ABSTRACT

This chapter sets out to explore the way in which the practice of, and adherence to, Calvinism, Judaism and Islam influenced the initial settlement and subsequent integration of Huguenots, Jews and Bangladeshis in Spitalfields. In essence this is not a theological evaluation or a measure of immigrant religiosity. Rather it is an attempt to comprehend how each of the three groups accommodated the prescriptives of their religion in Spitalfields, specifically within the context of space, economic activity and diet. At this point it is perhaps worth reminding the reader that the three are linked by more than just spatial chronology. All were monotheistic and believed that God was omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent. All three looked back to Abraham and his roots. Christianity followed the crucifixion, whilst Islam emerged in the seventh century as a result of the prophet Muhammad's belief that he had been called upon to ‘purify the religion which the Jews and the Christians had distorted’. All three knew marginalisation and persecution.