Moscow Choral Synagogue

The Moscow Choral Synagogue is the main synagogue of Moscow, on Bolshoy Spasoglinishchevsky Lane in Kitay-Gorod. Construction began in 1886, but Tsar Alexander III ordered the nearly finished building sealed in 1892 because its striking dome was felt to resemble a church too closely. Only after the 1905 revolution and the granting of religious freedoms did the synagogue open in 1906. Architect Semyon Eibuschitz designed a monumental eclectic-historicist structure with a large dome above the central hall. During Soviet times it remained one of the few active synagogues, and it was thoroughly restored in the 1990s. Today it is again a centre of Jewish life in Moscow, with services, a library, and a small museum on Moscow's Jewish history. Visitors are welcome and men are offered a kippah at the entrance.