Returning to Paradise: Churches & Shuls
“When you can’t find your way home.”
– Don’t Dilly-Dally on the Way, Charles Collins (1919)
Every summer, when New York City closes one avenue to traffic, I make my Hegira back to Washington Heights where I was raised. 50,000 steps, eight-hours, 27-miles round-trip. I should have my head examined.
What’s even crazier is, I hated my childhood, as well as Washington Heights.
It was once a Mecca for Jews, “Frankfurt-on-the-Hudson”, a beautiful subway-accessible oasis. When Israel’s first president Dr. Chaim Weizmann made his only state-trip to America, he Davened at Washington Heights Congregation, my Shul.
By the time I was growing up however, it was no longer beatific, indeed dangerous.
We played ball with, but also fought with our Irish and Italian neighbors. By my adolescence, they had been largely replaced by Blacks and Latinos. I remained consistent. No matter the hue of the fist punching me, I bled the same tint of red.
Why return then?
Because it remains my roots, the first 18 years of my life. When I met my wife a half-century ago, our first urban-hike was back to the Heights.
Every year I return there, I marvel that those familiar 150s -170s streets have somehow been miniaturized and moved to the Dominican Republic. Rarely do you hear English. Even business-signs are in Spanish.
A perennial destination is my 160th Street apartment. Around the corner was the Shul we Davened Friday night, Lieber’s.
(Back then, Shuls were called by their rabbis. Our Shul was Weinberg’s. Lieber was no longer the rabbi of Lieber’s, replaced by Rabbi Eric Zimmer, but was still referred to as “Lieber’s”.)
Needless to say, Lieber’s is no longer a Shul. Indeed, it is now Paradise. Paradise Baptist Church.
I walk by. The doors are open, a fundraising flea-market on the sidewalk outside. I find someone speaking English, explain I prayed in the synagogue as a child, ask if I could look inside. The woman could not be more gracious despite our limited communication.
I’m astounded. It looks the same, the set-up identical. I am certain the benches are the very ones I sat on seven decades ago. (Of course, the Aron Kodesh has been replaced by a Holy Cross.)
Standing there, I can hear the melodic Friday night German prayer, Tzadik Katamar Yifrach, “The righteous will bloom like palm-trees”, that I sang there, never sung at Weinberg’s.
Why weren’t we members there, instead of our Shul? Rabbi Zimmer was much warmer to us than our Rabbi was. When he saw me on my way to school, he stopped his car to give me a ride.
The answer was, Lieber’s was German; we were Polish. Back then, that was critical. Today, it’s as outdated as calling Shuls by their often-transient rabbis.
Standing there, I wonder if they still sing the “Righteous blooming” biblical-verse (albeit neither in Hebrew, nor the same melody.)
Clearly, the righteous here are blooming. I often see concerts and other events sponsored by Paradise in the neighborhood.
“Weinberg’s”, three-blocks away, a far more beautiful multi-story, stained-glass-illuminated edifice, was razed into a parking-lot.
I pass there. The parking-lot is gone, excavated to build a low-income housing-project. The area that was once our Shul is now… another outdoor parking-lot, 10 feet lower.
(Washington Heights Congregation moved uptown next to the George Washington Bridge, but then sold that building as well, and, for the moment, rents a room for services in another Shul.)
Should I feel better that, at least, it is not a church? That where the Aron Kodesh resided, there is now a Chrysler instead of a cross?
In point of fact, Lieber’s was not built as a Shul, erected in 1914 as Costello’s Movie Theater (seating 589.) It only converted to a Shul in 1950. It was named for silent-movie heartthrob Maurice Costello (not “Hey, Abbott!” Lou.)
Should I feel better if it reverted to a movie theater, no cross, but no God?
Neighborhoods change; Shuls are sold, converted into churches. Walk through Harlem, you’ll find many magnificent churches, obviously, formerly Shuls.
Why are Shuls allowed to be sold to churches? Because, once the Torahs are removed, it’s no longer a Shul, no matter how many Mogen Dovids appear in the stained-glass, how many Hebrew names are carved into the concrete.
Apparently, the same is true about churches, once the crosses are removed.
Many famous Shuls were originally churches, including Beth Hamedrash Hagodol, Bialystoker [not Max), Bnai Jeshurun, Chabads, Town and Village, Young Israels. Rabbi Moshe Feinstein’s Yeshiva of Staten Island was originally the Catholic Girls School of St. John the Baptist. (The Baptist giveth, the Baptist taketh?)
We are forbidden from entering churches, lest we sell our souls, but permitted to sell our Shuls to churches, purchase our Shuls from churches.
Ironically, after my father adamantly refused to join German Lieber’s, we finally escaped Washington Heights to Kew Gardens, where we joined Kew Gardens Synagogue Adath Yeshurun, an off-shoot of Breuers, the daddy of New York City German Shuls
(Also ironic, my wife, also not German, loves the prayer Tzadik Katamar and has performed it publicly, exquisitely I might add.)
What could be the greatest irony of all, the Washington Heights Jewish community in the 180s has recently, Phoenix-like, Tamar-like, bloomed, and continues to expand.
Imagine, what was originally Costello’s, then Lieber’s, now Paradise, in the future, becoming a Shul again..
That would truly be returning to Paradise.
