While for years, the congregation's religious services included a blend of Christian and Jewish traditions, in 2005, under its leader of many years, Rabbi Boris "Dov" Kaufman, it underwent a transformation to become a "strictly Jewish" synagogue without any Christian influence.

In 2010, The Christian Science Monitor reported that "nowhere are the ties between Jews and non-Jews here clearer than in Birobidzhan's tiny second synagogue, located on the outskirts of the city.

"[5] The Monitor went on to convey a scene to back-up its claim: It is Sabbath and it could be a 19th-century Jewish village were it not for the phone in the corner.

A dozen mostly middle-aged parishioners sit on benches, a simple curtain separating men from women.

The rabbi, Dov Kofman, an affable man who walks with a cane, says when the ceremony is over: "I love Israel, my son is now there serving in the army, but this is my fatherland."