Some Key Ideas from Sarna, Ch. 1

• “Port Jews” largely Sephardic• Background of the Inquisition & the European Jewish experience of

persecution and lack of religious liberty• 1654 Jewish refugees from Recife / Brazil to New Amsterdam• 1st known public Jewish worship in America: 1703• The Synagogue-Community model

• No need for rabbis!• Early synagogues tried to blend in, not be too obvious, deference to

majority Christian culture.• Great diversity of Jewish population in colonial period, including huge range

of religious observance.• Tolerated, 2nd class citizens with restrictions placed upon them.• The only organized non-Christian religious group, in a new emerging society

made up of various Christian religious dissenter groups.

Some Key Ideas from Sarna, Ch. 2

• Revolutionary period led to expansion of religious liberty in the new U.S.• Five principles of the “Great Tradition of American Churches”:

• Religious freedom• Church-state separation• Denominationalism• Voluntaryism• Patriotism

• Congregationalism instead of religious heirarchy

• From “Synagogue-Community” to “Community of Synagogues”• Congregational autonomy• Beginnings of Reform traditions in US• New Jewish community umbrella organizations emerge