I go to lots of functions and community meetings.

But none with the anticipation and sense of history that I brought to the dedication of the Ohr Hamizrach synagogue.

For 2700 years, there was a Jewish community in Persia/Iran. The Iranian revolution of 1979 prompted an exodus.

The late Rabbi Herman Neuberger was instrumental in bringing (sometimes smuggling) people to freedom. Thus, Baltimore has one of a handful of Iranian Jewish communities in this country.

Today, their synagogue on Park Heights Avenue was dedicated.

“We always have a beautiful shul in Iran,” a rabbi told the congregation.

The exterior is striking – pinkish stone with Oriental/Iranian design work and six-pointed Jewish stars..

By contrast, the first synagogue built in Baltimore, on Lloyd Street in East Baltimore in 1845, has no outward indication of its use.

Perhaps my ancestors attended similar ceremonies when the German and Russian Jewish communities reached a similar critical mass.

As a rabbi said today: “This is a public proclamation that a tribe of the Jewish people has not become extinct.”