Page:Jews and Judaism in America (Ezra).djvu/9

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own property, and are allowed to keep shops in town. They have likewise several ships which they freight and send out with their own goods. In fine, they enjoy all the privileges common to the other inhabitants of this town and province."

Of all the institutions, the Jewish Theological Seminary stands first and foremost in the mind of the thinking Jew. The future of historical Judaism depends largely on this Seminary, which has been founded by the late Dr. S. Morais, of blessed memory. At present it is presided over by an illustrious scholar, Dr, Solomon Schechter, and the Seminary has an endowment fund of over $1,000,000 (Mexican,) which was secured by individual subscription. New York has over 110 congregations, exclusive of numerous small ones. I have singled out New York above all the other cities in the United States, because it has the largest Jewish population. Time and space within the limited compass of this essay, would not permit any detailed accounts of such other places as Philadelphia, Chicago, Cincinnati, San Francisco and many others, where Jews have built and developed important Jewish institutions, which stand for the glory of Judaism. I will therefore only make a brief reference to them.

Philadelphian Jewry owes much to the zeal and ability of the late Isaac Leeser who wrote and edited some good works, in the early part of the Jewish settlement, on Jewish religion and ethics. His ten volumes of discourses on the Jewish religion, which were delivered in his lifetime, stamp the author as one of the most ardent and zealous champions of orthodox Judaism on record. He laboured indefatigably for the weal Jewry in his days; and never wavered one jot in his attitude of opposition to the rise of the reform movement. His apprehension that the innovations demanded by the advocates of "New" Judaism