About our community

The first decades of Judaism in Szeged

The first Jew to settle permanently in Szeged was Mihály Pollák, a merchant who moved to the city in 1781. In 1786, the Council of Governors allowed Jews to reside in the free royal towns without citizenship. In 1786/87 there were already 25 families in the town, with a population of 136. According to a record from 1788, a judge, two jurors, two treasurers and two church servants were elected. In 1789/90 there is already a rabbi in Szeged.

The community's first synagogue was built between 1800 and 1803 (on the site of the New Synagogue, built between 1900 and 1903), and in 1840-43, to accommodate the growing number of people, a neoclassical building was erected on another part of the site, with a capacity for 400 men and 260 women. This second building, now known only as the old synagogue, was designed by Henrik and József Lipowszky and inaugurated on 19 May 1843. From 1850, Lipót Lőw (1811-1875), the chief rabbi, former chaplain of the War of Independence, the most important Hungarian exponent of Hungarian-language preaching and organ services, and the first Hungarian representative of modern Jewish science, performed his rabbinical duties in this synagogue. This synagogue still exists today, although it is no longer functional, it is owned by the Municipality, serves cultural purposes, and is currently used by the MASZK Theatre Association.

From 1861, Jews could also be elected to the city's Assembly. The expansion of the minority played a significant role in the economic and cultural boom of the last third of the 19th century, which also had an impact on the development of the townscape. By the turn of the century, their population in Szeged had increased to 5,863. Before the Great Flood of 1879, a series of multi-storey houses were built (the houses of Lajos Eisenstädter, Philip Herz'l, Isaac Kirchner, David Kiss, József Neubauer, Salamon Politzer, Isao Rósa, Antal Scheinberger and Samu Vajda), after the flood, the main architects of the "palatial Szeged" (the houses of Emánuel Cinner, Károly Déry, Ábrahám Deutsch, György Goldschmidt, Jakab Holtzer, Izsák Kirschner, Henrik Kohn, Nándor Jiraszek, Lipót Krausz, Salamon Lőwinger, Mór Pick, Sándor Pollak, Sándor Politzer, Zsigmond Schäffer). Among the architects we can mention Alfréd Hajós, Sándor Baumgarten and Móric Pogány, among the fine arts we can mention Zsigmond Vajda, Artúr Artúr Ferraris, Fülöpö László, Ármin Kern, Ödön Heller, László Moholy-Nagy, Imre Góth, Endre Vadász, Lajos Petri (Pick), Sándor Gergely (Glück), Nándor Heksch and others.

The 20th century: the building of the New Synagogue and the tragedy of the Emergency

An initiative to build a new church was taken in the second half of the 1890s. The new synagogue and community centre was designed by Lipót Baumhorn on the basis of a competition in 1897. Construction work started in August 1900 and was completed by October 1902. The community centre was built at the same time as the synagogue. The two monumental, colourful buildings cannot be separated, the monumentality shows the former strength of the Szeged Congregation.

The story represents an era of light, which is connected to the rebuilding of Szeged after the devastation of the Tisza flood, the development of industrialisation and trade. This was the most beautiful period in the life of the Jews of Szeged, attracting people from far and wide. In 1910 there were 6,907 Jewish inhabitants, in 1920 6,954, and in 1927 nearly 8,000.
But already, with the global economic crisis, the rise of anti-Semitism, and then Jewish laws, the portents of tragedy are beginning to emerge. Men were called up for labour service, resulting in 612 labour service victims in Szeged, followed by the decree on the wearing of the yellow star and the localisation of the population, and finally ghettoisation. Of the 3,827 persons classified as Jews by the Szeged Jewish Council, 3,095 were sent to a collective camp.

8,617 people from the city and the surrounding settlements were concentrated in the Szeged ghetto, and in July 1944 the trains started to leave, the first to Auschwitz, the second and third to the labour camps via Strasshof in Austria. The ghetto set up on the site of the brickworks was emptied and the city of Szeged was cleared of Jews. After liberation, barely a third of the deportees returned. The city of Szeged lost 5,452 people in the Second World War, of whom 612 were Jews, 612 were labour service heroes and 2,091 were Holocaust victims. Compared to the 1941 census population of 4161, this was a tragic loss for the Jews of Szeged.

Life after the Soá

Some of those who returned after liberation began to rebuild their lives, and in 1947 the Hall of Martyrs was inaugurated in the synagogue's lobby, with 1900 names on marble plaques, although this number was already over 2200 in 1990. Another plaque commemorates the 3,000 martyrs deported from the South, while a third commemorates those deported from Kistelek. By 1956 there were only 750-800 Jews living in the town. The years of communism saw a decline in religious life, although the community was still alive and well, led by a rabbi. In 1979, a minor renovation was carried out, which lasted until 1989, but only occasionally improved the condition of the magnificent synagogue.

In the early 1990s, the "Foundation for the Synagogue" was established, which is dedicated to helping the community maintain and preserve the synagogue by organising charity events and promoting tourism. In the period from May to October, the synagogue hosts concerts and organ recitals, and every year the Szeged Autumn Jewish Cultural Festival is held, which, in addition to musical events, enriches the months of September and October with fine arts, literature and gastronomy.
There is the Christian Jewish Society, the Hungarian-Israeli Friendship Society, which aims at cooperation with the State of Israel, and the latter community - confirming Szeged's civic urbanity - held a dinner evening for the twentieth time in 2015, which is a symbol of a serious friendship, regardless of politics, religion, in unity.

Today, out of the nearly 300 citizens of Jewish origin in Szeged, barely a hundred are dues-paying members of the community. The majority of donations are used for the preservation of the value of the building, for maintenance, for religious festivals, for the renovation and preservation of the building of the Synagogue (which also houses our 22-person House of Love), for the reconstruction of the synagogue, and for the maintenance of the 55,000 m2 cemetery, which has been in operation since 1831. The cemetery is home to the graves of Lipót Lőw, Immánuel Lőw, Chief Rabbi József Schindler, painter Ödön Heller, editor Zsigmond Kulinyi and other famous people. Community life gained a new impetus in the second half of the decade before the turn of the century, which we hope will continue, with Hebrew language classes and Talmud Torah classes. In addition to religious events and festivals, the community's life is enriched by cultural programmes, literary, musical and theatrical evenings. Services and community events are held in the community hall, which has a capacity of 120 people, and in the synagogue only during the summer and on major holidays.
After liberation, the religious life of the community was led by eminent rabbis. After the tragic death of Immanuel Lőw, his former rabbinical companion of several decades, Dr. Jenő Frenkel, and after his aliyah, Dr. József Schindler, Tamás Raj, Dr. István Domán, Dr. Alfréd Schöner, István Zucker, András Schönberger, Tamás Verő (as a rabbinical student), from 2000 to 2016 Chief Rabbi Zsolt Markovics and Péter Schwarcz were the guides of the religious life in Szeged, and currently Attila Kendrusz is the religious leader.

For more than twenty years, the secular president of the Jewish Community of Szeged was Dr. András Lednitzky (who is also Honorary Consul of the State of Israel), and the current president is István Buk, as of May 2019.
The Jewish memorial sites of Szeged have been enriched with new values in the last decade: the Holocaust memorial pillar erected in cooperation with the municipality at the entrance of the former ghetto, and the menorah commemorating the victims of the Holocaust at the entrance of the synagogue on the occasion of the 70th anniversary, "May this lantern keep the memory of all those who were deported from here and never returned." "Killed by hatred, their memory is kept by love." - with inscription. In 2014, the Szeged-Csanád County Bishopric erected a statue in the Solidarity Park on Dóm Square in memory of the city's annihilated Jews, and a statue commemorating the life's work of the world-famous Chief Rabbi, botanist and folklorist Löw Immánuel is also in the National Pantheon, where wall plaques commemorating several Jewish celebrities from Szeged have been placed. On the streets of the city, 20 citizens who once lived here and were later exterminated during the Holocaust have had their memorial stumbling stones placed at their former homes, at the international initiative of sculptor Günther Demnig, and the list goes on, reminding us of the past of Szeged Jewry and testifying to the present's efforts to preserve values and traditions.

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