| Regions with significant populations | |
|---|---|
| Bitam,Oyem | |
| Languages | |
| French,Hebrew | |
| Religion | |
| Judaism |
Thehistory of theJews inGabon dates back to at least the 17th century, when Black Jewish communities existed along the Gabonese coastline. The contemporary Jewish community in Gabon is small.
In the seventeenth century a Black Jewish community existed on the Loango coast in theKingdom of Loango in what is now Gabon, theRepublic of the Congo, and theCabinda Province ofAngola. This community was first mentioned in 1777 and a more thorough description was provided by the scientific works which were produced by the German Loango Expedition of 1873–76. This community had no links with Jewish communities elsewhere and has now disappeared. According toTudor Parfitt, these communities were of considerable interest torace scientists during the period of theEuropean Enlightenment.[1] The Jewish community in the region may have been ofIberian Sephardi origin. Some European maps from the 17th century designate the Loango coastline as the Gulf of the Jews,golfo do judeus orgolfos dos judeos. According to the Moravian missionary Christian Georg Andreas Oldendorp, the Black Jewish community in the Loango region was established byJews from São Tomé who had been expelled and that it was from this population of exiles that "the black Portuguese and the black Jews of Loango, who were despised even by the local black population, were descended."[2]
In 1994, an April Fool's Day broadcast on Israeli radio claimed that there was a tribe of Black Jews in Gabon who were descended from theLost Tribes of Israel. At the time, there was only a tiny Jewish community in Gabon composed mostly of Israeli expatriates.[3]
Small Jewish communities composed of former Christians have developed in the towns ofBitam andOyem. These communities practice Jewish customs, but do not yet have synagogues.[4] These communities are located in northern Gabon near the border withCameroon and are led by Pascal Meka Ngomo, a formerEvangelical Christian leader who abandoned Christianity for Judaism. The community hung its firstmezuzah in 2014.[5]
