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.
Yalta
And some say that this halakhah was taught in a baraita: Ten things were said with regard to a cup of blessing [the cup of wine over which Grace after Meals is recited]: It requires…
Mishnah Terumot
1. If a woman [who was married to a priest] was eating terumah [the priest’s portion], and they came and said to her, “Your husband is dead,” or “He divorced you”; or if a…
Mishnah Makhshirin
1:1. Any liquid that is desired at the start, even though it is not desired at the end, or, if it is desired at the end, even though it was not desired at the start, [it] comes under the law of if…
Bavli Gittin
[The mishnah taught that] Hillel [the Elder] instituted a document that prevents the sabbatical [year] from abrogating an outstanding debt [prosbul]. We learned [in a mishnah]: [if one prepares—Ed.] a…
Ruth Rabbah
21. Orpah kissed her mother-in-law (Ruth 1:14). All kisses are of licentiousness, except for three: A kiss of greatness, a kiss of [greeting after] absence, and a kiss of parting. A kiss of greatness…
Aristobulus I
After their father Hyrcanus died, the eldest son, Aristobulus, saw fit to transform the government into a kingdom, which he judged to be the…
Octavian Confirms Herod’s Claim to Kingship
“Caesar,” he said, “I was made king by Antony, and I acknowledge that I have throughout served Antony’s interests. I will not conceal from you either that, if I had not been occupied with the Arabs…
Salome
When these letters were brought, the women stopped their efforts to flee to the Romans, which they had conceived under the assumption that Herod was dead…
Titus Marches toward Jerusalem
Titus was now on the march from Caesarea, having concentrated part of his forces there under his own command and ordered the rest to meet him at Jerusalem. He…
Riots in Alexandria, 38 CE
For it was more than clear that the rumor of the destruction of the synagogues that started in Alexandria would spread immediately to the districts of Egypt and speed…
Forced Conversion of the Jews
Now, however, to proceed with my narrative, a throng of Christ’s servants, greater than was thought to reside in that town, gathered together and prepared for the departure from Jamona [a town with a…
Judaism as a “Bad Law”
Those of pure laws and good tradition [dēn] are we, and also of the teachers of old. Those of mixed laws are practicing the strangeness of Sēn. Those of bad laws are the Manichaeans, Christians, Jews…