Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Dresden Gets First Town Rabbi Since 1938

The Jewish community of Dresden is installing its first hometown rabbi since 1938.

Alexander Nachama, 29, is to be formally inaugurated this Sabbath as rabbi of the new synagogue in Dresden, which is in eastern Germany. Dresden’s Semper-Synagogue was destroyed during the Kristallnacht pogrom in 1938. The new synagogue was dedicated at the original site in 2001.

Previously, Dresden was served by Rabbi Salomon Almekias-Siegl, who rotated between three communities before retiring in 2011.

Nachama, who also is a cantor, was ordained earlier this month in Erfurt after completing his rabbinical studies at the Abraham Geiger College in Potsdam. He is pursuing a master’s degree in Jewish studies, history and culture at the University of Potsdam.

Nechama’s late paternal grandfather, Estrongo Nachama, survived Auschwitz and became chief cantor for Berlin’s Jewish community. The rabbi’s father, Andreas Nachama, is also a rabbi and serves as spiritual leader of Berlin’s Hüttenweg synagogue.

Alexander Nachama, who began serving the Dresden Jewish community in 2012, told the DPA press agency that he hopes to inspire members to become more involved.

Dresden’s prewar Jewish community numbered more than 5,000; there were only 41 Jews there in the immediate postwar years. With the influx of Russian-speaking Jews since 1990, the Jewish community in Dresden has grown to 720 from 61 in 1990.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.