This program explores the remarkable, often overlooked history of the relationship between George Washington and early American Jewish communities, including the deep and meaningful ties between Jewish life and the American South, a connection that shaped much of our region’s early Jewish history.
For those of us connected to Sephardic tradition, this history has special resonance. Savannah’s Jewish congregation, the same one George Washington wrote to in 1790, was founded in 1733 by a group of settlers who were largely Sephardic, including Dr. Samuel Nunes, a physician who had fled the Portuguese Inquisition. That congregation remains the oldest Jewish community in the American South.
Rabbi Soloveichik currently leads Congregation Shearith Israel (the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue) in NYC; he succeeded Rabbi Marc Angel, a good friend over the decades to Congregation Or VeShalom.
HAMSA