Following letters of support from Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and City Council Member Brad Lander (D-Borough Park, Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, Kensington), the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) may soon move to protect the oldest synagogue in Borough Park.
The Chevra Anshei Lubawitz synagogue, at 4024 12th Avenue is the first built and oldest surviving synagogue in the heavily orthodox and Hasidic Neighborhood of Borough Park. Constructed in 1906-07 for Temple Beth El, a congregation of Eastern-European origin, the building dates to the beginning of the period when Brooklyn was emerging as a major Jewish population center, and Borough Park as a new Jewish neighborhood.
When the original Beth El congregation –which had grown enormously in membership and resources –built a larger home elsewhere in the neighborhood, it sold the building to Chevra Anshei Lubawitz, one of the earliest Brooklyn congregations to affiliate with the Lubavitch (Chabad) Hasidic movement. The Lubavitcher headquarters moved from Europe to Brooklyn in the 1940s, and the movement is now a world-wide phenomenon, with its central address at 770 Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights.
The synagogue and property were sold for $3.1 million in 2017 and the developer planned to raze the site for a new condominium building with a new synagogue on the first floor and basement. The plan, however, received strong pushback from the synagogue membership and the Boro Park Jewish community supported by Chabad leadership.
The membership succeeded in getting a court injunction against the sale and demolition of the synagogue, and on March 5 put in an application to the LPC for the building to be landmarked.
“The Borough Park Jewish community would not be what it is today without this synagogue. Its history is important to Jews worldwide and we’re confident the Landmarks Commission is going to recognizes its historic importance,” said Yaacov Behrman, a a Jewish community activist affiliated with the Chabad.
In perhaps his last piece of business as a City Council Member before becoming Public Advocate, Williams wrote LPC Chair Sarach Carroll yesterday in favor of evaluating the synagogue for landmark status.
“Anshe Lubawitz is the first and oldest synagogue in the neighborhood of Borough Park, and remains the oldest surviving undesignated purpose-built synagogue in all of Brooklyn that continues to be actively utilized as a synagogue,” wrote Williams. “Chevra Anshe Lubawitz of Borough Park opened its doors in 1914, over a century ago. It was the first synagogue in a neighborhood that grew into one of the most important Jewish communities not only New York but the nation. It is my strong belief that this location should be landmarked and preserved as a piece of history and a cultural cornerstone.”
Also supporting the landmarking status are City Council Member Carlos Menchaca (D-Sunset Park, Red Hook), Community Board 12 Chair Yidel Perlstein and a number of rabbis.
