![]() Built in 1854 with a land grant provided by the British, it remains the only synagogue in Myanmar today, and the only place in which the small community of Jews in Yangon can congregate to worship. It sits on a bustling one-way street, surrounded by Indian and Muslim retail and trade shops. The Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue is located in the center of Yangon (formerly ‘Rangoon’), Myanmar (formerly ‘Burma’). Surprisingly well maintained amid the graying buildings that line the street, the synagogue stands as a testimony to the proud community that constructed it in the late nineteenth century, and to the devotion of the few remaining Jews of Burma, who hold it in trust for an uncertain future.” Balconied buildings line the roads, ever confronting the incessant press of nature in hot, humid Burma.īut if you turn from the sights of the streets and raise your eyes, you will see above the white walls an archway decorated with a seven-branched blue candelabra and the name of the synagogue in large blue letters. A few blocks away is the Strand Hotel, where dignitaries, royalty and writers stayed when the British ruled the country in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. From the busy street corner one catches a glimpse of the Sule Pagoda, reputed to be twenty-five hundred years old, an important center of Buddhist worship in this deeply religious land. It stands behind high white walls, on a narrow street filled with vendors of betel nuts, bananas, books, paint, and homeopathic medicines. ![]() “It would be easy to miss Musmeah Yeshua, the grand and all-but-silent synagogue in the heart of Rangoon.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |