Colonial Jewish Roots in America Take Center Stage

THE TIMES OF ISREAL
By Matt Lebovic

Meyers Rimonim for Torah scrolls (photo credit: courtesy of Boston Museum of Fine Arts)

MASSACHUSETTS---Fewer than 2,500 Jews called the American colonies home in 1776, but today they are more alive than ever in US museums and universities. From North Carolina to Boston, early American Jewish artifacts are “moving out of the ghetto,” according to American Jewish historian Jonathan Sarna. Aspects of the phenomenon include new academic research about colonial Jews and recent high-profile auctions of private Judaica collections. The transition of Judaica from “the ghetto” to mainstream America is well illustrated at Boston’s Museum of Fine of Arts (MFA), where Sarna helped launch a campaign to enlarge the museum’s Judaica collection. [link]