrainian president's office in Kyiv, the city authorities ordered a halt to the hotel work in order to preserve the Jewish artifacts and to ensure the synagogue's outer walls would not be threatened. The mayor of Lviv also announced the city would proceed with long-delayed plans to build a

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

memorial near the Golden Rose synagogue in the former Jewish quarter of Lviv's old town. In July 2015 the Center for Urban History of East Central Europe, in partnership with a coalition that includes the Lviv City Council and the city's Office for Historical Environment Preservation, along with several US-, German- and Israeli-based groups, started work on the ''Space of Synagogues'' project. The initiative aims to commemorate the history of the Jewish community in Lviv by creating new memorial and educational spaces in the city, with attention to the sites of destroyed synagogues. Some assert that this project will contribute significantly to the conservation of the remains of the Golden Rose Synagogue. Others, however, believe that the Center caters to the local government, which, in view of its recent support of the plan to build a hotel on the site, has de facto thwarted the restoration of the synagogue.

Controversy

Adjacent to the site of the synagogue, Ukrainian entrepreneurs run a Jewish-themed restaurant, Under the Golden Rose, which opened in 2008.Liphshiz, Cnaan (April 3, 2016).
My queasy night at Lviv's controversial Jewish eatery
. JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency). jta.org. Retrieved 2017-04-11. The restaurant claims to honour the city's Jewish past. Diners are, for example, offered black hats with artificial sidelocks attached (suggestive of the traditional look of a religious Eastern European Jew); and, concerning the absence of prices from the menu, servers explain that it is Jewish tradition to bargain over the prices. Some local historians and members of the city's small Jewish community, as well as Jewish visitors from abroad, find such an approach kitschy and offensive, and argue that it fosters antisemitic stereotypes.Slideshow: Ukraine's Controversial Theme Restaurants
. ''The World''. PRI. Retrieved 2017-04-11.

Gallery

File:Золота Роза синагога у Львові 4.jpg, Interior of the synagogue File:Золота Роза синагога у Львові 3.jpg, Aron Kodesh File:Lwow-SynagogaZlotaRoza2.jpg, Interior of the synagogue File:Золота Роза синагога Львів.jpg, Drawing of the synagogue, 2017 File:Golden Rose Synagogue.jpg, Exterior of the synagogue, 2007 File:Золота Роза синагога у Львові 2.jpg, Memorial plaque File:Rudolf Bernt. Golden Rose synagogue..jpg, Interior of the synagogue (1898)

References

External links