Budapest Dohany Synagogue

I visited the Dohany Street Synagogue today, which is the largest synagogue in Europe and second largest in the world built in the 1800’s.  The largest is in Israel. When hearing the history of the Jews I can’t help but marvel at their resiliency.  Budapest is yet another European city in which the Jews were put in ghettoes left to die from illness, air bombs, or violence from the Government.  I am staying in the Jewish Section of the city now vibrant with café’s, restaurants and bars but many of the buildings are still not inhabitable or close to ruins.  Imagine being forced to live in a ghetto with 7 to 8 people per room.  Up to 70,000 were forced to live here.  It makes me reflect on so many cities in Europe with similar horrific stories, starting with Anne Frank’s hideout in Amsterdam.  She lived two years in a small apartment with other family members, windows blacked out and with no fresh air.  The only light or nature she saw was when she would sneak into the attic and look up through the rooftop windows and see trees and sky, but she could only imagine what it would be like to be outside again feeling a fresh breeze on her face or hear the leaves rustle on the trees. I can’t tell you how many gold plaques (Stolpersteine) we saw implanted in sidewalks and streets identifying Jews that were taken from there homes and sent to die in concentration camps.  Lives lost to the Holocaust.  We should never forget that this happened and not that long ago.

It also struck me when reading the literature in the museums of how something this horrific starts small with hateful rhetoric.  At first people ignored or played down the signs of a slow progression of ultra conservatism, Fascism, or racists laws. Even today, I see signs that are troublesome in the world.  Like the boiling frog apologue.  If a frog is put in boiling water, it will jump out.  But put in warm water that is slowly brought to a boil, the frog will not recognize the danger and be cooked alive.  Hungarian President Orban is far-right and makes outrageous racist comments, yet our Jewish guide yesterday said that he is not worried about him because he is all talk, and at the ground level, the Jews are still being supported by the current administration.

Memorial at Parliament on the Danube. Symbolic of the Jews that were killed and thrown into the Danube.