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.
On a Soviet Sabbath
Citizen Voli Brener
A Moscow snowy morning, sun-streaked and dry. When it falls on a Sunday, the morning shines with a thousand Moscow sparkles—rejuvenating white lights that charm and shimmer, as if…
After the Aliyah (Immigration to the Land of Israel)
The immigration of the Yemenites has halted. Over the past year, some two hundred and fifty to three hundred Yemenite families have settled in the colonies. The internal migrations of Yemenites from…
Shklover Jews
I know a town in White Russia [Belarus] on the River Dnieper. Its name is Shklov. I was born there, went to heder there, which is why I know it so well.The flame of life burns calmly there. Nobody…
Excerpt from a Letter to A. D. Gordon on Labor and Nature
[ . . . ] For the whole day after I received your letter, I had the same celebratory mood that one feels after a cleansing and encouraging spiritual moment. Yet I am too weak to hold on to it. In…
Lacking a Family Life
One of the causes of the failings in the lives of the young workers [in Palestine] is certainly the lack of family life. Here, too, there is room for observation. Here we have a phenomenon that is not…
Everyday Jews: Scenes from a Vanished Life
The question arises: How did my mother, who, with her first husband, the feldsher, resided in spacious rooms, with brass handles on the doors, come to be with Father, a village Jew who…
Return, Israel
A statement of reproof and a reminder and warning and a correction to our brothers, the Jews of Tunis, may the Almighty maintain it, amen, may God preserve them and sustain them, written by the dayyan…
I Can Get It for You Wholesale
I entered the restaurant five minutes late on purpose, but Babushkin was already there. He was at the small table I’d reserved way over in the corner, hunched over the menu because he was scared…
The History of Borsszem Janko (Johnny Peppercorn)
I was lying in bed sick when, on January 5th, 1868, the first issue came out. Understandably, the party line and the competition tried to alienate from me János Jankó, the illustrator of the…
Di shvue (The Oath)
Brothers and sisters—all working poor
Wherever you might be scattered on earth
This banner’s now waiting for you, together.
Waving, wrathful, this flag is blood red.
We swear! We swear by the…
Abishag
Abishag. Little, young, warm Abishag.
Shout into the street: King David is not yet dead.
But King David wants to sleep and they won’t let him.
Adoniyahu with his gang shout my crown off my gray head…
Erotica et Rustica
1.
Eyner hot lib a kale mit a sakh gelt, der anderer hot lib a kale on a hemd.
Some like a bride with a lot of money, others like a bride without a stitch of clothes.
Khuts…