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.
A Sermon contra Naphtali Herts Wessely
Beware! This man, Wessely, is an impious man. Beware, do not draw near to him! God, the Lord of Hosts, knows that for the sake of the glory of your Holy Torah I have come this day to hew down he who…
Lev ha-Ivri (The Heart of a Jew)
What would our ancestors have done if they had seen a Jewish community appointing a prayer-reader and a rabbi for themselves dressed in the vestments of a Christian priest, and setting up an idol in…
Lament of the Daughter of Judah
O Russians, you who love your fellow men! You would shudder from the bottoms of your kind hearts if you saw the effect of that terrible accusation which Jews who were eyewitnesses to the unjustified…
Scroll of the Book of Esther
This scroll of Esther from Germany, created for use on the holiday of Purim, is extensively decorated, with illustrations of biblical scenes from the Esther story, as well as various flora and fauna…
Triple Silver Yentl (My Elvis)
Triple Silver Yentl (My Elvis) is part of what is known as Kass’s Jewish Warhol series, a feminist comment on Andy Warhol’s famous screen prints of celebrities. Kass used the same mass-production…
Binah le-‘itim (Understanding of the Times)
First, we will explain the reason for the custom of all Israel to read from Tractate Avot on these Sabbaths. We would like to analyze the meaning of the name of the tractate, why it is called Avot…
Messiah
Son of fruitful Joseph, precious Ephraim,
child of joy, lush grove of magnificence,
you will exult and rejoice—for, with a vengeance,
the Just will arise over the House of the Barren
when the time…
Dedication (to Gracia Nasi): Consolações às Tribulações de Israel
The heart is prized as the human body’s noblest and most important organ, for it is the first to feel the pain which any other part of the body…
Magen ve-tsina (Shield and Bulwark)
The ten halakhic questions raised by a certain individual directed against the Oral Law, and several of the commentaries upon it, have reached us. I have not needed to carry out a great deal of…
Ma'ayan ganim (A Garden Spring)
The words of a pure woman “more precious than rubies”
whose wish is to attend to studies,
and her name is the gentle Dinah:
She seeks counsel from the wise
for she fears lest her honor may everywhere…
This wonder, this marvel
This wonder, this marvel,
which the deceitful fantasy
Basilisk or Asp believes it to be,
is an error of understanding:
Since if one considers it carefully,
the Divine Providence
is rewarding your…