is on the eastern side. But this rule, too, is often ignored under the stress of architectural difficulties.
Jewish tradition has a great deal to say about a body called “the great synagogue,” which is supposed to have been the supreme religious authority from the cessation of prophecy to the time of the high priest Simeon the Just, and is even said to have fixed the Old Testament canon (cf. v. 3 seq.). But Kuenen in his essay “Over de Mannen der Groote Synagoge” (Verslagen of the Amsterdam Academy, 1876) has powerfully argued that these traditions are fiction, and that the name keneseth haggădōla originally denoted, not a standing authority, but the great convocation of Neh. viii.-x. Some more recent scholars are, however, more willing to attach credence to the older tradition.
Compare, in general, Schürer, Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes, § 27, where the older literature is catalogued. For some unconventional views the reader may refer to M. Friedländer, Synagoge und Kirche in ihren Anfängen (Berlin, 1908). For the usages of the synagogue in more recent times, see Buxtorf, Synagoga judaica (Basel, 1641). On the history of synagogue services the works of Zunz are the chief authorities; there is also a good article on Liturgy in the Jewish Encyclopedia. Useful summaries in English are to be found in Dembitz, Jewish Services in Synagogue and Home (Philadelphia, 1898); and Oesterley and Box, The Religion and Worship of the Synagogue (London, 1907). The article “Synagogue” in the Jewish Encyclopedia is illustrated with numerous pictures of buildings and plans.
SYNAGOGUE, UNITED, an organization of London Jews, founded, with the sanction of an act of parliament, in 1870. It is confined, in its direct work, to the metropolis, but it exercises, indirectly, considerable influence over the Jews of the British Empire. It is governed by an elected council representing the constituent congregations. In religious and ritual matters it is under the jurisdiction of the chief rabbi, who is, to a certain extent, recognized throughout the empire. The president of the United Synagogue in 1910 was Lord Rothschild. Besides providing the worship of some twenty congregations, the United Synagogue directs and supports educational and charitable work. The title “chief rabbi” is not found in the pre-expulsion records, though, before the Jews were banished in 1290, there was an omcial named “ presbyter omniuni judaeorum Angliae.” The functions of this official cannot be proved to have been ecclesiastical. The title “chief rabbi” has become well known through the eminence of recent occupants of the position such as Solomon Hirschell (1762-1842). He was succeeded by Dr Nathan Marcus Adler (1803-1890), who was followed by his son, Hermann Adler, who raised the position to one of much dignity and importance. Dr Hermann Adler was born in Hanover in 1839, graduated at Leipzig, and received honorary degrees from Scotch and English universities, including Oxford. In 1909 he received the order of M.V.O. Dr Adler was elected chief rabbi in 1891. Besides several essays in the Nineteenth Century, Dr Adler has written extensively on topics of Anglo-Jewish History and published two volumes of sermons.
SYNANTHY (Gr. σύν, with, and ἄνθος, a flower), a botanical term for the adhesion of two or more flowers.
SYNAXARIUM (Gr. συναξάριον, from συνάγειν, to bring together), the name given in the Greek Church to a compilation corresponding very closely to the martyrology (q.v.) of the Roman Church. There are two kinds of synaxaria — simple synaxaria, which are merely lists of the saints arranged in the order of their anniversaries, e.g. the calendar of Morcelli; and historical synaxaria, which give biographical notices besides, e.g. the menology of Basil and the synaxarium of Sirmond. The notices given in the historical synaxaria are summaries of those in the great menologies, or collections of lives of saints, for the twelve months of the year. The oldest historical synaxaria apparently go back to the tenth century. The heterodox Eastern churches also have their synaxaria.
The publication of the Arabic text of the synaxarium of the Church of Alexandria was started simultaneously by J. Forget in the Corp. script. orient, and by R. Basset in the Patrologia orient., and that of the Ethiopian synaxarium was begun by I. Guidi in the Patrologia orient. The Armenian synaxarium, called the synaxarium of Ter Israël was published at Constantinople in 1834.
See S. A. Morcelli, Kalendarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae (Rome, 1788); H. Delehaye, “Le Synaxaire de Sirmond,” in Analecta bollandiana, xiv. 396-434, where the terminology is explained; idem, Synaxarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae e codice Sirmondiano (Brussels, 1902), forming the volume Propylaeum ad acta sanctorum novembris.
SYNCELLUS, a hybrid word (Gr. σύν, Lat. cello),[1] meaning literally “one who shares his cell with another.” In ecclesiastical usage it refers to the very early custom of a priest or deacon living continually with a bishop, propter testimonium ecclesiasticum; thus Leo III. speaks of Augustine as having been the syncellus of Gregory the Great. The term came into use in the Eastern Church, where the syncelli were the chaplains of metropolitans and patriarchs. At Constantinople they formed a corporation, and the protosyncellus took precedence of metropolitans and ranked next to the patriarch, to whose office he generally succeeded.
SYNCOPE (Gr. συγκοπή, a cutting up or short, from κόπτειν, to cut), a term used in grammar for the elision of a letter or syllable in the middle of a word (e.g. “ne'er” for “never”); and in medicine for the condition of fainting or shock (q.v.); and so occasionally in a general sense for a suspension or cessation of function. “Syncopate” and “syncopation” are analogous derivatives; and in music a syncopation is the rhythmic method of tying (A) two beats of the same note into one tone in such a way as to displace the accent.
SYNCRETISM (Gr. συγκρητισμός, from σύν and κεράννυμι, mingle or blend, or, according to Plutarch, from σύν and κρητίζειν, to combine against a common enemy after the manner of the cities of Crete), the act or system of blending, combining or reconciling inharmonious elements. The term is used technically in politics, as by Plutarch, of those who agree to forget dissensions and to unite in the face of common danger, as the Cretans were said to have done; in philosophy, of the efforts of Cardinal Bessarion and others in the 16th century to reconcile the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle; and in theology, of a plan to harmonize the hostile factions of the Church in the 17th century, advocated by Georg Calixtus, a Lutheran professor of theology at Helmstadt. Its most frequent use, however, is in connexion with the religious development of antiquity, when it denotes the tendency, especially prominent from the 2nd to the 4th centuries of the Christian era, to simplify and unify the various pagan religions. During this period, as a result of the intimate knowledge of the world's religions made possible by the gathering of every known cult of importance into the religious system of the Roman Empire, belief in the identity of many deities which resembled each other, and indeed in the essential identity of all, received a special impulse. Not only were various forms of the same deity, such as, for example, Jupiter Capitolinus and Jupiter Latiaris, recognized as being really the same under different aspects, but even the gods of different nations were seen to be manifestations of a single great being. Roman Jupiter, Greek Zeus, Persian Mithras and Phrygian Attis were one. The Great Mother, Isis, Ceres, Demeter, Ops, Rhea, Tellus, were the same great mother deity under different masks (see Great Mother of the Gods). Venus and Cupid, Aphrodite and Adonis, the Great Mother and Attis, Astarte and Baal, Demeter and Dionysus, Isis and Serapis, were essentially the same pair. Syncretism even went so far as to blend the deities of paganism and Christianity. Christ was compared with Attis and Mithras, Isis with the Virgin Mary, &c. Isis, perhaps more than any other deity, came to be regarded as the great maternal goddess of the universe whose essence was worshipped under many different names. This fact, with the spirit of syncretism in general, is well illustrated by Apuleius (Metamorph. xi. 2 and 5). Lucius invokes Isis: “Queen of Heaven, whether thou art the genial Ceres, the prime parent of fruits, who, joyous at the discovery of thy daughter, didst banish the savage nutriment of the ancient acorn, and, pointing out a better food, dost now till the Eleusinian soil; or whether thou art celestial Venus, who, in the first origin of things, didst
- ↑ Apollinaris Sidonius uses the pure Latin term concellus.
