The Ramban Synagogue () is the second oldest active synagogue in the Old City of Jerusalem, after only the Karaite Synagogue. It dates back in its current location to sometime around 1400. Tradition holds that as an institution, it was founded by the scholar and rabbi Moshe ben Nachman, also known as Nachmanides or Ramban, in 1267, but at a more southerly location on Mount Zion, to help rebuild the local Jewish community, which indeed expanded because of the synagogue's presence. The synagogue was moved to its current location around 1400, where it was destroyed in 1474, rebuilt in 1475, and continued functioning until being closed by the Muslim authorities in the late 16th century. The building was used for industrial and commercial purposes until its destruction in the 1948 Jordanian siege of the Jewish Quarter. After the 1967 Six-Day War, it was rebuilt over the old ruins and reconsecrated as a synagogue.
Description
The foundation of the building comprises vaults resting on Romanesque and Byzantine capitals. Along with the fact that there are no Gothic or Islamic architectural features, this suggests that the original building predates the Crusader period.
The synagogue is located three meters below street level, to comply with Muslim restrictions for Dhimmi houses of prayer not to be higher than mosques. The western entrance opens up to the Jewish Quarter Road and leads through the study hall or beit midrash to the main room, while the southern entrance can be reached from a staircase leading down from the Hurva Synagogue.
The synagogue's prayer hall has an elongated and slightly trapeze-like shape (21.5 m by 6.7-7.3 m). Four columns, all in secondary use and with unadorned square capitals, are splitting the hall into two isles. The fifth one was removed and placed outside the southern entrance, in order to create space for the bimah, which takes a central position but never stood under a dome. The western end of the prayer hall has been extended in order to allow for a women's section, while the other, eastern end holds the Torah arks, one at the end of each isle.
History
13th/14th century synagogue
Tradition
Tradition has it that Nachmanides was the one who founded the synagogue.
After the Disputation of Barcelona, Nachmanides was exiled from Aragon, and in 1267 he made aliyah to the Land of Israel. In an alleged letter to his son, he described the Jewish community of Jerusalem devastated by the Khwarezmian "Tatars":
Seventy two years old, he undertook the effort to rebuild the Jewish community and chose a ruined house on Mount Zion to reconstruct it as a synagogue. A number of Jews moved to Jerusalem after hearing of Nachmanides' arrival. The Torah scrolls that were evacuated to Nablus (near biblical Shechem) before the Mongol invasion were returned. In three weeks, for Rosh Hashanah, the synagogue was ready for use.
Scholarly view
Norman Roth, a scholar specialised in medieval Jewish history, dates the establishment of the synagogue as an institution to the 13th century or "somewhat later", with Avraham David dating its establishment firmly at the beginning of the 15th century, but possibly referring to the building as such in its final location. Both agree that the tradition is at least problematic. The authenticity of Nachmanides' letter to his son, along with several other letters attributed to him, is contested. Many details in it are doubtful, starting with the questions on Nachmanides ever reaching Jerusalem, and continuing with doubts on the small number of Jews (just two) after Saladin's 1188 call to them to resettle Palestine, and on why a scholar of Nachmanides' rank would need to bring Torah scrolls from Nablus, the capital of the Samaritans, which Jews considered to be heretics. Obadiah Bertinoro, the next source on the synagogue, writes in 1488 about it without ever mentioning the name Ramban/Nachmanides in his description In the first half of the 16th century there are already signs of the fictitious connection with the Ramban being circulated.
15th-16th century synagogue
According to Jewish educator Larry Domnitch, after a period of steady growth of the Jewish community, which was centered on the synagogue and yeshiva established by Nachmanides, around the year 1400 the synagogue was relocated further north, away from its initial location on Mount Zion.
A. David and others write that the synagogue established soon after 1400 was destroyed in 1474, then rebuilt in 1475. Ovadiah of Bertinoro, who arrives in Jerusalem in 1488, leaves a description of the synagogue, followed by one by Moses Bassola who visits in the early 1520s.