The Congregation Shearith Israel (Hebrew: קהילת שארית ישראל, romanized: Kehilat She'arit Yisra'el, lit.

After being initially rebuffed by anti-Semitic Director of New Netherland Peter Stuyvesant, Jews were given official permission to settle in the colony in 1655.

Although they were allowed to stay in New Amsterdam, they faced discrimination and were not given permission to worship in a public synagogue for some time (throughout the Dutch period and into the British).

In JTS' earliest days, it taught and researched rabbinics similarly as was done in traditional yeshivas, in contrast to the Reform Hebrew Union College.

In a sense, Shearith Israel helped create three of the largest and most significant Jewish religious organizations in the United States: JTS, the OU, and USCJ.

[10] Notable hazanim include Gershom Mendes Seixas (1768–1776 and 1784–1816), Isaac Touro (1780), Jacques Judah Lyons (1839–1877), DanAbraham Lopes Cardozo (1946–1986),[11] Daniel Halfon (1978-1980) and Albert Gabbai (1983–1986).