Obj. ID: 40014
  Architecture Soviet Synagogue in Saratov, Russia
sub-set tree: 
Between 1939 and 1946, there was no synagogue in Saratov.
A new Jewish community was officially registered in 1946. In 1947, it was able to purchase a small brick dwelling house (208 Posadskogo St.). In 1958, a mikveh was constructed in the synagogue’s yard – probably the only mikveh built in the post-war USSR. This Soviet-time synagogue held prayers until recently.
Since the 2000s, Saratov has had two communities: the non-Hasidic one develops the plot acquired during the Soviet period, while the community led by Chabad received the historical plot at Gogolia St.
The Litvak community (belongs to the Congress of the Jewish Religious Organizations and Associations in Russia, KEROOR), turned a small Soviet synagogue into a community Museum and built a new synagogue nearby. The Beit Shimshon Synagogue with a prominent dome was constructed in 2010–2015; it also houses communal spaces and a mikveh. The community museum houses both the Soviet artifacts and ritual objects from the historical synagogue at Gogolia St. that were received from the local museum in the 1990s.
Levin, Vladimir and Anna Berezin, Jewish Material Culture along the Volga
Preliminary. Expedition Report (The Center for Jewish Art, 2021), https://cja.huji.ac.il/home/pics/projects/CJA_Report_on_the_Volga_expedition_2021.pdf (accessed June 6, 2023)
Levin, Vladimir and Anna Berezin, “Jewish Prayer in the Heart of Russia: Synagogues along the Volga,” Ars Judaica 18 (2022): 111–44, https://doi.org/10.3828/arsjudaica.2022.18.6.