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The Paradesi Synagogue is the oldest active synagogue in the Commonwealth of Nations,〔(The Paradesi Synagogue, Cochin, India ). Database of Jewish Communities, Museum of the Jewish People. Accessed online 13 February 2007.〕 located in Kochi, Kerala, in South India. Constructed in 1567, it is one of seven synagogues of the Malabar Yehudan or Yehudan Mappila people or ''Cochin Jewish'' community in the Kingdom of Cochin. ''Paradesi'' is a word used in several Indian languages, and the literal meaning of the term is "foreigners", applied to the synagogue because it was built by Sephardic or Spanish-speaking Jews, some of them from families exiled in Aleppo, Safed and other West Asian localities. It is also referred to as the Cochin Jewish Synagogue or the Mattancherry Synagogue. The synagogue is located in the quarter of Old Cochin known as Jew Town,〔 and is the only one of the seven synagogues in the area still in use. The complex has four buildings. It was built adjacent to the Mattancherry Palace temple on the land given to the ''Malabari Yehuden'' or " Yehuden Mappila" community by the Raja of Kochi, Rama Varma. The Mattancherry Palace temple and the Mattancherry synagogue share a common wall. ==History== The Malabari Jews or Yehudan Mappilar (also known as Cochin Jews or Yehudan Mappila ) formed a prosperous trading community of Kerala, and they controlled a major portion of world wide spice trade. In 1568, the Jews of Kerala constructed the Paradesi Synagogue adjacent to Mattancherry Palace, Cochin, now part of the Indian city of Ernakulam, on land given to them by the Raja of Kochi. The original synagogue was built in the 4th century in Kodungallur (Cranganore) when the Jews had a mercantile role in the South Indian region (now called Kerala) along the Malabar coast. When the community moved to Kochi in the 14th century, it built a new synagogue there. The Malabari Jews' or Yehudan Mappila first synagogue in Cochin was destroyed in the 16th century by the Portuguese persecution of the Jews and Nasrani or Suriyani Mappila or Syriac (Aramaic) Mappila people. The second, built under the protection of the Raja, in Mattancherry, in 1558, during the Portuguese rule of Cochin, is the present synagogue, which is still in use for worship and can attract a ''minyan.'' It is called ''Paradesi'' synagogue because it was built by Spanish speaking Jews; this contributed to the informal name: ''paradesi'' synagogue or "foreign" synagogue." In addition, a new Jewish group had immigrated to Kochi, Sephardim from the Iberian Peninsula. They and the Malabari Jews or Yehudan Mappila shared many aspects of their religion, and the newcomers learned the Judeo-Malayalam dialect, but the Sephardim also retained their own culture and Spanish language at least for three centuries. By 1660 the Dutch ruled the Kochi area, calling it Dutch Malabar. In later years, the Paradesi Synagogue was used primarily by the Sephardim (who were also referred to as Paradesi) and their descendants, and later European exiled Jews. The Parade''si Synagogue had three classes of members: *''White Jews'' were full members. The White Jews, or Paradesi Jews, were the recent descendants of Sephardim from Spain and the Netherlands. *''Black Jews,'' or Malabari Jews, were allowed to worship but were not admitted to full membership. These Cochin Jews were the original Jewish settlers of Cochin. *''Meshuchrarim'', a group of freed slaves and their descendants brought by the Sepahardim, they had no communal rights and no synagogue of their own. They sat on the floor or on the steps outside. In the first half of the 20th century, Abraham Barak Salem, a meshuchrar, successfully campaigned against this discrimination. In 1968, the 400th anniversary of the synagogue was celebrated in a ceremony attended by Indira Gandhi, the Indian Prime Minister. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Paradesi Synagogue」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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