History

Jews were not allowed to settle in Sweden until 1779 and 1782 the Department of Commerce stated that Jews were only allowed to settle in the three major cities of Stockholm, the capital, Gothenburg

Gothenburg

Gothenburg is the second-largest city in Sweden and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated on the west coast of Sweden, the city proper has a population of 519,399, with 549,839 in the urban area and total of 937,015 inhabitants in the metropolitan area...

, the principal naval trade city, and Norrköping

Norrköping

Norrköping is a city in the province of Östergötland in eastern Sweden and the seat of Norrköping Municipality, Östergötland County. The city has a population of 87,247 inhabitants in 2010, out of a municipal total of 130,050, making it Sweden's tenth largest city and eighth largest...

, the principal industrial city.

Foundation

The Mosaic Parish in Karlskrona, , were founded in 1785 by the Jewish merchant and factory owner Fabian Philip. He had arrived to Karlskrona in 1780 via Stockholm from his native town of Bützow

Bützow

Bützow is a town in the district of Rostock in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in Germany, with a population of 8,122 .The town was first mentioned in 1171....

 in Germany. (Pages 224ff Judarnas historia i Sverige by Hugo Valentin 1924)

Fabian Philip were situated in Karlskrona, the principal naval base, and the second largest city of Sweden. He had made an offer to the Head of the Swedish navy and the Archipelago fleet, Supreme Admiral Henric af Trolle, that Fabian Philip could build a factory in Karlskrona and produce sails for the Navy, cheaper than what the navy at that time bought the sails from Gothenburg. Trolle liked the idea and proposed it for the king Gustav III

Gustav III of Sweden

Gustav III was King of Sweden from 1771 until his death. He was the eldest son of King Adolph Frederick and Queen Louise Ulrica of Sweden, she a sister of Frederick the Great of Prussia....

, who gave his permission for the Jew Fabian Philip to stay in Karlskrona even though the law did not approve it. Henric af Trolle died in 1784 and the merchants in Karlskrona tried to get rid of Fabian Philip by writing to the king, but the successor of Trolle, Supreme Admiral Carl August Ehrensvärd, were of the same opinion as his late predecessor.
From 1785 thanks to that Fabian Philip had fulfilled his agreement with the Navy and founded and built the sail factory in Karlskrona, more exactly in Lyckeby 10 kilometers north of the city, there were a public exception for Fabian Philip and his family to stay in Karlskrona from Comercial Colleges statement of where Jews were allowed to stay in Sweden. (Pages 9ff Familjen har aldrig assimilerats, den har alltid varit en del av Karlskrona' - Det karlskronitiska samhället och dess invånare av judisk härkomst 1779-1945 - en annan assimilationshistoria (Bachelor thesus, Theological Institution at University of Lund))

The Mosaic Parish of Karlskrona was the fourth Jewish parish in Sweden after three first approved settlement cities. The first name of the parish was the Jewish parish, but when the Jews living in Sweden were made Swedish citizens of the Mosaic faith, they were not considered as Jews by the Government any more, all the Jewish parishes in Sweden were renamed Mosaic Parishes. 1951 when it was made allowed in Sweden by law to be unorganised according to faith, most Mosaic Parishes in Sweden was by own will renamed Jewish Parishes, but not the parish in Karlskrona, which kept the old name of the Mosaic Parish in Karlskrona. (Pages 49ff Mosaiska församlingen i Karlskrona under senare delen av 1800-talet - en församling i förändring)

Future

In the year of 1994 it was decided that the Mosaic Parish in Karlskrona should not be closed but placed in a mode of resting, though the members had become old and it was hard gather a Minyan

Minyan

A minyan in Judaism refers to the quorum of ten Jewish adults required for certain religious obligations. According to many non-Orthodox streams of Judaism adult females count in the minyan....

. But when the day comes and there are Jews enough to gather a Minyan and there's a will of obtaining a Parish, the Mosaic Parish of Karlskrona can be brought back from its state of resting.

Litterature

Svensson, Harry R:son. 2001. Mosaiska församlingen i Karlskrona under senare delen av 1800-talet - en församling i förändring. Master thesus, Blekinge Institute of Technology. Karlskrona.

Svensson, Harry R:son. 2007. Familjen har aldrig assimilerats, den har alltid varit en del av Karlskrona' - Det karlskronitiska samhället och dess invånare av judisk härkomst 1779-1945 - en annan assimilationshistoria. Bachelor thesus, Theological Institution at University of Lund. Lund.

Valentin, Hugo. 1924. Judarnas historia i Sverige. Stockholm.