"The whole thing is rotten," said Morris Weiser, as he tapped his cane on the vaulted ceiling of the old and decaying synagogue in New York's lower east side. Morris Weiser was among the few Jews who survived the Janowska concentration camp in Poland, and now, a retired butcher in his seventies, his one remaining passion is to keep alive the Chasam Sopher synagogue. The synagogue has few Sabbath worshipers now, but Morris has put all of his savings into this place, sustains it by his constant effort, keeps it barely alive by the sheer force of his will. "When God saved me from Hitler," he said, "I promised that in any country I come I will do something for God."

The synagogue, like the tenements which fill the neighborhood in which it stands, is marked by peeling paint, deteriorating floo…