770 Eastern Parkway

Building in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, used since 1940 as the headquarters and central synagogue of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement

770 Eastern Parkway
Address	770 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, New York (with the adjoining 784–788 Eastern Parkway)
Location	Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York City, United States
Building type	Built as a house and doctor's clinic; used as offices, residence and synagogue
Owner	Agudas Chasidei Chabad (770); Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch (784–788)
Opened	Completed 1936; acquired by Agudas Chasidei Chabad 1940
Website	chabad.org (movement website)

770 Eastern Parkway, usually called "770", is a brick building on Eastern Parkway in the Crown Heights district of Brooklyn, New York. Since 1940 it has served as the headquarters of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement. It was the home and office of Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, and later the seat of his son-in-law and successor Menachem Mendel Schneerson.

The building is owned by Agudas Chasidei Chabad, a religious corporation formed in July 1940. The adjoining property at 784–788 Eastern Parkway, which holds the main part of the synagogue, is owned by Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch. Since the Rebbe's death in 1994 control of the synagogue has been contested in the New York courts between these corporations and the synagogue's gabbaim (managers).

The building's three-gabled façade has been reproduced in dozens of Chabad centres around the world.

History

Construction (1930s)

The double lot was bought in 1930 by R.H.K. Holding Co., a company owned by the physician Dr S. Robert Kahn. A contemporary building notice described "Number 770-8 Eastern Parkway., 3-story brick, doctor's office, garage and 1-family, 54×74; cost, $45,000", with E. Kline as architect. The architect, Edwin Kline, was known for Tudor-style houses in New York's suburbs. According to the Forward, the house and clinic were completed in 1936 and Kline had to sue Kahn to get paid in full. Court and newspaper records cited by the Forward show that Kahn lost his medical licence in 1937 and pleaded guilty to tax evasion in 1939. The bank repossessed the property.

Editor's note: the construction date is not settled in the sources consulted. The Forward and Cabinet give 1936; a local-history article on CrownHeights.info describes the building around 1940 as "six years after its construction", which would put completion around 1934. Cabinet spells the architect's forename "Edward"; the Forward and CrownHeights.info give "Edwin".

Headquarters of the sixth Rebbe (1940–1950)

Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn arrived in the United States in mid-March 1940. In July 1940 Agudas Chasidei Chabad was incorporated and acquired 770 Eastern Parkway. The Rebbe and his family lived there for the rest of his life. The Forward dates the purchase to August 1940. It says the building was chosen because the Rebbe used a wheelchair and the house had a lift, and because of the prestige of the Eastern Parkway address. Citing Chaim Miller's biography of Schneerson, it adds that Jewish neighbours opposed the sale for fear that Hasidim would lower property values. The ground-floor clinic became a synagogue. Henry Goldschmidt describes the house, "an imposing brick mansion at 770 Eastern Parkway, between Kingston and Brooklyn Avenues", as the community's "spiritual and political center" since 1940. The adjoining buildings at 784–788 became part of the complex in 1942.

Under Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1950–1994)

After Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn died in 1950, his son-in-law Menachem Mendel Schneerson took over the leadership of the movement and ran it from 770. The main building has been extended but is otherwise largely unchanged. Agudas Chasidei Chabad maintains the building as headquarters and synagogue and also houses the movement's library there.

In the 1980s the library at 770 was the subject of Agudas Chasidei Chabad of United States v. Gourary (see Schneerson library case). Barry Gourary, a grandson of the sixth Rebbe, and his mother claimed the books as an inheritance. In January 1987 the federal district court in Brooklyn ruled that the library belonged to Agudas Chasidei Chabad "for the benefit of the community", and the Second Circuit affirmed in November 1987.

The number has taken on religious meaning among Lubavitchers. The Forward reports that the numerical value of 770 equals that of the Hebrew phrase for "House of the Messiah".

Since 1994

After Menachem Mendel Schneerson died in 1994, worshippers who held that he could be publicly called the Messiah gained effective control of the main synagogue at 784–788. In 1996 the gabbaim incorporated Congregation Lubavitch, Inc. Writing in 2003, Sue Fishkoff reported that a yechi adoneinu banner (a messianic acclamation of the Rebbe) hung above the table where Schneerson used to sit, and that the synagogue was "firmly in Moshichist hands". For the movement's internal debate, see Chabad messianism.

Litigation over the synagogue

This section reports court records and the parties' sworn statements only.

• Plaque and title (2004–2009). In 1994 Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch fixed a plaque honouring Menachem Mendel Schneerson to the wall of 784–788. Its inscription was "offensive to some members of the Lubavitch community for religious reasons". On 5 November 2004 three individuals, Mendel Sharf, Yaacov Thaler and Bentzion Frishman, allegedly prised it off the wall, and Merkos and Agudas Chasidei Chabad sued. Congregation Lubavitch, Inc., formed in 1996 by the gabbaim, intervened in the case. In an order of 19 June 2006, Justice Ira Harkavy of the Supreme Court, Kings County, declared that Agudas owned 770 and Merkos owned 784–788, and he granted a permanent injunction. On 3 February 2009 the Appellate Division affirmed the declaration of title. It struck out the injunction against Congregation Lubavitch, Inc., finding "no evidence linking CLI with any of these acts of vandalism". It also noted that a doctrinal dispute did not stop the court from deciding title on neutral principles of law. In an affidavit, the lead gabbai, Zalman Lipskier, stated that "the real issue in dispute involves conflicting views on how our faith views the passing of the Grand Rebbe Schneerson and whether or not at this time he may be referred to publicly as the Messiah."
• Ejectment of Congregation Lubavitch, Inc. (2007–2009). After a non-jury trial before Justice Harkavy, a judgment of 27 December 2007 ejected Congregation Lubavitch, Inc. from 770 and 784–788. On 3 February 2009 the Appellate Division, Second Department, affirmed the ejectment. It deleted the references to the congregation and the gabbaim, because neither was a party to the action.
• Summary proceedings (2011–2024). Agudas Chasidei Chabad and Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch brought licensee ("squatter") proceedings in the Civil Court, Kings County, under index numbers from 2011. On 6 January 2022 Judge Harriet L. Thompson entered judgments of possession. On 19 January 2024 the Appellate Term, Second Department, vacated the judgments against Congregation Lubavitch, Inc., on res judicata grounds, and against two named unincorporated associations. It affirmed them against the gabbaim Zalman Lipskier and Avrohom Holtzberg and the caretaker Sholom Ber Kievman, and it affirmed possession of an office at 302–304 Kingston Avenue. The court noted that a beis din had ruled that gabbaim elected before 1995 could keep leading services, and it said that this question was not before it. It recorded the petitioners' statement that "any person who acts with proper decorum will be allowed to worship at the Synagogue".

Editor's note: later proceedings, including any appeal from the 2024 decision and enforcement, could not be confirmed from court records for this draft. The reports found came from outlets aligned with one side of the dispute and are not cited.

Replicas

The first building modelled on 770 was a 1984 memorial at UCLA. It was built after the university's first Chabad House burned down in a fire that killed three students. A nearly exact copy followed in Kfar Chabad, Israel, three years later, built on the Rebbe's instructions. Others include buildings in Milan (1994), São Paulo, Los Angeles, New Jersey and near Montreal. In 2022 Cabinet counted "thirty-five-and-counting" such buildings, drawing on the photographers Andrea Robbins and Max Becher, whose 2005–2014 project set out to document all of them.

The Forward quoted the sociologist Samuel Heilman as calling the building "an icon that stands for a missing person". The movement's media director, Motti Seligson, rejected that reading; he said the replicas "symbolize Ahavat Yisrael", the love of one's fellow Jews.

See also

• Agudas Chasidei Chabad
• Merkos L'Inyonei Chinuch
• Chabad messianism
• Chabad House
• Schneerson library case
• Crown Heights riot
• The Rebbe: The Life and Afterlife of Menachem Mendel Schneerson

External links

• Chabad.org (movement website)