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.
Letter to Zalman Shneour: On Children’s Education
Why should I write to you about myself? Nothing has happened in the meantime in my personal life. My son is still with me, as before. He is still an Extern. He knows the gymnasium [university…
My Memoirs
Jewish children grow up quickly. If only their bodies ripened as quickly as their hearts and minds! Were this an artist’s crayon in my hand instead of a pen, I would draw the following caricature of…
Diary Excerpt: Of a Sephardic Palestinian Soldier in the Ottoman Army
One of the more bitter days of my life that I will never ever forget is the 17th Adar 5677 [11 March 1917] at dawn when I was already being sought [the authorities had already dogged my footsteps and…
A History of the Jews in Russia
The idea of publishing a complete History of the Jews in Russia scarcely calls for extensive explanations or justifications. Russian Jewry, which quantitatively represents the most significant…
Tasks of the Polish Jews
The Jews in Poland still have a very demanding and holy task ahead of themselves. Or, to be more exact, they have a holy, lofty, most important and most responsible mission. Hasidism was born in…
A Trip to the Land of Israel in 2040
Jerusalem, our holy city, our soul’s yearning and the joy of our hope! Beautiful landscape, the joy of the entire land, if not the city of a great king (Psalm 48:1) . . . Now we cannot know how it was…
An Anti-Zionist Appeal from Istanbul
Nearly fifteen years ago, following frequent persecutions against our coreligionists in Russia and Romania, a few European Jews conceived of the project of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine and…
The World of Emanation: Reflections on the Volozhin Yeshiva
The yearning to modernize the yeshiva and give it the appearance of a seminary grew considerably in the hearts of our scholars; but, regretfully, they used whatever filth…
A Portrait of Karl Marx
It is not uncommon to find children of Jewish socialists with first names like “William Morris,” “Lassalle,” or “Bebel.” But we will definitely not find any children named after Karl Marx.
Morris…
Letter on Education
With the grace of God, Friday, before the Shabbat of the reading of Noah, 5672 [1911].
To our fellow Hasidim (in the city of Turov),
My stomach turned and my ears burned on hearing the terrible news…
Commentary on Sotah: On the Education of Girls
Rabbi Eliezer said: Whoever teaches his daughter Torah teaches her indecency [m. Sotah 3:4]
The rabbis wrote that this refers only to the Oral Torah; but the Written Torah—even though one should not…
Oyfn pripetshik (At the Hearth)
There’s a fire in the hearth
Warm and cozy as it gets
The rebbe teaches children
The Hebrew alphabet