New Synagogue Berlin - Centrum Judaicum — Attraction in Berlin

The Neue Synagoge with its shimmering gilded dome is one of Berlin’s most beautiful buildings. It is a memorial and an important centre of Jewish life.

On the night of the 9th of November 1938, synagogues all over Germany were burnt down. The SA also set fire to the Neue Synagoge in Berlin (New Synagogue Berlin Centrum Judaicum Foundation ), but the head of the local police precinct, Wilhelm Krützfeld, insisting that it was a historical listed building, called the fire brigade to put out the fire. He was one of the few people on the night of the November Pogrom to stand up to the destruction and the persecution of their Jewish neighbours.

Today, the golden dome of the synagogue still gleams over the centre of Berlin. The building, which houses a permanent exhibition, is not only one of the city’s most outstanding buildings, but also a centre of Jewish culture and an important place of remembrance.

The history of the Neue Synagoge

Once, the Neue Synagoge was the biggest and most magnificent Jewish places of worship in Germany, and a confident expression of Berlin’s established Jewish citizenry. Designed by Eduard Knoblauch in the Moorish style, it was built between 1859 and 1866. When Knoblauch became seriously ill, Friedrich August Stüler took over the construction. Stüler was a major Prussian figure at the time, a student of Karl Friedrich Schinkel and one of Berlin’s foremost architects. With its ingenious spatial design and the sophisticated steel structure of its galleries and roof, the Neue Synagoge was an architectural wonder of its day. The large main hall and the galleries have space for up to 3000 worshippers. The building was crowned by a gilded dome visible for miles around. The entrance facade is lavishly decorated with brick ornamentation and flanked by two towers, also topped with...

Very historic Jewish Synagogue in Berlin, which shows the history from the start in the middle of the 19th century, through the turbulence of WWii and the phoenix like transformation that took place. The Jewish community which occupy this building are Conservative

One of the few synagogues to survive Kristallnacht it was badly damaged prior to and during WWii and subsequently much was demolished; the present building on the site is a reconstruction of the ruined street frontage with its entrance, dome and towers, and only a few rooms behind. It is truncated before the point where the main hall of the synagogue began.

The main entrance has one main door. Beyond that is doors into the Synagogue for the men of the congregation; and a staircase for women & children to ascend.

Beyond the entrance, the building's alignment changes to "mesh" with pre-existing structures. The synagogue's main dome with its gilded ribs, is an eye-catching landmark. Sadly the Synagogue is not available to non Jewish brethren.

The central dome is flanked by two smaller pavilion-like domes on the two side-wings. Beyond the façade was the front hall and the main hall with 3,000 seats

The staff are friendly but keep the historic Synagogue closed to visitors. Un like churches throughout the world which are normally open to the public. Maybe this might be due to not enough staff being available to police...

My first visit was in 1984. It was still a burned out, gutted ruin of Kristalnacht. There was no entry fee, because no one was allowed entry, there were no open accesses through which to enter, and the East German Communist delusionals in power allowed that mark of former Jewish presence to continue to rot.

The negative comments on this web site make me wonder. The one stating the rebuilt structure is larger than the "normal modest size" synagogue means the inquirer has no clue about the size of Berlin's pre-1938 Jewish community and that the original, large building was designed to accommodate that one synagogue's large membership of families, wiped out by the Nazis.

The critique about not much to see inside amazes. Pre-Nazi photos and descriptions are gorgeous.

"Wasn't worth the entry fee"? Any of those disappointed visitors ever pay an entrace fee at a crumbled archaeological ruin without complaining it was empty or open or dusty?

No sense of history, humanity or context in those criticisms.

Concisely, just no...