A rabbi is not a priest, but a professional teacher of religion. He directs the ritual in the synagogue, he is in charge of religious questions and is the leader of the community. In addition to religion, he is also involved in guiding the community’s life. The last rabbi of the functioning synagogue was Dr Emil Róth, who spread Zionist ideas among the young. He was deported with his family in 1944.
In the testimony linked to this place the interviewee also speaks about Zionism. It is the Jewish national movement and ideology that started in the second half of the 19th century, with the aim of establishing and restoring a Jewish state in the territory of historic Israel. Rabbi Róth was also a Zionist, and organised meetings for young people to discuss the same. Edit thinks that these conversations played a great part in the fact that several young people from Győr moved to Israel before the war, where they survived the years of the Holocaust.