Resplendent Synagogue

Resplendent Synagogue represents the traditional wooden synagogues of eighteenth-century Polish Jewry, and delves in magnificent detail not merely into the architecture of the structure but also into the architecture of the community and the influences on the structure by the worshipers who davened there—and the influences of the structure in turn upon the worshipers by the nature of the edifice.

A pioneering work... the first detailed analysis of an East European synagogue on the background of both architectural and religious context... should appeal to a broad audience and belongs in serious collections of Jewish studies, sacred architecture and comparative studies.

The writing is scholarly and information is presented coherently, backed with historical documentation. A plethora of historic images, maps, intricate renderings and diagrams illustrate every aspect of the long-destroyed building, its construction and its position in the community. Where information on the Gwozdziec synagogue is lacking, such as who designed and built it, Hubka draws on the history and architecture of other synagogues in Poland so that every subject has been intelligently introduced… [Hubka] illuminates the interior of the building as seen by this person, introducing the reader not only to new surroundings but also to a different time period.”

One must surely recognize the value of his work, since he has created a fundamental awareness of the social and religious functioning of these once resplendent but now lots monuments of vernacular architecture. There are very few scholars able to contribute the kind of interpretation Hbuka has providd because the task requires the combination of knowledge in Jewish liturgy, history, art, architecture, and scripture as well as an ability to work in a wide range of languages… Hubka's work has wider imiplications for many disciplines and his contribution will not fade away as research evolves.

Hubka’s book exhibits a fine blend of scholarship, accessibility, and panache. In fact, Hubka’s is the only book in the field of Jewish architecture that attempts to contextualize a building with such specificity and with such a broad sense of the way it belongs in its immediate and more extensive cultural surroundings. It is unique in using architecture to fill in details of the relatively undiscovered country of pre-Hasidic Eastern Europe. The extrapolations it invites are essential to understanding the period and place, making Hubka’s thesis a force to be reckoned with.

This path-breaking book brings back to life the beautiful wooden synagogue, with its elaborate painted ceiling, erected in the eighteenth century in the town of Gwozdziec (today Hvizdets in Western Ukraine) and destroyed by the Nazis in 1941. It describes how the synagogue was built and movingly depicts its central role in the religious and social life of the town. A reconstruction of this syngagogue is a central feature of the core exhibition of the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. The book is essential reading for all interested in the history of the Jews in Eastern Europe.

Adam Kirsch...does a masterful job of summarizing the entire Talmud section by
section and is insightful as a both a reader and a storyteller. Kirsch’s work is another step in teaching the broader
Jewish world that the Talmud is a book worth opening again and again.