Parodos Kondylaki
73100 Hania
Greece
- Heritage
- Human rights
- Religion
- Youth and education
Etz Hayyim is a not-for-profit organisation with an international 12-member Board of Trustees and a staff of five (one full-time position), complimented by volunteers, among them successive long-term volunteers (one year each) from the Austrian organisation Gedenkdienst (i.e., the Holocaust Memorial Service).
Etz Hayyim’s operating budget comprises about EUR 100,000 annually. Funding comes from grants (foundations, EU programs, embassies in Greece) and private donations; it does not receive funds from Greek public sources or any corporations.
Etz Hayyim organises concrete projects in the fields of history, culture and heritage (exhibitions and participatory art projects, publications, guided tours, concerts etc.); these projects are based on its ongoing research and educational programmes. Projects are organised with local (e.g. Young Citizens of the World, Chania) and international partners (e.g. the Heritage Contact Zone consortium; https://heritagecontactzone.com/). Etz Hayyim also organises seminars for pupils and educators on Cretan Jewish history, which also address interreligious questions.
Etz Hayyim Synagogue is the last remaining witness to 2,300 years of Jewish history on Crete and a testimony to the island’s multi-faith past at the intersection between Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
Our projects and daily practices aim at making a contribution towards a more nuanced and inclusive understanding of the multivocal past and present of the Eastern Mediterranean:
Etz Hayyim is, on the one hand, an active synagogue which is open to everyone thus reviving the inclusive approach of the Ancient synagogue of the Hellenistic period. On the other hand, our historical, cultural and educational activities focus on the local and general Greek public in an attempt to broaden the narrative about Greek history and self-perception by highlighting Greece’s multicultural past in its Mediterranean setting.
At the same time, our activities and projects also aim at our many international visitors (about 30,000 per year), Jewish and non-Jewish alike, to further knowledge about and appreciation for the long and rich history of the Greek Jewish communities, which also most Jewish visitors are unaware of. The story of these native, Greek-speaking Jews, the Romaniotes, is an example of cross-cultural exchange and mutual cultural enrichment throughout the history of the Mediterranean. This story can contribute to promoting mutual appreciation, respect and understanding in today’s increasingly polarized and divided world.
Etz Hayyim’s founding director defined it as a “place of prayer, recollection and reconciliation.” The site functions as an inclusive religious space, a historic site, a venue for cultural events and a research and educational institution. Activities include inter-religious/inter-faith projects, concerts, readings and lectures reflecting the Eastern Mediterranean heritage, guided tours for about 30,000 visitors every year, and exhibitions on intercultural themes and (Cretan) Jewish history, as well as lectures for the general public and seminars for local schools.
Two examples of our most recent projects illustrate how Etz Hayyim explores and adds an alternative voice to the understanding of the history and present-day society of Hania and Greece:
In October 2019, Etz Hayyim hosted the exhibition “Parallel Points of View” as part of the EU program Heritage Contact Zone (HCZ) project. The exhibition (https://heritagecontactzone.com/hania) presented ten alternative perspectives on the history and society of Crete ranging from the mediaeval Emirate of Crete, the Ottoman period and today’s Muslim presence to Romaniote and Sephardi Jewish views, and a women’s perspective along with views from the Roma, LGBTQ+, expatriate and refugee communities. The exhibition was co-created by a curating artist in participatory workshops with local residents representing those groups.
In January 2021, Etz Hayyim published a map for a walking tour through the historic Jewish quarter of Hania (in view of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, we added an online virtual tour version of the walking tour: http://www.etz-hayyim-hania.org/the-jews-of-crete/hania-jewish-quarter-…). The map gives new, more tangible meaning to the name “Evraïkí”, which is still applied today to the area around Etz Hayyim Synagogue, and is used in everyday parlance, albeit with erased, or very little, meaning or connotation for locals. There is no memory of what life in this centuries-old Jewish neighborhood was like, or a sense of what the historic quarter could mean for today’s Hania. In keeping with the participatory character of the HCZ project, we added an interactive element to the Evraiki map: the “Mapping Hania” project invites the wider public to share their personal mental map of the city and will eventually create a multilayered mosaic of personal maps of the town and potentially start a conversation of what we do, could or maybe should not miss to see.
We feel that we can contribute to the Network by both sharing our previous experiences and by bringing these experiences and tested methods to the table for developing new collaborative projects with other Network members in Greece:
As an institution we promote religious tolerance by providing an open and welcoming space for meeting and exchange, by teaching about the common roots and values of the three monotheistic religions, and by promoting a multicultural and multivocal approach for viewing the past and present. We are actively engaged in public humanities projects and have worked with both groups of youth and members of the general public.
Our experience in working with contested heritage and promoting a more inclusive narrative about Greece’s past and present society, along with our daily practice as an inclusive space and a contact zone, can serve as an interesting example and learning opportunity for other small or emerging heritage organisations in Greece, facing similar challenges as we do.
Equally, we have experience with participatory arts projects as a form of citizen engagement and educational outreach programmes, which promote an inclusive view both of religions and society in general. Insights and conclusions from this experience of working with contested heritage and various forms of heritage presentation were put together in a Toolkit by the Heritage Contact Zone consortium (https://heritagecontactzone.com/toolkit/), in which Etz Hayyim is a partner.
We feel that our work and vision fit well with those of the Anna Lindh Foundation and therefore hope to connect with like-minded institutions in order to learn from other ALF Network members, find new potential collaborators, and promote agendas of social inclusion and historical awareness.
We feel that we particularly fit within the ALF priorities pertaining to Human Rights/Vulnerable Social Groups, Research, and Arts and Culture. To this end, we are concerned with:
a. public memory and perceptions of history beyond the ones established traditionally in the process of nation-state making (i.e., the mono-cultural national identity),
b. promoting and fostering of the history and current trajectories of minority groups/collectivities in Greek society, with Jewish identity as our model case study, albeit embracing all pertinent groups or cultures. For us, it is of the utmost importance to promote unexplored, silenced, or erased histories of groups/collectivities within the context of the Greek nation-state process, as well as the political/historical conditions in which the above took place, hence to provide a rightful place for them in the Greek (and European) public sphere,
c. high-level scholarly research in order to establish Etz Hayyim as an academic point of reference for the promotion of a more comprehensive perception of history, and for social awareness of less-dominant/less-hegemonic worldviews,
d. local and national impact though applied projects: educational outreach in local schools, apprenticeships (e.g. for university students), local and international volunteer programs, promotion and institutionalization of events pertaining to Shoah memory, co-creative participatory arts projects etc.