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.
Seder mitsvot ha-nashim (The Order of Women’s Commandments): On the Sabbath Eve
Every woman is obligated to kindle lights on the eve of each Sabbath and Festival and this is a great mitzvah. And she makes the blessing, “Blessed are You God, our Lord, King of the universe. Who has…
Ḥemdat yamim (Choicest of Days): On the 15th of Shevat
Even though the fifteenth of the month of Shevat is during the period of shovevim, one does not fast, for it is the New Year’s Day for fruit trees. And with the tikkun [mystical repair] performed on…
‘Ir giborim (City of Heroes)
It is known that in the case of any proper work to be accomplished or any project to be achieved, the essential point is the end goal [תכלית] of the project…
Colophon: Tikune ha-Zohar (Mantua Edition)
The peaceable and faithful in Israel (2 Samuel 20:19), the heads of the exile of Ariel, the same are the mighty men of old, the men of renown (Genesis 6:4), wise men of understanding [see Deuteronomy…
They call him Meir
When I heard that Meir the teacher had exchanged his glory for futility, I said:
They call him Meir, but he has no light, for all the lights around him have gone dim.
Indeed, he has a thick cloud…
Her Hair
O peerless beauty, veil your hair, lest you play havoc with the world, without lifting a finger! They are famous throughout the world, they ring in the ears of all who hear of them. The weakest…
To His Gadabout Wife
Only three exits are becoming to every woman, big or small. The first is when she exits from the womb, dirtied, as if from a deep swamp. The second is when she exits from her woman’s tent and enters…
Like the Root
You’ve grown
but not
grown up
You’re ripe
as earth is raw
where roots probe deep
Like all roots
you probe
in deep darkness
Translated by Marcia Falk.
Exercises in Practical Hebrew
“Are you at peace? Hast thou killed and also taken possession?”
(examples of interrogative sentences in a grammar book)
Vishniac’s Windows
How long this staring through a window
In an alley-way by few remembered,
Into the obscure, into a room
Empty of all but its walls
Where pictures hang all in shadow
But for one of mild eyes wide,
As…
Cult statues in Assyrian relief
Cult statues in Assyrian relief from the Palace of Tiglath-pileser III (reigned 745–727 BCE) in Kalhu/Calah (today’s Nimrud, Iraq). Although no Mesopotamian cult statues have been found, reliefs such…