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.
Women’s Finery
In that day, my Lord will strip off the finery of the anklets, the fillets, and the crescents; of the eardrops, the bracelets, and the veils; the turbans, the armlets, and the sashes; of the…
Fire and Revelation in Song of Songs Rabbah
In Song of Songs Rabbah 1:10, Ben Azai’s study burns with divine fire, revealing how rabbinic interpretation could reenact revelation through Torah itself.
John Hyrcanus
So Ptolemy [Hyrcanus’ brother-in-law] retired to one of the fortresses above Jericho, called Dagon. But Hyrcanus, having taken the high priesthood that had been…
The End of the Hasmonean Priesthood
Herod was then made king by the Romans, but he no longer appointed high priests from the family of Asamoneus [i.e., the Hasmoneans]. Rather, he chose certain men not from eminent families who could…
Doris and Her Son Antipater
When he came to the throne he had divorced the wife he took when still a commoner (she was a native of…
Factional Infighting in Jerusalem
So Titus made his way as described across the desert from north Egypt to Syria and arrived at Caesarea, where he intended to marshal his forces in…
Background to the Riots in Alexandria
His [Flaccus’] insanity, which was due to instruction from others rather than to his own nature, was further aggravated by the following incident. The emperor Gaius [Caligula] gave Agrippa, the…
Burning of the Synagogue at Callinicum
Ambrose, bishop, to the most charitable prince and blessed emperor, Theodosius the Augustus. [ . . . ]
A report was made by the military count of the East that a synagogue had been burned and that…
When the Zoroastrian Priests Came to Jewish Babylonia
Rabbah bar Bar Ḥanah was sick. R. Judah and the rabbis entered to ask him [questions]. [ . . . ] At that moment, a Zoroastrian priest came and took the lamp from before them. [Rabbah bar Bar Ḥanah]…
Alexander’s Ascent into the Air
The sages say: The only [idolatrous image] that is forbidden is one which has a staff, or a bird, or a sphere in its hand. “A staff”: with which it suppresses the world; “a bird”: My hand has found…
Hadrian’s Massacre at Beitar
The voice is the voice of Jacob (Genesis 27:22, NJPS): [ . . . ] R. Judah bar Illai used to interpret [the verse]: The voice is the voice of Jacob crying out from what the hands, those being the hands…
Divergent Conceptions of Fate
Jewish doctrine in fact takes three forms. The adherents of these sects are called Pharisees, Sadducees, and, thirdly, Essenes. [ . . . ] Of the two schools mentioned first, the Pharisees constitute…