Maintaining Orthodoxy in the New World

A Series of Four Lectures Given at the Young Israel of Avenue J

By

Dr. Yitzchok Levine

Department of Mathematical Sciences

Stevens Institute of Technology

Hoboken, NJ 07030

llevine@stevens.edu

Please note that these lectures are based on a number of articles about American Jewish history that can be accessed at http://personal.stevens.edu/~llevine/pub.html .

Lecture 1 (Wed. 2/13/08): From Columbus to 1700 - Inquisition in Spain and Portugal; Jews Who Came with Columbus; Jews in Central and South America; Inquisition in Mexico; Recife, Brazil; Jewish Communities in the Caribbean;  First Jew in North America; Jews arrive in New Amsterdam; Early New York Jewish Communal Life (Asser Levy, Jacob Barsimson); Shearith Israel

Lecture 2 (Fri. 2/22/08 - recorded on 2/24): 1700 to 1800 -   Colonial Jewish Communities; Savannah, Dr. Samuel Nunes, Escape from the Inquisition; Newport, Aaron Lopez; Israel Baer Kursheedt; Rebecca (Machado) and Jonas Phillips; Rebecca Samuels; Jews in the Revolutionary War; Hayyim Solomon

Lecture 3 (Wed. 2/27/08): 1800 to 1880:1800 to 1880: Jacob Mordecai;  Naphtali and Josephine Phillips; Warder Cresson; Isaac Leeser; Rabbi Avraham Rice; Battle with Reform; Jews and the Civil War; Grant's Expulsion Order; Rabbi Chaim Tzvi Schneersohn

Lecture 4 (Fri. 3/7/08 - recorded on 3/9): 1880 to 1940: Russian and East European Immigration; Rabbi  Dr. Henry P. Schneeberger; Rabbi Dr. Bernard Drachman; Rabbi Dr. Schepschel Schaffer; JTS, Harry Fischel, Yeshiva Etz Chaim; Rabbi Jacob Joseph; the RJJ School; TA, RIETS and Yeshiva College; Baltimore Hebrew Parochial School, Rabbi David Miller