Dohány utcai zsinagóga

Dohány Street Synagogue
The Dohány Street Synagogue (Hungarian: Dohány utcai zsinagóga/nagy zsinagóga, Hebrew: בית הכנסת הגדול של בודפשט‎ bet hakneset hagadol šel budapešt), also known as The Great Synagogue or Tabakgasse Synagogue, is located in Erzsébetváros, the 7th district of Budapest. It is the largest synagogue in Europe and the fifth largest in the world. It seats 3,000 people and is a centre of Neolog Judaism.

The synagogue was built between 1854 and 1859 in the Moorish Revival style, with the decoration based chiefly on Islamic models from North Africa and medieval Spain (the Alhambra). The synagogue's Viennese architect, Ludwig Förster, believed that no distinctively Jewish architecture could be identified, and thus chose "architectural forms that have been used by oriental ethnic groups that are related to the Israelite people, and in particular the Arabs". The interior design is partly by Frigyes Feszl.

The Dohány Street Synagogue complex consists of the Great Synagogue, the Heroes' Temple, the graveyard, the Holocaust memorial and the Jewish Museum, which was built on the site on which Theodore Herzl's house of birth once stood. Dohány Street itself, a leafy street in the city center, carries strong Holocaust connotations as it constituted the border of the Budapest Ghetto.

History
Built in a residential area between 1854-1859 by the Neolog Jewish community of Pest according to the plans of Ludwig Förster, the monumental synagogue has a capacity of 2,964 seats (1,492 for men and 1,472 in the women's galleries) making it the largest in Europe and one of the largest working synagogue in the World, after the Belz Great Synagogue and the Beit Midrash of Ger in Jerusalem, the Breslov Uman Synagogue in Uman, Ukraine, Temple Emanu-el in New York City, and the Yetev Lev D'Satmar synagogue in New York City. The consecration of the synagogue took place on 6 September 1859.

The synagogue was bombed by the Hungarian pro-Nazi Arrow Cross Party on 3 February 1939. Used as a base for German Radio and also as a stable during World War II, the building suffered some severe damage from aerial raids during the Nazi Occupation but especially during the Siege of Budapest. During the Communist era the damaged structure became again a prayer house for the much-diminished Jewish community. Its restoration started in 1991 and ended in 1998. The restoration was financed by the state and by private donations.

Exterior
The building is 75 metres (246 ft) long and 27 metres (89 ft) wide. The style of the Dohány Street Synagogue is Moorish but its design also features a mixture of Byzantine, Romantic and Gothic elements. Two onion-shaped domes sit on the twin octogonal towers at 43 metres (141 ft) height. A rose stained-glass window sits over the main entrance.

Similarly to basilicas, the building consists of three spacious richly decorated aisles, two balconies and, unusually, an organ. Its ark contains various torah scrolls taken from other synagogues destroyed during the Holocaust.

The Central Synagogue in Manhattan, New York City is a near-exact copy of the Dohány Street Synagogue.