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.
Or ha-ḥayim (The Light of Life)
I wrote and compiled bit by bit, here a little, there a little (Isaiah 28:10), that which I was able to understand. Some of these provide an explanation of verses by analyzing their words themselves…
Sifte da‘at (Lips of Knowledge): On Genesis
This is the statute of the Torah . . . זאת חקת התורה—It should say זאת חקת הפרה (“this is the statute of the heifer”), as it says elsewhere “this is the statute of the Passover” (Exodus 12:43)! And if…
Gur aryeh (The Lion’s Whelp): On Rashi’s Commentary on the Pentateuch
“R. Isaac said, etc.” In Genesis Rabbah it says: “Even though there is not a single superfluous narrative in the Torah—not even ‘the sister of Lotan was Timna’”—for it says in Sanhedrin Chapter ḥelek…
Ayelet ahavim (Hind of Love): On the Song of Songs
Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth (Song of Songs 1:2).These are the first spoken words of the student who yearns for the Torah, which is like the daughter of the king of kings with its…
Spanish Translation of Judah ha-Levi’s Kuzari
Ḥaver:Do you think languages are eternal, and have no beginning?Kuzari:They are invented and instituted by common consent, rather than natural; this is evident from their composition of nouns, verbs…
Colophon: Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah
The great work called Mishneh Torah by the rabbi, our master, Moses ben Maimon of blessed memory, comprises fourteen books.
Were it not that the Lord was with us (Psalms 124:1), the Torah might have…
Tsadik yesod ‘olam (The Righteous Is an Everlasting Foundation)
And so it was in the days of the Judge of judges; and so it was, a famine in the land. And a man went out from Bethlehem in Judah to live in the field of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons. (Ruth…
Sha‘ar ha-mitsvot (The Gate of Commandments)
By way of our prayers and our practical commandments that we perform below, we need to cause a coupling of the male and the female, and we raise them up…
Sha‘ar ha-yiḥudim (The Gate of Unifications)
If you prostrate yourself over the graves of the righteous, you need to have the proper intention, so that through your prostration, you will cause the soul of that righteous person to…
To You, Lord God, we call out
To You, Lord God, we call out
With cries and with clamoring
For we are most distressed.
See how we lose hope
If no one comes to our rescue.
You protect lost children,
The helpless orphans,
The…
Seder nashim (Order of Women): On Obligations
This is a prayer book for women in Ladino for the whole year, with its order of blessings at the end. And the order for washing the hands and many other laws applicable to all of the most common…
Divre shalom (Words of Peace)
In this way God sought to clarify, test, and verify the lesson which I wrote that the Torah is the essence of all entities, in two respects. First, in the previous sermon I wrote that God…