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.
License Authorizing Daniel da Costa Gomez to Be a Ritual Slaughterer
These letters of mine may be presented by the witnesses of the Lord, and they will be vindicated—to the effect that the young and delightful young man Daniel, whose utterances were genuine, appeared…
Responsa Hatam Sofer: Orah hayim 154
The reason for this is that if they see Torah scholars, and those who repair the breaches in Jewish religious practice, voiding the Torah in accordance with the exigencies of time and place, they will…
Letter to the Friends of Lessing (On the Spinoza Conversations between Lessing and Jacobi)
Our friend’s devotion to Spinozism is not to be seen as a mere hypothesis (as the Patriarch in Nathan puts it), postulated simply in order to discuss its pros and cons. Herr Jacobi, a man of…
Ha-tsofeh le-vet Yisra’el: Tashlikh (The Observer of the House of Israel: Tashlikh)
You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea: You will show faithfulness to Jacob. . . .
—Micah 7:19–20
In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, while I was walking along the…
Editor’s Note in Sha‘are mizraḥ (Gates of the East)
We gratefully acknowledge the signs of munificence shown to us by His Majesty’s government which has officially licensed our periodical, Sha‘are mizraḥ. We understand that this benevolence of His…
Keter Kehunah: On the Seer’s Fall
On the night of Simhat Torah 5575 [1814], the Seer closeted himself in his room on the second story of his home. The one window overlooking the wide Jewish street was open; it was very near to the…
The Pleasure Trip of Sweethearts Reunited after the Agonies of Love Unrequited in the City of Tiryaq in Iraq
An Explanation of the Plot of this BookNaʿma is the daughter of a caïd of one of the regions in Iraq, and Nuʿman is her paternal first cousin, whom she married while her father was still alive. When…
Drawing of Costume for Jitka in the First Production of the Opera Dalibor by Bedřich Smetana
This sketch for a costume was made for the role of Jitka in Dalibor, a Czech opera in three acts by Bedřich Smetana, first performed in 1868. The plot centers on the story of a Czech knight, Dalibor…
Songbird, or Six Folk Songs
(The songs)
It frightens us so,
With our poor wares to go
And face the wide world and its scorn.
We have lived many days,
But know only the ways.
Of the villages where we were born.
(The author)
Yo…
Tombstone of Isaac ben Hayyim
This tombstone of Isaac ben Ḥayim, who died in 1728, includes (at the top) a pair of deer and a pair of lions, animal carvings that often appeared on Jewish tombstones in Eastern Europe. They…
Ark and Two Cathedrae
This wooden Torah ark and its two cathedrae (chairs), from the Scuola Grande Synagogue in Mantua, Italy, date from 1543. Decorated with gilt carvings and architectural elements, they were meant to…
Tombstone (Rome)
This tombstone of Abraham Roccas (d. 1587) is located in the Cloister of the Papal Archbasilica of San Giovanni in Laterano, in Rome, Italy.