Uithoorn Synagogue (1805)

Die jüdische Gemeinde

The first Jews came to Thamen in the late eighteenth century; the earliest surviving marriage contract from Uithoorn is dated 10 Heshvan 5541, in the autumn of 1780. When the village was split in 1818, the Jewish community was divided too, into Uithoorn and Mijdrecht. Uithoorn obtained the status of a ring synagogue in 1821. Mijdrecht at first came under Maarssen, then from about 1835 until 1906 was an independent community, though it remained closely linked to Uithoorn. The JCK encyclopedia counts 96 Jews in Uithoorn and its surroundings in 1809 and 99 in 1840, then 49 in 1869 and 48 in 1899, so the congregation shrank by half while this building was in use. Uithoorn had a congregational board and a separate poor-relief board, and two societies, one maintaining the synagogue and one dealing with burials. There was no Jewish cemetery in Uithoorn; the dead were buried at Alphen aan den Rijn. Children were taught by a religious teacher.

Architektur und Gestaltung

No picture, plan or description of the building has been found. All that the sources say is that it was a Mennonite church, which according to the Protocol had been out of use for four years when the Jews acquired it, and that it was renovated before being consecrated as a synagogue. Before giving consent, the Amsterdam chief rabbi Jacob Mozes Lowenstamm had it confirmed that the church contained nothing ritually impure, such as graves. Dutch Mennonite meeting houses of the period were usually plain, unadorned halls, but whether this one followed that pattern, how large it was, how it was converted and when it had been built are all unknown. The building was damaged by a storm at the end of 1836 and repaired by 1838. The JCK encyclopedia calls it the church of Mijdrecht, while the Protocol calls it the local church of Uithoorn; its exact site is not given in either source, and its architect, style and capacity are unknown.

Leben in der Synagoge

The synagogue was founded by and long dependent on Amsterdam. According to the Protocol, the idea of a synagogue in Uithoorn arose at a circumcision performed by the mohel Abraham Aron Prins, who with his brother-in-law Samuel Levy and Daniel Abraham Rachmanuth, Aron Isaac Cohen and David Emanuel Kalker carried out the purchase. These five benefactors are repeatedly called the synagogue's directors, and the Protocol contains the contract between them and the members of the Uithoorn community, who were wholly subject to the authority of the Amsterdam chief rabbi and the directors. The bye-laws were signed by 26 members, and a list of Amsterdam contributors is headed by Jacob Abraham Levie. The consecration on Shabbat Nachamu drew visitors from Amsterdam and the surrounding area, and was described in the chronicle of Bendit ben Eizek Wing. The Protocol itself was written mostly in Hebrew and Yiddish, with some later entries in Dutch, and was lettered in calligraphy by the scribe Samuel ben Abraham.

Zerstörung

The building was not destroyed by violence. After the storm damage of 1836 and the restoration completed in 1838, the congregation struggled to pay for the work, and its finances were not settled until 1847. By the end of the century, with membership halved to 48, the old church-turned-synagogue was in poor structural condition. The JCK encyclopedia states that in 1900 the synagogue of Uithoorn was demolished because of its bad state of repair and replaced by a new building. The demolition made way for the congregation's new synagogue, but no source read names the contractor, gives the month of demolition, or says whether any material or furnishings were reused in the replacement. The later synagogue, which a postcard of about 1904 shows in the Mennonietenbuurt, has its own entry; its later history is not part of this building's story.

Das Schicksal der Gemeinde

The congregation that had worshipped in this building continued in its successor, but it kept shrinking: the JCK encyclopedia counts 29 Jews in Uithoorn and its surroundings in 1930. In the 1930s the new synagogue fell into disrepair and was no longer used after 1938. During the Nazi German occupation of the Netherlands, most of the Jews of Uithoorn were deported through the Westerbork transit camp to the east and murdered in the camps. According to the same source, only five local Jews survived the war, in hiding. The number of Uithoorn Jews killed is not given in the sources read. No congregation was re-established after the war, and in 1947 the Jewish community of Uithoorn was formally dissolved and merged into the Jewish community of Amsterdam, the city whose benefactors had paid for its first synagogue some 140 years earlier.

Der Ort heute

The site of the 1805 synagogue is not given in either source read. The JCK encyclopedia says the 1900 synagogue was built as its replacement, which suggests, but does not prove, that it stood on the same plot; a postcard of about 1904 shows the new synagogue in the Mennonietenbuurt in Uithoorn, a name that recalls the Mennonites. Nothing of the 1805 building is known to survive, and no marker for it has been found. Because the plot has not been identified, the map pin for this entry is a placeholder at the centre of Uithoorn and should not be read as the synagogue's location. The Amsterdam Jewish community archives, where the title deeds were kept, and the Uithoorn municipal archives may allow the site to be fixed.

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