The End of History for Kisvarda's Jewish Community

Both of Peter Spiro's parents are from the vicinity of Kisvarda, a small city in north-eastern Hungary, near the border with Slovakia and Ukraine. Most of their ancestors lived in or near Kisvarda at least since the 1780s. Prior to World War II, about a quarter of the population of Kisvarda was Jewish, and about 10 percent of the population of the surrounding villages. As this article so poignantly explains, there are virtually none left today.

Peter Spiro visited Kisvarda in July of 1998, and the prayer house, it turns out has not been emptied. Somebody must have intervened, perhaps as a result of this article, to stop it from being completely disassembled. However, its furnishings are in disarray, the ark for the Torah sits on the floor, and there was a wheel barrow in the middle of the room. Addendum: In September of 1999, another visitor reports back that the prayer house has been restored. This newspaper article has changed history!

There is an excellent website that gives historical and cultural information about Kisvarda, but it is only available in Hungarian. On that website, I have found photos of both the interior and exterior of the old synagogue, which is now used as a museum. For other photographs of Jewish relics in Kisvarda, click here.

To return to my home page, with other links to Kisvarda history, click here.

This article was found on the Internet, from the newspaper Uj Kelet, Nyiregyhaza, Hungary, June 10, 1996. It was written by Agnes Gyure, and translated by Peter Spiro. This prayer house was a small building next door to the former synagogue in Kisvarda. It was visited by Peter Spiro and members of his family in the 1970s. A small congregation still occasionally met there at the time, with a few old men. Mr. Czitrom, referred to in this article, was the moving force behind it.

If you read Hungarian, you can get the original of this article by clicking here.

Translation Copyright � 1998 by Peter S. Spiro

The Kisvarda Jewish Prayer House is Closed

The Kisvarda Jewish prayer house's relics are about to be thrown into a hole in the ground. This religion's only place of worship in the region is going to be closed. That was the news that reached our editor, and we set out to discover what was happening.

We were particularly surprised, because it was only last year that one of the country's most elaborate and moving Holocaust remembrances was held in this city. It was a very impressive sound and light show held in a huge black tent.

The synagogue was renovated four years ago. And one might think that there would be greater impetus to keeping up the Jewish tradition due to the fact that Kisvarda's twin city since 1990 has been Karmiel in Israel.

In connection with the twinning, the city government took a count of how many people in Kisvarda called themselves Jews. They found 22 individuals, but it appears that hardly any among them practiced their religion.

When I arrived, I found the prayer house doors locked. I stepped into the former synagogue building next door, which is now used as a museum. I was stunned by its dimensions, and by that unfamiliar world whose slightly decrepit documents I could hold in my hand.

From somewhere up above, I heard the voice of Bela Fehervari, the museum's director, who invited me into his office.

First, I asked him to fill me in on the background. It appears that from the end of the 1700s until the second world war Kisvarda was called the Jews' "little Mecca." The city was the crossroads for commercial and military traffic heading toward Ungvar. Since further north the terrain was marshy, Kisvarda became Hungary's gateway to Russia.

The whole length of Csillag Street was filled with businesses run by Jews: workshops (printers, hatters, and such), restaurants, small stores and moneychangers. Where the library is today there stood the imposing building of the Iparbank, which was owned by Jewish financiers.

The notably symmetrical synagogue -- which from above has the shape of a jewel box -- was for decades used by the members of the congregation. Nearby they built their own school, and the slaughterhouse for kosher meat. They preserved their own customs, traditions, and culture, and religion, and had their own separate cemetery. We can appreciate how numerous and wealthy this community was from the buildings they left behind.

In may and June of 1944, the Jewish population of the area was gathered together in the city's centre. The 7000 people filled two trains headed for Auschwitz. Four thousand of those destined for death there were from Kisvarda. Until the last moment, they (like many others elsewhere) did not believe that this absurdity could happen to them. In any case, there was no place in Europe to flee to. Afterwards, hardly any of them returned.

Between 1944 and 1983, the synagogue continually deteriorated. Its fate had to be decided. In the end, the city council bought it for 11 million forints, and the museum was moved here from the castle. Since then, it has become the property of the county government.

They acted to preserve many Jewish items, such as Torah coverings, memorial curtains, and holy books.

Over the course of the years, the museum's foyer has in some sense taken on the role of a shrine. Many come to see it from as far away as Australia, and of course from Israel. Last year New York's Governor George Pataki spent a long time going over the memorial plaques [listing the names of Holocaust victims; Governor Pataki's grandfather, a non-Jew, was born in a village near Kisvarda]. Additional notations are still being added to that, including names from Mandok and Nyirkarasz. In this way, it could be said that Kisvarda has not completely lost its former connection to the Jewish faith.

Mr. Czitrom, the last sexton of the prayer house, was buried not long ago in the Jewish cemetery. (Which, by the way, is looked after.) From the local inhabitants, it was impossible to find ten men of his faith for the funeral. At least that number are needed for a religious service.

We got in touch with Gusztav Zoltai, the head of the Association of Jewish Congregations. He entrusted the fate of the Kisvarda prayer house to two colleagues, Gabor Karadi and Zsolt Markovits, the latter being the rabbi of Debrecen. They gave the order to save what could be saved of the prayer house's contents, and what could not be placed elsewhere should be buried in the Jewish cemetery. "The closet holding the Torah, a few benches, many old books, and papers we will try to conserve." A stack of important papers was sent to the county archives. Conservators came from Kossuth Lajos University, and the museum will also keep a portion of the prayer house's contents. For the rest, there will have to be "the hole in the ground," as Bela Fehervari puts it.

On tiptoes we step into the prayer house, which is now just the home of destruction. On the ground in little piles are Jewish bibles from the past century. It seems as if some were deliberately stepped on. Neither of us can read this most authentic version of the Old Testament. The director complains, that nowhere in the vicinity is there anybody who can read the various forms of Hebrew writing. (Thus, they do not even know what is written on the plaques in the foyer of the museum.)

The dust of decades is on everything, and the disorder is overwhelming. Neither of us is Jewish, and still it is painful to see all this. We do not know exactly why, but we are ashamed of ourselves. With my photographer colleague, we pick up and dust off a few of the items that are condemned to decay.

Afterwards, back in Nyiregyhaza, we make some phone calls. We cannot reach Gusztav Zoltai. They promise that he will call back, but we wait in vain. He is a very busy man. In our anxiety, we obtain his unlisted home number, but there is always a busy signal, and the operator tells us that the receiver is off the hook. We look for other leaders, who might enlighten us. Can this community's past and present remain, if its place of gathering ceases to exist? Can a better future come out of a present such as this one?

In Debrecen they say that they are not responsible. Next, we contact Ignac Spiro [the translator's second cousin once removed, 80 years of age in 1997], the president of the Jewish congregation in Nyiregyhaza. He does not try to prevaricate, but explains calmly:

"The Kisvarda congregation did not end now, but in 1944, at Auschwitz. There is nobody to take care of our prayer house, nobody to spend money on it. There are maybe three Jewish men left in Kisvarda. All our funds are needed for the maintenance of the cemetery. We know about what is happening. We are dealing with the remaining objects according to the rules of our religion, which is to bury them. Have you seen the former synagogue in Mateszalka? It's better that you don't. Compared to it, the one in Kisvarda is in good condition."

"We have a promise from Bela Fehervari, that the prayer house will never contain a picture of the [Virgin] Mary or a tavern, and we can have a gathering in the foyer of the museum whenever we want. Every year we will have a memorial service there."

"Where there is somebody to carry on our traditions, that is where we will preserve our buildings. Now in this county [Szabolcs] the only place where this is possible is in Nyiregyhaza. On an average Friday night or Saturday we have a gathering of 10 or 20 men, and a similar number of women. At the major holidays, we have a turnout of 50 or 60 people. As for the future? There are 20 or 25 children in the congregation's school."

What will be the prayer house's future? There probably isn't the money to renovate it, and make it into a museum. Bela Fehervari says that it would require at least 6 million forints.

The little gathering house continues to decay, now empty of its ritual contents.