| Ben Ezra Synagogue | |
|---|---|
 The former synagogue, nowJewish museum, in 2011 | |
| Religion | |
| Affiliation | Judaism |
| Rite | Nusach Sefard[citation needed],Palestinian minhag |
| Ecclesiastical or organizational status |
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| Status |
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| Location | |
| Location | Fustat,OldCairo |
| Country | Egypt |
  Location of the former synagogue, now museum, relative to theNile Delta | |
| Administration | Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities |
| Coordinates | 30°00′21″N31°13′51″E / 30.00581°N 31.23097°E /30.00581; 31.23097 |
| Specifications | |
| Direction of façade | Southeast |
| Length | 17 meters (56 ft) |
| Width | 11.3 meters (37 ft) |
TheBen Ezra Synagogue (Hebrew:בית כנסת בן עזרא;Arabic:معبد بن عزرا), sometimes referred to as theGeniza Synagogue (Hebrew:בית כנסת הגניזה), theSynagogue of the Levantines (Judeo-Arabic: כניסת אלשאמיין),[1][a] or theSynagogue of the Jerusalemites (Judeo-Arabic: כנסית הירושלמים)[2] is a formerJewish congregation andsynagogue, located in theFustat part ofOld Cairo,Egypt. According to localfolklore, it is located on the site where babyMoses was found.[3]
Given the small population ofEgyptian Jews, the synagogue is no longer active and is largely a tourism site andJewish museum.[4]
Thegeniza or store room of the synagogue was found in the 19th century to contain a treasure of forgotten, stored-away secular and sacred manuscripts inHebrew,Aramaic,Judeo-Arabic, and other languages. The collection of approximately 400,000 items, known as theCairo Geniza, was brought to theUniversity of Cambridge inCambridge,England at the instigation ofSolomon Schechter. It is now divided between several academic libraries, with the majority being kept at theCambridge University Library.
The Ben Ezra Synagogue has occupied at least three buildings in its long history. There have been many major and minor renovations. The current building dates from the 1890s.[5] In a courtyard behind the buildings is the Well of Moses, in a fenced enclosure with a protective grill on its top. In local folklore, this is where the biblical Moses, as an infant, was hidden by his motherJocheved, and watched over by his sisterMiriam, until found and adopted by the Pharoah's daughter; and where Mary drew water to bathe the infant Jesus.[6][7]
The Ben Ezra Synagogue's founding date is unknown, although there is good evidence from documents found in the geniza that it predates 882CE and is probably pre-Islamic.[5][8] In 882, thePope of the Coptic Orthodox Church sold a church and its grounds to a group of Jews, and some 19th-century scholars have assumed that this was the origin of Ben Ezra. However, the buyers were followers of theTalmudic academies in Babylonia, and Ben Ezra was a congregation that observed the teachings of the rivalTalmudic academies in Syria Palaestina.[8] Modern scholars agree that the 882 land sale was to a rival synagogue.[9]
Little is known about the original building. In about 1012, theFatimid caliphAl-Hakim bi-Amr Allah ordered the destruction of all Jewish and Christian places of worship. The original Ben Ezra Synagogue was torn down, "its bricks and timber sold for scrap".[8]
The next caliph,al-Zahir li-i'zaz Din Allah, allowed the reconstruction of Christian and Jewish institutions, and the synagogue was rebuilt in the 1025–1040 period.[8][5] Study of a carved woodTorah ark door reliably attributed to the synagogue sheds light on the history of the synagogue's renovations. The door is jointly owned by theWalters Art Museum inBaltimore, and theYeshiva University Museum in New York.Radiocarbon dating verifies that the wood dates from the 11th century CE.[10]
Historically, synagogues have included agenizah, or repository for abandoned or outdated documents containing the name of God, since Jewish teaching is that such papers had to be stored with reverence, and then eventually buried in a cemetery. The 11th-century building incorporated an unusually large geniza, "two stories high, more silo than attic – with a rooftop opening accessible from above."[8] Some documents added to it had been stored in the previous building, and the oldest dated document is about 150 years older than the geniza itself. Documents continued to accumulate there for about 850 years. The diverse collection of documents included rabbinical texts, historical accounts, and religious and secular poems, dating from the sixth century through the nineteenth century CE.[11]
In 1168, a deliberately set fire destroyed much of the city of Fustat, where the synagogue was then located.[5] Fustat is now a part of Cairo. The Islamic vizierShawar ordered the city burned to prevent it from falling into the hands of an invading army led byAmalric of Jerusalem.Saladin, who becameSultan of Egypt shortly thereafter, ordered the rebuilding of Fustat.[5]
Also in 1168, the Jewish philosopher, physician and astronomerMaimonides settled in Fustat, within a short walk of Ben Ezra Synagogue. He lived there until his death in 1204.[12] Maimonides becameNagid, or leader of the Egyptian Jewish community in 1171, and worshipped at Ben Ezra.[13] Many of the geniza documents, including some in his own handwriting, discuss his life and work, and are the most important primary biographical sources for him.[12]
The style of the carving on the Torah ark door is incompatible with that of theFatimid Caliphate (909–1171 CE), and is more representative of theMamluk Sultanate (1250–1571 CE), specifically the 15th century. A medallion that decorates the door is designed with a motif common to bookbinding of that period. It is known that a 15th-century fire in the synagogue damaged thebimah, or pulpit. One plausible theory is that wood from the damaged bimah was repurposed to make a new door for the Torah ark.[10] The synagogue was repaired and renovated in 1488.[5]
The door also has traces of paint that conservators have identified as being no older than 19th century.[10] It is known that the synagogue was renovated in the 1880s,[10] completely rebuilt in the early 1890s,[5] and then remodeled in the early 20th century.[10]
Jacob Saphir was a Jew born in what is todayBelarus whose family settled inOttoman Palestine when he was a boy. He became a rabbi, and in 1859, took a world tour to raise money for the reconstruction of theHurva Synagogue in Jerusalem, which had been destroyed by the Muslim authorities in 1721. Saphir was the first to recognize the historic significance of the Ben Ezra geniza, which he described in an 1874 book. Jewish book collectorElkan Nathan Adler was the first Western European to enter the geniza in 1896, when he purchased a sackful of selected documents.[8] In December 1896,Cambridge University instructorSolomon Schechter, who later became a prominent American rabbi, began the first in-depth academic investigation of the documents from the geniza, and arranged to have a large selection removed from Cairo to his university library.[8] While the synagogue was being rebuilt from 1889 to 1892, the documents lay in an enormous pile out in the open. EgyptologistCount Riamo d'Hulst, arriving after Schechter's departure, hired a team of workers and spent 55 days excavating and examining as much of the documents as he could, and in May 1898 sent 16 large sacks of material to the Bodleian Library.[8]
Egypt's Jewish community is at the end of a dramatic decline, from about 80,000 people in the 1920s to less than a dozen of Egyptian ancestry residing in Cairo after 2014.[14] Accordingly, the Ben Ezra Synagogue functions now as a tourist attraction and museum, rather than as a functioning congregation.
Egyptian Prime MinisterMostafa Madbouly inaugurated the synagogue on 31 August 2023 following a decade-long renovation.[15][16] The renovation was completed by the Drop of Milk Association that works to preserve Egyptian Jewish heritage. The synagogue's ceiling was reinforced to prevent collapse, the library was heavily restored, and the building was further cleaned and insulated. Given the small population of Egyptian Jews, the renovation was largely done to improve tourism to the synagogue.[15] In December 2023 it was reported that there were tensions between the surviving Jews and thegovernment authority responsible for managing the site.[17]
Finally, there is the Ben Ezra Synagogue, with its cool marble floors. Lore has it that the Nile once flowed up behind the synagogue, and there, in the reeds, baby Moses was hidden.
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