Contesting religious space: spatiality, religion, and identity-making among Jews in Trondheim

Building on current research into space and religion, this article explores how religious identity is negotiated in the small Modern Orthodox Jewish community in the Norwegian city of Trondheim. The focus is on Jews who question the synagogue as an Orthodox site with its strict definitions of who has access to the religious services and sections of the synagogue, which reflects the ongoing construction of Jewish identity among Jews in Trondheim. Three significant factors constitute this negotiation: loyalty towards the first generations of Jewish immigrants who established the Orthodox tradition in Trondheim and founded an Orthodox congregation, the desire to create a congregation that lives up to the contemporary ideal of gender equality, the desire to be affiliated with a congregation for those who identify as Jews. This article argues that the way religious space is contested has much to say about the way Jewish identity is currently understood in the Nordic countries. A focus on space and place also proves useful when analysing religious identity in Europe more generally.