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.
Register of a Jewish Midwife
This is the book of the generations/children of man, those that were born by my hands among the Hebrew women. I came to them, I the midwife, for they are vital [Exodus 1:15–19] and give birth to a son…
Travail in an Arab Land
Free of any preoccupations, I allowed myself to seek out and investigate the Jews, their manners and customs. They are good-hearted folk, charitable and hospitable to strangers. They honor the Torah…
María
When my father made his last trip to the Antilles, Salomón, a cousin of his whom he had loved since childhood, had just lost his wife. At a very young age, they had come together to South America…
Sefer hitavkut (Book of Struggle)
You should know and believe me, and understand, that I did not become zealous against the scoffers for my own glory, or for the glory of my father’s house, but that it was zeal for the Almighty that…
Givat ha-moreh [Commentary to Maimonides’ Moreh nevukhim, Guide for the Perplexed]
The telos (takhlit) of man’s activities, in the aspect (behinah) of having will and choice, is the ultimate human good (ha’hatslahah ha’enoshi’it). This excellence necessarily comes after the…
The Rigors of Jewish Historiography
The historiography of no people is so beset with the pretentious and condemnatory views of dilettantes as is that of the Israelites, which everyone fancies to know from the relevant sources. Thus, no…
Impressions of the Prague Revolution
But I want to go on recounting how the Prague movement developed, and what made the revolution, which brought so many impressive, great, and noble things to light everywhere, made everything in Prague…
Song Settings for the Poet Lord Byron’s Hebrew Melodies
Hebrew Melodies was a collaboration between the English poet Lord Byron (1788–1824) and his friend, the Jewish composer Isaac Nathan. It is a collection of thirty poems by the poet, set to music by…
Title Page for His Version of Salamone de Rossi’s Hashirim asher le-Shelomoh (The Songs of Solomon)
Salamone de Rossi (1570–1630), composer, singer, violinist, and musician in the Gonzaga court in Mantua, is best known for his introduction of polyphony into synagogue music. Composer Samuel Naumbourg…
Portuguese and Ashkenazic Synagogues in Amsterdam
In 1670, Amsterdam’s Portuguese Jewish community commissioned a new synagogue, which, when finished, was the largest in the world. The master mason Elias Bouman, a non-Jew who had helped design the…
Purim Charity Plate
This Purim charity plate was made in Dordrecht in the Netherlands between 1590 and 1611. It was used by Jews living in The Hague.
Portrait of Abigaill Franks (1696–1756).
Born in London, as a young girl Abigaill Levy immigrated with her parents to New York City. In 1712, she married Jacob Franks, with whom she would have nine children. Despite his Ashkenazic family…