The history of Jews in the Americas dates back to Christopher Columbus, who left Spain to cross the Atlantic Ocean on the same day by which Spanish Jews were forced to either abandon their religion or leave the country. There were at least seven Jews, crypto-Jews (Marranos), or converted Jews who sailed with Columbus in 1492, including Roderigo De Triana , who was the first to sight land (Columbus later assumed credit for this), Maestre Bernal , who served as the expedition's physican, and Luis De Torres, the interpreter, who spoke Hebrew and Arabic, which it was believed would be useful in the Orient.

In the coming years, Jews settled in the new Spanish and Portuguese colonies in the Caribbean, where they believed that they would be safe from the Inquisition. Some took part in the conquest of the "New World," and Bernal Díaz del Castillo describes a number of executions of soldiers in Hernán Cortés's forces during the conquest of Mexico because they were Jews.

Nevertheless, several Jewish communities in the Caribbean, Central, and South America flourished, particularly in those areas under Dutch and English control. By the sixteenth century, fully functioning Jewish communities had organized in Brazil, Suriname, Curaçao, Jamaica, and Barbados. In addition, there were unorganized communities of Jews in the Spanish and Portuguese territories, where the Inquisition was active, including Cuba and Mexico, however, these Jews generally concealed their identity from the authorities.

By the mid-seventeenth century, the largest Jewish communities in the Western Hemisphere were located in Suriname and Brazil.