Liubarto St. 6

A committee for the accumulation of funds for the construction of Vilnius kenesa was founded on the initiative of the cleric Feliksas Maleckis and following the approval of the governor of the region. The building fund began to accumulate when funds from both local and other communities started to flow in 1904.

F. Maleckis created the committee for the building of the kenesa in 1908, which helped to get a lot for the building of a brick kenesa and a wooden house for educational purposes in Žvėrynas district a year later. The building works of a brick sanctuary of the Moor style began under the engineer M. Prozorovas' project in 1911. The foundation stone of the kenesa was consecrated on October 30 th of the same year. Following the decision of the city municipality the street facing the facade of the kenesa obtained the name of Karaimų (The Karaim street).

Unfortunately, Word War I interrupted the building works as well as the functioning of the committee. The majority of the Karaims, as well as other citizens of Lithuania, saving themselves from threatening famine and the war front left Trakai and Vilnius for the Crimea. Making use of the first possibility they returned to Lithuania in 1920 confirming that during five hundred years they had accustomed to consider Lithuania their homeland.

A new committee for the building of the kenesa, chaired by M. Durunča, was elected in 1921. The funds allocated by the Karaim communities of other countries, the money of local people and the financial aid of the state helped to complete the works in two years.

The brothers J. and R. Lopatos put their efforts and funds to build a wooden house for educational purposes of the community near the kenesa at the same time.

A ceremonious consecration and opening of the kenesa of Vilnius Karaims took place on September 9 th 1923 . F.Maleckis, the leader of the Karaim religious community of Vilnius, carried the ceremony.

The kenesa as well as many other cult buildings of Vilnius was closed after Word War II.

The Karaims entered their former sanctuary on March 9 th 1989 again after many years had passed. The gilded altar of the temple that was made of cypress wood had disappeared. No one has managed to trace it until now. Persian carpets, analoys (tables for service-books and other articles) together with their cloths, altar curtains, altar and side lamps, two chandeliers wooden benches disappeared too.

The chandeliers that hang in the kenesa today were given as a present by the Karaims of Haličas who managed to unhung them before their kenesa was demolished. They were restored by artists of the centre for the restoration of the art articles of the Ministry of Culture and Education.

The senior cleric Mykolas Firkovičius contributed a lot to the revival of the Karaim kenesa.

Ina Lavrinovič