1. The First Jews Came to Canada in the 18th Century
Much of Canada was originally a French colony, from which non-Catholics, including Jews, were barred.
A notable exception was a girl named Esther Brandeau, who disguised herself as a non-Jewish boy and got a job as a sailor, arriving in New France in 1738. When her identity was discovered and it became clear that she would not renounce her Judaism, she was deported to France.
In the mid-18th century, the British expansion into Canada brought Jewish traders, furriers and military men, mostly Sephardim. In 1768, they founded the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, which still functions in Montreal.
2. There Are Almost 400,000 Canadian Jews
The current Jewish population of Canada is estimated at almost 400,000, making it the fourth-largest in the world, after Israel, the US, and France.
3. The Largest Boost Came at the Turn of the Century
The ancestors of the lion’s share of Canada’s Jews came between 1880 and the end of World War I, when poverty and persecution in Eastern and Central Europe drove millions of Jews to emigrate. Following the Holocaust, an additional 40,000 survivors immigrated.
4. Yiddish Was the Third Language of Montreal
In time, a lively Yiddish-speaking community rose in Montreal, Toronto, and many other towns and cities across Canada. Following English and French, Yiddish was Montreal’s third language, widely used in business and more. For much of the 20th century, news was published daily in Yiddish in the Keneder Odler (“Canadian Eagle”).
5. Jewish Agricultural Colonies Rose and Fell
In an effort to provide destitute Jews with steady sources of livelihood, philanthropists founded Jewish agricultural colonies out on the harsh prairies of Saskatchewan. In time, the children of the original settlers moved on, and little remains of these colonies save for old buildings and a handful of scattered Jewish individuals and families.
Read: Roving Rabbis’ Report from Remote Saskatchewan
6. Canada’s First Yeshivah Was Founded in 1941
As the Nazis overran Poland and Lithuania, some students of the Chabad yeshivah in Otwock, Poland, fled to Vilna, and then Japan and China, using visas issued by Chiune Sugihara. In 1941, nine of those students arrived in Montreal. Upon the advice of the Sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson, of righteous memory, they founded the Rabbinical College of Canada, the first such institution in the country.
In time, the College grew to encompass a k-12 division as well as a parallel school for girls, operating under the name Beth Rivkah.
7. In the Late 20th Century, Toronto Overtook Montreal
As the rise of French Canadian separatists made life for English-speaking Montrealers complicated and uncertain, many Jews moved westward to Toronto, Winnipeg, and even Vancouver on the Pacific coast. Thus, Toronto, which had barely 70,000 Jews in the mid-century, became home to 200,000.
8. Moroccan Jews Arrived During the Same Period
The same dynamics that drove Ashkenazi Jews out of Montreal attracted many French-speaking Moroccan Jews, who found themselves welcomed in the increasingly French-dominated city.
Today, Canada’s Moroccan Jewish community is well-established with schools, synagogues and even Chabad Houses catering to their specific needs.
At the same time, as generations of Canadian-born children rise, the Morrocan newcomers have become increasingly integrated with their Ashkenazi cousins, and children of both communities speak English and French and learn from each other’s customs.
9. There Are Chabad Centers in 8 Provinces
Nearly 300 couples serve as Chabad emissaries throughout Canada, located in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan.
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