Happy Chanukah - The Jewish Georgian

Page 8 THE JEWISH GEORGIAN November-December 2011
A landmark synagogue in Brunswick looks to its future
By Lindsey Adkison
This article is reprinted from The
Brunswick News, with permission.
Dr. Mark Friedman gently placed the
yarmulke on his head and opened the door
of the synagogue. Stepping inside Temple
Beth Tefilloh, his face beamed.
“The synagogue was built in 1889 by a
Jewish architect, Alfred S. Eichberg, the
first Jewish architect in Georgia, and this
was the first temple to be built by a Jewish
architect in Georgia,” he said with obvious
pride.
“Although based in Savannah,
Eichberg never built a temple in that city.
Dr. Mark Friedman inside Temple
Beth Tefilloh (photos: Bobby Haven)
Our sanctuary was his first temple.”
Walking down the long aisle, Friedman
pointed out the structural appointments he
knows so well.
“This raised platform is called the
bema. And there is our ark. It looks like an
ark if you look at it from the side,” he said.
Friedman opened the doors of the ark,
the aron kodesh, or cabinet, that holds the
temple’s greatest treasure—its hand-written
Torahs, containing the Five Books of
Moses, known in English as Genesis,
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and
Deuteronomy.
Rabbi Sol Greenberg and Dr. Robert
Miller, holding the Torah, prior to the
Rosh Hashanah eve service
“These are our Torahs. This scroll is
about 150 years old. These other two are
both 300 years old,” Friedman said.
It’s clear that, while Friedman is familiar
with the scrolls, he’s still very moved by
their presence.
“This one is 300 years old. It is made of
deer skin,” he said, as he carefully unrolled
it. “They were usually made with the skin of
some kosher animal.”
Most aspects of these particular scrolls
remain shrouded in mystery. That’s even
true for Friedman, who serves as the temple’s
board president.
“I do not know the exact history of our
Torahs. We believe that one came from
Czechoslovakia, one from Lithuania, one
from the Ukraine, one from Poland and one
from Russia,” he said.
“Two of them are Holocaust torahs,
having been given to us by survivors of the
Holocaust. These are the two small Torahs
that I refer to as the pogrom Torahs. How
we got them, I do not know. If only they
could talk, what a tale they could tell.”
The majority of the Torahs were in
Brunswick before Temple Beth Tefilloh was
constructed. In fact, there has been a solid
Jewish population in the area for centuries.
“Then they met at private homes,”
Friedman said.
That was until 1886, when a group of
21 Jewish families started building the
house of worship on Egmont Street. The
building is still an awe-inspiring beauty
more than 100 years later. But, as with most
things, time has taken a toll, and the building
needs some structural repairs.
Standing inside the sanctuary,
Friedman points to the six pillars that provide
the support for most of the building,
including the temple’s tile roof.
“The six piers hold up the upper clerestory
(from which light enters the sanctuary).
They have pillars of brick underneath the
piers, and underneath that there is a crawl
space beneath each of them. The brick,
however, has sunk into the crawl space. The
only thing that is holding up the piers is this
thin pine floor,” he said.
That’s not the only restoration challenge
that the temple faces. Various pieces
of wood have eroded. The tile roof, originally
placed in 1903, is in desperate need of
repair. Many of the stained-glass windows
that decorate the temple have cracked with
age. A sealant used to increase their durability
had the unexpected effect of trapping
heat, which makes the building less energy
efficient.
But the biggest concern for Friedman is
the humidity level. Because the building
doesn’t have a modern heating and air conditioning
system, the humidity level in the
sanctuary tops out at about 80 percent. That
high level is dangerous for the precious
Torahs in the sanctuary.
How to donate
Donations to the Temple Beth Tefilloh building fund can be mailed to Temple Beth
Tefilloh, PO Box 602, Brunswick, GA 31521. Checks should be written to Temple
Beth Tefilloh.
“The Torahs are our biggest concern.
For proper preservation, they need to be
housed in an area with 46 to 49 percent
humidity,” he said.
The congregation is taking steps to renovate
its beloved temple. Members developed
a master plan to help them assess what
needs to be done first. Friedman says the
work should begin in late fall.
“We’re going to work on the subsurface
first. That should start before
Thanksgiving. Then we will work on the
roof, but we have to wait until Glynn
Academy is out of school, because we’ll
need a staging area in the parking lot area
[shared with the school],” he said.
All of the refurbishment will take a
great deal of money. The temple board estimates
that it will need $750,000 to complete
all that needs to be done. Friedman
concedes that it is a great challenge.
“We’re still in a fundraising capacity,”
he said. “The congregation has been very
generous, and we have received donations
from synagogues in Atlanta. One church on
St. Simons Island sent us a check for
$1,000.”
Still, the temple needs more money.
Friedman hopes that the community will
rally to the cause. He points out that having
a Jewish house of worship is important for
community viability.
“Our temple, which is alternatively
referred to as a synagogue or shul, is the
center of Jewish life in a community.
Temple Beth Tefilloh is the only synagogue
in a 70-mile radius. Many Jews will not
move into an area unless there is a nearby
synagogue they can worship in,” he said.
“Our community has already benefited
from having a Jewish population, in terms
of the lawyers, doctors, businessmen, teachers,
justices, and patrons of the arts we produce.
It is necessary to have a thriving synagogue
to have a vibrant Jewish community.
So supporting our temple has the direct
community benefit of attracting a very generous
and creative population to our area.”
On another level, Friedman hopes that
individuals will see the historical significance
that the structure brings to
Brunswick.
“We Americans are often accused of
being enamored only with the new. We are
often not respectful of our architectural heritage.
The sanctuary of Temple Beth
Tefilloh is a beautiful monument of the past.
Contributing to its restoration is a sign of
respect of our past. It is an architectural gem
that deserves restoration,” he said.