Temple Beth-El | |
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Religion | |
Affiliation | Reform Judaism |
Ecclesiastical or organisational status | Synagogue |
Leadership |
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Status | Active |
Location | |
Location | 7400 Telegraph Road, Bloomfield Township, Oakland County, Michigan 48301 |
Country | United States |
Location in Michigan | |
Geographic coordinates | 42°31′54″N83°17′10″W / 42.5317654°N 83.2860994°W |
Architecture | |
Architect(s) |
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Type | Synagogue |
Style |
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Date established | 1850 (as a congregation) |
Completed |
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Website | |
tbeonline | |
Temple Beth-El (1902) | |
Location | 3424 Woodward Avenue, Detroit, Michigan |
Coordinates | 42°20′45.92″N83°3′24.86″W / 42.3460889°N 83.0569056°W |
Built | 1902 |
Architect | |
Architectural style | Beaux-Arts |
Part of | Midtown Woodward Historic District (ID08001106) |
MPS | Religious Structures of Woodward Ave. TR |
NRHP reference No. | 82002911 |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | August 3, 1982 |
Designated CP | November 26, 2008 |
Temple Beth-El (1922) | |
Location | 8801 Woodward Avenue,Detroit,Michigan |
Coordinates | 42°22′49.82″N83°4′51.55″W / 42.3805056°N 83.0809861°W |
Built | 1921-1922 |
Architect | Albert Kahn |
Architectural style | Neoclassical |
MPS | Religious Structures of Woodward Avenue TR |
NRHP reference No. | 82002912 |
Added to NRHP | August 3,1982 |
[1] |
Temple Beth El is a Reform synagogue located at in Bloomfield Township,Oakland County,Michigan,in the United States. Beth El was founded in 1850 in the city of Detroit,and is the oldest Jewish congregation in Michigan. Temple Beth El was a founding member of the Union for Reform Judaism (originally the Union of American Hebrew Congregations) in 1873,and hosted the meeting in 1889 during which the Central Conference of American Rabbis was established.
In 1982,its two former buildings in Detroit,at 3424 and 8801 Woodward Avenue,were listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
In 1850,Sarah and Isaac Cozens arrived in Detroit and moved into a house near the corner of Congress and St. Antoine streets. At the time,there were only 60 Jews in Detroit (out of a population of over 21,000) and no synagogues. [2] Sarah urged her co-religionists to establish a congregation,and on September 22,1850,twelve Jewish families came together at the Cozens's home to found the "Beth El Society", [2] commemorated by a Michigan Historical Marker at this site. [3] The congregation engaged the services of Rabbi Samuel Marcus of New York. [2]
Rabbi Marcus conducted services in the Orthodox mode,first in the Cozens's home and later in a room above a store on Jefferson Avenue. [2] In 1851,the congregation legally incorporated,and adopted its first constitution the following year. In 1854,Rabbi Marcus died of cholera,and the congregation chose Rabbi Leibman Adler,the father of Chicago School architect,Dankmar Adler,as his successor. [4] Rabbi Adler fostered the temple's involvement the Underground Railroad. Fanny Butzel Heineman,Emil S. Heineman,and Mark Sloman were among the people who helped freedom seekers who crossed the Detroit River into Windsor,Ontario from 1854 to 1861. [5]
In 1856,the congregation adopted a new set of by-laws including a number of innovations from the then-emerging Reform Judaism. Although the congregation was slowly growing,due in part to the influx of Jews to Detroit,some members of the congregation were unhappy with the reforms. In 1860,the new by-laws were debated and re-affirmed. However,the introduction of music into the worship service in 1861 caused a split,with 17 of the more Orthodox members of the congregation leaving to form Congregation Shaarey Zedek. [2] The remaining congregants adopted another set of by-laws in 1862,introducing greater reforms.
Temple Beth El was one of the thirty-four congregations involved in the founding of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations in 1873,and immediately became officially affiliated with the organization. [2] In 1889,Beth El hosted the Eleventh Council of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations,at which the Central Conference of American Rabbis was founded. [2]
In 1861,the congregation moved into a new temple on Rivard Street. [2] In 1867,it purchased a spacious building on Washington Boulevard and Clifford Street, [2] where services were held until 1903. A number of rabbis served at Beth El,none staying for long [4] until the tenth rabbi,Louis Grossmann,arrived in 1884,immediately after his graduation from Hebrew Union College. [2] Grossmann was the first American-born rabbi of Beth El,and he organized a number of reforms,including the adoption of the Union Prayer Book .
Rabbi Grossmann resigned in 1898,and the congregation hired Leo M. Franklin,a young Rabbi from Omaha and another Hebrew Union graduate. The choice proved fortuitous,as Franklin served the congregation for over forty years. Franklin organized the United Jewish Charities (an umbrella organization to coordinate philanthropic activities),began the Woman's Auxiliary Association (later the Sisterhood of Temple Beth El),and assumed editorship of the Jewish American,Detroit's first English-Jewish weekly. He also instituted an interdenominational community Thanksgiving service and established a student congregation (the forerunner of the Hillel Society) at the University of Michigan. [2]
Under Franklin's leadership,Temple Beth El grew rapidly. In 1902,the congregation authorized a new building on Woodward Avenue near Eliot Street. The building was designed by the young (and then relatively unknown) Beth El congregant Albert Kahn. [4] Beth El used this building until 1922 when it was sold for use as a theater and remodeled by architect C. Howard Crane. It currently houses Wayne State University's Bonstelle Theatre. In 1922,the congregation of over 800 families [2] moved to another Albert Kahn structure at Woodward and Gladstone. [4] The building currently houses the Bethel Community Transformation Center.
Rabbi Franklin retired in 1941 and was replaced by B. Benedict Glazer. After Glazer's untimely death in 1952,the congregation elected Richard C. Hertz as leader who served until 1982. [2]
Once again,in 1973,the membership outgrew its facilities. With the movement of many of the congregants to the northern suburbs,Beth El built a new temple in Bloomfield Township at Telegraph and 14 Mile Roads. The facility was designed by Minoru Yamasaki. [6]
Temple Beth El currently has a membership of approximately 1,000 families and is led by Senior Rabbi Mark Miller,Associate Rabbi Megan Brudney,and Cantor Rachel Gottlieb Kalmowitz. The Temple remains at the forefront of current trends in Jewish worship and program,innovative lifelong education,and a commitment to interfaith relations and active work in the broader community. [6]
Temple Beth El has been the congregation for two well-known architects. The first is Albert Kahn,who designed both the 1902 and 1922 temple buildings.
Minoru Yamasaki's firm designed the 1973 temple building. The firm also designed the ill-fated Pruitt-Igoe complex in St. Louis,Missouri,and the World Trade Center in New York City. According to the congregation,the World Trade Center towers and the Beth El temple were being designed at the same time,and the models for both were physically adjacent to each other while they were being refined and constructed. Yamasaki was said to have designed the current Temple Beth El in Bloomfield Hills to resemble a tent as early temporary Jewish Synagogues during the Jewish Exodus from Egypt were located in tents. [7] The current Temple Beth El has many architectural features for which Yamasaki is known for;including poured concrete pillars,a natural skylight running the length of the building and large windows at ground level accommodating views of the surrounding natural landscape. [7] Yamasaki has been credited for giving Latvian architect Gunnar Birkerts his start,which has resulted in numerous award-winning projects,many of which are around Ann Arbor,Michigan and Corning,New York.
Dankmar Adler was a German-born American architect and civil engineer. He is best known for his fifteen-year partnership with Louis Sullivan, during which they designed influential skyscrapers that boldly addressed their steel skeleton through their exterior design: the Wainwright Building in St. Louis, Missouri (1891), the Chicago Stock Exchange Building (1894), and the Guaranty Building in Buffalo, New York (1896).
Congregation Emanu-El of New York is the first Reform Jewish congregation in New York City. It has served as a flagship congregation in the Reform branch of Judaism since its founding in 1845. The congregation uses Temple Emanu-El of New York, one of the largest synagogues in the world.
KAM Isaiah Israel is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue located at 1100 East Hyde Park Boulevard in the historic Kenwood neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois, in the United States. It is the oldest Jewish congregation in Chicago, with its oldest core founded in 1847 as Kehilath Anshe Ma'arav.
The history of the Jews in Omaha, Nebraska, goes back to the mid-1850s.
Leo Morris Franklin was an influential Reform rabbi from Detroit, who headed Temple Beth El from 1899 to 1941.
The Bonstelle Theatre is a theater and former synagogue owned by Wayne State University, located at 3424 Woodward Avenue in the Midtown Woodward Historic District of Detroit, Michigan. It was built in 1902 as the Temple Beth-El, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. As of 2023, the Bonstelle is planned to be renovated and integrated into a newly-constructed hotel.
The former Temple Beth-El is a historic building located at 8801 Woodward Avenue in Detroit, Michigan. It was built in 1921 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
Temple Sinai is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue located at 2808 Summit Street in Oakland, California, in the United States. Founded in 1875, it is the oldest Jewish congregation in the East San Francisco Bay region.
Beth Israel Congregation is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue located at 5315 Old Canton Road in Jackson, Mississippi, in the United States. Organized in 1860 by Jews of German background, it is the only Jewish synagogue in Jackson. Beth Israel built the first synagogue in Mississippi in 1867, and, after it burned down, its 1874 replacement was at one time the oldest religious building in Jackson.
Congregation Beth Israel is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue, located at 10460 North 56th Street in Scottsdale, Arizona, in the United States. Incorporated in 1920, the congregation affiliated with the Union for Reform Judaism in 1935.
Congregation Beth Israel is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue located at 5600 North Braeswood Boulevard, in Houston, Texas, in the United States. The congregation, founded in 1854, is the oldest Jewish congregation in Texas; and it operates the Shlenker School.
Congregation Shaarey Zedek is a Conservative synagogue in the Detroit suburb of Southfield, Michigan, in the United States.
Temple Israel is a Reform Jewish synagogue located at 5725 Walnut Lake Road, in West Bloomfield Township, Oakland County, Michigan, in the United States.
Congregation Beth Emeth is a Reform Jewish synagogue located at 100 Academy Road, in Albany, Albany County, New York, in the United States. Established in 1885, it is the fourth oldest Reform congregation in the United States.
Temple Beth-El is a non-denomational Jewish synagogue, located at 125 White Street, in Alpena, Michigan, in the United States. It is the only synagogue in northeastern Lower Michigan. The congregation is closely associated with the Hebrew Benevolent Society Cemetery.
Jews have been living in Metro Detroit since it was first founded, and have been prominent in all parts of life in the city. The city has a rich Jewish history, but the Jewish community has also seen tensions and faced anti-Jewish backlash. Today, the Jewish community is quite established and has a number of community organizations and institutions, based nearly completely outside Detroit city limits.
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Temple Beth-El was a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue at 945 Fifth Avenue and 76th Street in the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. The synagogue operated between 1891 until c. 1929, and was demolished in 1947. The Temple Beth-El congregation merged with Congregation Emanu-El of New York in 1927.
Louis Grossmann was an Austrian-born Jewish-American rabbi and professor.
Liebman Adler was a prominent U.S. rabbi. Adler was born in the town of Lengsfeld in the Grand Duchy of Saxe-Weimar, Germany. After studying under many prominent Hebrew scholars, he immigrated to America in his early forties, serving as rabbi at Temple Beth El in Detroit, the oldest Jewish congregation in Michigan, before assuming the pulpit of Kehillath Anshe Maarabh ("K.A.M.") in Chicago, the oldest Jewish congregation in Illinois, in 1861. A self-styled "orthodox reformer", he served the congregation for over 20 years, delivering his sermons in German. An "avowed abolitionist", he spoke out forcefully against slavery during the American Civil War. In History of the Jews of Chicago (1924), Hyman L. Meites wrote that Adler was "one of the most beloved rabbis to be found in the country", explaining:
"At last K.A.M. had a rabbi of whom it and the community could be proud, a rabbi who was a tower of strength to the congregation and the community for many years, and who won recognition at once not only for his high-mindedness and earnest Jewish spirit but for his timely patriotic endeavors. He preached many a memorable sermon against slavery, some of which were printed and distributed, and gave a striking proof of the sincerity and depth of his war spirit by sending his son, Dankmar Adler, a mere lad, to the front. Dr. Adler's arrival in Chicago was most timely and seemingly providential."