An Eye Looks Towards The West: A Jewish Colony in the Caribbean.

So, as I previously indicated, I don't know where to go with this. Does anybody have any suggestions or things they'd like to see?
 
Chapter Four: August 1687/ Elul 5447: ‘It is a good land that the LORD our God is giving us.’
(Short update incoming. I have some ideas for where I want to take this timeline, I just don't exactly know how to get there. It's primarily going to focus on the alternate makeup of the Jewish world. Right now I want to develop the Jewish society in Suriname a bit further. Ten year timeskip incoming.)

August 1687/ Elul 5447: ‘It is a good land that the LORD our God is giving us.’



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A decade had passed since the Great Manumission, the name by which the mass induction of former slaves to the Covenant of Israel had come to be known by. In that time, the Jewish population of Jodensavanne had doubled to approximately fourteen thousand individuals, the vast majority of whom were descendants of those unfortunate bondsmen. The territory in which the Jews of Suriname inhabited had been expended through the efforts of Nassy and other professional colonizers by several hundred hectares. More important than its expansion was the territory’s development, which had progressed rapidly in those ten years. No longer was Jodensavanne a collection of dispersed agricultural settlements, the plantations were connected by roads and one major town, which was officially named Goshen-to reflect the peace bounty that God had granted His people. While agriculture was still the colony’s main economic outpost, several Jewish merchants, shop-owners, and tavern-keepers had set up in the town. New immigrants came from the Caribbean, Italy, England, and other parts of Europe; but the majority of them were from the Dutch Republic. Most of the Gentiles that dwelled in Goshen were also Dutch; and the Dutch language slowly began to ascend the ranks of languages one heard on Goshen’s streets. Portuguese was still the language of the planters and would remain the dominant language for several more decades. Though the majority of immigrants were still members of the Nação; a sizable population of Ashkenazim-German and Yiddish-speaking Jews- had arrived as well. Deemed a financial burden by the Jewish establishment in the Republic, it was agreed upon by the Jewish elite of Amsterdam and Jodensavanne to send most of them to the colony; where they quickly dominated the non-agricultural sectors along with less prosperous Sephardim; both of whom adopted the Dutch language. Unlike the lofty Portuguese spoken by the planters, Dutch was the language of industry and trade. Those white Jews who dwelled in Goshen became known as Burghers-free citizens without any land to speak of. Some of the more well-off burghers owned a house slave or two, but the majority did not. They too were bound to the edicts of manumission.

Though the Sephardi and Ashkenazi populations increased; the predominant Jewish population of the colony were the descendants of those freedmen; who compromised approximately three quarters of the Jewish population. They were formally known as Meshuchrarim-manumitted ones. Colloquially, they were dismissed by the white Jews as Negerjoden. A plurality of them remained on their masters’ plantations as sharecroppers, but a sizeable amount moved to Goshen for work. The meshuchrarim had own institutions of shochtim, mohelim, and lay religious leaders. Most uniquely, the meshuchrarim began to develop their own form of speech. This new dialect, dismissed by the white Jews as Negertaal, was predominately Portuguese in body with uniquely African grammar. Smatterings of Dutch, English, Hebrew, and African words could be heard throughout. The antipathy directed at them from white Jews forced them into the less developed neighborhoods of Goshen and the less desirable jobs. They also made up the rank-and-file in the colony’s newly formed militia; officered exclusively by white burghers. Clinging to notions of superiority, Sephardim wanted virtually nothing to do with them. The Ashkenazim, on the other hand, were pragmatically amicable to an extent. White and black Jews did not pray, learn, marry, or even dine together; but an Ashkenazi burgher was more likely to employ or do business with a meshuchrar than a Sephardi burgher. Poverty makes for strange bedfellows, even among the Jews.



As is the case in any Jewish environment, the center of communal life was the synagogue. In addition to a place to pray, the synagogues also served as places for men to discuss business and socialize. The synagogues also served as houses of study for adults and children alike. Jodensavanne was unique in that it had four synagogues for its different Jewish populations, which was practically unheard of in the Americas. There was also one Calvinist Protestant church for the Dutchmen that lived in Goshen.

The predominant synagogue of Goshen was also its oldest. Beracha Ve’Shalom, colloquially known as the Esnoga, was where the planters went to pray on special occasions; most of whom had minyanim on their plantations for daily use. The concentrated wealth of its congregants essentially made the synagogue the legislative body for the whole of Jodensavanne, especially due to it housing the only beit din-ritual court- in the colony. The burghers had two smaller houses of worship: Neveh Shalom for the Ashkenazim and Tzedek Ve’Shalom for the Sephardim. It goes without saying that the meshuchrarim had their own synagogue as well, an unassuming building that went by the name of Darhe Jessarim. The congregants of Darhe Jessarim practiced strictly halachic Judaism, in the Spanish and Portuguese rite of their former masters, but their pronunciation and melodies had a uniquely Judeo-African flair to it. This new development in Judaic ritual disgusted many Sephardim, who saw it as a perversion of their unique legacy. Several planters even wanted to dis-establish the community, but this measure was quickly shot down by anyone with a remote eye for observation. The Ashkenazim largely looked upon them with indifference, but some burghers admired them for their piety. The average meshuchrar had less knowledge of the Holy Torah than the average burgher or planter; but what they lacked for in education was made up in ecstatic devotion. Though planter, burgher, and meshruchar all practiced the same faith, one could say that the only thing they had in common was the sand on the floor of their synagogues.
 
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Is there any chance of someone making a canon-blessed map of Jodensavanne at the time of the latest post, and the claims of various neighboring powers? Including any Native American neighbors?
 
Is there any chance of someone making a canon-blessed map of Jodensavanne at the time of the latest post, and the claims of various neighboring powers? Including any Native American neighbors?


Good idea, but unfortunately I am a bit technologically challenged. That might take a while.
 
Some updates:

1. I have decided that in addition to being a bit of a Jewwank, it will also be a little bit of a Dutch one too. Not a complete wank, but a bit of a stiffy.

2. If anyone would be willing to help me out with maps, I would be willing to pay and credit them.

A new chapter will come....eventually. I know where I want to go with this, but I don't exactly know how to get there.
 
Some updates:

1. I have decided that in addition to being a bit of a Jewwank, it will also be a little bit of a Dutch one too. Not a complete wank, but a bit of a stiffy.

2. If anyone would be willing to help me out with maps, I would be willing to pay and credit them.

A new chapter will come....eventually. I know where I want to go with this, but I don't exactly know how to get there.
what kind of map help do you need?
 
Chapter Five: He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship
September 1700/ Elul 5460: He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.
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By 1700 most of Suriname’s Jews lived in the Jodensavanne: that ever-expanding collection of plantations surrounding the town of Goshen. Even so, there was still a decent community of Sephardic merchants and their families in Paramaribo. They were centered around a synagogue by the name of Shearith Israel. Scholars and sages alike would ponder how oddly fitting that name was, for the remnant of that community would soon be forced to flee their homes for the new Zion coming into being on the other side of the Suriname River. The Jewish community of Paramaribo lived in security for a little under a century, keeping their heads down and accruing what wealth they could. That brief prosperity would end in anger, melancholy, and fire, a fire that erupted in a back-alley tavern. The average Surinamese tavern was nothing compared to the jovial beer gardens of Amsterdam, or the warmly lit pub on a London street. Paramaribo had made strides since its founding, but it was still a colonial town in a jungle backwater. This particular inn consisted of a two-story building with a bar and several tables, with three bedrooms on the second floor. The proprietor served rum, ale, and the unholy concoction the locals called "palm wine". In a small kitchen, his wife baked fresh loaves and served whatever concoction she had decided to prepare that day. The tavern was not exactly a full house on this September night. Two Dutchmen were drinking shot after shot of the proprietor’s rum, singing songs, and loudly airing their day’s grievances. At a table at the other side of the room, a dark-haired man sat with some ale, salted fish, and a loaf of bread.


“Who do these bloody Jews think they are?!” Loudly slurred one of the Dutchmen, prompting a loud laugh of approval from his colleague.

“They killed our Lord, and now they’ll kill off our farms!” the other Dutchman replied in turn. A keen-eared listener could detect a twang in their accent, indicating that they were colonials rather than settlers from the Netherlands.

As their conversation ebbed and flowed like the liquor in their mugs, the two men revealed a sentiment that much of Paramaribo’s white gentile community shared: there were too many Jews in Suriname. Ever since that shipment of Hebrew wretches were dumped on this land in 1654, the stiff-necked race had prospered beyond any conceivable notion. Dutch merchants had to actively work to make their goods more appealing than those of their Jewish counterparts, and Jewish planters bought up more and more land from honest Christian farmers. These resentments were compounded by the fact that these Jews preferred to circulate their wealth amongst themselves. Jews and Christians did business when it was called for, but the Dutch felt that the Jews held disdain for their stores, their halls, and their taverns. Never mind that a Christian would not be caught dead in the one Jewish-owned tavern in town, but that was different.


What enraged the Dutchmen the most about the Jews was not their insularity, nor was it their refusal to see that their long-awaited Messiah had already came. The fact that they killed him for thirty pieces of silver could even be forgiven, were it not for the fact that they had shamelessly bolstered their ranks by inducting the black man into their accursed covenant. The Dutch planters baptized their chattel with equal fervor, and one could argue that it was better for a Negro to be a Jew than remain in his heathen ways, but at least Christians kept Negroes in their place. Did not the Old Testament ordain slavery, or curse Ham and his descendants with their dark skin? By what authority did the usurers have the right to raise their property up to the rights of a free man? The honest answer is that the Jews never did so, but it felt all the same to the two inebriated Dutchmen. The two friends continued to vocalize their hated of Jews well into the night, while the dark-haired man quietly seethed into his meal. At one point, he could take it no longer and slammed his tankard into the table; his remaining dregs of ale spilling onto the floor. The two Dutchmen ceased their revenues and turned to look at him.

“Are you gentlemen finished?” The man asked, rising to his feet. He was a head shorter than the pair, and his Dutch was heavily accented with both a colonial twang and a Portuguese lilt. His (lack of) height, dark features, and linguistic peculiarities revealed him to be a Jew. The men snarled with disgust upon realizing the background of their new companion.

“What’s it to you, Christ-killer?” The man on the left spat.
The aforementioned “Christ-killer” merely rolled his eyes and muttered a curse in Portuguese under his breath, before repeating his previous statement with more emphasis.

“Are you gentlemen finished?” He asked again, placing a sarcastic sneer on the word “gentlemen”.

“We’re finished with you!” Shouted the Dutchman on the right. He would have assaulted the man were he not held back by his comrade.

“Willem, no.” The other Dutchman slurred. “Leave him to me….” He muttered darkly, sidling up to the Jew and forcefully shoving him in the chest.

The thin veneer of restraint inside the Jew snapped. He grabbed his wooden tankard off the table and slammed it up into the Dutchman’s chin. The Dutchman briefly staggered back before the Jew struck him in the jaw, knocking him down. Quickly straddling him, the Jew began beating him repeatedly with the tankard. Blood quickly began to stream down the Dutchman’s mouth as he struggled. Shocked, Willem ran out of the tavern and screamed that his friend was being murdered by a Jew. His friend was not-in fact-being murdered, the Jew had hopped off him once he had finished teaching the Dutchman a lesson. That did not stop an assembly of armed Christian men from forming outside the tavern. Their first act of violence was dragging the Jew out of the tavern and beating him to death then and there.

Once their initial bloodlust was sated, the procession made its way to the synagogue. According to one learned man, the Jews would be performing their evening prayers at this time; no doubt they were mocking Christ and His apostles as well. If one listened quietly, one could hear the Jewish families singing their prayers in unison. As shouts and jeers from the mob reverberated outside the synagogue, the melodic chants were smothered by a thick, fearful silence. It could have been a farmer that set fire to the building. It could have also been a pastor, nobody really knows; but the fact remains that the synagogue was set on fire within no less than an hour of the mob assembling around it. A few of the male synagogue-goers came out first, then the women and children, followed by the remaining men. Their attempt to shield them from the mob failed spectacularly. The Jewish faithful of Paramaribo were punched, kicked, and spat upon. By the time soldiers had been mustered from the local base and the mob dispersed, three Jewish men and one Jewess had been killed.

Within the week, the remaining Jewish families of Paramaribo made their way into Jodensavanne. The remaining possessions and trade goods they had loaded onto ox-drawn wagons or carried by Negroes on foot. Most of them took up tenancy and managerial positions on one of the Jewish-owned plantations, though a few settled in Goshen. In accordance with the Edict of Manumission, any Negroes brought with them were freed, converted, and made into hired help rather than slaves. A rock was thrown into a window of Goshen’s one Reformed church, but that was the extent of any Jewish anger towards Goshen’s Christians. David Cohen Nassy himself personally paid for the window’s restoration. Even though no vengeance was sought by the Jews of Jodensavanne; armed meshrucharim patrolled Goshen’s streets every night and were stationed at the gates and fields of every Jewish plantation. In addition to the increased security, the Jewish elite of Suriname sought out new allies in any potential conflicts that might arise.

Under the cover of temperate Caribbean darkness, David Cohen Nassy would venture out to speak to someone he had thought of as a strange, frightening creature up until this very moment: the granman of a band of Maroons….
 
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