Shalom Morris

"As I took in the smell of the salty sea water, and heard it lap against the canal walls, I found myself imagining what the bustling city must have been like 500 years ago."

"Their route to Israel took them via Egypt where political conflicts in the eastern Mediterranean required them to stay in Alexandria for two months."

"If Shylock was real, he likely was a former converso as were so many of Venice’s actual Jewish merchants."

Ensuring our historic synagogues remain living synagogues

Ensuring our historic synagogues remain living synagogues

"Like the Jews of the desert, many of the Jews of Spain and Portugal turned to what they considered idolatry"

"I shared the story of Moses Montefiore with the current Sheriff of London when I attended an official dinner at the Lord Mayor of London’s Mansion House this past Thursday night."

Comments and theories welcome!"This is one of the qualities that makes the few remaining S&P synagogues so special. They remain some of the few communities in the world that can lay claim to authentic tradition and minhag hamakom."

Comments and theories welcome!"This is one of the qualities that makes the few remaining S&P synagogues so special. They remain some of the few communities in the world that can lay claim to authentic tradition and minhag hamakom."

"Some have erroneously asserted that Jews as merchants and plantation owners were actually the central players in the entire slave trade."

"The issue of Sephardic involvement in slave trade becomes painful, or even that unbearable that it has to be denied altogether, only when historians take their personal assumptions and preferences or their institution's bias into their research."

"To pray at Shearith Israel is to feel oneself transported back in time, with its authentic representation of the S&P traditions as they have coalesced over the centuries."

"To pray at Shearith Israel is to feel oneself transported back in time, with its authentic representation of the S&P traditions as they have coalesced over the centuries."

"They were Jews of Spanish and Portuguese ancestry. They had escaped the terrors of the Inquisition to carry on their lives within a new Kingdom’s shores."

"I’ve had the pleasure to study the sefer following services at Bevis Marks whilst enjoying breakfast with my fellow minyan goers. Newcomers welcome!""Rabbi Gaguine actually reflected on the ‘custom’ to send New Years cards. While it has no real origin in Jewish tradition, he quite liked it."

"In the seventeenth century the leaders of all of the major Western Sephardic synagogues prohibited Jews from even visiting the Iberian Peninsula."

"During colonial times it was actually dubbed 'Jews Alley' since Jews so often used it as a shortcut to synagogue"

From my recent trip to Portugal. "Our group emitted a unified gasp as we witnessed tangible evidence of the ‘key story’ so often told of the Jews of the Expulsion."

The Jewish Encyclopedia references "the internecine quarrel among the Barbados Jews (1753);" I've been trying to find more details without success. Can anyone help elucidate? I looked up the reference (save for the Jewish Chronicle which requires a fee) and did not find anything. Thank you!!!

The Jewish Encyclopedia references "the internecine quarrel among the Barbados Jews (1753);" I've been trying to find more details without success. Can anyone help elucidate? I looked up the reference (save for the Jewish Chronicle which requires a fee) and did not find anything. Thank you!!!

"It is no surprise then that the ‘Liberty Bell’ also became an icon for America's colonial era Jewish congregations" (Spanish & Portuguese, of course!)

"It is no surprise then that the ‘Liberty Bell’ also became an icon for America's colonial era Jewish congregations" (Spanish & Portuguese, of course!)

"The Jews of the Ottoman Empire also made some of the historically most important intellectual contributions to world Jewry."

"In contrast to Aaron, we know the feelings of Judah Leon Abravanel, son of Don Isaac Abravanel, upon the loss of his son."

"As we’ve seen in the Miskan and Bet Hamikdash, there is a precedent for distinguishing between style and substance." "This then, surely was the mentality (hashkafah) of the Portuguese Jews."