Har Sinai Hebrew Congregation

 

 Har Sinai Hebrew Congregation

  

 

As the great industrial complex of Trenton began to grow immediately after the Civil War.

 

By 1850, there were several churches in the City representing Presbyterian (remember) Princeton was a Presbyterian Seminary), Methodist (John Asbury had a mission in New Jersey), Baptist, Roman Catholic, Byzantine Catholic, and other denominations.

 

New York and Philadelphia have Jewish communities already two centuries old. Slowly, after the defeat of liberalism in the German States in 1848-9, German Jews made their way to Trenton. This trickle formed a core Jewish community where none existed before. Accordingly, the Har Sinai Cemetery Association, formed on November 19, 1857, when 11 men met in the home of Morris Singer. They were (besides Singer): Marcus Marx, Julius  Schloss, Issac Wymann, lgnatz Frankenstein, Lazarus Gottheim, Isaac Singer, Joseph Rice, Ephraim Kaufman, Marcus Aaron and Gustavus Cane.

 

 

 

 

 

                   Vroom Ave Cemetery

As is common, the cemetery association a year later committed to building a place of worship. Its initial religious services were held in private homes; then in rented quarters.

 

A September 1858 newspaper item tells us that 52 persons attended New Year's services in Temperance Hall, then located at the southeast corner of Broad and Front Streets.

 

Formal services Har Sinai Hebrew Congregation building began in 1860.

 

In 1860, its trustees were Simon Kahnweiler, Isaac Wymann, Henry Shoninger, Herman Rosenbaum, Marcus Aaron, Leon Kahnweiler, and David Manko, most of the clothing merchants. Nearly all German, services and minutes were conducted in Hebrew and German.

 

Kahnweiler, a prominent business figure, tried his hand at several ventures: a brickyard, vinegar works, grocery store, and real estate. He became Har Sinai's first president, exercising considerable influence in the new congregation.

 

Kahnweiler purchased a Lutheran little brick chapel on the west side of North Montgomery Street, between Academy and Perry. It was refitted as a temple and dedicated with appropriate ceremonies on March 23, 1866.

Judge David Naar, an outstanding Jewish figure at that time, made the dedicatory address. Narr, who now lived in Trenton Former Mayor of Elizabeth and  Common Pleas Judge of Essex County, a member of the State Constitution of 1844, owner and publisher of the influential Daily True American, and a powerful figure in state Democratic councils.

 

Rabbi Isaac Lesser, who with Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise then shared the leadership of American Jewry, also spoke at the dedication. Lesser went on the found the Conservative movement in the 1880s. Wise established a Reform association in 1873 and a Rabbinical College in 1875.

 

There was some turmoil over the deed’s provenance and the building was sold at Sheriff’s auction in 1872. Kahnweiler had never deeded the temple to the congregation. But the deed was unclear and it was sold by the Sheriff.

There was a heroine, however. Mrs. Toretta Kaufman, mother of Amelia Block and S.E. Kaufman, both pillars of the business community, saved the temple building. Through her tireless efforts, she managed to collect sufficient funds so that by autumn of 1872 the congregation again owned the Montgomery Street property.

 

The largest contributor was said to be Joseph Rice, a member, a leading merchant, and one of Trenton's most respected citizens. He made up the balance needed after Mrs. Kaufman’s proceeds.

 

Like the German Jews in New York and Philadelphia, the German Jews helped their obscurantist, callow Jewish breather when they arrived as immigrants. Not knowing anything about the language, customs, ways of doing business, etc., these German Jews instituted charitable societies to assist them in their new environment.

 

Har Sinai sold its temple to Bayard Post, No.8, G.A.R. and in 1903, bought a lot at the southwest corner of Front and Stockton Streets to erect its second house of worship.

 

                                 Temple 1900

The temple was dedicated on the evening of October 7, 1904. Soon after, the congregation engaged Rabbi Nathan Stern, a Reform rabbi. English replaced German in the services.

 

Governor Woodrow Wilson gave a memorable address in the building on November 24, 1910.

 

In February 1922 the Board of Trustees voted to join the Union of American Hebrew Congregations as a member of the Reform movement.

 

                               Har Sinai's Famous Sanctuary

Soon after, the Temple found that its increased school enrollment necessitated a larger building In 1925 Har Sinai purchased a lot on Bellevue Avenue, then a pretty barren area, to erect its third house of worship. One of its members,  Louis S. Kaplan served as architect. (He also designed the War Memorial Building.)

 

The dedication ceremonies took place September 12 through 16, 1930. Addresses by Rabbi Louis Woolsey of Philadelphia, Dr. Julian Morgenstern, President of the Hebrew Union College, and Rabbis Sidney Tedesche and Alexander Lyons of Brooklyn. Julius Schafer was president, and Rabbi Abraham Holtzberg was in the sixth year of his contract.

 

Although Har Sinai opened its new temple doors during the depression years of the 1930s, the congregation managed to carry during difficult economic times. The temple was completely free of debt when it burned its mortgage on the evening of November 4, 1945.

 

Rabbi Holtzberg's spiritual leadership continued for 25-years. Indeed, Dr. J.M. Schildkraut was president for many of these years.

To commemorate the Jewish presence on Trenton, an official government plaque was installed at 20 West State Street.

 

By Gary Nigh, November 16, 2007
First Synagogue Marker

Inscription. Trenton’s first Jewish organization, Mount Sinai Cemetery Association, formed on November 19, 1857, later known as Har Sinai Hebrew Congregation, began regular synagogue services at this site in 1860.
 
Erected by Har Sinai Temple, Centennial Committee. 
 
Location. 40° 13.228′ N, 74° 45.983′ W. Marker is in Trenton, New Jersey, in Mercer County. Marker is on West State Street 0.1 miles west of Warren Street, on the right when traveling west.  On the fence in front of the Mary Roebling State Office Building. Marker is at or near this postal address: 20 West State Street, Trenton NJ 08608, United States of America.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With the death of Rabbi Holtzberg, Rabbi Joshua 0. Haberman, from Buffalo, replace his colleague in 1951.

 

Rabbi Haberman's rabbinate for the next eighteen years brought an extensive series of innovations, achievements, and activities which carried Har Sinai during the fifties and sixties through a period of unprecedented growth.

 

A significant addition to the worship services of Har Sinai took place in 1953 when Cantor Marshall M. Glatzer joined the Temple staff.

 

Changes in the religious practices of the congregation saw the return of the chanting of the Kiddush, skull caps, and the use of the Shofar instead of a coronet for Rosh Hashanah.

 

In 1957, Har Sinai celebrated its Centennial Year—"more than just another celebration", as Centennial chairman Sidney Goldmann, a member, said in this personal message, but "an occasion for spiritual rededication, a renewal of one's abiding faith in Judaism".

 

When Rabbi Haberman answered a call to serve as Rabbi for Washington

Hebrew Congregation (one of the most prestigious Temples) in Washington, D.C. in 1969, Har Sinai called to its pulpit Rabbi Bernard Perelmuter from Erie, Pennsylvania, who served Har Sinai until June 1982.

 

In June 1982, Har Sinai welcomed Rabbi David J. Gelfand to its pulpit from Temple Beth El in Great Neck, New York. Then, came David Straus and Stuart A. Pollack.