Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
B’nai Or Prayer Shawl
The idea for a multicolored prayer shawl (tallit) came to Zalman Schachter-Shalomi when he was meditating on a midrash about God creating the world while wrapped in a robe of light. Schachter-Shalomi…
The Artist behind Bars (Self-Portrait)
Boris Penson painted this self-portrait soon after he was refused a visa to emigrate to Israel. He depicted himself in prison stripes against a background of a grate against a dreary landscape. After…
Memories
I.
I must revive the experiences of the revolutionary path traversed in order to share memories and knowledge with workers and the younger generation. They want and need to have an…
The Pogroms in the Ukraine in 1918–21
Much has been written concerning the pogroms of Jews in the Ukraine in 1918–21. Countless reports of the atrocities perpetrated by the bandits in various cities and towns were published in the Jewish…
The Jews and Europe
That is how it is with the Jews. They shed many a tear for the past. That they fared better under liberalism does not guarantee the justice of the latter. Even the French Revolution, which helped the…
Of a World That Is No More
Our house was gloomy—one reason why, since childhood, I have preferred the street to the home.
One cause of this gloom was the Torah…
The Song of the Vilna Ghetto
The German occupation with its huge system of ghettos, concentration camps, death camps, and more cannot be represented in a normal human tongue. No depictions, documents, and images can…
To My Tunisian Friends
I have just spent a few days in Tunis.
My pleasure increases each time I return to that city and its inhabitants and experience the liveliness of the Avenue Jules-Ferry, and above all, the free and…
Poland: Memoirs and Scenes
Nighttime at the home of I. L. Peretz, and Shimon (aka Bernard) Kratko appears like a vision. Who masterminded an audience with Peretz, I can’t tell you, but it was all that mattered now, as if…
Epistle of Israel’s Deliverance
In the days of Nicholas the First, the great tsar and emperor (May he live forever!) who…
Kuntres ahavat David (Treatise: The Love of David)
Says the Author:
O my God! Remember for good my most honorable Master, my father, my teacher in respect of the Divine precepts—may his memory be for a blessing for the life of the World-to-Come! I…
Proclamation of the Alliance Israélite Universelle
Israelites! If, scattered over the whole surface of the earth and intermingled with all nations, you remain attached to the old religion of your ancestors, however weak be the bond that unites you…