I found myself last week standing in a spot on the outskirts of Kingston that most Jamaicans have never visited, and one which most people don’t know even exists.
It was the Hunt’s Bay Jewish cemetery, one of Jamaica’s oldest burial grounds and the oldest still-existing Jewish cemetery in the Americas.
With thanks to Douglas Reid, president of the United Congregation of Israelites, I joined a small group of dedicated volunteers who work to preserve Jamaica’s 15 historic Jewish cemeteries, some of which date back more than 300 years. A number of these sites have yet to be restored or fully documented, yet each one holds an essential chapter of Jamaica’s history.
One of those chapters involves Jamaica’s first rabbi, Yoshiyahu (Josiah) ben David Pardo, whose grave we visited during our gathering.
Standing at that site was chilling. And the synchronicity of events that led to that moment is something words can’t really describe.
I had recently just received a phone call from Rabbi Dovid Weitman of São Paulo, Brazil, a colleague of my father-in-law and a publisher of rare, medieval Jewish writings. In the course of his research, he came across the teachings of Rabbi Pardo from 1671 and noticed that the author was listed as being buried in Jamaica. When he realized that this year marks the 400th anniversary of the rabbi’s birth, he asked me if I knew where he was buried.
I reached out to Reid, who told me there was going to be a gathering of historians and community members at the very cemetery where Pardo was buried. In the days leading up to the meeting, I familiarized myself again with his story.
Pardo was born in Amsterdam in 1626 to a line of well-renowned Sephardic rabbis. At the time, Jews were slowly re-adopting their religious practices after centuries of persecution in Spain and Portugal. Like many others of his era, he crossed the Atlantic Ocean and settled in the Caribbean, serving the Jewish communities in Curaçao and then in Jamaica at Port Royal, the busiest and most important port in the New World.
He was a spiritual leader who helped establish Jewish life in the Caribbean, yet over time, his legacy was forgotten and the location of his grave lost. However, in 2008, a group of volunteers with the Jamaican Jewish Cemeteries Preservation Fund rediscovered his gravesite in the Port Royal cemetery, bringing attention to this key figure in history.
His tombstone, like many others from that era, contains a skull and crossbones. This is not, as many might assume, the Jolly Roger of the pirates, but rather, a symbol of death and mortality.
The rabbi’s writings took a similar path, which were unknown and unpublished throughout the centuries, only to be rediscovered and published in 2014 by Weitman.
Standing at Pardo’s gravestone, I shared a short reflection from his own teachings. We recited a prayer for the deceased and sang a song for peace. Then we read the words carved into the stone: Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pardo “never turned right or left from the path of God” (2 Kings 22:2).
That sentence felt like it was directed toward me. Not only because it was a beautiful description of the holy rabbi’s life, but also because it was a message for everyone today.
In a world so full of noise, pressure and constant distractions, the message was clear: Stay on your path. Do not lose yourself chasing every shiny object or distraction. Don’t turn right or left when your conscience says to keep moving forward.
I had encountered this very same message in the weekly Torah portion, Yitro, which speaks of Moses’s father-in-law. He had explored every belief system of his day before finally recognizing the truth of one God.
The verse records him saying “Blessed be God” for the first time in the Torah, which leads to an interesting question from the rabbis. This verse was said by many others before in history, so why was it that when Yitro, a spiritual seeker who converted to Judaism, said it, it was recorded?
The answer is that as someone who had lived in confusion and wandering, he understood and appreciated his spiritual truth more deeply. He knew for sure that this was correct. That same truth applies to us: Those of us who have known darkness and despair appreciate the light in a much more profound way.
Reflecting upon the stories of the loss and rediscovery of Pardo’s tombstone and writings, as well as his legacy of moral and upright living, brought me a sense of peace and joy for the future.
The Old Jewish Cemetery at Hunt’s Bay is on Jamaica’s list of National Heritage Sites. It is among the oldest burial sites on Jamaican soil and represents how the Jewish presence on this island is deeply woven into the country’s economic, cultural and spiritual fabric.
I applaud Jamaica’s heritage institutions for recognizing that this site is not a relic of the past, but a living reminder of who we are and where we come from. As Bob Marley famously sang: “If you know your history, then you would know where you’re coming from.”
Sometimes, the most powerful lessons we can learn are not taught through instruction alone, but discovered when we encounter history face to face—when ancient tombstones whisper to us, letting us know that we’re on the right path.
