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.
On Literature and the State
Our state is young, with a girl’s years, just fourteen. Still without her shoes, as the poet says. But she seems old, many generations old. In these few years, old age has pounced on her. No one is…
Friends Talking about Jimmy
Jimmy’s body was taken to Har Tuv, where the doctor confirmed his death, and from Har Tuv it was taken to the morgue in the hospital in the convent of Abu Gosh. He lay there, covered with a gray…
A Common Grave
To the sacred memory of dear Shmulik and his comrades who fell in the battle to liberate Yeḥi‘amHe rose from the bed shading his eyes with his hands as if it was light although it was still dark. His…
The Brigade
I was sitting next to Brodsky, and Sonnenshein was sitting opposite us, near the back of the truck. From the moment we had crossed into Germany, something had happened to him. His pipe never left his…
Dudu
Across a red horizon evening descends
In the breeze treetops tremble and sway
As we sit around the campfire and tell
Of a Palmach man, Dudu was his name
He was with us on long exhausting treks
We…
A Well in the Field
Shepherds had dug a well in the field
but herds of others encircled it.
They left, roaming the mountain trails,
the shepherds who had dug it.
Oh, oh, oh! Desert oases . . .
the lanes of the herd…
Kol Hakavod!
At noon in the kasbah
When the souk was packed
I’d be walking around
My chest toned and hard
And they’d all be saying: What a guy
And as I walked down the alleyways
From every window…
Memorial Service
Crags in the mountains facing us
are like bereaved mothers
who long ago altered their image:
dew does not slake them,
the sun does not gild them.
—How terrible their silence
and where can we flee?—
A…
Solomon Maimon: An Autobiography
I was sent to school at Iwenez, about fifteen miles from our abode, and here I began to study Talmud. The study of the Talmud is the chief object of a learned education among our people. Riches…
Rachel; or, The Inheritance
We had spent the summer at Enghien, in the pleasant Montmorency valley, where every year spring brings along with its fragrant greenery, the choicest Parisian society. Situated on the shore…
Aurelie Werner
The relationship between the lovers had already lost much of its intimacy when the couple was blessed with a thriving son. This event reawakened the count’s feelings of tenderness for the mother of…
Is the Printing Press Harmful? A Rabbi from Sarajevo Responds
How great is the benefit of the printing houses, for thanks to the power of the printing press, the Torah is enhanced everywhere in the world. The rabbis are certainly making the effort to produce…