SYNAGOGUE (Gr. synagoge, place of assembly). A Jewish institution for the reading and exposition of the Holy Scriptures.

It originated perhaps as early as the Babylonian exile. By NT times the synagogue was a firmly established institution among the Jews.

In the first Christian century synagogues could be found everywhere in the Hellenistic world where there were sufficient Jews to maintain one.

In large Jewish centers there might be numbers of them.

The chief purpose of the synagogue was not public worship, but instruction in the Holy Scriptures

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