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ABOUT OUR CONGREGATION
Congregation Beth Torah was established in 1957 to serve the needs of the growing Jewish Syrian Sephardic Ocean Parkway community in Brooklyn, New York. In around 1967 plans were finalized for the construction of the building now standing at 1061 Ocean Parkway, and in 1969 the building was completed and with it a new spiritual home for what would become a neighborhood of nearly 600 community families. The Beth Torah building received architectural acclaim. To this very day, Beth Torah's 50-ear-old structure has maintained its timeless, formidable and sturdy design, drawing the wonder of its congregants each and every time they enter the building and its Main Sanctuary.
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Beth Torah enjoyed steady growth under the past spiritual guidance of Rabbi Z. Lieberman, and the leadership of its early founders and hazzan Isaac Cabasso. During the late '70s and early '80s, Beth Torah expanded its services to oiffer an early minyan, a youth minyan and a young adult minyan, followed by another growth spurt in the '90s with the welcoming of our hazzan world-renown Yehezqel Zion, the acquisition of the building on the corner of Ocean Parkway and Avenue K known then as the "Club 1000" and yet another new program geared towards "fathers and sons." We continue to thrive under the leadership of our current Rabbi Yehuda Ari Azancot.
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In 2004, in part because of the growing young adult and youth populations- today attracting hundreds of children, teens and young adults each week- Beth Torah expanded its structure for the first time since its construction with the building of an extension on a parcel of land it had acquired on its north side.
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Today, our synagogue is home to almost 600 families and is considered a major community institution, opening its doors regularly for services, community events, fundraisers, educational events and family and community celebrations, including several dozens of catered events each year. Beth Torah hosts 9 weekly Shabbat minyanim and programs hosting over 1,000 worshippers each week and targeting childrn as young as 4 years old with our enriching Shabbat programs. Beth Torah is unique in its graceful balance of tradition and history with youth, growth and engaging an ever-growing and evermore developing community. Beth Torah boasts the remarkable ability to hold together, in prayer and community activity, family members of 4 or even 5 generations.