From Here to LA

I have just discovered that the Karaite Kenesa in Kyiv (now the House of Actors, see June 21st post) was in fact designed by one of the city's greatest architects, Vladislav Gorodetsky, born to a Polish-Ukrainian family in 1863, who also built the wildly eccentric ''House of Chimeras'' here, which will be food for a future posting.

As you can see from the picture (courtesy of WikiCommons) the Kenesa originally had a dome - this was lost or destroyed presumably during WWII, but indicates that the design of the building was almost certainly inspired by the Gur-e Amir mausoleum of Tamerlaine in Samarkand.

I have come across the Karaites twice before: once in the Crimea, whence they originate, and which still has a few traces of them, notably some sombre cemeteries. Some say they are descendants of the Khazars, the only state ever known to have converted to Judaism (about a thousand years ago). My second encounter was at the other end of Europe in Lithuania - at one stage the Lithuanian empire stretched all the way to the Black Sea and the King ordered a number of Karaites to come to his castle at Trakai and form his personal bodyguard. The kenesa at Trakai exists and still functions as such. I attended a Friday night service there and noted its close correspondence to an orthodox Jewish service. The main religious difference between Karaites and Jews is the fundamentalist approach of the former to the Bible, denying any authority to the Talmud or later Rabbinic interpretations. When I told the guy leading the service that I was Jewish he replied 'Oh yes, you guys are a bit like us'. He also informed me that these days the world centre for Karaites is Los Angeles, which I suppose is a step up from Trakai, Bakhchisaray or even Kyiv.

I asked how the Karaites were able to survive the Nazi occupation of the country in WWII. I was told the following remarkable tale:

The Germans weren't sure whether the Karaites qualified as Semites or not. The local Jews however pointed out centuries of Rabbinical decisions which stated that the Karaites were not acceptable in Jewish law for marriage to Jews, as they came of a different race. The Nazis accepted this - if the Jews would have nothing to do with them on racial grounds, then the Karaites could not be Jewish. In this way, although the Jews of Lithuania realised they themselves were doomed, they were able to save their distant 'cousins'.