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.
La vocación de Abraham
Terah’s wife is pregnant
day after day she turned pale,
she already knew what she had
but she did not reveal it to her husband.
One day she went out to fields and vineyards,
she found a cavern and…
Jewish Robbers
This engraving depicting “Jewish robbers” is from the book Des bekannten Diebes, Mörders und Räubers Lips Tullians, und seiner Complicen Leben und Ubelthaten (The Known Thief, Murderer, and Robber…
Toledot Adam (The Generations of Adam)
This two-page spread from Elijah ben Moses Loanz’s Toledot Adam (The Generations of Adam) includes examples of some of the kabbalistic amulets and formulae for which he was famous.
Portrait of a Man, Thought to Be Dr. Ephraim Bueno
Rembrandt lived in the part of Amsterdam where the artist’s guild (St. Luke’s Guild) was located; by coincidence, it was home also to a number of Jews. His artworks attest to an interest in the…
Book of Prayers for the Gravediggers Society
This illustration from a book of prayers for the Jewish Gravediggers Society depicts the cycle of life. Figures of men and women in pairs ascend and descend the staircase, progressing from youth to…
Talmud
The twelve-volume “Bermann Talmud'' was financed by the Court Jew Behrend Lehmann (Issachar Bermann Segal), printed in Frankfurt an der Oder, Germany, by Michael Gottschalk, and published by John…
Haggadah (Mantua)
This Haggadah from Mantua, published by the Christian printer Giacomo Rufinelli under the supervision of Isaac ben Solomon Bassan, relies heavily on the Prague Haggadah of 1526, with the addition of…
A Ruling on the Printing of the Zohar
The earth made noise as did the heavens, and the doorposts are shaking at the voice crying out that it would be wrong to publish hidden and sealed materials and to break through the fence established…
Livro de ascamot (Book of Regulations): On a Banned Book
In meetings of the community’s Mahamad [board of governors], past and present, discussions were held about a book that Gideon [Abudiente] ordered printed concerning the…
Kaddish for a Child Not Born
A Holocaust survivor grapples with the question: should one bring children into the world after experiencing the horrors of the death camps?
The Rabbi in the Attic
[…] What rabbi would come to this impoverished nowhere for the pishochs we offered, especially if he had to rent his own lodgings—the congregation had no money for an apartment when a perfectly good…